THREE

      

 

The Knights-Hospitallers of Rhodes sweated in their black robes sewn with white crosses of Saint John, dark skull caps drawn tight under their chins, their tasseled rosaries clashing lightly against their swords with each roll of the waves. A militant order they might be, but they were no match for Countess Beatrice. The only things that seemed a match for Lady Beatrice’s piercing voice were the spaniel’s barking and Elayne’s memory of Raymond, which felt as if it grew stronger and more tormenting instead of dimmer as the distance between them grew.

The glare of the sun already heated the deck, reflecting a brilliant shimmer off the heaving surface of the Middle Sea. Elayne had departed England on Midsummer’s Eve, with great fanfare, aboard her own ship commanded by the sober Hospitallers, sailing with a convoy of thirty vessels bound for the cities of the south. Her bridal wardrobe filled the hold, along with gifts and strongboxes marked with the Duke of Lancaster’s seal and the King of England’s white hart. At the stern flew the red cross of Saint George and the white cross of Saint John, and atop the mast a pennant full twenty feet in length spread the green-and-silver colors of Monteverde across the sky.

None of this pomp moved the elderly Countess Beatrice and her testy spaniel. While Lady Beatrice had readily agreed to alter her mode of transport to Rome and lend her venerable countenance to Elayne’s protection—at a considerable increase in speed and comfort and no expense to herself—the Countess of Ludford seemed no more pleased than Elayne at the unexpected reversal in their positions. In spite of being on Christian pilgrimage, Lady Beatrice practiced unkindness as a virtue.

By the time they reached Lisbon, she had chased all of the handmaids to the lower deck, and insisted upon treating Elayne as her servant within the cramped confines of the ship’s castle. Elayne did not object to the labor; she was glad enough for some occupation on this dismal voyage, but nothing she did was done well or to the countess’s taste. In the night her lantern was too bright. In the day she did nothing to prevent the sun from overheating the cabin. It was Elayne who made the ship roll without mercy. She caused the spaniel to bark angrily at seabirds. Her step was too quick and her voice was too loud. When she tried to be slow and quiet, she was chastised for skulking like a snake.

It appeared that being a princess had no benefit at all that Elayne could fathom, beyond wearing a great deal of velvet and miniver in a climate that grew ever more sweltering, and being addressed by everyone but Lady Beatrice with a number of empty praises and compliments. She could not even write or read in the rough sway of the ship. Her only escape was into prayers of desperate penitence and petition to her guardian angel to turn back the months and let her become simple Elayne of Savernake again—humble appeals that were somewhat adulterated by the simultaneous desire to be turned magically into a falcon, fierce and ascendant, and fly away to some vague place that greatly resembled her own bed at home.

To no one’s astonishment the Countess of Ludford and the Knights of Rhodes did not accord. If the Hospitallers recommended a position midway in the convoy for the sake of safety, Countess Beatrice wished to sail at the periphery, to catch a greater breeze. If the knight-brethren suggested a Benedictine monastery as having guest lodgings that were clean and cordial in port, the countess insisted that she could not tolerate the inflated Benedictine order and could only rest easy with poor nuns. But the most painful disagreement arose from the fact that the famous fighting order of Saint John was divided into seven Tongues, its members drawn from all of Europe. The two Hospitallers appointed to command Elayne’s escort had the effrontery to be French, and no amount of hectoring or contempt could make them English.

Elayne spent most of her days holding a basin for Lady Beatrice. She saw nothing of the fabled Pillars of Hercules as the ship passed into the Middle Sea. Instead she was rinsing the countess’s wimple in tepid seawater and attempting to contrive some way to hang it to dry in the steamy cabin that rolled and creaked with every wave.

By this morning, five days beyond their last view of the Spanish shore, Elayne had long discarded the elegant fur and stiff layers of clothing that swathed the countess. She wore the simplest gray smock that she could uncover from her chests, with just a white scarf thrown over her head and bare shoulders for modesty. She had even put off her rings and dressed her own hair in a loose pair of braids wound up around her head and off the damp nape of her neck.

She gathered the remains of the countess’s breakfast and prepared to take it away. Lady Beatrice, in spite of claiming the seasickness held her prostrate, was sufficiently hale to finish the last of the Portugal wine and berate the Hospitallers for their incompetence. The knights stood just inside the stern castle, bearing the countess’s tirade with perspiring fortitude and a few scattered apologies, when they could insert one. As well they might, since this dawn had discovered the ship alone on the empty Middle Sea, with no sign of the convoy’s sails in sight.

No one seemed quite certain how this misfortune had occurred. Before Lady Beatrice had awoken, the two knight-brethren in command had hastened to assure Elayne, when she emerged for morning prayers, that a correction had been made in the ship’s compass. The convoy would be back in sight before midday, they reckoned.

The crusading Knights of Saint John were celebrated as the greatest fighting sailors on the Middle Sea, so Elayne supposed they knew well of what they spoke. Lady Beatrice was not as sanguine. Or at least not so forgiving, when furnished such an excellent opportunity for scorn.

"We can only pray to God that you are better warriors than seamen, when pirates fall upon us!" she declared. She bore a close resemblance to her snub-nosed spaniel in a temper, pushing up her lower lip while her jowls quivered with disgust. " ’Tis fortunate that the princess has chosen to dress like a miller’s wife—she, at least, may escape the notice of a pack of infidels who would relish nothing better than to abduct a Christian noblewoman such as myself!"

The knights murmured and bowed as Elayne moved past them out the door with her bundle of linen and soiled dishes. She thought there was a little shame in the glance that passed between them. Or it might have been amusement at the idea that any pirate could be unwise enough to abduct Lady Beatrice. Elayne gave them a sympathetic nod. She was in no haste to rejoin the convoy. If she could have an answer to her prayers, they would toss the compass overboard and miss her destination entirely.

 

* * *

 

She lingered below deck, helping her maids to rinse the plate in a great tub the sailors had hung from a beam and filled with seawater. None of them paid any mind when the first loud cry sounded overhead—it was common enough to hear the hails of the crew as they went about their business. Elayne swished a goblet through the saltwater. She paused as more shouts broke out. The sound of sailors’ feet thudded above them.

They all looked up.

The deck tilted. Her maids squealed as the ship lumbered into a sharp turn, wallowing down with a force that threw them all flat to the floorboards. Dishes clattered as the tub swung aside and came back with the force of a huge boulder, pouring water and plate thunderously across the lower deck as the vessel rose and fell.

Elayne lay stunned for a moment. The countess began shrieking orders from the stern castle above. The spaniel yapped shrilly and the maids succumbed to paroxysms of terror. Elayne realized that her foot was trapped in a tangle of hemp rope and pewter-ware. She had to duck, pressing herself flat to the flooded deck as the tub came swinging in her direction, pouring water over her back.

It only wanted this, she thought, but her exasperation dissolved into a flash of panic as the cry of "Pirate!" ran through the ship.

Pirates! For an instant, Raymond’s name hovered in her throat, as if he could somehow save her, but instead an older guardian came, enfolding her in dark wings. She had no time to think or pray; she only knew that if she did not yield to the frenzy that surged up inside her, she could carefully relax her foot and wriggle herself free, sliding back from the reach of the massive tub.

She rose, drawing a deep breath. She clamped her hand over a maid’s mouth, stopping her wailing. "Hush!" she whispered. "Do you want them to discover us?"

The ship was lolling, the sails flapping loosely, but Elayne heard no sounds of fight or boarding yet. By fortune, none of the maids seemed to have been injured by the force of the swinging tub. They lay staring at Elayne in the dim light of the lower deck, their eyes wide.

"Conceal yourselves!" she whispered. "Under the bed-litter!"

While the maids scurried to find hiding places amid the bundles of straw and canvas, Elayne clambered up the ladder, pulling her wet skirts around her.

In the stern castle, the countess still screeched out hoarse directions while her spaniel barked. Elayne held on to the edge of the deck, craning out of the hatch. The commander-knights were nowhere to be seen, but the crew and men-at-arms lined the sides of the ship, crossbows and spears at ready. The green-and-silver banner of Monteverde hung limp, its fringed tip nearly reaching the deck. It fluttered and rose as the ship spun slowly, finding its way to the wind again. At first she saw no sign of any other vessel—then, as the ship’s sails filled, beyond the high structure at the bow she saw a bare mast. It too spun, the great spar rotating and tilting in the sun. The distant sound of men chanting drifted across the waves, a low hollow sound, terrifying in its regular deep timbre, as if fiends hooted their displeasure up from Hell.

Elayne gripped the hatch and bounded onto the deck. When she reached the mast, she could see a second pirate galley, the oars flashing, speeding toward them with a white spew of foam before it—as it rose on a swell, the apex of a vicious bow-ram split the air and then ripped through the water again, throwing spray aside like a racing sea monster.

As if in a dream, she stood with the crew and the soldiers and watched helplessly, the creak of the ship and the sound of the chants filling her ears. Their own vessel had regained some faint speed. The pirate galley seemed misaimed with its wicked prow— it did not pull straight toward the belly of the ship, but seemed to direct a line that fell away from collision with each passing moment as the sails collected wind and the ship added speed.

Elayne held her breath as the pirates came at them, clinging tight to a rope ladder at the mast, staring at the painted bowsprit above the ram, at the crossbows raised, at the ferocious bearded faces under infidel turbans—each instant seemed to unfold with a crystalline slowness; each second increased the chance that their ship would slip a hairsbreadth ahead of the galley’s strike.

At one and the same moment, roars of command issued from above her on the stern castle and from the deck of the pirate galley. The near oars on the galley swept upward as one unit, pointing toward the sky; at the same instant a flight of arrows hissed from the ship. A great sound rent the air, as if the heavens cracked open as the galley struck the ship’s huge rudder. Elayne fell to her knees with the impact. The pirate slid past under the stern amid a hail of screaming shouts, carrying the rudder away.

The ship still sailed, but it was like a wounded bull now between two wolves. The second galley came on swiftly, the chants a relentless rising tempo, unmindful of arrows flying as it swept alongside with men hanging from the spars and ropes. She saw that they were going to leap aboard in mass; she saw an arrow take one down; his body twisted as he fell like a broken bird into the sea.

The other galley was turning toward them again. Amid the war shouts, a heavy hand pushed her, half-dragged her toward the stern castle. Elayne stumbled inside just as the pirates began to leap aboard; the door slammed and she turned, scrambling for a bolt, a chest, anything to block it closed.

"Help me!" she screamed to Lady Beatrice. The old lady for once seemed to pay attention: she sprang with a startling energy to push one of their chests against the door. Elayne grabbed the other end as the spaniel scrambled aside. Together they hauled the heavy wood against the entry and gasped and heaved and flung the other baggage on top.

Elayne sat against it, her back to the muffled sound of the battle outside. The two of them huddled down behind the barricade of wood, waiting in the suffocating heat. Even the spaniel was quiet, panting from its hole under the sleeping berth. She could hear the infidels’ urgent shouts, and a renewed roar of command from directly above them. Splashes and thumps and incomprehensible cries followed.

Lady Beatrice reached out and took her hand. The countess’s fingers were trembling, but she gave Elayne a hard squeeze and a nod. In her other hand, she held up a tiny dagger, one of the pretty jeweled toys that court ladies wore on their girdles. With a grim look, the old lady made a thrust in the air, as if plunging the knife into an attacker, and then pressed it into Elayne’s hand. "Don’t tell them who you are, girl," she whispered harshly.

For the first time, Elayne felt a tinge of admiration for the countess’s fierceness. She accepted the dagger soberly. Crossing herself, she sent a prayer to her enigmatic guardian angel, begging that he not desert her now.

As if in answer, a strange hush fell over the ship. Elayne stared straight ahead at the one tiny porthole in the stern, listening. Through the bulkheads and the door and the sound of her own heart beating, she could make nothing of the faint voices from outside. She stiffened as the chant of the galley oarsmen seemed to draw near again, but then—amazingly—it began to fade away.

Elayne lifted her chin a little, peering over the countess’s bowed head. Through the porthole, beyond the chaos of the cabin, she caught just a glimpse of bright blue water and the white sails of another ship.

 

* * *

 

For some time Elayne waited. After many minutes she began to grow a bit impatient. If they had repelled the attack, then it would be benevolent of their own escort to come and inform them of it. She felt a strong urge to climb over the baggage and present herself with a demand to know what went forward. But the countess caught her arm tightly as she moved, and Elayne lapsed back.

The ship shuddered, a deep thump as another vessel came alongside. Elayne and Lady Beatrice stared at one another. Then, unmistakably, Elayne heard a voice shout, "Pax!"

She could not make out the exchange that followed, only that they all sounded quite calm. Even convivial. Elayne began to breathe again.

"Madam?" One of the knights finally addressed them in a loud voice, to the sounds of shoving and pressing upon the door. "Madam, we are out of danger, God be praised."

Lady Beatrice did not answer. But she took care, with Elayne’s aid, that she was standing proudly, leaning upon her cane with her chin up and her wimple in good order, as if nothing had disturbed her. The Hospitaller pushed past their barricade without much effort, glancing down at the chests and bags. He looked up. "Ladies, you are unharmed?"

Lady Beatrice thumped her cane against the chests. "See to this disarray."

While Elayne stood back in her wet smock and the countess held herself like royalty on the rolling deck, seamen hastened to set the baggage back to order and clear the passage. The spaniel began to bark again, but hushed when Lady Beatrice struck the deck an inch before its nose.

"Who is this varlet?" she demanded, staring with a stern distaste at the richly dressed stranger waiting behind their escorts. It might have been that he had just saved their lives, but Lady Beatrice gave no compliments for that.

"Captain Juan de Amposta, madam. He brings news." The knight bowed solemnly. "He respectfully wishes to make known to madam that the Moorish pirates in the Middle Sea have become abundant and incorrigible."

The countess stared at the stranger. "I take it that you jest."

The captain moved into the cabin and went to his knee with a lavish greeting. "Forgive my impudence, that I wish to serve a lady of your grace and gentleness!"

She tapped her cane. "I daresay you are of France," she said scornfully.

The captain looked up, grinning without rising to his feet. "Nay, my lady. I am a Portugal, here to offer you armed and Christian escort, if it please you."

"I have armed and Christian escort," the countess said, flicking her hand disdainfully toward the knight. "Such as it may be."

"My lady, it is my galley that I offer, to shepherd these slow-sailing craft. She is swift and well-equipped, to prevent a corsair from boarding you." He hesitated, glancing about at the confusion in the cabin. "I mourn that we did not arrive in time to spare you such a fright. We’ve been on the hunt for that pack, my lady." He made a sorrowful gesture with his hands. "But they scurry off like mice when they espy us."

"You must be more fearsome than our fine brethren of Saint John, then," she snapped, glaring at the Hospitaller. The knight narrowed his eyes slightly, but made no reply.

"Madam, your men did well," Amposta said courteously. "I saw five bodies afloat, and none of them Christian. Your pardon—it is impossible to defend a round ship such as this from galleys. It is by God’s grace that we came upon you when we did, or..." He glanced toward Elayne, then shook his head. "I do not like to think of the consequence."

"And what is your proposal, Captain?" Lady Beatrice asked peremptorily.

"I offer protection, my lady. We can rig a steering oar for your rudder, and accompany your ship into safe waters." 

"How much?"

Amposta tilted his head, making a negative gesture with his hand, as if the question shamed him. "I am told you are on Christian pilgrimage, my lady. A token, by hap. It is not important. Whatever you feel moved to grant once we have reached a parting."

"Fortune indeed, that you came upon us!" Lady Beatrice said. "After these fellows from Rhodes have made such a ruin of the thing. But they are French, God forgive them."

The captain smiled and glanced at the dour Hospitaller. "God bless them. We are fast friends of the Holy Order of Saint John."

The knight inclined his head, but did not return the tribute. He seemed to have little to say—Elayne feared that the weeks of humiliation by the countess and now disgrace over their navigational blunder had rendered the knight-brethren somewhat disenchanted with their service.

Amposta lowered his voice. "Nay would I propose such an invitation to any common wool monger, madam, but if my lady and her maid should wish to sail aboard my vessel, as a part of the pact, I make you free of her, and with honor. The accommodation is..." He shrugged and smiled. "By hap it would be a degree more to Your Ladyship’s taste."

"Countess!" the Hospitaller said sharply. "I cannot advise it."

Elayne might have thought that the Knights of Saint John would have learned something in their dealings with Lady Beatrice by now—the moment he stated a conviction, her decision was a foregone conclusion.

"An admirable proposal, Captain," the countess said, thumping her cane on the deck. "See to the removal of our baggage."

The Hospitaller’s mouth twitched once. He bowed deeply and stepped back, giving way to the captain. It was possible, Elayne thought then, that he had learned something of Lady Beatrice after all.

 

* * *

 

A number of uneasy prospects passed through Elayne’s mind as they went aboard Captain Amposta’s galley. She had heard of seraglios and slaves, and this captain had a dark Saracen look about him, even if he wore a Christian cross at his throat. But his first act upon installing them in the spacious cabin, among carpets and cushions, was to present Lady Beatrice with a silver rosary. The crew was courteous and disciplined, the food wholesome; altogether it was a marvelous increase in comfort and speed. The galley was so swift that it could circle the wounded sailing ship as it lumbered along like a greyhound could range about a plodding ox.

By tacit accord, neither the Hospitallers nor Lady Beatrice mentioned Elayne’s rank or destination to these strangers—an omission that suggested the countess might not be entirely convinced of Amposta’s good offices. But under the amiable influence of the captain, Lady Beatrice became better-humored; almost jocund. He was generous with gifts, and full of ghastly stories of his own captivity among the Moors, both of which recommended him to the countess, who delighted in tales of torture. His crew, unseen below, was so well-trained, the oars pulled with such steady vigor, that Elayne could even walk about on deck while the galley cut smartly through waves that tossed and rolled the sailing ship.

She was perfectly content to be regarded as a simple handmaid. A breeze lightened the oppressive heat of the Middle Sea. Like Lady Beatrice, she found her mood much improved. Her

melancholy began to lift; her longing for Raymond became a gentler thing, a yearning that he might be there with her to see the glorious sunsets and the luminous bow wave under the stars. She was sure he had never seen the like of this transparent sea. The lookout did sight one corsair, red sails on the horizon, but when Captain Amposta’s galley turned in swift pursuit, it fled. The captain lamented that he dared not leave the damaged ship to chase it down.

"Is that the coast?" Elayne asked on their third day aboard, pointing to a faint smudge of grayish-white on the blue skyline.

"You have excellent eyesight!" the captain said approvingly. "Nay, not yet. We are still a week out from Italy, rowing against these contrary winds. That is the isle of Il Corvo, the Raven. A beautiful place, and well-protected. By hap you will inform your mistress—if Her Ladyship the countess wishes to rest there for a day, we will put in and refresh our water."

The thought of standing upon dry land, even for only a day, was blessed. Elayne hurried to inform the countess.

 

* * *

 

They glided into the shadow of Il Corvo at twilight. Elayne stared up at the towering walls of the tiny harbor, at the white rock glowing pink against the last of light. A bridge crossed a ravine, supported by three dizzying stone arches that dropped sheer to the water, vaulting so far above her that she could see the radiant blue of the sky beneath them. There was no other sign of human habitation, save the huge mooring bolts sunk into the cliff wall. As one of the sailors dived into the water to secure the mooring cable, a dolphin surfaced and then vanished again into the clear green depths.

"Welcome," Captain Amposta said, with a bow and a brief smile. "Il Corvo awaits."

 

* * *

 

"God’s toes, why should I toil any further up this cliff to honor some foreign rubbish!" Lady Beatrice exclaimed. She leaned upon her cane, breathing heavily, and glared about the empty tower room. They had come to be presented to the lord of Il Corvo, climbing a steep narrow stair, escorted by Captain Amposta in the lead and an armed guard behind. "Let him wait upon me. Come, girl!"

The captain reached out and caught her arm as she turned. "I think not, madam."

"You wretched devil!" Lady Beatrice hissed, jerking away. "Unhand me! Are you possessed by the Fiend Himself?"

His lively demeanor had changed. "You speak more truth than you know. You may find that you fancy the Fiend better than my master."

The countess ignored him, limping with quick conviction toward the tower door. When the guard moved his pike, barring the stairs, Lady Beatrice shoved her cane into his belly-plate. "Stand aside!" she declared, her voice ringing off the rough walls.

Elayne stood silently, watching. The understanding slowly bore in upon her that they were made prisoners.

"Remove the weapon, varlet," Lady Beatrice ordered, flipping her famous reed cane under the man’s helmeted chin, pushing his head up and back. Elayne well knew that murderous tone of voice: it had reduced dukes and archbishops to quailing pageboys.

But the guard stood his ground. He merely looked over his nose at the captain, who laughed and shook his head.

Lady Beatrice’s translucent skin flushed with rage. She whirled about quickly, belying her fragile figure. She was three hands-breadth smaller than Amposta, and had not a single means to enforce her command as a countess here in this savage place, but her lip curled and her back arched as she spat, "You insolent harlot!" Her cane sliced the air, a supple snap of her wrist. The captain had not the reflexes of Lady Beatrice’s servants, or perchance he had not thought she would dare—his hand came up too late and the blow caught him smartly on the ear, a resounding smack that sent him recoiling, his shoulder colliding with the stone wall as he bent over himself.

"I do not suffer fools," Lady Beatrice said calmly.

The captain straightened, sucking air between his teeth. For an instant, Elayne thought that he would leap at Lady Beatrice like a wild animal. The countess had lowered the cane, but she held it lightly, drawing a circle with the tip on the floor.

"My dear lady—has this fellow been disrespectful?"

The quiet voice came unexpectedly, a shock in the small tower room. Elayne saw the captain’s face change—beneath the vivid red mark across his cheek, his skin drained stark white.

She turned about. There had been only the four of them present. Now, though the guard beside the door had never moved, there was a fifth.

He stood tall and still, watching them—arriving from nowhere, as if he had created himself out of the ether. Jet-dyed folds of silk fell from his shoulders to the floor: an iridescent cape of black. Beneath it he wore silver, a tunic fitted perfectly to his body. His hair too was black; the color of fathomless night, long and tied back at the nape of his neck. He was like to a statue of pure metal, something—some thing, inhuman—elegant and fantastic. Elayne was not even certain for a moment if he were real or a marble figure come to sudden life, but dark as sin, as gorgeous and corrupt as Lucifer himself.

For he was corrupt—and the master of this place—no one need bow to make that evident, although both the captain and the guard fell to their knees with haste. Elayne dipped into a reverence, keeping her head lowered, though she watched him from under her lashes. She could not tear her eyes away. Even Lady Beatrice leaned upon her cane and made a brief courtesy.

He smiled. "My lady, you must not bow to me. I do not require it." Though his words were deferential, though he smiled, it seemed less a courtesy than a mandate. "You have been served ill, I fear, to be asked to climb so far. My regrets, Countess. You may beat the man senseless if you like."

"And who might you be?" Lady Beatrice demanded—with considerable audacity, Elayne thought.

"Alas, I have no noble titles, my lady. They call me only Raven, after the name of this island—Il Corvo."

He might have no title, but he carried himself as if he were a prince. His cloak sighed and stirred like something living, light woven into black.

"Humph," Lady Beatrice said. "A graceless cur, I think, if it be your order that I wait upon you. I am the Countess of Ludford, on Christian pilgrimage, fellow!"

He studied her, and then his glance drifted to Elayne. She wanted very badly to lower her face, but it was as if a viper had her for its mark, his black eyes glittering with that subtle smile. She did not dare to look away.

"By hap you will muster the patience to enjoy my home and table while you are here, my lady Countess," he said, still watching Elayne. "My port-master tells me that your ship is in need of some repair—I hardly think it safe for you to venture forth in a leaking vessel."

"Trumpery!" Lady Beatrice exclaimed. "Do not suppose I am any such fool as sails into your harbor every day! That ship is sound enough. We shall not impose upon your idea of hospitality a day longer."

"I fear that you will," he said softly. He wore no ring or jewelry, but on the shimmering black robe there was a strange emblem embroidered in silver, not a coat of arms, but some entwined letters or symbols, like an astrological sign, or Mistress Libushe’s characters, but neither of those nor anything Elayne had ever seen before. "But Your Ladyship will like us better after I have Amposta here tossed onto the rocks below."

The captain made a dreadful sound, as if a protest had been choked to a gurgle in his throat. The man called the Raven looked toward him. Elayne could see Amposta freeze under that faint smile just as she had.

"A poor jest, though," the Raven said. "I see that you do not comprehend my humor."

The captain grinned, baring his teeth, the red mark on his cheek burning.

"Come and dine with me privately, my dear friend," the Raven said amiably. "We’ll talk of Moors and pirates. Mes dames, the sergeant will guide you to your accommodations. We do not keep great ceremony here, but it is my hope that you will find them comfortable."

 

* * *

 

"So we are hostage," Lady Beatrice snarled, pounding her cane on the tiled floor. "Sold like sheep! Those treachers of Saint John sold us!"

Elayne said nothing. The spell of the Raven’s presence still seemed to hover about her, strange and familiar at once. Besides, the countess would not like to be reminded that it was she herself who had chosen to go aboard the captain’s galley.

"Judas knights!" Lady Beatrice gritted her yellowed teeth. "You may be sure that their Grand Seigneur will hear of this, if I must go to Rhodes myself to complain!"

They did not seem to be going anyplace at present. The chamber allotted to the countess was richly furnished, covered with eastern rugs and silken hangings, lit by enameled oil lamps that burned without smoke. But the arrow-slit windows looked out on a moonlit sea lying so far below that Elayne could not even see the shoreline. The tower wall and cliff beneath were invisible to her, as if the room floated high above the water by sorcery.

A servant had come, a Moorish girl who seemed to speak no language that Elayne knew, but only brought a tray of superb fruits in syrup—figs and grapes and oranges. She placed a vase of flowers, too, poppies, such a dark purple they were black, and then vanished silently. Elayne served Lady Beatrice, who never ceased railing against the Knights-Hospitallers as she ate. But the countess grew weary at length, and willing to lie down on the feather mattress. Elayne drew the bed hangings and heard the countess snoring before she had even shielded the lamps.

Elayne sat down on a bench at the foot of the bed, toying with the stewed fruits. This Raven was a pirate, of course. They were his prisoners, had walked open-eyed and guileless into an elegant snare. She could not seem to quite apprehend it. She licked at the syrup on a fig and took a very small bite. Eating was still a burden to her. On Lady Melanthe’s strict injunction, she took enough to keep herself from wasting, but had no enjoyment in it. She lifted a section of orange, and then ate it. Her fingers grew sticky. She dipped them in the little bowl of water on the tray. When she looked up from drying them, she was not alone in the room.

Elayne started so that she upset the water as she came to her feet. "Sir!" she murmured, staring at the dark lord of the place as he stood in shadow not two yards’ length from her.

"My lady," he said, bowing.

"I did not hear—" She glanced toward the planked door, which she herself had barred from within. The heavy rail was still in place. She blinked nervously. "How came you here?"

"Talent," he said. "And study." He moved near, standing over her. Elayne stiffened as he touched her. He took her chin between his fingers, tilting her face up to him. She suffered his leisurely inspection, having no choice. He lost none of his inhuman perfection at closer range. His face was still that graven image of proud Lucifer, fallen from Heaven to stand over her and examine her with eyes as deep black and wickedly beautiful as the poppies.

"I know you," he said pensively. "Who are you?"

She lowered her eyes. "Elena," she said simply, using the name of her Italian christening, which had long ago transformed on English tongues to Elayne.

She hoped it would sound common and unremarkable in this part of the world, the name of a girl who had no ransom value to anyone. But his hand fell away as if she had just uttered some dreadful iniquity. Like a priest probing a heretic under inquisition, he leaned closer, searching every inch of her face.

"Who sent you?" he demanded.

Elayne swallowed. She shook her head slightly. She was afraid—and yet she felt remote, as if she were not really in this chamber, but safe somewhere, watching from afar.

He took her chin hard between his fingers. "Who?" He smiled with an affection that seemed warm and terrible at once. She stared at him. Though she had no intention of speaking, she felt the answer hover on her tongue, as if his smile alone could compel her.

"Tell me now," he said gently. "You must tell me."

"Lady Beatrice," she whispered, clamping her lips closed against saying more.

His black eyebrows lifted. "Nay, tell me who sent you. Who put you in her service?"

"The countess," Elayne mumbled. "I serve the countess."

"The Countess of Bowland?" he asked kindly, his voice very quiet. "Melanthe?"

Elayne’s eyes widened. But he seemed now not so threatening, more human. He looked at her with a fondness that made regret well up inside her; it was the way she had longed for Raymond to look at her, with love and tenderness. It seemed that if she did not tell him what he wished to know, she would be wrong; unfeeling. "The countess," she murmured. To gaze up at him made her dizzy. "She said..." She tried to remember, but all the voices of the past months seemed to clamor together in her head, a tumble of instruction and warning. "She said...she told me...trust no one."

She felt his hand tighten on her chin. He drew in air with a soft hiss. "Did she?"

"I don’t know," Elayne said in confusion. She put her hand on the bedpost. "I’m not sure."

He smiled, like the Devil speaking from the shadows. "Then trust me," he murmured, or Elayne thought he did. She could not seem to see him clearly. He faded, or the light faded, or the shadows crept into her eyes. The lamps went dark, leaving her standing in the blackness, with nothing certain but the wooden carving beneath her fingers and the sound of Lady Beatrice’s snores.

 

* * *

 

Under the influence of the hot southern atmosphere, the countess succumbed to a sleeping sickness. She would not rouse to sense except to complain weakly of her head aching, and to take drink and a little gruel. Elayne watched over her, worrying. She seemed to have no fever, even in this stifling heat. Indeed, she seemed cold and moribund, so Elayne tried to ask the Moorish girl for herbs to increase warmth and blood flow. She asked in every tongue that she knew. The girl only nodded agreeably and went away, returning with the same wine and white bread to soak in it. Elayne asked for a physician, and the girl nodded again. But no doctor came.

Elayne sat in the window embrasure, where she could catch the breath of a cool breeze in the tower chamber. Their baggage had been returned, no doubt after being thoroughly searched for anything of value. It seemed nothing had been alluring enough to steal, for all of Elayne’s possessions from her traveling chest were intact, including her daybook, still locked and undisturbed.

There was no bolt or bar on the door beyond the one she set herself from the inside. She seemed to be unimpeded in coming or going from the chamber, but she did not want to leave the countess. As disagreeable as Lady Beatrice could be, she was familiar and undaunted and English. Elayne had no knowledge of what had happened to the Hospitaller knights or the maids who had remained aboard the sailing ship. But the idea that the countess might succumb to her illness and leave Elayne utterly alone in this place was unnerving.

In the fourteen nights of slow imprisonment that passed, Elayne had far too much time to think, watching Lady Beatrice lie in heavy slumber with her ill-tempered spaniel curled up at her knee. Elayne’s earliest impulse—vague thoughts of escape—died a quick death under cold reason. Their chamber was not left unlocked through any carelessness on the part of their guards. It was clear enough that the island of Il Corvo was a prison in itself.

She thought of their captor. A memory teased her, a difficult image, too indistinct to catch. The Countess of Bowland, he had said, as if he knew all about her godmother. She had not told him of Lady Melanthe. But she had some apprehensive notion that indeed she had, only she could not remember when or how.

He was a pirate. He would be striving to obtain the highest ransom for Lady Beatrice. He would want to know if Elayne had any value. Possibly he intended to force her to write a begging letter for her release, full of dread and pleading.

She ought to be full of dread. She was surprised and a bit guilty to find that she was not. She had no notion of what was the best thing to do. But she was not, in truth, in any hurry to resume her journey to Monteverde and her marriage. There was a dreamlike quality to the days that passed in silent waiting, marked only by the rhythm of Lady Beatrice’s hoarse breathing and the cries of the seabirds outside. Elayne felt be-spelled: suspended between the earth and the sky in this rich carpeted room that seemed to hover like the gulls in the sapphire haze.

In such a reverie, anything began to seem possible. Lady Beatrice had only spoken of her own self to the pirate; she had not revealed Elayne’s destination or her consequence. If he discovered her identity, there was no surer thing than that he would try to ransom her back to Lancaster or her betrothed husband. But as long as he thought her merely a handmaid to Lady Beatrice, she did not see how she could hold much interest for him.

In her most secret heart, Elayne even dared hope that her destiny might change with this turn of events. If the pirate did not discover who she was; if he intended to negotiate a ransom for Lady Beatrice’s restoration to her family, Elayne ventured to dream that fortune might favor her. It might fall out in some way that she would be returned to England after all with the countess, still unmarried. It might even fall out...

She thought, in spite of herself, of Raymond’s last words. He had not wanted his marriage, any more than she wanted her betrothal thrust upon her. She prayed earnestly and repeatedly that his wife was in good health, and carefully did not allow any other sinful hopes or wishes to enter her mind as she recited her Aves each eventide. She prayed that Lady Beatrice would mend, and that they would be freed of this pirate’s clutches.

Then she sat in the window and gazed out at the sea, lost in the empty beauty of the blue night, not knowing what else to ask for.