She shivered. It would be folly to dwell over-long on the memory of it. In fact, it would be wiser to allow her thoughts to simmer and steep into a fine hatred of the man instead.
Man? Hah! A monster.No different than the pious jack-n-apes who’d forced Montgomery to bury her alive. Oh, how she wished she could visit that wicked bastard in his sleep.
She noticed her hands first. Her fingers trembled over the edge of the glassless window. But it wasn’t just her hands. The vibrations moved up her arms, into her shoulders. The back of her head tingled where his fingers had held her, had protected her head from knocking against the rough wall. She pulled her shoulders up to erase the sensation.
Even her breath vibrated as she exhaled. Then worse, still, the floor itself moved beneath her as her knees joined in.
She’d known these tremors before. In her tomb, the shaking had overtaken her while she waited to be rescued, not knowing if it was possible for the men to chisel through the thick stone floor upon which her tomb had been erected.
She forced her eyes to remain open and searched the distance for sunlight dancing on the waves.
“Ye see?” she whispered to herself. “Out…outside. I am outside.” She stretched her shaking limbs between the bars, rustled her fingers together. “Air. Sunshine. Sea.”
Outside.
Eventually, the shaking ebbed away. And the tears began.
A while later,there came slow footsteps in the stairwell. More than just her captor. A few more steps. A pause. More steps.
Isobelle’s curiosity could be contained no longer and she turned. Was she to be a sacrifice? Would a true monster be coming to collect her as his dinner? There had been a dragon carved into the wood above the arched doors, and a dragon carved on a pylon next to the dock. Was there a dragon living within her very tower?
She marveled that the memory of her tomb and the fear of another such sentence were more frightening to her than the possibility of a scaled beast coming for her. Perhaps it was because such a beast would kill her swiftly—a merciful death—while men who once sat in judgment of her had no mercy at all.
This time, she’d been arrested, imprisoned—albeit an unusual prison—and yet she could not say for certain her captor lacked compassion. There had been something in the way he looked at her, almost pitying, that made him different from the priest who had so gleefully sentenced her to death in Scotland.
This man, with his painfully beautiful face, had already plucked her from an unfriendly sea, had stood at her back while she recovered herself, had allowed her to take her plaid. He’d even given her hope that she might return again to her little cottage—though she could never return in truth, for Signora Crescento now feared her to be a witch. And even if she returned there on the morrow, the suspicion would grow and spread like a fire on a dry moor. She would be forced to move on, forced to leave no word for Ossian, for if she left a trail, those who sought out witches would be able to follow.
Without Ossian to stop her, she’d likely go home, even if it meant her death.
Thus, her captor might not be a monster, but he had surely ruined her new life in Venice. A fair enough reason to hate the man. It was not much, but if she protected that little seed of hatred, it would keep her from looking too deeply into his eyes…
The servant he’d called Icarus shuffled into the room backward, carrying the ponderous end of a long wooden bench. The man’s face was dark red and his cheeks pumped like billows as he walked beyond her vision into the shadowed side of the room, outside the decorative cage.
Carrying the other end of the bench was her tall tyrant who looked only mildly uncomfortable with his load. His tunicand cape were gone. His white under-tunic hung against his lean stomach. Tied at the shoulders were full white sleeves that billowed around his arms, giving her no sense of his strength other than the ease with which he’d thwarted her escape.
He gave her barely a glance before turning away, disappearing through the door. His servant limped along behind, one hand pressed to his back. The door remained open. Their descending footsteps were easily heard.
Why the bench? What purpose would it serve? Would she be expected to entertain an audience? Would a jury of churchmen sit before her and wait for a confession? Or did they hope to see some madness overtake her, to compel her to do something only a witch would do?
Well. They would be sorely disappointed on both counts.
She stood on the bed and peered through the little holes that decorated the upper edge of the iron wall. The bench was a stretch of brown shadow. No markings. No notches carved into it. No curve to the wood. With nothing to hint at its purpose, she was left wondering. The possibility of an audience left her a bit wounded. Would her captor betray her so?
Her handsome captor.
What could he be thinking, to bring her here? To a remote island, away from the city, away from the church and its leaders? An inconvenience for any who might be brought to see her. Or…
Or is he hiding me from them?
A flash of hope caught in her chest. It made no sense to hide a witch, unless… Unless he thought she might be of use to him.
“Hah!” Would that she were a witch, for the first charm she would attempt would be something to get her free again.
Was it only this morning she had awakened in her own cottage, free from the interference of any man? Left on her own. Abandoned by Ossian. The first day of a life she alone would determine?
Only that morning?
What heinous thing had she done that God would see her penalized yet again in a stone room? What sin had she committed?
