She saw the lady Agnes as the prince did. She did not see a walking corpse, a ghost in a grayish gown. She saw a vivid creature, all the intricate faculties of life occurring with great subtlety beneath the surface, as roots writhe and swell underground before at last showing themselves green and tender in the dirt. She saw again the slant of defiance to her nose and to her chin. She saw the clever shifting of her gray eyes—and oh, she felt a fool for ever thinking them dull and lifeless; they were so compelling to her now, perceptive but coy, somehow both solemn and earnest. She could have lost herself in those eyes, pondering their multitudes, searching their immeasurable depths.
It was not the same vibrant life as her cousin Marozia, the ever-more-resplendent flower. Agnes was another plant, trickier in its arrangement of petals, not so easy to find within a field of many blossoms, all competing for the attention of the sun and the admiration of humans. She was a night-blooming flower that did its growing in the dark, nurtured by the moon and weaned by the stars.
Waltrude saw the contrast of her black hair against her skin, with its soft, pearlescent luminance, and was made weak in the knees. She saw the way her full lashes curtained her eyes. She saw the tender bow of her lips and felt suddenly, alarmingly, obliged to kiss them. She saw even the faint swell of her breasts beneath the bloodied bodice and felt a pull in the base of her belly.
The Lady Agnes was beautiful. And that realization filled Waltrude with a cold, infinite terror.
Very briskly, Waltrude snatched the note from Agnes. She found that her own fingers were trembling as she folded it into her palm.
“I will take it to the prince,” she murmured. “I am certain it will please him.”
Shewascertain—horribly, wretchedly certain. She doubted that Liuprand had betrayed his wife in body—he was an astonishingly restrained man in that regard—but in spirit, his vow was broken. With despair, Waltrude knew that his heart did not belong to the princess. And she knew, because the Seraphine were not quite human—they were something slightly greater, with an augmented and refined capacity for love—that his heart never truly would.
Was the lady Agnes afflicted with this same catastrophic sentiment? Waltrude could not be as sure. But it did not really matter. The treason of the prince’s emotion was enough. Kingdoms crumbled and crowns were lost for less.
As Waltrude left the lady and began her terrible journey back to the prince’s chambers, her knees wobbled, and her back ached beneath the burden of this knowledge.You fool,she thought bitterly.You could well be the ruin of us all.
XXVIII
The Dagger Slips
It was not long after Waltrude departed that Marozia emerged at last.
She wore the same deep-crimson gown as the day before, though her hair was combed and fixed into a thick braid, and her red hood with biliments of gold was now a golden hood with biliments of white, which looked ever more like a tiara. Ninian was at her back, peering nervously over her mistress’s shoulder. She closed the door behind Marozia firmly.
“You look a fright,” Marozia said.
Agnes stared back at her hollowly.
Marozia’s lips twitched. She turned to Ninian and said, “Leave us.”
Ninian’s face fell. She appeared deeply crestfallen to have been dismissed, but she left as she had been ordered, with only one mooning glance back at her mistress. A faint flicker of irritation went through Agnes, though it extinguished quickly. Nothing within her could remain alight.
At last Marozia’s gaze fell to her hand. “You’ve had it wrapped. By whom?”
The question could not be answered in a gesture, but when Agnes looked over at the parchment and quill on the desk, she was overtaken by exhaustion.
It was not an exhaustion she could not have surmounted had she wished it. Though as her eyes lingered on the paper, she felt a protest harden in the root of her throat. She would not speak it aloud, of course. But it was there, calcifying with each second that passed, and it did not fade through her as the irritation did.
“Well?” Marozia prompted.
Agnes looked back up at her and did not answer.
A furrow formed in Marozia’s brow, and her dark eyes danced. It was not anger—not yet. It was merely the bewildered embers of it. Her mouth opened and then closed again, lips dragging down into a frown. She could not find the words to contend with Agnes’s refusal because Agnes had never refused her. Always her silence had been a weapon wielded against the world, against all but Marozia. Or—perhaps it had been Marozia’s weapon, all along. But now with her own dagger turned in against her chest, it was Marozia’s turn to fall silent.
She would not admit defeat so easily by getting angry. She blinked, as if to stamp out those early sparks of rage, and then said, “Let us get off your gown. It’s filthy.”
Agnes grew stiff in her seat. She drew her arms up around herself, but either Marozia did not notice this silent protest, or else she did not care, for she came behind her in the chair, lifted the sagging braids from the back of Agnes’s neck, and began to unbutton her dress.
Shakily Agnes stood. The gown fell down in increments, baring first her collarbone, then her shoulders, then her breasts. At last, it drooped forward, exposing her stomach. The scars shone bright in the glowing pink dawn. No blood had leaked through the fabric, and her skin bore only these old, healed wounds of the past. Wounds that Marozia glanced at but did not truly see.
A part of her wanted to know where Marozia had spent the night. What had happened in the gloaming darkness while Agnes had dreamed her hideous dreams. Her hand twitched toward the quill, but she could not make herself grasp it.
Marozia perceived the question from her anyway. As the gown puddled to the floor, she said, “Ninian made up another room for me. I will sleep there until this bed is clean. Until the prince calls me to his chamber.”
There was no tremor of uncertainty in her voice. Had some reconciliation occurred between her and Liuprand while Agnes slept?Had her torture—and the king’s obviously increasing madness—encouraged him to at last fulfill his marriage vows? More than ever the kingdom needed unity, confidence in this match. An heir, to mingle the blood of Drepane with the blood of Seraph.
Agnes’s gorge rose. She had not once felt the urge to retch, even as the king had visited his violence upon her, even as she looked upon her ruined hand, but now she did. The very thought of Marozia in Liuprand’s bed made her taste that foul bile of envy in her throat.
