“It is not my place to advise you on how to discipline the cravings of your soul. Nor, I think, need I remind you of the dangers that accompany such unshackled desires.” Around the clip, his fingers tensed. “It is notmywish, lady, to see you writhe and suffer more within the prison of vows and laws.”
Vows and laws that she had broken so recklessly. A fool, she thought; she was a terrible fool. Yet the true prison was of her own construction: the desires that kept her on this brazen and perilous course—invisible walls, invisible floors, such that could not be broken down because they could not be seen.
“Your Scrupulousness,” she choked out, “I must tell you the very worst thing, which is that I love him.”
This did not unmoor Pliny at all.
“I can see that,” he said. “Or else you would not risk such that youhave. If you allow me a moment of bluntness—the betrayal of a marriage vow, on its own, is not so unforgivable a crime; a thousand princes and kings before have shucked these hastily made promises, and done so openly. But should the prince father a child beyond the bounds of his marriage bed, death is the price. Neither child nor mother would be suffered to live.”
Agnes swallowed.
“Your fear is for naught,” she said. “In this matter, at least. Nothing in my womb can take root.” To speak the wordbarrenwould have been pure agony, a blister upon her tongue. She found reprieve within the cushion of euphemism.
Once more, Pliny nodded. A strange look came over his face, clouding his dark eyes. She imagined it might be grief. Grief for her? She did not know.
“If you would allow me,” he said slowly, “to offer my counsel.”
Agnes realized she had picked the white band of flesh around her nail to a bloody strip. “Yes, Your Scrupulousness.”
“I am not so green and so pitiless as to tell you to give this up—though perhaps I ought, at least, to try.” Pliny the leech never smiled, and so it chilled her blood now to see the corner of his mouth quiver with cold and humorless humor. “So I will say only this: There is, in Seraph, a bond that surpasses all earth-made vows. It is the bond between a soul and its matched half, and every rote human law withers to nothing in its face. At least, such is the custom on the mainland. It is not within the limits of my art to declare when such a bond is found—but I have come to know the prince well in these months, and I do not believe he would risk all for anything less.”
A bond that transcended all earth-made vows. Agnes recalled the words from Liuprand’s wedding ceremony—the vows he had sworn, falsely, because Marozia was not his soul’s equal.
I would have you as my equal, my matched half.
“I have heard tale of such a bond before,” was all Agnes said. “It is the inheritance of any who carries the blood of Seraph.”
“Yes, lady.”
The leech really was such a clever man. Not for the first time, Agnes felt grateful that he was loyal to her and no other. Grateful that she had his confidence, his wisdom, and his discretion. He was as faithful as the strange-eyed girl who stood at Marozia’s side.
So faithful that Agnes shucked her own trepidation, her own inhibitions. The urge to laugh was gone, but it had been replaced by another equally brazen sentiment. Love, which was more dangerous than the sharpest blade, and sweeter than the last fig on a branch.
Let me taste it,she thought.Let me cut myself on it. I do not care.
She lifted her gaze to Pliny’s again. Lowly, she asked, “Then will you perform the task?”
XIII
Innamorata
The candles would not go out. Pliny had seen to that. Just enough wax remained that they would stay lit for as long as they needed, and offer enough luminance by which to read. It would be better if he knew the words by heart, but this was not a ceremony he performed often. The last had been, of course, for the lady Agnes and his old master. And in that, his memory was pitted with black holes, like termite-eaten wood. Small details had been lost. Jettisoned, like ballast, to preserve the soundness of the vessel that was his mind. Because it could not comprehend so much tragedy and injustice; absolute reality was too much for any human to bear.
So he had arranged the candles, as was his task. He had read the lines in the book, murmuring them aloud to himself, until he could replicate their rhythm. He was not fluent in the tongue of old Seraph, and the vowel sounds demanded quite a lot from his untrained mouth. The Lady Agnes would not understand, but, he suspected, the prince would. He was a learned man. An honorable man. Just.
Perhaps it would be only Pliny who saw this act as one of honor. But it did not matter. Because no one else would ever be given to witness it.
The prince came first, his golden aura beating back the bleary darkness of the chapel. His clothes were not especially fine—Surgeon forbid he be stopped on his way, and his ceremonial dress questioned—but the beauty of his form was infinite, regardless of how he was robed. One concession he did make was the small golden circlet, which heonly placed upon his head within the chapel’s dim safety, for Pliny’s eyes alone.
What was the significance of the circlet, what was its provenance? It was not quite a crown, and it seemed both old and new at once, both tarnished and gleaming. A relic of Berengar’s? But Pliny imagined that the king would guard such an artifact jealously. What meaning did this piece of hammered metal hold for the prince?
Pliny never learned.
No words passed between them. They waited, but not for long. The door opened, and the sudden shift in air made the candles gutter, flattening and then leaping upright again, revived. A shaft of pale light patterned the floor.
The Lady Agnes entered. She wore a gown of gray so pale, it was almost silver—itwassilver, in fact, in the borrowed glow of a thousand candles. The white flowers were in her hair, and the necklace of teeth around her throat. She, like the prince, was not adorned in any especial finery, nothing that might reveal their purpose if they were encountered on their way to the chapel. Her dark hair fell to her waist, and Pliny realized that he loved her. She was his new mistress. His devotion slid into place like a wheel finding its groove.
Agnes did not come alone. Pliny was surprised, though perhaps he should not have been, that she was arm in arm with Waltrude. The wet nurse did not smile—he would not expect her to—but there was a ripple of fondness radiating from her, something invisible to the eye, something Pliny could only perceive with his mind. Or was it his heart?
