Kissed by Starlight (26 page)

“Please, Blaic, I’ve told you....”

He too was dressed in exotic fashion, the turban covering his fair hair giving him a dark, exotic look. She hadn’t realized how tan his skin had become, even in the thin spring sunshine. His long coat, of dark green satin, hung open, exposing his hard muscled chest. She saw that his body glinted with golden hair, spreading across his chest just where she would have put her hands if she reached out to touch him. She turned her head away.

“Yes, you’ve told me.”

In a blink, it was all gone. She thought she heard the leopard’s disappointed scream as the kitchen returned to what it had been before: cold stone floor, water-streaked walls, and inconvenient stove, sink, and cupboard. The dishes were all finished, stacked neatly, already dried. Felicia wondered if that was what he had intended all along.

He came closer. “I can help you.”

“I don’t want that kind of help. I have to think of the children. It would be too confusing for them to see things appear and disappear by magic. Don’t they have enough heartache in their lives?”

“Is it their heartache or yours that concerns you?”

“I don’t know what you mean,” she said, moving away from him, putting the plates away in the cupboard.

“You feel sorry for them because they have no one to love them.”

“They don’t. Certainly that awful creature gave them no affection. I didn’t realize it until Melissa mentioned it, but Miss Dravoget hadn’t been here long. I’m the fifth directress to come here in the ten years that Melissa has been a resident. I don’t know if the children will ever come to trust me.”

“They like you very well.”

“Do they?”

“Yes. They talk amongst themselves, you know, just as though they were adults. A few think you’ll leave soon, like all the others, but every one is enjoying the comforts you have brought.”

“I will do more,” Felicia vowed. “The boys, at least, will have enough education to overcome the stigma of their births.”

“So you intend to devote yourself body and soul to these wretched children.”

Felicia felt suddenly how much of a burden she’d taken on. Yet her heart had already been won by the children’s need of her. “Yes,” she said. “I intend to do all I can.”

“Then you’re a fool! Do you think you owe it to them because your father cared more for you than their fathers care for them?”

“It has nothing to do with my father,” she said, responding with faster speech and heightened breathing to the challenge in his tone.

“Of course it does. Don’t be an idiot.”

“I’m neither a fool nor an idiot. Don’t you see? I’ve never had anything to do before. This is my chance to make a life for myself, right here at Tallyford. I’ve never had a future before that I could see clearly. Now I do.”

“A fine life! To stay here and wear yourself out in the service of a woman you despise.”

“Lady Stavely hasn’t anything to do with this, either. It has nothing to do with anyone but me.”

Blaic shook his head disbelievingly. “You don’t belong here. Any girl could do this work. Dishes, and wiping noses, and kissing skinned knees. You could be so much more.”

She interrupted. “What else is there for me to do, for heaven’s sake? I can’t marry. I’m not trained for anything, not even needlework. Even if I did apply for a position as a governess, wouldn’t that be exactly as though I stayed here? Not to mention that I know of no one beyond Doctor Danby who would give me a reference, and a reference from any male is suspect when it is carried by a young woman. Especially a young woman like me.”

“You won’t be young long if you stay here. You’re nineteen. You shouldn’t take on a task that will inevitably wear out your youth. There must be a path where you would find someone to appreciate you.”

“Now you sound like Sir Elswith.” She spoke flippantly, wanting to make him smile.

If he had been forceful before, these words seemed to make him furious. His eyes became very cold, his voice slowing and dropping until every word seemed like distilled acid intentionally flicked on her skin. “Sir Elswith was right. There’s only one life for a woman like you. You should take what he offers you. Even that would be better than this.”

Blaic left, letting the door slam behind him. She looked out the window, hoping he’d forget to cast whatever spell it was that had kept him dry on the walk from his shed to the kitchen. She had the satisfaction of seeing him become instantly soaked to the skin.

Leaving memories behind, Felicia turned again with a sigh to the account books. They were heavy vellum, bound in red leather, each one weighing two or three pounds. After a few hours among them, Felicia felt as though she’d been dismantling a wall, stone by stone.

Finally, when the columns had begun to blur so much that not even rubbing her eyes made them march in proper order, Felicia took her maid’s advice. Hastily drinking a cup of lukewarm tea, she rose from her desk and went outside.

Her skirt trailed over rows of grass cuttings, their cut ends exuding that crisp sweet smell. She followed them, purposefully keeping her mind on the blueness of the sky or the dampness of the grass, rather than on where she was going. She heard laughter, high-pitched and childishly helpless, and turned in that direction. She had no intention, she told herself, of seeing Blaic. But if he and the children happened to be in the same place, it wouldn't be her fault.

She stepped out between two hedges to see Blaic, standing upon a natural bank, his legs braced, his hands moving endlessly while black balls flew around his head in an arc. She could not tell how many there were. He juggled effortlessly, with never a ball out of line, never a hesitation that would have brought the entire cascade down to bounce and roll away over the grass.

The children sat around him, either laughing or open-mouthed with awe. Felicia tended toward the latter reaction for this was no illusion or trick. She saw the muscles in his arm flex as the balls — which upon seeing their bare legs, she now realized to be the children’s rolled-up stockings — were caught and released as delicately as birds in flight.

Blaic saw her, a saint in a niche against the black background of wet yews. One balled-up stocking went awry, falling lightly to earth. The children laughed in delight, as happy in their innocence to see him make an error as to see him continue faultlessly.

He said, “I only made that mistake to show you that it can be done. If one of you — eh, Win? — would kindly toss it back to me...now!" It was done, and he blended the lost ball back into the others. Then easily, one, two, three, four, five, he caught all the balls in one hand and bowed grandly from the waist.

The older children applauded, but the youngest came surging up to him, eager to see how the miracle had come to pass. He knelt down to their level and showed them the way to throw and catch just a single stocking from hand to hand. Soon stockings were being chased after by short legs as they persisted in missing eager hands. It turned into a wonderful game of catch-who-can, leaving Blaic to talk with Felicia.

He remained kneeling as she came closer, a suitable position from which to beg forgiveness. But she made no reference to their quarrel. Her eyes were shining, and he felt a sharp and unaccustomed pain in his heart. He had hoped that their quarrel would count as a betrayal; certainly he’d seen that deep pain in her eyes when he’d said those dreadful things to her. Yet, upon his return to the Living Lands, nothing had changed. Would he be forced to hurt her even more deeply? Blaic didn’t know if he could stand it.

“Lucius touched you,” she said. “Or am I dreaming?”

“No, you’re right. He did.”

“But...how?”

“I don’t know.”

They both looked down as little Penelope tugged on Felicia’s skirt, holding up her stockings, asking to have them rolled again into a ball. Felicia did it quickly, her eyes never leaving Blaic. He bent and scooped the little girl up in his arms. “My, you’re growing big!”

“Yes, I am,” Penelope said proudly. “Mary snuck me ‘n extra helping of pudding last night.” Her blue eyes widened and she put her hand over her mouth. “Wasn’t s’posed to tell,” she said through her fingers.

“Never mind,” Felicia said, handing back the child’s improvised toy. “We won’t tell.”

The child wriggled in Blaic’s arms and he put her down. She ran away to play with the others. He said, “I don’t know why.”

“Your Ancient Law doesn’t apply to children, perhaps?”

“So far as I had ever heard or seen, it applies to all humankind. Certainly there are tales of some of my People falling thrall to a child. They are small and can move most silently. Fortunately for us, they usually demand no more than a sweet or a toy, not being greedy or cruel.”

“Then what is happening that these children can touch you and you do not serve them?’’

He ran his hand through his hair. “I wish I knew.”

Abruptly, he held out his hand to her. “Touch me.”

She wanted to. He saw it in her eyes. She lifted her hand to reach out, to caress the back of his. Then her fingers curled in and she froze. “Not here. The children will see.”

“I promise I won’t do any of the things I want to do. I only want to know if it is possible.”

Her touch was like snowflakes falling on his wrist, cool and fleeting. Blaic felt a shiver run through his body, but not from cold. Every cell answered her touch. He met her gaze with his own and said, “I’ve never known a mortal’s touch to be a pleasure before.”

A flash of joy crossed her face and she took her fingers away — just for an instant, only long enough to reach toward his face. Blaic felt the peculiar nausea grip his guts. He fought the words that forced themselves to his lips, battled to keep silent, but the Law in his blood and his history was too strong. He tried desperately to strangle his voice, but the whisper broke through.

“Command me.”

“I can’t think of anything in this world I want,” she said, and he did not blame her for the bitterness that flavored the words. Her disappointment fed his own. She turned away from him, her long black skirt dragging in the grass.

Some of the children shrieked as they played blindman’s bluff. Though she looked in that direction, Blaic didn’t think her thoughts turned toward them.

“There’s really no hope at all,” she said. “I keep believing that there may be a way for us to be together, but there isn’t. I wish...I wish....”

Blaic only hoped she wouldn’t wish him away. She could so easily. Then there’d be no chance for him to live again in the Wilder World. But he realized that never seeing   Felicia again would be worse. The People did not feel love, in the mortal sense, yet the thought of never again seeing her face, hearing her laughter, looking in those grave blue eyes, was as sharp a pain as a knife thrust from a trusted friend.

She called, “It’s almost time to go in, children.”

While the chorus of groans still filled the spring air, Felicia turned again to Blaic. “Finish your tasks. There’s a chair or two that want mending and I can’t afford to send them to a joiner. You may as well try your hand at them.”

“It’s done,” he said. Felicia stared at him. “Did you forget that I was awaiting your wishes?”

“I suppose I must have."

“Don’t worry. Mary was out of the house seeing to the cow. Ever, her fabled calm might not have withstood the sight of two chairs mending themselves.”

She did not smile. How Blaic wanted her to. His little shed was cold at night, warmed only by the memory of her face. Every day he found himself collecting her expressions, and reveling in the unexpected beauty revealed by the tilt of her head, the length of her neck, the unrivaled beauty of her form. Even in the Other Realm, maidens might blush in jealousy when compared with Felicia.

He remembered boasting that mortal women did not appeal to his taste, and grinned at his own small thoughts. Perhaps the only difference between human women and the People’s was that the beauty of the Fay struck one at once, whereas mortal women improved from day to day.

The other mortal woman in his life faced him that evening. “What have you been zayin’ to Miss Starret now?” Mary demanded, standing before him with his filled plate in her hands.

“Nothing at all,” he said, breathing in deeply the mingled scents of pastry, chicken, and gravy that arose from the crumbled portion of chicken pie upon the plate.

“Nothin, he zays?” she said, imitating his inflection. “Then why, pray tell, is she wanderin’ about like she’s lost her only blue ribbon, eh?”

“No doubt she’s worrying about the children. Are you planning to give me my dinner or hold it hostage?”

“No more ‘n you deserve if I does. There.” She laid it on the table in front of him. “But don’t think you can fool me! Larned zomethings afore you was ever though of, zo I did. She wouldn’t be the first fine lady that lost her heart over a good-for-naught with a handsome face and no zoul.”

“No soul?” he asked, alarmed. Though he could smile at Mary’s assumption of seniority in regard to years, her last words gave him pause. Did it show so much?

“Well,” she said, resting her floury hand upon her broad hips, “mayhap not ‘no zoul.’ But no heart, for that’s plain enough. If you had, you’d be wooing her with all your charming, zinful ways. An’ don’t try to gammon me into believing you could not if you would.”

“You wouldn’t see anything wrong with my wooing Miss Starret? Some might say she’s a little far above me.”

“A figo for ‘em! At any road, who’s to know or care? Her high and mighty Lady Stavely won’t care zo long as she needn’t be troubled.” Mary’s round eyes laughed. “And it’s not as if you were born to be a gardener, is it? One day you’ll tell me what game ‘tis you’re playing, my fine lad.”

“I?” Mindful of the piercing vision of those blue eyes, Blaic dug his spoon into the now nicely cooled pie lying crumbled on his plate. “Wonderful as always,” he said.

Mary looked wise. “Aye, put me off with your zoft words. I know what I know. What is it? Did you kill a man in one of them nasty duels and had to flee Lundon? Or were you a-makin’ love to a married woman? Not run into debt, I hope?”

Blaic shrugged and pointed to his full mouth.