The Flesh and the Devil (17 page)

         
All at once the shadows under the gateway were no longer
menacing, for she thought she saw a movement there, as if someone had stepped
deeper into the blackness. With a little cry of pure thankfulness, Juana ran
blindly down the steps and into the shadows of the archway, then stopped as
suddenly as if she had run into a blank wall.

         
The gateway was empty.

         
For long moments Juana could only stand, labouring for
breath, while a feeling of overpowering sickness gripped her. Sweat pricked her
temples and the nape of her neck under her heavy hair, and there was a sour,
nauseating taste in her mouth. If she had been bolder — or allowed herself more
time— or hurried past those gossiping courtiers instead of hiding on the
staircase like a coward —

         
Then she caught her breath. The gateway ran the depth of
the smooth-faced granite tower above it — a coach and horses could have stood
before the gate and been sheltered by the great curving arch — and in the shock
of disappointment she had missed what her eyes now saw, a narrow doorway cut
into the stonework just this side of the huge, barred gate. It did not look
deep enough to hide a man, but as she moved closer she saw a very faint
luminosity showing beneath the door. She reached out an investigating hand to
touch the bare wood, and the door swung open soundlessly beneath her fingers.

         
'Jaime?' It was a whisper; she dared not call. 'Jaime?' The
light seemed to come from the top of a flight of narrow steps that ran from
just inside the door to the rooms above the gateway, each tread a faint yellow
line that weakened until the spot where she stood was almost as dark as the
night behind her. She took a cautious step forward, listening, but there was no
sound.

         
Clutching her cloak about her she ventured a few steps
further and then stopped. Jaime would not risk discovery by entering the
gatehouse of leaving a light burning — he knew even less than she of the
castillo, and he would wait where there was no risk of someone coming upon him
and raising the alarm. Heart pounding, she turned to retrace her steps, too
fearful of being seen to palate her fresh disappointment fully. That would come
later, she knew, but first she must get out.

         
Ahead of her the door swung shut, stopping the way to the
night air. For a moment Juana could only stare numbly at the gap as it narrowed
and closed, refusing to turn to the figure who had waited behind the door and
now stood with one arm stretched across it in silent denial, watching her. When
she turned her head at last all she could see was the massive, broad-shouldered
outline, the white shirt chequered by her shadow against the dark wood, and the
unrevealing brilliance of green eyes in Tristán's shadowed face.

         
`Welcome to my abode, madam.' His voice was cool,
unflurried.

         
'You?' The word almost choked her. 'What are you doing
here?'

         
Ì told you, these are my quarters. You forbade me your
presence, so I brought you to mine. You made great haste here to change your
condition,' he added dryly, `but you need not. I would have tarried.'

         
His eyes flickered over her, assessing the slender shape
tense with repudiation, the dark eyes wide with speechless horror. The hood had
fallen from her head, and the swathes of raven hair looped in a knot at the
nape of her neck made her look like a terrified Madonna.

         
'I do not understand you, senor. I came here to meet a — a
friend, but it seems I am too late. Let me pass.' She spoke with instinctive
iciness, waiting for him to step out of her path.

         
Instead, he said deliberately, `My friend Pedrino was happy
to be my messenger, though he knew nothing of what was intended when I gave it
him. You have not come too late.'

         
'You . . . sent the letter?'

         
He bowed his head very slightly.

         
'Then, Jaime —' She broke off, shaking her head helplessly.

         
Nothing but her imagination had linked the message with
Jaime de Nueva, and now she had to face the consequences of her own
foolhardiness, to escape this trap, if trap it was. She stared back at the
mercenary, letting her hatred show in her expression.

         
He was taller than she even though she stood several steps
above him, and his presence was more overwhelming than ever in this narrow
space. He was standing motionless, his breathing soundless like a cat's, while
her own breath seemed to rasp and tear through her body.

         
'What do you want of me — why bring me here?' 'Can you not
guess?'

         
Involuntarily, she retreated a step higher. Now her eyes
were almost level with his, and she saw a disquieting flicker in their depths
like a swift lick of flame.

         
'Whatever the cause, you waste your wit, senor. I shall not
stay here, and I would not have come if I had known who wrote that letter—' She
broke off as he moved, taking an unhurried pace towards her. Ìf you do not keep
your distance I shall call for help. The other servants —'

         
'The
other servants
 
are all abed by this time or else carousing to
Bartolomé‘s future happiness. Besides, they know that your safety is in my
charge

         
— Eugenio has made me solely answerable if anything
affrights you tonight.'

         
'My aunt —' Juana backed another step.

         
'I doubt she would hear if you called her.'

         
She glanced round her briefly, fighting panic. The walls on
either hand were unyielding stone, so close that they barely cleared the
breadth of his shoulders, barring escape on either side, and the mercenary's
tall shape blocked the way ahead of her. With a gasp she turned and ran up the
stairs towards the light, her only thought that she must get farther from him.
A torch burned on the bare landing at the head of the steps; beyond she could
see a long, narrow room, as bare and austere as a monk's cell, in darkness but
for the faint moonlight through the high, slitted windows. For
a
 
fatal few seconds she hesitated, fascinated,
and as she glanced back she saw Felipe Tristán standing only a few paces from
her.

         
As he reached her the flaring light of the torch touched
his scarred cheek for an instant, accentuating the harshness of his face, the
stern planes disfigured by the puckered seam that ploughed through the flesh of
his cheek. Juana gave a smothered sound of revulsion; and he heard it, for
something stirred again in the cat-green eyes.

         
She shrank back instinctively, pressing back against the
unyielding wall. He was so close that she could see the glint of gold and
copper on the deep chest beneath his unfastened shirt, and she wrenched her
eyes away, staring at anything

         
—
anything —
 
rather than the powerful shape that threatened
to blot out her vision. The wall's hardness was bruising against her back as
his fingers clamped, with almost gentle ruthlessness, on the nape of her neck.

         
'Look at me.' His voice was level, inexorable. 'I said look
at me.'

         
It was the odd, insistent iteration as much as the pressure
of his thumb under her jaw that made her lift startled eyes to his, and she
heard him say scathingly, 'Would you be so dull in understanding if I were a
man and not merely a servant?'

         
She had time for only one sharp cry before his arms
imprisoned her and his mouth found hers. In the first instant of his kiss disgust
almost choked her; through the russet gown she could feel the length of his
body hard and merciless against hers, and she fought like a frantic tigress to
be free of the sensation. But his strength held her powerless, and she felt him
thrusting his fingers through the hair that he had loosened, winding it round
his fist to keep her face raised for his kiss. The ridged scar was like a brand
across her parted lips, and then he lifted his head, scanning her face for a
long moment.

         
'No.' She whispered the word, not knowing what she
gainsaid, only denying the demand in his face. `No, you must not.'

         
'Poor frightened virgin.' His tone was caustic. 'What is it
that revolts you?

         
Is it this?'

         
His free hand caught hers, pressing her fingers hard against
his blemished cheek. Beneath her fingertips was the faint roughness of shaven
skin, then the harder smoothness of his scar. She had thought it would be cold,
like a snake's skin, but it was warm, a pitiless indentation in the ravaged
flesh that was the width of one of her slight fingers. She gave a cry of
protest as his hand impelled hers, tracing the brutal disfigurement to his
mouth, and his lips brushed her palm in a mocking caress. Then she thought he
said, 'Or this?' and her hand was drawn in his down over his body, chest and
ribs, diaphragm tautening into ridges of steel, and then to a growing,
unimaginable strength that made her exclaim in sheer surprise before panic took
her.

         
She was thrashing, throwing the whole of her weight against
the barrier of his arms, and of its own volition her free hand crooked to claw
at his eyes. His hand wrenched her head back and he bent to take her mouth
again, plundering it with a deliberation more devastating than any heat could
have been. She did not notice that her cloak-strings were untied and the cloak
fallen at her feet, did not know that he was deftly unlacing the russet gown
until she felt his hand exploring the softness of her bare breast.

         
For a long moment derisive green eyes met hate-filled dark
ones, and then Juana's lashes flickered and fell. She was shivering
uncontrollably as he held her fast by her long black hair, his free hand moving
expertly over her breasts until her body's message had drowned the revulsion in
her brain, and the protest that she gave as he lifted her up in his arms had no
coherent words. He carried her through the doorway into the darkened room
beyond, and as he kicked the door closed and the shadows fell about them, he
said in a voice that stung, 'You may find me fairer in the dark.'

         
The realization of where she was jarred Juana back to her
senses. She had forgotten her attempt to escape the castillo, Jaime, de
Castaneda, even Bartolomé, in the tumult roused by Tristin's touch. She loathed
him, but his caress had ignited a response that shocked her, and she knew that
he knew it. As he set her down she screamed, the sound bouncing jaggedly off
the bare stone walls, and in the same moment Tristin struck her, open-handed,
across the face.

         
The motion was economical, almost negligent, but she
staggered and almost
fell.
 
Her
scream died abruptly, and she bowed forward, nursing her throbbing cheek. 'You
— you dare—'

         
She could not see his expression as he looked down at her,
but one of the silver spears of light fell across his hands as he began calmly
unknotting the strings of his shirt-cuff. 'Let us deal gently, and I need not
hurt you.'