The Queen's Consort (7 page)

             
“But then he's used to being handled,” Clairwyn said dryly.

             
“The Highland women are recognized as equals to their men. They don't have to use a velvet glove.”

             
Ansel rolled his eyes.

             
Clairwyn suddenly looked tired. She scrubbed her hands over her eyes. “Things are changing here. And those changes will spread.”

             
“You will need time and allies to make those changes.”

             
“You speak truly and wisely as always, dear Aunt. The sun sets.” Clairwyn roused herself and rose from the chair. “It has been overlong since I sent for Ansel. Guard?”

             
Ansel heard a slow tread and grinned. The Guard did not seem over-eager to tell her that they'd lost her prince.

             
“We cannot find Prince Ansel, my Queen.”

             
Abruptly she disappeared from his view. He shifted slightly and found her. She was satisfyingly distressed. “Explain,” she snapped.

             
“We have searched the castle. He has escaped.”

             
“Escaped?” She gestured and, pathetically happy to leave, the Guard practically ran for the door. “Why would he flee?” she said, almost to herself. “I asked him to stay.”

             
Gladnys poured her steaming green concoction into a mug. “His is not a trusting nature,” she said, unperturbed.

             
Clairwyn groped for her chair. “And yet,” she murmured, “I feel that he is close.” She raised her voice. “Call off the search, my Guard.”

             
“Yes, my Queen,” was the reply.

             
She lowered her voice. “If he does not wish to be here, by my side, I will not force him. I cannot. He has choices of his own to make this night.”

             
Ansel tested the blade against his thumb. It was satisfyingly sharp. All of his choices had already been made.

             
Gladnys held the mug out to Clairwyn. “You have fasted these past three days?”

             
“I have.” Clairwyn straightened. “Nothing, not even a sip of water, has broken my fast.”

             
Three days? Ansel's brow furrowed. Without even a drink? She'd treated her prisoners better than she'd treated herself. It irked him.

             
“Good. The greater the need, the greater the sacrifice, the more potent the spell.”

             
“Have I not sacrificed enough?” Clairwyn took the mug. Her face wrinkled at the green fumes. “My family, my own desires, all gone.”

             
“I said sacrifice,” Gladnys snapped, “not self-pity. Now drink.”

             
Clairwyn shrugged and, face screwed in distaste, drained the mug. Gagging, she forced it all down.

             
Gladnys reached for her arm and helped her rise. Clairwyn seemed unsteady on her feet and Ansel tensed. If she fell—

             
She didn't fall as the fey steered her to the bed. “Rest now, my dear, for the trials ahead.” Gladnys pressed a fond kiss to Clairwyn's forehead and left, closing the door as she went.

             
Ansel couldn't believe his luck. He slipped out of his hiding place and crossed the room. With one swift stroke he could kill Clairwyn. He chuckled. She herself had given the order to not search for him. After she was dead, he could probably walk right out of the castle.

             
He loomed over the bed, his shadow falling over her still form. Her pulse fluttered in her exposed throat. If he angled the strike rightly, her blood would not even mark him.

             
He raised his hand for the killing blow, then hesitated. He'd killed before, of course, but only in the heat of battle. To kill in cold blood was more difficult than he'd imagined. And to strike a sleeping woman seemed...dishonorable.

             
To worry about his honor now was ridiculous. The honorable thing to do, he reminded himself harshly, was to strike the blow. It was his mission.

             
But still he hesitated. If she would wake, would strike at him, would scream, it would make his task easier.

             
His hand closed around her shoulder. He intended to shake her roughly but her skin was so soft under his calloused fingers, her bones so fragile, that he couldn't do it. She was so beautiful at rest.

             
He wouldn't wake her. She should be beautiful in death, too, not marked by terror. He would strike quickly, surely, and she would feel no pain. It was the best he could do.

             
Her eyelids fluttered and rose over her dark eyes.

Seven

             
“Ansel,” she sighed, and reached for his hand. Her fingers closed around his and the knife slid from his grasp. She eased back into her drug-induced sleep and he dropped to his knees beside her.

             
How long he knelt there, entranced by the gentle rise and fall of her breath, the sweep of her lashes against her cheek, the fullness of her lips, he would never know. A bustle beyond her door finally roused him.

             
He climbed stiffly to his feet, grabbed the fallen blade, and scurried back behind the tapestry.

             
“Clairwyn.” It was the fey kinswoman who'd poisoned her. “It is time to rise.”

             
Her eyes opened on a sigh. “Gladnys. I dreamed of Ansel. I dreamed that he was here.”

             
“Of course you did,” her aunt soothed. “Can you stand?”

             
Clairwyn swung her feet to the floor and, with the help of a servant girl, stood. Her eyes cleared. “Has he returned? Is Ansel here?”

             
“No, my Queen,” the girl said. “The prince is well and truly gone.”

             
Clairwyn sighed again as a dozen girls filled the room with their soft voices and quick movements. Some of them set up a series of screens while others filled the large bath.

             
“Turn, Clairwyn,” her aunt instructed, and set to work on the fastenings of her dress. She might have been blind, Ansel thought, but she had Clairwyn out of her clothes nearly as fast as he would have done.

             
Her velvet dress fell to the floor, leaving her clad only in her filmy undergarments. Ansel decided that he could wait a little longer to kill her.

             
A girl tested the bathwater and then added a fragrant oil. It wasn't green, he noted in relief. Clairwyn didn't need any more stinky green mixtures.

             
Clairwyn shrugged her shoulders and the last of her clothing slid off her. She shook her hair loose and the dark wave of her silky hair fell to her slim waist. She had the long limbs and grace of a thoroughbred. Her breasts were lovely, firm and high, and her slim waist flared to gently rounded hips.

             
Thought fled and Ansel just stared at the vision before him. He might have made a sound but, if he had, he didn't care. If he was discovered now and hacked to death by her Guard, he'd have lived a full and happy life.

             
Clairwyn lifted her head.
Had
he made a noise? Coherent thought returned to him, crashing through him, but all he could think was
my woman
. She was so beautiful. She was right here. And she was his.

             
She turned as if searching the room. “Go to the Guard,” she said to a girl, “and ask again for word on the prince. He has not left me. I feel it is so.”

             
She waited, rigid, as the girl left. He could almost have reached out and touched her—

             
The girl returned. “There is no word, my Queen,” she said.

             
Clairwyn shrugged, obviously bemused. She stepped into the tub, lifting her dark hair to let it drape over the rim. “That witch's brew you gave me was ghastly, Gladnys. But I had the most pleasant dreams.”

             
“That was part of the intent.” The fey repacked her trunk with quick, efficient movements.

             
“Your Majesty.” A girl poked her head past the screen. “Your, um, guests will arrive soon. The Guard is searching them now. Very thorough-like, they are.”

             
“Tell them to be gentle.” Clairwyn lifted a sponge and ran it over a flawless arm. “None of my 'guests' will want me dead. At least,” she amended, “not tonight.”

             
“They was talkin' about strip-searchin' that prince.” The girl giggled. “I wouldnta minded being there for that.”

             
A gale of female laughter answered that.

             
“Chit.” But Clairwyn smiled, too. The sponge trailed over her breasts and dipped into the water, and Ansel's heart pounded so loudly he feared the sound would give him away.

             
Gladnys shook out the gauzy wrap he'd seen earlier. “Time to go, girl,” the fey said.

             
Ansel held his breath but a cluster of girls with towels gathered around the tub and reduced his view of Clairwyn to glimpses of wet skin. He bit down on his knuckles to muffle his groans of frustration.

             
The girls draped Clairwyn in the long white gown and robe. She wasn't going to receive guests in that, was she? It was entirely inappropriate. He'd never allow it.

             
While he fumed the girls brushed out Clairwyn's hair, drained the tub, and moved the screens. Although the night was warm, Gladnys stoked the fire and laid a poker across the glowing embers.

A solemn group of men, watched suspiciously by Guard, moved into the room. Ansel recognized Caine, Goddard, and
Sayer among them.

             
Sayer stepped forward. “Cousin,” he said grandly.

             
Clairwyn sighed and rolled her eyes.

             
Sayer whirled to address the crowd. “No doubt you are wondering why we are here—”

             
“Shut up, Sayer.” The fey stepped forward. “It's another Highland tradition, gentlemen. The Queen must have a consort, a partner, to help her in the coming troubles. You have all put yourselves forward. She will choose tonight.”

             
The men rustled expectantly, looking at each other.

             
“Sayer,” Clairwyn said, “do you have the blades?”

             
Sayer nodded, opened his mouth, glanced at Gladnys, and shut it again. With a flourish he produced a pair of jeweled daggers. They were finely wrought and beautifully decorated, but they were obviously deadly instruments.

             
“Be careful with those,” he warned. “They're sharp.”

             
Clairwyn rolled her eyes at him. She knelt by the tub and pulled back the long sleeves of her gown. With calm, smooth moves, she slashed both of her arms from wrist to elbow.

             
The men gasped in surprise and the servant girls screamed in horror. Shock rooted Ansel to his spot as Clairwyn's blood spurted in great bursts and splashed into the tub.

             
Sayer leaned forward anxiously. “You're taking this very seriously,” he said, his concern obvious. “Usually this is more of a symbolic gesture.”

             
“Not for me.” Clairwyn sank back on her heels and rested her arms on the rim of the tub. Her blood flowed freely.

             
“Stop her!” someone called, and others agreed.

             
Grim-faced, the Guard held them back. Gladnys stood immobile. Then again, Ansel thought angrily, the blind fey couldn't see Clairwyn bleeding to death. He twitched hard, fighting the urge to tear aside the tapestry and bind her wounds. She shouldn't escape him this way.

             
Clairwyn paled visibly as her blood continued to pump out of her wounds. Gladnys spoke to her softly in the lilting language of the Highland. Ansel bit down on his tongue so he wouldn't yell out and stop this madness.

             
Clairwyn lifted her head and her glazed eyes seemed to find him in his hiding place. He recoiled, then realized her eyes had that peculiar mirror-like shine he'd seen before. Whatever her eyes showed her, it wasn't him.

             
Caine shoved forward against the Guard, his face stark with panic. “Help her!” he cried. “You can't just let her die!”

             
The men surged and yelled and the Guard had to physically restrain them. The girls shrank away in terror, averting their eyes from the blood. Ansel fought his own internal battle. Could he let Clairwyn kill herself? She was tall but slim, and there was so much blood—

             
Finally she collapsed on the floor. Gladnys seized the poker from the fire and cauterized her arms, and the stench of burned flesh joined the heavy scent of blood. Clairwyn didn't flinch at the touch of the steel and didn't rouse as her hideous wounds were bound.

             
One of the Guard lifted her into her bed and then stepped back. He stifled a sob. “She'll be all right, won't she?” he asked Gladnys.

             
“She is a strong woman,” Gladnys said.

             
“I've seen strong men die from less than that,” another Guard said.

             
The audience watched with worried faces. “What do we do now?” Caine asked wearily.

             
“We wait,” Sayer said.

             
Gladnys pressed a flask to Clairwyn's lips and poured a trickle down her throat. Clairwyn coughed weakly, then roused a little. Ansel heard his name on her lips.

             
“Nay, my Queen,” Sayer told her somberly. “He is not here.” He leaned over her bed.

             
Ansel's muscles bunched. If Sayer touched her—

             
“Leave me,” she whispered.

             
Sayer leaned closer. “Are you sure?”

             
“Go. All of you.” She turned her head away.  

             
Slowly, reluctantly, everyone left. The fey Highlander was the last to go. “All will be well, my girl,” Gladnys said, but dashed a tear away from her cheek.

             
Clairwyn didn't answer.

             
Gladnys leaned over and pressed a kiss to her forehead, then hurried out of the room.

             
As the door closed behind her Ansel eased out of his hiding place. He dropped his kitchen knife on the table and lifted one of the decorative blades. If Clairwyn hadn't ended her life, he'd finish the job she'd started with this blade. It had a symmetry that appealed to him.

             
Conflicting emotions clashed in him as he looked down at her still form. She'd lost so much blood. Could she live? If she died this night, by her hand or by his, her country would be thrown into turmoil.

             
Ansel lifted the blade but, again, his hand seemed reluctant to do his bidding. The acrid smell of burned flesh lingered unpleasantly. She'd already suffered, more than she would have if he'd just killed her earlier.

             
Her skin was chalky and her lips were blue. He could barely discern the rise and fall of her breath. He'd seen her wounds and watched her bleed out. She couldn't possibly survive the night.

             
Ansel dropped the blade and pressed his hand to her cheek. She didn't stir. She was so close to the edge already....

             
He leaned closer until his lips were inches away from hers. “Clairwyn,” he whispered. “You had no right to do this. You are mine.”

             
Her eyes flickered open like dark pools falling away beneath his feet. Lured by the intoxicating depths, Ansel fell toward her and brushed his lips over hers.

             
Her lips moved, curving into a smile, opening on a small gasp of welcome.

             
She is mine.
Bought and paid for with time and treasure and treachery, she belonged to him. He'd waited too long to claim her.

             
But she was sore hurt, and he felt the injustice of it. No one had the right to take her from him. She had no right to escape him. His kiss grew more intense, more demanding. Death could not have her, not on this night. Tonight she belonged to him.

             
Her arms curled around his shoulders and her bandages brushed against him. His hands roamed over her, possessive and demanding, and her cold skin warmed at his touch. He pressed against her, willing her to take strength from him, to live.

             
Ansel hadn't known he could be so gentle, so tender a lover. He'd never cared so much about his partner, never worried about her pleasure or feared for her pain, before this night. But Clairwyn deserved the best of him and he gave her everything, offering himself up fully and freely.

             
And, after, he gathered his woman and held her as her eyes closed.

             
Ansel watched fearfully as she drifted away from him. He resolved to stay awake and just hold her. If she never woke, well, his mission would have been a success after all. But now the thought left a bitter taste in his mouth.