Chapter 25
XXV.
The Virgin Feast
Renaud returned that evening, surprising me in his chambers as I sat reading the transcriptions I had worked on earlier.
I was checking them for mistakes to soothe myself after the tumult of the day, so focused on my task I didn’t even hear his stallion in the courtyard or his boots in the hall.
He called my name, and I lifted my chin, thinking some trickery of the house was taunting me, but I met his dark gaze instead.
There was a naked gleam of satisfaction in his eyes as he looked me over, and I found myself blushing, a guilty feeling rising in my chest. To him, it must seem as if I had been dutiful and quiet all day long. I felt a strange tug in my chest as if I should confess to all that had happened.
“I hurried back to you,” he said quietly, crossing the room with long strides.
From where? But I bit the inside of my cheek and tried not to let it bother me.
His gloved hand came to my jaw, lifting me out of the pile of parchments.
He did not smell like the void with all its stars; he smelled like iron and mud.
I thought, wildly, with a beating heart, that he was going to kiss me.
Really kiss me, as if he missed me, as if he had longed for me.
He brought me to his mouth, but stopped short, our breath sharing back and forth.
“You cut me, ma petite chou,” he whispered and then released me.
I stumbled back, dizzy with desire and confusion. “How could I cut you? You do not bleed.”
“I bleed,” he said. “Reach into my chest. You will pull out the heart of a man who can bleed in your hands.”
I did not know what to say. I could not see how his words could be true, but the intensity of his attention and the sincerity in his tone made me unable to see how I could do anything but believe him.
“Ahh, see.” He stepped back. “How sharp are your claws. And here I ran all the way back to be by your side.” He had misread my confusion as coldness.
I didn’t hasten to correct him. “What draw is there to me, lord?”
He smirked. “A woman who stood before death. A sorceress with power beyond measure.”
I laughed. “I am not those things.”
“Not quite,” he said. Then he did something he’d never done before, something that shocked me completely. He sank heavily into his chair and sighed, a bone-weary sigh. “You are one of the strongest mortals I’ve ever met.”
The fire crackled in the silence. I was so unnerved I didn’t know what to do. I was used to the dynamic of a remote, immortal master. I did not know what to do with this figure on the other side of the desk who slumped.
“Are you well, Renaud?” I asked, soft, so as not to scare away the glimmer of man that showed through the cracks of his immortal facade.
He did not answer but lifted his hands and slowly removed his gloves.
My heart raced at the sight of his long, white fingers. He simply held the gloves, hands resting on his leg. His gaze lingered on the leather an overlong moment and I could swear we were both remembering.
“It was terrible without you here today,” I said.
“You’ve worked so hard,” he replied. “I’ll admit that I was surprised to return and find you still hard at work.”
He couldn’t know of my wanderings. My near death in the garden, I thought. But I wanted to be sure. “I was not so studious as you think.”
He glanced at me; eyebrow quirked.
There was something in it all that gave me a burst of power, a sense of familiarity. Maybe I did know what to do here. What ways to press. “I went exploring. I was curious,” I said.
“Did you go into the forest again?” he demanded.
“Of course not.”
“Where did you go?”
“The ballroom. Your library. Some bedrooms.”
He didn’t look at his own bedchamber, but I could have sworn I saw him resist it.
“I went to your room,” I told him so he would think I was unafraid and honest. “I couldn’t help myself.”
He stayed perfectly still. Perfectly unreadable.
“I saw your secret door. I imagine you keep your heart locked behind it. In a place I could never touch.”
His shoulders dropped. “My heart?”
“Oh, I know Death can have no heart. That’s why you keep your mortal one locked away.”
His fingers drummed thoughtfully, and he looked at me with this frozen kind of smirk fixed on his face.
I could not discern his thoughts, except that he looked maybe amused.
Finally, he gave me that sharp-toothed predator’s smile.
The one that made me equal parts terrified and excited.
“Join me, Salomé. In my bedchamber, for dinner.”
I nearly crowed but managed to hold it tight in my chest. I gave a dignified bow instead. “Of course, my lord.”
“I look forward to seeing you there.”
I walked back to my chamber with all the flush and flight of a girl, and a sick feeling of nervousness in my stomach.
To be in his presence felt as if his presence filled the world, set the world, determined the fate of it.
He crowded out the grief of being rejected.
I wanted nothing more, in the whole world, but to never again be a poor, desolate prostitute half frozen in grave soil.
I wanted nothing more, in the whole universe, than to be a consort of Lord Death, a great sorceress, a woman who truly could stand with him.
I did not know what to expect from this dinner but hoped, in spite of myself, for all these dreams. In that moment, it was a wild, enormous hope.
I smoothed down my dress, wishing for something finer to wear.
And when I opened my chamber door and looked at the chair, my wish had come true.
I had still not gotten used to the way the chateau seemed to read my mind, anticipate my thoughts. I wondered what it might whisper to him when he asked. What secrets it held for him or gave up to him. There was no question the house was loyal to him above all others. But I picked up the dress.
It was clear what was expected of me. The dress was the color of the deepest blue of the orchids that grew in that magical, treacherous glass house.
It was cut slim, without sleeves or shift underneath, so revealing as to leave even me blushing, embroidered in silver thread and glimmering beads.
There were thin stockings of fine wool with silky blue ribbon to tie them onto my legs.
And under the dress was a crown of finest wrought silver to rest upon my brow and hold a gossamer veil against my hair.
Night had fallen and the rain had stopped, but the heat still sat dark and thick in the air.
The giant’s lantern flickered in the quiet.
Despite bathing, I was nervous and sweating once out in the hall.
I became so overwhelmed, I paused, pressing my forehead and bare arms to the cool stones in an effort to calm down.
Why was I so nervous? This was Death, but he had once been a man.
I was the one in the world who knew him best. He slumped on my bed like any village man with coin in his purse.
But even though I tried to convince myself of this, I lived within his power every day.
I knew it’s width and breadth and magnificence.
He may once have been a man, but he was not one now.
I took a deep breath and pushed off the wall.
I longed to know the human he used to be, those mortal wounds he still carried with him.
I dared it—yes, I dared to think of myself as he told me, able to stand against him.
Able to find those wounds and nurse them into healing.
I thought of that secret inner room and truly believed it held his heart or some approximation of it.
What I was thinking was beyond romance, beyond love.
I wouldn’t have thought to put those words on it, even though it may seem that way.
This was pure connection, pure energy. And so, I walked into his quarters, willing and hopeful.
The bedchamber door was open, and inside, a small table had been set.
It was an intimate meal, the room warm and lit by the flicker of candles.
He waited, straight-backed and hands clasped, clad in the same black clothes he always wore.
That long swath of the abyss in the form of a beautiful and brutal man.
There was an intensity to his gaze as he looked me over in the dress that fixed me like a portrait in a frame.
I held my shoulders straight against it. I, of all women, had the power to.
“I haven’t seen a sight like you in what feels like an eternity,” Renaud said quietly. He bowed and sat with me and I noticed there was a plate laid out before him.
“Yes, but are you going to taste this time?” I asked. The fare was light but sumptuous—ham with a spiced sauce, bread, stewed figs, and a fine, soft cheese. Wine filled our cups to the brim, and I took a long drink as he continued to stare at me.
Finally, I could bear the silence no more and changed the subject. “You should teach me how to protect myself from summoning some creature.” I set down my glass. “I seem to do it easily.”
He gave me a strange look I didn’t understand and took a small bite of his food. “What do you mean?”
I was busy watching him chew—I hadn’t ever seen him eat and I’d almost believed he couldn’t. The red sauce splashed upon his white teeth like blood and then he licked them clean and white again.
“I summoned a demon today,” I said, belatedly remembering the question. “It was an accident.”
“A demon?” He scoffed.
“I can think of no better word to describe it.” I bit into the soft flesh of a fig, its sticky glaze clinging to my lips.
“I can assure you it was some kind of little goblin.”
His tone was so sure, to the point of being smug.
I narrowed my eyes. “Do you see goblins or demons often in your travels that you can tell the difference?”
His eyes met mine over the flickering candles. “I imagine you’ve met both in your former work, so I will defer to you.” He pierced a slice of ham with his fork, dark sauce dripping off the edge and a hard glint in his eyes.