Chapter 9
Belle-Belle
The next morning saw me simultaneously refreshed and restless.
Physically, I had rested well and was more than ready to climb into the saddle for another day of journeying. Mentally and emotionally, though, I was in tumult.
Part of me yearned to spend more time with Benoit, to settle his fears of rejection, to explore his body and mine and what they could do together.
I also had felt Lucas’s gaze on me more than once, and I suspected he would come to me if I summoned him and explained myself to him the same way that I had with Benoit.
This desire was only magnified when I came upon Lucas as he was seated in the hay, lacing up the bindings that ran the length of his legs.
His warm brown eyes latched upon me hungrily, and he asked me for help with the lacings.
I felt the heat roll off his body, even though our skin did not touch, and he fixed his eyes upon me the entire time I was near.
Finding the willpower to mount Comrade—instead of Lucas—right then was a monumental act of determination.
As with the previous night, I felt a flush in my cheeks, on the skin of my chest, the latter hidden by a magnificently brocaded coat over a fine linen shirt.
There was no way the others could see it—I’d chosen a low-brimmed hat that day as well—but I still felt marked by the burning on my skin, the desire for more.
And that desire, in turn, brought me the tiniest sliver of shame: for all my own innocence, I had heard of others who had deceived or coerced lovers into their bed. And I was resolved to not be that person. I wanted lovers who came to me willingly, or not at all.
My thoughts drifted back to the previous evening, to the sweat shining on Benoit’s shoulders as he knelt between my legs. How soon could we repeat that experience? And with what kinds of variations?
Lost in thought, I realized with a jolt that I must be proving a poor companion on our trek.
But I knew two things, and I knew them with a finality that rang as true as the other times this same clarity had appeared in my life: the shifts that had occurred once, when my mother had died, and second, when my cousin Claude had disappeared.
Both events had molded my family, albeit in different ways, both times irrevocably, as though I were looking back on the past that preceded those events through a fogged window that could not reveal the true landscape of the thing.
I knew that Benoit was mine. He would defend my back and come at my call, and there was a power in it, but it only worked because it went both ways: I could not enter his heart without letting him enter mine.
And I knew that I still desired the king. If I was a compass, he was true north. If I was a honeybee, he was the flower whose nectar I sought, knowing it would be the sweetest, the most sustaining.
Rocking gently with Comrade’s gait, I allowed myself to muse briefly on the implications of these twin forms of knowledge.
The fae lived long enough to take multiple consorts, as far as we humans could tell.
They certainly bragged about their lovers in their ballads that made it to our side of the hill, and they did not seem bothered by having simultaneous lovers.
Nor did the lovers seem particularly bothered by it, judged by a bawdy rendition a minstrel had sung at our estate before anyone had realized which version of the song he’d chosen.
The estate. Home.
My heart, so buoyed by the previous night’s events, faltered.
I could only hope that my father and sisters fared well; there was no certainty that I could send word, that a messenger wouldn’t be waylaid by spies or assassins sent by the Emperor Matapa. Indeed, the fact that the journey had been this calm this far was a little surprising.
“Dear Master, I sense your thoughts are troubled,” Comrade said.
I sighed, hoping I would not sound petulant or churlish.
“I long for home, to send them news, or send back some of the jewels in the trunk, that they might eat better in my absence.”
“Young Master, the riches of the trunk are for you alone, and should you attempt to share them with your family, they would vanish. The faerie saw to that, so troubled was she by your sisters’ cavalier attitudes towards her suffering sheep.”
Another mystery to chew on: why had the faerie tested us so, when she could have clearly used her immense power to rescue her own sheep?
Had the test been designed for me, since I’d always had a soft heart for animals?
Or had it been designed to lock out my sisters, who—I had to admit with honesty, as much as I loved them—each managed to be extremely self-centered even as they found a balance in caring for our family.
“Milord,” one of my men called, and I twisted around in the saddle. Benoit had ranged ahead, and Guillaume was last, which meant it was Lucas who was striding alongside Comrade and me.
My eyes found his, and I stared into their honeyed depths for a few moments without blinking. He held my gaze, then looked down, easily keeping pace with us.
“I only meant to ask, Milord…have you ever seen war? Been on the front lines?”
I stared ahead while I considered my words.
In brief, I had not, though my family’s position at the frontier meant that we had seen many a refugee caravan, featuring people of all ages in all states: from shock to belligerence and disbelief.
I had not been graced with healing gifts so I had not even tried to comfort them. This realization gave me shame.
“No, Lucas, I have not seen war.” I continued to stare at the path ahead as I spoke.
“Then trust you me, it is better that way,” he replied. “The sights and sounds are displeasing, to say nothing of the smells. I find violence distasteful, and would swear it all off if I could.”
“I wish I could shield us all from it,” I said softly.
“Would that you could, Milord…you would prove more marvelous than you have already,” and he gave me a gentle smile, one that warmed my heart.
Comrade whickered softly, flickering an ear towards Lucas, who then sped ahead of us, departing the conversation.
I felt pity for him then, as a person not much older than myself who had witnessed far more violence and terror than I had.
I knew I was sheltered, and I hoped it would not make me weak in the face of what was to come.
I realized then that I also wished to speak with Lucas more, to get to know him better, perhaps in a similar way as I had with Benoit the previous night.
Finding the resolve and the words took part of the afternoon, with my three men orbiting me as butterflies might a blooming bush. Finally, when only Benoit was near, I urged him closer and asked if he thought Lucas might join me that evening when we stopped for lodgings.
Benoit’s handsome brow creased.
“I cannot of course speak for the man, but he is of a similar mind to me in admiring everything about you, Milord, regardless of which gender you wear. He has not seen your true form yet, but I can only assume he would be as enamored of you as I am. Shall I bring him to you this night?”
“Yes, please, Benoit, and thank you. And while I might…” I paused, lowering my gaze while I blushed, “wish to have both of you join me in the future, I would like to get to know him one-on-one this evening.”
Desire snaked up my belly at the thought of having two men kneeling before me in a private room, Benoit’s blue eyes and Lucas’s honey-brown ones both fixed on me. But I put the thought aside; I would not presume to know a man’s predilections before he confessed them to me.
By then, the afternoon shadows were growing long, and Comrade suggested that we stop at the first inn we reached. After tedious stretches of forest, I had not been expecting to see a building springing up from the wooded path, but there it was.
Lucas had raced ahead to announce our arrival and reserve rooms, and thoughtfully, he had ordered a bath readied for me.
It seemed that many human dwellings had not yet incorporated faerie magic, and thus still had to heat the water manually—just as I had grown up doing.
What would be the custom in the king’s temporary capital, I wondered?
I tried to find Lucas to thank him for the kind gesture, but he was absent from the fuss as Benoit and Guillaume helped unload our things and lead Comrade—who surely needed no leading, but I suppose the faerie intended us to keep up appearances and not let on that we had a faerie horse—to the stables.
Submerged in the bath, I let Benoit’s words linger in my mind: that if I were to please the king, it would be most beneficial to know my own pleasure first. It was not something that had been mentioned much in my household, either in praise or shame; the latter attitude, I had heard, was mostly constrained to the fanatical followers of Xristos, who had never gained much of a following in our lands.
I decided to save such ruminations for later.
Dinner was brought up to my room by a servant, and after I had eaten, I reclined comfortably in the small bed, confident that Benoit would fulfill my request. I made sure that I was only wearing a white shirt, clean from wherever the trunk pulled clean clothing.
I huddled on the bed in it; it was long enough to cover half my thighs, in case I needed to give Lucas visual proof of my womanhood.
But I hoped that leaving the front of the shirt open was enough to displace the enchantment, for I very much wished to look fetching.
Indeed, only some time had passed before there was a knock at my door.
“Enter,” I said, willing my voice not to quaver.
Lucas appeared in the doorway—or half of him did. His face was bisected by the door, his one visible honey-brown eye wide.
“Lucas,” I said, inclining my head. “I would wish your company this evening.” And though I feared that any attempt to be seductive would render me a clown, a fool for pretending to speak a foreign language in which I was actually quite untutored, I let one hand roam and play on my thigh, trusting it would convey my meaning.
The one eye I could see was held very still, unblinking as moments passed. Then it blinked, and I could ascertain no expression on the rest of Lucas’s face.
Before I could say anything else, he vanished.
Quite literally disappeared.
All I could think was that he must have used his faerie-gifted speed to run away…from me.
The thought sank into my chest, into my stomach, and filled me with horror.
Was I so self-absorbed a chevalier as to not notice when one of my men clearly abhorred me?
Had I become wrapped up in fantasies since spending one night with Benoit, and had decided that all men must desire me so?
I bonelessly drooped back further onto the bed.
Was there any recourse for my selfish behavior?
Or was I doomed to end up alone, fulfilling my sisters’ worst mocking predictions about my fate? Assuming I even survived the war with Matapa…
My mind ricocheting with dire thoughts and anxieties, I closed my eyes and willed tears not to fall.