VICTORIA JANSSEN

THE DUCHESS, HER MAID, THE GROOM & THEIR LOVER

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For Lorrie. Twenty-plus years of pie and helicopters, and counting.

CHAPTER ONE

The Duchess Camille’s maid, Sylvie, draped a blue silk robe over her shoulders. Camille had to restrain herself from clutching it to her bare breasts. Normally, Camille had no particular emotion about being dressed or undressed by her servants—it was too common an occurrence—but today each touch made her flinch. Sylvie’s anger made her tension worse, even when demonstrated only as a hint of roughness when tugging Camille’s long, dark hair free of the robe. Sylvie hadn’t yet cleansed the splotch of Camille’s blood from the front of her own simple blue gown, and her long blond braid extruded messy wisps. It didn’t help to know Sylvie was not angry at her, but the Duke Michel.

Across the room, the midwife finished washing in a porcelain basin painted all over with flowers no larger than a woman’s thumb, the fierce jerks of her arms dripping water and imported jasmine-scented lather onto carpet so thick it swallowed the feet. The midwife’s cropped hair glistened in the light of a dozen fat candles. They were surrounded by all the luxury one could want, except for safety.

Camille didn’t dare give in to her own anger. She had denied it for so long that it had gone solid in her belly like a chunk of dirty glass. She felt sick with it, and weary down to her marrow. She would give anything to be alone for a few moments, to collect herself, but if she sent them away now, after the examination she’d just endured, she would reveal her weakness. She had already let slip her emotions once today, when the duke had told her Lord Alphonse was dead. In her distress, she had nearly revealed his mission, the mission which had led to his death. She would keep her dignity now, and with it her secrets.

Sylvie said, “I will fetch you a glass of wine, madame, and ice for your bruises.”

“Sit,” Camille ordered, unable to bear a continuation of Sylvie’s earlier pacing of holes in the plush gold carpet. She glanced toward the washbasin, carefully avoiding her reflection in the nearby full-length oval mirror, its wide frame like a tangle of golden brambles. “Mistress Annette?”

The midwife was thirty years old at the most, and normally worked at the brothel in the town, caring for the diseases from which prostitutes suffered and helping to birth what children they might bear. She was a tiny woman with hair cut close to her scalp and a scar on her chin. For her surreptitious visits to the palace, she dressed in a baggy dun gown, a sparrow flitting into a golden cage and out of it again, unnoticed by any except Sylvie and Camille. Camille had never seen her elsewhere. She did not even know where Mistress Annette lived; Sylvie always fetched her, when she was needed. But she would—had—entrusted Annette with her health and life.

“You were not pregnant, Your Grace.”

Camille did not allow herself to show any reaction, but all the same, Sylvie rose from her chair and returned to where Camille stood.

“Am I injured?”

Mistress Annette picked up a towel and dried her hands. “You are bruised,” she said, as if Camille had forgotten the reddened swelling over her jaw and cheekbone, her skin broken from the impact of the duke’s rings. Her left shoulder ached from slamming into the silken wallpaper of his private audience room; her hip and elbow throbbed from hitting the marble floor.

“There is no injury inside?”

“No, Your Grace.” Mistress Annette set down the towel and stepped closer, until she stood within arms’ reach. She said calmly, “He will kill you one day, you know.”

Sylvie began to speak but Camille held up a hand for silence. “I could become pregnant. I am not too old.”

Mistress Annette crossed her arms across her chest. “Your Grace, I am hard put to remember you are not just any woman. Because in this matter, you are certainly as unwise as any I’ve met.”

Camille heard Sylvie catch her breath; ironic, as Sylvie was not afraid to speak her mind to her duchess, either. “If I give the duke an heir, he will have no need to find another duchess.”

“His Grace has no bastards, but not for lack of trying. Not a one. If I were you, I would find another sire, and pass the child off as his.”

Mistress Annette had never stated it so boldly before. Camille shook her head in refusal. She had married Michel, a younger son, and in becoming her consort, he’d become duke, with power over her. She could have protested her father’s order to marry Michel and run away, but she had not, foolishly fearing the duchy would suffer without her. She had spoken the vows with her own voice. Once she had done so, she had a responsibility to her marriage, and a responsibility to her duchy’s people. She had stood up to her mistake for over twenty years.

A few blows should not weaken her resolve so much. Except, this time Lord Alphonse had died. He’d been killed while trying to help her, not even knowing that the appeal he carried to Lord Maxime betrayed his duke. He’d been barely older than Annette or Sylvie. Sylvie might very well be next.

“Madame!”

Camille blinked as the room slowed and settled. Sylvie was holding her arm, fingers digging painfully into her bruised muscles. Mistress Annette ducked beneath Camille’s other arm and supported her to her bed. The underside of the bed’s canopy, blue and gold like the sheets and coverlet, bore appliquéd figures of men plowing fields and sowing grain, a transparent allegory to encourage the fertility of the couples who lay within. Except Michel had never taken her here; she’d always been brought to his chambers, or more lately, wherever he felt she would be uncomfortable and refuse his advances.

“He will kill you,” Annette said again, without emphasis, as if stating the sky was blue. She laid the back of her hand against Camille’s forehead, then her cheek. Camille closed her eyes; that single tender touch brought her close to shattering. “Sylvie, fetch blankets.”

Nauseated and beginning to shiver, Camille said, “I’m only hungry. I didn’t eat while Sylvie went to find you.”

Annette tucked a pillow beneath Camille’s feet. She repeated, “He will kill you. And you know what will happen then. He will rape this duchy, and then move on to the next, just as your father did.”

Even now, Camille could not bring herself to say aloud that she had failed, that Michel had indeed won, even when it was true. She said, “You must leave the palace, before you’re found in my apartments.”

“Never fear, Your Grace. Unlike you, I have concern for my own skin.”

Sylvie returned and spread blankets over Camille’s feet before moving upward. “Madame, you need rest. Annette, what must I do?”

“Convince her to find someone else to get her with child,” Annette said. “And have a care that he’s healthy, and looks enough like the duke.”

Camille was no longer allowed to ride, but she could still venture out onto the palace’s high white walls and glimpse her horses from afar. Two weeks after Mistress Annette’s visit, she strolled there, her two eunuch guards trailing behind. Kaspar and Arno knew when she was not in the mood for conversation; this cool spring evening, they did not even speak quietly with each other.

The breeze from outside was sharper up on the walls, and she smelled a hint of rain mingled with the grass and manure of the paddocks below. She slipped into an embrasure, concealing herself from anyone’s view—anyone except her eunuchs, of course—and gazed toward the stable that held her mare, Guirlande, and all the others she’d spent so long cosseting, training and schooling.

The stableboy was riding Lilas, his body seemingly immobile atop her sleek back as she danced patterns into the loose dirt of the riding ring. Only his thick brown hair ruffled in the wind. Four years ago, the duke had forbidden her to ride, and since that day she had not been to the stables, nor near her horses, nor had she spoken to their keeper. But she had years ago watched the boy be trained to ride. She had ridden out with him, and she knew his posture and seat, even from this distance. Her Lilas was in good hands.

She wondered what he looked like now that he was closer to his man’s growth. She remembered big hands, lush eyelashes and an engaging, open smile. He would be almost twenty now, and might have changed a great deal. It occurred to her that he was half her age. If she had borne a child in the first years of her marriage to Michel, the stableboy was the right age to be her son.

Sylvie had reminded her that the stableboy’s eyes were blue. Like the duke’s.

Normally, she would watch until she had caught at least a glimpse of each of her horses, and perhaps drawn in her sketchbook, but this evening she turned away and strode toward her own wing of the palace. The wall’s stone felt cold beneath her thin slippers. Kaspar and Arno fell in behind her, their movements betrayed by the faintest chiming of their weapons; they followed her down the turret staircase, across a square of immaculate garden that replaced the old bare defensive area, and through enormous mahogany doors carved with the ducal arms, each door swung wide by a footman in the duke’s livery.

Camille led her eunuchs past the locked door of her audience room and through a hidden doorway. The narrow secondary corridor leading to her suite of rooms was thickly carpeted in blue and gold, an agreeable softness to her cold feet. Camille did not allow herself to slow and appreciate the softly patterned gold wallpaper, the candles muted behind colored glass or the paintings of horses that adorned the walls. Sylvie would have dismissed the rest of the staff by now, and they would have less than an hour of privacy.

Kaspar and Arno followed her through the outer rooms and into her bedchamber where Sylvie waited, perched on the edge of a spindly, decorative chair that Camille had never liked. “All is as you wished, madame,” Sylvie said, meaning that the suite was deserted but for the four of them.

For this meeting, they all should sit, Camille thought, for she asked more of her servants than duty. She looked to Kaspar and indicated the empty chairs. Kaspar grinned. “Perhaps not, Your Grace. I fear it would shatter beneath my weight.” He was taller than most and twice as broad. Leather straps crisscrossed his bare, hairless torso, supporting a knife sheath that nestled between his shoulder blades. The knife’s flat grip, she knew, had been etched and inlaid with silver filigree in her own crest. A short sword was strapped to each thigh atop his blue breeches, but those hilts were unadorned, wrapped in strips of dark blue suede.

Arno, the younger of the two eunuchs, said, “I would prefer to sit on the floor, Your Grace.”

“Very well,” Camille said. She took a chair. Even seated on the floor, the eunuchs were not so far below her and Sylvie. Once all were settled comfortably, she captured them with her eyes, giving each a smile. It was not only for herself and her own safety that she did this, but for theirs; it was only right that she pay them this respect. Then she said, “Of the men whom Sylvie has investigated, three were superior choices in terms of health, appearance and proximity to the palace.”

“Madame,” Sylvie said, “we could entice Lord Pierken from his estate. He has an interest in you.” Kaspar sent her a quelling glance, and she made a rude gesture at him.

“I fear not,” Camille said. “Remember, it’s planting season.” Also, Lord Pierken would not be content to simply impregnate her and depart. He would want something in return, more than she could give. She continued, “Of the three, Lord Gustave resembles Michel the most, physically. His temperament is not suitable, however. He is quick to take offense and convinced of his own importance. I dare not trust him to keep this secret. And he might require a longer-term liaison and a gift of political power in exchange for his seed, which I will not give.”

Sylvie asked, “And Lord Jon-Petite?”

“I fear he is too old,” Camille said reluctantly. “He has a son nearly thirty years old, and he has no other. He is my ally in the palace, it’s true, and it would be easier to arrange meetings with him, but if he cannot serve the purpose the effort will be wasted.” She had once considered him a friend, and though she rarely saw him anymore, she hated the thought of destroying their friendly relationship with her demand that he put himself in deadly danger to service her like a stallion. Also, she was not sure that Lord Jon-Petite’s scruples would allow him to betray her husband.

Sylvie said, “That leaves only the stableboy!”

Camille glanced to Kaspar, then Arno. Their expressions remained impassive. She said calmly, “You yourself brought him to my attention as a potential candidate. He is young and healthy, he has the necessary hair and eye color and his mother came from Michel’s homeland, so there is a superficial likeness of facial and body type. Best of all, he is loyal to me, yet will not feel entitled to interfere with my role as duchess. He is good with my horses. He is the best choice for this.”

“But—madame—he is a boy! Nineteen years old!”

“All the more likely he’s virile, then,” Camille said. “You will bring him to me as soon as possible. His name is Henri.” She swallowed the lump forming in her throat. Who was she to demand such a thing of him, when he’d given her nothing but loyalty? But if she did not do this, Michel would kill her, and she did not want to die.

“He will not understand the serious nature of this duty—”

“Sylvie, you will bring him to me.”

If Sylvie truly thought the boy would not serve the purpose, she would never have included him in her list. She stiffly bowed her head. It didn’t matter that she wasn’t pleased. She would obey. Later, she would see that Camille had made the wisest possible choice. She need not fear having to exchange political favors with a stableboy. And if he cared for her as he did for her horses, she did not think he could betray her.

“Kaspar and Arno,” Camille said, “this plan may fail. If it appears my imprisonment or execution is imminent, we must flee the palace. I rely on you both, and on you, Sylvie, to secure sufficient monies and supplies for a journey of some weeks. You three will accompany me. It is crucial that this activity be completely concealed from any in the palace or in the town.”

“It shall be done,” Kaspar said. “Where will we go?”

“We shall travel to the coastal protectorate, and there beg aid of Lord Maxime. He will keep us safe. He will not have forgotten that he and I grew up together, here in the palace.”

“Lord Maxime?” Arno blurted out. “Your Grace, he would like nothing better than to make the protectorate a duchy again! What better way than to harm you?”

Camille eyed him coldly. “Harming me would change nothing. It is my husband who will not free the protectorate,” she said. “He claims it is because my father conquered it and killed Maxime’s father, and it is his duty to care for the land and its people. But the duke wants only the protectorate’s income. Maxime will help me. Then we shall return here, and I will take what is mine.”

True, Maxime would want favors from her. He would not help her out of pure charity; for the sake of his people, he could not. For the sake of her own people, she would only give so much. But he would help her, and then…then she would make sure that Michel never harmed anyone again.

CHAPTER TWO

Henri ran his hands over Guirlande’s sleek hide, adding a final gloss to her grooming. As he ducked beneath the cross-ties which held her still, she snorted affectionately into his hair. Henri grinned and loosed the ties from her halter before moving on to Tonnelle.

“Boy!”

Henri whirled, wondering what he’d done—or not done— this time. A sharp-featured young blond woman stood in the open doorway of the stable, holding her skirts well clear of the straw. He’d spotted her once or twice before and assumed she was the lover of one of the senior grooms or perhaps of a courier. She wore a nondescript scullion’s dress, but gestured as imperiously as an upper servant. “Leave the horse. Come with me.”

“I have work,” he said.

“It can wait. Her Grace wishes to see you.”

At first, he was sure he’d misheard. He stood gaping. He hadn’t seen the duchess in months, even from a distance. He’d even heard whispered rumors the duke had killed her in a wild rage, or that she’d been shut up in an asylum, gone mad from failing to bear a child. Perhaps she had gone mad. It was unheard-of for her to summon a servant as lowly as he. Had he misunderstood? Was he meant to meet with a steward? Still, it would be good to know at least if she lived, and how she fared. Perhaps this woman could give him news; perhaps he could give her a message about the welfare of the horses. Perhaps that was why the duchess wanted to see him; she wanted to personally question him about her horses. “What does she want of me?”

“That is for Her Grace to say. Come, boy. I cannot loiter here all day.”

Henri kept his head down as he followed the maid through a servants’ entrance in the palace’s immense white walls, down a dim corridor, and through a fitted door into the ducal palace. Why had he been summoned? He could not guess if the purpose was good or bad. Or, he told himself, it might be good for the duchess, but bad for him.

The maid walked very quickly, without glancing behind to see if he followed. The floor was polished marble, a gray color that reminded him of winter ice. No one moved through the corridors, a circumstance Henri found chilling, as well; he knew the duke had nearly a hundred servants. Surely some of them would be about. Someone would have to clean this floor. And he knew a few footmen; they spent a great deal of time standing about in corridors, waiting for someone to need them. Where had the footmen gone? The only section of the palace that had no footmen was…but of course he could not be walking through the duchess’s wing of the palace. She saw her servants in an audience room, off the main hall, the one everyone knew from when court was open to the public. This must be merely a different route there.

That still didn’t explain the deserted corridors. The main hall would have even more servants than the duchess’s wing. As the maid led him up a narrow stairway that smelled strongly of lemon and beeswax, he wondered how many bribes their privacy had cost, and why the bribes had been necessary. Then the maid stopped before a mahogany-paneled door inlaid in gold leaf, opened it and gestured for him to go through. Henri did so; she did not follow. The maid shut the door behind him and he heard a thump, as if she had leaned her back against it.

The room was incredibly bright from a chandelier bristling with lit candles and crystalline droplets of the clearest glass he’d ever seen. The light reflected almost painfully from the white marble floor. The walls were hung with tapestries in lush twining, leaflike patterns of blue and gold, dazzling his eyes and muffling sounds. He felt as if he’d stepped inside a jeweled box, like the one in which the duchess had kept the bridle ornaments for Guirlande. Though for all its intricate glamour, the room felt too still; its air had the faintest dusty smell of disuse.

He turned to his right, intending to examine the tapestry more closely, and saw the duchess, immobile as a statue. Truly the duchess, and not some functionary. His breath caught at her beauty and aristocratic bearing. She wore a crimson gown with a belled skirt and a low squared neckline that emphasized her bosom, and more jewels than he’d ever seen in one place at one time, even on a courtier riding to a party. Faceted blood- colored rubies were pinned into her long silver-streaked hair; more rubies dripped from her ears like tiny clusters of grapes. Her pale eyes fixed on him, and he fell immobile from the intensity of her regard. Henri was rarely noticed by anyone. Being noticed by the duchess was like being hit in the chest.

She’d noticed him before. When he was a boy, it had been she who sent her own riding teacher to tutor him as well, for those times when she could not be present to school her own horses. And one time only, Henri had provided cupped hands to boost her foot into the stirrup. He’d been about fifteen then. He still remembered the gold heel on her supple leather riding boot, beneath a lavishly embroidered skirt hem; he’d been afraid to look higher. She’d given him a copper. Only weeks after, she’d been forbidden to ride—it was said her riding astride had prevented her from conceiving an heir. She had never even borne a girl.

She was forty now, and probably past bearing, so it couldn’t hurt for her to ride again, could it? She might defy her husband for such a freedom. Henri remembered how she’d stroked her horses’ necks and pressed her forehead to theirs. He’d watched her, many times. She loved her horses, he could tell, and for that reason he loved her. Horses knew people. One horse might love her if she were cruel, but certainly not all of them. Henri had ridden all of her horses, and every one worked with him in perfect trust. He’d ridden one or two of the duke’s hunters, as well; that had taught him that the duke was cack-handed and deaf to the animals’ body language, for their actions were stiff and awkward. In contrast, the duchess’s horses moved like silk.

“You look enough like my husband,” she said. “It should be possible.”

He couldn’t mistake her meaning. The whispers, the rumors, they were true. Henri couldn’t speak; one wrong word and she could have him caged in the city square and pelted with rotten fruit and rocks. But he couldn’t run away, either, because the duchess had summoned him. She’d had him summoned and he hadn’t fled, as any reasonable person would have done when the nobility took notice of them. If only he did not care. If only it did not matter to him if she bore an heir or if she died.

In this audience room, they were alone. If he were seen alone with the duchess, by anyone at all besides her loyal maid, he would die in the worst way imaginable. So far as he knew, the duchess was allowed no men in her direct presence without her eunuch guards—or without her husband, the duke, of course. Henri stared even harder at a porphyry medallion set into the white marble floor. The cleanliness and luxury made Henri’s knees shake and his balls shrivel. He was probably already doomed, when he had done nothing to harm anyone, nothing but obey the duchess’s maid who’d brought him here like a favorite riding hack.

“Boy? Do you understand what your duchess requires of you? I understand you know something of the breeding of horses, so you should be more than equal to this task.” Her voice was low but commanding. He could not imagine defying that voice.

She approached him, and he shrank from her. Was he supposed to reply? His throat felt stuffed with old hay. Then came the unthinkable—a light touch to his hair.

“Look up.”

Trembling, he did so, as if she tugged his reins.

“Please,” she said. She might as well have been asking for morning ale. Her face was like a silver coin he’d once seen, cleanly cut lips and a long, straight nose, but this close he could see the bruises, carefully covered, along her jaw, and fine lines feathering from the corners of her eyes. Thick swatches of iron-gray streaked the ebony hair that fell past her waist. Her eyes, the cold gray of a winter sky, shone and swelled with water before she blinked, once, and transformed them back to metal.

His world shifted for a moment into some afternoon fantasy, glimpsed in sunlit dust sifting down from the hayloft. He would save her, and she would…have him killed, so no one would know what she had done? “Y-Your Grace,” Henri said. Her gown exhaled costly spices he could not name. His own clothing was pungent from horses and leather and sweat. The maid had directed him to leave his muddy boots behind, so his bare, calloused toes curled against polished stone.

The duchess stood back from him, her skirts unfurling over her jeweled slippers. “If I do not provide an heir within the year, I will be killed, so my husband can take another wife within the bounds of law,” she said flatly. “They will shave my hair and cut off my head. Do you understand? Answer me.”

“Y-yes.”

“I cannot protect you. I am a woman and my command to my husband’s guards is not worth a copper coin.” She paused. “Will you do this for me?”

For her. She would never humiliate herself like this, not to someone like him, unless she truly needed his aid. His mouth felt numb with fear as he nodded and knelt on the marble, searching in vain for another flicker of humanity in her pale, regal face.

Her crimson gown rustled as she paced to the door, like the caged crow in the stables. He scrambled back to his feet and followed. She had what she wanted of him, as the aristocrats always had what they wanted. It was their right.

How in the world could he even disrobe before her? Much less…less…

She stopped before the door and said, as if discussing her choice of gown, “It’s best done now. My husband will send for me tonight.”

Henri nodded again. What else was he to do?

The duchess opened the door a crack and peered out. She murmured to her waiting maid, then snapped the door closed. Henri twitched. “This way,” she said.

He followed. A delicate wooden chair with a plush red seat and curving arms that ended in carved blossoms hid another door behind swaths of red fabric, embroidered all over with flowers in a deeper red thread. Henri expected darkness, but the corridor of red marble was lit by yellow beeswax candles, sweet-smelling and thick as his forearm, in gold sconces shaped as unearthly smooth disembodied feminine hands, braceleted in cruel red stones. He’d never seen so many candles in his life. Who lit them? Who trimmed away the drips? Ebony chairs lined the walls, each carved with more flowers and accompanied by its own little matching marble-topped table, for what purpose he could not imagine. Each table was bare. The duchess swept down the corridor without glancing at the paintings of flowers in gilt frames, the tapestries populated by gardens and ladies and fat babies, even the carved figure of the duke’s head in white marble whose gaze, blind but all-seeing, made Henri want to hide his eyes. To his relief, he saw no guards.

He had to catch himself when she abruptly halted and withdrew a golden key from her bosom. Hastily, Henri averted his eyes, saw the dirty smear his hand had left on the pale pink wallpaper, and scrubbed it clean with a corner of his sleeve. The key scratched in the lock and the door swung open.

Henri scarcely saw the rooms they passed through now. He retained a blurred impression of fresh flowers and jewel- colored velvet, oval mirrors in frames as wide as his hand, overstuffed tapestried sofas with matching pillows, silver platters of fresh, shiny fruit, sinuous glass oil lamps perfuming the air. When the duchess finally halted, a square wood bed loomed before him, roofed in wood, canopied and curtained in fringed gold silk and piled with tasseled blue pillows—a bed wider than a prize stallion’s loose box and half the size of the hovel where he had been born. Henri had spent his nineteen years sleeping on straw, his spare shirt for a pillow and rats scampering across his discarded boots. Now he was expected to service the duchess on a bed worth an entire village? Impossible. His cock dangled flaccid as an empty sausage casing. He didn’t recognize his own voice when he said, “Stop.”

The duchess turned.

“I—I want—” Henri swallowed.

The duchess gazed impassively at him. She said nothing. She did not have to speak, he realized. He was here; she’d got her way and apparently had no further concern for how the…act proceeded.

He would make her feel something. If he was to die after, then he wanted to die a man, not a silent slave. “I want you in there,” he said as firmly as he could, gesturing toward the room before, a less frightening room.

To his surprise, the duchess retreated without comment, her skirts brushing his leg as she passed. Henri shuddered like a nervous horse and went after her.

This room was huge as well, but at least there was no bed. The duchess said, “If you give me a child, I shall reward you in gold coin.”

Henri’s cheeks flushed with shame. He was not a whore. As if gold would help him, if the palace guards caught him in her chambers. Gelding by hot iron was the first and least of what he would suffer. Delicious anger stiffened his cock, rasping it against his homespun pants, and he found he didn’t care what she thought of him. He hadn’t been asked to be her friend, only her stud. He could do as he liked with her. Anything. In this room, Her Grace the duchess was his to rule.

If he failed, would she find another to do her bidding? He couldn’t bear the thought. He must not fail. For a little while, he must rule her.

“Remove your clothing,” said Henri.

“I cannot. You must help me.”

This problem had not occurred to him. He was not a lady’s maid any more than he was a whore. However, the idea curiously excited him. “Bend over that sofa,” he said. “No, over the back.”

She did exactly as he asked. Bent over like that, her bosom swelled out the top of her gown, almost bursting free. Her face was hidden, but he could see bare white skin at the nape of her neck. Henri circled her, looking from all angles. Buttons bound her into her crimson gown. He’d never seen so many buttons on one garment. He imagined how many hours a seamstress might have spent covering those buttons, sewing them on and painstakingly stitching fabric loops to hold them. He imagined ripping the buttons off, letting them fly everywhere. Instead, he slipped them free down to her waist, then insinuated his hands down her bodice to squeeze enormous soft handfuls of breasts. Her breath hitched. So did his. Her buttocks twitched against his groin. He closed his eyes. Yes, he could do this; his body was brave. Reluctantly, he let go of her and returned to his task.

The gown pooled at her waist. He knew how to unlace a bodice and accomplished that task swiftly. Beneath lay a chemise of fine silk, softer even than her skin. The chemise was meant to be drawn over her head, but the thin silk tore easily and the sound of its ripping traveled straight to his balls. Beneath it she wore nothing. Henri feasted on her exposed vertebrae. He sucked on her neck until he remembered the consequences of leaving a mark and changed his strategy, just in time.

She was breathing unevenly, and he felt fine tremors under his hands. He examined her disarray as if she were a saddle he’d been given to polish, except that this saddle was his to ride upon. He dug his toes into the thick carpet, trying to decide what to do next.

“Hurry,” she said.

He hesitated, then said, “No.”

Stripping off his patched shirt, he flung it aside. His skin tingled, caressed by cool, perfumed air. The heavily embroidered fabric of her skirt crackled as he gathered up fistfuls, his calluses snagging on the nap. “I want you to stay here, like this,” he said.

The duchess did not respond to what he’d said, so he lifted up her skirt—acres and acres of skirt—as if she was a kitchen maid. He finally crushed it as best he could around her waist, revealing another layer of thinner, stiffer skirts. He treated these perfunctorily, arriving finally at her drawers, no different from anyone’s except for being fine red silk. Curious, Henri inspected with his fingers and found a perfectly ordinary slit in the fabric, no gold thread or jewels or even embroidered flowers. But beneath! Perfectly smooth! Was this a sign of her aristocratic birth, or—of course not. Stupid. She had an army of maids to cleanse and shave her.

The image of her and her maids was nearly too much for him; it resembled a painting that hung in the Dewy Rose. Henri stroked one finger down her slit and she quivered, like a horse flicking off a fly. Her steamier heat rose from within, so he could not resist parting her lush folds and sliding his finger deeper still. She was slick as melted butter, ready for him already. He excited her. More likely, he thought, the situation excited her, but who was he to complain? His free hand untied his pants’ drawstring, and his cock fought free.

Booted feet rang in the corridor, blessedly some distance away. His feverish eyes lighted on a padded bench against the wall. He grabbed the duchess’s arm and hustled her to it, holding his pants with his free hand, letting her gown fall where it would. She stumbled and stepped out of it, whispering, “I hear the guards! You must—”

The boots didn’t slow as they approached. “Not for us,” he said. They wouldn’t dare. Not just before he entered her. The boots passed on. The duchess sagged, but only for an instant.

A neat pile of sewing rested on the bench he’d chosen, probably belonging to one of the women who served her. Henri swept it to the floor, all of it. She looked at him over her shoulder, her eyes icy; he took a deep, shaky breath and nudged the fabric carefully away from their feet.

He was relieved when she looked away from him again. She wore the remnants of her chemise and silk drawers with her earrings. Her slippers had disappeared somewhere along the way, but a heavy chain of brilliants collared her neck. He hadn’t even noticed them against the splendor of her gown. Her hair, though mussed, retained its ornate style and jeweled hair ornaments. He could almost imagine her a ten-copper lay, playing at being duchess in one of the bawdy houses down in the town.

She drew the ripped chemise from her body, each arm flowing gracefully. He’d never seen skin so white and smooth. A rich attar of flowers rose from her bared, heated flesh, making him want to wipe his feet on the carpet and cower even as he possessed her. He shoved his pants down his legs; luckily, his cock remained undaunted.

Her hands loosened the string holding her drawers, and slowly, so slowly, dragged them down over lush hips and plump white buttocks. The body of a woman made to bear children, Henri thought, burning even more hotly.

Unable to wait an instant longer, he mounted her from behind in one deep push. She groaned deeply as if he’d struck her. Henri savored her cunt’s scalding grasp as long as he could before beginning to thrust, short sharp strokes, each punctuated by his grunt and her gasp.

He heard boots again in the corridor, drawing nearer. The duchess gasped, either with fear or because his calloused hands squeezed her breasts hard each time he withdrew. Henri didn’t care about guards right now. He couldn’t stop. He wouldn’t stop. Blind to all but the bucking flesh beneath him, he crushed her into the bench, impaling her again and again. Her cunt squeezed his cock and he sucked in air. Seizing her hips, he ground into her as fiercely as he could, pressing her bud against the padded surface beneath them. Too hard; he should be more gentle, but she twisted and moaned, the sudden sound like fire down his spine. He jolted into her pulsing cunt, until she had drained him dry.

Afterward, silence. The sweat of his effort dried quickly, and he landed in cold and sticky reality. The sound of boots slowed and drew nearer.

Henri shuddered, then realized it was the duchess whose body shook. “Be still,” he breathed into her ear. The boots clicked away, down the hall. Henri let out a slow breath and withdrew himself from her body.

He didn’t want to just leave her with his seed drying on her thighs; he wouldn’t do that even to a whore. The duchess straightened slowly but did not turn to face him. Henri said, “Turn around,” but he couldn’t muster the commanding tone he’d managed earlier.

She turned anyway, a woman with thick long hair obscuring her luscious breasts, clad only in a jeweled collar and silken stockings that tied at her knees, like an erotic painting. She did not move to cover herself, but stood tall and poised; even in bare feet she was slightly taller than Henri, he noted for the first time. “You have done well,” she said. She did not smile.

Had anyone ever seen her smile? His anger was gone, spent. He felt only sadness as he looked at her.

Henri remembered the sounds she had made only moments earlier. He thought he had given her some pleasure, at least. “Will you tell me if you are breeding?” he asked, then glanced away, feeling heat creep down his neck. The whole duchy would know if she were breeding.

“Look at me.”

Henri lifted his head. Her cheeks and chest were still flushed, and the air reeked of sex and sweat. Yet she still appeared untouchable.

“Yes, boy, I will tell you if I am breeding,” the duchess said. “Now you must go. You’ve been brave, but it won’t do for you to be caught here. The duke is jealous of his possessions.”

He couldn’t bear to leave her like this. “No.” Henri took a step back and felt his pants under his heel. Slowly, he bent, picked them up, and stepped into them, all without turning his back on her. She was not looking at him. Her gaze rested on a portrait over the mantel, of three bay horses grazing among grassy hills.

The cloth of his pants felt coarse after the luxurious fabrics he’d ripped from the duchess’s body. Staring down at his hands as he knotted the drawstring, he said, “Your Grace, if you are not breeding, will you tell me?”

“If I am not breeding, it will be no surprise.”

Henri felt for his shirt on the carpet and finally located it. From inside its folds he said, “Will you come to the stables?”

“My husband does not permit—” She hesitated. “Yes, I will come to the stables.”

Her voice was as calm as it had been before, but he fancied he could catch a trace of hopelessness. He reached for her hand without thinking, then let it fall before it reached her, afraid of giving offense. Perhaps he could persuade her. “Come at night. I would save you if I could, Your Grace. If you would travel away with me. You can ride. You do not have to die.”

She crossed her arms over her breasts. Even nearly naked, she looked every inch a duchess. She said, “I do not think there is any escape from this life.”

He’d never before thought of the palace as a trap. He wondered if she ever struggled against it. “I did not think I could…try to give you a child, either.”

Her mouth twitched into an unconvincing smile. “We shall see, Henri. We shall see. Now, go. Sylvie will see you safely back to the stables.”

Henri knew what we shall see meant. She’d set herself on a course and meant to stick to it. He’d heard that tone before, from his most stubborn uncle, who’d ended up dying at sea, food for sharks, all because he refused to make peace with his father over a woman whom he hadn’t even married. Henri was in even less of a position to argue with the duchess. He might be good enough to service her, but she seemed unlikely to take advice from a grubby stableboy.

He lowered his eyes and quickly bowed before hurrying to the door. He would do better to forget about this, as soon as he possibly could manage it.

CHAPTER THREE

The Duchess Camille sat on the edge of her bed, the blue silk velvet coverlet caressing the bare backs of her thighs and the drawn-back curtains of the canopy brushing her bare shoulders. Under threat from Sylvie’s eagle eyes and sharp tongue, a flurry of bathmaids gathered up discarded towels, bottles of bath oil and skin cream, razors and strops, polishing grit and all manner of perfumed oils and balms, which Laure had applied to her skin while Tatienne and Solange shaved her legs and pubic area. It was all very tedious. She had never been sure why it mattered, since no one ever saw her bare skin except the maids and her husband. She sometimes wondered if the rituals of adornment were meant solely to devour time for women more idle than she.

Camille was now grateful she’d let the boy take her in a sitting room and not her bedroom. Sylvie had set a rose-scented candle burning in the sitting room, which overwhelmed everything. If the bathmaids had noticed anything amiss, they had not spoken of it.

She closed her eyes for a few moments, welcoming the spring chill as the perfumed bathwater dried on her body; she needed to return to reality before darkness fell and her husband called for her. If he called for her.

Now she was tired, and her body ached. Sylvie chased away the last of the bathmaids, summoned two footmen to haul away the tub, then returned to hover over Camille. “Madame,” she said, in a much gentler tone than she’d used with her fellow servants. “You must eat. I brought you food while you were in the bath. See? All things you like. I prepared it myself.”

There was a silver tray on her side table, filled with cubes of fresh bread, thin slices of sharp cheese, a ramekin of soft goat’s cheese, a cluster of meringues and a juicy pear, laid out in a fan of slices. “Thank you, Sylvie. You may go.”

“Madame, are you well?”

Sylvie had served Camille for too many years. Camille knew she was truly asking about the boy, and what she had done with him. Camille resisted asking Sylvie’s opinion of him. She said, “I am perfectly well. I do not require your help to eat.”

“Yes, madame.” Sylvie bowed and departed. Listlessly, Camille picked up a slice of pear and forced herself to chew it. She would need all the strength she could muster. She did not want to face the duke. Not just now. But she must face him. Doing things she did not care to do were part of her duty.

Heaps of documents obscured the surface of her marquetry desk, tucked into a corner near shelves of weighty tomes inherited from her father and his father before him. In her anxiety over the duke’s increasing impatience with her, she’d neglected her normal perusal of the financial and judicial reports, brought in daily by Lord Stagiaire’s secretary. More than five years had passed since the duke had removed her from sitting in judgment, or even from reviewing cases, but she hadn’t been able to stop herself from at least following the duchy’s business in private. Lord Stagiaire had been her tutor once, and still maintained a confidential position with the king. Even if the duke found what information he’d provided and continued to provide to Camille, his status as an elder of politics would protect him.

Once, Camille had been able to throw herself into the work of researching precedents and alternative judgments. It wasn’t how she might have chosen to spend her time, but it was worthy work, and she’d been well-trained for it. However, once she’d been denied directing or even witnessing the outcome of the issues she’d so carefully studied, her research had begun to seem more and more worthless, equivalent to decorative embroidery that would never be seen. Once she’d been forbidden her horses as well, she’d retreated into herself. The sight of her abandoned desk gave her a guilty stab. By giving up her studies, she’d done what the duke wanted. And here she was, trying to get herself with child!

She remembered hearing the door click shut behind Sylvie and the boy. No, not merely a boy, she corrected herself, but Henri, whom she’d taken into her body. If they’d been successful, he might be the father of a child she carried, and her child would not be fathered by some boy of no name. Camille tried to imagine having a child, seeing it grow and learn. Would it be a boy or a girl? A boy might be all that would keep her from death. She would never be able to tell it of its true heritage. That would be too dangerous. It would likely to be too dangerous even to allow Henri to see the child. Perhaps he would not care. She had been told the lower orders did not care so much for their children, as they lost them so often. She had no way to find out if it was true. No peasant would give a truthful answer to his duchess. Perhaps Sylvie would know. She was very resourceful. Perhaps the midwife would tell her.

After her first year of marriage, Camille had summoned a midwife from the town for a careful examination, as she hadn’t trusted the palace’s male physician. Nothing had been wrong with her physically, nothing that the midwife could see, and she’d been told to expect a child in good time. Two years ago, in desperation, she’d summoned a second midwife, whom Sylvie found for her; that was Annette. That first time, Sylvie smuggled Annette in as a pageboy, and she’d examined Camille thoroughly, both inside and out. Cold as her manner had been, Mistress Annette reassured Camille that she’d suffered no disease, and scoffed at the notion that riding astride could prevent pregnancy.

“Your husband’s jism is more likely to blame, he wastes it so freely.” Her scorn for the duke had been clear, and Camille was grateful for once that he had his own amusements and never visited the town’s brothel; if he heard Annette’s words, he would have her executed without a second thought. Camille had believed everything Annette had told her, but had not yet been desperate enough to try to find another possible father for her child.

Now she wished she had been. She had wasted far too much time in hope. How ironic that her own mother had given birth a mere ten months after marriage, though she had not had much to do with Camille afterward, leaving her to a wet nurse and having her brought down, suitably wrapped in velvet and a lace cap, for ceremonial occasions only.

Camille had no idea if she herself would be able to love her child. If she could not…how cruel, once it knew. To know you lived only to save your mother’s life. If she lived past its birth, though, she might have emotion to spare for her child. She would at least try. She would not leave the babe to nurses and tutors while she shut herself away among her own amusements. Perhaps none of it would matter. She did not feel pregnant. How long would it take before she would know? She felt sure she would know, somehow, in her body, before she missed her courses or had any other physical sign. She tried to imagine how her child would look, and could only picture a smaller, rounder Henri, thick brown hair matted to his forehead, endearing snub nose, wide blue eyes surrounded by lashes dense and long as summer grass, an enticingly plump lower lip. If she was not pregnant—she could not think of that now. It was out of her control for the time being. To think of her own doom was just as dangerous as thinking the opposite. She had survived so far by living moment to moment to moment. She should think on the present.

She sat cross-legged on the bed and ate another slice of pear, then a fragment of cheese. She could feel the stretch in her leg muscles from her afternoon exertions. Her quim throbbed pleasantly, deep within. It had been a long time since she’d had sex. The duke did not seem to care if she became pregnant or not. A younger woman, and a more compliant one, would be infinitely more to his taste, and had been from the beginning of their marriage, over twenty years ago now. His ideal duchess would be a younger woman who never spoke and always smiled. No, Michel wouldn’t notice the smile if the woman kept her legs open.

How unfair, to die because you were not a man’s preferred toy. If he’d put her aside in favor of his concubines, even publicly, she might have endured, holding on to her dignity as the only blood heir to the duchy. Her people would have blamed the duke, not her. That was likely what he feared would happen, should she be both out of his favor and alive. Even though he ruled, he had not been born in the duchy. Her people would remember. They accepted him now, as he’d been crowned by her father. What would happen if Camille repudiated him? Of course, she could not do so while trapped within her suite of rooms. He could find her too easily, and close her mouth by opening her throat. She had already embarked on the safer course of convincing him he’d achieved the heir he needed to consolidate his position.

She lifted her hair in front of her shoulder and fell back onto her coverlet. The tasseled golden ropes binding back the curtains could symbolize her bondage here in the palace. Perhaps she should have insisted that Henri take her here, but he’d been so afraid, and so defiant of his fear, that she had done what he asked. It had been a small thing. He was doing her bidding, after all. She refused to remember her small moments of fear, when she’d thought she would not be able to convince him to take her.

He had surpassed her expectations. There was something to be said for vigor and enthusiasm when accomplishing a difficult task. Being fucked over a bench had been unexpected. Caught up in sensation for which she had not planned, for long moments she’d been unaware of her surroundings, lost in the intensity of being fucked by a partner whom she could not see.

If Henri had been the duke, she would have wanted to keep an eye on him. She would have been unable to relax even a fraction. As it had happened…she had been surprised by her own response. Perhaps because she had known she could stop Henri at any moment she chose? The duke’s threats had always been present in the back of her mind, but for those moments with Henri, she had taken something for herself. How much risk would there be in summoning him again? It might take several tries before he impregnated her. If he failed, would she be able to remain hopeful, and find another potential sire?

Soon, she’d be expected to give herself to the duke. His pleasure would be at issue, and her life.

Until then, she had only herself to please. She lifted her hand and ran it down her belly, pressing in lightly with her nail, then sliding her fingertip between the folds of her quim. She circled her bud, then pressed in. She twitched inside, as if in residual orgasm. She still had life in her, even after what had gone before. She rubbed herself again, sliding her other hand to join the first, using that one to massage her outer lips, pressing into the finger on her bud. Her arousal rose and spread slowly, like golden light. She thought of riding, she and her bay mare Guirlande cresting a ridge near the east boundary just as the sun vaulted over the hills, her groom and guards far outdistanced for a moment alone, a moment of peace.

She trembled into climax, each gentle spasm flooding her with another liquid wash of delight. When it was over, she slipped beneath her coverlet and linens, curled on her side with her knees drawn up, and coasted into a deep, satisfying sleep.

“Your Grace.”

Camille blinked and stared up at the duke’s chamber servant, Vilmos. He wore his usual blue livery trimmed in gold, and carried one of her heavy silk robes over one folded arm. His thick neck, pale hair and heavy features could give the impression of stupidity, though she knew he was crafty and perhaps more intelligent than his master the duke. His eyelids always looked sleepy and full; she could never tell what he was thinking, or how far his loyalty extended. Presumably the duke did not fear him, or he would never allow him into his bedchamber. If she were the duke, she would be more cautious.

Camille swallowed and said, with as much alertness as she could muster, “Where is His Grace the duke?”

“He is waiting for you below,” Vilmos intoned. “I am to bring you and your escort.”

So she was to be summoned like one of his concubines. Again. Vilmos would ensure she did not refuse. “I am ready.”

He held out her necklace and earrings and waited while she put them on, then wrapped her impersonally in the red silk robe, knelt and inserted her feet into embroidered slippers, and led her through her rooms. Camille took a moment to be grateful that she wasn’t being taken to the duke naked, as she had been on other occasions. She suspected that had been the order, but Vilmos had given her the robe for his own private purpose. She wondered what that meant about his relationship to her husband. Could Vilmos, perhaps, be coerced to her side? And if so, what would be the best advantage she could gain?

She glanced at Vilmos, but he appeared lost in his own thoughts. She knew the game of conspiracy, from her youth in the court of the king, but Vilmos showed no hint of it. She was building castles from sand. A single gesture of humanity did not mean Vilmos would betray her husband. Perhaps he merely pitied her as she grew older.

Kaspar and Arno awaited them in the corridor. Though their muscularity was less impressive than Vilmos’s due to their castration at a young age, they were of a height with him and she immediately felt less vulnerable.

She held her head high as they walked through opulent corridors, past the occasional courtier or footman or maid, and once past a courtier and a maid copulating in an alcove with enthusiastic gasps, at least until they noticed Vilmos’s steely gaze. Camille involuntarily stepped back against Kaspar as Vilmos shot out a meaty hand, seized the maid’s shoulders, and dragged her free of her petrified partner with an audible sucking sound. “You,” Vilmos addressed the man, one of the lesser land barons whom Camille affected not to recognize. “Leave.”

Grabbing at his trousers, the baron backed away, eyes fixed on Vilmos until he rounded a corner and scuttled off. Vilmos clamped one hand around the maid’s upper arm and with his other, tugged her gray dress and shift back down over her hips. “Marrine, you are late for your duties tonight,” he said reproachfully, and dragged her along with their procession. One of her husband’s concubines, Camille guessed. Marrine stood barely as tall as Vilmos’s elbow and was thin as a wraith except for her exuberant bosom. Straggles of violently red hair escaped her sober gray cap. A red suck-mark was clearly visible on her neck.

Camille hoped Marrine had not recognized her. Why should she? Minus her gown and cosmetics, with her hair pouring down her back and Kaspar’s and Arno’s protective bulks blocking her view? Then again, why should she care? That would be less embarrassing than being shamed by her own husband. She didn’t doubt the whole palace knew the duke’s proclivities. The courtiers seemed to remain loyal to him despite how he treated his duchess. Perhaps it was simply easier to do so. If she had not rebelled, why should they? And how many of them knew for a fact how she’d been treated? If they were wise, they treated two-thirds of everything they heard in the palace as rumor.

Vilmos led them through a door flush with the wall paneling and down a narrow staircase lit by lamps burning perfumed, musky oil. Camille wrinkled her nose, then quickly repressed her reaction. She was obviously heading for another of the duke’s outlandish scenarios. He planned to make her watch. Inwardly, she sighed. She did not have the stomach to watch his pale buttocks pumping over some pliant maid in a strange costume for the rest of the night. Unfortunately, she had little choice. Had the last one been a milkmaid or an extravagantly female version of a courier? No, there had been two. One in a blacksmith’s apron and nothing else, the other wielding a bellows in ways Camille had found more humorous than erotic.

The stairs changed from carpeted wood to carved limestone. She had never traveled this passage before. Only servants and prisoners were obligated to visit the underlevels of the palace. She might be taken there if she were to be beheaded. Inwardly, she shuddered at the thought. Outwardly, she focused her gaze on Kaspar’s big shoulders moving down the stairs ahead of her.

She heard a clanking noise as Vilmos drew out a bunch of keys to unlock the red door she glimpsed at the bottom of the staircase. She guessed they must be adjacent to the cool rooms where cheese was stored, and for a wild moment considered what erotic use the duke had found for the duchy’s famed tart blue.

Camille entered the chamber, her guards swiftly positioning themselves at her shoulders. Vilmos had already dragged Marrine to the duke, who chucked her under the chin before he waved his hand toward a table heaped with furs. Vilmos lifted her as if she weighed as little as a broomstraw and deposited her there. Marrine did not fight him as he removed her cap and her red hair sprang free; she reached over her shoulder and began to unbutton her dress.

The duke strode over to Camille, reached out one manicured finger and hooked it beneath her jeweled collar. Camille took care not to jerk away; she did not want to be choked. “You’ve taken pleasure today,” he barked. “I know it.”

He didn’t know for sure, or he would have acted much more swiftly and decisively. “You keep an army of concubines, Your Grace,” Camille replied. “Do you begrudge me satisfaction? You’ve made no move to provide it yourself.”

“Women were placed on this earth to please men,” the duke said. His plump lips curved behind his silky gray beard, but his cold blue eyes did not change expression. “It has been a long time since you have pleased me.” He snorted. “It is a pity you had the time to dress before Vilmos brought you to me. Would you have liked to parade the palace naked, I wonder? Would your lover have seen you?”

His finger still crooked beneath her collar, the duke stepped closer. His floor-length robe of dense velvet was trimmed all down the front in silky black fur. One step more and the fur brushed her robe, raising a nasty prickle.

“You will tell me who it is,” he said. “I can make you afraid of me.”

She was afraid. He held her life in his hands. He simply didn’t want to see it. He wanted to break her anew each time, like a boy plucking wings off a populace of flies.

“I’ll have an answer out of you, Camille.”

“Yes, Your Grace,” she said, hating herself for letting him bully her, but hating him even more.

His left hand rubbed up and down her cheek, his hot fingers squeezed by rows of rings. The set stones caught the light and glowed dully, angrily: ruby, emerald, topaz, amethyst. Square plates of gold interspersed with hunks of tourmaline banded his thick wrist. She stared at the stones rather than look up at his leering face. She could smell the perfumed oil in his beard and the cloves he chewed for his breath.

At last he released her collar. He trailed his finger down and squeezed her breast through her robe. Perhaps she was to be his vessel tonight. He had to fuck her at least once, in case she had managed to become pregnant that afternoon. She wasn’t sure how she was going to manage that part. She closed her eyes, feeling her nipple draw tighter at the duke’s manipulations. Given enough time to prepare herself, this could be bearable. Just once, and never again. Just once—nausea strangled her. She could not. She would do anything if she never had to see his prick again.

She stared at his hand as his fingers pressed painfully into the soft flesh of her breast. His other hand grabbed her shoulder, forcing her to her knees. “Have you learned to swallow a cock yet? I’m told a lack of breath is an effective incentive. Vilmos, perhaps you could hold her, so she may learn properly how to please me.”

Camille couldn’t help her flinch, a choked whimper escaping her lips. The duke shoved her away onto the floor. He traced his foot over her bare fingers, as if contemplating how best to crush them, then shifted and ground his toe into her quim. “You are less amusing than you once were,” he said. To the air he said, “There is a throne for Her Grace. Secure her there.”

A spectator again. Relief drenched her. Arno glanced at her apologetically as he strapped her arms to the ornately carved chair. He settled at her feet like a faithful hound, his shaven head almost touching her knee. Kaspar stood behind the chair, a looming shelter. She could feel the warmth of his body on the back of her neck.

Camille had a clear view of the cellar room, which was carpeted in plush red silk and hung with erotic tapestries she recognized as having once hung in the duke’s bedchamber. She’d always despised them, because the women were always depicted being taken unwillingly, if one could guess from their stark facial expressions. An ebony table held a basin and pitcher; another held wine and cups. She could particularly see a side view of the fur-heaped table where Marrine reclined, naked and with her hips elevated on a pillow. A pile of cut roses on long, thorny stems lay near her. No costumes tonight, then, unless someone was to wear the flowers.

The duke unfastened his wide, jeweled belt and tugged it free. He draped it over one shoulder, the buckle dangling in front. His robe fell open, baring his naked body. He was thickening around the waist and sagging in the chest but his legs were still powerful. His prick hung turgidly; he stroked it as he lounged in a chair similar to Camille’s, though his boasted a padded, embroidered seat.

Camille glanced at Marrine, then at the duke, unsure of his intentions. He was not inclined to restraint. She lifted her chin, anticipating a new threat to be faced.

“Vilmos,” said the duke.

His servant turned, to face her, Camille realized. He wore knee breeches, stockings and flat shoes with his uniform jacket. He stripped open his jacket and pulled apart the halves of his shirt to reveal a massive chest. His chest hair was only fractionally darker than that on his head, and just as dense. Then he flicked open the buttons on his breeches and withdrew his prick, partially erect and already thick as Camille’s wrist.

“Her Grace will accommodate you for a few moments,” the duke said, smiling nastily. “Her mouth must be useful for something other than insolence.”

Vilmos stepped out of his shoes, pushed his breeches down his hips, and stepped out of them as well. He padded over to her in his stockinged feet, one hand holding his cock. He stopped a pace away from her. Arno glared up at him. Camille said softly, “Arno,” and he rose immediately, though without releasing Vilmos from his gaze. She heard Kaspar’s hiss of warning from behind her. At last, Arno stepped back. He rested one warm hand on her shoulder, an unusual liberty, but one which she did not deny him.

Vilmos pressed his shins against her legs and held out his cock. He looked uncomfortable. He did not have the control she did. She would show the duke nothing of her thoughts.

Vilmos was so tall, she scarcely had to bend to reach him. Thankfully, he was clean, his hot skin smelling of chamomile soap. Had he known this would happen? If so, she appreciated the consideration.

In other circumstances, she might have enjoyed tasting so large a cock, but not in front of the duke. She opened her mouth and took him in, sucking hard and dipping her tongue into his slit to speed him along and deny the duke as much pleasure as she could. Vilmos swelled alarmingly fast; she pulled back once, but he pressed against her lips until she opened to him again. He began squeezing and stroking his own length while she licked and suckled at the crown; she could hear him gasping. Just as her jaw was beginning to ache, he tugged himself free of her mouth, his hands falling to his sides.

The duke lifted a ringed hand. “You and the maid will entertain me now.”

Camille nearly laughed at his indifferent tone. She could see his prick nudging his belly, its head shiny with fluid. Had her submission aroused him, or Vilmos’s unquestioning obedience?

She did not want to watch the duke. Pretending he did not exist, she turned to Vilmos and Marrine.

Vilmos cupped his hands beneath Marrine’s thighs and pulled her legs loosely around his waist. She crossed her ankles and smiled like a dancer about to take the stage. He had powerful buttocks that clenched impressively as he guided himself into Marrine, or at least to a point just past the flange of his cock’s head. There he stopped. Marrine squirmed. Her arms, which she had flung provocatively above her head, reached for their joined bodies as if to tug him forward.

Camille wondered if calling out advice was allowed. She suspected Marrine would have better luck being taken from behind. She also suspected this awkwardness was part of the show. What a show! She fought back a laugh. Would they follow with a trip to the menagerie? And where were the food vendors?

Vilmos drew back and thrust forward again, his hands shoving Marrine’s thighs farther apart. At the peak of each thrust, he held still for a moment, and then pushed forward incrementally more. Marrine had uncrossed her ankles and her bare feet bobbed in the air. She was panting. Vilmos let go of her legs and held open her folds, rubbing her bud with his thumb as he continued his stuttered rhythm. Camille could see he’d penetrated a bit farther, and as she watched, he eased in farther still. His cock was dark maroon, shiny with Marrine’s fluids.

Vilmos thrust hard and Marrine groaned, a surprisingly deep sound from so small a woman. The involuntary sound was shockingly arousing, a visceral reminder of her own afternoon with Henri. Camille’s quim dampened as Vilmos sped up his efforts and, all at once, slid fully into his partner. After that, it didn’t take long. Marrine slid among the furs with the force of Vilmos’s thrusts, her fingers plucking at her own nipples. She groaned more loudly. Vilmos was silent, though his fingers kneaded Marrine’s quim, thighs and belly with frantic grasping motions.

Camille breathed slowly, showing nothing, though her body wanted to writhe. Arno’s hand tightened on her shoulder, and she glanced up at him in surprise. She had forgotten he stood there. He smiled at her, an expression she was not accustomed to seeing on the faces of her guards.

“Hurry!” the duke’s voice commanded. Camille twitched in distaste. Vilmos redoubled his efforts. Marrine squealed as she came, then relaxed as she rode out his last few thrusts. She was smiling, and sensuously writhed her shoulders against the furs.

Camille felt no such relaxation. Her bones thrummed inside her legs and arms. Her palms itched. Her quim contracted uselessly around nothing; her clitoris ached for her to press upon it. She focused on Arno’s grip on her shoulder. Gradually, she settled back in her chair. She did not want the duke to hear, or even see, her beg. She’d done so, before. Never again.

She heard a creak of wood as the duke stood. “My robe,” he commanded Vilmos.

Vilmos moved quickly for so large a man, and with surprising dignity for someone whose cock flapped free. He drew the robe from the duke’s shoulders and folded it over the back of his chair, while the duke went over to Marrine. As if inspecting a pastry, he prodded two fingers into her quim. She lifted her legs gracefully and clasped them around his neck.

The duke snorted. “I’ll have none of your theatrics, girl.” He reached up and gripped her calves, pulling them apart and down to his waist. “Vilmos! I require your service.”

Camille thought she saw a flicker of annoyance on Vilmos’s placid face, then it was gone. He bowed and returned to the naked duke. As the duke eased his prick into Marrine—whose smile this time seemed, to Camille, distinctly insincere—Vilmos warmed his hands beneath his arms, then laid them on the duke’s pumping buttocks.

Camille blinked. She had seen the duke use two female concubines at once, or even three, for his amusements, but never anything like this. And Vilmos had no erection whatsoever.

She meant to look away. She did not want to watch the duke, and his eyes were fixed on Marrine’s jouncing breasts, so he would not notice that Camille was ignoring him. But her curiosity kept her watching Vilmos, who had begun to trace his fingers down the crack between the duke’s buttocks. When the duke stopped moving and abruptly called his name, Vilmos bent and ran his tongue along the path where his fingers had been. To Camille’s astonishment, he then pulled the duke’s buttocks apart and began to lick around his hole. She thought he might have dipped into the hole with his tongue, but was not sure.

“Enough!” said the duke, and began to fuck Marrine again. Vilmos kept his hands on his master’s rear, his expression blank. When the duke stopped again and called his name, he worked two fingers into the duke’s hole. The rest of his hand jerked, as if he simulated a spurting prick.

The duke resumed his fucking, but this time Vilmos did not stop what he was doing. After a moment or two, the duke let out a cry such as Camille had never heard from any man and sped up his thrusting. His face had reddened, and sweat dripped from the ends of his hair. She watched Vilmos’s hand, and identified an upward stroke that elicited the duke’s pleasured cries.

The duke came very quickly. That much, Camille thought wryly, had not changed. She was impressed, though, with what Vilmos had done. She had never seen such a thing before, and if she had been watching any man but her husband, she might have found it arousing to see a man penetrated as if he was a woman, and to know that his pleasure came from the hands of his penetrator. The idea of that sort of control excited her in a way she was sure the duke had not intended. She had momentarily forgotten her predicament.

It appeared the show was over. Marrine was licking the duke’s prick clean, and Vilmos was washing his hands and surreptitiously rinsing his mouth with wine. Camille would have appreciated a glass herself. Vilmos brought a cup only to the duke, however.

“Your Grace,” Arno said softly. “Allow me to remove this.”

For a moment, she thought he meant her robe; then she saw his hand on the fur-lined cuff which bound her arm to the chair. She nodded, hopefully with aplomb. Arno set to work on one arm and Kaspar on the other. They both completely ignored the activity on the other side of the room, which she supposed made sense, as they were eunuchs. For the first time, she wondered if any sexual pleasure at all was possible for them. They still had, she understood, their pricks, though their sacs were empty.

When her bindings were entirely removed, she stood, careful to let the blood flow back into her knees before she attempted to straighten. She said, in her most commanding voice, “Do you have further need of me, Your Grace?”

Her husband had drizzled wine from Marrine’s breasts to her thighs, and was currently snuffling in her quim while she swatted at his flanks with a handful of the roses. He waved a negligent hand and said, “Vilmos, take her to her rooms and secure the door. Bring her back to me next week, and we shall see if she is more amenable.” Then he returned to his concubine. She was forgotten. Camille felt cold. The duke’s treatment of her made it obvious that he no longer cared if she became pregnant or not. She was only a toy to him now, and one of which he would soon tire.

Her time was rapidly running out.

CHAPTER FOUR

By the time Henri finished mucking out Guirlande’s stall and carting the soiled straw to compost, the moon was up. He stopped midway back to look at the stars.

Even a stableboy could be dazzled by the glory of the night sky. His heart slowed and swelled with awe. He couldn’t touch the stars, but he had touched the duchess.

He sighed and trundled his smelly wheelbarrow back to the yard. He needed to stop thinking of his afternoon with the duchess, stop making it into more than it had been. She had used him. Hadn’t she?

He couldn’t deny that, secretly, he had wanted her for years. Desire had slowly replaced his earlier fantasies that she’d singled him out for equestrian training because he was somehow special. Now the danger was past, he didn’t even mind she’d used him. There was no other way he could have had her.

How bovine he’d been, blurting out that he would help her escape. As if she would ever need him to rush to her rescue. Her maid was loyal, and her eunuchs. There would be others, too, greater than a stableboy. He wondered if any of them cared for her at all.

He took a last walk down the row of his charges, petting the noses of those horses still awake and eyeing him over their stall doors. He would have to be up early to school Tulipe in the ring, and Lilas needed to be conditioned on the longe line. Guirlande, he sensed, would be coming into season soon, and possibly Tonnelle also. That would mean a trip to one of the far-flung breeding barns and, for him, relative luxury. Not only would he be caring for far fewer horses, he wouldn’t be assigned odd jobs, as when he was easily in view of the stable- master and his chief grooms. He wouldn’t be catching the associated random blows. Even better, the breeding barns were built in past days of unimaginable affluence, for a duke who had loved his horses, so the hayloft where Henri slept would rival—well, he had used to think it would rival the very bedchamber of the duke, but today he had been disabused of that notion. It didn’t matter. Small luxuries were easier to enjoy.

He felt again the weight and smoothness of her dress as it sagged from his hands, inhaled the flowery perfume she’d worn in the crook of her neck. While he, Henri, stank of horse sweat and dung. She hadn’t flinched from his hands upon her. Still, he hadn’t dared touch her face, or kiss her lips. He wished now he had. Then he would feel they’d known each other, however briefly.

It was childish of him to expect so much. She was as far above him as the stars, and old enough to be his mother. It was true many men took brides much younger than themselves, so perhaps it wasn’t so awful. Why not the reverse? He imagined her in his imaginary cottage, gorgeously gowned, rocking a cradle, and he laughed. More likely he’d be rocking the baby and changing nappies.

He turned away from Tonnelle and headed out the double doors, into the night. His body hummed. He couldn’t sleep yet.

It was late, but not too late for a bath. Perhaps, afterward, he would indulge in something more. The Dewy Rose specialized in all sorts of relaxations, and he never spent much of his paltry wages, sleeping as he did amid the horses. Perhaps he would share some of his money with the girls of the Dewy Rose. He could afford one of the cheaper whores. For an hour, perhaps. He always allowed himself the possibility, though in the end he usually decided to save his money, knowing that if he was frugal, his own cottage would be real that much sooner.

He walked into the town, principal seat of the duchy. The streets were more active than the estate had been. Drunken revelers spilled from a tavern near the gate, coaches rattled over the cobbles, and a raucous game of dice devoured an entire alley. Most of the street whores ignored him. He looked like empty pockets. He was just as happy to be on his way unmolested. It hurt him to look at the streetgirls’ eyes.

The Dewy Rose, a massive building of rough gray stone, towered three stories over the neighbors on either side, its white windowsills scrubbed clean daily and the shingled roof trimmed with decorative strips of copper. Its baths were cheap and popular. It cost extra, though, to climb the stairs with one of the girls, and cost considerably more for one of the young men Madame Hubert had imported from a desert land far to the south. He had glimpsed them once or twice, on his way to the baths: slender men with flawless skin and dark outlining around their eyes, wearing only long silken drawers, layers of necklaces and silver rings on their bare toes. The duchess might have bought herself one of those, through an intermediary. Except their skin was too dark for any child of theirs to pass as the duke’s.

Torches crackled at either side of the grand front entrance. Henri shoved open the carved oaken door and was confronted by a giant elderly eunuch wearing a black robe. He silently held out one slablike palm, and Henri laid a quarter-copper there. The eunuch’s hand closed over it; with his other hand, he jerked a thumb at the corridor beyond. Manic laughter swelled from the house’s interior, mingled with the clink of goblets and knives and, faintly, a twinging harp.

The common room’s doors were folded back to allow heat to escape, and to let the bath’s patrons have a preview of the evening’s entertainment. Henri had meant to pass straight by. He could not resist a look, though, to see if his memories of the room’s appointments compared ill or favorably with those of the duchess’s.

He could not see much of the furnishings. The long buffet table bore food on either end and a nude woman in the middle; two men in shirtsleeves were licking honey and wine from her belly and breasts. A couple copulated in the chair nearest the door. The woman, bodice pulled down to her waist, gripped the arms of the chair to raise and lower herself on her partner’s swollen red cock, her white buttocks flashing as her minuscule skirt fluttered with each stroke. Henri gaped, amazed that they were allowed to do that in the common room, even in a brothel, until he saw a ring of watchers. This was some staged entertainment, like the two women arranged on a chaise by the fireplace, one daintily fondling the other, who plunged an ivory dildo into herself. One of the male whores was massaging her feet. She looked up, as if awaiting orders. Henri followed her gaze to the center of the room and saw the duchess.

He had seen that court gown at a distance, and the outline of her hair confined within its tiara was familiar to him from the coin he’d just placed in a eunuch’s palm. The skin around his cock tightened automatically. Except—she could not be here. She would not be here. He looked closer, and of course the duchess was only Madame Hubert, was only a whore.

If he emptied his savings and paid her fee, he could have her. Well, almost. In a year or two he would have enough. For a moment he considered it; but it would be a mockery. He felt ashamed even for letting the thought cross his mind.

He hurried down the corridor and exited into the quiet rear yard. The bathhouse occupied almost the entire space; the narrow alley between its wooden walls and the tall fence had been planted with wandering roses. Their scent flooded his nostrils, clearing the indoor stench of perfume and wine and sweat, and sweetened the woodsmoke which rose from stoves at the rear. He followed a white gravel path to the entrance and pushed open the door.

The bathhouse was unusually quiet; he could hear water lapping and trickling. The pre-supper crowd had already departed, and visitors to the brothel would not yet have emerged for a sluicing before they returned home.

Henri stepped onto a rough straw mat in the narrow corridor running the length of the building. To his right was an alcove with hooks and benches where he hung his clothes and left his boots. The child who normally guarded belongings was sleeping on a pile of towels in the corner. Henri let him be; he had nothing of value to steal, anyway, except his boots, which were mired in horse muck. He took a towel from a shelf and entered the next room along the corridor. The floor in there was limestone, just rough enough to avoid getting slippery. The sluicing room held stools and stone bowls of soft, gritty soap, the cheapest kind. Smooth perfumed varieties had to be purchased separately; Henri always used what was provided. It did well enough.

He hung his towel and scrubbed off. His shoulder and elbow were scraped where one of the upper grooms had shoved him into a wall that afternoon for being late. He washed the wounds gently, but they had stopped bleeding hours ago and the bruises were emerging. He’d barely noticed them at the time, and if they’d known the reason for his being late, it would have been much worse. A few bumps and bruises were a small price to pay.

Pipes trickled warm water into flagons; when they overflowed, the water drained through a hole in the center of the floor. During peak times, the time saved in heating separate containers of water balanced out the waste of it, and the brothel didn’t need to worry about their water supply running out since they controlled a natural spring, a secondary source of Madame Hubert’s wealth. The duke had a spring, too, somewhere in the bowels of the palace. To lay siege to a place with its own pure water supply would be the purest folly; that was one reason he held so much power. Or so people said. Henri thought it would be easy enough to take the palace, from the inside. But the people inside the palace lived in luxury, and were likely well satisfied with their lot in life. They wouldn’t want to tear it apart. Well, maybe the duke’s servants weren’t satisfied, but if he were one of them, he would go after the duke, not the palace. He’d want the palace for his own afterward. Any smart person would. A treacherous thought intruded: he would want the duchess for his own, as well.

Pouring water over his head, he didn’t hear the bathmaid enter. He shook his wet hair from his eyes and startled at the quiet figure standing near the door. She was perhaps his own age or a little older, with short-cropped ebony hair over a beautifully-shaped skull. The short cut made her dark eyes seem even larger than they really were. He didn’t often see this girl working in the evenings; usually it was the one-legged man, or the girl who never stopped talking.

She wore a thin shift that hung only to her knees. It clung damply to her small breasts and curving hips and a darker shadow between her legs. Sometimes the bathmaids worked in the nude, but Henri found her minimal clothing a thousand times more enticing. Her breasts looked like round peaches, just the size to cup in his two hands. She smelled of soap and roses.

He realized he was standing with his mouth open, soapsuds running down his legs, and a flagon dangling forgotten from his hand. He deliberately did not look down at his cock. It had risen as he handled it to wash, and he did not want to draw the maid’s attention to it. She likely had to deal with lecherous men all day, every day. He did not need to add to that. He’d had a tumble already. With mild hysteria, he thought of explaining to her that he was having a bath because that afternoon he’d fucked the duchess.

She said, prompting, “Are you ready for the tub, sir?”

Henri nodded. He hurriedly reached to place his flagon on the floor, but she took it from him, chose a full one, and said, “Stand still. There’s more soap.”

Henri closed his eyes as she doused him, head to foot, twice more. The water trickling down his body could have been her fingers, small and chapped from constant washing. He didn’t usually have this much trouble in the baths. Of course, usually the room was full of other men, and they would be dousing each other with careful courtesy. He wasn’t used to being alone with a bathmaid, much less a pretty one. He tried to think cold thoughts, and his erection did subside a little.

The bathmaid wrapped his towel around his waist before leading him to the next room. He’d never received such a service before. Perhaps she thought he was someone important? Or just hoped for a good tip. Or thought he was too slow to do it himself, and she wanted him to be done and clear out. She said, “My name is Nicolette. Nico.”

“Henri,” he said. Or perhaps she was being friendly.

She smiled at him and said, “I know. I’ve seen you here.” In the flickering lamplight, he watched the curves of her bottom move as she walked ahead of him and bent to turn a stopcock. Steaming water gushed from the pipe and into the copper tub. She tested the water and added cold water from a bucket, then tested it again. At her gesture, he climbed inside.

He’d worked hard all day, both before and after his visit to the duchess. The heat flooded his tired muscles like the rush of orgasm. “That’s nice,” he said, reaching out his legs and wiggling his toes.

“Let me wash your hair,” Nico said. “Here, lean back onto this towel.”

“I didn’t pay for—” He hoped she would not get into trouble for offering a free service.

“It’s all right,” she said. “We haven’t any other customers right now, and Suzette will tend to them if we do.”

“If you’re sure it’s all right,” Henri said, already tensing in anticipation of an unexpected treat. He leaned back.

“Suzette told me you work in the duke’s stables?”

Suzette had to be the one who never stopped talking. “I care for the horses that the duchess rode,” he said. “I hope someday she will ride them again.”

“I do, too,” Nico said. “I’ve always admired her. She seems so strong and dignified.”

Henri tried to think of a neutral comment. “She rides beautifully,” Henri said. “I’m lucky to learn from her horses.”

“Annette—she’s the midwife in the brothel—Annette has actually met her. In the palace, the duchess didn’t come here, of course. I asked what she was like. Annette wouldn’t tell me. She only looked sad. Annette never looks sad, that’s one reason why we…why I…oh, no. You’ll think I’ve turned into Suzette, if I keep on like this. You’re a good listener. Close your eyes.” She poured warm water over his head, then dabbed the drips from his face. She winnowed her fingers through his wet hair. “Your hair is so thick. It’s a pleasure to handle. I miss my own hair, but working here, it’s so much more convenient to keep it clipped. Madame Hubert requires it, anyway.”

“Clipped…it suits you,” he said. “I think so. I think it, it makes you look beautiful.” He could feel a blush scalding his cheeks, but in the dim room he hoped she wouldn’t notice.

“Thank you,” she said. “You’re very kind to say so.” She dug her fingers into his hair again, this time after coating them with soap. The scent of lavender washed over him as she scrubbed his scalp and squeezed the soap through hanks of his hair. He had to work not to moan at the pleasure of it. Each scratch of her fingers seemed to shoot straight to his cock.

“Do you like this?” she asked.

“Oh, yes,” he said. He felt drunk, only better, like being drunk ought to feel.

“Do you have time to stay a little longer?” Nico asked.

She’d sounded lonely when she spoke of Annette. “As long as you want,” he said.

“Sit up, and close your eyes.” She poured rinse water over his head, another hot rush of pleasure, then did it again, and again. Henri felt limp, except for his cock, which he could feel bobbing in the water like an eager puppy.

“Done,” she said. Then, “I would like you to fuck me.”

He began to turn around, but Nico put her hands on his shoulders, preventing him. “You’re wondering why,” she said.

This was true.

Nico began to massage his shoulders, digging strong fingers into the muscles by his neck, and he moaned. “You like that? Good.”

He more than liked it, he had never felt anything so good in his life, except his cock inside a woman’s slippery tunnel. He’d been ready to do anything she wanted after she’d washed his hair. He wasn’t going to tell her to stop, though.

Nico said, “The bathhouse is going to get crowded again later. It always does, after the shows in the house let out. Then we get another rush in the morning. Right now, it’s the only time there’s any privacy, and then you came in, and I’ve seen you. You’re always nice to us. Not like some others.”

“Hmm?” Henri said. He was listening, but her massage was making him sleepy at the same time that it aroused him.

“You don’t grab,” she said. “I like that. So I thought, why shouldn’t you get a reward? And why shouldn’t I have a little something for myself? We can enjoy each other.”

“Anything you want,” Henri said. Surely he was dreaming. No other explanation made sense for a day like this.

“Let’s go in the steam room, then. Have you ever tried it?” She gathered up his towel and a pile of others, tucking them under one arm.

“Costs extra,” he pointed out, standing up slowly. His blood was having trouble reaching his head. It kept getting diverted and pumping into his cock.

Nico held out her hand and he placed his within it. It felt natural to do so. She was like him, she knew what it was like to work all day and then to want to relax. He squeezed her hand and she peeked over her shoulder and smiled at him. She had a wide mouth, almost too large for her face, but somehow just right with her long nose and big brown eyes. When she smiled, her upper lip crinkled and so did the corners of her eyes. He would have followed her anywhere.

The steam room wasn’t very large. All of the walls were tiled, and running with droplets of water. Vapor poured into the room from a pipe near the floor. Through the billowing steam, he could barely see three wide benches placed against the walls.

He took a deep breath and nearly choked, the air was so thick. He began to sweat, or perhaps it was the steam on his skin. He couldn’t tell. “Easy,” Nico said, and then he could breathe, more deeply than he’d ever breathed before. The odor of crushed peppermint stung his nostrils. Relaxation flowed through him.

Nico spread the towels over one of the benches and all at once he understood their purpose. His cock, which had flagged a bit, recovered quickly. Nico turned to him and smiled again. “Would you help me with this?” She plucked at her now-sodden shift.

Henri palmed her breasts through the cloth first, sighing with her as he rubbed the wet fabric against her nipples. “I could eat them like apples,” he said. When he realized what he’d said, he looked away in embarrassment, but Nico giggled and put her hands on either side of his face.

“You are sweet,” she said, and kissed him. A droplet of salty sweat ran off her upper lip and into his mouth, and he swept his tongue after it, moaning low in his throat when she reciprocated, suckling his tongue and making him think of what it would be like to have a mouth on his cock. He ran one hand over the soft spikiness of her cropped hair over and over, but the other didn’t want to let go of her breast. He squeezed it rhythmically as they kissed, sure he’d found the softest thing in the world. It was funny that so soft a thing could make him so hard.

They stopped to breathe, slowly taking in the steam and letting it out again. He helped her drag her wet shift over her head, and then was lost again as he tasted the sweat on her throat and breasts while his hands traced her upper arms, petal-soft skin over muscles hard from labor. In return, Nico gripped and massaged his arms, his shoulders, his back. When her hands wandered down to his buttocks, he pressed his erection into her belly and thrust tantalizing, twisting strokes against her slippery skin.

His skin was wet, too, but felt as if it was on fire. He was going to come in a minute if he wasn’t careful. He pulled away from her, sucking air, and walked toward the bench with the towels, Nico playfully backing toward it as well. The bench caught her behind her knees, and she sat, reaching out her arms for him.

Henri sat next to her and dragged her onto his lap. He had to be inside of her soon, but he couldn’t stop moving against her for that delicious drag of wet bare skin on skin. He writhed against her with his hands, his face, his chest, his thighs. Nico straddled him now, her breasts on a level with his face. He buried his nose between them, where her scent and heat were strongest, and it was like being inside of her. He could feel her heart pounding, racing.

She shoved her belly against his erection, forcing it back against his stomach, and rubbing it between their two slick bodies. Little gasps escaped her, and he darted his tongue into her mouth three times, quickly. “Please, please let me fuck you,” he said. Before he’d quite finished speaking her chapped hand wrapped around his cock and fed it into her cunt. She plunged down and he grunted from feeling her wet cunt lips slap against his balls.

Gripping his shoulders painfully, she writhed on his cock, as if she were trying to find purchase, sucking at him from the inside and then shoving her hips forward. He worked his hand between their bodies and let her grind against the heel of his hand, hoping desperately she would start to move up and down soon; at the same time, he never wanted her to stop this exquisite torture.

“More,” she said. “More, more, fuck me!”

“Yes,” he said. Bracing his feet on the floor, he thrust upward with enough force that she jostled on his lap. Soon she joined in his motion and rode him until he thought his heart would burst. She came twice, he thought; the first time he was concentrating so hard to keep his own control that he wasn’t sure he really felt her inner flutters, but the second time was unmistakable; her cries rose and rose and then broke. He pumped into her a few more deep strokes and then he was spurting inside of her, his tension releasing in excruciating, ecstatic jerks, and even more wetness was trickling over his legs. He threw his head back against the wall, gasping, feeling as if he could sink into the wood bench. Nico leaned over to nuzzle his throat.

“You’re so sweet, Henri,” she said. “But I think you need another bath.”

This time, Nico scrubbed him off, and he scrubbed her in return. Their toweling dry turned into an impromptu kissing game, and by the time they had rubbed each other’s skins with oil, he wished he could stay even longer. But noises at the house were signaling an end to their evening together. He kissed her goodbye just inside the door, promised to return when he could, and hurried back to the stables, resolved that Nico was a very good reason to forget all about his imprudent dreams of the duchess.

CHAPTER FIVE

Vilmos ushered Camille personally into her rooms, indicating that Kaspar and Arno were to accompany her inside, instead of posting themselves to either side of her door as they normally did.

She wished they had not been so protective of her in the duke’s presence. The duke’s will was always supposed to supersede her own, even in the matter of her personal safety. They might pay for their loyalty later. She would have to take better care for their safety. Escaping the palace would be a good first step.

Vilmos stood, as if waiting. Arno turned his back suddenly and prowled the edges of the room. “Yes?” Camille said.

“Your Grace,” Vilmos said, and inclined his head.

Camille lifted her chin. She might have sucked his cock, but she was never going to bring up the subject again, even if Vilmos felt the need to apologize. She’d had little choice. Neither had he. It was useless to dwell upon past humiliation.

Vilmos bent respectfully into a low bow, then departed, locking the door behind him. She heard the bolts slide home, and the clank of the large iron hasp that bore the duke’s seal.

With that final sound, Camille’s knees weakened. She forced herself to stay upright. She might be safe while the duke was occupied with his private amusements, but…she no longer believed she would be safe any longer than that, even if she had gotten herself with child. She could no longer bear the thought of letting the duke fuck her, and if he did not, she would be killed as quickly for being pregnant by another as he would have her killed for being barren. She had been fooling herself to think that if she gave the duke what he wanted, he would let her live.

The clock on the marble mantel, a fantastically ugly creation embellished with golden angels and white-lacquered sheep and their shepherdesses, showed that the middle of the night had just passed. She felt as if days had gone by since she had summoned Henri to her audience chamber. How long would it be before the duke found a way to take her life? What would he do to her before he had her beheaded? Was it true that one could still see after one’s head had been sliced off? She felt like a bird fluttering against the bars of its gilded cage. She picked up her sketchbook, then put it down. She rubbed her wrists, though they bore no marks.

Kaspar said, “Shall I call for a bath for Your Grace?”

He always spoke first. She had never noticed particularly, but Arno always deferred to him, perhaps because Kaspar was older. He was nearly thirty, she thought, while Arno had been delivered to the palace at eighteen and was now not quite twenty-three. She had asked Sylvie their ages; it was difficult to tell when they never put on a man’s muscle, at least not in the way one was used to seeing.

“Where is Sylvie?” she asked. Baths were Sylvie’s duty.

“Sleeping, Your Grace,” Kaspar said. He stood at ease, his big hands resting on his sheathed twin swords. From this close, she could see the thin white scars that marked his forearms, old injuries from training with blades. His eyes were pale gray. “Shall I wake her?”

“No,” Camille said. She wanted a bath, but not enough to wait for one to be prepared. She had to think. And Sylvie had slept little recently, instead spending most of a night and day finding Henri and arranging to bring him to Camille. She should let Sylvie sleep now, she realized, because they must escape the palace tonight, she and Sylvie and her eunuchs as well; she could not allow them to die because of her. To die in her service was one thing. To die for nothing was quite another.

Right now, her brain spun like the innards of a clock, getting nowhere.

Arno stepped forward and laid his hand on her shoulder. For a moment, everything in her mind stopped. His hand was so warm. She drew strength from it. He said, in his gentle tenor, “Please, Your Grace, let us put you to bed.”

Kaspar added, “We will keep you safe.”

Surely they knew that was impossible. “That is your duty,” she said, to test his response.

“That is our duty and our desire,” Kaspar said. “Do not doubt, Your Grace, that we will care for you to our deaths and beyond.”

She could not protest his dramatic words; if she were killed, they would be killed as well. She nodded.

Arno added, before he let his hand fall from her shoulder, “You may ask anything of us. Anything we can do for you, we will. Let us serve you tonight.”

Camille drew a deep breath. She could not delay any longer, nor did she care to do so. “The guards at the outer walls change in the hours before dawn. We will leave then, both of you and Sylvie and I, and we will—” She hesitated the barest moment, remembering Henri with a rush of affection. “The stableboy is loyal to me. He will help us to hide until we can go.” If Michel discovered what the boy had done…and she was gone, and all her most treasured servants and horses…no. She could not abandon him to that. “The boy Henri will come with us, as well.”

Kaspar knelt before her, touching his forehead to her foot. “As you commanded, all is prepared for a rapid escape. I will follow you, Your Grace.”

“Arno?”

The younger guard knelt beside Kaspar. “Your Grace, I—I think I should not go. Not at first.”

Kaspar sucked in an audible breath.

“Don’t,” Arno said, touching Kaspar’s arm. Camille watched the interplay keenly; Kaspar did not look at him. Because he thought Arno’s plan unwise, or out of fear for his friend?

Arno said, “Someone will need to gather information, about pursuit. I could come to you later, on the road, or send someone I can trust. It is better me. You see, Vilmos will protect me. His mother was my mother’s cousin. It is not his fault I was cut, and ever since he found me he has watched over me. Also, now he owes you something as well, and will speak for you among the palace guard. I would not flaunt my presence in the palace. I have friends in the town.”

“Your Grace, he would be in grave danger from the duke,” Kaspar argued. “It is true, Vilmos’s loyalty to the duke is not strong, but—”

Camille’s suspicions were confirmed. Vilmos was not utterly enamored of her husband. She said to Arno, “It is more risk than I should ask you to bear.”

“It is your right to ask me to go to my death,” Arno said. “I do not think this will be my death.”

Camille thought. Kaspar was distressed, but Arno was correct. Arno’s actions might save them all from death. She nodded, once. “Arno will stay. We will have Henri to help care for the horses on the journey.”

Kaspar closed his eyes for a moment, then opened them. He bent and kissed her foot.

Camille and her guards packed the few personal items they would take with them; the rest would be retrieved from a hiding place outside the palace walls. They quickly finished, but nearly six hours still stretched out before they could depart.

Camille said, “We will let Sylvie sleep a while longer, then send her to the stables to find the boy. Until then, you must also rest.”

“Your Grace,” Kaspar said. “Let us serve you tonight.”

Custom encouraged using eunuchs for sexual pleasure. In all their time together, Camille had never asked. She’d been loyal to Michel, even after he’d betrayed her a thousand times. This afternoon, she’d betrayed him with Henri. To do this with her eunuchs—one of whom would go into desperate danger for her sake—seemed suddenly to loom as an important mark of how she’d changed. Also, it would be better than lying in her bed alone, staring at the ceiling and worrying herself to flinders. She said, “Thanks to you both. I would like that, very much.”

She let Kaspar take her hand and lead her to her bedchamber, Arno trailing behind.

Kaspar lit tapers on her nightstand and dressing table; after she sat down on her bed, Arno knelt and removed her slippers. The stubble on his skull glinted gold in the candlelight. He set the slippers aside but remained at her feet, his head bowed, the nape of his neck vulnerable.

When several seconds passed and he did not move, Camille said, “What is it, Arno?”

He shook his head, then bowed lower and kissed the tops of her feet, more sensually than Kaspar had done, warm damp pressure that sent tingles up her legs. She reached down and laid her palm on the crown of Arno’s head. His skin was hot, his stubble like a cat’s tongue and so pleasant to touch that she rubbed her hand over all of it that she could reach, ending with a tug at his ear. She sat back on her elbows. “Both of you, join me.”

“If I may, Your Grace?” Kaspar asked. He indicated his weapons. She nodded, and he divested himself of his harness, laying his throwing knife on her night table and his swords on the carpet next to her bed. Arno did the same.

Her two guards did not completely disrobe; they never had done so in her sight, and she had not liked to demand that of them. Kaspar kept his loose trousers, and Arno his long drawers. She wasn’t sure if their modesty was meant to protect them from her gaze or to protect her from having to see that they were not whole men. She thought of telling them that it did not matter, but then another reason occurred to her; perhaps they meant to reassure her of their intent. What they did was for her and not for them.

Kaspar untied her belt, pushed her robe from her shoulders, and lifted her in his arms, something he had never done before. He cradled her against his bare chest while Arno marshaled pillows into a nest, all without speaking. She wanted to turn into him—it had been years since she’d been held like this—but could not quite bring herself to do it and reveal her need. Just then, Kaspar’s hand cupped the back of her head and pressed her face into his shoulder. She closed her eyes. His thumb rubbed the back of her neck, his fingers tangling in her hair. “A moment longer,” he murmured.

His voice was lighter than a whole man’s but comforting all the same. What made him less than whole? The loss of his stones? She did not have a man’s stones, either. And in many ways, Kaspar was a better man than her husband, though such a thing could never be spoken. She wondered if either eunuch truly cared for her. If not, their pretense was infinitely better than whatever the duke felt.

Arno took her from Kaspar’s arms and laid her on the pillows. She sank into the pile of velvet and satin, so soft that she would have difficulty if she tried to struggle out, but she did not want to struggle. Her head lolled as Arno began to massage one of her legs, Kaspar the other, beginning at her toes and working up her foot to her calf. They both had considerable skill. Perhaps—probably—they did this for each other. Whom else did they have?

Her mind drifted, seeking refuge and rest in pure sensation. When her guards’ hands reached her knees, Arno continued upward, his big hands squeezing the taut muscles at the tops of her thighs and sweeping his thumbs over her hip bones.

The bed shifted as Kaspar departed, only to return a few moments later with a ewer and bowl, and a cloth folded over his forearm. Arno slid his hands intimately close and pressed open her lower lips. Camille closed her eyes as Kaspar bathed her in rose water, teasing her tender skin with friction from the cloth and trickles of water. She shifted restlessly against Arno’s hands, then tensed when the next pressure against her came from Kaspar’s tongue. At first flinching at the intensity, she soon twisted her hips, seeking more. “Use your finger, please,” she said. Kaspar’s finger nudged at her opening and she swallowed a cry.

Arno bent close and licked the shell of her ear. “What is your desire, Your Grace?” he asked. “Command me.”

“My breasts,” she said. “Suckle my breasts.”

Arno teased her nipples at first with light flicks of his tongue, but soon, in response to her arching back, pinched one between his lips and pulled, rolling her other nipple between his fingertips. Each squeeze stabbed her belly, pleasure sharp as that of Kaspar’s thick, calloused finger rubbing inside of her. She panted against the knots twisting her insides. “More,” she said.

Arno palmed her breasts and squeezed. She balanced on a web of tension. Kaspar could not reach deeply enough to cut her free. She gasped for air and pushed into his hand, but could not come.

“Arno,” she said. “In the drawer. By the bed. The ivory carving.”

Kaspar looked up. She gestured for him to stop what he was doing. He lifted his head but did not remove his fingers from her quim. His eyes had gone dark, and his forehead was sheened with sweat. She could see her own fluids shining around his lips. He said, “I have used such carvings before, Your Grace. Will you allow me to demonstrate for Arno?”

Camille breathed, forcing her heart to slow its gallop. Slowly, her desperation receded. “You will work together,” she said.

Kaspar bowed, his forehead touching her knee. “I am yours to command.”

The duke had given her the ivory cock in a fit of scorn. She had never used it, from anger at its source and from not wanting to be seen by her maids. Now, it was a further weapon against her husband, providing for her what he did not.

Kaspar took the carving from its drawer and extracted it from its layers of linen wrappings. It looked larger than she remembered, even cradled in Kaspar’s giant hands. “Arno,” she said. “Fetch the oil in the red bottle.”

Arno knew to look in the carved cabinet where her maids kept her bath and massage oils. He then went to the fire and poured heated water from the copper kettle into a bowl, to warm the oil. He carried bowl and bottle to her, and she removed its stopper, a spiral of red glass twisted with blue. “Lay the stopper on the linen,” she said. In the meantime, Kaspar warmed the ivory cock in the water, as well.

“Arno, perhaps you could apply the oil to me, inside and out,” she said. “Kaspar, then show us how you have seen one of these used. Arno will pay close attention, and perhaps take a turn if he finds himself intrigued.”

“And you, Your Grace?” Kaspar asked, with the barest hint of humor.

“I hope to be otherwise occupied,” she said.

Kaspar said, “If you will permit me, Your Grace?” He climbed onto the bed and knelt beside her. He laid the ivory cock on the coverlet and pressed her shoulders, encouraging her to lie back in her nest of pillows. “I will hold the bottle for now,” he said. Arno gave the oil to him and slid onto the bed. He placed his hands on her knees, pressing them apart so he could slide closer. Camille could hear his rapid breathing. She looked up into his face and saw his eyes were wide and dark.

He was afraid, she realized. He was not thinking of what he was doing now, but of what would become of him once she and Kaspar and Sylvie had escaped. He needed encouragement. She signaled Kaspar with her eyes.

Kaspar used his free hand to gently rub Arno’s bare shoulder. He leaned over and kissed Arno’s cheekbone. “Stroke her as you would stroke the petals of a flower.”

Arno said, his hands still cupping her knees, “Would you like that, Your Grace?”

“Yes,” she said. She let her knees fall open another fraction. “You may pour the oil as you wish.”

Kaspar tipped the bottle over her belly. It trickled onto her abdomen and down like the touch of fingers, trickling into the creases between her legs and slicking her mound.

“Now his hands,” she said. Arno cupped his hands as if to receive an offering, and Kaspar bathed his palms in oil.

“Gently,” Kaspar said.

Camille wasn’t sure what he meant by that, but the thought evaporated as Arno laid his hands on her, one hand cupping her mound and the other pressing into her lower belly with a tender pressure like two bodies joined.

She was already swollen from their earlier attentions; Arno’s finger nudged between her lower lips, and her breath caught. “Two fingers,” she said. “Spread the oil deeply within.”

Arno obeyed, his breathing rough but his fingers gentle. Closing her eyes made the sensation too intense. She focused on the ivory cock Kaspar was warming against his chest. Then he bent low and their eyes met. “Now, Your Grace?”

At first she could not speak, only nod. She swallowed and said, “Now.”

Arno moved aside, though he still held her thighs apart. Kaspar oiled the carving, knelt between her knees, and eased its rounded head inside her. When her breath rushed out, he sheathed it fully in her passage. Her bodily tension was such that the stimulation was sweet to the point of pain. She could wait no longer.

“Quickly,” she commanded. Kaspar gave her short, harsh thrusts with a twisting motion that in moments had her back arching off the bed, straining with her whole body toward her climax. Soon she could strangle her cries no longer as she shuddered in release, gasping with each fierce spasm.

Arno leaned to Kaspar and kissed him, at first gently and then hungrily. Camille might have wondered at it, had she not been so limp with fatigue and afterglow. She held out her arms, and was soon surrounded by their warmth and comforting bulk. Each kissed her in turn, a brief, warm pressure. She slept then, deeply, and woke to find Kaspar kneeling beside the bed, dressed again and weaponed, waiting for her to awaken.

“Your Grace,” he said. “Sylvie is here. I have sent Arno for a few small items, and to dress in ordinary clothes.”

Sylvie wore only a robe, her long hair escaping from a messy braid, her cheek creased from her pillow. “Madame,” she said. “What is this that Kaspar tells me? We are to bring the stableboy with us?”

“Yes. He offered his services of his own free will. You are to tell him, for me, that I have need of him now. He is to bring the horses, and a pack mule, and all necessary supplies for them. You recall I mentioned the breeding barn as a good hiding place before we can set out. He will know the best ways to conceal us there, and will be useful in other ways, as well.”

“Other ways—madame—”

“Do not forget yourself, Sylvie. You knew I might not get immediately with child.”

Sylvie flushed. “Yes, madame. I will do as you’ve ordered. I worry, however—”

“I will worry for all of us.”

As soon as Sylvie had dressed and slipped out to find Henri, Kaspar draped Camille in a hooded cloak. “Could you run while wearing it, Your Grace?”

She tested the drape, then gathered up swaths of fabric. Beneath it, she wore a riding habit with a man’s jacket to conceal her shape. She felt confined, but she could move. “I will do what is necessary,” she said, as Kaspar shrugged on a shirt over his knife harness and fastened its ties up the front. He looked different with his hairless chest covered: bigger and more solid. Arno came back into the room, pushed up Kaspar’s sleeves, and strapped on wrist harnesses for a pair of short-bladed knives, while Kaspar gave him what seemed to be a long catalog of instructions, delivered in so low a murmur that Camille could not discern his words.

She turned away from their colloquy and cast a final glance around her rooms. She might never return here again. She might be caught and killed on the journey. If she could not unseat Michel, she might die while facing him. It ought to be better, she reflected, to know one might die while in the midst of action, better than by being passively led to the block, but she could not muster any pleasure at the thought of simply avoiding execution to die in some other way. Dying was dying, and she did not want to die. She’d just begun to have a stirring of hope that life could be better.

Arno removed his nondescript soft cap and came to kneel before her. She kissed the top of his head and drew him to his feet, tugging his head down to kiss each of his cheeks then, formally, his mouth. She said, holding his gaze, “I do not want you to die for me, Arno. You will take care.”

“I will, Your Grace,” he said. “I should go now, when I will not be remarked.”

Camille took his hand and folded his fingers over her signet ring. It looked like a doll’s jewelry in his enormous hand. “You will do well,” she said. “You may go.”

After Arno had gone, Kaspar slung the larger of their bags across his massive shoulders. He reached for Camille’s smaller bag, but she forestalled him. “I would prefer your hands be ready for weapons,” she explained, taking her own bag herself. “We cannot stand on ceremony for the entire journey, not without drawing attention to ourselves.”

“Very well, Your Grace.” Kaspar laid a hand on her shoulder, guiding her toward the concealed door used by her maids. Camille’s heart sped up. She was truly leaving.

She had not traveled these corridors since her youth, when she’d snuck all over the palace for assignations with Maxime. The servants’ paths seemed smaller and darker now than they had then, and unnaturally silent as her riding boots tapped the scarred wooden flooring. The walls between these corridors and the chambers beyond were, by design, thick enough to conceal sounds as loud as rattling carts of porcelain dishes, so she did not need to feel nervous, but logical thought didn’t ease her mind. The air felt close, thick with the reek of burning tallow candles. Their smoke lodged in her throat.

Kaspar’s voice startled her. “Thérèse will not come to make up the fires for another hour,” he said. “Until then, these corridors are usually deserted.”

“And the paths leading outside the walls?” she asked. Even as a young girl, she had not slipped out of the palace at night, thanks to the guardianship of the eunuch Jarman.

“Those paths are less safe,” Kaspar admitted. “Sometimes they are quite busy with guardsmen and courtiers returning from the Dewy Rose, paid companions going back to their homes, and the like. I will guard you, Your Grace.”

Camille wished she could guard herself; she chafed at the need for circumspection. It felt cowardly, and she’d had enough of being a coward. She hadn’t been brave enough to confront Michel; she’d had the opportunity, but done nothing to take advantage of it. Next time, she told herself, she would not be so cautious. Next time, she would work from a position of strength.

Kaspar led her on a direct route to the palace’s main rear entrance. At the door, he reached to readjust the hood of her cloak. Camille brushed his hand away. “I am not a child,” she said, more sharply than she’d intended. Kaspar inclined his head, then loosened his right-handed sword in its sheath. He pressed his ear to the door before easing it open.

Darkness and cool air rushed in, carrying a rich scent of damp earth and crushed grass. Camille inhaled deeply, feeling the outdoors like a tingle of freedom on her skin. She fought a sudden urge to run full tilt into the starlight and roll in the greenery. Instead, she tried to steady her breathing as she stared beneath Kaspar’s massive arm and into the darkness. Distantly, she heard voices, resolving into a rumble of male ribaldry. Three men? Four? She heard a distinctive jingle—a chain-mail hauberk—and shrank back.

Kaspar tugged her forward. “Come. We must be out before they enter.”

Camille let him pull her out the door and to the left, staying in the wall’s shadow. A stretch of open grass, punctuated by a few sleeping cows, might as well have been a moat; they would easily be seen crossing it. The rear boundary wall reared beyond. In the illumination cast by their lantern, the shadows of four guardsmen loomed black against the wall’s gleaming white marble.

“Hold still,” Kaspar murmured, pressing her into a crouch next to the palace wall. Her dark cloak would melt into the dark granite, she hoped. He let his bag slide off his shoulder, next to her, and stepped into the light.

Trembling, Camille watched from beneath the hood of her cloak. Eunuchs were forbidden to venture outside the palace alone, and though she’d bent that rule before, there was no guarantee the guardsmen would do the same. If they decided to imprison Kaspar for the night, she could still make her way to the breeding barn alone, but retrieving Kaspar would be difficult, and delay their departure significantly. If the guards decided to escort him back to her chambers, and found her gone, it would be a disaster.

“Ho!” the smallest of the guardsmen called. “Kaspar!”

Worse and worse. Camille recognized the voice—Léopold, one of Michel’s personal honor guard, who reported directly to him. He stopped in the middle of the graveled path, hands planted on hips. “What’s amiss, eunuch? Searching for your manhood among the cowpats?”

“’Hap you can find it with them catamites at the Dewy Rose,” another said, and belched. A third guard cuffed him on the side of the head and murmured something, which led to a brief scuffle between the two.

Ignoring the byplay, Kaspar said, “I’m in search of Vilmos. Have you seen him?”

“Fucking His Grace, most like,” Léopold said, his perpetual sneer audible in his voice. “I’d leave his service first.”

The fourth guardsman spoke. “Better fucking His Grace than losing his ballocks.”

Kaspar said, his tone cool, “Better without ballocks than buggering His Grace’s filthy arse.”

If Kaspar provoked them into killing him, Camille would kill him again. She closed her eyes as insults began to fly faster and more foully, soon succeeded by the meaty smack of fists on flesh; the crash of the lantern being dropped; the thumps of large bodies hitting the ground; grunts and curses and panting. After a few minutes, she opened her eyes and found that two of the guardsmen were dragging Kaspar off Léopold’s supine form. The last guardsman doubled over in the grass, vomiting.

“You’d better be off before Léopold comes to,” one of them said. Camille recognized his voice: Rodrigue, another of Michel’s honor guard. “Eugène, you, too. You can’t afford any more trouble. Weren’t you due on duty at dawn?” Eugène cursed and sprinted for the door into the palace. Camille winced as the door slammed shut behind him.

“Thanks,” Kaspar said.

“You’d better be off to Her Grace, in case Léopold takes it into his head to make trouble,” Rodrigue said, bending to hoist Léopold over his shoulder. He snagged the fourth guardsman by the sleeve and then shoved him toward the door. “If I see Vilmos, I will let him know you asked after him. Take the lantern, will you?”

“My thanks, again.” Kaspar stood watching as Rodrigue and his drunken companion maneuvered Léopold through the narrow door, thumping his head against the wall more than once in the process. Then he wiped his sleeve across his face; in the lantern light, Camille saw a dark stain of blood beneath his nose.

Slowly, she unkinked her back and stood, propping one hand against the wall. Kaspar looked in her direction and snuffed the lantern. She heard his shoes crunching on gravel, then a clank as he set the lantern on the ground, next to the door. Camille took a deep breath and joined him. Softly, she said, “Thank you.”

Kaspar said, “Léopold might be trouble.”

“Then we’d best hurry.”

His hand took hers in the darkness, and as he led her to the rear gate, Camille felt a rising joy. Soon she would be free.

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