Ten
Cassandra woke to the sound of a haunting melody and the feel of warm arms about her. Her eyes fluttered open to the sight of her husband's beautiful calm face. She caught a flicker of emotion in those midnight eyes, a sadness that startled and confused her. He blinked, and they returned to their usual cold hardness, but Cass still sensed something vaguely different in his demeanor.
"What the hell did you think you were you doing?" he said in dulcet tones.
Cass sat up, and he dropped his arms, moving a bit away from her. "Where am I?" she asked, knowing perfectly well the answer, for the melody she'd heard from within the walls of the garden now rang clearly in her ears. But it gave her time to collect herself, and she glanced around with wide eyes.
The storm she'd predicted had broken, and they sheltered in a pavilion that looked to be made of marble but felt soft and pliable beneath her bottom. The rain created a sheer curtain beyond the roof and fell atop what she thought might be flowers of some sort, but their flat, round surface also reminded her of drums, except that when the rain beat upon them, they made ringing notes. The wind blew strongly now, and the whistling she'd heard before accompanied the ringing in harmony, and she searched for the source of that sound, her eyes widening even more as she discovered it.
The wind lifted the lavender petals of a plant and expanded them into long tubes that appeared to produce that whistling sound. As they waved and danced with the breeze the harmony changed, like the way fingers on a flute produced different notes. Just beyond that bed of flowers lay a patch of scarlet petals shaped like bells, the wind swaying them and producing the sound of thousands of tinkling chimes.
Cassandra looked up at Dominic in wonder. "Is this what Elfhame is truly like?"
His usually unexpressive face softened, and again Cass thought she detected an odd sort of sadness intermingled with anger before he quickly looked away and leaned against a pillar, the surface giving slightly with his weight. "I suppose."
Lady Cassandra stood and walked to the edge of the pavilion, breathing in the strange scents while her brain tried to match them with something familiar to her. Honey and roses, cinnamon and vanilla… perhaps clove and brandy? A myriad of fragrances she couldn't identify, and yet they seemed somehow familiar…
She glanced over her shoulder at her husband. "It smells like you."
He blinked, a sweep of long black lashes. "I come here often."
Cassandra looked out over the garden. Strange trees shaped into perfect circles, peculiar bushes growing in neat rows, white sparkling stones raked into smooth grooves, still ponds beneath miniature waterfalls, and clustered betwixt and between, tidy beds of bizarre flowers. "It's so… orderly."
"Indeed." His voice dropped so low, Cass strained to hear his next words above the sound of the music. "Father once told me that's why he made this place. To remind him of what he left behind."
She turned and faced him. "He must miss his homeland very much."
"Father finds order very boring, Lady Cassandra."
She frowned, trying to puzzle that out, but he moved closer to her and her body tingled with awareness and she lost her thought. He wore no coat, just fawn breeches tucked into brown boots and a white linen shirt carelessly buttoned, revealing his smooth throat and the upper contours of his muscular chest. The cloth, and even his leather boots, had been punctured and torn, a testament to the fight he'd waged to save her from the vine guardian.
"What are you doing here?"
She blurted the truth. "Looking for you."
"Why?" He reached out for her hand, fingering the damp sleeve of her gown, revealing the jagged tears in the fabric from the grip of those deadly vines. "It could have killed you, you know."
Cass shuddered. "This place. Everywhere I turn there are hidden dangers. How do you manage to live like this?"
"You get used to it." His beautiful face lay perilously close to her own. "What do you want from me?" he murmured.
Cassandra looked into the devil's face. If only he didn't have the beauty of an angel, her body might not have betrayed her. All thought of the Rebellion and her task and even the plight of England faded from her mind. She almost hated herself for the way she longed for him, and shyness made her admit it in a roundabout manner. She blushed. "You have been neglecting your duty."
He narrowed those deep black eyes. "I forget you're anxious to secure your place here as mother to my children."
Fie, she liked that excuse. "Indeed. I do not want to give your father a reason to be angry with me."
"Father's anger is nothing to fear. His boredom and suspicion are another matter." He stepped away from her, leaned casually against the pillar again, looking out over the garden. The wind plastered his linen shirt against his chest, blew his loose silver hair in streams behind his elegantly pointed ears. "But you needn't have worried. Father's attention is… elsewhere."
Cassandra hugged her shoulders. The temperature had dropped considerably with the storm, but her chill came from his manner. "He left the palace?"
"Aye."
"What for?"
"That's none of your concern. You should have just been grateful his absence allowed me to stay away from you."
She should never have admitted to herself that she was half in love with him. That realization prevented her from dismissing his rejection as she once had… and suddenly Cass could no longer keep up any pretense with him. She felt as if he'd run a dagger through her heart, and she allowed her voice to reflect her feelings. "I did not believe you found your duty so distasteful."
He continued to stare at the falling rain, but his muscular shoulders stiffened beneath the white linen. "Do not—"
"I am a fool," confessed Cassandra. "I thought you found pleasure with me. Despite everything… I thought you had come to care a bit for me." Why had she even imagined she could ever mean anything to him? She collapsed on the soft surface of the pavilion, hugging her shoulders even harder.
"Stop this," commanded Dominic.
"What?" Cass almost laughed. "Admitting what a simpleton I've been? I should have listened when you told me you had no human feeling. But I have no standard to judge a man, no experience with courtship and love games. Instead, I run after you like some love-struck little schoolgirl. I allow myself to become a laughingstock among the ton."
He turned toward her then; she could feel his eyes upon her but she refused to look up into that cold black gaze.
"You do not understand," he whispered.
"Oh, but I do. This shall be my final lesson, sir. I should thank you, I suppose, for teaching me the different ways a man can tell falsehoods with his touch."
"Stop it," he commanded again. She felt him crouch next to her. His warm hands fell on her shoulders and gave her a gentle shake. "I can bear no more of this."
Cass nodded. Oh, how well she understood. His embarrassment from her declarations surely equaled her humiliation in having stated them. She took a deep breath, gathering her composure. A fine spy she made. She had let her heart interfere with her task when she knew all along that her marriage to Dominic could be nothing but a falsehood. She had handled this very badly.
"Cassandra." He breathed her name like a benediction. She finally looked up at him, and her heart stopped. That controlled mask of his had crumbled. Cass felt as if the man who had made love to her within the shelter of their curtained bed now faced her in broad daylight. Finally she could fully see the true nature of the man she'd married.
Those deep black eyes shimmered with warmth. "You are a little fool for making me care for you."
And he gathered her into his arms, the heat of his body taking the chill from the air. And then he kissed her, so tenderly it took the chill from her heart. Her heart, oh, had she heard him aright? Did he say he cared for her? The elven half-breed who possessed no human feelings? Cass wrapped her arms around him and kissed him back with all the wonder and delight that she possessed. The wind played with her hair and the melody of the garden sang with her heart, and for one glorious moment she forgot herself in the warmth of her husband's embrace.
And then he pulled away from her mouth and gazed into her eyes. She'd had only glimpses before, but now he revealed his entire soul in those black crystalline depths, and it stunned her.
"You have completely destroyed my last desperate attempt to protect you," he said.
"I-I don't understand."
Dominic smoothed the hair away from her cheeks. "I know. And I will tell you, for I'm done fighting this thing between us." He sighed and sat down next to her, keeping her within the circle of his arms. "Ador was right… and very wrong, for I think I started to feel again from the moment I first kissed you. In that one single act you unraveled years of effort in burying my human heart."
Lady Cassandra's head spun. She looked up into his face, trying to fathom his words. What did Mor'ded's dragon-steed know of her? She feared to ask. "But why would you do such a thing?"
"Because everyone I have ever held dear has been used against me. And I swore to myself no one would ever suffer again because of me."
Cass shivered, and he pulled her closer. "Your father," she guessed.
"Indeed. Have I told you that your intelligence is one of the things I admire about you?"
"You certainly have not."
He smiled down at her and her stomach did funny little flips. She still couldn't quite believe that he truly cared for her. Cassandra, the little brown wren.
Dominic turned his face away then, a frown tightening his mouth. "You deduced that we might be spied upon in the palace. Did you not wonder who?"
"There are too many factions within the ton to guess."
"The nobles, ha. As if they would have the means or power to threaten me."
Cassandra wondered what he might think if he knew of the Rebellion. No, best not to pursue that. Not yet. She would be selfish and enjoy this closeness before she made any confessions that might completely destroy it. "Your father, then. But why?"
"Oddly enough, because he fears me. He fears I have the power of black fire, the most potent of his magics. And I think he might be right."
Cass glanced around the pavilion, the rain that still curtained them in, the music of the garden that muffled their words, and still her heart jumped. "Do not say such things. What if he's spying on us now?"
"I told you; his attention is elsewhere."
Still, she lowered her voice to a whisper. "What is this black fire?"
"It's the fire that burns in the mind, and all the more powerful for that."
"But wouldn't he have discovered that unusual gift at your trials? And if you indeed possessed it, wouldn't you have been sent to Elfhame?"
"Sent to Elfhame," he whispered as if to himself and then shook his silvery blond head, raised his voice again. "Ah, dear wife. I cannot use the black fire. It's been hidden from me, and therefore my father cannot find it. But he suspects. I am the strongest champion of all the elven lords, and this makes him fearful. He does not want to find his tool able to turn against him."
Cassandra gripped her hands tightly in her lap. She could not believe Dominic finally spoke to her about his life, finally decided to trust her. Perhaps he had not been able to before, if he feared that his father spied upon them.
She no longer cared about the Rebellion or Sir Robert. She considered only Dominic, how tormented he seemed, and that if only she knew more about him she could in some way help. And she sensed more… "What does he do to you?"
"We are all given a trial at puberty, when our gifts appear the strongest. Don't you remember yours?"
"Vaguely. I felt challenged. As if that black scepter of your father's attacked me and I had to defend myself. And then… then I danced, and your father laughed, and it was done."
Dominic dropped his head, that thick silvery hair falling over his cheeks, the wind twisting it to hide his face. But not before Cassandra saw his tortured expression. "The more powerful the magic, the greater the challenge. When Father suspected I might be hiding my gifts from him, he tried using… stronger incentives. He thought… he thought I would reveal myself to save those whom I cherished."
"Mongrel," breathed Cass. So that's how his pet had died. And Cook had mentioned his best friend… "Jack?"
Dominic did not ask how she knew of him too. His shoulders slumped with a pain she could only imagine. "In a fit of rage, I once tried to run my sword through my father. Jack paid the price for it."
No wonder he took such care to control his emotions. Cass could not comprehend what he had gone through watching his friend burn and being unable to stop it. She reached out and caressed his cheek, and he turned his face into her palm for a moment, and she could only feel grateful that her touch seemed to bring him some comfort.
Dominic straightened. "But I could not find the magic within me," he continued, "no matter how hard I tried. I could not save them. And now…"
He raised his head and Cass stared into eyes that resembled black velvet.
"And now I can't be sure if I'll be able to save you."
Cass felt humbled. All this time he'd been protecting her by treating her with disdain, by trying to keep his distance from her. And yet he'd come to care for her anyway. It occurred to her she'd done the same, trying to avoid involving her emotions with him, telling herself she only sought his affection because she wanted to use him. And she'd been just as unsuccessful as he.
The last two people in England who could afford to desire each other had managed to do so, despite their best efforts not to. He had not said that he loved her; indeed, she couldn't be sure his elven blood would even allow him that deeper feeling. But she knew she loved him. And she couldn't help but wonder if her love would be strong enough for what would come.