Dark Triumph - LaFevers Robin (бесплатная регистрация книга .TXT) 📗

I will leave this place, leave Mortain’s service. I have warned the duchess of d’Albret’s plans. Once I have told them all that I know about his intent to infiltrate their defenses, my duty is done. And my duty to Mortain? I snort like one of Guion’s pigs. Look what my service to Him has gotten me so far.

Heartened by this decision, I reach behind and begin to unlace my gown, thrilled to be able to step out of its grubby drabness. I walk naked to the tub and am pleased to find the water scented with lavender and rosemary. The duchess, at least, is not stingy with her hospitality. Slowly, and with a great sigh of contentment, I lower myself into the water.

The heavy curtains are drawn against the cold winter winds, and the room is lit only by the fire burning in the hearth and a brace of beeswax candles. As I sit there, I imagine all of my anger being drawn from me and let it flow out of me into the warm scented water, for I will not be able to make effective plans if my vision is clouded by my own anger. I lean forward and dunk my entire head so that I may wash it, too. Who knows what vermin I have picked up over the last few days’ travels?

Just when I pull my head back up and am rubbing the drips out of my eyes, there is a soft knock at the door. “Sybella?”

At the sound of Ismae’s voice, I call, “Come in.”

The door opens, then closes as Ismae hurries into the room. “I’ve brought you some clean clothes,” she says, pointedly not looking at me naked in the bathtub.

Her familiar modesty cheers me, and I lean back and place my arms along the sides of the tub, fully exposing my breasts, just to fluster her. However, she knows me too well and simply rolls her eyes at me. “Would you like me to wash your hair for you?”

I find that I would, surprised at how much I missed the kind, gentle touch of friendship. Because I want it so much, I only shrug. “If you wish.” I do not think she is fooled, for she plucks an empty ewer from one of the tables and moves behind me.

We are both silent as the warm water sluices down my head and falls across my back. “I have been so very worried about you,” she whispers. “Annith checked the crows daily for word of your whereabouts and safety, but there was nothing. And no matter how many doors she listened at, she could not catch a whiff of where you’d been sent or what your assignment was. When you didn’t come back for months, we began to fear the worst.”

“And now you know. I was sent to d’Albret.”

Behind me, I feel a shudder run through Ismae’s body. “I do not understand how the abbess could ask that of anyone.”

For a moment, a brief, reckless moment, I consider telling Ismae the truth—that it was my own family I was sent back to—but I am not sure I am willing to risk it, not even with her.

“I must write to Annith. She will be so relieved to hear you are safe. She’s checked every message that’s come to the convent since you left, desperate for news of you. Better still, once you are rested enough, you should write her yourself.”

“I will,” I say, halfheartedly, for the plain truth is, I am jealous of Annith, safe and snug behind the convent’s walls. I have never envied her special place in the convent’s heart more than I do now. “Has she been sent out yet, or is she still waiting in vain for her first assignment?”

Ismae hands me a linen towel with which to dry myself. “How did you guess that all this time, they never intended to let her set foot out of the convent? I received a message from her just after you left for Nantes.” She takes a step closer to me. “Sybella, they mean to make her the convent’s new seeress. Sister Vereda is ill, and they want Annith to take her place.”

Is that why there was no order to kill d’Albret? Not only could I not see it, but neither could Sister Vereda? “At least she will be safe,” I say, thinking of how often I longed to be back behind those thick, cloistered walls.

“Safe?” Ismae asks sharply. “Or suffocated? If memory serves, you could hardly bear being held behind those walls for three years, let alone the rest of your life.”

I wince at the memory and cannot help but marvel at how hard I worked to escape the convent when I first arrived. I remember Nantes, d’Albret slaying those loyal servants, the look of terror in Tilde’s eyes, and the scratching at my own door. “More fool I,” I say quietly.

As she helps me into a clean gown, the look on Ismae’s face softens. “Assigned to d’Albret’s household, you have faced more horrors than any of us. But truly, Sybella, I do not think you understand how hard it is to be left behind, to feel as if you will never be given a chance to prove yourself or make a contribution. Especially for one such as Annith, who has trained for this her entire life.”

“She would not survive a fortnight outside those walls,” I say, my voice harsh.

Ismae sends me a disappointed look. “She will never know now, will she?”

Since I do not have the heart to argue with her, I change the subject. “What is between you and Duval?”

She makes herself very busy pouring us each a goblet of wine. “What makes you think there is something between us?”

“The way you look at each other. That and the fact that you listened to him when he told you you could not kill whomever you were talking about. So, do you love him?”

Ismae nearly drops the goblet she is handing me. “Sybella!”

“You are in love.” I take the goblet and sip the wine, trying to decide what I think about that.

“What makes you say such a thing?” she asks.

“You are blushing, for one.”

She fiddles with the stem of her goblet. “Mayhap I am embarrassed you would ask such forward questions.”

“Oh, do not be such a stick-in-the-mud. Besides, remember who taught you how to kiss. Duval has much to thank me for.”

Unable to restrain herself, Ismae picks up the wet towel and throws it at me. “It is complicated,” she says.

For some reason, I think of Beast. I swirl the wine in my goblet. “It always is,” I say, then drain the cup.

“He’s asked me to be his wife.”

This surprises me, but it also makes me like the man more. “Are you not still married to the pig farmer?”

“No. It was never consummated, and the reverend mother had it annulled the second year I was at the convent.”

“What did you tell him?”

“That I would think about it. For, while I love him, and will do so always, it is very hard to give anyone that kind of power over me again.”

“What did the reverend mother say?”

Ismae wrinkles her nose and refills her goblet. “It is just one of the reasons I have fallen so far out of her favor.”

“You? But next to Annith, you were her favorite.”

“No.” Ismae gives a firm shake of her head. “It was not I who was her favorite, but the blind, adoring acolyte that she loved.”

And that is when I know just how fully Ismae has changed.

Before we can talk further, there is a knock at the door. Ismae answers it, and a whispered, urgent conversation takes place before she closes the door and turns back to me. “The council meeting will not be resumed until tomorrow. The duchess’s sister has taken a turn for the worse, and the duchess wishes me to mix a sleeping draft for her.”

I arch an eyebrow. “You are a poisons mistress, not some healer for hire.”

Ismae gives me a sad smile. “It is a dance with Death, nevertheless.”

Chapter Twenty-Five

SINCE I AM DRESSED IN one of Ismae’s habits, the guard at the palace door salutes respectfully and makes no move to prevent my leaving. I step out into the cold night air and head toward a bridge that is lit by a sparse row of torches whose light is reflected in the dark water below.

It also leads to the convent where Beast is being held. I need to assure myself that I did not bring him all this way only to have him expire while in the sisters of Saint Brigantia’s care.