Prince Ligurio of Monteverde had been dead three months, but for years before he drew his last breath, Melanthe had upheld her husband's place and powers. As he declined into illness and vulnerability, she had defended him by the methods he had taught her himself. He it was who had schooled her to guard her back, who had been her father from the age of twelve when a terrified child had left England to wed a man thirty years her senior; he who had ordered her to deal with the Riata, to tantalize Gian Navona—because the triangle would always hold, there would always be the houses of Riata and Navona and Monteverde like wolves prowling about the same quarry.
Now Prince Ligurio was gone. The triangle of power fell in upon itself, leaving Melanthe between the wolves and the fortune of Monteverde.
She relinquished it to them. She did not want Monteverde, but to yield her claim was as perilous as to contend for it. Like a fox making for a safe earth, she must dodge and deceive and look always behind her as she escaped.
She had bargained with Riata—safe passage to a nunnery in England, in exchange for her quitclaim to Monteverde. She had bargained with Allegreto's father: she had smiled at Gian Navona and promised to be his wife, gladly—so gladly that she would even travel to England first, to confirm her inheritance there, that she might bring that prize, too, with her to their marriage bed.
Promise and promise and promise. They were made to betray, in layer upon layer of deception.
She kept only one, if she died for it. To herself. She was going home—to England and to Bowland. The fox escaped to earth.
"I am displeased with thy interference," she said to Allegreto. "Thou dost not understand the English. If thou thought to discourage the duke by such a challenge—it has done no more than place him so that he must prove his devotion, and now tomorrow I must spurn him yet again."
"I know aught of these boorish English manners, my lady," he said with light malice, "if a man must thrust his attention upon a lady without her encouragement."
"Save thy indignation for a fool who meddles in his mistress's business. I had my own intent with regard to Lancaster."
Allegreto merely grinned at the rebuke. "Not to take him in marriage, lady, so I hope."
"If he will not bring himself to the point and ask, I cannot take him, can I?"
"He will," Allegreto said. He made a mock bow. "But my lady's grace would not break my father's loving heart that has bided so long in silent hope."
Melanthe returned his salute with an affectionate smile. "I will not have Lancaster at any price—but Allegreto, my love—when next thou dost write to thy father, tell Gian that in truth, thou art such a tender gentle boy, there are moments I should rather take thee to husband in his stead."
Allegreto's face did not change. He maintained the pleasant curve of his lips, his dark eyes fathomless. "I would not be so foolish, my lady. That price has indeed been paid already."
Melanthe turned her face. She shamed herself even to taunt Allegreto with it. What Gian Navona had taken of his bastard son, to be certain that Allegreto would sleep chastely in Melanthe's bedchamber, was beyond cost or pity.
"Let us go." She lifted her skirt, stepping upward, but he made a faint hiss of warning and raised his forefinger. Instead of waiting for her to pass, he turned, going lightly up ahead of her, his yellow-and-blue slippers silent on the stone stairs.
Melanthe's pulse heightened. That was her weakness, as the falcon was Allegreto's—she could not for her life keep her heart cool when her mind required it. Through the harder beat in her ears, she turned to listen behind her. "Come, give me a kiss, Allegreto," she said to the empty stairwell, "and let us be gone."
She heard nothing but the rhythm of her own blood. After a moment she stepped up quietly after Allegreto, her hand on her dagger, her eyes on the turning of the newel. This winding stair gave onto the ramparts above and the chapel below, with a door into a small stone passage connecting to her inner apartment. She had not liked the insecure arrangement when she saw it, and she liked it less now.
The door stood open to empty darkness. She hesitated, staring at it, assessing it. Gryngolet preened calmly, but the falcon was no dog to bark at danger. She held aloof from human matters, as did all her kind. Melanthe took her misericorde from its sheath and turned the blade outward. She lifted Gryngolet, ready to fling the falcon safely free if she must.
"Come, lady."
Allegreto's ghostly voice drifted on silence, beckoning her. She took a quiet breath and stepped upward through the door.
He knelt behind it over a deep shadow. Melanthe saw a white shape, a limp palm half-open—and the shadow became a form: the Riata assassin sprawled dead in the half darkness.
There was no blood but on Allegreto's slim dagger; she had seen him practice his thrust on pigs—to make a stab that stopped the life flow instantly—what little gore there was bled to the lungs and not the surface, as he had once informed her with his sweet pride and pleasure in his craft. He was not smiling now, but sober, skilled in his task, stripping the corpse of her livery.
She pressed her lips tight together. "To my garderobe," she murmured. "I'll send Cara and the others away."
He nodded. Melanthe moved quickly back down the stairs to the chapel whence she'd come, spent a moment pretending to pray, and then climbed to her apartments by the grand staircase. She retired to the solar, demanding a preparation of malvoisie wine sweetened with scented flowers and roses, and peace for her aching head. Her ladies knew better than to be in a hurry to return when she gave such an order.
When she was certainly alone, she unbolted the door onto the passage. Allegreto waited in the darkness, his prey stripped naked at his feet. He hefted the body to his shoulder, adept at that, too, though he staggered a little beneath the weight. "Fat Riata swine," he muttered, and flashed Melanthe a grin over the pale legs of the dead man.
She stood back with an unforgiving stare—which made Allegreto laugh silently. Bravado, perhaps, or real amusement: it was no more possible to know his true feeling than it was for her to reveal the emotion that swirled in her stomach. She would punish him for this murder, because she had ordered him to refrain—but that did not diminish the horrible shock of triumph, the elation of safety, however brief; of knowing the thing done.
He carried the body before her, naked arms dangling—a sight that she disliked—but worse yet was the garderobe, a cold small chamber and a cold stone bench, a revolting moment while Allegreto worked to arrange the Riata's flaccid torso, forcing it head downward into the shaft of the privy well, so that it would not wedge in the fall. He gripped it by the thighs, panting a little with his efforts. The white corpulent limbs scored against stone without bleeding, opposing him with slack resistance until he had shoved the thing in past the shoulders to the waist.
He let go. The feet vanished. For a long moment there was nothing. Then the sound as it hit the river—not what she'd expected, not a splash, but a boom like a stone catapulted against steel, echoing and echoing in the rank well.
He crossed himself and knelt before her. "I beg you pray for me, my lady," he said humbly. "I know I have displeased you, but I did it for your life."
She said nothing. He rose and caught up the pile of green-and-silver livery, folding it into neat lengths. From the yellow shoulder of his doublet, he plucked a loose hair. He held it over the privy and flicked his fingers, sending the strand drifting into darkness.