Alain let the stale air explode out of his lungs, and gasped in fresh.
Little lights suddenly sprang up all about him. He pushed himself back against the wall, his blades coming up to guard, then saw elfin faces by the candle-sized flames of miniature torches.
"We will lead you to safety, Crown Prince!" the largest of them said. He was quite tall by their standards, a foot and a half high, with a look of incipient mayhem in his eyes.
"You are the Puck!" Alain panted.
"I am, and come to save you from the peril into which your own foolish glands have brought you. Will you come?"
But Alain stayed where he was, pushing himself upright slowly, wary of a ceiling that might strike his head. "Nay," he gasped, "I cannot flee!"
"What nonsense is this?" Puck demanded. "Let us hear no foolishness of proving your valor, youngling! This is no time to play games of honor! Come, and come quickly!"
"I cannot," Alain said. "The Lady Cordelia ... if they have sought to slay me, they may seek to slay her ... I must find her!"
Puck calmed, staring at him. "Even so," he said.
For a moment, it occurred to Alain to worry about Geoffrey ...
Then he realized that he was being ridiculous. "Follow," the elf told him. "I will lead you to a place that is near to her chamber."
"I follow," Alain answered. He slipped down the passageway after the ring of fairy lights, barely able to see where his next step should be. "I thank you, Wee Folk." Puck exchanged glances with one of the other elves. It was rare that they met a mortal with a proper sense of gratitude. "Thou dost credit to thy parents and thine upbringing," Puck answered.
Then, suddenly, he came to a halt. Tiny feet pattered toward them, a little torch bobbing up and down, lighting a brownie's face.
"What moves?" Puck demanded.
"Not the Lady Cordelia," the elf answered. "Her room is empty; she is fled."
"Thank heavens!" Alain sighed, then suddenly stiffened. "Or has she been taken?"
"We shall seek," the elf promised.
"Aye, we shall find her, if any may," Puck said. "Come now, King's Son. Thou must needs leave this house with us."
"Not until I know that she is fled, not taken!" Alain protested. "Nay, do not stay by me, good folk, but go seek her indeed! Although, if you would be so good as to leave me a light, I shall be safe enough here. Do you seek her out..." Then, as an afterthought, "And you might spare a thought for her brother. Warn him, too—I doubt not he shall need it."
Puck regarded him for a moment, weighing his instructions against one another. The lad was safe enough—and he did need to prove himself to himself .. . "We shall attempt it. Are you sure you shall be well, though, King's Son?"
"I am certain," he said. "Go. I shall amuse myself by prowling these secret hallways, to discover where they lead. Who knows but it may be of benefit?"
"Even as thou sayest," Puck pronounced. "Take care, and do not seek to fight a whole army by thyself."
"I shall not," Alain promised.
Of course, he didn't say anything about a squadron. Puck went away with his little troop, well aware that he could not depend on the Prince to play it safe—not at his age, or with his overdeveloped sense of responsibility (or his being in love).
Of course, Puck wasn't about to let him really be alone. Alain thought he was, though, and felt the sense of abandonment creeping in. He threw it off and, lit only by the miniature torch (which, he noticed, was not burning down at all), prowled the secret passage. What he was really seeking, of course, was another door into the manor house's rooms—in fact, as many doors as he could locate. If Cordelia was in the slightest danger, he intended to leap to her defense by the quickest route he could find.
Cordelia, of course, was in no danger at all, except, perhaps, from her own emotions.
She flew in through her chamber window as the sky was lightening, feeling bone-weary, but with some measure of peace within her. She was emotionally wrung out and ready to sleep until noon, at the very least—but, as she was about to take off her travelling dress, she paused, a vagrant image of Alain drifting into her mind. It was not the Alain she had always known, pompous and selfimportant, but the Alain she had met the night before, the masked face with the gentle but ardent kisses ...
Then she remembered his face, staring at her aghast when he had been unmasked. She smiled, feeling very tender. She decided to seek him out, for she felt a sudden need to talk with him, heart to heart, mind to mind ... perhaps even breasts to chest ...
And if he was asleep? Well, so much the better. It would not hurt to catch him at a bit of a disadvantage. She laughed softly to herself and slipped out of her room.
Alain's chamber was all the way at the other end of the hall. She wondered idly who was his neighbor, and glanced at the panel next to Alain's.
Somehow, she was sure it was Delilah's.
Suddenly suspicious, she stepped up to Alain's door, hoping that she would not find the chamber empty. She turned the knob very quietly, pushed the door open, and slipped in.
The empty bed was almost a slap in her face.
For a moment, she raged inside—until she saw the overturned chair, the slashes in the tapestry, and realized that those stains on the floor were blood.
Jealously was instantly replaced by horror. What had happened to Alain? She whirled out of the room. If anyone knew, it would be Delilah.
Without the slightest attempt at discretion, she slammed through the door and strode in, ready to beard her rival in her den—or in her bed, which, with Delilah, was probably much the same thing ...
But she was not there.
Cordelia stared, completely taken aback. She stepped farther in, then halted, amazed at the splendor of the sitting room, at its spaciousness, its silken hangings, the depth and softness of the carpet on the floor, the grace and delicacy of the occasional tables and upholstered chairs.
Then she looked more closely, for signs of the night's events. There was only the one glass, with wine dregs, sitting on a table by a chair, and another that seemed to have scarcely been touched, by the door. Cordelia was tempted, for she was thirsty, then remembered that Delilah might have sipped from it, and turned her back on it.
She glanced at the hearth; there were still coals glowing there. Then she surveyed the walls, all hung with rosecolored silk; there might be a platoon of guards hidden behind them. She listened with her mind, but found no one nearby, and ignored anyone outside the room, her attention focussed only on its mistress. The furniture was white and gold, and the carpet was Oriental, with patterns of a dusky rose on a cream background.
But there was no one there.
Her heart began to hammer within her breast. She wasn't sure whether she was more afraid of not finding Alain at all, or of finding him in Delilah's bed. Silent as a morning zephyr, she slipped across the carpet to the door in the far wall, turned the handle as quietly as she could, pushed it open, slipped in ...
And saw no one.
The bed had not even been slept in. Now, suddenly, the rage of jealousy boiled up within her, but with terror right behind it. What had the witch done with Alain! Cordelia suddenly became tremendously afraid that when she found Delilah, she would find Alain, too. Why else would they both be gone from their beds?
She fled out into the hallway, then halted, in a quandary—where could she go? Where could she search? Forrest! He would know! The saturnine, hot-eyed, bearded face of the bandit chieftain rose up before her mind's eye. She could depend on him to help her, surely, as he had in the woods, when Delilah's "sister" had attacked, with her henchmen. Certainly, if he were really in love with Cordelia, he would leap at the chance to help her—even if it meant helping his rival, too.