“Enough, Hendon,” said Caradon sharply. “Send this warbling phebe away—we have men’s talk to talk and your childish festivities have wasted enough of my time.”
Tinwright thought the look Hendon gave his brother the duke was one of the strangest he had ever seen, a combination of amusement and deadly loathing. “By all means, elder brother. You may withdraw, poet.”
Tinwright, sickened, could tell that Hendon planned to murder his brother someday. He had also seen in that same moment that Caradon himself knew it very well, and that the duke probably planned the same for his younger brother. The two of them scarcely bothered to conceal their feelings, even in front of a stranger. How could one family breed such hatred? No wonder Elan wanted to escape them into death.
“Of course,” Tinwright said as he quickly backed away. “Going now. Thank you, my lords.”
He at least had the small satisfaction of seeing that Erlon Meaher, another court poet who thought much of himself, had been watching his conversation with the two Tollys. Meaher’s face was twisted in an unhidden grimace of envy and dislike.
“Get yourself some wine, Tinwright,” Hendon Tolly called after him. “I’m sure reciting poetry is almost as thirsty work as killing—if not quite as enjoyable.”
It was the hardest hour of waiting he had ever experienced. He knocked on her door while the bells were still chiming the end of evening prayers.
Elan M’Cory opened it herself, shrouded in a heavy black robe. She had sent away her servants to protect him, Tinwright realized, and he was surprised again by the intensity of feeling she aroused in him.
It was a touch of lover’s madness, surely—the very thing he had written about so many times. He had always felt secretly superior to the sort of lovesick people found in poems, almost contemptuous, but in these last days, as he had come to realize that he could not sleep, eat, drink, stand, sit, or talk without thinking about Elan M’Cory, matters had begun to seem very different. For one thing, although he had alluded in many a poem to the “happy pain” or even the “sweet agony” of love, he had not understood that the agony could be worse than any other sort of agony—worse than any actual pain of the limbs or organs, worse even than the way his head felt after a night out with Hewney and Teodoros, which he had previously thought could not be outdone for misery. And there was no way to separate a wounded heart from the body it tormented—no way except death.
He was terrified to realize he now understood Elan’s pain very well, although hers had quite a different cause.
He reached out to take her hand but she would not let him. “Let me beg you one last time, my lady—please do not do this.” He felt oddly flat. He knew what her response would be, and in fact, he could think of no other way forward at this point except to let the grim machinery turn, but he had to say it.
“You have been a loyal, kind friend, Matt, and I wish nothing more than it could be another way, but there is no escape for me. Hendon will never loose his claws. He savors my pain too much, and he would kill you in an instant if he thought I cared for you. I could not bear that.” She hung her head. “Soon Queen Anissa will be his, too, if she is not already—he pays court to her as though she were already widowed. Nobody knows the depths of that man’s evil.” Elan took a deep breath, then undid the tie of her robe and threw it off, revealing a brilliant blaze that startled him like lightning. She was dressed all in white, like a bride or a phantom.
“Do you have it?” she said. She was anxious, but happy, too, like a woman on her wedding day. “Do you have that which will save me, sweet Matty?”
He swallowed. “I do.” He reached into his pocket and found the swaddled flask. He had replaced the kelp leaf in which it had been wrapped with a square of velvet he had stolen from Puzzle, but it still smelled of the sea.
She wrinkled her nose. “What is it?”
“It does not matter. It is what you wished, my lady. My Elan.” He himself was as fretful as the most callow bridegroom. She looked so beautiful in her white nightgown, even though he could scarcely see her through his tears. “I will administer it for you. I will hold your head.”
She had been staring at the tiny flask with horrified fascination, but now she looked up, confused. “Why?”
He had not thought about this, and for a moment he was flustered. “So that it does not stain your gown, my lady. So your beauty is not...is not spoiled...” He gasped, a sob stuck in his gorge that was so big he feared he would not breathe again.
“Bless you, Matt, you are so sweet to me. I know I am...I know I am not fit for you or any other gods-fearing man... but...but you may love me, if you wish.” She saw that he did not understand. “Make love to me. It will make no difference where I’m bound, and it would be sweet to have such love from you before...before...” A single tear rolled down her cheek, but she smiled and wiped it away. She was the bravest thing Tinwright had ever seen.
His heart squeezed him. “I cannot, Lady. Oh, gods, my beloved Elan! I would like nothing...have thought of...I...” He paused and wiped his forehead, sweaty despite the evening chill. “I cannot. Not this way.” He swallowed. “I hope one day you will understand why and forgive me.”
She shook her head, her smile so sadly sweet it was like a knife in his chest. “You do not have to explain, dear Matthias. It was selfish of me. I had only hoped...”
“You will never know the depth of my feelings, Elan. Please. Let’s not speak of it anymore. It is too hard.” He squinted, wiped fiercely at his eyes. “Just...let me hold your head. Here, lie against me.” As she nestled against him, her back against his belly, her head against his shoulder, he could feel every place she touched him, through both her clothes and his, like a hot nail through a blacksmith’s glove. “Lean back,” he whispered, feeling as though he were a monster worse even than Hendon Tolly. “Lean back. Close your eyes and open your mouth.”
She shut her eyes. He marveled at her long lashes, which cast shadows on her cheeks in the candlelight. “Oh, but first I must pray!” she said in a small voice. “It is never too late for that, surely? Zoria will hear me, even if she decides to spurn my request. I must try.”
“Of course,” he said.
Her lips moved silently for a while. Tinwright stared. “I am done,” she said quietly, her eyes still tight shut.
He leaned forward then, letting her breath swirl gently against his face, then kissed her. She flinched, expecting something else, then her lips softened and for a moment that seemed like an hour he let himself vanish into the astonishing truth of what he had dreamed so often. At last he pulled back, but not before one of his tears splashed on her cheek. So sweet, so trusting, so sad!
“Oh, Elan,” he whispered, “forgive me for this—for all of this.”
She did not speak again, but lay with her mouth open like a child who waited, fearful but bravely patient, for some terrifying physic. He used his sleeve to pull the stopper from the flask, then used the needle ever so carefully to lift a single drop and let it fall into her mouth.
Elan M’Cory gave a little gasp of surprise, then swallowed. “It does not taste like so much,” she said. “Bitter, but not painfully so.”
Tinwright could not speak.
“I could have loved you well,” she said, and a smile played around her lips. “Ah, what a strange sensation! I cannot feel my tongue. I think...”
She fell silent. Her breath slowed until he could not perceive it any longer.