"I bade him not pray," Gilbert said, his voice tight in his throat.
"Did you truly?" Frisson turned to him. "I did not know. There was naught for me but the sense of aching loss, and I closed my eyes, that I might treasure the memory of the sight of her the longer."
"So she boxed you up right and proper," I said. "Does she feed you'll I"
Not herself, alas - but some barky monster that speaks not, and fills the air with musk."
interesting - she had a guard. A plant, from the sound of it, but I didn't think his classification would help us much. I glanced up at Gruesome and decided that with me there to goad Frisson into working magic, or at least to read his verses for him, there was an even chance. "Well, I don't like to cause anything pain - but there has to be a way to get you out. Which end opened up to let you in?"
"Yonder." Gilbert pointed. "I remember, for as soon as I could go no farther, I turned about, to rid my sight of that corrupted witch and saw that I did stare at a tree with a double trunk." I looked; the curves of the trunks suggested a man and a woman approaching one another in intimacy; I could imagine how they swayed, when the wind blew. How could Gilbert have missed it?
Because I had a dirty mind. In fact, the fruit on that tree looked like the epitome of sensuousness to me, the double swelling globes elongated just enough to suggest human anatomy, and covered with a downy softness that fairly begged to be stroked. I shook my head; dirty mind, as I've said. "I don't suppose you've eaten any of that fruit? "
"I did try," Gilbert admitted, "but when I reached out to touch, it did withdraw, ever tantalizing, ever just beyond reach.
"Figures," I muttered. After all, I knew that plants had sexuality, too. "Well, if the other end is the door, let me take a look and see how it's fastened." I went down to the end of the cage, pushing past a lot of leaves - it had been nice of her to leave them with a roof and inspected the corners. Sure enough, the corner-post trunk was right next to a vertical length of vine, almost as thick. There were at least a dozen creepers weaving back and forth between the two of them, though, and they were barky and looked tough. I stared, at a loss. "I hate to cause pain to a living being . . ."
"Do not," Frisson said quickly. "I will wait, I will wait gladly, I will endure a thousand days, if only at the end, she will come to bid me amuse her!"
"How hollow of you!" Gilbert cried. "Would you rush to sin, false man?"
"I am a poet," Frisson said doggedly. "I hear you speak of sin, but with the memory of that splendid form within me, the words have no meaning."
"They have to me!" Gilbert strode over to me and gripped the vines, shaking them with sudden rage, straining at them with strength that spoke of sublimation and should have moved half a ton. He had some effect, too - the vines keened, so highly pitched that it went right through my head.
"Leave off!" I cried. "You're hurting them!"
"What matter pain, when virtue's at stake?" Gilbert raged. "What matter the pain of a plant, for Heaven's sake?"
"Yes, for Heaven's sake!" I shouted. "I thought you were a Christian! "
He froze, staring at me blankly. "Why, so I am!"
"Then isn't charity as high on your list as chastity? Isn't it just as important that you not hurt another living being, as that you keep from having sex?"
"Nay," he said, "for sex-" He winced at the word, but forced himself to use it. "-sex is one among the means by which we are hurt, or hurt one another! To take a woman's virginity is to hurt her most shrewdly, to steal her greatest treasure and break her heart - and therefore, to take a man's will hurt him likewise, though he know it not! Even to fornicate with one not a virgin, will surely hurt her heart - or his, for that matter - and will cause that hurt whether she and he deny it to themselves or not! 'Tis to be used, exploited! " Now, that struck me as a sick attitude. I really wished I could disagree with him.
Unfortunately, I couldn't - not if I was really trying to be honest with myself. What he had said was possibly true and fitted my own experiences. Of course, it was sick nonetheless - or was it the exploiting that was sick?
"There are limits," I argued. "Under the right circumstances, sex can be a wonderful thing."
"Aye, if both are in love, and wedded!"
"Love is not needed," a throaty, musical voice behind me said.
"Only desire need be felt."
Now, to call that voice "musical" is like saying that champagne is old grape juice. It was lilting, it was transporting, and most of all, it was stimulating. It resonated in my loins and set up a charge that shot up to make my head giddy.
So, before I turned around, I made a stern effort to get control of myself, reminding me that she was just another woman who was looking for an angle to get what she wanted out of me, while giving as little of herself as she could. Thus buoying my concept of manliness, I turned slowly, saying, "Nymph Thyme, I presu-" I couldn't finish the word. The descriptions hadn't just failed to do her justice, they hadn't even leveled charges. She was even more beautiful and seductive and sensuous than they'd said - and nobody had mentioned her face, but for a few seconds, I couldn't notice anything else. Her face was heart-shaped under glossy black hair that tumbled down about her face and shoulders; her sloe eyes were huge and slumberous, shaded by long, thick lashes under delicate, arching eyebrows. Her nose was a delicious, tip-tilted confection that fairly begged to be kissed, and her lips were wide, full, dusky red, and aching to be tasted. Her gown was very low cut, but that mass of black hair tumbled in to fill what the dress revealed, allowing only tantalizing glimpses of cleavage between softly swelling mounds, which fulfilled every promise a man could ever have dreamed of as they strained the fabric of a velvet bodice that was the exact same shade as her skin. Frisson had been right-it fairly compelled me to reach out and touch it.
But I fought the compulsion and forced my eyes to stay on her face. The ripe lips parted, moistened, and breathed, "Come, lordly gallant! Will you not tarry with me, to enter my abode and taste of my pleasures? " Believe me, I was tempted. Tempted? I could barely keep my feet from moving. But I must admit to a certain incipient panic underneath it all, the old conviction that whatever she was really after, it wasn't entirely for my own good. Angelique! Save me!
After all, what's a true love for?
And she did save me - or the memory of her, anyway. Pale and smoke-thin as her wraith was, it still outshone in beauty and allure this gorgeous wench in more-than-full color right before me. How?
Maybe it was Angelique's innocent faith in love and her sheer goodness. Maybe it was the sweetness of her spirit. Most likely, it was all of it rolled into one, the totality that was that single wonderful being, Angelique.
Whatever it was, the memory of her protected me against the vamp right then, dimmed Thyme's attraction to bearable levels, and made me aware all over again that I was confronting a magical being on her home turf, and that the attraction I was feeling was anything but natural. That being the case, I needed to fight magic with magic.
"Frisson! Give me a verse!"
A grubby, spider-leg hand pushed a scrap of paper into mine. I snapped it open, tore my gaze off the purring vision before me, glued it to the letters, and chanted,