Durer stared at Allouette, then bared his teeth in a snarl. "Betrayed from the moment I talked to you!"
"Oh, be reassured sir," she said bitterly, "for you have destroyed my life for the second time and disintegrated any chance I might ever have held for happiness!" Her eyes narrowed, and everyone in the hall could feel the power building in her, the mental power with the rage of years behind it.
Gregory touched her shoulder. "Leave him to the Crown, my sweet. Do not soil your hands with his corrupted blood."
Allouette's gaze snapped to him, staring in incredulity. "Do not mock me, sir! Well do I know that you cannot remain married to a woman who is as treacherous as I!"
"Remain married!" Gregory stared back, stricken.
"Aye! Miracle enough it is that you took a serpent to your bosom once, who knew so many of your enemies that she was the obvious choice when they sought one to betray you! How could you ever trust me again!" She turned to march to the doorway, sheer leashed rage radiating from her so intensely that soldiers and prisoners alike flinched away.
Alea stepped between Alouette and the doorway, looking down at her in exasperation. "You fool! You absolute total fool! You have the richest love a woman could hope for, you have a man who loves you to distraction, who couldn't even dream of blaming you for the slightest flaw, can't even recognize that there IS a flaw, and you're ready to leave him because you don't think you're worthy of him?"
"Step away, virago!" Allouette's rage cut loose. "Frozen spinster who is eaten up by envy of the love you cannot find, who seeks revenge on the world because you think yourself unlovable! I have withstood your silent condemnation for months, I have endured your silences and slights, but I will bear them no longer, nor let you bar me one second from the fate I deserve! Stand aside, amateur, or learn what true psi power really is!"
Alea didn't budge an inch. Tense and white-lipped, she said in a low and venomous tone, "And this is the woman who claims she has abandoned the ways of cruelty!"
Allouette froze, turning pale—and in that moment, Alea stepped back as Gregory stepped between them, staring into his wife's eyes, then dropping to one knee. Gazing up, he caught her hands between his own and said, "You are everything that is good and right, you are all that is completely loveable, not only for your beauty but also for your warm and generous nature—and above all, for your loyalty. How could you ever have thought that I could believe you a traitor?"
The blood drained from Allouette's face; she stared down, still frozen, aching to believe but unable to.
"Trust him, lady."
Turning, Allouette found Magnus gazing down at her— but the grave look he gave her was full of sympathy, not enmity. "Those of us who think ourselves unfit for love must look now and then at truth."
Alea stared at him, thunderstruck.
"You proved your loyalty by telling Gregory at once of the ambush Durer planned," Magnus said, "loyalty that is so titanic it stuns me, now that I realize that, from the moment Durer approached you with his blackmail, you have been sure you would lose your marriage and your love!"
"How could you doubt me so?" Gregory rose, staring deeply into her eyes. "How could you doubt me when you have only given me cause to love you more?"
Still Allouette stood frozen, eyes darting from one to the other. Then belief and relief broke through her anger, and she fell sobbing into Gregory's arms.
He soothed her and caressed her, murmuring, "Nay, sweet love, 'tis done, and the monsters shall be banished from your sight. Never again shall they rise to hurt you. Nay, my jo, my dear, my precious, be sure that I love you with a love that shall never vary, never swerve, for I know you for what you truly are, and 'tis for that I do love you."
His brothers and sisters looked on, beaming fondly— but Alea whirled and ran from the chamber.
Twenty-Eight
MAGNUS STOOD STARING AFTER ALEA, STUNNED, then started after her, walking quickly, even now careful not to come too close too quickly.
He came out into the courtyard just in time to see her run into the stable. Knowing she was unlikely to leave, he followed slowly and came in carefully, searching about him in the gloom, then following the sound of weeping.
He found her leaning against the post between two empty stalls, head on her arms and weeping with the deep, racking sobs of true heartbreak. Magnus came up as near as he dared, then asked gently, "Why do you weep, companion of my bosom? Surely you cannot think that anything Allouette said in a moment of despair might be true!"
"But it is, it all is!" Alea groaned. "Go away, Gar! Let me be miserable in peace!"
"I cannot leave you sunken in lies."
"Lies?" Alea whirled to face him, face blotched, eyes red and swollen, tears still running down her cheeks. "She told only truth! I've always known I was awkward and gawky, too ugly for any man to love!"
"That is not true, not a word of it!" Magnus still dared move no closer, but he reached out. "But your feeling that way means that every word Allouette spoke went straight to that most vulnerable point in your heart."
"You can't deny that I'm awkward and gawky!"
"You are the soul of grace and deftness," Magnus countered. "Your movements in battle are a symphony; every step on the road or in the forest is sheer poetry. Oh yes, I deny most heartily that you are in any way awkward—but I can believe that you were in your teens."
Alea's eyes widened. Suddenly conscious of them, she made a quick swipe at her tears. "I'm far too tall to be graceful!"
"You're the perfect height," Magnus contradicted, then amended himself. "Well, perhaps an inch too short."
"Don't mock me, Gar!"
"I wouldn't dream of it." Magnus stared steadily into her eyes. "You want truth, and that is all I'm giving you— or honesty, at least; truth as I see it."
"You can't really believe I'm beautiful!"
"I've believed it since the first day I saw you," he said, "covered with briar scratches and smudged with dirt, your hair wild with two days' flight through a forest. I believed it then, but I knew it two days later, when you were clean and neat, and I thought I had never seen so beautiful a woman in my life!"
"All right, maybe I'm plain, not ugly—but you can't expect me to believe you find me beautiful!" Hope had crept into her voice, though.
"You must believe it," he said, "for it is true—believe that in my eyes, at least, you are beautiful." At last he stepped closer, lifting a hand to touch her cheek but not quite daring. "Come, you know you've caught me looking at you with admiration time and again—the times you caught me by surprise when you turned to look at me, and I hadn't been quite quick enough to look away."
"With admiration, yes." Her heart was pounding with hope that she tried to thrust down. "But desire? Never!"
"You've never caught me at it, no," Magnus said. "I hid it well, knowing you would see it as the worst sort of betrayal."
Alea stared at him, startled, then said, "For the first few years, yes, that was true—but not any more!"
"I could not take that chance, though, do you see," Magnus said, "could not take the chance of frightening you and hurting you and undoing all the progress you had made toward healing. So as to being repressed and frustrated, I most certainly am—but I will continue to be so, as long as that is what you need from me."
Alea only stared at him, wondering how so intelligent and sensitive a man could be so stupid, then said, "That's not what I need from you any longer. I need the final stage of healing now."
Magnus's eyes glowed; he stepped closer, but he only asked, "What could have wounded you so badly that it has taken so long to heal?"