Kiss Me Deadly Page 6

  “Take that!” yelled the hunter, jabbing. Bernard lifted his sword arm, and the hunter darted in, pressing back against Bernard and blocking his arm with her body. His hand was round her chest for a moment, and then they spun apart.

  The men’s cheers turned vulgar.

  “Italian tricks!” Bernard called back, and laughed. “Do you know this?” He swung his sword with a twist and a flick that Elise had seen him perform in many tournaments. But the hunter was again too quick and deflected his thrust with a flash of her own blade. Bernard was disarmed.

  The men all shouted; in agony or triumph, Elise was not sure.

  Grinning and unashamed, the nun pretended to bow like a man. Her attempt was shoddy and rough, though that did not surprise Elise. Did she not realize what they thought of her?

  Bernard also wore a grin on his face, then caught sight of his fiancé. “My darling!” he cried, striding over. “Thou that art now the world’s fresh ornament, and only herald to the gaudy spring...” He bowed—the bow of a true chevalier—and kissed her fingers. “Did you see me there, brought low by a woman?”

  “Indeed,” said Elise, glaring at the hunter, who had miraculously grown even more dusty and sweaty. Her face was flushed, her amber-colored eyes sparkled like true gems, and beneath her shapeless tunic, her breasts rose and fell as she panted. “Quite the display.”

  Bernard turned to the men. “Gentlemen. My beautiful bride!”

  The men let out a cheer.

  Elise blushed.

  “And everything a bride should be, I hear,” he said softly, so only she could hear. “Your blossom is even lovelier when placed next to this bulb of garlic.”

  Elise giggled, which she knew Bernard found charming. “Oh, really? You seemed quite engaged by this bulb.”

  “Gitta?” Bernard raised his eyebrows. “She might as well be a boy.”

  “Gitta?” Was that this hunter’s given name? How crude. Gitta was even now staring at her fiancé, her gaze one of almost masculine intensity. Why wasn’t she the type of nun to wear a veil? Shameless.

  Bernard’s hand slipped to her waist. “Are you not done with the training? I grow anxious for our wedding—and our wedding night.”

  He spoke these words out loud—too loud, as the men set about again with their catcalls. Elise’s becoming blush drained from her face. “Bernard!” She slapped his hand from her stomacher. Elise was no peasant, no immodest Roman nun.

  Gitta glanced at them, her expression of disdain as impertinent as ever.

  Elise lifted her chin and walked away.

  ***

  Gitta had been on her knees for hours, but God had not seen fit to provide her with an answer. The stone floor of the chapel was cold and hard, but her penance was slight compared to the fate that would await Enyo should she not find a way to resolve this situation.

  “Holy Father,” she prayed, “please come to me in this hour. Please guide my hand for the benefit of Enyo, the least of your creations.”

  But she could not give herself over fully to her devotions, for always in the back of her mind were the words of Elise de Commarque. Gitta could have fought harder on Enyo’s behalf. She could have come up with an alternative. She could have saved the unicorn’s life. She could have killed it for a nobler cause than that of these foolish French and their tepid, half-forgotten wedding traditions.

  And every time she put that guilt from her mind, it allowed another to rise, warm and bitter as bile: the feel of Bernard’s body against her own in the courtyard that afternoon. She’d never sparred with a man before. Now she knew why.

  “I beg you,” she whispered, then switched to her native tongue. “Bitte. Bitte, bitte.”

  “Gitta.” The name echoed through the empty chapel, deep and commanding, and Gitta started. But it was not the voice of the Lord. No, it was something much more of this Earth. She turned to see Bernard walking down the aisle toward her.

  Gitta rose from her knees, disoriented, as if woken from a dream. She was not used to being interrupted while at prayer. No one would dream of doing it in Rome. There, your only privacy was in communion with God.

  “I had hoped to see you at supper,” Bernard said. His dark hair was mussed, but his features were aristocratic and fine. He’d washed since their battle. “I skipped a meal with my father to find you.”

  “I’m sorry,” Gitta replied.

  He smirked. “As you should be.”

  Gitta was confused. What breach of etiquette had she committed now? If only she were back at the Cloisters. Or out in the wild, alone in her communion with God and unicorn.

  “I looked for you in the kitchens.” His tone was chiding, as if he spoke to a child. “Is this where you hide?”

  “This is where I pray,” she said.

  He smiled as if she’d been joking. “That’s right. You’re a nun. A bride of Christ.” He flicked his fingers at the wooden cross around Gitta’s neck. “How are you enjoying that?”

  “I beg your pardon, my lord?” He was standing so near. As near as he’d ever been during their match. His gaze bored into hers, his pupils wide and black, swallowing up all the color in his eyes.

  He leaned close, and his voice dropped to a low murmur. “Serving the needs of Christ.”

  Something hot rushed through Gitta at Bernard’s words. Her face and throat burned, and her throat went dry. She barely knew what he said, heard only the deep rumbles of sound from his throat. No man had ever spoken to her like this. Alone. In her ear, as if he knew some great secret in the depths of Gitta’s heart.

  “The way you moved today, Gitta,” Bernard said, and it seemed like he was all around her, “set me on fire.”

  Yes, Gitta could feel this fire. Was it the heat of Hell?

  “I have never known a girl like you.” He was all around her. His arms had caged her against the altar. “I have never known a girl could be like you. So strong, so agile. It was extraordinary.”

  His hands were on her arms. His thighs brushed her own. His face was inches from hers. Gitta’s skin sparked. She didn’t know why her clothes were not aflame.

  “You are...” he breathed against her, the air hot and wet and heavy between them. “You are what I always wished for. You are everything I want. And you’re a girl.” He pressed his mouth to hers.

  The kiss turned the fire to ice in her veins, and Gitta froze. She had never been kissed, never known what it was like for a man to even look upon her with desire. So this is what it was. So this is what Elise lived for.

  Gitta gagged and shoved Bernard away.

  He tripped over his own feet and fell, sprawling, on the stones. “Gitta!”

  “Get away from me, you pig,” she said. “How dare you take such liberties with a holy woman?”

  He pushed to his feet and dusted himself off. “You weren’t so very holy a moment ago,” he said with a sneer. “It’s a wonder you can still control that unicorn, since you act like such a harlot.” He grabbed her arm. “You feel it, too, don’t lie.”

  “I have no need of lying,” said Gitta. “God knows all of my failings. If I was tempted, I shall ask forgive—”

  His hand came down on her other arm, trapping her there with him. “ I won’t forgive you,” he insisted. “Not when I know there could be such pleasure between us. Gitta, you know who I am.”

  She struggled to break free.

  “And now I know you. I touch you, and I feel true fire. I hold you—my soul erupts with poetry. Listen!” he cried. “Let me not to the marriage of true minds admit impediments—”

  Gitta began to laugh. Bernard stopped and looked upon her with surprise. She wriggled out of his grasp. “You are a most unworthy man,” she said, trying in vain to catch her breath. “You are ... not only a fool, and a scoundrel, but you are a liar as well. Does your betrothed know of your faithlessness? Does she know, at least, of your thievery?”

  Bernard sputtered.

  “I am not as unlearned as Elise or the other girls you attempt to ensn
are, sir.” Gitta laughed again. “Your verse is not your own, and my body will never be yours to use as poorly.” She drew her dagger. “Do not come near me again.” She edged her way around him and began to back down the aisle toward the entrance to the chapel.

  What a cad. And how very weak she’d been, to entertain his flattery, even for a moment. To want in that moment to know what it felt like to be desired. To be beautiful, like Elise.

  She’d condemned Elise for this, but apparently she was subject to the very same weaknesses. And Elise had been trained all her life to find it complimentary, admirable. She’d been brought up for love and flattery, as Gitta had for weapons and war.

  But now Gitta knew the truth. Elise de Commarque was not so very different from her. They each were far too good for swine like Bernard.

  She stepped out of the chapel and ran smack into Elise.

  “There you are,” said the younger girl, her golden hair concealed beneath a thick woolen cloak. “I must speak to you.”

  ***

  Elise had brought a lantern, and with it, she guided Gitta to the far edge of the garden and beyond. To her left, the barn and stables, to the right, a series of low hills. Beyond lay a cluster of peasant cottages, and farther than that, the dark shadowed line of the forest.

  “Where are we going, my lady?” Gitta asked as Elise led them around the side of one of the hills. Into the hill was set a crude wooden door, tied shut with a knot of rope. Elise undid the knot and motioned for Gitta to follow her down a series of earthen steps.

  “These are the wine cellars,” she explained, though it was probably obvious to the hunter from the rows upon rows of bottles they passed. They crept through three chambers of these, and then Elise took a path to the left, where they passed one empty room, and then the tunnel grew narrow and short. Eventually, they hit a dead end, or what looked like one. “For this next part,” she said, “we must crawl.”

  She set down the lantern and pushed aside a great rock to reveal a dark hole in the earth. She wiggled her way through, then reached back through the hole to retrieve the lantern. She peered at Gitta on the other side. “Come through.”

  Gitta gave her a skeptical glance but shrugged and crawled through the tunnel, stumbling a bit as she tumbled out on the chamber floor. Elise waited, the lantern shuttered and dim, as the hunter pushed herself back up.

  “What is going on?” Gitta asked. “Why have you brought me down here?”

  Elise studied her carefully. “Can’t you feel it? I was sure you would. I never knew what it was before. Simply a thrill, I thought, because I was doing something forbidden. Sneaking around. But today, in the forest, I felt it again. And tonight, I put it together. I realized what it was. What it has been my whole life.”

  Gitta shook her head. “I don’t understand. What are you saying? Where are we?”

  Elise lifted the lantern. “My secret place.”

  The walls were alive. Great dark lines swirled over the stone, delineating giant beasts and lithe human figures. Drawings of hunters chased drawings of one-horned animals around and around the inside of the cavern, tossing long spears the color of dried blood into the sides of creatures painted with broad, curved strokes. Gitta gasped as the magic rushed through her. She hadn’t felt this way since the last time she’d been within the walls of her own dear Cloisters in Rome. These paintings held the same magic as the Order. This chamber held the same magic as the unicorns.

  “There were once many unicorns on this land,” said Elise. “And there were once many hunters.”

  Gitta dropped to her knees, speechless with awe. These paintings were older than her nunnery, older than the Church itself. If she touched them, would they crumble like Egyptian scrolls?

  “I have never shown anyone this before,” said Elise. “Not even my father.”

  “How did you—”

  “My grandfather’s sister,” Elise walked over to the largest of the unicorn drawings and held her hand up, a few inches from the paint. “She showed me when I was very young. This is our legacy. But it belongs to the women. The daughters of the blood, as you say.”

  “Was she a hunter?” asked Gitta. “I mean, like me?”

  “She was married at fourteen to a man who beat her to death by the time she was forty,” Elise replied.

  “I am sorry.” The nun clutched at her cross.

  “It was a bad marriage.” Elise shrugged. “And it was not her choice. We never have a choice, you see, Gitta. Not in our family. The best we can hope for is that our husbands are harmless. They can care for us or not, but gentle indifference is preferable to devoted mistreatment.”

  Gitta stared at her, her face drained of color. “Elise, your fiancé—”

  “I know,” Elise said softly. “You think I’m a fool, and maybe I am ignorant, but I’m not stupid. I know my fiancé is a cad whose love is fleeting, at best, and that his father sees me only as chattel. I know my cousin wishes me dead. And I know that I must cast my lot with one or the other. I have chosen life and the de Veyracs. You, who may go where you please and are answerable only to God, please do not judge me. My dog—my little Bisou—died tonight, of injuries inflicted by my cousin on a whim. I have only this cave to call my own.”

  The words fell into the ancient dust at their feet, and Gitta did not speak. For she had been guilty of judging this girl, of thinking her beauty and her softness meant that her life was just as sunny. She had not looked close enough at the gilt to see that the shine hid the bars of Elise’s cage.

  “Thank you,” she said at last, and fumbled in the shadows for Elise’s hand. “Thank you for showing this to me.”

  They stood in silence, their hands joined, and stared at the unicorns on the wall.

  “You wish to save your unicorn,” said Elise. “I wish this as well. Enyo should not die like Bisou. My cousin has spilled enough blood. We have several hours until the hunt. Let’s form a plan.”

  Gita nodded. Elise sounded very determined, but her hand trembled hard against Gitta’s, like a heavy bow held for far too long.

  ***

  Now Gitta knew why Elise had been so quick to draw the unicorn to her side. The girl had never been trained as a unicorn hunter, but she knew the taste of the hunter’s God-given magic. It was marked onto the very earth where she’d walked every day of her life. The lines on the walls were made with unicorn blood—their power reaching out through the ages to the two girls who stood in the chamber and plotted in whispers to prevent more blood from being spilled. Now Gitta knew who Elise was, beneath the powder and the stays and the springtime-colored silks. She was a warrior, just like her. She was a sister-at-arms, if not in vows, and Gitta would help her in any way she could, as any woman in the Order would step forward for the sake of another.

  ***

  Before the dawn broke through the trees, Gitta released Enyo into the forest. She crouched low over the unicorn and whispered words of reassurance and love into her aged ears. Not this time, my dear one. Not this time.

  Enyo disappeared into the darkness. Gitta turned and started hiking back to the tree where Elise and the hunters would meet for the ritual. The forest smelled wild today, as full of magic as Elise’s painted caves. She carried her knife and bow, but neither helped her when she was set upon by five armed men.