Christmas Nights (6 page)

‘The Count is right when he says that you should not be exposed to danger,’ Max told her.

‘I am coming with you,’ Ionanthe repeated, raising her voice so that he could hear it above the noise pouring in through the now open doors from the square below.

Somehow or other, without the need of heralds or trumpets, the crowd seemed to sense their presence, even though Max had descended the steps in silence. The words ‘the Prince’ seemed to pass from one person to another, to become a hush that gathered in force and intensity
until the whole square was silently expectant. A shiver ran through Ionanthe as she felt the ancient power of the people’s belief in and dependence on their ruler.

On the other side of the square the lights on the walls clearly illuminated the ceremonial uniforms of the Royal Guard, highlighting the disparity between their richness and the poverty of the small group of men they had herded into a corner and were keeping captive.
Her people
. A huge lump formed in Ionanthe’s throat and her eyes stung with tears of mingled pity and pride for the men who had been brave enough and foolish enough to want to protect her.

Without thinking, she turned to Max and hissed fiercely, ‘You must not hurt them.’

From deep within her memory she heard an echo of Cosmo as a young boy, saying savagely to her in the middle of a childhood quarrel, ‘
You
cannot tell me to do anything. I am Fortenegro’s ruler. No one can tell me what to do, and those who try have to be punished.’

Max was ignoring her, and instead was striding towards the captives and their captors. The mass of people in the square parted before him.

When he reached the guards, Max demanded, ‘What is going on here?’

‘We have arrested these troublemakers, sire,’ the most senior of the guards told him.

‘You have forced our Duchess to marry you under duress. It is our duty to protect her and her honour,’ one of the men under guard shouted.

Immediately someone in the crowd who had heard him yelled out, ‘Listen to how the traitor speaks of our
Prince and the honour of a family that has no right to any honour. His words are an insult to His Highness.’

Despite herself, Ionanthe shivered as she saw the speed with which anger burned its way through the crowd.

Max saw the colour leave Ionanthe’s face, and without being able to reason why he should want to do so he reached for her hand, holding it within his own and giving it a comforting squeeze.

Any prideful attempt she might have wanted to make to pull away was demolished as the crowd started to surge around them, almost knocking Ionanthe off her feet. Small stones were being thrown at the captive men.

Quickly Max pulled her close to him, holding her protectively and then commanding, ‘My people, listen to me. Today has signified a very special moment in our shared history. For your sake, and out of her love for you, the Duchess Ionanthe consented to become my wife. Those who have served her family have every right to feel great pride in the sacrifice she has made for the sake of our principality. Together we will work for the good of this island and its people—all its people. It is my will and my decree that our wedding day should not be marred by violence and punishment.’

Although initially shocked to hear Max speak in such a powerful and flattering way about her, Ionanthe recovered quickly, seizing the moment to join her own voice to that of her new husband and address the now silent and watchful crowd.

‘Your Prince speaks the truth.’ She turned to where the captive men were standing stiffly and resentfully and told them, ‘You do me great honour, but it is no exaggeration
to say that your Prince has done me an even greater honour in taking me as his wife.’

A low rumble of dissent from her people and an even stronger rumble of contempt from the rest of the crowd swelled ominously into the silence, but Ionanthe refused to be deterred. She could feel the warmth of Max’s arm against her back and she could feel too the protective clasp of his hand on her shoulder.

‘Out of our shared love for you, if God wills it, the Prince and I will create the son who will one day rule you all. It is for him that I have submitted to my duty in the eyes of our ancient law, for him that your Prince has accepted my sacrifice. My people—our people—we do this for you.’

The whole square had fallen silent once more, but it was a tense, watchful and judging silence, Ionanthe knew. A silence that brooded and threatened. And then, unbelievably, Max caught hold of her hand and lifted it to his lips. Placing his kiss not on her knuckles but rather opening her palm and placing a kiss into it. Those close enough to witness the emotional intimacy and intensity of the small gesture gasped.

‘My wife is right,’ Max told the crowd. And, raising his voice, he commanded them, ‘My people, this is not a time to dwell on past quarrels or injustices. It is a time to celebrate. Those who would have fought for the honour of my wife are to be praised, not punished, because in serving her best interests they also serve mine. I commend their loyalty, just as I promise my loyalty to all of you. Captain—’ he turned to the captain of the Guard ‘—these men are to be allowed to go free.’

There was a great cheer from the crowd, and then another, and then suddenly the people were surging all around them, laughing and cheering, the earlier mood of hostility wiped clean away.

‘Thank you for… for freeing them,’ she managed to say to Max, even though she knew her voice was stilted.

The movement of the crowd suddenly threw Ionanthe against Max’s chest. His arms came round her to hold her steady. Her hands were on his shoulders as she too sought to steady herself. She looked up at him, and then couldn’t look away. The noise of the crowd seemed to fade, and all her senses registered was contained within the encirclement of Max’s arms. He bent his head towards her own. Her heart was beating far too fast—and for no sensible reason. Her people were safe now, there was no need for her heart to thud or her pulse to race.

Max’s lips touched her own, their possession hard and purposeful. She should pull away, she
wanted
to pull away, but the dominating power of his mouth on hers wouldn’t let her. Instead she felt as though she was being carried by a swift and dangerous current that was taking her deeper with every breath she took. Until she was giving in to it and sinking down into its hot velvet darkness, allowing it to take her and possess her. Reality and everything that went with it was forgotten, sent into oblivion by what she was feeling, as though those feelings and her own senses had united against her, treacherously allowing an enemy force to overwhelm her defences.

Her whole body had turned soft and heavy, as though she had drunk some potion brewed by the witches who centuries ago were supposed to have inhabited the high
mountains of Fortenegro. Desires, longings, needs that less than half an hour ago she would have fiercely claimed it was impossible for her to feel for any man, much less this one, were now burning through her, invading her belly, making her breasts ache, making her long with increasing sexual urgency for the most intense and intimate possession of her flesh by the man who was holding her.

And then the darkness beyond the town square was broken as a firework display began, the sound bringing her back to reality. Above them in the night sky showers of multi-coloured stars exploded and then fell back to earth, their effect a mere shadow of the explosion of desire inside her. Shocked, Ionanthe pulled herself out of Max’s arms.

His arms felt cold and empty, and his body was racked with a physical ache that gnawed at him; all he wanted right now, Max acknowledged, was to take Ionanthe back to the castle and his bed. Her response to his kiss had ignited a need inside him that had taken him completely by surprise. And, more than that, during those intense moments a hope had come to life inside him that went against everything he had told himself he believed with regard to any marriage he might make. It should have been a salutary experience, or at the very least one which left him feeling wary and concerned about his own misjudgement, but instead what he actually felt was a feeling that was far sweeter.

Could it be that against all the odds—miraculously, almost—they shared a mutual desire for one another which could prove to be an unexpected foundation stone
on which they could build a strong marriage? Max asked himself ruefully. If so… He looked at Ionanthe.

Sensing Max’s gaze focusing on her, and dreading what she suspected she would see in it if she were foolish enough to meet it, Ionanthe fought to keep her burning face, with its scarlet banners advertising her folly, to herself.

She knew perfectly well what Max would be thinking. She had experienced male sexual arrogance—if mainly second hand—often enough during the course of her work in Brussels to know full well that the average man’s reaction to a woman who responded as passionately as she had just done to Max was to assume that she must find him irresistible, must be desperate for even more sexual intimacy with him. There was no way Ionanthe wanted Max to think that about her. It offended her pride more than enough that she had to acknowledge to herself that she had responded to him, without having to endure
him
smirking over her vulnerability as well. She had to say something that would convince him that she had not really been affected by his kiss at all.

Ionanthe took a deep breath and said, as coolly as she could, ‘Well, now that I’ve played my part and done everything I can to convince everyone that I’ve married you willingly, including that faked display of wifely adoration, perhaps we could return to the palace?’

Ionanthe took care to wait for the silence that followed with a small frosty smile that was more a baring of her pretty white teeth than a real smile, before actually risking a look at Max.

The stony expression carved on his face should have been reassuring—as should the icy-cold tones in which he informed her, in a very distancing manner, ‘Very well. I’ll get the Captain of the Guard to escort you back.’

Instead, for some silly reason, they actually made her feel abandoned and forlorn.

So much for his stupid hopes, Max reflected grimly as he watched the Captain of the Guard escorting Ionanthe back to the hotel. At least the Captain was a middle-aged, heavily set man, and not the kind of Adonis-like youth his first wife had seemed to find so irresistible—just in case her sister should have the same proclivities. What a fool he’d been to think for even a moment that there could be something personal between them. Hell, he’d already told himself that that was the last thing he wanted. Didn’t he already have more than enough on his plate, with all the problems involved in bringing a new era to subjects without wanting to burden himself with some more? He simply could not take the risk of allowing himself to become sexually or emotionally vulnerable to Ionanthe. He knew that.

Cerebrally he might know it, but what about his body?

His body would have to learn, Max told himself grimly.

It was late in the evening—far later than he had initially envisaged having this conversation, thanks to the incident in the square—and the formal surroundings of the Grand Ministerial Chamber were hardly suited to its subject matter. But he had been determined to sign the necessary declaration that would ensure the freedom of the protestors without any delay.

Not that their earlier surroundings had been any more intimate—their first shared evening meal as a newly married couple having taken place in the equally formal and grand State Dining Room, where they had been seated at either end of a table designed to accommodate formal state dinners. With the length of a polished mahogany table that could easily seat fifty people separating them, and a silver-gilt centrepiece from the Royal Treasury between them, even if they had wanted to talk to one another it would have been impossible.

However, despite the cold hauteur with which Ionanthe had made plain exactly what her expectations of their marriage were, Max felt duty bound to have this conversation.

‘As there hasn’t been time to arrange a formal honeymoon—’ he began.

‘I don’t want one.’ Ionanthe stopped him quickly.

He had taken her sister to Italy—surely one of the most romantic honeymoon venues there could be?—but that wasn’t the reason for her immediate interruption. That owed its existence to what had happened to her out in the square, when Max had kissed her. How easily she had risked humiliating herself. She could just imagine how much it would please her new husband’s male ego if he thought that he could arouse her so easily. Men had no conscience when it came to women’s emotions and desires. She had seen that so often in Brussels. She had seen how men exploited the vulnerability of women, persuading them to give up their own moral beliefs for their own advantage. She certainly wasn’t going to put herself in that position—not when there was so much
at stake for the country, for the son she hoped to have who would one day rule it.

There must be no further impulsive and unnecessary intimacies between Max and herself. It was her duty to consummate their marriage—how else could she conceive the son she was so determined to have for the people?—but she was determined not to put herself in a position where she might be sucked back into that dangerous state she had experienced earlier. A cool, calm and controlled execution of her marital and royal duty was her goal.

‘Maybe not,’ Max agreed calmly, ‘but it is expected. Therefore I plan to arrange for us to spend several days at the hunting lodge.’

Ionanthe looked at him in dismay.

The Royal Hunting Lodge was up in the mountains, and in winter doubled as a ski lodge as it was above the snow line.

‘Surely it will be inconvenient for you to be away from the centre of government?’ she protested. Not for anything was she going to admit to him that the hunting lodge’s remoteness and the fact that they would be alone there were filling her with panic.

When Max made no response she shrugged and affected a cool logic she was far from feeling, telling him, ‘I can’t see any purpose in us isolating ourselves in the mountains. It is our duty, I know, to produce an heir to succeed you, but we can do that just as well here.’