Dangerous Women (70 page)

He didn’t think it safe to leave the women; the banditti might come back, and a right numpty he’d look if they did. There was no sign of their driver, who had evidently abandoned them out of fright. He told the ladies to sit down under a sycamore tree and gave them his canteen to drink from, and after a bit, they stopped talking quite so fast.

“Where is Diego?” Rebekah said, quite intelligibly.

“Och, he’ll be along presently,” Ian said, hoping it was true. He was beginning to be worrit himself.

“Perhaps he’s been killed, too,” said the maidservant, who shot an ill-tempered glare at her mistress. “How would you feel then?”

“I’m sure he wouldn’t—I mean, he’s not. I’m sure,” Rebekah repeated, not sounding all that sure.

She was right, though; no sooner had Ian decided to march the women back along the road to have a keek, when Jamie came shambling around the bend himself, and sank down in the dry grass, closing his eyes.

“Are you all right?” Rebekah asked, bending down anxiously to look at him from under the brim of her straw traveling hat. He didn’t look very peart, Ian thought.

“Aye, fine.” He touched the back of his head, wincing slightly. “Just a wee dunt on the heid. The fellow who fell down in the road,” he explained to Ian, closing his eyes again. “He got up again, and hit me from behind. Didna knock me clean out, but it distracted me for a wee bit, and when I got my wits back, they’d both gone—the fellow that hit me, and the one I was hittin’.”

“Mmphm,” said Ian, and, squatting in front of his friend, thumbed up one of Jamie’s eyelids and peered intently into the bloodshot blue eye behind it. He had no idea what to look for, but he’d seen Père Renault do that, after which he usually applied leeches somewhere. As it was, both that eye and the other one looked fine to him; just as well, as he hadn’t any leeches. He handed Jamie the canteen and went to look the horses over.

“Two of them are sound enough,” he reported, coming back. “The light bay’s lame. Did the bandits take your horse? And what about the driver?”

Jamie looked surprised.

“I forgot I had a horse,” he confessed. “I dinna ken about the driver—didna see him lyin’ in the road, at least.” He glanced vaguely round. “Where’s Monsieur Pickle?”

“Dead. Stay there, aye?”

Ian sighed, got up, and loped back down the road, where he found no sign of the driver, though he walked to and fro calling for a while. Fortunately he did find Jamie’s horse, peaceably cropping grass by the verge. He rode it back and found the women on their feet, discussing something in low voices, now and then looking down the road, or standing on their toes in a vain attempt to see through the trees.

Jamie was still sitting on the ground, eyes closed—but at least upright.

“Can ye ride, man?” Ian asked softly, squatting down by his friend. To his relief, Jamie opened his eyes at once.

“Oh, aye. Ye’re thinkin’ we should ride into Saint-Aubaye, and send someone back to do something about the coach and Peretz?”

“What else is there to do?”

“Nothing I can think of. I dinna suppose we can take him with us.” Jamie got to his feet, swaying a little, but without needing to hold on to the tree. “Can the women ride, d’ye think?”

Marie could, it turned out—at least a little. Rebekah had never been on a horse. After more discussion than Ian would have believed possible on the subject, he got the late M. Peretz decently laid out on the coach’s seat with a handkerchief over his face against the flies, and the rest of them finally mounted: Jamie on his horse with the Torah scroll in its canvas wrappings bound behind his saddle—between the profanation of its being touched by a Gentile and the prospect of its being left in the coach for anyone happening by to find, the women had reluctantly allowed the former—the maid on one of the coach horses, with a makeshift pair of saddlebags made from the covers of the coach’s seats, these filled with as much of the women’s luggage as they could cram into them, and Ian with Rebekah on the saddle before him.

Rebekah looked like a wee dolly, but she was surprisingly solid, as he found when she put her foot in his hands and he tossed her up into the saddle. She didn’t manage to swing her leg over, and instead lay across the saddle like a dead deer, waving her arms and legs in agitation. Wrestling her into an upright position, and getting himself set behind her, left him red-faced and sweating far more than dealing with the horses had.

Jamie gave him a raised eyebrow, as much jealousy as amusement in it, and he gave Jamie a squinted eye in return and put his arm round Rebekah’s waist to settle her against him, hoping that he didn’t stink too badly.

It was dark by the time they made it into Saint-Aubaye and found an inn that could provide them with two rooms. Ian talked to the landlord, and arranged that someone should go in the morning to retrieve M. Peretz’s body and bury it; the women weren’t happy about the lack of proper preparation of the body, but as they insisted he must be buried before the next sundown, there wasn’t much else to be done. Then he inspected the women’s room, looked under the beds, rattled the shutters in a confident manner, and bade them good night. They looked that wee bit frazzled.

Going back to the other room, he heard a sweet chiming sound, and found Jamie on his knees, pushing the bundle that contained the Torah scroll under the single bed.

“That’ll do,” he said, sitting back on his heels with a sigh. He looked nearly as done up as the women, Ian thought, but didn’t say so.

“I’ll go and have some supper sent up,” he said. “I smelled a joint roasting. Some of that, and maybe—”

“Whatever they’ve got,” Jamie said fervently. “Bring it all.”

They ate heartily, and separately, in their rooms. Jamie was beginning to feel that the second helping of tarte tatin with clotted cream had been a mistake when Rebekah came into the men’s room, followed by her maid carrying a small tray with a jug on it, wisping aromatic steam. Jamie sat up straight, restraining a small cry as pain flashed through his head. Rebekah frowned at him, gull-winged brows lowering in concern.

“Your head hurts very much, Diego?”

“No, it’s fine. No but a wee bang on the heid.” He was sweating and his wame was wobbly, but he pressed his hands flat on the wee table and was sure he looked steady. She appeared not to think so, and came close, bending down to look searchingly into his eyes.

“I don’t think so,” she said. “You look … clammy.”

“Oh. Aye?” he said, rather feebly.

“If she means ye look like a fresh-shucked clam, then aye, ye do,” Ian informed him. “Shocked, ken? All pale and wet and—”

“I ken what ‘clammy’ means, aye?” He glowered at Ian, who gave him half a grin—damn, he must look awful; Ian was actually worried. He swallowed, looking for something witty to say in reassurance, but his gorge rose suddenly and he was obliged to shut both mouth and eyes tightly, concentrating fiercely to make it go back down.

“Tea,” Rebekah was saying firmly. She took the jug from her maid and poured a cup, then folded Jamie’s hands about it and, holding his hands with her own, guided the cup to his mouth. “Drink. It will help.”

He drank, and it did. At least he felt less queasy at once. He recognized the taste of the tea, though he thought this cup had a few other things in it, too.

“Again.” Another cup was presented; he managed to drink this one alone and, by the time it was down, felt a good bit better. His head still throbbed with his heartbeat, but the pain seemed be standing a little apart from him, somehow.

“You shouldn’t be left alone for a little while,” Rebekah informed him, and sat down, sweeping her skirts elegantly around her ankles. He opened his mouth to say that he wasn’t alone, Ian was there—but caught Ian’s eye in time and stopped.

“The bandits,” she was saying to Ian, her pretty brow creased, “who do you think that they were?”

“Ah … well, depends. If they kent who ye were, and wanted to abduct ye, that’s one thing. But could be they were no but random thieves, and saw the coach and thought they’d chance it for what they might get. Ye didna recognize any of them, did ye?”

Her eyes sprang wide. They weren’t quite the color of Annalise’s, Jamie thought hazily. A softer brown … like the breast feathers on a grouse.

“Know who I was?” she whispered. “Wanted to abduct me?” She swallowed. “You … think that’s possible?” She gave a little shudder.

“Well, I dinna ken, of course. Here,
a nighean,
ye ought to have a wee nip of that tea, I’m thinkin’.” Ian stretched out a long arm for the jug, but she moved it back, shaking her head.

“No, it’s medicine—and Diego needs it. Don’t you?” she said, leaning a little forward to peer earnestly into Jamie’s eyes. She’d taken off the hat, but had her hair tucked up—mostly—in a lacy white cap with pink ribbon. He nodded obediently.

“Marie—bring some brandy, please. The shock …” She swallowed again, and wrapped her arms briefly around herself. Jamie noticed the way it pushed her breasts up, so they swelled just a little above her stays. There was a little tea left in his cup; he drank it automatically.

Marie came with the brandy, and poured a glass for Rebekah—then one for Ian, at Rebekah’s gesture, and when Jamie made a small polite noise in his throat, half-filled his cup, pouring in more tea on top of it. The taste was peculiar, but he didn’t really mind. The pain had gone off to the far side of the room; he could see it sitting over there, a wee glowering sort of purple thing with a bad-tempered expression on its face. He laughed at it, and Ian frowned at him.

“What are ye giggling at?”

Jamie couldn’t think how to describe the pain-beastie, so just shook his head, which proved a mistake—the pain looked suddenly gleeful and shot back into his head with a noise like tearing cloth. The room spun and he clutched the table with both hands.

“Diego!” Chairs scraped and there was a good bit of clishmaclaver that he paid no attention to. Next thing he knew, he was lying on the bed looking at the ceiling beams. One of them seemed to be twining slowly, like a vine growing.

“… and he told the Captain that there was someone among the Jews who kent about …” Ian’s voice was soothing, earnest and slow so Rebekah would understand him—though Jamie thought she maybe understood more than she said. The twining beam was slowly sprouting small green leaves, and he had the faint thought that this was unusual, but a great sense of tranquility had come over him and he didn’t mind it a bit.

Rebekah was saying something now, her voice soft and worried, and with some effort, he turned his head to look. She was leaning over the table toward Ian, and he had both big hands wrapped round hers, reassuring her that he and Jamie would let no harm come to her.

A different face came suddenly into his view; the maid, Marie, frowning down at him. She rudely pulled back his eyelid and peered into his eye, so close he could smell the garlic on her breath. He blinked hard, and she let go with a small “Hmph!” then turned to say something to Rebekah, who replied in quick Ladino. The maid shook her head dubiously, but left the room.

Her face didn’t leave with her, though. He could still see it, frowning down at him from above. It had become attached to the leafy beam, and he now realized that there was a snake up there, a serpent with a woman’s head, and an apple in its mouth—that couldn’t be right, surely it should be a pig?—and it came slithering down the wall and right over his chest, pressing the apple close to his face. It smelled wonderful, and he wanted to bite it, but before he could, he felt the weight of the snake change, going soft and heavy, and he arched his back a little, feeling the distinct imprint of big round breasts squashing against him. The snake’s tail—she was mostly a woman now, but her backend seemed still to be snakeish—was delicately stroking the inside of his thigh.

He made a very high-pitched noise, and Ian came hurriedly to the bed.

“Are ye all right, man?”

“I—oh. Oh! Oh, Jesus, do that again.”

“Do
what
—” Ian was beginning, when Rebekah appeared, putting a hand on Ian’s arm.

“Don’t worry,” she said, looking intently at Jamie. “He’s all right. The medicine—it gives men strange dreams.”

“He doesna look like he’s asleep,” Ian said dubiously. In fact, Jamie was squirming—or thought he was squirming—on the bed, trying to persuade the lower half of the snake-woman to change, too. He
was
panting; he could hear himself.

“It’s a waking dream,” Rebekah said reassuringly. “Come, leave him. He’ll fall quite asleep in a bit, you’ll see.”

Jamie didn’t think he’d fallen asleep, but it was evidently some time later that he emerged from a remarkable tryst with the snake-demon—he didn’t know how he knew she was a demon, but clearly she was—who had not changed her lower half, but had a very womanly mouth about her—and a number of her friends, these being small female demons who licked his ears—and other things—with great enthusiasm.

He turned his head on the pillow to allow one of these better access and saw, with no sense of surprise, Ian kissing Rebekah. The brandy bottle had fallen over, empty, and he seemed to see the wraith of its perfume rise swirling through the air like smoke, wrapping the two of them in a mist shot with rainbows.

He closed his eyes again, the better to attend to the snake-lady, who now had a number of new and interesting acquaintances. When he opened them sometime later, Ian and Rebekah were gone.

At some point, he heard Ian give a sort of strangled cry and wondered dimly what had happened, but it didn’t seem important, and the thought drifted away. He slept.

He woke sometime later, feeling limp as a frostbitten cabbage leaf, but the pain in his head was gone. He just lay there for a bit, enjoying the feeling. It was dark in the room, and it was some time before he realized from the smell of brandy that Ian was lying beside him.

Memory came back to him. It took a little time to disentangle the real memories from the memory of dreams, but he was quite sure he’d seen Ian embracing Rebekah—and her, him. What the devil had happened
then
?

Ian wasn’t asleep; he could tell. His friend lay rigid as one of the tomb-figures in the crypt at St. Denis, and his breathing was rapid and shaky, as though he’d just run a mile uphill. Jamie cleared his throat, and Ian jerked as though stabbed with a brooch-pin.