The Passion (24 page)

In the more recent paintings, those depicting costumes from two hundred years ago or earlier, the presence of the wolves was almost innocuous—

running in the background, peeking out from behind garden shrubs or wooded paths, sometimes playing as cubs amidst delicately gowned females in a glade or woodland setting. Some of the most stunning portraits featured wolves without humans at al —a single wolf resting upon a sunny hil side, posing before a rosy fire, lifting his head in a howl of triumph.

But as Tessa moved backward through history, the portraits became more disturbing. In one painting of a red-haired woman in a Renaissance costume, the storm clouds as seen through her castle window formed the faces and sharp slanted eyes of wolves.

In another, a man stood upon a moonlit hil side and, arms outstretched, addressed an assemblage of wolves—wolves in the meadow, as far as the eyes could see, alert, attentive, listening to what he had to say. In another, wolves and naked children with long silky hair shared a feast of bloody meat. In yet another, a naked woman with silky blond hair cascading over her breasts and hips but with no hair at al around her private parts caressed a powerful black wolf whose commanding gaze dominated the portrait, and the look in her eyes was pure adoration.

But by far the most striking—and, in many ways, horrifying—portrait occupied the ful length and breadth of a special y constructed wal in the farthermost room, a room that was empty of al else except the huge canvas. In it, a larger-than-life-sized wolf, his male member enormous and engorged, his eyes blazing yel ow, prepared to mount a naked human woman. Her dark, wind-tossed hair suggested wildness; the fierce triumph in her eyes spoke of seduction wel planned. The evidence of her humanity was in the dark hair beneath her arms and between her legs. In the back-ground a cascade of history unfolded across a shadowed plain—troops of humans and bodies of wolves, bodies of humans in the jaws of wolves, wolves at rest in green paradise, humans at war in filthy cities. From the sky the ghostly shapes of creatures half wolf and half human, half human and half wolf, looked down upon it al in serene judgement. The impact of the painting was overwhelming, sickening, terrifying—but mesmerizing. Tessa could not take her eyes away even as she knew she could stare at it for decades and never see al the hidden details, never know al its encrypted messages.

"Does it disturb you?"

Tessa whirled, catching a gasp in her throat, at the voice behind her. Elise Devoncroix sat on a blue velvet viewing divan less than six feet from Tessa, and how she had arrived there unnoticed Tessa could not begin to imagine. Her hair was braided into a thick rope over one shoulder, and she wore purple bicycle trousers and a tight-waisted, ful -

sleeved silk shirt. Her boots were scuffed, and she carried a pair of worn leather gardening gloves in her hand. It was details such as these—the gloves, the boots—that never failed to put Tessa at her ease around the queen, and it had occurred to her to wonder once or twice whether Elise—so magical, so powerful—somehow manufactured them just to make Tessa comfortable.

Tessa turned slowly back to the painting, and answered honestly. "Yes."

"It's cal ed 'The Conception,' and it's quite the most valuable thing in my col ection. Wars have been fought for it, as a matter of fact. It's over five thousand years old."

Tessa cast an incredulous gaze on her and Elise nodded. "Oh, yes, quite true. You're only surprised because you're accustomed to measuring civilization in human terms. But our culture is much, much older, and our accomplishments, natural y, much more notable. Of course," she added, rising to stand beside Tessa, "the pigments are not as stable as we might like, and are particularly susceptible to deterioration from the chemicals produced by human breath and…" She looked meaningful y at the lamps Tessa had lighted. "Smoke."

Instinctively Tessa took a step back, dragging her gaze from the canvas. "I'm sorry," she said quickly.

"I didn't mean…"

Elise smiled. "I suppose we might stand here for a few more moments. And I'm curious. What is it about the painting that disturbs you most?"

Unlike Alexander, Elise never teased Tessa by speaking in a language that was not completely her own, but always addressed her in English—as a matter of courtesy, Tessa thought. But like Alexander—and every other werewolf she had met

—Elise could switch languages with uncanny ease, and never revealed the faintest trace of an accent.

Tessa returned her attention to the painting, though the answer to the question was obvious. "I was told

—that is, Alexander explained to me that such a thing…" She made a smal , shy gesture toward the canvas. "That the mating of humans and werewolves is impossible."

"That's true. The painting is meant to be symbolic."

Elise's voice was patient, but Tessa thought she detected the faintest trace of condescension there.

"I understood him to say that the very notion of such a thing was… disgusting."

"Do you find the depiction before you disgusting?"

Tessa looked again at the powerful, aroused wolf, the fierce and sharp-eyed human woman, and she swal owed hard, nodding.

"Then you see our two peoples have something in common," replied Elise.

"But no human artist painted this," Tessa pointed out. "No human wars have been fought over it and no humans treasure it. How can you place such a great value on something that's both untrue and moral y offensive to you?"

Elise laughed softly. "Wel , now, a question asked is halfway to the answer, isn't it? Unfortunately, I'm not sure there's a satisfactory answer for that, at least not one I can put in human terms. It has to do with humor. With the pleasure we take from mocking ourselves and our icons. No, there's no word for it in English, or in French. Do you speak Latin? No?

Wel , it doesn't matter. There simply isn't a human equivalent, although 'irony' is close. We value the painting
because
it is untrue and offensive and because it causes us to question what we value.

Also, of course, because it is a marvel ous work of art and tel s a masterful story."

Tessa shook her head helplessly, unwil ing to turn away from the painting. "I don't understand," she said.

Elise slipped her arm through Tessa's, patting her hand gently. "Then," she said kindly, "today you have learned something very important."

Tessa looked away from the painting and into the eyes of Elise Devoncroix. The contrast between the grotesquerie of the depiction and the porcelain beauty of the reality was startling, disorienting.

"You wil never understand us, Tessa LeGuerre,"

Elise said, not unkindly. "Our two species are alien to each other. We came to accept that truth long ago. And if you are ever to be content, so must you.

"Now come," she invited, drawing Tessa away, "let's put out the lamps before irreparable damage is done. I wil probably have electric lamps instal ed here as soon as our scientists discover a way to keep the heat from drying out the canvases. I can't help but think heat wil do far less damage than fumes, though."

Tessa cast one more uneasy glance over her shoulder at the painting. Elise watched her indulgently. "Final thoughts?" she suggested. "What wil you tel Alexander about your sojourn into the art history of our kind?"

Tessa was thoughtful in her reply. "Why is it," she said, "that in your legends and mine—in your art and mine—the woman is always depicted as the originator of al our troubles?"

Elise laughed out loud with delight. "What a lively debate we'll have at the dinner table tonight!"

They put out the lamps and left the gal ery arm in arm, and Elise never once reprimanded Tessa for going where she should not have.

Chapter Eleven

The family of Elise Devoncroix had built its considerable fortune on shipping—for
les loups-garous
, as Tessa discovered, though they were not overly fond of large bodies of water and often made poor swimmers, had an uncanny mastery of the sea. This was due in part to their innate navigational abilities, and in part to simple skil s like hand-eye coordination and masterful shipbuilding. Moreover, in the early thirteenth century, an enterprising Devoncroix had laid claim to most of the coal deposits in the British Isles, for werewolves had discovered the convenience and efficiency of coal long before the human population began to deplete the forests to such an extent that the price of firewood became prohibitive.

Their acute sense of smel al owed them to locate deposits of oil and gas far beneath the surface of the earth, and the coal mines gave birth to a new fortune. The same skil s were used to locate mineral deposits—gold, silver, precious stones—and the fortune grew.

They were shrewd, they were bold, and they were imaginative. From these two solid bases—shipping and mining—the Devoncroix had built a financial empire that criss-crossed Europe and the Americas.

Each generation brought a new component into the mix: railroads, in the case of Sancerre, who had been Elise's father; and, from Elise, perfumery.

Tessa, who had very little interest in the complexities of industry nor knowledge of how it worked, was nonetheless overawed when she considered the vast influence of the Devoncroix, and the possibilities that were implicit. Sometimes she thought she must not have understood correctly at al ; most of the time she found it more practical to simply ignore what she did not understand. One thing, however, became quickly apparent, even to her: while the position of "pack leader" might be purely symbolic and the associated responsibilities nothing more than traditional, the real power inherent in being a Devoncroix was financial.

What Elise Devoncroix had inherited in the year of 1897 was more than a fortune, less than a kingdom.

Centuries of ritual and circumstance descended to her, as wel as the moral responsibility for the preservation of certain values, skil s and traditions.

She opened the Palais for theatricals and athletic contests. She made available its pools and rivers for recreation and its vast, protected wooded areas for running. And although theoretical y these areas were open to al werewolves through the dictates of noblesse oblige, Tessa learned that only the very highest ranking were invited to the Palais, and no one got past the guards without an invitation.

Many of the werewolves who visited the Palais sought Elise's advice, intervention or financial aid, which she dispensed according to the validity of the request and the deservedness of the claimant.

Others came to inspect her, to determine her strength and her weaknesses and to decide whether or not it might be worth their while to chal enge her in battle. Tessa was outraged to learn this and demanded why her guards ever al owed such traitors to come into her presence. Elise just laughed.

"But those are the very ones I
want
to see," she explained. "How else can I know who my enemies are?" Then she shrugged and added, "If they do chal enge me they'll be kil ed, and if they don't they wil be rewarded for their wisdom and their bravery."

It seemed to Tessa a great foolishness and a waste of time, but she had too much respect for Elise to say so.

Elise gave her approval to marriages and officiated at births, and kept in her head the family tree of each member of the pack. This seemed to Tessa an astonishing feat, but Elise took it as a matter of course, for it was something she had learned from childhood, much in the way human children learn the alphabet and, once learned, never give it a second thought. The matter of families, of births, deaths and marriages—or matings, as they were cal ed—was of the utmost importance in their society, ranking far above squabbles, conquests or even the acquisition of wealth. Tessa found it odd that such an ordinary thing should be elevated to almost reverential status among a people who otherwise seemed almost completely ruled by pragmatism.

"Our numbers are fewer than yours," pointed out Elise, not unkindly, "which may cause us to value such things more highly than you."

"Or perhaps," suggested Alexander with a hint of bored annoyance, "it is simply that we
are
more valuable than you.
Vraiment
, mademoisel e, I don't know why you persist in indulging this bothersome child's curiosity upon subjects that don't concern her in the least."

"Because it amuses me," replied Elise smoothly.

"Do I need another reason?"

Alexander's eyes narrowed in quick recognition of his own words when he had been asked the same thing by Gault. Tessa smothered a giggle behind her hand, and Elise laughed out loud, and in a moment a reciprocal spark of appreciation shone in Alexander's own eyes.

He caught Tessa playful y around the waist and drew her to him. "Sharper than a serpent's tooth is a treacherous female," he declared. "I can see now my mistake in bringing the two of you together."

"It is always a mistake to underestimate the cunning of a woman," retorted Elise.

Tessa added, "Or a human."

They laughed together, and Alexander kept his arm around her waist as the threesome walked through the gardens. Tessa leaned against him, secure and content, and was once again struck by that sense of wonder that her life should be so perfect.

"What a foolish werewolf Denis Antonov must be."

Tessa said to Elise after a moment. "You never would have married him."