To Burn (16 page)

Cynric lurched to his feet and strode away from the table, his eyes an angry blaze of lust and fury; Cynric was finding it difficult to reconcile his distrust of the Roman with his desire for the woman. Cynric found his temper pushed to the edge by the little Roman snake.

"You can see the trouble she is causing," Cynric fumed, "and the pleasure she gets from it." Balduff and Cenred were debating, loudly, the quality of the wine from Melania's vineyard.

Wulfred, studying Melania's pleased expression with studied stoicism, said only, "She thinks she is causing more trouble than she is."

"She is a viper, slithering among us. A fire, burning each of us."

"I am not burned," Wulfred said easily. "And I am not afraid of snakes."

"Perhaps not you..."

"The solution is simple, Cynric," he said, facing his friend. "Walk away. If the fire is too hot, turn your back on it and walk away."

Cynric grimaced his anguish at the idea of retreat, before he did just that, but not before turning for one more glance at Melania.

Melania, always reworking her battle plan. She had the appearance now of one content, at peace with her situation and with her life, but he did not believe the pose. She was not happy. The hatred and violence of weeks did not turn easily to acquiescence; none knew that better than he. Melania was consistent, true to her stated goals, passionate in her vow of hatred. No, this was a new tactic, a new strategy to best him.

She was a resourceful adversary; he'd give her that.

She'd maneuvered him into prohibiting her from hard labor, into eating each meal at a place of prominence at his side, into daily baths; it had not been her initial intent to win these luxuries from him, but the result was the same. And now she teased his men into fits of desire and jealousy and he spent more and more of his days controlling them, redirecting their passions, because he would kill the man who touched her. His men did not act on her blatant invitation and they never would; he had declared her his alone, which all within the confines of the villa knew very well. Now she turned his protection of her to prick him. Oh, yes, she was very resourceful, very devious.

How to turn the trap she had set back on her again? What would eat at her? What would cause her to crash against the restrictions of her life until she drowned in endless despair? That was all he wanted for her, this Roman, to be crushed by his hand, as he had once almost been crushed. To taste the despair he had once known until she choked and vomited on it.

He watched her. It seemed he always watched her. Her hair was up, crafted into swirling, minute braids, the black gleaming in the torchlight, inky, shining, smooth, a perfect foil for her glittering eyes. The black makeup she wore accentuated the large almond shape of her expressive eyes—eyes in which he could read the shadows of spiteful pleasure. She was an exotic beauty like nothing his men had ever seen or ever known, even beyond his own experience of women, but she was Roman. He understood Romans.

She leaned back on her elbows and Balduff fed her. It was very seductive and she knew it well. She had filled out since her attempts at starvation had failed, but she was still petite, hardly more than a handful, hardly as high as his chest. A Roman to the bone, she was; they were not a large race, but they were proud and domineering. She was dominating them now, subjugating his men with desire. She, being Roman, would not be content until she ruled them all. An arrogant race. A seductive race.

Though he had never found anything about Rome to be seductive before knowing her.

She knew what she was doing. Every smile and tilt of her head was by design, She was clever. She was determined. And she had proven herself to be ruthlessly devious.

Spitting her fury at him, she had defied him. Demanding rights that were no longer hers, she had tried to bully him. Even when she was afraid, anger came spitting out of her. Anger, so often rolling out from her to slap against her foes, was her defense.

Wulfred smiled, knowing he had unearthed a weakness in his adversary, and then he laughed lightly; he could only appreciate her unflinching bravado. She did not give up, this one, and perhaps he might have admired her for it. Perhaps he would have felt desire for her himself, for her hair was as thick and dark as the night and her eyes as bright as the sun and her shape and form as delicate and feminine as the lark, and her spirit... her spirit was a blazing fire that would not be doused. Perhaps he would have felt these things, thought these things, if she had not been Roman.

Wulfred pushed away from the wall and dropped his arms, forcing himself to look away from her. She was like a fire in the night; if one looked too long, it became impossible to see anything but the fire.

How to stop her? How to turn this latest strategy against her? How to end the friction among his men? How to destroy her slowly, so that he could lengthen his own pleasure in this revenge? That was all he wanted, no matter her beauty and her fire; her defeat was what fed him, as planning his defeat fed her. She had not changed. She would never change.

He looked back at her over his shoulder. How long had he looked away? A moment or two? Had it even been that long? It had felt longer.

Wulfred, watching her sip her wine and smile at Cuthred across the rim, smiled as the perfect revenge burst upon his mind with the shining force of the rising sun. His smile was so full and so unexpected that Melania choked on her drink, eyeing him with instant suspicion. It was well she was suspicious, for he knew exactly how to stop all the trouble she was stirring up. This little Roman snake would cause no more trouble. He laughed out loud as he left the triclinium.

He could not see her, but he could feel her eyes on his back. And he could almost hear her rattle her alarm.

* * *

They stood in the dark of the wood, the scattered yellow lights of the villa twinkling warmly in the narrow valley below. Clouds of ice blue skidded across the night sky in tattered, tortured strips, running away to the east. A wolf cried sharply in the night, a broken cry of hunger. The leaves of last autumn twirled and hissed in a sudden strong gust of night wind, stirring the moist decay at their feet for a moment before dying off.

It was just such a night as this that he had taken her world for his own, taken it and destroyed it. It was fitting that this night should be so much like the first time he had seen her villa, so helpless and indefensible against the dark, for now he would destroy again, though in different fashion.

Why could his comitatus not see it as he saw it?

"I honor you always, Wulfred, but think again on this plan. This is no way to defeat her!" Cynric said, his voice quavering with tension.

"Better to kill her, be done with it, and move on," Cuthred said flatly, fingering his blade with a reluctance odd for him.

"Without my pleasure from her?" Wulfred smiled, with no thought at all of killing her.

"There is pleasure in killing," Cuthred argued.

"But there is more pleasure in torment, especially of a Roman," Wulfred said. "Especially of this Roman."

"If it is because she has.... well, if it is because she is beautiful..." Cenred stammered guiltily.

"And?" Wulfred prompted, squatting on his haunches and turning his shadowed face to the quiet villa below.

"If we have driven you to this by our attention to her..." Cenred continued, his guilt almost choking him.

"No one drives me to anything, Cenred," Wulfred said slowly, pulling his knife free and resting its tip on the ground at his feet. "You are not the cause of this. She is. As to her beauty, I have seen it always."

"Have you?" Cenred said, amazed.

"Certainly. Do you throw your seax away because it is covered in blood and mud? Do you not see its shape and form? Is it without virtue because it wants cleaning?"

"She has no virtue," Cynric mumbled.

"She has one virtue that I prize above all," Wulfred said, standing, holding his knife easily, aggressively. "She is Roman, and only a Roman can give me my revenge. For this I value her."

The group of warriors went silent at that. The night wind died to nothing. The leaves drooped from the branches and hung lifelessly in the dark. A large insect, black and armored, scuttled through the leaves; Wulfred flicked his knife and the insect was impaled, his armor a useless thing against a Saxon weapon.

"She is courageous and she is hostile, hating Saxons as you hate Romans," Ceolmund said, looking away from the quivering knife in the ground and down into the villa courtyard.

"Hating us?" Balduff asked, his light blue eyes round in disbelief. "She has been delightful, at least to me." He eyed Cynric judiciously.

"Hating us," Ceolmund repeated.

"You were not fooled?" Wulfred asked, looking at his companion with quiet respect.

"No," Ceolmund stated seriously. "I think that her hate is as strong as yours, Wulfred."

"Perhaps, but
she
is not as strong as I. She cannot win."

"No, she cannot win, but why do this to yourself? This method wounds you as it enhances her," Cynric said, his voice hot in the still night.

"Wounded?" Wulfred asked, flexing his right arm. "I shall not be wounded because I marry her."

The words settled into the darkness like a stone, sending back ripples that struck against their very bones. Only Wulfred was oblivious to their bruising. Only Ceolmund suspected why.

"No, but you will be tied to a Roman for the rest of your life. What vengeance is that?" Cenred argued.

"And she will be bound to a Saxon throughout her life, a very miserable life. There is my vengeance."

"You honor her with your commitment," Cynric said in a snarl, angry because the contrary woman
would
see it as a punishment. "She will be brought into your house. What greater honor for her?"

"She will not see it as an honor. For her it will be torture, and that is all that is important," Wulfred stated, closing the subject, he thought.

"Slavery can end at your will, but the marriage bond is binding. You will have her in your life for the rest of
her
life," Balduff said with a shudder that had little to do with Melania.

"Which is all the more reason for her to hate it and all the better for my purposes. There will be no release for her, and she will know it."

"She sees no release for herself as a slave," Cuthred said, "and yet she does not behave as a slave."

"As my wife, she will be tied to me with the tightest bonds possible, bonds nearly impossible to break. It will be my greatest joy to watch her spend her lifetime thrashing against these bonds of marriage."

"Wulfred," Cynric asked, taking him by the arm in gentle admonishment, "are you certain? Will she feel the bonds of marriage when she did not feel the bonds of slavery?"

The villa lay in peaceful repose, the lights winking out in the heavy darkness below. All were abed, or soon to be. Unsuspecting. She was so very unsuspecting of what he planned for her.

Wulfred smiled and his teeth gleamed white in the moonlight. "She will."

Chapter 14

It wasn't turning out at all as she had planned. Oh, it was going well enough with Wulfred's men, or it had been going well until just recently. Recently, in just the past few days, they had all but run from her whenever she approached. Cynric had looked close to throwing stones at her to drive her off.

Inexplicable behavior, even for Saxons. Still, it was mostly Wulfred's response, or lack of one, that puzzled her.

He didn't act anything like a jealous suitor, or even an interested suitor. He didn't act like a suitor at all.
Stupid, perverse, pagan barbarian.
Why, when all his men had fallen over themselves at a crook of her finger, did he remain so aloof? He did not treat her any differently than he ever had, the oaf. She was oiled and perfumed and coiffed and draped in beautifully worked wool, and he was just as surly and distant and dull as he had always been.

Imbecile.

Could he not see that she was more beautiful than any woman he had yet encountered in his miserable life? Could he not understand that she was higher in intellect and breeding and culture than any woman he could have possibly met roving through the woods, as was his natural routine? Could he not see her worth, her beauty, her desirability?

Not that it bothered her in any personal way that he was so obtuse. No, it was only that it would have been so delightful to watch him tear himself up with desire and jealousy. It would have been a wonderful game, one that she would have enjoyed completely until the time had come for her to kill him.

Melania licked her lips; they were trembling.

She
would
kill him. She was strong and rested and more determined to defeat him than ever. If he were intelligent, he would run from her villa, for she was set on destroying him.

And she would succeed. He would never anticipate violence against him, not from her, not now. None of them would; she had donned the role of beguiler too completely for any of them to see the role of executioner she had planned for herself. It would not be murder, not when it was retribution for what he had done to her. She had not forgotten her father, though the soil of his grave had settled during the summer and grass had seeded itself over the bare earth, gentling the raw reminder of his recent death. She had not forgotten, would not allow herself to forget, and Wulfred would pay the price for that murder, for murder it had truly been.