Valentine (29 page)

Adrian saw the thick metal collar around his friend’s neck, and he realized then the source of the choking and pulling sensation around his own throat. But whereas Constantine was tethered to the wall behind him, preventing him from kneeling or sitting, Adrian surmised his own bond terminated on the floor nearby. He could not move anything beyond his eyeballs at the moment to test his range. Constantine’s hands were free, however, and he utilized them to cross himself as he now finished his sonnet to the Great Pretend.

Adrian almost reconsidered then. What good would it do Constantine to know with certainty that he was going to die? Was it not kinder to let him believe, this last bit of time he had left, that he might be saved? That good would somehow triumph and right would win the day and he would see his little boy again? Why not let him continue in his delusion if it should bring him comfort, rather than have him die knowing that his name would be forever remembered as a traitor and a murderer?

Because it is a lie
, Adrian told himself.
Because he deserves the truth. If ever an opportunity arose for Constantine to save himself before he was executed, he must be aware of the truth, else he might just wait patiently for his rescue unto the very moment of his death.

Constantine saw then that Adrian’s eyes were opened. “Adrian?” he asked hesitantly, and Adrian realized that he must look as if he had already expired.

He gave a great effort and blinked.

Constantine Gerard’s broad shoulders slumped momentarily, and Adrian thought perhaps it was with relief. “We will survive this,” Constantine said firmly, his posture straightening as much as his tether would allow. Even the metal restraints weren’t enough to rob the commander of the Templars from his duty to lead. “God has spared us thus far—beyond the hundreds that were killed—for a purpose. And God will see us delivered.”

Adrian could only stare at his friend, leashed to the prison wall. For a moment, he wanted to believe, if only to delude himself against the inevitability of the fate that awaited them both. Adrian told himself it was the pathetic condition of his physical body that caused the wetness to leak from his eyes. Or perhaps the unspeakable pity he held for the capable and honorable Constantine. But he wept quietly all the same.

The sound of footfalls shuffled dully in the space behind Adrian’s head, and then the creaking of some gate being opened. Shadows interrupted the torchlight, causing Adrian to wince. A moment later, the wicked face of the Saracen general leaned into Adrian’s line of vision. His smile was bright.

“You are not dead,” he said with something akin to delight. “I am impressed, infidel. I have great plans for your conversion, indeed.” Then the face was gone, and a pair of metal dishes were dropped inches before his face, murky water and chunks of runny, unidentifiable stuff sloshing onto the stone and splattering Adrian’s cheek.

Adrian could not register any smells from the offering through his clogged nostrils, but he saw a speck of white morsel moving, wiggling within the mottled mass of gray.

Maggots.

He focused his eyes instead upon the soft-looking leather boots of the accompanying soldiers that crossed the floor beneath voluminous robes.

“Stay where you are, infidel,” the general called out to Constantine from where he still stood near Adrian’s form. The soldiers quickly deposited similar metal vessels on the floor at what looked to be the very limits of Constantine’s restraints. But Adrian could see a wide piece of the unleavened bread popular in this part of the world, and what was perhaps a leg of meat.

When the soldiers retreated, Constantine stepped toward the food, only barely able to drag it into his reach with the toe of one boot. The dish of water trembled wildly in his hands as he picked it up and brought it to his mouth.

The Saracen’s evil countenance came into Adrian’s view again, and he used one hand to push the low-rimmed bowl of rotting matter closer to Adrian’s face. “Here is
your
meal, infidel. Go on—eat it.”

Adrian closed his eyes against the sight of the wriggling mass.

“You must have nourishment,” the voice in the darkness cajoled. “To build your strength.”

“Don’t eat it, Adrian,” Constantine called out, his anger clear in his deep voice. “Why do you give an injured man rotting foodstuffs? Have you not done enough to him that you still seek to poison him?”

“Go on,” the Saracen encouraged from beyond Adrian’s eyelids. “If you do not eat, I will take away your friend’s food, as well.”

Adrian continued to lie very still while Constantine engaged the soldier. “Take it then, for I will not eat good food while my friend is offered that which swine would refuse.”

Adrian felt a painful rush of air over his skin and the Saracen’s voice was directed toward the back of the cell. “Is that so? How honorable of you. Thank you for illuminating my mistake, however, this business does not concern you. It is between myself and your friend, who killed my son.”

Adrian’s eyes opened then, and he saw brown hands snatch the dish of water from Constantine’s hands while another set whisked away the bowl of untouched food from the cell floor. His vision moved jerkily upward to see the Saracen general removing the short, beaded whip from his belt.

The man Adrian had slain at Chastellet had been the general’s son?

“Will you eat, infidel?” he asked pleasantly, but now Adrian recognized the hatred burning in the man’s dark eyes.

Constantine commanded, “No, Adrian. Don’t.”

Adrian stared at the whip, remembering its cutting song.

“Very well,” the Saracen said lightly. “You leave me no choice.”

In the next moment, a whistle of air preceded a clicking slap, and Adrian heard Constantine’s cry escaping through clenched teeth even as he tried to contain it.

Adrian closed his eyes. Perhaps if they thought him unconscious again . . .

But only a beat of time passed before the whip’s whistle and slap sounded again in the close air of the cell. Then again. And now Constantine could not withhold his shouts.

Adrian remembered the bite of the beads as they sank beneath his skin, the ripping as they retreated.

Again the whip sounded, and again Constantine screamed.

Adrian opened his eyes and saw Chastellet’s general crouched against the rear wall of the cell, his forearms raised to protect his face. Adrian tried to call out for the Saracen to stop as he raised his arm again, but his throat would not work. The whip fell with a gasp, and Constantine’s scream pierced Adrian’s ears.

Drawing strength from an unknown source, Adrian inched his face toward the congealing mass spilled over the side of the dish before him. The scrape of the metal bowl on the sandstone floor sounded like the sharpening of a blade. He peeled his lips apart, feeling the sting of the skin as it was pulled away. For a moment he wondered that he hadn’t already bitten off his tongue, for he felt nothing emerge when he willed himself to sample the rotten offering before him. But then he tasted its sour perfume, felt the liveness of the mass in his mouth, around his lips.

“Adrian, no,” Constantine pleaded in a breaking voice. “It will be as poison!”

But the whip fell no more, and the Saracen’s boots came into close relief as the man moved over Adrian once again and crouched down.

“Again, you surprise me, infidel,” the man said, obviously pleased as he watched Adrian struggle to swallow.

Adrian gagged as the mush pushed against the sides of his throat. He fought against the urge to vomit while he held the Saracen’s gaze.

“Sorry,” he slurred, his voice emerging thick and garbled, unable to open his jaws wide enough to form the words properly. “Your . . . son.”

The dark man blinked and his brow creased as he seemed to consider what Adrian had said. Then his eyes narrowed and he leaned forward on his haunches and spat in Adrian’s face.

“Eat it,” he commanded in his own raspy whisper and then shoved the dish toward Adrian’s face again so that the rim bounced off of his nose and upper lip. “All of it. I want to watch you.”

Adrian was thankful the Saracen was between him and Constantine so that his friend was not forced to watch the grisly meal. He hoped the dark man’s chuckling laughter was loud enough to mask the retching noises coming from Adrian’s body.

By the time the dish was empty, Adrian knew his mind had been broken, for he was praying for a dark angel to deliver him from the hell he had finally accepted was very real indeed.