chapter V

I N A WARM AND RICHLY FURNISHED ROOM IN RIVERSIDE, the smell of candles and food and bodies and wine wove a net of security and comfort around a group of men who usually settled for less. They were as happy as they were ever likely to be, with bellies nearly full, and no brakes upon the conversation.

“Pass Soliman the meat,” the Duke Tremontaine commanded. “He can’t discuss our animal nature until he becomes one with it!”

With his plate well stacked, the philosopher started up again. “All I was saying, with Dorimund’s permission, is that training is the antithesis of nature. It must be. If shunning what is called vice were natural, as shunning cold or the pain of a fire is, then we would not need to be counseled against it!”

Taking a drink, an older, bearded man said, “I see you have no children, Sol. You must pull their hands back from the fire a hundred times, or risk losing them to it.”

“Experience,” another asserted. “Experience is the teacher there. ‘The burnt hand shuns the fire’ and all that. There is a difference between experience and training.”

“Abstract thinking is what we’re talking about. The fruits of vice are not immediately apparent, as the pain of fire is.”

The duke leaned forward across the table. Like the scholars he was dressed in black, only his was studded with jet and dark embroidery. “The ‘fruits of vice,’” he said, “are open to debate. They are not empirical, like a burnt finger. They may be abstract, Dorimund, but—” He stopped when the boy Marcus appeared at his side. “Yes, what?”

“A woman,” Marcus murmured, “has come to the West door.”

“Bugger the woman,” the duke snarled. “Make her wait.”

His servant showed him a ring. “She said you gave her this.”

The duke’s eyes widened slightly. “And so I did. I didn’t think she’d show. I had better—” He pulled himself up from the table, bowing to his guests. “Gentlemen. I’ll catch the rest of this later, or when Soliman publishes his controversial theories to the disgust of all right-thinking people, an effort I will be delighted to finance. Sol, stop eating, you look all round and rosy and harmless; people will feel silly hissing someone on the street who looks like a cradle doll.”

To the laughter of his guests he left the table, ducking between hanging cloths, following Marcus through an arched door and down two small flights of steps, each one a different width, one turning to the left and another to the right.

T HE CLOAKED WOMAN STARTED WHEN HE ENTERED. She had not expected a door behind the paneling. The duke shrugged. “It’s quicker. I didn’t want you to wait. I was afraid you’d lose your nerve.”

Her voice was only a little breathy. “It’s quite steeled, thank you.”

Abruptly he caught her hand in his. “But you’re cold.”

“Chilly. I often am before a performance.”

“I’m not a demanding audience.”

“I’ve heard otherwise.”

His smile was slow and personal, oddly charming. “And you the celebrated Black Rose. Well, I am honored.”

“The honor is mine, my Lord of Tremontaine.” She took a strand of his long hair between her fingers, put it to her lips.

The duke closed his eyes for a moment. Then he twined thumb and forefinger about her wrist. “Not just yet,” he said. “There is the matter of your intriguing friend, first.”

She stood quite still. “He’s not all that intriguing.”

“I find him so.”

“You don’t have to sleep with him.”

“Neither do you, really, but you choose to do so.” She drew breath to speak, but he put his fingers lightly on her lips. “Lord Davenant is becoming an important man, closely allied to the new Crescent Chancellor. Prestige, money, adventure…It’s your game; I won’t tell you how to play it. I’m just delighted you’re going to play it with me, too.”

She raised her own hand to his to caress the backs of his fingers on her lips. Abruptly he turned away, businesslike. “I asked you for evidence of his latest clever scheme. Now, let’s see it. Even flat on my back—or yours—I can tell a real document from a fake one.”

The actress reached into the folds of her cloak. He stepped back a pace, because it might always be a dagger. But she produced a real document, hung with seals and ribbons, very official.

“Nice,” the duke said, examining it. “Very nice. This will more than do. Marcus—” Without looking behind him, he handed it to his servant. “Arthur knows what to do with this. Tell him to make two copies and return the original”—he looked the woman in the eyes—“how soon, do you think?”

“Soon. I’ll be missed if I’m not back tonight.”

“Can’t you tell him your rehearsal ran late?”

“I already have.”

The actress was trembling. The duke drew her into the crook of his arm, and slipped his ring back onto her finger. “Keep it.”

“I’ll probably sell it.”

“That’s all right.” The man in black pulled her against his chest. “I don’t give things away with an eye on their future.”

The Black Rose turned in his arms, a tall woman who still came only to his chin. Her mouth sought his skin above the embroidered collar. “You’re very generous.”

“Am I? You don’t have to sleep with me, either, but if it—”

“Prestige,” she murmured into his throat, “money, adventure.”

“—if it makes it any easier, I can give you—”

She kissed him, and he was silent.

They left through the door he had come in. Like a young man squiring a debutante through crowded seats at a ball, the Mad Duke escorted her through the mad halls of his house, from the secret room to a bedroom hung with red curtains, already warmed by a fire.

B UT THAT WAS NOT WHERE MARCUS FOUND HIM TWO hours later—more than two hours, for it took him a while to locate his master, after the woman had been shown the door. The Duke Tremontaine was alone in a room empty of furniture. He was hunched over a dying paper fire in an elaborately carved fireplace. His unbound hair swept the ashes. The room was cold and dark, but for the red glow of the last of the embers.

Marcus knew which floorboard creaked.

“I need more wood,” the duke said without turning around. “I’m cold.”

“There’s a fire in your bedroom.”

A shudder passed through Tremontaine. “No. I won’t go back there.”

“Shall I get blankets for you?”

“Yes. No—I can’t sleep in this room. Not here.”

“If you’d let me move a bed in, or even a couch…”

Tremontaine wore nothing but a velvet robe. It twisted around his long limbs when he turned to look up at his servant. “No, Marcus. There will not be any bed in here ever again.”

“All right. What if I make a fire in the library? You could have some blankets in there, and read for the rest of the night.”

“Where are my guests, my scholars?”

“They’ve all gone to bed, or gone home. Shall I wake one up for you?”

The duke shook his head, and noticed his hair. He tucked most of it into his collar. “No, you go to bed. I’ll…I’ll be along.”

“I think you’ll like the library,” coaxed Marcus doggedly. “There are cushions, and rugs, and nice heavy curtains. And plenty of books.”

“I know what’s in the library,” the duke snarled, sounding a bit more like himself.

Marcus held out his hands, and the tall man took them; together, they pulled him to his feet.