An Embarrassment of Riches (14 page)

“As you wish, Rozsa,” he responded with a duck of his head.

“See that you do.”

“Have I failed to gratify you the three times we have met?” He knew he had given her what she sought, even as her particular fulfillment deprived him of the intimacy he craved, and left him feeling deprived.

“No,” she admitted. “But you give me cause to hope for more—much more. Something along the lines of the passions of the great lovers of the past.” She hummed a fragment of a song about betrayed devotion.

“I cannot give you the love of the troubadours’ ballads,” he said, thinking that the fables they told were beyond any human capacity to achieve.

“You provide more than I would have otherwise, as I intended you should, and that will have to suffice,” she countered, a note of spite in her words. “I’ve told you that you are far preferable to my husband. You have agreed to pleasure me instead of risk accusation. And, true to your Word, you will give me no awkward children to shame me and bring dishonor upon my husband; not that you would escape damnation if you did.” She maneuvered herself onto the table. “The monks have gone in to sleep by now. I think you and I should begin our dalliance for tonight. We haven’t much time before there will be activity in the streets again, and we must be gone before that begins; as the night leans toward dawn, half of Praha wakens, and the servants and slaves make ready for the day. I wouldn’t want anyone to see either of us.”

He wanted to ask her how she had managed to get out of Vaclav Castle without being noticed, or how she would get back in without being observed, but he doubted she would tell him, so he said only, “I am here to do your bidding. You must tell me what you want.”

“Then come here and embrace me,” she said, gloating as he approached her. “I’ve loosened my lacings, so you should be able to undress me with ease.”

He did as she bade him, removing her gorget before he reached to lift her bleihaut over her head, raising it with care so that it did not catch on her gold-fretwork chaplet, and setting it on the end of the examination table where it could serve Rozsa as a pillow. “Byzantine silk,” he said as he turned back to her. “Very elegant. Very expensive.”

“Isn’t it? My husband at least clothes me well.” She fingered the ties on her knee-length linen chainse. “Shall I raise this or remove it?”

“Whichever will please you the most,” he said without inflection of any kind.

“Then I will take my chainse off and move it away from me. It’s too much like a married-woman’s nightrail, and in any case, it irritates me. I will have to tell my ’tire-maid to wash it for me, though she will note any stains upon it.” Her face revealed her distaste for the garment all married noblewomen were required by Church law to wear when having congress with their husbands: a simple ankle-length rail with a hole cut to allow for intercourse, thus preserving the spouses from the evils of lust. “Since you will not penetrate me to preserve my honor, I suppose it’s just as well that neither you nor I wear one, for there would be little either of us could do to rouse my carnalistic urges. One hole in a sack, that’s what it is. Only a priest could think of such a thing.”

Rakoczy said nothing while he watched her pull the chainse over her head and fling it away from her, then kick off her solers, paying no heed as they clattered on the rough stones. Now there was only the clout around her loins to clothe her. He began to untie the bands that held the clout in place.

“Kiss me,” she said, capturing his hands with her own.

Obediently he lowered his head and pressed her mouth with his own; he could sense the fury in her ardor as she clasped her arms around him. He took his time with their kiss, his tongue opening her lips to his exploration, all the while wondering if she might decide to bite him, for he could feel her caprice welling along with her desire, and angry mischief. He ended the kiss and took a step back. “Shall I untie your—”

“Not yet. All in good time,” she said, her hand caressing his jaw. “So carefully trimmed. You must spend hours working in the mirror to achieve this.”

“My manservant grooms me,” he said; he had had no reflection for more than thirty-two hundred years.

She managed an artistic shiver. “Embrace me again. I am cold.”

He almost laughed. “I doubt I can warm you.”

“Oh, yes you can. You have done so the previous times we have met, and you shall do so again.” The edge in her voice reminded him of how perilous their connection was.

“Then tell me what you want me to do,” he said, trying not to recall the many, many times he had asked that question, and what the answers had been. He banished the memories and gave his whole attention to Rozsa. “What will make you warm.”

“I want you to embrace me and caress me—slowly.” She smiled up at him. “If you hurry, I will not be pleased.”

“Then you must tell me if I go too fast,” he said, closing the gap between them and putting his arms around her; she snuggled against his cotehardie. “Where would you like me to begin?”

She thought for a moment, then said, “I think you ought to kiss my face, many, many kisses. Of all sorts. Everywhere on my face.” She tilted her head to make this easier. “Begin at my eyebrows. Now. Do not be too hasty.”

Rakoczy did as she ordered, making his kisses light, playful, and sensual; he smoothed back her hair and turned her face with his hands. He made his way from her eyebrows to her eyelids, then across her cheeks, never increasing the speed of his kisses, until finally he reached her lips, where he spent his time outlining her mouth with his own, growing more intense as he lingered, his tongue probing deeply. He was aware of her arousal, and her satisfaction, but he knew beyond all question that she did not want to include him in her fulfillment.

“Use your hands,” she said, pushing against him so he would have access to her body. “Start at my shoulders.”

Obediently, he began to stroke her shoulders as gently as if he held a kitten. Shoulders and upper arms gave way to her breasts. He fingered her nipples, fondled her breasts, watching her face suffuse with a concupiscence so inward that he felt himself an intruder in her arousal. He bent to take her nipple in his mouth and was rewarded with her quick gasp of pleasure. Carefully he leaned her back, guiding her so that she reclined on the examination table, her head resting on her folded garments, his hands continuing to venture over her body, probing enticingly, finding new ways to evoke her excitement, gauging his success by her shivers and encouraging sighs and moans. Gradually he felt her move into his hands.

“Do more, and do it sweetly,” she said, opening her legs. “You know what I like. Run your hands up my thighs.”

He faltered, wondering if she were trying to trap him in some way. “There is more I can do before I—”

“I
want
you to move lower. Now. My ardor is rising. I want you to use your mouth and your hands to delectate me. I want to be wrung with ecstasy.” She met his eyes with more determination than passion. “You promised me that you would not deprive me of my fulfillment: I hold you to that promise.”

Slowly, expertly, Rakoczy kissed and nuzzled his way from her breasts, along the flare of her ribs, the curve of her abdomen, to the dark curls at the base of her hips; Rozsa quivered as he gently tugged at the dense hairs, then bent to tongue the small bud that lay at the top of what she called
my most lovely rose.

“Not yet,” she said, her breath quickening. “Hands first. I want to prolong my exhilaration as long as I can.”

“As you wish,” said Rakoczy, and separated her sea-shell-scented flesh with his fingers and softly rubbed the little nubbin until it stiffened and grew red as a plum; Rozsa moaned her exaltation. Then he slid two fingers into her, taking his time so that she would gain the most arousal from it; when he tantalizingly withdrew his fingers and entered her again with three, all the while stroking the reddened kernel, Rozsa jolted in response.

“Use your mouth.
Now!
”

His lips closed on the swollen mote; he felt it jump and tremble; he heard Rozsa give an ecstatic whimper as she dug her hands into his hair. He increased the pressure of his mouth and her first spasm seized her, rocking through her like a miniature tide; she shuddered, her hips lifting rhythmically with her culmination, her throes casting her into a private paradise; Rakoczy wondered briefly what she envisioned behind her closed eyes. Her cries were soft, high, like the call of a distant hawk, and they, like her transports, faded fairly quickly. She shivered a last time, sighed a little, then let go of him. “I am most satisfied,” she declared, shifting away from him. “You have done what I require of you. I ought to thank you.”

“And you will keep your bargain—I have to be grateful to you,” he said with a tinge of sardonic amusement.

“You should be.” She contemplated him with the attitude of her superior rank. “Yes, I will abide by the terms I have laid out, I will spare you my—”

“Accusations of rape? That is good of you.” Rakoczy stepped back from her, feeling her disdain as if it were a cold wind between them. “I fear I may have broken the skin…” He gestured toward her loins.

“Did you?” She laughed quietly. “You must have been more determined than last time. You certainly increased my consummation.” She sat up and swung around. “You say you broke the skin: did you taste the blood?”

“Yes.”

She laughed again. “How perverse. Will you Confess it?” Saying that, she reached for her chainse, her mordant amusement fading rapidly. “Help me dress. I will have to leave shortly.”

Her abrupt shift from rapture to practicality, although he had seen it before, still had the capacity to shock him. “What do you want me to do?” he asked, feeling, as he had at the end of their previous trysts, a bit mystified. The very small amount of blood he had taken from her tasted flat, and he knew it would provide little nourishment, for there had been no real intimacy between them, no connection beyond the most superficial; the sustenance it provided was minimal.

“When I have my bleihaut on, you may tighten my lacings,” she said as she tugged her chainse over her head. “It is a good thing that you don’t undress, for all that it displeases me.” Without warning, she reached out, grabbing for his genitals through his clothing and shaking her head in disapproval “Soft, too soft.”

“Does that trouble you?” he asked. More than a thousand years before he had lost all embarrassment from his impotence and offered no apology for it now. “Were you not fulfilled?”

She fastened the neck-bands of her chainse, chuckling. “I’m not troubled; it suits me that you are … as you are. In fact, there is something very pleasing in your … condition. I feel that I achieve more because you achieve less.” This last revelation was accompanied by a wink. She got off the examination table and tugged the hem of her chainse to make it smooth, then reached for her bleihaut, shimmying into it with practiced ease. “The lacings,” she said to him bluntly.

“Of course.” He stepped behind her and began to secure the silken cords. “How tight?”

“I’ll tell you when you’ve—”

The sound of a door opening in the rear of the church made both of them start, then hold in place.

“The night-warder,” whispered Rozsa. “He is going to wake the slaves.”

“Then we have to hurry,” said Rakoczy, securing her lacings without her approval, and tucking the slip-knot into the neck of her dress. He gave her her gorget and veil. “You will need these.”

She grabbed them without ceremony, and bent to guide her solers onto her feet. “The warm nights will soon be over,” she murmured.

“Yes?” Rakoczy waited to hear what more she would say.

“When the rains come, the army will return from fighting.” Her voice was flat.

“Yes.”

She straightened up, still speaking softly. “We won’t be able to meet while my husband is here.”

“I suppose not,” he said, keeping his voice quiet and level.

“We won’t be able to speak except when meeting at Court functions, and then only of minor things: gossip, clothes, entertainments.”

“I am not completely ignorant of Court life, Rozsa,” he reminded her with a quick smile.

“No, no, of course you’re not,” she said with a dismissing wave of her hand. “But you are an exile, as you often remind me, and customs do vary from Court to Court.” She pulled her gorget over her head and reached for her veil. “I’ll leave first. Wait until the side-gate is closed before you—”

“I will see you safely away,” he told her firmly but without raising his voice.

She stared at him, as if shocked by his assertion. “I will leave first,” she reiterated in a tone that did not encourage argument.

“If you will permit me to create a diversion, you should be able to get away without being noticed.”

As if to underscore his instruction, a sleepy voice was heard ordering the slaves to collect their bread and then to set to work.

Rozsa nodded. “All right. But be quick. I must be in the castle garden shortly, and delay will do me no good.”

“Delay is what I seek to avoid,” he said, and went to the door of the charnel house, pulling on his liripipe as he went, making sure the hood was up and his features obscured. “You will know when to take your chance, Rozsa.”

She frowned. “If you must, I suppose you must.”