The question was petty but Merry did not call it back. A hardness entered Anna's face that had not been there before.
"Not even me," she said blandly, and Merry knew she'd hurt her pride. She felt a twinge of shame. This was a woman who, had circumstances been different, she would have liked to befriend.
Unaware of her regret, Anna continued. "I know whereof I speak," she said. "And little as I imagine you want to hear it, you'd do well to heed my words. Nicolas Craven is a rake. I don't deny he's charming or that he can be kind, but he does not have it in him to give a woman his heart. Not even for as long as it takes to fuck her."
With all her strength, Merry hid her blanch of shock.
"You're right about his charm," she said, in her chilliest, most duchesslike voice. "And his kindness. More to the point, though, since he fucks so very well, perhaps one shouldn't complain if he keeps his heart."
Anna stared at her, then burst into startled laughter. "By God, you're a cool one. If I hadn't seen the way you look at him, I'd believe he'd met his match. But you're a girl, Mary, a warmhearted, starry-eyed girl and all Nic's kindness will only break your heart the harder."
"That's not your concern," Merry said, wishing she could draw herself as tall as the other woman.
"No," Anna sighed, "I suppose it's not. And who am I to warn you against breaking your heart? If
nothing else, it will make a woman of you."
Was that what made a woman? Merry had never thought so, but maybe ...
She shook her head before the idea could form. No. Anna herself admitted Nic had failed to give his
heart to her. Perhaps her disappointment colored her opinion. In any case, Merry was not going to let
a warning from Nic's old lover spoil the nicest night she'd ever had.
Just once, she wanted to be the princess she'd always dreamed of being.
Seven
Even if Merry would rather have gone home, pride demanded she brazen the evening out. Her pulse
still ragged, she returned to the sitting room and paused inside the door. She felt better as soon as she spotted Nic, though his pose was strange for a man in the midst of company. He sat on the floor in
front of a large leather chair, his legs stretched before him, his head resting back on the empty cushion.
To Merry's eyes, he seemed more elegant man ever.
"You should come to
Venice
with us in March," Sebastian was saying. "I'm sure you could pick up a
few commissions."
"I have my show at Tatling's in March."
"Well, la-di-da. A show at Tatling's."
From Sebastian's tone, Merry concluded he had not been invited to exhibit at the exclusive
London
gallery. Rumpled and vaguely feral, Sebastian sat across from Nic on the long brown sofa. His forearms rested on his knees with his hands clasped in between. He seemed restless and dissatisfied, but vulnerable as well. With a gentle smile, Nic stretched one boot to tap his fellow artist's shin.
"Give it a few years, old man. By then the galleries will be fighting to hang your work."
Sebastian wagged his head. "I wish I were as sure as you."
"Hah," barked Evangeline, "I wish I believed I had a chance in hell of ever being hung. But we know what people think of female artists."
"You're an artist, too?" Merry asked.
Everyone looked up at her in surprise, making her feel very much the outsider.
"Only according to my gran," said Evangeline, after a brief, uncomfortable pause.
"And me," Nic added in the same soft tone he'd used to reassure Sebastian.
"I always tell you you've got promise," Gerald put in, clearly aggrieved to be ignored. Evangeline shot
him a scornful look that said what she thought of his opinion. "Well, I do," he insisted.
The couple made faces at each other while Nic beckoned Merry closer. He patted the chair behind him. "Sit with me," he said in a hot, rough voice that made her forget to care whether she belonged. "I missed you while you were gone."
Restraining the impulse to look around and see if Anna was close enough to hear, Merry slid into the
chair in her narrow purple gown, then coaxed Nic's head to rest back on her knees. He smiled up at her, fond and sleepy-eyed, and pretended to bite her leg. Merry took that, too, as a token of victory. Maybe she meant no more to him than other women, but she flattered herself at least she meant as much.
"Where's Anna?" Sebastian asked, with the air of one who wishes to liven up an evening. "I think we need a story."
Anna chose that moment to reappear. "Of all the nerve. First I make you supper. Then you expect me
to sing for it."
"Leo's Frenchman made the supper," said Sebastian. "And as hostess, you're obliged to entertain your guests."
Rather than contradict him, Anna turned to Leo. The older man had the armchair by the fire. Plainly,
he was content with the comforts of his life. He seemed happy to indulge any manner of foolishness
from his mistress's eccentric friends.
"Do as you wish, my dear," he said. "You know I always enjoy your tales."
His approval decided her. She crossed the Turkish carpet with its bold, dark shapes of red and brown, and perched her uncorseted form in the circle of the banker's arm. The fire gleamed on her loose
chignon, a wood fire that smelled pleasantly of cedar and autumn leaves.
"Very well," she said, composing herself, "I shall tell the tale of the queen of the fey and the randy shepherd lad."
Despite Merry's jealousy of Anna's many charms, and the thought of how she'd once used them on
Nic, the prospect of hearing something risque pulled her forward in her chair. None of her brothers had shown a fondness for lewd books— for any books at all, truth be told—and Merry had long wanted to read one, if only to discover whether their authors knew more than stable boys. She held her breath as their hostess began.
"Queen Mab," said she, "was no puppet on a throne. She ruled the fey with an iron will and an eagle eye. No detail was too small for her royal notice, no task too humble for her delicate hand. Thus it was that when a shepherd and his flock wandered into forbidden lands, Mab immediately flew down from her pearl-encrusted palace to investigate.
"Now, as everyone knows, some faeries are as large as you and I, while some are as small as enchanted mushrooms. Mab was of the larger sort, and quite the most beautiful faerie who ever lived. Her hair was black, her eyes green, and her breast as snowy as a dove's. Her wings sparkled with dew-drop rainbows wherever they caught the light. Naturally, she could not allow a mere human to gaze upon her glory so,
as she approached the intruder, she cast an invisibility spell to hide herself."
"Invisibility," leered Sebastian. "Imagine what a fellow could do with that!"
Evangeline snorted and rolled her eyes, but Anna ignored them both.
"The unsuspecting shepherd, no doubt bored by his duties, was napping beneath an apple tree. Mab
was able to draw quite close without disturbing him."
"And he was handsome," Merry said, beginning to see where this was leading.
"Quite," Anna agreed, her eyes sliding coolly to Merry's face. "With wheaten curls and a scent like hay
on a summer day. Mab didn't fall in love with him, of course. A faerie who gives her heart to a human must forfeit her powers. She did, however, immediately fall in lust. How could she not? The shepherd was as graceful as that statue by Michelangelo in the Louvre."
"Better equipped, I should hope," Nic said as he rubbed the back of his head against Merry's legs. Helpless to resist, she combed her fingers through his hair.
"Much better," Anna assured him. "I'm not implying Mab did anything so crude as disarrange the shepherd's clothes but, suffice to say, before she left the slumbering lad, she knew all of him to the inch—relaxed and at the ready. You see, she was so taken with him she sent him a dream of herself, posed in her diaphanous faerie gown, her nipples like cherries, her curves and dips a marvel no man
could see without rising to the occasion. In the dream, she let him kiss one breast and herself drew
one ivory hand up the tender inside of his thigh.
"This, however, was all the contact she permitted. He had not earned the right to more, not even in a dream."
"And when he woke?" Sebastian prompted.
Anna smiled. "When he woke, he thought he'd grown a hammer between his legs. No mortal man ever suffered such a cock-stand. It throbbed like the earth's own heart, long and thick and as glowingly red
as a blacksmith's fire.
"Being a sociable sort, and not realizing his dream had been a true faerie visitation, the shepherd hobbled home as fast as he could, grabbed the first milkmaid he saw, and proceeded to churn her into a froth behind the village pub."
"I can guess what Mab thought of that," Nic said, prodding Merry's skirt again with his head. He'd drawn his knees up as Anna spoke and she suspected he was aroused. Feeling flushed herself, she stroked the cords along his neck. Her reward was a momentary closing of his eyes.
"Mab didn't like it at all," Anna said. "Here she, the queen of the fey, had deigned to let a mortal see her secret charms and what did he do but pour the lust she'd stirred into the first coarse vessel he found.
"Seething with fury, Mab cursed him. Even as the shepherd labored over the sighing maid, the queen
took her revenge. From now on, she vowed, tup as he might, this scoundrel would not know completion's bliss until he turned his lust where it belonged."
"Ouch," said Gerald.
"Ouch, indeed," Anna agreed. "Cursed though he was, the hapless fellow's mighty instrument did not soften in the least. If anything, it grew in stature and demand. By this point, the well-sated maid was pushing him off her in disgust. Maddened by desire, the randy shepherd sought relief from every woman in the town. Young, old, handsome or hideous, he thrust his sword in every sheath. All to no avail. The faerie's curse had taken root. Give pleasure he could, even take it, but the ultimate joy was forever just out of reach.
"Finally, the women hid when they saw him coming. A truly tireless lover, these damsels discovered,
was not a comfortable thing.
"Thrown back on his own devices, the shepherd tried to relieve the pain himself. For hours it seemed he wanked his monstrous prick until he feared both for it and his weary arm.
" 'I have been cursed,' he concluded, his mind clearing for a moment in exhaustion. "That faerie I saw
in my dream must have been real. Mayhap if I return to what I was doing when this began, I can find
her again and beg her to release me.'
"Holding firm to this purpose, the shepherd—hobbling even worse than before—retraced his steps to the faerie mound. Again he lay under the apple tree and again, though without much hope, he composed himself to sleep. His effort was rewarded. As soon as he closed his eyes, the queen of the fey returned. Dazzled by her beauty, the dreaming shepherd fell to his knees. He knew he had found the source of his
trouble. "Between his trembling thighs, his organ buzzed as if it harbored a nest of maddened bees.
" 'Forgive me, queen of queens,' the shepherd pleaded. 'I am not worthy to kiss your wondrous toes.
If only you'd tell me how I offended you, I'd do whatever is in my power to make amends.'
"Naturally, Mab was not pleased he could not guess what he had done, but knowing how men are, and impressed by his humility, she took pity on him. 'You must give me what you wasted on other women,' she said, 'and you must not cease until I say.'