Wielding a Red Sword (7 page)

Mym quailed. Fair was fair—but naturally he had suf
fered the masculine reaction; if he stripped, this would be all too evident.

Rapture blushed. “Some other time,” she decided, and fled.

Of course his thought had been about as revealing as his body would have been. He blushed himself; he had not meant or wanted to expose her to that. She was a fine, discreet woman, who had probably never seen a man in—

Enough
! her thought came, undiminished in intensity despite the distance she had put between them.

At that he had to laugh, ruefully. The Castle was making fools of them both.

Rapture reappeared. She was trying to maintain her anger, but the perverse humor of it was spreading to her.

“We must escape this castle!” she exclaimed.

“Y-y-yes!” he agreed fervently.

“Y-y-yes,” she echoed, and she was not mocking him.

But neither of them had much of an idea how to do it. The estate was girt by a high enchanted wall that could not be scaled, with a lake on the back; the only approach was by magic carpet, and they had none. They agreed to ponder during the night and compare notes in the morning.

They got through the evening meal, and then Rapture shut her eyes and pumped while Mym washed. If she peeked it didn’t matter, for she could not help but read his physical state through his mind. She merely flushed and continued pumping, while he counted numbers backwards constantly to drown out what he could of his own thoughts. He was glad when it was over.

They separated, each going to the appropriate suite. But Mym had hardly entered his when her scream resounded through his mind. He charged to her section, threw open the curtain—naturally there were no doors—and found her standing with her delicate fist in her mouth.

“Something was there!” she cried.

From her mind he got the image—some shadowy, skeletal, demonic figure that had sought to sneak up on her, but retreated when she turned to look.

“But there are no other people or creatures on the premises,” Mym reminded her. “We would intercept their thoughts.”

“I
saw
it,” she insisted, and he knew she had—or believed she had.

Which left open the possibility of something other than a person or a creature, he realized. Was this Castle haunted by demons?

“Demons!” she exclaimed, horrified.

But why would there be anything like that in a castle intended for lovers?

“To ensure that they are together,” she said.

And that, of course, was it. Those who insisted on sleeping apart would discover company of an unpleasantly alien nature. Rapture was obviously extremely ill at ease; he felt it throughout her mind. What were they to do?

“I will ignore it,” she said bravely. But though she intended to make the effort, he read her deep fear of the demonic. She would not be able to sleep.

It was a man’s business to protect a woman from whatever threats existed, in whatever way he could. Mym knew that his sword would not be effective against a demon—but that was not the point.
I will stand guard
, he thought.

“I couldn’t ask you to do that!” she protested. “We must sleep apart!” But she wished he
would
do that, for she was genuinely afraid.

I will sleep by the door
, he decided, amending his notion.
That will be no hardship
.

Her relief was manifest. “I wish I could thank you, Prince Pride,” she said.

They both knew why she could not. “I prefer Mym,” he sang.

“Mym—the name they gave you at the sideshow,” she said, reading the context. “Where you met the woman you love.”

Where I was happy
, he agreed.

She retired to her large, soft bed of feather pillows and colorful quilts, and he settled down in the doorway and slept in the way a warrior did, alert for any intrusion. They left the lamp on, so that nothing could enter unseen.

In a moment he jerked awake. A horrendous demon was tiptoing toward the bed. Rapture turned and saw it, and screamed.

Mym leaped up, his sword whipping from its sheath—but the demon charged through a wall, making no sound, and disappeared.

He turned back to the bed, where Rapture was shaking with reaction. Her emotion was a tangled mass of loathing, fear, and shame, for she knew she was imposing on Mym despite her resolve to cause him no more trouble.

He went to her, sat on the bed, and took her into his arms.
It is the nature of the innocent to be afraid of evil
, he thought soothingly. He felt no fear himself, of course, merely disgust that he could have allowed an intrusion of this nature. He had been on guard, had he not?

She sobbed into his shoulder. Then, buoyed by his lack of fear, she calmed. “I—I apologize for my weakness, that so inconveniences you,” she said. “I never meant—”

I know
. The Castle made deception impossible; she was not practicing any artifice in her fear, and he practiced none in his lack of it. They had been trained for different things.

“But this is exactly what the Castle means to do!” she said. “To force us into each other’s arms—”

“There is no love in it,” he said. “I would hold a frightened child so.”

That abashed her further, yet she could not deny it. “If child I must be, then so let it be,” she said. “My weakness and my humiliation are laid open to you, and I deserve your contempt.”

You showed no contempt when I stuttered
, he reminded her.

“But you couldn’t help that!”

“And you can not help this.”

She paused, considering. “I showed none because I felt none,” she said slowly. “But had I felt it, I would have changed my opinion by now. You are a brave man and a kind one.”

I am a Prince. I am what I am trained to be
.

The bravery, yes
,she thought back at him.
The kindness, no
.

The best ruler tempers justice with mercy
, he thought, echoing what he had been trained.

But with you the mercy is stronger than it should be
.

This was true, he realized. He had mastered the physical abilities required of his office, but not the emotional ones. Had he possessed proper discipline, he would not have been swayed by the fate of the concubines he rejected or by the subservience of the cavalry officer who had come to bring him back. He was weak- and his father the Rajah had played upon that weakness with an expert touch.

“Oh, Mym!” she cried, reading his mind. “I did not know!”

It was not your business to know. Was not similar pressure put on you to come here
?

“Not exactly. My father simply shipped me here. I had no choice.”

Being a woman, he agreed. A prince must accede; a princess must obey
.

“Physically,” she agreed. “But my heart is my own.”

Or
his whom you love
.

“Yes,” she agreed. But now another aspect of her embarrassment was spread out involuntarily for his perception—she had no other love. The man she had been interested in was not the equal of Mym and no prince; that interest had evaporated like vapor in the past few hours. She had resisted coming here simply because she did not like being played like a pawn, assigned to a man for the sake of a political liaison. She was no concubine!

I never thought of you as a concubine
! he thought.

“Oh, I wish I could keep my thoughts to myself!” she wailed. “All my secrets are leaking from me!”

Your secrets become you
, he responded.

“I would rather lie naked to your gaze!”

She had already stood naked to it when she washed. But he understood exactly what she meant. A woman, more than a man, was a creature of dainty privacies, of hidden places, and it was cruel to expose these.

“Thank you,” she said.

Lie here. Sleep. I will remain alert
.

“It is our separation that emboldens the demon,” she said. “Keep your arms about me and sleep yourself; the demon will not come.”

Surely true. This intricate, so-personal net of the Castle annoyed him, but he saw no way to break out of it. They lay down together, she in her negligee, he in his dayrobe, with his sword on.

Tomorrow we shall flee this place
, he thought with determination.

“Tomorrow,” she agreed. Then, slowly, they slept.

 
4
 
STORM

In the morning they got up, and Mym faced away while Rapture changed into fresh apparel; then they went to his suite, where she faced away while he changed. But it hardly mattered; the enforced openness of their minds and feelings made physical concealment pointless.

They had breakfast. Then they took a walk by the placid lake.

Mym stood at the shore and removed his clothing.
Two times two is four
, he thought intensely.
Two times four is eight
. It pretty well drowned out whatever else he might have been thinking.

Rapture looked askance, then nodded. She was bright enough.
Two times three is six
, she thought as she removed her own dress.
Two times six is twelve
.

Their two sets of computations tended to interfere with each other, making concentration difficult. They simply started over, when an error was made.

Naked, they entered the water and swam for the far shore. Mym had not dared to ask directly whether Rapture swam, for that would have betrayed his intent. It was evident that she did indeed swim well; in fact she was especially lovely as she stroked along beside him. He remembered
the mermaid in the tank—but Rapture was far prettier than the halfling had been.

Two times twenty-four is forty-eight
! Rapture thought emphatically, reminding him to keep his mind on his own computations. Half-guiltily, he did.

In that manner they crossed the lake, making excellent progress. But as the farther shore approached, there was a swirling in the water around them, and small fish of many hues glided by in schools.

Then four fish poked their snouts up in front, chanting: “If your father knew, he would fall into a deadly rage!”

Rapture gulped a mouthful of water and spluttered. For a moment she thrashed inelegantly, before recovering her equilibrium. “My father!” she exclaimed, upset.

Mym was treading water, making sure she was all right before resuming the swim. The speaking of the fish had been a shock, but this was evidently a harmless manifestation. He glanced back—and saw a huge fin cutting the water toward them.

Now he felt dread, for he was weaponless and ill-equipped to defend himself in the water. Rapture, of course, was even more vulnerable. She screamed.

The fin circled and cut between them and the shore ahead. There it remained, awaiting them.

Mym considered. The talking fish had made it clear that their attempt to escape had not gone unnoticed, and the fin suggested rather strongly that it would not go unpunished. He sighed.

He pointed back to the Castle. They began to swim back the way they had come—and the fin did not follow.

They spent the rest of the day touring the lovely gardens and alcoves of the premises, remaining close together, and it was pleasant enough. The Castle did not threaten them as long as they tried neither to escape it nor to separate from each other. But this proximity continually caused Mym’s thought to dwell on the obvious virtues of the Princess, and she felt flattered, though she tried to fight it, and this feeling came back to Mym, encouraging further thoughts.