Page 67 of Beneath the Devil's Mask
“You what?”
“Didn’t she ever tell you? She knelt to me in the gutter, begging, crying for the return of her brat. And I spurned her, left her groveling in the murk where she?—”
The rest of Sir Lucien’s boast went unfinished as Mandell’s fist smashed against his jaw. Briggs shrieked as Fairhaven stumbled back, his mouth smeared with blood. A low growl of rage escaped Sir Lucien and he lunged for Mandell.
But the ice inside Mandell shattered, splintering into myriad white-hot shards. Before Sir Lucien could strike, Mandell leapt upon him, dragging him to the floor of the tavern to the accompaniment of crashing tables and shattering glass.
Lucien got off a blow that glanced off Mandell’s cheek. Mandell felt nothing but the force of his own blind fury. He drew back his fist again and again. Fairhaven’s head snapped back, his features slick with blood.
“Stop! Mandell!” Briggs cried out. “You’ll kill him.” But his frantic plea was all but drowned out by harsher voices, cheers of encouragement coming from cruel mouths. Greedy eyes gleamed like the demons of hell.
Lucien went limp, his eyes fluttering closed, but Mandell could not seem to check the beast that raged within him. Hisbreath coming in ragged gasps, he drew back his arm to strike again. But something struck him hard from behind, his world exploding in a flash of bright light and pain.
Mandell wavered and fell, darkness misting before his eyes, a darkness that ebbed and flowed, in waves of agony. He no longer knew where he was or what was happening to him. Dimly, he realized that he was lying on some hard surface and cold water was being dashed against his face. He tried to turn away from it and open his eyes, but the effort proved too great. From a great distance, he heard a man’s voice sobbing.
“Mandell? I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to hit you so hard. Please open your eyes. Say something. Oh, dear God, I’ve killed you.”
Killed him? Mandell’s pain-fogged mind latched upon the word. Was he dying then? Surely there was peace to be found in dying, not these sharp spirals of pain, this terrifying feeling of being suffocated in the dark.
“You’ll be all right,” the voice promised. “I’ll get you out of here. I’ll get you to a doctor.”
No. Mandell tried to form the word, but it would not come. He wanted no doctor. There was only one person he wanted, needed. The thought pierced his haze of pain with astonishing clarity.
“Anne,” he whispered. “Take me to Anne.”
Thirteen
Anne had no idea what time it was, only that it was well past midnight. Bathed in the glow of the lamp in the nursery, she cuddled her daughter in her lap, attempting to lull Norrie back asleep by reading to her from her favorite book of myths.
Disturbed by another of her coughing spells, Norrie had had a restless night. So had Anne, for vastly different reasons. Exhausted as she was, she felt grateful for this opportunity to snuggle Norrie close, to breathe in the sweet scent of her silky curls. Seated in the old wing chair, watching the fire in the grate burn low, it restored some sense of normalcy to her world. Heaven knew Anne needed that after what had happened last night.
She was tormented by the memory of struggling to get dressed in the darkness of Mandell’s bedchamber, bewildered by his abrupt change of heart, even more bewildered by her own. Of a sudden, it had been Mandell remembering the proprieties, commanding her to leave him when she had been more than willing to stay. The recollection left her feeling confused and shamed, angry with him and with herself.
“Mama.” Norrie tugged at the sleeve of Anne’s dressing gown, reclaiming her straying thoughts. “You stopped reading again.”
“What? I’m sorry, my love.” Anne deposited a kiss upon her daughter’s smooth brow and glanced down the page with a frustrated sigh, trying to relocate her place in the text.
“And because Lady Persephone had eaten the seeds of the pomegranate,” Anne read, “she was ever after obliged to spend six months of the year in Hade’s underground kingdom.”
“Autumn and winter,” Norrie murmured against Anne’s shoulder. “Do you think it made Lady Persifee sad to stay with Hades?”
“I really don’t know, Norrie,” Anne said wearily, attempting to go on with the tale, but Norrie persisted.
“I don’t think so,” she said. “Perhaps she didn’t really want to leave the magic underground kingdom forever. Perhaps she started to like the dark lord a little and that’s why she ate the seeds.”
“Nonsense, Eleanor.” Anne was disconcerted to find herself thinking not of Hades, but of Mandell. “I am sure the lady was merely dreadfully hungry. She could not have wished to stay with someone that wicked.”
“Why do you think the dark lord behaved so badly, Mama, forcing Lady Persifee to go away with him?”
Anne grimaced. “I have often wondered the same thing myself.”
Norrie’s small browed furrowed in frowning concentration, then she brightened. “He must have been very lonely in his dark kingdom with no one to love him.”
“That is still no excuse.” Anne brought herself up short as she remembered what she and Norrie were really discussing, a man of myth, not one of flesh and blood. If Mandell so masteredAnne’s thoughts that she was reduced to arguing with a seven-year-old child, then she was indeed in a wretched state.
She shifted uncomfortably upon the chair, and when Norrie started to pipe up again, Anne silenced her with a swift hug. “If you don’t stop interrupting me, Eleanor Rose Fairhaven, we will be awake reading when the sun comes up and Aunt Lily will scold us both.”
“Aunt Lily never sees the sun. She’s always still sleeping.” Norrie giggled, but she subsided, nestling back against Anne’s shoulder.
