Page 21 of What Dreams May Come
“I took it from the unconscious Prospero’sbroken finger.”
“Oh.” I contemplated the band, the dark jewel that Prince Escalus used to permanently mark me as his possession. “I see.” I did. Another demonstration that I lacked the strength of a man. Like I didn’t already know that. Like itwasn’t constantly, every day of my life, ground into my mind by society, the Church, and most of all bymen. None of whom I likedat this moment.
“Right before I placed a gold coin on each of his closed eyes.”
Oh. My lips formed the word, but I didn’t voice it. According to ancient tradition, one laid two coins on a corpse’s eyes to pay for Charon’s transport across the river Styx and into the lands of the dead. I indulged in a moment of imagination; Count Prospero’s moment of disorientation on regaining consciousness, of suffering the weight on the eyes and then realization—coins! As if he had already died! And not merely coins.Goldcoins from Verona’spodestà.
When I regained my voice, I asked, “A subtle portent to Count Prospero?”
“Less than subtle. He leaves Verona this morning and forever, or suffer the wrath of the prince of Verona.”
I’d never heard Prince Escalus speak of himself in regal third person, and I took that as a portent as surely as Prospero, on his waking, would take the warning.
I needed to know one more thing. “My prince, how did you know the ring had gone astray?”
He drew himself up in chilly reprimand. “Madame Culatello knows her duty, if you do not, and sought me out to tell me the whole story and beg my help.”
I wanted to collapse in relief.“I’m so glad!”
Clearly he was puzzled. “Glad that she alone in this affair has good sense?”
“No, glad that she wasn’t the one who betrayed me to Count Prospero. I consider her a friend, and when I thought she had...I believed for a few horrible moments that she’d betrayed me to him. It was a misunderstanding, one I should never have allowed myself to indulge in.” I thought of Count Prospero’s fist to her face. “I pray she hasn’t suffered too much for this night.”
“I also do so pray.”
I walked toward the gate. “If you’re done playing cat-and-mouse games with me”—yes, I was grouchy—“I would go home to Casa Montague and seek solace in my bed, for I’m weary and sore with much effort.”
“Yes, you can go.” He stopped me with one hand on my arm.“In a minute.”
I feared what more he would do and say, but he paused to grimace and rearrange himself as if his codpiece fit too tightly for comfort.
Small consolation, that, but I felt pleased to be not alone in my suffering.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
The prince’s bodyguards, Dion, Marcellus and Holofernes, waited in the street, twirling their scarlet satyr masks while they waited for their master to finish disciplining his wayward betrothed. I wanted to say something scathing about terrorists who made it their business to frighten a woman, but the sight of the prince’s sedan chair made my aching legs wobble.
Blessed Mary, I didn’t have to walk.
Escalus bundled me in, shut the curtains around me. The chair rose and moved rather rockily through the silent city. What could I expect? These men weren’t experienced bearers and mayhap resented this added duty. Nevertheless, I stretched out my feet and closed my eyes, and a mere second later, Prince Escalus touched my shoulder. “Wake, Rosaline, you’re home.”
I blinked the sleep out of my eyes. He held my arm as I slid out of the chair and saw before me the great ivy-covered wall that protected Casa Montague’s garden and the Montagues themselves.
The prince moved to the narrow door, almost hidden in vining leaves, and using the key Papà had given him, opened it and ushered me inside.
I was going to make it. I was going to get away without explaining myself. “Good night, sweet prince.” I thought to soften him up with an endearment, grease the waterwheel,escape swiftly.
His midnight voice brought me to a halt. “How did Princess Isabella come tolose the ring?”
The code of the Big Sister: I would not tattle. “How do youthinkshe lost it?”
The latch clicked firmly behind him. “That’s not an answer, Rosie, and your evasion tells me more than a straight reply.”
Once again it was him and me alone in a garden. I turned my back and walked briskly up the wandering path, through the hedges toward the house. Let it not be said I hadn’t learned my lesson. “Since you know Princess Isabella lost the ring, you must have some theory as to thecircumstances.”
He kept pace with me, one step behind on the graveled walk. “I suppose she was doing something she should not.” He sounded jaded, like a man who had, after the deaths of their parents, raised his much younger sister and now realized his best efforts might be flawed.
I contemplated a reply that would not necessarily reassure but tell enough to satisfy him. “She was doing something daring, something she never would have before she met...me.” Best not to mention Katherina.
