Amanda McCabe - NOTORIOUS in the Tudor Court - A Sinful Alliance / A Notorious Woman

What was wrong with her? Surely she just needed fresh air. Needed to clear her muddled head and regain her sense of purpose.

Maybe the only way to do that was by pushing Nicolai Ostrovsky into the Thames!

As they emerged from the banquet hall into the chilly night, Marguerite chuckled at the image of Nicolai cartwheeling into the river. Vanishing under the waves, leaving her to be as she was before, whole and cold and untouchable. The only trouble was, he might very well drag her in with him.

“And what makes you laugh so, mademoiselle? ” he asked, as they turned down one of the pathways, shining white in the starlight. They ducked behind a concealing hedge, away from curious eyes.

Marguerite shook her head. “Merely a jest of my own.”

“I am glad to see you catch your breath enough to make jests.”

She drew in a deep breath of the cold, smoketinged air. She was surprised to find that she had caught her breath, that her lungs were expanding, opening up so she could smell everything. The clear breeze, the chimney smoke, the frosty river, the flowers slumbering under the ground. The stones and grass and wine. Nicolai’s scent, his hair and wrist and neck.

Her world tonight kept expanding and retracting in ways she could never have imagined. She remembered what it was to fly free in the dance, and now she twirled in a circle, her head tipped back to take in the night sky. The endless expanse of stars. She imagined herself soaring up into the endless blackness, free.

What had got into her tonight? The wine, the music? She could not fathom it. She could only twirl faster, her arms outstretched to take it all in.

The world would retract again soon enough, pull back inside to that one pinpoint that was her life—to deceive and defeat.

Nicolai laughed, catching her hands in his as she twirled. He tried to still her, but she would not let him. Instead, she pulled him into her circle, and they whirled and whirled until the sky and the palace and England itself were nothing but a buttery blur.

“Who is this mad creature?” he cried. Just like in the dance, he caught her around her waist, lifting her up and up until she flew into the sky. She lifted her hands as if she could grasp the very stars and pull them down to put into his beautiful hair.

“What has possessed you, Marguerite?” he said. “My wild rusalka. ”

“I am possessed,” she gasped. She buried her fingers in his hair, the warm strands slipping silkily from her grasp. “Come, Nicolai, be mad with me. We shall have to be sane again soon enough.”

“I fear one of us will have to be sane right now,” he said, lowering her to her feet. “Or trouble such as we have never known in our very troublesome lives will descend on us.”

“ Non, non, ” she said, still caught deep in the moon’s spell. “Kiss me, Nicolai.”

“Marguerite…”

She grasped his hair again, and drew him toward her. Their lips met, and there was no practice to it, no artifice. Just a hot, blurry melding of their mouths, their passionate needs, so long denied.

She remembered Venice, how for one fateful moment she lost herself in him there. Just as then, she fell into him, into that bright essence of him, drowning, overwhelmed. She could not pull away, could not reach for her dagger. She threw herself heedlessly into him, deeply, madly. She held onto him as if she would never, ever let him go. She was his captive, but he would be hers, too.

He tried to draw away, to resist her. She could feel it in the tension of his shoulders, the supple arc of his back. She refused to let go, though, and he surrendered with a groan, falling into her as she did him. His arms closed around her, drawing her close against him, so close she could feel every inch of his body, every lean muscle and sharp curve, the heavy press of his penis through her skirts.

His lips dragged from hers, tracing fiery kisses to her jaw, her throat, the tiny fluttering pulse where her blood burned so hot just above her diamond. The plump curve of her heartbeat, concealed by her bodice.

How she wanted him! Every bit of him, his beautiful acrobat’s body, his laughter, his strength, his sex and, yes, his kindness, too. All that tenderness he showed Dona Elena and her son, she wanted it for herself. The terrible, desperate sense that it could never be hers, that it—he—was too good for her made her all the more desperate on this strange night.

She buried her fingers in his hair, pressing him closer to her heartbeat, the very life of her. “ Mon ange, mon beau ange, ” she whispered. And she meant it. Only an angel, or the worst sort of demon, could make her forget everything as he did.

He went still, perfectly still, his lips to her breast, and just like that she felt his soul fly away from her. It was as if her voice broke their spell. She clung to him, as he did her, his arms around her waist, his lips moving to the curve of her neck, their breath mingling. They were nearly as close as a man and woman could be, yet he was gone from her.

“Will you kill me now, Emerald Lily?” he said roughly. He slid his clasp to her hand, drawing her arm straight as he peeled back her sleeve to reveal the small blade strapped to her forearm. She had forgotten it was there, forgotten all but his kiss.

Now, as she stared down at the polished steel, she felt everything again. The cold night, the hollowness at her centre. She heard the distant thunder of revelry from the banquet house, and remembered where she was.

She pulled her arm away, shaking the sleeve into place. “If I had wanted to kill you tonight, you would have been dead long ago.”

“So, why am I not? What is it you want?” His Slavic accent, usually so faint, so lightly musical, was hoarser, rougher. He stepped back from her, wiping his lips with the back of his hand as if to erase the very taste of her.

Marguerite turned away, wrapping her arms tightly around herself. Her madness leached away, leaving her feeling brittle, angry. But angry at who, what? Nicolai—or herself?

She forced herself to laugh mockingly. “La, monsieur, I only desired a kiss! A kiss from a handsome man—is it so much to ask? So odd to you that it must be madness?”

He stood there in silence, just watching her as if to say he knew her too well now to believe that. To believe that her only motive could be a stolen kiss in the moonlight.

How infuriating he was, with those knowing eyes! How she wanted to kill him—or to weep.

But she would never give in to tears, especially not here and now. “I am sorry, monsieur, if I offended your modesty,” she said teasingly. “I assure you it won’t happen again. Now, shall we go back inside? I have an invitation to join Dona Elena for cards later.”

He gave her a low bow, his hand flourishing in a gallant, theatrical gesture toward the palace. “By all means, mademoiselle, let us go play games—of cards.” His voice lowered to a rough whisper, just loud enough for her to hear as she brushed past him, “But you know well this is not over.”

Ah, yes, she knew that all too well. This, whatever it was, would not be over until one of them was dead.

The scene in the Duke and Duchess de Bernaldez’s apartment was very different from that of the grand banquet hall. Indeed, it could almost have been taking place in an entirely different palace, Nicolai thought.

He gazed around the room as he strummed lightly at his lute, taking in all the people. The players in this little pageant. It was mostly the Spanish party, friends of the duke, the lilt of their Castilian accents soft above the music, the flicker of gilt-edged cards, the clink of golden goblets. Their laughter was gentle and muted, unlike the raucous banquet, the colours of their rich clothes subdued, glowing like ancient jewels. The whole room was dim, full of shifting shadows, hidden nooks that melted into the dark linenfold panelling.