Kushiel's Dart - Jacqueline Carey [137]
That is why the subsequent cutting is done very, very slowly.
Blind and dangling, gripped by terror and longing, my entire consciousness narrowed to the scope of the flechette's blade as it harrowed my flesh with agonizing slowness, etching an unseen sigil on the inner swell of my right breast. I could feel the blood running in a steady trickle between my breasts and down my belly. My skin parted before the blade, and flesh was carved by it. It was like the pain of the marquist's needles multiplied a thousand-fold.
How long it continued, I could not say; forever, it seemed, until she stopped cutting and traced the point of the blade slowly down the path my blood had taken.
"Phedre." Melisande's voice whispered softly at my ear. I could feel the warmth of her body. The tip of the flechette trailed downward from my belly, a cool and deadly caress, until I felt it hovering near my nether lips, and trembled like a leaf. I knew where next the blade would go. I could almost hear Melisande's smile. "Say it."
"Hyacinthe!" In a paroxysm of terror, I gasped the signale, and every muscle in my body went rigid against the force of the climax that overtook me. Not until it ended did Melisande laugh and withdraw the flechette, and I sagged, limp, at the end of the chain.
"You did very well," she said tenderly, removing my blind. I blinked upward in the lamplight, half-dazzled, as her beautiful face swam into focus. She had taken off her mask, and her hair fell loose, rippling in blue-black waves.
"Please." I heard the word before I realized I'd said it.
"What do you want?" Melisande cocked her head slightly, smiling, pouring warm water from a ewer over my skin. I didn't even glance as it sluiced away the blood.
"You," I whispered. I had never asked it of a patron before: never.
In a moment, Melisande laughed again, and unbound my hands.
Afterward, she was well-pleased and let me stay, toying with my hair. "Delaunay saw to your training well," she said in her rich voice, sending a thrill through every fiber of my being. "You could match your skills against any House in the Night Court, my dear." She drew one finger up the line of my marque and raised her brows. "What will you do when it's done?"
Even now, I shivered at her touch with the aftershocks of pleasure. "I don't know. I've not decided."
"You should think on it. You're near enough to it." She smiled. "Or has Delaunay some target left for you?"
"No," I said. "I don't know, my lady."
She wound a lock of my hair around her fingers. "No? Perhaps he's satisfied, then. He used you to gain access to Barquiel L'Envers, didn't he? And used the Duc to gain revenge on the Stregazza." She laughed at my expression. "Who do you think taught Anafiel Delaunay to manipulate others, my dear? Half of what he knows, I taught him; he taught me in turn to listen and observe, and the two skills together are more formidable than either alone could hope to be."
"He said you were well-matched in many ways," I said.
"All but one." Melisande tugged gently at my hair and smiled. "Sometimes I think we should have wed anyway, for he's the only man who truly makes me laugh. But then, his heart was given long ago, and I think a large part of it died with Prince Rolande."
"Rolande?" I sat upright, staring at her, my wits scrambled into a dazed sort of alert. "Prince Rolande?"
"You really didn't know, did you?" Melisande looked amused. "I wasn't sure. Yes, of course, ever since they were together at the University of Tiberium. Even Rolande's marriage couldn't come between them, though of a surety, Delaunay and Isabel detested each other. You've never read his poetry?"
"There's no copy to be found in the City." My mind reeled.
"Oh, Delaunay keeps a book of his verse, locked in a coffer in his library," she said idly. "But what's he up to, then, if he's no longer using you as his eyes and ears?"
"Nothing," I said absently, trying to remember. There was a coffer; I'd seen it, atop a high shelf on the eastern side of the room. It was dusty and uninviting, and I'd never wondered