Kushiel's Dart - Jacqueline Carey [37]
"Oh!" Alcuin drew back, gazing in awe at his skin, shivered into gooseflesh with subtle pleasure. "You know so much!"
"You are better than I at the things which matter to Delaunay," I said shortly. It was true. As much as I had learned, I could not match the quicksilver facility with which Alcuin observed and recorded. He could remember whole conversations and relate them in their entirety, right down to the speakers' intonations. "Alcuin." I changed my own tone, putting on the murmurous, beguiling inflections of Cereus House that I heard underlying Cecilie's voice. "We could practice, if you like. It would help us both to learn."
Alcuin shook his head with a susurrus of moonlight-colored hair, wide eyes ingenuous. "Delaunay doesn't want us to, Phedre. You know that."
It was true; Delaunay had made it explicit, and not even the lure of gathered knowledge was enough to tempt Alcuin to disobedience. With a sigh, I returned to my books.
But of course, there was nothing to prevent me from practicing on myself.
It began that night, in the darkness of my little room, which I had all to myself. We were studying the opening caresses of arousement. Throwing off my coverlet to lie naked on my bed, I whispered their names to myself, tracing their patterns on my skin, until my blood burned beneath the touch of my fingers.
And yet I refrained from seeking the release I knew was to be gained, adhering strictly to the lessons we were allotted. I cannot say why, save that it was a torment, and as such, was sweet to me.
Older and wiser than Delaunay in the service of Naamah, Cecilie Laveau-Perrin discerned my predicament. We were reciting Emmeline of Eisande's Log of Seven Hundred Kisses (most of which I was unable to practice by myself) when I felt her shrewd gaze resting upon me and faltered.
"You are impatient with these studies, no?" she asked me.
"No, my lady." Long trained to obedience, my reply was automatic. I raised my eyes to meet her gaze and swallowed. "My lady, I was raised in the Night Court. Had I been allowed to stay, my training would have begun a year gone by. Even now, I might be saving toward my marque; perhaps even paying the marquist to limn the base, if my virgin-price were high enough. Yes, I am impatient."
"So it is money that is the spur which goads you, hmm?" She stroked my hair, smiling a little.
"No." I admitted it softly, leaning into her touch.
"It is Kushiel's Dart which pricks you, then." She waited until I looked up again, nodding, not a little surprised. She had never spoken of it, and no one in Cereus House had known me for what I was. Cecilie laughed. "Anafiel Delaunay is not the only scholar in the world, my sweet, and I have done a fair amount of reading since I left the Court of Night-Blooming Flowers. Never fear, I'll keep Anafiel's secret until he's ready to reveal you. But until that time, there is naught you can do but suffer the torments of your own devising."
A flush of embarrassment suffused my skin.
"There is no fulfillment that is not made sweeter for the prolonging of desire." She patted my burning cheek. "If you wish to improve your skills, use a mirror and a candle, that you may see what you're about and study the lineaments of desire."
That night, I did. By candlelight, I traced the patterns of arousal upon my skin, watching it change and flush, and thought about the fact that Cecilie knew, and Alcuin, and wondered in a delicious frisson of guilt and shame if either had told Delaunay what I did in secret.
So did my education continue.
ELEVEN
In the two