Kushiel's Justice - Jacqueline Carey [65]
"Here," Mavros murmured in my ear. "You've got all of a minute.”
Sidonie was waiting, hidden by a tall marble column. The sight of her nearly broke my heart. Her honey-gold hair was piled in a coronet and my sunburst earrings adorned her delicate earlobes. Her black eyes were filled with tears.
"Sidonie …" I whispered.
She shook her head. "Don't. Don't say anything.”
I took her face in my hands and kissed her instead, long and deep. I pressed her against the column so hard it must have bruised her shoulders. She clung to me as though she were drowning and kissed me back, hands tugging the hair at the nape of my neck, silently urging me for more and more and more.
Shouts of mirth and laughter rose above the music. In the hall, blindfolds were being removed, one by one.
"Time," Mavros said quietly from the other side of the column.
We broke apart. I touched Sidonie's kiss-swollen lips. "I love you.”
Her eyes glittered. "I love you, too.”
And that was all, all that there was time for. Mavros came around the column to take Sidonie's hand and lead her discreetly back into the crowd. I loitered a moment before following.
Such was the eve of my wedding night. Ysandre and Drustan had made an appearance. They had even taken part in the blindfold game in a display of good-natured sportsmanship. I stood at Duc Faragon's side as they made their farewells, and Sidonie stood at theirs, avoiding my gaze. Everyone else seemed very pleased at this splendid evidence of rapprochement between House Shahrizai and House Courcel. The Queen had proved her generosity of spirit; the truth of Duc Faragon's oath of loyalty was acknowledged with gratitude.
At last, their efforts had borne fruit untainted by my mother's treason.
I wondered what they would have thought, both sides, if they'd known that for me, for Sidonie—and for Mavros, who was complicit in it—the entire evening existed for the purpose of one last, desperate kiss. One last yearning press of bodies, crush of lips, and starved tangle of tongues that could have brought the whole edifice of rapprochement and goodwill crashing down if we had been discovered.
It would have been worth it.
Almost.
I nearly wished it had happened. But there was Alba; there was Drustan's honesty and his faith, and promises I'd made. There was Dorelei, sweet and trusting. There was youth, Sidonie's and mine, and Maslin of Lombelon, and the fact that I couldn't say, not with utter, absolute certainty, that in a year's time, I would feel as I did now, that my heart was being yanked from my chest at the thought of being parted from her. It would have been simple, so simple, if we were commonfolk. It wouldn't have mattered, then.
But we weren't.
We were the Dauphine of Terre d'Ange and a Prince of the Blood, soon to be a Prince of Alba. And we could not afford to be any more young and foolish than we were. The stakes were too damnably high.
So I stood beside barrel-chested Duc Faragon, the head of House Shahrizai, his hair silver with age. Stood and watched Queen and Cruarch depart, their guards escorting them, their daughter beside them, her carriage erect and proud. Her slender back upright as a spear, giving no sign that I'd bruised her shoulder blades against the cold, unyielding marble column, pinning her with my passion.
Elua! I could have wept.
I didn't, though I wanted to. I watched them go, dry-eyed.
And on the following day, I married Dorelei mab Breidaia.
The ceremony was held in the Palace gardens, site of a thousand fêtes. Drustan and Ysandre's own wedding had taken place there and I was meant to be honored by the gesture, though of course it only served as a bitter reminder of Sidonie's birthday and the pangs of loss and resentment that consumed me.
Indeed, the entire day felt like a wake. It was strange to arise in my room in Phèdre's townhouse—my tiny bedchamber, Ysandre had called it—knowing I wouldn't be returning to Montrève's household. Oh, I'd visit, of course, but it would all be different. No more days beginning with Ti-Philippe's teasing