No Greater Pleasure (7 page)

Florentine patted out another ball of dough, her strong hands thinning and stretching it to make it the right thickness. “ ’Tis far more than that. For a hundred years the women of Alyria were no more than chattel. Slaves. Made to cover themselves from head to foot so as not to affront any man with the sight of their faces. Women had no rights in that land but for the right to bear children and die.”

Quilla got up to use some of the kettle’s hot water to brew another pot of tea. She stood with her back to the fire, warming herself, while Florentine spoke.

“I was born to a merchant father who had vowed to kill the folly, my mother, if she bore him another daughter. That’s what they called them. Follies. After Kedalya’s Folly.”

Quilla had heard the story. Though it featured the Invisible Mother, the tale was not one in the canon of her faith. “He would have killed your mother for having another girl child?”

“And been praised for it, no doubt.” Florentine’s tone wasn’t bitter, just resigned as she sliced the dough with her sharp knife into thin strands. “But instead, she gave my father a son. Me. Florentine Allumay. And I lived as a boy until the revolution when the women threw off their veils and took back their lives.”

Quilla had been trained to always know what to say, even when at a loss for the right words. “She risked much. Your mother.”

Florentine gave her a shrewd, sideways look. “Aye. She did. She died before she ever got to take off her veil.”

“I’m sorry.”

Florentine hung the noodles on the rack and took the last of the dough from the bowl. “We were given the choice, us lads who were really lassies. Live as we’d done our whole lives, or take on new roles. I chose to leave. I went to Firth, where I met Master Delessan. I had no money. No belongings. I was slaving away in a tavern kitchen, paid with gruel and the occasional beating for good measure. He took me away. When he found out what I was, or rather what I was not, he encouraged me to leave behind the twig and berries I’d never really had betwixt my thighs. Become a woman.” She gave Quilla a sly look. “As best as I could, anyway. But a dress is only clothing. It doesn’t change who the person is, inside it.”

“Of course it doesn’t.” Quilla watched Florentine’s strong hands work the dough. “But you are a woman.”

“I am.” Florentine finished the last of the noodles. “Which is why that little cocktease Allora makes me so angry. She takes her twat for granted. Uses it to get things she wants. She’s a disgrace to her cunt.”

Quilla bit her lower lip. “You think the same of me, don’t you.”

“You”—Florentine pointed the knife at Quilla—“don’t manipulate, so far as I can see. Do I think ’tis right you spread your legs for anyone who thinks a fuck will solve their problems? No. But do I think you do it out of true purpose rather than simply to scratch an itch or further your own needs? Yes, Quilla. I do believe so, and ’tis what makes the difference.”

Quilla didn’t much care for that assessment, but she supposed it was better than being a disgrace to her cunt. “I’m sorry, Florentine.”

“Don’t be sorry for me.”

“I’m not sorry for you. I’m sorry you had to endure what you did.”

Florentine finished the last noodles and pushed the rack closer to the fire. “If I hadn’t had the life I did, I’d not have become the person I am. Crotchety, stubborn, and a right old bitch.”

“You are a trifle difficult to endure,” said Quilla.

Florentine looked up with a broad grin. “Yet you keep coming round. I might start to think you fancy me.”

Quilla laughed. “Let’s just say you don’t scare me as much as you might like.”

Florentine straightened and put both hands to her back as she stretched it, twisting at the waist. “Whatever, you’ve taken the harsh side of my tongue with a smile. ’Tis more than many could do.”

“I’m trained to do it.”

“Trained to be pleasant to those who berate you? I’d not make a good Handmaiden, then.”

“No. Perhaps not. But you’re an excellent chatelaine.”

Florentine fixed her with a serious look. “That I am, and don’t think that just because I’ve gone all soft and emotional with you today that I don’t run this house with an iron hand.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it.”

Florentine nodded, seeming pleased. “And as for Allora, well, I like to snap her garters when I can. She’s too hoity-toity for her own good.”

“I don’t think she likes me,” Quilla said and fixed cups of tea for Florentine and herself.

“She rides so far up Mistress Saradin’s arse she practically lives in her throat. Of course she won’t like you. Mistress Saradin doesn’t like you.”

“Mistress Saradin has never met me.”

“She doesn’t need to meet you, Handmaiden. She knows what you’re here to do.”

“And what, exactly, does she think that is?” asked Quilla, refusing to be taunted into an angry response.

“She knows, as we all do, that you’re here to heal the master’s heart.”

“And you all think his heart should remain unhealed?”

Florentine shrugged. “ ’Tis not for me to say.”

“But you will and you do, Florentine.”

The cook nodded slowly, looking at Quilla. “I would like to see the master smile again.”

“But his lady wife would not?”

Florentine laughed. “Not unless ’tis her who brings it to his face. Don’t you know anything about jealousy, Quilla?”

She knew too much about it. “I thought you said she was mad.”

“Mad, not stupid. Insane, not incoherent.”

Quilla sipped her tea. “I’m here for a reason. I’m sorry it won’t please everyone else, but I answer to the Order of Solace and to Master Delessan. I’ll be here until my work is done.”

“And until you can add another arrow to Sinder’s Quiver. I know.”

“Yes.”

Florentine pulled out another bowl and began sifting flour into it. “Mistress Saradin will never like you, noble purpose or no.”

“She doesn’t need to like me.”

Florentine laughed. “No. She surely does not. But ’ware her, Quilla, for she’ll try to make your life so miserable you’ll think banishment to the Void a better ending.”

Quilla shook her head. “Thanks for the warning.”

“Oh, ’tis no warning,” said Florentine. “ ’Tis a promise.”

Chapter 3

 

 

 

 

 

S
o many books. From the sacred to the mundane, dozens of volumes graced the shelves. While all of them were bound in fine leather, with expensive paper, many were in disrepair. All of them were dusty. Today, Quilla had decided to begin the task of ordering them.

“Good morning, my lord,” she said when he entered the room.

She left the shelves and pulled the kettle from the fire just as it began to whistle, poured the hot water into the pot, and took the napkin off the basket of fresh-baked scones she’d brought with her from the kitchen.

“How do you do that?”

She paused in buttering the scone. “Your pardon?”

Delessan slid into his chair and waved at the teapot. “How do you know when to put the water on so it’s ready the moment I walk out the door? ’Tis been two morns in a row.”

“Shall we make a game of it? See how many times I can do it?” she said lightly, finishing with the scone and adding a dollop of tumbleberry jam to the top of it. She handed him the plate.

“How did you know I like tumbleberry jam?”

Quilla regarded him with a straight face. “Magic.”

His lips thinned for a moment, the faintest hint of a smile quirking the corners. “You asked Florentine.”

“Of course I did. I need to know all about you, if I’m to be your Handmaiden. What you like and what you don’t.”

He bit into the scone and then sipped some tea. “Perhaps I should make you a list.”

Quilla smiled, then Waited. “If it pleases you.”

It was his turn to regard her with a serious expression. “Do you wake every morn with such an abominably cheery manner? Or is it something you put on, like your gown?”

“I was blessed with an easily contented nature. No matter how I feel when I go to my bed at night, there are few mornings I do not wake with the knowledge that each day is mine own to control.”

“So you’re happy all the time?”

She shook her head. “Of course not, my lord. I am sad, or weary, or irritable as any other. I just make a rather greater effort at finding joy when it insists on hiding.”

He snorted. “You speak as though joy were something anyone could find, like a slug beneath a rock.”

“More like a flower in a garden of stone, my lord.”

“Ah. You’ve been walking the grounds.”

“Walking is good for the legs.” She watched him. “Your garden, forgive my saying, could perhaps use a bit of color.”

“We have the conservatory and greenhouse to provide flowers.

The stone garden is not a place for frivolity, but for meditation.”

“Of course. ’Tis your garden, and should be planned however you choose.”

Delessan finished his scone and reached for the second she’d already prepared. “Don’t you want anything to eat?”

“If it pleases you for me to eat with you, than I shall.”

He frowned. “Are you hungry?”

“I am.”

“And if you were not?”

“If I were not hungry but it pleased you to have me eat with you, I would do so.” Quilla put some jam on an unbuttered scone and took a bite. It was delicious. Better than her simplebread.

She looked up to see Delessan looking at her with a mixture of appalled astonishment and speculation in his eyes. “Do you not have limits, Handmaiden?”

Quilla took a swallow of tea and wiped her mouth before answering. “I do, my lord.”

“And what are they?”

“I don’t know. I have never had them tested.”

“Never had—” This seemed to set him aback. He stared down into his teacup, brow furrowed, mouth pursed. “Why not?”

“I have never been assigned to any patron who has pushed me farther than I am willing to go.”

The answer was simple, but true. She’d been asked to do many things, and she’d always done her best to provide them. She hadn’t always succeeded, of course. Eating food that turned her stomach had made her ill more than once. Her poetry had earned disdain. She’d fallen asleep when requested to stay awake. Overall, she did her best to provide what her patrons needed.

“Then how do you know you have limits?” His gray blue eyes burned into hers.

“Everyone has limits,” she said, her voice huskier than normal, before she cleared her throat self-consciously. “I am not without morals.”

“So you would not say, steal, for a patron?”

“I think not.”

“Even if it made him happy?”

Quilla had heard stories of Handmaidens who’d committed crimes in the names of their patrons. It didn’t matter in the eyes of the courts, or the priests. They’d been held accountable for their actions.

“Theft rarely makes anyone happy, my lord. When happiness is measured by wealth or assets, then accumulating more, even by theft, rarely satisfies. If a patron wished me to steal in order to provide him or her happiness, I would likely decline, knowing no matter what I did, my efforts to provide that joy would be fruitless.”

Delessan looked at her while he sipped his tea. “Likely would refuse. But you’re uncertain.”

“I have never been told to steal. I believe I would refuse. But I cannot say I would never acquiesce, for there are always situations which defy reason.”

“Can you think of a situation in which you might agree?”

Quilla put down her cup and folded her hands, the back of her right in the palm of her left. “I have known of Handmaidens who became thieves for their patrons. All the cases I heard of, and we are all taught of them as cautionary tales, my lord, had one situation in common.”

He sat back in his chair, one leg crossed over the other, teacup cradled in his long-fingered hands. “Which was what?”

“They all fancied themselves in love with their patrons, my lord.”

“Ah.” He sipped. “You say fancied themselves in love. Is it difficult for you to believe they actually were?”

Quilla shook her head. “It’s not my place to judge their feelings, only that whether or not they had given their hearts in addition to their service, committing a crime is immoral and the intensity of emotion cannot make up for it.”

“So you’ve never been asked to steal but you believe you would not do so, even if you were in love with your patron.”

“I have never been in love with a patron, but no. I do not believe I would steal. Nor murder, if that is your next question, and yes, I have heard of Handmaidens who did that, as well.”

“It would seem you are a most violent bunch, then. Thieves and murderers? I thought the Order of Solace would not condone such practices.”

She bristled at his cool tone, but kept her voice calm. “We are all human. There are far more thieves and murderers who are not members of the Order than are.”

This made him smile. “Agreed. And I see that though I try to make you angry, you refrain. Tell me something, Handmaiden, how much harder would I have to try?”

“Much harder, my lord, for I have heard every insult to my profession you can imagine and likely many more you have not. I have been called a whore, a demon, a temptress. I have been spit upon in the streets, set upon by jealous spouses; I have been slapped and kicked and bitten. I have been told I will freeze in the Void and there is no place in the Land Above for me. I’ve endured insult and degradation aplenty.”

“Why, then, do you continue?” He seemed genuinely curious, so Quilla gave him an honest answer.

“Because ’tis my pleasure to bring comfort and solace. Because I find joy in bringing joy. Because I truly believe in the higher purpose and that by following this course I am doing my part to fill Sinder’s Quiver. I believe there is a place for me in the Land Above, I do not believe I am a whore or immoral, and because I know the goodness of my heart and of my soul, I care little for those who denounce me out of their own insecurities. I don’t go ’round forcing my services on anyone, my lord. I am assigned to people, such as yourself, who have a need for what I can provide.”