Once Tempted (33 page)

“It is so a part of me goes with you to him.”

She closed the lid and turned the key in the lock. Handing it to Father Mateo, she said, “There is no other way. You must go. Without me. It is the only way to avoid our enemies.”

“I won’t leave you. Not now. Your husband would never—”

“My husband is a prisoner of the sultan’s forces. I rule in his stead. The treasure goes with you and you alone. You must obey me in this.” She reached over and touched his sleeve. “Take this ransom to Álvaro’s captors and see my husband and your king freed.” She smiled at him. “Who else can I trust but you, my cousin?”

Father Mateo nodded. He motioned to the two servants standing close by, two men Queen Caliopa and Father Mateo trusted as much as they trusted each other. The pair struggled to hoist the laden chest, but as they went to leave, Caliopa stopped them.

“Take the other stairs,” she said.

“But Your Highness,” one protested, “those are only for you and our King.”

“Take them to avoid any prying eyes. I hear my husband’s cousin in the courtyard and I would not want him . . .”—she paused, trying to find a way to phrase her next words without disparaging her husband’s relative—”to delay your travels with added instructions,” she finally said. “He has been overly attentive of late, and I do not want to tax his kindness any further.” The men nodded in understanding and struggled with their load to the hidden entrance behind a large tapestry.

When the men left, Caliopa turned to Father Mateo. “Help me.” She crossed the richly furnished solar to a bench and pulled a cloth away to reveal a chest, one matching the ransom chest in every detail.

“Help me put this in the middle of the room,” she said, struggling to lift one side.

Father Mateo grabbed the other handle, and the pair of them hauled the heavy load across the room until it sat in exactly the same location as the first one.

“What have you got in here?” the holy man asked.

“A treasure of stones and lead,” she said. “This will give Eurico no reason to follow you, for he will think I have not yet sent the ransom.”

Caliopa’s worst fear in the last month was that her husband’s cousin, Eurico, would use Álvaro’s imprisonment to stake his own claim to their small but prosperous kingdom.

“This is a dangerous game you play, Caliopa,” Father Mateo whispered, no longer using her title or rank as he addressed her. In this moment, they were just Caliopa and Mateo, like the children they’d been when growing up on her father’s estates near Madrid. “Your husband’s cousin will not appreciate your duplicity in these matters. If he decides to strike, he may well take far more than just the ransom gold.”

“Never you fear, good cousin. Eurico will not dare harm me. He fears Álvaro’s wrath more than God’s.”

“As he should,” Father Mateo muttered under his breath.

Caliopa hid her smile. Wandering over to the chess table she had set up in the corner of the room, she studied the pieces before her. The game was half finished, in the same position as it had been when she and her husband had halted their play at the news of the invasion of Moors from Africa. Her fingers stroked the proud king, standing as it was next to its queen.

Her husband was a fierce warrior, unmatched by any man she had ever seen. That he had been not only defeated but captured seemed beyond comprehension . . .  and spoke of something that she did not want to consider.

That her husband had been betrayed by someone close to him. Someone who might have seen an opportunity in Álvaro’s misfortune and the rest of Iberia in turmoil over the tide of Moorish invaders. In such chaos someone like Eurico might even be able to take a small kingdom if he played the game correctly.

But Caliopa hadn’t learned the game of chess just to amuse her husband. She’d become a master of the game by watching the political machinations first of her grandfather, then of her father and now of her husband.

She may be a mere woman, but she knew she held the final piece to this checkmate.

The ransom for her King.

The door to her chamber flew open without a knock or even a by your leave. Eurico strolled in, arrogant and swaggering, as if the right was his to enter the Queen’s private chamber at his own bidding.

He came to an abrupt stop when his gaze fell on the chest. Not even the duplicitous Eurico could hide the avarice in his heart at the sight of the ransom before him.

“My lord,” Caliopa said, greeting him with a deferential nod, when in her heart she wanted to reach out and strangle the lout. “I was just at my prayers with good Father Mateo. Perhaps you have come to join us and pray for my husband’s release.”

Eurico spared Father Mateo barely a glance when he told her confessor, “Leave us.”

Father Mateo glanced over at Caliopa. She nodded to him to follow Eurico’s order. What better way to get Father Mateo out of the castle than on Eurico’s own order?

The priest bowed his head to her and backed out of the room.

Godspeed, Mateo,
she prayed silently.

The moment the door closed behind the priest Eurico moved closer, circling her like a bird of prey. “I don’t like you having men in your room.” He glanced around, his eyes narrowing with suspicion. “And without even a maidservant present. What were you two plotting?” He moved closer still.

“Plotting with Father Mateo?” She laughed and sidestepped out of his orbit. “He is my confessor. He was hearing a confession of my sins.”

“Lusting after me already, dear cousin?” he asked. “Wishing for me to warm your bed while your husband dallies with his enemies?”

Caliopa sent him an icy stare, one that matched the chill his words left curling in her veins. “How dare you presume what is not yours, Cousin.”

Eurico’s arm snaked out and caught her wrist. He yanked her into his embrace, his breath fetid against her cheek. “You’re a comely bitch, Caliopa, so I will tolerate your insolence for now. But you had best learn to treat your new king and master with the deference I prefer or you will find yourself in grave circumstances.”

“Let go of me,” she said.

His grip only tightened. “I have come to claim my right to Álvaro’s lands, his kingdom . . .” He paused for a moment, wetting his lips with his serpentine tongue. “. . .  and his wife.”

In a moment that seemed to last an eternity, she saw the dementia in his eyes. A raging, twisted insanity, the madness of a rabid dog. “Never,” she whispered. “Never will I come to you.”

He laughed. “Oh, you will come to my bed, you little whore, and you will please me, or I will start killing everyone you love. Starting with that priest lover of yours, and finally with your dear husband, my cousin.”

She broke his hold, desperation and fear giving her new strength. Backing away from him, she stumbled into the chess board, scattering the pieces, but the distance from Eurico gave her new courage. “What will you do?” she asked. “Challenge Álvaro when he returns?”

He shrugged. “Who says Álvaro is coming back?” With that he put his booted foot atop the chest. “I prefer to keep my treasury right here where it belongs, in our bedchamber, rather than give it to some insolent barbarian.”

Caliopa looked down, hiding the triumph she feared might show in her eyes. To her dismay, the white king lay broken at her feet.

An omen. An evil one,
her fears declared. A deep-seated tremble sent her hands and limbs shaking.
No,
she told herself, willing her mind to focus, to stay attentive.
This is naught but my fears getting the better of
me.
The board beside her was just a game, a trifling means to pass the time. But the man here in her chamber was the devil come to life, and she needed all her wits to check his intentions.

“Let us see what you have hidden in here, Caliopa,” Eurico said as he knelt before the chest and attempted to open it. “I would know this chest’s secrets before I attend to my next order of business.”

“What is that, Eurico?” she asked, moving slowly toward the window. In one hasty glance, she saw a lone traveler leading a laden donkey pass unheeded through the gates.
Mateo.
Beyond the hills the sun was just about to finish setting, and soon the entire countryside would be cast in darkness. Welcoming, shielding darkness that would allow Mateo to gain enough distance from the castle to elude Eurico and his hired minions.

Her husband’s cousin glanced up her. “Fetch me the key.”

Caliopa smiled as she gave him her answer. “No.” She needed to gain as much time for Mateo as she could.

No matter the cost.

Eurico erupted with rage. “Give me the key right this moment, or I will have that confessor of yours brought up here and I’ll consign him to hell with my very hands.”

Time. Time. She needed time.

If he called for Mateo and found him gone, he would know she had deceived him. If he opened the chest with the key or not and found its worthless contents, he would know.

So she needed to keep his thoughts free of Mateo and free of the chest.

And she knew there was only one thing Eurico coveted more.

God may forgive her for what she was about to do, but she couldn’t help but wonder if Álvaro would.

She threw her shoulders back and pressed her breasts upward, allowing them to strain against the velvet edge of her gown. Slowly she pushed back her hair so that it left her neck bare.

Eurico watched her every movement. His chest rose and fell in seizing heaves, as if he could barely control his need for her.

Pulling at the golden chain around her neck, she allowed a few of the links to pluck free from between her breasts. “At the end of this chain, my lord, is the key to that chest. If you are man enough to discover where it rests, then in the morning it will be yours.”

The moment she’d made her pledge, said her desperate words, Eurico was across the room. He threw her onto her bed and was atop her before she could even manage another breath.

And in that moment, Caliopa knew that she had indeed consigned her soul to the devil and her body to hell.

The first stains of dawn began to paint the skyline when Caliopa was able to leave her bed. Thankfully Eurico had left an hour or so earlier, so she didn’t have to share these few moments with his gloating boasts. Around her neck still hung the key to the chest that for now Eurico had forgotten.

For now.

Caliopa wasn’t so foolish as to think she could hold his avarice at bay with her body forever. And soon he would be returning to take his treasure as he had her body. Pillaging and stealing what he had no right to.

She didn’t dare look down at herself, for she knew the sight of bruises and marks marring the same fair, soft skin that had given Álvaro so much pleasure would only bring tears to her eyes.

And she wouldn’t cry in front of Eurico.

Tugging on a light chemise, she passed by the chess board and caught up the pieces of the king in her hand. They were cold and hard and gave her little comfort, but still she had to believe that her king, her flesh and blood husband, would soon come home and make all this right.

And yet when she looked around, she still could not see where the white queen had fallen.

She put that thought from her mind and looked again out the window, thinking of Father Mateo.

“I have given you all the time I can, Cousin,” she whispered.

As if on cue, the door bounded open, this time nearly tearing it off its leather hinges. “You deceptive bitch!” Eurico cursed. He stomped inside, stopping in front of the chest, followed by several of his henchmen. “Where is that priest of yours? Where has he gone?”

“He should be in the chapel,” she replied, staring him directly in the eye. “You do know the building? The one with the cross over the door.”

He came closer and slapped her hard across the face. “Insolent still. I see you need more lessons in humility.”

“From you? You haven’t the wit or the
weapon,”
she said, casting a disparaging glance at his breeches.

His men snickered.

This only served to inflame Eurico further. He caught her by the throat and forced her toward the tall, open window. His grip cut off her air, and she gasped, clawing at him to no avail. The king in her hand fell, shattering into a thousand tiny pieces as it hit the tiled floor.

Then amidst her struggles she saw as well the fate of the white queen. The lady lay nearby, her head separated from her broken body.

Álvaro was dead, and she was lost.

It was no omen but the truth, the gut-wrenching knowledge that all her plans had been for naught.

She had lost more than the game. She had lost their kingdom, their life together—at least in this time, in this place.

Eurico pushed her further until the back of her legs pressed against the low metal railing that served as a small balcony outside the great window.

“Where has your confessor gone?” Eurico asked again.

She couldn’t speak, for he still held her throat pinched tight.

His free hand ripped her chemise from her body, then his fingers scavenged over her breasts like a vulture picking bones until he found the key. With a quick jerk, he yanked the delicate chain, tearing it from her neck.

Eurico tossed his prize to one of his leering men. “Open it.”

Caliopa closed her eyes. She knew she should pray, offer words begging forgiveness from God for what she had done, but all she could think of was her husband.

Forgive me, my dearest Álvaro. Forgive me, my love.

The key rattled in the lock, and for a few tense seconds the clumsy oaf Eurico had entrusted with it could not get the lock to work. Another of his minions, impatient to see the treasure they’d been hired to steal, cuffed the man out of the way and twisted the key so that it finally turned.

When the last tumbler fell with a distinctive click, Eurico and all his men took a collective, expectant breath. He relaxed his grip on her throat, and Caliopa took a deep breath.

She knew in a few moments it would be her last.

As the lid was flipped open, every man leaned forward, eager for the glittering wealth, their faces mirrored expressions of untamed greed. As each one came to the startling realization of the true nature of the contents, his expression changed first to disbelief, then anger.