The Promise (2 page)

“You would cease to miss this gilded prison in only a few days,” he boasted. “I would keep you smiling so much, you would not care for the riches your father bestows, or for this fat man who wishes to put his fat fingers on your beautiful breasts.”

He squeezed her breasts through the linen of her chemise, and it hurt.

“These are mine,” he muttered fiercely, and she glimpsed the thinly disguised rage beneath his ardor.

She shoved away from him. “No, you petulant ass, they are
mine.
And you will not touch them again without my permission.” Anger rolled through her in waves and gave her command added strength.

He stepped back, surprised by her response. Men often were when they discovered her strong will.

He recovered quickly.

“I believe you gave me your permission some time ago.” His dark eyebrows dipped down as he perused her body from her bare feet to her breasts, which trembled with every breath she took.

Instinct warned her something was not right. He was different. Harder. Angrier. Not the tender swain murmuring flowery words of love to her whom he had been just yesterday; that is, until she had told him of her father’s plans for her betrothal, and of her intention to obey him.

I must be calm. I must show him no fear.

“Then I withdraw it,” she said imperiously.

He moved toward her now with the slow, graceful fluidness that made women wonder what it would be like to bed him.

“Once given, such permission cannot be withdrawn.” The smile he gave her chilled her blood. “You will be mine tonight,
miro-chi.
In every way a man can possess a woman. And when I am through with you, with taking what you have promised me, no one else will want you. No one but
me.”

His eyes, black as coal, flared with heat. “And
I
will want you forever.”

The hair at her nape stood on end. For the first time, Alonsa became truly afraid. She was alone with a man who had confessed his desire for her, and no one else knew of his presence. What had she been thinking?

“I promised you nothing,” she stammered, backing away from him. She bumped against something hard, and she realized the wall behind her impeded her escape.

He stalked closer to her, breathing heavily.

“You promised me
everything.
With each look, with each kiss, you promised me the world. Do you think I have waited this long to take you just to let some other man have what is mine?” he snarled, thumping his chest. He shook his head, his black mane of hair falling across his forehead. “No. I prepared you to receive me, and receive me you will.”

He was mad. Only this could explain his actions. How could he think to do this to her here, in her own home, and not be caught?

He reached for her, and she screamed. His mouth pressed hard against hers, quickly smothering the sound. He lifted her until her feet left the ground, thrust her against the rough ivy-covered brick of the wall. She felt the vines digging into her back while her bare feet tried to find purchase on the ground. She cried out again, but the words choked in her throat.

She wore nothing beneath the thin cloth and knew the moment he felt it. He groaned and closed his eyes, then thrust his hips between her flailing legs and shuddered as he rubbed against her. She recoiled, knowing instinctively he would harm her if she did not get free. She tore her mouth from his.

“No.
Please, for the love of God, do not hurt me,” she begged, all pride gone now. Tears streamed down her face as she sobbed in fear.

At that, he opened his eyes and looked at her, truly looked at her, for the first time since he’d seized her. He blinked and his brow furrowed, as if he only now realized what he was about to do. His gaze bored into hers, and she thought she saw madness battling with the remaining good inside of him.

“I—I do not wish to hurt you,
miro-chi.
Do you understand nothing? I love you. You are everything. You are my life. I cannot give you to another. I
cannot.”
His voice dropped to a heavy whisper. “I could not bear it. I would rather die first.”

His eyes changed, became hard, unreadable.

“I would rather
see you
die first,” he hissed, and as he spoke, his hand slipped to her throat. He squeezed, hard.

The madness had won.

She struggled, desperate with fear and pain, while he choked the breath out of her and bright starbursts flashed in her eyes. She clawed and kicked at him, but her slight form proved no match for his powerful frame, and she knew with great certainty she would die tonight.

Suddenly, he jerked and made a gagging sound, his eyes wild. He dropped his hands and staggered backward, trying desperately to reach behind him. When he reeled away, Alonsa saw her father standing there, his weathered face mottled with rage, his golden eyes filled with fury.

Uncomprehending, Alonsa slumped against the wall, gasping for air. Miguel spun and dropped to his knees, and Alonsa saw the jeweled hilt of a dagger protruding from between his shoulder blades.

Papa’s dagger. Papa had stabbed Miguel. He had saved her life.

Miguel fell, face forward, onto the hard cobblestones below. Her throat on fire, Alonsa could not move, and her father stood still as stone, watching, waiting …

Miguel’s laugh suddenly tumbled into the obscene silence, and both she and Papa jumped. Her father moved toward him, prepared to finish the task he had started. Miguel did not move, however, but kept laughing with a horrible sound. He turned his head, his black eyes shifting to hers as blood trickled from his mouth.

“Listen to me,
miro-chi,”
he rasped. “Listen well. I loved you. Now I curse you.” His eyes glowed with fire.
“When he loves, death will follow.”

With that, the light in his eyes died, and he laughed no more.

CHAPTER TWO

Ten years later, in the Lombardy Region, just outside the city of Pavia

“I
NÉS, MAKE HASTE!
”

Alonsa shouted to the market woman handling the reins of Alonsa’s merchant cart on the God-cursed, thrice-damned byway the Lombards thought of as a road. Clenching her teeth, she tried to urge the cart, laden with her goods and wounded betrothed, faster by sheer force of will.

Tight-lipped, Inés glanced over her shoulder. Her gray eyes darkened for a moment, touching on the soldier’s shivering form lying prostrate beside Alonsa in the back of the cart.

“SÍ, Señora”
Inés gave the reins another sharp snap, and the dray horse increased its pace.

Alonsa felt Martin Dietrich move, his body jerking in concert with each bump and sway of the cart over the rock-studded road. She stared into his eyes and touched his brow, stroking his dark hair away from his solid square face. His heavy lids drifted down as though he had received from her hand a benediction, and not a curse. She knew she would always live with the haunting memory of that look.

The eyes of her betrothed … and the eyes of her last victim.

There would be no more.

Even as she pressed the makeshift bandages soaked in healing herbs against Martin’s side, she swore it to herself. While the cart bounced across rutted country paths, she swore it to God. Lips trembling, she laid her hand upon the case containing the emblems of her family’s trade: blades of the finest quality, handcrafted in her father’s artisan shops in Toledo. She took her oath upon them as though they were a relic of the Church.

It ends here. No matter what else is to come, it ends here.

They passed through empty farmland dotted with bare-branched trees, the air filling with the footfalls of several hundred women, children, and merchant men in the baggage train escaping to safety. Murmured voices carried above the snorting of the horses, and the rumble of wheels dragged across open land. Far ahead of them, as well as taking up the very rear, a few ranks of soldiers marched in ragged flanks, guarding them as best they could.

The families of the soldiers and the merchants who catered to the moving army constantly in need of supplies hurried alongside the carts of the baggage train, grim-faced. In the endless territorial battles between the king of France and the Holy Roman Emperor, these people were casualties of war just as often as the soldiers who fought in it.

The cart jolted and Martin moaned, muttering words of nonsense in his pain. He drifted in and out of consciousness, and she felt the first flush of fever on his skin.

“Shh, Martin,” she crooned to him. “All will be well.”

He turned his deep brown eyes toward her voice, and she saw his doubt.

“Will I die?” he whispered.

Her heart clutched. “I … think not.” She did not lie. Only God knew the answer to his question, and she prayed it would be otherwise.

He closed his eyes. “I am sorry … my beloved.”

She drew back. A stab of fear stopped her breath. He had never called her that before.
The words of a lover.

She forced herself to breathe once more. She had no cause to fear such words. The fever spoke for him, not love. She knew Martin, a mercenary soldier, admired her, but she knew also his desire for her father’s fortune was stronger than his desire for her.

She did not mind the lack of love; indeed, she had relied upon it. Though they shared a mutual affection, she knew Martin was no threat to the curse; she thought he would be safe, and together they could continue to sell the blades despite her late husband’s untimely demise. Except…

Now Martin lay dying, and unless she carried out the plan forming in her mind, another man might soon take his place.

Alonsa’s gaze shifted to the imposing figure of Günter Behaim riding alongside the cart on a commandeered horse. A study in counterpoint, his dark-blond hair revealed bronze highlights glinting in the sun. It made for a surprising contrast with eyebrows dark as a raven’s feathers over emerald green eyes. A slash of high cheekbones and a wide jaw covered in beard stubble opposed the marble smooth curves of his mouth.

He had removed his breastplate and cuisses, but had left his two-handed great sword strapped to his back. The black stones on the cross guard glittered in the sun. Mud and blood spattered his doublet, which clung to his broad shoulders like a lover. His unkempt clothing could not detract from the bearing of a professional mercenary, a
Landsknecht
in the service of Emperor Charles V. Despite being worn from battle, he was still the most striking man Alonsa had ever met.

She stifled the guilty yearning that always came with his presence and forced herself to think of her vow.

Günter contemplated Martin in the cart and turned his probing gaze her way.

“How fares he?” he asked in German.

“¿Qué?”
she responded, startled into her native speech.

His eyes narrowed. He repeated his question in Spanish. “Martin. How fares he?”

Alonsa flushed and tore her gaze away from his. She removed the sodden bandages from the wound, transferred them to the water-filled bowl in her lap, and refused to look at Günter again. “The injury still bleeds. We must find rest for him soon. He cannot travel much longer this way.”

She spoke in her best German, wringing out the bandages in the now-crimson water.

Günter nodded and responded in kind.

“When I rode to the rear, one of the wounded said the attacking French column has broken ranks and now moves west, back toward Pavia. We ride north to San Angelo to regroup and tend our wounded. It won’t be much longer.”

Alonsa felt Martin’s eyes upon her. She smiled at him reassuringly, and he stared at her, his gaze intent. Then, closing his eyes, he reached for her hand.

“Yes,” he whispered. “All will be well.”

She nodded, though she did not agree.

Alonsa had not known their destination until Günter spoke of it. She had not thought to ask. She knew only they fled from the unexpected dawn attack on their troops’ position near Pavia. The Swiss mercenaries hired by Charles V’s sworn enemy, the French King Francis I, had struck them with little warning. Mounted knights had gone into battle still strapping their armor to their backs.

She had trusted Günter to know the way because Martin trusted him. Reason enough, and yet she’d almost let her fear of him convince her otherwise.

Yes, he frightened her. Günter had raised an unnamed apprehension for her the first time Martin had introduced them. He had stared at her with narrowed eyes and a clenched jaw, his green gaze flicking over her. Something hot, possessive, speculative gleamed in that look. Then his gaze had shifted to Martin, and back again, and his face had gone blank as a slate, as though that look had never been.

He’d been unfailingly polite ever since, but she had never forgotten it. She would never have chosen
him,
of course, after her husband’s murder; Günter was so loyal to Martin she doubted he would have shown any interest in her once he knew of Martin’s suit in any case.

Still, she glanced up at Günter now, unable to prevent herself.

She shamed herself. She owed poor Martin all of her attention. When she should have eyes only for him, when she should be attending to his needs alone, yet she stared at Günter’s impassive profile, her gaze drawn to him like iron to a lodestone.

It terrified her. It cursed him. It betrayed Martin.

God help them all.

His eyes lingered on his friend, and in them she saw bleak despondency.

“Can you care for him?” Günter finally asked. “I must ride with my contingent to retake our position. It’s necessary, or I wouldn’t go.”

“I will,” she promised. “He will lack for nothing, if it is within my power to provide it.”

Günter looked at her. A curious series of expressions passed over his face. Longing? Denial? Resolve?

“I knew you wouldn’t leave his side,” he murmured, his brief smile bittersweet. He turned away from her. His back straight, his reins in hand, he wheeled the horse around without a backward glance.

The cart jolted again. Martin groaned.