The Execution (23 page)

Julianne cried as they embraced, tears
streaming down her lovely, dirt-streaked face.

“
Are you hurt?” he
breathed.

“
No.” She dismissed his
concern. “I have missed you so much, but my tears are for
happiness.” Her mouth trembled; it had been a long and arduous
journey for her. She was weatherworn and exhausted, and she sobbed
as the magnitude of her efforts surfaced. He just held her, until
her sobs waned. She was with him and suddenly the world was right
once more.

D’ata could only imagine the danger of
her coming alone. In all his worry and sorrow, he never considered
she would risk so much to come and find him. He kissed the salty
offenders away and lifted her easily, laying her instead to the
rear of the pulpit, on the lovely tapestry of Christ with the
bleeding heart. He straightened her skirts, so they could recline
next to each other and then he draped his robes across her, to warm
her from the chill and wet.

Holding her close, in the quiet of the
church, they spoke quietly of their weeks apart, of the agony of
it. Their bodies warmed and steam rose soft and sweet from the damp
wool robes. Her trembling ceased and she whispered of her escape to
him.

Julianne had told her father that she
wanted to go to town to spend a few days away with her friend,
Babette. He agreed it would be good for the girl to be around her
friend, as she had been so sullen as of late. Julianne, however,
never made it to Babette’s.

Instead, she snuck off to the Cezanne
estate, and Henri had given to Julianne the old roan mare for the
journey. He told her the Baron would never notice such an animal’s
absence, and Henri could explain it away with natural death if need
be. One look at the sad torment on the face of the girl and Henri
must have realized that without the horse she would walk, if that
was her only option.

Henri was kind, said he missed D’ata
and would silently offer prayers of safe journey and happiness for
them both. He gave her a few rations, a hay hook for protection,
and a roughly scrawled map, describing D’ata’s
whereabouts.

D’ata smiled as she told her story. He
cherished the kindness that his old friend bestowed upon his
beloved. It did not surprise him at all.

Julianne had plodded slowly but
steadily to Nimes, without her father knowing. Nobody knew. She was
just all of a sudden gone. The boys would have to care for
themselves, she explained. She didn’t worry too much—they were
strong and would have to help father manage without her. Certainly,
they would be confused; her father would be furious and worried,
but in time she planned to come back to make things right. She
didn’t know how she would do this, only that she would.

It had been most difficult to say
goodbye to Yvette. She’d kissed her baby sister on top of the head,
struggling to hold back tears. She didn’t know when she might see
her again and that was what made it so difficult. When Yvette was
older, she would understand. Perhaps one day, when people were more
accepting and things were sorted out, they could all rejoice in the
love that was D’ata and Julianne. For now though, it was just how
it would have to be.

* * *

The evening waned and the church
darkened. D’ata rose to light a single candle so that he could see
Julianne’s face and placed it behind the altar on the floor. As he
sat down next to her, looking into her eyes, he took her body into
his arms, that long absent ache in his groin returning along with
the stir in his belly. To look onto her face was to look upon the
creation of all that was good. He was completely and utterly
overwhelmed with the great benevolence of her heart, that she’d
risked everything and traveled such a treacherous distance to see
him again.

“
Julianne, I didn’t know
if—I wasn’t sure that you...” He couldn’t find the
words.

Julianne reached up to brush a finger
along his lips, to trace the smoky shadow of his jaw and quiet him.
“I love you, D’ata.”

There were no words of God and
obligation now.

They kissed deeply, and presently her
lips wandered from his, following the stubble of his jaw to the
lobe of his ear, down his throat to where his priest’s collar bound
his neck.

He moaned, the feel of her touching
him like this burned his skin in a wondrous and remarkable way. He
could take no more. He pulled the collar free and roughly loosed,
first his robes, and then her gowns. He drank in the beauty of her,
his eyes wandering unabashedly over her body. He feasted on the
delicate perfection of her, thin and pale, and brushed his
fingertips over her nipples.

Julianne gasped and her eyes smoldered
as she viewed the naked beauty of him. Such a contrast it was, her
milky whiteness and honey hair to his tawny skin and raven
locks.

She reached for him and there, on the
thick wool rug in St. Aloysius cathedral, as he’d done so many
times in his dreams, he lifted his body over hers. Amid the rush of
desire, he took her tenderly, completely, and
ravenously.

Julianne, startled at his aggression,
gasped at the initial pain, but after a short spell the pain
subsided and she matched the rhythm of D’ata’s desperate
lovemaking. Soft, sweet moans escaped her as well and served to
excite him even more.

D’ata gasped and groaned, his body
arching hungrily into hers as he experienced, for the first time,
such unimaginable, unbearable ecstasy. His breath caught, ragged as
the waves washed over him, until he finally shuddered in glorious
relief. Collapsing on his elbows, he leaned his damp brow against
her neck, his breath hot against her shoulder.

There was nothing but the wind against
the windows, the rain spattering out their own song, the marbled
Madonna smiling down at them.

D’ata sighed deeply and kissed her
eyelids as he slid from her, pulling her against him, covering them
both with his robes. “I love you,” he murmured.

“
As do I,” she whispered
back.

He buried his face in her hair,
smelling the woods and earth. He vowed that never again would he
let her go. They should be together—of this he had no doubt. He
prayed a silent prayer, thanking God. His conviction was complete
and his belief absolute—God had answered his prayers.

There was no guilt, no remorse. Love
barred the outside world from them and, finally at peace, they
slept the sleep of children.

* * *

It was three hours later when
Monsignor Leoceonne noticed the roan mare tethered beneath the
lean-to outside the church. He discovered the pair sleeping naked
beneath the priest’s robes, a dark stain of blood on the lovely
wool tapestry obscuring the bleeding heart of the figure of
Christ.

CHAPTER
SEVENTEEN

†

The Dungeon: Midnight

The brothers sat back to back in the
dark, pulling warmth from each other as their stories unfolded. The
torch had long ago expired and the only light was the sliver of a
moonbeam that washed cold across the unlikely pair. Like bookends
they sat, shifting at intervals. The stone floor was a constant
discomfort, but the stories they told were gripping and poignant.
They endured the cold without comment.

Ravan, pondering D’ata’s tormented
history, was silent as he considered it. He pulled the flask to his
lips briefly before offering it to the other. This time D’ata took
a draw himself. Ravan leaned more heavily against him, apparently
finally comfortable with their proximity. “Now you’ve done it,” he
muttered more to himself than to his companion.

D’ata swallowed the wine, welcoming
the warmth in his belly. He’d neglected to eat again this evening
and the wine felt good. Waving a hand carelessly over his head,
there was apathy in his voice. “We loved each other,” he argued
weakly, closing his eyes. It was obviously painful to recount such
memories, especially when he had become so accustomed to burying
them. But perhaps his brother felt less like a stranger now, and
the past might be shared. He dropped his face into his hands and
rubbed his eyes.

“
Yes, and you fornicated
in a church,” Ravan said dryly, mercilessly, turning his head
slightly to discern the reaction on his brother’s face. He said it
without malice, but it was harsh nonetheless.

D’ata winced, that his brother should
describe it so bluntly. “I know, I know,” he sighed, hanging his
head. “Don’t you see—it was all wrong. Not us, I mean, but the
whole affair. The world was—is wrong.” He dropped his hand into his
lap and leaned his head back, resting it against the head of his
companion. Looking up at the tiny, moon-blessed window high above
them, he said, “I was not meant to be there and she was not
supposed to come; it was all wrong. We were not supposed to be in
this life.” He lamented softly, almost a whisper, “I know that
now.”

“
Well, you have obviously
considered the error of your ways, or you would not be here tonight
to offer me redemption,” Ravan said softly, turning his head
slightly. “That should make it right? Should it not?”

D’ata straightened his legs in front
of him, working a spasm from his calf by twisting his foot in
circles. A rat scuttled away beneath the straw. “Yes, well, God is
my salvation. I know no other recourse.” He spoke from rote memory,
the lines carefully memorized, spoken a million times before. It
was dull and ugly, and it gave no solace.

They sat quietly for a spell and then
Ravan ventured carefully, “Tell me—was she good?” He grinned,
elbowing his companion gently. It was more a stab at kindhearted
levity than a serious query.

D’ata
hesitated, turning a bit, surprised by the impudence of the
question. He pondered Ravan’s raw audacity, but then he caught on
and took the bait. “I can’t believe you! As compared to
what
, might I ask?” He smiled painfully at the sad humor of it,
all the same. “As though I made this a priestly, everyday affair?”
He tried hard to sound properly indignant. It was odd that mirth
could surface at such a time as this.

Ravan chuckled and D’ata followed a
few seconds later, their voices eerily mingled into one soft
laugh.

Another moment of silence, then D’ata
offered, “You didn’t seem to be in such a fanciful state of affairs
either. Tell me...” he shifted, an identical grin spread across his
face. Mimicking Ravan’s crass approach, he ventured, “Did Pierre
finally have his sordid way with you?”

He felt Ravan bristle against him, as
though humiliated by the question. Ravan eventually realized the
intent of the priest was to evoke just such a response in him, a
game of pas de deux . The pair erupted into laughter, the sound
oddly out of place in the dungeon.

Outside, the sleeping town remained
oblivious. No one cared about the two in the cell, forsaken
captives, as the inevitable morning circled them like an unfed
wolf.

CHAPTER
EIGHTEEN

†

Ravan slept when needed, which seemed
much more often as the days passed. Mostly, though, he lay
motionless, drifting in and out of dreams. His subconscious watched
the slowly changing countryside as it crept by. He couldn’t
remember eating. He lay still for hours until his hip and shoulder
were numb, and then when he moved, the newly formed pressure wounds
stuck to the coarse blanketing beneath him. The fleas tortured him
and when it became too much, he would pick at them and fling them,
one by one, from the hold.

Sometimes he sat bent over, holding
onto the rails, his wrists and ankles shackled. He peered out
between the folds of the swaying canvases and felt as though he was
in a cave. He looked blankly at his bonds and wondered to himself
why Duval thought it necessary to fetter him so?

‘
What were the shackles
supposed to accomplish? Should he happen to make it from the cage,
would they keep him from a dramatic escape from the men on horses?
Fate had already determined the outcome of that scenario, had it
not?’

He ultimately decided the manacles
were simply a weapon of demoralization. Bind the flesh—bind the
heart.

The metal was so very cold, and his
wrists and ankles took on a dull gray hue as the iron familiarized
itself intimately with his flesh. 'Why was he even here?’ he
wondered. ‘What purpose would a man such as Duval have of him, a
mere boy?’

These were questions he asked only of
himself. Reasonable answers neglected to surface, and with time he
stopped trying to rationalize his circumstances. He was weak and
increasingly dulled. Concentration held for only short moments
before he would again lie down and drift away.

As days went by, Ravan watched blankly
as the terrain turned from rolling hills and vast forests to much
steeper country with mountains and deep valleys. Travel was arduous
and considerably slow.

It would take almost twelve weeks for
them to reach the Chamonix valley along the Arve River. Many of the
small villages along the way were dead and vacant, left like
societies’ forgotten tombstones after the plague had taken them.
Untraveled, the road sometimes turned into little more than frozen,
rutted trails. Ravan’s body ached as he was thrown about the cage.
He longed to be out, to walk or run freely through the
woods.