The Lion's Daughter (14 page)

She
was no saint and, being female, must have some feminine
susceptibilities. This she understood. Yet it didn't mean she
approved, or wished to encourage her frailties. There was no place in
her life for such foolishness.

Besides,
it was mortifying. How he'd laugh if he guessed what his ugly,
scrawny little interpreter felt. Had she been a beauty, tall and
voluptuous
...
but
she was not and never would be. For that, she should be thankful.
Since he'd never find her desirable, her virtue would never be
tested. She'd enough cause to blame herself, enough reason for
sorrow. She certainly didn't need to heap shame upon grief.

They
rode on in silence for an hour or more, and Esme felt his gaze upon
her several times. She resolutely kept her own eyes upon the
treacherous path ahead.

“Are
you angry with me?” he said at last.

“Yes,”
she answered. “I should not be, because you cannot help being
-what you are. All the same, it is most trying. You have a gift for
making difficulties for yourself.”

“Good
grief, you're not still upset about my swim in the river?”

“I
do not know what is to be done with you,” she said. “You
are like those little children who seem to spend all their time
devising new ways to hurt themselves. Since I cannot swaddle you up
or tie a leash about your waist, I am convinced you will be dead by
the time we reach Tepelena, no matter what I do. Then Ali will blame
me. If he's in an amiable mood, he might merely have me shot from a
cannon. Otherwise, I shall probably be roasted upon a spit, or torn
limb from limb. Whatever he chooses, it is bound to be humiliating.
One rarely dies with dignity at his hands.”

“I
see. It's not my survival that worries you, but your own.”

“Of
course your survival concerns me,” she answered coldly. “You
are a guest in my country. I am obliged to see to your safety and
comfort.”

“But
except for that, you don't give a damn about me.”

“What
is the use, when you do not give a damn about yourself? I do not
pursue hopeless causes.”

His
sharp intake of breath was clearly audible above the hoofbeats.”

“Well,
that wasn't pleasant,” he said. “The truth rarely is, I
understand. Not that I'm much acquainted with truth, personally,
but
...
Drat
it, Esme, you don't even know me.”

She
almost felt sorry for him. She'd never imagined anything she said
would penetrate his arrogance. 'This is true

enough,”
she said after an uncomfortable moment. “I know only what I
observe. Perhaps there are extenuating circumstances.”

He
considered. “Perhaps. Perhaps not. It's just that
—
oh,
never mind. 'Extenuating,'
“
he went on more lightly. “Your
English vocabulary is remarkable.”

“My
own language is more beautiful,” she said, “but sometimes
yours offers a greater choice of words.”

“I
should think that the case always. You can choose among several words
to convey exactly the nuance you wish.”

She
nodded and clicked her tongue. “You don't know my language, and
so you don't understand. In Albanian, one conveys the nuances, as you
say, in tone, expression. It is more subtle. It has more feeling.”

“That
may be so. Regrettably, I have found its speakers remarkably
unfeeling.”

Esme
felt a nasty prick of conscience. She ignored it. Her conscience was
an idiot to respond to the plaints of a spoiled, selfish libertine.
“That is not reasonable. In Rrogozhina, my countrymen treated
you like a prince. What more do you want?”

“Your
countrymen have been unremittingly kind and gracious,” he said.
“Perhaps I should have been more precise. I meant you.”

“You
find me unfeeling?”

He
shifted uneasily in the saddle, and his mount snorted in annoyance.
'That's not quite what I meant. You've looked after me very kindly,
indeed, and I do appreciate
—
that
is, you did save my life
...”

Esme
waited, but his lordship produced no further enlightenment. “Then
I do not understand what you are complaining about,” she said
haughtily. “When you discover what it is, I shall be honored to
hear,”

THEY
REACHED LUSHNJA at midday, and it was there Varian first encountered
the harsh reality of Albanian tribal justice. Two men had recently
quarreled, and one had murdered the other. The murderer had fled, and
the chiefs of his tribe had set fire to his house and land. Another
blood feud had begun.

Though
Esme had assured him guests were safe from attack, Varian refused to
linger in the town. Even the promise of a hot bath could not tempt
him.

“It's
barbaric,” he told her as they passed the charred field. “A
man must be punished for murder, I suppose, but why punish his wife
and children as well by burning their property?”

“Others
will look after his family,” she said stiffly. “They at
least will not be thrown into dungeons for their poverty. My father
told me that in England a man and his whole family may be imprisoned
merely because they are penniless.”

That
struck too close to home. Lord Edenmont himself belonged in debtors'
prison. As to his own lands, he'd needed no torch to devastate them.

All
the same, he'd rather quarrel with her than endure more hours of cold
silence. Varian was unused to coldness, unused, certainly, to such
open contempt, and it upset him far more than he could have guessed.

He
didn't know how to fight it. All his attempts to defend himself
sounded querulous
...
and only made him appear more
childish than ever. It was mortifying that Edenmont, who could coax
warmth from the stoniest ogre of a dowager, could not elicit a
glimmer of softness from this adolescent girl.

This
was how low he'd sunk: wanting to make her berate him, mock
him
—
anything
but that chilly disregard.

“True,”
he said. “But we English place a high value on money. This is
what distinguishes us from less civilized nations,” he added
provokingly.

“You
English recognize only one civilization
—
your
own,” she returned. “Albania built fine temples and
created great art while your ancestors lived like animals in mud
hovels and caves. The Romans sent their noble sons here, to
Apollonia, to be trained as warriors, and these men sailed across the
seas to conquer the savages of your little island. Time after time
nations have come and tried to rule us, yet they could not mold us to
their will. They could not even mold our language
—
not
the Greeks, nor the Romans, nor even the Turks. Four centuries
they've ruled us, and still the only ones who speak Turkish here are
the Turks themselves. How long did the Normans need to convert your
people to French? A week?” she concluded scornfully.

'That's
simply because we're so enormously hospitable. And not nearly so
obstinate. Of course, your people may have retained the one language
simply because they were
incapable
of
learning another.”

“How
can you be so ignorant? I speak four languages excellently, and even
in Turkish I can communicate.”

“But
you're half English.”

She
threw him a murderous glance.

“Is
that the evil eye Petro speaks of?” Varian asked. “It's
quite good, I must say. If I weren't so hardened in wickedness, it
should stop my tongue for a fortnight.”

“You
have been provoking me deliberately,” she accused. “Why?”
Do you
like
to
hear me scold?”

“Yes.
You make such wonderful speeches. I wish I could let you take my
place in the House of Lords. You'd enliven the proceedings
considerably.”

Esme
in England. The prospect boggled Varian's mind. What would they make
of her, this ferocious nymph? Add a few years
—
Esme
at eighteen, perhaps
—
and
place her at Al-mack's among the glittering, bored lights of society.
What then?

Then,
Varian had small doubt, at least a few perceptive men would discern
what he did. Though she was unlike anything they knew, and possessed
virtually every quality most disapproved of in females, they'd glance
once into her passionate green eyes and forget utterly everything
they'd ever believed about women.

She
was looking away from him, her high-boned cheeks tinged with pink.

“I
see,” she said. “You are amused. I make a fine court
jester.”

“The
jester, may I point out, was usually the only member of the court who
dared speak the truth.”

“Aye,”
she answered wearily, “and they all laughed, just the same.”

•
• •

THEY
STOPPED TO make camp just before sunset and, for the first time, his
lordship made himself useful. He assisted not only in unloading the
horses, but in setting up the tents and collecting fuel for the fire.
Esme thought he was more in the way than helpful, but the men didn't
seem to mind his incompetence, though they were obviously amused. He
seemed amused as well. Esme heard a great deal of laughter,
interspersed by Petro's translations
—
inept,
no doubt.

She
was not allowed to join them. His royal highness had pointed to one
spot near the horses where she was to remain until their tent was in
place, unless she wished to suffer some perfectly ghastly punishment.

The
threat was unnecessary. Esme fully understood why she must keep away
from the men. If they discovered her gender, they could easily,
though unintentionally, misspeak in the wrong company. A single
word
—
a
feminine pronoun instead of masculine
—
could
arouse suspicion, and one could never be certain where Ismal's spies
were.

Nonetheless,
Esme found she could not wait calmly. She had never been good at
waiting, and now she felt so restless she could scream. It was his
lordship's fault. He made her tense and unreasonably angry and,
driven by anger, she found herself behaving exactly like the
uncivilized heathen he thought her.

How
many times had she insulted him? A hundred, at least. Yet it was his
fault, too, for provoking her, and treating her like a helpless
child, and nearly falling off his horse in amazement every time she
showed the smallest sign of intelligence.

Extenuating.
You'd think it was the most obscure
and complicated word in twenty languages. And to say English was
precise
—
when
he could not produce a string of words in that curst language to
explain himself.

Also,
he'd said she was unfeeling. She, wracked with grief for a murdered
father. She, anxious
—
for
all her assurances to everyone else
—
for
her young cousin. Should she have wept and worried the whole day? Or
perhaps his lordship would prefer to hear her boast of her plans for
revenge, and the certain death she was headed for. Or maybe she
should moan pathetically that she was all alone in her own country,
and the few who cared about her at all planned to send her away to a
foreign land and a family that despised her.

Aye,
she had plenty of feeling to show, were she weak-willed enough.
Should she tell him, too, that he only made everything worse?

From
the clearing beyond came his low-pitched drawl and another burst of
laughter from the men. Esme kicked a stone. There he was, charming
them all, as usual. And here she was, driven to distraction, because
the sound of his voice drew her entire being to him, and she could
not stop it, for all her will.

She
sent another stone flying into the thicket and wished she could find
some greater damage to inflict. She wished she had Ismal's neck in
her hands at this moment, for she could have wrung it as easily as if
it were a chicken's. It was
all
his
fault, every bit of it, up to and including this devil of an
Englishman.

“Are
you trying to pave a road for me singlehanded? How very thoughtful,
ma'am.”

Esme
turned hastily. She'd not heard him approach. “I was bored,”
she said, dropping her gaze to the ground. “Better to kick
stones than living targets.”

“Do
you want to kick me so badly?” he asked. “What have I
done now?”

“You've
made me stay in one place, all by myself, while you go and amuse
yourself with the other men. I wait alone and listen to you laugh,
and no one tells me the jokes.”

“Of
course not. They're not fit for a young lady's innocent ears.
Besides, you wouldn't understand them.” He paused. “At
least, I hope not.”