Jane Feather - The Diamond Slipper

He shook his head almost impatiently. He had less faith than Cordelia in the power of mere emotion as shield and buckler. "You must go back now," he said heavily. "I will work as fast as I can to get you away, but for now…"

"Yes, I understand." She smiled, the same vibrant smile he had learned so reluctantly to love. "If only I could find out what happened to Mathilde." Her smile was wiped clean from her face and she stared in horror. "He couldn't have had her killed… or… or imprisoned, could he?"

"Of course not," Leo said with a confidence he didn't feel. Michael wouldn't resort to murder, he was certain, but an oubliette in some dark French prison wouldn't be hard to arrange for an errant servant.

Hurriedly, he threw on his clothes, while Cordelia shrugged into the robe. Her color had returned and the white velvet now accentuated her radiant beauty instead of drowning her deathly pallor.

"Let me carry you. Your feet will freeze on the floors." Marble and stone were hard on bare feet, and Cordelia didn't demur as he swung her easily into his arms. She felt very different this time. Stronger, firmer, more supple, no hint of leaflike frailty.

"I can defeat Michael," Cordelia said into his ear. "I am stronger than he is. I don't need to prey upon people in order to feel powerful. I will beat him at his own game, Leo."

"And what happened the last time you tried that?" he asked dryly. Much as this return of the vital Cordelia delighted him, he was only too painfully aware of the dangers.

"I'll be careful," she said after a minute. "I won't make the mistake of gloating again."

They turned onto the corridor that housed the von Sachsen apartments, and Leo felt Cordelia tense in his arms. His mouth tightened. The thought of putting her back into that hellhole filled him with revulsion, but he could see no alternative. Not for the immediate future.

As they approached the door a figure emerged from a corner of lingering shadows not yet pierced by the early light.

"Mathilde?" whispered Cordelia, almost in disbelief. Then she was struggling in Leo's hold. He set her down and she ran barefoot toward the woman who held out her arms to receive her.

"There, baby, there, baby," Mathilde crooned, stroking her hair, her back. Her eyes, sharp and bright and shrewd, looked over her nursling's head at the viscount. She seemed to read everything she needed to know in his face, because she nodded and a grim little smile touched her mouth.

"What did he do to you, Mathilde?" Cordelia straightened, pushing her hair out of her eyes, her retreat into babyhood passed. "Did he hurt you?"

"Bless you, no, dearie," Mathilde said briskly. "But he's turned me off without a character, without a sou, just the clothes on my back. But never you fret, Cordelia, he'll not keep me from you."

"But what will you do? Where will you go? I can give you money, of course, but-"

"There's plenty of places for a body to lie quiet in this palace," Mathilde told her. "The place is a small city, with staircases and nooks and crannies everywhere. I'll be around, dearie. I'll be watching you even if you don't often see me." She didn't say that the prince had given her a choice of leaving quietly, or of being arrested on a charge of theft and spending the rest of her natural life in the Bastille, her nursling lost to her forever. The threat still hung over her if the prince ever laid eyes on her again.

She didn't say this, but Cordelia made a good guess. She looked at Leo, a question in her eyes.

"I'll take care of Mathilde," he said, turning to the elderly woman. "Cordelia will need you until I can get her away from her husband. I'll hide you and we'll contrive somehow that you should see her often."

Mathilde looked shrewdly at Cordelia, then again at the viscount. Then she nodded, but this time with brisk satisfaction. "Well, that's as it should be," she said obliquely. "I always knew it had to be. The little one will only love once. Just like her mother."

She drew Cordelia to her again and kissed her. "I'll get you something that will give you some respite from that brute of a husband, don't you worry now."

"What kind of thing?" Cordelia was immediately curious. Mathilde was as devious as she was clever, and she knew many strange arts. If she were pitted against Michael, Cordelia would put her money on her nurse anytime.

"Never you mind."

"Listen to me, Cordelia." Leo spoke urgently. He didn't have Cordelia's faith in Mathilde's ability to draw Michael's teeth, and even if he did have, the woman was offering no immediate solution. "You must promise me that you won't provoke him again."

"I can't let him think he's beaten me," she said fiercely.

"Swallow your pride for a while. Just until I can contrive something." He tipped her chin, forcing her to look up at him.

"I'll be very careful," she conceded. "Not good enough! Do you love me?" "You know that I do."

"And you have put this hideous situation in my hands. Haven't you?" "Yes, but-"

"Therefore you will do as I tell you. I cannot help you if you don't do as I say. Is that clear, Cordelia?"

She hesitated, wanting to agree but knowing that her spirit would not allow her to give Michael even the illusion of victory. Then footsteps sounded from along the corridor behind them. Heels taptapping on the marble. Voices came closer. One of them belonged to a courtier acquaintance of Michael's. Cordelia had vanished like a white wraith through the door to their apartment and Mathilde had melted into the shadows, before Leo could move.

Leo swore under his breath. She had not promised. Didn't she understand that she had laid upon him the heaviest burdens a man could bear-her trust and her love? He had carried those burdens for Elvira too, but he had dropped them. He would not fail Cordelia in the same way. But dear God in heaven, how was he to protect her when she deliberately courted danger?

Cordelia closed the door to the salon. Monsieur Brion stood in the kitchen doorway, his expression startled as he stared at the barefoot princess in her chamber robe. Cordelia looked across the room and met his gaze steadily. She knew he and all the servants knew what went on at night behind her bedchamber door. Just as she knew how Michael misused them when it pleased him. Now, with her clear-eyed gaze, she offered the majordomo an alliance.

Monsieur Brion bowed. "Good morning, madame." Casually, he adjusted an ornament on a side table before saying, "His highness has not yet rung for his coffee."

Cordelia smiled. "Thank you. You may send Elsie to wake me with my chocolate in ten minutes."

Monsieur Brion bowed again, and Cordelia went into her own room. She threw off the chamber robe and climbed into bed. The sheets were cold. She pulled up the coverlet and smiled to herself. She would not break. Now she would not break. She had the love of her life. She knew what love was. And knowledge was power. The knowledge of love would protect her.

Cordelia lay abed until ten o'clock that morning. She was filled with a great lassitude although no desire to sleep and could see no reason to get up when lying dreamily in bed was so pleasant. However, at ten o'clock she received a summons to attend the dauphine. Indolence vanished at the prospect of some private conversation with her friend after the stiff formality of the past weeks. She was also intensely curious about Toinette's experiences and impressions of her own new husband, the dauphin.

In dishabille she hurried into the salon to inform her husband of the summons. He was sitting at breakfast and looked up as she entered. His eyes slowly ran over her and she knew he was looking for the marks he had left upon her the previous night. He could see the blue bruise on her cheekbone, the series of finger bruises on her neck where he'd held her down. And she saw the triumphant satisfaction spark in his eyes.

She returned his scrutiny with a cool contempt and, to her own satisfaction, saw puzzlement replace the gratification in his gaze. She was supposed to be cowed, bruised, defeated. And she wasn't. If anything, she was stronger than she'd ever been, and she knew that strength radiated from her.

After a long minute, she curtsied deliberately. "Good morning, my lord." She held out the written summons. "I am to visit the dauphine this morning. I thought you would wish to know."

He took the paper from her and cast his eye over the message before commenting frigidly, "It is good that you remain in her favor. I would not wish you to become a member of her household, that would occupy you too much at court, but you will ensure that she continues to regard you with goodwill."

"She is my friend, my lord. Such friendships are not at the whim of politics." Her eyes flashed, her chin lifted. She loathed and despised him, and she would let him see it.

His brow darkened. "Have you not as yet learned the unwisdom of arousing my anger, Cordelia?"

"There are some things I find it difficult to learn, sir," she retorted, with another insolent curtsy.

He rose from the table and came to stand over her and with grim triumph she saw the frustration in his eyes. "You will learn," he said softly. "Make no mistake, my dear."

"Did Elvira arouse your anger, sir?" She regretted the words the instant they were spoken. She had promised Leo she wouldn't deliberately provoke Michael to violence, but it was too late now. He struck her mouth with the flat of his hand.

"You try my patience, madame."

The slap had not been hard enough to do any damage, but the shock and sense of violation still rocked her to her core. She couldn't keep the distress from her eyes, and she knew that he'd seen it. She had no choice but to leave him in possession of the field.

"If you will excuse me, my lord, I will prepare myself to wait upon the dauphine."

Instead of answering, he turned from her and returned to the table. Cordelia left the room.

In the privacy of her chamber, she touched her lips fleetingly with her fingertips as she examined herself in the glass. There was no swelling or bruising, but the bruise on her cheekbone was very noticeable. Would it be best to try to cover it, or to leave it and invent some lie? Toinette would be bound to ask.

"What gown should I put out, my lady?"

Cordelia jumped. She'd forgotten Elsie. The girl seemed to fade into the wallpaper when she wasn't actually doing something. She stood now behind the armoire, her hands twisting in her apron, radiating anxiety to please. Cordelia forced herself to smile. It wasn't the girl's fault that she wasn't Mathilde.

"Let me see." She went herself to the armoire, riffling through the contents. She needed a gown that would cover her throat. The prevailing fashion was for extreme decolletage, but she found a robe a I'anglaise of saffron muslin over a green satin petticoat. The gown had a wide lace ruffled collar and a muslin fichu that could be used to conceal a multitude of sins.

Elsie took the gown reverently. "Will you be powdering your hair, m'lady?"

"No, it's not a fashion I care for," Cordelia said. "On state occasions it has to be done, but not for every day."

"How tightly should I lace you, m'lady?" Elsie approached with a corset.

Cordelia bit back a sigh. "I'll tell you when to stop. But fetch my stockings first."

"The white silk ones."

"The white silk ones," Cordelia agreed. She didn't have any other kind of stockings, but presumably Elsie was not familiar with the contents of her wardrobe and dresser.

It took an hour of fumbling and innumerable questions before she was ready for the day. Elsie had volunteered no comment on Cordelia's bruises, but she had produced the hare's foot and box of powder without being asked. Cordelia brushed it lightly across her cheekbones. It didn't conceal the bruise completely, but as long as the marks on her neck and upper arms were invisible, she could find an excuse for a bruised cheek.

Monsieur Brion awaited her in the salon to escort her to the dauphine's temporary apartments on the ground floor of the palace.

She hadn't seen him since their strange, silent encounter that morning. She smiled quite naturally and wished him good morning. He bowed and a tiny conspiratorial smile touched his usually solemn mouth. "I trust you slept well, madame?"

"I find one sleeps much better knowing who one's friends are, Monsieur Brion."