Mona Lisa Blossoming

Chapter Eight

The surprises weren't over yet, I found, when I walked downstairs a short time later and felt a distinctive presence before I saw her.

"Mona Carlisse," I exclaimed. I'd rescued her from a band of outlaw rogues, the same ones that had captured me. Beside her sat her daughter, a little girl with gold spun hair and sea blue eyes so like Amber, her half brother, who had settled his large presence in the far corner by a windowsill.

"And Casio. What a pleasure it is to see you again," I said, smiling. The neat and clean, beautiful child looked so different from the wild creature I'd first met in the forest.

Mona Carlisse stood up nervously and bent her head in greeting. "Mona Lisa. Forgive us for coming uninvited."

"Not at all. You are always welcome here."

Some of the stiffness left her at my warm greeting and she introduced the two men who had also stood when she had risen. "These are my guards. Miguel…"

He was a dark-haired, mustached man, trim and dapper, about my height, not much taller than his Queen. Though his soft dark eyes shone with warmth, and his mouth curved with easy charm, I sensed some tenseness, some constraint in him as he bowed.

"And this is Gerald."

The other guard, more serious in mien, also bowed in greeting. There was an uneasiness in him as well. He was taller, with sand-colored hair and watchful hazel eyes, broad-shouldered but slender. From the feel of his presence, I would have pegged him as the younger of the two, but I could have been wrong. Age did not always correspond with strength, I'd found.

"It is actually I who brought them along," Healer Janelle said. "It was too good an opportunity to allow to pass. I wanted Casio present, if I was to spend time teaching you the healing arts. I wished to use the opportunity to begin instructing her as well."

"Casio?" I said.

"She has the gift within her for healing, I discovered," Janelle said.

"How wonderful." I smiled at Casio, then wrinkled my nose at the shy child. "Although you will probably learn quicker than I."

Casio hid her face against her mother's side, but not before I caught a glimpse of a smile.

Tomas and Dontaine were also in the room. "Tomas, where are the others?" I asked.

"As you were indisposed, Lord Gryphon, Chami, Aquila, and Thaddeus accompanied Steward Horace on a tour of your holdings, after which the good steward will be leaving."

I nodded my approval. Sooner seen, sooner gone. "Thaddeus went with them?"

"More the other way around," Tomas answered, his sweet plain face twisting wryly. "The others are accompanying Thaddeus and Aquila. Those two seem the most comfortable with matters of business."

Another area in which age did not correspond with expertise. Thaddeus, though young of age, was not tender. He seemed more confident in the affairs of commerce than I.

"Did Jamie and Tersa also go with them?" I asked.

Tomas glanced briefly at Halcyon, sitting alone in a chair, a flickering gaze that danced quickly away. "They are helping their mother in the kitchen."

I frowned, wondering if they were uncomfortable in the presence of strangers, then let the thought go as Dontaine stepped forward and knelt before me. Tall, fair, and dazzlingly handsome, he was a forceful presence, especially when compared to Mona Carlisse's two guards—much more striking in looks and strength. "My Queen. I wished to thank you for your care before I took my leave," Dontaine said.

"I did nothing," I said, speaking the unfortunate truth. "You healed yourself."

"You were… kind when you need not be." A hint of sadness lurked in his moss-green eyes. Gone was the cockiness, the eager challenge. He was dimmed a bit without it, somehow. I hadn't realized what a large part of him that confident arrogance had been, or that I would miss it now that it was gone. He stood and turned to go.

Mona Carlisse's presence reminded me of what I had once advised her about men. Sometimes you just had to trust them. You would know soon enough whether your judgment had been correct.

I called his name. "Dontaine."

He stopped and faced me once more.

"What position did you hold? As a guard," I clarified quickly when I realized it could be taken in another manner. Like in Mona Louisa's bed.

"I was second-in-command to the Master of Arms."

"And the Master of Arms? Where is he?"

"He departed with Mona Louisa," Dontaine replied.

"I see." A quiet pause. "Then I would ask that you take up the vacated position."

"Me?" He looked to Amber, dazzled, confused. "But I lost the challenge."

"You did not need to challenge for the position. I would have likely made the appointment in light of your experience, had I known."

"But I lost," Dontaine repeated like a broken record stuck in a groove.

I sighed and turned to the man who had defeated him. "Amber, do you wish to be Master of Arms?"

"No. I have the position I desire." Amber's eyes heated and warmed, making me blush. Making it clear that the position he held and was so very pleased with was in my bed.

"See?" I said, turning my attention back to Dontaine. "I'm going to give you enough rope to either hang yourself or prove yourself to me. You have the position on a tentative two-month trial period. You know the needs of this territory and the men here. Organize them as you will, but out of courtesy, I would appreciate it if you kept Lords Amber and Gryphon and me appraised of all matters." My eyes narrowed. "I want things changed, Dontaine. No more fights or challenges, understand? All advancement will be made upon merit of strength, on experience and skill. You are going to set new rules and implement the changes. I cannot afford to waste anymore time having my men fighting amongst themselves, especially when we're short a healer. Are you up to the challenge?" Mentally I rolled my eyes as I heard myself. I couldn't believe I was starting to talk like a Queen.

Dontaine snapped to attention, his eyes sparkling with wonderment and a return of his eager, passionate spirit. Cocky confidence rang once more in his voice. "Yes, my Queen."

"Good," I said, happy to see some of his natural irritating manner restored. "We'll see how comfortable the fit is to us both two months from now."

"Yes, milady… and thank you." He bowed low and left.

My first new act as Queen. I searched out Amber's eyes and was rewarded with his approval.

"It is a good decision," he said quietly.

"God, I hope so." I really, really hoped so.

Rosemary had taken over the role of chatelaine of the entire house, not just of the kitchen, God bless her capable soul. Under her guidance, the mess we'd made in the downstairs guestroom had been miraculously cleaned up. Fresh air wafted in through the open French windows and the sweet perfume of roses drifted up from the sprawling English gardens below. Dontaine's blood had been washed from the walls and scrubbed from the carpet. I'd have to ask Rosemary how she had accomplished that amazing feat. She'd obviously had more years of experience cleaning up blood than I had. I was just more experienced in spilling it.

"Will this be okay?" I asked Halcyon, gesturing to the room. Rosemary had suggested that Prince Halcyon stay down here. Janelle, Mona Carlisse, and her small entourage took up the remaining guest rooms upstairs. Full house now.

"This will be fine," Halcyon said. He'd been unusually quiet and reserved. We were the only ones in the room, although I was sure Amber was keeping an ear open and tuned to all that we said. But at least Amber had the courtesy to give us a semblance of privacy. Had Gryphon been here, we would not have been alone. The one single person in the world who seemed to trigger Gryphon's jealousy was Prince Halcyon. All other men, he seemed eager enough to throw me at or on, as long as they had a smidgeon of talent they could pass on.

"I'm sorry the room is so small," I said inadequately, stuffing my hands in my jeans. "But at least it has a private bath."

"This more than suits my needs," Halcyon assured me, as polite as I was, making me wonder what we were doing, dancing around like this. We weren't usually like this, tiptoeing around each other.

"I am glad you are better. May I see your leg?" he asked, kneeling before me in a fluid movement.

At my clumsy nod, he carefully lifted the denim cloth, baring my right calf. He behaved himself, no invisible caressing hands or such, but I felt his gaze running like an actual weight over my healed skin. Somehow, baring that small inconsequential bit of my leg felt as if I were exposing other more private parts of my body to him.

"Does it still hurt?" Halcyon asked softly.

"No." Gently I stepped back out of his reach, and the denim slid down to cover me once again. "Uh, thanks for bringing Healer Janelle here so quickly."

"I am happy to be of service." He stood gracefully, his dark brown eyes unreadable. "Perhaps now that you are well, I should go."

"You hate the room," I said, distressed.

He gave a tiny hint of a smile. It flickered for a moment like a shy moth then disappeared. "No, but you seem nervous of me." His voice lowered, roughened. "You have no need to fear me, ever."

"Oh." I closed the distance between us and took his hand in mine. "Never think that. I'm not afraid, just a little embarrassed."

I gave a short laugh. "Hardly dressed upstairs and naked the last time you saw me."

I brought his dear hand to my cheek, felt the brief caress of his palm and the lightest touch of his sharp nails against my skin before he turned his hand over and brushed me with the back of it, turning those lethal nails aside.

"I'm glad you came," I said fervently. "I am always, always glad to see you."

"Ah, Mona Lisa." He carefully drew his hand away.

"Stay for a while, if you can."

He searched my eyes, deeply, intently, before saying, "I can."

I smiled. "Good. Then do. Is there anything else I can get you? That you need?"

He studied me for a long moment then shook his head.

"We'll talk more later, after I get Mona Carlisse and her people settled." With that promise, I left.

He was such a lonely man, I thought sadly. And that loneliness was seen most sharply when he was among others, lonesome in a crowd. There was an invisible wall between him and the rest, a wall of fear, a shield of caution. Separated by his differences. I'd met him in a sun-dappled meadow before I knew what he was. I knew him only by the fruit of his actions alone there in the wilderness with him, unprotected. And his actions had been that of a gentleman, kind and concerned, that of a friend. I'd teased him and held his arm before I knew that those deadly nails, when lengthened in his other form, could slice off a man's head with one easy stroke, that the demon dead could take the form of a beast far more fearsome than Dontaine's Half Change.

My elegant demon prince. He'd saved me, brought me back from Hell, and told me that he loved me. And I had asked him to find another to love, for both our sakes. Were I less scrupulous, less stringent in my morals, he and I would be lovers as well. Although perhaps it was less morals and more fear that kept me from reaching out to him. Fear of losing the precious love I had only just found with Gryphon and with Amber. It was hard enough bridging the differences between us without throwing a new friction into the mix. I sighed. I'd gone a lifetime without love and now an abundance of it threatened me.

There was no aphidy, no chemical pull between the demon prince and me. Just a short wealth of trials and experiences that had bonded us. Pure emotions. I fell for the heartbreak of his agony. Suffering drew me. Some inbred instinct in me wanted to ease it gone, caress it away.

In truth, had it been Halcyon that Gryphon was throwing me at, I may not have resisted.

"Another strong warrior yet you add to your fold," Mona Carlisse greeted me upon my return to the elegant parlor. She shook her head disbelievingly. "How fearless you are." And then more quietly so that I had to strain to hear her, "You shame me."

"Whoa." It took me a moment to realize what she was talking about. "Do you mean Dontaine?"

"Yes." Mona Carlisse was conspicuously alone in the room. "I hope you do not mind. I sent the others away."

"Why?"

"I wished to speak with you alone."

I lowered myself onto the oversized armchair across from her. "How can I help you?" I asked softly.

Tears glistened for a moment in Mona Carlisse's pretty eyes before she veiled them with her long lashes. "Is it so obvious then, that I need help?"

I chose my words carefully. "Forgive me. Your hands betray your distress."

She looked down at her clenched fists, opening them. Her nails had dug half crescents into her palms. She gave a brittle laugh, and self-consciously relaxed her fingers.

"Are you well?" I asked gently. She was a beautiful woman, this Queen that I had somehow befriended. The only decent one I'd met so far.

There were other things that I had noticed about her but did not mention. Other things that had also hinted of trouble. Her hair, for one thing. Its length was coiled back in an elegant knot, revealing the purity of her large brown eyes and delicate oval face. It was an attractive arrangement, but Monère Queens usually wore their hair long and loose, flaunting their beauty, their availability, their power. Mona Carlisse had worn her hair bound back like this when I had first met her, held captive by a band of rogues led by Amber's outlaw father. Sandoor had faked both his and his Queen's death, so that no one had known Mona Carlisse was still alive. She'd been at their mercy for ten long years and they had showed her none. It was an experience bound to leave ugly scars. It actually spoke greatly of her strength that she had emerged from the ordeal with her sanity intact.

"No, I am not well." Mona Carlisse angrily wiped away a tear that had spilled over. "I had returned to speak with Healer Janelle, but she cannot help me because…"

"Because it is not your body that is injured," I finished quietly for her.

"No," she said sadly. "What ails me, she knows not how to repair."

Were it any other woman, I'd have taken her in my arms and soothed her like a child. But the presence of a Queen was abrasive to another Queen. Prickles of hot awareness was already a low stinging buzz against my skin just sitting this close to her. Distance, a lot of it, was a more natural order of things between two alpha gals. Nature's design to help propagate our species—disperse wide and rule. So on and so forth, and all that other crap.

Mona Carlisse's wounds were not on the surface. They were deeper, darker… her heart injured, her trust betrayed. Serious injuries. And yet, her spirit had not been broken. Frankly, she needed to see a shrink. But somehow, I doubted the Monère had anything like that available. For one thing, they hadn't evolved enough for something that… unnecessary; that's how they would see it. A doctor for the mind was a luxurious matter, really, not something the brutal Monère society would have advanced to yet. It was a harsh culture. If you were that weak and fragile, you died, simple as that.

"Do you have any psychiatrists in your… I mean, our society?" I asked.

"What is that you speak of?"

Mentally, I groaned. Times like this, I hated being right. "Do you have any counselors, priestesses or wise women you can speak with?"

"No one," she said, looking at me intently. "No one but you."

Great. I pitied her. Fixing things was not one of my talents. Destroying things or people that threatened me or mine… that came far more naturally to me.

Yeah, yeah… I was a nurse and I'd had some basic training in psychology. But I'd never taken any advanced counseling courses. Those hadn't been offered to mere nurses. But it seemed that I was all she had. Poor thing.

"How can I help you?" I asked again. Maybe if I asked enough times, she'd finally tell me.

Her brown eyes dropped back down to her hands. They had tensed again. She spread them deliberately, fanning them flat on her lap. When she spoke, it was so softly that I had to strain forward to hear her. "I cannot bear to be intimate with any of my men. I cannot stand to touch them or have them touch me."

Pity stirred in my breast. "It's only been several weeks since you've reclaimed your rule." And her freedom.

She shook her head. "It only worsens with time, not eases. My people, my men, do not know how to treat me. I am so different from what I was before. So much less."

"All your people were returned to you?" They'd been scattered, absorbed into other territories when all had thought that she had died.

"Yes, but perhaps it was a mistake to call them back to me. They all remember me as I was, and are disturbed greatly, unsettled at what I have become."

"And what have you become?" I asked gently.

"It takes a great deal of arrogance, of natural fearlessness to be a Queen. To rule a people."

"Does it?" I said, my tone sardonic. "And here I thought it was just nasty personality traits that came from having too much power."

"We are raised such, for a reason," Mona Carlisse said somberly, looking at me with her wounded doe eyes. "Even you have it in natural abundance."

I winced. "I don't consider it one of my good points."

"It is an important part of what makes you a good Queen, Mona Lisa. And yet you temper it with kindness, with compassion. With love."

I winced again, more and more uncomfortable. Especially with the last word. Four-lettered words were almost as bad as three-lettered ones.

"I have spent a great deal of thought on the matter and have concluded that it is the combination of hardness and softness that draws your men to you, that binds them to you with a strength that is even stronger than demon chains." Mona Carlisse sighed, and it was a sad, lost sound. "I have no arrogance left in me. No confidence. And I am too afraid to risk kindness or love. Indeed, I live in constant fear and distrust."

"What are you afraid of?"

She smiled sadly. "That someone will betray me once more. Fake my death. Steal away with me as Sandoor had once done." Her knuckles whitened as her fists balled up once more. "I would truly rather die than put myself at the mercy of such men again. But I cannot rule this way, mistrusting my people, having them unsure of me."

She looked up and whispered, "And I fear what I am becoming. Miguel, my guard… he has grown stronger in my long absence." She laughed harshly, unhappily. "He possesses not even one half the power of your Dontaine. And yet, many times as I lay alone in my bed unable to sleep, I considered killing him before he became too great a threat to me." Her eyes were a luminous brown floating in a sea of welling tears as she said softly, "I loved him once."

"Oh, honey."

"I considered giving up my throne," she confessed in a quiet whisper, "but then what would I do? My people would be absorbed elsewhere as they were once before. But who then would protect me? You called me a good Queen and I was once, but with this killing dread in me, I fear that I may easily become the bloodiest Queen of them all." The horror of it was clear in her shaky voice.

I made myself take a deep, calming breath. "But you didn't kill him."

"What?"

"You said that you thought about killing him, but Miguel is still here, alive, by your side."

She nodded, hugged that fact to her in comfort. "I wish to reclaim that part of myself that I have lost. But I do not know how."

And she hoped that I did.

The solution was obvious to me, but I didn't think she would like it. But you know that saying: Nothing ventured, nothing gained. Trite but, oh, so true. "Choose one of your men. Take them to your bed once more."

Mona Carlisse just looked at me with those swimming eyes. "It was once a great joy to me. But that seems so long ago, a distant memory. Any pleasure I once felt in mating has long been pounded out of me."

I winced at her choice of words. It was unfortunately literal. The rogues had not been gentle with her.

"They used me like a whore and beat me when I did not glow beneath them. They not only raped my body, they raped my mind, turned it so that I had to make myself feel pleasure as they rutted over me. All I feel now is disgust and dread at the thought of being intimate once more with any man."

"You said under them."

"What?"

"You said that they forced you to submit your body, your will, your pleasure to them. Why don't you turn it around, vent some of that anger and resentment that you have bottled within you?"

Mona Carlisse looked confused. "What are you suggesting?"

Good question. We'd see if the answer was as good.