Order of Darkness Read online

  It took her only a moment to decide. ‘I cannot think of marriage,’ Isolde said flatly. ‘Forgive me, Prince Roberto. But it is too soon after my father’s death. I cannot bear even to think of it, let alone talk of it.’

  ‘We have to talk of it,’ Giorgio insisted. ‘The terms of our father’s will are that we have to get you settled. He would not allow any delay. Either immediate marriage to my friend here, or . . .’ He paused.

  ‘Or what?’ Isolde asked, suddenly afraid.

  ‘The abbey,’ he said simply. ‘Father said that if you would not marry, I was to appoint you as abbess and that you should go there to live.’

  ‘Never!’ Isolde exclaimed. ‘My father would never have done this to me!’

  Giorgio nodded. ‘I too was surprised, but he said that it was the future he had planned for you all along. That was why he did not fill the post when the last abbess died. He was thinking even then, a year ago, that you must be kept safe. You can’t be exposed to the dangers of the world, left here alone at Lucretili. If you don’t want to marry, you must be kept safe in the abbey.’

  Prince Roberto smiled slyly at her. ‘A nun or a princess, my princess,’ he suggested. ‘I would think you would find it easy to choose.’

  Isolde jumped to her feet. ‘I cannot believe Father planned this for me,’ she said. ‘He never suggested anything like this. He was clear he would divide the lands between us. He knew how much I love it here; how I love these lands and know these people. He said he would will this castle and the lands to me, and give you our lands in France.’

  Giorgio shook his head as if in gentle regret. ‘No, he changed his mind. As the oldest child, the only son, the only true heir, I will have everything, both in France and here, and you, as a woman, will have to leave.’

  ‘Giorgio, my brother, you cannot send me from my home?’

  He spread his hands. ‘There is nothing I can do. It is our father’s last wish and I have it in writing, signed by him. You will either marry – and no-one will have you but Prince Roberto – or you will go to the abbey. It was good of him to give you this choice. Many fathers would simply have left orders.’

  ‘Excuse me,’ Isolde said, her voice shaking as she fought to control her anger, ‘I shall leave you and go to my rooms and think about this.’

  ‘Don’t take too long!’ Prince Roberto said with an intimate smile. ‘I won’t wait too long.’

  ‘I shall give you my answer tomorrow.’ She paused in the doorway, and looked back at her brother. ‘May I see my father’s letter?’

  Giorgio nodded and drew it from inside his jacket. ‘You can keep this. It is a copy. I have the other in safe-keeping; there is no doubt as to his wishes. You will have to consider not whether you will obey him, but only how you obey him. He knew that you would obey him.’

  ‘I know,’ she said. ‘I am his daughter. Of course I will obey him.’ She went from the room without looking at the prince, though he rose to his feet and made her a flourishing bow, and then winked at Giorgio as if he thought the matter settled.

  Isolde woke in the night to hear a quiet tap on her door. Her pillow was damp beneath her cheek; she had been crying in her sleep. For a moment she wondered why she felt such a pain, as if she were heartbroken – and then she remembered the coffin in the chapel and the silent knights keeping watch. She crossed herself: ‘God bless him, and save his soul,’ she whispered. ‘God comfort me in this sorrow. I don’t know that I can bear it.’

  The little tap came again, and she put back the richly embroidered covers of her bed and went to the door, the key in her hand. ‘Who is it?’

  ‘It is Prince Roberto. I have to speak with you.’

  ‘I can’t open the door, I will speak with you tomorrow.’

  ‘I need to speak to you tonight. It is about the will, your father’s wishes.’

  She hesitated. ‘Tomorrow . . .’

  ‘I think I can see a way out for you. I understand how you feel, I think I can help.’

  ‘What way out?’

  ‘I can’t shout it through the door. Just open the door a crack so that I can whisper.’

  ‘Just a crack,’ she said, and turned the key, keeping her foot pressed against the bottom of the door to ensure that it opened only a little.

  As soon as he heard the key turn, the prince banged the door open with such force that it hit Isolde’s head and sent her reeling back into the room. He slammed the door behind him and turned the key, locking them in together.

  ‘You thought you would reject me?’ he demanded furiously, as she scrambled to her feet. ‘You thought you – practically penniless – would reject me? You thought I would beg to speak to you through a closed door?’

  ‘How dare you force your way in here?’ Isolde demanded, white-faced and furious. ‘My brother would kill you—’

  ‘Your brother allowed it,’ he laughed. ‘Your brother approves me as your husband. He himself suggested that I come to you. Now get on the bed.’

  ‘My brother?’ She could feel her shock turning into horror as she realised that she had been betrayed by her own brother, and that now this stranger was coming towards her, his fat face creased in a confident smile.

  ‘He said I might as well take you now as later,’ he said. ‘You can fight me if you like. It makes no difference to me. I like a fight. I like a woman of spirit, they are more obedient in the end.’

  ‘You are mad,’ she said with certainty.

  ‘Whatever you like. But I consider you my betrothed wife, and we are going to consummate our betrothal right now, so you don’t make any mistake tomorrow.’

  ‘You’re drunk,’ she said, smelling the sour stink of wine on his breath.

  ‘Yes, thank God, and you can get used to that too.’

  He came towards her, shrugging his jacket off his fleshy shoulders. She shrank back until she felt the tall wooden pole of the four-poster bed behind her, blocking her retreat. She put her hands behind her back so that he could not grab them, and felt the velvet of the counterpane, and beneath it the handle of the brass warming pan filled with hot embers that had been pushed between the cold sheets.

  ‘Please,’ she said. ‘This is ridiculous. It is an offence against hospitality. You are our guest, my father’s body lies in the chapel. I am without defence, and you are drunk on our wine. Please go to your room and I will speak kindly to you in the morning.’

  ‘No,’ he leered. ‘I don’t think so. I think I shall spend the night here in your bed and I am very sure you will speak kindly to me in the morning.’

  Behind her back, Isolde’s fingers closed on the handle of the warming pan. As Roberto paused to untie the laces on the front of his breeches, she got a sickening glimpse of grey linen poking out. He reached for her arm. ‘This need not hurt you,’ he said. ‘You might even enjoy it . . .’

  With a great swing she brought the warming pan round to clap him on the side of his head. Glowing embers and ash dashed against his face and tumbled to the floor. He let out of a howl of pain as she drew back and hit him once again, hard, and he dropped down like a fat stunned ox before the slaughter.

  She picked up a jug and flung water over the coals smouldering on the rug beneath him and then, cautiously, she kicked him gently. He did not stir, he was knocked out cold. Isolde went to an inner room and unlocked the door, whispering ‘Ishraq!’ When the girl came, rubbing sleep from her eyes, Isolde showed her the man crumpled on the ground.

  ‘Is he dead?’ the girl asked calmly.

  ‘No. I don’t think so. Help me get him out of here.’

  The two young women pulled the rug and the limp body of Prince Roberto slid along the floor, leaving a slimy trail of water and ashes. They got him into the gallery outside her room and paused.

  ‘I take it your brother allowed him to come to you?’

  Isolde nodded, and Ishraq turned her head and spat contemptuously on the prince’s white face. ‘Why ever did you open the door?’

  ‘I thought he woul