Then I kissed her, and tasted tears and flowers, fear and hope, dread and dreams. Her lips were as soft and warm as the petals of a sun-heated rose, and something rose within me, a thing of fire and feathers, spreading wide wings. This was not wise, it was not politic, it was not sane, and yet I no longer cared for anything but the way she trembled when I touched her, and pressed so close to me. Not a curse, this feeling. A blessing.

Her lips held the sweetest and most intoxicating brew in the world, and I drank, and drank, and drank until I was dizzy with it, and her.

And so they found us, when they broke down the door, lost in that embrace.

•   •   •

I had been to Castelvecchio only twice in my life—once to be presented to Prince Escalus when I was only six years old, clumsy and fat in my finery, and once when I accompanied my cousin and uncle there for a feast.

This time, I was marched through the long, narrowing series of halls and doors, and the straight line of smaller and smaller arched doorways seemed as if I were being swallowed up by a giant beast of marble, stone, and plaster. Fine works of art glared at me from the walls, as if angered by the clatter of my passing—the jingle of my guards’ swords and armor. I walked silently, and unarmed by so much as a dagger. Even my hands were firmly tied.

Following along at a distance came the Capulet family—the great man and his lady, and a heavily veiled and guarded Rosaline behind them. Somewhere in the distance, perhaps, my uncle might arrive, but by the weak, fragile light of this day, I was not sure he had the stomach for more grief.

I resigned myself that this trial would be mine alone. Oh, Mercutio, is this your last laugh? Am I your final victim? It might be both.

I felt weary, dirty, and hungry; they’d let me quench my thirst, but I still wore the clothes in which I’d been taken, and the apple I’d downed many hours ago had long since ceased to keep body and soul together. My head ached dully.

And oddly, I had never felt quite so fine in my life.

“I don’t understand you,” said the guard at my right elbow; he was a talkative, amusing fellow, while the one at my left was as taciturn as a stone. “Throwing away your life for a woman. You know the prince will exile you for this, on the Capulets’ bitter complaints; he will not be disposed to aggravate their grief just now. And yet you smile!”

“I do,” I agreed.

“Why?”

“Because I am happy.”

He shook his head, and the chain mail lapping his neck made a slithering hiss, like a serpent preparing to strike. “Fools are happy, young sir. Wise men are always sad.”