He took the wine, drank a fair amount without taking his eyes off her and frowned. He kissed her. It was effortless—they flowed together and were one, for so long that he almost spilled the rest of the wine.

And then she placed her hand firmly on his breastbone. She was not weak.

“Swear,” she said. “I won’t make you pretend you’ll marry me. Just that you won’t do what some noble bastard did to my mother.”

Gabriel sat on the chest. His mind was going around and around, and half of it seemed to be chasing Amicia. And the other half was utterly captivated.

“It is not that I won’t swear,” he said. “It’s that I don’t like what I see in the mirror if I do.”

Blanche’s breath caught. “I know you’ll marry the Queen,” she said suddenly. “I know what I am, and what you are.”

Gabriel didn’t catch himself. He laughed.

“No,” he said. “I can imagine many outcomes, but those pips are not on the dice.” He smiled at her. “And I’m at least as much a bastard as you.”

She leaned back, as if to look at him more closely. “Really?”

He got up. He was overcome with her—the palpable reality of her, her smell, her unwashed hair and the taste of her mouth and the clove she’d just chewed and what that said.

“State secret,” he whispered.

She licked her lips. “I know who your parents are,” she said.

He froze. She felt the tension in his muscles, and he took a step for the door, but it was as if he was in the aethereal. He meant to step to the door, but instead he was holding her. Her warmth went through his hands. Without a conscious thought, he pulled the veil off her hair and put a hand behind her head. Her kirtle opened at the side, and fit like a glove, but he managed to find the skin where her shoulder met her neck.

“Swear, damn you!” she said. She pushed him hard enough that he fell back across the chest. “Or leave,” she said.

“That hurt,” he said, and meant it. “I swear on my sword that any baby we make will be reared as my own.” He caught his breath. “I’m only promising so that you won’t hurt me again.”

She laughed.

The taper gave up—a last flare of light that showed her laughing at his discomfiture, and then darkness. The moon was on the other side of the tower, and her window was closed and shuttered. There was some rustling.

“I feel I should tell you—” he said to the darkness.

“Stop talking,” she said, very close.

Her lips found his.

After a pause, she said, “It’s side opening, I’ve already unlaced it.”

His hand finally found bare skin…

Chapter Eighteen

Gilson’s Hole—Sauce