‘A little slow in the beginning, but quite a satisfactory climax,’ said Vannes.
Damen was unshackled from the lovers’ seat and pushed back down onto his knees. Laurent was seated opposite, legs crossed. Damen’s eyes fixed on him, and looked nowhere else; his breathing was still noticeable, and his pulse rapid, but anger produced all the same effects.
The musical
sound of bells intruded on the gathering; Nicaise interrupted without any sign of deference to those of higher rank at all.
‘I’m here to speak to the Prince,’ said Nicaise.
Laurent lifted his fingers minutely, and Vannes, Ancel and the others took it as a signal to make a brief obeisance, and depart.
Nicaise came to stand in front of the bench and stared at Laurent with an expression of hostility. Laurent, for his part, was relaxed, one arm spread out over the back of the bench.
‘Your uncle wants to see you.’
‘Does he? Let’s make him wait.’
One pair of unlikeable blue eyes stared at another. Nicaise sat down. ‘I don’t mind. The longer you wait the more trouble you’ll be in.’
‘Well, as long as you don’t mind,’ said Laurent. He sounded amused.
Nicaise lifted his chin. ‘I’m going to tell him you waited on purpose.’
‘You can if you like. I just assumed he’d guess, but you can save him the effort. Since we’re waiting, shall I call for refreshments?’ He gestured to the last of the tray-bearing servants, who stopped his retreat and approached. ‘Do you take wine, or aren’t you old enough yet?’
‘I’m thirteen. I drink whenever I like.’ Nicaise scorned the tray, pushing at it so hard it almost overbalanced. ‘I’m not going to drink with you. We don’t need to start pretending politeness.’
‘Don’t we? Very well: I think it is fourteen by now, isn’t it?’
Nicaise turned red, under the paint.
‘I thought so,’ said Laurent. ‘Have you thought about what you’re going to do, after? If I know your master’s tastes, you have another year, at most. At your age the body begins to betray itself.’ And then, reacting to something in the boy’s face: ‘Or has it started already?’
The red grew strident. ‘That isn’t any of your business.’
‘You’re right, it isn’t,’ said Laurent.
Nicaise opened his mouth, but Laurent continued before he could speak.
‘I’ll offer for you, if you like. When the time comes. I wouldn’t want you in my bed, but you’d have all the same privileges. You might prefer that. I’d offer.’
Nicaise blinked, and then sneered. ‘With what?’
A breath of amusement from Laurent. ‘Yes, if I have any land left at all, I may have to sell it to buy bread, never mind pets. We will both have to navigate the next ten months on the tips of our toes.’
‘I don’t need you. He’s promised. He’s not going to give me up.’ Nicaise’s voice was smug and self-satisfied.
‘He gives them all up,’ said Laurent, ‘even if you’re more enterprising than the others have been.’
‘He likes me better than the others.’ A scornful laugh. ‘You’re jealous.’ And then it was Nicaise’s turn to react to something he saw in Laurent’s face, and he said, with a horror Damen didn’t understand, ‘You’re going to tell him you want me.’
‘Oh,’ said Laurent. ‘No. Nicaise . . . no. That would wreck you. I wouldn’t do that.’ Then his voice became almost tired. ‘Maybe it’s better if you think that I would. You have quite a good mind for strategy, to have thought of that. Maybe you will hold him longer than the others.’ For a moment it seemed as if Laurent would say something else, but in the end he just stood up from the bench, and held his hand out to the boy. ‘Come on. Let’s go. You can watch me get told off by my uncle.’
CHAPTER 6
‘YOUR MASTER SEEMS kind,’ said Erasmus.
‘Kind?’ said Damen.