Fruit of the Golden Vine Read online

  “Anything to seem a little less respectable, Father.”

  Father chuckled and patted her arm. His cheeks were flushed and his eyes merry. Presumably he’d downed at least a glass of wine before dinner. “You have my blood in you, there’s no denying it. It’s made a devil out of you, but it still makes a man proud.” He nudged Marconus. “What do you think, Marco? She takes after me, don’t you think?”

  “Undoubtedly,” said Marconus. “She has much of your distinctive character.”

  Adelina refrained from stabbing Marconus with a butter knife. He’d intended to offer a compliment, after all, and it was what Father wanted to hear.

  Father tugged on Rafael’s sleeve. “Eh, Rafael. Adelina here—what do you make of her? As a man of the world, speak. Do you think that one day she’ll make some man happy?”

  Rafael smiled at Adelina. Unattractive as she found him, it was hard not to be charmed by the gentle humor lighting his eyes. “I certainly believe she’ll make somebody happy,” he said. The implication behind his vague phrasing was obvious to Adelina, and she blushed.

  Father chuckled. “Now, now, you’ve made her crimson. Don’t court both my daughters at once, you cad!” He reached for a date. “Try these, Rafael, they’re divine.”

  Adelina continued her path around the table and arrived, exhausted, at her place. Mother and Silvana were already in discussion, and Mother’s fierce expression suggested that it wasn’t entirely cordial. “…an unfortunate state of affairs,” Mother was saying. “In a world ruled by violence, we have no recourse but to pray to God, and of course God has His own affairs to manage.”

  “What affairs would those be?” Silvana glanced at Adelina and smiled. Adelina blushed and shivered. At this rate, she’d be in pieces by the end of the night. “It’s hard to conceive of the daily life of a Creator.”

  “Affairs of heaven and earth, of course. Devising blessings for the devout and reprimands for the iniquitous. Like the master of a grand household, only His household is all that was and ever will be.” Mother took a furious sip of her soup. “Are you so wholly irreligious as not to know this?”

  “Religious observances vary across the continent, Mistress Delfina. I’ve seen such varied theologies that it becomes hard to accept the rule of any single one. How do you know your faith is the right way?”

  Adelina’s stomach tensed. Nobody ever spoke to Mother this way. Irena, too, seemed to have been caught by the unexpected tone of the conversation, and she shifted away from an indignant Felise to listen.

  “My life is woven through with miracles, that’s why. My continued existence is an act of heavenly confirmation.” Mother dabbed her lips with a napkin. “I cannot imagine what your existence stands in testament of. Sheer impiety, perhaps.”

  “And what makes me so impious?”

  “Well, your provocative manner of dress, for one. That sword, those trousers, that hair of yours, even the way you sit. It’s as if you wish to appropriate maleness.”

  “Womanhood takes many forms, and we’re not bound to behave in any way other than that we deem fit. It’s not a question of maleness.” Silvana took a mouthful of soup while Mother waited, her eyes glittering. “Why shouldn’t a woman wear her hair as she pleases? Carry a sword if it’ll keep her safe?”

  “There are certain spheres for men and certain spheres for women. Women conduct themselves in a way that is congruent with our God-given form of life. That is to say, a woman has no need for a sword. She needs only a man with the strength to wield one for her.” Mother glanced at Rafael, who was laughing with Marconus over some joke. “And you appear to have one.”

  “Rafael? I’m safer when his clumsy sword is sheathed. So is he, for that matter.” Silvana arched an eyebrow. “Mistress Delfina, it’s absurd to suggest that a perfectly fit and capable woman should refuse to defend herself and her family. Wouldn’t you wield a sword to protect your daughters if they had no other defense?”

  Adelina took a mouthful of warm, salty soup to prevent herself from cheering at Mother’s rare expression of doubt. “I’ll grant you that I might do just that,” Mother said. She sucked hard on her teeth, her eyes quick with thought. “But that would be an act of desperate motherhood, whereas you seem to live a life of male violence as easily as if it were your own skin.”

  “So you admit men are violent.”

  Mother shrugged. “Who would deny it?”

  “Let me put something to you. These so-called ‘spheres’ of yours are not the work of God, but of men. It is their great injustice toward us, one that darkens our lives and reduces the most unfortunate of our sisters to mere property.”

  Adelina trembled, and Irena blanched. What would Mother say to that?

  “Is that so.” Mother took a fig, chewed it with slow deliberation, swallowed and cleared her throat. “You speak as if you envy men their privileges. But what are these privileges really? The privilege to go to war and die for us? The privilege to work hard to support us? Do we really desire that sphere of life, Mistress Silvana, considering its labor and brutality?”

  “Who governs your republic? Men. Who votes for them? Men. Perhaps if it were otherwise, there would be fewer wars.”

  “Yet governance is decidedly men’s business. We would only burden ourselves by participating.” Mother pursed her lips. “Adelina. Stop gawking at us, girl. Focus on your meal.”

  “Adelina is no girl.” Silvana turned her dark gaze on Adelina. “She’s a woman and a striking one at that. With her quick wit, she could be a tutor, a judge, a mayoress, a poet, a merchant—any trade she might imagine. As her mother, do you really think it right that she should have only one possible fate, the drudgery of meek domestic servitude?”

  “How peculiar.” Mother’s pale tongue slid over her teeth. “Here you are, a woman well out of her youth, unmarried and childless, and you have the audacity to lecture me about motherhood.” Her eyes narrowed. “Tell me, why is it that you remain without husband or child?”

  “Because I don’t care for either.”

  Mother’s nostrils flared. “I suppose you consort with men out of wedlock, a heathen like you.”

  “No. I don’t.” Silvana held Mother’s stare until Mother reddened and looked away. Adelina suppressed a giggle while Irena, after a dazed blink, turned back to Felise and resumed their conversation.

  The door opened to admit the twins, who had brought platters of pale, stringy meat. As the meal was dispensed, Adelina turned in her chair and touched Silvana’s forearm. “Silvana, may I ask about your upbringing?”

  “Of course, Ada.” Silvana reached for a goblet of wine. “As a child, I divided my time between reading and roaming the grounds in solitude. I preferred it that way, and my father and mother made no attempt to force me to do otherwise.”

  “How reckless of them,” said Mother. “Were they faithless too?”

  “On the contrary. They were the most religious people I’ve ever known.” Silvana paused a moment, as if held by some stray memory. “Don’t think of me as a hermit however. I’ve enjoyed my adventures, and your southern land has proven particularly rich with experiences. For such a pious people, there certainly is a great deal of debauchery to go around.”

  Mother snorted. “I don’t doubt you’ve partaken in your share of it.”

  “Oh, I’m as debauched as a winter’s night is long.” Silvana’s focus remained on Adelina, who fought to keep her hands from shaking and spilling her wine. “Rafael is an impeccable character, but I’m afraid I’ve been an inveterate sinner. Wine, gambling, intimacies…”

  Mother frowned. “But you just denied consorting out of wedlock.”

  “That wasn’t quite what I said.” Silvana’s smile arched into wickedness, and a dull yearning stole through Adelina’s body and took root in her loins. This older woman, so mysterious, so assertive, so beautiful, was professing to a forbidden attraction, and only Adelina had the wits to grasp it. It was like one of Adelina’s fevered private daydreams come to life
—excepting, of course, that no one was yet unclothed.

  “Your contradictory words aside, I’d politely request you keep any coarse talk away from my daughters.” Mother sliced a ragged hunk of meat. “This food is excellent. Why don’t you be a gracious guest and pay attention to our hospitality?”

  “As you say.” Silvana inspected the greasy hunk on her fork before putting it in her mouth.

  Wild laughter broke out at the male side of the table. Orfeo seemed to have gotten some food caught in his beard, and the drunken males around him were celebrating the event. Only Rafael remained distant, and though he smiled, the curl of his upper lip suggested contempt. He caught Adelina’s look and gave her a grimace, and she grimaced in return.

  Silvana lowered her fork. “Do you have a favorite book, Ada?”

  Adelina covertly appraised the room. Mother had turned her attention to Irena while Felise sat in her own world, building a mountain out of dates. Father and his companions were not only out of hearing but drunk beyond sensibility. It seemed safe to speak as she wished. “I do. It’s called Daughter of the Heavens. ”

  Silvana brandished her goblet as one of Bruna’s boys walked by, a wine bottle in his hands. “Tell me all about it.” The dark stream of wine approached the top of the goblet. “That’s enough. Thank you.”

  “Well. A princess is walking through the palace gardens when a voice speaks to her from the wind. She calls back, and it reveals itself to be a childlike spirit named Tipu. It tells her that she was born not of her mother, but of the heavens, and that she is prophesied to bring peace to the world and water to the desert.”

  “Go on.”

  “Tipu takes the princess to a village, which is being terrorized by a three-headed giant. The giant is a monster, an eater of children, and it lives on a mountain that nobody can climb. The princess arrives at the foot of the mountain and circles it three times. Each time, she can’t find a path. In despair she falls to her knees and weeps into the sand. A voice speaks to her—the voice of the sky. It says, ‘I am your mother, and I will raise you in my arms, daughter, because I love you.’ A cloud descends, and it carries the princess softly to the mountain peak.”

  Silvana sipped her wine. “You’ve a lovely voice, Ada. I could listen to you all evening.”

  Adelina’s blush returned with scorching intensity. “Um. Thank you.” She took an unsteady breath. “The giant is waiting for her. He sees her, a mere child, and believes that he’s found his dinner. But the princess doesn’t run, and so the giant falters in his stride, never having once met a child who wouldn’t run. ‘Small creature,’ he says, ‘don’t you understand that I will eat you?’ And she replies, ‘I’m not afraid of you, because I was born of the sun and stars.’ And the giant trembles, because her voice is louder than his own, and her eyes are bright as torches. And he falls to his knees and begs to be spared.”

  “Just like that?”

  “Yes, just like that. But as she turns to leave, the giant changes his mind and lunges for her. She turns and touches his hand, and says, ‘Do you not understand all the pain you have caused?’ And in that moment, the giant understands all the sorrow he has wrought, and he weeps until the mountain shakes. The villagers look up and take his sobs to be thunder and his tears to be rain. But the children know the truth, and they run in the streets, cheering and laughing…”

  Silvana smiled. “You talk like one in a dream. As if you can see the tale even as you tell it.”

  “I can.” Adelina sighed and stared at her untouched dinner. “Life is so beautiful in tales. I want to lose my breath in a thrill of wonder, to open my eyes each day to some new enchantment…Instead I live in unhappiness, and each year brings me closer to some new misery.”

  “This wine is remarkable.” Silvana extended her goblet toward Adelina. “You ought to try it.” Adelina giggled, and Silvana raised an eyebrow. “What amuses you so?”

  “It’s our custom that only a courting couple may share a goblet of wine. If a man desires a woman, he’ll offer her a sip from his goblet, and if she feels the same passion in return, she’ll accept it.” Adelina giggled again. “But you couldn’t have known that.”

  “On the contrary. That’s our custom too.” Silvana tilted the cup forward. “As I said, you ought to try it.”

  Adelina’s breath stopped, and her thoughts whirled away in disorder. As she reached for the goblet’s curved edge, she looked into Silvana’s eyes, and without averting her gaze she lowered her lips to the dark liquid and took a long, sweet sip. Her pulse flew, a fire raged in her chest, her spine seemed alive with lightning, yet her soul held calm. This was the day she’d hoped for, the day that a woman came to court her, and as she stared at Silvana—God, that slanted smile, those lowered lashes!—it seemed that her breath would never return.

  Chapter Four

  Silvana watched as, one after another, the women retired from the table. First went Felise, the little one, it being apparently past her bedtime. Next Delfina, who claimed to be feeling ill. More likely the old woman was exhausted from her perpetual scowling. Irena followed not long afterwards, pausing in the doorway to blush beneath Rafael’s extravagant goodnight filled with compliments and promises for the following day.

  That left only a goblet of good wine, the remaining half of her fig pudding and the endless pleasure that was Adelina.

  Silvana chewed on a chunk of pudding as Adelina spoke with charming nervousness of the previous summer and its accompanying sights—a carnival, a roaming book merchant, a group of visitors from over the sea. Silvana nodded and said little. The tales were interesting, and it seemed that every time Silvana opened her mouth, Adelina stumbled on her words and forgot her place. Better to keep quiet and enjoy her soft words, the nervous flickering of her lashes and the gentle movement of her lips.

  Sebastian rose at the far end of the table, that strangely divided battlefield, and tapped his goblet on the varnished wood. “It’s far past your bedtime, daughter.”

  “But Father—”

  Sebastian’s voice descended to a growl. “Ada, come now. Don’t make a petulant protest in front of our guests.”

  Adelina gave an exasperated sigh. Silvana smiled. A lesser maiden faced with such a rebuke might have burst into tears, but not this one—the heat of her indignation was palpable.

  “Shall I see you tomorrow?” said Adelina, and her fingers rested upon the back of Silvana’s hand. The contact was timid, but it must have taken some daring.

  “Of course.” Silvana rested her other hand atop Adelina’s fingers, securing them. “May your dreams be as sweet as your company.”

  An ecstatic luster filled Adelina’s eyes. “Goodnight, Father,” she said without looking at him. She took back her hand with obvious reluctance and then bowed to the grosser end of the table. “Goodnight, everyone.” A chorus of uneven farewells rose from the men, and Rafael even tipped an imaginary hat as Adelina left the room.

  Sebastian turned his interrogative gaze toward Silvana. No doubt he was waiting for her to flutter her lashes and prance off to a lace-swaddled slumber. “I’m looking forward to seeing this tavern of yours,” she said. “Even in cities four days away, we heard its name mentioned in rapturous whispers.”

  The big, red-whiskered man snickered, and Sebastian frowned. “I hadn’t expected you would…I mean, it’s a respectable tavern, but at this time of night…”

  “I understand your apprehension, Master Sebastian,” said Rafael, “but my sister’s not some dainty creature. I’d be appreciative if she were permitted the same allowances that you offer me.”

  It was about damn time he spoke up for her. Sebastian folded his hands on his belly, inspected Silvana for a moment and nodded. “So be it. But don’t be offended, my dear lady, if certain words pass by and burn your ears.”

  “Have no fear,” Silvana said. “I’m as unflappable as an iron bed sheet.”

  Sebastian snorted. “Well, at least you can trade with Marconus in bad humor. Come, then, let�
�s make for the road. I’ll spare you the company of these oafs. Travel with your brother and myself, and Matheus will carry off the drunkards in his own coach.”

  “Hurrah!” One of the men raised his cup. “By the way, my lady, we aren’t introduced. I’m Marconus, beside me is the mountain range dubbed Orfeo, and the corpse that’s waiting to be dragged away is Matheus.”

  Silvana allowed the tipsy, disheveled gentlemen a curt nod. She’d seen the way that Orfeo had ogled Adelina and Irena, and her fingers had twitched with the urge to toss a carving knife at him. “While you prepare the coaches, Master Sebastian, perhaps you would allow me to take some air in my brother’s company?”

  “Naturally, naturally,” said Sebastian.

  Rafael rose, swaying only slightly, and patted Sebastian on the shoulder. “It seems my sister beckons! I’ll see you all in good time.”

  The drunkards gave an incoherent response, and Rafael nodded as if he’d understood them. He joined Silvana at the discreet side entrance and they stepped into the cooler hallway beyond. As they proceeded to the lobby, Rafael hummed a simple tune.

  Silvana asked, “Is that merriness the wine, or are you genuinely pleased with the day so far?”

  “A little of both.” They walked across the moonlit floorboards, and Rafael turned the silver handles of the front door. The night caressed them with a mild warmth, and Silvana inhaled deeply as they followed the rocky path toward the garden.

  Rafael stopped her by the base of an immense tree. “Silvie, now that we have a moment. Aren’t you getting a little carried away?”

  Silvana relaxed against the tree and reached for a thin branch. “Are you referring to Adelina?” She ran her fingers through the silver leaves, plucked one and touched it to her nose. It exuded a strong, dizzying perfume.

  “Yes, the middle daughter. I noticed your shameless act of courtship. So did her mother, by the way.” Rafael scratched a speck of dried food from his sleeve. “There are any number of women in that town you could have, you know. Must you ruin our chances by chasing skirts up here?”