Author's Note: Another exceedingly stubborn chapter. Sulpicia is such a tricky character to write. As always, I must thank those that took the time read/review/favorite. Your feedback has been awesome. I hope you enjoy!
Disclaimer: I claim no ownership of Stephenie Meyer's work.
Chapter Six
It is early autumn and the swollen moon invades the sky, casting the dew into brilliance and white flesh into shadow. Marcus watches Sulpicia from a tight alcove, his hands folded before him as he ruminates. Were he not a monster, he could pass for a monk.
The hour is quiet. Echoes stir up from the city, a slight mist crowding the air. Most of the guard has gone hunting. The others patrol the halls of the stronghold, leaving the night pregnant with unspoken tension. Sulpicia stands alone at her post on the terrace. She does not know she is being watched.
Or so Marcus fancies, judging from the relaxed drape of her shoulders. She is unmoving, yet restless, her flaxen plait limp, her eye's deep-set and indifferent.
And it is this that worries him.
Marcus has always considered himself a curious man. A lover of the enigmatic, as Didyme put it with supreme eloquence. She has also called him thoughtful and politic and wise. A mediator. A ford between Caius's intemperance and Aro's capriciousness. Since the founding of the coven, he has acted as a guardian to its stability, ensuring everlasting strength from within.
He is the custodian of the empire. The caretaker. The one who soothes tempers and quells passions and keeps his brothers united throughout the darkening of days.
And tonight, in the tepid, close air, he faces his greatest challenge yet.
Sulpicia.
The woman is danger herself…if only because Aro loves her.
Loves, yes, loves her. Marcus is no shrewd miser, but rather a great devotee to life's most promising joy. He married young and encouraged Caius in his own romance with the soft-spoken, gentle Athenodora. And he had hoped that Aro would someday find a mate, a mindful, intelligent woman who might complement their growing family.
Not corrupt it.
He did not expect his brother-in-law to become enamored with such a dark creature. Sulpicia encompasses all of his fears, surpassing them, even, with her practiced neutrality.
She is aloof, haughty, commanding and strong. Dangerous, Marcus concludes. And something must be done.
He is comforted alone by the knowledge that she has not returned Aro's love, for her pride has been wounded by his impulsion. But it is only a matter of time, really, before Aro comes to the heart of the matter.
Before he realizes that he only need ask her to join him and she will.
Now, however, in this moment of doubt, Marcus has the advantage. And he intends to make full use of it.
Stepping out of the alcove, he approaches the silent Sulpicia.
"Good evening, my dear," he says kindly. "I would like us to have a talk."
I am going to leave you, she thinks angrily, deliberately, the tips of her fingers drumming against his sternum. I am going to leave you and run far from this place. And you'll have to kill me if you want me back. Aro, do you love me now?
Sulpicia raises her eyes to her lover's, anticipating his reaction. But he is languid, his head resting on silken pillows, one arm dangling off the edge of her bed. He pays no notice to her thoughtful rebellion.
Why?
He is doing it to spite me, she reasons. Any moment now, any second, he will bare his teeth and fury will flood the creamy lethargy of his patrician features.
Aro must know of her intent. She is offering it to him. Her sacrifice. Her martyred lamb.
I know you hear me, Sulpicia tells him with her thoughts. Pressing her ear to his abdomen, she listens to the great roar of air filling his lungs and the echoing emptiness left behind when it is exhaled. Blood, fresh from a recent kill, races through his ivory veins. She traces the line of his pelvis, smiling when he groans softly.
"Mea culpa." The whisper rises from her lips as a prayer.
Aro shifts beneath her. "You have sinned, my dear?"
"And in the sinning, I rejoice." Sulpicia knots her fingers over his hip. "Do you expect anything less of me? Your concubine?"
He frowns now and leans forward on his elbows. "You use that word too freely."
"But isn't that what I am? Your sister thinks so. She thinks you are incapable of love."
Aro's hand flits over her bare shoulder. "Didyme has no business with us."
"It is hard keeping things of this nature from Marcus," she points out. "Just as I cannot hope to shield my thoughts from you. We are all trapped here, bound to each other…lost."
Sulpicia relishes in teasing him. It's much like looking into the mouth of a lion, feeling the hot breath of the creature upon her face, seeing her death in the blackness of his blood-slicked throat.
She almost wants Aro to find out about her plans to flee. Self-destruction is a rare pleasure, though entirely tantalizing.
Didyme urged me to leave, she thinks, her lips tasting the space between his navel and ribs. And your brother, Marcus, came to me the other night and told me I should head for Russia and that he would lie to you, mislead you. There is a conspiracy in your own house, Aro. Are you blind to it?
Her breathing becomes shallow and she waits, her body arched over his. Surely he has heard her this time. Surely he knows…
"Are you so very unhappy here, Sulpicia?" Aro asks. His question is baited.
She hesitates. "I did not come here to be your concubine."
"Then why did you come to Volterra?"
Aro's expression is open and honest. For a fleeting moment, Sulpicia believes she has been granted the ultimate privilege; a glance behind his mask.
And oh, he is beautiful.
I am confused, the thought leaps into her mind before she can stop it. I've never known want, or rather, want has never known me.
I could be happy with you…
"Amun accused me of trespassing upon his hunting grounds," she replies at length. "He wanted me out of Egypt and knew you would steal me away."
"I never lust in vain," Aro murmurs wryly.
Sulpicia flinches, wounded by his biting wit. "He told you where as I was and you sent Felix after me. That is why I came to Italy."
He stares at her, his eyes no longer sharp, but soft and wide. The eyes of a child. Of a boy.
Sulpicia realizes she is too close…too, too close to him. The thought terrifies her.
She scrambles away from him.
Aro, however, reaches one hand out to her, his fingers open. She sees what he is offering, hears it in music of his soul.
Union.
Trembling, Sulpicia places her hand in his.
I do not understand.
"You must learn to trust."
I have always been alone.
"This is my invitation to you."
I am frightened.
"What have you to fear?" His eyes, both clouded and keen, follow the contours of her harried countenance.
She does not answer. The pressure on her hand grows. Aro clenches her fingers until they crack.
"You do not know." He is neither amused nor curious. With a feather-soft sigh, he releases her hand. "Sometimes I think you are more confused than mad."
"I should rather be neither," Sulpicia says.
Aro exhales sharply and his breath whispers across her exposed flesh. She hates being naked and clutches the sheets about her, aware even now that he has invaded her sanctum. His scent is everywhere and it clings to the air like smoke, pressing her thoughts until they swirl and swell like a tarantella.
I am going to leave you, Aro. And I will not return.
But her mantra remains unheeded. Aro swings his long legs over the side of her bed and stands, his movements effortless and fluid.
"You are right, I think," he says, magnificent in naught but his gleaming flesh. "We are bound to each other. All of us."
After he leaves, Sulpicia promises herself that she will never see him again.
Author's Note: Poor Marcus. He certainly has his work cut out for him. As to why Aro didn't pick up on Sulpicia's telepathic messages, I've always considered his ability voluntary, or tactile. He wasn't particularly focused on her thoughts when she was attempting to sabotage herself…or he was in complete denial. ^_^