The Maestro's Maker (15 page)

Michel gave the boy’s cheek a couple of light smacks. “You don’t have to be the hero

who protects the virtuous woman, Bernardo. There is no longer virtue there to protect.”

Bernardo looked at Florentine, who bowed her head and began to sob. There was a

part of me that felt bad for them, for being babes in the woods. They had just experienced

what I had experienced so many months ago, having their world torn from them and

becoming slaves of another. But my pity was short-lived, even as I listened to what

Claude-Michel had to say.

“Yesterday, your virgin sister was ravished by two vampires on the forest floor. You

and she now belong to those vampires, and you will do what you’re told or suffer the

consequences.”

Bernardo looked down, then reached up to touch the bite-mark on his neck. He

flinched. His eyes grew larger. “What do you want?”

Claude-Michel smiled. “Your blood and your bodies.”

Bernardo seemed to consider this. “What consequences?”

“You said you wouldn’t kill us,” Florentine said, her voice rising with panic.

Claude-Michel gave her a look that was almost kind, like a father looking at a very

young daughter who is frightened of a monster that doesn’t exist. “No,” Claude-Michel

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said. “We won’t kill you. But this morning, we are going to give you a demonstration of

what will happen if you dare to disobey our wishes.” When he spoke the next sentence,

his voice became dangerous. “Chloe, come to me.”

My stomach boiled with fear. I shook my head. “Claude-Michel—”

“Do what I tell you to do,” he said, blinking. “Come to me.”

I hugged the carriage door tighter. “But Claude-Michel, you can’t mean to—I

thought—”

“Chloe!” he shouted. Florentine stopped sobbing. Bernardo swallowed visibly. Even

Jean and François jumped. Then Claude-Michel smiled and softened his voice. “If you

do not come to me when I ask, it will be much worse. You don’t want it to be worse, do

you?”

I obeyed, but could not keep my lip from quivering. He took me by the wrists and

held me in place. “Jean, if Bernardo or his sister tries to flee, prevent them.”

“
Oui, Monsieur
,” Jean said.

“If you fail, you will be whipped.”

“
Oui, Monsieur
,” Jean repeated.

“Anyone who tries to flee will be whipped,” Claude-Michel said. Florentine moved

closer to her brother. “François, retrieve the crop from the carriage and remove her

clothing.”

François returned from the carriage brandishing the riding crop like a sword. As he

walked past them, he glanced down at the brother and sister, who watched him fearfully.

There were dark circles under their eyes, but I could tell they were wide awake.

I watched over my shoulder as François approached. Tears coursed down my cheeks,

but I did not struggle in Claude-Michel’s grip. I felt resigned to my fate.

“Do not move,” Claude-Michel cooed as François approached. He let go of my wrists

to pull my blouse over my head. Then Claude-Michel took my wrists in his hands again.

He looked into my eyes but addressed the brother and sister. “I am your master. You

will obey me in all things, or be punished. François is my second, and will have the

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power to punish as well. Obey him, except where his will conflicts with mine. Chloe has

been disrespectful toward François, and now she must suffer the consequences.” Claude-

Michel shifted his gaze to François. “At your leisure.”

I bowed my head. I was not prepared when François brought the crop down

ferociously across my shoulders. I could not keep myself from whining like a child as

my body shuddered. My hands balled into fists. Claude-Michel held my wrists securely

as François brought down the lash again and again. My body struggled. The pain was

almost unbearable. Several times, my knees buckled. From somewhere outside of me, I

heard François’s name.

It was Claude-Michel. “Enough!”

I collapsed against him and sobbed freely in his arms, half from relief that it was over,

half because it had happened at all.

“Claude-Michel,” François said with a laugh. “You can’t mean me to stop now. I’ve

just begun.”

“It is enough, François. When you punish them you must remain here in your

mind.”

“Oh,” François said. “Of course.”

“If you wish to further demonstrate your mastery over her, you may take her.”

I waited, to see what he would say.

“Perhaps later,” he said, and walked away.

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A week later we were in Venice.

With the money we had left over, we found a suitable apartment and stabled the

horses and carriage. The next day, Claude-Michel used his Venice accounts to purchase

new clothes for us all, including servant-wear for Bernardo and Florentine, but not for

me, which made François scowl and me laugh. François had insisted on going with him,

and suggested that he shouldn’t touch his Parisian accounts yet, as he wanted to appear

dead.

“Yet, it will be obvious I am not dead when we return to Paris,” Claude-Michel

said.

“I still have time to convince you not to go,” François answered with a wry smile.

The rest of us pretended not to hear the conversation—Florentine glancing up from time

to time from a book Claude-Michel had bought her, Bernardo pacing the room like an

angry tiger, Jean putting away our things. I sat on the couch near Florentine, dividing

my attention between watching her read and listening to the men, wondering what in the

world was going to happen next.

While they were out, Claude-Michel and François had found the house where that

woman Katarina’s son lived.

“Paris is a fool’s errand,” François said in low tones. For once, I agreed with him.

“Perhaps,” Claude-Michel replied.

The apartment had two adjoining bedrooms—a master room with a large bed and a

room with two smaller ones. François tried to change the subject by suggesting that he

and Claude-Michel take the large bed and leave the others to the rest of us.

“No,” Claude-Michel said. “Chloe will share my bed. You will be my lieutenant in

the servants’ room. I want you to take Bernardo into your bed and teach him to please a

man. Jean will do the same with Florentine.”

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I glanced over to see Jean look at him suddenly, unable to disguise the pleasure in his

eyes.

François sounded stricken. “Claude-Michel, what are you saying? Did we not agree

that we two were the heads of the family? The parents? Shouldn’t you and I—?”

Claude-Michel put up an impatient hand. “I don’t know what madness has overcome

you, François, but I prefer to have a beautiful woman sleeping beside me night after night.

Don’t make me regret what we have shared recently by acting like a woman instead of a

comrade.”

François opened his mouth, throwing his hands wide in supplication, then gestured

to himself indignantly. “Have you not made use of Jean since he first came to work for

you?”

Claude-Michel sounded weary. “Jean is a young man. You, mon ami, are forty-five

years old.”

“But I am beautiful yet,” François said, pouting.

It was true, I had to admit. The turn had erased what gray had been in François’ hair,

making it much more golden than it had been. He was still a beautiful man. But Claude-

Michel was right. There was a masculine hardness to his features that Jean did not yet

have.

“Bernardo is beautiful and young,” Claude-Michel said. “He will share your bed—”

And here he gave a sardonic smile, “—until I call for him. He is mine, after all.”

“Yours?” François spat. “What makes you think they can all be yours? What gives

you the right to claim everyone?”

“If you wish to challenge me, François...”

François’s gaze faltered. By now I knew they had both been soldiers in their youth,

and were both very good with weapons and in a fight, but that Claude-Michel had always

been the more dominant of the two. From the moment I met them I suspected François

would never challenge him, and I was right.

Claude-Michel went to him and placed his hand against his cheek. François took in

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a breath and nudged against him, closing his eyes without caring who was in the room

witnessing the spectacle. Claude-Michel spoke softly. “We are the most powerful of our

little family. We have to spread ourselves among our children or they will grow restless.

It does not mean I love you less.” To my surprise, he kissed François deeply, as I watched

with my mouth open.

“Let me go with you tonight,” François breathed.

“No,
mon ami
,” Claude-Michel said. “Stay here. Lord it over our children. I won’t be

gone very long.”

“But what will you do with this Gypsy boy? Do you think he will suddenly call you

papa? He probably wants to kill you.”

“He will have a difficult time if that is what he wants,” Claude-Michel said. “And

now I am going to sleep for a while.”

He stretched out on the bed and dozed. I curled up next to him but only pretended to

sleep, so I heard François leave, and the brother and sister retire to the other bedroom to

whisper and finally fall silent, and still did not move when Jean came to wake Claude-

Michel.

“We must hurry,
Monsieur
,” Jean said. “The horses are ready.”

I felt Claude-Michel sit up and swing his legs over the side of the bed, and opened my

eyes in slits. Jean brushed Claude-Michel’s hair. The boy had already dressed, in a light

blue textured coat to match his coloring, along with a matching blue ribbon. He turned

toward me. I closed my eyes quickly.

“We are quite a pair, Jean,” Claude-Michel said.

“
Monsieur
Villaforte would not like to hear you say that,
Monsieur
,” Jean answered,

and I could have sworn I heard a wry smile in his voice. “He is jealous now.”

“
Oui
,” Claude-Michel said with a flourish of his hand. “François, Chloe. I have too

many wives. It is good you are not so jealous.”

“Your happiness is my happiness,
Monsieur
,” he said.

“Such a loyal servant,” Claude-Michel said. “Perhaps Chloe should have turned you

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instead.”

Hearing my name made my heart flutter, even though he was saying it only in

passing.

“Where is my old friend?”

“He said he needed to clear his head,” Jean said.

Claude-Michel grunted. “Then it falls to Chloe to watch over our beautiful young

Italians. She is obviously capable.”

I could not resist opening my eyes a little as Jean helped him dress in his new suit—a

coat of royal blue with matching ribbon in his hair; new, silver-buckled shoes; white

stockings that displayed the impressive curve of his calf. He wore no makeup, saying he

did not wish to appear ostentatious, and no wig, preferring to display his natural hair as

he claimed the young men now did in Paris. When Claude-Michel was dressed, Jean left

to bring around the horses. Claude-Michel inspected himself in the mirror.

“I hope there is some small part of Katarina alive in her son,” he said softly. “And I

hope there is part of me in him as well.”

I could no longer pretend to sleep, especially when private moments with Claude-

Michel were so rare. “You are very handsome,
Monsieur
,” I said, sitting up.

He turned quickly, with a startled expression on his face. Then he smiled. He came

to stand next to the bed, and burrowed his fingers in my hair, tickling my neck. My jaw

went slack. I wished I could have him to myself for a while.

“My darling,” he said. “You are beautiful in the morning.”

“It isn’t morning, Claude-Michel.” I looked up at him, unable to resist smiling.

“Ah, but the universe revolves around us,” he said. “We are the sun that lights its way.

As we have just risen, it can be nothing but morning.”

For some reason, his teasing only saddened me.

“What is it,
cherie
?”

I shook my head and got out of bed, putting on a covering and throwing open the

balcony windows to stand with my hands on the rail. A child ran by a group of men on

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the street below. From far away, a woman’s voice called for Paolo.

“I’ve grown accustomed to these things quickly,” I said. “These windows, and such

wonderful fabrics. My husband was never able...” Here I choked. I did not like to let

myself think of him, or my children. My memories burned me like fire. “But he loved

me.”

Claude-Michel came to stand beside me. “You grieve your family as I grieve mine,”

he said.

I know I looked at him with an expression of surprise. “I tell myself, they are asleep

in my mind.”

“It is the past,” he said quietly. “Our future lies with each other.” He placed his

fingertips on my chin and gently turned my face to him. “My beautiful Chloe. You gave

me this wonderful gift, to see in the darkness. I have only this one errand, this one piece

of my past to visit. I have, perhaps, one child left to me. I must know him.”

I nodded, though I was perfectly aware there was this, and then his revenge, and then