Chapter 4: Five Of Wands

Marriette awoke in her bed still wearing the servant's dress. The cloak hung by itself in a closet that once held her gowns. Her father was standing watching her, his face hard and cold.

"So, now you must humiliate me by walking the streets like any common strumpet. If you prefer to be clothed in rags that will be all you may wear." He leaned over her. "It isn't enough that you go out consorting with some merchant's son, ruining my reputation, you are brought home in a drunken stupor by Wagoners! Foreigners!" He slid his belt from around his waist. "You have shamed me for the last time."

"Then kill me and have done with it." Marriette turned to face the wall.

"Oh, no, I need you, but you will be properly punished." The first blow came as a shock, as it did each time. Some part of Marriette protested. This was her father. He wasn't supposed to treat her like this. It quickly gave up the protest, as it did each time. The blows struck an increasingly numb body. She tried to withdraw into herself completely but the pain of the bruises and cuts refused to let her go. Marriette tried facing her father since she didn't think he'd mark her face. Soon the dress hung in tatters from her body, and her father was breathing heavily and licking his lips. This was when he would run out the door and leave her for a servant to come and clean.

Today, he fumbled with his pants as his eyes looked glazed and distant, like he was seeing someone else in her place. The last fragment of Marriette fled screaming in horror as he pushed her to the bed and began a whole new kind of torture.

"You witch," he muttered as he lay on top of her. "Would you seduce me too? You witch...."

When he was finished, her father pushed himself away and snorted in disgust. He slapped her face harder and harder until she moaned in response.

"Look what you've done," he said. "Clean yourself up, then you can clean this room." He picked up his belt and stalked out. Marriette looked at the blood spattered on the walls and felt the pain in her body and soul. She stumbled to the washstand and began washing blood and worse from her body. Then her stomach revolted and she vomited until she had no strength left. She fell to the floor whimpering and wishing that she were dead.

The servants found her and roughly cleaned her. They put her in bed and left her. Marriette lay listlessly in the bed and tried to die. She held her breath as long as she could, but her body always rebelled and started breathing again. She thought about breaking the mirror and using the edges to cut herself, but she'd have to get out of bed to break it. Despair weighed her down and trapped her into living.

A man in a doctor's smock came and examined her impersonally while her father watched.

"Yes, it is as you suspect, my Lord Duke. She is no longer a virgin. I will leave some herbs that will prevent any complications," the doctor said to her father. "Take care not to use too much if you want her to bear children later." He stood to leave. Marriette tried to summon the strength to say what had truly happened. It was too much for her and she fell into a troubled sleep.

She stayed in the room, while the welts on her body healed. A maid rubbed them with an ointment to prevent scars. Marriette learned that her father decided it was time for her to get up when the servants dragged her out of bed and dressed her. They marched her through the halls of the great house until she began walking with them. After that, she was allowed to walk by herself, shadowed by a servant charged with keeping her obedient. Marriette didn't care; although her heart beat, she was dead inside - a ghost in her own body.

A week after she had been dragged from her bed, servants dressed her in one of her fine gowns. It hung on her like rags, but they led her down the stairs to have dinner with her father. They ate in the formal dining room. Her father never ate anywhere else. The huge room never warmed up, no matter what fire burned in the grate or candles on the table. Marriette shivered as they directed her to the hard wood chair at her father's left.

"You are too thin," he said, "eat something before you starve yourself."

Hope bloomed and she turned away from the table refusing to sit down.

"You will eat, or I will have a servant force you."

She spat in the soup and glared defiance at her father.

His face darkened and he moved to slap her. Marriette lifted her face.

"Go ahead, Father," she said, "you enjoyed yourself so much the last time."

"You try to seduce me again?" he hissed, but sat back in his carved armchair. "You ought to be burned at the stake as a witch."

"Better burning in hell than another day in this house!" Marriette screamed. The words burned her throat like acid. She drew breath to continue, but her father nodded at the servants and two men pushed her down into the chair. She fought against them with her weakness, but they ignored her.

"My loyal servants know how troubled in mind you have been, Marriette. They will know to treat whatever you say as the ravings of a lunatic. Now, will we eat as civilized people, or will you be fed like a sick animal?" Her father's cold voice shattered the hope and the rage. Marriette became a ghost again. She let her arms fall to the table.

Her defiance shattered, Marriette slumped in her chair and ate the soup. The next day, she was again brought down to dine with her father, and every night following. He talked at her as if she hung on every word. He was already important, but schemed constantly to improve his position as if the whole world conspired to cast him down from his pinnacle. Marriette only cared that he didn't demand she respond. Her body filled out her dresses again. She tried to find her anger with her new health, but it was buried deep. The only emotion she felt was self-loathing.

One evening, he looked especially pleased with himself.

"You want to escape my house?" he asked. "I have arranged a marriage for you. He is willing to overlook your...unfortunate virtue because he is growing older and needs an heir."

"How fortunate for you, Father. How much was he willing to pay to marry the daughter of the Duke deLanguiers? Have you recovered the cost of raising a woman of dubious virtue?"

"Careful," her father said, face darkening, "I will not be mocked."

She looked in his face and saw an awful hunger in his eyes.

"Very well, Father," she said, "I will be the dutiful bride."

The wedding day came far too slowly for Marriette who counted the days to freedom from her father. She couldn't imagine that this groom would be any better than her father, but he couldn't be any worse. She woke in the night with nightmares of a man lying on top of her as her father had, causing awful tearing pain. Some nights, her father grunted and muttered in her dreams, other nights it was a man identical to the duke, but lacking a face.

Cold-faced women fitted her for a grand gown in the softest white. A veil would hide her face and gloves would cover her hands. I will look like a ghost. Marriette almost smiled. Her father lectured her each evening at dinner on the importance of this union. She would bind this man closer to him.

The night before the wedding, her father came to her room.

"Remember, daughter, you are mine. I brought you into this world. You will do as I say whether you abide here or in your husband's home." He looked hungrily at her, breathing hard.

Marriette just nodded.

"I must rest, Father," she said, "if I am to look beautiful and do you honour tomorrow."

Her father spun and left the room. She heard the lock click into place. She didn't care. Tomorrow she would be free. By some blessing, she didn't dream at all.

Early in the morning, the servants came and dressed Marriette in her wedding dress. They pulled her hair into an intricate arrangement of braids and flowers. They put makeup on to add colour to her face, then placed the veil on her head to cover it. The carriage came and took her and her father to the cathedral for the grand wedding.

The church was full, as befitted the marriage of the daughter of the Duke of deLanguiers, the most important noble in the realm apart from the king. The king himself was there looking much younger than Marriette thought a king ought to be. He had to be there on the off chance that he would forbid the marriage and claim her for himself. It was a tradition that Marriette's father had explained carefully. She wasn't sure whether her father wanted the king to notice her or not. The queen certainly wouldn't approve of the king claiming her. The king just nodded absently at her when she walked in on the arm of her father.

Huge windows surrounded her with a riot of colour contrasting with the flat grey stone making up the columns and walls of the cathedral. People filled the vast space and added their own colours and scents to the mix. If she looked up, she would see the carved ceiling. Right now, she was determined to make it to the front of the cathedral without tripping or otherwise humiliating her father. She could see the archbishop in his gold robes at the front, waiting patiently for her to arrive, so he might begin.

The only people she knew were her father and the archbishop, who had visited and lectured her at length about the ceremony and what was expected of her. Her oppression from the stares increased as she walked up the long aisle. She wondered what they thought about her, what her father had told them. They arrived at the front and her father joined her hands with the stranger who was going to be her husband. The groom was older than her, not as old as her father, but much older than Art. She could see dimly through the veil that there were lines around his eyes and he leaned on a cane. She thought it an affectation until she saw the twisted leg that no amount of tailoring could hide.

He looked almost as nervous as Marriette, but then, if he knew what kind of family he was marrying into, he should be terrified.

"Friends, we have come to celebrate the joining of Count Torrance leBraun and Marriette deLanguiers..." the archbishop began the liturgy. Marriette stood, knelt and spoke as required. It seemed like the ceremony lasted forever. Finally, the archbishop concluded. "...I pronounce you husband and wife. You may kiss the bride."

As her husband lifted her veil back, Marriette got her first good look at him. The lines around his eyes crinkled as he smiled wryly. His brown eyes were warm.

I could learn to like this man.

"So, will I do?" he asked quietly.

"I think so," she said just as softly.

He kissed her gently on the cheek then led her after the archbishop to put their signatures in the immense register. After centuries of use, it was little more than half full; not many people were important enough to get married in the cathedral.

A grand celebration followed the wedding service but Marriette didn't remember anything but the brief awkward dance with Torrance. Mercifully, she was able to politely avoid dancing with the eager young men who flocked around her trying to use her to gain her father's ear. At midnight, Marriette and Torrance were allowed to escape, leaving the party to wind down without them. Torrance handed her up into a coach that wasn't nearly as grand as her father's but more comfortable without his presence.

"I understand that you don't know me at all," her husband said taking her hand, "but I expect we will learn more about each other as time goes by." He stared off into the nighttime streets for a long moment. "I will endeavour not to let the ghosts of the past come between us, but someone of my age has as many scars inside as out. There may be days that they claim my attention and it will seem that I am cold and distant. I apologize in advance for those times."

"We each have our scars," Marriette said.

"Your father told me of your experience at the hand of the Wagoners."

Marriette opened her mouth to explain the truth, but she remembered the look her father had in her room the night before. Just how long was his reach?

"I am not ready to talk of it," she said.

They rode the rest of the way in silence. Marriette found that she liked the warm strength of Torrance's hand on hers. The carriage pulled up to a house that was not nearly as large as her old home, but there were flowers set out and a staff of servants awaited their arrival. Torrance introduced her to them, then led her across the threshold of her new home.

"I cannot carry you across as custom demands," he said, "but this is now your home as much as it is mine. If you need anything, you just need to ask, and, if it is in my power, I will get it for you. I will protect you to the limit of my strength." He led her to a suite of rooms decorated in subtle blues and greens. "My staff begged permission to redo the master suite in your honour."

Marriette wandered through the rooms marveling at the love and care that went into decorating them.

"They wouldn't let me see them either. I have been living in the guest rooms for a month." He came up behind her and put his arms around her waist. Marriette stiffened and Torrance began to pull away. She put her hands over his.

"You just startled me," she whispered. "I am not used to a gentle touch." She turned and took Torrance's face in her hands. "I will try to be as good a wife as you plan to be a husband, but all this is new to me."

Torrance ran his fingers through the tangle of hair and flowers that graced her head. He kissed her forehead gently. She lifted her face and he kissed her lips. Her hands clutched at his back as the kiss grew stronger. Torrance's hands wandered to the fastenings at the back of Marriette's dress. The heavy gown slid to the floor leaving only her underdress. She shivered uncontrollably and buried her face in his shoulder. The ties for the underdress were under his fingers. Marriette made herself nod, and soon it, too, slipped to the floor. She gasped for breath, but allowed Torrance to step back and look at her. His eyes were sad as he pulled a sheet from the bed and wrapped her in it. As soon as the soft material covered her, she was able to catch her breath.

"I know I am not beautiful," she said softly.

"No!" he said. "You are more beautiful than I deserve. I need to cover you so I can control myself. I will not force myself on you. Our marriage bed is for pleasure, not fear." He led her to the huge bed. She could see a deep, deep sorrow in his eyes. "I will sleep on the couch."

"Please," she said holding his hand, "please, just hold me tonight. I don't want to be alone."

So he lay down beside her and she laid her head on his chest and wept quietly. He stroked her hair and whispered gentle words in her ears.