The Prince of Midnight Read Online Free PDF Page B

her eyes. Her face was white and stark, set in hostility. "I don't
want your help. I don't need it."
    He sat down on the bed, catching both her wrists in one hand before she could
start to fight. She tried to avoid him, but she was too weak to put up any
struggle. She turned her face away instead, her breath rapid and shallow even
with that small effort. He stuffed a pillow behind her head and held the cup to
her lips.
    She refused to drink. "Leave," she whispered. "Leave me alone."
    He tilted the cup. She stared dully ahead, her eyelids barely open. Her skin
felt like paper, dry and ashen except for that bright deadly color on her
cheekbones. He pressed the cup against her mouth. Water slid uselessly down her
chin and throat.
    He stood up and added two fingers of brandy to the cup, downing it himself.
The welcome heat of alcohol swamped the back of his throat and blossomed in his
weary brain.
    "Let me die," she muttered. "It doesn't matter. I want it." Her head rolled.
"Oh, Papa, let me die, let me die."
    S.T. sat down in the chair and put his face in his hands. She was going to
die, yes; she'd made that choice somewhere in her delirium, and what the fever
didn't burn up simply faded with each passing day. She called for her father
with increasing frequency, drifting in and out of sense, falling deeper into the
hours of silent stupor.
    S.T. hated her. He hated himself. Nemo was gone. When he thought of it, he
felt as if he'd been hit in the stomach; his chest and his throat ached for
breath that wouldn't come.
    "Papa," she whispered. "Please, Papa, take me with you. Don't leave me alone
. . . don't leave . . . don't leave ..." She turned her head restlessly, lifting
one weak hand. "Papa ..."
    "I'm here," S.T. said.
    "Papa . . ."
    "I'm here, curse it!" He strode to the bed and grabbed her hand. Her bones
felt like porcelain in his fist. He reached for the ladle and filled the cup
again. "Drink this."
    At the touch of the cup rim against her lips, she lifted her lashes. "Papa."
She wet her lips and opened them. When S.T. tilted the cup this time, she
swallowed. "That's good," he said. "That's my girl."
    "Oh, Papa," she mumbled. She drank again, her eyes closed, each breath and
swallow an effort.
    "That's my Sunshine," he murmured. "Keep trying."
    Her fingers curled in his hand, seeking reassurance like a child. He held her
tight, listening to her mindless whimper fade away into silence.
    Don't die, damn you
, he thought.
Don't leave me with nothing
.
    She took a deep, shuddering breath and swallowed the last teaspoon of liquid
in the cup. He smoothed her burning forehead, brushing the short, dark curls
back from her face. 'Twas a true tribute to her beauty, he reckoned, that after
ten days of nursing he could still see it.
    He'd seen every inch of her by now. He wondered what her precious papa would
think of that. Personally, S.T. was too damned tired and sick at heart to care.
    He coaxed and bullied her into drinking a second cup of water. She managed
half of it before he lost her to exhaustion and grogginess. After a halfhearted
attempt to straighten the bedclothes, which he had a vague idea was proper
sickroom procedure, he went downstairs to face the problem of food.
    At the door to the courtyard he stopped and whistled. Twice. He had to
restrain himself from a third time, or a fourth or fifth or a thousand. He stood
in the dawn and listened to the sound of his own breathing.
    He walked across the yard and whistled again. The ducks came waddling after
him, irritable and hungry, but he left them to fend for themselves as he headed
for the garden. He ought to butcher one, he knew—that was why he'd started the
flock—but when it came to the decision he never could quite choose the victim.
He'd reckoned he'd leave that to Nemo, who had no such scruples.
    Nemo.
    S.T. whistled again. He didn't allow himself to stop walking. The crunch of
his boots on limestone and dirt seemed very loud,