The Princess of Cleves #14

"Oh, I did very little."

"Did you see anyone?"

"Why yes, my uncle, and then few ladies came to wish me well."

There was something in the way she spoke; if it was not an outright lie, it was at least a lie of omission. "Were they pleasant visits?"

"Yes," she replied, giving her husband a suspicious look.

"I only ask because you look out of sorts my love."

Rosalind frowned. The Prince could see her slowly decide to stop feigning ignorance and admit that she had seen the Duke, that he may still be hiding in this very room. "The Duke came to see me, and I sent my women to tell him I was ill."

Sitting beside her, the Prince took her pale clammy hands. "Why did you do this my love? Is he not just another courtier?"

"Stop calling me that." Tears began to shine in her eyes, and her head hung down to her chest.

"But you are my love, my darling wife," the Prince said. He pressed his mouth roughly against her's, holding her wrist in an iron grip as she tried to move away from him. Something cruel within him had awoken, and he wanted to make her cry. He bore her down beneath him, rubbing his sex against her hips. "Tell me my faithful, tender spouse, has the Duke done something to offend you?"

She was weeping, shaking. "N...no...he has not," she stammered. Her face was flushed red. She was aroused, or angry. No, this was his Rosalind, it was both.

The Prince found her flesh warm, inviting. With his wife and lover, he had gotten used a life filled voluptuous nights and languorous afternoons. Now, he barely remembered the last time he'd made use of his privileges. Pinning her arms by her sides, he kissed her throat and chest, tugging her chemise down with his teeth. "Don't you understand, the Duke, and possibly others as well, will think you sent him away because you love him, and seeing him in private would be unbearable."

She turned her face away from him. "I thought we weren't going to speak of this," she said stiffly as he penetrated her.

"Yes, I thought so as well." Each word was a grunt as he thrust himself inside her. "I find myself as unworthy of your confession as you are of my love." Taking her hair, he forced her to look at him. "I am the unhappiest man in court. Not only are you in love with another, but he knows of your love."

Her sullen expression was melting away to lust. At first she lay still and passive, then she began moving beneath him, arching her hips to meet his body.

She had just refused to see the man she loved, and now was being roughly used by her husband. There should have been anger in her face, perhaps sorrow, but not acquiescence, not the first soft blur of pleasure. Who did she love, if not the Duke? The question pounded his mind, who who who who? He didn't notice her hands caressing him until she cried out with her climax. When she looked up at him, her eyes had softened.

It was too much like a reconcilliation when what he wanted was a fight. He withdrew from her, his own desire unsatiated, and left the room without a word. Listening at her door, he was only satisfied when he heard her weeping.

* * * *

After the King's death, the Chevalier was very busy with his family's political machinations. He thought he'd been forgotten, written off as weak and left to his own devices. What really happened was the Duke de Guise saw a great deal of use for spy in the family, and so the Chevalier had been allowed to develop naturally. At least, he'd been told this before he'd been handed a list with places and times. Those marked in black were meetings upon which he was to spy, and those in red were one where he'd report what he'd learned to his family.

Try as he could, he couldn't completely focus on family business. The Prince was mad at his wife, thinking she'd spread the rumor of her confession. Caught between them, he thought it best to allow the Prince some time to calm down, and reconnect with his wife. If the Prince remained stubborn, the Chevalier would then intervene on Rosalind's behalf.

He continued to see her, and was disturbed to find how tense her relationship with her husband had become. Even though he knew making love to her would soothe her, the Prince was so angry even seeing her felt like betraying him. Of the Prince, he had seen little. The man had been sulky and intractable, half the time locking his door and feigning sleep. The Chevalier was desperate to speak with his lover before the chaos of the court's journey to Chambort.

Much to the Duke de Guise's displeasure, the Chevalier informed him he would be unavailable to spy after 10. If he wasn't so useful, there would have been a row. As things were, the Chevalier had been more than cooperative, providing them with critical knowledge, and he was allowed to take the evening off from his duties. The Chevalier spent his first hour sniffing around the Cleves' quarters. The Princess was shut in her room crying, and from the Prince's chambers came an unnatural stillness.

The Chevalier scratched at the door, but his lover decided not to hear him. He scratched a second time before he tried the door, only to find it locked. The Prince was being stubborn, surely he realized the Chevalier would secure his own copy of keys for their apartments. Letting himself in the room, he expected the Prince to say something to him, make some expression of joy or anger.

When he touched his shoulder, the Prince remained limp. For a moment, the Chevalier panicked and scrambled onto the bed, pressing his fingers all over the Prince, searching for signs of life.

"Wretched man, can't you see I don't want you."

At those words the Chevalier began to wail. The Prince was touching him, trying to get his arms around the Chevalier as he crouched over the Prince's prone form. He knew what the Prince wanted, that they not be discovered, so he stuffed his fist in his mouth. There were soothing words coming from the Prince's lips, but he could not understand them over the blood pounding in his ears and the keening that continued in his head.

Something wet touched his cheeks, and it was not his tears. He turned to find the Prince kissing him, tears staining his pink and cream cheeks. Their lips met, and it felt like it had been an eternity since the Prince kissed him like that.

"I'm sorry, it's stupid of me to be jealous of you and my wife. After I instigated the affair, I can hardly be cross if enjoy both her and my company," the Prince murmured as the Chevalier peeled back the covers of the bed to reveal the Prince trembling in his nightshirt. He continued to babble as the Chevalier caressed his thighs, slowly revealing more and more of his velvet skin. Just as the Chevalier's tongue reached out to touch the Prince's sex, the Prince stopped him. "No, please, before you touch me, tell me that you love me, that you forgive me for my jealousy."

"I haven't touched your wife since you quarreled with her. In all honesty, even talking to her feels like a betrayal to you." The Chevalier smiled, and took his lover's hand. "I love you, and forgive you. Now that my family is in power, now that they need me to help them spy, I shall bedeck you with such riches and honors that while you will be a Prince in name, in truth you will be King."

They kissed, wreathing their tongues around one another, feeling the seams of each other's clothing as they pressed their bodies together. "I don't want those things, I just want you. And I don't want to have to share you with that woman either, any of you."

The anger, the need, in the Prince's voice startled the Chevalier. The man he'd first met wasn't capable of such fire, but it seemed the gossip and rumors of court had finally cracked the Prince's sweet and noble spirit. It only made him love the Prince more, and want to protect him. If he put it into Rosalind's head to run off with someone, he and the Prince could live in peace.

The Chevalier made these plans as he made love to the Prince. He took the Prince's sex into his mouth, thrusting it deep into his throat until he gagged and the saliva streamed from his gaping lips. He would feel hoarse tomorrow, and every time he spoke he would think of the Prince's soft moans, his hand clutching the back of the Chevalier's head as he thrust his hips upward. With one hand, the Chevalier stroked his shaft, twisting his fingers as he worked them up and down. The other he used to loosen the Prince's anus, preparing him for the Chevalier's sex. His phallus ached as he thought about Prince in his arms, his cheeks flushed. He thought about the Prince's limp wet sex laying between them, stirring to life as the Chevalier plunged himself into the Prince.

Spurned on by these fantasies, the Chevalier worked his mouth on the Prince with great ferocity, and soon he drinking the Prince's seed, moaning at the feel of the Prince's sex surging in his mouth. It was in the afterglow of an orgasm that the Chevalier liked to take the Prince. He rubbed the tip of his phallus against the Prince's anus, making him twitch. He feebly batted the Chevalier away as he milked the Prince's soft sex, rubbing the drops of dew he coaxed from it on his own sex.

The Prince hissed as the Chevalier slid himself in, slowly, gently, until Prince arched his back so the Chevalier sheathed the full length of his sex inside the Prince. The Prince gripped the Chevalier's hip, coaxing him to a hard and rapid rhythm. The Prince's phallus grew turgid and pressed uncomfortably into the Chevalier. The Prince's head was thrown back, his mouth stretched open in a grotesque contortion.

When he came for the second time, his anus clutched the Chevalier's sex so tightly he gasped in pain. He grunted as he came inside the Prince. The Prince wrapped his arms around the Chevalier, undulating his hips to move the Chevalier inside his body, but the Chevalier only slipped out with a hot wash of his seed. They fell asleep in one another's arms, filthy, exhausted. When they woke from their first sleep, they found they had become stuck together, and it was necessary to conceal their laughter.

* * * *

It would seem the night before the journey to Chambort the entire French court thought of nothing but love. Hearing the Duke had attempted to see his mistress, the Marechal was determined to sneak into her room that night and see how she fared. Now that the Prince and Princess would no longer be leaving for Spain, they would have to alter their plans. If the Marechal could excuse himself from the trip to Chambort, he could focus on his preparations, and they would be ready to leave when the court returned. He would have to ask Rosalind if she would be traveling with her husband.

It was early, 9, and the Marechal was already hiding in the garden, waiting for true dark. At 10 he saw a figure creeping around the hall, most likely the Chevalier. It headed toward the Prince's room after an hour of getting lost in shadows, pausing, watching. The Marechal tapped at her window. Rosalind's face emerged from the blankets, her eyes red and raw. She rushed to open the window.

"What are you doing here?" she asked. "You'll be caught, you must leave. I think I heard the Chevalier earlier."

"I'll only be caught if you leave me standing here." The Marechal quickly jumped up onto the sill and into the room. "Please pardon me for intruding. I heard the Duke had been here today, and I wanted to check on you," he said, taking her hands.

She yanked them away from him and snapped, "I didn't even see him."

"And still, he upsets you. I promise my love, we will leave hear soon." She let the Marechal hold her, and he could feel her tears wetting his shirt.

"I will be going to Colomiers while the Prince attends the King's coronation in Chambort. After that, someone else will conduct Madame Elisa to Spain while I languish at the Louvre. Would it be possible for you to take me away while he is gone?"

"It will be difficult, but for you I will try," the Marechal said, lifting up her chin to kiss her.

"I want you to make love to me, and to tell me about our new house, and our new life."

The Marechal trembled. "Rosalind, you make me the most happy man in the world." Stripping off his clothes, he climbed into her bed. She laid beside him, and he took her from behind, describing their new house, a day in their new life.

"We will sleep as late as we wish, and in the summer when we get up, we will have breakfast outside in the courtyard." He eased himself into her as he spoke, his nostrils filled with the smell of sweat and roses. "There will be fragrant sweet peas and all manner of blooms, and when one blossom fades, another will open. My gardener has promised me, my garden will never be without flowers."

"What will we eat?"

"Why, cream and berries, and a baguette and bowls of hot chocolate. After our meal, if we feel ambitious, we will get dressed." She was arching her back, taking in his full length, one leg raised high. With one hand he kneaded her breast and twisted her nipple. "Then we will go for a ride in our carriage. We will take a picnic basket with us, and eat under an oak tree that stands by the pastures. We will watch the shepherds and shepherdesses tend their flocks and listen to their songs. We will make love in the dappled sunlight."

The Princess clutched his hand to her breast, holding his arms tight around her.

"When we return home, we will send away the servants so that we may play." He felt her sex tighten around him. "I will teach you how to tie knots, and you can bind me and do to me as you will. And some nights, it will be my turn to be your master. I will show you what pleasure there is to be found in pain."

As he whispered those words into her ear, she orgasmed. The Marechal told to her about the textures of different leathers, the glorious freedom one feels when one is released from one's bonds. He told her how he would torment her orifices, how he would first take her from the front, and then from behind. They came together, and then lay in her bed, conspiring.

"I will have a carriage waiting at midnight outside of Colomiers, the night before the courtiers leave to return to Paris. Will you be bringing much with you?"

"No, there's nothing I want from this place. All I want to do is leave," she said.

"Soon, the Louvre, the Prince, the Duke, they will be distant memories, that I promise you. Do you remember where I would leave my notes?"

"Yes, why? I'll only be gone a few days before we leave," she replied.

"In case there is an emergency, that's how we will communicate with one another." He saw the suspicion in her eyes. She must be miserable to be doubting him, his poor love. "I am not lying to you, I will carry you away from this place, it's what I always wanted. From now on, it is too risky for us to see one another. The next time I see you, we will never have to part again."

They talked for a few more hours, their hands idly moving over one another's bodies. They discussed the new wardrobe Rosalind would need for her life in the country. The Marechal watched her as they conversed. She had gone from despair to joy, and it was because of him. He was only able to half focus on their conversation, his heart was so full.