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Blindfolded and dying in the dark she feared so ave Gelina the respect she so richly deserved and listened to every gory detail She was so quiet that Gelina poked her at the end, to be sure she was still conscious

"What do you think, eh? I like the part where I make him eat his own testicles best" She had read that in a book about the Inquisition, and had not yet had the time or subject to try it out herself

"I’hed "For e carpet, Ms Pollock I a to catch your friend and her brother I hope very much that I will be able to play with both of the Gelina had to lean close to hear it It was the Twenty-third Psal of faith that the monks had ed her

"There is no God," she shouted at the dying wo her over and over "Only the valleys of shadows and pain and death Only hell, you stupid bitch, and it is"I know" Blood bubbled up from her split lips "And I am sorry for you"

Gelina ripped off the blindfold "Are you sorry now?" She used her long, sharp nails on Leann’s face and throat, tearing at her like an ani red, she licked the blood from them and spit it in the woman’s ruined face "Noho is sorry? Eh? Who is sorry?"

Leann didn’t answer She only stared at the candle burning next to her head, her eyes wide and grateful, the pupils fixed

Phillipe found Alex in a tourist bar called Midnight Sax in the Quarter, where she was sitting in a dark corner and drinking a bottle of ale On stage a large black wo any attention to her She atching a heavyset man at the table next to her Theheavily

Since his ht Alexandra back to La Fontaine, Phillipe had tried to do what he could to make her comfortable As Cyprien’s seneschal, it was his duty, and Phillipe still felt partially responsible for her situation

He also liked Alexandra She reminded him of his sister, Maere, who had been just as s in her fearlessness Maere had nursed hi the sickness from him, and died a few days after he had risen to ith the Kyn In secret Phillipe had watched her sirave for months after her death, but feoround

Phillipe did not wish to haunt Alexandra’s grave

He walked over and sat down in the empty chair beside her "How is the ale?" he asked in his careful English

Alexandra regarded the bottle in her hand "Corona is beer, Phil And it’s too warm" She looked over at the heavyset man

Phillipe studied the man, too He had bruises on his fists and the set me?" She didn’t wait for him to answer "He wouldn’t chase me himself No, he’d send a flunky to do it Does he think he can tell ht?" she asked the ale bottle "If he does, he’ll be picking those pretty white teeth of his out of the carpeting"

"The master wishes you return" He waited a"Alexandra, please?"

"I heard you Your master can bite e--even Gerood Like hed "Tell uys really been alive since twelve hundred so?"

"Oui"

"You’re really seven hundred years old" She rested her cheek against her fist

"I do not know exact," he told her How did he put into English that he had been a simple peasant, and no one bothered to record the year of his birth? That part of his life existed only in the cycle of the seasons he had spent working in the fields Cyprien was his senior by a handful of years; he could ree where he and his father lived "A little less than the et it, Phil I just fucked a seven-hundred-year-old ed Cyprien’s bed linens He should say soratulations?"

Alexandra looked at hihter s about her did

"Coot up from her seat and held out her hand

He took it and she pulled hied hie "We’re going to dance"

Under the s was slow and sensual, the ret "I do not do this"

"You do tonight" She studied his face "You don’t kno?" He shook his head "It’s easy You hold me"--Alexandra pulled his limp arms around her--"and move me around Come on, you can do it"