Lair of the Lion

Every muscle in her body clenched, waiting.
    Sarina sighed softly, her shoulders slumping in defeat. She looked her age, thin and worn. "Forgive me, Isabella. I've grown so fond of you. I shouldn't have been so willing to risk your life for our sakes. None of us should have." She hung her head. "That first night, the night you arrived, do you remember the scream you heard, when the lions roared?"
    Isabella turned away from the housekeeper, a shiver running down her spine. She had wanted to know. From the very first night she had wanted to know what had happened.

    Now she wasn't so certain. She backed away from Sarina.
    "Nicolai had a meeting with his most trusted men, Sergio Drannacia, Rolando Bartolmei, Betto, and another man named Guido."
    Isabella took another step back, shaking her head.
    "You have to know," Sarina insisted tiredly. "You need to know. Nicolai loved Guido and trusted him as he does his captains. They were all boyhood friends. There was a terrible argument that night. Guido wanted Nicolai to send you away. Nicolai refused. No one really knows what happened—no one knows whether it was Nicolai or another lion that killed him—but Guido was torn to shreds. It was strange, the argument. They had never raised their voices at one another, they had never said cruel things, but that night Guido did." Sarina sighed softly. "Betto was very upset at what was said. He told me he hardly recognized Guido. Guido fancied himself a ladies' man, and he often was indiscreet with the maids, but he wasn't a man who raised his voice. Everyone ended up shouting at one another. Nicolai told Guido to go take a walk. The last anyone saw that night of Nicolai, he was walking away from the palazzo. The next time Betto saw him, he was standing over Guido's dead body, blood all over him. He looked a lion, with his great, shaggy mane, but it was Nicolai. To us, he is unmistakable."
    Isabella twisted her fingers together behind her back to keep from trembling in front of the housekeeper. She could feel her heart pounding in alarm. She couldn't move, couldn't breathe.
    Sarina rushed to comfort her, but Isabella shook her head and turned away, desperately trying to compose herself. She thought of Nicolai, his gentle touch, his smile. His eyes.
    How utterly alone he was in his castello of twisted legends. She knew what isolation did to the soul.
    Isabella lifted her chin as she turned back to the housekeeper. "I am mistress of my own fate, Sarina. I entered into the bargain willingly. If I should change my mind, I'm certain Don DeMarco would allow me to leave. I'm no prisoner, no sacrifice."
    "You're trapped here now. There's no way for you to leave," Sarina said sadly.
    Isabella waited in stillness while her heart pounded out a rhythm of fear. Nicolai had grown from that beautiful child who brought joy to his people, to a powerful, dangerous man of mystery, one with a sinful smile and a promise of erotic ecstasy in his gleaming eyes. Her heart trapped her in the valley, her fidelity to a man who had been willing to bargain for the life of a stranger. She kept her promises. Her word of honor was her life.
    She wouldn't believe that anything else kept her there—that way lay disaster. She was mistress of her own fate.
    "Nicolai won't harm me, Sarina," she said firmly. Her heart believed it was true, but her mind was stubborn, remembering the needlelike claws puncturing her skin. For one terrible moment the wounds burned and throbbed as a reminder. Had Nicolai killed his friend? A man who had trusted and served him? Was that possible?
    Sarina went to the wardrobe. "If you're to meet him for your morning tea, you must hurry and dress. Something beautiful, Isabella, to give you courage." She flung open the doors to the wardrobe and cried out, the sound escaping before she could stop it.
    "What is it?" Isabella pulled her robe tightly around her and crossed the room to stare in horror at the floor of her wardrobe.
    Captain Bartolmei's coat was lying there, shredded almost beyond recognition. Great, rending tears in the material made the coat nearly unrecognizable as anything other than scraps. There were claw marks on the floor of the wardrobe, great gouges, deep and angry, scoring the wood for all time. Beside the tattered remains of the coat lay the gown Isabella had been wearing the previous evening. It, too, was in ribbons, the remnants of the material mixed with the shreds of Captain Bartolmei's coat.
    "Isabella." Sarina