“Now, then,” Peter says companionably, turning his gray hawk’s eyes on me. The sunlight slanting through them brings out the hidden honey in their depths. “What’s been preying on your mind, bee?”
I pause, hesitating for a moment. Whatever his intentions toward me, Peter has known me since we were babes; our mothers are dear friends, and we were born within days of each other, my mother going into labor just hours after having safely delivered him. We are both eldest, reared together, washed in the same basin and swapped freely between our mothers’ breasts, sharing the same milk.
No one knows my soul quite as he does.
“I delivered the Countess Báthory’s son from death, and now she’s set her sights on me,” I say, all in a rush. “She wants me as her chambermaid, but my father will not let her have me for the sum she’s willing to pay. And I think—I know—she will not merely let me be. Between them, I fear they’ll tear me in two.”
Peter recoils a little, lips parting with surprise. “The countess’s son?” he says carefully. “Maybe you’d better tell me how all this trouble found you.”
I spill the entire strange tale to him, words tumbling over each other, sped along by a healthy wash of wine. I swear him to secrecy when I explain Gabor, though I know Peter would sooner die than betray my trust even without such prompting. Finally, I come to this morning, Janos’s glowering shadow at our door, the quiet ruthlessness of his insistence.
“He frightens me, Peter,” I finish, wrapping my goose-bumped arms around myself. “Or she does, I suppose. Something has me badly out of sorts, at any rate.”
“But does she frighten you?” he asks, dark eyebrows lifting. “Does she, really? It sounds to me as though you rather liked her.”
“I—I did, I suppose,” I falter, unsure why I cannot meet his eyes. “But even so. Mama needs me more than ever, with the boys so hard to manage. Honestly, sometimes I fear Father would let Klara starve if I were not there to sneak her my scraps. I’m afraid to go, even if it would mean more coin than we’ve ever had; more likely than not, he’d line his gullet with it anyway. But I cannot see how to slip loose of her.”
“I can,” he responds, and there’s something determined in his voice that draws my startled gaze. “I had hoped to do this later, properly, when I had everything ready, but . . .” He ducks his head at this, jaw working as he struggles to master himself. My heart plummets in anticipation, falling like a stone. “But you need me now, not perfection later. So wed me, Anna. The lady couldn’t force you to come, were you a married woman. Becoming my wife would keep you safe from her.”
I blink rapidly, a prickly tangle of shock and dismay writhing inside me, for all that I dreaded this was coming. I can feel myself blush furiously, the hot scarlet splotch of it stealing up my neck. “So it’s true, then,” I manage through clenched teeth. “What the entire village has been twittering about for weeks. It seems you’ve seen fit to share your intentions with everyone but me, Peti. I would have expected better of my best friend.”
He winces sharply at the remonstration, averting his eyes. “For that, I’m sorry,” he says, low. “You should not have heard it from anyone else. But that was my mother’s doing, not mine. I implored her to keep silent, but you know how hopeless she is when she’s excited.”
The notion that his ebullient mother would thrill at our betrothal, though I am daughter of the village drunk, warms me despite myself. “Even so. That is hardly the point. We’re friends, Peti. Don’t you think you should have asked me first?”
“Just listen, bee,” he plows onward, his gray gaze slicing back earnestly to me. “Let me finish, now that we’re already here. If we were wed, your family would be mine as well. There would be coin, food enough for feasts, plenty of everything. No need for you to worry ever again.”
“But your father hates me,” I protest weakly, though I’m aware that it is not me his father despises. “And I have no dowry to offer.”
“Why would I need a dowry, when I could have you?” he scoffs softly, a corner of his mouth curling. “And you know well enough that Apu hates Istvan, not you. Never you. He simply cannot abide a drunk, not as often as he serves them. Though I have yet to see him turn one with coin away.”
“And what of love, Peter?” I ask so softly it’s barely above a breath. “What of your heart? Or mine?”
“I cannot speak to yours, Anna, though I badly wish I could.” He reaches for my hand, slides his warm, callused fingers through mine in a strong grip. I can see his relief when I don’t pull away. “But I have loved you since I knew my own name. There’s been no one else, no one that could matter as you do. Would that be enough for you, do you think? At least, to begin?”
Though I’ve averted my eyes whenever I could, it is no secret to me that Peter has long yearned for more than just our deep and abiding friendship. While he has been content to hope and wait for me, never so much as letting an embrace linger too long, I could not have missed the desire brewing in him—without ever sensing so much as an answering flicker of the same within myself. Now I consider it again, chewing on the inside of my cheek. Peter is more than handsome enough, strong-backed and tall, with a dark tousle of hair, clear-cut features, and those spectacular predator’s eyes, incongruous in their gentleness. Certainly he turns enough heads in our village, and likely the ones beyond as well—though I cannot say I have ever wanted to steal his kiss and mingle my breath with his. I have never wanted that from any of the boys who strut about our village with their fuzz-patched faces and cracking voices, playing at being grown.
But he is the only man with whom I’ve ever felt safe. I would not fear sleeping next to him, nor wake with my hands fisted to protect my face. And he does not look upon me as others do, covetous of my charms while balking at my full measure.
And yet, my insides still churn with rebellion. To wed Peter is to belong to him, for all that he would prize me, never to lift a finger to me in anger. And I don’t want the gilded cage of such a love, not from him or anyone.
But maybe this time, I can’t afford to refuse it.
“I know honeybees have wings, Anna, if that’s what you fear,” he says, interpreting my hesitation with startling accuracy. “Know that I would never strive to curb you.”
“I know you wouldn’t,” I say, squeezing his hand, pressing down the sadness that swells up at the flare of hope in his eyes. “It’s such a kind offer, Peti. More than I deserve.”
He shakes his head, wry now. “‘Kind’ is not exactly the answer I was hoping for.”
“Tell me—is this truly what you want between us?” I peer closely at him, hoping to uncover at least the hint of a doubt that mirrors the legion of my own. “Are you absolutely sure?”
“Of course it’s what I want,” he replies, vehement. “I’ve thought of it for years, yearned for us to be even more than we were. Nothing could please me more than to call you my wife.”
“Then let me think on it. But before I do, tell me something else. Will you . . .” I pause, uncharacteristically bashful, uncertain how to articulate my fear.