Inamorata by Megan Chance Page A

mean?”
    “I have done this before. So many times. Before him, there was a musician. He was just the same. He had a great deal of talent, but he was penning songs for school children. I took him up. I was his muse, his inspiration. His new compositions were well received by the church, published in psalters, and for a time, he was very famous indeed. And quite rich.”
    “He must have been glad,” I said.
    “For the money?” she asked.
    “For fame,” I said, unable to keep the envy from my voice. “People knew his name. They remembered him.”
    She looked at me, and I saw something in those black eyes, a piqued interest. “You wish that for yourself?”
    “To not die in obscurity? Yes, of course. Who does not wish to leave a mark on the world?”
    Her gaze slid away. “Ah.”
    I didn’t know what I’d expected from her, but her response disappointed. I felt I’d lost her attention, and I wanted nothing more than to call it back. “What happened to him? The composer?”
    “His songs have fallen out of favor. He has not had the influence I thought he should.” She leaned close again. “I think I do not have the eye. Do you think you could do better, given the chance?”
    “Me?” I laughed. “I hardly know.”
    Her words lingered throughout the nights that followed. I had been enraptured and ensorceled. Madeleine had shown me how small was the world I’d lived in. She had shown me how much more there was, how much to be had.
    What do you most desire, Odilé?
    Even as I stood on my Venetian balcony and smelled Venice, it was Paris that was in my head. Paris, and Madeleine. I thought of everything she had given me, the years as I had known them, but I no longer felt a sense of wonder. Only exhaustion. There were times, like now, when the curse of my nature overwhelmed everything. It was too late in the cycle for joy. My hunger cramped, squeezing tight and painfully. Time was running out. Somewhere in this city must be the man who could inspire a world. Somewhere. And if I did not find him—
    Barcelona flashed through my mind. A vision of waking from a nightmare only to discover that it was no nightmare at all, but real. Real and terrible, and I was nothing but darkness writhing, a vortex of need, and him standing in the doorway, haloed with sunlight, a look of horror on his face, the monster I had become reflected in his gaze. . . .
    I closed my eyes, forcing the memory away. He was not even here. He had not found me. I had days yet to make a choice without fear of his intervention. He could not destroy me, but what he could do, what he could force me to become. . . .
    Another stab of pain, worse this time. Enough of memories; it was time to hunt. Usually I liked the Rialto—it was one of the busiest places in Venice, and I never failed to find someone there—if not true and lasting talent, then at least someone to ease my hunger for a time. But today I had something else in mind. I remembered the faint strains of music I’d heard coming from a church last week, sweet and alluring. The sound of possibility.
    I called for Antonio to ready the gondola, and I was just stepping into the boat when he said, “He is dead, padrona .”
    For a moment I had no idea whom he was speaking of. I’d already forgotten the writer, you see.
    “Signor Stafford,” Antonio said.
    “Oh. How do you know this?”
    “He was found in his courtyard.”
    Gossip in Venice never lacked speed. The gondoliers knew everything nearly the moment it happened.
    Antonio made a slicing motion across his wrist. “Suicide.”
    Another one. I did not have to manufacture my dismay or my sorrow. I had not wanted this. I never did. I thought of the poet as I’d seen him last, collapsed on the floor. The tears in his eyes when he realized I was banishing him. My appetite surged at the memory. Antonio put his hand suddenly to his heart, frowning—and I felt a rush of nourishment and remembered with a start his gondolier’s songs. A