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Antoine de Bellamont sat trembling in the presence of the dark Lord of Roanan. How could plucking one bloom from a rose vine have found him thus?

"And what explanation do you offer for your thievery, man?" The dark Lord's voice angrily boomed, echoing through the grand hall like a violent, threatening storm.

"I . . . I would hardly call it thievery, Milord," Antoine replied. "One bloom from such a rose vine as that on your eastern wall . . . it is merely a trifle."

"You trespassed upon my grounds and stole from me!" the dark Lord roared. "'Tis thievery as the law deems it--plain and simple! And that without reckoning for the trespassing, for which I may take the liberty of killing you!"

"But surely, Milord . . . " Antoine began.

"Silence!" the Lord of Roanan barked.

He watched the man sitting in the shadows before him. Enormous in stature, the dark Lord's size alone was enough to intimidate. Yet, add the angry voice and a character apparently void of any compassion, and the Lord of Roanan was no less than terrifying. Antoine wished for a moment he could see the man's face more clearly. Similar intimidation he had never known. Even for his trade as a merchant, he had not known such a threatening presence as now sat before him, half hidden in shadow. Still, in the next moment, Antoine de Bellamont was grateful he could not make out the man's countenance--his features. Better to leave the devil's face a mystery.

"I asked for an explanation and you have given me none. Only feeble excuses," the dark Lord said. "What explanation do you offer, thief? I ask this for the last time, so speak the truth. I will know if you are in earnest . . . or a liar as well as a thief."

Again, Antoine swallowed hard. He reached up with one trembling hand to brush a lock of silver hair from his forehead. Perhaps the truth would set him free.

"I am a merchant, Milord. Antoine de Bellamont, from one day's ride south of here, in the port town of Bostchelan," he began. "Do you know it?"

"Of course I know it, you imbecile!" the dark Lord growled.

"Forgive me, of course, Sire," Antoine continued. "A merchant I am. However, I have been informed just this morning by messenger, that my ships, all three, have been pirated. All cargo aboard lost as well."

"Pirated," the dark Lord mumbled. "Thieves . . . such as yourself."

"No, Sire, please. Only wait," Antoine pleaded. "I am penniless, destitute and must now return to Bostchelan to my four daughters . . . all of whom will now suffer in great impoverishment."

"What has this to do with your own thievery? What has this to do with my rose?" the dark Lord demanded.

"I am returning to my daughters, Milord," Antoine explained. "Of the four, three are quite spoiled, I am reluctant to admit. I have pampered them, given them anything they required or desired."

"Then you prove yourself an imbecile as well as an appalling parent," the Lord of Roanan said.

Antoine nodded, though he was loath to agree with the angry man. Antoine knew himself to be a good parent. Hadn't he given his daughters everything they had ever desired? What made a good parent if not that? He suspected such a cruel man, as sat cloaked in shadow before him, had no children. What would such a dark Lord know of parenting? Still, he was fearful, and agree he must. And yet, a vision of Coquette entered his mind then--Coquette who asked for nothing, expected nothing. Coquette, for whom Antoine had plucked the fateful rose.

He continued his explanation, gazing with pleading eyes into the shadows hiding the man's face, "Yet, there is one daughter, my little Coquette . . . she is unlike her sisters. When I asked her what I might bring back for her from my travels to Roanan . . . she asked only for a flower--a rose, that she might gaze upon its beauty in remembrance of her dead mother."

"How touching," the dark Lord growled. "I see you put the little one on the same path as the others . . . the road to ruination by way of spoiling her."

"No," Antoine said. "Coquette is not little. I only call her "little" because she is so very precious to me. Coquette is this month twenty and one."

"Twenty and one and begging for a flower?" the dark Lord mumbled. "Is she malformed? Why has she not wed? Why have none of your daughters yet wed? Me thinks were they wed, your destitution would not matter so much and your thievery may have been avoided."

"My daughters, all four, are very beautiful, my Lord . . . Coquette most of all," Antoine explained. "But, I fear I have found no suitor worthy of any of them, particularly Coquette."

The dark Lord was silent. Antoine hoped pity for his daughters would keep the man from exacting any punishment for the stolen rose.

"A sad, emotive story indeed, merchant," he said at last.

Antoine smiled, relieved. He felt hope rising--hope of being released, of avoidance of peril.

In the next moment, however, the dark Lord stood, drew his sword and slammed it down on the table between them. Antoine gasped, startled and terrified.

"I am not without compassion," the Lord of Roanan growled. "Therefore, I will give you your own choice. Do you know the laws of Roanan pertaining to thievery?" he asked.

Antoine swallowed, the beaded perspiration on his brow beginning to trickle over his temples. Indeed, he knew the laws.

"Amputation, Milord. Amputation of . . . of the hands," he stammered. Pain pinched at his wrists as he looked at the steel blade drawn before him."

"That is correct, merchant," the dark Lord said. "I may cut off your hands for stealing from me. Here and now, without pause, I may do it and the law would not question."

"Please Milord!" Antoine began, panic rising in him like a killing fire. "Please! How . . . how would I provide for my daughters? How would I live without my hands?"

"Where were these thoughts before you stole from me, thief?" the Lord of Roanan asked.

"Please, Sire, please," Antoine begged, trembling as he watched the man lift his blade. "You . . . you spoke of a choice. You . . . you said you would give me my own choice. What choice did you speak of?"

Sword yet in hand, the dark Lord turned his wrist this way and that, the sword, the glint of the steel catching the dim light. "It is very sharp. An excellent weapon. The cut will be swift and clean, I assure you," he said.

Antoine gulped, terror and fear, as he had never imagined, rising in him! "What choice do you speak of, Milord? Please! I beg your mercy!"

He heard the dark Lord inhale deeply, releasing the breath in one long, slow exhale.

"Your hands, or your daughter . . . the one you favor . . . the good one, the unspoiled one. What did you call her?" the dark Lord asked.

"Coquette," Antoine whispered.

"Yes, that was it. The only daughter who will not care you are destitute, merchant. The daughter for whom you stole from me. I will take her hand in marriage instead of yours from your arm here at my table. I will wed her, for I am in need of an heir. I will even restore your trade to you. Three ships? Is that what the pirates took from you? Then I will give you three ships and this as well."

Antoine's eyes widened as the dark Lord pulled a black velvet purse from his coat pocket and tossed it on the table. The sound of the purse landing on the table, echoed through the grand hall, and Antoine knew it held a great sum.

"Seventy gold pieces, merchant. Payment for you daughter," the dark Lord said. "Or, I can take your hands." A triumphant chuckle emanated from within the shadows as the Lord of Roanan continued, "But I am not a monster. Thus, the choice is yours. I will cut off only one of your hands here and now--whichever one you choose and you may seek the aid of the physician in Roanan. I will have you brought to him as soon as the deed is done, in fact. You will surely survive and be able to continue to provide for your daughters--perhaps not in the manner to which they have become accustomed, but provide for them you may all the same. Or . . . you can give me something in return for the thing you stole from me . . . your daughter."

"You . . . you would leave me both hands and restore my ships and trade?" Antoine asked. Perhaps it was good fortune, not bad which led him to pluck the rose.

"In return for your favorite daughter as wife," the dark Lord growled.

"Still, Coquette," Antoine stammered. "She . . . she has done nothing to deserve such . . . "

"No. She has not," the Lord of Roanan confirmed. "And yet, you consider it, do you not, merchant?"

Antoine moistened his lips as he gazed at the velvet purse on the table before him. He must have his hands, both of them! Such a deformity was surely not comely, not to mention the pain of amputation. Further, however would he provide necessity for his daughters without one or the other? And how would he provide necessity for them without his ships? Surely he could not be expected to kneel to hard labor to provide for them. Even yet, hard labor would not provide for their extravagances.

"Still . . . she is my daughter," Antoine whispered, reaching for the purse.

He startled and yelped as the sharp blade of the dark Lord's sword bit into the table near his hand.

"Make your choice, merchant, for my patience is wearing far thin," the dark Lord growled.

Antoine moistened his lips again. It was not a hard choice to make. Coquette, angel that she was, would never be happy knowing her sisters were not. His ship and trade restored! Why, with 70 gold pieces he could return to Bostchelan a wealthy man and fill the list his daughters had given him--all but Coquette's request.

"What of the rose, Milord?" Antoine asked then. "May I . . . may I retain it and present it to Coquette if I choose to give her over to you?"

There was silence as the dark Lord seemed to consider his request. "Yes," he growled.

"And you will treat her well?" Antoine asked. He would not have Coquette treated poorly. At least, not too poorly.

"No," the Lord of Roanan answered. "I am the Lord of Roanan! I will take from her what I will when I will! She will serve me as I deem she should!"

"But she is kind, Milord. Her spirit as beautiful as her image. I . . . I . . . " Antoine stammered, still staring at the purse on the table.

"However," the dark Lord interrupted. "She shall want for nothing. Any possession she desires, she shall have. This I can promise you."

Antoine grinned. Triumph! His ships and trade restored, his hands still attached to his person. There was no question! He knew the choice Coquette would want him to make. At least, that is what he whispered to his conscience.

"Agreed," Antoine said. "I will keep my hand that I may provide for the three daughters left to me. You have promised to provide for my fourth, and though I am loath to give her over to you, it is the only choice before me."

"Is it?" the dark Lord mumbled.

"But of course!" Antoine exclaimed. Oh, how relieved he was! "One daughter that I may keep my hand and provide for the other three?"

"I warn you," the dark Lord began, his voice low and resolute, "I will have an heir . . . no matter what manner of treatment it may cost her. And once my heir is born, I will put her off as I would an old dog."

"But Coquette is strong my Lord," Antoine explained. "The strongest and bravest of my four daughters. She can stand whatever treatment of her you see fit to find your end means."

The dark Lord of Roanan was silent for a time--such a time that Antoine feared he had only been in jest, feared he did not truly intend to restore his trade and ships to him.

"Bostchelan is one day's ride from Roanan," the dark Lord said at last. "If your daughter is not here by the sun's set the day after next . . . then I will ride to Bostchelan myself, cut off your hand and you shall have no ships, nor trade."

"Agreed," Antoine said, fairly leaping to his feet. He moistened his lips once more, nodding toward the purse on the table. "And the purse, Milord?"

"Take the damned purse, merchant!" the Lord of Roanan roared. "And watch the port at Bostchelan for three ships to come to you."

Antoine reached out and gathered the purse into his hands. Carefully, eyes wide with excitement, he placed it in the pocket of his breeches.

"Thank you, Lord of Roanan . . . for your mercy," Antoine said, bowing low.

"Thank your daughter for my mercy, you coward!" the dark Lord shouted. "Be gone! Be gone, before I change my mind and run you through before me!"

"Yes, at once, Milord," Antoine said.

He turned, fleeing from the great hall of Roanan Manor House. As he fled, he smiled. What luck! Surely such luck was not so simply applied! His ships returned! Seventy gold pieces in his pocket!

"Merchant!" the dark Lord shouted.

Antoine stopped. He considered his chances of escaping through the open doors before him. Yet, they were still twenty or more feet in advance. Two guards stood before them as well. He could not escape and thus, he turned.

"Yes, Milord?" he choked.

"The rose," the dark Lord said. "The purse you have, but you have neglected the rose."

"The rose?" Antoine asked.

"Godfrey," the dark Lord ordered. "Give the fool his damnable rose!"

Another man stepped from the shadows. Antoine had not noticed this man before and surmised he must have been standing near to the Lord or Roanan the length of the ordeal.

The man, older yet robust in appearance, lifted the rose from its resting place on the table. In his excitement over the purse of gold pieces, Antoine had completely forgotten the presence of the rose.

With the regiment, rhythm and timing of one of the king's soldiers, the man named Godfrey strode to Antoine. He stopped short before him, clicking his heels together and extending his hand with the rose.

"I thank you," Antoine said. "Remember, merchant," the dark Lord called as Antoine hurried for the open doors and freedom, "by the sun's set day after next--she will be here or I will come for you."