But with a smile he pulled her gown apart and slipped it off her shoulders and down her back to the floor. A glance down his body told her that he wanted her now. The sight thrilled her, but she still felt uneasy and not able to give herself wholeheartedly to him and to the act of love. "Let us attend to the grime," she said with a small smile. In the next room, its walls tiled in white, she lay in a round sunken tub filled with hot water piped in from the castle kitchen. It was large enough for Daoud to stand over her in it. He took over the task of washing her with scented soap imported from Spain. At first she simply lay back and enjoyed her renewed acquaintance with the amenities of Manfred's kingdom, so much more like Constantinople than life in the Papal States had been. But as the hot water relaxed her and as Daoud's hands, slippery with soap, slid over her skin, she felt the rising warmth of desire. Nothing mattered but this moment. She wriggled her legs and hips against him in small, almost unwilled movements. "The grime first," he said with a soft laugh, and continued methodically to soap her until she was mad with wanting him. He picked her up in his arms and carried her into the next room, its tiles the red-orange of sunset, which was taken up by a great pool of very hot water. Usually this chamber would be occupied by anywhere from six to a dozen men or women. But tonight Sophia and Daoud were quite alone. Still carrying her, he descended the steps into the hot pool. Ribbons of steam rose around them. He lowered her into the water. When she stood neck-deep in it, the heat was almost unbearable, as if she were about to be boiled to death. But then the heat soaked into her until her very bones felt liquefied. Her whole being melted until she was not a person who felt desire, she _was_ desire itself. With her arms around his neck she pulled his head down and kissed him, flicks of her tongue tip luring his tongue into her mouth. He pressed her back against the warm tile wall, and she knotted her legs around his waist as he took her standing up. Moments later her ecstatic cries were echoing through the bathing rooms. They forgot about time. Her voice rang again and again in the vaulted chamber. They made love in the hot water and then lying on linen cloths on the masseur's slab beside the pool. They nearly fell asleep in each other's arms. Laughing at their bodies' foolishness, they plunged into the last pool, cold water in a blue-tiled room, then hurried through a door to the place where they had started and dressed again. When they were back in their room, Daoud's voice was drowsy as he lay beside her on the gold-curtained bed. "You must have bypassed Rome when you came down, with the Count of Anjou and Simon de Gobignon both there," he said.