I slumped against him, my legs shaking, as he grabbed a condom. I felt the hot fullness of him pressing at me and I knew immediately this was more than just simple sex. He was hard and savage, drawing a cry from me as he hilted himself. I wrapped my arms weakly around his muscled back. This wasn’t about sex. It was about
him,
the white-haired man. I groaned as he pressed me back against the tiles and thrust into me again. Jagor was reclaiming his territory. Fucking the other man out of me: and oh,
God
, I needed him to.
He wrapped one arm around my waist, lifting me, and suddenly with my shoulders against the tiles and his thick forearm tight against my back, my feet came off the floor. I clung to him, snaking my legs around him, wanting him deeper. He started to pump at me, his mouth at my ear. We were both panting like animals now, lost in it. My arms went around his shoulders – whether to slow him down or urge him on, I don’t know – but he dragged my hands from him and pinned them above me with his free hand. His hips slammed my ass against the tiles as he drove into me: stretching me, possessing me, and it felt so damn good I moaned his name into his ear. I felt it building inside me again, out of my control this time, a direct line from the silken friction to my brain. My hands made fists, and then I was suddenly over the edge, the water pounding down over my face as I came in a silent, shocking orgasm that left me reeling and weak in his arms.
The hotel had seen better days, but it was still upmarket enough to offer robes. Jagor lifted me from the shower and wrapped me, still dripping, in white terry softness and carried me to the bed.
“Sleep,” he told me. “You need it.”
Obeying wasn’t difficult, even this early in the evening. My mind and body felt shredded by the past few days and now that the sex and the shower had wiped everything clean, I was pleasantly exhausted.
I was vaguely aware of Jagor leaving and returning with a tray, and of clinks and pouring sounds and the intense silence of concentration. When I awoke from my doze, it was to a smell I’d almost forgotten.
“I think I finally got it right,” said Jagor, indicating a steaming French press. He managed to look proud and a little ashamed at the same time.
I threw my arms around him. It wasn’t that it was important. It was that it was trivial, and he’d tried so hard anyway, just because he knew it would cheer me up.
Everything, I decided, was going to be okay.
There was a noise outside the window – a pounding, hammering sound. At first, I thought it was a pneumatic drill, but it was getting louder, shaking the windows. I frowned at Jagor, and he tweaked the curtains aside, just as puzzled as me.
The French press exploded, boiling water and glass spraying across the room. Something tore into the bed, ripping a long tear in the sheets. Then another and another, shredding the pillows, as the glass in the windows shattered and fell like rain. A pounding metallic roar made it impossible to think. I watched hundreds of holes blossom in the curtains, each one a portal onto a blazing, flickering light.
Jagor screamed something at me, but I couldn’t hear.
The TV in the corner of the room exploded. A trail of destruction was sweeping through the room – first away from me; then back towards me. I realized, in an abstract way, that it would hit me soon.
Jagor slammed into me and rode me to the floor as plaster exploded from the wall behind us. He dragged me to the door and out into the corridor. Behind us, the noise finally ceased; through the shredded curtains, I glimpsed the helicopter moving away.
We heard shouting and gunfire downstairs. We came to a stop looking down into the lobby, as the main doors were kicked open and Asterian soldiers burst in.
I was clinging to Jagor. My legs felt like they were going to collapse. “How did they find us?”
I saw his jaw tighten. “I told the French where we were.”
The world seemed to drop out from under me. Sarik had thought all along that a foreign power was supporting the coup. We’d gone begging for help to the very people behind the whole thing.
The soldiers raced up the stairs, guns leveled at us. We let them lead us downstairs, both of us in a daze. The rebels had already been subdued – four of them lay dead and the rest were standing with their hands on their heads, Dagus among them.
And then, walking in through the splintered, ruined door, we saw him. The white-haired man, dressed in a long belted trench coat and shining boots, as if for a night at the theater. He stopped in front of Jagor.
“Finally,” he said. “I’d meant to have this reunion at the palace.”
Jagor glared at him uncomprehendingly.
“Do you not recognize me?” the white-haired man asked. “Brother?”
Chapter Twenty Four
I saw the emotions pass across Jagor’s face. First confusion – amusement, even. Then I could see the doubt start to creep in. I understood because I was going through the same thing. Looking at the man’s face. Comparing the features. Judging his age. The certainty hit me first, because I’d met him twice before. I knew now why I found him so disturbing; he was another version of Jagor, with everything I loved twisted into something horrific. The other side of the coin.
Jagor was shaking his head. “We found your body.”
“You found pieces of some local farmer’s child. I was spirited away to Russia, by Yuri.” He indicated the Russian. “You remember Yuri, don’t you, Jagor? He was the one who shot you.”
I glanced at Jagor. His face was frozen, back in the horror of his childhood bedroom.
“The men who tried to liberate Asteria from our family all those years ago weren’t just locals. A few of them were outsiders who believed in the cause. They raised me as their own, in Russia. They educated me, Jagor: told me the truth about Asteria and kept me safe until I could claim the throne.”
I understood, now: could see it all in my mind. Some twenty years ago, a small band of men had come up with a plan to murder the royals and claim power in the tiny, poor nation. When it all went wrong, they’d fled the summer residence with Vinko…and then when the palladium mines opened and Asteria became rich, they’d realized their hostage was a potential goldmine. They had decades to twist Vinko’s mind: they raised an heir to the throne who would do their bidding. The greedy Asterian military gave them the muscle and the French provided the money.
“You poisoned him,” Jagor said between gritted teeth. “You tried to kill our father.”
“He was going to hand the throne to you on a silver plate – like everything else in your life. He was going to neuter our military. And the French were getting oh-so-impatient for the palladium: they even supplied the poison.”
I remembered meeting the French politicians in Paris. “W
e were all shocked to hear of the attempt on your father. He is recovering well?”
I could feel the rage and shame soaking through me. I’d thought that I was beginning to understand it all, that we’d been
smart
, calling the French.
“What happens now?” Jagor asked. I could see his fists bunching.
“We take you to the palace, where you can join your beloved mother and father. There will be a public trial – quick and efficient – where the public will learn the truth. Let’s see. How you stole all the riches from the palladium mines and funneled it out of the country—”
“It went to the military!”
“How you callously ordered your older brother killed, so you could claim the throne—”
“That’s not true!”
“Fortunately, I was spirited to safety and have now returned to save our kingdom.”
Somehow, hearing the lies he was going to tell was the worst part of it. Knowing that Vinko was going to rewrite history and wipe out everything good Jagor and his parents had ever done. “No!” Jagor shouted.
“You, the King and Queen will be found guilty of corruption and murder,” Vinko told him. “And executed.”
“You’re going to take the money for yourself!” Jagor yelled. “You’re going to hand the mines to the French and put us back in poverty!”
Vinko grinned: a smile without warmth. “Not all of us,” he told Jagor. “In six months, I, Yuri, the heads of the military and a few other loyal men will be billionaires.” He gazed at me, smirking. “In your American movies, I think this is the part where you tell me I’ll never get away with it.”
I just glared at him. There was nothing to say.
“You,” Vinko told me theatrically, “did
very
well. At first, when the convoy was attacked, I thought there must be a leak. But then I remembered the blonde slave at the club. How very
selfless
of you,” he spoke to me but his eyes were on Jagor, “to display yourself so wantonly to me, just to save your lover.” I glared at Vinko, aware of Jagor bristling with rage.
He stared at me for a moment, pondering. “In fact,” he mused, “I think I’d quite like to see you again,
Exkella.
Won’t you undress for us?”
Jagor snarled and took a step forward. Three soldiers leveled rifles at him. “
Don’t!”
I shouted. Jagor stopped – just.
“Even now, she protects you, brother. Come, then, Exkella: let me see – without the mask, this time.”
He was grinning cruelly. Behind him, his men angled for a better look. He was going to humiliate me, in front of Jagor. Make me cower and plead and beg, and then strip the robe from me regardless. I could feel the fear rising in me; standing there in the cold lobby, their eyes on me, I’d never felt so lost and alone...or so far from home.
And then I remembered what the Queen had said to me, in one of my interminable training sessions. And I knew what I had to do.
I’d been looking at the floor, unable to meet Vinko’s eyes. Now I raised my chin proudly and stared him down. I unbelted the robe – it seemed unimportant, suddenly: irrelevant. There were muffled gasps from both Vinko’s men and the rebel soldiers as I let it fall to the ground and stood there: as a princess.
Vinko glared back at me as he felt his victory snatched from him. I could feel him willing me to lower my eyes again. I didn’t. This pretender, this
traitor
didn’t deserve my respect or my fear.
He looked away, waving for me to put my robe back on, and as I slipped it over my shoulders, a glow of satisfaction pushed back the despair.
“Take him to the palace,” Vinko snapped. Soldiers moved forward to grab Jagor.
“And the rebels?” Yuri asked, indicating the remainder of Alvek’s forces.
Vinko glanced at the men. “Kill them.”
“No!” Jagor shouted. “They’re no threat to you! Take their guns, but—”
“Do as I say,” said Vinko. His soldiers ordered Alvek’s men to their knees. I saw the young Dagus kneeling in disbelief. He gave a forlorn glance in my direction.
“
No!”
I screamed.
There was a deafening burst of gunfire and Alvek’s men were cut down. I stood frozen, my chest heaving, staring at Dagus’ body.
“And what of the Exkella?” Yuri asked.
Vinko stepped close to me and smiled. He brushed a lock of damp hair back off my forehead, enjoying the way I shrank in disgust. “Take her with us. When she’s watched her prince die, I think I’ll take her as my slave.”
***
They made us ride in separate SUVs – each of us in the middle of the back seat, a soldier on either side. They’d allowed us to dress, though it seemed so unimportant, now. I ignored the tanks and troops as we drew closer to the palace; the hastily constructed barricades and checkpoints. All my attention was on the SUV in front, and Jagor. How long, now, before I lost him forever? A day?
Somewhere, in the depths of my mind, the thought of my own future was sending out cold spikes of dread. But however horrific it seemed, however much the idea of life as Vinko’s slave made me want to curl myself into a ball and sob, it seemed like background noise compared to Jagor’s fate. Not because I was some sort of selfless saint: because anything Vinko did to me would come after Jagor was dead. And that meant it wasn’t real to me, because I couldn’t imagine existing without him.
The troops must have been told that the Prince had finally been re-captured, and his Exkella, too. There were whoops and cheers, and a few banged on the roofs of the SUVs as we passed. Many more, though, were standing well back, looking uncertain – maybe conflicted. Alvek had been right: the soldiers were just following orders, any loyalty to Vinko fragile. But right now, that didn’t seem to do us any good: a reluctant soldier is still a soldier, and once Jagor was dead, there’d be no one to sway them.
We were led at gunpoint through the palace, Vinko sweeping along in front in his trench coat. We eventually found ourselves in the same drawing room where I’d met the queen, just after I’d returned to Asteria. The vases lay in jagged pieces on the floor. Someone had slashed all the portraits with a knife, creating ugly, faceless monstrosities. It was the mindless rage of a child: Vinko.
And in the center of it all, sitting with their usual dignity...the King and Queen. The King seemed to have aged another ten years since I’d seen him. The Queen was her usual venomous self, but I could see the fear beneath the icy mask.
“Mother!” said Vinko, as if delighted. “Father! I’ve brought your favorite son and his American
rolkvatch.
Were you aware that she’s been parading herself in a sex club? Hardly behavior suitable for an exkella.”
The Queen stood, shaking off her husband’s restraining hand. “She’s twice the royal you’ll ever be.” If I hadn’t been so scared, I would have been pleased.
Vinko stepped forward and slapped her hard across the face. Jagor leapt forward and it took all my strength to haul him back by the shoulders.
The King stepped in front of his wife as she held her throbbing cheek. “Vinko,” he grated, “these men – the ones who took you – they’ve poisoned your mind. There’s still time to make this right.”