The Twelve Kingdoms (12 page)

I
ce clawed at my heart. Warning me of trouble to come.
Too thin-skinned.
“To what do you refer?” My voice came out as cold as my foreboding.

“Why do you let him brutalize you?”

The shock hit me in the gut, taking my breath for a moment. Blindly I stared at the fire, willing it to chase away the discomforting chill. I poured more wine and took a deep drink from my goblet, willing it to dull the pain of humiliation. Willing him to shut up already.

“Am I supposed to ignore it, like everyone else? Collude to make it appear you earned this injury in honest combat instead of—”

“Instead of what, exactly?” I cut him off, unable to bear any more. “You are an outsider. You know nothing of our ways.”

“Your ways? You're quick to criticize Dasnaria, and then you defend this. You wish me to agree that it's simply a different custom for a father to blacken his daughter's eye?”

“For a king to discipline his heir,” I corrected, my chest unbearably tight. The wine did nothing to loosen it. “To teach me to get back up again.”

“If you believed that, you wouldn't have tried to conceal it.”

“It's time for you to leave, Captain.” I reached to pour myself more wine, but he startled me by taking the goblet from my hands, seizing them in his own and dropping to his knees before my chair.

“Ursula.” He tightened his grip, leaning his weight in and pinning my legs to the chair when I would have moved to tear away. “Look me in the eye and tell me why you let him do it.”

Because he's my father. Because it's my duty. Because if I question him, then I will be forced to question everything.
The foundation of my world would come crashing down and I didn't think I could survive that. The sound of teacups smashing filled my brain and I couldn't make any of the words come out over the din.

“It's not right, Ursula,” he said, the quiet tone cutting through the jangling noise. “You know it's not right. I saw how it hurt your heart as much as your body. It cut me to the core.”

“Let me go.”

“I want to help.”

“I don't want help, mercenary.”

Instead of flinching, he smiled. “But it's in my contract.”

“Not against the High King.”

“Against all threats. Not because it's in the contract. Because I want to.”

“My father is not a—What are you doing?”

“Your hands are cold. I'm warming them.”

He curled his fingers around my hands, stroking my palms. Shivers of warmth traveled up from his touch, thawing me where the wine hadn't.

“Well . . . don't.”

“What are you afraid of, Ursula?”

“You yourself called me fearless.” Which wasn't true. My fears hounded me, baying that everything I believed might be a lie. Fear that sickened.

“Then why are you afraid of my touch? If you won't talk to me, let me comfort you, at least.”

“I'm not afraid of you.”

“Am I repugnant to you? You don't have a lover, according to Lady Mailloux. You're not promised to anyone, and you yourself said your virtue is not an issue.” He lowered his head and, turning my hand, pressed a kiss to my palm.

I gaped at him, struggling to assimilate this shift in the world, the fiery sensations traveling to my heart, my groin. Thawing deep cells long since frozen over. This had never happened to me. I had no training, no skills, to counter it. The romantic posturings of my barely enthused suitors had been easy to ignore, to snip off neatly and early. Not so this visceral attack that no doubt penetrated because my defenses had fallen so low. “Are you trying to seduce me, Captain?”

He smiled, sensual and slow, then pressed a longer, lingering kiss to my palm. “How am I doing?”

“I—I have no idea. I don't think anyone's ever tried before.” I'd never let anyone get this far. Why him? Why now? And with so much else tearing at me.

“And you scoffed at the Dasnarian women. What are your men thinking?”

A dozen overheard jokes and bawdy songs flew through my head. None that I cared to repeat, though surely he'd heard them. Harlan's hot mouth traveled up my index finger, pressing a kiss to the tip, and the words melted away.

“I love that you have sword calluses,” he murmured, dark voice buzzing over my skin. “I have this idea of how your hands would feel on me, strong and soft, rough and caressing, all at once.” He drew my finger into his mouth and the fire became lightning. Heat ran over me in waves and I suddenly seemed to be out of breath.

Unable to pull my thoughts together, I drifted on the furling flames that licked through me. This, then, was what it felt like, that drove everyone so. I'd been forever outside, looking in the window through a thick pane of glass and not understanding. I'd seen people eating at the banquet table but hadn't smelled the food or tasted it. Now the glass had shattered and I found myself starving.

For what I couldn't have. Would never have.

“I can't possibly do this.” Though I said the words, I couldn't pull my hands away from the stirring sensations his mouth awoke in me. He'd worked his way to my pinky finger and nipped the tip with his teeth, so I gasped, my core clenching. Only hands, and yet... “I mean it. Stop this.”

With a show of reluctance, he lifted his head, still holding my hands, rubbing my palms with his thumbs, a deeper echo of his kisses. “I think it's not me. Do you prefer women?”

I wished I did. It would be so satisfying to say so. And yet, I couldn't quite make the lie come out. I also couldn't tell him the truth.

“What's wrong?”

I shook my head, unable to find words. “I don't . . . I don't
do
this.”

“Why not?”

“It's not who I am.” It didn't matter that I was broken, so deeply flawed. I yanked my hands from his grip and pushed him away, easily extracting myself, as I could have at any moment, had I had the wit to make the effort. My head swam. Too much wine.

“You're a woman who finds me attractive. I'm a man who wants you. Uorsin has his lovers. You can, too. Your right as much as his.” He leaned in, put a hand on my knee, hot through my silk court gown. “It's not more complicated than that.”

“I don't have the luxury of taking lovers.”

“I won't get in your way. Our goals are aligned. Protect the High Throne of the Twelve Kingdoms.”

“Only you're paid to do it.”

“Thus you know exactly where I stand.”

“Is this part of the service you provide—did you pleasure the other princesses?” The anger flared in me and I stood, pacing a safe distance away from his seductive touch. “Were they locked away by their daddies and thrilled to have a hot man between their virgin thighs?”

He didn't pursue, didn't show any sign of being bothered by my slicing remarks. Instead he shifted to sit, back against the chair and one knee drawn up, massive thighs flexing. “Is that who you are, Ursula?”

I laughed and it came out harsh. “Don't be ridiculous. Just because I eschew lovers doesn't make me some blushing virgin. I simply have better things to do.”

“Do you? Like anesthetizing yourself with wine and working your body to exhaustion just to get a little sleep?” His pale eyes stayed on me, clear and calm; he never raised his voice, but he tested my guard with those taunting feints. “You keep your head down and lock yourself in your lonely chambers, pretending that you're not as much your father's prisoner as any of those princesses you so detest?”

“You know nothing about me. I don't need rescuing and I've already asked you to leave once.”

He didn't move. “I know more about you than you want me to, which is the problem. You trembled when I touched you, heating willingly to my hand; thus, I know you want me. You wear the bruise on your face that your father dealt you and pretend to me and the world that it's not so. You tell lies to yourself and you expect me to believe them, too. I don't. You think it's your job to protect everyone else. Perhaps you should consider protecting yourself.”

I tapped the hilt of the sword I still wore, the topaz smooth and warm. “This is my protection.”

“Only if you use it,” he retorted. “If you won't take care of yourself, then it falls to me.” He tipped his head toward my desk. “Contract.”

Wrapping my hand around the hilt, I pulled the sword an inch, feeling more balanced with it in my grip. “Time for you to leave, mercenary.”

“Will you draw on me?” He didn't drop his voice, but it still somehow grew deadly quiet.

“If necessary.”

“You won't admit me to your bed or meet me on the practice ground in an honest match, but you'd have me believe you'd draw your sword, knowing me to be unarmed. Your honor won't let you.”

“You don't have much room to call me on questions of honor, mercenary, since yours is available to the highest bidder.”

“I imagine you think that if you keep saying such things, you can convince yourself you don't want me as much as I want you.”

My temple throbbed and I pressed a finger to it, wishing I hadn't drunk so much wine.
Anesthetizing yourself.
That was the only reason I let things go this far. “I apologize if I gave you the wrong impression, Captain. But I'm truly not interested. There are a very many good reasons I don't take lovers. The first and foremost is I can't possibly compromise the High Throne. I look to Danu, and many of her priestesses are celibate.”

“Yet you've taken no such sacred vow.”

“I can't. I would have.” Kaedrin would have sponsored me. Hoped to salve my hurts that way. Not long after she suggested it, Uorsin had declared Glorianna's temple supreme and all Danu's priestesses—including Kaedrin—unwelcome in Ordnung. I followed Danu's teachings in my heart, where it wouldn't offend him. He accepted her as a patron of warriors, at least. “But there is always the possibility that I will need to marry, to serve the High Throne and the Twelve Kingdoms. I won't be foresworn to my goddess, so I am celibate in practice only.” I let out a long breath, rolled my head on my shoulders. That was mostly true. Close enough to serve as the truth. I would never marry.

“Come and sit.” Harlan patted the floor between his spread knees. “Let me rub your neck at least. Relieve your headache.”

“I'm fine. It's late and you should leave.”

“Afraid to let me touch you again?”

Yes. My starving body still throbbed, full of yearning to sate myself at the banquet table. A feast that had always been easy to ignore until now. He'd awakened a hunger I hadn't known I was capable of, one I needed to lock away again.

“You could probably break my neck with your bare hands.”

“But I won't. If you won't let me be your lover, let me be your friend.”

“I have friends.”

“Do you? I see you with your subordinates, the people who turn a blind eye to what you suffer. I have not seen any friends.”

“My sisters.”

“And what do they say about how your father treats you? Ah.” He nodded, though I hadn't replied. “They don't know, do they? You protect them, too. Shield them from the truth—and from being hurt also.”

“Look . . .” I had no idea how he had seen through so much so quickly. It left me off-balance. Not myself. Terrified that he'd see my worst shame. “Would you please leave?”

“Let me rub your neck and I will. If you won't let me pleasure you with sex, then let me do that much. You felt better after I worked on your back.”

It was true. So much so that the prospect of him loosening my neck appealed far more than the promised seduction. I knew where that would lead, the shame and pain of it. But this—I wanted this bit of comfort, as weak as it might make me. “And you'll cease bothering me?”

“I'll leave and let you get some sleep.”

I didn't miss that he hadn't quite promised what I'd asked. “Fine.”

“Do me a favor and leave the sword behind.”

“Now who's afraid?”

“Justifiably cautious.” His lips twitched in a wry smile and he patted the floor in front of him.

I unbuckled the sword belt and sat cross-legged between his knees. “I still have my daggers.”

“I know you do.”

His hands, always so warm on my skin, settled on the base of my neck and dug into the tight muscles there, much as he'd massaged the palms of my hands. He worked them up the tendons to the base of my skull and a groan escaped me at the delicious feeling of release. He laughed, low and dark. “Ironic that you make no sounds when I kiss you, but you melt under my hands for this.”

“This is better,” I lied. “Where did you learn these techniques?”

“Most Dasnarian warriors do. It's considered as much a part of our training to maintain our bodies as any other exercise. Our bodies are our first weapon, the one that cannot be lost in the heat of battle, the one we take to our graves—or that will take us there if we fail to keep it honed and in the best possible working condition.”

“I'd never thought of it that way.”

“See? We have much to learn from each other.” His voice, deep and vibrant, loosened my nerves like his deft massage rubbed the knots from my muscles. So much so that I nearly forgot to pay attention to the meaning behind the soothing sound of it.

“I'm sure there are plenty of court ladies willing to entertain you. Go learn from them.” I meant it to sound tart, but my voice came out sleepy. The sheer pleasure of his hands on me wound with the heat of the fire and the warmth of the wine, conspiring to blur my mind.