Lauren blinked at him in horror and glanced at the princess to see how she’d taken the endearment.
It was too much to hope she hadn’t noticed.
She looked like she was trying to decide which of them she wanted to choke worst—or maybe which to start with.
“I … uh … chose a poem by one of our best known and loved poets. I’ve translated it. I did my best to translate in the spirit of the piece, to maintain the rhythm and rhyme of it, but I have to warn you it isn’t nearly as beautiful as the original.”
Neither Rama nor Althea had a clue of what a poem was—not surprising given the fact that they were aliens and even though there were remarkable similarities in their development, naturally enough it differed almost as much or more than it was similar.
The Uti did seem to love folk stories and ballads, however, and she thought they would enjoy the effort even if it lost something, or a lot, in translation. It was a beautiful love story—sad—but satisfying in that it engaged the listeners and allowed them to experience a whole range of emotions vicariously.
Well, humans.
It was anyone’s guess whether the Uti would care for it.
Fortunately, the first group of entertainers got underway before anyone could think of anything else to bring up for discussion that would make it impossible for Lauren to eat. It was a group of tumblers/acrobats and even Lauren was impressed with their skills, enough that she forgot herself and clapped. Everyone was looking at her strangely when the group had trooped off. Lauren shrugged uncomfortably.
It was way too easy to ‘forget’ herself and revert to her typical behavior instead of using what she’d learned about the natives.
It might seem like a simple thing and yet it had drawn attention to her, singled her out as ‘different’.
Nothing was minor when dealing with a people that they didn’t completely understand.
Especially when anything was liable to be interpreted as their equivalent of witchcraft—which was no more acceptable here than it had been on Earth when people had terrorized themselves with it.
Fear brought out survival instincts—which meant the urge to kill to preserve one’s own life.
The thoughts were an exercise in self terrorization, which not only brought cold reality into focus, it had her jittery with anticipation.
And exhausted with waiting so tensely through three more groups.
She was sent, finally, to take her place in the area cleared for the entertainers.
Before she got started, she explained to the best of her abilities that the interpretation she’d done for them couldn’t possibly be as good as the original written in her own tongue, but that she’d done her best and hoped they would enjoy Evangeline—A tale of Acadie by the great poet, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
A deafening silence fell as she recited the first few lines.
She hoped that meant they were so keenly focused that they were listening with baited breath for the tale to unfold.
Apparently, they were. The silence held for long enough after she’d finished to make her worry about their reception, but then they began to pound the tables so enthusiastically it was deafening. She curtsied and escaped, more grateful for the chance to leave than she was for their appreciation of her efforts.
Stripping off her costume as she entered Rama’s suite, she went immediately to her bag and retrieved her hab suit and boots and then out onto the balcony ledge.
“Command Center—this is One—what is the mission status?”
“We are on track, One. I repeat, we are on track. We have received samples from all points. We have positive samples. We have an inoculation and treatment in the works. First trials expected in the next couple of weeks.”
It took Lauren several moments to process when the tech had told her. When it finally sank in that they’d found what they needed and were working on a cure, she thought she would burst into tears. “Jana? How is Dr. Holmes?”
“Stable. We may be able to bring her out as soon as week after next if the trials look promising.”
Tears filled Lauren’s eyes then in spite of all she could do, but it was tears of gladness. She resolutely pushed the realization to the back of her mind that the good news meant that she would be going home—and leaving Rama—and she didn’t want to think about that. “That’s … great!” She sniffed. “What about my extraction?”
“We’ve been trying to contact you in that regard. Naturally, we must honor the agreement, but we’ll be sending a pad via drone for a particle jump. You’ll need to find an area clear of anything you don’t want to be inadvertently transported.”
A cold, fearfulness washed through Lauren.
She’d never traveled by particle transport before and she wasn’t crazy about doing it now.
Unfortunately, she had no choice.
She directed them to leave the pad for her on the ledge where she was currently standing and signed off once they’d gotten the coordinates.
She slammed into something that shouldn’t have there as soon as she stepped back into the room. Her fear instantly leapt up several notches when she looked up to discover it was Rama who’d grabbed her.
His expression was grim, his eyes filled with furious suspicion.
* * * *
Rama was annoyed with himself. He was not inclined, ordinarily, to act upon impulse. Experience had taught him that was a bad idea at least as often as it turned out to be fortuitous, possibly more often.
And yet he had not even attempted to consider what the consequences might be of suggesting he was emotionally attached to his Di-ore.
Mostly because the moment the impulse hit him it threw him into a state of turmoil and confusion.
But also due to a misguided, he realized now, desire to protect Lauren from Althea’s malicious tongue.
In addition to that, he had been highly displeased with the Princess Althea—who seemed to be laboring under the impression that he was not only slowwitted but prone to manipulation due to an elevated conceit.
From the moment she had arrived she had set up his back by ordering him around as if he was her lackey rather than ruler of Proushta, interspersing backhanded compliments with outright insults as he struggled to play polite host.
He could only deduce from her behavior that either her father, King Alf-red of Livina, believed he was still fifteen summers and inexperienced and easily manipulated, or he had sent the she-devil in hopes that he would take her off his hands, or he had sent her as an insult in response to his advisor’s attempts to ally him to another powerful house.
It remained to be seen which of the three was the truth, but any of them were an insult in response to his honorable offer.
There was a fourth explanation that came to mind when he looked at it like that, but he could not entertain it without evidence of some sort.
Besides her provocative behavior.
Which he realized after he had had time to consider it, might be an act to ensure that she was sent packing in short order—either because she was against the match or because she had been directed to behave in such a manner to cover evil intentions.
He shook those thoughts off, but they returned over and over and he couldn’t decide whether his instant dislike of the woman was distorting his perceptions or if his instincts were trying to warn him of danger.
It transpired, though, that he reached the limit of his forbearance as Lauren concluded her performance. As soon afterward as he could without making it patently obvious that he was anxious to follow her to his suite, he excused himself and left Althea to enjoy the remainder of the entertainment he had had his foreman line up in solitary splendor.
Lauren was nowhere in sight when he reached his suite.
His belly instantly tied itself into knots as that circumstance brought into brutal clarity the suspicions that Gil-liana had aroused earlier with her report. Particularly when he realized almost immediately that she was up to it again.
Following h
er voice, he arrived without surprise at the window and strained to hear what she was saying—an exercise in uselessness, he discovered, since she was speaking in her tongue.
Unreasonable as it was, that only lifted his suspicions higher.
He did not know if he most wanted to throttle her because she seemed to be going out of her way to convince him her motives in coming were less than honorable—in fact a threat to him directly and his realm indirectly. Or if it was because of the emotions that had been tumbling through him since he had felt the impulse to call her ‘dear heart’.
Whichever was the case, he reacted with anger when he would ordinarily have kept a cool head, grabbing her none too gently as she started back in.
As dark as his thoughts were, as high his suspicion, as angry as he was at the thought that she had betrayed him, it vanished like mist when she jerked a fearful look at him and he saw the tears on her face.
He swallowed with an effort against the lump that instantly knotted in his throat. “What is it that has distressed you, dearest? Only tell me and I will help.”
“Well! This is very touching!” said a feminine voice dripping with sarcasm from the doorway.
Chapter Ten
Startled by the intrusion even more than the accusation attached to it, Rama and Lauren both jerked a look in the direction of the voice—which was clearly interpreted by Althea as guilt. An expression of smug satisfaction settled over her features. “I could not believe that you would so blatantly and publicly insult me by abandoning me and following that … that whore off! But I see that I was entirely misinformed where you are concerned! You are no gentleman! You have the manners of a peasant!”
The comment threw Rama into a blinding rage. “Watch your tongue, viper, if you have a desire to keep it!” he growled.
Striding quickly across the room, he grasped her arm and led her forcefully from the room. “How dare you intrude in my private quarters as if I was nothing more than a commoner! Take care, woman! This borders on treason and you would not like the penalty that goes with that charge!”
Lauren’s first instinct was to retreat to a safer distance. The woman had interrupted a confrontation between her and Rama, however, and she thought he probably wouldn’t take it well if she was gone when he returned to finish what he’d started.
Especially after the battle currently in progress.
More stunned by Althea’s behavior than Rama’s, she finally retreated to her corner pallet and sat down, covering her ears to block the heated discussion underway.
She thought Rama was justifiably furious at the trespass in his inner sanctum—the only area of the castle that was private—where no one was allowed to enter without his leave. Under those circumstances, she thought anyone would be furious and Rama’s position only made it all the more outrageous.
Althea’s behavior bordered on insane jealousy.
Her comments—to King Rama no less—were outright treasonous.
Lauren knew and she was completely new to all of this.
How could Althea not know?
The answer of course was that she must.
So she had knowingly and willfully thrust herself into a situation that could get her killed—probably would have if the king she’d pulled this on had been any but Rama.
Maybe that was it, though? At least part of it? She’d been willing to risk her neck to test out what she’d heard about him? That he had a soft spot where women and children were concerned? That he gave them far more leeway than most people thought he should?
Maybe.
Maybe not.
But she didn’t think that Althea was insane or nearly as stupid as she pretended to be. It was all some sort of elaborate act for a purpose.
She just couldn’t figure out what the ‘game’ was.
Rama was still furious when he returned.
She knew this because he slammed his door so hard it felt as if it shook the room.
He was glaring at her balefully when she dropped her hands and jerked her head up to look.
For several moments, their gazes locked and then he turned away. Stripping his clothes off, he strode into the bath. She heard the water splash as he climbed into the pool.
Minutes passed. Her anxiety slowly began to ebb.
“You have not offered to scrub my back or wash my hair!” Rama bellowed from the bath.
Lauren shot to her feet as if she’d been jugged in the ass.
She raced across the room but paused at the door, peering around it.
The look Rama sent her made her eyes widen like saucers. Before she could decide whether to retreat again or not, he summoned her with an imperious gesture.
She moved cautiously inside.
Clearly he hadn’t choked the life out of Althea or his mood would have improved. He seemed like a person who hadn’t managed to vent their fury entirely.
That being the case, she had two options that she could see.
Run—which she didn’t think she could manage.
Or she could try to soothe the ‘beast’.
She approached the pool and collected the soap.
Rama’s eyes narrowed.
“It will be easier and more comfortable for me if you get in so that you can reach better.”
She smiled woodenly.
She really didn’t want to get in with him in his current mood, but she knew she didn’t really have a choice and delaying was only going to make him more irritable when Althea had already set his back up by disrespecting him and his position.
She nodded a little jerkily, put the soap down, and stripped down to her underwear. The damned T-shirt floated up the moment she climbed into the water. She pushed it down again, stroking it until she’d pushed the air out and the wet material stuck to her skin.
Rama was studying her when she picked up the soap and glanced at him.
He said nothing, however, merely presenting his back when she approached him.
She lathered his wet hair, noticing for the first time how fine it was. She was surprised. It was so straight and thick, she’d thought it must be coarse.
Or maybe she’d thought it must be because he seemed such a manly man and baby soft hair didn’t seem to go with that image.
It was such a pleasure to touch, she lathered it twice, scrubbing his scalp and then massaging it. He seemed to relax fractionally, but he took exception to her trying to lather his hair a third time, plopping a sloppy wet cloth over his shoulder and liberally splattering her in the face with it.
At any other time, she might have interpreted the little mishap as provocation—either to fight or play. But she was still leery of Rama’s temper so she merely swiped the water out of her face the best she could with her wet hands and then lathered the cloth.
She scrubbed his back and then, since he seemed in no hurry for her to stop, she dropped the cloth and massaged the tension from the muscles there.
“Why were you weeping?”
The question brought the tears back to sting her eyes and nose. “A dear friend of mine is very ill,” she responded finally.
He stiffened and twisted around to search her face with his gaze. “And you learned of this by using that thing to talk to those at home?” he asked neutrally.
There was something about his tone that gave her pause, but she couldn’t think of anything she’d done wrong that might warrant it. “Yes,” she responded finally, truthfully, but with uneasiness threading through her.
He caught her arm and dragged her around to face him. “I did not make it clear that you were not to communicate with this central command while you were my guest?”
Lauren gaped at him, blinked several times, trying to resurrect the memory. “I … uh … don’t recall that you specifically said that. You said that you would make me regret it if I was bent on treachery … but I wasn’t. Haven’t been. I just … have to make arrangements to go home. The ... uh … life-pod that I came in is … uh … trashed. I can’t use it to go back.”
“I’m to return day after tomorrow.”
He moved across the pool from her and soaped the cloth to finish his bath.
Lauren couldn’t decide if she’d been dismissed or not. She’d just decided he must have dismissed her when he spoke again.
“You will be happy to return home?”
In many ways, she would be delighted, but the question brought home just how much she would miss seeing Rama every day. “Yes, I suppose, but … I’ll miss you,” she said after a long moment, knowing she shouldn’t but unable to resist.
Something flickered in his eyes. “Will you?”
She scanned his face, trying to judge his mood but failed. “Yes,” she responded finally, realizing abruptly and with absolute certainty that she was going to miss him the rest of her life. She’d never met anyone like him before in her life and she knew she never would again. He was an exceptional being—in every way that counted.
He held out his hand to her in invitation and she moved readily into his embrace, slipping her arms around his shoulders to hold herself closer to him, struggling with tears as she tried to fill her senses and her memory with the feel of him, his scent, his touch. He stroked a hand down her hair and then grasped a fistful and tugged until she tilted her head back. He matched his lips to hers then in a hungry, open mouthed kiss, tangling his tongue with hers in a mating dance that shared far more than intimate touch. They shared their essences with one another, each filling their senses with a part of the other that they had rarely shared with any other being.
The feelings they inspired went well beyond desire, but it was the passion that expressed in beautiful detail what words could not.
They were both intoxicated with one another by the time they broke the kiss, gasping for breath. Rama set her away, peeled her under things off and tossed them aside, and then pulled her close again. Dragging her across his lap so that his cocks burrowed between the lips of her sex, he captured her face between his palms and kissed her with an urgency that was contagious.
The Nine Realms of the Uti I: Warrior Prince Page 9