by Kelly Hunter
‘Okay,’ she said finally. ‘And, forgive me the intrusion, but do you find sex satisfactory?’
‘What are you now? My virgin sex therapist?’
‘Do you need one?’
He barked a laugh. Better than a growl for this confidante with a sharply honed wit. ‘I get by.’
‘Some of your ancestors have preferred men. They’ve required wives who could accommodate those preferences. Turn a blind eye at times.’
‘I prefer women.’ Truth.
‘What of fidelity?’ she asked. ‘Will you practise it?’
‘Yes.’
‘Do you require fidelity from your wife?’
‘Yes.’ Surely she knew this already? He’d already banned her from taking her kisses elsewhere and had almost punished her guard the other morning for daring to spar with her. ‘I don’t share.’
More typing and no comment whatsoever.
‘I’m thirty years old. I prefer women to men. I’ve never been in love. And I thought I had more time in which to marry before the courtesans of old descended from a mystical mountain to help me do my duty,’ he offered curtly. ‘I can find my own wife, regardless of what you, your Order or my sister might think. The only reason I’m here is because I refuse to let you conspire behind my back. You may as well conspire with me. It’ll go much faster if we work together on this.’
‘Yes, I know,’ she offered quietly.
‘I also want to be able to explain your role here without calling into question my sanity, my morals or yours. From here on in when you’re dealing with my staff or handling guest lists you’ll be known as Lady Sera Boreas, Executive Function Manager for the Royal Palace of Arun. You’ll answer to me or my executive secretary. You will oversee the functions in person but not be in attendance as a guest. I want you in corporate clothing. Smart suits, modest jewellery, tidy hair. No shackles or manacles, no golden bustiers, no six-inch heels while you’re on duty in public.’
‘And in private?’
‘I can’t tell you what to do once you’re in the privacy of your own quarters.’
‘Actually, you ca—’
‘Don’t say those words.’
It occurred to him that he was already telling her what to do in the privacy of her quarters, and he smiled without humour. It was an impossible situation and he saw no way out of it other than to make her leave or turn her into a respectable employee of the palace. He waved his hand around the room. ‘All that you’ve brought to my palace works against me in the wider world. The rebirth of these quarters is all my staff can talk about. Word has spread. King Augustus of Arun keeps a courtesan hidden in a round room, built like a birdcage. He’s been bewitched, his needs are dark, he’s not a modern-day king. You’re a sorceress, a temptress, a creature of myth. That’s what they’re saying about you, me and this situation. It’s time to take control of this narrative.’
‘You want to reframe me.’
He nodded. ‘Minimise the mystery. Modernise the mythology. I need you to arrange for one piece of art to be displayed in the palace’s grand entrance hall. I want notes to accompany it, emphasising its historical significance. I want a dozen books from your collection showcased in the state library, several pieces of art or treasures of historical significance in circulation throughout our galleries. I want a narrative built around the Order of the Kite that starts with it being supportive, historically complex, non-political, culturally significant and ends with the information about your current non-sexual role in my administration. I want you to give history talks in university lecture halls and libraries. I want you to be the guest of honour as each treasure on display is unveiled. I want you to talk about the Order of old and then I want you to talk about the roles women have traditionally played in government, the roles open to them today and your own education.’
‘Your Majesty, the Order does not seek publicity.’
‘Then they shouldn’t have sent you here.’ His gaze clashed with hers, storm clouds meeting a bleak black sea. ‘I’m asking you to be a modern-day woman for a modern-day audience. One who embraces the history and power of your Order and can competently explain your presence here. One who shines a favourable light on us both. Do it or I’ll do it for you.’
Augustus shoved his hands in his pockets and turned away. Looking at her never ended well. He always grew resentful of his body’s instinctive response and his brain lost its way. ‘You’re not stupid, Sera. Philosophy, politics and economics—those are your degree subjects and you only ever earned distinction marks or higher. If you want power here I’m challenging you to take it openly. Carve out a place for yourself that the public will accept. That I can accept.’ He spared a glance for the pleasure wheel. ‘Because there are too many elements here that I dare not accept.’
‘Your Majesty—’
He wanted to hear her say his name. Not Your Majesty or milord or sire. Only his mother and sometimes his sister had managed to make his name sound anything more than an unwieldy mouthful. They’d laced it with affection and love. Exasperation too, for his cool and calculating deliberations. His father didn’t call him by name all that often. His father called him Son and it was a reminder of his role in the continuation of their line more than anything.
He wanted to hear her say his name but there was no picture in the carpet for that. ‘The only words I want to hear out of your mouth are “I accept your challenge and this amazing opportunity to become a relevant member of your court”.’
Silence filled the room as he looked up to the soaring ceiling, anywhere but at the woman seated somewhere to his left. There were other ways he could deal with this. Send her away on a quest, take his case to parliament and the high courts and dissolve the accord and make an enemy of a secret Order with tentacles everywhere. The way he’d outlined—dealing openly with a modern interpretation of her position here—was by far the best. But he needed her co-operation.
‘I accept your challenge.’
He closed his eyes as her soft words slid through him and with them came relief. ‘Your owls have returned,’ he said by way of acknowledgement. ‘Two of them. Are they inside or out?’
‘In. But I don’t think they’ve returned. I think these ones were merely absent when Tomas came for the rest. I’m glad they were both away and not just one of them. I think they’re a mated pair.’
‘Do you know what kind they are?’
‘Tomas tells me they’re Great Horned Owls. I sent him photos. Lianthe would say it’s a good omen.’
‘And what do you say?’
‘As long as they stay up there and I stay down here, I say we can probably come to some kind of mutual living arrangement. The bathing pool was filled today.’ It was a change of topic, a change of voice—lighter now, with a faint undercurrent of enthusiasm. He risked a backwards glance and found her standing and somehow changed. More hopeful, perhaps. More relaxed. ‘It really has been a pleasure to see this place come alive again. It’s been over a hundred and twenty years since anyone’s lived here. Don’t you find that just a little bit fascinating?’
Memory conjured up the marble pool room, with fancy tiles, private alcoves and exposed stone benches. He did want to see the transformation; there was no denying it. ‘Show me.’
The dirty grey colours he remembered now glowed ivory, each marble vein shining beneath layers of polish. Sera flicked a switch and lit the area, contemporary lighting, all of it, but it felt as if flame flickered and shadows danced.
‘What are the alcoves full of pillows for?’ he asked.
‘Massage, body treatments, sex. There’s a steam room here too. I know you’ll not use any of it but we went with authenticity. This was its function.’
She had such an easy way of saying sex. As if it was nothing. Just another function of the body. He’d never found it so, endorphins or otherwise. Sex was revealing, and he far preferred to kee
p his own counsel. ‘And the main pool is heated?’
‘To three degrees above body temperature. Three hundred years ago your forebears and mine used fire to heat the pool. Yesterday, engineers from the High Reaches laid solar strips to the framework of the dome. This part of your palace now powers itself, and then some.’
Her face had lit up and her pleasure at the improvements seemed real.
He’d agreed to modifications to the rooms Sera occupied. He hadn’t specifically agreed to any of this. Under the guise of honouring tradition, it felt as if the power here had been quite deftly wrested from his grasp.
She watched him from the shadows while he struggled with what to do with her in private as well as in public.
‘Would you like to bathe?’ she asked at last—she had to know he wanted more than that. She’d been taught to read people, had she not? Surely she could see the tension and the want in him and not just for warm water. He wanted what the cursed pleasure wheel had told him he could have. He wanted her hands on him, undressing him, washing his hair as he reclined. All those things the bathing picture showed and more, while the light from the wall sconces threw puppet shadows on the walls.
‘I shouldn’t.’
‘Seems a shame to let it go to waste.’
‘Don’t tempt me.’
‘Sometimes a bath can be just a bath.’
‘Say my name.’ He needed to hear it fall from those perfect lips.
She looked at him, as if trying to read his mood and good luck with that.
‘That was an order.’
‘Augustus.’
She made it sound like welcome and desire all rolled into one and he tried not to curse as he shoved his hand through his hair and tried to make sense of both his demands and his resistance. ‘Did they make you practise that?’
They had. Sera knew better than many how to modulate her voice to convey different feelings. But the breathlessness in her voice this time was all hers. She gestured towards a stack of towels and potions, trying to get back on track. ‘Augustus, would you like to bathe? The pool is ready and I’ve had lessons in how to make the experience a relaxing one. I could wash your hair. Oils to soothe, invigorate and everything in between. What is your mood?’
‘You mean you can’t tell?’
‘You’re hard to read.’ She hadn’t been expecting the way forward for her that he’d proposed. A public image to craft and shape. A role beyond those already identified by the tapestry. And nothing but strict hands-off in private. It was the keeping-distance-in-private request she would have the most trouble with. ‘Or you could bathe alone and I can go and read a book in another room. This pool is for your use, Augustus. In any way you see fit.’
She turned away, left him to his thoughts, and approached a small side table groaning with essential oils and liquid soaps. She reached for the sandalwood, bergamot and orange and mixed them in a hand bowl, taking her time. ‘I find ritual soothing,’ she murmured, still not looking at him as she took the bowl to the water’s edge and poured the fragrant oil mix into it, rinsing the bowl three times before setting it aside and rising. ‘But if you prefer less ritual and more distance, perhaps you might cast me in the role of pool attendant. I can pile towels by the side of the pool and leave you to it.’
She didn’t want to shatter the fragile peace they’d created this evening. She wanted it to continue.
‘What does the ritual involve?’ he rasped.
‘I would remove your clothes, provide your soap, wash your hair, towel you dry, moisturise your skin and dress you again. It can take up to an hour of your time.’
‘And what’s in it for you?’
‘Ritual soothes me. And also...’
‘Also what?’
‘You’re not going to like it.’ He wasn’t going to accept it. ‘I want to serve here, the way I’ve been trained to serve. It doesn’t have to be sexual. It doesn’t have to be complicated. You could find refuge and relaxation here if you wanted to.’
‘Do it.’
His words didn’t come from a place of acceptance. They came at her twisted and wrapped in loathing. Not a good start but at least she had permission to try to bathe him properly.
She ventured closer, until she was standing in front of him. Undressing a man wasn’t a hard thing to do. There was an order to the releasing of buttons and the removal of clothes. She knew what to do. Only her trembling fingertips betrayed her as she reached for one of his wrists, turned his forearm towards her and fumbled with the tiny cufflink there. She bit her lip, intent on her task, and wondered if the crazy throb of the pulse point at his wrist was for her.
She slowed her breathing and got on with her task, undoing first one cufflink and then the other. She stepped in closer as she undid his tie, and his eyes never left her face and hers never left his. Buttons, so many buttons on his shirt, tracking a path down his chest, the last of them hidden beneath his trousers as she pulled the shirt free and dealt with them too. Buttons and knuckles and air that had suddenly grown too thin for breathing.
‘This isn’t going to end well,’ he rasped.
‘Relax. I’m a professional.’ She pushed the front of his shirt aside and slid her hands up and over his shoulders, taking his shirt with her. By the time she’d smoothed her hands down his arms the shirt was on the floor.
She knelt at his feet, removing his shoes and socks and running her hands up his legs and over his thighs as if soothing a savage beast. She kept her hands on him as she undid his trousers, slid her hands beneath his waistband and down over his buttocks, taking the fabric with her, all the way down his legs. ‘Put your hand on my shoulder or my head for balance,’ she said, as she lifted first one foot from the puddle of his trousers and then the next.
His boxers were stretched tight over his manhood, plumper now than it had been moments ago but not yet at full stretch. If she removed his underwear in the same manner she’d removed his trousers she was going to get an eyeful.
And then she leaned in, her hands high on his thighs, and breathed him in.
Hours of video instruction had done nothing to prepare Sera for the impact of the man standing before her. The heat coming from his skin and the scent of him. The glittering black eyes and his complete attention.
She didn’t know where or how he exercised but he did, his body lean and his belly ridged with muscle. He had body hair but not a lot. His manhood looked thick beneath the thin stretch of cotton, and she wondered if her mouth would fit around it. Not just thick but long as well. The stretch for her mouth and throat would be considerable.
He took a ragged breath and stepped away from her touch and shed his boxers. He was beautiful naked. He was beautiful everywhere.
‘I’ll take that bath now.’ His voice whispered over her, making promises not kept by his retreating body. She felt the loss of his regard as he stepped into the water and submerged himself completely. The bathing rituals went unobserved as she knelt on a cushion and waited for him to need something more from her, hands clasped in her lap, back straight, head bowed. Still and silent until needed. Ritual.
She watched from beneath her lashes as he selected soap and started washing, his touch far rougher than hers would have been. She watched him rinse off, water running in rivulets down the hard planes of his chest, dripping from his elbows as he pushed dark tendrils of hair away from his face. He caught her watching him and stilled. Did he want to get out now? Should she anticipate his need for a towel? Would he accept one from her hand? Bathing rituals shot to hell by him, leaving her untethered and wanting.
‘Sera.’
Surely she could look her fill now that he’d called her name. She lifted her head.
‘Will you wash my hair?’
Finally, something she had previous experience with. She almost fell over herself in her haste to fetch the water jug and shampoo selection. Ritual, a
s he watched her prepare the edge of the pool and gesture for him to lie back with his head in the shallow dip. She leaned over and filled the jug, wetting his hair all over again, her hand firm on his forehead to prevent water trickling down his face.
She opted for a firmer touch than the one she’d used on the children of the High Reaches, massaging his scalp once the conditioner had gone on and drawing from him a groan that made her smile her relief.
‘Harder,’ he rasped, so she increased the pressure from her fingertips and leaned into it. With his eyes closed she could study his profile more closely. Inevitably, her gaze moved on from his lips to his chest, then his stomach and onto lower depths. His legs were slightly parted. His manhood looked erect.
When she finally turned her attention back to his face, he was watching her through narrowed eyes.
Hot-faced, she filled the water jug again and began to rinse his hair.
He let her finish, he gave her that, and then he was underwater again, and again, and then standing and heading for the steps.
To ogle his sharply defined muscles and the proud jut of his arousal or pick up a towel and have it ready for him? Sera knew what she ought to be doing. She’d trained for this.
By the time she reached the side of the pool and handed him a towel and he’d taken it and wiped his face and dropped it and stood naked before her, she met his gaze unflinchingly. He had nothing to be ashamed of.
Neither did she.
‘If you could kiss me in one place and one place only, where would you kiss?’ he demanded.
She’d seen so much sex in the guise of instruction. She knew the psychology and physiology behind each and every action, but knowing wasn’t doing and she’d never done any of it. His lips beckoned, the fierce cut of his cheekbones. The curve of his shoulder appealed, the water droplet sliding down his neck—she could lap it up and find the pulse point.
But his hand moved to curl around his erection and it drew her gaze like a lodestone. More than anything else, she wanted to know more of that. For some reason, kissing his lips seemed like more of an intrusion than kissing him there.