by Megan Derr
If only Theoren would take it thusly and they could forgo the rest of their meal.
But stalling further would only drag the matter on, and the sooner Kamir got this confrontation over with, the better. Then he could go back to thinking about his new house, his moving plans… and Jader, of course, as well as the responsibilities unexpectedly thrust upon him. Responsibilities he would be formally assuming in a few days; he still could not think about the sum proposed as payment without wanting to laugh or cry.
"Are you certain you don't want something to slip into his food?" Velina asked as he stepped into the main room. "I have two or three substances that people would be more than happy to accept as a weak heart."
Kamir smiled faintly. "Better not to risk it, but the thought is more pleasant than it probably should be. Thank you for watching the children. I am sorry I've been thrusting them upon you more than usual."
Velina scoffed as she fussed with the yarn she was pulling out to work on her latest knitting project. "This is the first time in years you've taken time for yourself that wasn't an afternoon to dye your hair." She looked up through her lashes as she settled her knitting in place. "I like seeing you with the High Commander. He suits you. He's always been a bit of a—" She narrowed her eyes as she thought. "Rushta is the word; I cannot think of it in Harken. He likes to flit from pretty to pretty, like a rushta, a type of… octopus, that is the word. Loves to play, but never with one thing for very long. The only exception is during mating season." Another sly look. "They are fiercely loyal to their mate and offspring. It's a term we use for young people, mostly, but also those who do not settle easily. It's a playful… no, affectionate, that's better. It's an affectionate word, not like the way Mainlanders think of us."
Floater was the word she wasn't saying. Kamir smiled. "So rushta is what I should be calling you?"
She gave him a little grin. "No, I have a set circle of lovers. If you were being polite, you would admire my prowess and maturity. If you were being naughty, you'd call me a port."
Kamir stared a moment, then half-heartedly covered his mouth as he burst into giggles. "I see."
"Get along to your dinner with that bottom-feeder," Velina said, looking pleased with herself.
"Goodnight, Velina."
Doubts and pessimism tried to crowd his thoughts as he wended through the palace, but Kamir kept the negativity at bay by replaying the previous evening with Jader. He'd thought, after their night in the city, that would be the last he saw of Jader beyond occasionally crossing paths in the hall. Only in his wildest, most private imaginings had he ever though Jader would show up impulsively and drag him to bed.
And he hadn't yet decided if he loved or hated that Jader was very, very good in bed.
Even worse, he was wonderful outside of bed, had even mentioned Kamir's children with genuine interest. No one had ever spoken in such away about his children. Kamir had never been allowed to forget they were one of the reasons everyone considered him ruined and not worth marrying. People in power wanted their own children, not the leavings of a first marriage that had ended in a shameful divorce. Never mind all the adoptions and sires and dames—but it wasn't a day if there wasn't some hypocrisy.
Kamir kept trying to remember to go slow, be careful, look for all the signs of trouble. But in all the years he'd watched Jader, he'd never seen the things he had come to notice about Theoren. The sorts of things he saw in his parents, in other people around the palace—in his sister, and she and her Shadow Bell mercenaries did not have a shining reputation by any definition.
Jader had never shown any of that, and the more Kamir got to know him, the better he seemed. Hopefully he wasn't setting himself up to be a damned fool yet again.
As he neared the banquet hall, he finally switched his thoughts to Theoren and the miserable dinner he would have to slog through for at least the next two hours. The idea of a private dinner with Theoren was unbearable, but in public Theoren was much, much worse because he could put on a show and expect manners and society to chain Kamir in place. Kamir had watched in miserable, wretched silence on more occasions than he could count as Theoren charmed the people around them, or otherwise dissuaded them from helping Kamir. Back then, Kamir hadn't been willing to challenge him publicly. Theoren wasn't the kind to hurt him over every slight, but he could still be nasty once he reached a certain point—and he reached that point a lot faster if humiliated in public.
So while facing him in private wasn't ideal, it was better than enduring him in public.
The large double doors of the public banquet hall were wide open, and he could tell from the amount of noise that the High King and Consort were dining that night. Mostly because of High Consort Allen, who did his best work at such gatherings. Anyone who wanted to garner his attention, this was one of the best times and places to do it.
Thankfully, Kamir did not have to deal with the public hall, though for once that might have been preferable. Instead, he stepped past the main doors and through a side door that led down a long hall of rooms that were for private dining.
A servant stood outside the room marked with a songbird, and she bowed as Kamir reached her. "Good evening, my lord. I'll bring wine straight away. Your usual?"
The palace staff had noted his usual? Since when? Well, that was stupid. Since rumors had spread about him and Jader. "Uh. Yes, please, that would be appreciated. Thank you." She walked off down the hall and Kamir took one last moment to brace himself before grasping the handle and pulling the door open.
He'd been so studiously avoiding Theoren since receiving his note that he hadn't done more than glimpse him long enough to know to duck down another hallway. One of his biggest fears was that he'd prove weak again, be taken in all over by a handsome face and sticky-sweet charm.
Staring at Theoren now, all he could wonder was how his younger self could ever have been so gullible.
Theoren was older by five years, but he looked closer to ten now. He was tall, slender, with gold-toned brown skin, thick tufts of ill-kempt hair, and a scraggly goatee he'd be better off shaving. His eyes were as hard and mean as Kamir remembered, though when they'd first met, and for too long after, he'd thought them dark and mysterious.
His clothes were out of fashion and strangely plain, but in relatively good condition—not surprising for a man who'd always been on the wrong side of vain, though it was hard to believe that looking at his bland, outdated clothes.
He stood as Kamir approached the table, and offered the smile Kamir had once been so easily fooled by. Kamir took his seat and folded his hands in his lap. "Hello, Theoren."
"Here I was certain you'd say Master Masterow," Theoren said, smiling pleasantly but sounding condescending.
"What would that accomplish?" Kamir asked. "We have far too much history for that."
Theoren narrowed his eyes, but surprisingly, didn't respond. "How are the children?" he asked instead, which was even more shocking.
"None of your business," Kamir said tersely.
At that, Theoren did bristle. "They're my—"
"No, they're not," Kamir cut in, voice level but fierce. He might not have much of a spine, but he would be damned if he ever let his family or Theoren do to his children what they'd done to him. "You signed away all rights to them in return for all the proceeds from sale of the house and all assets aside from immediate personal effects. Your dick may have been involved in the process, but they don't belong to you, and I won't stand for so much as a hint of interference. Do you understand me?" He clenched his hands tightly in his lap, grateful for the table that hid his trembling.
Rage filled Theoren's face for a moment—a rage Kamir had endured in the form of punches and kicks and slams into the wall only a few times, but the first time had been the moment he realized he had to get out or he'd be leaving someday on a pyre. The worst was that, if Theoren hadn't had such a terrible day, hadn't come home that night already on the verge of snapping, Kamir might have been oblivious to how deep hi
s problems really were for who knew how much longer. He'd hated that night, but looking back, he'd been grateful it had happened sooner rather than later.
The door opened before Theoren could speak, thankfully, and his face smoothed into a semblance of that saccharine charm Kamir remembered as he flirted half-heartedly with the servant, who returned it with the polite diffidence all palace servants learned.
Another stone of fear weighing Kamir down fell away as he watched; Theoren's charm seemed far less so now, badly contrived and painful to watch, though Kamir couldn't say if it had always been so cringe-worthy or if Theoren had lost his touch in the past eight years—but he was inclined to think the former, and that he'd simply not been equipped to realize it back then.
Either way, the man who'd ensnared the boy Kamir had been was long gone. In the years they’d been separated, Kamir had faced far worse than the pathetic, fading man before him.
Theoren was roughly the same age as Jader, but could not be more different. Theoren was full of false, poisonous charm; Jader was sweet and engaging. Theoren possessed a sharp-edged, dangerous vanity, the kind that cut when it satisfied; Jader was also vain, but he was the sort who was simply happy to have someone pay him any sort of attention at all, be it someone admiring his earrings or children eager to hear his stories.
It was still disconcerting the two had elements of personality in common, but then, Kamir probably had something in common with a terrible person somewhere, too. Or some shining star of the High Court who would be mortified to find they shared a trait with the court embarrassment.
Kamir thanked the woman for the wine and platter of bread, cheese, and olives. When she was gone, the door closed firmly behind her, he took a bracing sip of wine and asked, "What do you want Theoren?"
"It's been eight years, and I never thought we would cross paths again," Theoren said, his smile this time showing a better effort at being charming. "We were married once. Is it so strange I'd want to see how you are doing?"
"I believe your last words to me were that I'd regret divorcing you because nobody else was ever going to want a sniveling boy who'd already been used up and proven worthless. So yes, Theoren, it is strange."
That rage filled Theoren's face again, and Kamir tensed to flee—but Theoren only picked up his cup of wine and drained it. Kamir held back a grimace at the idea of wine being drunk so, but said nothing, just helped himself to some of the food.
So similar to the meal he'd shared with Jader. An ache twisted sharply in his chest. He really was a damned fool, spending such time with a man who wanted only to play, but he would give anything to be dining with Jader right then, with Theoren still nothing but a bad memory.
Pouring himself more wine, Theoren took a large gulp, set the cup down hard enough some of the wine splashed over the rim, and said, "Has it ever once occurred to you, in all that snotty superiority you've acquired, that maybe I regret some of things I said and did? I did marry you, if you'll recall. Even though your parents cut you off and we were left with practically nothing."
Once upon a time, those words had crippled every argument and protest Kamir had mustered the strength to voice. It had taken all the meager courage he possessed back then to defy his parents—but infatuation guised as love had made him foolishly brave. Then he'd endured far worse under Theoren than he ever had under his parents.
Velina was the one who had first inspired the strength to defy Theoren, to earn his own money and tuck it away, to look into what he would have to do for a divorce. But even then he'd faltered, made excuses, stuck to patterns and evils he knew rather than once more throwing himself into the unknown and risking an even worse fate.
It was his then-unborn children, and the very real, visceral love he'd felt for them, that had made him brave enough to step into the unknown, to obtain his divorce and fight for absolute control of his children. All of that had meant slinking back to his parents, but even back then he'd known eventually he'd break free of them as well.
So words that would have left him fumbling and stuttering, cowering and backing away and agreeing to whatever Theoren wanted to keep him happy, now only left him bitter and tired.
Losing what little interest he'd had in the food, Kamir replied, "Yes, practically nothing but the five thousand crowns you possessed, and the five hundred crowns I managed to bring with me. Perhaps that's a pittance here in Harkenesten, but you and I both know very well that back in Eushan that sort of money would have lasted us a long time if you hadn't drunk and gambled and whored it away." When he was certain his hand wouldn't tremble, he lifted his wine cup and took a small sip to wet his lips. "If you only came here to try and guilt and cajole me the way you once did, Theoren, you are wasting your time. I'm not even certain to what end you're behaving thus. If it's money you're after then you should really know better. My parents are as severe now as they ever were—and even if they weren't, I wouldn't give you money, and you should know that."
That rage filled Theoren's face a third time, but this time it came with an underlying smugness that put a knot in Kamir's stomach. "I think you'll do anything if it means keeping your children."
"Don't you dare bring my children into this," Kamir hissed, curling his hands so tightly his nails dug into his palms. "Harm my children, or try to take them from me, and you'll regret it."
Smugness growing now he knew his barbs had struck, Theoren ran his fingers over his wine cup. "I'm just not certain you're the best parent for them, given your history and inability to support yourself. I made a mistake eight years ago. I never should have agreed to let children be raised by a child—"
"A child you were more than happy to marry and fuck and get pregnant," Kamir snapped. "Don't you dare try to play this like you're the responsible one. Challenge me in court and you will find yourself the same loser you were eight years ago." He rose, threw his napkin on the table, and forced himself to leave sedately and quietly.
Out in the main hall, he finally succumbed to the trembling rushing over him, choking on panic.
Theoren wouldn't. He couldn't. Kamir had made damned certain that no one and nothing could take his children from him.
But Theoren had never much cared for idle threats. If he was threatening to challenge Kamir for his children, then he must have good reason to think he could.
"Kamir?"
His head snapped up, and misery further soured his empty stomach.
"Are you all right?" Jader asked, and beside him stood a woman Kamir had seen when he was at dinner with his parents the previous night—the woman who was unmistakably Jader's long-lost sister. On a purely aesthetic level, she was his equal in beauty. But Jader had warmth, an energy, that drew the eye. She seemed more like a painting that, while impressive, was still easily passed by.
And of course, Kamir looked like a pathetic weakling right there of all places. "I'm fine," he managed, forcing a smile. "Thank you, Commander. My pardon for interrupting your evening and, of course, the lady's. I hope the r-rest of your evening g-goes well." He bowed hastily and fled, not quite running through the halls, but not exactly walking sedately either.
He'd only just turned down the hall that would lead him back toward the private portions of the palace when Jader called out his name.
Closing his eyes, wishing fervently the ground would just swallow him up, Kamir turned around and waited for Jader to reach him. He gasped as Jader gently gripped his shoulders, then slid his hands up to cup Kamir's face. "What's wrong?"
"N-nothing," Kamir said, and when Jader frowned added, "Nothing I can't handle. Dinner with my ex was exactly as unpleasant as I feared it would be, that's all. If you would excuse me, I need to go see my children."
Jader immediately let him go, but reached down to take Kamir's hand and squeeze it gently. "Then I apologize for delaying you. Come, I'll walk you the rest of the way." He started walking, keeping hold of Kamir's hand, giving Kamir no choice but to move or take a tumble.
"You needn't escort me. I'm sure your,
uh, dining companion must be most irate—"
"I really don't care," Jader said, an edge to his voice that Kamir had heard in Velina's voice before, a tightness that spoke of a lifetime of being thought less—and so treated as less—for the crime of being an Islander. "I'm going to Benta with her despite the fact everything in me rails against it. She can manage one dinner without me." He looked at Kamir and smiled, tired but true. "I'm more than happy for an excuse to spend a few minutes with you. Is there anything I can do to help?"
For a brief, panicked and lonely moment, Kamir was tempted. But he would never stand on his own if he did not stand on his own. "No, he's nothing I can't handle, but thank you."
They came to a stop in front of Kamir's door. Jader nodded. "I have every faith you require help from no one, but should you ever want it, you've only to tell me what to do." He curled one finger beneath Kamir's chin, tilted his face up, and bent to brush a soft but lingering kiss to his mouth. "I hope the rest of your night is better than it's thus far been. Sleep well."
"Sleep well," Kamir echoed, unable to think long enough to come up with something else to say. He watched Jader walk away, curling his fingers into the cuffs of his jacket and biting his bottom lip to keep from calling him back.
He could and would handle his own problems, and he would not abuse Jader by leaning on his authority and connections to make Theoren go away.
Once Jader was out of sight, he stepped into his suite. Velina looked up sharply, but Kamir just kept going until he reached the children's bedroom. Opening the door, he went to each of them. They were fast asleep, mercifully oblivious to the treacherous bastard trying to steal them away. Kamir fussed with their blankets, kissed their foreheads, and finally withdrew.
Back in the sitting room, Velina threw her knitting aside and stood. "What did that worthless scum-eating bottom-feeder do?"
"He's going to try and take the children away," Kamir said. He went over to the table and sat down before he fell down. "I don't know what he has in mind, but he didn't make that threat idly. He's going to force me to give him money, or he will try to take my children."