by Sarah Hawke
I nodded slowly. I had never seen the First Wife like this before. She seemed bizarrely…human.
“I also want you to understand that not everything in this palace is always as it seems,” Lysandre added, placing her hand on my shoulder. “The Dragon God’s attention is glorious but unpredictable. I am pleased he has chosen you as his new avatar, but you need to be careful. Do not believe for a moment that his affection will last forever.”
I didn’t know how to respond, so I remained silent. Was she threatening me? Was she warning me? This was all so unexpected I couldn’t tell.
“You’re nineteen years old and you’re already one of the strongest among us,” Lysandre said. “In time, I doubt anyone will be able to challenge you. My son would be wise to respect you and those you consider friends. One day, he will rely upon your counsel—and your power.”
“Thank you, mistress,” I managed.
She grunted. “I don’t expect you to understand all of this now, but you will. In the meantime, I will tell my son to keep his distance. And as for you, I sent more reading to your chambers. Prepare yourself—your skills will be tested sooner than you think.”
Lysandre leaned in to kiss me again. There was an odd desperation on her lips and tongue, and when she finally pulled away she turned back around and faced the empty grave. I walked back to the stairs, my mind racing with a thousand questions.
Just before I closed the door, I could have sworn I heard a sob.
***
Inexplicably, Charisse wasn’t in her chambers when I returned from Lysandre’s office. She wasn’t in the communal bath or the commissary either, and I started to fear the worst before I spotted one of our other friends, Valeera, mulling about the corridors.
“There you are,” Asha called out. “I’ve barely even seen you since you returned from the Dead—”
“Where’s Charisse?” I asked. “Do you know?”
“Erm,” she mumbled, clearly taken aback by my urgency. “I assumed she was with you—or rather, I assumed you were with her. She bolted out of here about twenty minutes ago.”
“Do you know where she was headed?”
“The Velvet Shadow, obviously. That’s why I figured you’d be there with her.”
I paused and frowned. Why in the bloody void would she be headed to the Shadow now? Jorel told her to stay in her quarters, and she had no idea that I’d spoken to his mother.
“Is something wrong?” Valeera asked. “Chari looked a little manic, even for her.”
“I’m not sure,” I admitted. Charisse had every reason to be upset about the way Jorel had treated her, but I really hoped she hadn’t gone and done something stupid. Though honestly, I didn’t even know what that would be at this point…
“Well, I’m sure you can catch up with her,” Valeera said. “You want me to come along?”
“No, it’s probably nothing,” I soothed, forcing a smile. We exchanged a few pleasantries, at which point I set out for the Velvet Shadow one more time. Business was as booming as normal, but Jirrah didn’t come to greet me at the door. Once I learned that Charisse was indeed here, it didn’t take me long to figure out why.
I dashed upstairs to the private rooms, but by the time I arrived the scene was already unfolding: Madam Jirrah was naked and kneeling on the floor, her face buried deep between Charisse’s legs. Her wrists were bound behind her back, and the young retharri whore, Rubis, was thrusting furiously into her bowels.
None of them noticed me. Rubis was busy struggling not to spill, and Jirrah was just as busy struggling to try and breathe. Charisse’s eyes were closed, and she had a cold, wicked smile on her lips that I’d only seen a handful of times before.
My first impulse was to try and stop them, but it was already too late. Rubis frantically pulled out and sprayed his seed across Jirrah’s pale back, and Charisse was deep in the throes of her own climax. I shut the door behind me and waited, wondering just what in the bloody void had gotten into my friend’s head and wishing I didn’t know the answer.
“Not bad, whore,” Charisse said as she grabbed a clump of Jirrah’s hair and roughly pulled back her head. The woman’s face was glistening, and her normally immaculate eye shadow was smeared down her cheeks. “How’d you like getting ass-fucked by your own half-breed slave, eh? Maybe if you treated him better he would have used some oil first.”
“Charisse,” I said, my hands balling at my sides.
She hopped in the seat when she noticed me for the first time, but she didn’t reply for a few seconds. “Give us some privacy,” she said eventually. “You can go back to work, Rubis, but your mistress isn’t done just yet.” Charisse pinched the Avetharri’s pale cheeks. “You look like shit, but I suppose that’s all right. Have one of your girls fetch the biggest phallus you have, and make sure she fits you with a gag, too. I don’t think you’ll be speaking much the rest of the night.”
“My lady, I still have other business to attend to tonight,” Jirrah pleaded. “I will happily—”
“I don’t care about your business or your opinions,” Charisse interrupted, her fingertips crackling with electricity. “Phallus and gag. Understood?”
Jirrah flinched. “Yes, mistress.”
“Good. Now go.”
She nodded and left the room, a haunted look in her glowing blue eyes. I flashed her a sympathetic glance, but she completely ignored me.
“What the fuck was that about?” I growled. “Why are you treating Jirrah like—?”
“Like a whore?” Charisse asked. “Because that’s what she is. I am a Dragon Bride, and she is a whore. It’s important to remind her of that every once in a while.”
She leaned up and grabbed a bottle of wine off the nearby table. It was nearly empty, and I doubted she’d shared it with anyone else.
“Why did you even come here?” I whispered. “I told you to sit tight while I spoke to Lysandre.”
“Because I was bored and wanted to fuck someone,” Charisse said. “So what did the First Cunt say?”
I sighed and folded my arms over my chest. “She agreed that Jorel stepped out of line. He won’t be stopping by tonight. Hopefully, he’ll just start avoiding us altogether.”
Charisse took another swig. “I’m so glad all we had to do was run and tattle to his mother. Are we Dragon Brides or children?”
“Chari…”
“Don’t,” she growled. She glared at me hard for a long moment before she finally hurled the empty bottle against the wall. I caught it in a telekinetic grip a split second before it shattered.
“You know how much I wanted to hurt him,” I said as I gently lowered the bottle to the floor. “For a moment there I almost drew my sword.”
“I know. I’m glad you didn’t.”
Charisse closed her eyes and clenched her fists. No tears slid down her cheeks, however—we’d had that particular impulse beaten out of us at the academy. Vaylin had taught us to channel our rage into more useful things, like fighting and fucking.
“If the Emperor really wants to earn back the loyalty and reverence of his people, he needs to start by doing something about his son,” she added after a moment. “Does he even know how Jorel acts?”
“I don’t know,” I admitted.
“Well, then you maybe you should talk to him. You’re the only one he ever visits anymore.”
“Maybe I will.” I thought about sitting down on the couch with her, but I knew it wouldn’t help. She didn’t need or want my pity right now. What she did need—what all of us needed, frankly—were answers to a lot of uncomfortable questions.
Starting with why our husband had become so distant and reclusive when his kingdom was on the verge of falling apart.
“Lysandre told me something else while I was there,” I said into the pause. “Have you ever heard anything about a Bride named Shandris?”
Charisse finally reopened her eyes. “She was a traitor, I think. She was executed and tossed into the charnel house with all the failed acoly
tes.”
“Not exactly,” I murmured, wondering where she’d even heard that rumor. I shouldn’t have been so surprised—she always seemed to know more about palace scuttlebutt than I did. “Lysandre said that she and Shandris were best friends, and that about twenty years ago they both gave birth to a prince.”
Charisse frowned and leaned up. “What?”
“That was my reaction,” I said. “Apparently Jorel had a half-brother, but the child was killed along with his mother when she was charged with treason.”
“That’s…” Charisse shook her head. “Why would Lysandre tell you this?”
“I don’t know exactly, but she claims that Shandris was framed by the previous First Wife. It’s all very strange, like something you’d hear about in King Sorokar’s court in Abethaal.”
Charisse pursed her lips. “Well, I have heard about Aranya. Several of the older Brides are convinced that Lysandre’s the one who shivved her in the back. They think the Vin Aetheri were just a scapegoat.”
“Do you believe them?”
“You have met Lysandre, right? She’d slit anyone’s throat if it gave her the slightest boost in power. You know that.”
“Maybe, but…” I paused and sighed. “When she was telling me all of this, she seemed…well, genuinely upset.”
“I’m sure she did. She is the one who taught us how to lie properly at the academy.”
The memories flashed in my head: weeks spent mastering the body language of every race in Narthil, months spent training my own face not to betray my emotions…and then, of course, the final test. We had all been dumped in different settlements just outside the kingdom. The goal had been to earn the trust of a local and get ourselves back to Thalamar in one piece—not a simple task with closed, heavily-patrolled borders. I had ended up “cheating” by using force instead of guile. I had intimidated a local merchant and threatened his family until he paid a smuggler to slip me across the border. Once we arrived, I’d killed the smuggler and dropped his corpse in front of local garrison as a trophy. I could still remember the horrified stares of all those soldiers when they looked upon me, a sixteen year-old girl, like I was some sort of unstoppable monster…
Charisse had completed the trial the “proper” way. While I was a far better swordswoman and sorceress, she had always excelled at the more subtle arts. Somehow, she had seduced an enemy soldier and convinced him to give up everything to be with her in Narthil. She’d eventually dropped his corpse at the garrison as well.
“I remember,” I said eventually. “You were a good student.”
“For once,” Charisse muttered. “All I’m saying is that you shouldn’t believe everything Lysandre tells you. And we need to assume she had some ulterior motive for telling you about all of this in the first place.”
“I have no idea what she hoped to gain.”
“Who knows? Maybe she just wants to get on your good side now that you’re the master’s favorite.”
I nodded absently. I didn’t buy that explanation for a moment. One line kept looping through my head over and over: carry out my will, and I shall plant the seed of Narthil’s future inside you. If he really had told Lysandre the same thing twenty years ago, what did that mean? Did he understand that Jorel was a monster? Did he want to start over and replace his own son?
“You were right before,” I murmured. “I need to speak with Kamir before I leave for Vantriss.”
“You could always head down to his chambers and demand to see him,” Charisse suggested. “If the Wyrmguards refuse, just kill them. I won’t shed any tears.”
I sighed again. “This is all my fault. Jorel is using you to get to me. If I hadn’t—”
“I’ll be fine, honey,” Charisse assured me. “I know you forget sometimes, but I’m not a delicate snowflake. Jorel doesn’t actually scare me. He wouldn’t bother trying to undermine my authority if he weren’t at least a little bit concerned about what I could do.”
I knew she was just trying to hide her pain, but I still respected her for it. I might have been more powerful than her in every measurable way, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t tough. She was a Dragon Bride, not a peasant girl.
“Besides, I still have full authority over his goons,” Charisse went on. “If any one of them so much as snicker in my presence, I’ll cut off his balls and leave them on Jorel’s desk.”
I grunted softly. “How about you come back to the palace with me tonight? You can fuck me if you want.”
Charisse glanced over at the pieces of her armor and clothing strewn about the room. “What if I’m not done with Jirrah yet? You could join in.”
“Jirrah will still be here tomorrow, and so will Rubis,” I said, stepping forward and offering her my hand. “Come on, let’s go home.”
She stared up at me for a moment before she finally nodded. “Fine, but you’re going to have to help me get dressed. The wine is finally kicking in, and I’m not even sure I can walk right now.”
Cherish your friendship. Draw strength from your sister. And never take what you have for granted.
“I’ll take care of you,” I promised as Lysandre’s words echoed through my head. “Always.”
Chapter Eight
The next several days were a blur of reading, training, and fretting in roughly equal portions. Prince Jorel obeyed his mother and left Charisse alone, mercifully, and she threw herself back into her duties and tried to pretend nothing had happened. We spent our nights in the private rooms of the Velvet Shadow, either wrapped around each other or one of the retharri girls. As always, Charisse was far more domineering when she was frustrated, but I didn’t mind. I could take her punishment far better than Jirrah. Besides, role-reversal was a nice change of pace every now and then, and I’d almost forgotten how good it felt to be tied up beneath her all night.
At the end of the week, however, Lysandre informed me that our quarry was on the move. The Trelathi Corsair ship we were planning to ambush had set sail from the east, and she was already making arrangements with the navy to intercept the vessel and begin the first stage of our plan to infiltrate the Vin Aetheri. In other words, I was now officially out of time.
I was more eager than anxious. I’d already mastered the Luvani fighting styles taught to me by Vaylin, and I’d read over Lysandre’s reports so many times I could close my eyes and rattle off relevant names and details for hours. Impersonating a pirate and joining the rebels was going to be easy. The part I was worried about was back here in Thalamar.
The night before I was scheduled to depart, I finally made the decision I’d been dreading all week: I was going to approach the master’s lair and beg for an audience. Even his Wives rarely disturbed him in his den, and we had been taught over and over at the academy that the master chose when and where he wanted to visit his servants. He was a dragon, after all—mortal concerns were often beneath him, and he possessed a clarity of vision we humans lacked.
Still, I knew it wasn’t completely unheard of for Brides or Wives to request an audience, and I had to hope he would be pleased to see me. I was honestly a bit surprised he hadn’t visited me at all after my first night back in the city. As far as I knew he hadn’t visited any of my other sisters, either, which meant he might not have left his chambers at all. There was only one way to find out.
I left my quarters and journeyed deep into the bowels of the palace. The spiral staircase seemed to wind downwards forever, and nearly all of it was cloaked in darkness. When I finally reached the bottom, I took a moment to breathe in the warm, acrid air seeping in through the enormous stone door warding the master’s cavern. All of Thalamar was built atop an ancient, dormant volcano, and the master slumbered somewhere within its warrens.
Two golden-armored Wyrmguards were standing outside the door, their polearms held stiffly at their sides. They didn’t acknowledge my presence in the slightest, and by the time I was standing in front of them I was almost convinced they had been replaced by golems.
“I real
ize this is unusual,” I said, “but I’d like to request an audience with—”
“The Emperor has been expecting you, Sister Asha,” the guard interrupted. “You may enter.”
The two men leaned down and turned the winches next to them. The gears cranked so loudly it echoed through the cavern and back up the stairs. A burst of hot air blasted through the door the instant it opened, tousling my hair and warming my skin. The cavernous chamber would have been completely dark if not for the pools of glowing magma along the side.
Bracing myself for the worst, I stepped inside. The cavern was even larger than I’d imagined—it stretched for thousands of feet in every direction, and the ceiling was at least two hundred feet high. Massive, obsidian-crusted stalagmites speared upwards from the floor all over, creating something of a rocky forest in between the pools of lava. The heat was so oppressive I feared I might actually cook inside my armor.
Here goes nothing.
Once the guards closed the door behind me, I removed my mask and set it down upon the floor, then set to unfastening the straps of my breastplate. I knew how much my master enjoyed seeing me in my armor—and watching me slowly remove it—but this was about respect, not seduction. I wanted him to know that I wasn’t keeping secrets from him.
Once I had fully disrobed, I tiptoed across the cavern and focused on taking deep, hearty breaths. My skin was already slick with perspiration, and I had to step quickly to avoid burning the soles of my feet. By the time I’d taken forty paces, I was panting; by the time I’d taken a hundred, I was scared I might actually pass out. It was only then that I saw the shadows in the back of the cavern move and writhe, and I immediately dropped to my knees and bowed my head.
“My lord,” I said. “I submit to your power and humbly beg you to grant me an audience.”
For a moment, the only sounds that greeted my ears were ones I had not heard for a long time: the rustle of his long trail dragging across the floor, the clicking of his massive claws against the stone, the snarls of his reptilian nostrils drinking in the smoldering air…