To Be King

by Lara Blunte

  He wished the army to be damned, and the clergy, and the rising classes; now he wanted to go up the stairs and ravish his queen ten times.

  "Your Grace?"

  It was Lord Jollan, looking at him inquisitively. Tameas saw that they were all looking at him.

  "What do you think, Your Grace?"

  Tameas cleared his throat. "I think it is intriguing," he said to gain time.

  They all looked at each other, and Donnet frowned at him with a puzzled expression on his face.

  "We mean, Your Grace, whether a thousand men would do, rather than the one thousand two hundred you wanted for the army?"

  "I repeat," Tameas said, "it's an intriguing proposal. Let me think about it. Shall we adjourn for today, my lords?"

  "Are you unwell, Your Grace?"

  Tameas couldn't help a smile, since he was as far from unwell as could be. "I think we all need to reflect on the proposals made here, and I have affairs of succession to think about."

  "Succession, Sire?" Sir Jochim piped in eagerly. "This is something that concerns us all!"

  No, it doesn't, Tameas thought, but he said, "Then here is work for you, Sir Jochim. Find me anyone in the nation or beyond who might think they have a claim to my throne!"

  "Well," Sir Jochim began. "There is the..."

  "I want everyone, the remotest claim, and that will take you a while." Tameas stood up. "Good day, my lords!"

  They were confused, but stood up, still looking at each other, and walked out one by one.

  The king had motioned to the secretary who took the minutes of the council, asking for writing implements, and when he got them, he dipped his quill in ink and smoothed the paper before him.

  Someone came to lean against the table.

  "Why won't they see the importance of the army?" Donnet asked. "A newly formed kingdom and an even newer king..."

  "Sir Jochim is most probably taking commissions from all the things he wants built," Tameas said serenely as he kept writing. "That's why he insists on them."

  "What?" Donnet cried, outraged. "And you won't throw him in a dungeon?"

  "No, because he is the cousin of the Earl of Whitehall, a man with a good army that I want on my side. He can be a good counselor, as he is such a gossip, if I manage to keep his corruption to a minimum."

  "A good counselor? He is a thief, he has no honor!"

  Tameas laughed at this. "What do politics have to do with honor?"

  Donnet was looking closely at him. "What is with you? Sleeping on your feet at training, dreaming through council...?"

  Tameas kept writing as he replied, "I didn't sleep much last night."

  "Why are you smiling like that?"

  "Go away," said the king.

  "What are you writing?" Donnet perused the paper, where black strokes of the quill were appearing, without him being able to understand what they said. "To whom are you writing?"

  "To the head of the guards, to have you taken away!"

  The king had thrown ash on the paper to dry the ink, folded it, set his seal and called the page, telling him to hand the letter to the queen, “Be sure to give it into her own hands,” he said.

  Donnet's eyes widened and he pointed a finger at his friend. "Oh! Oh! Oh, oh, oh!"

  "Go away, I said, or I will really have you taken away."

  Donnet looked at Tameas with his mouth open. "It has not only happened, but it was... good?"

  "I am not discussing my wife with you as if she were a tavern wench.” Tameas stood up, smiling. He stopped and added, “On the other hand, those thoughts you have about her have officially become high treason."

  He started walking out, but Donnet followed him. "That good?"

  Tameas only gave another smile in response, and disappeared inside his chambers, closing the door on his curious friend.

  SORCERY

  The queen had been tortured that morning by Dorthe, who had seen her straggling in with a guilty face at six o'clock.

  The nursemaid had clapped her hands, made high pitched noises and almost danced.

  "Be quiet!" said Isobel. "Don't behave like a fool!"

  "It has been done, it has been done," Dorthe was crying. "Oh blessed be God, blessed be our sweet Lord! Finally! The king couldn't resist you forever, not such a beautiful girl! Oh, we will have babies, princes..."

  "I said be quiet!"

  Dorthe stopped talking, only to peer closely into Isobel's face. "You enjoyed it..."

  Isobel stomped her bare foot, “I forbid you from mentioning this..."

  But Dorthe wouldn't stop, and was embracing her instead. "You enjoyed it, you have found love!"

  Isobel pushed her away with all her might. "I have found no such thing. You know whom I love!"

  She ran into her water closet and slammed the door.

  Dorthe was more subdued later, when all the ladies sat together. Some of them were embroidering, others threading pearls, and Isobel and Agnetta looked at a book together under the window.

  Isobel tried hard to understand what was written, and was glad when Agnetta started reading out loud as she pretended to follow the princess' finger over the words.

  How could she have felt like that? The king had put a spell on her; it was sorcery, it had to be! It wasn't possible that he should have made her feel like that.

  It was men who loved that act, women only tolerated it, unless it was with their true love. But even Harry's kiss had not made her lose herself the way she had the night before.

  From the moment Tameas had tricked her and managed to put his lips on hers, she had lost all power and had only been able to hold on to him as she might to a tree, if the waters of a powerful river were carrying her. Every touch of his had brought a terrible pleasure, every kiss, even his voice ─ and the thing she had feared the most, their coupling, had been like nothing else on earth.

  The images and sensations of the night before, and of that morning, went over her mind again and again, till she felt almost ill with desire.

  A page had entered and she heard him say that he wouldn't hand the letter he had for her to Dorthe, but that it was meant for the queen's hands alone under the king's strict order.

  "Let him in!" she said, in a voice that didn't sound like hers.

  All the ladies had stopped what they were doing to watch the letter being delivered to her, and they were all frowning. The king, writing to the queen? They waited for her to read the letter; she wanted to tell them to leave, but that would only make everything worse.

  Isobel broke the king's seal and turned her back on the others, opening the letter. She recognized the first five words immediately:

  "Your Grace, the king is..."

  Her heart skipped beats and she frowned as she concentrated, thankful that Agnetta had not asked if she needed help.

  "...m-u-c-k, no, much. The king is much a-f-f-l-i-c...afflicted?" She gasped. Why was the king afflicted, he had seemed so happy that morning when they had said goodbye! She struggled a little over "by thoughts of the" and then, the next word was so long! She almost shook the paper, so that it would say what it meant immediately. "By the...n-a-k- nack? No, nake-d-n-e...nakedness of the queen!"

  Isobel let out a loud laugh and then covered her mouth, swiveling around. All faces were turned toward her in high curiosity; Agnetta was smiling, while Dorthe seemed triumphant. Isobel threw her nurse a black look and turned her back to the room again to continue reading.

  "The king is much afflicted by thoughts of the nakedness of the queen, and begs her attendance in his room..." The last word took her a while, though she wanted desperately to know when he expected her attendance. "Forthwith!"

  Isobel gasped again, then looked around at all her ladies and, blushing, said, "The king requests my presence."

  She walked the length of the room, trying not to look at anyone, not even at the beaming Agnetta. She only threw another look of death at Dorthe, and when she was in the corridor, she began rushing towards the king's chamber, but a thoug
ht stopped her.

  Harry! She leaned against the wall, ignoring the guards, and the servants who went to and fro on household business, bowing low and curtsying to her.

  Harry...How could she betray him like that? Tameas was her husband, and it was her duty to sleep with him, and to have babies that would ensure the succession ─ but how could she enjoy it the way she had?

  How could she be running to the king?

  What a horrible betrayal of her love for Harry! Was she a wanton harlot, then, a woman without word, without faith, without honor?

  She kept walking toward Tameas with a much heavier heart, knowing that she couldn't let him make her like what he did, that she must obey him, but dislike it, or she was the worst woman in the world.

  Yet, when she walked through Tameas' antechamber and found him in his room and he took her by the wrist without saying anything, without asking why she was so serious or why she frowned, when he simply began to kiss her, Isobel had a second to think again that this was sorcery ─ that it wasn't she who inhabited her body anymore, but some other creature, some incubus or demon who couldn't resist the pleasure the king gave her.

  MOONLIGHT

  The new kingdom still needed consolidating, especially now that Tibold was dead, and that meant ─ among other things ─ that there should be many splendid events at court to keep the nobility occupied and away from their own knights, and thoughts of rebellion.

  The Dowager Queen, who knew everyone of note, was instrumental in inviting the greatest subjects of the king to Lathia on her stepson's behalf. Lavish banquets were served and it was fashionable, in the year after the Great Wars, that there should be music and dancing.

  As the music started that night, Isobel took advantage of a private conversation that Tameas was having with Lord Jollan to escape up the stairs. She stood on the terrace outside her room feeling the balmy summer breeze on her face, and looking at the city.

  "Moonlight suits you."

  She turned to find the king at the door. "Your Grace..." she said.

  Isobel did not know why she kept slipping into such a formal mode of address, when she had been sleeping in his bed every night for a week.

  "Your Grace," he inclined his head, walking slowly towards her.

  "I meant to return..." she said.

  "I mean not to," he replied. "Perhaps now you know why I used to drink so much. It makes time go by faster."

  The music was drifting up to them. There were never but the most skilled musicians at the castle, as Tameas' keen ears would not have tolerated anything except very good music.

  "Will we not give offense if we don't go back?" she asked.

  "Oh, I don't think they expect the anointed to stay among them for too long," he smiled. "It would tarnish our crown. I wonder if it was boredom that sent you away, though. You have a greater notion of duty than I do."

  He was near her now, and she saw that his eyes were mischievous.

  "I wonder if you have become used to being ogled in that way," he continued.

  It was hard to hide things from him, and she knew it. He was very sharp. She shrugged, "I will get used to it."

  "You must feel very exposed."

  Isobel struggled with words for a moment, then said, "I had thought that only my husband would ever see me as I am. I know the notion seems ridiculous here, but... but there was a sweetness in it for me."

  She raised her eyes to his, and saw that he wasn't laughing, that in fact he was staring at her pensively. "I think there is a sweetness to it as well," he said. "To the fact that only I will see you, at least as long as I am alive." He was very near her now, "Only I will ever see you as you truly are. Even if men think they can guess, they can't possibly know..."

  She was blushing hotly, unable to say anything.

  "But still," he went on in a lighter tone. "It's dangerous for the queen to let the king go up the stairs alone."

  He had leaned against the balustrade and crossed his arms, instead of kissing her. He never did anything that was obvious.

  "Why?" she frowned.

  Tameas turned his head sideways to glance down at the city as he spoke, "These wily ladies of Lathia make their dresses fit their form even more closely in the summer, by putting them over wet bodies..."

  Isobel gasped. He smiled, still looking down.

  "Have you not noticed?" he asked.

  "Why, I have never heard of anything so shameless!" Isobel's cheeks were more flushed than before.

  "They wear their linen and their silk a little wet to show off their bodies, and then stand in the staircase to tempt the king as he goes up," Tameas went on. "They used to do it when I was the prince as well..."

  "The vile harlots!" Isobel cried in her contralto. "I will show them!"

  She started marching towards the staircase, but he held her back. "What will you do?"

  "I will throw them in the street!" she cried.

  She struggled, but he held her arms behind her body, and laughed.

  "Let me go, Tameas, it's intolerable!"

  "I have already told the guards not to let any ladies loiter there," he said.

  She stamped her foot, "But I will show them...!"

  "Why?"

  She stopped short. "Because ─ because the king must not be disturbed..."

  "Oh?"

  "The king must not be fooled by self-serving..."

  "Can not the king take care of himself?"

  "The king..." she whispered, and suddenly she said decisively. "You mustn't look at them!"

  "No," he smiled. "Not while I can look at you."

  She realized that he had managed to make her all but confess to jealousy, and call him Tameas. She wondered how many more things he might make her do, but she had no desire to leave and avoid any of them.

  "Still, I think the queen is neither bored nor so modest," he was saying. "I think the queen is shy of dancing."

  He stood next to her, facing the same way, and offered her his hand. She hesitated for a moment, then gave him hers. He started moving with the music and she followed.

  "Three steps, stop, turn, your palm, your shoulder, turn, your palm, face forward..."

  He talked her through the steps, and they repeated them until she felt quite comfortable. For the first time Isobel began to lose herself in the music and the movement, in his touch, in his eyes when they met face to face.

  "There is nothing so terrible in it," he told her in a low voice that made her shiver as they put their palms together.

  "No," she agreed dreamily, and turned again.

  Now he was behind her, his hand on her waist as they moved. She could feel the strength and warmth of the body close to hers. There was a sweetness in that too.

  When the music came to an end they were face to face again, and this time he did step forward, and he did kiss his queen in the moonlight for a long time.

  ISOLT

  "Isolt," Tameas had whispered when they were making love.

  They were now lying side by side. Isobel could feel the sweat pooling inside the crevice at the base of her neck. "Is it your name for me?" she asked

  "You left the end of your name in Stonemount," he said. "So I thought I might take the first part here. They will keep Bell and I will take Isolt, like the queen in the old tale..."

  She looked at him and saw that he was smiling. Perhaps it was his way to acknowledge that the memory of Harry lingered, and that he knew that she had not forgotten the man she had loved from childhood.

  Isobel had thought it sorcery that Tameas could give her so much pleasure, and hadn't even known how many ways he could do it. It could be in an excruciatingly slow way, which left both of them feeling ready to burst, or in a quick way, without even pausing to remove her dress or his breeches.

  It seemed that it was hardly ever the same thing, because he was so ingenious at making love different, like a thousand songs which could use some of the same words, some of the same notes, and yet not be the same at all.

 
; She thought that they would get enough, or that she would get with child and neither of them would want to continue, but for a month now their bodies could hardly stay away from each other if they were in the same room, though they tried to dissemble in company.

  They didn't know what it was that made them want other people to think that they were as indifferent to each other as ever. Was it modesty or was it pride that made them not want to admit that they did not dislike their marriage so much?

  Or was it because they wanted their time to be their own?

  There were occasions, too, when they sat in public and watched each other. She watched his hands, his eyes, the line of his cheek and jaw: he watched her neck, her breasts and lips. Sometimes it became so difficult not to touch that Tameas would smuggle a hand under the table to caress her thigh, or she would press herself against his arm.

  They didn't know that everyone could see.

  It had become a rule in the castle to make a lot of noise while going anywhere, so that if the king and queen were kissing in a nook on the stairs that had been cleared of wily ladies, or somewhere in the garden, they would have time to compose themselves.

  There was, also, quite a bit of royal giggling coming from behind the tapestries.

  At first Isobel had thought that they slept in the same bed because they were so exhausted after making love, or because it was too late, or too early, until she had to admit to herself that it was because they liked it. She liked the way they fell asleep, almost as if they collapsed together, she liked how deeply they slept in each other's company, she liked that he was the first thing she would see in the morning. She would lie in his arms, looking out at the pink mist rolling over the fields, at the flocks of colorful birds flying by, and they would greet the new day together.

  But the most surprising thing wasn't that she, in the flame of her youth, should desire a handsome husband who was skillful in bed, or that he should want his beautiful wife. The most surprising thing is that they started to like each other.