by S. K Munt
‘Maui,’ I said, winking, and he blinked at me and then grinned and shook his head.
‘I should have assumed you knew already, hmm? With your test scores and all?’
‘Actually, I knew that because Kohén was so invested in the subject growing up. Always so eager to know his brother’s life as best as he could. We’d go through old encyclopaedias and spin his globe…’ I smiled a sentimental smile and took a sip from my glass of champagne. ‘I owe so much to him.’
‘And now the little brother owes his very own title of Lieutenant-General to you.’ He saw me blink and held up his hand. ‘Relax, it will become a duchy in addition eventually, I do not doubt that. But Duke is a royal title, and can be granted by the king only. I am certain that Elbert will come to see Kohl’s potential, but we still need to make that potential shine brightly so that he looks at all. So I have asked Kohl to become my new Lieutenant General, and to spearhead the settlement of Isthmus Isle using half of the Corps we have stationed on Caldera, and the prisoner Corps that are coming to us at the end of the year - most of which will eventually become your workers.’
‘Prisoners?!’ I squeaked, but he held up his hand again and laughed.
‘It’s not going to be a boatload of miscreants, sweetheart. This crop will be made up of people who have begged to be re-accepted into a society after having being evicted for committing a series of minor crimes- meaning that they’ll have more than three glyphs each, but for petty crimes like getting pregnant out of wedlock, insignificant but recurrent thievery, or prostituting to make money, etc etc.’
The boat I would have been on according to the duchess’s plans!
I twisted my pursed lips to the side, but nodded, accepting that. ‘So… people who fell through the cracks, like me, but didn’t have a guardian angel to pull them back out?’ I smiled wryly. ‘Huh. That’s kind of perfect.’
‘I thought so. Not only will this position give him the chance to shine while bearing quite a burden of responsibility, but he will be acting mayor of the village that will be established there over the next four years and-’ his eyes shone proudly, ‘he confessed to me, that being my second-in-command is his wildest dream, so relax, Larkin…’ he patted my shoulder. ‘It is my footsteps that he wants to follow in, for now, not his actual father’s. That will probably change, for I speak from experience when I say that it’s hard to stop climbing the ladder of success once you’ve overcome the fear of heights. But it will suffice for now, and instead of having to wait until he is eighteen to have any at all, Kohl will bear that title proudly on Sunday. And because it is a military issue, not feudal- I cannot be overruled.’ He wriggled his eyebrows. ‘Nor will Kohl be able to be overruled by Kohén- for lieutenant general will outrank prince on Pacifican soil, at least until Kohén is crowned King of it.’ He held up his glass. ‘So, do I get a thank-you?’
‘I have told Elbert no, so that is my thanks,’ I clinked my glass against his and grinned. ‘But this is a toast for hope for things to come in addition to that! From the bottom of my heart- and glass!’ I giggled, seeing that I only had a splash of liquid left. ‘Gosh, this is my third in an hour, I better slow down, hmm?’
‘Not at all! This is your day, and it must be celebrated until we are singing and having to pour ourselves into bed.’ He chuckled. ‘After we have discussed some loose arrangements regarding your future of course.’
‘Neither is very ladylike behaviour,’ I said, finishing my drink. ‘But to hell with manners!’
‘To hell with castes!’
‘To hell with champagne!’ I clacked my glass against his again. ‘Where’s the ale? Cigars? I ought to celebrate my feminine victory, in a masculine way.’
Atticus laughed and I finished what champagne I had, and looked around for somewhere to set it down but a servant appeared out of nowhere and handed me a glass of beer.
‘I couldn’t help but overhear, and this is supposed to be going to the Earl of Janiel, but here you go miss!’ she said, then turned around again. ‘I’ll see if I can’t swipe one of his cigars too!’
‘Thanks!’ I called, but turned with her, pulling on her blue apron strings. ‘Hey!’ I said assessed her dark hair, bountiful curves and olive skin. ‘Don’t I know you?’
She glanced back at me over her shoulder and smiled briefly. ‘Well, I have worked in the palace a few times over the years as a caterer-’
‘Not from here. Not…’ I followed her and turned her around, and then recognition hit me. ‘Oh my gosh! Siria, isn’t it? Weren’t you a Companion?’
The maid’s brown eyes widened and yes, they bore a trace of gold, just as Siria’s had. ‘N-no miss,’ she stammered. ‘You are confusing me with my sister.’
I pressed my hand to my chest. ‘I thought she was from Tariel?’
‘She was- I mean- we both were. I was born first and she, a few minutes later.’ The girl lowered her lashes. ‘We are identical but like the prince and his twin, not equal. Hector of Tariel took her in on his fifth birthday. And I…’ she lifted her eyes to me, and she was so beautiful that it stopped my heart. Beautiful, and sad! ‘My parents couldn’t stay and watch her life unfold like that. They requested a transfer for them and my older brother and I here, so they would not have to see her go through that life, and I qualified as a waitress just as she was released from her contract.’ She sighed. ‘I tried to transfer to re-join her in Tariel, but it was denied.’
My heart ached for her. ‘So you do not see her?’
‘I do now that we are grown, but only I do, and it is not often.’
I looked around, trying not to look like I pitied her too much, but how could I help it? She was a lot older than me- at least twenty-eight, going off the Prince of Tariel’s birthday, and she was unmarried and working and missing a twin. ‘Is she here today?’
‘No, but she may be here on Saturday, weather permitting, for the roads north have suffered a bit of rain damage last night and are all muddy.’
‘I hope she makes it,’ I said. ‘I never got to see her after the incident at the ball last year! I was taken outside too quickly and then sent off to bed.’
‘She was unharmed,’ the girl assured me, then shook my hand. ‘I saw her after myself, and a few times since. I’m Gabby-’ she held her hand out to me, balancing her tray on the other, and her skin was as warm as her eyes. ‘It is a pleasure to meet you for real, Larkin. I knew Lindy and her husband rather well, so I was grateful to hear you passing along her name to my sister- who had her make a pretty gown for me too!’
‘Really?’ I was beside myself with excitement, and the girl nodded, her eyes darkening.
‘I knew your mother as well. She used to do clothing alterations on our uniforms…’ she smoothed out her Blue Collar apron and smiled sadly at me as my heart sank. ‘Her funeral was pretty, Larkin- all of the nurses who knew her from the hospital came, and the seamstresses from where she worked…’ her voice trailed off. ‘I’ve said too much, I’m sorry.’
‘No,’ I shook my head. ‘It’s fine. I’m glad to hear whatever pleasant things I can, for I was still unconscious when the funeral took place.’
‘Well, that’s good. Anyway…’ her eyes drifted across the green. ‘I better get back to my duties. I ought to say that I hope to see you again soon, but I will not- just in case I jinx your escape.’
I laughed. ‘Thank you, Gabby.’ I stepped back to Atticus and grinned, thinking that I’d have to find a way to get her transfer approved. Surely Kohén would back me on that, because she was a twin as well? ‘Small world.’
‘I have no idea what you two were on about…’ he said, finishing his own champagne then turning it upside down. ‘But I do know that she forgot to offer me another beverage.’
‘Here, take mine,’ I thrust the beer into his hand. ‘I’ve just realised that I’ve had too many without a bathroom break, so to save me from doing something hopelessly masculine- like peeing behind a tree- I better duck inside.’
‘So long a
s you don’t pee on the wrong throne!’ he called after me, and I laughed, excited to get the bathroom business out of the way with so I could return and grill him on the nitty gritty details of his relationship with Jovi. What a match! What a DELIGHTFUL match!
It took forever to get up the green slope of the common with a sloshing bladder, and I was stopped so many times that by the time I made it through the front courtyard, I was in agony. I tried to go to the public restroom by the pool just inside the west wing doors, but there was a line of women already waiting and so I huffed and puffed and made my way toward the north wing instead. It was silent and dark inside the harem’s corridors, and because I wasn’t certain that I would make it past the bubbling fountain of the spring, I used the toilet in the spa and then practically danced toward my bedroom after, realising that I was actually drunk and ought to at least check my hair and make-up and re-apply some perfume spray so it wouldn’t be too obvious.
And I should probably try and find Kelia… we could get drunk together! It’s not like anyone is ever going to mistake us for born-nobility again!
Swaying, I opened my bedroom door and then stepped inside, but then gasped when I was greeted by utter destruction. My things were everywhere! Absolutely everywhere! Vases smashed against the carpet, curtains ripped from the rods, my duvet was on the floor and when I stepped forward, something crackled under my boot. I looked down and saw a sheath of paper and my heart stopped when I recognised Kohl’s handwriting. Instantly terrified, I slammed my door behind me and locked it, and bent to gather up the three pages of the letter lying there, and my eyes followed the trail of destruction all the way to the over-stuffed chair in the corner where Kelia was huddled, hugging my bible to her chest.
‘Oh my god…’ I gaped at the girl, whose hair was a mess, and whose mascara was running down her face. Her feet were bare, and her tiny frame was shaking. ‘What…?’
‘There’s nothing comforting in here…’ she croaked, and I wasn’t certain if she was talking about the bible, or the harem, until she tapped the mouldy, warped cover. ‘It’s all damnation for a whore… unless you’re the prodigal son’s favourite, like Mary.’ She made a face at me. ‘Like you.’
‘Kelia, what’s the matter?’ I picked up my letter and hurried to kneel at her feet. ‘What have you done? Why would you do this?’
‘He released me,’ she whispered, and my chest tightened. She didn’t look at me, but kept her haunted gaze locked on the old book in her hands. ‘Not just me- all of us.’
I blinked rapidly. ‘When?’
‘Twenty minutes ago,’ she whispered. ‘He summoned us all inside, and released us. His father was with him, and he tore every contract in two and told us to enjoy our last days in Eden at our leisure.’
‘Oh, oh no!’ I tried to take her hands, but she wouldn’t relinquish her hold on the bible. ‘That’s terrible!’
Kelia’s eyes flashed. ‘Kohén said it was an honour. That we were already wealthy, and that we would be the youngest companions in Calliel, and would make a killing. Not just that, but we could afford to be selective.’ She began to cry. ‘And Elijah said that he would find placements for us all- that he’d even hit up the dignitaries here and ask if any of us were to his liking… but… but… I can’t be a whore!’
‘You’re not a whore,’ I assured her. ‘You’re a Companion.’
‘No, I’m not.’ She shifted her eyes to me. ‘I am nothing, Larkin with the potential to choose between two fates- resign myself to be a common man’s whore, or join the Corps.’
I furrowed my brow at her. ‘What?’
‘I am a virgin,’ she whispered. ‘But I got a sixty-four overall. So if I admit that this…’ she held up a limp, gold-encrusted wrist, ‘is a lie, I will be put into the Corps to earn a wage, with a savings bond of golden trinkets waiting for me when I get out- as a favour from the prince.’ She swallowed, and my eyes widened. ‘But if I… if I want… I can…’ she sniffled and raised the book to cover her face. ‘I am nothing! Either way, I am nothing, and you get EVERYTHING!’
I scurried back a few paces when she lifted the Bible and threw it, shattering my mirror. ‘What are you talking about?’ I demanded. ‘You’re not a virgin! I SAW you-’
‘There are ways that a woman can be taken by a man and left intact!’ she screamed at me, and I honestly thought I was going to throw up when I realised what she was saying. ‘Oh, yes, look disgusted with me! But it was what he wanted from me, okay?!’
I pressed my hand to my stomach and stared at her in horror. My feelings for Kohén were like sands in an hourglass, constantly filtering from one extreme to the next, and Kelia’s confession flipped my sentiments towards the boy I had held in my arms only an hour before and saw them trickle down to the depths of depravity once more. ‘Why would you ALLOW him-’
‘I needed his protection!’ She pushed out of her seat and stomped past me. ‘I saw him, running out of the prime minister’s house and I just knew- I just KNEW by the look on his face, and the way Kohl ran in after you, that you’d finally screwed things up! You were his favourite, but he not yours, and now that he knew it, he would want to forget about you! So I threw myself at the chance to be more than just another, and I told him that if he branded me in gold, I would ask him to do so. I would lose my airs and graces, and beg at his royal feet to be defiled… to be his perfect little Companion if ONLY he’d make me his favourite and keep me in the palace forever!’
I got to my feet, and the room was now spinning rather than twirling. ‘But-’
‘But he said no!’ she cried, wiping her tears away. ‘He said the only thing I’d had going for me was my reluctance, and now that I was begging for what I had not inspired within him to beg for, he wanted me gone! He said that when we got back, he’d throw my snobbish little backside into the Corps for having called you a slut-’
‘A WHAT?’
‘You don’t think I saw the way you eye-fucked Kohl? Or the way he lingered near to your bungalow window at night?’ she sneered, stepping closer to me and pointing to the letters. ‘And now that I’ve seen those I know that I was right: you are a slut!’ her face broke and she spun away. ‘I was scared, okay Larkin? Don’t you get it? I was scared! I’d made him so angry, the only chance I had to smooth things over, was to take advantage of the fact that YOU had made him angrier!’
She was making me dizzy with the way she was steering about her moods, like the drunken captain with a sharp prow of a ship. ‘Kelia-’
‘So I offered him the one thing that I knew he would not be able to resist,’ she twisted back and smirked at me, and I saw her disgust toward men written all over her pretty, smudged features. ‘A way to have me, and my snobbish little backside, in a way that would ensure that the next time he took me- I’d be a virgin to sully again.’ I pressed my hand to my gut and she smiled knowingly. ‘THAT sparked his interest, and he was dragging me to the beach in a heartbeat, hell bent on pounding his frustration with you into me. So yes, you saw us together, and yet- I am still technically a virgin.’
I covered my mouth with my hands, deciding then and there that Kohl was the ONLY Barachiel option for me! How many times had Kohén… while angry with ME...? ‘Oh my god… Kelia… I’m so sorry!’
‘Don’t be,’ she shrugged. ‘I rather enjoyed our time together. Why do you think I’m upset at the idea of leaving him and that charge of his?’ She grinned evilly. ‘He had me orgasming within seconds.’
I turned away from her, not enjoying this interaction at all. How could someone go from weeping to bragging about being sodomised in the space of a few seconds?
An insane person- one who has a thing for stabbing people, and one that you have your back to!
I spun back. ‘So…?’
‘So after he spoke with us all just now, he took me aside and told me it was my call. Everyone has to be inspected when they leave here, and because I would pass the purity test, I would fail to qualify for a brothel of my own, but get to keep my gold
. Then he said that if I still wanted to work in this sort of role instead of doing hard labour… I had until Saturday to find someone to gift my purity to.’ She narrowed her eyes to slits. ‘But then he told me that it would not be him, and that if I wanted to become a Companion, then I should try his twin or his older brother or failing that- one of the guards!’ She jerked around suddenly and smacked her tiny fist into my leather bedpost. ‘One of the GUARDS, Larkin!’
I pressed my fingers to my forehead. ‘I can’t believe I’m hearing this! How DARE he take you so many times and then-’
‘He didn’t, Larkin…’ she sighed, deflating immediately. ‘He was still trying to get inside me properly, when you apparently showed up and made him go soft. He fought us all off, threw an electric storm in a fit of frustration then went after you when it started to rain and he hasn’t come to ANY of us since, as far as they know anyway.’
I felt my face screw up as blood spiked at my brain like acid. ‘What? But your gold-’
‘He comes to my door,’ Kelia conceded, ‘but only to slip another trinket under it to keep up appearances as his way of apologising...but he barely looks at me and in case you haven’t noticed, the others are wearing the same amount of gold that they had before we left for Pacifica, because he’s been ignoring them too and acting infatuated with me.’ She wiped at her eyes while I pressed my hand to my chest, feeling the hourglass upend itself once more. So Kohén HADN”T actually had her? What I’d witnessed had been only an attempt? ugh, this was so confusing! ‘So I am a whore by nature, not nurture, and if I don’t want to live my life as a Blue Collar servant, then I have to find someone to defile me enough to put a roof over my head before I turn into a fucking rotten pumpkin at midnight on Saturday, because he’s refusing to be ‘unfaithful’ to you, now that being faithful to you is apparently possible.’ She picked up one of the letters from the bed and studied it thoughtfully. ‘I probably would have gone to Kohl, and I figured that he wouldn’t turn down sex if he knew he wouldn’t get in trouble for it- but I saw him charge outside in tears last night after following you and...’ She turned and held up the piece of paper and dangled it in front of my eyes. ‘He’s selected his favourite too, hasn’t he? And from what I hear, you two are now planning to set sail together- and leave your bestest friend at permanent half mast behind forever!’ She smirked and flicked the paper at me. ‘Or at least, you were.’