‘I will never come to kiss you,’ she shouted after him, then stood in impotent rage. The villain! How dare he goad her with accusations of dallying with Sh’hale and then mock her fidelity. She would kill him before she became his cousin.
Lae snatched her skirts and stormed back the way she had come, almost colliding with Mooraz whom she’d left in a hallway off the courtyard.
‘My Lady is not attending the ceremony?’ he asked, making no comment on her furious breathing or her angry expression.
Lae looked up at him, for he was as tall as her betrothed and a good head higher than herself. ‘Could you kill Pagan the Guardian?’ she asked.
‘My Lady, yes,’ Mooraz replied, his sloe eyes showing no change of expression.
‘That is good news,’ she said to herself, then turned in a circle and looked back out to the courtyard and the hedgerow path on which she’d encountered the villain. ‘To know that he can die at any moment does my heart good.’ Her grim smile held a moment, then began to fade. ‘Although … Pagan is a Guardian.’ She frowned. ‘Perhaps the King will not want such a one killed.’ She turned back to her father’s Guard Captain. ‘Do not hurt Pagan unless you have my express command.’
‘As you wish, My Lady,’ Mooraz replied and waited patiently as she paced the hall, up and back. Finally she stopped before him again.
‘I will give no such command, Mooraz,’ she said. ‘Forget I mentioned it.’
‘It is forgotten, My Lady,’ he replied.
‘Good.’ She nodded. ‘I will go to the ceremony now and you will accompany me.’
If Mooraz thought it odd that she made the same journey twice, he said nothing, but followed her quick progress down the hedgerow path, his own stride much longer and necessitating a slower pace. ‘Keep up, Mooraz,’ she called over her shoulder, hoping she would find Pagan on her path. He would not ridicule and mock her if she had Mooraz at her back, of that Lae was sure. And yet, what of Sh’hale? If she found him on her path … Unconsciously, Lae’s feet slowed and her hand came up to cover her mouth. Had she tempted Sh’hale to flatter her? And what if he had stayed longer? Would he have been tempted to more? To a kiss?
The memory of his soft cloak brushing her arm set Lae quivering and she knew her desires were wild and ungoverned. She wanted only a kiss. Not Sh’hale’s kiss, but one from her own betrothed. It was the lack of that kiss, and not Sh’hale himself that had made her to think of … matters unbefitting her current position.
Confusion clouded her mind and a sudden restlessness caused her to stop and turn to Mooraz. ‘Am I ugly?’ she asked him, her eyes searching his own, uncaring that the question was not one a Lady should ask her servant. ‘Are my lips thin? Do I not look enough of a woman to be made a wife?’
Mooraz’s expression did not change. ‘Has the Guardian, Pagan, said this to you, My Lady?’
Lae found her lip trembling. ‘The hateful boy. If he was not soon to become my cousin, I would kill him myself. Except that it would upset my beloved.’
Mooraz observed her steadily and Lae found a kind of comfort in his changelessness. Though he said nothing, she knew he must think Pagan a fool. For truthfully, she was not ugly and Talis had agreed to marry her now, therefore he must be ready to join with her.
‘Pagan is a fool,’ she said for both of them. ‘In future I will simply ignore him.’ She glanced away at the berries, then reached forward to pluck a pair. ‘And if that does not bring me peace, I shall poison his bread.’
She nodded and set off again, Mooraz behind her.
‘As you wish, My Lady,’ he said.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
The sun was hot, but Khatrene bore the discomfort because Djahr liked to see the effect it had on her, how the light reflected off her in vibrant colours, illuminating anyone in her vicinity with rainbow splashes. Illuminating him.
He looked at her hand and she wriggled her fingers for him, but her own attention remained on his face, tracing the swirl of tattoo across his brow and down his cheek. How she longed to reach up and touch it, touch him.
‘Beautiful,’ he said and his gaze rose to meet hers, his dark, unfathomable eyes setting off the same reaction in her each time; a weird combination of hot lethargy and leaping desire. ‘I never tire of gazing upon your divinity,’ he said, and Khatrene knew exactly what he meant.
If Mihale had told her that her whole life was to be spent looking at Djahr and never touching him she would have agreed to it, although it would have driven her even crazier than she already was. The feeling he gave her was too rich, too achingly real to live without. But the thing that made her the craziest was that she had no idea how Djahr felt about her, whether she evoked the same feelings in him, or if he was simply marrying her because he’d been told to.
‘What else would you like to know about Magoria?’ she asked, pleased to have an endless source of easy conversation.
‘I want to know more about the panther,’ he replied, and smiled at her, ‘Though you may call it vanity to ask.’
Khatrene smiled back. ‘It’s not vanity,’ she said, though perhaps it was a form of vanity, as she’d told him on several occasions that he reminded her of the large sleek cats. ‘You’re just curious.’
‘About a great many things,’ he said softly, and gazed into her eyes so deeply she had to remember to breathe.
‘The panther,’ she said, trying to steer her mind back towards the conversation.
‘What is its customary diet?’ he asked.
‘Mmm?’ She’d been watching his lips, the way they formed words. The way his tongue moved in his mouth. Imagining it moving in her mouth. ‘Diet?’ Khatrene didn’t have a clue what they were talking about.
‘Does the panther eat grasses on the plains where it lives?’ he asked.
‘Panther.’ She frowned, glanced away and cleared her throat. ‘The panther eats smaller animals. It’s a predator really.’ No sooner had Khatrene said this than she realised Djahr might be upset by the idea that one animal would eat another. After all, it must be alien to their culture. ‘But I think, sometimes, they might eat grass.’
‘So to eat the flesh of another animal is to be a predator?’ Djahr asked, seemingly unaffected by her gaffe.
‘That’s … yes.’
His eyes had locked onto hers and the air between them scorched. ‘How powerful the panther must feel devouring its …’
‘Prey,’ she whispered, her lips tingling.
‘I fear then that I am a predator,’ he said softly, and Khatrene suddenly realised they were speaking in metaphors. Either that, or the fact that she couldn’t stop thinking about sex when she was with him had scrambled her brain. If she wasn’t careful she’d have the chaperone sitting between them.
‘It’s lovely here,’ she said, and tore her attention away from Djahr to glance around at the fragrant ahroce bushes. ‘This was our mother’s garden.’
‘You played here as a child,’ Djahr said. ‘You don’t remember it?’
‘The scent of the flowers is familiar.’ Khatrene hated admitting to Djahr that she didn’t remember Ennae, although it appeared to please him that the one thing she did remember was his face. He’d told her it was destiny, which was very romantic. Except that destiny wasn’t love.
Djahr rose from their intricately quilted picnic rug and walked to one of the bushes. He returned a moment later and sat beside her, a little closer, she imagined, than he had been before. �
�This variety was your favourite,’ he said and handed her the flower carefully, so their fingers wouldn’t touch. Involuntarily Khatrene cast a glance at the old man who sat watching them.
‘Thank you,’ she said to Djahr and sniffed the flower.
Muddy-coloured and thick-stemmed with eight or ten fat, pillow-like petals, it looked nothing like the flowers Khatrene was used to, but the scent was a cross between honeycomb and cut grass. Fresh and sweet. She liked it. ‘How did you know it was my favourite?’ she asked.
Djahr now observed her steadily. ‘It was also the Queen’s. In this, and many things you thought alike.’
‘We look alike too,’ Khatrene said, searching his face for any distaste this might cause him. It must be odd for him, marrying a woman he remembered not long ago as a child. A woman he would never have imagined marrying.
Djahr merely smiled. ‘Beauty is often inherited,’ he said.
Khatrene found herself smiling like an idiot. He thought she was beautiful? The hot lethargy inside herself deepened and her aura changed subtly, now gilded in gold. Peripherally, she saw the chaperone shift his position but her eyes stayed on Djahr’s.
‘I wonder,’ Djahr said, ‘if the child of our union will be as beautiful as its mother.’
Khatrene had to swallow. Several times. He was talking about making love. About the child produced by their joining. Her cheeks felt suddenly hot, yet instead of stammering a reply, she said what was on her mind. ‘I haven’t thought that far ahead.’
Djahr smiled at her audacity. ‘I, too, have difficulty thinking past our wedding night,’ he said, and the heat inside her turned molten. ‘Yet I would not hurry the day.’
Khatrene shook her head, not understanding. She wanted the day to be today. Yesterday.
‘There is much pleasure to be gained from the expectation of what will come. To long for something,’ he said softly. ‘To eat its image again and again in your mind, in your heart, in your body … this adds depth to experience.’
Deep enough to drown? Khatrene simply stared at his lips, unable to speak.
Yet before he could say more, her brother’s voice came from behind her. ‘Discussing flowers?’ he asked, and flopped beside them on the quilt, his shirt and pants cut of the same embossed gold fabric as her dress. This was the third day in a row that he’d matched her outfit and it was starting to irritate her. As did his interruption.
‘Majesty,’ she said, casting her brother a not-so-subtle glance. ‘Do you need me for something?’
SARCASM DOES NOT BECOME YOU.
‘Companionship,’ Mihale replied. ‘Djahr will have you forever. I have only days until you leave, and then months before I see you again at the Ceremony of Atheyre.’
Having recently witnessed the Ceremony of Haddash, Khatrene could happily wait for that event. Talis had told her that once a year the embalmed bodies of the nobility were offered in their House shrines to the Airworld of Atheyre. The chosen were lifted on a column of air to spend eternity in the bliss of spiritual nirvana, although Talis had never seen it happen, which only fuelled Khatrene’s scepticism. The ‘unchosen’ ended up at the grisly cremation ritual she’d recently attended; year-old smelly corpses tossed into the Volcastle mouth. She’d been hard put keeping her porridge down. Yet it was all taken very seriously.
Haddash, where her own father had ended up, was the world where you did your penance before being reincarnated, either in Ennae or, if you were particularly bad, Magoria which was considered the bottom rung of the spiritual ladder, The ultimate aim was to reach Atheyre. As religions went it wasn’t particularly loopy, but Khatrene had to work hard at hiding her disbelief. If The Light started questioning their doctrine it might cause more problems than she wanted to be responsible for. Besides, she didn’t want to hurt her betrothed’s feelings.
‘Majesty,’ Djahr said, and though Khatrene put a hand out to stop him, he had already risen to bow to his King, those deliciously seductive eyes of his amused at the interruption. Unlike his bride-to-be, Djahr relished delay and having received the King’s permission to leave, Djahr turned to Khatrene and threw her one of the smouldering glances she’d been replaying in her mind each night before sleep claimed her. ‘Khatrene …’ he said and she wondered if he knew what saying her name that way did to her. Soft and low, like fingertips gliding down her spine.
‘Djahr,’ she replied, her voice equally low.
He inclined his head and left them, his entourage gathering up in his wake like fishes dragged in a net. Khatrene gazed after him until he was out of sight, then closed her eyes and imagined him some more.
‘You and he are like a pair of …’ Mihale struggled.
‘Lovers?’ She looked back in time to see her brother spluttering.
‘You have not —’
‘Of course I “have not�,’ Khatrene said. ‘I’m not desperate enough to do it with a chaperone watching.’ Although, she had to admit, she was getting more desperate for Djahr with each passing day. If only they could touch. Kiss. Something.
Mihale looked after the way Djahr had gone then back to her. ‘But his presence heightens these feeling of …’
‘Lust?’
His horrified expression was almost comical and Khatrene had to wonder why she was winding him up, acting as if she was an experienced woman when she had no more experience than he. Their mother’s illness hadn’t allowed her time for boyfriends, let alone lovers. Was she still angry at Mihale for arranging her marriage, despite the fact that she was thrilled about it?
‘Your words frighten me,’ he said and she nodded. He looked frightened.
‘I feel overwhelmed most of the time myself,’ she admitted. ‘But I can’t help being attracted to him. He’s gorgeous. And anyway, you wanted me to marry him.’
‘I thought you would marry him from duty. I did not think that —’ Mihale faltered to a halt, then looked at her with guilt in his eyes.
She reached up to tuck a strand of hair behind his ear and noticed his freckles seemed more prominent, as though he’d grown paler. ‘You thought I wouldn’t be attracted to him,’ she said.
He had the honesty to nod.
‘And you still wanted me to marry him? Out of duty? Is that what you’re planning? To marry for duty?’
‘I have not thought about marriage,’ he said softly and looked away, his eyes suddenly so troubled Khatrene hated herself for hassling him. When she’d come to Ennae she’d expected to live with Mihale, to take up where they’d left off, trusting that the bond between them would be unaltered. But she’d been wrong. Even before she’d met Djahr and become mesmerised by him she’d known there was something wrong between herself and Mihale. Now she could see it was nothing more than an embarrassing misplaced crush. She’d come back to him so much older and he’d become confused.
Yet instead of trying to help him over that, to find the bond between them again and strengthen it, she’d let herself be distracted by her desire for Djahr. She’d shut Mihale out and that wasn’t fair.
‘Look, I’m sorry,’ she said, and reached across the quilt. The poor kid was trying to run a kingdom at seventeen, struggling with his feelings for her, and what help was she giving him?
She took his hand, tried not to cringe when he clutched at hers fervently. ‘Listen to me,’ she said. ‘One day when you’re older, you’re going to look at a woman and feel the same way about her as I feel about Djahr. I’m sure there must be —’ Khatrene suddenly remembered. ‘What ab
out Ellega Verdan? She’d be perfect. Her brother is a liability I know, but she’s pretty and smart and you must have noticed the way she looks at you —’
‘No.’ No justification. Just no.
Khatrene gazed at her brother a moment, then thought better of matchmaking. It wasn’t her job. ‘Well, maybe not Ellega, but eventually you’ll meet someone who makes you feel —’
‘I already feel … things …’ He glanced up at her but couldn’t seem to hold her gaze. ‘When first you returned I felt only relief at your presence, yet quickly afterwards came confusion and … longing —’
‘Shhh.’ She pressed a finger to his lips. ‘I know.’
They looked at each other and Mihale clung to her hand.
‘I’m going to marry Djahr,’ she said. ‘And I’m going away with him. Not because I don’t want to be near you, but because he lives somewhere else. You have to let me go.’
Mihale shook his head, desperation in his eyes. ‘Do you love him? Or is it just …’
‘I don’t know. What does love mean? I know I want to be with Djahr. I want to be his wife.’
‘But I want you … to stay.’ His hand was sweaty in hers now and Khatrene felt some of his desperation. He knew what he was feeling was wrong, but he couldn’t stop himself. What could she do?
‘I think you need to talk to someone about this. Maybe Talis,’ she said, holding his gaze. ‘He’s sensible and kind and he cares a lot about you.’
‘I don’t want to lose you,’ he said.
Khatrene disengaged her fingers. ‘You will never lose me. I will always be your sister and I will always love you. Do you understand that?’
He nodded, his Adam’s apple bobbing.
‘And one day we’re going to look back on this and laugh,’ she added, although the wide, lost eyes of her brother looked so far from laughter they frightened her.
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