The table was set with all good things, Sunjaa foods from hot, flat bread cooked over a camp fire to mounds of vegetables like onions and greens, from baked fish to roasted ox-flesh. Konas saw bowls of olive oil, figs, and honey, and his mouth watered. They were giving him a proper feast, even here in this little oasis. They honored him, and their display of hospitality emboldened Konas. He snapped his fingers for a cup of beer, and a slave put one in his hand.
“The Seranimesti have a family tradition,” Konas said, raising his cup. “We like to drink to sacred oaths, those we hold most dear. When one person promises something to another, the recipient receives the promise through a symbolic drink, and then the one who makes the promise seals the oath with a drink from the same vessel.”
“What’s brought this on?” Kamen asked.
“I must confess that I love your daughter, have loved her ever since she was of age in Sunjaa society.”
Kamen and Ajalira exchanged glances but said nothing. Did they approve? Did they disapprove? Kamen did not at once attack Konas, so he cleared his throat and continued.
“Once I was convinced that my brother never intended to marry Sillara, my thoughts turned to her with an insurmountable passion. You must know that she is peerless, that no man can claim her. She must deign to take up her suitor’s hand and place him beside her. So it is with Sillara. She has accepted me, and with your permission, Lord and Lady Itenu, I would like to make her my wife in truth.” Konas thought it best to let Kamen go on thinking his daughter was still a virgin, because if Kamen accepted him, then when next they met, she would not be anyway.
Kamen looked at Ajalira, and she nodded. “If she accepts you, and your brother truly does not mean to honor his vow,” Kamen said, “then the gods give you joy of her. You’ve known her all your life; you’ve educated her and been with her daily. Who knows her better?”
Soren did. Konas knew that in his heart, but he said nothing. Kamen, though he was Sunjaa, had never considered Sillara and Soren as a match. Not only was Kamen married to an Ausir himself, but also Sillara had been raised in the Ausir fashion to meet her destiny as the Ausir Queen. The thought of a traditional Sunjaa brother-sister marriage had simply never crossed his mind.
Konas rushed on with his vow before Kamen could change his mind. “I promise to love her and keep her, honor and protect her, and be faithful to her as long as I live.”
“I accept your promise.”
Konas passed Kamen the cup, and he drank. He took the cup back and raised it to his lips, but Kamen fell back choking.
“What’s the matter, my love?” Ajalira took Kamen by the arm.
Konas looked in the cup. Beer. Nothing more. Perhaps the liquid had gone down the wrong passage.
But Kamen continued to sputter and gasp. Ajalira helped Kamen to lie back on a low divan. She then jumped to her feet and snatched the cup out of Konas’s hands. She put her nose to the lip and inhaled.
Ajalira’s eyes filled with tears. “Muscarine!” She dashed the cup aside and ran back to her husband, wringing his hands and stroking his dreadlocks back off his brow. “Oh, my love, my love.”
“Poison?” Konas asked himself, staring at the broken cup on the carpet, watching the sand drink the dark liquid. “Who?”
No one heard his questions. The slaves wailed, and Ajalira sobbed. Konas knew who: Nathen. And Kamen had not been his target, or, rather, he did not mind killing everyone in the tent that night as long as Konas did not come out alive.
In a flash, Konas understood everything. The little parcel Merieke had given Nathen had been the poison. He had taken it to poison someone, but he did not know Konas was married to Sillara until they arrived at the camp. Who then was the muscarine originally intended for? Konas ordered the facts in his mind. Nathen wanted Sillara and would do anything to get her. As far as Nathen knew, Konas was not a bar to him getting what he wanted. What was the bar? Tivanel. Sillara was promised to Tivanel. Nathen must have learned that Tivanel loved Ajalira once. Did he know that Tivanel still wanted her? If that were the case, then all Nathen had to do was make Ajalira available. How? Kill Kamen. But once Konas announced his marriage to Sillara, Nathen must have switched targets. If the muscarine killed Ajalira and Kamen, too, then there would be two fewer people to object to Nathen marrying Sillara.
It was the perfect crime for Nathen, for who would ever suspect him? Kamen had many political enemies. Any one of them could have bought Kamen’s slaves to poison him while out of the city. Konas picked up the decanter still mostly full of beer. It was all poisoned.
Violent coughing wracked Kamen’s body, causing Ajalira to cry out. With tears streaming down her golden face, she turned to Konas. “Fetch in Lord Kesandrahn and any others fit to witness my husband’s end.”
Konas’s mind rebelled at the request, and he stood frozen. Why would Ajalira want anyone to see Kamen choke to death? Poison was a horrible, ignominious way to die.
“Go!” Ajalira cried.
Konas fled the tent and called for help. “Help! Lord Itenu is poisoned!”
Darien and Orien came running, and the broad-shouldered Admiral barreled his way through Konas, knocking the Ausir from his feet. Orien stopped only long enough to help Konas up.
“What’s happened?” the captain asked.
“Poison.” Konas peered with keen eyes through the dark night. Nathen was nowhere to be seen.
The tent was filled with wailing. Darien knelt by his old friend, hugging on his shoulders and crying for hurts that could not be healed.
“Kamen is poisoned,” Ajalira said through her brave tears. “Perhaps if Saerileth were still alive, she might have been able to do something.”
That was bitter to Konas, for doubtless Saerileth had taught Merieke how to concoct poisons. The very craft that could have saved Kamen now killed him.
“Soren, Sillara.” Kamen choked on the names. “Wish I could … say goodbye.”
Ajalira pressed her forehead against Kamen’s, her fair skin against his black. “I love you more than my own life.”
And out of that love they had created a perfect being. What would Sillara say, what would she do, when she learned of her father’s death? She would weep, and Konas would give her his shoulder to cry on. He would hold her and comfort her, and she would love him all the more for his compassion.
Ajalira looked up from where she had been kissing Kamen’s lips. “You must be our mountain, Lord Seranimesti.”
The mountain of the Tamari, that place where the old—when the Burning came upon them—went to meet death in battle, either against a foe or against the cruel ice of the north. Konas understood at once. Ajalira would not let Kamen die without her, and she was not going to sit by and let the muscarine unman him as it worked its hours-long death through his body.
Konas stepped forward and drew his sword.
Darien leaped to his feet. “Why do you draw steel in this tent, Ausir?”
“To honor Lord Itenu and his wife. I will be their mountain.”
Darien glanced at Ajalira in confusion.
“Peace, old friend.” Ajalira laid her hand on his thick forearm. “It is our way, the way we always intended to go together.”
Not you without me, nor I without you.
Kamen mastered his agony, rose to his feet with Ajalira’s help, and stood bravely before his friends. No one else dared touch him. They were performing a holy act, and even though no one was Tamari, everyone understood on some instinctual level.
“No, Kamen.” Darien’s voice was a mere whisper, his spirit broken within his strong frame.
Kamen grasped Darien by the forearms and looked into his eyes. “I learned something of love from you and Saerileth, and you helped me find my own bliss. I go to live with Ajalira beyond the confines of this world. Think often of me.” He embraced Darien, and the old Admiral wept. “Farewell.”
Konas looked from Kamen’s face to Ajalira’s, for he did not know whom to kill first. But he did not have to ask. Ajali
ra understood his hesitation.
“I should be first, for my lord’s life is already over,” she said, her eyes shining with proud tears. “As I am Tamari, be my mountain, noble Seranimesti.”
Konas nodded and stepped forward.
Ajalira turned and took both of Kamen's hands in hers, holding them to her breast. “Not you without me.”
“Nor I without you,” Kamen said, finishing their old vow.
Ajalira kissed her husband one final time and then proudly faced Konas. With a quick and sudden thrust that surprised Ajalira, he stabbed her through the heart.
Kamen grabbed her and with heartbroken cries laid her out on the carpet. “Oh, my life. My love.” A spasm rocked his withering frame. He bent over her and kissed her lips. Closing her eyes, he struggled to his feet and bared his naked chest to the blade.
“Take care of my children.”
Tears blinded Konas at that moment to think that he was orphaning Sillara. But what could be done? Nathen’s treachery had done its work. Konas could do nothing but give them an honorable death. “Farewell.” He ran Kamen through on the sharp point of his blade, spilling that noble man’s blood upon his wife’s body.
Darien caught Kamen and laid him out beside Ajalira. Orien stood amazed, but Konas fell to his knees and wept at the beauty of their deaths.
Nathen burst into the tent, then, and when he saw the grisly scene, he moaned and tore his hair. “Cruel! That Kamen's political enemies would strike at him in a moment of vulnerability! To kill him outside the city when he was concerned only for his daughter's well-being. This must be revenged.” He even managed to summon up tears.
Konas still held the bloody blade, and for a moment he considered rising and slaying the murderer where he stood. But for Sillara’s sake, he mastered himself, for he was without allies. Konas was alone with three Kesandrahn, and he could not know how Darien and Orien would react to what they would see only as a rash murder. Would they believe Konas once Nathen was dead? And if Konas first accused Nathen, would they even believe him then? And what if Nathen fled and escaped?
No, Konas swallowed his anger and plotted his revenge. He would wait until he returned to Tambril’s City and tell the Itenu children how Nathen had murdered their parents.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Sillara sat up in her bed, her arms wrapped around her knees. The westering sun filled her room with orange and red light. She buried her face in her knees, trying not to cry.
Konas and Nathen had left well before noon, and Nathen had promised her rescue from her plight. She laughed bitterly, and the laughter became the tears she had tried to avoid. Nathen could not save her from her plight, for she did not care about leaving Tambril's City or the Desertmasters. No, she cared only about being with Soren.
Soren, who was at that moment in the bedroom across the hall.
With Merieke.
Sillara bit her lip to keep her sobs quiet. She was glad that Soren was near her, but to know that he was so near and yet with Merieke—it twisted her insides in a nauseating pain. The Desertmasters had, of course, been delighted to have Soren live in the same house they had provided for her. She still marveled that the house had been built with the advent of Abrexa's first priests here. For centuries this house had stood here, known as the Queen's house, and it had awaited her.
But if Abrexa's visions were so clear that these distant people had long known of her coming, how could they think that Soren was to be the King? He was her brother only, not her husband, too.
Low laughter reached Sillara's ears, and she lay down on her side, gripping her pillow with both hands and burying her face in it.
But her hearing was too keen. She could not block out the sounds. She could hear Merieke's low, seductive voice.
“Come, Soren, it is the first time since you took me with Nathen as witness that we will get to be alone. Don't get me wrong, love! I adore having you and Nathen both at once, but he likes to have a bit too much of you sometimes. I'm glad that I can have you to myself for a while.”
Sillara bit into the pillow, muffling the scream that wanted to come out. She had never been jealous of Soren's lovers in the past, but things had been different after Merieke had opened her eyes to sex. From that moment, Sillara realized, she had disliked the idea of any other woman giving that pleasure to Soren.
If only I had realized that I wanted to be the one to pleasure him.
The sobs that wracked her frame shifted, taking up the nausea that coiled low in her belly, and Sillara sat up quickly, darting to the water-basin by her bed. There she vomited up the little she had been able to eat, for even at their table, Merieke had run her hands up Soren's thigh and winked at Sillara.
Gentle, calloused hands pulled Sillara's hair back from her face, and she looked up to see Soren's anguished eyes looking down at her. Beyond, in the doorway to Soren's bedchamber, Sillara could make out Merieke, naked and lovely, and the nausea swept over Sillara again.
“Sister, what's wrong?” Soren wiped her mouth with a cloth from the table.
Tears filled Sillara's eyes, and she glanced at Merieke.
“Merieke, take this basin downstairs.” Soren gave the vomit-filled bowl to Merieke. “And bring up some water for my sister.”
Merieke rolled her eyes, but she did as Soren said, coming to take the basin. And she flaunted her gorgeous breasts before Sillara's eyes as she did so.
When Merieke had gone, Sillara clung to Soren.
“You're sick.” Soren's worry was clear.
“No, not sick,” said Sillara. “Just—”
“Oh gods.” Soren pulled back from Sillara, holding her at arm's length to look into her face. “He got you with child, didn't he? That backstabbing, thieving, deceitful—”
“No.” Sillara shook her head. “Praise Melara, no.”
“How can you be sure? You're vomiting but not sick?” Soren's grip on her arms was almost painful. “When I think of his child in your womb—”
“No, my love.” Sillara smiled, despite her shame. “No, I have bled since he last took me.”
Soren relaxed his grip and smiled, too. “I was eaten up with fear and jealousy, sister.”
“That is why I was sick.” Sillara dropped her eyes. “For I know that Merieke will please you, and it is right that she should. I would not want you to miss even a single pleasure—”
“How could I take pleasure in her arms now?” Soren leaned his brow against Sillara's. “Now that I know you are the wife of my soul, that all this while I have been seeking you in other people's arms, how can I take any pleasure in any other embrace?”
Sillara smiled, her heart swelling with love for Soren. “You—”
Soren laid his finger to her lips. “I know, sister. But when I think of you with Konas—”
“The Desertmasters nearly killed him when they saw us … coupling. They thought he was taking me by force, but even when I told them otherwise, they said that no pure-blood—they call those of a single race 'half-blooded' actually—could ever be the Queen's King. They refuse to acknowledge him as my—” Sillara could not say the word “husband”, so she went on in a rush. “They will not let him anywhere near me, brother, so we are safe.”
At that moment Sillara heard Merieke's foot on the stair, and she ceased speaking. She did not trust Merieke, not since Nathen's attempt to use Lotus-tricks on her mind.
“Do not worry, Sillara.” Soren kissed her brow and rose. “Sleep in peace, and know that I will guard your heart.”
“Thank you, brother.” Sillara took the cup of water from Merieke, and repeated her words. “Thank you.”
“You're welcome, sister.” The word on Merieke's lips was like a slap in the face, and Sillara wanted to throw the mug at Merieke. She did not, however.
Instead Sillara smiled at Soren.
Then Soren withdrew to his bedchamber across the hall, and Merieke followed him. The door closed behind them, but Sillara heard every word they spoke.
“You sho
uld sleep downstairs, Merieke.” Soren's voice was not harsh or cold; it was simply firm.
“But, Soren, my love, I want you.” There was a pause, and judging by the sound, Sillara figured that Merieke was slowly, with that catlike grace she always possessed, gliding across the room toward Soren.
“Wanting is not the same as having.” Soren's full meaning was clear to Sillara, as she knew full well it would not be to Merieke.
“Come now, you're just teasing me because Nathen's not here. You've no need to be jealous, love.” Merieke's voice stopped moving suddenly, and Sillara knew Soren must have stopped her with an outstretched hand.
“Go sleep downstairs,” said Soren.
“I'm your concubine,” said Merieke, her voice almost a purr. “I have rights to you, you know.”
“No,” said Soren clearly. “You don't. You are forgetting that neither your mother nor mine is or ever was treated as a concubine. They were treated as wives. You are not my wife.”
Sillara's heart surged with commingled joy and shame. Merieke was not Soren's wife, but Konas was her own husband.
“What?” Merieke was obviously stunned.
“I have all the rights,” said Soren. “I may do with you as I please, may do anything I please, and you have no say.”
Merieke's voice had lost all its displeasure, and it was instead filled with desire. “Oh, I know. I know that I am yours for the taking, and I have nowhere to turn when you would take from me whatever you want.”
“And I want nothing from you,” said Soren. “Go downstairs to sleep. There is a bedchamber there. It is yours now.”
Sillara heard the door opening and closing, and then she heard her own door being opened nearly silently.
At that moment she realized that Nathen was certainly the more thoroughly trained of the siblings, for he had been able to climb her tower wall without her hearing him. Merieke, on the other hand, Sillara could hear, though she doubted if anyone else—aside from Soren—could have.
And Sillara lay perfectly still, keeping the rise and fall of her breast perfectly even. She did not want to heap further shame on Merieke. Sillara heard her door close again, and Merieke's footsteps carried her down the stairs.
The Lotus Ascension Page 23