“Nasty fucker, isn’t he?” Bobby says, jerking his thumb towards a man who resembles a bear. Gerald Barrowman. Second cousin to us, though I don’t know the precise heritage details. “Looks like he could rip your throat out with his thumb and pinky.”
“Nah. He’d have to use his whole hand,” I say, now noticing that Rayse has slid his way over to them, and has engaged my living tank of a second cousin into conversation. It could be perfectly innocent – not everything Rayse does is to spite me, but I highly doubt it. A small wave of dizziness hits me. Perhaps I’ve drank too much, but I want to make my way over there and find out what’s going on.
“Sorry man, but I really don’t like your brother,” Bobby says then, yanking me out of my intentions. “Doesn’t he look like some squirming toad over there right now, talking with that dude?”
“He does a bit,” I agree, not bothering to hide my sneer. The drink flows inside, bold and strong. It’s fairly common knowledge in our clans that we don’t get along. And that if the clan was ever led by him, we would potentially see a full-blown war between us and the Hartsons, rather than the occasional skirmishes and seething hatred we suffered through in the past.
There are, of course, people just like him, who slaver for that day to come.
“Toad’s too nice a word for him,” Pearl says then, speaking up for the first time in a few minutes. “He’s a dangerous and hateful little man.”
“Don’t let him catch you saying little,” I grin, struggling to form my words. “He might just work himself up into a fr – a frothing faint.” Whew. Now the drink’s hitting me. It’s a good burn, though my head feels stuffed with wool.
Pearl lets out a snort of disgust, and seems about to say something, when she notices the attention of more than a few people on her. She shuts up instead, and gets drawn into conversation a few moments later with that accursed servant again. I prefer the Graves guards. Even though they routinely inspect and eavesdrop upon us to make sure no abuse is happening, they do it as discreetly as possible and serve us with respect.
Since I don’t want to create a spectacle, I let it happen, though I long to just punch that idiot Grantmore stable boy in his stupid face. How dare he talk to her. I know his game. He thinks he can stick his dick in my wife. I drain my mug and reach for more liquid from the casket.
“Mate, you’re drinking too fast,” Bobby hisses to me, and I scowl. He’s probably right. My father’s droning on about something. Our Bonecleaver ally is being conspicuously ignored, precisely because of the fact of his heritage. At one point, Rayse points at Pearl and says something, and Gerald Barrowman smirks.
That’s it. My brother, that servant, this boring feast, these awful people and all this posturing and pretending to be nice and words so sweet they make teeth ache – I’m done. I don’t have the patience for this kind of shit. I just want to be back to two hours ago, when Pearl and I were about to fuck for the first time since our marriage. God, why can’t I be there instead?
“Pearl, c’mon,” I say, grabbing her by the shoulder. “Let’s go. We have – have unfinished business.” I wink at her, though I feel the pressure to get us out of here before my brother does something to shame us all, or I do.
Her eyes widen. Instead of her looking flattered or aroused, however, her lips purse into a tight line. “I’m not about to leave in the middle of a feast. How d’you think that’s going to look?”
“What? You were, you were eager for this earlier,” I say, dimly registering her and Bobby wincing. Did I say that too loud? My head’s spinning. The emotions blur together. Have to get out. Can’t she see how bad this will be? “Everyone already thinks that’s how it is with you anyway.”
Her eyes flash, and her voice grows cold. “I am not that kind of person.”
I jab at the retreating servant she was talking to. “If you speak to vermin like him, people will, they’ll think otherwise. He’s after one thing from you only. I’m your husband. Don’t let him sniff around your skirts –”
“What the hell is the matter with you?” Pearl hisses, her teeth clenched. Hands grab me from behind, and I flail at Bobby, who is now manhandling me from the chair.
“I’m sorry,” he stammers to Pearl. “He’s had way, way too much to drink. Come on, mate. Let’s get you out of here.”
“M’fine,” I retort, resisting, straining against my friend’s bear-like arms. “My fucking brother, you know, I bet he sent that Grantmore to talk to Pearl. He’s talking to that Barrowman – spreading lies about my wife –”
“I’m not spreading lies,” Rayse says over the deafening quiet. When did it get so quiet? “I’m merely telling the truth.” He smiles wickedly. “You can dress up the pig and teach it etiquette, but it’s still a pig at the end of the day.”
Gasps erupt around the table. Women react with shock, and Pearl burns red, tears spluttering through her eyes. Bobby’s grip tightens. But it’s not enough to hold me. Screaming in fury, I lunge across the table, hands outstretched for my brother.
I slip on the tablecloth, and one foot slides into a plate of stew. My brother laughs, right until the moment I smash into him, and we hit the ground hard. Air whooshes out of his mouth and he croaks something, but I land one solid punch in his face. Snarling, my brother strains, reaching for his pocket, tugging out a small knife. One he shouldn’t have brought with him to the feast.
He stabs at me, but I roll off just in time, the world spinning around me. There’s so much noise. My thighs hurt for some reason, and I can’t quite get myself upright because one boot’s too slippery. Rayse flies for me, but arms grab at him, stopping the knife from doing damage, and someone yanks me upright as well. Screams and yells hit in a swarm, but bearing down, bigger and angrier than anyone else, is the pale, blazing face of my father.
10
Pearl
“You are a disgrace.” Rysin’s voice cracks like a whip. He glares at Desmond and Rayse. “Both of you. I am ashamed to call you my sons.”
I watch the two men squirm under their father’s gaze. I’m sat with Bobby, who needed to testify as a witness to Rysin about what led up to Desmond’s unhinged assault across the table to Danny and Morgan, who are to take all the information and report to their own clan. I’m still hollow inside. Desmond said such hurtful things.
“I swear to you,” Bobby hisses, while Morgan leans forward, clearly to overhear, “he wasn’t trying to slight you. He’d had a lot to drink, and Rayse was being a little bastard. He was obviously setting Des up for a fall. They’re always at each other’s throats.”
“You did hear what Desmond said to me?”
Bobby groans softly. “Look, okay, that was tactless of him, but I think he was just trying to get you both out before Rayse did something –”
“Instead, Desmond did something instead,” I hiss back. Bobby appears wounded and confused by my venom. His cheeks inflate, his hands face me, palms upward.
“It’s not Des’ fault. I swear.”
I get Bobby’s trying to stick up for his friend, but it still doesn’t take away what Desmond said. Loudly, without any volume control, for the entire room to hear. He’d basically proclaimed me a whore. That was definitely Desmond’s fault. I’m not deaf, and my memory isn’t addled. Then his brother piped up. My cheeks have just about finished constantly burning in humiliation, but I’m fairly certain whatever good things I’ve managed to build for myself have been torn to shreds. Paul Grantmore will probably avoid me from now on. Jay will likely have a worse time in the estate if I do.
“You brought a knife and tried to kill your brother,” Rysin says, pacing up and down before the two brothers. While I’m seated with the Graves guards and Bobby, Rayse and Desmond stand before their father’s clan-hall chair, more of a throne, and Rysin swishes in front of it. His wife sits in the other throne-chair, expression unreadable. “You brought a knife to a feast, where weapons are explicitly forbidden.”
“Desmond attacked me. You saw it. I was just defen
ding myself.”
“No, you were trying to remove the heir to my legacy with a convenient excuse,” Rysin snarls, and his youngest son pales. “I have enough credible evidence that shows you insulted your brother, and his wife in front of a whole audience of people. Desmond was drunk as a fucking skunk with piss-poor judgment, but you should have known better.”
Rayse says nothing. He stares sullenly at the ground.
“I also have been informed politely by the Grantmores that you were showing blatant hostility towards Desmond’s wife. Who, may I remind you, is now a Claymore.”
I wince when he uses Claymore to describe me. I can’t think of myself as one, even though I’m married.
Morgan coughs next to me, as Rysin continues to lay into his sons. “We’re not going to report this one,” he whispers. “From our point of view, Desmond was defending your honor. And the only people physically hurt and threatened with death came from the two brothers themselves. Rayse might be a problem, though.”
“He is,” I reply, still stung by what Desmond had said, but dimly warming to the idea that his judgment was impaired. He was slurring. He wasn’t thinking clearly. He probably didn’t mean to call me a whore.
Or maybe he thinks I am, but it’s buried deep within.
“Dealing with you all is like dealing with a bunch of headless chickens,” Danny says then, as Rysin shrieks at Desmond and Rayse about almost ruining things with the Barrowmans, and risking a clan massacre from the Graves. The lanky Graves guard shakes his head, and my attention turns to him. “You’re all so, so damn stupid. It’s a wonder you can all even breathe. I don’t exactly want my clan to have to commit to their promise, but if you keep this up...”
Bobby holds his head in his hands and slumps from Danny’s words. “Yeah. We are fucking stupid.” He’s so melancholy in that moment that I have to pat him on the shoulder, even though I now feel more confused than ever. The meaty Claymore accepts my touch, not moving from his position.
When the grisly confrontation ends, Rayse is in a foul mood, having been confined to house arrest and forced to undergo etiquette lessons. Which Bobby informs means that he won’t be going out on any raids for a while. Yeah, I can see that crippling Rayse with boredom. Desmond, meanwhile, has a few things to answer for with me.
The moment we’re alone together in his suite, the atmosphere between us frosts over noticeably. Though Desmond has sobered up since the debacle in the banquet hall, he looks extraordinarily hungover, and more than a little waspish.
“Don’t you start too,” he says, which doesn’t help with my mood. I’d been anticipating talking to him, without anyone else around. To dig into the bottom of everything.
“Am I not allowed to talk to you, my husband, about your behavior?”
“I’ve already gotten a reaming from my father, and been almost stabbed by my brother. Just – I need space.”
I fume silently as he goes and pulls off his pants, leaving boxers on, changes his shirt, and slides into bed. I want to bombard him. His words hurt me, and my lungs feel twisted in my chest. However, I can see that he won’t be in the mood. Best to wait until the morning.
Though the morning feels like it’s forever away. The thought of lying in bed next to him with words left unsaid, with that ache in my heart, is awful. I remain in that silent, brooding state, wondering if this is how things between us will always be. Not allowed to speak against my husband. Not allowed to make a bad move while all the servants whisper against me, pushing at my endurance because they think I wouldn't dare risk killing all of us for something as petty as them.
Paul treats me nicely. I want to speak to him or Jay, though I have noticed Jay spending less and less time with me. I'll need to look into that to make sure she's not somehow being bullied away from me, though I can see it happening.
I think I finally manage to get some sleep, since the next thing I'm aware of is the bed shaking. It's done in near silence, but I don't have to wait long before I realize what's happening.
Desmond. Relieving his frustrations by my side, back turned to me, covers pushed off enough so that the quilt doesn't move with his arm. All my annoyance and notions of rejection vanish when I register the act. Heat rushes through me, burning under my skin like a furnace. I barely remember how to breathe. There's something powerfully erotic in this, in being witness to a moment like this, and wondering if the cause of it is you. My own body feels so heated, so turned on that I can barely contain my excitement. I remain still, like a rock, as his breaths quicken, though I can tell he's trying to rein in those sounds as best as able, to make sure I don't know what he's doing.
My mind keeps wandering, though. What he must feel like pressed up against me. What he must feel like if he pushes my legs apart and takes me. If he was able to release himself in me rather than to empty air.
I could do it. All I need is to reach over, and tell him I'll help with that. We were close before, until that interruption dragged us to the feast. I saw the lust in his eyes, felt the lust in my own heart. I could grip him gently, massaging until whimpers escaped his throat. I could whisper in his ear how badly I want him, that I need to be fucked, to be consumed in bliss, and I know that'll electrify him. We could play one another to perfection, and claim our title as husband and wife.
Yet something else locks my limbs in place, and prevents me from doing what I visualize and yearn. He lets out a sigh as he finishes, his body shivering in the process. My name escaping his lips as a whispered prayer.
Oh. I shiver, wanting to touch myself as well. Something about him hissing out my name has such an overwhelming thrill in it, that I'm surprised I don't have a tiny orgasm on the spot. I remain still until his breathing slackens, a part of me wishing he'd faced me while doing that. What fear and excitement he might have felt if he saw me watching him.
But then I remember that we're not exactly on good terms with each other right now. Maybe there was something before, a promise of better times, but his behavior, his father and brother – everything just serves to make it so much more complicated.
I fall asleep once more, fuming my way into the morning.
Waking up reveals an empty bed, and a scribbled note explaining he had “important things to do.” Fine and dandy. My mood darkens further. He's probably avoiding me and using this as an excuse. But whatever.
As I pass through the corridor to head to Jay's room, Paul's walking in the opposite direction. He stops and smiles, waving at me.
“Hey! Good to see you. If you're looking for Desmond, he's visiting Tielman lands today.”
Tielman lands? How does the servant know more than I do? I feel ill at ease. “How long might that take?”
“It depends. The average trip lasts about two days. But it also may be a formality meeting by the border.”
Two days. That's one hell of an avoidance my husband is doing.
I just wish he'd told me. Woke me up, explained what was happening. That we would talk later. Not this. Not the whisper of my name in the night, and then nothing. Paul sees most likely that I'm upset, because he says, “Oh, I'm sorry. Come with me. Maybe you want to see Jay? She's in the servant's lounge. I'm sure she'd love to see you.”
I decide not to mention that Jay was my original destination. “Thanks,” I mutter, allowing Paul to lead me forward. He's still keeping up his friendly act, and now I'm not sure if it is an act. Maybe he really does want to make an effort for me. Compared to the other scowling servants, or the ones who look away rather than at me. It would be nice to manage a walk through this place without getting a single glare. I might faint when the day comes.
Paul leads me into a small, run-down looking living room, where Jay is slumped over a pack of playing cards, trying to stack them together in a precarious paper tower. “I found her. Now you can play to your heart's content!”
Jay's face lights up in happiness, and I suddenly wonder if something's going on between her and Paul. I then feel bad for assuming that, just because he's
being nice. My mind has clearly been tainted by doubt. Wonderful, really.
“Paul found me some cards,” Jay says, now shuffling. “I was wondering if you wanted to play?”
“I'd be delighted to,” I tell her. We soon have ourselves embroiled in the simplest card games I've seen servants play in the household, and Paul wants to join in. We have to teach him the rules, of matching cards of the same suite or same number, of three being the minimal number for a complete set, and of being the first to complete a seven card hand.
Though I enjoy the company, some of the conversation goes to areas I'd rather it didn't.
“I heard what happened at the feast last night,” Jay says, staring curiously at me. “I wasn't allowed to be there as a low ranked servant, but I heard it went super wrong.”
“You could say that,” I reply, glancing up to see Ethel passing by, delivering her trademark hostile glare. “It was mortifying, to be honest.”
“I saw most of it,” Paul says with a sigh. “But already there's back whispers about it, and we all know how exaggerated things get there.”
“Back whispers?” I say, feeling a sense of foreboding. They can't be anything good. Just another way to humiliate me, I'm sure.
“A lot of them are wondering if we're going to have a duel between the brothers. Rayse and Desmond are clearly at each other's throats right now. Others are wondering... if the only reason you two are lasting in a relationship together is well, because you know a few tricks in bed. Since they can't believe a Claymore would marry a Hartson otherwise.”
I flush at this. It's about what I expect, but it still sucks majorly to hear it. “For fuck's sake,” I say, and both servants flinch from someone so high up using a curse. “I wish people would just leave me alone.”
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