The Emperor escorted her down to a picnic where her favorite foods and drinks waited. Sitting in the grass beside her, he smiled at her. Again, he was unfailingly pleasant but sat apart from her and called her Empress. He did not hesitate to look at her but no warmth lit his eyes. She still felt the sparks emanating from him but even they had been subdued. He had invited her here yet she felt as if he only tolerated her presence. The Spirit of Distance stretched between them.
Fury bubbled up within her. No audience watched them in this place; he had no need to pretend he cared or regarded her as more than a burden. She ground her teeth, fisted her hands and rolled her eyes.
The Emperor started a conversation about his last visit to the East. Raeche had not accompanied him. She had sworn she would not go East again until her mother was committed to the Spirit. He spoke of her land, perhaps hoping to elicit nostalgia and calm her. He should have known this was mistake. That place had never been home. She had always been destined for the palace in the North and no one, not even her mother, treated her as one of their own. So Raeche did as she was wont to do. She stopped listening. She closed her ears and gave the appearance of paying attention. This was pure folly as it left her nothing to do but watch his lips. They were full like hers, as if someone from the East had given them to the Emperor’s ancestors generations ago. He had said he wished they had played together when they were children. And he had slipped much closer to her, and his eyes had started to warm while the sparks grew, and he seemed to want…
Spirit help her, but she believed he would kiss her! Spirit take her, but she wanted him to. Raeche shuddered from the intense pull at her breasts and the place between her thighs–a reminder of something she had known only briefly but needed to know again.
He did not kiss her.
“Play for me.” Raeche made her request with a low voice and still body.
“Empress?”
She turned to her husband, her eyes on his. “My Spirit does not sing. Play timra for me.”
The Emperor watched her for a moment before saying, “Yes, little dark one.”
Whenever he called her that, his pale green eyes seemed darker and she was once again showered with little sparks of lightning. In those moments, Raeche believed the Emperor wanted her the way Galan had. Raeche had always wanted to be wanted. Her weakness gave the Emperor power and the Emperor always craved power.
Sitting beside her, he crossed his long legs then raised one hand high in the air. When he drew it down, the timra appeared as if he had drawn an arrow. The delicate instrument was made from the long, round, headless body of the timra–a poisonous serpent found at the south border. Dried and hardened with black sap, the tail was snipped then replaced with a small wooden pipe suited to fit between the lips, and the other end covered by a slotted disk. Tiny, meticulous holes had been bored in the skin on all sides. Fine fibers weighted with bells made from blax tree seeds hung inside the instrument. A player blew into the top, causing the bells to provide a constant soothing timbre beneath the sounds achieved through breath and the dexterous placement of fingers on the holes.
The Emperor brought the instrument to his lips and played. The bells’ deep and subtle ring, coupled with the softest, most fragile notes, caused Raeche to cry and ask her husband to stop playing. But he would not and his eyes commanded her presence as he finished a song too beautiful for her. Her blood-mark throbbed beneath her skin.
When he was done, these words escaped her lips: “I would never betray you.”
What stupidity! Raeche had betrayed Lanus in one of the most fundamental ways a woman could betray a man. Though she would never willfully bring harm to the Empire, she had also betrayed it when she conceived a child with Galan–even if that great farce had ended well for the Emperor. Shamed by the bitter thought and her awkward, blurted, unconcealed lie, she struggled to understand the impulse that had led her to speak.
She could not look at him. The air surrounding his body changed. Its effect on her changed. The addictive sparks he transmitted to her ceased altogether. She no longer felt anything from him and Raeche grieved for the loss of it.
“I do not love you, Raeche, but I would not betray you.”
Her eyes grew wetter. Tears fell and Raeche did not want him to see them. No one loved her. She knew this. No one ever had. Yet his words cracked her open. She broke. Standing to leave, she felt a warm hand on her bare calf beneath her simple green dress.
The rush of heat over her skin and pain in her heart was a shock to her system. Raeche wanted to fall before him but did not.
“Why do you do these things?”
“What things?” Her voice faltered.
“Why do you provoke me?”
Raeche could say nothing. Her cheeks were hot. Servants looked on, and even Rucha had turned in her seat to watch when Eynow scratched her arm and pointed.
“There was no reason, no reason at all for you to say that.”
Raeche feared she was beyond reason. For cycles, she had been provoking him–saying things she should not, interrupting him as he conducted the business of the Empire, and declining his invitations only to show up on a whim, curious how he acquitted himself without her.
Raeche pulled away from her husband’s grasp and discovered a stronger sense of loss than she had ever felt for Galan. She ran, without shoes, back into the palace.
By the time Dark came, Raeche had starved her vulnerability and bolstered her confidence with counterfeit indignation. She stomped into the Emperor’s apartments as he readied himself for bed and complained about Taritana’s overreaching Spirit. When that did not work, she bemoaned Eynow’s weak character and demanded that he be rejected as Rucha’s betrothed. Without response, she hurled an accusation that Eynow spoiled Rucha and had made it so that his daughter would never accept her husband as her equal.
Lanus merely let out a soft chuckle.
She stalked toward him, forcing him to look at her in her sheer black gown that clung to her, emphasizing her naked flesh beneath. When his expression channeled the Spirit of Patience, she reached for those hot sparks, which had become pure addiction to her, but found nothing save tepid air.
Her husband infuriated her.
The following day, she replaced his favorite sword, favorite arrows and favored armor with instruments of poor quality, disguised with Spirit. But she cried when he left for the South with his small war party. She did not want him to die. She used what Spirit she commanded to send him what he needed. The effort sucked her deep into blackness, and she had to be treated by the best Spirit Wielders. As they sent her into a healing sleep, Raeche apologized to the Spirit for her failures. For her irrational behavior. She begged the Spirit to keep her from dreams.
Chapter 8
Raeche was blessed with empty sleep until one morning when her body grew warm and tingled with excitement. The Emperor had returned. She rolled her spine, moaning. Then she reached up and wrapped her legs around her husband. Their tongues touched and she slid her body against his. Her womb clenched painfully as she awaited him. When she woke, she remembered that it had been three rings since she had been touched by a man. Tears fell because the only man she knew was her husband and she had become infatuated with him. Who would not? He was handsome, strong, cold but hot, brave and so smart. He was loved by his daughter so intensely and the very few times he laughed, he made her laugh, too. Women sighed when he strode through the halls or rode out into the courtyard on his mount, even when he looked like the Spirit of Cruelty.
She tried to stay in bed until the violence stirring inside her quieted. Raeche yearned, as she did at times, to hurt him. She did not know how she would–he was far stronger than she, in body and Spirit–but she wanted more than anything for him to feel even half her pain.
When finally she rose, she realized that Dark had come. Taritana had already made her visit because a small plate with pieces of bread, meat, cheese, salted berry sauce, and a pitcher of klova juice were on the bureau.
With a sigh she looked around her quarters, her trap, her cage. She paced and grew furious. Then she walked past the dark liquid. It sat on the tall table where Taritana placed important things–or, rather, things from the Emperor. In a clear container, the liquid stirred, sparked as if it were in motion. She eased closer to the squat bottle. It seemed lit from within, flashing red, orange, and brown against the wall behind it. Raeche picked up the small card folded next to it.
A day you do not choose to celebrate, yet a day for which I am thankful. This is not an apology.
The Emperor had written the card in his own hand. For a moment, she did not know what he meant. Then she realized. Each ring on this day, Raeche had been melancholy and inconsolable. This time, it had passed. She had nearly forgotten it. Her birthday, the day on which she had clawed free of her despicable mother only to be shackled to the Emperor.
She lifted the bottle then pulled a heavy stopper carved like three leaves from the top. After sniffing the priceless scent, she dabbed some on her throat and wrists. The smell–wild and calming, like the still center of a forest–warmed her. Extremely rare and usually reserved for formal events, Black Seed Extract was the most expensive scent in the Empire. Yet there was another use for it.
On some special occasions, it was used as drink. Even though she had never tasted the elixir, she had heard of its effects. Black Seed Extract eased the Spirit, opened one to their truest and deepest emotions, darkened the eyes, and rushed a warm current through the body.
She bent to grab a glass from the cooling tray then went to her bed with the Black Seed extract and glass in hand. Tonight, she would have a small celebration of her birthday. After all, she needed to finally sort through the strangeness of these last days, of the tension mounting between her and the Emperor.
A tiny sip from the glass as she sat alone in the center of her bed caused her muscles to relax and she smiled. Yes, this would help.
Chapter 9
The Emperor’s chamber was separated from hers by mere curtains. They might have been a wall formed from the thickest rock. As long as they had been married, the curtains had never been parted. The rare times he came to see her he left his room by his door then knocked at hers. She did the same. Lately, Raeche had become deeply dissatisfied with the cleanliness of the curtains. She had them cleaned but no matter how many times the men and women came in with ladders, buckets, sprays, and some Spirit-driven contraption that dried the fabric as it went, Raeche was not satisfied. She had ordered them taken down and sent to the Clear Pool, but the Emperor heard and refused to have it done, insisting they wait until the temperature rose so that Raeche did not take a chill from the huge room that was naturally difficult to heat evenly. When she asked that the chamber be modernized, the Emperor appeared horrified. This chamber had not been changed in centuries and would not be for centuries to come. It was in that room that a king became an emperor, a kingdom became an empire. Raeche knew the story but she did not care and silently considered setting fire to the curtain.
Then she stared at the curtain until it did catch fire. Glee tickled her as she watched flames lick quickly higher. Glee was replaced by despair as the blaze died abruptly and even appeared as if it had never been. Instead of smoke, she inhaled Lanus’s Spirit.
Something coursing through her like the dancing light in the bottle caused her to take another drink and imagine the Emperor’s possible expressions when he had noticed the burning fabric. She saw terror, which didn’t ring true, humor, which was more plausible, and an overabundance of patience. Never once as a child had she disobeyed or purposely rebelled, but now defying her husband intoxicated her. She could not stop doing it.
Raeche took a final sip then did something she had never done before. She went to the edge of the curtain against one wall and pulled layer after layer of heavy fabric back until she could skirt around it, let it drop, and look directly at her husband.
Lying on his side, one elbow propping him up, he read by the light of five fresh avla eggshells. His daystar-streaked hair was pushed over his shoulder, hanging down to the white covers, strands catching dark fire from the flickering glow. His chest was bare. Flat planes contrasted with the rounded muscles of his arms. The build of a warrior yet his hands turned the pages with the lightest of touches. He tensed and looked up, right at her.
“Raeche.” Her name flowed over perfect lips. “I am surprised to see you come around the curtain.”
“I tried to burn it down.”
“The Spirit of Luck is with you,” he congratulated her.
The barb stung, for all knew there was no such Spirit.
Raeche swayed with the longing to lay her hands on his chest. She wanted her fingertips and palms to warm against his flesh. The urge to touch him caused her to say, “You did not enjoy it.”
“Yes, I did, Raeche, but you did not.”
That he knew her thoughts should have amazed her but Raeche understood what no one else did–the Emperor could hear the thoughts of most in his presence when he chose. He had picked directly from her mind the vision of their first night wed. Of her being carried to his bed by his father and brother. Of him being ushered in by her mother, his aunts and cousins, with a ceremonial sword pressed into his hand and petals sprinkled over his head.
Born for him, given to him, given to his pleasure, Raeche felt shame as she reflected on that night. She had not pleased him, had failed in the only task she had ever been given. He had done his duty, done it quickly and found release, then left her immediately. After one more such encounter, he had never returned to her bed.
In an act of pure impulse, Raeche reached for the haphazard bows tied at her shoulders to keep her soft white nightgown up.
“Please, do not.” Calm, voice modulated, not a trace of change on his face, and yet the tiniest spark leapt in the air. It arced and shot through her like an arrow. Sizzling power singed her senses. Her body hummed.
“You are angry with me.” Raeche did not like to pout yet she had done much of this in recent times.
“How would you know that, little dark one?”
Such reverence and sweetness marked the endearment. She had always liked him most at times when he used those words. At least twice he had called her “my sweetest little dark one” and she had felt warmth in her belly.
“I find I am able to read your mood, Emperor. When you are angry, I feel sparks. When you are happy, as you are with Rucha, I feel as if clouds lift my feet and warm syrup courses through my veins, though I still feel sparks.”
“And when I am aroused?”
Raeche blushed, looked at the floor.
His quiet, seemingly involuntary groan transformed the blush to a burn.
“Go back to bed, Raeche.”
Instinct, combined with breeding, demanded she do as he commanded. Yet her feet stayed rooted to the ground as she searched his face, then the tendons of his throat and the curves of his muscles even down to his belly. A thin sheet hid the rest of him but she knew that beneath were strong legs, thighs corded with muscle and a light dusting of sleek hair. Above those thighs? Something she had not felt in a long time, something that had brought her pain once, something that had inspired fear.
Yet now, she felt no fear.
It had been a long time. A very long time. She now knew well that the Emperor had not hurt her on purpose. If he were to enter her again, to stroke a little, make her ready for him, maybe the low hunger that had eaten at her for cycles and cycles, since she had borne Rucha, could finally be satisfied. Once maybe. Just once this desire to lie with a man, this man, could be slaked and maybe–
“Stop it.”
She winced. Whether emperors were mind readers or not, his eyes and the dry rustle of his Spirit told her he
was exasperated, that he knew the direction of her thoughts.
“You have not been pleased with me,” Raeche declared. “I have been wed to the Empire for five rings yet I have not once pleased it.”
“You are the Empire. You have been wed to me and you have given me a daughter. A daughter who will, as my oldest, rule this land after me, who will be greater than I have been or will be. There is nothing more I have the right to demand.”
“Those are not the words of a conqueror.”
“I have no interest in conquering you.”
He lowered his eyes and went back to reading his book. Raeche furtively searched the area near her.
Casually, he said, “There will be no violence between us. I will not tolerate it from myself, though I have in the past ring had a growing desire to wring your neck every time the nightstar goes full round, and I will not tolerate it from you.”
“How will you prevent it?” Raeche asked, horrifying herself. She clamped her hands over her mouth.
“You confuse me.”
She confused herself. “Emperor?”
“In here it is Lanus.”
Raeche tried to say it but could not force the name through her lips. Frustration pounded at her like waves against rocks. Her body hot, her skin sensitive, standing still grew difficult. More of those angry flashes of power sparked off the Emperor and onto her, sending her up in frustrated flames.
“Say it,” he told her in what sounded like a purr.
“Say?”
“Lanus. Say Lanus.”
Something poked like a stick in her chest. More awful, unwarranted and undesirable words tumbled forth. “Rucha is your daughter.”
The muscles in his arms and shoulders tensed but when he spoke his tone lacked all expression and his words were mundane. “Yes, she is,” he responded. “There was never any doubt of that.” Theoretically, Raeche posed to herself during a brief storm of reason, she should let this rest. But she could not, not any longer, not if she were to allow herself to enjoy his kiss.
The Empire (The Lover's Opalus) Page 4