The Forbidden Fruit

by S. K Munt

  ‘Only on the first round,’ I said quickly, turning my attention back to him. ‘Karol got a ninety-six on his second.’

  Kohl rolled his eyes. ‘It’s an excuse to get you on my turf Lark- are you in, or out? I already know that my brother has made plans with the girls to go to the luau tonight so… he may be occupied for a while with one of them after...’

  My heart twisted, but I ignored the pain. To be fair, Kohén hadn’t gone off with a single girl since we’d gotten there, making his preference for my chaste company over their gratuitous kind clear, which was mollifying me a little. ‘I’d love to go- send for me when you are ready, all right?’ I stepped back, already determined to ask Kelia along to thwart Kohl’s intention to have an intimate evening for two, and then giggled when I saw Kohén climb into the piercing chair. ‘Oh, hello!’ I exclaimed, turning away. ‘Did I start a trend?’

  ‘Barachiel see, Barachiel do,’ Kohl joked. ‘You gonna get an eye-patch next, Big Kahuna?’

  ‘I was thinking more like a crown,’ Kohén said, and my instinct was to punch him in the nose. But then he smiled and said: ‘But mother’s spent so much of her time here parading you in front of father and Atticus’s nose that I doubt that’s going to happen so who knows… maybe I’ll get a cane?’

  ‘Or a top hat,’ I said as Kohl snorted, reaching for his hand when I saw the beautician pull out her needle. ‘Either way, you’ll look positively fetching for your date this evening wearing nothing but an ear stud and a smile, your highness.’

  Kohén winced before the needle pierced his skin. ‘Say the word before I bloody detonate Larkin, and they all go.’

  ‘And what word would that be?’

  ‘Yes.’ He smiled salaciously. ‘Please. Now. Harder… deeper…. there are many to choose from.’ He wriggled his eyebrows at me and I wanted to slap the pretty off his face. ‘But, ‘See you in the morning,’ or ‘I’m deathly jealous,’ will suffice if you cannot manage any of the others.’

  I turned to the woman with the needle and said ‘Now- harder, and deeper,’ then turned back to him with an impish smile. ‘How was that?’

  Kohén winced. But he squeezed my hand then as the needle came to his ear, and I squeezed back- not just because he needed me, but also because I needed to be needed by him, and not even Kohl’s proximity could negate that.

  ‘I’m deathly jealous,’ I whispered, kissing the tip of his nose. ‘I wish I had it in me to be your Companion for you.’

  ‘I am glad you are not,’ he whispered back, and then moaned as the needle went into his skin, and I loved him for meaning that.

  *

  After we left the salon, Kohén led me up to the main house, and into a small room marked with the bright red: ‘Caution: Entrance restricted- Monarch’s only.’ I poked my tongue out at the sign as I was pulled into the dark room, and then forgot to feel self-important when Kohén flicked on a light switch, illuminating the solitary glass display cabinet in the centre of the room.

  ‘Oh my gosh!’ I exclaimed, rushing over to it and biting on my fingers to keep from touching the glass. ‘What is this?’

  ‘Treasure,’ Kohén whispered, moving behind me. ‘Actual buried treasure. The Corps found it while clearing room for a new field about a week ago, and this safe was built for it immediately.’ His voice was low, and hushed. ‘Beautiful, aren’t they?’

  ‘Sinfully so,’ I agreed, my eyes roaming over the assortment of jewels rapturously, and Kohén laughed, hugging me.

  ‘I love you,’ he said softly. ‘You embrace the need to boil water for tea here and turn up your nose at every sort of comfort you’ve ever been offered- but like the bird you are, the sight of something shiny makes your pupils dilate.’

  ‘It’s an odd weakness, isn’t it?’ I asked, smiling at the truth in his words. ‘But I wouldn’t be surprised if most Blue-Collar reared girls felt the same. Our homes are lovely and cosy, don’t get me wrong, but nothing glitters in our houses, aside from glass. To me, diamonds evoke what I’d expect to feel if I could hold moonlight and sunlight in my hands at once- and they come from dirt being packed hard enough to transform itself! It’s the ultimate Cinderella story, really.’

  ‘It is,’ he agreed.

  I shrugged. ‘Or maybe I’m just more of a girl than I thought I was. I mean, I was bound to catch a bit of shallow from sharing a dormer with that lot for the last twelve years…’

  Kohén chuckled. ‘Nah. I’ve seen you get almost as excited over a shooting star or a potato crisp that has curled in half, or a carrot that is much larger than others, so I think I’ve figured it out- you are drawn to things that are one of a kind or at least, rare.’ He tickled my ribs. ‘And that’s why you keep your heart from me, isn’t it? The fact that I have a doppelgänger qualifies me as common, rather than unique?’

  ‘You two don’t look that much alike…’ I said, feeling a bit sick.

  ‘Do you think we are alike?’

  ‘As much as you can be for two people raised so differently.’

  ‘I suppose…’ he cleared his throat. ‘You get along well. Kelia mentioned that you are going with him to the barracks tonight…?’

  ‘With Atticus, yes I am and I was going to ask Kelia to come along too.’ I smiled at him, relieved to see a bit more relief in his eyes, while silently cursing Kelia for interfering. ‘As a third-born, I could not stop myself from seeing what may have become of me.’ I turned away. ‘And as for us getting along- he is your other half, so I figured it was an unspoken command from you that I do. Not because you are a royal, but a twin.’ I gasped, and then pointed to a string of bright white stones that were reflecting blue light. ‘What are those? They look like ice!’

  ‘Those are diamonds, sweetheart- their bluish tint is a product of their supreme clarity.’ Kohén said softly. ‘Father says that is the most valuable necklace in existence, because each diamond is considered perfect, and there are at least seventy of them. You’d be hard-pressed to find another diamond to equal one of them, or to glow as prettily.’

  ‘Hard-pressed,’ I giggled. ‘Like a diamond. And that electric blue! It is just like the colour of your eyes when you are excited.’ I shook my head and grinned. ‘Perfect! How old is this stuff?’

  ‘Judging by the clasp, early twentieth century, we think.’ I felt him a brush a strand of my hair behind my ear. ‘But we won’t ever know for sure, and it’s hard to know the value of them, when there is nothing to compare them to.’

  ‘What do you think?’ I asked. ‘Roughly I mean. You’re usually pretty good at guessing this sort of stuff.’

  Kohén smoothed his fingertips down my braid. ‘You flatter me darling,’ he joked, but his voice sounded strange when he said it, like there was something he wasn’t saying and his voice was low, making me wonder if this was a secret or something. ‘Well, back then, it was probably only worth about a million dollars, I think, depending on the designer,’ he said. ‘But right now, I don’t know… six or seven million? Which is the worth of a very small kingdom with undeveloped land, or a VERY large favour.’

  ‘Whoa!’

  ‘I know.’ He pointed to the glass but didn’t touch it, telling me that the pale green glow shrouding the case was sure to either cause us pain, or trigger an alarm. ‘The collection as a whole is practically invaluable, and it belongs to Pacifica alone. Imagine that, huh? The tiniest, newest quasi-nation is now in possession of the largest collection of jewels on the planet!’

  ‘Yay for the underdog,’ I said, hugging myself so I wouldn’t be tempted to stroke the glass.

  ‘I thought you’d appreciate that, and I knew you’d fall in love with that choker at first sight.’ Kohén knelt beside me and turned my face to his, and his eyes were softer than coconut cream. ‘Which is why I’ve decided that it will be my wedding gift to you.’

  My mouth fell open. ‘Excuse me?!’

  ‘I want you to have it one day,’ he said seriously. ‘It is the only thing in the world that comes close to being a
s beautiful as you are, my little bird.’

  ‘That’s impossible!’ I whispered, shaking my head. ‘And unfair! Why should one person have so much when a whole kingdom could benefit from a seventh of the funds that it would take to procure that chain?’

  ‘Because I love you more than I love my kingdom or myself, and I have hurt you.’ His dimples vanished. ‘I need your forgiveness, darling- I need to know that you understand that you are what is priceless to me so that you marry me someday.’ He glanced at the glass, looking wistful. ‘And if you wore that, everyone else would know your worth too!’

  ‘Everyone would hate me!’ I exclaimed. ‘I would hate me! If it is my favour that you are after, why not invest a seventh of that amount of money into farming and construction so that the country can support the obliteration of the third-born caste?’

  Kohén frowned at me. ‘Because I will not have the funds to do that! If I am crowned king of Pacifica though, all of these will belong to me and that could be gifted to you, not purchased with money that Eden does not have to spare.’

  ‘So it is not a gift at all,’ I said. ‘You’re keeping the money in the family- just dangling it around my neck!’

  ‘Most women would kill for such a thing,’ he said, looking annoyed. ‘Why are you getting so angry? I banked on your delight!’

  You’re banking on owning me!

  ‘It’s too much pressure, and I am NOT most women!’ I cried. ‘And I am not swooning Kohén but offended, and if you knew me at all, you would have anticipated that!’ I pointed to the case. ‘I would not sell you my body for gold, so you want to buy my forgiveness for going to other women with diamonds?’ I stepped into him. ‘What would you do if you were penniless huh? If these urges were just as strong, but you without the funds to marry me or access to a harem- how would you have handled them?’

  Kohén glared at me. ‘To have these urges, one has to be a Nephilim- and there are no penniless Nephilim Larkin, and even if there were- they would not be royal and prohibited from having a relationship until they are thirty like I am, so your question is unfair!’

  ‘No- your answer is unfair, and wrong.’ I stepped back. ‘Kohl is a penniless Nephilim with urges that he can’t have met for four more years by paying for it, or nine years after THAT by marrying! And, yet one year after coming of age, he is a virgin still and no one’s dropped dead yet!’

  ‘He doesn’t have the love of his life with a body from the very devil in his face every fucking day!’ he cried.

  ‘Do NOT use your love for me as an excuse for what you have done! I will hate you for it even more!’

  ‘You hate me anyway!’

  ‘Be grateful that I feel something so passionate for you yet!’ I exclaimed. ‘I want to be numb to you Kohén!’ I clutched at my chest as I felt the crackle of breathlessness develop in my airways. ‘I want to forgive you, but I don’t think I can, okay? Knowing that other women can do for you, what I cannot-’

  ‘They cannot!’ Kohén roared, and I jumped. ‘They never have!’

  I made an awful face at him. ‘Oh come ON-’ but he lunged forward and took hold of my shoulders, silencing me.

  ‘Why do you think I am so frustrated?!’ he demanded. ‘Why do you think I have been keeping my distance from you this last year? Because I was so happy? So satisfied that I climb the walls? So sated that I hum?’ He squeezed my shoulders more tightly. ‘I have known release with one of those girls -ONCE- and since then, trying to do it again has been a maddening exercise in futility- and it is all your fault!’

  My mouth popped open. ‘What? They wear gold! They speak of your prowess-’

  ‘They like my stamina! They think I am a God because I stay hard enough long enough to find THEM again and again and they’re so inexperienced, that they don’t realise that they are not doing the same for me, okay?’ he released me and stepped back. ‘So it’s all been for nothing. I hurt you for nothing! I keep going to them now because I have already ruined them for marrying someone else, and feel indebted to gift them with as much gold as I am able to in compensation for that. But it does practically nothing for me. In fact, I have to take them by their hair and turn their faces away so that I can pretend they are you enough to get hard at all, and if I’m lucky, I can fool myself for long enough to get to the precipice of release with the friction- so that I can finish myself off in my room after! But I have not come with any of them since your sixteenth birthday, and I’m fairly certain I never will with anyone; ever- again!’ He stepped closer to me. ‘But with you…’ he shook his head and swallowed hard. ‘I can get there in my dreams with you and the other night, when I touched you, that was almost enough too unman me.’

  I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. ‘That can’t be true,’ I whispered. ‘If you could arrive with Emmerly once-’

  ‘It’s not physical, Larkin.’ He tapped the side of his head. ‘I am emotionally impotent. My body works and responds just fine to a point, but every time I get close, I see your face in the hall that night after I left Emmerly’s room when I was sated and…’ his voice broke on a sob and he turned away. ‘The guilt… its like I’m denying myself permission to be sated again without you, lest it would cause history to repeat or my future to implode!’

  ‘Oh my god,’ I whispered. ‘That’s… awful.’ And it was- we’d been ripped apart by that harem, and it had all been for nought.

  ‘Yeah,’ he said roughly, and then turned back to me. ‘Lark? I have to know… why were you in the hall that night? Really?’

  Oh no! No, no, no!

  ‘I told you…’ I said softly, looking down at the carpet. ‘I wanted to thank you for the statue.’

  A long silence followed this and he whispered. ‘How were you going to thank me? Tell me the truth, please.’

  Tears pooled in my eyes and one dripped onto the floor as I remembered how full of hope and love I had been in that moment. I knew I shouldn’t say it, but I had to. ‘I was going to tell you that if you let them go, I’d be your only…’ tears clogged my throat, stalling my speech.

  ‘My only friend?’ he asked thickly. ‘Companion?’

  My throat felt like it was full of sharp rocks. I shook my head.

  In a small voice he asked: ‘My everything?’

  I nodded, and suddenly the room filled with blue light and I ducked and screamed.

  17.

  ‘Fuck!’ Kohén turned around and punched the wall, and his fist disappeared through it. ‘Fucking hell! I knew it! I waited! I hoped! You-’ he turned back to me and pointed a finger at me and I screamed and rolled out of the way, even though only plaster dust fell off his fist with some of his blood.

  ‘Don’t hurt me!’ I squealed, scrambling to my feet as he yanked me back up with a crackling hand. ‘I’m sorry!’

  ‘You’d think I’d hurt you?’ he cried. ‘All I’ve ever wanted to do is love you!’ He pulled me roughly to him and pressed his mouth to mine so hard and with so much passion that static crackled between our lips, making me jump. He then released me just as violently, turning away again to bow to the ground, facing away from me. ‘Fuck!’ he hit himself in the head. ‘FUCKING HELL!’

  ‘Kohén stop!’ I got my feet and pulled on his arm, pushing him down as I did. ‘Please, don’t!’

  ‘You don’t understand me!’ he bemoaned into his hands. ‘Or the way I feel for you! I make ONE mistake and you punish me-’

  ‘I’m not punishing you!’

  ‘Well, I am being punished by someone, aren’t I?’

  ‘I didn’t know!’ I protested. ‘How could I? You’ve been so in control of your powers that I thought that was a sign that you were handling this! That bolt you just sent out-’

  ‘I train with Regan for four hours a night to keep my powers under control, while you’re all sleeping soundly!’ he snapped hotly. ‘And I wouldn’t have had to do anything with anyone if you’d just-’ He spun around and took me into his arms. ‘Why didn’t you say it?’

  ‘Because b
y the time I realised that I could say it, it was too late!’

  ‘Why did you let it go too late?’ he demanded tearfully. ‘You knew I was at your door!’

  ‘I didn’t see her- Liberty- until after I’d done crying and…’ I shrugged. ‘I ran straight out to find you the moment I did, but you were already coming out of her room and yes, it was too late.’

  He lifted my face to his. ‘But you understood what the statue symbolised? My devotion, I mean?’

  I smiled wryly. ‘For about two and a half minutes, I was fairly sure there had never been a man more devoted to a woman since Miguel Barachiel.’

  ‘And I proved you wrong and myself utterly worthless over ONE error?’ he asked, stricken.

  ‘The error was not yours, but mine.’ I looked down at his chest. ‘I interpreted your gift to mean more than what it did, Kohén. All of that time, I’d feared what giving in to you would mean for my future, and I’d always equated leaning towards you, as leaning too far over the edge of the Tidal falls. It is a thrilling thing to do, but I’ve always pulled back the moment that I felt gravity grasp me and urge me toward danger and then have stayed back after- certain that I would fall and end up pushed under the ocean’s surface with the power of the water, and be pinned down to drown. I would lose my purity, my status, my dreams- and all for the want of a man who could never marry me.’ I swallowed. ‘But I saw my statue and I realised that I didn’t care if I drowned or not, because the fall would be so beautiful. I believed that your love would be a fair exchange for any dream- that I wouldn’t need a future if I had your heart, and there could be no greater love than one that made me feel as vulnerable but protected as yours did.’ I wiped away my tears but they continued to fall. ‘So I went looking for you, ready to tell you that I didn’t need cotton, my reputation, a wedding band any of it- and then I saw you with Emmerly, and it was more like I had fallen over the side of the falls at low tide rather than high tide.’ He groaned morbidly and I looked up at him again. ‘Instead of drowning, I was pulverised into the rocky, sandy grotto beneath and that’s when I knew- I couldn’t give you my heart, because I’d ALREADY given you my heart- and you had just shattered it….’ I gasped for the pain shooting through my heart and bowed. ‘You broke me that night, and I have been breaking into smaller pieces since so yes, it is too late because I don’t think I an ever allow myself to fall in love again.’