The corridors were silent as he sought his chambers, the harem as still as an abandoned tomb. His door was unlocked, which shouldn’t have been the case, but he must have forgotten to secure it with all his other distractions. Sighing to himself, he went to prepare the tray for her wine. Maybe, tonight, he could catch her and the prince before they grew sweaty and sleepy-eyed from lovemaking.
As ever, he poured a sip into the golden cup for himself. Deir treasured Tou’s trust, but he always tested it anyway. His queen didn’t have to know he protected her.
He put his mouth where hers would go, just above the emerald cabochon. The wine was sweet and clear, exactly as she liked it.
One last kiss, he thought as he wiped away the residue. One last kiss for lips that might never meet again.
THIS had to be the sweetest kiss of Memnon’s life.
Tou’s arms hugged him greedily close, while he cradled her head and clamped her strong, round bottom tightly enough to lift her to her toes. They were plastered to each other, not a breath of space between them as they kissed and kissed and dared the world to make them notice it.
He was drunk on her, aroused and hot and thoroughly home.
“I love you,” he murmured against her mouth, not caring how many men had said it before. He meant it. With all his heart and soul, he meant it.
Tou drew back, her eyes wide and wondering. “Mem.”
He smiled and touched the lips his hunger had turned red. “I like when you call me that.” He hitched her groin more perfectly to his. “It makes me hard.”
She laughed softly. “Everything makes you hard. Memnon, I—”
And then Deir’s knock sounded on her door.
Memnon cursed, but she touched his arm. “We were so quiet, he must have thought it was safe to knock.”
They’d been quiet because their tongues had been busy with other things, because they hadn’t immediately gotten naked and started thumping the furniture. Memnon told her with his eyes that she would pay for this delay. When hers sparked back at him over her shoulder, they told him she wouldn’t mind.
“Just serve it cool,” she said to Deir as he came in with the mulling tray. “I’ve had enough complicated tastes in my mouth tonight.” She laughed and touched the base of her throat. “Hunger must have lent the food of Kemet savor when I was a girl. I swear, I don’t remember it being that atrocious.”
Some of the strain left Deir’s face as he smiled at her. “It was rather unique.” He knelt when he placed the tray beside her bed, a graceful, practiced motion. He lifted the wineskin to pour, then—inexplicably—set it down and stood jerkily.
“Excuse me, my queen,” he said, white as chalk. “I don’t feel—”
Memnon was already stepping toward him when he rushed to a corner and vomited.
“Don’t touch the wine,” Memnon snapped at Tou. He caught Deir’s shoulder, hoping against hope, but it was too late. Some part of him had known that the moment the man went pale.
“What’s wrong with him?” Tou asked, her voice as small as a girl’s.
He didn’t answer, and probably didn’t need to. Deir was convulsing in his lap, his eyes beginning to roll. Memnon held him, able to control the violence of the spasms but not the cause. He stroked Deir’s hair from his clammy brow.
“Take…care—” Deir managed to choke out.
“I will,” Memnon soothed. “I promise.”
Deir’s body relaxed as suddenly as it had convulsed. His eyes were wide and staring, his chest no longer moving with his breath.
Tou let out a keening wail.
“He wouldn’t,” she said through the fingers of her shaking hands. “Deir wouldn’t poison himself. He wouldn’t poison us. He isn’t a man who loves that way.”
Memnon eased the former consort’s body gently to the floor.
“Shh,” he said, rising and going to her. “I don’t think he did.”
“But who could have?” Her tears slowed as she pushed back from his embrace. “Deir isn’t careless. He keeps all these things locked up.”
Memnon didn’t have to think twice. “Zahi,” he said, the answer a growl. “He wasn’t at the banquet tonight.”
“Your body slave?”
“My father’s choice, not mine. I imagine he could get through any lock he wanted with sufficient time.”
“But…the wine was for both of us. You must have been a target, too. Lords of Sky and Darkness, Ravna must not ever want to give up his throne.”
Memnon was grateful beyond measure that she wasn’t thinking what others would: that Memnon could have known what would happen and simply refused to drink.
“No,” she said, reading his expression. “I know your character better than that. If you wanted to kill me, you’d do it face-to-face and stick me through the heart.”
He barked out a laugh that just as quickly stilled. A prickling dread was rolling across his scalp. “Tou, this can’t be all. My father had to be planning more than killing us. He’d want to press his advantage as fast and hard as he could.” He squeezed his pounding temples between his palms. “If you were dead, it would throw your guards into confusion, which would be the perfect cover for an attack. He must be hoping to take Hhamoun.”
“His troops would never make it inside the palace.”
“But if there were someone to sneak them in…”
“Memnon, I don’t care how clever your Zahi is. One slave can’t manage all of that.”
“Unless he had help. Unless he’d gotten word to his handlers how a dozen agents could be invited in by the queen herself.”
Tou’s mouth dropped in horror. “The Kemish cooks!”
Memnon shook his head grimly. “I think you’ll find the real cooks from Kemet were intercepted and killed on their journey here. Those who prepared that banquet are my father’s men.”
Tou took four paces back and forth across her floor, her tears mere tracks drying on her cheeks. “We have to alert the guards. Coordinate a defense. The cooks are inside the building already…” Her eyes met his. “They’ll have found ways to let others in. We may have to fight through the corridors.”
He strode to her wall and pulled a pair of short swords and daggers from their display hooks. Tou handily caught the pair he tossed her, slinging the belt that held both around her shoulder. Decorative or not, the blades were working weapons, as worthy of respect as the chiefs who’d sent them to her as gifts.
“You used to lead your men into battle, as I recall.”
She looked behind her, toward Deir’s lifeless form. When her eyes returned, they burned with the cold, hard rage of the witch-whore his father feared.
“I did lead them,” she said, testing the short sword against her thumb. “And I assure you, I haven’t forgotten how.”
HE followed her lead. She didn’t have to argue, he just did it.
“These are your men,” he said, running full out with her. “Your home. You know its ins and outs.”
They engaged the first invaders near the kitchens. Tou’s captain hadn’t liked letting her risk herself, but with Memnon and his god-touched strength to guard her back, the plan was the best they had. The bulk of Tou’s forces were in Kemet protecting the fort. They’d have to be cunning if they were going to win this without great losses.
“Don’t kill them all,” Memnon had warned her. “We want them calling for reinforcements, and we want as many as possible chasing us. They won’t be able to resist. We’re the targets they came here for.”
She knew he was right, though it was difficult to rein in her rage over Deir.
“Back!” she cried to Memnon now, parrying the six who came hard at her.
She was glad now for the practices she’d taken with her harem men. They’d kept her reflexes sharp. More attackers joined the ones they were already fighting as she and Memnon retreated into the bowels of her lower floor. They’d seen dozens of the enemy now and had killed perhaps half of those. Memnon had predicted at least a hundred would
make up the attacking force.
It’s what I asked for, he’d said, when I offered to take back Kemet.
Her brows had risen at the smallness of the number. She was fortunate he fought for her and that the invaders weren’t men he’d trained—probably because Ravna hadn’t trusted them to betray his son. Tou was glad Memnon didn’t have to kill friends, or watch her do so. As to that, she suspected men he’d trained would have been harder to trick than these.
Not that tricking them was all fun and games.
“Shit,” he said as another group came at them at the meeting of two narrow passageways. They were back-to-back now, a pair of heroes out of a tale, circling and slashing to keep their enemies at bay. There was a bitter joy in knowing they’d defend each other to the death, in knowing she had at last found her match. Tou’s muscles sang with effort, but she was not tired.
For Deir’s sake, she could have slaughtered these men all night.
“I count forty,” she said, jumping back to avoid the sweeping swing of a bloodied blade. It was her blood, as it happened, though the injury from which it flowed was numb.
“All right,” said Memnon. “Forty will have to do. You take out the torches on the right.”
Tou let out an ululating cry and ran, extinguishing the torches with the neat expedient of slicing off their heads. Memnon bolted after her, as did the attackers. They shouted excitedly, obviously believing they had their prey running scared. By the end of fifty paces, the hall was black as a cave. As one, she and Memnon increased their speed, much too fast for ordinary men to catch up.
Being blessed by the gods did have its advantages.
“Here,” hissed a voice, guiding them into a side chamber.
Stone rumbled far behind them, a giant grindstone that would block the enemy’s retreat.
“We’re ready,” said the captain of her guard.
When he opened his lamp, revealing his fresh and well-armed force, the forty bedraggled invaders skidded to a halt.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Their victory was violent and swift. King Ravna had sent two hundred men, but thanks to losing the element of surprise, that hadn’t been enough. Ravna’s soldiers were no match for hers. Even her harem had killed a substantial number—despite their inebriated states. The treacherous body slave, Zahi, had fallen to Abram and Joseph, a loss no one appeared to mourn.
To Tou’s relief, she had wounded among her people but no slain.
Except for Deir, she thought, her grief welling up anew. He had loved her better than she’d ever loved him, and had lost his life for hers as a reward.
She pressed her hands to her eyes, willing the endless tears to ebb. Bad enough she hadn’t been able to face returning to her chamber. Rather than watch her men remove the body, she’d escaped to the palace roof, now under the discreet protection of a dozen guards. In the grounds below, hundreds of torches flared, their dancing flames twinned by her long reflecting pool. Extra patrols slipped like shadows between the palms, on the lookout for more attacks. Tou didn’t expect one. She was safe for the night, she judged, or as safe as any queen at war could be.
She wondered if Ravna had realized his failure to take Hhamoun would guarantee she’d be that. Maybe he hadn’t cared. A man who’d try to assassinate his only son wouldn’t quibble over starting up a war again.
Quiet masculine footsteps had her twisting around. It was Memnon, returned from speaking to the wounded and victorious. No one had batted an eyelash when she’d ceded that task to him. He had slipped into the role of leader as smoothly as if it were his skin. Now he gazed at her with so much understanding her heart couldn’t help but turn over.
“Tou,” he said, pulling her into his arms.
Though she’d been crying for what felt like hours, she broke down again.
“I’m sorry,” she said between gasps for air. “I hate being weak.”
“You lost your oldest friend, the only one who knew you from your early reign. If I’d lost a friend as dear as that, I’d be crying, too.”
“You wouldn’t be abandoning your responsibilities to someone else. You wouldn’t be hiding on a roof.”
He eased her face away from his warm shoulder, gently tipping up her chin. “If I weren’t here to help, if you didn’t trust me to stand in for you, you’d be doing everything you think you’re hiding from.”
She sniffed and wiped her arm across her tear-wet cheeks. “I love you,” she said, trying to be steady, “but after this attack, our people are going to be more at odds than ever.”
His thumbs caught the tears she’d missed. She wished she could make out his expression, but the glitter of starlight was all she read in his guarded eyes.
“Do you want me to stand at your side?”
“Of course I do.”
“Then that’s where I’ll be. It’s time for peace, Tou. Time for your people to enjoy the fruits you’ve won for them. Time for mine to trust their king again. Southland can be united under both of us.”
“You’d go against your father?”
His laugh was like the rattle of river reeds. “I believe my father decided that question himself tonight. He never meant for me to woo you. He only wanted to use me as a Trojan horse, one he could kill when he was done with it. The thing is, I have supporters, Tou. I never courted them, but they exist. I think we could overthrow him with minimal bloodshed.”
In spite of everything, her heart beat faster.
“Oh, gods,” she said. “I think the idea of more fighting actually excites me.”
“You are a queen,” he said, and she could hear the smile in it. “A warrior. I’d be surprised if you felt otherwise. I do have one condition. Some people will expect it, but I don’t want to sit on your throne. You’ve earned your crown, maybe more than I’ll earn mine. I want us to rule as equals, each over our separate realms.”
He struck her dumb. Of all the respect she’d earned, his meant the most to her. And what other man in the world would offer what he was? She had to clear her throat before she could speak. “If ever I were to take a king…”
“Yes.” He pressed his lips to her forehead. “That I would be the king you’d choose is all I need to know.”
“My harem—”
“Will live without you,” he finished for her, his warmth abruptly cooled. “I will not give you a chance to crave them. That much I promise you.”
It was a promise he could keep. She bit her lip against her amusement. Here was the pure male arrogance he hadn’t shown before. She enjoyed it more than she cared to have him know. “My harem has served me well. They even killed for me tonight.”
The growl that rumbled in his chest made her knees secretly go weak.
He lowered his head and kissed her, the delving of his tongue sufficiently explicit to have arousal welling inside her. His reaction was equally fervent, perhaps because the most primitive drive in life was pushing at them both. They’d faced death tonight, and they’d survived. Holding her tighter, he nipped her lower lip and groaned in her ear. His cock bumped thick and hard against her, rising fiercely beneath his fresh white kilt.
The way he could grow so big so quickly was a marvel she’d never weary of.
“The scent of you…” he murmured. His hands roamed restlessly down her back, squeezing her bottom in a brief caress. “I swear, it’s enough to drive a grown man mad.”
Tou nuzzled the prickly tightness of his jaw. To her, his sweat smelled as alluring as her arousal. “I smell this way because I want you, because that cock of yours is the most impressive I’ve ever known.”
“If your guards weren’t all around us, I’d remind you how impressive my cock can be.”
She tipped her head to let his voracious kisses trail down her throat. His arms had locked her hips tight against him, the throb of his erection an astounding thing. She thought the ridge was as big as when he’d hit his cycle’s peak a week ago.
A sticking plaster clung to her side where she’d been injured, but she w
asn’t feeling it now.
“The guards won’t stop us,” she said. “They’ll understand if I can’t wait.”
He stared at her, a muscle ticking in his jaw. “Tou—”
“You’re wet,” she said, her nails digging into his bare shoulders with her need to convince him. “I can feel you dampening your kilt.”
His gaze lasted one heartbeat longer, time enough for his pupils to jump larger. Then he kissed her, deep and desperate, and she knew she was about to get what she wanted.
“Here,” he said, lifting her off her feet. “At least we’ll go as far as here.”
He carried her to the wall around the stairwell he’d come up from, pressing her spine to the plaster with a throttled moan. The sound was enough to draw a fresh rush of fluid burning from her core.
“Spread your legs,” he said, already kicking her feet apart. “If they see us, they’ll only think we’re kissing.”
Tou doubted that, but she let him gather up the front of her gown. His fingers found her cream-drenched folds and parted them: a quick, but pleasurable prelude, during which he also fumbled with the wrap of his kilt. Soon his shaft slid huge and hot between her sexual lips, rubbing, teasing, then finally tilting for the drive inside.
She gasped at the feel of him slowly filling her. Her head shook back and forth helplessly. “You’re so big, Mem. Oh, gods—”
He grunted and pushed harder, his hands like iron at her hips. “Take me, Tou. Take it all.”
She wriggled and spread her legs wider. “I want to wrap my thighs around your waist.”
“Leave them where they are.”
She groaned. “I need to.”
“Leave them.”
“The guards won’t care.”
“I’ll—” He shoved one more inch and sucked in air. “I’ll care. I’m not…a performer. Oh, gods, Tou, you feel so good.”
He was all the way inside her, hot as noon and shaking with pleasure. His breathing was loud in the hushed, dark night, and Tou was as stretched and eager as she could get. His cock felt like a heart beating in her sheath, each hard pulse a tormenting tease. She could hardly bear to restrain herself. She was used to letting go with him, used to being taken hard and fast.
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