Men of Valor, Books 1

by Kiru Taye

  Nonye squeezed his hand one last time and arose from her seat. "Thank you, my prince. Do I have your permission to take my leave? I need to finish my packing as I'll be leaving in the morning. I'll be back later with your dinner."

  "Of course. I'll see you later."

  Nonye walked past Ezinne and headed toward the door.

  Ezinne stood on the same spot for a brief moment, her eyes lowered. When she looked up at him, he saw a flash of anger in her eyes, her lips pursed with distaste. It rammed into him, disorientating him for a moment. He blinked several times not quite believing what he'd seen. What does she have to be angry about? I granted her wish, didn't I?

  With her shoulders straightened, she swiveled and followed Nonye out of the room, her back turned toward him. Something she'd never done before; something she wasn't allowed to do.

  Instead of raising his anger, her actions excited him, his sense of guilt and caution thrown to the wind. Whatever game Nonye and Ezinne had instigated, he would play along. Maybe it was better this way.

  This was fate. The gods had presented him with Ezinne. Who was he to turn it down? He wanted to find out more about the fiery maiden hidden beneath Ezinne's demure exterior. His outlook for the next four weeks brightened.

  Chapter Four

  Ezinne stood outside the door to Prince Emeka's private rooms, bracing herself. It was the day after she'd been offered to him as a companion. Even thinking about it still made her blood boil with anger. Yesterday she couldn't believe that he'd agreed to the whole ridiculous plan. But yes, it was actually happening.

  Nonye had left for Umulari with her convoy earlier in the day, leaving Ezinne here in Umunri to cater to Prince Emeka's needs. A warm shiver slid down her back, and her hold on the wooden tray of food tightened as she continued to hesitate.

  The guard standing beside the doorway glanced over at her before staring straight ahead as he normally did. She wondered what he must think of her, standing at the threshold quivering because she had to take food in to their master.

  She had managed to avoid the prince all day, refusing to go to him until he summoned her. However, he hadn't ordered her presence. Now she couldn't avoid him any longer as she was the one scheduled to provide his evening meal. She could ask someone else to do it, but that would mean admitting she was a coward.

  A coward, she wasn't. Furious, she was.

  Allowing the anger to bubble and rise within her, she stepped forward through the door frame into Prince Emeka's main chamber. He wasn't in the first room. With fraying nerves, she flicked her eyes to the door leading to his sleeping chamber. Then, she swiped her lips with her tongue in a nervous movement.

  "Who is there?" Prince Emeka's strong, grave voice rumbled from the other room.

  She was wound so tight with worry, hearing him speak nearly made her leap out of her skin. The tray in her hand wobbled, the dishes doing a precarious dance. Nothing fell off, and Ezinne thanked the gods. The last thing she needed was an embarrassing scene to top everything else. Telling herself she could do what was required, she coughed to clear her throat.

  "My prince, it is me, Ezinne. I brought your dinner." As fate would have it, she spoke clearly and showed none of her nervousness.

  "Put it on the table. I'll be out shortly," was his calm response.

  Ezinne took it as a good sign. Hopefully he wasn't angry with her for avoiding him all day. She laid out the bowls of food on the table and the gourd of water.

  When she was done, she stood by the table unsure of what to do next. She wasn't used to working as a companion. Was she allowed to sit in the chair at the table or sit in one of the other chairs where Prince Emeka and Princess Nonye usually sat? Nonye wouldn't be happy if Ezinne sat in her chair. She knew that for sure. So she chose to stand instead.

  The prince walked out of his inner chamber. Their gazes connected, his black eyes rooting her to the spot.

  Mouth dried out, she swallowed hard, her saliva feeling like stone it went down her throat.

  Everything else receded to the background. All she could see was him, looking resplendent in a light blue flowing caftan. It was made with soft material that seemed to shimmer in the light. Navy thread embroidery ran around the neckline and seams.

  Majestic. Powerful. Tall. There were no other words to describe him. Even in the privacy of his quarters his authority overwhelmed her. There was no detracting from whom he was—the crown prince.

  His outfit wasn’t traditionally Ibo, covering him from neck to feet. However it didn’t hid the strength of prince as it seemed to caress his skin like a stream of water. Her gaze moved to his chest, the embroidery pattern formed a v shape down from the collar, exposing copper-colored skin.

  Strangely, she envied the fabric its closeness to his skin. What would it feel like to feel the whisper of his skin again hers?

  The sound of coughing brought her back from her musing. Now aware of her surroundings, she lifted her gaze, meeting his knowing gaze that seemed to glitter with amusement.

  Heat singed her cheeks. Embarrassment and self-awareness overrode her mind.

  "My prince." Suddenly recovering her comportment, she curtsied in the usual formal manner and lowered her gaze to the floor. The black spots on the leopard skin carpet wavered, seeming to mock her.

  What had she been thinking? She was in the presence of the heir to the throne of Umunri. A man beyond her reach and station. A man in charge of everything within his realm. Her master.

  Granted, Nonye attendance always acted as a buffer between them. Now it was just the two of them—alone—in large room. For the first time in a long time, she felt vulnerable and ill at ease. She didn't like the feeling of being helpless and exposed to someone else's control.

  He seemed to consider her in silence because he didn’t say anything in response to her greeting. Though the urge to look up plagued her, she kept her gaze lower and her body stooped as was required until he gave her permission to rise.

  She’d wondered if she had offended him. Yesterday she had been brazen by turning her back on him as she left his obi. It had been a moment of madness, knowing he could’ve instructed his guard to take her out into the courtyard and whip her for insubordination.

  Perhaps her punishment still waited.

  Her anger returned. Her grip tightened on the back of a chair, her short nails digging into the hard wood, inflicting pain on her fingers.

  Let him mete out a reprimand for her actions. It wouldn’t change her mind or make her yield to him. She had only one purpose for being here. She would fulfill it and move on.

  "Rise, Ezinne," he said.

  The intense timbre of his words resonated, doing odd things to her insides. She’d heard him speak before. Still, being alone with him seemed to heighten the effect of his voice on her body.

  She straightened but kept her eyes lowered. She needed to gain back control of her body. If she kept her eyes lowered, away from him, she could keep her body in check.

  "Look at me," he said in a snappy and low… dangerously low tone.

  Was he annoyed?

  Slowly she lifted her chin, her stare connecting with his once more. His lips were pursed, confirming her suspicions of his irritation.

  Anxiety and excitement caused her heart to thump against her chest. Instinct told her to look away. This was the prince. He was capable of crushing her with a snap of his fingers. She should heed the warning.

  Instead, she refused to look away and held his gaze. Infuriation crept up her spine at a snail's pace. She would not be intimidated.

  "When you are in my presence, you will look at me directly," he continued.

  "As you wish, my prince." She nodded and curtsied briefly still maintaining his gaze.

  "And when we are in private like right now, you will use my given name, Emeka."

  Doing that would mean accepting this whole arrangement as his con—companion. She couldn't do that. She wouldn't do that.

  "No, my prince. Regardless of where we
are, you are still the Crown Prince of Umunri, and I'm just a servant in your palace. I can't address you by your given name. It is improper."

  "That may be so. But for the next four weeks, you are here to grant my every desire as my concubine."

  A soft gasp escaped her lips. The way he said the words conjured up images of the two of them intertwined. Heat traveled through her body. She noticed that his lips were lifted in a half-mocking smile; both eyebrows raised, daring her to refute his words.

  Sure she'd agreed to this arrangement, but she wasn't going to let him treat her like some woman with no scruples. She was doing this for her own reasons, even if he'd never know them.

  "I'm not your con—" She broke her gaze with Prince Emeka. Cringing, she couldn't even bring herself to say the foul word out loud, thinking it would taint her.

  He took an imposing step toward her. Panicked, she backed away.

  "You were going to say what? That you are not my concubine? That Nonye didn't promise you some sort of reward to keep my bed warm for the next few weeks. That you are not looking forward to the prestige that comes along with claiming you have been bedded by the Crown Prince of Umunri. Or you want me to believe that you agreed to this charade out of the goodness of your heart?"

  "I—"

  He lifted his hand, stopping her speech.

  "I have no wish to hear your lies. Sit down. Let's eat this meal before it gets cold." He pulled out his chair but stopped when she didn't move.

  Gripping the chair in front of her tighter, Ezinne bit her lip to control the anger bubbling in her belly, but it erupted before she could put a lid on it.

  "I'm not a liar. Neither am I your concubine. In the next four weeks, I'm here to serve you in every capacity as your companion. But I'll not 'keep your bed warm' as you aptly put it. I'll not bed you, even if there were no more men in the whole of Umunri."

  "Bravo.” He clapped. “Finally, you show your true colors. That's more what I was expecting, and I like it. Since you've got that out of your mind, can we eat dinner?"

  He remained calm and sat down. Now that the haze of anger had passed over her, Ezinne stood still in shock. She was expecting Prince Emeka to be angry and lash out at her or order her punished with several stokes of the whip.

  He appeared far from angry. In fact he looked decidedly amused; his face widened in a broad smile that dimpled his cheeks, his eyes glimmered with barely concealed laughter.

  What is going on here? Why isn't he angry? The truth was she wanted him to be angry. She had hoped she would provoke him and get to see his true personality. Because she knew that once he punished her, the feelings that had been rising within her would subside and she would hate him. She wanted to hate him just as she hated every other man. Men were all alike. Brutal, unforgiving, and selfish.

  As she stood rock still watching him, she sensed there was something different about him. He wasn't like all those men. She'd sensed it the first time she'd met the prince. She hadn't paid much attention to it in the past because she'd focused on doing her duties. Now that she was stuck with him for the next four weeks, her awareness of him was rising by the minute.

  "Ezinne, sit down, or I'll sit you on my lap and feed you myself. Maybe that's what you'd prefer?" He raised one eyebrow in an acerbic query.

  Ezinne bit her tongue to stop from retorting. She had already insulted him once tonight. She really didn't want to push her luck. While she didn't mind being whipped for being insolent, she certainly didn't want the humiliation of sitting on his lap for the rest of the evening.

  Heaving a sigh of resignation, she walked to the other end of the table to sit down. The farther away from him she sat the better.

  Emeka shook his head. "No. Sit over here." He patted the seat next to him.

  She stopped. "But that's Princess Nonye's seat."

  "You're standing in for her, aren't you?"

  Frowning to show her displeasure, Ezinne moved to the chair on Emeka's right-hand side. She felt odd sitting at the table where she'd served food for the past few months and could only watch from the shadows. Now she was seated next to the prince, in her mistress's chair able to observe everything as the princess would have been able to.

  Remember you station. This is only for a short interval.

  She kept her eyes fixed on the food as she started dishing it out into the plates.

  Before they started eating, she passed him the large bowl of water to wash his hands. She refused to look at Emeka as they ate in silence. Her tongue didn’t seem to be functioning correctly as she didn’t taste the food flavors. It wouldn’t have mattered if she was eating chaff.

  No one would believe that sitting next to the prince and eating dinner was not filling her with joy as it would any other woman or person. Instead she was filled with apprehension, worried about what the night would bring.

  Would he ask her to his bed tonight? Though she had claimed she wouldn't bed him willingly, he was within his right to force her since she had already agreed to the arrangement in front of a witness. She would be unable to do anything about it. Even if she called for help, no one would come to her rescue. He was the crown prince after all.

  "I never realized you were this stubborn."

  Without thinking, she lifted her gaze and looked at Emeka. The serious expression in his cold, hard eyes had her worried. All the humor was gone from his face.

  She lifted her shoulders in a defensive shrug, unsure of what to say, unable to tell what he was insinuating. She returned her stare to the bowl of food on the table.

  Obstinacy was a family trait. He would have to live with it if he wanted her here until his wife came back.

  "Are you usually this way?” he asked, his tone blunt. “Or have you reserved this special performance just for me? I know you don't disobey orders from your mistress. Otherwise we know she would run out of patience very quickly."

  Nonye was her burden to bear. Ezinne tolerated her for a reason. She didn’t have to bear the prince.

  Ezinne still refused to look back at him. Being this close to him affected her in an adverse way. Affected her judgment. She needed to keep control of her senses.

  "In the space of a little while, you have insulted me, disobeyed my request, and continue to behave with a bad attitude. Are you going to continue that way till your mistress returns?"

  Why wouldn’t he just drop it? She just wanted to get on with the whole ridiculous affair with the least effort required. Her wish was for it to end soon.

  In any case, it was his fault that she was here. All he had to do yesterday was to say “no” and none of this would have happened.

  Yet he'd asked her to choose. As if she held any sway in the world. Of course she had to say yes. She'd promised Nonye and couldn't go back on her words.

  Before they'd arrived at his obi, she'd prayed with utmost most fervor to the gods for Prince Emeka to refuse and call the whole thing off. But he hadn't.

  So tough, but she wasn't speaking to him unless it was absolutely necessary.

  "Answer me, woman!"

  She flinched and snapped her eyes up. She couldn’t miss or ignore the hardness of his voice as if reinforced words with iron. This time he did look riled, a vein pulsing on his forehead, his black eyes piercing through her.

  "If I have a bad attitude, it's your fault for making me do this," she retorted, glad to finally get it out of her system. He might as well know it was his fault.

  Prince Emeka burst out in a chuckle, yet it lacked real humor. "What? My fault? How do you figure that? I gave you a choice and you said yes."

  "The choice you gave me was an empty one. Sla—" Nonye had banned them from referring to themselves as slaves since Prince Emeka had announced there were none in Umunri.

  All her life, she’d been treated as a slave. The truth was, regardless of her location or job title; she still felt like one—dominated by her mistress and bound to serve without recompense. She was a slave.

  But knowing the prince hated th
e word, she revised her statement.

  "Servants do not have choices,” she started again. “They do whatever their mistresses or masters require of them. I couldn't possibly say no to my mistress. You on the other hand are the master. You choose your own destiny. You could have said no to this whole debacle. Instead you had to say 'so be it,'" she said mimicking his speech tone from the other night.

  Prince Emeka stayed silent for a little while watching her with an expression she couldn't read. He looked neither angry nor happy. Then he washed his hands in the bowl, drying it on the piece of cloth before turning back to face her.

  "Ezinne, I think I need to clarify a few things about me, the palace, and Umunri in general," he started. He looked away, the line around his lips tightened. When he looked back at her, she saw sadness flicker in the depths of his eyes, and then it was gone.

  "There are no slaves in Umunri. My father set all them free when he started his reign two decades ago. We only employ servants in the palace. Everyone is paid for their work. It is their choice to work here. If someone is unhappy with their job, they are free to leave. I certainly don't wish for unhappy staff.”

  He paused, his gaze assessing. It was as if he was referring to her as an unhappy employee and expected to make her complaints known. Her nervousness returned. She pulled at an invisible thread on her skirt.

  “I know that things were different in Umulari, but you now live in Umunri, which makes you a citizen in this kingdom. You are subject to our laws which say you are a free woman. If you have no wish to be here, you are free to leave when you want. No harm will befall you. I swear it on my life."

  Surprised at his grave oath, Ezinne couldn't say anything for a while.

  Could he really be serious? No one swore on their lives with jest. The consequences could be devastating. He had no reason to reassure her. He was the prince. She had to accept his words as law.

  "I have no wish to leave, my prince," she said finally when she got her voice back.

  "But you have no desire to share my bed. Is that correct?"