by Georgia Fox
Did Gaston fully understand what his role would be? She hoped so. Tonight, however, he was just a little boy, grieving for his father. She wanted him to have that time. These would probably be his last hours of boyhood.
As the King's widow, Ariana grieved too, of course. It was expected, and she always did her duty— just as her mother once lectured her, "Let no one ever find fault in your behavior, Ariana. You are a princess, and you must be above reproach. In Ersadonia you will not only be their queen, but you will be our ambassador too." So she followed all the proper steps and played her part, performing for her husband in death, just as she did when he lived. No one would find fault in his queen.
But she did not feel great sadness for her husband. He had been ill for months, slowly and painfully fading away. Death, for the proud man who never complained, never let anyone see how badly his body had shriveled and let him down, came finally as a blessed release. She was there when the last sigh left his body and in that brief moment, when he looked up at her, his misty eyes had cleared with a bright twinkle once again. It was a glimmer of the old mischief. In that moment, with that look, he had urged her to stay strong. And she remembered his advice.
Always look to the future. The past is done, and the present is over the moment one thinks of it. But the future has promise. A man looking to the future is ever moving forward, and one must never stand still for that is when the arrow strikes.
Dear Septimus; he was a good man, much older than her, but kind, patient and generous to his very young, second wife. She came to him when he was a widower, still bereft after the sudden loss of his first wife and the abrupt end of a twenty-year marriage. Had that first union resulted in a surviving son, Septimus would probably never have remarried when his wife died, but a constant rhythm of miscarriages had left him childless and in desperate need of an heir for the kingdom. Thus, his advisors chose Ariana, a princess from an allied nation, to take that empty place at his side. Young, fertile, virginal and healthy, she gave him the son he needed. But Ariana knew his fondness for her did not match the love he had for his first wife. How could it? They had too great an age difference and too little in common, but they found their way to an understanding, a level of dear friendship. She knew how to amuse him when his spirits were low and he was always ready to guide her with advice.
As long as she fulfilled her one purpose and gave Septimus his "future" in the shape of a son, nothing else mattered. After that she was mostly ornamental, expected to stand behind her husband and say nothing.
Now, here she was, the King dead, their son—Gaston— still a boy. Her place was precarious. There was an unsettled watchfulness in the air. Even as she prayed by her husband's deathbed earlier that day, she heard the rustling of men's robes behind her, the maneuvering already begun, the jostling for power and influence. Whispers fluttered in dark corners, sly murmurs causing the candle flames to dance and weave in her peripheral vision.
Queen Ariana's world had changed in a matter of hours. Her husband's death was like the felling of a once sturdy tree. His shelter and support had been removed brutally and forever. Now she must stand without him, facing the harsh wind and rain that would come.
She knew so little of the world outside those palace walls. Septimus had never liked her to go outside without a large escort. He did not believe in mingling among the citizenry, for he held to the theory that a King should be God-like, feared as much as he was loved, and kept on a high pedestal away from the touch of the "common folk". He also had a great fear of disease which made him prefer the cool, cleanliness of his palace. If he heard reports of a plague within fifty miles, he would order the palace gates shut, allowing no one in or out until he could be assured the danger was passed. As a consequence, for ten years Ariana had been a virtual prisoner within the palace, having no power over her own life.
"You have everything you could possibly need here," her husband had said to her. "If there is something you lack, you have only to tell me and I will have it brought to you."
Now, a widow at twenty-seven, with a young son to protect and her husband's royal legacy to preserve, she was suddenly forced to act. She must take up the reins of her life— the same reins that were taken firmly by Septimus when she married him.
It was time to place her trust in a few good souls and ask for help.
And the one man she knew Septimus would call upon in this time of need was Ram Thruster.
Where the devil was he? Impertinent, disrespectful wretch to keep her waiting!
She chewed on her fingernail. He had better not desert her. A terrible rumor had reached Ariana that afternoon— despicable whispers that Ram had been offered a large purse of monies to fight for one of their less friendly neighbors. When she heard it she refused to pay the rumor any credence. Besides, he wouldn't leave, would he?
Yet where was he now? She pressed a hand to her heart as if she could somehow slow down the beat.
How strange it was that she had never realized how much she would miss the ill-tempered, unsmiling oaf, until there was a chance she might never see his grim face again.
Chapter Three
The young page led him through the palace, walking swiftly, head high with pride for the importance of his job. Ram, doing his best to walk in a straight line behind the lad, lifted his head just enough to recognize a few blurred faces they passed, but no one raised a hand in greeting and his scowl certainly didn't encourage contact. If they recognized him, their whispers ceased mid-syllable. He knew they must be wondering what he was doing there. Who had sent for him. And why.
Well, the why was not so hard to figure out.
Ten minutes after his arrival within palace walls, certain people would start checking behind their bed curtains before they blew out their candles. They were wise to worry. Ram knew where all the bodies were buried and all the dirty secrets kept. He knew which men were in debt and which men would bend their "loyalty" under the slightest of drafts. He knew which men kept mistresses, and which men were kept by their mistresses.
That was the benefit of listening more than he talked. Occasionally people forgot he was there. But life in the palace was a strange, false performance and he had no time for the pretense of politics, or for those who practiced it. So mostly he stayed away, attending only when the king commanded him there for some reason. Sycophants and hypocrites made his skin itch and his jaw ache.
He tripped over a non-existent bump in the floor, but kept walking. All that ale must have taken effect finally, but he could manage it. He'd been told before that it was difficult to ascertain when he was inebriated, because he had a tendency to just become even quieter. Folk didn't know for sure if he was soused, bored, or simply about to fall asleep.
But a few years ago he'd even won a joust while entirely pickled. He'd also fucked the breath out of Lady Jocelyn Le Rocha — and her two big-bosomed sisters, whose names currently escaped him—immediately after the tournament too. So he could handle himself with a few extra ales on board. No difficulty.
Expecting to be taken to the queen's wing, he was surprised when the young page led him across a deserted courtyard, through a gate and down a narrow passage where he'd never before walked. There were no guards in evidence. All was silent, but for water dripping somewhere, hitting the cold stone with a steady, annoying splat. A strong, waxy scent of soap filled his nostrils.
The page led him up a flight of winding stairs to a studded door.
"Majesty," the boy hissed through the wooden planks, "I have found him. All is well."
After a slight pause he heard a rusty bolt rattle. The door creaked open and there she was.
The emotion named Ariana.
She wore a simple, deep blue gown, with a white shift visible under the laces of her sleeves and bodice. Her long hair hung in a single braid threaded with slender ivory silk thread. For once she wore no jewelry, no gold or silver. She did not look like a queen, but like a woman. A sad, frightened, beautiful woman. And completely alone.
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"Finally, you deign to come," she exclaimed.
He sniffed and looked at the ground, which was usually the safest thing to look at in her presence. "Majesty," he exhaled in a cross sigh.
She stood aside, gesturing that he enter. After a few soft words with the page and the exchange of a coin, she closed the door and bolted it again.
Ram stared into the dim corners of the small chamber, but quickly saw that his first impression was correct. She was alone. They were alone together. No maid bustling about, no twittering ladies seated with their sewing or their little dogs, no lute player strumming in the corner. He swallowed hard and his nose and throat was immediately filled with the scent of her.
Instantly he felt a raw, grinding hunger. Her fragrance reminded him of grass after a fresh spring rain. After he'd tumbled a woman in it and the green marked his knees.
What a thing to think of in her presence! Not a good start.
He glanced over at the bolted door again and then at his queen, in that slender linen gown with firelight caressing her curved shape. She breathed rapidly, her firm breasts rising and falling, drawing his narrowed gaze until he succeeded in dragging it away and down again at the floor.
"I know what you are thinking," she said pertly.
Oh, he very much doubted it.
"You wonder why all the precautions and secrecy," she added. "You wonder why I am hidden away here in the laundry quarters."
Ah, so that's where he was. Explained the dripping sound, as well as the wooden racks hung from the rafters on pulley ropes.
He slowly scratched his unshaven cheek, walked to the fire and stared into the flames. Odd, he thought, how it was always cold in the palace, no matter what the season. The thick stone walls, of course, kept the heat out and denied the sun. A person who lived there may never feel the sunlight on their face. Then they would shrivel like a neglected rose.
Ram glanced over at the Queen and quickly down at the ground between them. "You are right to be cautious. These are dangerous times." Did she think he was stupid? Yes, naturally. In her eyes he was merely a dumb beast, who obeyed on command, a peasant who could not even read.
She moved around the room, her gown whispering softly against her legs.
Don't think of her legs. He had never seen them, of course, for they were always covered. But he could picture them all too clearly, knew they were long. Even knew how they would feel under his rough palms. How they would taste. Their fragrance, softness. Unbearable.
Her skin's scent tickled his flared nostrils again. Like hot spice it rushed through his blood and enflamed it. Carefully he reached out one hand and pressed it to the stone fireplace, waiting for the sudden dizziness to pass.
"You know then why I sent for you," she said quietly, her voice breaking a little on the last word.
He waited, staying silent, watching the fire.
"My son needs protection. There are some here at court who would rather not have a boy on the throne and they will see this as their chance to step over him. I fear the lengths to which they may go. While Septimus was alive they would never have dared—"
"You speak of Humboldt de Bonneville." Why tip toe around the name, he thought. Why say "they" when her meaning was clear? Everybody knew of the Bonneville family's ambitions. It was only the popularity of Septimus that had prevented Lord Bonneville from putting up a reasonable challenge for the throne these past few years. His discontent was always known, but kept in its place because the people of Ersadonia had great respect for their ailing King and Humboldt could never raise enough solid support for his cause. Now he would see his chance to claim something that he, a distant cousin of the King, believed was rightfully his.
"Yes." She sighed. "He has already suggested to certain members of the Council that he be made Regent until Gaston is eighteen. An age, of course, he will not reach if Humboldt has his way."
Ram looked at her over his shoulder, surprised.
She snapped, "I suppose you are shocked that I, a mere woman, would have my own spies at court? That I would be capable of finding out what I must know, even while everyone around me thinks I am an ignorant creature of no importance, someone to be pushed aside. A female not even allowed to sit on the almighty, all-knowing Council?"
There was a pause, but he did not respond. His tongue felt thick in his mouth. Whenever she moved it seemed as if she taunted him deliberately with all her rounded parts. But in the few sober corners of his brain yet remaining tonight, he knew it was by accident on her part. She would not try to tempt him. Ariana did not know what she did or what power she had over her husband's servant. He had kept his dark secret for ten years— even tried to deny it to himself.
It was not her fault that he looked at her and felt like a starved hound. That tonight, when he found her alone in the firelight, his pulse thumped heavily, all the way down his torso to the root of his cock.
She spoke again, apparently misreading his expression and thinking him annoyed with her. "You expect me to be silent and stand aside while my son's throne is usurped by a man who will do all in his power to make certain he never sits upon it?"
"Silent? No. I never expected you to be silent." She was a woman, after all, he mused grimly. Every bit of her. Women were never mute unless their tongues were ripped out, or a Scold's Bridle was employed to silence them.
"Then you must help my son. For Septimus. You must protect his son and heir from Bonneville's schemes."
She did not, he noticed, ask him to help for herself. A spark of mean anger danced through his gut. Bloody woman.
"Will you sit?" she said, gesturing elegantly to a chair by the fire. "You look tired."
"I'll stand." He wiped a hand across his brow and felt a little dampness there.
"I hoped we might talk for once as equals."
Equals? He sucked on his tongue, flexed his fingers.
She would not sit either, but circled the chamber, her gown fanning out gently behind her. Although he didn't want to watch her move, he did. It was a bad habit he'd acquired over the years, usually resulting in a bad mood that only ale could sooth. Or a quick, hard rut with some woman who didn't mind his rough manners, and didn't object if he took her from behind, pushing her fine bubbies up against the wall, her fingernails scratching at the stone as she searched for something to hold onto.
Again he swept a hand over his brow, his temperature rising. He stepped to one side, slipping into the cooler wedge of shadow away from the fire. Better. A little.
Only a moment ago he was pondering the ability of these walls to keep out the sun's heat. Now he felt as if he baked in it.
She, on the other hand, was cool and unruffled. Even when angry her words were precise, unfaltering.
Ariana moved like a swan he thought— smoothly gliding, with a poised natural beauty. And, curiously, she was never more graceful, more beautiful than she was when cross and determined, when she felt an injustice. She was bolder these days. Different to how it was when she first came to Ersadonia as a wide-eyed young girl.
The glittering memory swept through his mind.
Bracken crunching underfoot, the sweet scent of warm leaves, sun dappling a forest like gold paint flicked haphazardly from a painter's brush. A girl emerging through the trees to stand like a long-legged doe before him, her long dark hair only slightly visible under a thin silk headdress that fluttered around her face.
Her eyes were lush pools of brilliant emerald, fringed with thick black lashes. She was something rare, exotic, caught in the shifting pattern of shadow and light.
In her presence Ram felt twenty times clumsier, rougher. But he couldn't help that and why should he? He was a man— not meant to be dainty and fragile, but made for hunting, for war, for conquering.
And she was a woman, meant to be delicate, soft, yielding. To be hunted, captured and conquered.
She was innocent when she first came to Ersadonia and didn't seem aware that life could sometimes be unjust, that there were people in the w
orld who would not only dislike her, but would try to harm her. Since then, she'd learned. Some of her husband's Council had not wanted him to marry again when his first wife died, because they had their own ideas of who should take the throne when he was dead. They had their own ambitions to nurture, their own horse in the race. And she was a foreigner— in the eyes of many, even after ten years as their Queen, she was still a foreigner.
Poor Gaston had not yet been alive enough years to protect his mother.
But Ram Thruster could.
A quickened, maddened pulse raced through him now, just as it did ten years ago when he first laid eyes on her. But worse. It was shameful. No other woman ever had this effect upon him and after all this time it should surely have lessened its grip, not grown in force.
Once she was a pretty, blushing girl of seventeen, and he was a young soldier bringing her to his king. In the ten years since then he had watched her blossom, even though she spent most of her time in the King's shadow, kept within the palace's cold stone walls where pretty things could feel no sun. Somehow she survived, even flourished, fulfilling her duty to Septimus. It told Ram that this woman was strong inside. Stronger than she looked and probably stronger than she thought she was.
Tonight she wore no crown, no circlet, no heavy, bejeweled bracelets — the sort that had always made Ram think of the shackles put around prisoner's wrists to chain them against dungeon walls. She had put all that aside to greet him in a plain gown. She had even asked him to sit in her presence and talked of being "equals". The Queen must want his allegiance very badly indeed to set her haughty pride aside and meet him in a laundry chamber.
He looked away and then back at her again. Slowly he unclenched his fists. "Where is Prince Gaston tonight?"
"He is well guarded in the house of Matthias Falconer."
"The Prince's tutor? What will he do if he faces an assassin—throw a book at them?"
"Matthias is a calm, steady man and he will be good companionship for Gaston. Somebody familiar, comfortable and trusted at this time of grief and transition. And do not scowl. I know you have no liking for books, but a clever mind can be just as great a weapon as a sword."
