Booted footfalls retreated down the corridor. Clearly, he had orders to inform someone when Kevral awakened. She closed her eyes and waited, hoping Cymion would not come to gloat. She had borne more than her share of shame for one day.
An eternity seemed to pass before steps again filled the hall. The lock clicked, and the squeal of hinges followed. Opening her eyes, Kevral rolled her head toward the intruder.
As she turned, the other dropped politely to her level, acutely attuned to her discomfort. Towering over her would only have heightened the dishonor. She recognized the long dark hair and soft blue eyes at once. The prince of Pudar had come.
Kevral looked away. “Don’t touch me.” She added emphatically and with intense distaste, “Sire.”
“Kevral.” Pain tinged Leondis’ voice. “I brought you some water.”
Kevral closed her eyes, needing what he offered. If she died of thirst, she would damn herself to Hel. So long as she remained alive, she could find a way to die fighting and in honor. And exact revenge. Opening her eyes, she whipped her neck back toward him, immediately wishing she had not. The sudden movement crushed dizziness down upon her and ached through her head. “What kind of drug is in it this time? Something to make me your willing slave?”
Leondis accepted the hostility without comment. “It’s just water. I filled it myself.” Hefting a waterskin, he poured clear liquid into a mug.
The sight of it sparked need. Kevral’s parched lips parted, and she cursed the mortal weakness.
Leondis raised the mug, then hesitated. “I’m going to have to support your head. May I?”
Like I could refuse. “Do as you please,” Kevral said.
The prince placed a gentle arm around her head, lifting it to the mug. Kevral sucked down the contents in an instant. He repeated the maneuver three more times before Kevral finally felt satisfied.
“Enough,” Kevral said. The word had many references.
Leondis placed mug and waterskin aside. “There’s more if you need it. And I brought food as well.” He skittered back to her side and sat.
Kevral returned a penetrating stare through eyes burned and bleary. “Do I get that before or after you rape me?”
Leondis cringed. “Kevral, please. Don’t make this any harder.”
“It’s only hard for me.”
Prince Leondis sighed. He reached up a hand, as if to brush a stray hair from Kevral’s forehead. Catching himself in mid-gesture, he withdrew. “You’re wrong. I don’t like it either.”
“Then don’t do it.”
“And let the best fertile woman in Pudar go sterile?”
Kevral had the perfect solution. “I didn’t say I refused to have another baby. I can be talked into that. Let me free, and I’ll choose a father.”
Leondis ran a hand through his dark hair, then let it cascade back around his face. “You think my father trusted me with the key?”
“You’re the crown prince.”
Leondis replaced the canteen in a sack, then pulled out a loaf of brown bread and an apple. “And this is too important to my father.” He drew out a jar containing a purple spread. “Kevral, you have to understand that whether or not mankind has a future depends on you and a handful of others.”
“Charra made that point well enough.”
“I’m sure you can think of worse men than me.” With a utility knife taken from his belt, Leondis cut a slice of bread and spread it thickly with the purple substance.
“You mean, like your father,” Kevral fairly hissed.
Leondis shrugged. His patience showed no sign of waning, despite having admitted he was accustomed to immediate satisfaction of his demands. “I won’t convince you, but he really is a good man. The people uniformly like him, which is difficult enough for any king.” Leondis shook his head, clearly frustrated by the need to detail what seemed obvious to him. “Historically, disruption of even a hated king’s line results in chaos. People lose direction and faith. Wars over the crown ensue. Our line has done well for Pudar for centuries. It’s only natural for the king to want to perpetuate it.” He offered the bread.
Though starved, Kevral had to ask the question first, “Why at my expense?”
The bread hovered. “Because, as I said, you’re the best fertile woman in Pudar. He can’t settle for less. And I think he still hopes you’ll decide to stay.”
The suggestion seemed ridiculous. “After this?”
Leondis rolled his pale eyes. “You know you couldn’t, and I know you won’t. Just so it gets said, he promised that, if you stay until the baby’s born, you’ll get to raise the twins.”
He’ll let me mother my own children. How generous. Kevral kept the thought to herself this once. As Cymion had said, he could do as he pleased. The current arrangement assured she would not see her boys until they were at least nine months old. “He’s not serious about keeping my babies.” She glanced at Leondis, wishing she looked less vulnerable. “Is he?”
“Can you think of a better way to assure you bring his granddaughter back?” Leondis raised the bread to Kevral’s mouth again.
“You taste it first.”
Without hesitation, Leondis took a big bite. “Grape preserves. The best.”
Kevral surrendered to the protests of her gut. The spread tasted sweet, a delicate contrast to the yeasty flavor of fresh bread. No food had ever tasted better. She spoke between bites. “So, there’s nothing else I can say? You are going to rape me.”
The prince waited until Kevral finished the entire piece. He rose from his hunkered position near her head and finally dragged away that errant hair from her forehead with a warm, easy touch. “Kevral, I won’t hurt you. Whether it’s lovemaking or rape depends wholly on you.” He met her gaze with compassion, awaiting an answer Kevral did not feel ready to give. When she said nothing for several moments, he returned his attention to the bread, cutting her another piece and smearing on more of the preserves. “It’s unfortunate but true, Kevral, that you’ve become as valuable to the world as you’ve been for Pudar’s guards. We need you now, not as a teacher, but as mother to the world.”
“Le,” Kevral finally said.
A smile flickered across the prince’s features, then disappeared. He looked up. “Yes?”
“Can I have one more night to think this over. To get used to the idea before we . . . start?”
Kevral read definite relief on Leondis’ face. He did not want to inflict this on her any more than she wanted it. In a way, he was bound, too, though his chains were invisible. “I have no problem with that. Eat. Talk. Let me know how I can make this as easy on you as possible.”
His words failed to soothe. Kevral spoke little, eating until her stomach felt queasy, then slipped into an anxious sleep.
* * *
Tae swept from the meeting room with an irritation that lengthened his stride. Momentum pushed back black hair now hacked short, and the cold touch of air at the base of his neck made him feel unprotected, vulnerable. Usually, Weile and Tae found compromise with minimal argument. Tae’s compassion tempered his father’s experience and wisdom, and Weile’s eye for strategy turned Tae’s wildest suggestions into viable alternatives. This time, discussion had become shouting, then lapsed into name-calling that, mercifully at least, could not include the usual jabs at mother and family. That realization had given Tae an idea; and he had ended the session with an insult, aimed at himself, that rebounded perfectly: “My father is an idiot!” He took some solace in the knowledge that he had left Weile Kahn laughing.
But the matter they had argued over would not leave Tae’s mind so swiftly. The return message from Pudar revealed their new association with elves and the details of women spared by the infertility plague. Within days, every fruitful woman in the Eastlands became a ward of the king.
Those married were awarded housing for self and family near the castle, their babies raised either by themselves or by sterile women chosen by their husbands, depending partially on choice and pa
rtially on a formula Tae had not studied carefully enough to understand. Babies born of rape or single mothers were awarded to worthy couples. Men found opportunity to become fathers based on acts of loyalty to the kingdom.
The entire arrangement stabbed at Tae’s conscience until it felt raw with guilt. He imagined the unwed women, their world narrowed to the third floor north wing of Stalmize Castle, their fate certain. Now the property of the king, they would carry infants until their wombs failed or childbirth killed them. He imagined himself as a young girl, not yet even of age, forced to lie with strangers and bear babies for others to raise. Tears stung his dark eyes, and he retreated deeper inside himself. For several moments, a frightened female child trod the corridors in Tae’s place. Words, responsibility, and sensations he could barely comprehend bombarded him from all sides, a ceaseless attack of terror that drove him into a wild run for freedom. Are a few extra generations of mankind worth the torture inflicted on innocents?
Tae shook off this new role, eager to return to self and shocked that he had discovered sympathy so shallowly buried. The streets taught boys and girls to trust no one, to do nothing that did not directly benefit self. No matter their occupation, or fate, his parents had trained him better, instilling deeper lessons than he realized. He wondered if he had inherited the ability to place himself in others’ places from his father and if the skill accounted for Weile’s talent at organizing and rallying those whom most dismissed as hopeless.
Tae’s thoughts brought him to the north staircase, and he climbed with trepidation. His father insisted that the arrangement pleased the vast majority of Eastlanders; near unanimity was a rarity he could not sacrifice for the Western values of an individual, even his only and much-trusted son. Tae intended to hear the women’s viewpoint and to force it upon Weile as well. Perhaps, if the leader of the Eastlands heard their stories, it might trigger the same mercy that haunted Tae. Weile might come to realize the hardship he inflicted on them and find a better solution. And what would that solution be? Tae could hear his father’s voice in his head, but his heart gave him no answers yet.
A pair of guards stood in the stairwell, in front of the third floor north wing door. Their rigid demeanors and unfamiliar faces revealed them as castle regulars trained by royalty and now happily in service to the man who’d brought the Eastlands peace. Apparently, they recognized Tae as he had not them. Each nodded, leather helmet shifting in acknowledgment, and they stepped quietly aside. Tae continued past them without comment, not knowing what to say. He wrenched open the door, hinges creaking, to reveal a festive hallway decorated with wildly unmatched pictures and amateur murals, most only partially finished. Doors on each side interrupted the corridor at regular intervals. A few women whirled toward the sound, then disappeared into openings like ants scrambling for burrows when a stone is overturned.
Tae closed the door behind him, then looked into a now-empty hallway. Eyes studied him from around doorway corners, and whispers spattered throughout the wing. He cleared his throat, the sound carving a loud echo, as if through a tunnel. Giggles followed, then a noisy shushing sound.
Tae suppressed an urge to tiptoe and headed carefully down the corridor. Women, many much younger than his own nineteen years, retreated into the darkness of rooms as he drew near. Even without looking back, he could tell by the shuffle of movement that most slipped right back to their doors as he passed. Soon, he realized the hallway would end in an enormous common room. Voices wafted from it in normal waves of conversation. The women there had, apparently, not yet noticed the intruder.
Soon the hallway filled with quiet footsteps behind Tae. He pretended not to notice as a host of women followed him toward their meeting place. His back prickled, long habit raising alarm. Though he knew they would not harm him, the idea of a horde behind him as he approached a dead end sent every nerve into jangling awareness. The need to glance at them became all-consuming; still, he resisted.
At length, Tae’s long walk brought him to the entrance of the common room, and he looked over a disarray of stools, chests, and benches. Dark-haired women of myriad shapes and sizes had broken into comfortable groups. Most chatted. Others worked on the floor or at the few desks. A group of eight played cards at a rickety table. Tae counted nearly a hundred. As he turned to enter, finally letting his gaze play over those trailing him, he counted a like number in the hallway. All but a few sported the standard Eastern swarthy features and dark eyes. Many were round with child, though others carried only a subtle bulge or nothing at all to indicate pregnancy. They ranged in age from a child who seemed about twelve to a woman well into middle age. None looked particularly frightened or worried, their actions more curious than afraid.
The eldest looked up from a tiny sweater she knitted. “Hello, sir. Are you looking for someone specific?”
A group of young adolescents giggled, silenced by their companions’ glares.
“No,” Tae admitted. “I came to talk with all of you.”
The speaker gave him a narrow-eyed look. “Are you favored by the king, sir?”
Even after four months, Tae could not get used to the title. Weile called himself a leader, never king. Not at the moment. “I’m his son. Tae—”
Whispers traversed the women, again swiftly silenced. Several dropped to their knees, then others followed in a disorganized wave. The speaker set aside her knitting, rising awkwardly. “Your pardon. Sire.”
Tae suddenly wished he had not revealed himself. “Please, no.” He gestured frantically. “Up! Up! Don’t do this.” For the first time, he understood why formality embarrassed Matrinka. “Act as you were, please.”
Raggedly, the women obeyed. Their heads bobbed as they examined every part of him.
Beneath the intense scrutiny, Tae realized several things. First, by identifying himself, he had probably made it impossible to win their confidence. Second, they surely expected him to select a bride or, worse, just a breeder. And, third, he suddenly felt intensely edgy. Trying to salvage as much of the situation as he could, he selected an empty crate and sat. “My father didn’t send me. I came to ask after your comfort.”
Several women answered at once, everyone asserting joy and great honor.
Tae raised his hands, and they all quieted. “You don’t understand. I want your honesty. Any complaints? I want to hear about them. No one will be punished in any fashion for candor.”
Again, sundry voices alleged satisfaction. A ring tightened around him, a few touching him not-quite accidentally. Wedded to realism, Tae knew they were not attracted to his irresistible beauty. They loved his title, not himself, the honor of carrying the “prince’s” baby.
Tae sighed, mentally kicking himself for his mistake. “No one is happy all the time. Please. Someone gripe about something.”
Silence ensued, broken by a woman in her twenties who edged forward hesitantly. “I . . .” She glanced around for support. “Sire, I don’t care for the way the cook prepares the peas. Too much erenspice.”
A few nodded agreement.
Tae smiled. “Good.” A start, at least. “But drop the ‘sire.’ Just call me Tae Kahn.”
One of the youngest piped up in a squeaky voice. “Hate sharin’ quarters with Zeldar. She acts like my mama.”
A thirtyish woman, apparently Zeldar, glared at the speaker.
Other complaints surfaced: “We need more red paint.” “I gotta pee all the time.” “Monika cheats at cards.” “My legs are swollen, and the healers can’t do nothing about it.” “The man I picked gets rough sometimes.”
The last earned the derision of her companions. Several sneered. One shouted, more child or doll than woman, abdomen enormous above legs like twigs. “You ain’t knowin’ rough. You ain’t never been buggered by six bassards in a dirty alley.”
Though Tae was no stranger to violence, the image the child’s words conjured awakened outrage. “No, don’t stop her. That’s the sort of thing I want to know.”
The knitting elder
whose name, he discovered, was Niko, spoke, “The men we sleep with are interesting to you?”
“No.” Tae watched the tide of women shift around him. The contacts continued, despite his obvious quest for something other than a wife. “I want to know if you feel like prisoners here. If it’s freedom you wish, I’ll do my best to see you get it.”
Tae’s words disappeared into a hush electric with tension. A child a year or two younger than Kevral started sobbing. Believing his words had touched her, Tae rose and walked to her side, women parting in front of him like water. The girl on the bench beside her moved away, and Tae sat, placing a comforting arm around her shoulders.
She flinched, head jerking suddenly upward and moist eyes dodging his gaze. “You can’t send me back.” She gasped for a breath, and her demands softened to desperate pleas. Sliding from the bench, she threw herself at his feet. “Sire, I beg you. Please don’t make me leave.”
Stunned, Tae found himself incapable of movement. He glanced at the nearest woman, who shrugged then indicated the pleader’s belly. “Her own father’s.”
The cruelty inherent in such an act flashed anger through Tae again. He glanced around the room, seeing fear in many eyes that he had not noticed at the time of his arrival. “I’m not sending anyone away who wants to stay. Even if I wished to, I don’t have the authority.”
One of the women helped the crying girl back onto the bench. She calmed noticeably, though quiet tears still glided from dark eyes.
“Isn’t there anyone who longs for freedom?”
The women spoke among themselves. Finally, Niko addressed Tae. “You don’t understand what it’s like out there.” She made a sweeping gesture intended to include every Eastern street. “Rape. Murder. Both. Violence against women is no crime.”
“We’re working on that,” Tae promised. Memories returned in a rush, suppressed from his own youth. During his time on the streets, survival had obsessed him. The idea of harming others had never entered his thoughts, though he knew many of those who served his father had started in exactly that fashion. He imagined how much worse matters might have become in recent weeks, frustrated men rationalizing rape and incest in the name of preserving their own perceived, unique qualities. In the West, he hoped, such a thing could never happen.
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