Tales of the Thasali Harem Box Set

by Danielle Summers

  “Sir. I’m sorry. Is this a bad time?” Eyakan smiled, although the smile seemed a little uncertain, not quite as confident as the one he had seen earlier in class.

  Duga blinked and cleared his throat. “Of course not, Eyakan. Yes. How can I help you?”

  “I just wanted to thank you.”

  “Thank me for what, Eyakan?”

  “For earlier. It was fun with you. It felt good,” he said.

  His smoky eyes seemed to have lost a little of their sparkle. Maybe he was tired at the end of a long day? thought Duga.

  “Well, you were, or are, very good at what you do.” Even for an undercover sex trainer in the Thasali harem, Duga thought there was something unreal about this exchange that they were having outside of his office. Saying “thank you” seemed a flimsy excuse for Eyakan to visit Duga. He wondered if he should offer Eyakan tips on something. Wasn’t that what teachers did?

  Instead, Duga said, “There’ll be more of that tomorrow. I’ll see you then.”

  “I don’t think so, sir. We have music class with Master Mekko.” Here Eyakan made a sour face.

  Duga laughed inwardly at this confirmation that Mekko’s charms were lost on Eyakan.

  “But if I wanted to, could I come by tomorrow to talk, sir?”

  “Of course. Is there anything in particular you want to talk about? So I can prepare, if I need to.”

  “No, it’s nothing like that. I—”

  Eyakan stopped at the sound of someone coming down the corridor pushing a sweeper. It was Gyles, who whistled tunelessly. In a sea of beauty, his blandness made him nearly invisible.

  “Good fortune, sir,” Eyakan said as he quickly turned and walked away. Suddenly, it seemed as though he couldn’t get away from Duga fast enough.

  “Good fortune, Eyakan.” The young man had moved so swiftly that Duga wondered if he had heard him.

  Gyles kept pushing the sweeper down the corridor, and when he passed Duga, he gave him a little salute and went on his way. Duga wondered if Eretu had been wrong about Gyles. The man seemed like a simpleton. Duga wasn’t sure how he was supposed to help.

  Duga turned in that night knowing that he had one day fewer to find a nest of assassination plotters or the assassin, if there was one, and save the lives of the harem boys. He wondered if Kuzabu might be involved in such a plot. He still had a hard time believing that any harem boy could intend physical harm to a member of the royal family. He went to sleep telling himself that he would have to find out much more by lamplight tomorrow.

  Chapter Four

  Around midday, after a morning spent lecturing a class of initiates about how to look fresh as a jusubo flower when awoken in the middle of the night by a royal family member with needs, and looking for signs as to who might be a potential assassin, Duga was on his way to lunch with Kuzabu, his most likely suspect. He went to his office to drop off some papers first, and there was a knock on the door as he was filing them away.

  “Enter!” Duga said, almost absentmindedly. He was thinking of questions he could ask Kuzabu to see if he could draw him out, perhaps catch him in a lie.

  “Good day, Master Menasta.”

  Duga looked up. “Eyakan. Good day.”

  “Do you have a few minutes now? To talk?”

  Eyakan looked over his shoulder even though the door was closed and no one but Duga was in his office.

  “Of course. Sit down. Please,” Duga said. He still had a few minutes before he had to head off to lunch with Kuzabu.

  Eyakan sat down in one of the two chairs in front of Duga’s desk. Duga looked at him expectantly.

  “I hope you’re going to understand what I’m going to tell you. I need your help. You seem like someone I can trust,” said Eyakan. “I come from Marqash, sir. Do you know it?”

  Duga nodded. He was happy to realize that he had managed to build up some rapport with Eyakan, but he knew very little about Marqash besides the fact that it existed at the outer edge of the Thasali stronghold. It had next to nothing by way of natural resources that the royal family and its loyal merchants could exploit. Marqash was generally ignored and neglected. Duga was surprised to hear Eyakan was from Marqash because even the harem recruiters didn’t go there that often. Not even the young people of Marqash were viewed as valuable to Thasali.

  “I know it’s mostly desert,” Duga said. “That’s about all I know.”

  Eyakan grinned. “That’s right, sir. There are spots of green here and there, but not many. It has its own beauty. There’s nothing like playing in the sand falls as the suns set. My family are still in Marqash, but they didn’t want me to join the harem.”

  Here, Eyakan leaned toward Duga and lowered his voice.

  “Marqashians distrust Thasali. When the harem recruiters came—and they hadn’t been in so long—and I was chosen, I thought about not telling my family. I thought about just leaving. I really wanted to see what the world had to offer me. In the end, I told them. I couldn’t just leave, but I left without their blessing. You know, once I was marked and officially accepted into the harem, Thasali sent my parents payment, but they refused it. That money could have really helped them, but they refused it.” Eyakan’s eyes widened. Their refusal seemed to weigh heavily on him.

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” Duga said, wondering if this was what Eyakan had meant by needing help, just someone to talk to. He started to get up and motioned toward the door. “Eyakan, perhaps we can continue this later. I have some time this evening—”

  Suddenly, Eyakan grabbed Duga’s arm. Duga looked down. Eyakan had grabbed him on his left forearm, just above the space where his Thasali harem tattoo used to be. Duga could see the shadow of his tattoo even if no one else could.

  “Sir. Please listen. They want me to kill him.”

  At those words, Duga’s head snapped up. He leaned closer to Eyakan and whispered, “Kill who?”

  Eyakan glanced around, looking for some spy who might have snuck through Duga’s closed office door. Eyakan leaned farther forward and tightened his grip on Duga’s arm.

  “The Crown Prince Baboye. They want me to kill him,” Eyakan said in a hoarse whisper. It seemed as though the words were strangling him.

  Duga realized that he had found his potential assassin.

  “They’re making me do it. They say they will kill my family if I don’t do it. I know they don’t approve of me being a harem boy, but I don’t want them killed. I don’t know what to do.”

  And Duga realized that he was going to have to do more than identify a would-be assassin who was little more than one scared young man. If he turned Eyakan into the Thasali security service, he would be executed. Other harem boys would be saved, but Baboye’s heart would be broken, and those behind this plot would just find another to torment into doing their filthy work. Baboye’s life would still be at risk.

  “Who are they, and how do you know that they mean what they say?”

  “My younger sister. They sent me her finger. They cut off one of her fingers and sent it to me.”

  Duga sat back down and motioned Eyakan, who seemed on the verge of tears, to do the same.

  “Are you sure it’s hers?

  “Yes, it had a ring on it. My mother gave it to her. Marqashian mothers give their daughters a ring at their sixteenth year. It signifies their adulthood. They can get married and own property in their own right then, if they want. The ring has our family’s design.”

  Duga took a few deep breaths. He had to figure out how to save not only this boy, but the boy’s family and the other harem boys.

  “Where’s the finger now?” said Duga.

  “I have it hidden in my room,” said Eyakan.

  Duga hoped it was well hidden, and he started to form a plan.

  “Whatever your schedule is today, keep to it,” Duga said.

  “Sir?”

  “Do you want to do it?” Duga lowered his voice. “Kill the prince? Do you want to do it?”

  “No, sir! I could never—
”

  “Good. We’ll have to talk later. I’ve got an appointment I can’t miss. You need to keep to your schedule so no one will suspect that you told me anything, but I want to know as much as you can tell me.” Duga paused. He didn’t want the Thasali security service to make Eyakan just disappear before he could get to the bottom of this plot. “And we need to talk where I can guarantee even the Matriarch and her spies will not be able to hear us.”

  He remembered that there was one place in the harem compound that the Matriarch and her spies couldn’t access. Or at least they couldn’t many years ago. Duga and Shebi had learned about it a few months after they became harem members. The secret room hidden in the walls of the harem compound was a closely guarded secret among the harem boys that was only shared amongst the most senior and most trusted.

  The smallish room could be accessed through a short, narrow door just big enough for Duga to fit his shoulders through at the back of a broom closet in the library. The tiny room was where he and Shebi used to hide from particularly onerous requests from minor members of the Thasali royal family. That room seemed like it would be the ideal place to talk to Eyakan, and he hoped it was still there.

  “In the back of the library, there’s a broom closet,” Duga said. “Meet me there at lamplight. Understand?”

  Eyakan nodded, a shadow of his usual sunny smile hovering at his lips. Before Duga realized what he was doing, he reached out and caressed the boy’s cheek.

  “Thank you, sir.” Eyakan got up and left with a brief backward glance. “I will follow your instructions.”

  Before he could give in to feeling stunned by this turn of events, Duga did some quick research on Eyakan and Marqash. Everything Eyakan had said was true, and he was the only Marqashian in the harem at the present time.

  He wrote a note to Shebi on a small scrap of paper in a code that they hadn’t used since they were in the harem together. He hoped Shebi would remember it. He asked Shebi to round up some of his friends and send them to Marqash to ensure Eyakan’s family’s safety. He didn’t have confidence that the Thasali household guards and agents had not been infiltrated. He knew he could trust Shebi. On a second scrap of paper, he wrote a brief note to Prince Baboye, telling him that he was making progress but not giving any details.

  Duga headed out of his office to find Gyles, his only means for getting the notes out of the compound. Duga passed Gyles in a corridor just outside the dining hall and pressed the notes firmly into his hand as they passed like they didn’t even know each other.

  Duga’s lunch with Kuzabu was not as fruitful as hoped, but it wasn’t because Duga was late. He ended up with the sense that the games master’s criticisms of the Thasali family didn’t mask anything more sinister than middle-aged disgruntlement with his lot in life. Duga just didn’t see him as the puppet master of an assassination plot. By the time lunch ended, he was already thinking about seeing Eyakan again at lamplight, and he hoped Gyles had gotten his messages to Shebi and the crown prince.

  *~*~*

  As the suns set and most of the harem members headed to evening meal, Duga took a roundabout way to the library to reduce the chance that he was being followed. He entered the room filled with books that would help harem boys with their education and the records of every harem boy who had ever served the family. He deeply inhaled the smell of aging paper, and then he heard a voice.

  “Master Menasta,” Eyakan whispered, but Duga couldn’t see him.

  “Eyakan? Come out where I can see you.”

  “Is it safe, sir?”

  Duga sighed. “As safe as I can make it. Come out.”

  Eyakan slid out from behind a shelf just ahead of Duga. He flashed Duga a sunny, sexy grin. Duga wondered how he could look so happy, considering the situation they were in.

  They headed to the back of the library, and Duga opened the broom closet door.

  “Get in.” He ducked in behind Eyakan, shut the door and sneezed. It was as if no one had been in this closet since he and Shebi had been there twenty years ago. The dust was so thick. Maybe this old harem tradition had become more of a secret than when he was in the harem? Maybe no one knew about this room anymore? All the better, thought Duga. They both switched on their crystal-powered torches, and there was light.

  “When was the last time anyone was in here?” Eyakan asked, as he swept the torch beam around the closet, the light illuminating the half-bare shelves and discarded cleaning equipment.

  “I have no idea, but shine that torch over here.” Duga ran his fingers over the wall. “It should be here.” He pushed on a spot in the corner, which opened up to the tiny hallway Duga remembered, although it seemed even smaller now.

  Eyakan gasped. “Krask! Are you going to hide me in there?”

  “No. This is the only place I felt we could talk without being overheard or interrupted. Get in,” Duga said, pushing Eyakan ahead of him into the room, which was bare except for a couple of low stools, the sort fit for children. Duga and Shebi had brought them here many years ago. The air was close and musty, and it appeared that this hidden room was even more of secret than before. No one appeared to know about it, and, if they did, they hadn’t been here in a very long time. Eyakan eased himself down onto one of the stools. Duga could see out the corner of his eye that his initials, which he had carved into the wall so long ago as Shebi etched in his, were still there.

  “How did you know about this room?” Eyakan asked.

  Duga thought quickly. He had to maintain his cover. “All harem teachers are given plans and layouts of the compound. It’s easy enough to deduce that there would be a little room like this. The compound is the sort of place that would have secret rooms, don’t you think?”

  By the expression on Eyakan’s face, it seemed like he accepted Duga’s explanation.

  “How can you help me, sir? Shouldn’t we go to Master Oraj, so he can tell Prince Baboye?”

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea,” said Duga. “Earlier today, you said I seemed like someone you could trust. I need you to trust me and tell me everything you know.”

  Eyakan took a deep breath. “It started with strange notes. I’d come back to my room and there’d be a note stuffed under my pillow or in the pocket of a robe or in my music or economics or history book.”

  “Do you still have any of these notes?”

  The young man shook his head. “I burned them. I didn’t take them seriously. The first one welcomed me to the harem. The ones after that began to mention how they knew I was from Marqash, but most people in the harem knew that. There have never been that many Marqashians in the harem, so I stand out. I thought these notes were odd, but I didn’t think that much about them. Then the notes started talking about how, as a Marqashian, I know what it’s like to be ignored by Thasali. Yes, I know what that’s like. Sure I do, but I’d never thought it was something I could do anything about. Whoever wrote me these notes kept saying that there was something I could do about it.”

  Eyakan stopped talking. He nervously switched the crystal torch off and on a few times. Duga remained silent, although he had numerous questions. He remembered the note he had received very recently.

  “Then I got the note that told me what I could do to pay back Thasali for their generations of neglect of Marqash. It told me that I could kill the crown prince.”

  Again, Eyakan stopped talking.

  “Did you take it seriously?”

  “No.”

  “Did you ever attempt to reply to any of the notes or find out who was sending them to you?”

  “Krask! No and no. I tried to ignore them. I told myself that they were only the fevered imaginings of a lunatic. They stopped coming for a little while.”

  Eyakan rearranged himself on the stool so he was leaning back against a wall with his legs crossed. The light from their torches cast dramatic lines on his face and chest, which was peeking out of his loose-fitting robe.

  “Then, two weeks ago, I received another note. It s
aid that I must assassinate Prince Baboye or my family would be murdered. It also said that further instructions would be left for me at the base of the tallest omple tree by the lake. I was to go after lamplight to retrieve whatever had been left for me. I didn’t go. Three days later, there was a box left in my room. My roommate said he didn’t know who had left it. He saw it at our door and that it had my name on it, so he brought it into our room and put it on my bed.”

  Duga’s stomach clenched, as if bracing itself against Eyakan’s next revelation.

  “My roommate left for a class he was taking, and I opened the box. It was filled with salt. In the middle of it was Sefra’s finger.” Eyakan sounded as if he still couldn’t quite believe what had happened. Again tears started to appear in the corners of his eyes.

  “I haven’t had any contact with my family since I left. I don’t know what’s going on.”

  “Eyakan—”

  The boy gave him a wild, scared look. “Whoever it is, knows where I go every day, my whole schedule. They left me the means to kill in my gymnasium locker!”

  “What? What did they leave you?” Duga wrapped his arms around Eyakan.

  Eyakan closed his eyes. “A knife. A vial of davosira.”

  “Krask!” Duga knew, only from what he heard from a Thasali botanist, how toxic davosira was. One drop would make a person’s throat rapidly close up, strangling them to death. No one ever survived. It worked too quickly. “What have you done with them, the knife and the vial?”

  “I threw them in the lake.”

  Duga shook his head and ran his hands through Eyakan’s soft hair. He had Eyakan’s words, but still little hard evidence. “They will provide you with more, I’m sure. When they do, don’t throw them away. Keep them. We want them to believe that you intend to go through with it, and I need to see whatever they leave you.” He thought the instruments of assassination might hold a clue as to who was really in charge.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Do you know when they want you to kill the prince?”