by P. J. Fox
“I should order food,” he remarked. “Are you feeling carnivorous?”
“Yes,” she confessed.
“So it would appear,” he agreed, not referring to food. She made a face, not in the least put out but pretending to be. He smiled lazily.
“You seemed to like it,” she said primly, pushing herself up onto one elbow.
“God, Aria, you almost killed me.”
“Delayed gratification is a beautiful thing,” she reminded him. “But you being an invalid, I should send for something.”
She was amazed, even as she said the words, how quickly they’d fallen back into the simple forms of domestic routine. Even before they’d gotten married, their interactions had felt bizarrely natural. Like those of people who’d known each other for a lifetime and who, through learning each other’s habits, had fitted together like the pieces of a broken vase. On some level, even then, she’d known that she belonged with him. But, she thought, sitting next to him on their bed, it was even better now. Because now, she’d made a conscious decision to be exactly where she was.
“When I’m feeling better,” he warned, “you’ll regret teasing me.”
“I look forward to it.” She flashed her most saccharine smile, knowing full well that he could see her much better than she could see him.
“I’m going to turn you over my knee and spank you.”
He was perfectly serious, too. She’d discovered, much to her shock, that this was an activity she’d come to like. At least, she liked the fact that he never raised a hand to her until she was so desperately aroused that she felt like putty in his hands and would have let him do anything to her, and the mind-numbing, soul-destroying bliss that invariably followed. She was never conscious of actual pain until after, when she lay in bed next to him.
He was a considerate, attentive lover even then; which, although lacking any basis for comparison, she nevertheless knew to be rare. He wasn’t afraid of hurting her, but he never did. And while she feared him, in and out of the bedroom, she also trusted him—and always had, she’d come to realize.
Slipping out of bed, she wrapped herself in her robe and went to procure food. Kisten remained where she’d left him, content to let her wait on them both. She smiled, standing in the door to her room, and he smiled back.
After holding a brief conference with Garja, whom she’d found enjoying her own ill-used bed, Aria returned to her husband to await their dinner. He’d undoubtedly find fault with her selection, but that was what came of not choosing for himself. At least she wasn’t threatening him with another dose of eggs benedict. She’d never heard poor, inoffensive hollandaise sauce described in such lurid terms, nor imagined such a simple food capable of causing such upset. Kisten was, she had to conclude, the pickiest eater in the universe.
He’d decamped to a chair and was reading a dispatch. He’d managed to put on a dressing gown, and looked quite regal in the old fashioned garment. The robe itself was quilted silk, the color of blood. The collar and cuffs were black velvet. His inattention was an act; he knew exactly where she was, and what she was doing. “What am I eating for supper?” he asked.
“Cold cucumber salad, smoked salmon, stuffed mushrooms and chicken bastilla,” she replied.
“Your fondness for sugar is bizarre,” he said, making a note on his tablet.
He was referring to her fondness for chicken bastilla, layers of puff pastry filled with minced chicken and almonds and sprinkled with cinnamon and powdered sugar. That she could eat sugar on chicken was, in Kisten’s opinion, proof of her continued need for responsible male guidance. He claimed that, unless he forced her to, she’d eat nothing but sugar and drop dead of malnutrition.
She sat down on the floor and rested her head against his knee. He stroked her hair absentmindedly and went back to work, and she found herself thinking about Alice. Whatever she’d tried to tell herself, her friend hadn’t been happy. She’d been the furthest thing from, and Aria knew her well enough to recognize the obvious. What she couldn’t figure out was why Alice had been so unhappy; and that conviction that she’d missed some crucial piece of the puzzle was what still worried at her hours later.
“What?” Kisten asked, seeing her discomfort.
“I’m concerned about Alice,” she replied.
“She doesn’t have much experience with men,” Kisten said, making another note, “and one man in particular was being rather attentive. She was nervous, is all—which is, I take it, typical of the breed.”
“What breed?”
“Virgins.”
Aria blushed. Kisten’s views on sex were horrifyingly matter of fact. But further conversation was forestalled, as just then a slave appeared with their supper. By the time they’d finished eating, Aria’s mind was occupied with other things and she’d forgotten all about Alice.
FORTY-FIVE
“I’m getting married!” Alice announced.
Aria put down her coffee cup. “Oh!” she said, completely at a loss. To be honest, she wasn’t sure that she’d heard right. Married? But Alice, at all of nineteen, didn’t even have a boyfriend! Not that, Aria reasoned, boyfriend was much of a concept within Bronte culture. But surely Alice, who’d been raised in Cabot Lake Township just like Aria, wouldn’t marry a complete stranger. Would she?
She smiled weakly as she tried to absorb the news.
She, Lei and Sachi had taken over the smaller of the residence’s two living rooms and were chatting over coffee when Alice arrived. Pasha hadn’t seen fit to join them and Deliah was still spending most of her time in the hospital. Naomi, too, was nowhere to be seen. Aria couldn’t help but wonder what she thought of this development. Or, for that matter, what Deliah did—or if Deliah even knew. Deliah had, understandably, been preoccupied. She and her husband were, technically, Alice’s guardians—although, at nineteen, Alice was of legal age and no longer required Isha’s consent to get married.
Aria motioned for Alice to join them.
“Who’s the lucky man?” Sachi asked brightly.
Alice flushed, and stared at her hands. The question seemed a rather obvious one, Aria thought, to provoke such an embarrassed reaction. Then again, this was all new to her. Aria herself hadn’t much enjoyed talking over the prospect of getting married, but then again her only companions had been Grace and Naomi; both of whom, albeit for different reasons, had been dreadful.
“Captain Gore,” said Alice. She didn’t use his first name.
Even Sachi sensed the awkwardness and, while kind, she wasn’t the sharpest twig in the forest. She and Aria exchanged a look.
“Tell us about him,” suggested Lei, pouring Alice a cup of coffee. Since Deliah wasn’t home to host them and Naomi, in her absence, wasn’t willing, Aria and her friends had begun gathering at the residence. Aria usually wrote until mid-afternoon, if she felt inspired, and then broke for a late lunch with a friend or two. Sometimes she went back to work, and sometimes she joined Lei or whoever else was around for walks, picnics or other activities.
Alice accepted the coffee with a faint smile. It seemed that, between meeting him at Aria’s wedding reception and being locked into Deliah’s basement during the mutiny, Alice had spoken with the young and dashing Captain Gore on several occasions. He’d managed to charm her and, slowly but surely, draw her out of her shell. Which was no mean feat; Alice, while friendly, was painfully shy around people she didn’t know. And Kisten was right: she had virtually no experience of men. Growing up the middle of five girls and having attended an all girls’ school, the only man that Alice had ever known well had been her father—and he’d died when she was a child.
Captain Gore was a gentleman if not titled, the scion of a well-established family on Brontes. In addition to his regimental draw, he had a sizeable private income. That he’d chosen to make his career in the army wasn’t surprising; a number of well-born men did enlist, if only to gain experience for other ventures, and as the second son he wouldn’t inherit the bulk of his father’
s estate. Only his income, and a small estate that was more of a country home. At least by Bronte standards.
After the funeral, he’d taken her on a walk and there pressed his suit. And Alice had accepted. From her somewhat garbled recitation, Aria drew that the decision—on his part as well as hers—was largely reactionary: she was alive, and thankful to be so, and so was he. And like so many hasty wartime brides, Alice knew well that life was all too short. Why wait around and get to know each other, when either of them could be dead tomorrow?
He’d told her a great deal about his life, and it sounded like a glorious fairy tale to Alice: the exotic trips, the eccentric relatives, the famous ancestors and holiday disasters. He knew very little about hers but then, what was there to say? Alice’s mother had been an administrative assistant and the most exotic hobby any of her sisters had was checkers. And hadn’t she left home to find a new life?
She looked plaintively at Aria, waiting for her to respond.
“His given name is Ramesh, isn’t it?” Sachi asked, temporarily sparing her.
“Yes,” Alice agreed.
“He’s very handsome.” Sachi winked. Ramesh Gore was handsome. He was tall and well formed, even Aria had to admit. If she hadn’t already been married, she might have found him attractive, herself. He had toast-colored skin and intelligent gray eyes. Aria didn’t doubt that a great many women had set their caps for him, voyagers in the so-called fishing fleet.
“Does Deliah know?” she asked artlessly.
“Deliah,” said Alice, “thinks he’s a catch.”
And what do you think, Aria wanted to ask. Alice didn’t seem too cheerful, for a soon-to-be bride. “When?” she asked instead.
“In three nights’ time. Pasha has offered to host the reception.” Pasha was the Hanafis’ next door neighbor and had, Aria was sure, insinuated herself right into this situation. Hosting a party was just another way of making oneself the center of attention, and Pasha would do her best with what limited materials they had available to make this reception as awe-inspiring as possible. Most colonial weddings were, of necessity, subdued affairs; Pasha had always denied, on some level, that she’d ever left home.
“He sees no reason to wait,” added Alice.
“And what do you think?” probed Aria.
Lei, sensing that Alice might not want an audience, invited Sachi outside with her to view the garden. Sachi, while not bright, was perfectly capable of taking a hint. Soon, Aria and Alice were alone. Alice smiled sheepishly. “I think it’s a good idea,” she said in a small voice.
“You don’t know him that well,” Aria ventured slowly, anxious not to put a foot wrong and sour the conversation before it had even begun.
“You didn’t know Kisten,” Alice pointed out. Which was true, and left Aria at a loss for how to respond. She returned Alice’s small smile. Alice sipped her coffee, and then put it down on the table. “You’d spoken to each other—what? Three times, before you got married?”
Aria thought it was more like five, but she nodded.
“And that worked out,” Alice said judiciously. “Lei and her husband were perfect strangers.”
“You’re very young,” said Aria. “Are you sure that this is what you want?”
“Were you sure?” Alice asked.
She was being serious, Aria saw; she genuinely wanted to know the answer. And as she sensed that a great deal might rest on what she said next, Aria made an effort to put aside her own embarrassment and be as truthful as possible. “No,” she said, “I wasn’t. I didn’t know what I wanted out of life, when I left home, and I was terrified: of making a mistake, of letting everyone down and, eventually, of Kisten.” She still was terrified of Kisten. Sometimes. But she also did love him.
“I missed Aiden and wished I hadn’t left him.” Mainly late at night, when she’d stared up at the ceiling and wondered what the hell she’d done. “And then other times, I was glad I had. I was confused.” But then she’d met Kisten. Even though she’d attributed her response at the time to loathing—he was the most difficult man she’d ever met—she’d known that her life would never to be the same. One way or the other. “I didn’t know, at least not consciously, if I wanted to be in the same room with him let alone marry him.
“But on some level I must have,” she continued. “Even so, I was beyond anxious and worried, for a long time, that I’d made a terrible mistake.” Except, not such a long time. She was, although she had a hard time crediting the fact, still a newlywed.
Time played tricks, she’d discovered.
“What changed?”
“A lot happened in a short amount of time,” she said. “Coming here, adjusting to a new life and a new house and a new culture, the mutiny.” She sighed. “I realized that I was in love with him and, whatever the obstacles, I wanted to make things work.”
“See,” said Alice, “that’s just how I feel.”
“Ready to take a risk?”
Alice nodded. “He’s a good man, with good prospects, and he”—she blushed—”says that, for him at least, it was love at first sight.” Her voice dropped on those last few words, as though she were confessing something naughty. “And he’s attentive, too; he thinks I’m funny, and witty.” Which was important to Alice; not many people thought her smart, although she was; their collective assumption, that nothing coming out of her mouth meant nothing going on upstairs, rankled her.
“And he’s very handsome. Naomi is green with envy.”
Well that answered that question. And Aria suspected that Naomi’s jealousy was about more than good looks: as much as she might wish for things to be different, within Alliance culture a woman needed a husband. Naomi’s interest in acquiring a man of her own stemmed, at least in part, from her recognition of the unfortunate fact that, without one, she had no real position in society and no security. If she were brutally honest with herself, Aria had to admit that—whether she loved Kisten or not—she’d married well. Love was desirable; some might argue, necessary. But love didn’t keep a roof over one’s head.
So why shouldn’t Alice marry Captain Gore? He seemed stable enough and had a promising career ahead of him. And Alice must care for him to some extent; Aria hardly thought that her friend would marry a man she detested, or felt nothing for. She would, in time, no doubt grow to love him.
Except Alice was, in many ways, younger than her nineteen years and Aria worried that she might not be fully acquainted with the realities of married life—or, indeed, life in the rigidly patriarchal society into which they’d come. Aria liked Bronte culture, fit into her new role quite well, but she still struggled with the fact that Kisten expected her to do as he instructed simply because he was a man and her husband.
“Some families are…more conservative than others,” she ventured.
“That’s true,” said Sachi, reappearing. “My husband is from Alam. The Alamish are generally more liberal.” She gestured at Lei. “And you know what they’re like,” she added, referring to the ultra-conservative Braxi. Lei’s marriage had been arranged, as was Braxi custom, and she hadn’t met her husband until the beginning of the week-long wedding festivities. They hadn’t spoken privately until their wedding night.
“Have you discussed expectations?” asked Lei, resuming her seat.
She’d picked up the thread of the conversation with no difficulty at all. Aria wished that she and Sachi had stayed outside a little longer, but perhaps it was best that they’d come back in. Even Sachi seemed to grasp perfectly well what was going on. She had, after all, gone through much the same series of adjustments as Aria and every other woman in the Alliance. She might have some insight that Aria lacked.
“What do you mean?” asked Alice.
Aria and Sachi exchanged a look, which Alice missed.
“About marriage,” said Lei.
“But everyone has the same expectations about marriage,” she protested, clearly puzzled.
“Well, for example,” began Aria, wishing that th
ere was someone else to have this conversation with Alice and simultaneously wondering how Alice had managed to remain so naïve, “what his expectations are of you: whether you’ll cook and clean or let servants do those tasks for you, to what extent you’ll manage the household. Whether you’ll have to ask for permission to, for example, have friends over.” Aria paused, chewing her lip. “Whether he has a concubine, or plans to take one. Whether he keeps a mistress.”
Alice looked shocked. “No man would do that,” she said archly. “When you love someone, and are committed to them, you naturally want them and only them. Everyone knows that.”
And then Aria made a mistake. “Alice,” she said, “that’s not true.”
Watching Alice’s face change was like watching a summer squall sweep through Cabot Lake. Her face darkened as her eyes flashed. “I came here, expecting you to be happy for me, and you’ve been nothing but discouraging! I’m trying to get married and have my own life, and someone who loves me, and all you’re doing is trying to talk me out of it! I’m doing exactly what you did! I guess it was good enough for you, but not good enough for me, is that it? Or are you jealous, because I actually got to choose who I wanted to marry?”
“Alice, I’m sorry, I—”
“Just because you’re not happy, doesn’t mean everyone else has to be miserable!”
And on that sour note, Alice got up and stormed off.
Aria tried to call her back, but Alice refused to be called. Aria stared after her, feeling useless and not a little embarrassed. She hadn’t thought she’d done that poorly; but while it was tempting to interpret her friend’s reaction as confirmation of her own view, that Alice was insecure about her choice, the far more likely explanation was that Aria hadn’t been terribly friend-like.
