Oathbound
The Emperor’s Conscience: Book 2
Michael K. Combs
Longship Publishing, LLC
I would be remiss if I did not acknowledge the talent and hard work of:
Cameron: The editor that can tell when I cheat—and doesn’t let me get by with it.
Thank you, sir.
Anna: The wizardry behind my covers. I cannot thank you enough for your hard work and professionalism. You are truly talented and a joy to work with.
Thank you!
Their skill, talent, and professionalism is a blessing for which I am grateful.
Copyright © 2021 by Michael K. Combs
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
For my mother: Who taught me to read and write and encouraged my love of stories.
And who also promised to read all the sex scenes twice…you go Mom!
Contents
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Prologue
1. The Velvet Pearl
2. Knives in the Dark
3. The Setup
4. The Politics of Sex
5. Lessons
6. Fashion Show
7. Training Day
8. Boundaries
9. The Mata's Bulldog
10. Finished Business
11. Andvari
12. Humble Beginnings
13. Foreplay
14. Love Letters
15. First Date
16. To Tame A Shrew
17. Move-in Day
18. Much to Do
19. Dancing with Dragons
20. The Nightmare
21. Family Reunion
22. Escape and Evade
23. Balance of Power
24. The First Temple
25. The Other
26. Family Matters
27. The Savior of Trular
28. Homecoming
Epilogue
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Prologue
Two beads of sweat dripped down Tessa’s body. There were more, of course, but these two commanded her attention. One traced down her throat to her chest before disappearing beneath the low-cut neckline of her cotton blouse. The other followed the line of her spine and caused her to shiver despite the stifling, late summer heat that pervaded the crowded tavern. Each was annoying, but not as annoying as the man beside her.
She had been listening for two hours as this fool prattled on about the latest taxes levied on winemakers, and he lamented that they would surely drag him into poverty. It wasn’t the only thing he’d raved about—just the latest. He had been in here every night, here or a tavern like this one, running his mouth about the governance of the principality, and more specifically, her Prince. And he was the reason she had to be here.
She and her sisters hadn’t had any trouble finding him. He was the loudest voice any place he went, knocking back ale after ale and proclaiming the Prince’s shortcomings at the top of his drunken lungs. He was gaining a following, too. No matter where he went he could find those who would believe the latest conspiracy and hitch up to the wagon, for the sake of inclusion, if nothing else. It made them feel important without the investment of time, energy, or money. All they had to do was agree, hurrah in the right places, and toast their champion without added commitment.
Tessa shook her head at the naïve fools. She knew they were deluded, and she didn’t really blame them. They didn’t have the capacity to discern the Prince’s brilliance or his plans to make Trular the Empire it deserved to be. She knew, though. She and her sisters knew much.
Tessa looked at the man deriding her Prince and distracted herself with memories of the harsh words and tender touch of her lover. The Prince was a harsh parent, but she did so love her Papa—she even called him Prince Papa when they were alone, either just the two of them or when her sisters joined them. She loved that. The three of them together knew how to make their Prince happy, and her Prince’s happiness was all that mattered to Tessa and her beautiful sisters.
“You know what I hear,” the man said in a slurred attempt at a whisper that could be heard throughout the tavern. He had a name, but Tessa didn’t remember it. It wasn’t important. What was important was his message, and Tessa hung on every word. “I heard the Prince is about to start a civil war, I did. He’s raising taxes on all the hard-workin’ folk to raise coin so he can toss his old man into the piss-pot.” His announcement sent a skittering of comments and hushed conversation around the room. They had hitched up already, Tessa knew, but that was fine because the problem would be out of sight by morning, and in a week’s time, all this nonsense would be replaced with other nonsense. It was the way of things.
“You don’t say,” Tessa said as she looked up at him with her big, blue, innocent eyes. “You are so knowledgeable about such things. How did you come by this?”
The man looked down at her, noticing her for the first time, and grinned with an—‘It is my business to know such things, my dear’ look. He tapped a finger to the side of his nose.
Tessa sighed aloud and rested her head on his shoulder as he returned his attention to the crowd.
The more the man drank, the more he talked. The more he talked, the more Tessa pawed at him. It wasn’t long before the ale and his baser instincts overcame him. Tessa leaned in and whispered in his ear, and in a flash she had him by the hand, skipping for the door, blonde braids bouncing in the hot summer breeze.
She pulled him outside, around the building, and into the alley before she rounded on him. He crashed into her and she giggled when he didn’t pull away.
“Where are we going?” he asked.
Tessa looked around. “This is far enough,” she said as she tugged the laces of her blouse. She was nearly spilling out of it—as was her intention, for Tessa did nothing accidentally. She loosened the leather tie further. Her shirt parted and the man seemed to realize that he was getting more than he bargained for. Much more. He grinned stupidly and took Tessa in his arms.
“You are a dirty girl, aren’t you?” he crooned.
“You have no idea,” she said as he leaned down. “I have sisters, you know.”
He pulled up short. “Sisters?”
Tessa nodded enthusiastically. “They’re just as pretty as me,” she said, “Except Marjory.” Tessa pouted. “Her breasts are twice as big as my poor puppies.” She stared down into her cleavage, her loosened shirt barely clinging to her sweat-damp skin. His eyes followed. She jerked her head up and looked into his eyes with a wicked smile. “Have you ever been with three girls at once? It’s really fun.” Tessa giggled again.
“I think I would like that very much,” the man crooned, his eyes drifting back to stare down her shirt.
“Good, because they’re here,” she said as her sisters slipped from the shadows of the adjacent buildings.
The man started to turn, but Tessa grabbed his head and pulled him to face her.
“I found you, though, so I claim the first kiss.” She rose up on her toes and kissed him hard. He wrapped his arms around her and leaned in. Her tongue probed his mouth. She felt a surge of ecstasy when his body stiffened.
The air blew f
rom his lungs when her sister’s blades slid between his ribs. She finished her kiss just as his heart stopped, looked up into his lifeless eyes, and sighed in satisfaction. He fell when she released his head and her sisters withdrew their weapons.
He collapsed like a used rag.
“Mmmm,” Tessa crooned. “That was amazing.”
“Next time I get to be the bait,” Litha said. “Why do you get to have all the fun?”
“It’s because she has the assets to lure any man,” Marjory said. “And what is this about me having bigger breasts than you? You’ve always had more than your fair share, you bitch.”
“It’s too easy,” Tessa giggled as she retied her blouse. “Show a bit of flesh and talk about tits and a man’s mind drops to his crotch faster than a knife thrust. They don’t stand a chance.”
“We should hurry,” Litha said excitedly. “If we are lucky, Papa won’t have had his bath yet and we can help.”
Tessa giggled, Marjory smiled, and hand in hand, the Sisters of Jerea skipped into the darkness together, as good sisters should.
The Velvet Pearl
I spent three months holed up in a Trulari whorehouse, and while I wouldn’t say it was a wholesome experience, I had to admit I learned a lot…besides the obvious, of course.
“Aren’t you going to do something about this?” the woman standing at my shoulder asked. “It is what I pay you to do around here.”
“I already did,” I replied. “I threw them into the street and to be honest, I’m rather enjoying the show. Besides, you pay me to take care of problems inside.” I jerked my head back to indicate the doors which led into the front salon of The Velvet Pearl, a high-end brothel on the northeast edge of the Highmarket District, unwilling to take my eyes off the drama unfolding before us from the front steps. “The problem is no longer inside. Now it’s a matter for the City Guard.”
Two men, one a minor noble, Lord Tyrus, who had seen his best years through the bottom of a wine bottle, and a rather successful but dumpy merchant, Master Keirenan, were battling to the death in the middle of the street. Well, probably not to the death, but certainly to bruises and battered pride. The men didn’t seem to care in the least that they had no martial skill whatsoever. Neither did they seem to care that they were naked as the day they were born. Not that it mattered much. It was the middle of the night and the street was all but deserted.
Tyrus had Keirenan in a headlock and was punching the back of his head. The merchant, being the sound strategist that he was, stomped the noble’s bare foot with his heel, causing him to howl in pain and release him. He spun and delivered a punch to the blond noble’s half-erect member. Myself and Mongo, who was leaning against the walls by the closed doors, were the only other men present for tonight’s festivities due to the late hour. We both reacted with a reflexive flinch and ‘ooh’ in sympathy.
I was fairly certain that Mongo wasn’t his real name, at least I would hope no mother would name her baby boy something so ludicrous. Mongo used to be head of security for The Velvet Pearl. That title was now mine.
“They might be outside, but it’s still a problem. We don’t need this kind of attention, not here in front of the place.” The woman’s frustration was evident in her voice.
“Two men fighting naked in the street have something to settle,” I said matter-of-factly. “It’s personal. Look, anything worth fighting about naked is worth fighting about.”
“You’re an expert on fighting naked, are you?” she asked.
I thought about that for a moment. When I didn’t answer immediately, she flexed her leg and kneed me in the back.
“Now that you mention it,” I said, “of all the fighting I have done, none have been more important than the fights I fought when I was naked.”
“I would pay good coin to see that,” said a silky voice at my shoulder. I turned and looked at the beautiful young courtesan and the cause of all this mess occurring in the street.
“I could never charge you, Shani.” I waggled my brows at her. She sat beside me on the step, wrapped in my cloak, an amused smirk on her pretty face. She giggled and shook her head at my lame attempt at flirtation.
The near transparent wrap she usually wore on the floor was impractical against the night’s chill, as was in full evidence by the gooseflesh of her skin and, more noticeably, the pert points of her chest, thus why I offered her my cloak. Her arm hugged mine and she leaned against my shoulder, enjoying the mayhem she had instigated.
I knew that Shani was older than me by a year or two. By her looks, however, she appeared much younger. Since I met her, I hadn’t been able to decide if her apparent youth was a blessing or a curse.
For the sake of her patronage here at The Pearl, as the girls liked to call it, it was a blessing. She drew numerous old lechers to the salon that paid handsomely for the chance to spend a night with someone so seemingly young and innocent. Outside of this lifestyle, however, I doubted it would be much of a boon. Hessa’s tits, it was likely the reason she was in this line of work to begin with. At least she was safer here at The Pearl with people like me and Mongo to attend to the worst of her ills than she would be on the streets fending for herself. The world was not kind to women in general, let alone those who were young and reeked of innocence, as Shani did. If I were to call Shani innocent, she would deny it, considering her occupation, but I had come to know her in the few months I had been here. I believed differently.
It also wasn’t fair to say she had created the turmoil, even if the entire debacle was over her. The two men were fighting because they had both been trying for months to ‘court’ the young lady in separate attempts to get her to marry them. The sad bastards had spent fortunes trying to woo her away from ‘her life of depravity,’ all the while handing over fistfulls of coin to bed her. The problem had arisen when she was in the throes of her appointment with Master Keirenan, just as Lord Tyrus arrived for his ‘date.’
Already disrobed in anticipation and as yet unsatisfied, Lord Tyrus recognized the passionate wails of the Lady Shani in the adjoining room and barged in, breaking the latch that I had said, time and again, needed replaced with one heavier.
The fighting started in the bedroom. I heard Shani scream. I stormed up the stairs in a rush and grabbed both men by the scruffs of their necks.
“Don’t you morons know what brothels are for?” I scolded them as I dragged them down the stairs. “Settle that shit outside.” I threw them into the street.
In hindsight, I could have shoved them out into the back courtyard. It was more private and would not have raised any ire except, perhaps, from other patrons. But if those patrons were doing what they were supposed to be doing, a few more grunts and cries would have been indistinguishable from the typical noises of a brothel. The front door was closer, though, and funnier. I had to admit the idea of two naked men fighting over a prostitute was hilarious and the spectacle before me had proved me right.
“Would you really fight naked for me Evan?” Shani asked. Her smile was mischievous in the lantern light.
“My Lady, if you but wished it, I would kill these men and none would ever find all of them,” I said with a genuine smile of my own. “I would even do it naked.”
She shook her head at me. “I am the furthest thing from a Lady that can be.”
I reached out and lifted her chin with a finger, and looking into her eyes, I said, “All women are Ladies if one but has eyes to see it.”
The smile she gave me lit up her face, and her dazzling green eyes shone in the dim illumination.
“Oh Evan,” she giggled, “you’re sweet.” She shouldered me and I exaggerated falling over under her assault. This caused her to lose her balance and she squealed loudly enough to echo in the empty street. I caught her and righted her as we laughed.
Master Kerenan was sitting atop Lord Tyrus’s chest bashing his head into the cobbles, but her chirp caused them to pause and look at us with murderous expressions on their faces.
; “Do all men get erections when they fight?” Shani asked, nodding toward the men in the street.
“I…um…I don’t know,” I said. I racked my brain and honestly could not recall. “When someone is trying to kill me, it doesn’t leave a lot of time to notice if I am aroused by the struggle to stay alive.” I shrugged. “I would guess that some men are, though.”
Shani laughed and bumped me again.
“Gentlemen,” I barked now that I had their attention, “The Lady has had her fill of entertainment for the evening and bids you both a good night.” I was still sitting on the stoop with Shani wrapped around my arm, and she jumped at my parade-ground voice.
They extricated themselves and seemed only then to realize their nudity.
Lord Tyrus spoke up, “But Shani, our, um, appointment—”
“—will have to be rescheduled,” I said. He started to protest but I waved him off. “You should have thought of that before showing your ass tonight, Tyrus.”
Shani giggled.
“Mongo, please fetch the gentlemen’s garments,” I said.
Mongo disappeared into the brothel for a few minutes and reappeared, throwing wads of clothes to the now embarrassed patrons.
They each caught their belongings and scrambled to put them on as they made their way back towards the main plaza on opposite sides of the street, occasionally glaring their hatred toward one other.
Oathbound: The Emperor's Conscience, Book 2 Page 1
