"NO!" snapped Xanir furiously. Water slopped from the glass slammed onto the wooden worktop, and Alanna flinched at the bruising grip on her shoulders. Her bare feet jarred on the rough tiled floor when he jerked her forwards off her perch and hissed, "Do not keep asking."
Her breath, just beginning to regulate after their latest shattering interlude, speeded back up. Alanna looked sharply away from the black eyes searing down at her, furious at the tears prickling her eyes. For the fortnight since her transgression up the tree, the stony remoteness had distanced him, even while he had continued to demand she be brought to him daily. She should be thankful -- she was thankful, it made it easier to pull her mind away in between encounters, even though her damned traitorous body still melted to his expertise. Her naked back hit the edge of the thick slab of wood when his grip suddenly released. The Tahl loomed, arms folded, expression implacable. "The Tahl-maia does not ride a horse."
The sleek, muscular lines of his chest and arms were offset by the rough cotton waistcoat he evidently wore for a morning of horse-breaking. Infuriated at her own unthinking response to his stance, his proximity, she snapped her traitorous body erect, wrapping her arms around her trembling torso. Anger warred with worry as her blurred gaze swung sideways out of the small barred window of the tack-room, across the multitude of paddocks surrounding this palatial stable-block. Beyond the second fence, the alert stance and pricked ears of Rigal showed that he had not moved a muscle since he had spotted her being escorted here with the tea tray. She swallowed against the lump in her throat. "He is my horse." The hoarse choke lifted in volume while her husband's footfalls approached the doorway. "Please let me at least talk to him."
There had been worrying gossip among her women this week that the magnificent Westhaven stallion gifted to the Tahl by the northern king was to be taken to the desert stud. Alanna couldn't leave this alone.
"He was part of your dowry," retorted Xanir, then crashed the door open and called a harsh order. Searing black eyes turned back to her, and she blinked as he seemed to offer a rare explanation. "The paddocks and stables are not fully secure -- I should not have had you brought outside the citadel, even today." The scowl was deepening between his eyes.
The tears pooled in Alanna's and she jerked her gaze away again, back to Rigal's vigilant ears. Her heart was burning. "So. A prisoner of the harem," she whispered in her own tongue. For a year. Drawing her tattered dignity around herself, she sank into the formal obeisance to a visiting ruler, addressing his knees in a detached voice. "I thank my Lord for letting my enter the Queen's garden."
Xanir stiffened, blood leaping as it always did when she tried to distance herself from him behind her perfect manners. And she was still pretending she couldn't speak his language properly.
The sound of approaching footstep halted his step towards her, and his mouth quirked when she shrank and dove for the tiny heap of material on the floor. Shaking it out in frantic haste, Alanna froze when a warm chest suddenly pressed against her back and Xanir took the dress from her limp grasp. "Stay there!" he ordered over his shoulder to the silhouette who had appeared in the doorway.
Voice softened, he bent his head and murmured in her ear. "Still so shy, little bride? You should be proud - the whole court is scrambling to try to get an unrestricted view of what has held me entranced these past two weeks. These beautiful curves that I cannot keep my hands or my lips from."
Or mind, he added to himself.
Alanna closed her eyes when his tongue traced gently down the side of her neck, leaning back against him when her knees wobbled and blood leapt in excitement. As it always, always did. "I think you not try very hard," she managed to whisper unevenly. This was the first relaxed exchange in weeks.
Xanir chuckled, tantalisingly feather-light brushes of his fingertips tracing up over her belly towards her already throbbing breasts. A hard erection was growing against her buttocks. "Do you want me to?"
Alanna caught her breath, unable to answer, her whole being centred on the explosion of feeling when gentle fingers teased the mounds he had suckled to tight, unbearable sensitivity merely minutes earlier. A wisp of attention strayed to the urgent, throbbing length nudging rhythmically into the crease of her buttocks, and her blood pulsed, thunderous in her veins.
His hold was getting stronger. She had thought that she would grow inured, prayed at times that she would, but instead her sense of self seemed to be retreating, mind losing the battle with her highly-charged body more and more swiftly each time he called her to his bed.
The sharp thought pierced the shroud over her mind: she had never been near his bed. Nor he hers, after her tears that night almost two weeks ago. A gritty whisper bit: "Rigal is mine."
Warm hands lifted and spun her to sit on the worktop again, his knee nudging apart her dangling legs while Xanir advanced and slid a hand up between her breasts to ease her onto her back. Alanna resisted for a second, eyes flying stricken beyond his shoulders to the doorway, but relaxed on seeing that the shadow had retreated. Glancing up into the dark, intent face of her lord as he focussed on the nipple he was teasing back to painful fullness, she failed to catch even a glimpse of the earlier anger at her insistence.
"But you are mine," he replied, the smile still playing around his mouth as he focussed on his task and his bride's breathing hitched. "And therefore all that you possess is also mine, no?"
A sound almost like a sob fluttered from Alanna, but she yanked her mind back to the conversation and spluttered, "For a year."
The dark eyes lifted swiftly and locked on hers. Something dangerous flickered. "Sven Bjornsson," Xanir breathed. The next second Alanna arched on a cry of almost pain at the bewitching drag of tongue, teeth and lips possessing her nipple, the astonished recognition that he knew that her former betrothed had promised to wed her on her return. Thought disintegrated instantly in the storm of heat as his fingers plunged between her open thighs.
Xanir's lovemaking was much more fiery than usual, he seemed to want to burn his touch into her. Her voice was hoarse by the time he finished forcing her to peak under the slam of his thrusts and skilful brush of fingers, demanding her breathless admission that she was his, his, his.
But he held her afterwards, a welcome return of gentleness after a fortnight of rejection, brushing her hair from her sweat-gleaming skin, cradling her trembling form while she pushed her face into his shoulder and tried to still her rioting senses. He even ignored the tears that escaped into the smooth cloth of his shirt, gently massaging her scalp.
There was a hint of regret to the line of his jaw, Alanna thought later, seated on his knee. Her eyes explored his sombre features while she cupped her hands around his wrist while he let her drink.
But she kept her eyes down, skin prickling with unease despite his shielding arms while a silent servant deftly placed a washbowl , soft flannel and sun-warmed towel at his elbow before being dismissed. So she was to be permitted water to cleanse him today. Him only. No washing allowed for her. She was supposed to flaunt the scent of his pleasure clinging to her glistening skin.
Cheeks flushed, Alanna's mind was darting, trying to work out what this change meant, fearing too much, hoping too much, while she finished up her task. Then he swiftly re-tied the gossamer wisp of material around her and strode out into the sunshine without so much as a backwards look. She gritted her teeth and snarled after him.
Stop forgetting you are just a damned symbol. A toy.
***
Xanir was cursing himself as he vaulted back into the saddle. The trouble was, her facade was so damn perfect. He hadn't seen the manipulative side again since the day she had interrupted his morning ride. But, he reminded himself, she was clever, very clever. As had been Hajima, Adrienne, Immi -- it was easier to cope with the stupid ones, although more dull. Because she had an agenda. They always had an agenda, and there was some underlying purpose to her ceaseless questions. He had done his duty; now he really had to cure himself of this ridiculous excitement and stop summoning her so often.
His blood lurched in protest, and he scowled, leaning into the wind as he raced across the paddocks to where his vizier was waiting, arms folded, beside the gatehouse.
Dammit. And she had made him late for his next appointment.
***
Apparently the mosaics decorating the walls and dome of the star chamber commemorated feats of the previous Tahls. The Victory at Luido, the Treaty with the Sea Lords, scaling the Nizrat with the Five Thousand - usually Alanna lingered to admire the artwork and learn more history from her guards, but today her primary desire was to wash the sticky scents off her skin and scarlet cheeks as soon as possible. The walk back from the vast stable yard outside the inner walls had been interminable, seemingly every single lord in the castle finding time to waylay and admire her even more blatantly than usual. They had been becoming increasingly vocal as the weeks progressed, lust sometimes tempered by politeness or political acumen, but as their Tahl showed increasing favour to his northern bride, his subjects went out of their way to seek out and applaud his choice.
Oh, they never spoke to her. They spoke about her, loudly praising her figure, hair, skin. The bright eyes that steeled at their words. The breathless cries of pleasure she made when cloistered with the Tahl. Damn him. Underneath her aching heart, anger simmered at the sensitivity and soreness which was reinforced with every step. She wanted so badly not to melt at Xanir's touch. Not to feel every breath of air as she walked back to her rooms. Her bath.
A melodious voice stopped her in her tracks as she crossed to the corridor leading to her wing.
"Honours to the Fifteenth Tahl-Maia of the glorious Xanir Tahl," said his favourite concubine sweetly. As always, Rihanne emphasised the ordinal while sinking into a graceful bow and pressing her forehead to the tiles. Smugness reverberated underneath the respectful tone, and every line of her beautiful figure exuded contempt. Brides were temporary. Concubines were not.
Alanna looked down at the bowed head, jaw set. Princess Alanna Fortuna Kjeldahl was so not in the mood to put up with this right now.
"Greetings, Rihanne. That bead looks delightful in your black hair."
The beauty remained with her forehead pressed to the floor, but her shoulder-blades tensed, the smugness evaporating in anger. Alanna looked out of the nearby window, her fingers tracing over the twin beads plaited into a lock hanging by her right ear. She was irritated with herself: why did she care? She didn't care.
"Alas, not the Royal Blue," the voice by her feet hissed in hasty retaliation, the graciousness evaporated in anger. "But I look forward to seeing that shade offset to perfection within the shining locks of Her Excellency the Inchotan."
Alanna frowned, filing away the opaque snipe for future investigation, but in truth she barely heard, eyes caught by two figures standing under a secluded palm tree in the terraced gardens outside. Hector Beguine appeared calm, but something in his companion's demeanour made it clear that they were not simply passing the time of day.
Who was the woman? She was dressed in the well-cut but unadorned gown of a very high-class servant, or low class noblewoman. Alanna caught her breath as the woman accepted something from Beguine; a small bag which she swiftly hid beneath her robe. He made an impatient gesture and stepped closer, obviously displeased about something. The woman stood her ground, frustration in ever line of her buxom figure as she replied.
Unfortunately the woman's face was dappled by the shade of the tree looming over the pair of them. However, occasionally the pattern shifted under the light breeze, and Alanna remained motionless, carefully cataloguing the few half-seen features, attempting to build a picture so that she would be able to recognise the stranger again.
"My princess, we should return to your rooms," Limaq interrupted at her elbow. She ignored him, intent upon that face.
"Princess." The voice was sterner, closer, and Alanna speeded up trying to get a proper idea of what Beguine's co-conspirator looked like before she was hauled away.
But Limaq's hand never clamped on her elbow. Distantly Alanna recalled his initial explanation of the duties of her guard: they were even allowed to touch her, to prevent her laying hands on her gentlewomen, from straying, or hurting herself.
But she was doing none of those right now. So clearly they were not allowed to touch her.
Standing in motionless silence, a wisp of a smile lit her face as it gradually dawned on Alanna that evidently Rihanne was not permitted to rise until the Tahl-maia had moved on either, or to speak again unless she was first addressed. Alanna settled lightly into her 'parade stance' and tuned the warnings out as she narrowed her attention on the distant figures.
***
Xanir was furious. Striding with an angry lunge, he kept snapping questions at the delegates from North-eastern Akkar who were scurrying in his wake, trying to maintain their consultation and clarify the situation regarding the warship construction despite this damn interruption. Absolutely furious: confrontations between brides and concubines were not uncommon, but trust that golden-haired temptress to have found a method that couldn't be resolved without his own direct intervention. It irritated him further that the delegation were clearly delighted by this disruption of their audience, and eager to witness the Tahl reinforcing his rule over the two most beautiful women in the empire.
His anger increased, fuelled by the hot pull of lust at the sight of her looking out of the far window. Judging by the whispered profanities and blessings of the men accompanying him, he was not the only one so affected by the sun streaming through that wisp of silk, still dishevelled from his self-indulgence not long ago in the stables. Xanir's eyes flashed when he observed the princess' aloof expression, as though her attention was elsewhere. Time to ensure her attention became acutely, blatantly fixed on him.
Alanna's head snapped around when his deep voice demanded, "What happened?" Her heart thumped in a feeling like panic; she had thought him angry before, but this? Xanir was standing near the centre of the room, legs astride and arms folded, and his black eyes scorched hers for a second before returning to Limaq. Her chief guard bowed and began unemotionally to recite word for word the short exchange between the two women.
Approximately a dozen men had accompanied him in addition to his guards, and were now fanning out along three sides of the pentagonal chamber, excited eyes darting between the Tahl, the erect figure of the Tahl-maia, and the woman trembling in full obeisance at their feet. The whole room stilled, the watchers' eyes widening and gasps escaping as Limaq, after a brief hesitation, recited the last phrase about the Inchotan, the daughter of the ruler of Siane, before falling silent. The tension in the room thickened to choking. After a long, silent moment when all Alanna could hear was the pounding of her blood in her eardrums, Xanir slowly turned his face down to his favourite concubine.
"Do you know my future, woman?" he asked, his quiet voice cuttingly chilling. Alanna felt a twist of something like pity as Rihanne tried to shrink into the tiles. In the deepening silence a shiver ran up her spine when she noticed that Xanir was slowly removing the sword strapped over his shoulder, and stripping the weapon from the long supple belt which usually held it across his back. "Do you?" he barked. The girl flinched lower, her trembling visible, but wasn't foolish enough to answer. Handing the sword to one of his guards, the crack of leather striking the tiles beside Rihanne made half the room jump. Alanna was trembling now, and felt tears flush her eyes.
"Let us first deal with this new honorific you have given my bride. Fifteenth?" the quiet voice was deadly, looking down at the woman cowering at his feet. "I must assume you have graciously been teaching the Tahl-maia to count. Let us see how well she has learned. If she gets any wrong, we will start again."
Alanna caught her breath, biting her lip to stop the plea which rose to her lips as he flipped the silk up over Rihanne's back. A murmur of appreciation rose from the men lining the opposite wall, eyes fixed on the pale globes of the concubine's perfect behind. However, Xanir was staring challengingly at his bride and Alanna swiftly dropped her eyes on another sharp inhale. Her skin burned but this was not a moment to cross him, to even coax.
"Speak clearly," he warned, raising his belt, and the colour in her cheeks deepened.
"One," whispered from near the floor, and Alanna flinched at the crack of the leather hitting naked flesh, the gasp of pain. Before she could speak, the Tahl's cold voice said:
"Fifteenth, not fifteen. You must count the order of the lashes."
"First," choked the trembling voice, and Alanna tried to hold herself steady against the second crack of leather hitting flesh, tears jumping to her eyes.
"Princess?" demanded her husband.
"First," she repeated quietly, swallowing as she stared at her toes.
"You must watch. We will start again."
Why? Her eyes wrenched back to his, drenched with her pleas, and read the answer in the cool, implacable gaze. This punishment was for her also, being made to count the strokes for her rival, having forced this confrontation. She blenched. How could he know that this would hurt her? He barely even spoke to her. A frisson of doubt ran down her spine, a new, unusual fear: he couldn't know her. Couldn't understand her. Could he?
"Start again," Xanir ordered the woman at his feet quietly.
Rihanne's buttocks were glowing when Alanna choked out the final count. The room remained perfectly still apart from the concubine's ragged breathing while Xanir drew his sword from the scabbard held by his guard. A swift flick of the gleaming tip, and the prostate woman broke into soft sobs as another guard bent and retrieved the blue bead from the lock of shorn hair that tumbled across the tiles.
Xanir accepted it absently, his eye's meeting those of Em Feliz while he murmured, voice cold, "It can be so valuable to question those who know the future." A moment later his spymaster escorted the weeping beauty from the chamber.
Alanna could not prevent a half-step backward when the Tahl turned those cold, fiery eyes on her. Although her regal training whispered that his swift retribution was just, it was also harsh and his detachment from his favourite so chilling: brutal.
"Stand still," he ordered quietly. "Hands by your sides."
She gulped and hung her head, trying to block out the excited whispers from the men lining the walls, skin shuddering.
"Look at me!"
The fire in him was scorching, and she dropped her watering eyes from his, blenching again as he said silkily, "Your aversion to public actions would appear to have dissipated, princess."
She didn't mean to whisper, "Please."
His eyes hooded as he stepped closer and seemed to sigh, so softly it was barely audible. "You must remember who rules here, princess. Say it."
She had to swallow before she could croak, "Xanir Tahl," staring at the strong column of his throat inside his open-necked shirt.
"Louder." His hands were gentle on the tie of her halter dress, and he watched the colour flood her cheeks as she fumbled a repeat, his title breaking in the middle. The bright blue eyes darted up to his, anger and fear submerging under growing shame as the soft silk swept down over her curves and pooled on the floor around her feet. Her fair skin was suffused with colour, highlighting the growing tremble in her limbs. A lost look clouded the sparking eyes while she seemed to shrink into herself at the growing whistle of the crowd.
Xanir's hand cupped her cheek gently, the other trailing down the side of her neck toward her collarbone. "Louder," he repeated firmly.
"Xanir Tahl," her voice was chilled with suppressed tears, anger lifting her chin. She felt so cold, here in this warm air. Then a different tingle ran down her spine as feather-light fingers traced down from her collarbone toward her breasts. The tempo of their dance increased with her shortened breaths, and her eyes refocused, a warning, a plea shot from hers to his.
Then Alanna blinked, meaning filtering from the encouraging noises that the crowd were making: they were asking their Tahl to move aside. Heat ran back over her skin and she looked up at him again on the realisation, imploring.
"Xanir," she breathed, her voice breaking as his fingers circled a nipple. She swayed closer to the wide chest shielding her from view.
"Good. Keep reminding yourself, and everyone."
"Xanir!" she cried as his hand closed firmly around one breast, fingers squeezing, teasing. The other was firm against her lumber and she was arching backwards, away from the lips closing fiercely on one tender tip. She cried out again, toes almost leaving the ground, fingers caught in thick hair while unwanted excitement pulsed though her. Her body knew his touch too well, liquefying despite the crescendo of whistles from the audience at the fluttering glimpses as she writhed in his arms.
He knew her body too well.
Tears were tracing to her temples and she was panting harshly, trembling in desire when he pulled her back upright and spun her to face the window.
"Xanir," she begged almost inaudibly while he bent her forwards at the waist, hands firmly positioning hers on the edge of the stone embrasure, longing for the courage to run out from behind the shield of his bulk, run for her own rooms, seclusion, privacy. "Not here, please."
"Louder," he reminded her, and her flush darkened almost painfully. A detached corner of her brain noted that he had explained why he would not heed her: the challenge to his authority had been in public. Hence the punishment would be. She would do well to remember.
A fire of shame and desire was burning along her skin, and she hated the melting tremble in her belly as he pulled her hips back towards him. A hush had fallen in the room, the air seeming to pulse with the anticipation of the watchers straining to see past their emperor while his guards held them against the opposite walls. A sigh of satisfaction swept the room as she cried out when he thrust into her in one swift motion.
"What do you say?" he growled, circling his hips back as he slowly, slowly withdrew. A spark of unaccustomed anger lit in him at the longing whisper of, "look at that ass," from one of the watchers.
"Xanir," she mumbled, chest heaving as she struggled not to cry. A different pang of pity wrenched through him even while he slammed back home, forcing a new cry from her which she managed to strangle breathlessly to end in his name. Then she arched violently back again when his hand snaked between her legs and her voice broke into pleading cries of not here, please not here, please Xanir. Don't make me.
"Keep saying my name," he growled into her ear sternly, and worked his fingers and cock to bring her voice to a helpless, groaning ripple of sound echoing around and around the vaulted chamber. He had trained her body to respond so beautifully to his touch.
Xanir froze suddenly, eyes caught by the scowling figure of the Zalmat guard crossing under the window; the Norveig interloper who Em Feliz was surreptitiously keeping under surveillance.
Had his bride seen him? His mind travelled back to her preoccupied stare out of the window when he had arrived, and he drew a harsh breath. What had she seen?
"Shield wall," he snapped suddenly, breathlessly, his own lust surging eclipsing his control as her lithe body rippled under him, her back arching on a wordless, helpless cry of release. Eyes opaque as the pleasure of her rippling passage swamped over him, Xanir 's eyes flashed at the cries of disappointment around the walls while his and her guards blocked them from view. His hands were fierce on her hips, jerking her back to his plunging thrusts as his own release began to rocket to the surface. He shouted in pleasure, seed exploding in her depths.
Long moments later he gently withdrew from her shaking form and turned to take the carafe of ginger water, pouring some into a glass with slightly trembling hands. Never had his pleasure been so fierce; a small smile was tilting his mouth. It would seem that he loved that their audience could both see and not see.
A gulped sob sounded behind him, a harsh grunt from one of his guards, and Xanir turned, astonished, to see her shaking form sprinting up the corridor to the bridal suite, hands pressed to her burning cheeks. Her own guards were after her in a second, Limaq looking a question back at the grim-faced Tahl, but Xanir was distracted by soft hands on his foot and looked down to Bethesda in full obeisance.
"My lord, she is very young," the Mistress of the Chamber cajoled breathlessly. "And public intercourse is very shameful for her people. Please let her calm down before she apologises."
But it was the stricken panic glimpsed in the bright blue eyes as she ran from him that held Xanir from having his bride dragged back. He nodded a curt dismissal to Limaq, and turned away, slugging back the water in his clenched hand.
***
Near midnight, Em Feliz was arguing fiercely in the privacy of Xanir's chambers. "It may have some bearing on the Siane plot - Rihanne knows nothing, she is just fixated on this insane belief that you will impregnate the Inchotan. Ask your bride what she saw," he demanded.
"After today? She hated that punishment, Emf. You could not feel the tension under her skin - it was a miracle I was able to make her beg at all."
"And yet you did. Multiple times."
"For which she hates me."
"She is but a bride," said Em Feliz. "Her duty is to tell you, if you ask, regardless of her personal feelings. Just as it is her duty to accept and respond to your touch whenever you choose to bestow it. If she lies, there are -."
"Silence," hissed Xanir, and watched in grim satisfaction as his spymaster choked off the end of his sentence.
Then his cousin simply raised angry eyes and retorted, "Xan, I'm trying to help you. You know you have to send her back at the end of the year. Don't get attached."