Sarah gasped as Khan's passion
overwhelmed her. He dove deeper inside her than he ever had, driving her to new
heights of ecstasy with every surge. Not his surge alone, but the ocean's
around them, its waves cascading over their flesh and turning their fire to
steam. Sand, wet sand, spread beneath her, shaping itself to her back like a
welcoming blanket. Her new diamond ring, her only adornment, flashed in the
bright crescent moon.
She
gripped his elbow with one hand and the back of his neck with the other,
squeezing him in every way she could. Another wave crashed down upon them,
driving him further and deeper and harder, filling her in ways she'd never
imagined. She closed her eyes, threw back her head, and sang a note of joy.
With
the roar of a beast, he came to her, and she to him, and all was warmth and
flesh and sand and sea.
They
lay there together as one. He reached for the sand beneath her and eased his
way down, pressing his trimmed black beard against her cheek. She felt the
whisper of his breath across her ear, heard the thrum of his heartbeat against
her breast. He kissed her, and with his lips still upon hers, he eased his way
back from her, gently slid in just once more, and then slipped away and rolled
to her side.
The
waves were calmer now, and gentle with her long black hair. He brushed the hair
away from her bright green eyes – "emerald eyes," he'd called them,
and she'd called his eyes silver in return. He was a strong man, tall and
slender, with wiry muscles all across his arms, legs, and chest. Wealthy, also
– far wealthier than any tailor's daughter, and what had she to offer him?
The
exhausted, tender smile on his face suggested one answer.
But
no; she had to be more than that to him. Had
to be; the ring on her finger was proof of that. But what? What had he seen
in her? A chance for charity? She'd come to him in desperation, seeking nothing
but a chance to afford her mother's medicine. And he'd given her more than a
chance. He'd given her hope.
And
now, here they were, together in the surf below the castle walls, the music of
the royal ball still wafting down to harmonize with the waves. Their clothes
lay discarded near the bottom of the path down the cliffs; she'd shed hers
first, then gained a head start while he wrestled off his boots. It hadn't been
their first time, nor even their first time there. But this time, with the ring
shining bright, the ring he'd gently pressed into her hand at the waltz up
above, it felt…different. Not only better,
though it certainly had been, but…
Significant,
somehow. She wondered. No, she
thought, it was too early to wonder. She'd know in a month, at the earliest.
But still…
He
pulled her in for a kiss, stroking her thigh as he took in her tongue. The
waves came again, stronger now. Did he hunger for more? Did she? She'd give him
as good as she got, she decided, and he looked more than ready—
This
time, the waves hit harder, crashing straight between them and forcing them
apart. She rolled away, spinning twice before landing hard on her elbow with a
mouth full of sand and a nose full of seawater.
"Sarah?"
she heard him call, half muffled in the pounding surf. "Are you all
right?"
Of
course she wasn't. She was cold, naked, and covered in dirt. Another wave, this
one harder still, slammed down upon her and nearly knocked her flat. Enough, she thought.
She
coughed, stood, and woke herself up.
"Star?"
It
was the boy who called for her, red-haired Arikk, and his voice grated nearly
as much as his incessant knock. Beneath her bed, the ship lurched hard to port,
tall waves slapping the hull as thunder pealed above. She tossed aside the
cramped cabin's single blanket, piling it over her still-sleeping husband.
Husband. Was he still, after her
"death" those many years ago? What would the courts say? She nearly
laughed aloud at the idea of man's court holding any sort of power over her,
but she entertained the question in her mind. The last any living soul had seen
of Sarah Eilon, she'd walked into the sea in a storm of despair. Khan had been
the only witness, and from what the boy Arikk had told her, he'd stayed only
briefly in town afterwards before an angry mob had run him off into the woods.
If
any legal body did consider her dead, it certainly wasn't the banks. They'd
sent her off with a wave, a smile, and the Eilon family fortune. She hadn't
shown her face, of course. It was still much too early for that. But her seal, and a few glib words from a certain
man of hers, were all the money-men needed.
Much
of that money now rested beneath her, locked tight in the many chests sliding
back and forth in the hold. The rest was in the bricks of her many holdings,
and in the pockets of her many servants. Khan, she knew, even at his most
generous, would have been content to see most of it sit and grow, simply for
the sake of growing. Now, in her hands, it served a greater purpose. Her coins,
and his, rolled out across the whole of the Two Kingdoms, all while he lay
sleeping.
And
sleep he would, for as long as she willed it. He lay on his side, facing her,
still as death save for his slow, shallow breathing. His hair and beard were
gray now, gray as his ever-closed eyes, and thicker with each passing day. Perhaps,
when she had time, she'd give him a shave like she had in the old days.
"Star?"
the boy called again.
She
thought of calling back, telling him to scurry off, but just as she opened her
mouth, she remembered her voice. Catching the call in her throat, she looked
down to her hooded robe, with its special white cloth and red stripes. It lay
on the floor, piled together with her underclothes. With a quiet huff, she
swung her legs away from the bed, drew the underclothes about her tightly
enough to hide her figure, and then stretched and squirmed until the robe
shrouded her entirely.
As
soon as the hood dropped over her face, the blackness came. To her, it only
stretched the dark around her, made each light dim and every shadow long. But
to Arikk, and to any others unfortunate enough to see her, her face was night
itself.
And
the voices. They came whenever she slipped on the hood, and sometimes stayed
long after she removed it again. Whispers to her, they flirted with her ears,
spinning round her head high and low. But her own voice gave them purpose and
direction, spiriting them outward at her command to mask the speaker and sway
the listener.
She
took the long red gloves from the stand beside the bed, pulled them both on,
and faced the door as the Crowning Star.
"I
bid you enter, Captain," she said. "Make it short."
The
speaking style she'd chosen when she first became who she was. She found that
the rhythms had a way of lulling her flock into nodding along. She'd never been
much of a poet before, but…well, that was before.
Arikk
Tresbitt stepped cautiously into the room, dressed in his full "caped
swordsman" regalia. He had his green-dyed leather armor – armor, as if
there were anyone to fight in the middle of the ocean – his long red cape, red
as his hair, and his fine sheathed saber with its silver hilt. His eyes, green
like his armor but darker than hers, flitted about the room, away from her
hidden face.
Perhaps
someday, she'd let him see.
He
briefly glanced at the form of the man beneath the covers. Sarah saw his fists clench and release. Arikk hated
the man, and she knew why. But things had changed. Khan was hers now, and that
was the end of it. She'd let Arikk ask about him once, and only so that she
could tell him never to ask again.
He
swallowed hard, and looked for a moment as if he'd forgotten why he came. She
turned her palm upward and held it out toward him, a gesture she'd trained him
to know as Get to the point.
"We've
arrived," he said at last.
Larric.
She'd seen the country once before, between the end of the war and…what came
after. Hardly a man there had kept all four limbs through the decades of
fighting, and those who had now broke their backs in place of those who hadn't.
Entire towns still stood in ruins, their crops long since withered or burned.
Even in the capital of Cel-Cabiri, the streets lay choked with misery.
And
here she was again. But not as a visitor.
"The
captain wants to weigh anchor till the storm passes," the boy went on. "But
the harbor's straight ahead. Well," he corrected himself, "the
'harbor.'"
Sarah
turned and glanced through one of the cabin's small portholes. Ahead, through
the driving rain, she saw the tall gray cliffs of Larric's southern coastline.
Atop the cliffs, an old castle emerged from the stone like a raised fist. Far
below it, at the level of the sea, the gaping mouth of a cave awaited their
ship's arrival.
"All
well and good," she told the boy over her shoulder. "Now go, and leave
me be."
"Star,"
he said. He put his fist in his palm, bowed his head, pivoted on his heel, and
left, closing the door behind him.
She
turned both the door's locks as he left, then discarded her robe and climbed
back into bed. Pulling the blanket back over herself and Khan both, she eased
his arm over her side and kissed him on the forehead.
The
dream on the beach had been one of many. She might take them back to the royal
ballroom next, to their daughter's first steps, to their favorite festival, to
a beautiful future where the two of them saw their daughter wed. In Garland's
Grove, just outside their home in Meligreas, with the sun shining down and all
who loved her gathered round, beaming with joy. Perfect, she thought.
Of
course, all of that would have to wait. There was work ahead, great work,
greater than any the world had ever known, and when all was done, there'd be
time for all the pleasure she could ever wish for—
The
ship lurched again, to starboard this time, scattering the contents of the
nearest shelf all over the rickety floor.
She
glanced back out the window. The storm would rage for hours. There was nothing
for it, and nothing else to do until it passed.
Smiling,
she kissed his lips again.
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