Darkburn Book 3: The Gates of Kelvha by Tayin Machrie - HTML preview

Chapter 19

“Come in,” said Huldarion.

Meya entered his bed-chamber and closed the door carefully behind her. It was late and he was already disrobed and covered by the heavy dressing-gown, preparing to go to bed. Although he had not expected her tonight, he had hoped that she might come; and despite her somewhat sombre countenance he was very glad to see her.

“How was your evening with the ladies?” he asked her warmly. “I trust the Riders gave no cause for complaint.”

“How could they?”

“Their manners and clothes are not what the castle is accustomed to.”

“I found their manners and their clothes perfectly acceptable.”

He found himself thinking of her clothes; of how he would like to help her remove them, slowly, gently. It would have to be in the dark again, but that hardly mattered. He wondered how she would approach things this time. He was already hardening at the thought.

Meya walked over to him. He took her hand, prepared to raise it to his lips and kiss it. But before he could do so, she led him to the bed. There she shielded the lantern with a swift movement and then sat next to him in the dark. He smiled to the darkness in anticipation. She was silent, as if contemplating.

Huldarion waited. “What would you like to do?” he asked. “Just talk? Or something else?” He felt sure that talk would lead to something else.

“I don’t know. I don’t know if.” He had to bend close to hear her. “I don’t think I can do this.”

He felt all his anticipation turn its face away. At its back was apprehension. He was almost afraid. He felt ashamed of himself, naked beneath the ugly dressing-gown. And angry: angry with himself as much as her. He should have foreseen that it could never be so simple.

“What has changed?” He had to ask it much more quietly than he wished.

“I’ve had time to think. Time to see things… and… I find just now that it is difficult to go to bed with you.”

She did not say make love. Of course they both knew that love had nothing to do with it. It was a bargain, and now she was about to break it. He would have to start all over again with some thin frightened girl, and bear Nerogun’s contempt. Or he might not be allowed a second choice at all. He grew cold at the thought.

“What have you had time to see?”

She raised her chin, not looking his way. He could just make out her profile against the glimmer of the lamp.

“How much you calculate,” she said. “How everything is a calculation for you.”

He was silent for a moment. “I cannot deny that. I am here in Kelvha for a purpose, as you know. But my calculations wish no harm to you or Kelvha. I hope to benefit both.”

“You use us.”

“And Kelvha uses me. It’s politics.” He licked his dry lips and quietly asked the question that was thick in his throat. “Does that mean that you cannot go to bed with me, or that you cannot marry me?”

As he waited for her answer he was aware of a pain somewhere. In his heart, perhaps. In his pride, more likely, he admitted to himself. And he feared to see his plans brought down. But maybe a little in his heart as well. Despite the dark, he closed his eyes.

“Oh, I’ll marry you,” she said, “and once we’re married I will not deny you.”

He took in a long breath of relief and opened his eyes again to that faint glint of light. “Once we’re married you will have every right to deny me, if you wish.”

At that she turned her silhouetted head to look at him. “Really? It is not so in Kelvha.”

“It will be so with me.”

“We sealed our marriage troth that other night. That is unbreakable, for me at least.”

“And for me.” The pain receded a little.

“Last time was very enjoyable,” she said. “Much more than I expected. But I expected nothing. I thought of nothing except my immediate aim.”

“Which was?”

She leant her head closer towards him, until it was almost resting on his shoulder. He had to resist the strong urge to put an arm around her. He could make no assumptions now.

She put her lips closer to his ear. Even so, when she replied, it was in so soft a murmur that he could barely hear the words.

“I have a daughter. She’s five. I don’t want her to grow up here.”

So this was the heart of it. Her child was the heart of her.

He turned to reply. His lips were against her cheek, so smooth. Her hair held some faint perfume of soap or flowers. He whispered to the softness of her skin.

“Then she will grow up in Caervonn, if I succeed. And if I don’t succeed, there will be some proper home found for her elsewhere amongst the Vonn.” Olbeth, he thought. No. Yes. The farm would be a good home for a child. If he failed.

But he did not intend to fail.

“Your daughter shall be forced to no man’s will,” he told her, trying to load the quiet words with sincerity, “and nor shall you. That shall be part of our bargain. And that part is unbreakable for me. Then our troth stands?”

She sat up straight again. “Yes. It stands. Thank you.” He felt her rise to her feet, and then sit down again next to him. “I can’t leave so quickly. It would look strange to the watchers.”

“We can sit in silence here, or we can talk.”

“You’re angry with me.”

“I was angry, for a moment,” he said. “I was afraid. It’s not your fault. Love should not have to be a tool.”

“Oh, it’s always a tool,” she said, which made him wonder what her marriage had been like. She immediately answered that. “With my husband… there was, shall I say, no physical reward. The men of Kelvha do not reward their wives in love. Or very rarely. Some are luckier, I daresay. I don’t know. No-one talks about it. So bedding him was merely my duty. It kept him content. It made me a good and honoured wife to an honourable man. And he was an honourable man. He was without deceit. But to him love was for creating children. So it was a tool, and it served its purpose.”

When she added no more, he spoke in turn, his voice as low as hers. “I have had no wife. And before you, only two other women. One was a woman I loved very long ago, more than a lifetime it seems now, before my burns. The other was a brief agreement three years afterwards to check if everything still worked.”

“So love was a tool in that relationship.”

“Yes, in a way. We agreed that there would be no lasting tie. I have had no other lover since Caervonn fell: at first because of my burns, and then because of my position.” He thought of Olvirion, the cousin who had ousted him – a man rumoured to have had several liaisons and possibly even unacknowledged children. Huldarion had been desirous to avoid any such entanglements. “I always knew that I would have to bargain with myself,” he said. “That was always in my calculations. Yet when I chose you I did not calculate at all. Or hardly at all. It was an impulse.”

“Hardly at all?” Now she sounded faintly amused. “You’re very accurate.”

“I try to be.”

“I think there is a great deal that you do not say.”

This was undoubtedly true. “You think that deceitful?”

Again she sat in silence before murmuring, “I can hardly complain of it, can I, in a place like this? While the hidden spies sit listening. Or trying to listen.”

“There will be no spies in Caervonn.”

“If you ever get there.” She sighed, and then laid her hand upon his leg. Both of them sat still. “It was hardly fair of me,” she said, “to come here, having led you to expect what I would not deliver. But I can do something for you.”

“There’s no need.” He felt ashamed, again, of his nakedness and his desire. She was aware of both, for her hand slipped beneath the dressing-gown and held him.

“I know that,” she said. It was a ridiculous situation to be in, him sitting on the bed, her hand… oh, but it was such a strong, smooth, caressing hand. As it moved he didn’t want to be there and yet he did. He felt himself to be at her mercy. Had she calculated this? Perhaps it served him right for last time. He hadn’t really given her much choice then, but to feel pleasure…

Pleasure. He couldn’t help himself. He turned towards her and grasped her shoulder, burying his face against her neck.

“More,” he said silently. “Harder.” But she must have heard, because she obeyed, and he gripped her against his chest. Pleasure. That was all it was. Just pleasure.

He closed his eyes. Who just did what to who? Who just won what, there?

She kissed him gently, on the scarred cheek. “Does that hurt? The scar?”

“Nothing hurts just now,” he said. “But yes. In general it does hurt.”

She made no sympathetic noises. But her hands were still there, one on his body, one on his cheek, soft now, a reassurance that he did not actually repel her. She had not pulled away.

“It has another effect,” he said after a while. This was something he had often thought and never voiced before. “Because it can be painful for me to move my face, I limit my facial expressions. I can’t smile or frown without it hurting. And sometimes I think that I feel less emotion for that reason: as if I could not feel happy without physically smiling. As if the smile caused the happiness.”

“Perhaps it does. And so, instead, you calculate?”

“I think I always did that, even as a boy. But maybe I rely more on my calculations and less on my feelings to make decisions. I just didn’t calculate on you.”

“You relied on your feelings when you chose me?”

“On my instinct, perhaps. I thought you would be sensible. I liked your independence. I knew you would not be afraid of me. You attracted me from the moment I first saw you scolding that unfortunate servant boy.”

She laughed and then sobered, lowering her voice again. “That was no joke for that poor boy.”

“Is he in trouble?”

“Nothing to do with you.”

“I imagine Nerogun has a way with sloppy servants.”

“You might say that.”

Their dislike of Nerogun was a common ground. But he did not explore it. He did not want the Post-Regent anywhere near his bed. And now she took her hands away and found a cloth to wipe him clean, making him feel ashamed a third time. She was the one in control. She stood up, kissed his head and left, finding her way out of the room in the dark without even stumbling into any of the furniture.

He sat there on the bed alone and wondered.

Meya would still marry him. He would not have the dreadful task of trying to choose another wife; or the worse humiliation of not being allowed to.

She would marry him. But he took nothing else for granted now. He thought he did not understand any of what had just happened. Perhaps she had calculated that.

After a while he nodded into the darkness of the room. Marriage to Meya would not be simple. But it would be interesting. They were well matched, indeed.