A Lotus for the Regent (23 page)

“
You have not merely the best claim to the throne, you have the
only
claim.” Kamen slid Ajalira off his lap and rose, pacing about the room.

“
No, my love. I am but a daughter.” Ajalira missed the warmth of
Kamen's flesh. She felt cold, so cold she did not think she could ever be warm
again. “My father was no King, my mother no Queen.”

“
You are the only living vessel for the royal blood of either the
Larenai or the Tamari.” Kamen's voice rose in his anger. “I wish we had never
come here!”

“
But I am simply Zomalin,” said Ajalira. “A Tamari noblewoman, to be
sure, but that does not mean quite what it does for the Larenai, or even the
Sunjaa.” She pulled her knees up to her chin and wrapped her arms around her
legs. “A Tamari noble does not necessarily even keep servants. We did not when
we lived in Icedeep.” Speaking of trivialities kept her mind off her dread.

“
You never lived there.” Kamen stopped his restless pacing, pausing
in front of the same mirror where Ajalira had earlier sat and dressed her hair.
“You were born off the coast of Tendol! You grew up in Norivea!”

Ajalira rocked
back and forth. “I was raised as though my father had never left. My mother
brought the first servants into the house. Until I became a—a Lotus, I was a
pure Tamari.”

“
Tamari!” Kamen picked up a bottle of perfume and hurled it against
the wall as he had the vase earlier. “Tamari!”

“
Yes.” Ajalira licked her lips. Her mouth had gone dry. “I am a
Tamari noblewoman—
not
a princess—and I will do what I have to do. For
you.”

“
For
me
?” Kamen's hands were shaking, and he did not seem to
know what to do with them.
 
“This is not
for me. No, no, Lira, this is for
your
people, for those damned Ausir.”

“
I do not care about that so much.” Ajalira wanted nothing more than
to go to Kamen and beg him to hold her. “But I could not give you my
maidenhead. I
could
and can give you my honor. If I fail in this duty
that you have given me, then I have nothing to give you.”

“
You have nothing to give me.” Kamen repeated her words, and the
deadness in his voice terrified Ajalira.

She leaped from
her spot on the divan and ran to him. She put her arms around him, and her
tears flowed down her cheeks, soaking his chest.

But Kamen did
not put his arms around her. He stood, unmoving, as she wept on him, and Ajalira
could not breathe. It was not, however, her sobs that took her breath. It was
her need for Kamen to hold her, and still he did not.

“
All the Ausir, even the Larenai, would agree with me.” She kissed
one of his scars. “They would agree that I am sullied, worthless, and can give
you nothing.” Her innermost fears, reawakened by seeing so many of her own
kind, spilled out of her mouth.

“
The Tamari are indeed a hard people,” he said at last. “Heartless
people.”

“
Please, Kamen!” Ajalira could not speak further.

Kamen stepped
away from her, turned on his heel, and walked out.

Ajalira's tears
did not stop. Kamen wanted honor for her; she knew that. But what did that mean
without Kamen? And worst of all, what did that mean
for
Kamen? For
herself, she knew that life without him, even life as Queen of all the Ausir,
would be misery. But she knew misery. Her life at the guildhouse had been shame
heaped upon shame. These weeks of belonging to Kamen had been the only time
since childhood when she would have preferred life to death.

She ran blindly
out of the room, not noticing or caring where she went. Their chamber opened
onto a broad balcony, and she ran until her hips bruised against the stone
railing. She looked down with eyes at first unseeing, and when at last she
focused, she saw the green and blue waters of the Meshkenet Sea.

Meshkenet Sea.

She had not
thought of it as the Aras Arlluvia; she had thought of it as the Sunjaa would,
as Kamen's people would.

She would be
the worst Queen the Ausir had ever known.

Queen of the
Ausir. The very words brought a fresh wave of tears. During her time in the
guildhouse, she had hoped only to escape someday, either to die gloriously or
to live in obscurity, hiding her shame. But since she had belonged to Kamen,
she had known bliss. He had seen no shame in her. He had loved her. His gentle
kisses, his inexorable fucking—he was the only master of her heart. He held her
life in his hands, and if he wanted her to go to the Ausir, she would.

But he did not
want her to go.

Ajalira knew
this. She knew it in the depths of that heart that belonged solely to him. He
did not want her dishonored because he loved her. But he did not want her to
go. Ajalira grasped the stone of the railing, and the roughness of it beneath
her hands was something to focus on. She looked down at her hands, their pallor
contrasting with the darkness of the stone beneath them.

Kamen's dark
skin.

She closed her
eyes, conjuring up the vision of Kamen as she had first seen him, moving among
the Ausir and the Zenji like a King. Humans and Ausir alike acknowledged his
superiority, and she was grateful that she had been able to help him.

But now what
would she do? Would she leave Kamen to be unhappy without her? That he would
sorrow over her loss she was sure. He loved her.

That thought
was the only one in her mind that was not pain and misery. She loved Kamen, and
he loved her. But she was to be the wife of another man.

Another man
would touch her. Another man would taste her body. Another man would have
rights to her.

Another man
would fuck her.

Ajalira's
stomach roiled, and she leaned over the balcony to vomit.

It would be
just as it had been in the guildhouse with Evix. She would be with a man who
had no rights to her, and he would take her body.

Ajalira sank
down to her knees, wiping futilely at her mouth.
How can it be that I should
be married to a man and think he has no rights to me?
Ajalira knew
perfectly well that, though he was nothing compared to Kamen, at least she had
not felt guilt when Evix had, after swearing a marriage oath, taken her. So why
should she feel guilt when another man, who would marry her, would take her?
For guilt racked her, and horror brought the bile again in her throat.

She was
Kamen's, always. She was Kamen's concubine. How could she be anything else? She
heard her own words in her head, and she heard them this time with Kamen's
ears. She heard herself speaking words of duty and honor, of needing to redress
the shame she brought on Kamen by offering him a former Lotus. But Kamen did
not hear that. Kamen heard her prattle on about needing to redress a shame he
did not see. He heard her speaking of honor, but it meant only that she would
leave him. That she would go to the Ausir and be their Queen. She heard
herself, and she hated what she heard.

Kamen would
think—for how could he think otherwise, not seeing her shame as she did?—that
she
wanted
to go, that being Queen was more to her than being his.

Too late she
heard the light footfalls. She could not count the numbers, for she had been
too absorbed in her own tears to note them in time.

She slid her
hand up her thigh, pulling out the blade she had strapped there. Kamen's blade,
his gift to her.

This at least
was clear. This was of a piece with what had happened before, with the attack
on Kamen. She whirled around to face her attackers, not surprised to see the
curving Ausir horns of the men who set upon her.

Chapter Fourteen

Was it honorable
for Ajalira to leave Kamen? Did she want to? Would the very thing Kamen loved
her for—her pure Tamari nature—drive them apart? Kamen growled and punched the
wall as he stormed down the torch-lit corridor. Just thinking about it boiled
his blood. He had no desire to return to the main hall to sit and talk and
listen to the Ausir lords prattle on about their pedigrees and how well they
were suited to rule. Someone had assassinated the Ausir King, and Kamen
suspected that some horned devil who shared the festhall with him was
responsible.

A stack of metal
basins towered near some closed door at the top of the stairs. Kamen swerved to
kick the pots down the steps, and the crashing sound silenced the sound of
distant voices raised in excitement. Were the Ausir playing a game? At a time
like this?

Banar, the
festhall master, met him on the stairs. “My lord?” He was all jowly smiles.

Kamen wanted to
punch the fat man in the face, but he checked his anger. Banar looked at the
scattered basins only for a moment, snapping his fingers and setting his slaves
to cleaning up the mess.

“
A thousand apologies, Your Grace.” Banar stood on the steps and
bobbed his head several times in small bows. “I'll have my servants beaten for
their laziness.”

Kamen's anger
dissipated. “It's nothing.” He felt bad that the slaves would be punished for
his outburst, that they would be blamed for having left something to obstruct a
guest's path. No matter what he said now, Banar would have his slaves thrashed.
A loud communal cheer rose up, surprising Kamen. “What's happening?”

“
Quoits, out on the lawn.” Banar's grey eyes danced. “The lords grew
agitated in your absence, and I thought a game might divert them.”

Meaning the
Kimereth and Seranimesti factions might have come to blows had they been left
to their own devices. Kamen should not have stormed out and left them alone in
the hall together. But what else could he have done? They wanted to take
Ajalira away from him.

“
Will you join them, Your Grace?”

Kamen nodded
once. He was the arbiter, the Regent of the Sunjaa, mightiest nation of men and
masters of the sea. He could not afford to lose his temper again; he could not
be seen to sulk.

Banar chattered
at him the whole way, down the stairs, through more rooms than Kamen could
count, and out onto the sunlit lawn. The festhall was as large as the Sunjaa
palace itself, and Kamen could not guess at Banar's wealth. The Ausir stood on
the lawn in two groups, the Kimereth at the far end and the Seranimesti the
near. In the middle of the lawn stood five wooden pegs in an X shape. Their
ends were different colors, the middle being bright red. Two metal rings lay
around a green peg, and Ansim Kimereth was swinging the metal ring in his hand
like a pendulum. He squinted at the arrangement of pegs some twenty paces from
himself, clearly judging the force with which he would need to hit his mark.

“
Quoits?” Kamen asked.

“
Yes, my lord.” Banar prattled on explaining the rules, but Kamen
only lent half an ear. His mind was still on Ajalira. The participants were
supposed to get their metal rings around the pegs in order, the last being the
red one in the middle. The first one to do that won. Simple enough, and the
Ausir seemed to be having a great time. Here stood mortal enemies, locked in a
mighty struggle of … quoits.

Kamen shook his
head as Kimereth's men cheered. Ansim had ringed his peg, and Kamen wanted nothing
more than to slap the smug smile off his face. It was Tivanel Seranimesti's
turn now, and Kamen hardly cared. One of these horned bastards would take
Ajalira away from him. If he could, he would murder them both. But the Ausir
civil war would grow worse, pull other nations into the conflict, and leave
everything in ruins. Besides, Ajalira saw it as her Tamari duty to bring peace
to her people.

Cheers assaulted
Kamen's ears again, ripping him once again from his painful reverie. Tivanel
had ringed his peg.

“
They're good,” Kamen said, trying to find relief in the game. There
was none.

“
Quite impressive for beginners.” Banar's chuckle was a low, jolly
rumble buried somewhere in the recesses of his fat. “But from what I've seen of
Ausir, they're quick learners, and they excel at physical sports of all kinds.”

“
Indeed?” Kamen peered at Kimereth and Seranimesti. Were they good in
bed? Would they fuck Ajalira the way she wanted to be fucked? He clenched his
fists, digging his fingernails into the flesh of his palms. The pain kept him
from flying at the Ausir and beating them all to death. Kamen's blood coursed
like acid through his veins. He would see them all dead before they laid a hand
on her!

“
Lord Itenu.” Tivanel, upon turning around to be congratulated by his
kinsmen, spotted Kamen.

Ansim made a
move as if to approach, but Kamen waved him off. In a loud voice, Kamen called
across the lawn. “Please, my lord. Take your next throw.”

Ansim smiled and
readily did so. Truly, the Ausir loved sport.

Tivanel took the
opportunity to approach Kamen, but Kamen could not speak to him. When he turned
to ask Banar to have someone go fetch Saerileth, he found the Lotus at his
elbow. He should have suspected as much. “Always in the right place at the
right time.”