Fantasyland 02 The Golden Dynasty (25 page)

“Indeed,” she replied distractedly, I looked
to her and then I followed her gaze.

That was when I noticed what I hadn’t
noticed before. There were two warriors standing outside my cham.
Feetak and the grinning one who Lahn spoke to the night of the
games.

He was not grinning now, he was scowling, as
was Feetak and the instant they laid eyes on us, they turned to my
cham, bent and entered.

“Is something going on?” I asked as Diandra
and I got closer.

“I do not know,” she answered softly. “But I
do know, we soon shall see.”

We made it to the cham and I entered first.
There was candlelight and the space was filled with warriors.
Feetak and the grinning one, another one I’d seen in passing often
speaking with Lahn, Seerim and Lahn.

My eyes stuck on Lahn who didn’t look at all
like he was in a good mood. I started to smile hesitantly and
whispered, “Hey.”

It was then he instigated the breaking
point.

He took two swift, angry strides to me, his
arm going down and across his body and before I knew his intention,
he swung it out and struck me with the back of his hand on my
cheekbone.

He did this with all his substantial
strength and therefore my vision burst in a firework of white
lights, agonizing pain radiated out from my cheekbone, piercing
through my eye, my face and my brain to bounce against the inside
of my skull and I flew to the side and went down on the hides.

I was blinking and concentrating on getting
the excruciating pain to fade when I heard Diandra start, “Circe,
are you –?” and I turned my head to see Lahn thrust her back with
such force, she went flying into her husband. Seerim caught her,
his fingers closing on her biceps as he held her steady but not
tenderly. He, too, I noticed vaguely as the pain faded but did not,
by a long shot, go away, looked seriously pissed.

Lahn was barking words and my eyes moved to
him to see he was staring down at me as he raged. My hand drifted
up to my cheekbone and I stared dazedly back at him.

“He… he wants me to… to… translate,” Diandra
said haltingly then spoke a flurry of quick words in Korwahk.

I said nothing, just stared at my
husband.

Lahn’s enraged eyes didn’t leave me when he
snarled more words and Diandra started talking.

“He… the Dax… he says he did not know where
you were. He says they’ve been looking for you. He says you are
never to leave the cham without a guard.” She paused and Lahn kept
thundering then she went on. “He says you are queen and you must
understand this and the possible dangers and you must never, never
leave the cham without a guard.” She stopped then she said, “Circe,
I’m so sorry, I didn’t –”

I took my hand from my face, lifted it
toward her palm up and she stopped talking.

Lahn had quit speaking but his dark eyes
were still filled with wrath and they were burning into mine so
fiercely I could actually
feel
the fire.

And I did not
fucking
care.

I pushed to my feet and turned my body to
facing him.

Then I spoke and when I did, so did
Diandra.

“
My father loved my mother. He loved her
deeply. He said they were the perfect match. When I was ten and she
was murdered,” Diandra stopped talking and I heard her soft intake
of breath but then she carried on because I didn’t stop. “He never
got over it. Never got over her. Never. And he gave me all the love
he would have normally given me
and
the love he would have given her. He thought I was precious
and he treated me that way. This was because I was his daughter but
it was also because I was the most important thing my mother gave
to him and I was all he had left of her.” I swallowed and watched
my words start to penetrate Lahn’s fury but I didn’t care about
that either and kept right on talking. “And I promised
myself,
vowed
, that I
would find a man like my father who would love me deeply and
treasure me more than anything in the world.”

I stopped talking when I saw Lahn’s body
lock.

Then I kept going.

“
You raped me,” I whispered and Diandra
spoke softly, “and somehow I found it in me to forgive you. You
left me out in the burning sun even though I told you the harm it
would do to me and I forgave you. This is your world, this is your
way and I have struggled with it but I have accepted it.” I pulled
in breath and continued, “But what you did just now, taking your
anger out on me when I did something in all innocence, I
cannot
and
will not
forgive. You do not know your own strength but it
is formidable, so formidable it cows men but I am no man. I am a
woman,
your
woman and
you used
all
of it
in violence
against me and that, kah Dax, is
unforgiveable.
”

He held my eyes at the same time he held his
body completely still.

I finished and I did it quietly, “My
father was an honorable man and he would wish for me to be
treasured. If he were here, he and all of his men would fall by
your Horde’s swords in order to protect me from the harm you’ve
inflicted on me. They would do it and before they did it they…
wouldn’t…
blink.
And
because of that, because I know that in the depth of my soul and
because of everything he gave to me, all the love he showed me, in
return, I loved him more than anything in this world. I respected
him. I honored him over any man I ever met. But he is lost to me.
He is gone and therefore could not be here to protect me but you
should know this, my king… if he knew you, he would
not
like you.”

When I stopped speaking, I realized my chest
was rising and falling rapidly and I held his eyes as they burned
into mine.

Then he barked out the words, “Tahkoo tan!”*
and the instant he did, I felt the tent empty but I didn’t tear my
eyes from Lahn.

We stared at each other for long moments
after we were alone, Lahn statue-still, me breathing heavily before
he said in a quiet voice, “Vayoo ansha.”

I shook my head and whispered,
“
Never.
For good
and always, you have lost me. Na me lapay kah Lahn. Not
anymore.”**

I watched him flinch but I didn’t care about
that either.

When he recovered, his voice was soft when
he said, “Vayoo ansha, kah rahna fauna.”

I shook my head again and moved. Skirting
him, I went to the trunks and dropped to my knees to open one to
get a nightgown thinking I had no escape. I had nowhere to go. I
didn’t even have another fucking
room
where I could hide and let lose the tears that were burning
in my throat.

I felt him come at me before he got to me
then his arms closed around me from behind, trapping mine tight to
my front and he pulled me to my feet. He held me close and bent at
the waist so his face was in my neck. There he spoke more soft
words and I pushed hard against his arms caging mine but, as usual,
there was no give.

That burning in my throat grew so hot it
rivaled the pain I still felt in my cheekbone and I felt the
additional sting of tears in my sinuses.

“Let me go,” I whispered on another attempt
to jerk my arms free.

He spoke more soft words and I jerked again.
Then he let me go, I started to step away but before I could I was
up in the air, cradled in his arms but they were like steel bands,
locking me close. I tried to arch my back and buck but this was to
no avail. He turned and took two long strides to the bed, sat then
fell to his side, my back to the bed, my hips in his lap, thighs
over his and I couldn’t swallow the sob that tore from my throat,
filling the tent with the sound of sorrow.

“Kah Lahnahsahna Circe,” he whispered, his
hand cupping my head, forcing it into his chest as his other arm
locked me in place.

“Let me go,” I sobbed into his chest, my
hands flat against it on either side of my face, pushing, but he
didn’t move. I gave up and whispered, “Let me go.”

He didn’t let me go, he kept my face in
his chest and his arm tight around me as I cried, I sobbed, I
bawled, I let it all hang out. Everything. Everything I was
feeling. Everything that haunted my headspace for days. Being in
this world and not knowing why. Being hunted and raped. Being
confused and hurt. Watching a man die while his chain was hooked to
me. Losing my world, my father, my job, my friends, my culture and
everything I knew. Finding friends and building friendships at the
same time not knowing if they would be torn away. And struggling
against starting to fall in love with a man I didn’t understand,
whose ways frightened and repulsed me but I was drawn to him by
something I couldn’t deny because it was just… that…
strong.

And then, with one swing of his mighty arm,
falling right out of love and landing with a crash so brutal, it
shattered me.

In other words, I cried a lot of fucking
tears.

So many, it exhausted me. So much emotion, I
couldn’t get it all out, it was impossible, the effort felt like it
would kill me and my body had to shut down just to survive.

Therefore I fell asleep in Lahn’s cradling
arms even as the tears continued to fall.

* * * * *

I woke in the night still in Lahn’s arms and
I didn’t hesitate in pulling away, rolling and getting up from the
bed.

Candlelight still spluttered, as it always
did, he never extinguished them in the night, and it led my way to
the trunks. I opened one, selected a nightgown, pulled it out, took
off my clothes and jewelry, dropping them unheeded to the rugs at
my feet and then I slid the nightgown on.

Then I moved to the bed of hides by the
flaps and laid down, my head to the cushions, my back to Lahn in
the bed.

I barely got settled before I was going up,
his arms around me, cradling me to his chest again and I was back
in bed. He jerked the silk out from under us, settled it over us
and then he pulled me under his body, his heavy legs tangling with
mine, his arm nearly fully around me, his weight pinning me to the
bed.

As ever, no escape.

So I escaped the only way I had.

I twisted my neck to turn my face away.

But I was with Lahn and Lahn being Lahn, he
didn’t even give me that.

His big hand curved around my jaw and he
turned my head so I was facing him then his fingers glided into the
hair at the side of my head, his thumb against my cheek, forcing my
face into his throat and keeping it there.

I felt the burn in my throat and pulled in a
deep breath that broke in the middle, loudly, communicating my
struggle against tears.

Lahn’s fingers tensed into my scalp but
otherwise his hand didn’t move.

It took a lot out of me, everything I had
left, but I succeeded in holding them back.

When my breath evened, communicating I won
my battle, Lahn’s neck bent and I felt his lips on my hair as his
fingers again tensed gently into my scalp.

There he whispered, “Na lapay kah rahna
Dahksahna. Na lapay kah Lahnahsahna. Na lapay kah Circe. Fahzah,
Circe.
Fahzah.
Farzah
kay markan nahna rah ruhnee zo kay.
Farzah.
Kuvoo sah, Circe, loot farzah
danhay.”***

One couldn’t say I had the Korwahk language
down pat, not even close, but I knew enough to know what he was
saying.

And from the way he said it, I knew he
really meant it.

And there it was, I had no choice, I had no
escape, I had nothing.

So I closed my eyes, forced my body to relax
and tried to find sleep.

This took awhile before I succeeded and
his hand never left my head until I was out and when I went out, I
went
out
.

So I didn’t feel nor even sense Lahn’s hand
drifting down to curl around my neck nor did I feel the pad of his
thumb tenderly press up on my jaw to expose my face to him.

And lastly, I didn’t feel his lips brush
mine before his arm curved around me, he pulled me deeper under him
and then he fell asleep.

*
Translation:
“Leave us!”

**
Translation:
“You are not my Lahn.”

***
Translation:
“You are my golden queen. You are my tigress. You are my
Circe. Always, Circe.
Always.
Never will I allow your gold to be taken from me.
Never.
Understand this, Circe, and
never forget.”

The Gifts

The noises of the Daxshee being disassembled
and packed up were all around me but I didn’t see it nor did I hear
it.

I was completely in my head.

Being in that world was no good place to be
and being in my head wasn’t much better.

Still, it was better so that was where I was
going to be.

It was early afternoon the next day after
Lahn struck me and I knew from the noises invading the cham that
woke me up (alone in our bed, might I add) that the packing up had
already begun.

The minute I moved in bed, my girls swung
into action, feeding me, bathing me, dressing me like the queen I
was and then quickly went to work to pack our belongings for the
ride.

Now, I was sitting outside on a big, soft
hide with some cushions under a piece of gauze that had been set up
on a slant to protect me from the sun. I had a plate of untouched
food in front of me, a jug of water, a cup and Ghost was rolling
around, playing with some toy one of my girls had made for her (in
other words, tearing the thing to pieces).