Chapter Twenty-Two
After my impressive performances in the garden, Luthian insists I stay tucked away in his house for the rest of the day. I choose to lounge about the library, reading from things that interest me, while he tends to letters and papers at a small desk by the fire.
“What happens if Cassan loses the wager?” I ask.
Luthian doesn’t glance up. “He won’t.”
“How do you know?” I close my book and sit up on the chaise I’ve been draped across for an hour.
“I’m an excellent judge of character and action. And now that he knows that his father also desires you, he’ll cling to his convictions even harder.” He puts an audible flourish on the parchment with his pen, then sets it aside.
I watch as he deftly folds the letter and drips sealing wax upon it. “You have everything planned perfectly, don’t you?”
“I try.” He applies his seal to the wax. “I have a meeting this evening. You’ll be on your own. But you will make an appearance.”
“By myself?” I don’t know why I’m nervous. I went to the king on my own and survived.
“There’s a ritual tonight,” he goes on. “I think you’ll find it entertaining. There is appropriate attire in your wardrobe. Sarta will have marked it.”
“A ritual?” I know of only my mother’s rituals, in which she welcomed the seasons and helped them change all around our manor. She never spoke of group rites.
“Once every season, the court worships the gift of Living Essence. I find it tedious, but others enjoy it.” He pauses. “Obviously, there is group sex involved.”
“Obviously,” I say with a laugh. “How will I know the etiquette?”
“Observe. I trust you’ll be able to pick it up. As I said, it’s tedious. And unimaginative.” He makes a disgusted face.
“And you so conveniently are otherwise engaged,” I point out. “Where and when should I report for this ritual?”
“Follow the crowd from the main gardens when the moon has appeared.” He tucks his letter into his jacket. “Now, I must leave you. Bring me a full report tonight.”
As he passes, he stops, as if without thinking, and drops a kiss on my forehead.
* * * *
Walking through the darkness of the gardens, I adjust my mask so that I can see better. The robes Sarta designed for the ritual are long scarves of transparently thin emerald silk, held into the suggestion of a garment by a tightly-cinched belt of ivory around my waist. My mask is a collection of verdant leaves, splayed across my face like a butterfly’s wings from the bridge of my nose.
I don’t know what I’m meant to be disguising; everyone at court has already heard of the human woman of voracious and adventurous appetite.
The path to the king’s gardens is lit with fires on evenly spaced plinths. I see courtiers moving down the tiers and follow them. Unlike Luthian’s gardens, which seem to stretch on forever, the king’s garden ends abruptly at the tree line of a dark and imposing forest. I’m grateful to have someone to follow, though the sound of drumming might have led me to the right place on its own. As the winding path brings me closer to the drums, firelight flickers through the trees, and the oddest sense of anticipation tingles in my blood. I know magic. I’ve felt the rise and fall of it, held a ball of it in my hands. I can’t direct it, but I recognize it, and I let it draw me along, just as the crowd sweeps me toward the sacred clearing.
An immense bonfire licks at the sky above, dwarfing the standing stones that surround it. Inside the circle, identically dressed priestesses in robes of moving water walk a clockwise circle, their lips murmuring a chant I can’t make out. Each of the stones bears a chained and naked faery, all of them with cocks that stand out from their bodies, swollen and jerking. They’re blindfolded and gagged with strips of leather.
I glance around the outside of the circle, where the court has assembled in numbers so vast, they spread far into the trees. Some of them hover, wings fluttering, others have climbed into branches. Everyone wears a mask, but I find the king immediately; he’s the only one seated, on a throne of quartz that hums with power.
He finds me, too, his eyes settling on mine from behind his mask of amethyst. I drop my eyes demurely but see him gesture to one of his sylph guards. Still, I feign surprise when they approach and urge me to the king’s side.
“Cenere,” he says, patting his knee. “Come, sit on my lap.”
Cassan stands to Arcus’s left, his face covered with a leather mask of a stylized fox. An appropriate animal, given the impression I have of him. I flash him a sly smile and tilt my chin as I pass him, and he doesn’t hide his grin.
To the king’s left stands a much taller faery, shirtless, his muscular body clad only in a small leather loin cloth. His gleaming amber eyes give the feathered owl mask he wears an uncanny effect, and golden hair cascades down his tanned back. The firelight casts every line of his powerful muscles into deeper contrast. He doesn’t look at me, or at the king or prince beside him. He doesn’t appear to want to be here, at all.
Arcus notices where my gaze has landed, and he catches my hand to pull me onto his knee. “That’s my son, Kathras. Unpleasant bastard. Loathes participation in my court.”
“It’s a lucky thing for me, then that my king is immortal.” Kathras keeps his gaze trained straight ahead.
In the circle, the maidens have stopped before the bound faeries, each of them holding a golden cup. The drumming picks up its pace, and my heartbeat strives to match it. The captive faeries twist and groan, as if tormented by an unseen force. The drumming reaches a crescendo, then abruptly stops. The fire flares brighter, and in unison, the chained faeries come, their seed falling into the goblets.
The drumming begins again, slower, and the chained faeries moan, some in agony, some in pleasure. One of them shouts and strains at his bonds.
“Have you seen such a ritual before?” Arcus brushes my hair back to press his lips to the hollow of my throat. “Your fragile mortal heart is racing.”
“No, Your Majesty. Never.” I breathe and squeeze my thighs together. I think of Firo, of tormenting him in the library and how powerful I felt. I wonder if he’s here, remembering the same thing.
Arcus’s hand falls to my lap and pushes through my robes. He delves between my thighs and thrusts two fingers inside me. When he withdraws them, a web of fluid stretches between them. “You’re enjoying yourself.”
“I’ve enjoyed everything I’ve experienced here, Your Majesty.” Even your attempt to terrify me. “Will you explain it to me?”
“The priestesses are the Gwragedd Annwn,” Kathras says before his father can speak, still not looking at me. “They are water. The fire should be obvious, even to a human.”
I bristle at that. “And I suppose the seed represents the soil?”
“No.” Now, he does look at me, to reach out and touch my mask. “You represent the soil, and all that grows from it. Do you see the others dressed like you?”
I loathe that I was wrong, when he is so haughty and dismissive, but I do see more plant masks.
“And air?” I gesture overhead at a merry dance of winged fae whose masks are adorned with feathers like his.
“All of this talk of ritual bores me,” Cassan complains.
“Cenere has a promising future here at court,” Arcus says, lazily waving his hand. “Your brother is right to educate her on the customs Luthian never bothered to.”
“Luthian?” Kathras’s face blanches visibly, even in the warmth of the firelight.
“Father allowed him to return, thanks to this luscious human,” Cassan explains.
“Having Luthian at court is a small price to pay for such a wonder.” Arcus moves one of my flimsy scarves aside to bare my breast. He cups it and rubs his finger over my nipple, turning it flush and hard.
In the circle, the drums have again reached a peak, and the bound faeries grunt and moan as they empty themselves into the goblets again. When the drumming starts up once more, some of them begin to weep.
“Pleasure and Torment,” Arcus whispers. “Wait until I have you next, and you will learn the depths of both.”
I have already learned, from a far better tutor. But I shiver, which he seems to enjoy, and I reach up to brush my fingers over his mask. “And you, Your Majesty? What element do you represent?”
“Magic.” He flicks his finger against the arm of his crystal throne, and it lights from within with a short pulse of white.
I let out a little gasp to show how impressed I am. For a king, he’s shockingly easy to manipulate. Perhaps having such an inflated sense of self-worth makes one blind to how malleable they truly are.
Kathras speaks again, as if his lesson wasn’t interrupted. “When the goblets are full, they’ll be passed around the courtiers to share, to take in the power that was raised.”
“And then, lovely Cenere, we’ll celebrate our new power with a game,” Arcus says.
“A game, Your Majesty?”
He taps the end of my nose. “I wouldn’t want to spoil the surprise. But expect to be taken tonight. And expect me to take you.”
“If you find her first,” Cassan says casually.
Should I taunt him about the wager? For if he does take me tonight, he’ll have already lost. I’ll wait until I know if the bet is a secret or not.
“I’ll have her, anyway,” Arcus growls, his pride unmistakably wounded. He reaches between us to unlace his breeches.
I move obediently into place, sliding from his knee to stand. He lifts me onto his cock, parting my legs around him, and I find myself in a position very like the one from the throne room. His thick shaft opens me, and I moan, leaning my head back on him while he thrusts with the lazy rhythm of the drums.
“She’s mine,” the king warns his sons. “She may be Luthian’s mate, but this cunt belongs to me.”
The more Arcus talks, the more I look forward to his death. I keep my gaze fixed on the activity in the circle, though I don’t forget to perform appropriately for the king’s ego. He speeds up when the drums do, go still when they stop, resumes when they pick up again, and soon I’m no longer feigning my enjoyment. His fingers trip across my clit while his other hand holds me upright, mashing my breast. I move with Arcus, forgetting how personally repugnant he is, and I come again and again with the faeries in the circle.
I glance up now and then to track the movement of the moon across the sky. By the time it reaches its apex, the chained faeries are no longer crying out or resisting. They whimper, their mouths slack, some of them drooling as their heads loll on their necks. The drums stop one last time.
The goblets are full to the brim, and the Gwragedd Annwn move through the gaps between the stone. Courtiers fall into line, awaiting their turn to drink from the vessels.
One by one, I watch as they swallow the living essence, then vanish. A priestess approaches our royal cluster, and Arcus withdraws from my body, depositing me on my feet. I shift my toes through the leaf litter on the forest floor, my sex throbbing; I was so close when the drums stopped.
“You should go first,” Arcus says. “I’ll be along after. Be sure to give me a good chase.”
I don’t know what that means, but I step forward and let the Gwragedd Annwn press the rim of the goblet to my lips. I take a swallow, and the clearing is gone.