36. Two More Days #2
“Good evening everyone. What’s going on?
” I asked as good-naturedly as I could. A night ritual was something most of the servants and lower class in the Palace looked forward to, because it was a rather leveling affair.
I didn’t mind being humbled in front of these women. But I didn’t want to be embarrassed .
“Don’t worry, Your Majesty. I promise you’ll be pleased,” Turner said quietly.
“I hope so.”
“Don’t worry! We’re going to make you irresistible,” Keesa whispered.
“And I don’t want you to see until it’s all done.
” With quiet instructions, she turned me around.
“Just while we’re getting everything ready,’ she whispered happily, placing a soft, black scarf over my eyes and tied it carefully at the back of my head.
Then she clapped her hands and started issuing orders…
A few minutes later I was utterly disoriented, and my theories on what Keesa had done were changing by the moment and growing more and more unlikely. I’d been pawed and gripped and giggled over. Parts of my body felt far too tightly secure for nightwear. Yet others were alarmingly open to the air.
Finally, Keesa clapped her hands again.
“Everyone stand back, we need to make sure it’s secure.”
I went still again as every hand left me and there was a sense of sudden isolation. The room went quiet.
“Your Majesty, could you turn a slow circle so we might see every angle?”
Bemused, I did as she asked.
“Good, good. And… do you mind… dancing a little? Just so we can be sure?”
My face heated—I knew exactly why she was asking. But I cleared my throat and took a few rolling steps as I’d been taught in my teens, letting my hands drift in the air.
“Oh good! I think… I think we’re ready for you to see!”
The blindfold fell away, and I blinked away the blur. Slowly the women were revealed, staring at me, hands over their mouths, all clearly beaming behind their fingers.
“Look over here,” Keesa murmured, nudging my shoulder to turn me.
I turned my body and my head at the same time, finding the three paneled mirror now behind me… and what I saw in the reflection dropped my jaw.
I’d known since I was young that when I turned thirty I would dance the night fire, either to call a mate, or to claim my mate and to encourage those who followed me to know their worth as well .
Because that was the heart of the night ritual—a woman standing before the ruling class and claiming her value.
Demonstrating it. If she was unmarried, she let the men see what they had to earn if they presumed to court her.
And if she was already married, her husband celebrated her and claimed her before all eyes.
It was rare, these days, for a noblewoman to wait until her thirtieth to marry.
But I had dragged my feet whenever the issue of succession was raised.
Losing my parents in my early twenties and taking the crown when we had expected decades more under their rule had given me a few years respite—our people had to be secure and I had to know what it was to rule before I could effectively identify the man to rule them for me.
The stronger I was as a Queen, the stronger my King would be.
But in recent years, it had become a niggling question at Court, and my Advisors had pushed for a decision.
I’d decided on Turo because I trusted him, and knew he’d rule with integrity. He would make the succession simple because he was already known and trusted by the people as well. It had been an easy decision politically, though far more difficult personally.
I hadn’t been excited to dance the night ritual for him, but I had hoped it might help awaken that side of myself that had always seemed so… numb.
Now… as I stared at what Keesa had made for me, I swallowed hard, my mind flashing on Melek and that fire he ignited in my blood.
My body had been wrapped in wide bands of sleek, black leather that must have been made from kidskin because it was so soft it felt like silk.
A wide band covered my breasts, pressing them high, then angled across my body to wrap my hips and cover the apex of my thighs.
Yet, that dark shape was only implied, because my body had been draped in a single, long, semi-sheer fabric, so light it caught the air of even a breath.
Keesa had fashioned a wide, flat neckline that ran from the point of one shoulder to the other, hugging my collarbones, then the fabric simply fell to my ankles at front and back.
But that leather emerged from the gap at the side, slipping over my hip, and wrapping over the fabric, across my belly and under my breasts.
The firm but flexible leather hugged the soft fabric to my skin, creating a loose, billowing curtain that covered me modestly, but hinted daringly of my skin and the very little covering me underneath .
When I turned in the mirror, the fabric rippled softly against my belly and thighs. The long slits at the sides were held together around my ribs, but openings above and below fluttered, suggesting that with the right movement I would be completely bare.
And yet, I wasn’t.
The dark bands of leather under the fabric covered my sacred places completely… and yet hugged them so perfectly, it left no room for imagination.
My form was lined in black, draped in blood red, teasing the eye. Yet the only visible skin was the strip left open at the sides of my thighs and waist.
“I don’t know how you did this,” I breathed. “But… thank you.”
The women laughed and clapped, joy bursting out of them like they’d been holding their collective breaths.
I turned, staring at myself in the mirror’s surface, a roiling conflict of emotions churning through me.
I would have given anything to stay here in this room, call Melek to me, and torment him with this… what? What was it? A dress? A nightgown? Underthings?
In my mind’s eye I could see his expression when he caught sight of me in this. See his big hands reaching for me, drawing lines along my skin, searching for the end of the leather to loosen it and free my body for his hands—
I swallowed hard and turned to Keesa. “It’s incredible. And I’m covered. Thank you.”
This gown was daring, yet hid more of me than most of the others I’d seen growing up.
Most women, including my mother, had worn soft, sleeveless nightgowns that appeared modest… until the light of the flames behind them showed every dip and valley of their bodies.
“Now… please tell me I won’t be dancing alone?” I made myself ask the question I’d been avoiding until now, afraid I’d lose my nerve.
“No, my Lady, of course not,” Turner piped up from beside Keesa. “The threat of war has motivated several maidens to take part with you, don’t worry.”
Thank God for small mercies. I was about to ask how many women would dance when a deep, rumbling roll began.
My first instinct was that it was thunder, that our night might be rained out. But then the rumbling crescendo peaked and the drums began their steady beat, calling us to the ritual .
Every woman in the room—including me—turned to look out the window in the direction of the sound where darkness was overcoming twilight and the night was beginning.
My heart raced double-time in rhythm with the deep boom, boom, boom, boom...
Tonight I would dance the night ritual. Tomorrow I would declare the male that had won my heart. And then the whole nation would finally know who Melek really was.
Shit was becoming very, very real.
“I believe it’s time,” I said quickly, licking my lips because they suddenly felt very dry.
There was an explosion of feminine excitement at that as my servants and ladies prepared to accompany me out of the Palace and to the bonfire. But it was interrupted by a knock at the door that we barely heard over the booming of the drums.
I frowned when Diadre’s voice rose on the other side of the thick wood and sent one of the maids to let her in.
To my shock, it wasn’t a uniformed and booted soldier who stepped quickly into the room and looked for me, biting her lip. But my friend, with her wavy hair hanging loose past her shoulders and draped in a thin shift.
I blinked and beckoned her closer. The women around me parted to let her pass, and when she reached me, we stared at each other. Her eyes went wide when she finally saw my entire outfit, and a beaming smile tugged at her lips.
“Oh shit, Yilan. He’s going to lose his mind.”
I stared at Diadre. “You’re going to dance the flames?” I asked her, incredulous.
My friend’s smile faltered, but she nodded. “I didn’t want you out there unprotected,” she said quietly. “I have two daggers on a belt under this, and one at my thigh. If they get out of control, I’ll have your back.”
I gaped at her. “But, Diadre,” I hissed. “If you dance, the men can declare for you!”
She shrugged and her eyes drifted down and away. “I doubt any of them will have an eye for me. And besides, I can just… not accept any suitors. I didn’t want you out there on your own.”
Touched—and a little relieved that she’d be close—I pulled her into a quick hug, squeezing her hard and enjoying it when she squeezed me back.
“I’m so glad you’re here,” I whispered in her ear.
She nodded, then hooked her elbow into mine and then we turned for the door, walking out in time with the beating of the drums in the beckoning dark.
“Don’t worry,” Diadre murmured, turning her head so I’d hear her lowered voice. “If anyone loses their shit, just look at me. I’ll toss you a knife.”
“Just make certain you don’t apply blades to an ally,” Turner said dryly from my other side. “I know the men can be a little, er, enthusiastic. But let’s not reduce the ancestral bloodlines without good reason. We have only a small number of truly strong stallions, after all.”
Diadre and I both spluttered laughter, which was a great release of tension.
I took a deep breath as we all began the walk through the Palace.
It was finally happening.
Just a few more hours before I could tell the world that Melek was mine.