Chapter 3 #2
cup, as did several others at the table. The serving maid’s tray
rattled and Feroz, the merchant’s son, laughed out loud and clapped
Aleksandr on the shoulder. Yago’s black eyes narrowed to slits and
his knuckles were white around the stem of his goblet. Aleksandr
sat there with a lazy grin on his face, baiting the Wolf.
Yago was neither small nor softly muscled,
but given Aleksandr’s height and breadth, Sahar thought it prudent
that Yago resist the taunt. She raised her cup to Yago with an
encouraging smile and took a sip before glaring over the rim at
Aleksandr, whose grin faded as his jaw tightened.
Thankfully, the servants entered the salon
with trays laden with roasted lamb and savory carrots, onions, and
turnips. The table of hungry men filled their trenchers to
overflowing and attacked the meat and vegetables, silent but for
their chewing, and stopping only to lade their plates fuller from
the bowls of seasoned rice and kamut. By the time the trays of
cheeses and honeyed dates and pears were brought out, conversation
resumed, at least amongst everyone at the table except for Sahar
and Yago. Sahar because she was a woman and not invited to
participate, and Yago because he sat silent and sullen and drinking
more wine than was wise. Not that she blamed him. True, he had
insulted Aleksandr first, but it was obvious that the others had
sided with Aleksandr, and Yago, alone and far from his home, had to
feel the slight.
Yago left the table as soon as was polite,
and the mood there instantly lightened. Sahar glared her
displeasure at Aleksandr, who shrugged and then picked over his
trencher, packing bits of juicy lamb and rice and soft cheese into
a square of linen. He folded it up and stuffed it into the pocket
of his tunic, ignoring the curious glances of the other riders and
giving Sahar a quick grin.
“Once a stable boy scavenging for scraps,”
Anastasia said from her position standing beyond the table wearing
a snide smile on her deceptively fair face, “always a stable boy
scrapping for royal leftovers.”
“Sister,” Aleksandr said through gritted
teeth. “How kind of you to watch over your brother so
attentively.”
“Half-brother,” she spat.
Sahar waited for Aleksandr to explain that
the scraps were for the poor, starved kitten he had found, but he
picked up his goblet and drained it, pointedly ignoring Anastasia’s
presence as he set the empty goblet down on the table with a
satisfied, “Ahh.”
Anastasia tossed her flaxen hair and flounced
away, settling at a table occupied by two older wealthy princes.
Sahar excused herself to visit at her parents’ table, while two of
the Scorpion’s daughters not so discreetly made their way over to
the riders’ table and held a lively conversation with Aleksandr and
Feroz. The girlish giggles assailed Sahar’s ears. Pleading her
self-imposed training regimen, she said her goodnights to her
family and left the salon, but instead of going to her chambers,
she took the long way around to the kitchens, where she asked Anya
for a small bowl of goat’s milk.
“Certainly, young miss,” Anya said as she
went to the cupboards for a bowl. She poured a ladleful into it and
handed it to Sahar. “May I ask you something?”
“Of course.”
“This Aleksandr and his sister, Anastasia.
What are they like?”
“Why do you ask?”
“My husband and I, we came from the Northern
Steppes to settle here with our young son. I was curious. It’s been
a long time since I have met anyone from our homeland.”
“I didn’t know that,” Sahar said. “Though now
I can hear the similarities in your accent to Aleks…them.”
Anya smiled sadly.
“You miss your homeland?” Sahar asked.
“I do,” Anya said. Then hastened to add, “But
King Asad and Queen Oona, this city, have been good to us. We had,
I have, a good life here, but yes, I do miss some parts of my
homeland.”
Sahar nodded, remembering that Anya had been
widowed a few years ago now. “Would you like me to ask if you could
speak with them?” she said.
“Oh yes, please,” Anya answered. “But,
perhaps you could ask only the king’s son, Aleksandr. I think he
would be more agreeable.”
Sahar laughed, not at all surprised that Anya
realized the chance of Anastasia conversing with a servant for the
servant’s pleasure was slim to none. Her parents always said if you
wanted to know what was truly happening in a household, ask the
servants, a piece of wisdom learned from her grandmother, Queen
Noor.
“I will ask Aleksandr the next time I see
him.”
Which would likely be sometime late tomorrow,
after he slept off the night’s festivities with the Scorpion’s
daughters.
“Come now, my little Kiska,” Aleksi coaxed.
“You must try to eat a bit more of this rice.” The kitten had eaten
what meat and cheese he had allowed her for the night with
enthusiasm, but he had to keep a little set aside for the morning
before he could bring her some egg and milk from his breakfast. “If
only we had some milk now, eh, to soak this rice in and make it
more to your liking.”
“Ahem.”
Aleksi snapped his head up. Sahar was
standing at the open half door that separated his antechamber to
Zolotoy’s stall. She looked as surprised to see him as he was to
see her, though it was his room.
“How did you get in here?” he asked. “I did
not hear a sound. Not even a single blade of straw shift.”
“We cats can be quiet when we wish to.” She
thrust a small bowl at him, “I brought you, the kitten, milk from
the kitchens.”
He stood, tucking Kiska into the crook of his
arm. “Thank you,” he said, taking the proffered bowl in his other
hand. He set it down on the chest at the foot of his cot. “Would
you like to come in?”
Sahar took in the cramped room with only the
cot and a stool to sit on. “No. I wanted to bring the milk. Oh, I
promised Anya, our head cook, that I would ask if you would take
the time to meet with her. She is from the steppe lands too, and is
hoping to speak with you of your homeland.”
“Of course.” Aleksi stepped up to the door
and Sahar took half a step back. He grinned and her cheeks pinked.
“Perhaps tomorrow after training I can meet her at the kitchens,
maybe sweet talk her into some more milk and meat to fill Kiska’s
little larder.”
“That would keep your half-sister from
calling you a scavenger.” There was pity in her expression and her
voice, something Aleksi didn’t want from her or anyone. “You
could’ve explained your actions, then she would have looked the
fool, not you.”
“What do I care what she calls me, or why,”
he said so gruffly that Kiska mewled. He tucked the kitten closer
and ran a soothing hand down her back. “I know the truth,” he said
in a harsh whisper. “You know the truth. What do I care what those
spoilt, cannot-see-beyond-their-own-royal-noses like Anastasia and
Yago think or say about me?”
“What does Yago have to do with what your
sister said?” she snapped.
“He’s like her, thinking he’s above others
because of an accident of birth.”
Her big green eyes grew larger and she lifted
her chin a notch. He had insulted her again. He should be sorry for
it, but all he could see was that cursed oily worm fawning over
her, and her accepting—no, enjoying it. He set his shoulders and
narrowed his gaze on hers. “Why do you defend him?”
“Because,” she said, her voice as stiff as
her spine, “I prefer to judge a man by his actions, and he was the
only man to step aside and offer me a place beside him in the line
of riders. He treated me as an equal.”
Aleksi snorted. “You are as blind as you are
beautiful.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“Ask someone who was there, someone who saw,
who truly saw.”
“Like who, Ratter? Your new best friend, a
man who hates the Wolf’s parents almost as much as my parents
do?”
Aleksi shifted Kiska, who had fallen asleep
and was purring in his arm. “They have good reason to hate them,”
he said. “Surely you have been told the stories. Talk about judging
a person by their actions.”
“Yago is not his parents.”
“And you are not yours, and I am not
mine.”
“Why do I even try to talk to you?”
Aleksi smiled, slow and sure. He reached out
and twined his fingers into the thick, black length of her hair.
This he knew the answer to. “Because,” he murmured, “you are drawn
to me as I am you to. Because you could scorch me to bare earth
with those blazing eyes of yours and I would rise back up and take
it all again and again and again.”
She swallowed hard, and the fire in her eyes
melted into swirling pools of emerald. “Why did you call me
tigress?” she whispered.
He wrapped his hand around the back of her
neck and pulled her closer. “Because,” he said, his voice coming
from somewhere deep in his chest, “you are a tigress.” He closed
the hair’s breadth between them with his lips. “You are my
tigress,” he breathed into her parted lips and grinned as the
breath she had caught and held came out in a sigh. He touched his
lips to hers, nibbling lightly, tasting her salty sweetness, and
when she neither bit nor pulled away, he covered her mouth with
his, devouring her lips, her breath, a starving man granted a
sumptuous feast. She moaned in surrender, the most sensuous sound
he had ever heard, and he pressed closer. An ear-splitting shriek
broke them apart.
Aleksi glanced down at Kiska, who had been
squished between them and was giving him her most indignant glare.
“So sorry, little one,” he cooed, shifting her on his arm. He
looked back up at Sahar, grinning from ear to ear. She slapped him
across the cheek. Hard.
Sahar slept little and fitfully. The low,
resonant sound of Aleksandr’s voice vowing to rise again and again,
the warm strength of his hand on her neck, pulling her inexorably
to him, to his mouth, soft and tender as a whisper one moment and
then hard and unyielding the next, swirling round and round her
sleep-starved mind with the dizzying heat of a fever dream.
Finally, exhausted, she slipped into a
semblance of deep slumber as the sun began its ascent in the
eastern sky, and did not rise from her bed until almost noon. Most
of the household were already busy with the day’s duties, so she