The Patience Room
SEVRIN
Rathmor Palace
The summons arrived at Yvara's rooms at the third hour after dinner. Sevrin had sent it without explanation. He rarely offered any.
The healer's words had not left him since they were spoken. Not pregnant. The lie had been complete, offered without hesitation and accepted just as easily. It was not the worst of what she had done. It was only the easiest place to begin.
Yvara smoothed her robe and smiled. "Majesty. I came as quickly as I could." She moved to the center of the room, arranging herself with practiced ease. "I hope I have not kept you."
He said nothing.
She waited. Then tried again. "The weather has been terrible. I do not know how the servants manage the upper gardens in this cold. Though I suppose they do not have much choice." A light laugh. "I asked for extra blankets last week and they brought me wool. Wool, as though I were—"
"Sit down," he said.
She sat.
He looked at her then. Not with anger, not with heat, only with the particular quality of a man who has finished deciding something and has moved past the point of feeling anything about it. His eyes moved over her face with the unhurried attention of someone taking inventory.
She smiled again, smaller this time. "Majesty, do you wish me to entertain you this evening? Perhaps I should, before the child gets bigger and it becomes too much."
He did not answer.
"Are there any lords available?" she asked.
"Yes," he said.
He called for his attendant without raising his voice, the man appearing within moments. “Bring the lords invited to the Ivory this evening.”
The attendant bowed and withdrew.
Sevrin looked at the candles along the upper wall. "It has been a long day," he said. "I wish for darkness."
He rose and extinguished everything himself, moving through the room with unhurried precision, pinching each wick between his fingers until only a single candle remained, the one on the low table beside his chair. Then he returned to his seat and picked up his glass and did not speak again.
Yvara waited in the dimness. Then, smoothly, she reached for the clasp at her shoulder and let her robe fall. She moved to the bed and arranged herself against the pillows with the ease of someone who has performed this many times and has long since stopped thinking about it.
The door opened. She looked up.
Two men entered.
She went still. Her eyes moved to Sevrin.
"Two?" she said carefully. "Majesty, perhaps this is too many."
He looked at her over the rim of his glass. "Perhaps."
Silence.
The men waited near the door.
"You need not trouble yourself, Yvara," Sevrin said quietly.
She looked at them again, at the door, at the single candle, at Sevrin in his chair in the near dark. Then she said, with a lightness she did not entirely manage, "I do not mind trying something new."
“Get on with it, Highness,” one of the men said.
Sevrin saw her stiffen at the raw edge in the tone, though she couldn’t see anything beyond the shadow that loomed over her.
The wet sound of spit hitting a palm rang out, followed by the rustle of cloth.
A grunt marked the man’s movement as he pushed into her, rough and without hesitation.
“Fuck, so soft… so damn sweet,” he growled, his voice thick with hunger.
Sevrin watched the faint outline of the man leaning down, sucking loudly on her breasts.
The second man closed in soon after, his presence announced by a low, sneering rasp.
“Open that mouth, Highness.” Sevrin noted Yvara’s flinch at the command.
He heard her choked gasp as the man pushed himself past her lips, the harsh rhythm clear even in the dark.
“Take it well, royal slut,” the man muttered before pulling back slightly.
“Yes, I’m a royal slut,” Yvara said with false enthusiasm, remembering the king’s preference for degradation.
Sevrin then caught the faint motion of him smacking her face with his length, a wet, degrading slap that echoed before driving back in.
It was then that a strange smell began to creep into the room.
It was damp, raw, thick with the reek of unwashed skin and something primal, fouling the Ivory’s usually pristine air.
Sevrin’s nose wrinkled in revulsion, and he pressed his handkerchief to his face, stifling a gag at the rancid stench.
He kept his reaction quiet, a private disdain, but Yvara, blind to him in the darkness, seemed to misinterpret the muffled sound.
Her movements grew more desperate, her moans louder, forced and exaggerated, as if to please whoever watched.
Then, her voice broke through, tremulous but eager.
“His Majesty enjoys this. Please… hit me with it again. Smack me with it, again and again. Rub it on my face.”
Sevrin sipped from his goblet. It was his favorite, aged perfectly. Asharin’s fork from weeks ago rested inside it, and he turned it once, watching as softened scraps of fowl drifted upward through the wine.
Perfection.
He took another sip, his eyes never leaving Yvara. The second man obliged her with a rough chuckle. The wet slaps rang out as he struck her face again and again, dragging himself across her cheeks, her pleas only urging him on. “Beg louder, Highness. Let the king hear how much you like it.”
“I love it,” she gasped, her voice shaking with a mix of shame and forced zeal. “Please, don’t stop. Smear it on me.”
The second man pulled back from her mouth with a rough groan, and Sevrin watched the faint outline of him leaning over her as he spilled across her face. “Wear that,” he rasped, stepping back with a satisfied huff.
The first man remained between her legs, his pace turning uneven before he looked toward Sevrin in the dark. “Where would you like me, Majesty?”
Sevrin looked at Yvara, his tone smooth and cutting.
“That is up to Lady Yvara.” He paused, letting the moment hang, before adding with a pleasant edge, “There is no concern for pregnancy, since she already carries my child.” His eyes bore into her through the dimness. “And her face is already… soiled.”
Yvara understood the trap immediately. She heard it close around her. If she refused it would be clear that she was not pregnant. She had no room to refuse. She said, instead, “Inside of me is fine, although if it pleases the king, my breasts—”
Before she could finish, the man grunted loudly, spilling inside her.
“You’re a good royal whore,” he said, wiping himself on her leg.
Afterwards Sevrin rose from his chair and moved through the room lighting the candles one by one, each wick catching in turn until the Ivory came back to itself, cream walls and gold veins and soft light rising in tiers.
He did it without hurry, his back to the bed, as though he were simply completing a task that needed doing.
Yvara pushed herself upright.
Then she saw the first man properly. Older. Missing several teeth. Dirt worked into the creases of his hands and neck in a way that suggested it had been there for some time.
Sevrin turned. "I forgot the introductions," he said. "This is Lord Akin. He works the gardens and was kind enough to make time for us today.” He looked at the second man. Younger, an eye patch over the left eye, boils across his jaw and throat, something proud and unbothered in his posture. "And this is Lord Gizzard. He cleans the chamber pots of the lower levels.” He looked at the man. “Isn’t that right, Gizzard?”
The man grinned, his teeth brown at the roots. “Yes, Majesty.”
Yvara’s voice shook. “These are not lords, Majesty. These are… worthless creatures.” Tears streamed down her face as she began to process what happened. “How could you—why would you do this?”
Gizzard looked at Yvara with easy contempt. “Careful with that tone. One day you may find yourself below… and I will be the one emptying yours.”
Yvara looked at the first man. She gagged, her cheeks red. Her voice came out thin and vicious. "You're disgusting."
Lord Akin spat on the floor beside the bed. "And you're a used up whore," he said. "Everyone knows the King only wants your sister. They sing songs about it in the capital."
Sevrin waved his hand once. They left.
The door had barely closed before Yvara turned.
"Majesty." Her voice was raw now, the performance gone entirely. "There is no way that was safe for the ch—"
The candleholder left his hand without warning and struck the far wall.
Yvara went silent. Sevrin stood with his arm still extended, his eyes on her. His voice when it came was entirely even. "There is no child, Yvara. Stop the lies."
He smirked as she wiped the mess from her face, her eyes still burning with tears. "It is no fun being kept in the dark, is it, Lady Yvara?" His voice was dark, the amusement gone.
Her hands began to tremble. She pressed them flat against the sheet.
His eyes moved over her face and something in them changed, a slow red rising beneath the surface that was there and then contained, pressed back down into stillness.
"But that is not the greatest of your crimes," he said.
"The greatest is what you did to Asharin. "
"That useless wh—"
"Shut up." He crossed the room in three steps and his hand found her hair before she could move, fingers closing around it, pulling her toward him with a force that was controlled and absolute.
"Yvara," he said, his voice dropping until it was nearly gentle. "I want you to know something."
She did not speak.
"Your sister," he said. "If she were mine, I would never allow another man to touch her." His eyes held hers without looking away. "You are nothing more than a worthless whore I paid in promises. Covered in the filth of the lowest servant in my palace.”
He released her hair and she fell back against the pillows.
He looked at her with something that was almost reflective. "Perhaps you will get pregnant after all."
The color left her face completely. Then, beneath the fear, something else surfaced. She lifted her chin. "You are insane," she said. "Asharin will never love you. She only wants Cols—"
He laughed. It was not the sound she expected. It was not cold or controlled or performed. It came from somewhere real, harsh and uneven, his head lifting with it, his eyes bright.
He looked at her. "That is where you have me mistaken," he said.
He was quiet, his hands loose at his sides, something in him that had been held very tightly for a very long time releasing into the air of the room.
"I do not need your sister to love me," he said.
He looked at Yvara as though she had revealed something about herself rather than him.
“Reciprocity is a human need. I have no such requirement.”
“Proximity.” His hands moved at his sides in a faint, involuntary motion he did not appear to notice. “That is all I require.” He exhaled once. “And make no mistake. The moment that is not enough, she will be mine. But she does not need to love me. That was never necessary.”
He straightened his cuffs. "Just know this, Yvara. From the very beginning, the throne was never going to be yours." He looked at her with something that was almost kind. "You were simply preparation for what is to come."
He called for the guards. They entered with their eyes down, an attendant rushing in behind them. Sevrin said without looking at her, "It is time."
The attendant produced a brown dress, plain and rough. Yvara pulled it over her head with shaking hands. The guards respectfully averted their eyes.
"Escort Lady Yvara to her new lodgings below," Sevrin said. "I heard from Kinsad that the cell next to Pinovar's is now free."
One of the guards cleared his throat. "Aye, Majesty. Though there was another harvi outbreak in the west cells, apparently bad, the bugs are everywhere. The caretaker has said the place must be cleansed."
Sevrin considered this. "Tell him he can wait a while before that.
" A brief pause. "Pinovar murdered a child, if I recall correctly.
" He looked at Yvara. “And Lady Yvara seems quite comfortable around vermin.” He smiled at her. “Perhaps they will provide you…entertainment while you await your sister’s visit.”
She screamed as they took her arms.
He watched her go. Then, as the door closed behind her, he called out pleasantly, "Do tell Gizzy I say hello when he takes your pot tomorrow."
The Painted Room was dark when he entered, the ambient glow from the corridor enough to move by.
He walked along the mural wall slowly, the way he always did, taking in each image in sequence.
His eyes moved over them without hurry. He had commissioned these months ago now.
The painters had been discreet, talented, and handsomely compensated for both qualities.
He stopped at the image near the far end. "She sleeps in a dungeon full of bugs now, Asharin. I did not kill her. You may do that yourself.”
He looked at it for a long time. Then he opened the small drawer in the table beneath the mural and removed the veil. It was worn soft from handling, the fabric thinner at the folds than it had been. He had not noticed when that happened.
He pressed it briefly to his face and breathed.
"I will find you, Asharin," he murmured.
He folded it carefully and returned it to the drawer. Then he crossed to the bed, lay back against the pillows, and looked up at the ceiling where she looked back at him from the plasterwork above. He closed his eyes, letting his chest clench again as he thought back to that day.
He should have turned around. He knows it now. That mistake will not be repeated.
He was asleep before the last candle burned down.