Chapter 17 George goes to a banquet. #2
The king called Peros and his aide next. Isahn stiffened on the lectus as his uncle drew near.
“You’re my good Salskanan pet, aren’t you?” George tried her best to remind Isahn that he was fully concealed behind a false exterior. His uncle would be none the wiser.
“Yes, Your Majesty, how can we serve you?” Sir Sarma groveled.
Isahn turned his derisive snort into a quiet cough.
The woman was forced onto her back on a low table, produced by pixies just for the occasion. The king instructed her to fill her cheeks with olives and lie with her mouth ajar. Peros then had to fish them out one by one using only his tongue.
George felt horrendous for the woman, especially since Peros was not shy about how much he enjoyed the activity. If his moans weren’t enough of a giveaway, the tent of his toga was a sure sign.
Repulsive.
She had no choice but to kiss Isahn soundly, to hide his sneer from the other guests’ view.
The main course tinkled into existence soon after. They dined in a half-dazed state, trying to find some comfort in the savory food and each other’s company while pretending to enjoy the king’s unseemly show of power.
After the secunda mensa had come and gone, whisked away by elf magic, George clasped Isahn’s hand tightly in her own and gave him a steadying squeeze.
“We’re up soon,” she whispered.
He gazed into her eyes for a moment before releasing her hand to tangle his fingers into her curls and pull her down for a kiss.
“Ah! It seems my daughter is keen to perform for you all this evening! And here I thought she was shy,” the king blared to the room.
Isahn eyed George apologetically as he pulled away. She hadn’t minded, and tried to let him know it wasn’t his fault with a stroke of touch magic down his arm. It was odd that her father hadn’t called attention to her earlier.
Yanking on a mask of enjoyment, George giggled demurely, fanning herself with her free hand. “My Salskanan pet is simply so entertaining,” she tittered.
This placated the king, who called up another viceroy and his wife to perform a show with honey.
Their turn came too soon.
George’s hand vibrated with tension against Isahn’s forearm while they walked to the front of the room.
“It’s just me and you. Take us to space,” he said in a hushed voice as they stopped before the king.
George squeezed her earl’s arm, beyond grateful for his presence. She hated this part of the banquet and often fantasized of throttling her father with her touch magic right then and there. But the king had touch and sight magic, just like her. And he was stronger.
Isahn was made to retrieve an almond and rose water pastry and pop it in the exposed seam of George’s bosom. He brushed his fingertips over her skin as though savoring a private moment, not standing before sixty other people.
“The stars, Georgie,” Isahn whispered, his mouth barely moving.
She sent them as requested, and when all she could see was the two of them and a sea of endless sparkling pinpricks of light, he set to his assigned task.
He put on a show, nibbling on the dessert between them. Then Isahn glanced up at her, his eyes filled with desire in spite of the unconscionable circumstances.
“This tastes like you.” His tongue flicked out to tease the edge of the pastry.
George almost melted, there amongst her stars. But only for a split second before her father’s droll voice cut through the illusion of privacy. “This bores me. Take your seats.”
They returned to their spots on the lectus, and she snuggled close to Isahn, tucking a leg between his for the simple comfort of being in contact with one of the few good men in the room.
King Gasparo ranted for a few minutes about how the performances were entertaining but not captivating enough to be pleasurable. Several viceroys cheered in agreement, and George took note of the ones with the brightest eyes.
“There wasn’t enough fear this evening. Not enough flavor for my liking,” the king growled. “Bring in the young chef! He’ll sample his goods.”
Shit.
George caught Dunstan’s gaze across the room, followed by Wynnie’s. They eyed one another in abject terror as they waited for Ceadda to be brought in.
Their dear friend, with his short coily hair and his heart always out on his sleeve, was soon escorted into the triclinium by a fearsome pair of guards who stepped aside to wait by the door.
Isahn turned to George with a question in his eye. He hadn’t met Adda yet, but based on her stiffness and silence, she figured he realized this was her friend. Her kind, innocent friend.
Her putrid father leaned over his aide, his hot breath stinking of whiskey as he asked George, “Where’s that one you selected earlier?”
“With Dunstan,” she eked out.
“Ah, yes.” He swiveled, pointing a fat finger at Helena across the room. “You! Come up here again. Strip.”
George wanted to vomit.
Beside her, Isahn gasped.
“Do you want me to send you to space?” she whispered. This was new, this was egregious, even for Gasparo.
“Will you be there?” he replied softly.
“No.” George wouldn’t look away, no matter how terrible the abuse her father brought onto his subjects.
She would, of course, afford the victims as much privacy as possible, but she wouldn’t avoid the onlookers.
It was cathartic, cataloging each and every one of the aristocrats who leered at their peers and the aides while they were mistreated. She kept track. One day she’d be queen.
“I won’t avoid this either.”
She squeezed his hand.
“You’ve made this syrup? Yes?” The king gestured to a large bowl of spoon sweets, figs, cherries, and citrus peel, all soaked in a rich, sweet liquid.
“I have, Your Majesty,” Ceadda replied in his low baritone.
“Wonderful. Sample it for me.”
George recognized the gleeful shimmer in her father’s eye and realized what he had planned. Fucking gods. He’d reached new levels of depravity. Never before in her twenty-three years had she seen him do this.
Adda tipped his chin and moved to lift a spoonful of syrup from the bowl.
Gasparo waited until the spoon was an inch from Ceadda’s mouth before he stopped the chef with three horrifying words: “Off her cunt.”
Three. That’s how many viceroys grinned at her father’s command.
Four others smiled when he screamed at Helena for covering her breasts.
And two laughed when Gasparo forced Adda down onto his knees with a burst of touch magic so harsh a crack rang out against the tiles.
She cataloged the audience as Adda completed his task.
When it was done, the cook was ordered back to the kitchens, and the aide re-dressed herself in her crumpled toga. Isahn gagged, lips twisting as he swallowed back his own vomit.
George caught his gaze, her own filled with apology. She hated this. She hated her father. He didn’t deserve the power he held. He needed to die.
Finally, after-dinner drinks replaced the desserts. She downed a full glass of whiskey before helping herself to a second. Isahn did the same.
The guests began to stand and mingle, viceroys with their aides on their arms, chatting with one another in small groups. The king called in the musicians and dancers who wore what amounted to little more than bathing cloths.
The shifting activities were the opportunity George and her friends needed to escape.
Wynnie escorted her aide from the room first, clutching his ass tightly as she made a big show of dragging him off to have “fun” together.
Dunstan went next, carrying Helena out as he murmured something in her ear.
To anyone watching, it looked like he was impassioned.
He was probably promising to get her out of the party to safety.
Then it was their turn. George ran her palm languidly down Isahn’s chest as she moved behind her father.
“Oh, my dearest Georgetta, off so early?” His falsely singsong voice slashed at her eardrums.
“We are, Father. I find I can’t keep my hands off my Salskanan pet any longer,” she purred as she tweaked one of Isahn’s nipples.
This placated the king well enough, and they got away.
At the far end of the long hall outside of the triclinium, George, Isahn, and Burke met up with Wynnie and Eanraig, who buzzed around her head, waiting for his next assignment.
Dunstan stood a few feet away, speaking with his assigned aide.
“Are you certain?” His voice was low, locs covering the side of his face as he leaned down in conversation.
“Yes,” she replied firmly. “I need to remember. I need to know. It’s fodder.”
He murmured something softly, then Helena slipped away around the corner.
They learned Wynnie’s aide made the same choice. Both wanted to remember why they needed to escape the king.
“We need to check on Adda,” George said. “Ean, have Hildy meet us in the kitchens. Is Chef Carozza down there?”
The young faerie nodded. “Yes, according to Bina.” She was a pixie enslaved in the kitchens whose job was creating fresh berries for the chefs.
“We’ll see you there.”
Ceadda was a shell of himself, sitting upon a wooden stool as he rocked back and forth. “I didn’t want to. I didn’t want to. I didn’t want to.”
“Adda,” George spoke softly as she approached her friend and crouched down before him. “I’m so sorry.”
His father looked over at her, his tired eyes brimming with tears, and she offered a small shake of her head. It had never been that bad before.
“Is she all right? I didn’t want to.”
“She’ll be fine. Her friends will care for her, and she’ll remember nothing of the night,” George lied.
“I need to forget, too.”
Nodding, she looked to Burke, Wynnie, and Dunstan for support. With her helping that evening, one of them would not be needed, but they’d determine that between themselves, and George would handle her assignment accordingly.
Isahn stood in a shadowed corner, looking forlorn, eyes sparkling with unshed tears.
“Carozza, would you help us?” George asked Adda’s father who was taking his frustrations out on a lump of dough.
“Of course. Son, are you sure you wish to forget?”
“Yes.” Though he turned to face his father, Adda’s eyes remained wholly unfocused.
“I’ll put on the tea.” The head chef busied himself with the kettle and herbs that would allow Ceadda to sleep while they overwrote his memory.
After a lifetime in the palace, George knew mindmolding wasn’t a cure for trauma, but it seemed to help many, especially if it was done soon after the incident.
Still, a person’s body would never truly forget the horror.
Bile would rise and muscles would tense each and every time a victim was near the king.
Even without remembering precise incidents, there were enough known reasons to hate him; most didn’t question their physical reaction.
Hildy joined them, and the group gathered around their broken comrade. Remaining near the wall, Isahn observed the mindmages in action.
“What do you wish to remember?” Wynnie spoke softly.
“I was on break after making dinner, playing with the new puppies in the barn.” Adda’s voice was flat, emotionless. He accepted a cup from his father. Chef Carozza knelt, placing a steadying hand on his son’s forearm.
They stepped away to plan, ensuring the changes would stick.
The wards who the king kept to overwrite memories stuck to simple scenes, lying in a bed and staring up at a blank ceiling, or sitting before a roaring fire.
George and her friends, as rare as it was that they chose to forget, opted for happier scenarios implanted in their minds.
“Do you want to handle the touch?” Dunstan asked George. “I can stand guard.”
George nodded, her lips pressed tightly together as Ceadda was lulled to sleep by the tea. His head thunked down on the wooden table, and his father coughed. It was time.
With their hands piled on Adda’s head, each touching him with at least a fingertip, they focused.
A new reality formed from their flowing magic, each sense brought by a different mindmage as they pushed away the invasive abuse wrought by the king, replacing it with quiet footsteps padding across the lawn to the barn, the yips of happy pups, the screaming goats, soft fur, and the pleasant odor of hay.
Ceadda moaned in his sleep as the final pieces of his new memory fell into place.
When they were finished, George and her friends fell back, exhausted. Cook retained enough strength to pour them each a cup of wine, spread between an array of mismatched cups and glasses.
Isahn joined Georgie, resting a palm on her lower back as he took a mug for himself and sipped from it.
The night had been difficult, but they made it through as they always did. Still, it was untenable. It had to end, and she had to finish it soon.
George nestled her head against Isahn’s chest while he wrapped her in a hug. Carozza held his son. Hildy went to Dunstan, and Burke pulled Wynnie into his arms. They stood in silence for a long while, comforted by closeness and the crackling of the ever-burning kitchen hearth.
“Thank you, and I’m so sorry,” George whispered to Isahn.
“You have nothing to thank me for and nothing to apologize for,” he spoke into her hair before pressing a warm kiss to the crown of her head.
She melted into his embrace. This was what she needed, his strength, his support, the permission he freely granted to break down as she waded through the rancid floodwaters of King Gasparo’s reign.