19. Chapter 17
Chapter 17
Raven
I could not hide my body’s reaction to Caelan’s words, though I tried. Little shudders ran through me like spasms and I clenched my thighs together. My breathing was shallow and quick. I caught myself leaning towards him, and straightened again.
Fuck, what was the matter with me?
He was a Slayer . It was sick that I had to remind myself of this. It should be all I thought about when I was with him.
“Take off your fucking clothes,” he said.
What would he do if I denied him? He might tear my pants from my body with his own hands. Or perhaps he’d be at a loss, unsure what to do with a woman who didn’t jump to obey him.
I wanted to know which it was.
“No.”
A wicked smile curled up Caelan’s face. “Say it to me again.”
I felt less sure of the word this time, but I pretended otherwise, raising my chin and spitting it at him: “No.”
“No, my prince ,” he directed. He strolled back to the sideboard and popped another grape in his mouth.
I vividly remembered the last time I ate a fresh grape. It had been cycles ago, before I went into Los. The unfriendly land there didn’t allow them to grow, yielding only bitter fruits with tough skins that were no good for anything but staving off disease. And I couldn’t pretend I wasn’t hungry.
Caelan chewed carefully, exuding calm. He slowly reached out a hand and plucked another grape. When he bit into this one, he allowed some of the juices to splash onto his chin. I didn’t realize how hungrily I must be looking at the moist, sweet droplets until he chuckled.
I schooled my face but it was too late.
“Are you hungry, Eave?”
He knew I was. All the food I’d eaten since I met him, he’d passed me from his pack. All the water, he’d provided from his canteen.
“I’m used to scarcity in the deserts of Los,” I said, trying to sound like those heavy, round grapes were nothing to me. As I lied, my mouth watered at the yeasty scent of fresh bread beside them.
“Do you understand what a companion is, Eave?”
“Sure. It’s a whore-slave to someone rich or royal.”
Caelan chucked. Ate another grape. “Wish now that you’d turned back at the river?” He was the image of ease, but the way he stilled as he awaited my answer made me think he really cared. I never would have thought an Havard would care about such things, but then, I never would have thought an Havard would spare an innocent life either.
“No,” I said, though my voice wavered. Ever since we crossed the river, I’d had the feeling that I’d gotten myself in very, very over my head. What would happen to me now? I suspected I couldn’t imagine what it would cost to earn the kills I craved.
“You are my companion and I’m your master. As your master, every aspect of your life is up to me,” Caelan said conversationally. He tore off a piece of that fresh bread with his teeth and talked as he chewed. It was hearty but springy, filled with grains and bubbles. “What you eat. When. How much. It is up to me whether you continue to experience scarcity, or whether you enjoy abundance. I do like to spoil those who please me. Do you understand, Eave?”
“Of course,” I said through gritted teeth. Oh, I understood fine. I expected the next words before they came.
“Good. Would you like some bread while it’s still warm?”
Pride gathered inside me, swelling up like a big bubble about to burst. Words of denial lingered on the tip of my tongue. I wanted to spit them out just for the satisfaction of the look on his face. But I swallowed them back. I was hungry. I was dirty. My wound needed thorough cleaning. And denying Caelan would win me nothing but a short-lived, shallow feeling of victory. The true victory would come when I could make him trust me. The true victory awaited at court, where I would arrive on his arm as his official companion.
I’d made my choice. No second-guessing now.
“Yes, Prince,” I ground out, trying and failing to sound gracious. I thought he might remind me that I’d forgotten to say "please,” but the victory he’d won seemed enough for him, for now.
“After your bath,” he said. Then he waited, chewing his bread, trying to look disinterested. But I could see the truth beneath his disguise. His cock was still half-hard, and his eyes, which kept drifting away from me, always came back again. His breathing was too heavy for a naked man eating grapes.
I dropped my hands to my belt and untied the knot. I loosened the waist of the pants. Caelan’s eyes were sharply focused on me now. I was used to intensity in a man, but damn. He might as well have been a bird of prey himself the way he locked onto me and wouldn’t look away. My nipples tingled at the attention.
I dropped my pants. The fabric fell to my ankles and I stepped out. I wore nothing beneath. Revealed to him was the small patch of black hair that curled between my legs, which were muscled and lean. In Los, they’d told me I was too skinny to be practical—no good for battle or for bearing children. Perhaps a life in the shadows had kept me small.
“Shall I get in the bath?” I asked.
Caelan was staring. My heart thudded at the attention. I wasn’t used to being looked at at all, let alone inspected like this.
“No, come here,” he murmured.
I went. The scent of bread wafted into my nose, mixed with the lavender oils of the bath and the clean male scent of him.
He’d stopped eating. He lifted his hand and gently brought it to my skin, curving over the side of my breast and down my ribs to the narrow point of my stomach and down the side of my hip. It tickled at the juncture of my hip and I shivered. It was not often I’d been touched in my life, and even more rarely had I been touched so gently. The sensations surprised me as they flitted across my skin, spreading out from the point of origin until they made me feel in places he hadn’t even gone.
“Are you a virgin, Eave?” he asked softly.
“No.”
“Good. I wouldn’t want to be your first. Turn around.”
My heart raced. Was he going to take me now, before I even bathed? I’d expected…what had I expected? That he’d romance me first? Wine and dine me as if I were a noblewoman whose favor he wished to win? Naive. I was a slave, and his whore. That’s all a companion was. It was a fancy word for whore.
But I’d known that when I entered this room. I’d known what I might end up doing for this mission before I even crossed the river.
So I obeyed.
At first, I didn’t realize what made him gasp, but when his hand roughly swept my hair off my back, I did. His hands fell away and he didn’t touch me at all, or move.
“What the fuck is that?” he asked, dangerously. His tone, so recently gentle and soft, had hardened. Genuine anger filled his voice. I was suddenly aware in a new way that I was naked. I carried no weapons. I was helpless.
“It’s a tattoo.” I tried for lightness and failed. The heaviness of the mark on my back hung in the air between us, unable to be denied.
A raven, black as dragonstone, flew between my shoulders. Its wings spanned from one shoulder to the other, the details of the feathers etched out. The raven stared straight out, body below, claws lowest of all, sharp and open, ready to capture its prey. It was the symbol my father had named me after, a symbol that once flew on countless flags, that inspired peasants and nobles alike, a symbol that once meant hope for thousands across Vaharilar. Now, drawing it was treason. It was the sigil of House Rosa, and I was the only member left alive.
“The Traitor’s mark.” Caelan's anger made his voice vibrate.
“Yes." There was no use denying it.
“Where did you get it?”
My inspection had become an interrogation. The steam from the bath made the air feel thick and heavy, too hot to breathe.
“Many carry the mark in Los.” That was a lie, but he wouldn’t know. I’d been marked before I left Vaharilar, branded by the Coterie. They were still loyal to my father's memory and mission after twenty cycles and they taught me that my loyalty to the same must be my entire purpose, too. My handler had given me the mark before I went into Los. I wondered sometimes if he thought I'd forget who I was once I was on my own and be swayed away from my loyalty by the promise of a normal life. As if my craving for vengeance would ever let me.
“Rosa never allied himself with the demons. Why should they carry his mark?”
“True, and in that, they see a wasted opportunity." Now I was just making things up. "Had they sided together, the outcome might have been different. In Los, as in Vaharilar, the raven is still a symbol of rebellion against the crown.”
“If I rip the clothes off Tanead Tajawl, will I find a bird painted on his back, too?” The words were a sneer, clipped and ugly.
“Tanead would never mark himself with the symbol of any house other than his own. He’s too proud of his name.”
“But you’re not proud of yours? Come on, Eave.” Caelan sneered the false name I’d given him. He wanted me to know that he knew it was fake. “Tell me who you are.”
My heart pounded. I had given no thought to what might happen when he saw my mark. I too often forgot I even wore it. But of course he’d ask these things. I had to take back control.
I turned around to face him. It seemed to snap the tension line between us.
“I have no house name to be proud of. I came from peasants. My father was called Angel Samaras. But I suppose the curse of being Touched made me wish to be a part of bigger things. I told you I orchestrated my own sale to Tajawl. I also read Rosa’s book, The Traitor’s Manifesto . It’s not banned in Los; I found a copy. I read other books, too, and histories. I found I believed in the things Rosa stood for.”
“Rosa just wanted the crown for himself, like a thousand ambitious men before him.”
I shook my head, coming alive in defense of my father. “No. He wanted better lives for peasants—lower taxes and fairer ownership systems regarding land. He wanted men to feel pride in their work and ownership of themselves. He wanted to treat people with dignity.”
Caelan snorted. “And for these things you branded yourself with his mark? He was already dead. He’d already failed.”
“Ideas like his don’t die. They burrow into the hearts of men and plant seeds. The day will come when a revival of his ideals bears fruit and on that day, I will be proud to bear this mark.”
I said these words fiercely, full of accidental fiery honesty. I only realized my mistake when Caelan’s face hardened. His hand rose faster than a man of his size should be able to move. It closed around my neck but didn't squeeze. Only forced my head to tilt uncomfortably far back. Forced me to look at the fury that danced in his red-speckled eyes. My breasts were raised, my nipples so close to him, they almost touched his chest. But they didn't. He held me away from him, his rejection clear.
"You are mine, now, Eave, and I don't like to see the mark of another man on my property. One day, you will fall to your knees and apologize to me for this mark. You will beg me to forgive you and despise nothing more than wearing the mark of another man on your skin." He growled out these words and then released me abruptly.
"Take your bath," he commanded coldly, and declined to watch as I slithered into the tub and soaked my tired limbs in its tepid water. The room felt cold and empty now, the delicious, dangerous tension that heated the air only moments before snuffed out. I scrubbed at the blood on my stomach, staining the water red. I massaged my scalp and shook away the sand.
Caelan didn’t speak again until I was done. “A peasant who can read. Fancy that. I’ll have a clean dress brought for you. You’ll sleep in the corner tonight.”