Purity (Pure and Tainted) (28 page)

“Oh dear, you’re deep into the second phase of your cycle, aren’t
you?” Vanja’s voice pulled her out of her worried contemplation.

“Are my eyes glowing again?” K asked, turning to face her.

“I’m afraid so, dearie.” Vanja sat down beside her. “Would you
like me to ask your mother to send in someone to take care of you?”

“Take care of me?” K frowned.

Vanja cleared her throat delicately. “You know…someone to give you
a release.”

Understanding washed over K. “You mean she’ll get some stranger to
contaminate me,” she said flatly. “No thank you. I’d rather feel the pain.”

“Now dearie, it’s not so bad,” Vanja said reasonably. “After all,
the second phase doesn’t last very long. And once it’s over, you’ll have a
little reprieve before you enter the third phase. Your mother should have all
the candidates lined up and ready for you to pick from by the time your eyes
turn solid gold.”

“But—” K started.

“She’ll get you a good selection, my love, never fear,” Vanja said
earnestly. “You can pick the one you want.”

“Unless the one I want happens to be Boone,” K muttered.

“Well, no,” her nurse acknowledged. “You can’t have the giant,
dearie—he couldn’t help you anyway. Not when it came to satisfying your first
cycle.”

“He did fine satisfying me last night,” K muttered and then felt
her cheeks get hot. Why had she admitted such a thing to Vanja?

But her old nurse seemed completely unperturbed.

“He might be able to see you through the first phase of your cycle—maybe
even the second, my love. But no non-Erian could possibly help you get through
the third.”

“Why?” K demanded mutinously. “What’s so special and different
about Erians?”

“Why, an Erian male can give you satisfaction as many times as
you’ll need it to get through your cycle.” Vanja spoke as though it was
obvious. “You’ll need to be bred, dearie.
Fourteen,
fifteen—maybe as much as twenty or more times.
The male you’re with when
those urges come on you must be able to give you what you need.”

K felt her stomach drop. “When you say bred, you mean…penetrated—right?
He’ll have to be able to…to penetrate me that many times in a row?”

“And fill you with his seed. That’s the mating urge.” Vanja still
seemed extremely calm and unembarrassed. Apparently this wasn’t an awkward
topic for her at all.

Probably because they’re so
disgustingly preoccupied with sexual procreation here,
K
thought, feeling ill. The idea of letting a stranger penetrate her
over and over and inject his essence into her made her stomach roll like the
spicy
helikat
Loki had given her the
first time she’d tried eating.

“I can’t do it.” She jumped up and began pacing.

“You’ll have to, dearie—your body will force you to choose,” Vanja
told her. She leaned forward, a cautioning expression on her face. “Only,
don’t
pick the one you want for your
permanent consort as your first lover.”

“Why not?”
K turned to face her. “And why
would I pick more than one?”

“Well, my love, you royals are so high strung…” Vanja looked as
though she was trying to think of a tactful way to explain. “Oh dear, this is
dreadful. If only you hadn’t been taken so young—you really don’t know anything
about your cycle, do you?”

“No, I don’t so just
say
it,” K said. “Tell me what you’re talking about.”

“Well…” Vanja cleared her throat. “It’s just…the first candidate
might not survive your encounter together. The second either. Really it’s best
if you try to save the one you really want for your third or fourth pick. That
way most of your mating rage will be spent on the first two or three and the
one you want as a permanent consort should survive.”

“Survive?” K raised her eyebrows at the older woman and stared at
her.
“Survive?
Are you telling me
I’ll be so irrational, so completely out of control with lust I might actually
kill
the male I mate with?”

For the first time, Vanja looked distressed. “I know the idea of
killing someone is frightening and appalling, dearie. Believe me, I do. But you
have to think of it this way—all the candidates know what they’re getting into
when they are called by the Empress. And they consider it a great
honor
. If they die, they lose their
lives in service to their home planet. Don’t you see?”

“It’s you who doesn’t see.” K turned to face her again. “It’s not
the killing that bothers me, Vanja. I killed my first man at the age of
twelve—it earned me a step up in rank. But if I’m really going to be that
deadly—”

“Not until you reach the third phase of your cycle, my love,”
Vanja said earnestly. “And you’ll have plenty of warning—your eyes will go pure
gold just before the mating rage takes over. By then your royal mother will
have all the candidates for consort assembled. She’s calling them together—they
should all be here in the palace by tomorrow morning at the latest.”

K felt numb. The Empress was calling together a group of strangers
for her to mate with—males who would contaminate her over and over. What was
she going to do?

Suddenly she had a comforting thought.
Boone knows genetics. He’ll be able to help. I just have to get to see
him.
She grasped at the thought desperately. Yes, Boone—she had to see
Boone.
Of course.

“I’m in pain
now,
Vanja.
I don’t want to wait for tomorrow morning
.”
She gestured at herself. “I need help…someone to help me.”

The older woman rose heavily from the bed. “I’ll just go have them
call someone for you.”

“No.” K frowned. “I don’t want anyone but Boone.”

“But dearie,” Vanja began patiently. “I’ve already explained to
you why you can’t have him. He can’t satisfy your needs. And even if he could,
you’ll want to leave him be if you truly care for him. There’s nothing worse
than killing the one you love and waking up later to realize what you did.” She
stepped over to K and looked at her earnestly. “Believe me, child, I’ve seen it
happen.”

“You have?” K looked at her uneasily.

Vanja nodded. “It happened to your mother.
Her
first cycle—it was one of the worst I’ve ever seen, before or since.
She
put the one she really wanted as her consort second in line—the first candidate
was such a big, burly fellow, you see.
Much like your giant.
Your mother thought he would last through most of her mating rage and then she
could have the second fellow—the one she really wanted—as her permanent
consort.”

K put a hand to her throat. “What happened?”

“She killed him,” Vanja said sorrowfully. “The one she really
wanted. The first didn’t last very long at all, you see. She ripped out his
throat after the first few matings and then it was on to number two. And then
three and four.” She sighed. “Actually, it was the fifth candidate your mother
ended up with as her consort. And she never really loved him, you know. It was
one of the greatest sorrows of her life—made her afraid to love again. I think
that’s one reason she let you imprint on me when you were born.”

“I…see.” K ran a hand through her hair again. The story hit home
in a way Vanja’s other warnings hadn’t. What if Boone couldn’t help her after
all? What if…? But she pushed the thought away. If he couldn’t help, she would
do whatever was necessary. In the mean time, she’d never know if he could help
or not unless she got to see him. And considering the entire squadron of
heavily armed guards the Empress had left outside her door, it was clear she
was going to need some help getting to him.

“Let me get you someone, dearie. Your eyes are glowing more all
the time,” Vanja said.

“No, please…” K forced herself to put her hand on the other
woman’s arm. The skin-to-skin contact wasn’t as bad as she had feared—maybe
because she’d been imprinted on Vanja when she was little—but it still made her
skin crawl. Purity, she needed Boone
now.

“Child…”

“Please,” she said again. “I swear I just want Boone to help me
through the second phase—that’s all. But there’s no way I’ll get to him without
your help, Vanja. The guards they have posted outside my room—I’ll never get by
them alone.”

Of course, she could have taken out the entire squadron with the stun
gas capsules she had in her skinsuit but she wasn’t certain she could drop them
all before they sounded an alert. And then she would also have to take care of
whatever guards were posted outside Boone’s door and somehow get them both out
of the palace…

Vanja sighed heavily. “There
is
a way you can get to your giant. I shouldn’t tell you, though.”

“Please.” K tried to beg though it was foreign to her nature.
“Please, Vanja, I need to see him—to be with him again. He’s the only one I
want to touch me.
Please.”

“Ah, dearie…I never could refuse you anything.” The older woman
shook her head. “All right then. Come on.” She led K to a corner of the bedroom
which was hung with pink satin drapes. When she pulled the heavy, silky
material aside, a small archway carved with tree branches was revealed. “In
here,” she said, motioning for K to enter. “It’s your old library.”

“Real books—not reading cubes.”
K stepped into the room and ran
her hand over their leather bound spines in wonder. There were fairy tales from
Earth-that-was as well as the usual Eros classics. “
Berlita and the Talking Bearicorn…The Princess and the Cawrin… The Boy
who cried Garneg…
I forgot about these,” she murmured. “I forgot so much…”

Whatever memory block the Purists had used on her, it had been
extremely extensive. Only now, when she was finally coming face to face with
her old life was it finally giving way. A sudden thought came to her—maybe this
was why the High Sentinel had been so against letting her see the Erians she
was supposed to kill. Maybe he feared the sight of people from her home planet
would trigger her memories.

But why had the Purists taken her in the first place? And why
train her to be one of them? Why not just kill her outright? K didn’t have any
answers and didn’t expect to get any. Her body throbbed with need reminding her
that right now, she just wanted to get to Boone.

“If you forgot about the books, you probably forgot about this
too,” Vanja said, coming up behind her and laying a hand on the bookshelf. She
tapped the spine of one ancient book—
Alice
in Wonderland,
K
saw—and then tilted the book ever so slightly outward.

To K’s amazement, a narrow section of the bookshelf slid out,
revealing a dark, cobwebby space behind it.

“The secret passage!” she exclaimed as yet another memory clicked
into place.

“That’s right.” Vanja smiled. “You used to play in it when you
were little. You just
loved
popping
out of the woodwork and scaring the life out of me.”

K poked her head into the narrow space and pulled back, frowning.
“I remember it being a lot bigger than that. It used to seem like such a vast
black tunnel.”

“Well, you’ve grown considerably since you last played in the
secret passage, my love.” Vanja smiled a bit sadly. “It might be a bit of a
tight squeeze now.”

“I’ll manage,” K said grimly. “I
have
to.”

“Do you remember the way to the West Wing?” her old nurse asked.
“That’s where they put your giant—in the blue room, I think.”

K closed her eyes for a moment, reaching for the information…and
it was there, like a map in her head.

“I remember,” she said, nodding.

“Then go,” Vanja said. “But please, my dear princess, be quiet and
be careful. I love your royal mother with everything that’s in me but I must
say she has a temper on her. If she finds out you’ve defied her orders to keep
away from that giant of yours, she’s going to be very,
very
upset.”

“She won’t find out,” K promised.
At least not until it’s too late. I don’t care who she is, if she thinks
she can keep me here against my will she’s sadly mistaken.

“Go then,” Vanja said, smiling. “Enjoy one last night with the one
you really want.”

“But you’re sure—absolutely sure he’ll be safe?” K asked
anxiously.

Her old nurse nodded. “I’ve seen girls and their cycles—so many of
them, dearie. You’ll be in the second phase until morning, I’m certain. Don’t
worry—you won’t go into the mating rage until your eyes turn gold.”

“Thank you, Vanja,” K said, really meaning it. She had a sudden,
foreign impulse to hug the old woman—a holdover, no doubt, from her half
remembered childhood—but she couldn’t quiet bring herself to do it. Instead she
squeezed Vanja’s hand before ducking into the narrow passage.

“I’ll wait a few minutes before I close it behind you,” the older
woman called. “Be careful, dearie.”

“I will be. Thank you, Vanja.”

K took a moment to orient
herself
in the
dark, cramped space and then began moving in the direction of the West Wing.
In the direction of Boone.
Already her body was crying out
for his touch—for the forbidden yet soothing feel of his big hands on her bare
skin.