The Invisible Chains - Part 3: Bonds of Blood (15 page)

Lorcko, still lying on his belly, balled his fists, rose half on his elbows and turned to the prince.

“I've never been... never before... I don't care what you heard. And I'm not a whore either. Besides you didn't make me cry. You
couldn't
.”

Notwithstanding his defiant words, he let his head fall down in his cushion, crying desperately.

Timishi had heard both the recalcitrance and the desperation in his words and tone of voice. He thought it was a strange mixture.

He lay down upon the back of the page, putting his head beside him, his long hair covering Lorcko's.

“You know, we don't have to do this the Mukthar way,” he whispered softly in Lorcko's ear. “I recently learned red so le>��some Ximerionian tricks. But first, if it's not me who made you cry, why don't you tell me who or what exactly did?”

Lorcko looked at the Mukthar prince with utter stupefaction.

It was all the pent up anger and frustration. All the sorrow and heartburn. All the guilt and self-recrimination.

The injustice and cruelty of it all. It all poured out, unstoppable as lava out of a volcano.

Once he had, hesitatingly, stammered a few incoherent sentences, the poison seemed to flow out of him, uncontrollable. He bared his heart, he bared his soul, as his body had been bared, for the Mukthar prince who still lay on his back.

When finally he was done, his eyes were still sad, but dry.

For a long, long time Timishi said nothing, but just kept lying upon him, covering, almost protecting him.

“Most people would say you got served a meal you prepared yourself,” he eventually said softly.

“Why not?” Lorcko replied, almost resigned. “Everybody thinks so, why not you as well?”

“I said most people. I am not most people, Lorsho.”

The Mukthar prince clambered off his back.

“Turn around,” Timishi said, “I recently was taught some things you can do with your mouth and your tongue, and I've grown quite fond of them.”

Later, when the Mukthar was stroking his member, Lorcko held onto him as if for dear life. When the tension became almost unbearable, between gasps, he bit in the prince's shoulder.

When he came, pressing his member between their bellies, held fast by two strong arms, the tears came back as well.

She had to lean on the arm of the chair to keep her balance. Giggling she let herself fall down in it.

“You're drunk, dear,” Emelasuntha said.

It was a sober statement, not a reproach.

“The expression, my dear,” the baroness replied, “is stinking drunk. I believe I've heard it being called sloshed, hammered, shitfaced, wasted—”

“I think I've got the idea, Sobrathi, love.”

They were sitting in a room of the Sermyn farm, north of Ormidon, a secondary safe house of the Tribe of Mekthona. Emelasuntha feared that by now her presence in Ximerion would be common knowledge. She didn't think the main Chapter House was safe for her and Sobrathi anymore.

The Sermyn farm, besides being less known as a Mekthona Tribe property, lay far away from any village or hamlet, had thick, high walls surrounding it, and moreover, lay in the middle of open land. The drawback was that it was further away from the capital.

“All in the line of duty, dear,” the baroness said. “You wouldn't believe what I have to suffer, serving the House of Mekthona.”

“At least, did you learn anything useful?”

“As a matter of fact, I did. There always are, you know.”

Emelasuntha sighed.

“There always are what, dear? Or who?” she asked patiently.

“Those who don't fit, of course. Those who don't like the herd. Those who want to escape the cozy protection of the clan. Who want to broaden their horizon. The lone wolves.”

“I see,” the queen, not seeing anything, said.

“And where do they all go? Where do they all end up? Tell us, dear, tell us... No?”

The baroness giggled again.

“In Ormidon,” she continued, answering her own question. “In that steaming, writhing cesspool. In that city where you can disappear, reinvent yourself and be who you want to be... or die a miserable death in an alley, more likely, now that I come to think about it.”

Again Emelasuntha sighed.

“A little less local color, dear, and some more factual information. If you please.”

“Oh, all right. You're absofuckinglutely boring, you know. Anyway. I was thinking where I would go if I wanted to leave my ancestral home, and it immediately struck me that the Narvall quarter of Ormidon would be the ideal destination. Cheap lodgings to be had, reasonably prized eateries, that is, if you don't mind having the runs now and again, and lots and lots of fine establishments to quench your thirst—”

“Which you obviously sampled one by one.”

“As good as, my dear, as good as,” the baroness said, slurring her words. She hiccuped. “Until, that is, it occurred to me to simply ask.”

She burped and looked blankly before her.

“So you asked. What? And what was the answer?” the queen said, now with a slight edge to her voice.

“I asked,” the baroness said, waggling her index finger, “which waterhole I would have to visit to meet some fine, young, fuckable Cheridonian men, in need of some funds. I said I liked their horsey smell.”

She burped again.

“I got some surprising offers,” she continued, frowning. “Perverse ones. Maybe not if you are a horse.

Anyway, it so happens that they like to flock together in a tavern called ‘The Brittle Bridle’. Sordid kind of place. Stank of stale beer and puke. I liked it. Had that lived in feel, you know. Anyway. Got to talk with one of the recent arrivals there. They're quite famous among their tribe, nowadays. Those two. You know who I mean. Most of them are jealous that your son chose them for friends. So, since we already knew that the Hemarchidas-fellow is squeaky clean, I started asking about the other one... Lethingy...”

“Lethoras, dear. His name is Lethoras.”

“That's the one. Poor fellow has three younger sisters. Now, in the Cheridonian tribe a woman is as important as her dowry. They feel that, now their older brother is as good as nobility, thanks to the favors a certain blond prince of our acquaintance showers upon him, they should have a big one. Dowry, that is. Seems

Anaxantis made him a general. And a military governor. The Gods know what else. So they upped their demands. Cheridonian women nag. Seems they torment the poor fellow for more and more money. The sweet dear can't refuse them. Weak hearted, I suppose. And not a little bit terrified as well. They want to marry into the top echelons of the tribe.”

The baroness hiccuped and blinked at Emelasuntha.

“So, he's not really in any deep trouble?” the queen asked.

��as t>

��Rash words, my dear. You don't want to be on the wrong side of Cheridonian women, I gather. But, yes, I guess it's only a family dispute of sorts. Annoying for the poor guy, nevertheless. He sends them almost everything your son pays him, and still they keep complaining. Anyway. He's not the traitor.”

Sobrathi let out a long sigh.

“Easy, easy, dear,” the queen said, “your breath is inflammable. By the way, how do you figure that?”

“Simple,” the baroness said, trying to focus her eyes on her friend, “we know it was your dear husband who planted the traitor. Some time ago. His money troubles are too recent.”

“And too insignificant, I suppose,” Emelasuntha mused.

The baroness wasn't listening anymore. A grating snoring sound indicated that she had fallen asleep.

“
So who? It's not the farmer's son either. The cavalry general? Is the business of the Theroghalls in trouble?

Some bad investments maybe? Or is it that most efficient of assistants, master Parmingh?”

The long, elegant fingers massaged his deflated nipples teasingly, while the most beautiful face on earth smiled, both naughtily and lovingly at the same time, at him. He studied the perfect teeth, then followed the hands as they began their journey downwards, to his sparse bush. A perfectly formed, beautiful member, thicker than his own in full erection, swayed above his. It descended ever so slightly, lightly brushing his cock with its tip, steered by the inviting hips. He looked down at his protruding hipbones and his thin calves.

Before the hands could even touch him, merely by the contact of the other member sliding over it, his cock swelled, and, helplessly he felt himself climax, against his will and much too soon, spurting weak, watery semen on his belly.

He awoke with a startle. Still drunk with sleep, he looked around in the semi dark of his room. Luckily Sterff hadn't hear a thing and was still sleeping, once in a while grunting. Then he felt the stickiness of his sheets in the area of his groin.

Ambrick of Keyld lay back down, cursing Lorcko, cursing himself.

How was this possible? Why was he still there, in his sick, sick brain? He had destroyed him, hadn't he?

Lorcko of Iramid was a joke, the laughing stock of the corps of pages, wasn't he? Then why was he still walking around with his head held high up? Why was his face impassive, as if chiseled out of marble, like the statue of a young God, haughty and untouchable? He should be cringing with shame, his face contorted with either anger or humiliation. But he wasn't. He kept looking at them as if they were ants whom he could trample at any moment. He kept looking through them.

And why, why, why was he still in his dreams? Why? Hadn't he pulverized his image completely? Degraded his beautiful traits into the cheap trappings of a whore. Hadn't he debased that enchanting smile into the mercantile grin of a common prostitute? He should be gone by now. Not, not, not haunting his every sleeping moment, teasing him, seducing him, making him come, merely by smiling at him. Making him afraid to close his eyes. Making him mortally terrified that he had committed the gravest error of his life. That he had thrown away his one chance at love. At being wanted for who he was. At being wanted for being Ambrick and not for being the future count of Keyld. Who paid. Who paid handsomely.

It was all Lorcko's fault. He shouldn't be that beautiful. He shouldn't be that desirable. He shouldn't be there.

He shouldn't be.

“You know,” Sterff of Rivrant said, scratching his scalp through his unkempt hair, “I think he should be taken down a peg or two. After all, who does he think he is, lording it over us like that?”

Ambrick sipped of the warm, spiced wine that actually tasted more like herbal tea. He and his friends were having breakfast at The Hole. He had casually guided the conversation to Lorcko and his insufferable behavior, without letting it seem as if he cared too much.

“Let's just ignore him,” he said slowly. “of course he will keep looking at us as if we are contemptible worms. Strange actually, when you stop to think about it. As those things go, the House of Iramid is fairly recent. I don't know the particulars but a few generations ago they were still simple knights. Before that?

Who knows? Probably well off farmers. And yet, like he's strutting around he probably thinks he is of royal descent. It's pathetic, really.”

He smiled thinly.

“Pathetic?” Morneck exploded. “An outrage, that's what it is. He has no right, no right at all to behave like we are his inferiors while in fact we are far above him in social standing and nobility.”

“
Hm,”
Ambrick thought, “
the county of Miradano was a creation of Orrigar II the Silent, if memory serves.

Not all that ancient either.”

“Maybe he doesn't mean anything by it”, he said.

“Like Murokthil he doesn't,” Sterff said. “Someone should teach him a lesson.”

“Maybe he can't help it,” Ambrick said. “After all, he is beautiful. You can't help getting stuck-up when you're that handsome. Inhumanly handsome. It's only natural he gets ideas above his station. Maybe he thinks he is indeed the son of a God, looking as he does.”

“Well, he should just stop it,” Sterff grumbled.

“But he won't. Not as long... but no.”

“What? What were you going to say?” Morneck asked.

Ambrick seemed to hesitate.

“Nothing. Really. Just some silly notion. That's all.”