To The Princess Bound (15 page)

And, for his troubles, her father had beaten him bloody.

Victory dropped her forehead to the bed beside his shoulder, stifling a wretched laugh.  “I’m sorry.  You must be very unimpressed with my family.  Two heartless bastards and a woman who goes into screaming fits for no reason.”

He did not respond.

Gingerly, she crawled up onto the bed beside him and pulled the covers over herself.

“You have a reason,” he said.

Victory sat up quickly, her heart beginning to pound.  Dragomir’s eyes were closed, rapidly moving against the lids as if in a dream.  She watched him for several minutes as he continued to snore softly.  Then, slowly, she lowered herself back to the bed.

When Dragomir opened his eyes, it was to the tingling wash of Imperial nanos working their magic within him.  Usually, he would have removed the disturbance within his tissues immediately, much preferring to heal normally than to use the Imperium’s dispassionate tech.  He hated the odd feeling, the strange energy the tiny machines left behind that was so foreign to his own, but at this point, feeling bones in his back and ribs and arms mending, he was willing to put up with their internal buzz.  His ribs were killing him, and his shoulders felt like they had been hacked off and their bloody stumps used to pound at his empty sockets.  He groaned and tried to roll off his arms.

Too late, he found himself face-to-face with the sleeping princess.

He froze.

She was beautiful.  Body and soul.  When she slept, her ramas opened slightly, allowing some of her deep silver energy to flow through, setting her
au
aglow.

Dragomir knew he should probably roll back aside quickly, before she could catch him staring at her in her sleep like some morally-deprived letch, but he found himself enraptured by every curve of her face, the gentle lines of her nose and chin.  Against his better instincts, he settled back to carve every detail into his memory.  Her smooth face, completely devoid of fear or anxiety, was an exquisite work of art, and the gentle curve of her neck as it disappeared into the hem of her nightgown, the way her raven hair lay across her chest in luxurious ripples, took his breath away.  Had he had his sketchbook, he would have taken pleasure in drawing her freckles, her alabaster skin…

Her green eyes popped open suddenly, startling him.

Instantly, she sucked in a huge breath and—

“I’m rolling back over!” he cried, fighting the wash of panic she was throwing out.  “See?”  He flopped onto his back and winced at the way his shoulders started to pound again.  He rolled onto his other arm, scooting himself away from the edge of the bed. 

“Why were you staring at me?!” she demanded.  She had crawled out of bed and was at the other end of the chain.  He knew, because he felt it go taut.

“My arms hurt like hell, Princess,” he said honestly.  “I rolled off of them when I woke up and you were there.”

He could feel her squinting at the back of his head.  “Then that’s what woke me?  You rolling over?”

“Probably,” he lied.  He wasn’t sure how long he had been staring at her, but he was pretty sure it had been upwards of fifteen to twenty minutes.  He wasn’t about to tell
her
that, though.  She’d probably think that he had been planning some nefarious deed, or something else equally as ridiculous.

After a moment, she tentatively said, “I had an interesting dream.  Very vivid.”

Sensing an olive-branch, still facing the opposite end of the room, Dragomir gingerly said, “What about?”

“It was about a one-eyed woman.”

He froze.  Trying his best to sound disinterested, he said, “Really?”

“She was taken from her village by a handsome soldier.  A general of some sort.  For some reason, I kept feeling like I knew him from somewhere.”

Dragomir winced.  “Probably your brother, then.”

There was a long pause.  “You’re hiding something.”

Oh crap.
  “No I’m not,” he blurted.

“Sit up,” she growled.  “I want to see your face.”

“I’m comfortable right here,” Dragomir said.

“Now.”

He sighed, deeply.  Lancing agony through his ribs at the contortions necessary to get into a seated position, he let out a huge breath of relief as his head came to rest on the headboard.

She squinted her emerald eyes at him.  “There’s something you’re not telling me about that past life.”

Dragomir tried to keep his face utterly straight, the picture of sagely, knowing wisdom.  “What makes you say that?”

“You want your hands unshackled?” she demanded.

He sighed and slumped forward, the scholarly façade vanishing in an instant.  “Lady, you sure know how to dangle a carrot.”

“Tell me what you forgot to mention last night.  Don’t think I didn’t catch the way you babbled like an idiot trying to change the subject.  What did you find?  Was I a mass murderer or something?”

He looked up at her, scanning her face. 
She’s going to think I’m lying.
  Softly, he said, “Your village got taken by an invading army.  I was one of the officers.  I grabbed you and threw you over my horse.  You weren’t pleased.”

She stared at him, clearly in disbelief.  “That man was
you.
”

Dragomir allowed himself a nervous grin.

She narrowed her eyes, her face darkening.  “You took me against my will.”

Dragomir reddened.  “Uh.  From your home, yes.  But, uh,” he said, remembering the dream, “Not sure how much of the life you saw, but you were more than willing by the time I took your virginity.  Took a couple months of coaxing you.  Was hard to get you to trust me, considering.”

Her mouth fell open.  At first, she started to blush.  Then her hackles went up, and anger started boiling up from within, making his skin ache where it radiated outward.  “I didn’t get to that part,” she growled.

“I warned you,” Dragomir said, glaring.  “I wasn’t going to say anything, but you got pushy.”

“Tell me of another,” she snapped.  “Something I can believe.”

Once again, he felt as if he had become the passing entertainment for a bored princess.  Dragomir sighed and closed his eyes.  “Very well,” he said.  One of the curses of being an Emp was that people always wanted insight onto their past lives, always too fascinated with what had once happened, and not with who they were now, and what they planned to do.  Fortunately, until today, he had been able to simply tell them, ‘Not right now,’ and they would bob their heads and babble their thanks that he would consider it, someday.

Here, with the princess, he had the feeling that he’d get the same result telling the princess ‘Not right now’ that he would get telling God to halt the tides. 

Settling himself, Dragomir focused on her
au
.  Within moments, he found another strong soul-thread drifting through the embarrassment and irritation that was her current state of being.  He narrowed his consciousness to that single image, then followed it back to its soul-bead.

She was a merchant’s son who grew up in his father’s footsteps.  He watched him count every credit, watched him save up the money for a new mansion and a retirement at a very young age, watched him sell his empire and move to the colonies for adventure.  He watched a great catastrophe befall the colony’s supply lines, watched much of the colony deteriorate to primitivity within a few short years.  He watched a band of desperate raiders attack his manse, take his food, and cart off his property.  He saw the raiders force him to the ground, hogtie him, saw them put a gun to his head.  He saw a fiery redhead stop them, saw her step forward and lift his chin, a warning in her deep blue eyes…

Dragomir’s mouth fell open as he watched himself claim the young merchant, take him for his own.

“What?” the princess demanded, wary.

“Uh,” Dragomir said.  He replayed the lifetime, trying to find some evidence that it wasn’t
him
carting the merchant off to work her fields.  But he knew.  There was no mistaking the fiery redhead…or the passion they shared between the sheets.  “Uh.”  He swallowed, his mouth suddenly very dry. 
This can’t be happening,
he thought. 
Coincidence.

“Tell me, slave,” the princess growled.

The word ‘slave’ got under his hackles just enough to make him tell her.  Dragomir grinned, all teeth, and said, “You were a merchant’s son who inherited a vast trading empire.  You sold out, went out to the colonies, claimed yourself a huge swath of land, had a mansion built.  The colony’s supply lines failed—I got the feel maybe it was an exploding star that rendered one of the jumps unusable…”  He paused, frowning.  “Stars can explode?”

“Probably a supernova,” she said dismissively.  She was watching him hungrily.  “What else?”

Still frowning at the idea of an exploding star, Dragomir haltingly continued, “Well, you were a practical man, and rich, so you had plenty of stored foodstuffs.  You did well for yourself, right up until the point where some starving colonists raided your mansion and put a gun to your head.”

When he stopped there, the princess frowned.  “They killed me?”

“No,” Dragomir said reluctantly.

“What happened?” she demanded.  When he didn’t respond, her look was utterly cold.  “I have seen horrors that you can only imagine, slave, and if you think to spare me some shock to my sensibilities, you’re wasting your time.”

Dragomir narrowed his eyes.  “You’re going to unlock the cuffs?”

She bit her lip and eyed his hands warily.  “We’ll see.”

“I want your word.”

“You’ll tell me what I want to know and I’ll think about it.”  No threats.  Just a statement of fact.  Once again, Dragomir was reminded of just how much power the princess had over him in his current state.  Life or death.  She could deliver either, with a single word.

Sighing, he said, “A redhead woman told them to hold their fire.  Saved your life.  Raiders told her to take him home with her, ‘cause they weren’t leaving evidence for the government to find, if it ever did get back on its feet.  She trussed you up, threw you in a wagon.  Took you back to her farm to work her fields.  That was me, too.”

Victory stared at him so long that Dragomir began to wonder if something inside her brain had snapped.  Finally, she laughed and said, “Another.”

“What do you think I am?” Dragomir growled, “your personal storyteller?!”

The princess narrowed her eyes.  “Until I say otherwise, that’s exactly what you are.”

And Dragomir realized she was right.  He found himself feeling very much like he was facing off an annoyed tigress.  Nervously, he searched through her
au
for another powerful soul-image.  He found it and followed it back to the lifetime-bead.

He watched her born a chieftain’s daughter on one of the forgotten colonies.  He watched her people struggle for resources, watched her grow to a life of war.  She was raised a warrior, a glorious Valkyrie amongst a militaristic people.  He watched her lead raids on countless towns and villages, watched as she accumulated a vast wealth, blossoming into a chieftain in her own right.  He watched her fall to a peasant’s shovel, watched her men pushed back in retreat.  As the village finished routing the attackers, searching back through the fields of wheat looking for raiders to put on display and execute, he watched her thrown over a shoulder, quickly scurried off the field by an anxious villager.  He watched her trussed up to a barn post.  He felt her defeat, felt her acknowledge the laws of combat and victory’s spoils.  He felt her not care.  He watched her open her eyes, take in her captor’s face for the first time…

Dragomir stared at the man’s face, recognizing it from his own memories. 
This can’t be right,
he thought.

“Well?” the princess demanded.  “Another one of the two of us?”

Dragomir fumbled through the lifetime.  Finally, he just stared at her.  Suddenly, the dormant connection was beginning to make a lot more sense.

“Let me guess,” she sneered.  “I captured you, brutally whisked you away to my home, and tied you to my bed.”

“Uh,” Dragomir said.  “Not quite.” 

She raised a brow, waiting.

Reluctantly, he said, “You were a great warrior princess.  You led many successful raids on nearby towns.  You were very wealthy—a sign that you were good at what you did—and beautiful, in an ‘I’m Going To Crush Your Scrotum For Looking At Me Sideways’ sort of way.  You were in the middle of a raid when a peasant snuck up behind you and hit you in the head with a shovel.”