31. Twenty-Eight

Elindir fell asleep with his head resting against my thigh, my fingers tangled in his hair. Outside were the sounds of the village people going about their day, but it was muffled coming through the walls. The sun rose higher, warming the air, but still he stayed, breathing quietly, calm at last.

There were decisions to be made. I should have been making a list of my best warriors to offer the bone empress or otherwise preparing for war. Yet I was lost in him, frozen beneath him as if he were the only thing that mattered.

Elindir was nothing. A coincidence. A piece on the board I had never even planned on but taken advantage of just the same. I would yet still. He was a tool. He was a man. He was mine. All true. All lines that would collide violently very soon.

But for now, he was here, his cheek resting against my leather clad thigh, soft brown locks wrapped around my fingers.

I closed my eyes and leaned back against the wooden lattice that served as the hut's skeleton, and I slept.

Elindir's stirring woke me sometime later. When I opened my eyes, I found him looking up at me. I expected him to jerk away when he realized the compromising position he was in, how intimate it was. Instead, he nuzzled his cheek against me in the way a cat might, marking its territory with claws and scent. Eyes half lidded, I watched as he lifted his head, resting his chin on my knee. Elindir's gaze was that of a man content, but it was a lie. I had seen that look one too many times in the shadows of a brothel, or some roadside inn. He was good, my slave, but he was not as good as he thought he was at manipulating me.

"I see you," I said slowly, my mouth betraying how tired I truly was.

Not just bone deep exhaustion from being on the road for so long, but a tiredness of the soul. There was a time when I confided in my siblings, told them everything I planned, laid out all my secrets. With spies among us, and swords at our throats in the night, that was an option no longer. Everyone's loyalty was suspect. There was no one to talk to, no one to listen. The burdens of my heart were mine alone to bear.

I was tired of fighting battles without swords, of all the jabs and parries with words and looks, the treason of whispers and bare flesh. This was not the fight I wanted. It was not a fight I would win. Elindir had found my weakness and now applied pressure.

Strong fingers gripped my thighs and squeezed. A man prowled up my body, muscle graceful under tight skin, a wildcat stalking prey. He wore a collar, masquerading as a tamed house cat, but he was a lion, playing with his food, using the only weapon I had left him.

He draped his body over mine.

A hard body.

A warm body.

One that I had claimed as mine in every way but one.

It had been mere hours since I'd offered him the world if he would but stand by me. I'd played my hand, and he saw it for what it was. Loneliness, desperation. A mistake.

I caught his chin, digging in my fingers. Pink lips parted, revealing sharp, white teeth, a soft, wet tongue, an invitation to throw it all away and forget.

I thought I wanted to fall into him, but realized too late I had already fallen. He wasn't mine. I was his.

And then a horn. A voice outside, tearing us apart. "It's time."

Sweat slick, hearts racing, we parted and took a moment to smooth out our clothes. By the time we emerged from the guest hut, no one would have looked at us and seen anything less than a king and his slave.

We were led back to the center of the stone circle. It was dusk and the whole village had turned out in throngs. They'd opened the pit and removed the horse carcass, now roasted to perfection. A man in white face paint cut off the best portions, offering them on bended knee to the women of the tribe. Horned women warriors reclined on beds of soft fur while their men fed them with their fingers. Naked children hopped around, chasing each other in circles. Men wearing rabbit fur played hide drums, shook bone rattles, sang with their voices restrained deep in their throats. At the center of the circle, a woman in streaks of blue paint danced with snakes draped over her shoulders and bells on her wrists. Sweet smelling smoke filled the air, fanned into the circle from great braziers where herbs had been thrown over coals.

Our escort brought us before the Empress of Bones and her bone witch, who was dressed in crow feathers and wore the bones of birds as clothing. A large red cloth had been spread before them. Rune laced vertebrae lay scattered about it.

We stopped just short of the cloth, our escort putting out his hand to halt my advance.

"Come, Elindir of nowhere and nothing," demanded the empress.

He looked at me, going forward only when I nodded that he should.

The empress planted her skull topped scepter against the ground, peering out from inside the wolf's jaws. "Kneel."

He knelt. Men came forward, stripping him of everything but his collar and stepping back, heads bowed.

The lighting changed and my breath caught. I had known we were coming on the eve of the solar eclipse, but seeing Elindir in profile against it was awe-inspiring. He was like a sun god bathed in shadow. His skin glowed under the strange light, making him seem bigger than he was. My feet went from under me and I was suddenly on my knees, the sky and shadows pressing down on my shoulders.

The bone witch began a chant and picked up some of her bones, casting them again and again to verify the conditions were ideal for her spell. When she determined they were, she drew a long, curved knife. Runes glowed in the steel, red and hungry.

The woman dancing with snakes brought one to the bone witch who, chanting, lifted the serpent into the light of the moon over Elindir and promptly sliced its body in half. Elindir flinched as serpent blood rained down over him. The snake, dying, writhed and bit, but the witch paid it no mind, letting its fangs sink in while she danced and chanted, shaking more blood and viscera onto Elindir's head. When the serpent was dead, she pried its jaws from her forearm and cast it aside, leaning over Elindir to draw symbols on his face, his neck, his chest in the blood.

Another snake was brought, and the knife was given, glowing hot with magic, to Elindir with the order, "Cut off its head, and be free."

The drums beat faster.

Elindir took the knife, a god bathed in the blood of his sacrifice. The snake hissed and reared. There was no hesitation in his swing, not even an ounce. The knife cut, severing the snake's head from its body before it could strike. A cheer went up from the crowd. Spears, swords, fists all thrust up to the sky, the energy in the air palpable. Elinder's fingers sought out his collar, pulling, wrenching. Blood flowed. Magic rose.

I held my breath.

The collar came apart with a mighty clang and a ripple of magic went through the air like a shockwave, pushing us all back a step. The drums and chanting stopped. Silence fell over the gathered people, all of us waiting to hear a slave speak.

Elindir wrapped trembling fingers around his throat. Blood was still trickling from the holes the collar had left. His chest heaved with breath. Then he threw back his head and let out a guttural scream into the night.