translated as “I will see you as we ride.”
I nodded, he gave me another squeeze with another sigh, he looked over my shoulder and jerked his chin up and I looked too to see a warrior nod and move our way.
My guard.
Then he let me go.
I moved away quickly, closing the box and shoving it under my arm and Diandra was instantly at my side.
Before she could say a word, I spoke.
“Are you okay?” I asked and she blinked.
“Pardon, my dear?”
“Did your husband take a hand to you last night?” I clarified.
“No!” she exclaimed. “Of course not.”
“He was angry,” I reminded her.
“He was, Circe, but he just yelled at me, I yelled back because, you were right, neither of us knew we were doing anything wrong. It was all innocent. It took awhile for me to calm him down, get him to hear me but I did and he realized it was an innocent mistake and all was well.”
“So he doesn’t hit you?” I asked and she eyed me.
Then she answered quietly, “Not anymore, my dear,” then quickly, “and not for some time.”
“Right,” I muttered.
“My goodness!” We heard and both our heads swung to Narinda who was standing in front of us and we would have bowled her over if we didn’t stop. She lifted a shaking hand toward my cheekbone then she dropped it, grasped my hand and tugged me close. “Oh Circe,” she whispered. “What on earth happened?”
“I displeased my husband last night,” I told her shortly, Narinda reared back in shock, her face paling instantly and Diandra sucked in breath.
I turned to her and she had her mouth open to speak.
And I knew what was coming so I lost it.
“Don’t,” I whispered on a hiss, shaking my head at the same time tears sprang to my eyes.. “Don’t. Do not tell me more of how this place and these people work, what they do, what are their ways. No more explanations of who they are and why they behave the way they do.” She blinked with obvious hurt, I let Narinda go, turned fully to Diandra and grabbed her hand, squeezing hard. “I adore you, my friend, you already own a piece of my heart but you and I know there is no excuse for what he did last night, there is no Korwahk explanation that enlightens me to the ways of him and his people that would justify him unleashing his fury on me the way he did. You cannot look at my face, see his mark and know the woman I am and think I could ever do, no matter the wrong he perceives, anything to make him strike me the way he struck me and that would be in any way okay. You know it, Diandra,” I squeezed and shook her hand sharply. “You know it.”
“Circe,” she whispered, squeezing my hand back, “please listen to me. There are things you don’t know. Things you have yet to learn. Things Lahn knows and Seerim told me last night he was wild with worry –”
I shook my head hard, let her go and took a step back. “No. No, I won’t listen to you now. Maybe later when I don’t feel the ache of the back of his hand smashing into my face but not now.”
Then as quickly as I could, before she could say another word and without a glance at either of them, I hurried back toward where my cham used to be.
My guard followed.
* * * * *
I stared at the stars overhead and there were a lot of them. They blanketed the dark sky in a twinkle of lights that was breathtaking. I’d never seen anything like it. Not in my life.
Then I moved my legs and my entire body protested.
We’d ridden from afternoon into the night. It had been years since I’d been on a horse and my body wasn’t used to it. I forgot how much it took out of you physically, riding. Now I remembered.
We didn’t make camp. Once we stopped, I dismounted from Zephyr, a strapping young boy was instantly there to take her away and then Teetru was there, grabbing my hand. My girls gave me water to wash my hands and face, served me a simple meal of dried meat, cheese, flatbread and dried fruit with a cup of water and a chalice of wine. This was cleared away and I was led in the clothes I wore that day to a stack of hides that I took to be my bed. They were out in the open, as everyone else appeared to be bedding, though somewhat removed from the others.
I wasn’t keen on camping though I was an experienced camper. I was the only child of a man who was a man and he liked fishing, hiking and shit like that. So he took me with him. But I’d never slept under the stars and was uncertain I wanted to. I wasn’t in Rome, but I was in Korwahk and therefore had to do what the Korwahks did. So bed under the stars it was.
I slipped off my sandals and slid under the top hide. They were set on a slab of cream stone but there were a lot of them (giving me an understanding of why Lahn had that huge pile in his cham) so although it wasn’t the softest bed I’d ever lain in, it wasn’t hard stone either and my aching body was glad to recline.
The girls had rolled some hides at the top to act as pillows and I lay on my back and stared at the stars.
I had seen Lahn that day, several times. He rode mostly at the front of the procession of hundreds of horses that was followed by at least double that amount of wagons but he would often drop back to ride next to warriors and speak with them. I caught his eyes on me twice but he never got near me.
I rode with the women who rode behind the men. I did this but I did it while avoiding Diandra on her roan mount because I felt badly for my outburst. Not that my words were wrong, just that I should have weighed them before hurling them at a woman who had been nothing but kind to me.
I lost sight of Lahn the minute we stopped and hadn’t seen him since.
The stars were drifting from sight because my eyelids were drifting closed when I heard Lahn’s boots approach. I turned to my side away from his side of the hides and heard, one after another, his boots hit stone. Then the top hide moved. Not a second later, I was hauled across the hides and my body was forced to curve into the large, hard, warm one at my back.
He spoke quietly into the back of my hair as his hand drifted up to cup my breast and I stilled. He kept speaking and I waited for him to do something. It would be just like him to try to have sex with me with hundreds of people camping just feet away.
But his thumb did not wander across my nipple, his hand just cupped me warmly as he continued to speak words most of which I didn’t understand.
Then he stopped talking, his head moved, I felt his beard against the skin of my neck as he used his chin to pull my hair away and then I felt his tongue taste me from the back of my ear down the length of my neck and further down the length of my shoulder.
Throughout its journey, I steeled myself against the shiver and fortunately succeeded in beating it back.
At the point of my shoulder, he rubbed the long hairs at his bearded chin back and forth which felt sweet and nice and made my nose sting with tears that this time I held back with sheer willpower.
He did this for a long time as if he was staring into the darkness deep in contemplation at the same time delivering to me a preoccupied caress that was still, nevertheless, a caress.
Then his arm around me pulled me deeper into him and he settled back into the hides, he tilted his big body slightly into mine and I listened until his breath evened out.
Only then did I allow my eyes to close and my body to fall asleep.
Chapter Sixteen
Take Heed
Five Days Later…
I was riding way back amongst the wagons, the ones that carried the chams and belongings and the slaves
