Leola sat down next to her and Dorva began to pull apart her braids. “You must have done something very amusing to the king last night,” she laughed.
Leola’s face went red again. “I—what? Why do you say such things?”
Dorva pressed her lips together and smiled, taking apart the braids with a grin for a few moments. “He seems very happy, that is why I ask,” she said in a low voice. “Whatever you have done, he must have pleased you as well, for he does not believe you will run away.”
Leola narrowed her eyes thoughtfully. It was strange.
Then she shrugged. “Where would I run to?” she said with a sigh. “I do not even know where I am, and I would not be welcomed back home.”
It was true. This was her fate: she would be the plaything of the beastly king, and when he was done, she would be passed to another barbaric warrior. It was better than starving to death, or being killed… and after last night, she could imagine that sleeping next to a warm, solid man would not be the worst fate ever…
“You are thinking of him,” Dorva said sagely. She was smiling. “Tell me, is he the great man all say he is?” She held her hands apart wide, indicating, in a crude gesture that made Leola blush again, the size of his manhood.
Leola shook her head. “I cannot… speak of such things!”
Dorva laughed. “You Southerners,” she said cheerfully. “Such… modest ways.”
She stood up to tend to the fire and the pot of water. “And boring,” she added. She smiled as she poked at the fire.
Leola looked at her hands clasped in her lap.
“I do not know,” Leola said, after a silence.
“Do not know what? How big his cock is?” Dorva cried out with a peal of laughter.
Leola shook her head and bit her lip. “I do not know… if I… pleased him.”
Dorva rolled her eyes. “He seems quite pleased,” she told her. “He kept you all night long.”
“But… he did not…” Leola blushed and shrugged.
Dorva stopped stirring the pot and stared at Leola. “He did not…?”
“He didn’t… I mean, he did some things, but at night we… merely… slept.”
Dorva’s mouth fell open.
“What is it?” Leola asked her, suddenly afraid that this was a bad omen. If Sedrak did not keep her as a plaything, what would happen to her? She did not want to be touched by another man, she wanted—
Her blood ran cold as she realized: she wanted him.
“What does that mean?” Leola said, when Dorva did not answer.
Dorva snapped her mouth shut. She became very serious. “I have heard nothing of this, and you have not told it.”
“But—”
“Shhhhht!” Dorva hissed. “You have not spoken to me of this, nor I to you.” She poured the water into the vessel. “Now,” she said with fake cheer. “Bathe, and I shall wash and comb your hair so that it glows.”
“Dorva…”
But the woman cut her off with the sharpest look Leola could have imagined, and so she was left to wonder even more about Sedrak’s strange behavior, what it meant, and her own fate.
Chapter 8
The tent flap swept open. Sedrak strode in. Seeing Leola made him catch his breath and straighten.
Dorva had washed and then brushed her hair to a shiny, glorious mane, which she left down, tying only a few intricate laces of leather into the front strands, which kept Leola’s hair pleasantly away from her face, and somewhat tamed. The dress she had stitched up with the same type of leather laces, and so it fit Leola snugly. Dorva had stepped back, and looked Leola up and down. “Fit to be…” she had begun, but then quieted again.
Sedrak’s reaction wasn’t lost on Leola, despite the torturous emotion roiling in her belly. He seemed pleased, even attracted to her. And yet…
“Thank you, Dorva,” Sedrak whispered, his eyes still upon Leola.
Dorva curtsied. “You’re welcome, my lord,” she said with a pleasant smile.
“You may go,” he said. “And enjoy the day. Three days marching waits us.”
“Yes, my lord,” she said, curtsying again, then ducking out the entrance. She gave Leola a quick, strange look, and then disappeared.
Sedrak walked slowly toward Leola. He reached for her cheek, and she turned away on impulse, unable to bear the roiling emotions she was feeling. He overwhelmed her, and yet she was afraid of him, of his mercurial moods, of him holding her fate in his hands.
His expression darkened. “Have I offended you?” he asked.
She shook her head. “No, Master,” she said, offering a tight smile. Beneath her features, she felt a deep sadness, so profound she could not even cry. “I am merely trying to be… well behaved.”
He shot her a puzzled expression before holding out an arm for her to take. “Then come with me. You can behave yourself while we walk. Spring is in the air.”
What a fool I am! A silly little girl who believed…
She dared not finish the thought. What had she believed? Dorva, and Sedrak himself, had made it clear what her purpose here would be. She was a pet. A toy. A plaything. Nothing more. But Dorva’s strange silence before the events of last night, and her refusal to talk about them, burrowed into Leola’s heart, spreading panic that she knew she must keep quiet.
Sedrak paused at the entrance. He reached up to take the leash from where it now hung on the wall of the tent. He hesitated, then looked at her and offered his arm instead.
She took his arm, for she did not know what else she could do. Her mind felt like a storm, but she let him lead her into the sunshine.
Chapter 9
The camp was buzzing with activity, perched on a hilltop overlooking a snow-covered valley into which was tucked a small
