Total pages in book: 138
Estimated words: 137958 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 690(@200wpm)___ 552(@250wpm)___ 460(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 137958 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 690(@200wpm)___ 552(@250wpm)___ 460(@300wpm)
I smiled but I did not receive the same in return.
“You were that much alone in your home, mia figlia?” Elpis asked.
I shook my head vehemently. “It is not so bad. I like being alone.”
“As do we all, Silence,” she replied softly. “Until we don’t wish that. And when we don’t wish that,” her gaze just glanced off Sofia before it returned to me, “we need our friends.”
“And now you have them,” Farah declared. “Not friends. Sorelle. That is what we are. Sorelle della Bestia.”
Sisters of the Beast.
“Hear, hear,” Elpis called, lifting her fumaria.
“Huzzah!” Jasmine shouted, striking out to the side of the bath toward her own elaborate pipe.
I took up mine.
“To us!” I cried louder than I’d ever spoken before, lifting my fumaria. “Sisters of the Beast!”
“Sisters of the Beast!” the ladies called.
We all smoked (save Zosime, who just smiled).
Then we all giggled.
Outrageously.
And thus when we did, we did not notice the waters of the pool, the very earth underneath…
Rippling.
25
The Lecture
Lord Johan Mattson
East Corridor, First Floor, Catrame Palace, Fire City
FIRENZE
Really.
The man was vile.
This was what Johan thought as he strode down the corridor and his future son-in-law strolled toward him.
He wore no shoes.
And he was again in those leathers without sleeves that he’d worn to the parade.
They were practically sculpted to his skin.
It was obscene.
And his long hair…
Piercings…
Scars…
Johan could barely stand looking at the animal.
By the gods, even if his daughter was not destined to get his own name in the tomes of history (and he reckoned that the man was becoming so enamored with Silence, Johan would get that preposterous dowry back tenfold the moment he instructed Silence to ask for it), they’d be on their horses and out of this foul city before the boor could blink.
When they were near, Johan stopped and said, “I’ll have a word, Mars.”
The king stopped as well and lifted a brow.
“Mars?”
Johan didn’t understand the question for, unless he had a twin, he was Mars.
The man did not hesitate answering Johan’s unasked question.
“Did I forget giving you leave to use my given name?”
“You’re to marry my daughter in two days,” Johan noted with exasperation.
“Yes,” Mars agreed.
He ignored this ridiculousness and stated, “We need to speak.”
The large man rocked back on his (bare) heels and crossed his arms on his (massive) chest.
“And what do you wish to say to me, Johan?” Mars asked.
“Lord Johan,” he corrected glibly.
He was not feeling glib but a second later when he could not help himself from recoiling when he saw…
Could it be credited?
A burst of actual red flame light in the king’s eyes.
By the bloody gods.
“Let us not,” Mars growled. “I’ve had a trying day. I missed dinner with my bride. It’s late. I marry the day after tomorrow and there is much still to be done. If you wish to speak, do it,” he ordered.
Johan lifted his chin.
“I have sent word for the rest of Silence’s dowry to be delivered,” Johan declared.
“This I know,” Mars returned.
“I have showed you that respect,” Johan told him.
Mars said nothing.
“My daughter is twenty-three years of age,” Johan stated.
“Fascinating,” Mars murmured, his gaze darkening, and Johan got the distinct impression the king was no longer even aware Johan was there.
He fought snapping in the behemoth’s face and instead snapped with his voice, “Thus she is young and has been very sheltered.”
Mars blinked back into the conversation but only visually, not audibly.
“She received these piercings of yours today,” Johan reminded him.
“Did you stop me on my way to my bed to tell me a variety of things I know, and only one I did not?” Mars queried.
Johan was losing patience.
“She’s showing respect to you as well,” he clipped.
“It is our way.”
“It is not ours.”
“And thus I am aware, Lord Johan, that this is a gift she has given me. She. For it is her skin that bears the marital hoops that I will fill with my chain. What I’m not understanding is why I’m in the corridor discussing it with you.”
“Then I’ll explain. I would like respect returned by you not making my sheltered, young daughter do such as share a bath with women who wear no clothes while she engages in that vile smoke.”
“This is of my people too,” Mars replied.
“Silence is—”
“Enough,” Mars whispered, and there was no flame, but his tone, his look, and the strange appearance of his body having grown several inches in both height and width made Johan fight taking several steps back. “I will give you what you desire, Lord Johan.”
“I desire nothing but—”
“One small chest of Firenz emeralds.”
Johan gasped.
That was…
Well, it was worth the entire dowry and then some.
“One large chest of Airenzian gold,” Mars went on, to Johan’s shock, for this was far more than ten times the cost of the dowry. “And a pouch of Firenz rubies.”
Johan was suddenly feeling much more beneficent to his future son-in-law.