“Let me bathe you first, then. Let me ease you,” she said softly.

  He looked down at her for a long moment, his face inscrutable. Then he petted her hair, which she had twisted into a taut golden braid during her traveling. She knew he preferred it loose, but it just wasn’t practical when traveling and he had given her permission to bind it. Now she hastened to undo the clasp that kept it from unraveling and combed her hands through the woven braid until her hair hung in a thick, crimped curtain.

  He immediately buried his hand in the loose tresses, and she saw the ghost of a smile flit over his lips. She had pleased him. He was not the sort of man to keep his pleasure a secret, but he was tired. That small smile was likely all she would receive in praise. That was all right. She wasn’t looking for praise. She was looking to please him.

  “Very well,” he said. “I’ll have a bath drawn for me, and you can attend me.”

  She smiled with soft satisfaction, and he chuckled.

  “Does it please you that much?” he asked.

  “It does.”

  Chapter Two

  Valerian regarded Melena silently for a long minute. Then he stood up and separated himself from her in order to walk to the front of the tent. He lifted the flap, letting in a wash of cold air that made her shiver, her nipples tightening almost painfully. He spoke to someone outside the tent and then dropped the flap and returned to her. He sat down once more, and she immediately rested her cheek against his thigh.

  “They will bring the bath shortly. For now, I need you to sit over there on the divan.”

  He pointed to the couch settled not too far away from them. She frowned. “But I want to stay here with you.”

  He scowled at her, and she immediately recognized her mistake.

  “Of course, Sir,” she said softly. “I will not argue with you.”

  This made the scowl disappear, and she sighed inwardly with relief. She moved to the divan immediately and sat upon it. He watched her with intense interest.

  “Lie on your side. Display all your charms to me and anyone else who walks in.”

  She hesitated, the idea of being naked for all to see once again causing her anxiety, but she had to trust him. It was the only way she could prove she was worthy of his trust in return. So she did as he requested, stretching out on her side, her top knee bent a little and her torso supported by the brace of her elbow. She saw how intensely he watched her and dared to run her hand down the length of her own body, caressing her throat, her breast, her , and her hip in one sweeping gesture. His eyes were magnetized to the caress, never once looking away. She felt powerful then. She felt secure in the power of her beauty and the fact she was learning how to be seductive.

  “Now stay there, just like that, while I write some letters,” he said, his voice a low rasp. She realized she was in control for a change and wondered if he realized it as well. And she wondered that she wasn’t more elated with the idea than she was.

  In the beginning she had longed for a time when she would be able to manipulate him. Now she wasn’t interested in gaining power over him. She didn’t fully understand why. She should be taking any advantage she could to press her own will on him.

  She had been. She had been coaxing him into seeing what kind of man his brother truly was… and what kind of man he was to let it happen. She knew he saw it for himself, but there was something holding him back from acting definitively. If she could just figure that out, then maybe she could convince him to rise up against his brother once and for all and take the power of the emperor for himself.

  The brothers were not cut from the same cloth, for all she had thought so in the beginning. Valerian was a man of principle and honor. He was dutiful and obeyed his brother’s commands, but he also shaped those commands the best he could in order to create a better outcome with his fractious sibling. He was able to manage his brother’s moods and perversions to a certain degree.

  But it was not enough, and she could tell he was beginning to see that. She also knew he blamed her for bringing unrest into his ordered existence. She was all right with that. She didn’t mind being responsible for the disquiet of his mind. In fact, she fed it as often as she could. Someone had to. It was the only hope for her people and the peoples Vicktor had conquered.

  It was an awesome responsibility, but she did not shy away from it. She would gladly take on the role of the voice of conscience to this man of great dominance and great power. She knew her motives to be pure. She was not wholly selfishly motivated. She wanted to see good in the world all around, including good for Valerian himself. It was suddenly important to her that he find peace and happiness. She didn’t know why, but it was.

  She did not wish to bend him until he broke, however. He might feel the need to do so to her, but she did not disillusion herself into thinking she had anywhere near the power required to do so to him. Coaxing him into seeing the truth was one thing, manipulating him outright was another… and she had no desire to control him like that.

  Not that she ever could. He would see through a motive like that very quickly. As it was she had to play her hand very carefully. If she did anything overtly manipulative, he would see the act for what it was… and she would suffer for it. She would lose all power with him. She would lose his trust… something she was only just beginning to earn. For all his strength, his trust was a fragile thing. Easily broken and easily lost… but hard to maintain.

  She waited with her thoughts to occupy her, watching him as he began to go through the stack of missives and papers on the table in front of him. He was so tired. She could see it every time he stretched out his neck or rubbed his eyes. These were rare tells, however. Even though she was the only one there to see, he still maintained his veneer of indefatigable strength.

  She watched as he wrote one letter after another. Most men of his station had others do their writing for them, but not him. She could see he was a man used to doing everything for himself. Preferring it that way.

  After some time there was a sound at the front of the tent. The flap opened and in walked several women carrying yokes across their backs. Balanced on each end of the yoke was a bucket of steaming water. Melena was so eager to bathe her master she wasn’t really aware of being naked and on display when two men entered the tent and moved the heavy copper tub closer to one of the stoves.

  The women then emptied their buckets into the tub and headed out for more. After about three such trips, the tub was ready and full. The serving women then laid their master’s drying robe nearby and a soap and cloth as well. Once they all left, Melena turned her attention to the man who had not stopped in his work as the cavalcade of servants marched through the tent. She dared to stand up and move over to him, immediately dropping to her knees at his feet, and ran strong hands up his thigh and chest.

  “Come, let me bathe you,” she invited him.

  His jaw tightened a moment, and she feared she had stepped out-of-bounds. Then he dropped his quill and sat back in his chair, rubbing briefly at his neck. “Very well,” he said.

  He stood up and began to disrobe, but she immediately surged to her feet and stopped him. “Let me.”

  He dropped his hands and let her pull his shirt over his head. Then she went to kneel at his feet once more and pulled at his boots, freeing first one than the other. Once they were gone she moved on to the tightly laced front of his breeches. She undid the lacing and then peeled down the skintight fabric.

  He was naked.

  Gloriously so.

  There was no denying what a powerful and virile man he was. He exuded that strength he always portrayed in deep, prevailing waves. She took his hand and led him over to the bath. He stepped in with urging from her and stood in the water.

  “Sit. Relax,” she instructed.

  “Are you giving me commands now?” he asked her. But there was lightness in the question. He was not scolding her.

  “For now, yes. You don’t know how to care for yourself at times. You are too preoccupied with taking care of everyone else.”

  “I have a great many responsibilities, as you well know,” he said as he lowered himself into the steaming water. He sat back in the narrow tub and let out a sigh. She smiled to know he was able to relax with her at least a little bit. It made her feel somehow special.

  “You cannot maintain those responsibilities if you do not maintain yourself first. You are a wise man. Surely you know this. A warrior who does not take the care to hone his body will never be a success on the battlefield. The same is true for a leader who does not have a care for the rest his body needs.”

  “When did you grow so wise?” he asked her.

  “I have always been wise. You have just been preoccupied with my other qualities before now.”

  A corner of his mouth twitched up into a smile. “Perhaps I have,” he said. He reached out to tuck a wave of her hair back behind her ear. “How remiss of me.”

  “Now relax, Sir,” she urged.

  He sat back in the tub, and she picked up the soap and cloth. She began bathing him innocently at first, focusing on his less intimate parts. It had been some weeks since they had last been intimate, and they had had only a few days together before Vicktor had sent his assassin after her. They had been uprooted before they could explore one another more thoroughly. So, she was still a little shy. She had come this far on bravado, but being up close to him and maintaining an air of matter-of-factness was much more difficult than it seemed to be at first.

  Still, she persevered. She studiously washed away weeks’ worth of grime and travel from his body, feeling the need to bathe herself more keenly as she went. She looked forward to her own bath.

  “Where have you put Daria and Hassa?” she asked.

  “They are in the harem tent. You will not be staying with them. Until I know whom to trust, you are to stay by my side at all times.”

  “But surely you do not suspect Hassa. She is so sweet.”

  “I am more inclined to think it was Daria,” he agreed, “but I cannot be certain, and until I am I would have you safe by my side.”

  She felt her face warm with pleasure. His attentiveness to her safety made her feel incredibly unique. She tried to remind herself that this was only a temporary thing. She was his favorite of the moment. She would not always be so.

  The tub water clouded with soap as she bathed his long, strong legs and then moved onto his hips. She washed through his pubic hair and then encircled his sturdy cock with her washrag. She stroked him, cleaned him, until she was satisfied and until he was hard with stirred desire for her. He reached to stroke her hair and her cheek in thoughtful sweeps of his fingers. “You’re very thorough, Pet,” he said softly.

  “I only seek to do what no one else seems to think needs to be done. I seek to take care of you.”

  “Why is it so important to you? Am I not your enemy?” he asked.

  “Not anymore,” she replied baldly. “I don’t look on you that way now.”

  “And what has changed to make you feel differently?” he asked.

  She looked down at the surface of the water and was silent a long minute. He let her gather her thoughts. “Because no one has cared about me before. And I know, in your own way, that you do.”

  He was silent a long minute, then reached out to touch her chin, tipping it up so she was able to meet his eyes. “But you have your brother and sisters who cared about you.”

  “I was useful to my brother, and my sisters… well, they depended on me. But never have I felt they would step in front of a blade for me… as you have done.”

  “Surely they would have. What makes you think otherwise?”

  “When the soldiers came to take us captive… my sisters hid behind me and pushed me out in front. Even though I was not the eldest I was expected to be the buffer between them and danger. Not that I minded so much… I would do anything for them. It just… hurt to think they would not do the same in return.”

  “They were frightened,” he said softly.

  “So was I.”

  His dark eyes studied her for a long minute. “I am glad you see I am here to protect you. I will care for you.”

  “You have proven that already.”

  “But,” he said firmly, “I expect you to do the same for me. I expect you to be willing to step in front of a blade for me. I pray that time will never come, but you must feel it all the same.”

  “I do,” she insisted.

  “I do not believe you… yet. We have much work to do, you and I, before I will trust you that much.”

  “Yes, Sir,” she said softly. “I shall endeavor to please you.”

  “It already pleases me to hear you say so. Now come, it is your turn to bathe.”

  He stood up in the tub, water sluicing down off his hard body. She was on her knees beside the tub, so he towered over her. “But I have not finished with you!” she protested.

  “Any more thorough a job, Pet, and this will become more than a bath. Come and get in the water before it grows any colder.”

  He stepped out of the tub and lifted her from the floor, placing her in the water, which was still hot enough, and she sighed to feel it surrounding her. She immediately began to soap up the washrag and hurriedly scrubbed at her body.

  He reached out and took her hand in his.

  “Slow down,” he said. “Let me watch you.”

  She looked at him curiously. “You want to watch me bathe?”

  “I want to watch you do everything, all the time. I don’t think you appreciate how beautiful you are.”

  She flushed. She had never been considered a great beauty, and she had never wanted to be one. Her sister was far prettier than she was and had been the one to garner the attention of the boys in town. Melena had gone virtually unnoticed in her wake.

  But in the end that had been a fortunate thing. They had been right. She had ended up in the bed of the second most powerful man in all the mighty Jorku nation. Only a twist of fortune had kept her out of the bed of the most powerful man. Out of Vicktor’s bed. She shuddered to think what Vicktor’s tender auspices would have been like.

  Instead she was here. With him. Being made to feel treasured and beautiful… in the most contradictory of ways. Valerian was both intense and easy, tender and brutal, gentle one moment, pushing her mind and body to its limits the next.

  It amazed her that something she had first abhorred was now something she was beginning to crave. For that was the truth of it, she told her rebelling mind. Although a part of her still flinched to think she could find anything good in the way her enemy treated her, a larger part of her acknowledged that his seemingly harsh ways had brought her far more pleasure than she had ever known in her previous life.

  Then again, her life had been a hard one, toiling on the farm and taking care of her siblings since she had been just a young girl herself. Ever since their mother had died, the responsibilities of being the woman of the house had rested solely on her shoulders. Her older sister had not been capable of doing so.

  Melena considered the ways her life had changed in a brief instant. She didn’t dwell because his dark eyes were trained on her expectantly. She lifted one long leg out of the water, trailing the washrag down the length of it, watching him as he watched her. He moved to grab up the drying robe that sat folded on a stool nearby, and pulled it on over his still damp skin, his eyes never leaving her.

  She washed herself thoroughly and slowly… at least, as slowly as the cooling temperature of the water allowed. She raised each body part out of the water as she attended to them -- legs, arms, breasts, belly and hips -- until she was standing in the tub, water dripping down off her skin, her fingers dropping the washrag into the cold water.

  “Now your hair,” he said, moving to pick up a bucket of rinsing water that had been left behind. “Kneel,” he said.

  She lowered back down to her knees in the water and bowed her head. He poured half of the bucket over her head, then put it aside. He picked up the soap for himself, knelt beside the tub, and took to scrubbing the bar through her grime-laden tresses. He made quick work of lathering up her head, his strong fingers scrubbing through her roots feeling so decadent and seductive. He picked up the bucket again, and they both worked to rinse her hair clean.

  Once they were done, he got back to his feet and pulled her to him, lifting her out of the water and grabbing up her drying robe. He helped her wriggle into it, closing it tightly across her chilled skin, then used a separate towel to dry the dripping length of her hair until it fell damply down her back. He moved her closer to one of the stoves, stoking up the coal fire within it, making sure she was warm.

  As soon as the excess of water was dried and the fire was built up, he stripped the robe off of her and let her stand naked before him once more.

  “Go to your knees,” he instructed her. She obeyed without question, looking at him curiously when he chuckled.

  “What is it?” she asked.

  “There was a time, not too long ago, when you would have fought me on even that small command.”

  “Perhaps I am merely saving my energy for bigger battles,” she said primly.

  “Perhaps you are. I wouldn’t doubt it. However, I am too tired to battle with you tonight.”

  There it was. He was confessing his weariness to her. A sense of satisfaction stole over her. He had finally admitted to weakness, however small. And he had done it in front of her. He was trusting her with his vulnerability. It pleased her to no end.

  She showed her pleasure and her understanding by leaning her willing body against the braced strength of his legs. She trailed fingers up the inside of his leg beneath his robe. When she reached to top of the inside of his thigh, she turned her hand and cupped his soft sac in her palm, her fingernails scraping over the skin up along the back of it. She pushed the robe open and apart until his thick member was protruding toward her. She caught him with her free hand and stroked his length, her thumb rubbing over the slit at the end as she licked her lips. He said no words of encouragement. He didn’t need to. She knew what he wanted from her. Obedience, submission. He wanted her to cater to him just as he had catered to her when he had washed her hair. She didn’t hesitate, moving her head forward and taking the tip of his cock into her mouth. But only the tip.