“I said I would,” she said sharply. “I am a woman of my word.”

  Unlike you. The words were unspoken, but they could be heard just the same. His face darkened.

  “When you return to me see that it is without this streak of nasty defiance. I don’t know what has come over you, but it will end now.”

  She yanked at her hand hard, pulling it free, turned her back on him and marched out of the tent. She didn’t care if her temper caused her grief in the long run, she wanted to indulge in it for just a little while. She deserved her feelings. She was allowed to be disappointed with him. He might not think so, but she believed she had the right.

  Chapter Two

  She made it back to the women’s tent, silently dropped her cloak, and got into the tub. The water was still warm enough, but she really didn’t care that much. She sat back in the water and stewed about her situation. She would have to go back to him. She would have to listen to his expressions of love and know they didn’t mean anything. How would she be able to tolerate it?

  Tears gathered in her eyes. She sniffed. Daria must have heard her because she paused in the card game she was playing with herself. Hassa had been dragged away, and Daria had hardly missed a beat. She didn’t seem affected at all by what had happened. That was when Melena realized she was a simple woman at heart. All she wanted was the comforts of her life. As long as that was not threatened, she was happy.

  “Why are you so emotional? You didn’t know Hassa that well,” Daria noted.

  “It is not Hassa. It is nothing.”

  “Ah. I see. It is our lord who hurts you. Well, you will learn he has a knack for hurting his women. Both physically and mentally. The sooner you accept that you will never mean more to him than an occasional plaything the better you will be.” She tilted her head. “Although… the gifting of that collar makes you special. Perhaps even special enough to touch his cold heart.”

  “Has he… has he ever told you he loves you?”

  Daria snorted. “Never. Valerian does not know how to love. He is too cold. Too calculating. Too selfish.”

  “I wonder that you speak such words freely. Aren’t you afraid I will report back to him? You could lose everything.”

  “Valerian and I understand each other. We are both cut from the same cloth you could say. We value honor above all things. It almost hurts me to know he suspected I was the one who betrayed him. He should know me better than that. Not that I feel any emotional attachment to him… although I am fond of him in my own way… but that I would never risk the comforts of my life just to battle for position with a new girl. Hassa wanted nothing more than to wear that collar. I would never want it. It is a hurtful thing to be so treasured by Valerian… or so I always thought. But as long as you wear that collar you will be constantly at the front of his attention. He will be expecting you to live up to whatever it is that it means to him. You will have to live up to his expectations… while enjoying the comfort of never having to live up to yours.”

  Melena blinked away her tears and regarded the other woman with a newfound respect. Daria had found a way to accept her place in Valerian’s affections. Indeed she seemed to thrive in not being the center of his attention. Melena didn’t know if she could live like that. Would he one day grow tired of her as well? Would he take back the collar as easily as he had seemed to give it?

  “It is best you don’t expect too much of him,” Daria said with surprising sympathy. “It will go better for you that way.”

  “I… I thought he loved me,” she said miserably.

  “He has a way of making you feel treasured… then yanking the feeling away from you. Learn to expect that and you will be able to protect yourself from hurt.”

  Melena felt more tears burning. How could she live like that? To be promised something and to have it jerked away in the next moment. To live her life as a forgotten plaything? She didn’t think she could do that.

  “With any luck he will get you with child.” Daria hoped to comfort her. “Then you will have something to love and keep you occupied. I never wanted children myself… but you seem the sort who would thrive in that role.”

  “You see a great deal,” Melena remarked, forming a new respect for Daria.

  “I see truths. I am gifted in that way. But here’s a truth for you. Valerian has never given that collar to anyone before. It does mean you are special to him in some way. Just not perhaps in the way you would like to think.”

  Melena brought her wet fingers up to dash her tears away. She wouldn’t wallow, she decided with a lift of her chin. She would learn how to manage. She would survive. After all, wasn’t that what she was good at? Survival?

  Oh, but she wanted more, her heart cried. She wanted so much more! Perhaps Daria was right. Perhaps having Valerian’s child would be the answer for a heart that promised to grow cold and lonely over time. But those kinds of thoughts would only turn her into Hassa over time. No. She needed to deal with Valerian’s coldness and uneven ideas of a relationship head on. She had to find the strength to find a way to make him experience what it was like to be one of his women.

  Unfortunately she had already professed her love to him, so she could not retract the emotion. Besides, he was her lord and master; whatever he commanded of her she must give… or pay the consequences. What those consequences would be she couldn’t even imagine, yet still she shuddered to think of it. If one thing could be said about Valerian it was that he was very imaginative. He could very easily think of ways to hurt her that she would not enjoy.

  Melena finished her bath because the water was growing cold as she sat and wallowed in her misery. She made a perfunctory business of it, taking no pleasure in it like she usually did… even though she knew it was likely to be the last bath she would have in quite some time. They would be marching on by noon, her brother and his army in tow behind them. Other armies would join them as well, and perhaps still others would oppose them. But it would be weeks before they would have to worry about that. An army was a slow-moving beast in general, only a quarter of it powered by horses in some way. Still, in an army of twenty thousand that was quite a bit of cavalry. The horses would be used to pull supplies, wagons, and mounted men.

  As she dressed she tried to continue thinking about the army and the trek they were about to embark on, but then all she could think of was the danger it put Valerian in. Within a couple of weeks Vicktor was sure to learn of his brother’s march toward him. Once he did there would be no turning back. Vicktor would do all in his power to see his younger sibling destroyed.

  She was tying on her cloak as Daria stood up and walked over to her. In what had to be a rare show of affection, the other woman took Melena into her embrace and hugged her. Then she stood back and met her eyes.

  “There is of course the chance that I am entirely wrong. That he might truly come to love you and respect you above all other women. But… I would not hold out hope, if I were in your position. I would try to find another way to make myself happy… as I have done.”

  “You are content to laze around in comfort,” Melena said. “I could never do that.”

  Daria chuckled. “I do admit I love to be spoiled, but I also take the time to read… extensively. To learn languages. To expand my mind. Nowhere else could I get such an opportunity to learn something new every day. Were I to be married off to another man where I would be expected to keep his house and bear his children I would be utterly miserable. This is why I must beg you to think of me when you speak to Valerian and be careful of what you tell him. I am trusting you. Do not give me reason to regret it.”

  “I will not. You need not worry. All your secrets are as safe with me as mine are with you,” Melena said.

  “I am glad we understand each other and can be friends. I don’t make friends with Valerian’s other women usually, Hassa being the exception because we started this journey together having been given to Valerian as his first shisha. Anyway, I am clever enough to know I should be friends with the woman most likely to remain his favorite for a long time. That collar says you are that woman. I know it sounds selfish, and maybe it is, but I do genuinely want to help you. We will be in close companionship very often as this army moves. I think being friends is the wisest choice.”

  “I agree. You do not hold it against me that Hassa is gone?”

  “Hassa let her jealousy rule her. She made friends so she could gauge Valerian’s emotional attachment… in order to make herself feel better about her future. I don’t know what about you threatened her so early on. But she proved to have uncanny instinct since you did end up posing the ultimate threat to her. Of course it was a self-fulfilling fate she consigned herself to. By acting against you because she feared you meant her doom, she damned herself and made you her downfall. Not very wise of her. But she did play a very mean game of chess. And Hellis Mark.”

  “I can play Hellis Mark,” Melena offered with a small smile. Daria was trying to give her comfort, she realized. It was kind of her. She took the offered arm gladly. She could use whatever comfort and friendship she could get. “I must go. Valerian has commanded I present myself to him.”

  “Then you are right. You must go.” Daria gave her a soft-eyed look of compassion. “Remember what I said. He has a way of making you feel like you are the only woman in the world for him… but he has a harem for a reason. He will always crave variety. His attention always wanders.”

  “I understand,” Melena said softly, looking away from her new friend before she could see the tears threatening in her eyes. She would not be weak about this. She would use Daria as a point of strength. It gave her comfort to know there was someone she could lean on.

  Melena entered Valerian’s tent moments later to find it abuzz with activity. It was also nearly empty. The furniture had all been removed, including the bed and the stoves that kept the tent warm. The only thing remaining was Valerian’s table with its many letters atop it, although the pile of letters had dwindled dramatically. They had been sent, she realized, flying ahead of them to contact the lords and landowners in Vicktor’s nation asking them to choose sides.

  Valerian was in discussion with one of his lieutenants, giving him final commands. “I want a wagon full of hay to follow those of us on horseback so the women can rest if they grow tired,” he said to the man she had seen often before. Valerian had never seen fit to introduce her to him by name. It had been a basic lack of manners she hadn’t noticed until then. Either that or he really did see her as worth so little it wasn’t worth his time.

  When Valerian looked up and saw her, a jolt on anxious emotions rocketed through her. She couldn’t tell if it was nervousness or the usual thrill she got when he took notice of her. Either way she wanted to scold herself for it. She had to gain control over her emotions. She had to somehow gain the upper hand. Valerian had had it for far too long.

  “Valerian,” she said, purposely dropping the respectful “Sir” she had been trained to call him by. “I wish to speak with you.”

  He noticed the difference in her address right away. He narrowed his eyes on her. “About what?”

  “In private,” she pressed, looking around at all the people crowding the tent.

  Valerian looked around as if he had noticed them for the first time. That didn’t surprise her. She sometimes thought he took his position in the world for granted. She wondered if he realized what his life would be like without all these people following him and waiting on him so religiously. He was a capable man. He could easily survive on his own if need be. However, it would be a shocking change for him. One that might come to pass if his army abandoned him in his efforts to march on Vicktor. He would know once he made the announcement to his troops that they would be marching on the emperor.

  But she knew that wouldn’t happen. Valerian was the type of man who would always have devotees and followers. He was magnetic in that way. He had earned their loyalty in that way. She might be upset with him for his shortcomings, but she had to give him credit where it was due. He was a man of honor, and men of honor earned friendships easily. He was a man of intelligence. Men like that attracted others who were less so… and equally so.

  “Franso, clear the tent,” Valerian instructed the lieutenant at his side.

  So that is his name, she thought.

  “Everybody out!” Franso shouted at the top of his voice. It amused her. Valerian could have easily done the same thing.

  The contents of the tent emptied out quickly, leaving Melena alone with Valerian. He leaned a thigh against the lone remaining table, crossed his arms over his chest, and confronted her with his gaze.

  “Valerian, is it?” he said ominously.

  “Yes,” she said, her chin lifting as she drew her cloak around her more. Without the stoves to heat it, the tent was growing cold. “I should prefer to call you Valerian in the company of others.”

  “Then you will be disappointed. You will call me Sir, especially in the company of others.”

  “Am I never to be considered equal to you?” she demanded. “Am I always to act as though I am less?”

  “Where is this coming from?” he asked. “You were content to call me Sir an hour ago. What has happened between now and then other than you discovering Hassa’s treachery?”

  “Maybe it is Hassa that has me thinking. What will happen to me when you grow tired of me? What worth will I have then? How will I pass my days then? I am a farm girl born and raised. I work hard. I do not do well sitting in the lap of luxury all day.”

  “There will be very little in the way of luxuries these next few months. Perhaps longer.”

  “That is all you can think of to say?” she snapped. “That is what you focus on? Not my fears or my concerns? Don’t you care?”

  He launched off of the table and was on her in a heartbeat. His hand wrapped into her hair, and he tightened his fist; he forced her to look up at him… to look into the anger in his eyes. “How can you accuse me of not caring? Have you not been listening these past days? Have I not made my emotions clear to you? I have made them clearer to you than any woman before you.”

  “And after me? What woman will you love after me?”

  “Why are you focusing on that?” he asked irritably. “Can’t you enjoy the day as it happens and let the future take care of itself? Especially in times of war you must hone your appreciation for life into the moment that is happening. I am not thinking of any other woman right now, isn’t that enough for you? Isn’t it enough for you that I am so obsessed with you that I let important matters slide just so I can indulge in you?”

  She hadn’t known that much. What important things had he let slide? She wished she knew so she could judge the obsession he said he had for her.

  It didn’t matter, she reminded herself. He was obsessed now… but what about the future?

  “I have no guarantees it will stay that way. You may be obsessed with me, but that is obviously a temporary condition. You are always obsessed with a new woman when she comes, according to your other women.”

  “Who told you this? Hassa? Why would you listen to anything that treacherous bitch has to say?”

  “Because she has seen it happen! Time and time again! Woman after woman until she was so far forgotten that she felt the need to rid herself of incoming competition. And you knew it too! Otherwise why would you have me go and take a bath in the women’s quarters just so they could see this collar?” She reached up and touched the golden inks beneath the cloak.

  “Perhaps I was too hasty in giving you that collar. Perhaps I was wrong in thinking you were the one who would love me without condition,” he said bitterly.

  “I do love you! But I love myself as well. I am willing to give you everything… but you must give me something in return!”

  “I am! I am giving you my love! Something, along with that collar, I have never given a woman before!” He reached out with his free hand and yanked the tie of her cloak. The tie came free and the cloak billowed to the floor. “I will take it back. I will take it all back!”

  He grabbed the collar and yanked it hard. The links snapped under the tortious action, and it came away from her throat painfully. She gasped at the shock of it… not the pain, but the shock that he would so easily take back something he said he felt so strongly. It only proved to her he knew so little about what he truly felt.

  She fell to her knees, tears stinging her eyes. His hand was still in her hair and was pulling it painfully. She saw him throw the collar across the room out of the corner of her eye, and it only deepened her pain.

  “How could you?” she asked in an aching voice. “How could you?”

  “How could I? How could you? How could you make me believe you were perfectly obedient, that you were giving me everything, when in fact you have given me nothing at all! No faith. No loyalty! Nothing! You sit there and question me… question the veracity of my feelings for you? You hurt me with your faithlessness like none have hurt me before!”

  “You hurt me first! By devolving this relationship to nothing but master and slave, owner and owned. I know you own me. I know that! You own me right to my heart! But what you said about me not owning you… if you had true love in your heart, then you would feel I have a part of you under my care and my control. Am I asking you to be slave to me? No. But at least let me own a little part of you!”

  He was breathing hard, his temper radiating out of him in a tremor she felt through the roots of her stretched hair. She dared to touch him in the face of his tenuous control over his temper. She knew he could explode any second. He could beat her in a way he had never done before… with anger and hatred in his heart. It would be very different than the punishments he inflicted on her in order to draw pleasure out of her.

  She reached up and touched both of her hands to his belly, stroking over it and sliding her hands up to the bottom of his ribs. He was wearing a hard leather vest, so she had slipped her hands beneath it. She wanted him to feel the supplication in her touch. She wanted him to know she was still his Pet. She had not abandoned him. She was merely asking for more of him than he seemed willing to give. The pain of loving him in spite of his recalcitrance was too much to bear.