“I’ve never been able to understand people like that,” she said, watching Derand pour himself his own cup of tea. “They seem to think that having a title means living well and doing as you please. How do they miss the fact that right is always linked with responsibility, at least for anyone with intelligence? If you don’t take proper care of the people who make it possible for you to live well, you can’t expect to go on living well.”

  “The key word you used was ‘intelligence,’” Derand answered after sipping at his tea. “When your greed is so strong that it blocks out thought of everything else, any intelligence you may have is immediately turned useless. We still have that man Jivlian Hoid, the one buying up property, to see, and then you and I are going to take some time for ourselves. We’re supposed to be newlyweds, in effect, and it’s time we acted like it.”

  Elissia realized that Derand meant to add support to their pretense, which was necessary if the plan was going to work. She just wasn’t comfortable not knowing the details of what he had in mind, but before she could ask a guard entered the room.

  “My king, the merchant Jivlian Hoid has been brought,” the guard announced. “Do you want to see him now?”

  “Yes, I certainly do,” Derand answered, putting aside his teacup. “Have him brought in.”

  The guard nodded and stepped outside, and a moment later a fat and sweating man in very expensive clothing was dragged into the room. Behind him walked a woman who was dressed just as expensively, and the way she held herself said she was allowing everyone around her the favor of her presence. She wasn’t a particularly beautiful woman, Elissia noticed, but her complete self-possession made her looks beside the point.

  “Jivlian Hoid,” Derand said, again making the name sound like a proclamation of doom. “Have you been enjoying yourself forcing others to give you what belongs to them, Hoid?”

  “Excuse me, Your Majesty, but my husband has done nothing illegal or wrong,” the woman said before Hoid could do more than babble out something about being innocent. “I’m Valda Hoid, and all my husband’s business deals are completely aboveboard.”

  “That’s not what some of his victims are saying,” Derand responded, doing nothing to soften his tone.

  “When you threaten people into doing business with you, the deals can’t in any way be considered legal.”

  “But I haven’t threatened anyone, Your Majesty!” Hoid protested, looking totally confused. “I won’t try to claim that I didn’t make a nice profit on my latest deals, but that’s what I’m supposed to do. I offered less than what the various properties were actually worth, but if the former owners didn’t need my gold they would have refused to sell. Claiming now that they were cheated isn’t unusual when people recover from whatever troubles caused them to sell in the first place.”

  It was difficult to doubt that the man was telling the truth as far as he knew it, and that made Elissia stop to think. Derand also seemed unsure now, so Elissia decided to get into the discussion.

  “But that doesn’t explain the complaint of someone who hasn’t sold yet,” she pointed out slowly, watching Hoid as she spoke. “The people involved don’t want to sell their property, but they’re being pressured into making the deal.”

  “Forgive me, Madam, but why would I do that?” Hoid asked, still obviously very nervous. “If I forced people into selling, they’d be able to complain to the king and I would lose everything I had. Acting that way makes absolutely no sense.”

  “It would make sense if you’d noticed that ordinary people weren’t being allowed access to the king,” Elissia mused aloud, her attention now on Valda Hoid. The woman had very briefly allowed herself to be intensely amused by what her husband had said, and that made Elissia suspicious.

  “For how long a time did your wife attend audiences, Merchant Hoid?”

  “Oh, Valda didn’t attend for long,” Hoid began just as his wife snapped, “Don’t answer that! What I do and don’t do is no one’s business but my own!”

  “Ah, now I see the way of it,” Derand said, glancing at Elissia with a smile before returning his attention to the people in front of him. “Mistress Hoid decided that her husband’s business practices were foolish and unnecessary, so she went about making things better - obviously without telling him what she was doing.

  My people will take the names of the men you hired to bully those who were reluctant to sell at your husband’s price, Mistress Hoid. After that I’ll have scribes go through your records, Hoid, and you’ll have to return all the property that was sold to you because of the threats. You do understand now, I hope?”

  “Yes, Your Majesty, I understand,” Hoid said in a hollow voice as he stared at his furious wife. “I just don’t believe this can be happening. Valda, how could you?”

  “How could I what?” the woman snapped, still furiously angry. “How could I turn you into a man of wealth instead of letting you go on in your piddling little usual ways? If you don’t appreciate what I did, I do!”

  “We’ll see how much you appreciate what you did once you’re made to paid for it,” Derand told her, gesturing to the guard. “Take that woman to a cell in the dungeons until I decide what her punishment should be.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” the woman scoffed just before two guardsmen took her arms. “I’m a woman, so you can’t - No! Let me go at once!”

  The woman’s words turned to screams as she was dragged out, and the fat merchant actually took a step after her before realizing what he was doing.

  “Please, Your Majesty, please be lenient with her,” Hoid said after turning back to Derand, agony in his voice and eyes. “She doesn’t understand that she was causing harm with her actions! She was just trying to help me!”

  “No, actually she was trying to help herself,” Elissia said when it was clear that Derand was having trouble refusing the man’s pleas. “She doesn’t care about anyone but herself, and if you can’t see that then I feel sorry for you. If the king is lenient with her she’ll just feel free to try something of the same again, which can’t be allowed. There are innocent people to consider, after all.”

  “Yes, of course you’re right, Madam,” Hoid said in a dead voice, all hope gone out of him. “I’ll just - go home now, if I may, and make things ready for her eventual return. She’ll really need me then? “

  Hoid bowed and then left the room, a pathetic picture of desolation. Elissia watched him go, then shook her head.

  “Talk about your horrible examples,” she said after finishing the tea in her cup. “That’s what can happen if you end up loving someone who doesn’t love you back. There ought to be a way to let everyone in the world see him - to save others from the same terrible fate.”

  “Yes, the poor man’s fate is terrible, but I doubt if people would take him as an example for their own lives,” Derand answered after a brief hesitation. “Love does turn people blind, after all? And now we can take that time for ourselves that I mentioned earlier.”

  “Just a minute,” Elissia said as the man offered her a hand. “What exactly will we be doing?”

  “We’ll be taking a ride through our very private gardens,” Derand answered, an odd smile curving his lips.

  “I’ve heard some of the servants wonder why I haven’t taken you through there yet, so we definitely have to go.”

  “Yes, of course,” Elissia responded as she let him help her up from the chair. If people were discussing the matter it had to be taken care of, but why people would be talking about their not visiting gardens was a curious point?

  Even more curious was the fact that Derand led her, not outside, but to stairs leading upward. Then she remembered that she’d have to change her clothes to go riding, and was glad she hadn’t made any foolish comments about the direction they were taking. The prospect of being alone with Derand had turned her foolish as it sometimes did, a reaction she would have thought would be gone by now?

  When they reached their bedchamber, though, Derand kept her from ringing for maids to help her change.

  “You’re probably thinking about changing into a riding skirt or trousers,” he said when she raised her brows in surprise. “Since I’ve already arranged for a sidesaddle, different clothing won’t be necessary.

  But something else is necessary,

  even though I know you won’t enjoy it.”

  “What sort of something else?” Elissia asked, instantly suspicious. “Just going for a ride shouldn’t require any special preparation.”

  “This won’t be an ordinary ride in an ordinary place,” Derand said, his expression sober and calm. “We’ll be in what’s called The Lovers’ Garden, and we’ll be expected to act appropriately. No one else will be really close, but we’ll still be under observation from a distance. That means we have to take care of your ? problem before we start.”

  “You’ve got to be joking!” Elissia stated, appalled by the mere suggestion. “You expect me to ride a horse with that thing inside me? Do you have any idea what the time will be like for me?”

  “I know it won’t be pleasant, but what choice do we have?” he countered, still patient and calm. “We’re supposed to be newlyweds who are hungry for each other, and if you don’t really feel that way someone is bound to notice. We can keep the horses to a walk and that should make things a bit easier. So let’s get it done and the time will be over with that much sooner.”

  Elissia found herself babbling a protest that made absolutely no sense as Derand went to his wardrobe to get that awful bead. The method she’d found to keep her private feelings really private had turned around and bitten her, and her mind refused to come up with an argument that would save her. She did still need the camouflage for her feelings, but -

  “You’re being really sensible about this and I’m proud of the way you’re supporting our plan,” Derand said, suddenly beside her again with a chair. He sat in the chair and had her over his lap before Elissia could do more than babble again, and then her skirts were up over her back and head. She felt his hands at the ties of her underdrawers, and half a moment later the underdrawers were down to the middle of her thighs. Two heartbeats later that horrible bead was being put inside her, giving her no choice but to gasp at the sensation. A thought occurred to her then and she began to speak, but she’d hesitated just a little too long.

  “Ow! No! Stop!” she gurgled out as her bottom was smacked hard five or six times. “Stop doing that!”

  “Yes, yes, it’s all over now,” the monster assured her in a soothing voice as he began to replace her underdrawers. “The bead does best together with a good spanking, but you haven’t done anything to be punished for. That’s why I gave you

  only a few small pats, just enough to help. No sense in doing something if you don’t do it right.”

  “Pats,” Elissia muttered as he pulled her skirts back down and then helped her to her feet. The sting in her bottom called him a liar, and there were too many layers of clothing in the way for any rubbing to be effective. And that damned bead had already started to work on her?

  “You’re in for a treat now that I think you’ll really enjoy,” Derand said as he wrapped her arm around his and then led the way out of the bedchamber. “These gardens are more unique than any you’ll have seen anywhere else. Just watch.”

  Elissia expected him to take her downstairs again, but instead he turned in the direction that took them more deeply into the apartment. They walked for a good minute in what should have been the wrong direction, the movement doing its usual damage to Elissia’s self possession, and then they turned a corner to find six guards in black leather standing in front of a door. When the guards saw them one stepped back to open the door, allowing Derand to urge Elissia out first. She stepped outside and then just stood staring with her mouth open.

  “These gardens were created for no one but the king and his queen,” Derand said from behind her as she looked around at incredible beauty. “The entire area is braced as strongly as the palace itself, so the weight of the earth and the trees and everything else isn’t likely to cause the gardens to collapse. Even riding along the bridle paths doesn’t cause a tremor. I know, because I’ve done it.”

  Even as he spoke, Elissia found it hard to look away from the incredible expanse of grass and flowers and trees. The grass and flowers were close to the door they’d come through, only a few small, ornamental trees standing in the midst of flower beds. Larger trees could be seen in the distance, a distance that said the gardens stretched at least as far as the ends of the palace. The place was unbelievable, and then Elissia was being urged to the right of the door.

  “Our mounts are all ready,” Derand said, bringing Elissia’s attention from the distance to the area right near her. Two grooms stood with two beautiful roan horses, the horse equipped with a sidesaddle standing next to a mounting block. That brought back Elissia’s unhappiness, but she was being “helped”

  to her horse before she could say a word.

  “These horses are stabled up here and are allowed to graze here as well,” the monster said as he gave Elissia no choice about climbing the steps of the mounting block. “They were brought up here as colts, and that was hard enough. Bringing up full-grown horses would be possible but not very pleasant, especially for the horses. Up you go.”

  As soon as Elissia’s bottom came in contact with the saddle she knew she’d been right about not wanting to do this. Throwing her right leg over the braces and putting her left foot into the stirrup did nothing to make her position more comfortable, not even allowing her to raise up more than an inch or so. By the time she discovered that she also discovered that the monster was mounted and ready to go, and when his horse led off, hers followed.

  Elissia was able to keep silent for a time, at least until a glance over her shoulder showed that the grooms had gone back to wherever they’d come from. Their being alone let her look at the monster, who had slowed his horse until he rode to Elissia’s left.

  “I really can’t bear this,” she choked out, having found that the few smacks she’d been given made her squirm on the saddle. That squirming made the bead in her bottom even worse, and she was rapidly losing control of herself.

  “You’re doing it for a good cause so you will be able to bear it,” the monster disagreed softly, his hand coming to touch her cheek gently. “The gardeners aren’t very close, but even seeing us from a distance will let them spread the word about how much in love we are. And that’s the point to all this, isn’t it?”

  He’d taken her right hand, and after asking his question he raised her hand to his lips without moving his gaze from her face. Elissia closed her eyes in defeat, unable to say even one more word. The way he touched her and kissed her and spoke to her? She’d never have guessed that the man would be this good at pretending, and now the time with him threatened to be much more painful than she’d expected?

  The horses continued to move sedately for another couple of minutes, and then they passed a last flower bed before an open stretch of grass. As soon as the horses saw the open grass they began to trot, and if Elissia had been any worse a rider she might well have fallen off. In no more than an instant she wished she’d fallen off, and it was all she could do to get enough control of herself to finally pull her horse back to a walk. By then the open stretch of grass was behind them, and they were among flowers and bushes and trees again.

  “We have to stop right now,” Elissia said when Derand turned his horse and rode back to her. “If we don’t then I’ll probably start to scream and foam at the mouth!”

  “Well, we can’t have you doing that,” the monster said, very obviously keeping himself from showing any amusement. “There’s a nice little bower just ahead, and it’s made for brief rest stops. Come on, I’ll show you where it is.”

  He turned his horse and led off, completely ignoring Elissia’s having said now. Under other circumstances she would have dismounted by herself, but she’d been stupid enough to let herself be given a sidesaddle.

  As she reluctantly stayed in that torture saddle and let her horse follow Derand’s, she swore she’d never be this stupid again.

  The bower Derand had mentioned wasn’t very far, but it also wasn’t quite as close as he’d suggested. By the time he dismounted and came to help Elissia down, she was nearly beside herself.

  “Yes, I know, but we’ll make it all right,” he murmured as he held her in his arms once she stood next to her horse. “We’ll make everything all right.”

  His head bent and he kissed her then, and in spite of her burning need Elissia couldn’t help but return that kiss. She wanted to kiss and love the man Derand pretended to be, but she’d have to settle for the kiss alone. Also loving a pretend man would have been pitiful, and Elissia couldn’t bear the idea of being pitiful.

  The kiss lasted until Elissia couldn’t keep herself from squirming hard again, and then Derand took her hand and led her to what he’d called a bower. A narrow opening in a ring of tall bushes led to a padded bench shaded by the branches of a nearby tree, and when they reached the bench he had her lean down on it with her forearms. Her skirts were quickly thrown over her head and her underdrawers taken down to her knees, and then she heard the sound of leather being moved.

  A moment later Derand was presenting himself to her, making it very clear how eager he was. Elissia cried out as he entered her, her need so high that her body spasmed as soon as he was inside her. By the time her mind reeled back from the relief it had needed so badly, she found that she was well on the way to being that badly in need again. The man inside her was stroking hard and fast, bringing her body sensations that simply couldn’t be ignored. And she couldn’t stop squirming, it just wasn’t possible?

  Quite a lot of time passed with Elissia barely knowing where she was and then, suddenly, she found she wasn’t where she’d thought. Her skirts were down again and she sat on Derand’s lap, but her underdrawers hadn’t been pulled back up and the bead hadn’t been taken out of her bottom.