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Chapter 14 – Fuel
Metheus
I had never thought of marriage or sex since I was a teen. Well, except when jeered at it by Razuku and the rest. Ironically, my most impure of thoughts came over me before Cora was ever interested. You could say our lines had drawn parallels with each other. They would never meet.
At fourteen or fifteen, I had wondered what it would be like to take a woman to my bed. My father was very accommodating to my curiosity. He took me to a brothel to see what was going on there. A heavily made-up woman had offered to teach me the ways. Despite the moans and bare skin I was exposed to, I did not feel much. It was like my imagination was better than seeing the actual action. It was disappointing.
“Handsome lad, come over here. Your Highness needs the best of what we can offer.”
I did not believe she was the best the brothel had to offer because of the telltale rashes on her throat. I knew that they could not mean anything good, but maybe they also meant she was popular.
‘T-thank you, ma’am, b-but I think I should go. Muh-my father is waiting for me outside,” I stammered and went through the beaded curtain as fast as I could. The colorful bed she was beckoning me to did not tempt me.
I could still hear my father’s boisterous laughter when he saw me sprinting to go outside. When we were out of earshot, he was far more understanding.
“Those things never go well, though I have to admit I’ve had my share of women before marrying your mother,” he confessed in our wagon.
“But not after?”
“No, never. I would never have done it to your mother,” my father said. Though people thought of him as a pompous ass, I could at least say that he genuinely loved my mother.
Even when she died weeks after the little trip to the house with the red door, my father kept away from women. He was happy enough with Rowali and me, and I was grateful.
#
Marrying Luella was an adventure, I have to admit. Married women wanted to be wooed and made love to. The other end of the spectrum took it all like a sacrifice. Luella just wanted me to heal the soil. There was not a lot of pressure there. I could not tell her that, at least with a beautiful woman by my side, people did not have to look at me strangely. They did not have to wonder why a prince was never interested in bedding a woman.
She should never have known what I could do, yet I was not discreet during our wedding night. I knew that I was undressing in front of a woman who had not had a lover in years. Yet, I acted as if I owned the room – that nobody else was there. I knew she was looking, and I made her look.
My new wife was a restless soul. She needed to calm down. So, I took her arm and rubbed it. Again, I should not be showing her what I could do, but I started taking away the heat that built up in her body. Her passions. Her frustrations. I took them all, and they simmered inside of me.
What happened to the fire I consumed?
They boiled inside of me. I was a bottomless pit that could take more. More and more. There was a hungry void inside that kept me clutching at warmth. Without the warmth, I was chilly. Frost over the desert sands. But when I was boiling over, I could release them where they were needed: when heartless souls needed to know warmth, icy continents like Ruzata, north of Mogochislenia, and waters that needed to evaporate from other lands.
I became a traveler at the age of eighteen. I had carried the heat of Prozeus to Ruzata at its most frigid winters. I took care not to melt too much ice. Controlled fire also meant transformation, balancing forests and other ecosystems.
But Luella’s fire burned hot in me, almost stirring something that I never thought I had. It frightened me how her hand in mine seemed to do something to my chest and stomach. Still, the sensations were pleasant. So, I pulled her closer to me. She seemed content wrapping herself around me from behind. We fell asleep like that.
#
“Metheus, good morrow,” a voice whispered in my ear.
After embracing her for the night, she seemed to have gained courage and had not eased away from me. It was a hot and humid day, as it was becoming common in Queenspell, but Luella did not seem to care.
“Good morrow, wife,” I teased.
She giggled at that. I guess she was not that bad, almost like a best friend – oh no, not like Cora. Almost like a sister, but not quite. My thoughts stopped right there when I saw what Luella looked like in daylight. With the sun streaming in generously through our window, I saw every curve of her body underneath her thin chemise. No, definitely not like a sister. My mind was going on a dangerous route, and my heart was pounding.
There was no way.
I got up as quickly as I could.
“Where are you going?” she asked. Her voice had lost the earlier glee, but it did not reveal anything else beyond that. She kept it even, but she was still in bed, one elbow supporting her head up.
“To the fields. Where else?” I answered, not really knowing what I was doing. Usually, the soil had a particular pull that I could not deny, but I was not feeling it that morning. Damned if I would admit it to my new wife.
“It is the morning after our wedding night,” she protested. “You are not expected to be out there. What will they think? Will they think I was -?”
