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My mother and Salvar Rhodes are equally baffled. They exchange a wordless stare, and he's the first to recover.
"It is an incredibly prestigious honor to be chosen by the king, Helyn. One he has not bestowed on any woman to date. You're now the head of this court, second only to the king himself. The only person higher in the hierarchy would be a wife."
Anger wins. “I don't care about hierarchy, or honor and prestige.” I could scream. “Can you get me out of this ridiculous, outdated, misogynistic mess or not?”
I didn't make waves in the throne room, because airing my laundry in front of a mob more likely to support him than me wouldn't be smart, but if Zale thinks for even a moment that I'll let him reduce me to his royal seed receptacle, he's even more insane than I thought him to be.
He made me sit at his feet on the cold floor for hours, and the court couldn't stop gushing about how lucky I was.
Lucky!
"Well," the duke starts, "women selected to be part of the king's harem can be released from their duty..." I sigh in relief before he finishes his sentence. "By the king."
I screech.
"I don't understand you, Helyn. Zale Devar is a handsome young man, rich beyond measure, influential, and he clearly cares for you," my mother reasons. Then she sighs. "But if your affections are engaged elsewhere, surely, His Highness will understand, and release you if you ask it of him."
She can't be this naive, can she?
“Zale,” I hiss, “hates me. He hates me more than anyone or anything on this planet. In fact, Zale’s hatred for me has only one equal, and that’s my feeling towards him. The god of shade has never hated the goddess of light more than I detest him!”
My mother's speechless. She hasn’t had the pleasure of witnessing one of my legendary fits of temper yet. With her, so far, I've remained cold and impersonal. She's never been close enough to me to see me lose it like this, unlike Grandma Lyn, who typically just laughed at me and made me tea.
I miss her terribly all of a sudden.
"That's not the impression I had," the duke says diplomatically. "You seem perfectly civil to one another.”
"Has no one ever told you about a thing called pretense? You're a politician, you should know what it's like!"
He winces. "All right, fair. Then, you think he chose you as a way to vex you."
“I know he did. If I were on fire, Zale wouldn't piss on me to put it out.”
"All right, I get the picture." A chuckle escapes the duke. “Well, you may yet use the situation to your advantage."
Now he has my attention. "How so?"
He shrugs. "Well, a first concubine has rights as the head of the royal household. The king may ask for your company, and have you dressed a certain way..."
My jaw slacks at that news. "I don't see any advantage."
"What he cannot demand is your, ermm—" he glances at my mother. "Your attention."
"So, I'm now his slave, but that's good news because he can't force me to jump him?" I practically shriek, incapable of calming the anger rising again.
Truth be told, that is good news. I can't imagine Zale would want me, but his desire to make me suffer might exceed his disgust for my common blood.
"No, of course not. The advantage is that he may not send you away. The only person in the world with that right would be his first wife, the queen. As he doesn’t have one of those, you’re his equal in the eyes of the court. At any time of your choosing, you may appear and demand to be seen."
My first instinct is to yell some more. Why would I want to spend more time with him? But I soon understand the duke's train of thought. "I could annoy him into letting me go free."
It’s one thing for Zale to call me to him at times he’d find convenient in order to annoy me, but he would hate my invading his life under any other circumstances.
He inclines his head. "He might have picked you to displease you, but you do have the power to be as much of a nuisance to him as you wish."
I'm still nettled and on edge, but I do manage a fleeting, grateful smile for the duke, just as a knock startles us.
"Yes?" he calls imperiously.
