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Ren draped himself over my shoulder with a shameless batting of his kohl-lined eyes, and sucked suggestively on his orangesegment an inch from my own mouth. My husband was all willowy grace, long limbs, and seductive expressions, and so terribly distracting that I almost tripped down the stairs myself.
And then his eyes were drawn to the huge mechanical clock standing at the end of the corridor, its cogs and weights dutifully working away.
Groaning, he let his head and sticky hands fall forward onto my chest. It didn’t escape my notice that his clothes were still pristine and free from juice, and on a day where I wasn’t already facing a world of pain when he next got me alone, I might have remedied that.
“Shit, I’m late,” Ren muttered, dragging me closer by a handful of my shirt so he could wipe his fingers clean on it. I rolled my eyes. “Normally I wouldn’t care, but as I said…an unpleasant matter is on the agenda today, and I don’t want to give my asshole councillors anymore of an excuse to berate me for it.”
He brushed our lips together in a parting kiss, his eyes boring into mine with rare sincerity swirling amid their usual warmth. “I just have this one meeting and a couple of hours of taking citizen appearances. And then Mathias, I am all yours – and you mine – for the rest of the day, I promise. I’ll see you soon,sí?”
“Sí,” I said happily. I couldn’t wait.
*
Chapter Five
I didn’t linger outside the Council chamber for long, heading down to the kitchen and laundries and speaking with the staff about their ideas for improved operational efficiencies. Then after peering into each of the classrooms at the back of the palace and finding them empty, Parvan and I walked down to the gardens where Lilia liked to take her students when the weather was nice.
I’d hoped my old friend would bitch about the Quarehian sun as much as Zovisasha and I did, but for a Mazekhstani used to snow, Lilia had proven surprisingly fond of the heat. Or maybe it wasbecauseZovisasha didn’t like it: the two of them enjoyed being contrary.
I was just immensely glad they’d both accepted my offer to come and live with us. It had made being away from the north a little less scary, and their familiarity never failed to provide comfort when the locals’ comments about my heritage grew sharp enough to draw blood.
I liked to think I had a thick skin – despite being easily provoked, insults didn’t usually hit home beyond some initial indignation. But a year as Ren’s consort had brought no less racism and prejudice than I’d endured as his prisoner...only now it was more subtle. Double takes at the colour of my skin. Over-explanations of basic concepts. The nobility looking at me whenever anything north of the border wasraised in conversation, as though I knew about every single thing that had ever happened in Mazekhstam and Temar. Daily microaggressions that were so fucking exhausting, and yet...were those Quarehians to blame? I didn’t know. Most of it wasn’t intentional, just the result of the centuries-long feud between our peoples and us only beginning to learn to replace our mutual ignorance and cruelty with understanding.
I found the group of children sprawled across the grass on the upper lawn, giggling and pointing at things for the others to name in Mazekhstani.
Tree. Cloud. King consort.
That one had to be gently corrected by Lilia when they used a close sounding but incorrect noun.
“Say hello,” she instructed as I drew close.
“Zdravstvuyte, Nathanael!” a dozen ten-year-olds enthusiastically chimed, and I returned their collective wave with a deep bow.
“Zdravstvuyte.”
This. This was what it was about. Teaching an entire generation to respect and appreciate other cultures...and to not call me Your Fucking Highness while they were at it.
Valeri and Astrid were facilitating similar education in their own countries, with the hope that the citizens who viewed the world with the least bias – our children – could light the way for the rest of us.
Our children.Fuck. There was no ‘our’, and there never could be.
Ren and I had both been avoiding the subject like the plague, mostly because of how much it hurt each time I remembered that it was because ofmethat he couldn’t have what was expected of every Quarehian king. Because I was the first kingconsort in the country’s recorded history, and that came with its own…biological challenges.
I’d never be able to give Ren a son – or a daughter, now we’d changed the gender laws to allow women the same rights as men. Once again, our love had come at a huge fucking cost, and it was echoed in the hollow, remorseful ache I felt every time I heard a child laugh or a baby cry. The wistfulness I caught in Ren’s expressions sometimes when we talked about our future.
I cleared my throat, forcing myself back to the present.
“Lilia,” I greeted warmly, and then nodded to the woman sitting on the garden bench with her. “Alondra.”
Ren’s sister had returned to Máros a few months ago and had immediately devoted her time to tutoring the palace’s students in the subjects she’d learned in the same classrooms as a child. The difference was that this time, these children were not just royalty and nobility, but the offspring of all who lived and worked in the palace.
Another idea that had seemed so beautiful and obvious in my head, but had caused us infinite difficulties. Thankfully, most of the objections – frombothsocial classes, with the nobility fearing their children would catch fleas and the commoners worried thattheirchildren would be exposed to increased bullying and abuse – had died down when nothing apocalyptic had resulted.
“Nathanael. What can we do for you?”
“I need the-”
Both women waved identical rolls of parchment at me, and I hastily shut my mouth.
