TEN

After a shortened day of work, Adriana took Shian’s hand as they walked back to Chainhome. They both knew why shortened days of work existed, though neither of them had tried to push their relationship to the point where they used them as intended. They kissed, they cuddled, they talked and hugged, but Adriana knew it wasn’t enough. If they didn’t start doing things as they should, Chiara would be back to haunt them.

Fortunately, Shian had learned about Destin, even though he thought she was unwise to give her heart to a wolf. For her part, Adriana mostly kept her thoughts regarding her captain to herself. He was stronger than that.

As soon as they got to Chainhome, there was a meat stew waiting for them inside their cell. Another incentive to do what they were supposed to do.

“Is the work getting easier?” She finally asked as she chewed on a piece of bread. “I can tell your arms are getting stronger.”

He sat down and immediately started rubbing at his arms with something that should have been a laugh, but lacked the strength to actually sound like one. “Are they? It feels to me like they’re getting weaker. All they do is hurt.” He groaned and shook them out again, trying anything to get the ache to subside. It didn’t help that he also had several small cuts along his forearms from instances where his hands had slipped on the wood he carried through the work site. They were wrapped in bandages that prevented him from losing too much blood, but he dreaded taking them off. “Tomorrow they said I’m being reassigned to the sails, since they’ve decided I’m useless anywhere else.”

“You are not useless. You just aren’t used to this type of work.” She jiggled a stone loose from the wall and pulled out a small clay pot before she moved close to Shian. Without asking, she unwrapped his bandages and gently rubbed salve from the little pot on every place that started to bleed. “Kaia gave this to me, so I know it will work well. She’s meticulous even if she’s a little crazy. And working on the sails won’t be so bad. Malcom will be there.”

“Oh good. I have as much value as a kid. I feel much better.” He hissed in pain a few times as she worked on his arms and tended to the bandages, but the salve did seem to numb them quickly, even if it also left his arm full of tingles and strange sensations. “You should save that stuff for when you really need it. I’ll just go out and get a few more of these tomorrow.”

“You need it. That’s enough of a reason to use it.” She re-wrapped another part of his arm and kissed his cheek gently. “I’m trying to take care of you. Is that alright with you?”

He smiled under the kiss, but his emotions on the subject were complicated at best. He had grown fond of Adriana in the days they’d been together, and he knew, even if she was in love with a wolf, and a high-profile wolf at that, she was still a good person, just as kind as she was fierce. But knowing that she was in love with a wolf made it harder for him to know exactly what he should be feeling for the woman at all. “I didn’t see you for most of the day, are you alright? Of the two of us, I’m a lot better at whining when something hurts.”

“I’m alright.” She looked down at herself, and while she had some cuts, she’d certainly suffered a lot worse. “They ease up slightly on the women who are supposed to be bearing children.” Adriana spoke softly before she finished tending to his wounds. “Shian, I think…” She moved a little bit closer to him and sighed. “This doesn’t have to be awkward between us. I’m sorry that I made it that way.”

Footsteps moved along the hallway outside their cell, and Shian moved to help her put the salve away in its hiding place before anyone else saw she had it. By the same instinct, he moved with her to sit on the straw mattress they shared and leaned back against the wall.

Shian drew her into his lap so that the overseers of Chainhome could see that they obviously weren’t having any problems being close to each other. It felt good to have her so close, and she could feel a slight tremble in his hands whenever he touched her that had nothing to do with how sore they were from the day’s work.

“Tell me about Piers, the man you were paired with first, before…” he still wasn’t sure exactly how to talk with her about her wolf, since just talking about humans having any kind of legitimate, loving relationship with their captors was still completely foreign to him, “before your captain.”

Adriana draped an arm around the back of Shian’s neck as she pressed herself close to him. She kissed along his neck to keep the momentum moving. “The first breeding season after I bled, I was paired with Piers. I didn’t know anything about him, except that he was a lot older than me.” She shrugged and smiled just a little. “He taught me some of the fun things first. He taught me how to kiss. He taught me how to caress and entice. He was gentle, even though he was a big, strong fighter. He always told me it was because I was so pretty that he wanted to treat me right so the affection between us was real. And it was.”

“So did he…I mean, the two of you could have been separated whenever they wanted, he could have been moved, they could have given him another female to be with…how did you deal with that? I know it’s not like we have much choice, I just…” he stumbled and stuttered most of the way through his words, wanting to return the affection she was showing him, but not sure how.

The sound of footsteps outside continued to spin him in circles about his situation. He thought of what he wanted for her, what she wanted for herself, what their masters wanted for both of them, what Shian wanted for himself. None of them aligned, and they never would. “That’s not a life, having the things that should matter most to a person dictated by some Stoneborn shoving people into cells.”

“This is as much of a life as most of us get.” She kissed him again. “Piers and I loved each other, even though the love meant something different to both of us. He told me I stole his heart, and I just wanted to make him happy.”

Even as she said it, she realized the way she was affectionate with Shian had changed since she had been with Piers. The way she rested her face against his, it was like she was already a wolf, at least in spirit. “Piers and I stayed together because we were successful together. We wanted it that way. They don’t pull pairs apart unless they can’t get along or they can’t conceive.” She finally kissed his lips and wrapped her legs around his waist. “You are the only person I have now. We are friends, and I know that every day, I love you just a little bit more. What more can people in our position hope for?”

He wasn’t completely inexperienced, that was obvious from the way his hands moved easily to push her dress up to her waist, but his eyes never left hers. “We can hope for anything. We have that much freedom, at least so long as there are no Heartborn around.” He pulled her down into another, more heated kiss, more than any they had shared under their own influence. “She’s not here right now, and I don’t want her to make us into something we aren’t going to be. I hope…”

He hoped for a lot of things, and had hoped for even more before being sent off to the Queen’s Isle. Most of those hopes were starting to feel like unremembered dreams as he tried to look back at them through the haze of work and stone and chains that was the backdrop of his new life. But he still remembered the only hope that had ever mattered to him. Hoping to find someone he could share what little life and freedom he was given with, for as long as possible.

His life with Adriana was nothing like he had envisioned it would be, and he wondered if she was even the person he would have chosen if he’d had the choice. But as she’d said, she was the only person he had, and he was lucky to have her. “I hope you’re as happy with me as you were with Piers. Someday, if not today.”

Adriana slowly tugged off his shirt and tossed it aside so she could run her hands over his skin. When she spoke, it was between heavy breaths. “I am happy with you, Shian.” She gently pushed his shoulders so he would lay back on the mattress with her still sitting on his waist. “You mean a lot to me already. And I’m going to show you how much I want you to forget the harshness of this new life of ours. Just for a while.”

* * * * *

It was Miris’ turn to be on watch out in front of Chainhome for the afternoon, and he didn’t even condescend to look in the eyes of the slaves passing by. Not long ago, he would have been one of them, coming home every night to whatever female they left for him and working through the days as one of the carpenters building the ships for the royal fleet. His eyes had once been a brilliant green. Now they were as mottled and confused in color as his life had become ever since his turning.

Before, his sister would have been coming home with him from the shipyard. Not any more.

The Stoneborn on the other end of the long ramp leading up to the prison kept her silence, as always, preferring to work with the pile of rocks she always had sitting beside her on watch. She made them into small trinkets or animals or some such that Miris couldn’t have cared less about. None of it mattered.

As the sun began to set, he could feel some of the other Stoneborn behind him begin to prepare for the first night of the Fulness, closing up the prison house of the humans so that no one could escape. Ostensibly, it was also for the safety of the humans inside, but every human knew, and Miris still knew, that it was just to keep them contained during the days when wolves were most vulnerable.

He should have gone in and assisted in making sure the bars of each cell were secure against escape, but he truly didn’t care. Let them escape if they wanted to. Fewer rats to watch.

He turned and raised an eyebrow at the sight of Chiara and her entourage coming up the ramp toward him, a few guards shadowing her as always. He dropped to one knee, since he valued his life and his sanity, but his instincts did not extend to his mouth. “Cutting it a little close to the Fulness, aren’t you, Highness? Or just hoping to get a little taste of what most of these rats are up to before the first night?”

“Breeding season is my favorite time of the year.” Chiara responded with a grin as she looked Miris up and down. “I’m not concerned about the Fulness. I’ve always been the adventurous type.” She looked at the other guard, a Stoneborn female who couldn’t help but shake her head at Miris. “Are you bitter because you’re jealous of some of those noises coming from inside?” She turned her gaze back to Miris. “It was easier for you to find partners when you were human, wasn’t it?”

“Well it helps when they’re delivered to my room.” He didn’t get up from the stone, some of the metal around his leg still ringing upon impact as if to act as a strange kind of cushion between his knee and the ramp. “They always left me the sickly ones, though, it seemed like. They weren’t much good at actually surviving the birth of the children I gave them. I kept telling them I needed a good, strong bitch who could actually handle me, but no one seemed to listen.” He shrugged nonchalantly without looking away from Chiara’s fascinating eyes.

“Don’t expect that to change.” She moved closer to him. “No one listens to me either, unless I make them.” Chiara grinned and reached to run a hand along his arm. “You seem so dissatisfied with your position. Are you not happy with the way things ended up? Is this not the reward you hoped for?”

“No one gets a reward in this world just for surviving.” He wasn’t bright enough to keep his mouth from running, but he was smart enough to always be afraid when she reached out and touched him. He had seen all his life what the woman was capable of when she reached into the mind of her victims, and she wasn’t a wolf he wanted to be on the wrong side of.

His eyes flicked past her to the guards of her retinue, and she could feel the surprise run through him to see not just Earthborn and Stoneborn among them, but an Ironborn like himself as well. “You may not have a problem with my kind, but that doesn’t go for everyone else in the kingdom.”

“Your kind fascinates me.” She ran her fingers along some of the metal on his arm. His arm was familiar to her, but she was certain he didn’t remember her from before. It was safer for him that way. Often, though, she desperately wanted the nearness of someone familiar. “Tell me, Miris, what is something that you want but you don’t think you can ever get?”

His mind answered before his mouth did, for once, and she could see the simple fantasy with brilliant clarity, since he had gone over it so many times.

He and his sister had wanted to be turned, find mates, serve the royal family in whatever capacity they thought best, live in a comfortable home, come and go as they pleased, and be respected in wolf society for their service.

He wanted to live to the incredible old age that wolves were capable of, with friends and his woman or whatever women he chose to keep close, and die in some respectable way before he reached the decline of his life and withered away.

He wanted to be a wolf and have a wolf’s life, but he was stuck between the world he’d wanted to escape and the one that would not accept him. He had no illusions that that fact would ever change.

“Not much point talking about desires if they’re not going to happen, is there, Highness?”

“You are deliciously complicated, my friend. I used to be that way once.” She looked at the metal he had on him once again. “Do me a favor, will you?” She leaned in close and tapped on her ear. “I always wanted to see an Ironborn at work in a different way. Take your best metal and put it through my ear.” Her guards moved closer, but she held out a hand to keep them away. “Both ears. If it feels good, I promise to reward you for your work.”

He glanced at her guards when they moved in closer, but she could feel that it wasn’t fear that prompted him to do so. The moment they made a threatening move, he was immediately looking them over and deciding how he would kill each of them.

The Ironborn was closer to the back of the group, so he would deal with him last. The Stoneborn would try and use the ramp against him, so they needed to die first. He’d lay their bodies out as obstacles for the Earthborn behind them to give him time to put a spear through both Earthborn, then stand and deal with the Ironborn carefully.

The entire plan moved through his mind in an instant before they obeyed Chiara and stepped back again, but Miris didn’t forget it, and kept watching them out of the corner of his eye.

When she didn’t move away, he shrugged and looked down at the metal coiled around him in a variety of ways. Most of it was iron taken in bits and pieces from the bars of the cells inside Chainhome, but he’d also managed to steal a few scraps of silver that he kept wrapped around his wrists beneath the rest of his armor.

A small, sharp tendril of it broke off from the rest of one of the bracelets and coiled around his finger like a tiny snake. He let her watch it coil as he moved in close enough that his body was pressed against one side of her own. Her perfectly styled hair was brushed roughly away from her neck, drawing a few more growls from her guards. All their anxiety did was amuse Miris. He tilted her head to one side and looked down in her eyes, the silver poised close to her ear.

“This is going to hurt.” The growl against her ear wasn’t exactly a warning. It felt more like a promise.

She smirked in a way that made her look as crazy as her reputation said she was. Chiara raised an eyebrow as her violet eyes held his hazel ones. His eyes were so familiar but the gaze behind them proved he didn’t remember. “I’ve suffered worse.”

He nodded to say that he believed her, then held her head forcibly in place while the silver pierced her ear not once, but twice in rapid succession, coiling through the outer edge of her ear in a quick spiral before the ends shaped themselves into a tiny representation of an actual snake, with a pointed tail and small indentations for eyes above infinitesimal fangs.

It was more violent than beautiful, but he seemed satisfied with himself as he let go of her chin. He brushed past her to the other side and did the same, knowing she could see his handiwork through his own eyes by way of her witchcraft. “Everything you hoped it would be?” He let go of her when he was finished, without moving away.

Chiara reached up and touched the metal, and when she pulled her hand away, she could see droplets of her blood on her fingertips. “Perfect.” She looked back at her guardsmen. “Whatever metal he wants, you will deliver it to his home.” She demanded before she turned back to Miris. I have one more task for you, with a higher reward. Chiara reached out and ran her finger down his chest to make sure she had his attention.

Hearing her speak into his mind shot him right back to his days as a slave, especially to one instance in which she had thoroughly convinced him to be desperately in love with a woman who had been the single most unpleasant cellmate he had ever endured. It wasn’t a favorite memory. Anything in my capacity, Highness. I’m as much your property now as I was then. Even more now, maybe.

Chiara leaned in and whispered into his ear as she pressed herself into him. She missed him, even if he didn’t remember her. “Watch Destin’s human closely. If anyone comes to visit her, I want to know who and when. If anyone helps her, make sure no one else knows about it except me. If she’s comfortable, she’s more likely to make mistakes.” Chiara kissed along his jawline before she stepped back so that he could look into her eyes again. “Will you do that for me?”

Miris had no lingering fondness for Adriana, just as he knew Adriana had no fondness whatsoever for him. While there was a hint of reluctance when it came to spying on his former companions inside Chainhome, it evaporated quickly in the crashing reminder of his place in the world and the opportunity in front of him to improve it.

“With great pleasure, Highness.” All he’d seen of Adriana’s cell in recent days had been her and her new breeding season companion, and he hadn’t noticed any other visitors. With Chiara’s instruction, though, he would keep a much closer eye on it.

“Good.” She looked back at her guardsmen and gave him a warm smile. “Helon, you will take Miris’ place here tonight.” She looked back at Miris and beckoned for him to follow. “Why don’t you spend the night with me?”

When he looked back at the guard who was set to replace him, the man didn’t seem particularly bothered about being relegated to watch duty over Chainhome. Helon stepped up to take Miris’ place, outfitted in much better armor and bearing some of the most beautiful weapons Miris had ever seen from his own kind.

He was hesitant to accept at first, but he picked up his spear from where it leaned against the stone and he bowed slightly. “As you say, Highness.” He was still her property, after all, just as he’d said, on that night and on any other.