‘Other side,’ she hissed, twisting his head and near shoving her fingers up his other nostril. He hardly even knew she was undoing his sword-belt until he heard it clatter to the floor. Disarmed in every sense.
Bloody hell, he wanted to sneeze, stood for a moment with eyes closed, trying to smother it. When the urge passed, he found she was kissing him, gentle little nips at his mouth, then she twisted his face side on to hers, started lapping, sucking, biting at him.
He squeezed at her ribs but couldn’t really feel her, just a fortress of corsetry, stiff as armour. The burning in his face was fading, his head pleasantly spinning. His mouth moved mechanically, numb and clumsy. Lips all fizzy. He could taste wine on her tongue.
Whether it was her, or the drink, or the stuff for artists up his nose, Leo couldn’t say, but he’d started to feel bold. Wild. He was the bloody Young Lion, wasn’t he? He’d come for a fucking adventure! He was one of history’s great lovers, damn it!
He gave a lion’s growl as he caught her face, thumb under her jaw, caught the strap of her dress and gripped it, twisted it, his knuckles pressing hard into her shoulder, making her gasp, turning her, until he was the one shoving her up against the edge of the desk. He caught his foot on his sword, staggered, and she kicked it away with one pointed shoe, blade half falling out of the scabbard as it clattered into the lion-carved feet of the printing press.
His face didn’t hurt any more. Not one bit. He could hardly feel a thing from the neck up, but twice as much as usual from the waist down.
She grunted in her throat, lips curled back into something between a smile and a snarl as she nipped at him with her teeth. He felt her fumbling with his belt, dragging it open, felt his trousers sagging down until they were tangled with his boots. The air was cool on his arse, then her hand even cooler.
Any thought of saying no was long gone. Any thought at all, for that matter.
She wriggled nimbly back onto the desk, almost as if she’d had a lot of practice, skirts rustling as she pulled them up, pulled them up, and she dragged him after her, hand twisted in his hair.
Almost painful, but not quite.
Substitutes
‘By the dead,’ groaned Rikke.
She propped herself up on her elbows, tried to blow free the hair tangled across her face and failed. She had to drag it back with her fingers, squeeze her stinging eyes shut against the light then bit by tiny bit peel open just the one.
She was lying with a sheet tangled around her hips, one leg sticking out, which she knew must be hers ’cause she could wriggle the toes. She was stark naked but for her shirt, the sleeve all rucked up around one wrist and the rest spread out limp across the bed like a flag of surrender.
She frowned past the shirt, towards the window, then jerked up, staring about.
Where the bloody hell was she?
The room was big as a chieftain’s hall, acres of rich-coloured drapery stirring about the great windows. The far-off ceiling was all crusted with gilded leaves, the furniture all polished to a blinding sheen, the door high enough to be used by giants with a knob shaped like the sun of the Union.
It turned, and the door shuddered open as if from a kick.
Someone came in with a silver tray teetering on one hand, things sliding dangerously about on top. His crimson jacket, heavy with gold stitching, hung open to show a strip of pale and slightly hairy chest and belly. He turned slowly towards the bed, concentrating furiously on keeping his tray balanced.
It was Crown Prince Orso.
‘Oh.’ Rikke felt her eyebrows go very high then, as that last part of last night suddenly came rushing back. ‘Oh …’ She’d been about to cover up, but now there didn’t seem much point, so she just flopped back, arms outstretched.
‘You’re awake,’ he said, grinning.
‘So you say,’ she croaked out. ‘How much did I drink?’
‘All of it, I think.’ He put the tray down proudly on the bed beside her. ‘I brought you an egg.’
She lifted her chin a little to give it the eye. Her guts had felt far from settled ever since Leo’s duel. They felt less settled than ever now. ‘Well done. Lay it yourself, did you?’
‘There’s no point being a crown prince if you mean to do all the hard work. But look, I carried it from the door to the bed.’ And he gestured at the path he’d taken. ‘As you observed last night, fucking a crown prince is no great distinction, even if you did it rather bloody well—’
She gave a humble shrug. ‘I’ve a gift, what can I say?’
‘—but being brought breakfast by one, that is a rare honour.’
She had to admit to feeling a little bit honoured. She wasn’t sure anyone had brought her breakfast before. Leo certainly never bothered. The thought would never penetrate his thick skull that there were needs in the world other than his. She wondered where he was, now. With that hideously beautiful woman, more than likely, who she couldn’t even hate on account of the absurdly generous gift of green jewels that were right now gleaming on her chest.
‘What’s this?’ she asked, fishing a crumpled sheaf of papers from the tray. She was no expert on printing but she reckoned this a poor example.
‘It’s a newsbill. They tell you what’s happening.’ Orso thought about that. ‘Or they tell you what to think about what’s happening.’ He thought more. ‘Or the really successful ones just confirm what you already think about what’s happening.’
‘Huh.’ There was a smudged etching on the front of Leo on horseback looking even more pompous than usual. There must’ve been half a page about exactly how he trimmed his beard. Then there was something about Breakers rampaging, trouble in the South, rivalries with Styria, how immigrants had ruined the tone of a neighbourhood, how everything was better during the reign of King Casamir …
She gave a disbelieving snort. ‘Hear this shit. “His Highness was observed leaving the function in the company of the beautiful and mysterious Witch of the North …”’
‘Now, that is poor writing.’ Orso ever so gradually leaned towards her as he spoke, eyes fixed earnestly on her face. ‘It should say beautiful, mysterious, shapely, cunning, talented, highly entertaining—’
She flung the newsbill fluttering across the room, grinned as she caught Orso by the ear, pulled him close and kissed him full on the mouth. A scuzzy and sour-tasting kiss, but if you hold off till everything’s perfect, think of all the great kisses you’ll miss.
‘You’re not quite what I was expecting,’ she said as they broke apart.
‘Even more handsome in the flesh, eh?’
‘Handsome, I expected. Kind, I didn’t.’
‘Kind?’ He gave a her a strange look. ‘That might be the nicest thing anyone’s ever said about me.’ He peered up at the ceiling. ‘Now I’m wondering if it’s the only nice thing anyone’s ever said about me. I could show you the city!’ He jumped up from the bed with an enthusiasm that made her head hurt. ‘Adua! City of White Towers! It’s the centre of the world, you know.’
‘So I hear.’
‘The theatre! I can get the place cleared. Arrange a private showing, just for the two of us.’
‘Folk acting out silly stories? All magic and wars and romance? Don’t reckon that’s for me.’
‘Cards, then. Do you play cards?’
‘Not sure it’d be fair. I’ve got the Long Eye, remember?’
His eyes went wide, like a boy who’s found a fine new game. ‘Even better! I can finally wipe the smirk off that bastard Tunny’s face at the gaming table!’
‘Thought you had a parade to lead?’
Orso’s mouth twisted. ‘I don’t deserve a parade. Unless it happened to be stomping over me, I suppose.’ And he flopped down on his back, staring up at the gilded leaves on the ceiling.