Brent Weeks - Beyond the Shadows

They’d met twice in their dreams.

“You don’t hate me,” Vi said in the first dream. She marveled at it.

“I hate the price we have to pay.”

“Can you ever forgive me?” she asked.

“I’m trying. You did what had to be done. You’re not a bad woman, Vi. I know that you’ve been giving me and Elene space and time, and I know it’s hard for you, too. Thank you.” He glanced down at her night dress; this one actually fit, and his gaze was admiring, but deliberately brief. “I just wish you weren’t so damn beautiful. Good night.”

The second dream had been harder. It had been one of those nights where Kylar lay on the opposite side of the wall so tormented he thought he would burst. In the dream, Kylar stood at the foot of Vi’s bed, naked. His eyes were closed and Vi drank in the sight of him, his hard lean limbs, flat stomach etched with hard muscles. She was wearing one of Master Piccun’s nightdresses, which she’d left behind in Cenaria. It was white silk and short with sheer panels, but more pretty than provocative: a make-love-to-me, not a fuck-me. It was one of the first things she’d ever bought from Master Piccun, and in four years she’d never worn it. Men made love to their wives or girlfriends. Vi got fucked. Her hair was unbound and combed out glossy.

Vi had a revelation at the very moment Kylar opened his eyes. Kylar had never seen this dress. This wasn’t his dream. It was hers. She froze, feeling more exposed than she had when she’d stood naked in front of the Godking. Garoth Ursuul had judged her not knowing her. Kylar had far more power. He was here because she desired him. Vi had long been the object of desire, and she’d mocked men for it.

Now, the numbness that had sat between her legs since the first time one of her mother’s lovers raped her was thawing. The ache there was so foreign that Vi hadn’t been able to name it. For all the fucking she’d done, Vi had not once taken a man to bed for pleasure, much less love. The receding numbness, though, not only allowed her to feel desire for the first time, it also threatened her. Through the ice, Vi could see the outlines of a mystery: she could imagine bringing her desire—of which fucking was a part, but not the center—to Kylar and experiencing union, wholeness in a fragmented world. She’d made fucking a simple physical exertion, as monotonous but as necessary to her work as exercising. If she ever wanted to experience what was beneath the ice, she’d have to feel the pain and violation frozen inside it. If Kylar were to speak while they had sex, she’d remember all the bastards who couldn’t shut up. If he were to remain silent, she’d remember the brutes who fucked silently. If Kylar were to twine his fingers through her hair, she’d remember all the assholes who pawed her hair like she was an animal. If Kylar ripped her clothes off in his passion, she would remember when Hu Gibbet did it and spat on her face. If Vi were ever to enjoy Kylar’s desire and allow herself to reciprocate, she’d have to trust him with her brokenness, and she’d have to wade through all the hells her numbness had spared her.

She understood all of that in the very moment Kylar’s opening eyes met hers. She tensed and immediately her hair was back up in its ponytail, tight enough to hurt. Two waves of feeling raced through Kylar, the second chasing the first, and even with her emotional stupidity or however Sister Ariel had said it, Vi could name his feelings through the very air. The first was desire, and though it was physical, it wasn’t only physical. A month of cuddling the woman he loved had been a month of foreplay. But right after that, he withdrew.

“Vi,” Kylar choked out. “I can’t even be here.” He ignored his own nudity, and her near-nudity, looking into her eyes and letting her read his.

Her rapists had shattered the bond between sex and intimacy, leaving her only with fucking. In ring raping Kylar, she’d left him with only intimacy. The difference was, the only person who could damage Kylar as she had been damaged long ago was Kylar himself. The integrity between what Kylar’s body did and what his heart felt was still intact. He was sorely tempted, but so far unbroken. If he cheated on Elene, he would be a cheater in his own eyes—for the rest of a very long life.

He’d turned and walked out of her dream.

Vi cleared her throat and met Sister Ariel’s gaze. “Things with Kylar are fine.”

Dorian knew he was in trouble as soon as the dancing girl entered the throne room. He’d been meeting with the Graavar chieftain, a hulking highlander whose raven hair hung in great mats to his waist. The Graavar were a powerful highland tribe, and Grakaat Kruhn was highly regarded by all the tribes. He had come to test Dorian. It was a harmless bit of highlander play, mostly—the highlanders hadn’t made a serious attempt at independence for more than a century—and Grakaat had found Dorian satisfactory in all ways. Until this.

“Your Holiness,” Grakaat Kruhn said, his half-lidded eyes too self-satisfied by far, “I would like to present you with a gift to seal our treaty.” He gestured and two girls came forward. The dancer was about sixteen, the other, who held a highland flute, was perhaps thirteen, and though they were both pretty, Dorian had no doubt they were the chieftain’s daughters.

As the dancer began a sensuous rondaa, most of Dorian’s guards and all of his courtiers averted their eyes. The highland version of the dance was different from what Dorian had seen as a youth. The girl wore a wide garment with exaggerated wide shoulders from which were suspended strips of cloth. Around the hips, the cloth had bells sown in. As her sister played, each gyration of the dancer’s hips made the bells tinkle and revealed glimpses of her nakedness beneath. As in the lowland dance, the girl appeared to float, chest and head immobile while her body tantalized, but the lowland dance was more focused on the stomach, which this girl had fully covered. Nonetheless, in moments Dorian was drawn in. The chieftain’s daughter was talented.

The rondaa gave way to a beraa, and removed the last doubts from Dorian’s mind about what that chieftain intended. The beraa was faster, more erotic. The girl clapped her hands in time over her head, exposing the sides of her breasts, her hips snapping side to side, but now also undulating front to back in a motion that would torment any man with a pulse.

Dorian was trapped. He wasn’t sure if he was glad that Jenine was sequestered for her moon blood or if he wished she were here. Perhaps her presence would have changed things. Grakaat Kruhn wouldn’t have his daughter dance a beraa for the Godking unless he planned to give her to him. A marriage to seal a treaty had far less weight in the north than it did in the southron realms, but the smile that had been on the chieftain’s face told Dorian something else.

Dorian thought that taking many wives would have quelled the rumors he’d begun by entering the castle as a eunuch, but if anyone found out that he wasn’t using his harem, the Halfman jokes would begin again. A highland warrior like Grakaat Kruhn achieved his place through the force of his virtu, which meant not only virtue, but also strength and manliness. To the highlanders, the three concepts were one. What manliness could a eunuch have? How could a war chief submit to half a man?

Dorian made a small gesture and the throne room cleared quietly of everyone except his guards and several Vürdmeisters. Grakaat Kruhn looked disturbed, but his daughter didn’t miss a step, and Dorian kept his attention full on her, not giving the chieftain any clues. Inside, Dorian’s stomach roiled. God, give me strength for what I’m about to do. But he’d rejected the One God, and the thought of what the God would think of this cooled whatever arousal Dorian still had left. Would Jenine understand?