Page 7 of Heirs of the Cursed (A Curse for Two Souls #1)

6

Bellmare

Naithea’s body still trembled from the manifestation of her siren song. The maids had arrived with the first rays of light to clean the room, carrying along a tonic that would eliminate any possibility of unwanted pregnancy. She’d drunk it without paying any attention, immersed in her thoughts.

Calling upon her magic had been risky, but leaving the soldier alive was a loose end. If someone asked the right questions, Naithea’s power could fire back. And if she failed to control the monster she harbored inside her, it would kill those who posed a threat to save her own skin.

Better him than us , that voice in her head growled.

Naithea shook it off before she could agree, walking through the brothel’s halls. It wasn’t long until she found Jehanne outside the bedroom they shared, wearing a gray dress with long sleeves. They were far less ostentatious than the gowns the madam made them wear in the evenings, but just as special, since she’d sewn them herself.

When she wasn’t yet old enough to work properly in the brothel, the innocent girl Naithea had once been, had admired the elegant dresses that covered the older hetairas’ bodies. Now, there was nothing she loathed more.

And goddesses, she couldn’t wait to get off her clothes and take a bath—even when she knew that the scorching water wouldn’t wash away her shame.

“How did it go?”

Naithea lowered her head to the basket her friend held in one arm, filled with fruits and vegetables for the brothel’s cooks to prepare a nutritious meal before the hetairas went back to work. She picked up a red apple and took a bite, feeling the sweet taste slide down her throat.

“Just as I told you it would be,” she promptly exaggerated to conceal her emotions. “I had to pretend I was very satisfied.”

Two other hetairas approached them, inseparable despite being so different. While Baelisa was tall, with dark skin and black curly hair that fell over her brown eyes in a messy way, Sundi was small and her short ash-blonde hair had been fading in color, though a singular joy remained in her gray eyes.

“Was it that bad?” Baelisa asked with an amused laugh.

“Believe me, it was,” Naithea replied dishonestly.

“At least he paid you well, didn’t he?” Sundi inquired.

“I would if it was Ausra who was sucking my balls,” Jehanne replied, earning a punch on the arm from Naithea. “What’s with that name, anyway?”

She shrugged. “I like it.”

It was much more than just a preference. The word meant ‘sunrise’ in saagrati, the ancient language of the dryadalis, and it was the reason Naithea awoke with longing and excitement to behold the beautiful colors that lit up the sky before her life darkened for the rest of the day.

They walked out the brothel, the cold rays of the autumn sun greeting them.

“So, how much did you earn?” Sundi insisted in a low voice so that the citizens wouldn’t hear her.

For some reason, she always asked about her earnings, as if Naithea making more vramnias than her worried her. Their work was an explicit competition: the more money they made in the night, the more comforts were handed to them during the day. Madame Dimond had orchestrated that dispute, wanting to turn the sisterhood they had into enmity to see who was her favorite.

Yet she hadn’t succeeded.

“Twenty vramnias.”

“Twenty vramnias of what?” Baelisa asked.

Naithea sighed softly. “Gold.”

“By the Triad . . .”

“That’s my girl!” Jehanne congratulated her, linking arms with her. “Madame Dimond will be very pleased. She might give you a night off after all!”

That was another reason why they worked so hard to please their madam. If one of her hetairas accomplished the seemingly impossible, she’d promise them a night off from work to do whatever they wished. Some of them spent their nights sleeping with men they did desire. Others visited their families, from whom they stayed away for the rest of the year so as not to bring dishonor to their homes.

Naithea had no lovers, no family and no home.

All she wanted to do was lie on the damp sand of the shores and gaze at the glitter of the stars above her head, wishing they could guide her back home. She didn’t know where that was anymore, but she was sure the answer was up there, next to the three goddesses she prayed to daily.

Still, there were far more important things to do, like finding out the rest of the story Leonel Ramsdean had kept to himself. Naithea had absorbed her power before she could take the soldier’s soul and leave a corpse in its place. She knew it had been the right thing to do, but a part of her wished she hadn’t stopped until she got the information she didn’t know she was looking for.

“Je, may I speak with you?” Naithea asked slyly, looking away from their two friends. “Alone?”

“I thought I made it clear that I would no longer practice kissing with you,” Jehanne joked, rolling her amber eyes.

She would have laughed if it wasn’t so urgent.

The hetairas used to sleep with each other and practice their seductive moves for suggestions and sometimes corrections. Jehanne and Naithea were no exception. Their relationship hadn’t changed as had some of the hetairas, who had fallen in love and were trying to pay for their freedom to leave Bellmare for good.

But Madame Dimond would never let her go. She was her main source of income, her most prized trophy. One would think that training a hetaira wasn’t a difficult thing, yet it had taken years of lessons for her to become the woman she was now.

Naithea took Jehanne by the arm and dragged her back to the brothel. It was getting harder and harder to find privacy. Since the business had expanded, they no longer slept on the floor huddled next to each other; still, their personal chambers were small.

The corridors were crowded with their friends, who combed their hair and covered every inch of their skin in oils that would make them look smooth and beautiful. They all gave them a quick wave when they saw them pass by, but Naithea kept walking with a troubled mind.

Upon arriving at their bedroom, she found Caisen and Larka lying on one of the beds, laughing loudly at some anecdote from the night before while the latter was trying to braid Caisen’s striking orange hair to no avail.

“Thea, fix this?” Caisen pleaded.

Yet Naithea only said, “Out, please.”

Her friends looked at each other, and then to Jehanne, who simply shrugged as confused as they were. They retreated without even taking their robes to cover their half-naked bodies, and Naithea thanked them in a whisper before closing the door.

Jehanne raised her eyebrows in astonishment. “Was all that necessary?”

“Yes,” she said immediately.

“All right.” Her friend nodded and sat on her mattress. “What’s wrong?”

How could she tell Jehanne the information she’d obtained from the soldier without her thinking she was out of her mind?

Naithea tried her best.

“What do you know about the Fallen Kingdom?” she asked.

Jehanne shook her head. “Not much.”

“My mother never spoke of Ro’i Rājya, as if she feared that doing so might invoke something ancient and evil,” Naithea recalled. “But Bellmare is one of the most loyal cities to the capital. I’m sure you must have grown up hearing all sorts of stories about it.”

“Thea, I grew up in Hamleigh and you know it.” She pushed back her wine-red hair and rested an elbow on the mattress. “Are you okay? Why are you so worried about it, all of a sudden?”

“The soldier . . . He did more than give me money in exchange for my services.”

“What did he say?” Jehanne bristled slightly at her best friend’s words, curious.

“He mentioned that two souls who should be locked away had vanished,” she recited Leonel’s words, etched with fire in her mind. “I don’t even know what that means.”

“Perhaps it means nothing. The soldiers had been drinking hours before any of us arrived. And I know you. I saw you come out of The Grumpy Dwarf with two bottles of wine.”

“Oh, come on.” Naithea rolled her eyes. “Just because he was drunk doesn’t mean it isn’t true. There’s a reason they’re here, Je. Aren’t you at least a little worried?”

“Of course I am!” she replied and, noticing the loudness of her voice, Jehanne sighed. “The Royal Army’s presence doesn’t bode anything good. You know what happened the last time they were here.”

Naithea remembered it. The soldiers had destroyed half the city in search of one of the king’s favored mistresses, who had escaped from the capital. The rumors that had traveled all the way to Bellmare, bringing the soldiers with them, said that the young woman had witnessed something sinister that Kirus Allencort had no intention of revealing to anyone.

The hetaira hadn’t been seen ever again.

“All the more reason why we must know who these cursed souls are. His friends said Leonel somehow saved the kingdom. But if that were so, they wouldn’t be here.” Naithea draped a cloak the color of waves on a dark night over her shoulders, pulling the hood up to conceal her unmistakable boreal eyes. “Will you come with me or not?”

Jehanne shook her head, tearing at the calluses cracked by the needles from days of sewing. “I’m sorry, but I can’t give Madame Dimond any more reason to throw me out.”

Years before, Madame Dimond had arrived in Hamleigh in a luxurious carriage with nothing but empty promises on her lips. She’d convinced renowned healers to treat Jehanne’s ill younger brother and, unlike Iseabail, he’d survived.

Naithea couldn’t blame her. Her friend’s family depended on her work and the opportunity her employer had granted her.

“You’re right,” she acknowledged. “I’ll talk to Madame Dimond and—”

“What will you do if she decides you can’t leave?” her best friend asked nervously.

“I will convince her to do so,” Naithea assured her.

The clientele at Bellmare were typically known for their presence until dawn. Naithea only needed a couple of hours to find out what was happening. She would be back just in time to see the drunken Bellmarians wandering around the tavern in search of a woman to warm their beds, and maybe she could earn a few extra vramnias so as not to upset Madame Dimond even more.

Jehanne nodded, and Naithea knew she was trying to convince herself that it was a good idea to aid her sister.

“I know someone who might be of help.”

Naithea crossed her arms. “I’m listening.”

“He’s a delusional old man, or so I told myself when I went in search of the bracelet Madame Dimond had requested of him,” she told her. “He sells black magic artifacts.”

That last revelation caught her attention. She took a step closer to her friend so that no one else would overhear their conversation even though they were all alone. Naithea hadn’t heard of wizards in a long time. It was a dangerous trade, especially when men from the capital were nearby. Like rebels and other threats, the king had hunted them down to near extinction.

“If there is anyone who has the information you seek, it’s Dyron Selmi,” her friend concluded.

“Tell me more,” Naithea asked, as she smirked with satisfaction.

After speaking with Jehanne, Naithea’s curiosity only increased.

Once she laced her boots, she slipped a knife she’d acquired one night at the tavern into the thigh leather belt Jehanne had sewn for her, after she’d shared her fascination with daggers.

She stepped out of the room and headed toward Madame Dimond’s chambers. Unlike the cramped space and unforgiving mattresses where the hetairas slept, her mistress’ chambers were a lavish testament to her greed, adorned with luxuries that left the hetairas neglected.

Naithea knocked on the door with her knuckles and lowered her head in a gesture of submission. She knew that confronting her would only result in violence, in a beating.

“Yes?” Madame Dimond asked.

Upon her response, she crossed the threshold. The madam stood on the balcony, leaning against one of the tall glass doors. The icy breeze from Salismar Ocean ruffled the thin red curtains and the salty scent permeated the room.

“Madame Dimond,” she whispered, clasping her hands together in front of her.

The madam spun on her heels and focused her brown gaze on her. “Naithea, you should be working with the rest of your companions,” she declared in a hard voice. “Or have I given you permission to interrupt your duties?”

“No, madam.”

“Then what makes you think I’ll tolerate this disobedience?”

“I wish to ask you to make an exception,” Naithea proposed and inwardly cursed herself for her choice of words. “Just for a couple of hours.”

“Tell me why I would do that,” she inquired, raising an eyebrow.

Naithea remained silent as she moved about the room, reaching for the pouch hanging from her leather belt. With a determined gesture, she handed the bag to her mistress, who untied the knot securing its contents. Her eyes widened at the twenty gold vramnias glittering under the light of the oil lamps.

“Where did you get this?” she asked and took a coin between her fingers to turn it over, making sure the gold was real.

“It appears I did a splendid job last night.”

“Nobody pays that kind of money for a cunt.”

“I thought we’d already established that my cunt is special,” Naithea said, and just when she thought the woman before her would strike her for such language, her eyes widened at an unusual sound.

Madame Dimond was laughing .

“If this is what you earned last night, I can’t imagine how much you will make today,” she stated, before tossing the coin back into the bag. “Only two hours. I want you back before midnight and I expect your earnings to be as high as this until the Royal Army departs back to the capital.”

Naithea nodded fervently. A shiver of excitement ran through her body as she imagined the possibility of leaving the brothel and gazing at the stars for the first time in a long time.

“Yes, Madame Dimond. Thank you.”

“Don’t disappoint me.”

Before she could change her mind, Naithea left the room and hurled herself into the imposing darkness of the night.