Page 3 of The Bone King and the Starling

Ale sloshes over the sides of my pitcher as I move quickly between tables. My arms ache with the weight. My legs ache for other reasons. I’ve banged my shins and knees multiple times on the edges of the bench seats as I squeezed between the narrow gaps between the tables.

It is my least favorite duty because the more the males drink from their horns, the more lecherous they become — and the king’s men are rowdier than ours, which only heightens the debauchery. There must be over two hundred people crowded into our village hall. It’s much too small to fit all six tables, but crammed in here they are, so I have to squeeze between seats that are nearly pressed together.

The high table is positioned in front of the throne, parallel to the back wall. All of the other five tables are organized horizontally to it, pressed together bench to bench to fill the full width of the hall. Only a small pathway for the thralls and kitchen staff to run along files down the wall leading connecting the back wall to the front entrance.

Wedged between two of the tables now, I pour ale to every outstretched horn and cup that shoves itself towards me, being careful to avoid the high table as well as the seats nearest it where the highborn warriors sit alongside their families. I feel Tori’s gaze on me at several points in the night. He hails me with his horn, but I pretend not to notice. Each time he does that and I look back at his face, I catch his smile widening. I quickly shuffle on.

Sweat drips down my back, staining the collar of my dress. Washing it will be a difficulty, but I am overdue a wash. I stink and I know it, even more now with how much ale has spilled over me tonight. Finally brushing the back of my wrist across my hairline, I pour my last cup from this pitcher.

With the good excuse that my pitcher is now empty, I make my way towards the entrance of the hall. It’s still hot in here despite the fact that the only fires that have been lit tonight are the torches. For once, I welcome the icy breeze that wafts through the open doors.

Thralls and other cooks dash around me, adding to the feeling of frenzy. I know I can’t be caught dawdling, but the festivities are magnificent. I glance at the array of tables smushed from wall to wall and inhale deeply, marveling at it all and knowing that I will see no such sight again in my life. This is likely the only time anyone of such importance will ever grace us with their presence here in Winterbren and I will likely remain in Winterbren until the day I die.

I long to look at the king but nervousness prevents me from staring. I spare him only a quick glance. Positioned in the center of the high table, the king's red hair stands out. He stares forward, Chief Olec leaning in towards him and speaking into his ear. Despite Chief Olec’s boisterous laugh, the king’s stare remains flat and uninspired. I shiver, remembering what Ebanora said and looking towards her. She is seated on the edge of the table closest to the entrance where I stand now, and when she meets my gaze, she flashes me the white cloth she has hidden in her hand. I smile.

She gives me an excited little wave and, as I brush past her, she slips me a little folded square. She’s done this three times already and each time, it’s been a sweet cake — my favorite, though far too high a delicacy for any thrall to have. I’ve only ever tried them thanks to her. My parents had never given me one to sample before they passed away. Even when they were alive, my position within the tribe had been little higher than a servant’s. My father had been a farmer and a warrior, when required, but hadn’t been very good at either. We’d been quite poor.

My mother had been a talented seamstress, but the first time one of the village ladies paid her for one of her designs, my father hit her so hard she lost a tooth. It was a higher payment than he’d received in a year and he’d been insulted. She didn’t sew again after that and any designs she had made, I didn’t inherit. I believe Rosalind took and sold those that there were. I’ve never seen them since and wouldn’t ever have dared ask about them.

I scurry against the outer wall, passing by dozens of other thralls carrying trays and carting pitchers of water, flagons of wine and tuns of mead, eager to get to the back storeroom where the alcohol is kept so I can eat my treat while I refill my pitcher.

I’m jostled by an older male thrall and slam against the wall. I drop my pitcher with an audible “ooph,”

but keep my treat in my clenched fist. The male doesn’t turn to look at me, but limps off. I know better than to expect acknowledgement, let alone an apology. We are punished if we are caught flagging or seen making conversation with one another.

Massaging my shoulder, I reach for my pitcher. As I do, Torbun’s booming voice calls out, “Silence all, quiet, quiet!”

Torbun is our chief’s second in command. As such, I have waited on him at Chief Olec’s often, but I’m not sure he’s ever much noticed me. His wife is the great beauty of the village, even now that she’s well past her prime childbearing years, and he’s always looked at her with affection.

I snatch up my pitcher just as my back is pressed against the wall by another thrall, Elena, who moves to stand in position directly next to me. My shoulders brush servants on both sides. Both stand taller than I do. Elena by only a little, the male by quite a lot. I hold my pitcher tight to my chest and look towards the high table. With everyone seated now but those of us serving, it is easier to see the chief and the king seated beside him in the position of honor.

The king is relaxed in his seat now, leaning back, a horn of ale in his fist that he brings to his mouth as his gaze sweeps the space, never landing. His expression is indecipherable. His eyes are dark. His red hair looks even redder in the light of the torches that gleam across it. He’s removed his furs, tossing them over the back of his chair to reveal a scant smattering of leather, concentrated mostly over his chest and leaving his arms bare.

I swallow hard. He is a frightening male to behold. I can picture Ebanora’s stories clearly now. I can see how he could have performed the ritual of Davral, which if true, would have ended with him bathing in and drinking his enemy’s blood.

His shoulders and arms are even larger than they seemed atop his horse, no longer hidden beneath his furs. His biceps bulge with each movement of his hand to his mouth, veins streaking across them. All of his warriors are twice the size of the largest of ours, but he’s largest. All but one other male seated at the high table is dwarfed in size compared to the king, and that warrior male is rotund and built like a boar, laughing riotously into his wine cup.

Torbun claps twice and raises both hands. The chatter dies slowly. I glance sideways at Elena, who offers me a small shrug, her stare returning forward. Torbun already made introductions, so I can’t fathom the reason for the interruption at this late stage in the evening. Still, he smiles. He has a large smile.

His voice is booming as he speaks. “We are grateful for King Calai and the bounty he has brought to our village, are we not?”

A great roar goes up and I can’t help but smile myself. Though I haven’t yet had my chance to partake, King Calai was generous and set aside a large feast for us helpers specifically. Very few guests we’ve had have come bearing gifts and none have been so generous.

Torbun claps again, demanding silence. “The king has brought us a feast for the ages and in three days, will be taking warriors from our small village to train in the great capital of Ithanuir, returning them in one year so that we can remain protected and safe.”

The hall cheers again. “If there is a way we could repay our great king’s generosity, should we not take it?”

The roar is loud enough to make me want to cover my ears, had I any hands to spare. Instead, I laugh and nod along at Torbun’s words. He’s riled up, riling all of us, and earns another loud whoop from the crowd when he gets up and stands on his chair.

He throws his arms to the side and says, “But His Highness Calai is king of all of Wrath and we are but a small village on its farthest edge. What could we possibly have that he cannot find elsewhere in greater, grander quantities?”

Whispers rise up. Torbun fans them like embers. “Does anyone have a guess?”

A few guesses are thrown out — mead, ale, fish, fur — but Torbun shakes his head. “You men should know better than any what we have that the other villages of Wrath do not…”

He pauses and when there are no further guesses, he shouts at the top of his lungs, “The most beautiful women!”

A cheer goes up loud enough to bring down the hall. A violent wind would have had a less catastrophic effect. Elena hisses beside me and shakes her head. “Fools,”

I catch her mouthing. I might have laughed, but I’m distracted by Torbun again. “Our king has requested the company of a willing female for the night. If any such unmarried females exist in this hall, please stand so that King Calai may take his pick. Fathers, release your daughters without fear, for King Calai is a generous male and intends for a great honor to be bestowed on his prize — undoubtedly riches that will make this feast seem paltry.”

This time, female voices squeal and screech. Limbs are shuffled and elbows are thrown as a dozen — no, dozens of women find their feet. I watch as Lucildeth — a widow of fifty — pulls her neckline down and her breasts up at the same time that Ebanora tentatively rises from her bench, her mother’s hands fixing her hair while her brother stares on slack-jawed and angry and his father restrains him.

Ebanora looks at me and I widen my eyes. Her cheeks tint pink. She only just got her moon blood earlier this warm season. The king is over thirty-five. I believe he may even be older than Ebanora’s father. And the stories she told me. He is a cruel, beastly male. She cannot want this…

My lips part but my throat is dry. I know how the world works and despite the fact that Ebanora feels like royalty from where I kneel so far below her, I know she is far from wealthy.

The promise of riches for her family in exchange for their only daughter’s virginity is too great a chance for Ebanora to remain in her seat. And she is beautiful. I can only hope that the king carries an ounce of honor in his body, that he wouldn’t take someone so young and innocent. I glance at Lucildeth again as she puckers her mouth and hope — pray to Lohr, the god of lust — that he prefers a woman with more experience.

“And what a fine selection we have here for you, my liege. On behalf of the chief, his beautiful wife, and our entire village, we welcome you to take your time inspecting our array of willing females, each guaranteed to offer you a pleasurable night.”

He gestures at the risen women and my gaze strays from Ebanora’s flushed red cheeks to the king. My heart sits like a dagger in my neck.

He rises to his feet, pushing his chair back. It groans under his displaced weight. He drops his empty horn on the table and begins to walk with purpose. There’s no way he’d be able to stick his meaty legs through the narrow gaps between the benches, so he does the reasonable thing and comes down the servants’ aisle. The one Ebanora is currently standing far too near to. It’ll put her directly in his path.

My stomach clenches as I watch him. His heavy feet are wrapped in fur-lined boots. The leather and fur of his pants strain against his powerful legs. His weapons knock against his thick thighs as he takes step after step, moving down the row lined with servants, closer and closer to Ebanora while his gaze sweeps to his right, across the tables where so many eager women have risen.

Those nearest to him look so hopeful as he approaches them, and their hope is immediately crushed as he continues, his steps sure, his stride unfaltering. His red beard catches the light, shimmering brown and burgundy and orange. As does his hair, the top half of which is bound back away from his face, a few loose braids woven through the mass that falls down to his shoulder blades.

His large head swivels and his massive breadth storms forward. Ebanora and I stare at one another. Her expression has fallen slack and I don’t quite understand why she’s staring at me in such shock until it hits me that the king has come to a stop directly before me.

Me.

The immense presence of the king of Wrath tramples me like a horse and my gaze is wrenched from Ebanora to the male standing above me. His shoulders twist smoothly to face me, and his head turns away from the risen women, gaze finding my face and focusing on it like it’s the first face he’s ever seen.

His black eyes move over my forehead and nose, cheeks, chin and lips before dropping down to my chest. He looks my body over briefly and then returns his gaze to mine. Face tilted up, I disgrace myself by not looking down quickly enough. It is not appropriate for one of my station to look at him directly, and yet, he does not punish me. I stare down at his legs, waiting — hoping — for him to ask me to fetch him something. I am a thrall. That would be my duty. Anything more I am not prepared for.

Beside me, Elena stiffens while the male to my right edges away from me, putting space between us. What is happening? Heat hits the backs of my eyes as I wait and pray to Raya for mercy.

And then he takes a step. There can be no mistaking the fact that he’s standing in front of me now. Any cowardly hope I might have had that his focus was on Elena beside me is gone. King Calai’s enormous body eclipses the world behind him. I take a tentative glance up to his chest and warily eye the leather straps that crisscross all over it. Beneath them, scars shimmer. He has a cut on his stubbled jaw where no hair grows. It’s small but glistens silver when he tips his chin down to look at me. I shame myself by glancing into his eyes a second time. Fool. If he hadn’t intended to punish me before, he certainly will now.

He edges forward another step, and then another. My back is plastered to the longhouse wall, yet his chest is almost against mine, separated from it by only the pitcher between us. And then…not even that. I flinch when he takes the pitcher by its open mouth, using just one of his massive hands to remove it from my grip and hand it absently to the male standing to my right. The bone king then reaches for my left hand, clenched around my treat. It shakes. I cannot control it.

His large, leathery fingers skim the outer edge of my wrist. His hand is so big, it doesn’t look real. I’ve never met anyone as big as he is. He deftly turns my palm over in his. Lingering over the veins in my wrist for a moment, he opens my fingers with his thumb. They’re dirty, my fingers. His are callused, but clean as they stroke my skin. All of his movements are sure. His thumb moves down towards the heel of my hand and flicks one edge of the folded napkin with his short nail. I don’t dare try to keep my treat from him. If he came to punish me for having it when I shouldn’t, I won’t resist. Whatever punishment I shall receive, I’ll live.

He makes a soft sound through his nose, one I can’t interpret. Then his thumb pushes my fingers back around my sacred, stolen morsel.

“Are you willing?”

he says, his hand still cupping mine, holding it aloft between us. He rakes his thumb over my knuckles, the gesture strange and familiar even though he doesn’t know me and I exist in a world apart from his. He is as distant to me as the gods. At least…he was.

I still do not believe that he could be talking to me. I want to glance to someone — anyone — for aid, but I’m too frightened to look away from his hand closed around my trembling fist. I gnaw on my bottom lip, too afraid to answer.

“You are standing,”

comes his low brogue, “so I will assume that you are.”

I’m a thrall. I’m not allowed to sit at a feast. He knows that. He has to know that. There’s a male standing right beside me. But who am I to tell him any of that? I open my mouth but a whimper is all that I emit.

“Look at me.”

Oh no. I can’t do that. It’s a flogging offense for a servant to meet a king’s gaze directly like this.

“I give you permission.”

His hand releases my fist and it drops like a stone. I am unbearably attuned to the brush of his fingers on the outside of my dress. His fingers trail up my forearm, past my elbow. He picks a loose string — one among many — off of my dress before he reaches my shoulder and touches the place where my shift meets my skin, tracing the edge with his callused fingers. He moves his hand along my clavicle, his knuckles brushing over it so softly, yet with so much threat. He could break the bone with just that hand, I’m sure of it. And I feel like sobbing at the realization.

“I require it, little bird.”

I shiver from head to toe despite the heat of the hall — and the even greater heat he emanates. I may be a thrall, but I have never been touched like this before, not on my bare skin, so intimately, with such implied intent. My lower lip trembles as his hand moves to the side of my neck, which he strokes gently with his rough thumb, up and down my quivering muscle.

“Shh,”

he says. “Be still.”

He touches my jaw and then forces my chin up, but I keep my eyes closed, much to his disproval, because he clacks his tongue against the backs of his teeth. “Little bird, look at me.”

I swallow hard. His hand momentarily fists around my throat as I do. I struggle to lift my gaze past his beard and take several short, hot breaths to build the courage. I finally take in his nose, but he loses patience and tips my chin even further up with his thick thumb, giving me no other choice but to look into his dark and violent stare or up at the patchy thatch roof above his head. I don’t dare defy him again and choose the more frightening of the two options. I meet his gaze.

Later, I will wonder if what I heard was true or a conjuring of my frightened imagination, but in the instant our eyes clashed, I could have sworn I heard the king take in a sharp breath, as if I’d startled him. But I will never know for certain.

In the next moment, his cheeks turn ruddy and his naturally pink lips take on a more striking carmine color, flushed from wine or something else. A vein throbs across his forehead and a muscle in his neck jumps. His hand flinches around my throat, making me jump. In a moment of silent shame, I drop my sweet bread.

I wipe my now sticky palm off on the rough material of my threadbare dress as my gaze passes between his eyes, trying desperately to decipher if the corners of his mouth and the stitching of his prominent brow betray ease or an edge. Right now, I feel all of his sharp edges stabbing and jabbing into me as I wait and pray for whatever ill is to befall me, but when he speaks, he does so gently, his voice taking on a tone that tickles my sense of familiarity once again.

“Have you bled?”

His words are low and soft.

Startled by the question, I answer in truth with a shallow nod before the humiliation of his request can wash over me.

His brows pull even closer together, as if he is displeased with my answer, or unsure if I’m telling him the truth. “How many years?”

I hold up one hand with my thumb, pointer, middle and ring finger lifted. My pinky finger I keep lowered against my sticky palm.

His full, pink mouth tightens and he speaks in a gruff voice that cuts like broken glass, “Does another soul here hold your heart?”

I shake my head even though I am confused by the question.

“Where is your family?”

I shake my head more quickly, my hair shifting around my shoulders. He reaches up and grasps the end of one curl. His nostrils flare. I wonder if he smells my stench. I am embarrassed…humiliated…confused. My stomach is in knots and if it would not have embarassed me further, I suspect I’d have lost control of my bladder the moment he touched my arm.

“Are you claimed by another?”

I shake my head.

“Are you promised to another?”

I hesitate and before I can think of a more acceptable, decent answer, I stutter, “Not for a w-wife, my king.”

“Hm.”

He is twirling a single curl around his finger, watching it with fascination before his gaze slowly passes from my hair to my shoulder beneath it, and then across the top of my dress. His hand tightens just a little around my throat in a way that can only be interpreted as a threat. Is he…is he going to kill me here? Like this? Perform the ritual of Davral on me right now?

“My king…”

I whisper. “Mercy. Please…”

I haven’t led a particularly beautiful life, but it’s mine and I intend to see it through. I might not have much, but I have hopes…hopes for furs, for clean shoes, maybe even one day, if I get really lucky, a poor farm boy to take me for his…and if I were truly to be spoiled by the gods, maybe even with him a couple children to raise and to love and to shower with all the affection I didn’t receive from my own kin. Yet the king does not release me. Instead, he closes his eyes.

“Mercy,”

he repeats. He repeats it two more times.

His eyes open and his gaze grows distant as it lingers on my ear. He tucks the curl he’d been toying with behind it and says so softly I strain to make out his words, “How can I offer what the gods have denied me? The gods do not intend mercy on either of us.”

“Please,”

I say again, heat pressing at the backs of my eyes. “I have nothing to offer.”

His gaze snaps to mine and his hand drops halfway onto my chest. He rubs his thumb across the thin bones of my sternum. “Would you like to come with me?”

I freeze. Panic consumes me. “I’m just a thrall,”

I whisper brokenly.