Responsibility Ch. 25

Author's Note: I'm so sorry for being so slow. Not only do I have my job, but I got a new relationship, and that stuff takes up a lot of time. I do hope to finish this story, though.

***

"Ah. So that's what happened," the Empress Dowager said rather thoughtfully, swirling a swallow's worth of water around in a cup of hers.

The Emperor, Rahela, and their attendants were having a solemn kind of breakfast with the Empress Dowager and her attendants, all seated on a veranda. The morning air was cool and wet, which was logical because there was a light rain. The roof protected everyone, along with their moderately lined cloaks and slightly thicker clothing overall.

Rahela put down a knife she'd been using and said, "Yes Madam. That's indeed what happened."

The older woman gave a slow exhale as she looked out at the gray, oddly smooth clouds. She wasn't smiling, but there was something relaxed in her tone. "It was far too easy for everyone to forget the old alliances made between the Chachuk and Markov families. Even I couldn't think of it all. In the past, they've pushed each other apart, but it seems that was all a false surface."

Cutting into a little pastry, the Emperor coolly said, "My wife was able to notice this because she still has the perspective of an outsider. The view outside a house is much different than inside."

Lowering her head, Rahela tried to counter that statement. "I was being studious, as was required of me. I wouldn't have noticed the link if I hadn't been reading so much."

The Empress Dowager only nodded and called Rahela a nervous little puppy sniffing and howling at the world.

***

There were lovely, pink and orange sapphires innocently sitting in a little tray lined with silk. They'd been removed from certain soap bars that had been used down to nothing. Rahela wasn't the one playfully running her fingers through the loose stones, making them clatter and smack each other. She was the one stiffly sitting in a chair and watching the fingers play with the stones. The Emperor's. He was listening to the almost gravel-like noises as his fingers moved.

"The soap's fragrance disappeared long ago," the man quietly said. "Understandable, indeed, and here we have some leftovers." He pinched up a certain gemstone. It had three different colors in it all at once. Orange, pink, and dark pink.

"Yes My Lord." That was all Rahela could think of to say.

Putting the stone down and taking up a different one that had less pink in it, the man said, "You could have these stones placed in a piece of jewelry."

"Yes My Lord." Rahela sighed and looked around her bedchamber. There wasn't anyone else. Her chambermaids, Yana, Oksana, Gabi, even Ammas, they were gone for the time. They'd left very obediently.

She sighed again with what was almost a blink.

"Perhaps they could be sewn onto a new headdress for you," the Emperor said.

Layering her hands in her lap, Rahela replied, "I have many headdresses. If I were to sell them, the profits could be used to fund a useful project, perhaps an organization that would train people for a variety of careers."

Dropping the stone, making a seemingly final noise against the other stones, the Emperor looked up from the tray and down at Rahela's head. She turned away from the warmth that was hiding just behind his eyes. She'd never been an adequate judge for that.

Maybe he was feeling lustful. Maybe he was thinking he'd just outsmarted her over something, from an issue as insignificant as a card game or an issue as grand as war. Or maybe he was just thinking she was funny and the warmth was about to turn a bit lighter.

"You must be content here," the man. It felt random and unexpected. Rahela jolted in her seat once her brain had fully processed the words. She was impressed with the man for being able to force such a reaction out of her. Would she ever stop being impressed with him?

Looking at a tapestry full of flowery imagery, Rahela gently said, "My position is the most honorable, the highest and grandest under Your Majesty."

"You certainly are protecting your position well." She heard his feet on the tiled floor. He was wearing one of his softer, more worn pairs of shoes. His steps weren't dainty, but they certainly were lighter than usual. "You aren't a fool. You know what's at stake."

His body heat was right beside her.

She felt his breath even through the veil that covered the top of her head.

"Thusly," he said with a tone that reminded one of formal events, "for your sake, the sake of Testoa, and even for the sake of your little sister," here, Rahela shivered, because she felt the man's fingertips through her sleeve, "you should tell me about your blessing."

Her heart tripped, and she had to put her fingertips to her throat, but she managed to hold onto her calm demeanor and ask, "My Lord, are you referring to a time when I approved of someone's actions?"

His fingernails ... she could feel those too.

"No, Little Bacon. You were blessed. It's quite plain under my eyes."

Slow taps. His fingernails were tapping on her shoulder then. Rahela had to swallow down a sudden lump of mucus. "A blessing? Someone gave me approval?"

"You know that's not what I meant."

That was one of the quietest, most dangerous voices she'd ever heard.

***

What?

No.

No, Your Majesty. I barely understand that you'd even suggest such a thing.

What evidence do you have to support this accusation?

No, no. What evidence do you have to even support the very concept?

Your Majesty ...

I know my place in this world. I'd never be so foolish as to lie to your face. There's too much to lose, too many lives at risk.

How could I?

***

No longer is there any benefit to hiding this.

Will you continue to deny it?

***

She'd slid out of her seat, fallen to her knees. She'd begged him to ignore whatever irritating little inkling had sprouted in his mind. She trembled.

And all he did was grin down at her, that mad grin, that manic grin, that evil grin.

He'd won. He knew he'd won. All that was left was to have her admit it.

But she was still fighting. She couldn't do anything but fight.

No. No. He was mistaken. That was what she insisted.

But he ended her undignified words with this statement.

"Then swallow this whole."

He held his palm under her face. In the center, there was a black pill. She thought she knew what it was.

"If you don't swallow this whole within ten seconds after I finish speaking," the Emperor said to her, "I'll assume you're holding even more secrets and working against me."

That was what broke her. That was what had her truly losing to him.

Rahela snatched the pill up, tossed it into her mouth, and swallowed it. She didn't even take water.

Her back slumped a bit. Her fingers and braids grazed the tiles in the floor. Her heart was wilder than before, much wilder. Her face heated. Tears came. They slid down her cheeks. Her sinuses were irritated and clogging up.

But the hint of a taste lingering on her tongue confused her after a moment.

It wasn't metallic, not earthy, not even green.

It was salty with maybe a hint of charcoal, perhaps activated charcoal?

"Had you truly believed I'd force you to take poison?" He laughed. It made Rahela flinch and close her eyes as embarrassment flooded through her. It was as if she'd been rubbed and peeled open, her insides bare to the most dangerous gaze in the world.

She wanted to speak, but she had no words.

"The Traveling Tall Maiden," the Emperor said with a little roll in his tone, "she's real, no?"

At this point, Rahela thought it was clear. One of her hands rose to her cheek, where her fingernails glided on her skin, not enough to hurt, but enough to remind her of the concept of hurt. She was staring down at the floor, covered in gentle shadows in the weakened sunlight.

"Little Bacon." There was a stern quality to his tone. In fact, he made her flinch. Still, Rahela couldn't sense any true anger, perhaps only something victorious and sprightly. "Funny Little Bacon, I've waited for you to tell me for far too long, but you're a thick little nut. You wouldn't even crack when the one that blessed you appeared on Imperial lands."

Rahela didn't know if she wanted death or not. All she knew was that she couldn't think of any way out of this situation, at least not right then.

She saw his feet before her. Then she felt his hand on top of her veil, a light rub and a pat. She wasn't wearing a Yahsin headdress. "The Traveling Tall Maiden," he said, "she has some abilities. She might even be a demon. And you," here, his fingertips danced right where the the parting of her hair would be under the cloth, "you might be one of the few people she was willing to bless. She's blessed you with an immunity towards poisons and toxins, and that's why no matter how often you'd consumed or otherwise contacted those frightening substances, you never died, never even felt a symptom."

Funny thing, that was when Rahela's brain let her find a few words. She inhaled very slowly, put her hand to her bosom, stared down at the man's shoes, and said, "I've been told she's not a demon, but a fairy instead."

She actually saw one of his feet clench a bit behind the leather!

He cleared his throat.

"Fairies are ... are beautiful." That was what he said after a moment.

"Beauty is subjective," Rahela wearily argued, "but even so, simply because many of us have been told fairies are beautiful doesn't turn it thus."

Another moment.

Rahela's knees were stinging from the pressure on the hard floor.

"Why were you blessed?" he asked.

Folding her arms, still shaking, Rahela gave him a brief version of the story.

"It was summer. I was still in my mother's womb. The maiden appeared before the royal court while my father was away. She was accused of murder but there wasn't enough evidence. The maiden then vanished from the court, as if she'd only been there because something had interested her and that something had left. My mother later told me she thought that maiden had been seeking out a rat because there was a distinct lack of vermin that summer."

"The next morning, that peculiar maiden appeared in the hunting grounds before my mother and while she was alone. There, she told my mother that the child in her belly would be immune to every poison and toxin that she new of. Then she vanished again."

The Emperor's legs bent. He knelt down. Rahela didn't look up. She saw his fingers press down on that floor that hurt so much, as beautiful as it was. "Once more, why did the The Traveling Tall Maiden bless you?"

With half a shrug, Rahela said, "My mother assumed it was because she refused to have the maiden punished without enough evidence to prove a crime, and the maiden happened to be in a joyful mood, but that was difficult to gather because her face is always so cold."

"The maiden is capricious," the Emperor seemed to guess.

"I believe as much, however ..." Rahela's voice faded and blended into a cough. She put a fist up to her lips as it happened. When her voice returned it was mostly stable and occasionally watery. "I've never been certain. Aside from her blessing, I have no connection to her. I swear." Her eyes slid up to the Emperor's knees were behind his tunic. "Your Majesty, that's the reason why I hid the truth. I feared that assumption would be made, that I could be accused of having an alliance with such a frightening creature."

She saw movement behind the hanging fabric. She also saw one of his legs slide a bit to one side, as if he was shifting his weight. "All this time, that was the only reason you had for hiding this?" He sounded disappointed, and that actually comforted Rahela. That meant he believed her.

Wiping at one of her eyes, Rahela quietly enjoyed the cooling in her face. It was fine. This was fine. She wasn't about to be executed. Gabi wasn't about to be executed. Testoa wasn't about to essentially be raped.

Yet she was still trembling.

"There are other stories I haven't shared with you," the Emperor said quietly and smoothly, as if he was getting tired but still held onto his strength, "but I believe you already understand their common thread. Now that the Traveling Tall Maiden has proven herself to be real to us, we must be careful. Do you know if she's truly a murderer?" He stood back up.

Rahela was able to push herself up to her feet. Her knees hurt, but she wasn't upset about it. That wasn't worth her concern at the moment. "The only answer I can give is, 'I'm not certain.' I only know some rumors." She was looking at the man's chest. He didn't have on any necklaces. He didn't even have on a cloak. The room had been kept quite warm. A fireplace was practically raging while all the windows and doors were tightly shut.

His arm bent and his hand rose in a light gesture. "Do you know anything?"

Flipping one of her braids behind her back, Rahela said, "No, although I believe she responds well to promises of food. I'd imagine even a simple loaf of brown bread could hold her fury away."

"That's a reasonable strategy." The Emperor reached out then. He put a hand on her shoulder. The palm's heat was soaked into all her layers of fabric and into her flesh. Rahela's chest swelled as she sighed at the feeling. "Do you know what her preferred route is? Can you tell me if she'll leave Yahsin or if she might remain?"

"Once more, My Lord, I'm not certain." Rahela thought she was calm again. She had high hopes. The path she was walking on a rough road, not a narrow and rickety bridge over a great ravine. "Perhaps she wanders, remains when her interest is held, and then wanders again once she tires of what's around her. That's a speculation and nothing more."

"Is there anything else you must tell me?"

She shook her head. "There's nothing else, My Lord."

From the shoulder over to one of her braids. He held a good portion of its length. A little tug. A change in his voice. Fuzzy and warm. "I suspect that, in a smaller part of your heart, you feared that one could take advantage of your blessing, use you as a tool."

Another tug. This time, he forced her forward. She tripped into him. Her hands flew up and pressed against his ribs through his clothes. Her breath skipped. At least she was able to keep her face from crashing into him.

"Pitiable, too pitiable," the man said, "you'll certainly be used. It would nearly be a sin for me not to use you."

She tried to push herself away, but the Emperor's free hand went over her back.

Something was different.

When he lifted her up by her waist, when Rahela looked up to see his now heated expression without any sign of his more insane smile, when she felt his lips and breath on hers, she knew something was different. Her fingernails lightly scraped his clothing as she denied herself the option of digging into him.

What in the world was so seductive to him at this moment? Was it something he'd said that stoked his own fire? Was it her reaction, or what she'd hoped was a lack of a reaction?

Once their lips were separated, and he set her back down on the floor. His eyelids looked heavier than normal. His cheeks were darker and rosier. Rahela remained cold even as his heated fingers went to her veil to pluck at the pins and thin circlet keeping it from slipping away. In fact, the Emperor did let the veil slip away. It seemed to whisper its way all the way to the floor, where it piled and pooled.

Something was different. Not only with him. Actually, Rahela thought something was wrong with herself.

The Emperor was now leading her by her hair off and away. Over to her huge bed, where he set her down beside him on one of the mattress' edges. Visibly docile yet frigid, Rahela offered no protest, not even a flickering pale eyelash, as the man sighed and even cooed at her hair. He admired a braid, untied it, and ran his fingers through the forced waves.

After a time, Rahela silently admitted to herself that her hair felt lighter and her belly felt hollow. Then, she found herself repressing urges she barely knew were there, as if she was repressing out of pure instinct and not out of fearing whatever she needed to repress. When the Emperor was unraveling her other braid, she finally figured out her body wanted to cry and laugh all at once, although she wasn't sure why.

Her hair was free. She smelled the familiar bacon scent. She thought of varying points in her life. She also thought of a time long ago when her mother had told her to always keep her blessing a secret. It was the wisest decision. If anyone with a dangerous mind knew ...

He wasn't playing with her hair anymore. His palms went to her cheeks. He tilted her head back and planted a humming little kiss on her lips. The exhale from his nostrils felt hot. She had to wiggle her nose to keep from sneezing. What might've been part of a chuckle followed that exhale. Her face flushed at the noise.

The Emperor nudged her back onto the mattress. He was over her. Fine. Rahela was concentrating on trying to hold her peculiar emotions back.

She smelled a soap's or perfume's fragrance on him. Perhaps he'd been loosely inspired by her old bacon soap from the past. This scent in his skin was like dried beef, herbs, and a bit of charcoal.

Her stomach seemed to whine into her throat.

For what might've been the first time, Rahela refused the Emperor his attempt at producing an heir. She put a hand to her lips and rolled out from under the man, landing on her knees on a rug on the floor. Her other hand went to her belly. She shivered. She honestly thought she'd vomit.

"Ah? Little Bacon? What's troubled you?"

Rahela heard the mattress creak, the footsteps too. Rahela gasped and tried very hard not to cough. She believed if she coughed then all the foul and acidic things that were apparently in her belly would spurt out. She even thought she could taste its threatening presence.

The Emperor stopped before her, and he knelt down. He even folded his skirts under his knees to make a neater image. It was almost dainty, and Rahela could hardly believe the man had performed such an action. "Little Bacon? You couldn't have been poisoned. That's impossible." He sounded so warm and supple. We may assume one of two things."

Rahela shuffled a few inches away from him as he went on. He even rose a hand to count with his fingers. "Firstly," he said, "you might have eaten something that had turned rotten without anyone knowing." The second finger stretched out. "Secondly, you might finally have my child." His fingers closed back in.

Rahela blinked at one of the veins bulging in his wrist, although she wasn't exactly looking at it. Her stomach was panicking again, and her throat was far too wet. She gurgled and tried to clear her throat, which only intensified the sensation. "Mah ... agh ... ah!" She swallowed down an excess of saliva and mucus. "If I'm with child, then it would be too early for symptoms."

His palm flipped up and the hand swept along an upwards curve in a light gesture. "Every pregnancy is different, even with the same mother."

"My ... My Lord," here, Rahela had to gasp a bit more, "ah ... hah. My Lord, I'd never accuse you of dishonesty nor foolishness, but I must ask how could Your Majesty hold such confidence with this womanly matter?"

Putting both hands on his lap, the Emperor lightly said, "Hm? I've been married before, quite a few times. There were miscarriages, but there was also a delivery. I have no living children, but I've had pregnant wives."

Rahela still didn't believe his judgment could be trusted. He spent most of his time away from his home, certainly away from his wives. Rahela believed she had to have eaten something at least a bit expired. Certainly so! It wasn't that she didn't want to be pregnant, exactly. It was indeed the most advantageous thing she could imagine at the time. She simply didn't want to put too much hope there.