The Rebel's Wife Pt. 04

My second bath with Oksha, the maid, was a particularly painful shade of embarrassing. I admit that as she cleaned my face with warm, lavender scented urns of water, I could not help but weep. Before my abduction I had a general idea of what happens between a man and a wife after their wedding, or for the wicked, any night beforehand. However not in my most wild and imaginative state could I have envisioned what Gareth had just done to me. He had stuck his cock far into my mouth, and without worrying about my need to breath or swallow, used me for his pleasure.

My mind shied to think of what had happened next, but Oshka's warm washcloth wiping up my face was a continuous reminder. He had spent himself on me, making his seed run down my face like obscene tears. It had gotten in my hair, and in my eyes, and even flecks of it were evident on the beautiful silk robe that had been lying on the floor beneath me. And as if this degradation had not been enough, he had proceeded to torturing my clit.

Admittedly my sobbing in that bath was not entirely over my hurt and disgust, but also was the result of my frustration and shame. For long minutes Gareth had assailed my clit, building up a heat and a pressure deep in me. After he had left the pressure had remained. I could still feel my heartbeat between my legs, beating a reminder of his relentless fingers. I found myself thinking back to the day before, and how it had felt to be taken by Gareth on Kavan's table. I was thinking about his cock tearing through my most private of places, and the savage rhythm that our bodies had made together. These thoughts only made the pressure worse. I wanted to reach down and touch my clit in the way Gareth had just done, but the presence of Oshka in the room stymied this desire.

By the time I was on to my next ordeal I had cried myself out. In fact, I looked quite presentable. My hair had been combed out by Oshka again, into a straight, silky curtain. My face was clean, my eyebrows had been plucked, and even my teeth had been rubbed to a shine with some paste. I was given a robe to wear, green this time, with an elegant crane embroidered on it, while the tailor and her assistants set up in my bedchamber. They instructed me to stand on a small pedestal, and like a swarm of bees, started taking my measurements. The tailor's girls spoke similarly to girls from my village, and this small connection to the world outside the castle warmed my heart. They complained amiably about having to get a wedding gown done in half a day, but I could tell they were excited.

When the robe got in the way of the measurements the tailor had me cast it aside. I was relieved to note there was not a single man in the room. Even my door guard was waiting in the hall. The girls seemed completely comfortable with my nudity and continued to take measurements on my body for which I could not even imagine a purpose. "Your neck is so delicate, Lady Isme. It must look so elegant in your jewels," One piped up, to my surprise.

"Your hips are so full! I want hips like those," the girl who was measuring around my thighs sighed wistfully.

"Her hair! I never can grow mine out that long." Another assistant girl whispered to yet another and pulled at her chin-length sandy hair. "Oh it will be so lovely at the wedding!"

In a motherly way the tailor shushed them, "the fact that not all of us are cut out to be Queen of this country... should be surprising to none of us." She had a long-suffering tone as if she spent too much of her time having to keep these girls in their respective places. "Be quick now, there is much to be done." The girls turned back to their work, except one, who's gaze lingered on my full breasts, as if wondering what she would look like with them.

The girls' reactions to me shocked me. In my village my beauty had been a source of shame. Women cast me out of their conversations when they saw their husbands eyeing me. They called me a whore and a slattern under their breaths and stepped on the hems of my dresses to try to trip me. It had felt so unfair, because I had done nothing to encourage their husband's sideways glances. In fact, I had never talked to men, unless it was absolutely crucial to an errand I was forced to run. Besides maybe once, I had done nothing in my life that deserved such cruel words.

Once, when the faire had been in town, I had caught the eye of one of the traveling storytellers. He had bought me drinks, which I had refused to imbibe, and plied me with compliments that I did not even half believe. However, he was charming, and nice on the eyes, with his dark shaggy beard and blue eyes, so I found myself unable to convincingly banish him from my presence. One night, with a sly look in his eyes, he commanded me to meet him by the riverside at midnight. I told him I would not go, but he had just replied sternly that I would. He seemed to know about a facet of me that even I had not guessed at. That night I did indeed show up at the riverbank.

He was there waiting for me, and business-like, told me to pull down my dress to show him my breasts. All the flattery in his voice was gone, leaving a deep, forceful voice that I had a hard time refusing. My hands performed the task he wanted, while my brain was confused why he was getting his way. I knew I should not encourage him, and that I should stay completely chaste for my future husband. "Stand still now for me." He cupped my now exposed breasts, using his thumbs to roll my nipples in small circles. I had been breathing shallowly and felt as if a veil of unreality was covering my vision. I felt like I could not move, both out of fear and out of a strange desire to please him. I had let him suck on my breasts, and bite at them. He only stopped when a group of three drunk lads from the village stumbled down the riverbank near us. The storyteller had pulled my dress back up, and ordered me back to bed, as if being out there had been my idea. The rest of the week I had struggled to hide the blue teeth-marks he had left on my breasts from my aunt and the other women bathing at the river.

Back then I had not been anyone important. I was a poor, orphaned ward of my aunt and uncle, and my looks had singled me out and put me in danger. Now, betrothed to a Duke, who somehow aspired to be King, I was someone these seamstresses admired. Ironically, now that I had every reason to be called a whore, I was being called a Lady.

The rest of the hour passed in a parade of colorful silks. Every color was held up to my skin to see if it was acceptable. Sometimes the tailor even asked my opinion. Gowns in late stages of completion were fitted to my form, and vast swaths of ivory lace were pinned around me, then whisked away. Thinking about the eventual purpose of the mountain of ivory cloth made my stomach clench and spin. Despite not wearing a corset, I found it hard to breath. I had always known that I was to be wed off, and not to a man of my choosing. But I had not anticipated the man being anything like Kavan. I was soon let off my pedestal and outfitted in a gown of sage and lilac cloth. While it managed to cover all of the parts of me, I was still lacking undergarments. I was led from the bedchamber by a harried-looking Oshka. She took me through too many passageways and portals to count on my fingers, eventually depositing me in a prim sitting room.

The woman that awaited me there looked formidable. She had high cheek bones and an even higher collar on a severe black dress. "I am Madame Depanne, and I am to teach you everything you need to know, in one hour." The thin line of her mouth made it clear how she felt about this task. "I am to turn you," she gestured at me dubiously, "into a functioning member of this court. How I am to do that," she waved her hand in the air, "evades me." She held a stick in her left hand that looked like a thin, bejeweled cane. "Can you read, girl?"

"No." I whispered, cowed by this woman's sophistication and disdain. Whap! As quickly as a striking snake she rapped the top of my wrist with her cane.

"No, Madame, is what you shall say. Now sit up straight. A queen is to always have each of her vertebrae perfectly at her command." Frightened and stinging, I tried to copy her posture. She then went about teaching me the names, titles and holdings of all of the important families in court, and how to greet them. She quizzed me, and when I forgot a detail, she would ruthlessly employ her rod. Her favorite spots to hit were the palms of my hand and the tops of my thighs. Soon these spots were pale blue with bruises, like a winter pond. "To whom is Lady Callaway of Pentree married?"

"Earl Lackmore, Madame?" I hedged. Whap! The stick hit the tender skin on the bottom of my forearm, causing a red mark to blossom against my smooth tan skin.

"Earl Lackimore. Also, her father is a Loyalist." She sniffed with disgust. Confused by how this information was relevant, I looked back down at my arm. Madame Depanne caught me wincing and cracked a humorless smile. "I believe in your time here you will have to grow a thicker skin." She caressed the line of my jaw with the jewel at the end of her stick. "Lord Kavan is not a bad man. No, he is not bad, but in this castle his appetites are... known of. And you are so pretty," Depanne mused, touching my loose hair with her cane. "Do you know what to do when a man strikes you?"

"No, Madame," Whap! She hit me on the upper thigh, by my hip bone.

"Do not mumble. Either speak clearly or do not speak at all. What you are to do if you are hit by your man, is nothing. You are not a common village shrew anymore and you shall never speak out against your husband."

"And if I am hit by another man, Madame?" I asked. She looked troubled.

"That shall not happen... but if you are bothered by any of the men you may report it to Sir Gareth of Nemor, Lord Kavan's man. Lord Kavan will be too busy to be bothered by your small plights." She must have noticed the color drain from my face. "You will learn how to serve your husband in time Lady Isme. He is a very important and powerful man, yes, but he is also just a man, and men can be very simple. Queen Lorraine learned to please him quite sufficiently, after a rough beginning, and she used to be a girl much like you... though noble." I was grateful that she misread my concern and I fought to comport myself.

"Yes Madame." We spent the rest of the time going over more etiquette of Kavan's court, and me only earning four more strikes from her cane, before it was time for me to be bustled off to my next destination, this time by a team of serving women and a household guard.

By the time the sun was setting I had been primped, coached, perfumed and plied with teas and breads by a vast team of servants. My hair had been painstakingly put up into a magical network of braids and twists and curls. It felt as if I was carrying a whole village on my head, the pins pulled at my scalp so. Most confusingly, a small man with even smaller lips had been tasked with covering my nails with a clear lacquer. After the delicate procedure was over, my nails looked much the same, except perhaps had a bit more shine. Was that something that men noticed? Was Kavan to be displeased by dull nails? It had seemed to me, when we had met, that my nails were the last thing of interest to him. In fact, he had not even been interested in my maidenhead, a prize that men obsess over in songs and stories.

As my wedding loomed closer activity increased in the halls of the castle. Servants were carrying food and decorations through the halls, almost at a run. Nobles were arriving from beyond the castle and tried to peek at me through their dense retinues of guards. Younger servant girls stared at me, giggled and tittered. The older ones gave me knowing looks and tight smiles, but never would speak to me beyond a few words. It was their reaction to my predicament that alarmed me the most. Madame Depanne had said that Lord Kavan's appetites were known throughout the castle, but surely his predilections could not be more debasing than those of Lord Gareth. I was eager to be wed and to be safe from further advances, and found myself looking over my shoulder in the corridors, checking for Gareth's looming presence.

I knew the ceremony was to be held soon when I was hustled past a large banquet room, laden with green and gold decorations, to a small room behind it. Guests and their servants were starting to enter the banquet room, I had seen, through the grand main door. The sun had set just minutes ago, causing motes of pink and orange light to cascade through the tall windows that lined the hall. The small glimpse I had of the banquet room made it look quite magical. Despite myself, and despite what I knew, I felt optimism and excitement blooming in my chest. I knew I was being a stupid girl, and that I remained in danger, but this was too close to a fairytale to truly abhor.

The back room was statelier and more feminine than the other small rooms I had been groomed in that day. The walls seemed to be made of marble, and there was a beautiful mahogany pedestal that I was to stand on. My breath caught as my wedding dress was carefully lifted onto me and sewn into place. It had layer upon layer of creamy white silk and lace and yet managed to look sleek and fitted at my small waste. The train fanned out for feet behind me, and the rest of the skirt pooled at the sides of my feet, looking like molten glass. Most shocking, and also breathtaking to me, was the neckline, or rather the lack of one. The fabric plummeted from my shoulders, over my clavicle, leaving a long, narrow passage from my throat to my navel which as left completely bare. My skin was darker than the white fabric, but somehow managed to look luminous, due to all of the treatments and grooming I had received that day. I noticed, looking down self-consciously, that the low neckline of the dress alluringly revealed the barest sliver of the sides of my breasts.

One maid wove a green wire tiara into my hair, while another of them made final adjustments to the waistline of the dress, making sure it hugged my stomach and hipbones just so. Meanwhile a cleric went through the vows with me. I stumbled a bit but had known the marriage vows since I was a child. As a girl, my friends and I would always play at being married to a prince in a grand ceremony.

Dizzyingly soon, I was led out of the dressing room by the cleric into a dark hallway. There were no windows, so candles mounted on the wall gave out the only light after the door had shut behind us. The hallway widened out into what looked like a staging area, with doors which I presumed led out into the banquet room. A few people had gathered there, all with an air of importance about them. A thrill went through my heart when I glimpsed Kavan at the far side, surrounded by attendants. The cleric went over to converse softly with other old men, leaving me in my pool of white lace. I was accurately aware that some of my most sensitive and private skin was on display, and was being tickled by a draft.

"You look positively stunning, Milady." I jumped at Gareth's voice. He had removed himself from the crowd, and was standing by my side, a bit closer than was polite. "You truly are doing me a credit. Perhaps I will get a promotion when Kavan sees you looking like this." Gareth's tone was so courtly, it almost made me forget the kind of man he was.

"Promoted, Sir?" The idea of him gaining more power in this castle was more than a bit unnerving to me. Gareth chuckled.

"You are a perceptive one. You of course, are right, I have the highest position there is to hold in all the land, sparing that of King Kavan. And perhaps that of the False King." His eyes continued to wander along me, especially eyeing along the slit at the front of my dress. I could feel his eyes on me as if he was laying his fingers everywhere he looked. "I do not envy them their positions. To be King is to be in the public eye. It is to produce babies and placate angry lords, and marry beautiful maidens in big stuffy ceremonies." He winked at me. "I find I have a lot more license in my position." I looked away from him, hoping he would go away, for I found myself heating up at his words. I did not want to sweat off the delicate layer of makeup on my brow. "I get to come and go as I please, without too many eyes on me. I am too high up to be the subject of base court gossip, and nobody pries into my personal affairs."

I kept quiet, waiting for the cleric to collect me again, or Kavan himself to sweep me away and protect me from this man. "Do you get my meaning, my sweet?" Gareth touched my chin, talking now into my ear. "I know it will get lonely, being a busy King's second wife. A toy, that does not get enough play. Do not worry Isme, I will not let you get too terribly bored." He discretely squeezed my thigh through my skirts, paining me as he hit the bruised flesh left by Madame Depanne. I could taste the peppermint that was on his breath even as he walked away.

Soon the ceremony began. Kavan and I were led onto the stage of the banquet hall through separate doors. The ceremony began with the words I anticipated. "On this night we forge a sacred bond." I was now standing across from Lord Kavan, and I blushed slightly as I realized this was the first time he had seen me with clothes on. Not that I felt particularly covered up, as he unhurriedly raked his gaze down me. I could see he had cleaned up for the wedding, his stubble was gone, replaced by clean-shaven skin around a neat beard. He was about the height of Gareth, a whole head taller than me. He was imposing in his vaguely martial formal clothing, all leather and emerald brocade. He wore many rings, including on his wedded finger, which reminded me this was not the first time he had heard these blessings the cleric was uttering.

The crowd was especially quiet when it came our turn to give our oaths. With a scratchy voice, I managed to play my part. "I promise to always be obedient to my husband, to serve him with grace and humility. To love and to nourish him at all times hence." The cleric sprinkled my brow with water.

"I promise to give my wife the honor and protection of my name. To be a father to her children and to not desert her unto my death."

What followed was a sumptuous feast that made my luxurious breakfast earlier that day look like a pauper's meal. There were thick steaks, vegetables I could not identify, artistically molded breads, and wine and spirits in abundance. I had difficulty putting away any food, and drank no wine. It felt as if a herd of horses was traveling around my stomach, and I could not stop myself from continuously glancing over at my new husband, who seemed unruffled by the whole event. He devoted his time to greeting the many well-wishers that came up to our table, occasionally putting his hand over mine possessively. I smiled at the courtiers but did not seem expected to give any of the formal greetings Depanne had drilled into me. I recognized many of the names of the nobles from my lesson, but not those of the generals and commanders who paraded by.

Finally the stream of nobles and military men abated, in time for the wedding cake to be cut and served. The tone of the room shifted, turning more raucous and celebratory and less ceremonious. The cake was three levels tall, and I was told by my attendant woman that it was apricot cinnamon, with vanilla buttercream frosting. I pretended to know what that meant, nodding, and was incredibly pleased at the taste when I received my slice. Four bites in, I noticed Kavan watching me enjoying my treat. His own cake sat untouched in front of him. He flashed me a dazzling and unexpected smile. Self-consciously I finished the last bit of frosting on my fork, unable to help myself, and primly pushed away the plate. I hoped desperately that I looked like a Lady and that Kavan was not thinking of me as slovenly.