Dark Enchantment
Authors: Janine Ashbless
Contents
About the Book
In the follow-up to her peerless first collection,
Cruel Enchantment
, Janine Ashbless brings you more breathtaking tales of lust and magic, dark fantasy and even darker desire. An unearthly stranger who pursues a newlywed on her Mediterranean holiday, an opera production where emotions run out of control, and a ghost who wants one thing only from the descendant of her murderer are just three of the seductive and stylishly written stories that will tease, tempt and transport you to fantastic realms where dreams – and nightmares – can come true.
About the Author
Janine Ashbless is a well-established writer of fantasy, horror and erotic fiction.
She is the author of
Burning Bright
,
Cruel Enchantment
,
Dark Enchantment
,
Divine Torment
,
Wildwood
and
Enchanted
, all available from Black Lace.
Also by Janine Ashbless
Burning Bright
Cruel Enchantment
Divine Torment
Enchanted (novella collection)
Magic and Desire (novella collection)
Wildwood
For Annie
who asked for a story
Dishonour
MY NAME IS
Raihn and I am third concubine to Lord General Mershen. I was born in Halghat of the White Cliffs, in the east of the Eternal Empire, the sixth child of a prosperous perfume merchant. When I was eighteen my parents offered me as a gift to the Glorious General upon the occasion of him passing through the city, in the last throes of the civil war. My lord was most graciously pleased to accept me. This is a story about Lord Mershen. I want you to hear it.
When news was brought that armed riders were approaching swiftly up the mountain road and that they did not bear the Imerho family banner, Surya ordered the servants to leave the house. Most obeyed, heading into the cedar forest; those that were left – and the slaves who had no right to flee – she told to hide in the cellars and the grain tubs in the kitchen. Above all they were not to attempt any kind of armed resistance: the House of Dark Needles had never been built to be defensible, and there were no soldiers among the men General Imerho had left with his only daughter. This was the oldest and the least accessible of the family’s holdings, their last refuge. It would not, she knew, remain so for long under any attack.
Having made the one decision left up to her – flee or surrender – Surya paced the polished wooden floors, sick with fear, clutching her bow. It had a short span but was deeply recurved when strung, and it was the only thing that gave her comfort. A quiver of bronze-tipped arrows hung at her hip.
If
a soldier must surrender
, her father had said long ago,
then he should show that the choice was his. There is no respect for the helpless
.
Like all men of his class Imerho was full of military advice and Surya had grown up in awe of him. She would have liked to have had the poise of her mother, who’d accompanied her warlord husband to the very edge of the battlefield where she would live or die as he did, but Surya was too young and too untried for such stoic courage. She knelt briefly before the family shrine and thrust incense sticks into the basins of sand, but the gilded statues of the gods grinned at her with more than normal vacuousness it seemed, and mocked her trembling prayers:
Let it be good news. Let it be peace. Let it be mercy
.
It was to be none of those things. She knew that when she heard hooves on the hard earth outside, heard a man yelling commands to keep the rear covered, and the order: ‘With me! Quickly!’
She ran to the window and looked down upon a dozen horses and men milling about before the house – men with the long hair of soldiers, and the uniform of the Imperial Army but the cloaks of a noble’s household. The hot breath of the horses mingled with the mountain mist, and dew hung in the plumes of the helmets. A burgundy pennant bearing a white egret ensign swayed in a soldier’s grasp. She knew that livery, and for a moment her heart crashed against her breastbone. She could see no faces because of their bronze helmets, but heads were tilted watchfully towards the tall façade of the house.
Burgundy cloaks, the white egret. It was Lord Mershen’s colours. She tasted the brief elusive sweetness of hope, remembering mornings in the Imperial Palace at Antoth even as she retreated from the window and the searching gaze of the men. Then doors slammed open below, echoes bouncing down the
wooden
corridors of the ancient building, and boots drummed on the boards. They hadn’t removed their shoes. Such flagrant disrespect for the house would have told, if nothing else did, of their intentions.
But
, a part of her protested,
he was … He smiled …
Recollections of winter mornings half an Empire away tangled her fingers as she bent and strung her bow. Mornings had been reserved on the Palace Field for the young women of the Imperial Court to practise the arts considered proper to their age and gender and class: horsemanship and archery. Not that they were ever expected to use those skills in battle, but for the Irolian people the raising of warriors was a matter of pride.
Lions are not born of ewes
, as her father had said. So Surya had, along with the dozens of other unmarried noble-women resident in the palace, clattered out dutifully on horseback each morning to ride at full gallop up and down the lists, turning their small horses with a twitch of the reins, shooting at targets both before and behind them from the saddle. It was a minor form of entertainment for the noblemen of the court too, assessing the marriageable women for skill and grace and looks.
Lord Mershen had been a regular spectator. He’d always had some sort of reason to be there, she noticed: a meeting with other members of the Imperial Council, a game of tiles, a healthful stroll across the palace grounds. Always some excuse to be there, watching. At first she hadn’t even differentiated him from the other noblemen until, leaning on the balustrade one morning, he’d caught her eye and told her, ‘I should have you in my archery corps.’ His eyes had crinkled warmly when he smiled. She’d blushed. After that she’d been aware of him every time; it had rattled her somewhat, and made her practise with more determination.
Protocol, of course, meant that she couldn’t talk to him
without
her father’s permission but only smile and look coyly pleased. She’d hoped that Mershen himself would make the proper enquiries to her father, but these hopes were dashed along with so many others as political strife had split the Imperial Council. She made do with gossip: that he was unmarried, and regarded as a competent soldier but stubbornly apolitical. An honourable man, they said in public – which meant that he lacked ambition and behind the scenes he had few allies.
Then the civil war had washed over them all, sweeping so many noble houses away, and alliances and favours and ambition had been tested to breaking point. And honour, it turned out, still had hard value. Now he was here, and of all men, all the Emperor’s loyal men, that it should be him – Surya didn’t know what to think. Perhaps he would help her. Perhaps.
But deep down she knew that if he were truly an honourable man he would not permit himself that.
Surya had a half-formed intention of waiting for them in her father’s audience hall, where she felt some dignified and defiant attitude might be struck. But her nerve failed her when she set foot in the corridor; it was patently too long and exposed for her to retreat all the way down, so in a flurry of panic she slipped into the family sitting room opposite the shrine and pulled the door shut. This was the room where her mother liked to lie on a day couch and watch the ever-changing clouds as they broke and formed and flowed upon the mountains. A screen door in the far wall gave access onto the balcony and Surya wondered if it was possible to slip out that way, to drop into the garden and scale the wall in her embroidered robes and flee into the forest.
It wasn’t. The door slammed open and a man’s voice shouted, ‘Here! Sir!’
Surya whirled, nocked and drew in one motion, determined that she would go down proudly, as her father would wish it. But her best intentions vanished as a man in full armour pushed into the room and she backed up several steps, only halting when her thighs connected hard with a rosewood cabinet.
‘Lady Surya.’
The bleached tunic was stained with mud – and with a reddish filth that was not mud – but there was gilding on his breastplate and helm. He was followed by a squad of soldiers even more dirtied than he, brandishing long-bladed spears. Their bronze kilts rattled with every step as they fanned out.
‘Lord Mershen!’ she gasped.
The one in the ornate helmet held up his hand and turned his head briefly. ‘Hold.’ His voice was as she remembered it, but hoarse from bellowing on the battlefield. As his men halted he pulled his helmet off to give her a long, even stare. There was no warmth in his face on this occasion. He looked grey and sweaty and two grim furrows were etched down to the corners of his mouth. ‘Put the bow down, Surya, and we will talk.’
Nodding, she lowered her bow and slacked the tension. It was a relief to be told what to do, even by him.
‘Wait for me outside,’ Mershen ordered his men. Surya, feeling light-headed, watched as the soldiers withdrew. Walking back to the door, he kicked it shut then dumped his helmet on a cupboard top.
‘The war’s over then,’ she said, wondering how she could sound the words when there was no breath in her lungs.
He nodded.
‘My father?’
‘He’s dead.’ There was neither regret nor triumph in his voice.
No need to ask about her mother then, she knew: Lady Imerho would have opened her wrists when her husband’s standard fell. ‘My brothers?’
‘All died on the field. None were captured.’
‘Oh.’ She knew she should be proud of them but she felt only dizzy. It wasn’t real. None of this could be real. ‘All of –’
‘You are the last of Imerho’s line.’ He was a tall man and the armour looked like it belonged on him: far more so than the courtly robes she’d last seen him in, almost a year ago.
‘May his star look down upon us,’ she whispered.
Very pointedly, he did not echo her words. ‘Lady Surya …’
For a moment the room seemed to swim. ‘I am a poor hostess,’ she said, her dry voice cracking a little. ‘Would you care for a drink?’
Softly, he shook his head. ‘No.’
‘My father’s estates produce the finest plum brandy in the Eternal Empire.’