Knights and Kink Romance Boxed Set (88 page)

Syr Phillip laughs. “Actually, some might say you’d
be crazy to say yes.”

“Why?”

“Well, being Crown Princess, and then, Queen of the
Middle Kingdom—the largest kingdom in the SCA in terms of both
geography and SCA member population—is a huge responsibility, and
requires a huge time and financial commitment as well. Don’t say
yes to me just yet, okay? For your own good, Lisa.”

I sigh and stare at the Formica tabletop. “All
right. So what exactly
is
required of a King and Queen in
the SCA?”

“Quite a lot, I’m afraid. But first let me explain
how one gets to become a King and Queen. That alone is a bit
complicated.”

“Okay, so explain,” I say, growing impatient. A
skinny waitress shows up with our beers. Syr Phillip drinks his in
almost one gulp and asks for another. I think about gulping mine
down too, but decide I probably need to be sober for this little
talk.

Syr Phillip settles back into his chair and takes a
deep breath. “Lisa, as a Knight of the Midrealm I’m automatically
entitled to an invitation to Crown Tournament every six months. But
despite that qualification, I’ve only fought in one Crown
Tournament during the whole six years of my knighthood. The one I
did fight in was five years ago, when I was still a relatively
inexperienced fighter, even as far as knights go. I lost in the
second round then. But I’ve improved over the years, and I probably
could have won a couple Crown Tournaments by now if I’d chosen to
enter the Lists. But I didn’t.”

“Why not?”

“A lot of reasons,” Syr Phillip says, fiddling with
his napkin. “For one thing, being King of a kingdom as large as the
Midrealm is very expensive, what with all the travel involved, and
the garb you’re expected to wear, and the gifts you have to procure
for people who assist you in your duties—“

“What kind of travel is involved, exactly?”

“Well, for a full year of your life, first as Crown
Prince and Princess and then as King and Queen, you will spend
literally every weekend going to SCA events all over the kingdom.
And I mean
every
weekend. The royal couples must visit every
barony at least once during their reigns. And that’s quite a lot,
considering the Middle Kingdom is made up of six U.S. states and a
fairly decent-sized chunk of Canada.”

“Uh huh,” I say, nursing my beer. “So a lot of road
trips, then. Sounds like fun.”

“Well, I’m sure that some of it
would
be
fun,” Syr Phillip agrees, running his finger along the top of his
empty beer glass in a manner that I find insanely erotic. “But I’m
afraid that most of it would be grueling. Lots of long drives, lots
of cheap motel stays or sleeping on the floors of strangers. And
lots of days off work, too—some of the longer road trips can take a
couple of days, each way. How many vacation days do you get a year,
by the way?”

“Um, I only get two weeks off a year,” I say,
staring at the floor. “But my boss is a jerk who usually doesn’t
let us take it more than two or three days at a time.”

Syr Phillip sucks in his breath. “Well, that would
be a pretty big problem in and of itself. Never mind—we’ll worry
about that later. Let’s get back to why I didn’t fight in the Crown
Tourney lists for so long.”

“Okay.”

Syr Phillip takes hold of my right hand again; his
is cold and wet from holding his beer glass, and the sensation of
his cool, wet palm against my nervous, warm one is enough to
accelerate both my breathing and my heartbeat.

“Are you all right, Lisa?” Syr Phillip asks,
concerned. “You look a little flushed.”

I shift in my seat, hoping to tame the wild urges
arising from my lower body. “Oh, I’m fine, really,” I lie. “Go on,
please.”

“Right. Well, one of the big reasons I didn’t fight
in the Crown lists for so long was because I didn’t have a favored
lady who was up for the responsibility of being Queen, which is
another requirement of registering for the Crown Lists. I dated a
lot of women over the years, but only one steadily enough to carry
her favor—and that was Lady Rowan of the Fenix Barony. But she was
a medical student, and just wasn’t up to all the travel,
responsibility and expense that would come along if I were to win
Crown. She finally left the SCA altogether not too long ago, so
that was pretty much it for our relationship, too.”

“Did you carry Lady Rowan’s favor the one time you
did fight in Crown Tournament?” I ask, almost afraid to hear the
answer.

Syr Phillip makes an odd face, strangely similar to
the one Baroness Barlonda made back at my apartment. “Actually, I
carried Duchess Danyel’s favor that time, believe it or not.”

Duchess Danyel?
He wanted to be King with
Duchess Danyel? That old, gray-headed bag of a woman?

“I see,” I mutter, and pull my hand away. I suppose
my suspicions about Syr Phillip and the bawdy old duchess aren’t
that ridiculous after all.

Syr Phillip races to grasp my hand again, and
strokes the inside of my palm with a nervous index finger. “It’s
not what you’re thinking, Lisa. Duchess Danyel and I are old
friends, and nothing more. And it’s not uncommon in the SCA for
knights and fighters to carry the favors of those they aren’t
romantically involved with. It’s purely a symbolic gesture in many
ways. Besides, the only reason I carried Danyel’s favor that year
was because I was dead-set on fighting in the Crown lists, and
Danyel was the only woman I knew willing to risk the responsibility
of becoming Queen. She’d already been Queen three times in two
different kingdoms by then, and considered the possibility of
another reign pretty old-hat.”

“Uh huh,” I sigh, not sure whether to believe him or
not. “But it would seem to me based on all the women who
practically threw themselves at you on Saturday that you’d never
have a problem finding someone to fight for at Crown
Tournament.”

Syr Phillip laughs. “Well, maybe
now
I
wouldn’t have a problem. But the main reason for that is, now I can
actually
afford
to be King.”

“What do you mean?”

“Lisa, in addition to all the time that being Middle
Kingdom royalty takes, it also takes money. Lots of it. As you
might have guessed by now, just being a lay member of the SCA can
be a pretty expensive hobby, what with the garb and the armor and
the event fees and all that, but being King and Queen of a kingdom
as large and as populous as the Midrealm is an extremely expensive
undertaking.”

“How expensive?” I ask, taking a big gulp of my
beer.

“Thirty or forty thousand dollars for the reign
year, give or take.”

I spit out a mouthful of beer onto Syr Phillip’s
face, covering his forehead with foam.
“What?
You’re
kidding!”

Syr Phillip quietly mops up his forehead with a
napkin without comment. “No, I’m not. In fact, the Middle Kingdom
Earl Marshal instituted a policy a few years back that created a
new requirement for fighting in Crown Tournament. Time was that you
could automatically qualify for a spot on the Lists if you were a
knight, and a limited number of highly skilled unbelted fighters
usually got invited as well. It was based solely on fighting skill,
and nothing else. But in the past eight to ten years or so, the
cost of being King and Queen got so expensive that it was actually
causing some couples who did it to go bankrupt, to lose their
houses, and worse. A few marriages even got broken up over the high
cost of being Middle Kingdom royalty. So now, in addition to being
one of the best fighters in the kingdom, the other main requirement
for entering the Crown lists is being able to document that you,
and/or your favored lady, have thirty to forty thousand dollars in
disposable income available to support your reign year.”

My jaw drops with a
click
. “Uhhh, I don’t
have that kind of money.”

Syr Phillip smiles. “Well,
I
do. I’ve had a
couple of very good sales years with Pfizer. And as you probably
saw at the Blood and Roses Tournament, my desirability as a
possible King Consort therefore has gone up quite a bit with
all
the SCA ladies. It’s a purely financial thing.”

Somehow, I doubt that. It seems to me Syr Phillip,
with his oozing charm and hammered physique, would be pretty
desirable to all the SCA ladies even if he were flat broke. But I
don’t say this. I just give him a smile and nurse my beer.

The waitress shows up with our pizza, and Syr
Phillip digs right in. “So, what do you think?” he asks through a
mouthful of sausage and cheese.

“About what?”

Syr Phillip chews and swallows. “About being Queen.
So have I completely scared you off the very thought of doing it by
now?”

I don’t know what to say, so I just shrug my
shoulders and grab a slice of pizza.

“There’s still a lot more I haven’t told you, you
know.” Syr Phillip licks sauce and grease from his fingers. “This
is excellent pizza, by the way.”

“Best in Dayton for ten years running, according to
the
Dayton Daily News
,” I say flippantly, hoping to break
the sexual tension that keeps rising and falling between us.

“I can see why.” Syr Phillip’s expression changes
from relaxed to serious. “Lisa, in addition to the huge time
commitment, and the travel, and the expense of being Crown Princess
and then Queen, there’s also the neverending paperwork. Lots and
lots of paperwork, lots of late-night conference calls with the
royalty and mundane leadership of other kingdoms, lots of e-mail
and letter reading and writing. Then there’s the researching of
awards to hand out around the kingdom during Royal Court. And of
course, there’s Pennsic.”

“Yeah, I’ve been hearing a little bit about
Pennsic.”

“Well, Lisa, if you decide to be my favored lady at
Crown Tournament, I’m afraid you’ll be hearing a lot more about
Pennsic. More than you ever thought you wanted or needed to know,
in fact.”

I gulp the dregs of my beer and grab another slice
of Marion’s famous wafer-thin pizza. “So what is Pennsic, exactly?
Pegeen told me it’s some kind of a war, but I don’t know whether I
believe her.”

“Well, she’s exactly right, it
is
a war. A
war between the Middle Kingdom and the Eastern Kingdom. It’s been
going on every summer for over thirty years, ever since some crazy
old-time SCA guy named Syr Cariadoc of the Bow, who was King of the
Midrealm way back in the early seventies, decided it would be cute
to declare war on himself at a camping event. And he lost.”

I drop my pizza slice on the tabletop. “Huh?”

“He declared war on himself, and lost. Get it?” Syr
Phillip chuckles and grabs another slice.

“No, I don’t get it at all, sorry.”

“That’s all right. Most people in the SCA don’t get
it, either. And that’s kind of the whole point.” Syr Phillip gulps
the last of his second beer, and I notice the alcohol is starting
to do its work on him as his jawline relaxes and his hard, angular
shoulders start to ease a bit.

“So, is there more to this Pennsic story?” I
ask.

“Well, the whole story on how Pennsic came about is
pretty complicated, and it’s probably not all that relevant to
whether you’d want to be Queen or not. What
is
relevant is
what Pennsic has become in the thirty-odd years since Syr Cariadoc
started the whole mess by declaring war on himself. Whatever might
have started it, The Pennsic War is the flagship event of the
international Society for Creative Anachronism. Over ten thousand
people show up for it every year, and the royalty of every kingdom
in the SCA Known World—and we’re talking from all over the United
States and Canada and several other overseas countries, mind
you—all show up and hold Known World Court. It’s quite a spectacle,
and if you and I were Crown Prince and Princess at the War, as
heir-apparents to one of the warring kingdoms we’d be one of the
most visible royal couples there. Imagine it, Lisa. You and I would
walk together down the center aisle at War Court, and every single
person at Pennsic would watch every move we made.”

My eyes start to glaze over at the thought of Syr
Phillip and me becoming royalty in the midst of such a huge event,
with ten thousand-plus pairs of eyes looking just at us as we walk
arm and arm into War Court, the flashiest, most elaborate garb
Baroness Barlonda can sew adorning our bodies. The very idea is
wondrous, exciting, powerful, even sexy—

Not to mention really fucking scary.

I flag down the waitress and order another beer.

Syr Phillip—or just plain old Phil Dawson—stares at
me expectantly as he wipes grease from his fingers with his napkin.
“Well, Lisa? Are you up to being Queen of the Middle Kingdom?”

I don’t think it’s a good idea to answer right away.
I need some more time to think. “When do you need to know?”

“As soon as possible.”

Well, that doesn’t give me much time. “How about
tomorrow? Can I sleep on it?”

Plain old Phil Dawson grabs another slice of pizza.
“Sure. As long as you tell me for sure in the morning. And maybe I
can arrange to be there in the morning when you decide, if that
would be all right with you.”

A slow smile spreads across my face. “Is that a
proposition, Phil Dawson?”

“It is whatever you, the lady, wishes it to be.” Syr
Phillip’s rich baritone and knightly charm swiftly replaces the
muted demeanor of plain-old-pharmaceutical-salesman Phil Dawson as
he takes my greasy, tomato-sauce stained hand and kisses it.

“I have an idea of what I’d wish for it to be,” I
reply, breathless.

“Then you shall have to educate me of your wishes,
milady.”

“I think I can do that back at my place,” I
purr.

****

Syr Phillip and I head back over to my apartment
with a doggy bag of leftover pizza in tow. My body is so abuzz with
arousal and anticipation, it’s all I can do just to get my keys out
of my purse. I try to unlock the door, but my hands are shaking so
much I can’t get the key into the lock.