She wondered in what other ways they might have common ground. She feared learning anything more about him. Anything that might make her like him any more than she was already beginning to.
“Where are we going?” she asked as she realized they were leaving the town behind. She could hear the sound of children playing. Laughing and screaming.
“You’ll see,” he said.
As they came over the snowy rise they came upon a frozen lake. The screaming and laughing children were playing on the ice.
Ice sliding.
“Come. You said you hadn’t done this since you were a child. Why should the children be the only ones to enjoy it?”
He took her hand and brought her to the edge of the lake.
“Oh no! I couldn’t,” she said, pulling against him.
“Yes. You can.”
He reached out and snared her about her waist, scooping her up into his arms as if she weighed no more than a flea. He walked out onto the ice, tottering once as his feet tried to slide out from under him.
“Keep still or we’ll both go down!” he said, laughing.
She immediately obeyed, going still in his arms until he had her out on smooth ice. The children were running and sliding, challenging each other to see who could slide the farthest. Sin dropped her feet and waited until she had them under herself before loosening his grip on her. She slipped, but he caught her. She squealed as she almost went down, nearly taking him with her.
“Perhaps this is too dangerous for you,” he said dubiously.
That just got her dander up.
“No! I’ll be fine. I just need a minute.”
She wobbled a bit, caught her balance, then gave him a triumphant smile when she took two very steady steps on the ice.
“Yes but can you run and build up speed?” he challenged her.
“Enough to beat you!” she cried.
Then she ran a few steps and, locking her ankles, she slid. About a foot. He laughed at the pathetic attempt. Determined now, she ran a few steps more and slid. Before long she was sliding three and four feet at a try.
Laughing and rosy cheeked, she challenged him to do any better. He obliged her by running and sliding a good ten feet.
“Hey! How’d you do that?” she asked with consternation.
“Raja Sin’s the best ice slider around!” a little boy said.
“So you do this often! That isn’t very fair.”
“I’m not the one who threw out a challenge. Are you ready to get beat?”
The children all shouted encouragement. One child drew a line in the frost of the ice.
“You can only run up to the line, then you slide as far as you can,” he said, wiping his running nose on the back of his mittened hand.
“Start here! Start here!” A little girl said, pointing to a spot on the ice.
“Don’t I get to practice first?” Ariana asked hesitantly.
“Scared?” he taunted.
“Not on your life! One test run. That’s all I ask.”
“Very well. One test run.”
She set herself at the start and waited until he shouted, “Go!” before running and hitting the line. She skidded a good distance, but it was nowhere near what she had already seen him do. Oh well. She was the one who had made the challenge after all. They reset together and when the little boy yelled “Go!” they both ran like mad and hit the line. But just as Sin hit his line she lobbed a fireball into his path. The sudden appearance of fire startled him and he lost his footing, crashing down onto the ice. Of course that meant she slid the furthest and she laughed and jumped in celebration until she too slipped and fell onto the ice.
“You cheated!” he cried, crawling over to her.
“Cheat! Cheat!” the kids cried in unison.
“No one said anything about no fire!” she declared as he reached her and, grabbing her foot he yanked her toward himself. Her momentum slid her completely under the cage of his body, so he was kneeling hands and knees over her, their noses level, their faces close.
“I would think that was a given,” he said dryly. “It is ice after all.”
“It isn’t as though I melted it out from under you,” she said, her hands going to his chest as he loomed over her. “That would have been mean.”
“Far be it from you to be mean,” he said, smiling down into her face.
Suddenly Ariana was aware of just how near he was. Just how intimidating it was to have so much raw muscle and power hovering over her. She was suddenly breathless and it had nothing to do with the cold or how hard she had been laughing. Sin seemed to notice the change that came over her almost instantly, and he shifted his weight to one hand so he could free up the other. He used it to brush back the tangle of curls that had escaped Mariah’s hard work of the morning, her pins half scattered on the ice.
“Please don’t,” she whispered.
“I can’t. I can’t help myself,” he said apologetically right before he lowered his mouth onto hers.
Just the same, he tested her gently, gave her full opportunity to buck him off of her and shove him away.
She did neither.
Sin’s mouth was firm and vital, everything that the man himself was. Dominant. Fierce. Male. His free hand tipped her chin up and gave him better connection between them. He kissed her soulfully deep. As usual he didn’t bother with slow introductions. He took her ferociously. His kiss was heated and intense and then, with the gentlest slip of his tongue, it was profound. He swept her tongue up with his, tasted her in every corner of her mouth. He groaned when she tentatively did the same to him.
Oh, she shouldn’t be doing this! she cried to herself. She should be pushing him off and away. She shouldn’t be letting him this close. This was dangerous. Oh so dangerous.
Apparently she liked danger. She liked him. The feel of him. The taste of him. Who he was and the things he did. Oh, not all the things he did. She disagreed with his tactics in many things. Not the least of which was those concerning herself. But there was so much about him that she understood now. Maybe she didn’t want to understand, but she did.
She withdrew. Pulled away from him an inch and he caught her gaze with his.
“Please. Don’t leave me,” he said softly. Imploringly.
It made her long to come back to him. Made her crave his mouth and the heat of his dominant, passionate nature.
But she couldn’t.
“Please let me up,” she begged him. She wished she could say she was growing cold on the ice, but with the incredible heat he was generating, there was no hope of that being the truth.
To her surprise, however, he obeyed her. He let her up, standing up and holding a hand out to her to help her. As she stood up she realized her cloak was wet. She had generated so much heat during the kiss that she had melted the ice a little.
“Come on…let’s slide a little more,” he invited her.
She hesitated, part of her thinking she should put an end to this now. That it had already gone too far. That her defenses were already too far gone. But given a choice between ice sliding with him and returning to her imprisoning little room, she decided she would remain with him a little while longer.
So they spent the afternoon on the ice. She found herself laughing as if she hadn’t a care in the world. As if she weren’t a prisoner in a strange land. By the time they headed back to the temple she was rosy with laughter and the cold.
They entered the hallway leading to her room, and a sudden pall fell over her.
Chapter Twelve
“Please,” she heard herself saying. “I don’t want to go back in there.”
He stopped and looked at her. He seemed to think on it a moment. “Would you like to go over some of the accounts with me? I was going to—“
“Yes!” she said brightly.
Sin had never seen anyone so eager for the dry task of tabulating numbers. He supposed he should have exercised more caution. He was trusting her now with the intimate financial
details of his government. Should she ever make it back to Saren, she could use it against him.
She was never going to make it back to Saren, he thought fiercely. She was going to stay with him. He would never let her go.
He showed her into his study and her eyes widened at the sheer volume of ledgers on the desk and tucked into the bookshelves behind him.
“You do all of this yourself? You don’t have accountants?”
“I do not trust anyone to do it right. And besides, it helps me to keep my finger on the economic pulse of my people.”
She couldn’t help but be impressed. Still…
“Wouldn’t your time be better spent elsewhere?”
“Perhaps, in the future, once my economy is stable and my people are being housed and fed properly, then I will trust the coffers and accounts to others. But right now I can’t afford mistakes and I can’t afford thievery. Every coin counts.”
“Are you that poor then?”
“No. Not poor. But balancing precariously between mine production and trade agreements. There is some little to save, but it will take many autumns to amass the wealth we had before the land sale once more.”
He sat her down in the chair behind the desk once he had taken her cloak from her. She could feel the warmth of the room after being out in the cold for so long. It was cozy and contenting. He put the cloak aside on a chair and pulled one of the ledgers in front of her. He leaned over her shoulder and opened the book.
“This is the imports accounting. Each businessman deals with his own accounts, but the crown has separate needs. For instance, the seed and supplies I was telling you about. The crown absorbed the cost of all of the startup equipment for the farmers. They will be responsible from here on out, but to get them started each farmer was allocated a portion of seed and there was a thresher bought for each ten parcels of land. They will share in the labor and the equipment. Each farmer will work at threshing the other farmers' fields when the grain is ripe and take turns in their time. They decide amongst themselves who will go first and who will go last. If there are any disputes, the marshals mediate. Each farmer then pays the crown a small portion of the proceeds or product of the crop. They can choose to sell the crop and give those proceeds in cash or they can pay with the crop itself and the crown will sell it or use it as necessary.”
“It is such a sound system,” she marveled. “We implement taxation. It’s the same idea, only it affects all citizens equally. Businessmen as well.”
“Well, importers pay a tariff. Miners pay a tithe to work the mines. Most of the mines are owned by the crown though.”
“That should make you very wealthy.
“Normally it would, but we just—“
“Bought the land. Yes, I see. And we have demanded a annual tithe on top of it.”
“I made the agreement. I wouldn’t have made the agreement if it weren’t possible.”
“I know you wouldn’t have.” She bit her bottom lip a moment. “So what are we doing here?”
“We are tallying the import tariffs. That’s this book. This one is for the mine production and this one is tracking the feed and grain supplies.” He pointed to each book as he spoke of them.
“So we are tallying the tariffs for…the month? The week?”
“I do it biweekly.”
“All right. Give me a quill and an abacus.”
“I do the figures in my head,” he said with a smile.
“Oh. Well, I can do that,” she said, not willing to admit he had advantage over her. “Although…I may need a bit of paper.”
“Of course.” He found a quill and inkpot. He put them in front of her along with some scratch paper to help her tally the numbers. Then he pulled up a chair close to her and opened one of the other ledgers.
They tallied figures together for the better part of an hour. It was by far the most peaceful hour Sin had known for quite some time. Having her there put him at ease. It felt good to not be overwhelmed with this desperation to have her. She was there. She was his and she was there, in his world. Granted, he had trouble concentrating because he kept looking up at her. He loved the way she bit her lip as she thought and added. Her hair was still mussed from their outdoor play and it kept falling in her face. She would occasionally blow at a curl that drifted down over her nose.
She was perfect.
After another half hour, which he spent watching her more than he did his numbers, she leaned back and stretched.
“I’m starving,” she said.
“Dinner should be ready soon,” he said, closing his ledger.
“Aren’t you worried that the ink will smear?”
He wasn’t. He hadn’t written a figure for the last fifteen minutes. As it was he was going to have to go over his own work later.
“It’s fine. Let’s go see about dinner.”
“Will we be eating in my room?” she asked quietly.
“Yes,” he said, knowing that she’d rather not. “But I tell you what…tomorrow night you’ll eat with my family.”
She brightened at that. “Really? I would like that.”
“You haven’t met my family. You might change your mind.”
“Well they can’t be any worse than you,” she said cheekily.
“You’d be surprised. Come, let’s eat.”
He guided her back to her room, noticing she took in every detail of where everything was as they passed. He wondered briefly if she was trying to remember her way as a matter of fact or if she was planning some type of escape route. He would have to make certain they were careful with how much time Mariah spent with her. She would not attempt to escape without Mariah.
The thought made him frown. The idea of her trying to escape him made him angry. Why couldn’t she just find it in herself to consider a life with him? Had he been someone else he would have been able to court her properly according to her own customs, but he wasn't someone else. He was the man she hated. He’d had no choice but to take her for himself. And maybe that was selfish, but damn it, he needed to be selfish for a change. He spent so much time looking out for everyone else. Whenever did he get to look out for himself?
He passed the guard at her door, noting that it was someone else now, Mordol having been relieved. He walked her into the room and she took in a deep breath. Dinner was waiting for them and it smelled delicious. He had worked up quite an appetite himself.
He seated her then began to serve her as he had each night they’d dined together. He was learning her likes and dislikes by watching what she did and did not eat when he put it on her plate. She didn’t care for purple vegetables…she liked potatoes. Once he had served himself he sat down and they ate heartily. She chatted about the ledger she had been working on, her agile mind having quickly grasped some of the finer nuances of the tariffs. But of course she would. She no doubt had similar taxations implemented in her government.
No. It was no longer her government, he told himself firmly. She would find her place here with him and that would be the end of it.
The thought did serve to darken his mood though. He began to toy with his food.
“Did you have a nice day today?” he asked suddenly.
She looked at him, stopping mid-sentence. He had no idea what she had been saying. His attention had drifted too far away.
“Why I—“ He saw her dilemma instantly. She had had a good time, but she didn’t want to admit it. She didn’t want to admit that she could find time with her brutish captor fun. But then she surprised him. “Yes. It was a lovely day. But…it doesn’t change things. I still don’t belong here.”
“You belong here,” he countered stubbornly. “There is a place for you here with me if you but open yourself to the idea.”
“My place is back in Saren, leading my people,” she said stubbornly.
“They can be led without you.”
“What do you know about it?” she demanded. “Do you have any idea the events you have set in motion by taking me? My country c
ould be on the brink of civil war right now for all we know!”
“Civil war?” He was surprised.
Ariana bit her tongue. She had not meant to give that detail away. If he thought the Sarens would be too busy fighting amongst themselves, then it solidified the idea that they wouldn’t go to war over her.
“It’s nothing,” she said, getting to her feet and moving away from the table. He followed her, catching her wrist in his hand and tugging her back around to face him.
“It’s not nothing. Tell me what you meant.”
She sighed, rubbing at a spot that ached on her forehead.
“As you know the Sarens are ruled by a triumvirate. Each triumvir holds power over their own army…men who come from the large amounts of land they have inherited. It won’t be long before I am declared gone for good and my heir will take command of my army. She will want to have her rightful seat in the triumvirate. Only it won’t be rightful because she is not suited to the job. She is vain and selfish…conniving and power hungry. She is my sister and I love her, but she is not suited to become triumvir.”
“Then why did you not name a different heir?”
“She is the only blood relative I have. With us the line dies out. Gretha is mother to no children as yet, although she is married. To a very powerful Heddah…who will also have control over lands and an army…albeit on a much smaller scale. Mason and Jutsin will want nothing to do with her. They would rather make the government bi-political than see her have power over the lives and welfare of their subjects. That means warring within our own borders. Brother against brother.” As she spoke she grew more anxious, twisting one hand within the other. “Don’t you see? I must go back,” she begged him. “My country needs me.”
“I need you,” he said stubbornly.
“You are but one man! I am speaking of thousands of lives!”
“If they know you are alive then your sister cannot inherit?”
“No. She cannot. But they don’t know I am alive. And even if they did, I need to rule my people and I cannot do that from here! How do you think I will get my armies to follow me if I am sitting here dining with the enemy they fought against for autumns? Gretha might swoop in regardless of my being alive and wrest control away and there would be nothing I could do about it from here!”