Total pages in book: 138
Estimated words: 137958 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 690(@200wpm)___ 552(@250wpm)___ 460(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 137958 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 690(@200wpm)___ 552(@250wpm)___ 460(@300wpm)
A heavy crimson silk that went to his ankles at the back and cinched at his neck with a wide, gold clasp studded in the center with a large Firenz ruby.
The back of the mantle was embroidered with fire out of which rose the coiled Firenz black asp, its head raised, green eyes alert, mouth open, forked tongue snaking, fangs bared to strike.
The same snake was forged in gold with eyes of emeralds and these were affixed to his leather arm shields that were buckled to his forearms.
All in all, vastly different than the ceremonial royal finery of golden chest shields, thick leather blades tipped in gold and rubies dripping from his kilt, and helmets with plumes of vermillion feathers his father wore.
And a damned sight less heavy.
“We’re to be away soon and I’ve been told the others are gathering in the vestibule,” Mars noted quietly. “Did you come for an escort down the stairs?”
Elpis lifted her gaze to his.
“I hear the cheers of the crowd all the way to here,” she replied. “The acrobats and fire eaters are already entertaining. Our people have something to watch so we have a moment before the procession. I’d like to take it.”
He needed to take a moment for Silence before they left as well.
But he’d give his mother this as he would give her most anything she asked.
“Then do,” he invited.
She turned, and from the folds of her skirt, took a long, thin box he hadn’t noticed she carried when she arrived.
It was ebony, and as he moved with her to his bed, where she laid it, he saw on the top it was crusted with large, exquisitely-cut rubies and crescents of onyx.
It was seeing that, his gaze went to her face.
But he had her left profile. He could not see her wedding chain.
He heard the clasp release, looked back to the box she had opened, and felt his chest grow tight.
In a bed of black satin, two long, thin chains rested.
The top one: simple, minute, but brilliant gold links. Though there was a hoop studded in flawless rubies at the place where the chain hit the lobe of the ear.
The bottom, the same links, but at the lobe hoop of rubies fell three strings of gold links on which diminutive jewels dangled: one string with onyx, one of ruby, one of ice diamonds. The same size and type of jewels hung from the line that fed from lobe to nostril.
His mother’s wedding chain.
And his father’s.
“Mama,” he whispered.
“It is time,” she said to the box, then turned her brown eyes to him, and that was when he noticed she wore a new chain of only rubies with some emeralds, no longer diamonds and onyx. “And I’ve instructed the servants to move me out of my rooms tomorrow. I’ll take others, in the east hall, not close to you and your bride. And I will remain in them for the time it will take to ready the relict house for me.”
It was time. They both knew it.
In fact, Mars should have assumed her rooms on his coronation.
But he didn’t have the heart for they were the rooms she shared with his father.
Mars didn’t protest her offer.
He simply nodded.
“The day after tomorrow, so if she’s in any discomfort, she won’t feel it at the betrothal dinner tomorrow eve, I’ll gather the women and we’ll perform her piercing ceremony,” she declared. “It won’t be a lot of time to make sure the piercings are clean and no poison gets in them. But this is all going very quickly, and she wasn’t pierced at thirteen to await her marital chain. We’ll just have to hope for the best.”
“It is good I have you to think of the things I have not,” he murmured.
His mother searched his face before she whispered, “Does she speak to your heart?”
“You withhold from her,” he noted instead of answering. “And not simply because she is often with Farah and Sofia.”
He watched the flash of grief mixed with anger brighten her eyes at the mention of those two women before she repeated, “Does she speak to your heart, my son?”
“She has a soul of silver,” he answered.
“Silver is bendable,” she replied.
“Silver is luminous and precious,” he returned. “And Father taught me bendable is not to be avoided. It’s breaking that is.”
His mother nodded.
She knew Ares had taught this lesson.
And lived it.
Mars carried on, “Though it is her wit I look forward to discovering.”
Her wit and her breasts and that pink mouth and watching her abundant curves on her wee body as she rode his cock.
He did not share this last with his mother, however.
“I’ve not noticed much wit. She’s very quiet,” his mother remarked.
“She does not speak unless she has something to say.”
Her head tipped to the side. “She told you this?”
He smiled at her. “Moments after we met. When I was demanding she say something.”