- The Queen of the Night
He rose. The wench turned without waiting, hips rolling under a skirt of faded indigo that clung damply to her thighs from the heat. The sweet, cloying smoke, thick as syrup now, curled around them as she led him away from the table, past scarred benches sticky with spilled rum and sweat, past the low mutter of voices that parted like water around a shark’s fin.
Up the pale stone stairs that were worn smooth and warm from countless bare feet, each step released a faint puff of dust and old spilled wine. The rail under his palm was slick with spilled drink and generations of greasy hands. Somewhere below, a monkey screeched and a glass shattered, the sound muffled by the rising heat.
She pushed open a heavy door of dark, salt-bleached wood. The hinges groaned like an old ship. Inside, the air was cooler, heavier, laced with crushed frangipani and the sharper bite of that strange, honeyed tobacco. A single oil lamp swung from a chain, painting slow gold circles across low cushions and a table barely big enough for two.
The wench smiled. “Someone will be with you soon.”
He watched her retreat out of the room and felt a wave of disappointment. Her company would have been most welcome.
He looked out of the window. They were on the other side of the building from the bay. The whole view was inland, showing only jungle sprawling across the rising slopes before giving way to red-brown rock at the highest point of the island. It was savage and beautiful and entirely fitting.
The sound of heels on stone made him turn back to the doorway. A new wench entered carrying a fresh bottle. Whatever disappointment he had felt at the prior girl’s exit vanished entirely.
She moved like she owned the floorboards and every inch of air above them. Skin a deep, sun-warmed bronze that caught the lamplight like oiled mahogany. Black curls, tight and wild, tumbled loose around her shoulders, framing a face that could start wars or end them. Green eyes, bright as new leaves after rain, locked on him with lazy, predatory amusement. A white linen blouse hung off one shoulder, barely clinging to the swell of her breasts, the black leather corset beneath laced just tight enough to make breathing feel optional. The neckline plunged low, framed by dark ribbon and careless confidence.
She set the bottle down with a soft clink and leaned one hip against the table and held up the bottle. "We thought you might prefer wine this time." She suggested, her voice a low murmur that barely disturbed the quiet air. She opened the new bottle, letting the rich, complex notes of cherry and blackberry waft from its neck and mingle with the last vestiges of the honeyed tobacco smoke. "The owner wishes you to enjoy your time here."
"I should thank him."
She smiled, a slow, predatory curve of her lips. "The owner will be most pleased to know that. What else would bring you pleasure now?"
Marco ran his eyes over her smooth, dark neck and the bare shoulder exposed by the falling linen, and back up to her eyes. His stomach was tight, a knot of tension and anticipation. The light from the single oil lamp made the sweat on his own brow feel clammy and cold.
"It would be my pleasure to share this bottle with you."
"It would be mine also."
"Marco."
"Tiana." She offered her hand across the small table, and he kissed it softly; her skin was warm on his lips. She dropped gracefully into the seat on the low cushion and poured out a generous cup of the deep red wine. The wine, as she poured it, left a dark, oily track down the side of the glass.
"We should get another cup."
"Or we can share." She raised the cup, her green eyes challenging him over the rim.
"I suppose that way I know you're not poisoning me."
"Unless I am immune to poison," she said, playfully.
"I'll suffer that risk. Are you from Nemedos, Tiana?"
"No. I'm from a small island far from here. You would not know it."
"Are all the women there as beautiful as you?"
"No."
Marco chuckled at her refusal to be coy.
"I am a rare creature," Tiana stated.
"Most certainly," Marco agreed.
"And you," Tiana said, turning the conversation back to him. "You are a noble son from one of the great maritime cities. Venturia? No. Livonia, perhaps?"
"Who says I am a noble?" Marco challenged.
She laughed, a low, throaty sound that warmed the cold stone room. "You do. With all that you do. Your voice. Your clothes. Your weapons. The way you wield them." Tiana glanced off to the corner, as if cataloging the evidence in the air itself. "Oh yes. And the fact you came into this bay with a Livonian warship."
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"You know a lot," Marco admitted.
"No," Tiana said. "I know what every soul on this island knows. Gossip travels faster than sails around here."
"Then it seems I am at a disadvantage," Marco conceded.
Tiana took a sip of the wine, her green eyes never leaving his, and then handed the cup to him. "But I think you like that. I think you like the thrill of being out of your depth and seeing if you can cope."
"Or I simply make very poor decisions," Marco said, before taking a deep, savoring sip of the rich wine.
Tiana took the cup back and raised it in a toast. "To poor decisions and may you continue to make them." Her lips touched the glass at the exact spot his had, and she handed it straight back. "So tell me, noble son. What poor decisions led you to Nemedos?"
So he told her. He told her about the arranged marriage. He told her about Fernanda and their three awful days. And she laughed at his telling. Laughed like a babbling waterfall. Laughed with her whole face, pulling that sensuous mouth wide.
He told her how he took over the ship and steered a course east and concluded with a smile. "In the end I knew that I would choose death over misery and with that came my liberation. Now I learn how to live free."
Tiana grinned and held the cup to her mouth before placing it back down before him. "It is a good story," she declared.
"What do you mean by story? It is all true, I assure you."
She put her hand on top of his, the touch a spark of excitement. "I am not saying it is a made up tale. But it is not quite the truth either." Her fingertips traced the back of his hand like she was trying to read his palm upside down.
"And what part fails to convince you?" Marco asked, the wine forgotten as the true negotiation began.
"You say this is a story about freedom. But you could have sailed anywhere. You could have sailed to one of the river realms' ports and sold the ship. It would have been enough money to start a new life." Tiana teased, leaning forward across the low table, the air between them growing heavy. "You could have sailed all the way to the frozen north where no one had even ever heard of your family."
Her fingers entwined with his, the warm pressure of her grip tightening. "You could have gone anywhere but instead you came here, you pointed your ship right towards danger and sailed straight to it."
"What does that mean then?" Marco asked, his pulse a heavy, rapid beat against his ribs.
"You're not looking for freedom. You're looking for a life that is wilder, darker, more exciting. One that makes you know what being alive feels like."
Her words went right through him, striking a nerve he had kept hidden, even from himself. The soft wool of the low cushions beneath him felt suddenly inadequate and thin.
"That would be a strange story, would it not?" Marco mused, his voice low, a near-whisper.
Her free hand slid down to his thigh, the smooth leather of her jerkin brushing against his trouser leg. "Stranger and far better. Any fool can long for freedom. But few men sail into the heart of a storm to get it." Her finger brushed up his inner thigh and into his lap, the touch immediate and scorching. "That's exactly the kind of man I like."
"And you are just the kind of woman…"
His words failed him. The hand was no longer trading in subtlety; her fingers had slipped inside his trousers and wrapped around his rigid shaft with lazy certainty. He could not remember it ever being so hard.
"Come."
With that same hand still curled possessively around him, Tiana led him out of the little table room and into the next. The air was cooler here, thick with old rum casks and sun-baked cedar. A single oil lamp swung from a roof beam, painting slow gold across a low, wide bed draped in faded indigo sheets.
She pinned him against the rough plaster wall and they drank from each other’s mouths the way they had shared the wine: deep, greedy, no space for air. His jerkin came off in one impatient yank; her corset followed with a soft hiss of unlaced leather. Buttons scattered like hail across the floorboards.
They found each other again with raw hunger, teeth grazing necks, cheeks, the newly bared slopes of shoulders as shirts and blouses were dragged down and away. Her skin was fever-warm, tasting of salt and frangipani; his own pulse hammered so hard he felt it in his teeth.
His back hit the bed first. She pushed his tunic up over his face, mouth hot on his chest, his throat, his mouth again as the cloth worked free. Her white blouse and loosened corset slid down to her waist in one motion; her breasts spilled free, full and perfect, and then they were in his hands, in his mouth, all in one feverish rush.
She shoved him flat again, knees forcing his thighs apart. His remaining clothes vanished in one rough tug. Cool air kissed overheated skin for only a heartbeat before her slick, oiled fingers found him: stroking down him, then lower, pressing inside with deliberate patience.
Marco’s eyes flew wide.
"What are you—"
"Embrace it," she ordered, voice velvet and iron.
To his own astonishment he did. Pleasure flared sharp and bright, rolling through him like thunder over the bay. A low, broken sound escaped his throat.
"By the gods…"
"This is what you wanted, isn’t it?" Her hand left him aching and empty. She rose above him, green eyes glittering in the lamplight. "Something wilder, darker…"
She pushed the bunched fabric at her waist down over her hips and let it fall. Where her skirt had been there was a harness edged with runes with a leather attachment drooping between her legs.
"…more exciting."
As she said the words the runes flashed. The black leather grew and straightened, swelling and extending.
He gulped.
"Will you sail into the storm for me, my Marco?"
She gripped hold of herself and gave a teasing smile.
“Or are you just a spoiled Duke’s son playing at danger?”
Marco drew in his breath and met her eyes. “I sail into the storm.”
She beamed, victorious, and leaned forward to kiss him on the lips.
“I knew you were the right one.”
Her body flexed and his tensed in response.
The storm was now within him.