Page 16 of Settle Down, Princess

Though the sins I’d accumulated since I’d last seen her were far worse than all of my past misdeeds combined.

I looked around me at the sleeping bodies of the men I’d… disported myself with for most of the night. I blinked and saw that it was nearly morning. The thin grey light of early dawn was already in the sky. Then my mother drew my attention back to her when she gestured for me to follow her.

“Come with me, now—” Her voice was the sharp tone she’d perfected over time, that told me I’d done something wrong without announcing it to everyone around us.

“No, Mother.”

I tried to move, to find something on the bed to cover my nakedness, because even if I hadn’t felt any shame last night, I did now. To no avail, Creed’s arm tightened around me again like iron, keeping me pinned. I’d admired his muscular size before, but now it had become a liability. As I grunted and wrestled my way free, Mother looked about her, then twitched a man’s shirt from the floor and handed it to me once my feet hit the floor. I tugged it on over my head before turning to her to lay out my case.

“I won’t return to the castle,” I said. “You know this marriage is a death sentence, and I, for one, refuse to die for a short-lived alliance.”

“I do know it.” I looked at her closely. Her flashing eyes and the way she held her head high told me that she was there not simply as my mother but as the woman who was queen. She was dressed in the kind of drab, everyday clothes a maid might wear, but even with none of her regalia, there was something majestic about her. Her voice was steady as she continued, “And I refuse to allow my daughter to die at that monster’s hands. There are things you don’t know, knowledge I must impart, but I cannot do it here.”

“I won’t go to the castle,” I said, my jaw locking tight.

“Then come with me to the Temple of the Women.”

There were few spaces dedicated entirely to women in Stormare. We were allowed the women’s quarters, where no man was permitted to enter, but that was mostly to alleviate men’s fears that we’d all turn into ravening slatterns the moment their backs were turned. But the Temple of the Women? Men muttered all the time about shutting it down due to the inappropriateness of such worship, citing the goddess cults of the kingdoms in the far south, but it never went anywhere.

I had entered it when I had my first moon time and then every month since, following my mother and grandmother through the rituals, but right now I couldn’t see how marking the seasons of my body could possibly help me avoid the fate that awaited me in Khean. However, the temple was near the docks. If I went with Mother now, I could make my escape afterwards. That decided, I made my mother wait as I swapped the shirt for my underdress, shoved the bags of gold into my pocket, then tossed my hair over my shoulder as we went to the door.

I stepped through but hovered on the doorstep for just a moment, looking back at each man in turn. We’d had an unbelievable night. I felt the ache of muscles well-used, reminding me of exactly what we’d got up to, but I refused to feel bad. I would be walking in the world with my eyes open now, realising that every married man or woman experienced this kind of bliss every night. And I had joined their number. Arik, face down in his pillow, snorted as we went to close the door, his head popping up, but when we slipped out, he buried it back into the soft surface and started snoring anew.

“So, what do you have to tell me?” I asked as we walked up the steps to the temple. My grandmother stood at the top of them, staring down at us. “I already have a plan. I sold the pearls from my dress and my jewels. I’m going to buy passage on a riverboat and sail down the Tellene until I reach the women-ruled realms.”

“Before or after you’re raped repeatedly by the crew?” Mother stopped, then turned and frowned at me. “Because that’s what men do to unaccompanied women they have no connection to. It’s the perfect crime. You have no father, no brother, no uncle to protect you, so who is to stop them?”

“I’ll have money,” I said, but my retort came out thin and weak.

“Money they’ll have snatched from you the moment they get out of dock,” she said, shaking her head sharply.

“So, you’ve come.” My grandmother stood tall, her walking stick held nonchalantly in one hand. “And now you’ll find out the truth.”

“About men and women and what they do together?” I asked. “I worked that out for myself, thank you very much.”

“Sex? Pfft…” My eyes went wide as my grandmother snorted rudely. “Though, it plays a role in what we have to tell you.”

“What then?” I stopped where I was, waving away my mother’s attempts to usher me into the temple. “That men are beautiful, and they can do wondrous things with their hands and tongues?”

“Found yourself some likely lads who put your pleasure first, did you?” My grandmother’s smile was slow and sharp-toothed. “Well, good for you, girl. If you’ve developed a taste for sex, then all the better for this plan.”

“What plan? What mysterious truths do you have to reveal?” I asked in exasperation. They were being just as opaque as they usually were, if not more so. I was a woman grown, and I deserved—

“Your father is not your father.”

My grandmother said the words so simply, yet the air was driven from my lungs. No, I’d forgotten how to breathe. My chest burned, and it took a sharp thump of my fist to get it opening again.

“What? I’m… I’m… a bastard?” I squeaked out.

“You and most of the ‘noble born’ children on the continent.” Both Mother and Grandmother stared at me steadily, as if daring me to challenge them. “So, are you ready to listen to our story now?”

I didn’t answer and they didn’t wait for a response as they swept inside, leaving me to trail after them. Not…my father? Their words echoed around in my head until we reached the inner sanctum of the temple. The abbess came forward with a bag in her hands.

“The bag you asked for, Your Majesty.”

My mother took it from her with a smile.

“Thank you, Sister Jane.”

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