Part of Logan was ravenous for her, as he had been ravenous in the Hole. For the past three months, he’d been so weak, so starved, so preoccupied with surviving that he’d barely spared a thought for sex. Before the Hole, it seemed he’d barely spared a thought for anything else. Now that he was out and regaining his strength, that old Logan was coming back. Terah Graesin was tall and lithe, her curves almost boyish, but her smile was all woman. She moved like a woman who knew what men liked and knew that she had it. The starving, greedy part of Logan wanted to fuck her.
And pissed-on bread always looked so good, until you tasted it. But at least it filled you up, no matter how you felt about it afterward. At least he’d have sex. By all the gods; at twenty-one, he was still a fucking virgin!
The irony of the thought made him smile grimly. Terah saw the smile and smiled back. She did look fantastic. Her hair was teased up into—well, something fancy. Logan wondered how many tailors had been cursing at each other for the last two hours as they’d somehow altered one of her dresses into a wedding dress. It was the traditional green of fertility and new life, slim cut to Terah’s slim body, with ornate groom ties up the back, and a long expanse of leg exposed that was certainly not traditional but welcome nonetheless. It was completed with a stylish veil symbolizing chastity that worked perfectly with the dress, if not so well with the woman in it.
Well, I’ll have as much sex as I want, if her reputation is at all deserved. The thought sloshed in his stomach like warm piss. No, better not to think about her reputation.
Whatever he felt, Terah Graesin somehow pulled off what he had thought was impossible. She was sexy and regal at the same time—to her it was all power, whether it came from her status or her personality or her body. They were all tools to impose her will.
Power. Count Drake said the temptation was power.
Terah came to stand beside him and took his hand shyly. The people cheered. It was just like Jenine Gunder had taken his hand when her father had announced their marriage. Logan swallowed his rising gorge. For Jenine, it had been a spontaneous act. Terah had been at that dinner. She’d seen what Jenine had done and how people had approved. She was imitating Jenine deliberately.
“Relax,” Terah said. “You’re five minutes away from everything you ever wanted.”
You’re a fool if you believe that, Terah. Logan painted a smile on his face and willed his body to relax. No, it wasn’t what he would have chosen, but he would be able to change everything. He could defeat King Ursuul. He could root out the Sa’kagé. He could abolish the poor laws. He could …
That was it. That was what Count Drake meant. That was the temptation of power. He’d turned his ambition in his own mind. It isn’t for me, he’d told himself, it’s for the people. But that wasn’t altogether true, was it? He’d liked ordering Gorkhy’s death; he’d liked dismissing the count: Logan spoke and things happened. People obeyed. He’d been so powerless for so long in the Hole that the idea of never being subject to anyone was honey on his tongue.
Fine, Count Drake, I understand. Now where’s the way out?
It was too late. On one side stood a hecatonarch in his rich cloak—a hundred colors for the hundred gods. On the other stood a man in simple brown robes, a patr of the One God. Duke Wesseros took his place in the middle. Terah had made sure that their marriage would be performed in triplicate. The cheering crescendoed as fifteen thousand people shouted themselves hoarse for the couple they thought would save them.
“May I address the people?” Logan asked.
“Absolutely not,” Terah said. “What kind of a ploy is this?”
“It’s not a ploy. I just wish to speak to those who will bleed and die for us. I haven’t had the chance to do that.”
“You’re going to set them against me,” Terah said.
“How about,” Duke Wesseros said, “how about Logan swears not to say anything negative about you? And if he does, I’ll step in and stop him? Is that acceptable, my lord?”
“Yes.”
“My lady?” Duke Wesseros said, “He is their king.”
“Make it quick.”
“Logan, five minutes,” Duke Wesseros said. He stepped close and lowered his voice. “And may the spirit Timaeus Rindder inspire you.”
It was a contingent declaration of support. Timaeus Rindder had been an orator of such skill he’d turned a chariot race loss into a coup, though he had been bound by exactly the restrictions that Duke Wesseros had put on Logan. In framing the rules the way he had, Duke Wesseros was saying, “If you can get the people on your side, I’ll come, too.”
“My friends, tomorrow we will stand together in the clash and roar of battle.” Logan had barely spoken the first sentence when his words were doubled and redoubled in volume. He paused, then saw Master Nile standing near the front, smiling. Logan pretended that it wasn’t important, and in a moment, everyone else did, too. “Tomorrow, we will face a foe whose face we know. You have seen his face darkening your doors. You have seen his boots muddying your floors. You have seen his torches setting fire to your fields. You’ve felt his fists and whips and scorn, but you refused to yield!”
Logan’s nerves and self-criticism—Could I have said that better? Is my voice steady? Why is it so hard to get a full breath?—faded as he looked at the upturned faces of the people who would be his people. He’d had no idea just a few months ago who the Cenarian people were. He’d known and loved the Gyre’s smallfolk, but had shared the noblemen’s fashionable disdain for the unwashed masses. How easy it was to ask a nameless, faceless mob to die.
“My friends, I spent the last three months in the depths of Hell’s Asshole. I was trapped with the shit and the stink of humanity. I spent my time fearing death and things worse than death. They took my clothes. They took my dignity. I saw the good suffer with the evil. I saw a woman violated and a woman kill herself so she wouldn’t be violated again. I saw good men and bad make their deals with the darkness. And I made my own. To survive.
“My friends, I was imprisoned beneath the ground. You were imprisoned above it. You knew the fears I knew. You saw the horrors I saw, and worse. We had friends killed. We knew that to resist was to die …and my friends, my people, we looked at the odds against us and we saw no hope. We fled. We hid.” Logan paused, and the people were silent.
“Were you there with me?” Logan asked. “Did you feel rage? Did you feel powerless? Did you watch evil and do nothing to oppose it? Were you ashamed?”
The men and women didn’t look to the left or the right, afraid that their neighbors would see the tears in their eyes. Their heads nodded, yes, yes.
“I was ashamed,” Logan said. “Let me tell you what I learned in the Hole. I learned that in suffering, we find the true measure of our strength. I learned that a man can be a coward one day and a hero the next. I learned that I’m not as good a man as I thought I was. But the most important thing is this: I learned that though it costs me dearly, I can change. I learned that what has been broken can be made new. Do you know who taught me that? A prostitute. In a bitter woman who made her living in shame, I found honor, courage, and loyalty. She inspired me and she saved me.
“Today, there are women here who taught you the same lessons. Many of you are ashamed of your mothers and your wives and your daughters who were raped, who were pressed into sexual slavery at the castle, who sold themselves in brothels so they might survive. You’ve shunned them, rejected them.
“But I say your wives, mothers, and daughters have shown us how to fight. They gave us the Nocta Hemata. They have given us courage. They have shown us the road from shame to honor. Let every woman who fought that night stand forth!”