The Conqueror's Wife Read online

  My father swallowed hard and his eyes skittered about the room as if searching for an escape. He would scurry off to weigh his options, to find a way to prosper regardless of the outcome.

  But Bessus was no fool.

  “You will do as I say—remain here in Bactria to oversee the production of more equipment after we march,” he said, dunking a piece of bread in the soup. He took a bite and grimaced, pushing the plate away as if the food was rancid. Perhaps it was.

  My father bowed his head like a recalcitrant child. “As you wish, satrap. Of course, it would make my heart light if there was an alliance between our families. My daughter, Roxana—”

  I almost gasped aloud, so startled was I to hear my name. Parizad’s eyes widened too, his mouth a perfect O of surprise; then he pressed his cheek even closer to mine. Together we peered back inside as Bessus raised his hand. “Your daughter’s name remains a bad taste in my mouth.” He wiped his lips with a napkin. “Much like this soup,” he muttered. “Prove yourself to me and I’ll consider Roxana once again.”

  “Perhaps as your wife this time? After all, the King of Kings can take as many wives as he wishes. And if she gave you a son . . .”

  I loathed my father, but sometimes I had to admire his audacity. Still, I knew he cared only that he might be the grandfather to the future King of Kings in that far-fetched scenario. My position was inconsequential, at least to him. I sat back on my heels, the lure of being the satrap’s—or perhaps one day the King of Kings’—wife dazzling me once again.

  I’d refused the satrap once in order to best my father and had paid for it today in the courtyard. I wouldn’t make that mistake again.

  “Perhaps when I return,” Bessus said, and I could hear the glare in his tone.

  “As you wish,” my father answered, bowing over his hands and kissing his fingertips in a proskynesis, giving the satrap the honor due only to the king, the temple’s sacred fire, and the gods.

  Parizad scrambled to his feet next to me. “Father’s coming,” he hissed.

  I almost fell over in my haste to stand, the lashes on my back stabbing me anew, and together we ducked into an open storeroom packed with barrels of fermenting wine. My nose twitched from the dust, but I willed myself not to sneeze.

  A choice lay before me, and it would be lost when Bessus left my father’s house. And my father would be staying here, his whip constantly at hand. . . .

  I waited for my father to pass, then nudged the door open. I’d scarcely peered into the dank corridor when Parizad yanked me back, jolting my back and making me hiss with pain. “What are you doing?” he asked.

  “Go keep Father busy,” I said. “Ask him how to hide extra grain from the collectors after the harvest, anything to buy me time with Bessus.”

  “Bessus?” A dark understanding dawned on his beautiful face. “Why?”

  “Because I’m going to become his concubine and convince him to marry me after he becomes king.” I bit my lip, for I knew not what might motivate Bessus to make me his wife once he’d already enjoyed me, but what choice did I have? Even a life as a concubine was better than this.

  I gestured down at my shabby clothes and a crushing wave of doubt nearly stole my breath. “If he’ll have me, that is.”

  “A beautiful woman can have a man eating from her hand,” my brother said, pressing a warm kiss to my forehead. “You could have Bessus on his knees with the right words.”

  “And if I have my way, Father won’t palm a single copper from the deal.” Even as I said it, Parizad’s eyes danced with glee and a grin spread across his face.

  “Father can drown in the well of Duzakh,” he said. “But he’ll beat you within a breath of your life if he finds out you tried to circumvent him.”

  I’d strip naked in front of Bessus before I let that happen.

  Parizad pressed another dry kiss to my forehead, then hurried down the corridor after our father. I drew a steadying breath and slipped into the receiving room.

  But Bessus was gone.

  “No,” I moaned, almost falling to my knees. Yet the satrap couldn’t have gone far in the time I’d been in the storeroom with Parizad. I couldn’t blame him for not wishing to spend a single moment longer in my father’s house than he had to.

  I turned and ran as best I could, my breath shallow from the shards of agony in my back.

  Pain overwhelmed pain.

  I was dizzy from the torment of my lashes by the time I saw Bessus enter the courtyard. His chariot awaited and once it left our walls, my chance would be gone.

  “Wait!” I cried out. “I request an audience.”

  An honorable man might have refused to see the unwed daughter of one of his underlings, but Bessus of Balkh only inclined his head at me, scattering his slaves with the flick of a beringed and swollen hand.

  “Roxana,” he said. “So we meet again.”

  I ignored the rush of sound in my ears as Bessus’ eyes raked over me. He sniffed and his nostrils flared at the breeze. I sent my silent thanks to Parizad for the spikenard perfume.

  “Out,” Bessus commanded his driver, the axles groaning with relief as he alighted from his chariot. “Now.”

  My cheeks flushed with pleasure at this newfound power as his driver scurried after the slaves. I could command a man’s attention with a drop of perfume and a conveniently draped robe.

  Power emanated from Bessus, despite the pouches under his eyes and his fleshy nose webbed with red veins. He might have been handsome once, but those years were long since spent, lost to his banquet table and wine cellars. “I assume your father sent you?”

  “My father doesn’t know I’m here.”

  “No?” Bessus crossed his arms over his belly and twisted a gold band high on his arm, a lurid thing shaped into horned griffins inlaid with enamel and onyx. It glittered brighter than anything I’d ever owned. I longed to touch it.

  “If your father didn’t send you,” Bessus asked, “why have you come?”

  Was it because I was greedy and grasping, cast in the very image of the father I hated, or because I’d do anything to be free of him? Perhaps both?

  My fingers twitched like dragonfly wings, but I clasped my sweaty palms behind my back, letting Bessus’ eyes rove over my breasts.

  A beautiful woman can have a man eating from her hand, Parizad had said. If only I knew the words to say.

  “You desired me when I once came to your palace,” I said, hoping he didn’t hear the quaver in my voice. “I’m a woman flowered now, and hoped you might be willing to entertain my counteroffer.”

  “As fair-faced as any virgin, yet you speak like a lender ready to fleece me.”

  My tongue turned to rock and Bessus leered at me. “Pray continue,” he said.

  “I assume my father set a high price for my company the last time you negotiated with him. If you’ll take me from here, I’ll give you whatever you desire. No payment required.”

  His chins wobbled as if he was choking back laughter. “A girl like you only has one thing to offer a man like me. Do you know what that is?”

  “I do.” I tilted my chin. “And I’d give you my maidenhead of my own free will.”

  “Nothing in this life is free,” Bessus said. “What do you want in return?”

  I thought on that, although I’d already rehearsed my requests. “A position in your army for my brother.”

  “Is that all?” he asked.

  I shrugged. “I wouldn’t mind gold bangles and pearl necklaces, or silk robes and tooled leather slippers. And I’d require your promise that you’ll keep me as one of your women. In your palace.”

  “Your father should beat you for this,” Bessus said. “Women do not negotiate with men.”

  I didn’t flinch at his accusation, only took his hands in mine and pressed them to my breasts, scarcely daring to breathe les
t he feel the edges of the lumpy bandages that wrapped around my ribs beneath the worn orange wool. I tilted my chin so he could drink in the graceful curve of my neck. “This woman does.”

  “You’re as slippery as a snake,” he said, but his eyes lingered on the mounds of my breasts, pale as two full moons. “Bangles and necklaces I have aplenty. And there’s always room for an extra woman in my palace.”

  Bessus reached out then and ran a coarse thumb over the soft flesh of my shoulder. I shuddered from a mixture of trepidation, fear, and the heat burning in his eyes. I thought of having my own slaves to massage almond oil into my hands and feet, and chests of silk robes and beaded headdresses to wear every day.

  “You’ll give me what I ask?” My voice came out breathy and I gasped as Bessus’ lips dropped to my neck.

  “No more negotiations,” he said, his hand expertly unfastening my jasper girdle. It clattered to the flagstones, scattering several more shoddy gems.

  “Not here,” I said, glancing around the deserted courtyard before leading him to the stables, my heart thudding in my ears. Our father’s horse was only just returned and penned next to our aging donkey, but the ramshackle building smelled of decades of accumulated hay and dung. The musty odor didn’t faze Bessus, for he pushed me into a stall still scattered with the remnants of old straw. Before I knew what he was doing, my hair tumbled from its threads and he tugged at my robe until my breasts were exposed.

  “You are glorious, Roxana of Balkh,” he said. His own robe fell loose, revealing two sow’s teats and a chest covered with thick black hair as he kicked off his shalvar. He wrestled with the tie that released his zir-šalvar and I forced myself to watch as the undergarments fell to the ground, for although I’d often gone swimming with Parizad as a child, never before had I seen a grown man in his full nakedness. His manhood stared at me huge and dark, standing erect from its nest of black hair.

  I dared not let him see the hideous bandages around my waist or the ruined flesh of my back. Instead I tugged down my own shalvar to expose my pale thighs before he could undress me further, keeping my robe pinned at my waist. It occurred to me then that he might have me here in the stable muck and then rescind his bargain, but from the way he backed me into the stall, it was too late to change my mind even if I’d wanted to. Instead I arched my back to keep from touching the wooden wall as his fingers probed the cleft between my legs. Then with one adept movement he lifted me and hefted me against the wall, smashing my damaged back with a flash of scorching agony. The scream of pain built at the back of my throat, flying free as he parted my legs with his hairy knees and entered me with one hard thrust. I cried out in double agony as he began to move inside me, writhing and wrapping my legs around him to save my back, all the while staring down at the griffin’s gleaming horns still perched high on his forearm.

  I bit my fist while Bessus labored into me, grunting like a boar at a trough. My nails dug into the flesh of my palms, but the pain there wasn’t enough to drown out the combined white fire of my back and the flesh between my legs.

  I’d been wrong: Pain doesn’t always overwhelm pain.

  But I had to make pain look like pleasure, for otherwise Bessus would surely cast me aside like a bruised cabbage leaf. So I moaned my pain through clenched teeth as he thrust into me and used my nails to scratch his back, opening it the way my father had opened mine.

  Bessus moaned and stiffened, then fell against me in a crush of flesh, sweat, and coarse hair. “You’re a loud one,” he finally said, standing and shrugging his legs into his silken zir-šalvar. I managed to cover my breasts, stiff-spined as I tried not to move the muscles of my back. I expected to feel something for the loss of my virtue, but I could scarcely think through the red fog. Bessus was retying his kamarband when his face changed and he pushed me aside.

  “What is this?” he asked, running a finger along the stall, its wood marred by a dark stain on its smooth planks.

  He held up a forefinger streaked with blood, and only then did I notice the dampness on my back and the cool air against my mangled skin. The bandages had come loose and I felt the gashes weeping warm blood, just like the tears that flowed freely down my cheeks.

  “Turn,” Bessus said. “And let me see.”

  I did as he commanded and endured a fresh wave of mortification as his hand twined in my hair so he might inspect my back. “Your father’s handiwork, I presume?”

  I nodded.

  He sighed and some unnamed emotion flitted across his pockmarked face. “No wonder you threw yourself at me.”

  “We had an agreement,” I said, my thoughts coming in a jangled rush. “I swear I’ll heal and the scars will be small. My brother has poultices—”

  “Have your slaves gather your things.”

  “What?”

  “I gave you my word that I’d take you and so I will. After all, I can still use a bed warmer while on campaign,” Bessus said, replacing his robe and the crimson sarband on his head. “It’s within a father’s right to beat his children, yet it’s a crime against the gods to mar such beautiful flesh as yours.”

  “You’ll take me on campaign?” I almost fell to my knees in gratitude that he still wanted me, even as I shuddered at the thought of traveling with an army. I’d hoped to be ensconced in a luxurious estate somewhere, not dragged along on dusty marches with only a cot of tanned hide to sleep on and dried ox flesh to gnaw on each day. But it would take me away from my father. . . .

  “You’re under my protection now, and I leave for this campaign against Alexander at dawn.” Bessus looked at me askance. “There will be plenty of spoils to retake from the Macedonian baggage train, silks and baubles to make any woman’s feeble heart flutter.”

  I heaved a sigh, gingerly rearranging my robe. It was a start.

  “And my brother?” I asked. “Will you give him a position?”

  “There’s always room in the ranks for a young man eager to die for honor and glory. Now stop asking for things.”

  I wouldn’t let my brother die on a battlefield anywhere. His talents with herbs and healing meant that he could serve as a healer for the half-wits who volunteered to fight. There was time enough to maneuver that from Bessus.

  “Will you take me with you to meet Darius?” I dared ask.

  “The King of Kings won’t want you,” Bessus sneered, the hardened satrap once again. “He prefers the company of his eunuch Bagoas even to his slew of concubines.”

  “But you plan to supplant Darius,” I said, taking yet another chance. “I heard you with my father.”

  In that instant Bessus stood so close I almost gagged over the smell of fish soup he’d choked down with my father. “Not a word of that to anyone, do you understand?” he snarled. “Pretty face or no, I’ll gore you myself if your tongue wags.”

  “Forgive me,” I said, falling to my knees before him. “Take me away from here,” I gasped, “and you’ll have my unswerving devotion until my dying day.”

  He stared at me, then pulled me to my feet. “Nothing so dramatic as your death, I hope.”

  I followed him to his chariot as he yelled for his slaves and my brother, the hot glow of triumph making me grin as my father emerged, spluttering and demanding to know what was happening. Parizad followed in his wake, his questioning look transforming into one of pride as he saw my face.

  “I’ve claimed your daughter as only a man can,” Bessus said, removing the griffin armband and tossing it at my father like a bone to a dog. “Take this and be happy I don’t flog you myself for the damage you’ve done her. Your son—” He glanced at me.

  “Parizad,” I provided.

  “Parizad shall travel with me on campaign as well.”

  I allowed myself a malicious smile as my father dived for the gleaming armband. The next time we met, I’d be his anointed queen, and could command all manner of punishment to remind him of the yea
rs of torture I’d endured.

  For now I turned my back on him, leaving behind the crumbling house of my girlhood. I was a woman now, and one day I might live in Babylon’s grandest palace, sleep in the frescoed chambers of Queen Amytis, and walk in the Hanging Gardens.

  The promise of jewels and silks meant that I could tolerate this bloated carp of a man, the pain in my back, and even the fire that still raged between my legs.

  I’d endure the flames of Duzakh for a chance to be queen.

  CHAPTER 10

  Pella, Macedon

  Thessalonike

  I raised my hand against the unassuming wooden gate and knocked, my heart clogging my throat. Cynnane’s villa—formerly the home of her husband, Amyntas—sprawled far enough from Pella that someone like Olympias might pretend that the white smudge on the horizon didn’t exist. I listened for grunts and the cries of swordplay to echo over the walls, but instead only the breeze and the occasional shriek of a cicada drifted our way.

  Arrhidaeus and I had left Pella’s walls after giving the palace guards the slip, and I’d followed my brother through town into the yellowing countryside, past barren orchards of apricot, quince, and olive trees, and farmers harvesting the late-season barley. Cynnane often invited Arrhidaeus to visit her, in compliments of their shared Illyrian blood and her affinity for our simpleminded half brother.

  It stung more than I cared to admit that she’d never thought to invite me.

  But today I’d invited myself, having stewed over Hephaestion’s suggestion that I seek out her and her sword arm.

  “Greetings, Arrhidaeus,” the guard at the gate said, removing the wooden bar. “Come to visit with Cynnane today? I see you’ve brought a friend.”

  “My sister Nike,” Arrhidaeus said. “She’s taking me fishing after we eat pomegranates with Cynnane.”

  The guard allowed us inside with a smile, then relayed my stuttered request to see my half sister. We waited in the open courtyard and I helped Arrhidaeus cut into a pomegranate I’d pilfered while strolling up Cynnane’s path. He dived into it, leaving smears of crimson across his cheeks, while I perused the household gods in the courtyard’s center altar.