1 comments/ 3809 views/ 1 favorites The van Sietter Bride Pt. 02 of 03 By: NaokoSmith The van Sietter Bride Who Brought Happiness in Her Pocket Part 2 of 3 (Not much sex in this bit) She was pretty. The daughter of the el Shostas was a plump curving creature with golden hair dressed simply on her head. She had a sweetly full bosom, a tidy curve into her waist and then an appealing curve out round her hips. She probably had a good fresh complexion from the exercise of running about the Thiel woods and rivers but it was not possible to tell because her cheek was pink with powder. Her dress was old-fashioned like her hair, Arkyll knew this must be an happy accident. Thiel was such a back region they would not have access to dress-makers and ladies' maids skilled in the new fashions. The tight waist and big skirts suited her figure although the petticoats meant it was not possible to guess at the shape of her legs but Arkyll knew she must be a good rider -- they all were, the el Shostas. He could assume she would have muscular legs with a good definition in the thigh. Tisha's had been a softly indulged squishy thigh but discreet subsequent exploration had led Captainofthepeace-Lord el Maien to decide that he preferred an athletic leg with the muscles delineated so clearly that you could run a finger up the defining groove in the thigh. Like Daria's leg. For a moment he thought van Thiel and his mother were mistaken, that there would be no difficulty palming off this ladybird on some decent son of the high nobility more her own age. The daughter of the el Shostas was a bit young for him. He ought to have gone to court some time back and picked out someone elegant with good political connections and an appreciation of the work he was involved in. Now here he was, being asked to pretend to an interest in a young woman so she could be taken to the mid-winter Angels' day balls at court with a flutter of gossip to puff her into the arms of someone suitable. He knew it was because he was considered too high above her but he felt curiously piqued by it nevertheless. She was a tidy little handful of curves and probably full of bounce: fit with running and riding wild in the Thiel woods, possibly swimming in the lakes too. Naked. She stood with her head turned to the side, maybe she was blushing under the face paint, she was charming in her old-fashioned green silk gown. He thought that if they cleaned up her face she would easily catch someone's eye. Then she lifted her head, dipped lashes which he realised were painted so much that they had actually stuck together and put an hand up to cover a snigger out the corner of her painted mouth. Instead of giving him a friendly greeting, she slid her gaze rapidly over him with a dip of the eyes that he might have thought shy if they had not gone straight to the rank of First Sietter officers dismounting behind himself and his parents: dashing young blades in the regional colours of red with the gold-embroidered collar and the thigh-length brown boots. There would be no problem with her being a slut, of course, but she must learn to be discreet. Men of honour expected to give the glove if a favour was being forced or seduced but they did not like to be constantly throwing their lives in the hazard just because some stupid woman was so careless that everyone thought they could gossip freely about the manner in which she stained her marital honour. Still, she looked biddable. A man with a firm hand would be able to hold her on a tight rein and ensure she behaved with outward propriety. Maybe she had ... some pleasant pretty chatting ways? although his mother said she was ignorant and his father, who had actually met her at some fishing party of van Thiel's, was ominously silent about her. van Thiel was coming to offer a sword arm to his father, saying "Ho ho ho! you are Clair and I am Clair, we are both Clair!" van Sietter cast a speaking look at his Lady wife at this but she only looked at him with veiled blue eyes so he grasped the shoulder of his youngest son and pulled him forward, saying with gritted teeth, "yes and this is a Clair, too. We are all Clairs here." van Thiel looked in surprise into young Lord Clair el Maien's astonished face and then started rolling about with laughter, slapping his thighs and slapping poor Clairan on the back so hard that Clairan, who was slight of frame, stumbled forwards. Arkyll sniggered into his arm, pretending to sneeze. Dame van Thiel was wafting them up the castle steps and down the castle corridors into a small parlour while babbling eagerly on. She had clearly determined that this was an intimate social occasion and that they should be greeted in a privy manner by the family while the officers and lesser aristocracy of their retinue were directed off to some larger more formal reception room. Arkyll walked into a room full of flowered fabrics, noticing with another snigger his father wincing because the pattern of the curtains clashed with not only the carpet but the different flowered fabric of the sofas and armchairs. Normally this was probably a comfortable sitting-room for the ladies, full of sewing-baskets and silly novels. It had been tidied into a stiff-backed propriety, the cheap ornaments people had given other people as gifts had been interspersed with gold and silver objects which belonged in more formal parts of the castle and there was only a small collection of faded poetry and philosophy books on one side table which Clairan glanced at with a raised eyebrow. On the central table were a selection of delicate small sandwiches with the crusts cut off them and tiered plates of cakes, iced biscuits and Soomara chocolates. This was obviously Dame van Thiel's idea of a most elegant entertainment for the el Maiens and Lady el Jien. The biscuits had been iced with the Sietter insignia. Arkyll was tempted to nudge his little brother and point this out but he preserved a proper solemn dignity since he was being wafted by Dame van Thiel's excited little hands to a sofa by young Lady el Shosta's side. The two el Shosta boys nudged each other and snickered, young Lady el Shosta became convulsed with the giggles, twisting to the side and refusing to turn to him a face in which the blush was so high that it was evident beneath the pink powder. "Sevie!" her mother said crossly, "I mean, Lady Sevianne. Do pass Lord Arkyll those cakes. She made them herself, your Ladyship, I mean Lady Arianna. So sweet as any you could buy from the pastry shop." Dame van Thiel was still a very attractive full-figured beauty herself, obviously the source for young Lady el Shosta's sweet curving figure and the puckered cherub's bow of her lips just visible under poorly applied paint. The paint was rather better applied over Dame van Thiel's mouth. Since his naive mother was sitting closer to him and his father had been seated in an armchair too far away to kick him, Arkyll made a sweetly smiling long inspection of his prospective mother by marriage's mature beauties. Dame van Thiel lowered her lashes over her blue eyes at this with a small smirk in the corner of her mouth that made an alluring dimple dip in and out her cheek before turning to nudge Sevie's hand holding the plate of cakes towards Arkyll again. It was plain to be seen how she had succeeded in entrapping old van Thiel, who was sitting uncomfortably upright on one of the sofas, casting wistful looks at the door. He had probably been a dashing officer-aristocrat in his day: big and blond, but he was fattening up now in spite of the hard riding he still did at the hunt. The way he sat on the sofa instead of in some favourite armchair which had moulded itself to the shape of his bottom made it evident that he never spent time in this ladies' sitting-room. He was like a dog not normally allowed in the house, watching anxiously for the right moment to beg for a walk -- he was just watching for when he might say, "well my dear, perhaps I should take the menfolk to the games room for some billiards." Poor old dog. Because they wanted Arkyll to continue sitting here with Lady el Shosta he would not be allowed to go off and have snifters of spirits and a game of billiards. "Y'know, papa," Arkyll said, his kind heart exercised by the sight of van Thiel's mournful expression when he was handed a delicate bowl of tea. "You were telling me how much you admired the arrangements in Lord van Thiel's kennels. Will you not ask him to show them you again?" "Pleasure," van Thiel assured his fellow sworn Lord hurriedly and with great sincerity, his eye brightening. He gave Arkyll a look of intense gratitude. Lord van Sietter shot a look of uncompromising resentment at his son, across the annoyed glances of Dame van Thiel at her husband. He replaced the piled plateful of tiny sandwiches which he had been hungrily scoffing on the table and unfolded his long lean legs from his armchair. As he turned to go out the room he gave Arkyll a piercing stare from his slanted grey eyes, Arkyll looked back with his exquisite slanted blue eyes limpid with innocent inquiry, successfully repressing his giggle. The two el Shosta lads seized the opportunity to rush out as well, chortling loudly as soon as they were out of the door, and Arkyll was left accepting a cake from a plate shakily held out to him by a sniggering damsel who would not look him in the eye. Young Lady el Shosta was squirming uncomfortably in her seat beside him and sliding anxiously sniggering glances aside at her mother. Arkyll stopped imagining Dame van Thiel's plump bow of a mouth wrapped round his cock and took a cake from the plate with a flash of his slanted blue eye at Lady el Shosta beside him. She cast her over-painted eyes up at him briefly and then suddenly aside but not before he had seen an all too familiar look in eyes that sparkled with nervous exhilaration. Suddenly he realised that she had not looked at the young First Sietter officers with an eye calculating which was the easiest fruit to pick from the tree. He realised that under the vivid paint on her face she was even younger than he had supposed, not much older than his baby brother. Her manner was that of the young women who would come and hover nearby if he and his peace corps chums were taking tea in a café -- women too young to go into the taverns or even the hotel bars. Mimi, Lisette and his Lieutenant Jamies Velor would start laughing and kicking him, he would kick them back but eventually he would smile at the silly maidens and they would come in a blushing bouquet of rosy cheeks holding out bad reproductions of pictures of him from the gossip-sheets and begging him to scrawl a few words on them. This behaviour was not at all what he had expected of some younger daughter of the high nobility, confident of her social rank and brought up in a spoiled indulgence to have an arrogant appreciation of her own beauty and cleverness. He saw her hunching her shoulders around her lovely curving body and he realised with a qualm at his heart that like so many of these nervous shy maidens who stuttered to beg him for a signature to his picture, she did not even realise she was pretty. Her figure was not fashionable but he pictured her riding careless in the hunt with her family or fishing the rivers with a bunch of young friends, the unselfconscious smile curving her pouted cherub's bow of a mouth with no paint on it and her shoulders throwing back to cast the line so that her round bosom lifted. He thought of her dancing shyly with the young men who would be discouraged from becoming intimate with her and fretting that they did not come asking for her hand because there was something unattractive about her, rather than something about her mother's repressive eye which made them go elsewhere for a dancing partner. She would be eaten up by some of the sons of the high nobility like the tea-time treats her mother was anxiously offering his mother. His mother had with an effort started a conversation about stitching (which bored her dreadfully although she turned it out supremely well). Arkyll was about to engage Lady el Shosta in some light chit-chat when he saw with a qualm his young brother Clair shift in the sofa opposite and lean forward, pushing to the side of his plate a biscuit of which he had taken one bite before discarding it as inedible. Clair gravely fixed the Lady el Shosta with his serious grey eye. He was a slender scholar with the delicate el Maien frame and the same features as their sister Arrie's but he had dark hair which he kept cut shorter than the fashion while she was blonde and they rarely looked alike because Arrie almost always had a cold lack of expression on her face (except when she had just sold you down the river to your mother when an hideously beautiful joy would make her face light up like a pale Angel's). Clair's face was mobile with gentle humour and affection and when thinking something through he would frequently stick his tongue out of the corner of his mouth in a peculiarly appealing manner. "Have you read a good book lately?" Clair inquired in a tone of polite interest. "I see you have Piria's classic text on the mundane here," he added, picking up one of the faded volumes on the side table. Arkyll groaned to himself. It was clearly something that had been suggested to him when he complained that he had no idea what to say to people who did not know anything about architecture or agriculture, V'lava's darker poems or Hyaline's laughing watercolours or where to go at court for a tip-top meal of P'shan sweetly spiced delicacies and how to get a table there since that restaurant was always full. "Um, such lovely cakes!" Arkyll said loudly but the unfortunate young woman was giggling now and saying, while sliding her eyes at her mother, "Gracious Angels! I do not have time for books, what with the stitching and cleaning stuff and helping my mother with the household, whatever. I swear, I should like a nice rest with a book." An appalled look came into Clair's all too expressive face, Arkyll hurriedy repeated his compliment about the cakes but she was only sniggering and giggling at Clair's horrified expression. Such nonsense. He knew it well, she was obviously a lazy pussy-cat who snuck off from any cleaning of ornaments or flower-arranging they made her do in order to hide in some rarely used room and stick her head in dreadful novels about brigands or pirates carrying off fainting maidens and then improbably refusing to stain their honour, preferring to die in their chaste arms when their cruel vengeful fathers caught up with the unhappy couple. At the least of it she had not started recounting one of these to his highly intelligent brother who would have been even more revolted than he was to imagine she did not read at all. Arkyll sat politely inclining his head to the sniggering maiden by his side, repressing his own sniggers and wishing Hanya had been in the frame of mind to appreciate a long hilarious letter about it all. Actually the cakes were light and sweet, very tasty. --- Lying with his head on his arms thrown back onto the pillows of his bed staring at the canopy above him, Arkyll heard a gentle tapping on his door. When he lifted his head and called out, "Halloo!" Clair opened the door and came to sit on the bed beside him, looking at him in an hilariously stern solemn manner. Arkyll lay back in his pillows, raising one dark eyebrow in question over his warmly affectionate slanted blue eye. "Arkyllan," Clair said in a voice of quivering appeal. "You are not truly going to offer for that ... that person are you?" Arkyll laughed. "C'mon, Clairan, gimme rein," he said lazily. "I prithou!" Clair said, still intent in appeal. "You cannot seriously want to offer for ... that silly bitch!" "You are being very rude," Arkyll said sternly, leaning up on his elbow in annoyance at this. "Shut it, Clairan. You do not understand about these matters." "Yes I do!" Clair said. Arkyll saw in consternation that his lip was quivering. "I know that mama wants van Thiel's counter for her programme of proposals. I know how many people will benefit, so much poverty may be weeded out, but I beg it of you, Arkyllan, not to sacrifice your own happiness for that." The tears suddenly spilled from his round grey eyes. Arkyll sat up quickly and gave him a soft buffet on the shoulder before putting an arm out for Clair to lean in to his shoulder. "Stop being a goose," he said, giving his brother's cropped head of hair a casual caress. "I am not going to offer for her. She is rather young, eh? They just want me to pretend to be interested then she can go off to court and the other silly sons of the high nobility will come chasing her. There now, shut it, you soppy bit of biscuit. Gimme rein." "I was so worried!" Clair cried, sobbing now with relief. "C'mon, Arkyllan, confess it. She is a silly bitch." "I shall not say such a cruel thing about anyone," Arkyll said angrily. "Never mind a ... shy and sweet young woman who has not been brought up to the high standard of discussion and morals which we have." "Well it is not nearly so cruel as the things Arrie will say if you bring home such a bird-brain," Clair pointed out, wiping his sleeve over his eyes. A quiver of apprehension went through Arkyll only to imagine what his sister would do to some silly bitch like Lady el Shosta if she were ever brought in a wedding coach to be the Lady wife of el Maien van Sietter. How fortunate that he was not going to marry her -- for her! "Why do people imagine mama and papa would make you take someone like that?" Clair demanded indignantly, "when they let Hanya and Arrie choose to marry each other for love." Arkyll laughed. "Han does not have to think about who he marries," he said. "He is not of the high nobility, silly goose. He is a Knight." Clair looked surprised to realise that the oldest brother under whose affectionate eye he and Arrie had always run about was not after all the same as they were. He said slowly, "but Arrie. Papa was only fretting because Han was riding to war direct from the honeymoon. He never tried to put up Arrie like some disgusting piece of meat for sale." Arkyll smiled. "No," he said, "not papa. But mama was hoping to bestow her on Stevan el T'fel van P'shan." "What?!" Clair cried indignantly. "That kid who showed off about his skating when we went up to P'shan for the winter sports! He is even younger than me." "He was a skilful sportsman even then," Arkyll answered. "That was a long time ago. He is a young man now. In a two-three years they will send him to someone's army. He will probably go to be cousin Vadya's junior officer. He is some years younger than Arrie but he is an oldest son and will inherit what is the wealthiest region in the country. She would have suited the el T'fels, she is a woman of high honour and el T'fel would give the glove if any man of slack morals so much as looked at her. She would have helped them with the defence of the region and she liked the winter sports almost as much as she loves her horses." He watched Clair think about young van P'shan with whom they had once enjoyed an happy holiday playing at the winter sports in the H'velst Mountains. The el T'fels with their slanted dark Northern eyes and thin wiry frames made for dashing young officers. He watched Clair think about Stevan el T'fel grown up and wearing the double-breasted black tunic with blue details of the H'las army. "Why do they not palm off that silly girl on el T'fel," Clair demanded crossly. Arkyll smiled patiently and said, "because she is a silly girl. I mean young woman. She must get someone serious like me showing an interest in her to make them think she is something more than a silly woman." He knew the proud van P'shan family would never look at Lady Sevianne el Shosta van Thiel. The van Sietter Bride Pt. 02 of 03 "There must be someone-else who would take her," Clair complained. "You mean like el V'lair van Athagine?" Arkyll suggested. Clair pulled a revolted face. "If they do not give her a bit of a show the poor kid will end up with el V'lair or one of the el Statens," Arkyll explained. "van Thiel knows he ought to have got her a bit of polish but it is too late now and he is her father. He loves her like we love Arrie and he wants to try to get her someone decent who could make her happy, not see her chained in Athagine." "Arrie did not go to Athagine," Clair said fretfully. "Why cannot this silly girl get a Knight like Arrie did." Arkyll laughed out at this. "She is not a wild cat like Arrie," he said in amusement. "She is just a biddable pussy-cat who does as she is told. Arrie has to suffer a lot of gossip about being allowed to marry Han. Uncle Tashka has had to threaten the glove to get men to leave her alone in the strategic staff offices because they imagine that since she was bestowed on a Knight of the back hills who is known to be a pacifist nobody cares what-all becomes of her honour. People say papa ought to have brought her to some oldest son's bit not let her kick her heels up and run off with Hanya." They both grinned to think anyone might imagine their poor father could control their sister's obstinate wild ways. Clair said slowly, "mama and papa never came to ask me to think about anyone." He lifted his round grey eyes shyly to his brother. Arkyll laughed and punched him softly in the arm. "Of course not, darling," he said. "Your preferences make you ineligible. Now go off and get some rest so you can dance to break all the young girls' hearts like you usually do." "Shut it," Clair said with a blush and a shy snigger. He was a kindly soul and always very sorry when he realised his friendly ways had lured some poor young woman into feelings for him which he was incapable of returning. Unfortunately with his delicate el Maien prettiness and his dreamy scholar's eyes lit up with his friendly open-hearted smile they would always be chucking their unwanted hearts at his fingers. Never mind the string of panting officers who came hustling more aggressively around him to his adolescent embarrassment. Clair el Maien was a cerebral rather than physical being, more their mother's than their father's son, and having to learn to put on the cold repellent look of his sister's ice cold beauty in order to make clear how choice he was of his body. As he went off out of the room, he said, "Such luck! I have found quite a pile of novels under the bed in my room. Jolly stories about brigands and pirates and whatnot. Should you care for one, my dear?" "Um no, I give you my thanks," Arkyll said, repressing a snigger as he lay peacefully back in the bed. --- She made a reasonably pleasing appearance at the ball that night. Well, of course her face was painted in a manner which caused his father's face to glaze over and even his mother to look startled but she wore a pleasant old-fashioned dress in blue satin with silver lace cast over the full skirts. After considerable discussion between van Sietter and Lisette her lady's maid, it had been determined that Lady van Sietter's figure was best suited by the old-fashioned full skirts too so she did not draw the van Thiel ladies' attention particularly but Arkyll saw to his concern Dame van Thiel and young Lady el Shosta cast intent looks at a couple of the Sietter Dames who had worn the dashing new slim cut fashionable at court. Arkyll had gone along in a dark grey raw silk suit, cut in the latest style for men and with flowers embroidered at the bottom edge of the jacket and around the high collar in a blue which picked up the blue of his eyes. An earring studded with a flower of tiny sapphires and with a grey pearl dangling from it swung in his earlobe. His jacket was longer than the old-fashioned waist-length doublets which the van Thiel menfolk wore and hung over the belt of weaponry slung low around his hips but vents in the side allowed you to see that he would easily be able to put an hand to his gloves or the decorated handguards of his sword and dagger if he so wished. van Sietter also wore the latest cut of jacket, in a severe undecorated dark blue, which fitted so perfectly around his hard body and under which the weaponry swung so carelessly that all the men were as usual nervous around him. He had booted Clairan into a lovely suit of soft green silk and loaned him a jade earring since Clairan had forgotten his own jewellery but Clairan refused to wear weaponry since he was not a man of honour but a pacifist. Arkyll reflected that he must get his mother to talk to her mother about her manner of dress. He was sure that as soon as the two silly pigeons got to court and saw the ladies going about in the new cut they would rush to buy Lady el Shosta a dozen new gowns and it would not do for her. Those narrow skirts and the low cut V neck would not flatter her curving sweet figure. The old-fashioned gowns with the bounce of the petticoats gave her rustic regional ignorance a charming appeal that would be lost if she forced her rounded breasts into the new cut in an attempt to make herself appear tall and slender. The new cut was designed for women like his sister. Well in fact it had been designed for his sister. He could see her in his mind's eye in an ice-blue satin dress that the famous artist Hyaline and his life partner the former King's seamstress ran up for her with an high stiff collar up around the back of her neck, a delicate white lace of flowers cast over the whole that made you think perhaps she might one day melt out of the Ice Princess which her expressionless face suggested she was. The slim skirts ran down her long legs from her slender waist so strong from riding, scandalously suggesting the elegant shape of them as she moved in the shimmering satin skirts. She was suddenly so beautiful, even to his careless brotherly eye which had often seen her legs in jodhpurs and thought nothing of them even if they were being delicately suggested by the shimmering swish of satin skirts. He turned laughing to Hanya and saw Hanya's face golden bright with lust staring at her and he suddenly realised how dangerously alluring the sight of her legs was. They both turned to van Sietter, he adored a bit of come-hither in a dress so he was just watching her with a rueful pride then van Sietter's face suddenly clenched up in thunderous wrath and they turned back and saw she was dancing in the arms of that scum el V'lair van Athagine. Angels of Hell! el V'lair's father old van Athagine was still a friend of their father's and of Uncle Tashka's (although Uncle Vadya never would give him a sword hand) so their father could not give young van Athagine the No for a dance. Old van Athagine was a damned reprobate but his son was a disgusting scoundrel whose company the younger el Maiens avoided. Arkyll felt a quiver go through his shoulders to see his sister: tall and fair and pure, with el V'lair van Athagine breathing down her neck. He saw out of the corner of his eye Hanya's hand clench so hard that the knuckles went white on the hilt of his sword where it swung in his belt beside the big muscular thigh in a brown thigh-length army boot but Hanya could not give the glove over Arrie, they all knew she was kissing him but he had not offered her a ring. The kid was so young, that was why, their father had said to poor Hanya that she could not possibly know her own mind so he kept his favours in his pocket. She was so young she probably did not know el V'lair's disgusting reputation. The scum was laughing at something she had said, some innocent remark and that louche villain had the nerve to laugh down her neck, his fingers loose around her strong hand always so perfectly in control of her horses, his horrible hand groping her slender ice-blue satin waist. el V'lair's head lifted and he saw them looking at him dancing with that flower of the high nobility whom all the oldest sons were starting to sniff at: the honourable daughter of the el Maiens. He gave a disgusting grin and turned her in the dance and Arkyll saw that her normally cold expressionless face was shining with the wicked beautiful laughter of a pale Angel as she looked deep into Hanya's angelic beautiful blue eyes creased with torture to have to see her dancing with an oldest son who could come and ask for her body to be bestowed on him in exchange for the rich wine-growing region of Athagine. Angels, that wild one. The oldest sons of the high nobility ought all to breathe a collective sigh of relief that she ran off with a Captain-Knight of her own region instead of coming to be bestowed on any of them. None of them did: that proud beauty, they looked wistful if they met him and hesitantly asked after Captain-Lady Arianna el Maien of the King's Generals' strategic staff offices and whether he had any hopeful news of the war, would she be riding home any time soon? Oh how he longed to see her cold face come riding back through the grey stone castle gateway with her husband by her side, and run himself ragged trying to guess what wildness she might be about so he and Han could save her from the worst of it. Meanwhile there was this soppy biscuit to consider, standing in her best dress sniggering anxiously and shoving at her younger brother who was poking her in the backside. Dame van Thiel suddenly snapped a fan on the boy's head with a furious whispered expostulation, Arkyll pretended he had not seen any of this, repressing the amused curl of his sweet full red mouth, his slanted blue eyes sparkled round to Clairan with laughter. Clairan was looking forbiddingly stern, obviously outraged by this childishness. He had not offered her any ring so he was not in any way obliged but this was an excellent way to get the tongues waggling. Arkyll stepped up to the uneasy cluster of the van Thiel family and said courteously, "Lord van Thiel, may I ask for the honour of Lady el Shosta's hand in the first dance?" van Thiel was red-faced with gratitude. Dame van Thiel nearly burst into tears of joy, giving Lady el Shosta such a shove in the small of the back that the poor young woman stumbled and nearly fell into his arms. Arkyll adroitly caught her by the waist and one hand, supporting her weight easily through the adaptation of a move he had learned in the peace corps. He turned, slipping her hand in his arm to stand with her while they waited for the musicians to strike up. Inevitably the silly bitch, er biscuit, was sniggering and giggling helplessly. This would not enhance her reputation so he looked at her with a fierce glare and said in an unusually harsh tone of voice: "Do you have an opinion on the war?" It lacerated his heart to expose himself to thoughts of those so dear to him on the battlefront but he must find some way to get her to appear sensible. She was not actually that bad, just a sweet little pussy-cat who had been brought up in some slack lazy way and required firm management. "Oh um er, sort of," she stuttered. Then she said shyly: "My uncle is at the war. Mama had a letter a two-three weeks back but they may not write how it is truly going, may they?" "No," he said softly, "but it is always good at the least of it to know ... people are still alive." "Your sister and brother are at war," she said. "Yes," he answered her. He stared off at the empty wooden floor of the big old dining hall with its tables cleared away for the dancing and the people surging chattering around the edges. When she gave his arm a gentle squeeze with her hand, he looked at her in surprise. He smiled softly and sadly at the young woman who also feared for family members at war. His slanted blue eyes that she had so often read descriptions of in the gossip-sheets (they were like sapphires, they were like the eyes of newborn kittens, they were laughing or sparkling or flirting) slid away from her hesitant sympathetic gaze with a flash of tears in them. When he took her in his arms for the dance he became much more hopeful of her chances. She probably did a lot more riding and running about than they would admit to and so she had a physical fitness that allowed her to move with lithe grace in the dance. Her curving waist was surprisingly firm under his big fingers, it was hard to resist the temptation to grope her sweet curves while pretending to just be moving her about, to pull her closer to his cock which was swelling softly under the cover of his long jacket and let her weight press on it. She swung prettily down the floor from his hand, laughing with a sweet pleasure shining in her over-painted eyes. Arkyll loved to dance even when he was not feeling tempted to grope his partner and he was supposed to be behaving in an improper manner with her so he asked her for the next dance too and threw himself enthusiastically into the enjoyment of dashing up and down, lifting her and swinging her about, feeling the swish of her big skirts wrapping around his legs, laughing down at her with those exquisite slanted blue eyes as she laughed up at him with her over-painted round eyes. He realised because he was so close to her that her eyes were brown, pretty with her blonde hair. He made a mental note to tell his mother to tell her mother to stop disguising this by slathering her eyelids in blue under the mistaken impression that blonde hair should have blue eyes to achieve some spurious ideal notion of beauty. van Thiel and Dame van Thiel and his mother were grateful. His father watched with an expressionless face before turning to politely offer his hand to Dame van Thiel for some more sedate dance, lightly kicking his youngest son in passing as he did this to remind him to go and seek some suitable partner. Arkyll felt he had begun compromising himself well with the two dances he had given Lady el Shosta and took a break to eat some snacks and share a joke with Clairan before offering his hand to some other over-excited flattered young women. He interleaved the good dancers with some plain women who probably did not ordinarily get even the one dance, ensuring that he handed them over onto some Knight or officer. The officers of the ceremonial First Sietter troop in their gorgeous red parade silks with the gold-embroidered collar knew what the van Sietter family expected of them in this regard and went to it willingly. The First Thiel officers in fetching brown and gold were surprised but acquiescent. The First Sietter officers were dreadfully young because the older ones had transferred into field troops to go to war, Arkyll had to kick one or two of the gigglier ones and he and the First Sietter Commander grinned indulgently at this. He was sorry to see that Lady el Shosta had been obliged to go up and down with some ruddy-faced boar of a Knight, obviously some old friend of her father's. She looked reasonably happy to be jigging up and down in the dance but he thought it was a pity they had not made sure she got the pick of the young men to make her laugh and her eyes sparkle so that she could set off to court confident of her charms. His poor old papa. Arkyll went to the musicians and had the pleasure of a word then trotted over to the down-hearted van Sietter to say: "C'mon papa: the men's dance. You'll give me one dance before I break my heart over Lady el Shosta, eh?" He sniggered and winked and smiled to see his father's lean handsome face light up. His father loved the men's dance, which he used to dance at the hunt balls with Uncle Tashka, the two of them going up and down the wooden floor stamping their boots, throwing each other's long lean bodies to and fro, laughing and flashing their infamously charming eyes about. As the music for the men's dance started up the dancers surged chattering off the floor and stood around the edges, raising their hands ready to start clapping. Arkyll wrapped a muscular arm around his father's lean hard back and felt his father's strong thin arm wrap around his back. Two of the First Sietter Lieutenants had come out on the floor to join them and one of the more flirtatious had naughtily sought the hand of a First Thiel Captain who had come with a titillated gleam in his eye. The music started and they went stamping and laughing up the floor, Arkyll swinging his father's tall lean long body about and pulling it back, his father jerking Arkyll's muscular big-boned body to and fro, his slanted grey eyes gleaming with fun at the unexpected treat of the men's dance he loved. As they came panting and laughing out of the vigorous dance, Arkyll bethought him that it was time he rescued Lady el Shosta from boring buffton friends of her father's and took her up and down the floor again himself. He looked about the big dining-hall, in amongst the gowns and silken outfits, but he could not see her. He gave a puzzled frown and eventually he strolled over to her mother who was refreshing herself with a bowl of wine punch and laughing merrily with some other Dames, clearly highly relieved it was all going off so well. She tilted her eyes at him with that alluring smirk in the corner of her plump mouth and the dimple dipping in and out in her cheek. He liked a mature lover, she usually brought experienced skills and sometimes some interesting new trick to his bed and his father did not ordinarily trouble him about any one-day-one-night set of favours he collected off someone who would not expect him to be offering his ring but he stood well back from Dame van Thiel without an answering smile. They had come here for van Thiel's counter for his mother, not for his glove on behalf of his wife's honour, and poor young Lady el Shosta would become down-hearted and cease to sparkle with happiness if she thought her own mother had lured the prize of the marriage market away from her own shyly emerging physical charms. "Sevie?" Dame van Thiel said, taking a quick look about herself, "er, I mean Lady Sevianne must ... perhaps have gone to see about the snacks." He looked coldly at that and she blushed, putting her bowl of wine punch down and saying she would go and bring the silly minx ... the Lady Sevianne back to the dancing. She was that conscientious, Captainofthepeace-Lord Arkyll, such an help in the management of the household. His mother would find her a great help around Castle Sietter. Er, his father. Arkyll reflected that the gossip would be even more beneficial if it was rumoured that he and Lady el Shosta had snuck off out of the ball together so he said he would take the air and cool himself down. He strolled down the corridor towards the castle entrance, turning over in his mind some issue related to the mission he had been involved in. When he overheard a scuffling through an half-open door, he initially assumed it was the flirtatious First Sietter Lieutenant and the First Thiel Captain and put a bit of speed on but then he heard a squeaky voice say, "No, no!" and he knew it was a woman. "Come on, you minx," growled a male voice. "It is not the first you have given and that lovely young Lord is not serious for you, I know that." Arkyll shoved the door back to disclose Sevianne in the grip of the ruddy-faced buffton Knight who was a friend of her father's. His peace corps training took over. He was in the room with the disgusting boar in his grip, one arm twisted up the man's back, the wrist of the other in his tight fingers. He dragged him off Sevianne and chucked him to the side of the small chamber into which the loathsome scum had lured her for his groping hands to violate. She stood staring at him with her eyes wide and her chest starting to heave up and down in terror in the bosom of her blue silk gown. He could see the hysterics coming, he turned and gripped her by the arms, saying in an intense hiss: "Not here, not now, you silly bitch! Save us the scandal!" Luckily she burst into tears at this instead of starting to scream her head off. The van Sietter Bride Pt. 02 of 03 Arkyll turned back to the Knight, who was standing with his head towards them, holding his arm, a savage grin on his face. "What, no glove?" the Knight said in a sneering tone. "No, you do not truly want her honour under your eye, do you? pretty peace corps boy." Arkyll stepped up and seized him by the lapels of the jacket and shovelled him back against the wall, staring intently into his face. "Do you want it?" he snarled in a voice hoarse with rage. "Do you want the glove of el Maien van Sietter over his ... betrothed?" His slanted blue eyes had become cold slits through which he peered at the man he shoved back so easily. The Knight looked startled and Arkyll could see him thinking it over. He was remembering him that Arkyll wore a sword and dagger and gloves in his belt when off duty, he was a member of the peace corps but he was not a pacifist. He was a man of honour. He was the son of el Maien van Sietter, who marked el Parva van Selaine in the face for only writing a poem addressed to his Lady wife; he was the nephew of el Maien van H'las, that infamous cold killer in the duel who had slaughtered like animals those who had stained the el Maien family honour. "I never meant any thing, Sevie," the Knight whined, looking round at her standing and sobbing helplessly. "You mistook me ...." Arkyll shoved him against the wall again and he hurriedly muttered, "I beg for the Lady's pardon." "Get out," Arkyll said, slinging him at the door. He resisted the temptation to kick the Knight in the backside since with his peace corps training he knew this might cause the Knight to rethink taking the glove. Sevianne's reputation would never survive him fighting some louche boar of a Knight over her honour. An handsome young officer would have been another matter. Sevianne was still sobbing and crying, her plump little fingers clutched up together in the skirts of her dress, the paint streaked down her face. Arkyll regarded her ruefully. The aristocrat in him recognised that there would be no getting her back to the dining hall for a couple more dances so she could waft off to court on a golden cloud of gossip suggesting that she was so desirable even el Maien van Sietter rather than some buffton old friend of her father's was sniffing her bottom. Then the peace worker remembered that the poor kid had nearly been raped, he went over and bent to look gently into her face, saying: "Did he ... did he take your favour?" She stared speechless into his eyes. He remembered him that he was the last person she would want to confess such a thing to and his face clenched up. But there was no other peace worker here. He stood back from her and said in as bland a tone as he could manage, "If you care to tell me what has been going on, perhaps I can help you arrange matters." After a while she sobbed out, "I thought ... it would only be a kiss." Arkyll absorbed this surprising information then enquired, "You ... prefer his kisses?" She looked into his gentle handsome humorous face: the serene broad brow with the dark curls elegantly tumbling over it, the exquisite slanted blue eyes so kindly bent on her, the full red mouth soft with sympathy. He was gorgeous. She knew he was not supposed to take her seriously but even to be able to pretend that this delicious staple of the gossip-sheet menus was chasing her skirt had been Heaven. She had never hoped for more than the callow young officers who were not wise enough to give the chance of her favours the go-by but she had vaguely stupidly fantasised about el Maien van Sietter seeing something in her he liked (although what there could be that he could not find in an hundred other girls was a question) and ending by giving her a romantic kiss. Instead she had been found by him in this horrible situation, which in one of her novels might seem sexy but in actuality made her feel cold and shivery and as if she was some ragged dirty thing for men to wipe themselves on before throwing aside. Her paint-streaked tear-blotched face suffused with scarlet. She blurted out: "No! of course not. I .... He ... has always had a kiss. He never tried ... this before -- just made me give a kiss." In the wide brown eyes staring into his he saw that habitual frozen blankness which in his work he sometimes had to see in young people's faces who had been exploited in this way by someone they were obliged to treat with trust and he would struggle not to make obvious how angry he felt on their behalves. "When I was a little girl," she said, as if this would explain the matter to everyone's satisfaction, "he used to give me a sweetmeat but ... of course not now." Arkyll stood with his face immobile to hear this. --- Dame van Thiel shouted and made excuses and blamed everyone but herself, getting redder and redder in the face. van Thiel blustered and ramped up and down the carpets of the floral ladies' sitting-room, past van Sietter sitting very still in an armchair with a cold lack of expression on his face, Lady van Sietter sitting on one sofa with her back very straight and a veil in her blue eyes, her face cold pale and statuesque, and Captainofthepeace-Lord el Maien standing on the hearthrug in front of the low flickering fire. Finally van Thiel turned on his daughter who was sitting on the other sofa with her shoulders hunched, contorting her sweet plump figure into an hideous lump, her face still blotched with tears and streaky with face paint. He said pitifully: "I might have known you would put a spoke in the wheel and ruin it all! Is this what it comes to? I invite so fine a young man as any stupid cow of a girl could wish to have pretend an interest in her to our home and you treat him to such an entertainment!" Arkyll saw Sevianne's head lift and her face went pale under the streaks of paint so that her eyes became brown woodland pools in which the terror lurked like wounded deer seeking a last desperate refuge. "And now I've to give the glove to a man who has fought by my side and ridden to the hunt with me for years," van Thiel whined. van Thiel was of course going to take his daughter's honour under his eye so he was just venting his grievance about losing a long-established and pleasurable companionship with a former comrade in arms but at this, van Sietter jerked upright out of his armchair and stalked over to Sevianne on the sofa. He rested an hand on her shoulder and squeezed it, turning a face livid with hot scorn on van Thiel. "Give the glove to yourself," he snarled, "if you cannot keep the honour of your daughter safe under your eye, never mind her happiness." Dame van Thiel leapt improvidently to her husband's defence, declaring: "You are a fine one to tell us of how to keep a daughter's honour bright! Bestowing your own daughter on a mere Knight. They said she could even have got el T'fel van P'shan but you threw her away on a Knight of your own region, just for the sake of his father!" van Sietter's lip curled and his slanted grey eye flashed. "While her honour was under my eye, Captain-Lady el Maien was never suborned to sell a kiss for a sweetmeat!" he hissed. "I bestowed her mindful of her happiness although I knew it would expose both her and myself to slack-mouth gossip. And I taught her to defend her own honour if she so pleases." Suddenly he said, "I beg for your forgiveness, Dame Sevianne. You are overset and I am wrong to push you in such a situation." He gave an heavy sigh and added, "Any man who tries to take the honour of my wild kitten under his eye has my sympathy," his grey eye, his thin mouth were soft with tears, "but yours is not a wild cat like mine, just a little chicken whose honour has been attempted by someone sneaking in under the cloak of friendship. I ... know how that feels, Clair, but before you go and give the scum what he deserves for it, be mindful of your little one." He pressed his hand on Sevianne's shoulder again, looking down at her with that gentleness which he bent over all those who came under his eye: his former soldiers, his servants, his children. "You must not blame yourself, my dear," he said softly. "You must not think we will think the worse of you because some scum floated close to your skirt." But in the desolation of her pretty shallow brown eyes Arkyll could see she knew that the gossip rippling out from this ball was wrecking all her hopes: for the rest of the evening's dancing, the trip to court, the marriage of high honour and prestige enhancing her family's position, all lost and her to sit on in the back region of Thiel, stitching and listening to her parents grumbling irrationally about it. She was not like his mother or his sister or his colleagues in the peace corps, women who went out into the world seeking knowledge and challenging injustice while the men fell adoringly at their feet. Marriage was everything to her but she must be taken, she might not choose on whom to depend for the happiness in home and family which she longed to enjoy with honour. And here was his beloved mama, sitting stiff-backed on the sofa with her blue eyes veiled to disguise the pity she felt for a young woman awkwardly situated and her regret at the wreck of her hopes for van Thiel's counter and her splendid humanitarian programme. When he stirred on the hearthrug they all looked at him: desolately, hopelessly, with sympathy, wistfully. He stood big and muscular in the suit cut to the latest fashion, the candlelight sparkling on the sapphires and grey pearl in his ear and on the rueful smile in his exquisite slanted blue eyes, the curve of his warm red el Jien mouth: sweet as a bowl of cherries. "Mama," he said, "may I have the pleasure of a word?" They were all surprised at this but not as surprised as she was when they had stepped outside the room and he said to her, "have you got some sapphire ring with you that you no longer care for, my dear? Any old sapphire ring will do; I will get you a much nicer one for mid-winter Angels' day in return." He had remembered him that that soppy biscuit loved to read romantic novels about pirates and brigands. Of course he would ask for her to be bestowed on him in marriage in order to save her from this dreadful mess but if he had to send her the ring by King's messenger in some mundane way she would be down-hearted and her soft brown eye would not sparkle nor her little bow of a mouth curve in the kissable smile. His mother gripped her long pale fingers on his arm, looking with intent anxiety into his face, her round blue eyes suddenly clear with the veil ripped away from them. He gave her a smile back that was cherubic with innocence; that same smile he used to give when he had been accused of stealing the jam: Oh no, I never would, his father would become incandescent with fury at the lie, outraged that any son of the el Maiens should stoop to such subterfuge. She sighed, her head went down, then she lifted her head to smile softly into his slanted blue eyes and then she sighed again. She had always looked forward to his marriage, imagining that this would bring someone with similar intelligence to her own as a companion to her in her work. She would be glad to get van Thiel's counter, which would be in her pocket forever now. But she did not think it was worth it, to get a daughter by marriage of the likes of Sevianne el Shosta. When they were sitting together in the splendid guest room which had been assigned to Lord and Lady van Sietter, Lisette brought them Lady van Sietter's jewellery boxes. Lisette was thrilled at the prospect of a new young Lady wife for the van Sietter family. She opened a small box to show to Lady van Sietter who took it with the smile still regretful on her wide warm el Jien mouth and then showed the ring to Arkyll: an huge heart diamond with tiny sapphires embedded in the setting around it. She said, "this was my mother's betrothal ring. Would this please your heart, my son?" "Oh yes," he said with a twinkle of the blue eyes which gossip-sheets said were like sapphires. "My maternal grandmother's ring, I would probably have held her in great affection -- if we had ever spent much time with her, so her ring would have particular meaning for me. Very romantic, my dear. Eminently suitable." "We-ell," she said with an hesitant slide of the eyes at Lisette, who sniggered, "my mother was an infamous slut in her day. Nearly as scandalous as your father," she sighed. He burst out laughing, saying, "that sounds promising, my dear. I will buy you some splendid set in return: bracelet, necklace and all." "No no," she said affectionately. "I will do much more than this for you if I may. And for her," she added hurriedly. Arkyll strode back into the sitting-room where the van Thiels were sitting sullenly on one sofa while Sevianne sobbed on the other in the sympathetic curve of his father's arm. His father looked suspiciously at his mother coming in behind him and his face became crosser when she gave him an angelic look of innocence in reply. Arkyll went and knelt in front of the silly daughter of the el Shostas, raising blue eyes to her in which he was unable to repress a sniggering laugh at this romantic game he was playing. She was leaning back from him with her tear-bedewed face anxious, in fears that he had some tease on the go. His father had taken the opportunity to give her a rough cleaning with his kerchief so that she looked as if she did ordinarily have a prettiness about her, when her cheeks were not blotchily red and swollen and her eyes creased up small with misery. "I beg of you to do me the honour of bestowing your hand on me in marriage," Arkyll said, adding hurriedly, "although I realise it is most improper of me not to have approached your father first and can only live in the hopes that he will smile on my suit and not cut me to ribbons for my impertinence." van Thiel started spluttering behind him. He held the ring carelessly out to her, the firelight and candlelight flashed in the diamond and made rainbows run over her face. His father stiffened in disbelief at the sight of a ring with which he was probably all too familiar in rather different social settings. "We el Maiens usually give sapphires of course," Arkyll said. "This ring was my maternal grandmother's betrothal ring and has particular meaning to me. I hope you will find it acceptable although the main stone is a diamond? Happy to buy you any other you have a preference for, my dear, of course," he added in a final mumble. He was starting to laugh too much to keep up the charade. Her face suddenly flushed with joy, the brown eyes which lifted to him sparkled in a tremulous appealing delight almost as much as the diamond. It was almost worth it. "Mama!" she was saying, lifting her head in excitement. Dame van Thiel was already there staring incredulous at the ring which Arkyll slipped hurriedly onto Sevianne's trembling finger. He got stiffly off his knee and stepped back into the joyous embrace of that undeserving dog van Thiel's arms. They were bustling all about with excitement, van Thiel going to call the servants to fetch something very special from his cellars then coming back without calling to look again in disbelieving wonder at the precious ring on his precious daughter's finger. "Give the man a kiss then!" he cried. "No no!" Arkyll said hurriedly. Sweetmeats or sapphires, he did not want a kiss bought from anyone's lips unless she was a properly trained prostitute. Later, as he walked back to their room with his Lady wife, van Sietter said in a tone of immense displeasure, "here's a fine basket of fruit you have landed us in." "Promiseds't it me woulds't never speak to me again if this came about," she reminded him demurely. --- Arkyll sat in one of the flowered armchairs in the ladies' sitting-room alone with his head in his hands, staring at the carpet which clashed with the armchairs and with the curtains, and wondering what he had gone and done. What was Captainofthepeace Daria Inien going to think of this silly bitch on his arm? What were Mimi and Lisette going to think? What would Tisha ... his mouth twisted wryly at the corner. No, Tisha would approve of the comely young bird-brain with her big round hips so promising for easily pushing out the van Sietter babies. He knew exactly what Arrie would think and she would say it in no uncertain terms. He heard a noise behind him and sat up to find that van Thiel had come back in the sitting-room and was wending his way between the armchairs. Arkyll had no wish to be exposed to more of his future father by marriage's nonsense and started to get up but van Thiel nodded his head insistently to make Arkyll sit back down again. Arkyll saw with a qualm that he was holding a tray with a decanter and small bowls on it. "Ver' special brandy," van Thiel slurred. "Las' bottle. Won it off van Athagine one time. Took his encampment inna practice raid. van Athagine's own brandy. Ver' special, my son." He blubbed a bit to call Arkyll his son. Arkyll calculated that van Thiel must have won the brandy off van Athagine at least twenty years previously and if it was from van Athagine's own cellar it was certain to be a rare treat so he accepted a bowl and sniffed it expectantly. van Thiel sat staring solemnly at Arkyll and finally he said: "My son. Everyone was cross when I ran off with Sevie's mother. Only a Dame, no polish, not fit for the sworn Lord," he pulled an expressive face and Arkyll briefly saw through the weathered skin and wrinkles and little layer of fat a laughing careless young officer-aristocrat with blond hair and brown eyes like Sevie, who had engaged in practice battles with Arkyll's uncles in the Vail plains and Thiel woodland where they liked to practice the summer manoeuvres -- when they were at peace. "Never regretted it," van Thiel said solemnly. "Comfortable. Like to come home of an evening and take my ease, not be troubled with a lot of stuff about art and politics and whatever. Excellent mother," he said with emphasis. "Devoted. Always had my happiness under her eye. Eh?" He looked anxiously at Arkyll. "Oh yes, sir," Arkyll said politely. He smiled at van Thiel's owlish solemn drunken face, his slanted blue eyes crinkling appealingly. "I like to take things easy myself." He took a cautious sip of the brandy, reflecting that it would certainly be pleasant to have the compensations of someone maturing in his bed into the luscious charms of a tame tigress like Dame van Thiel to look forward to. He smiled again, in deep appreciation. The brandy truly was superb. Almost worth it. --- Owing to the war and the van Thiels' eagerness not to let him slip through Sevianne's plump little fingers with the sapphires and diamond on one of them, Arkyll was able to push for a modest and early wedding the following Spring. Sevianne said, "Oh! no trip to court?" mournfully but Arkyll glared at her mother and said in repressive tones that he would take her himself on an honeymoon trip. He had no intention of letting loose his prospective bride in unsuitable garments featuring the new cut at parties where el V'lair and those slack-moral el Statens would come sniffing around her skirt. He walked down the corridors of Thiel Castle from a final bowl with the menfolk, resplendent in a dark blue silk high-collared jacket and breeches, a flight of birds embroidered in silver flashing up and over one shoulder. Sevianne had made a pleasing appearance one step in front of her father at the chapel door. His father had arranged for one of the older ladies' maids from the Castle Sietter staff to go down to Thiel and lend her advice on the el Shosta bride's trousseau. Tillia had clearly gained considerable influence (well worth the double pay van Sietter had been obliged to give her to get her to go to some back region where the women-lovers only had rough bars to go to instead of pleasant sophisticated cafés). Sevianne had still been wearing the charming old-fashioned dresses which suited her best and had learned to manage her face paint so that you could actually see how pretty she was. The van Sietter Bride Pt. 02 of 03 Since it was to be a modest wedding, Arkyll had been able to get away with saying he would hold a splendid dinner for his friends on his return instead of inviting them to come to Thiel with him. He could easily make this a lads' and lasses' night and leave Sevianne out of it so he did not have to see the pity in the wise beautiful eyes of Captainofthepeace Daria Inien or the forbearance of his chums in the peace corps because politics meant he was obliged to take the hand of a silly bird-brain. His father had of course insisted on a privy chat with him about it all. The old man had said it straight that if Arkyll was not happy with the match he would break the betrothal and take the glove off van Thiel himself and that he thought this would be perfectly sufficient to get Sevianne well on her way at court. But to his father Arkyll could admit that he was content to take Sevianne for his Lady wife. He could explain to a man with a sophisticated appreciation of sex who had enjoyed relationships with all manner of people besides his own elegant and intelligent Lady wife, some only of rough good humour and affectionate friendliness, that although he had always imagined he would take someone to his bride who would be like the other members of his family, superior to him in intelligence and throwing schemes and ideas at his head to make him sit up and run in excited circles, when he saw a soppy biscuit like Sevianne so incompetent at getting herself out of a mess she had not got herself into and when her brown eyes lifted to him with a gratitude so warm that he knew she worshipped him more than she did the Angels, he changed his mind. His work for the peace corps was absorbingly interesting, it was ethically crucial and it was exhausting. Sometimes at the end of a long day, he did not want to go back to his clever family with their laughing arguments and fascinating accounts of painting or humanism or whether the peace corps ought to be re-organised in some less authoritarian structure -- a process which would be a great nuisance to himself and his chums if his mother actually tried it out, so he felt obliged to join in the argument even when they argued about whether his opinion was more valuable because of his experience in the peace corps or should be barred because he was involved in their work and so could not but be partial. Instead of going home he would often go off with Lieutenant Jamies Velor and have several bowls of beer and some cheap food from a roadside stall and they exchanged childish details of sexual activities and sniggered. As van Thiel had said it, sometimes you did not want to be troubled with a lot of stuff about art and politics. And she would be an excellent mother, he could tell. He could always have some side-slip affair. His father delicately made it apparent that there would be no difficulty in paying for an apartment in Sietter Town if Arkyll found Lady el Shosta uncongenial. He knew he was easy-going and he had no objection to keeping the slack behaviours of some silly bitch under a firm hand. Nobody could ever be as much trouble to them as that wild cat his sister. Lady el Shosta was young, she was biddable and she was in an incredulous craven state of trembling happiness to have handsome Arkyll el Maien whom women sighed to read about in the gossip-sheets for her lover. He would have no trouble booting her into doing whatever he wished her to do. It was probably worth it, especially since he could keep a discreet mistress who would know how to pleasure his body once he had the succession secured. Arkyll loved sex but he only liked to have one lover, not to slut it about. He would rather have kept his favours for his wife but if necessary he knew he could keep her on a rein and a mistress on his heartstring. (Continued in Part 3 -- the wedding night)