“Of course, baby. Let me get you some.”
He left the table and came back with three more thick slices of cake for her, all piled on a larger plate.
Allara was delighted—she couldn’t help herself. Sweets were only served on High Holy Days at home and she had never tasted anything half so nice as the “wedding cake” Lauren had made for her and Brand.
As she was sampling the other layers of cake, there was a squeaking sound and then Kat’s voice came through the air sounding magically amplified. Looking around, Allara saw that the red-haired woman was standing in a corner of the room, next to a kind of machine. She was speaking into what looked like a thick metal stick which must be the thing that made her voice sound louder.
“And now that the cake and toast are finished, I am officially opening the karaoke station!” she said. “If anybody wants to sing, come try it.”
To Allara’s surprise, Brand raised his hand.
“I’d like to sing,” he said to Kat. He glanced at Allara. “I hope you don’t mind—when I found out how important music is to your people, I picked out a song to sing for you.”
“Oh, of course.” This didn’t surprise Allara at all. In fact, it was the first time the wedding ceremony had even remotely resembled the ways of the Q’ess.
He wants to sing his song of ownership and dominion, she thought, watching as the big Kindred went over to Kat and spoke with her in a hushed voice. At least one thing would be normal about today. She wondered if her new husband would then expect her to sing her song of submission. It might feel strange to do so outside a Song House, but there were so many strange things today. She supposed she could manage if—
And then Brand’s deep, resonant voice filled the air and she forgot what she’d been thinking—forgot everything but the warm, sensuous sound that washed over her and enveloped her so completely.
“You feel the wind against your cheek
It is my love.
You see the stars in space so deep
It is my love.
Wilder than a river
Deeper than the sea
My love will always
Bring you back to me…”
There was more but Allara could hardly concentrate on the words. It was his voice that moved her so deeply. It had sounded deep and musical when he was talking but when he used it to make Song, the sound was beyond anything Allara had ever heard. It was even better than the string quartet with their vio-lins, she thought!
Deeper than any male voice she’d ever heard among her own people, it filled and overflowed her. As the big Kindred sang, she felt as though her whole body was being caressed by a big, warm, gentle hand. The tips of her breasts became tight and tingly and the place between her legs where a woman may not touch herself felt swollen and hot. What was wrong with her? Her whole body was reacting to him—reacting to his Song in a way that it had never reacted to anyone else’s Song she had ever heard.
It was incredibly arousing and also terribly frightening.
What is he doing? Why is he doing this? she thought frantically. Is he trying to make me betray myself with emotion?
It wouldn’t work, she promised herself. She would keep her face blank and not show all the tumultuous things she was feeling inside. But she couldn’t help the tremors that ran through her. Her eyes grew wide and her breath began to come in short pants. The forbidden places of her body throbbed and she began to feel a deep yearning for something she could not name.
And all the time he sang, the big Kindred looked right at her. His golden eyes captured and held her as his deep voice poured over her like warm saffra honey. Oh Gods of All Creation, would it never end?
She both wanted the Song to finish and wanted it never to be over. But if it didn’t stop soon, she felt as though something was going to happen to her—something surprising and frightening and illicit. She—
“Deeper than the ocean,
Wilder than the sea.
My love will always bring you
Back to me,”
Brand sang and then he smiled at her and handed the metal loud-talking stick back to Kat. Everyone clapped their hands together and, after a moment, Allara realized she ought to be clapping too.
She did her best to join in the clapping as her new husband came back to sit beside her. But her whole body was still throbbing and she was panting with the internal tumult his Song had caused in her.
“I hope that was all right?” he asked, looking at her uncertainly when he sat down.
“Every…every note was true,” Allara whispered, looking up at him. “I felt your Song, my husband,” she could not help adding. “It touched me.”
She meant it in the most literal sense but she wasn’t sure if Brand understood that. However, he seemed to like what she said because his handsome face broke into a broad smile and he took her hand in his and kissed the back of it gently.
“I’m glad you liked it, baby. I wasn’t sure if I should do it or not but Kat talked me into it.”
Allara didn’t think she ought to thank the red-haired woman for that. She had been sent to kill the evil one and satisfy the Blood Feud. But no one had told her that her new husband would have such a voice! No one had warned her that his Song would touch her and stroke her like a knowing hand and move her body in ways she had never been moved before.
No, that’s not quite true, she thought. She remembered once, long ago, after a performance of a trio of moun horn players at the Song House, how she had come back home to her room and felt compelled to touch her forbidden places. Unfortunately, her aunt had caught her at it and beaten her within an inch of her life.
“Never!” she had screeched at Allara as she beat her with the thick wooden handle of a broom. “Never must you touch yourself there! No female may do such things—that place is for the making of babies and nothing else! Until you have a husband, no one may touch it! Do you understand, you loathsome little beast?”
Crying, Allara had tried to explain that it wasn’t her fault—that the moun horns had driven her to it because of the intense feelings they caused in her. But her Aunt had not accepted this excuse.
“Everyone has ‘feelings’ in the Song House but that is where they must stay—in the Song House!” she had shouted at Allara. “Never, never let me catch you touching your forbidden places again! If I do, you will be kicked out of the house and then where will you go? You will no longer be a maiden of one of the Seven Great Houses. When it comes time for your bride auction, you will be sold by the Space Port—sold to a stranger with no status!”
Her threats had put the fear of the Gods into Allara and she had never, ever touched her forbidden places again. But when Brand had been singing, it was as though he was stroking them with his Song—making her feel things she should not—especially not with the evil one she was soon to kill.
“I hope you don’t mind that there’s no dancing,” Brand remarked, breaking her train of thought. “I wasn’t sure how your people felt about it, so I didn’t have Kat schedule a DJ or anything.”
“What is dancing?” Allara asked him. “And a DJ—what is that?”
“A DJ is someone who plays prerecorded songs so that people can dance to them. Er…move to the music,” he explained.