Chapter 2: Every Bond — The Key of Oslov

Volume 8: I'll Be Watching You

Chapter 2 Every Bond

Chapter Notes

If you’re wondering who Vera Linnett is, she was introduced in the “Marinating” chapter of A Serviceable Boy, where Tilrey kept his distance from her because her infatuation had already gotten him in trouble. And now she’s back. Thanks for reading! <3

Chapter Notes

Vera Linnett shut the door of her apartment and pressed her back against it. Not that she’d actually try to keep him from leaving if he wanted to, but—“I know,” she said, as Tilrey hung his coat in the closet and tugged off his boots. “I know you think I’m going to start with all that again, but I swear, I’m not.”Without speaking, Tilrey held out his hand, and she pulled off her own heavy coat and scarf and gave them to him to put away. “It’s been what, seven years since we last talked?”He nodded and took her boots.“And ten years since . . . well, anyway, like I said on the tram, I’ve buckled down. I want to stand for Council election within five years. And I’m married.”Again he nodded, unsmiling. “To Tollsha Linden. I heard, Fir’n. That’s quite an alliance you’ve made.”“It was Mother’s idea. She thinks linking ourselves with the Lindens is our way back to power—that and the committee she heads, and your Fir Gádden’s support.” Green hells, she sounded like a child, babbling on about her mother’s plans. Why was she always undercutting her own authority?She ushered Tilrey into the living room, trying to act like a proper high Upstart, like an adult for once. She was almost sorry she’d already asked him not to call her Fir’n, though formality would seem absurd once she explained why he was here. Wasn’t it already absurd?Tilrey sat on the couch, taking up space with that languid confidence Vera admired whenever she saw him. Mostly these days she just caught glimpses in the Sector, but a few times, years ago, she’d followed him. From the gym to the Café to his Councillor’s apartment; from the Sector to his Laborer dorm in an outer ring. She wasn’t proud of it, but sometimes you just needed a glimpse to keep you going.As she stepped into the kitchenette to heat the water, Tilrey said, “You don’t wear that purple-and-gold scarf anymore.”Vera’s breath caught. “Verdant hells, no. I told you why I wore it, didn’t I?”“Something about being a Hargist and rebelling against the system.”“It was silly.” She imitated her mother’s high-handed tone as she measured leaves into the pot. “I got in with this group of malcontents—not actual Dissenters. We thought we were above politics. We showed our displeasure with the status quo by wearing outrageous colors and sometimes even masquerading as Levels above or below ours. We called it ‘seeding chaos.’ We’d dare each other to stand out in the cold, even go to ground level and walk from building to building.”She was breathing too quickly, probably sounding frantic. She reminded herself it was all in the past, a funny story to tell. “One of my friends died from exposure, actually. He tried to walk right out of the city, just to show he could, and he . . . he . . .”When she looked up, Tilrey’s eyes were on her—not shocked or disgusted, as she half expected, but calm and steady. “I’m sorry, Vera. Was he a good friend of yours?”No one should be sorry about your damned friend. It’s an unworthy death. Her father had said that, and she’d wanted to shout at him, to ask what kind of person could be so unfeeling, but she already knew the answer. People like her parents, pillars of the Republic, couldn’t afford to care about people who wanted to topple it all.“Not really,” she said. “None of them were real friends, just people I hung out with to piss off my parents. My younger brother got involved, too, and—anyway, it was a mess.”She hoped Tilrey hadn’t heard the whispers about Valgund. It was her fault her brother was in moral rehab instead of working in the Sector like her.There was only commiseration on Tilrey’s face as he said again, “I’m sorry. I always admired you, you know. The first time we met, you made these grand critiques of the system using words I’d never heard.”“Yes, well.” Vera grabbed the pot and two tumblers and went in to join him. “I was a silly girl, sheltered and spoiled, and you know how that turned out. I actually feel awful about how I talked back then, how I treated you. So full of myself.”She poured the tea, slopping it a little, and sat down at a respectable distance, trying to ignore the masculine energy radiating off his body in waves. She could practically see the magnetism in the air between them, seething and golden and—no, no, that was all over.Nearly thirty was way too old to be pining over someone who’d never been a remotely appropriate match. Vera was old enough now to understand that, however knee-weakeningly beautiful Tilrey might be, she was the Upstart, the one with the power. She’d found ways to fuck up his life twice, and she wouldn’t do it again.He was watching her with a slight furrow in his otherwise smooth brow, as if detecting the turmoil inside her. “That’s all in the past, Fir’n. I have a good situation now.”With Gersha Gádden. Vera couldn’t repress a prickle of jealousy. “Yes, I’m so glad about that. You were always so bright, and Mother says you’re invaluable to Gersha.”Tilrey picked up his tea and blew on it. When his eyes met Vera’s again, as if to say, And now, Fir’n?, their sky-blue was so intense she had to look away.“I,” she said. “This is going to sound ridiculous. But I want you to understand I’m not, uh—well, I’m not in love with you. Anymore. If I ever was. I think I talked a lot about passion and destiny back then; it was part of my rebellious phase, and—”He was inches from her suddenly, his hand reaching out to right her tipping tumbler, the faint musk of his skin stealing her breath. “Vera. Are you okay?”“I’m fine. Fine.” She laughed nervously and backed away from him. Is his hair longer? I love when it flops in his eyes. I love how his eyes catch the light, and how he looks up through his lashes, and that gritty rumble in his voice when he’s not sure about something, and—STOP.She shoved her own wild hair out of her eyes. Might as well stop wasting his time and say it. “I mean, I am fine, really. I was dead set against the marriage at first, but I got to know Tollsha, and we don’t have much in common, temperamentally, but he’s . . . decent.”“I know Tollsha a bit, Fir’n. He used to try to protect me from his uncle.”The memory of seeing Tilrey with a black eye made Vera wince and avert her eyes. “I know he was hard on you—the uncle, I mean.” Tollsha’s uncle was the late Edmond Linden, former General Magistrate of the Republic. “I’m so sorry. I always wanted to do something to help, but—”“You couldn’t,” Tilrey said almost sharply. He retreated to his end of the couch and drank his tea. “The elder Linden was just a cruel, failing, frustrated old man. So, you’re married. Does that have something to do with why I’m here?”He’d given her an opening, and now she had to take it. Spit it out. “We’re trying to have a child, Tollsha and I. It’s time. The problem is, I can’t, um . . . well, Tollsha says I’m not responsive.” She couldn’t look at him. “Because I can’t come with him. And he refuses to do it if I’m not enjoying it. He says it’s important to him.”Tilrey snorted, making her wince again. “That sounds like Tollsha.”“Do you, uh . . .” She was not going to ask what he knew, if anything, about her husband’s sexual proclivities.“Oh, Tollsha’s mainly into women.” He leaned back, looking thoughtful. “He used to brag about giving girls a good time. He’s the type who sees getting his partner off as proof of his manhood.”“Which isn’t a bad thing,” Vera said hastily.“Not at all, assuming you’re attracted to him. Are you?”An image of her husband flitted before Vera’s eyes. With his butter-blond hair, pouty upper lip, and over-ripe athlete’s body, Bertholdt Linden was handsome, she supposed, and good-natured enough. But he was seven years her senior, and his lordly confidence and limited aspirations made her want to scream. In Tollsha’s view, culinary and sexual gratifications were second only to serving the Republic in the list of priorities, and he considered himself an expert on all three. He never questioned anything.“I’ve tried,” she said.Tilrey chuckled. “It doesn’t work that way.”Now or never. Vera stared at her feet. “I’m not blaming Tollsha. He’s tried, too, but the problem is me. I’ve been with men and women, a decent number, but I’ve only ever actually come with, well . . . with you.”Her face burned. Would he be cocky about it, or accuse her of being in love with him all over again? She counted to ten, barely breathing, before Tilrey spoke—sounding not triumphant, as she’d feared, but still thoughtful.“I thought you didn’t, actually. That time ten years ago—I didn’t know what I was doing.”Vera said in a small voice, “Whatever you did worked.”“You’re talking about the second time here in Redda?”She nodded. How could he not remember every second of that afternoon? She’d gone over it in her mind till it resembled an ancient book with crumbling pages, not a sentence intact.Tilrey was staring into space. “I guess for me that day was kind of eclipsed by what came after.”“Yes.” Did they have to discuss that?“I didn’t think you’d ever want to speak to me again.”Vera looked up too sharply, nearly spilling her tea once more. “You can’t think that. You shouldn’t think that. It wasn’t your fault!”“But that’s just the point, right?”Vera clenched her jaw and tried to focus on the snow that now battered the unshuttered window, flakes fleetingly visible inside the reflection of the room. Against her will, the memory came to life again.She was twenty years old, still at University, and she was in love. Her grandfather had invited her to dine at the Restaurant with him.Throughout her childhood, Vera had looked forward to these dinners where Grandpa talked with her as if she were an adult, chewing over heady ideas and listening to her with great seriousness. Unlike her parents, Magistrate Linnett was shocked by nothing she said. Her pointed questions about the logic of this or that rule failed to faze him. The way Oslovs lived, he’d told her once, was just one of many possibilities, “not decreed by any god on high, whatever they tell you at school.”Tonight Vera was eager to engage her grandfather in a debate about Hargism—perhaps to show off for him a little. She stepped into the Restaurant’s hothouse warmth, breathing in spices unknown in everyday cuisine. Her grandfather was seated at his usual booth in the back, against the ribbed, floor-length windows with their exotic décor of potted tropical plants, and beside him—Vera stopped short. You aren’t supposed to be here.She knew, of course, that Tilrey lived with her grandfather, that he slept with her grandfather. But she did her best to block that out when she was in bed with Tilrey, as she’d been five days ago, experiencing the best three hours of her life. Besides, her grandfather had always been discreet, keeping that part of his private life away from his family. To see them together was wrong.Grandpa Malsha rose to greet her, as affectionate as ever, but she had eyes only for Tilrey. Dressed in the Upstart clothes that advertised his kettle boy status, he didn’t acknowledge her arrival, just gazed out the window with a sullen expression. It was a world away from how he’d been in her bedroom—calm and confident, with strong arms and an easy laugh.Something was very wrong. Vera settled on the banquette opposite them, her face burning.Her grandfather sat back down, too, and wrapped his arm around Tilrey’s waist, drawing him close. Vera shivered with repulsion. For a split second, Tilrey did, too, but he didn’t pull away or raise his eyes. If he hadn’t looked so unhappy, she might have thought he was drugged into numbness.Malsha said softly, “You’ve met my piece?”Vera flinched at the word, staring at the oak tabletop. “Yes.”“Yes. I imagine you’re confused. But so was I, when I learned you’d stolen something that belongs to me.”The server picked that moment to arrive. Vera sat in agonizing silence, unable to look at her lover, while Malsha Linnett ordered eel rolls and raw salmon and rice cakes and hard cider and real Harbourer cheese and pickled sea urchin and mixed seaweed and some Harbourer-style casserole of which he requested a detailed description. If those moments in bed with Tilrey had been the best of her life, Vera decided, these moments were the worst.When the server had been dispatched, the old man leaned back and placed his right hand, tightly entwining Tilrey’s, on the table. “I hope you’ll be understanding, Vera,” he said. “I’ve never had cause to reprove you before. But there are boundaries, and I’m afraid you’ve crossed one.”Someone knew; someone had told him. Surely not Tilrey! She sputtered something that made no sense.Her grandfather replied smoothly, “Yes, indeed, there was a witness. A concerned bystander who told my driver, who followed you on a second occasion. But that’s not the point, Vera. If you hadn’t known you were doing wrong, you wouldn’t have done it on the sly. You would have come right out and asked me.”“Asked you what?” She glanced wildly at Tilrey; she couldn’t help it. Why wasn’t he speaking up? Why wasn’t he explaining that he chose to spend his free time with her because he . . . well, he liked her at least, didn’t he?Tilrey’s lower lip was between his teeth, his eyes down. He didn’t wrench his hand from Malsha’s.“You didn’t ask me if you could use the boy,” said her grandfather, still in that gentle voice. “I would have said no, because it goes against his proper function as political currency, not to mention it’s downright unsavory, and rather absurd, for us to share him. But I wouldn’t have been offended by the request. I know how tempting he is.”Vera was beginning to feel queasy. Being a Linnett, though, she managed to gather a certain icy dignity. “I would never ask to ‘use’ him. He’s a free citizen and not—not something that belongs to you.”Malsha Linnett smiled the way he always did when she showed off her knowledge, but this time she glimpsed his teeth. “I applaud your spirit, my dear, and your idealism. But there are certain realities one must face.” He stroked Tilrey’s captive hand. “No, I don’t own him. But, as his patron and protector, I do own his time, which is quite valuable, and it’s in my interest to control access to that. Now, can you offer me any good reason why you should steal my boy’s time?”Vera was not prepared. The two times they’d gone to her room and shed their clothes and made love—her preferred phrase—she’d told herself a little story in which Tilrey was a fellow student, or perhaps a Laborer working in the admin office. She hadn’t wanted to think about this.If only Tilrey would speak up and explain. Say something smart and witty. Remind her how special he was. But he just sat there in her grandfather’s grip looking dazed and wretched, as if he really were a thing.Vera stumbled over her words. “We’re friends. I knew him before you even did. Before he was your kettle boy.”Malsha looked stern. “Yes, because you snuck into the room where your father was keeping him. That was partly your father’s mistake, I suppose, and partly yours. Either way, the one who suffered for it was poor Rishka, because your father insisted on punishing him for what happened next. What kind of friend are you, Vera, if you get him in trouble and cause him pain?”Tilrey’s mouth twisted, and the knuckles of his trapped hand went white, but he still didn’t speak.Vera wanted to protest, but she couldn’t deny the logic. She’d been explicitly forbidden to enter that room in the Southern Range, forbidden to talk to the frightened Skeinsha boy her father had brought home as a gift for her grandfather. (“It’s a political thing,” her mother had explained, clearly uncomfortable with the whole business.) But Vera had entered that room, and she’d talked to Tilrey and kissed him and fooled around, and he alone had been punished for the things they chose to do together.She’d been living in a fantasy where the two of them could freely choose each other, and she saw now that the choices were all on her side, along with the responsibility. Wrong or right, that was how things were.“Please don’t punish him this time,” she said. “Not for this. It was my fault.”Malsha relaxed his grip on Tilrey’s hand. “Believe me, I don’t want to. But I can’t punish you, and how else can I stop this from happening again?”“It won’t!” Images and sensations jumbled in Vera’s brain. She saw the two sunlit afternoons they’d tangled in her bed; she heard Tilrey’s coaxing murmurs; she felt his skin sliding against hers, smelled the sharp scent of his sweat. The softness of his hair, his teasing tongue, his cock burgeoning against her thigh, the way she’d arced her back and left her body for an endless moment—it had all felt so right, but it had been wrong. It can never happen again. Never.“I promise you,” she pleaded with her grandfather. “It was my idea, all mine, not his. I practically forced him. I won’t touch him again. Ever.”She didn’t know what “punishment” might entail, and she didn’t dare ask. It was unbearable to think of Tilrey being hurt and unbearable to think of her grandfather hurting anyone. “I swear,” she said. “Please don’t make him suffer because I’m spoiled and selfish.”She had been selfish. When they met by chance in the Library and she proposed going back to her room, Tilrey had hesitated. Not for long, but long enough. Then, in her room, she was the one who’d touched him first, who’d kissed him, who’d begged him to take her virginity. And again he’d obeyed.Before Vera could continue with her begging, the server brought glasses and cider. Her grandfather released Tilrey’s hand and poured for the three of them. Vera saw it all through the tears that rolled down her cheeks.When the server was gone, Malsha said, “Drink up, my dear. This isn’t worth all the theatrics. Since you’ve acknowledged your mistake, the boy won’t be punished.”Vera gulped and swabbed at the tears with her napkin, feeling lighter and heavier at once. “You promise?”“I promise,” said Malsha solemnly. “And I understand if you’d prefer to leave now.”Released, Vera sprang to her feet; all she wanted was to put miles between herself and the two of them.But she was weak. Before turning to leave that hateful room, she looked back once, just once, at the man she had until tonight considered her lover.For the first time, his eyes were on her—his beautiful layered, intelligent eyes—and they were shining with his own tears, and they were speaking to her. For years afterward, Vera would try to tell herself Tilrey’s silent message had been Thank you. But she had a feeling it was more along the lines of Damn you.“It was a bad time,” Tilrey said. “For both of us.” He’d closed the distance between them and was holding her hand, but there was nothing amorous about his grip. Vera realized she was shaking.“I didn’t do the right thing, did I?” she said. “I should have insisted Malsha let you speak for yourself. But you wouldn’t speak.”“Before you got there, he told me that if I said a single word to you, if I even looked at you, I would regret it.”Vera nodded, sad but unsurprised. For years, even after her grandfather had been exiled as a traitor, she’d wanted to remember him as the man she’d adored as a child. “I should have told him off. Done something.”Tilrey released her hand. “What would be the point? You know, Fir’n, I was a silly boy myself back then, and I almost thought I was in love with you. I think Malsha knew it, too. He did us both a favor by nipping those feelings in the bud.”Vera didn’t think it was a favor, but she said, “Yes.”“And now you come to me because you want . . . well, what do you want?”Shame rose in Vera’s throat and choked her. But when he looked straight at her and said, “You want to be taught how to come so you can do it with your husband,” she nodded.After a moment, Tilrey smiled radiantly. There was no malice in his eyes. “I guess I’ve developed a reputation as some kind of sex doctor.”Vera grinned back because if she didn’t, she might cry. “I know how it sounds. But it would be only a few times, and only . . . well, sex. I wouldn’t ask anything else from you. And I can give you something in return. My allegiance to Gersha’s faction when I enter the Council, and maybe Tollsha’s allegiance, too. I think he’d be open to leaving the Island Party if I just gave him a push.”I want more than that. So much more. But she was past her days of making reckless demands on anyone.Tilrey’s smile didn’t fade; it was starting to edge into mania. “And if you gave Tollsha a mind-blowing orgasm and the satisfaction of knowing he’d given you one, I’m sure that would put him in the right mood for a little political conversion. Yes, Vera. You’ve come to the right place. I can help with this sort of thing.”

Vera Linnett shut the door of her apartment and pressed her back against it. Not that she’d actually try to keep him from leaving if he wanted to, but—

“I know,” she said, as Tilrey hung his coat in the closet and tugged off his boots. “I know you think I’m going to start with all that again, but I swear, I’m not.”

Without speaking, Tilrey held out his hand, and she pulled off her own heavy coat and scarf and gave them to him to put away. “It’s been what, seven years since we last talked?”

He nodded and took her boots.

“And ten years since . . . well, anyway, like I said on the tram, I’ve buckled down. I want to stand for Council election within five years. And I’m married.”

Again he nodded, unsmiling. “To Tollsha Linden. I heard, Fir’n. That’s quite an alliance you’ve made.”

“It was Mother’s idea. She thinks linking ourselves with the Lindens is our way back to power—that and the committee she heads, and your Fir Gádden’s support.” Green hells, she sounded like a child, babbling on about her mother’s plans. Why was she always undercutting her own authority?

She ushered Tilrey into the living room, trying to act like a proper high Upstart, like an adult for once. She was almost sorry she’d already asked him not to call her Fir’n, though formality would seem absurd once she explained why he was here. Wasn’t it already absurd?

Tilrey sat on the couch, taking up space with that languid confidence Vera admired whenever she saw him. Mostly these days she just caught glimpses in the Sector, but a few times, years ago, she’d followed him. From the gym to the Café to his Councillor’s apartment; from the Sector to his Laborer dorm in an outer ring. She wasn’t proud of it, but sometimes you just needed a glimpse to keep you going.

As she stepped into the kitchenette to heat the water, Tilrey said, “You don’t wear that purple-and-gold scarf anymore.”

Vera’s breath caught. “Verdant hells, no. I told you why I wore it, didn’t I?”

“Something about being a Hargist and rebelling against the system.”

“It was silly.” She imitated her mother’s high-handed tone as she measured leaves into the pot. “I got in with this group of malcontents—not actual Dissenters. We thought we were above politics. We showed our displeasure with the status quo by wearing outrageous colors and sometimes even masquerading as Levels above or below ours. We called it ‘seeding chaos.’ We’d dare each other to stand out in the cold, even go to ground level and walk from building to building.”

She was breathing too quickly, probably sounding frantic. She reminded herself it was all in the past, a funny story to tell. “One of my friends died from exposure, actually. He tried to walk right out of the city, just to show he could, and he . . . he . . .”

When she looked up, Tilrey’s eyes were on her—not shocked or disgusted, as she half expected, but calm and steady. “I’m sorry, Vera. Was he a good friend of yours?”

No one should be sorry about your damned friend. It’s an unworthy death. Her father had said that, and she’d wanted to shout at him, to ask what kind of person could be so unfeeling, but she already knew the answer. People like her parents, pillars of the Republic, couldn’t afford to care about people who wanted to topple it all.

“Not really,” she said. “None of them were real friends, just people I hung out with to piss off my parents. My younger brother got involved, too, and—anyway, it was a mess.”

She hoped Tilrey hadn’t heard the whispers about Valgund. It was her fault her brother was in moral rehab instead of working in the Sector like her.

There was only commiseration on Tilrey’s face as he said again, “I’m sorry. I always admired you, you know. The first time we met, you made these grand critiques of the system using words I’d never heard.”

“Yes, well.” Vera grabbed the pot and two tumblers and went in to join him. “I was a silly girl, sheltered and spoiled, and you know how that turned out. I actually feel awful about how I talked back then, how I treated you. So full of myself.”

She poured the tea, slopping it a little, and sat down at a respectable distance, trying to ignore the masculine energy radiating off his body in waves. She could practically see the magnetism in the air between them, seething and golden and—no, no, that was all over.

Nearly thirty was way too old to be pining over someone who’d never been a remotely appropriate match. Vera was old enough now to understand that, however knee-weakeningly beautiful Tilrey might be, she was the Upstart, the one with the power. She’d found ways to fuck up his life twice, and she wouldn’t do it again.

He was watching her with a slight furrow in his otherwise smooth brow, as if detecting the turmoil inside her. “That’s all in the past, Fir’n. I have a good situation now.”

With Gersha Gádden. Vera couldn’t repress a prickle of jealousy. “Yes, I’m so glad about that. You were always so bright, and Mother says you’re invaluable to Gersha.”

Tilrey picked up his tea and blew on it. When his eyes met Vera’s again, as if to say, And now, Fir’n?, their sky-blue was so intense she had to look away.

“I,” she said. “This is going to sound ridiculous. But I want you to understand I’m not, uh—well, I’m not in love with you. Anymore. If I ever was. I think I talked a lot about passion and destiny back then; it was part of my rebellious phase, and—”

He was inches from her suddenly, his hand reaching out to right her tipping tumbler, the faint musk of his skin stealing her breath. “Vera. Are you okay?”

“I’m fine. Fine.” She laughed nervously and backed away from him. Is his hair longer? I love when it flops in his eyes. I love how his eyes catch the light, and how he looks up through his lashes, and that gritty rumble in his voice when he’s not sure about something, and—STOP.

She shoved her own wild hair out of her eyes. Might as well stop wasting his time and say it. “I mean, I am fine, really. I was dead set against the marriage at first, but I got to know Tollsha, and we don’t have much in common, temperamentally, but he’s . . . decent.”

“I know Tollsha a bit, Fir’n. He used to try to protect me from his uncle.”

The memory of seeing Tilrey with a black eye made Vera wince and avert her eyes. “I know he was hard on you—the uncle, I mean.” Tollsha’s uncle was the late Edmond Linden, former General Magistrate of the Republic. “I’m so sorry. I always wanted to do something to help, but—”

“You couldn’t,” Tilrey said almost sharply. He retreated to his end of the couch and drank his tea. “The elder Linden was just a cruel, failing, frustrated old man. So, you’re married. Does that have something to do with why I’m here?”

He’d given her an opening, and now she had to take it. Spit it out. “We’re trying to have a child, Tollsha and I. It’s time. The problem is, I can’t, um . . . well, Tollsha says I’m not responsive.” She couldn’t look at him. “Because I can’t come with him. And he refuses to do it if I’m not enjoying it. He says it’s important to him.”

Tilrey snorted, making her wince again. “That sounds like Tollsha.”

“Do you, uh . . .” She was not going to ask what he knew, if anything, about her husband’s sexual proclivities.

“Oh, Tollsha’s mainly into women.” He leaned back, looking thoughtful. “He used to brag about giving girls a good time. He’s the type who sees getting his partner off as proof of his manhood.”

“Which isn’t a bad thing,” Vera said hastily.

“Not at all, assuming you’re attracted to him. Are you?”

An image of her husband flitted before Vera’s eyes. With his butter-blond hair, pouty upper lip, and over-ripe athlete’s body, Bertholdt Linden was handsome, she supposed, and good-natured enough. But he was seven years her senior, and his lordly confidence and limited aspirations made her want to scream. In Tollsha’s view, culinary and sexual gratifications were second only to serving the Republic in the list of priorities, and he considered himself an expert on all three. He never questioned anything.

“I’ve tried,” she said.

Tilrey chuckled. “It doesn’t work that way.”

Now or never. Vera stared at her feet. “I’m not blaming Tollsha. He’s tried, too, but the problem is me. I’ve been with men and women, a decent number, but I’ve only ever actually come with, well . . . with you.”

Her face burned. Would he be cocky about it, or accuse her of being in love with him all over again? She counted to ten, barely breathing, before Tilrey spoke—sounding not triumphant, as she’d feared, but still thoughtful.

“I thought you didn’t, actually. That time ten years ago—I didn’t know what I was doing.”

Vera said in a small voice, “Whatever you did worked.”

“You’re talking about the second time here in Redda?”

She nodded. How could he not remember every second of that afternoon? She’d gone over it in her mind till it resembled an ancient book with crumbling pages, not a sentence intact.

Tilrey was staring into space. “I guess for me that day was kind of eclipsed by what came after.”

“Yes.” Did they have to discuss that?

“I didn’t think you’d ever want to speak to me again.”

Vera looked up too sharply, nearly spilling her tea once more. “You can’t think that. You shouldn’t think that. It wasn’t your fault!”

“But that’s just the point, right?”

Vera clenched her jaw and tried to focus on the snow that now battered the unshuttered window, flakes fleetingly visible inside the reflection of the room. Against her will, the memory came to life again.

She was twenty years old, still at University, and she was in love. Her grandfather had invited her to dine at the Restaurant with him.

Throughout her childhood, Vera had looked forward to these dinners where Grandpa talked with her as if she were an adult, chewing over heady ideas and listening to her with great seriousness. Unlike her parents, Magistrate Linnett was shocked by nothing she said. Her pointed questions about the logic of this or that rule failed to faze him. The way Oslovs lived, he’d told her once, was just one of many possibilities, “not decreed by any god on high, whatever they tell you at school.”

Tonight Vera was eager to engage her grandfather in a debate about Hargism—perhaps to show off for him a little. She stepped into the Restaurant’s hothouse warmth, breathing in spices unknown in everyday cuisine. Her grandfather was seated at his usual booth in the back, against the ribbed, floor-length windows with their exotic décor of potted tropical plants, and beside him—

Vera stopped short. You aren’t supposed to be here.

She knew, of course, that Tilrey lived with her grandfather, that he slept with her grandfather. But she did her best to block that out when she was in bed with Tilrey, as she’d been five days ago, experiencing the best three hours of her life. Besides, her grandfather had always been discreet, keeping that part of his private life away from his family. To see them together was wrong.

Grandpa Malsha rose to greet her, as affectionate as ever, but she had eyes only for Tilrey. Dressed in the Upstart clothes that advertised his kettle boy status, he didn’t acknowledge her arrival, just gazed out the window with a sullen expression. It was a world away from how he’d been in her bedroom—calm and confident, with strong arms and an easy laugh.

Something was very wrong. Vera settled on the banquette opposite them, her face burning.

Her grandfather sat back down, too, and wrapped his arm around Tilrey’s waist, drawing him close. Vera shivered with repulsion. For a split second, Tilrey did, too, but he didn’t pull away or raise his eyes. If he hadn’t looked so unhappy, she might have thought he was drugged into numbness.

Malsha said softly, “You’ve met my piece?”

Vera flinched at the word, staring at the oak tabletop. “Yes.”

“Yes. I imagine you’re confused. But so was I, when I learned you’d stolen something that belongs to me.”

The server picked that moment to arrive. Vera sat in agonizing silence, unable to look at her lover, while Malsha Linnett ordered eel rolls and raw salmon and rice cakes and hard cider and real Harbourer cheese and pickled sea urchin and mixed seaweed and some Harbourer-style casserole of which he requested a detailed description. If those moments in bed with Tilrey had been the best of her life, Vera decided, these moments were the worst.

When the server had been dispatched, the old man leaned back and placed his right hand, tightly entwining Tilrey’s, on the table. “I hope you’ll be understanding, Vera,” he said. “I’ve never had cause to reprove you before. But there are boundaries, and I’m afraid you’ve crossed one.”

Someone knew; someone had told him. Surely not Tilrey! She sputtered something that made no sense.

Her grandfather replied smoothly, “Yes, indeed, there was a witness. A concerned bystander who told my driver, who followed you on a second occasion. But that’s not the point, Vera. If you hadn’t known you were doing wrong, you wouldn’t have done it on the sly. You would have come right out and asked me.”

“Asked you what?” She glanced wildly at Tilrey; she couldn’t help it. Why wasn’t he speaking up? Why wasn’t he explaining that he chose to spend his free time with her because he . . . well, he liked her at least, didn’t he?

Tilrey’s lower lip was between his teeth, his eyes down. He didn’t wrench his hand from Malsha’s.

“You didn’t ask me if you could use the boy,” said her grandfather, still in that gentle voice. “I would have said no, because it goes against his proper function as political currency, not to mention it’s downright unsavory, and rather absurd, for us to share him. But I wouldn’t have been offended by the request. I know how tempting he is.”

Vera was beginning to feel queasy. Being a Linnett, though, she managed to gather a certain icy dignity. “I would never ask to ‘use’ him. He’s a free citizen and not—not something that belongs to you.”

Malsha Linnett smiled the way he always did when she showed off her knowledge, but this time she glimpsed his teeth. “I applaud your spirit, my dear, and your idealism. But there are certain realities one must face.” He stroked Tilrey’s captive hand. “No, I don’t own him. But, as his patron and protector, I do own his time, which is quite valuable, and it’s in my interest to control access to that. Now, can you offer me any good reason why you should steal my boy’s time?”

Vera was not prepared. The two times they’d gone to her room and shed their clothes and made love—her preferred phrase—she’d told herself a little story in which Tilrey was a fellow student, or perhaps a Laborer working in the admin office. She hadn’t wanted to think about this.

If only Tilrey would speak up and explain. Say something smart and witty. Remind her how special he was. But he just sat there in her grandfather’s grip looking dazed and wretched, as if he really were a thing.

Vera stumbled over her words. “We’re friends. I knew him before you even did. Before he was your kettle boy.”

Malsha looked stern. “Yes, because you snuck into the room where your father was keeping him. That was partly your father’s mistake, I suppose, and partly yours. Either way, the one who suffered for it was poor Rishka, because your father insisted on punishing him for what happened next. What kind of friend are you, Vera, if you get him in trouble and cause him pain?”

Tilrey’s mouth twisted, and the knuckles of his trapped hand went white, but he still didn’t speak.

Vera wanted to protest, but she couldn’t deny the logic. She’d been explicitly forbidden to enter that room in the Southern Range, forbidden to talk to the frightened Skeinsha boy her father had brought home as a gift for her grandfather. (“It’s a political thing,” her mother had explained, clearly uncomfortable with the whole business.) But Vera had entered that room, and she’d talked to Tilrey and kissed him and fooled around, and he alone had been punished for the things they chose to do together.

She’d been living in a fantasy where the two of them could freely choose each other, and she saw now that the choices were all on her side, along with the responsibility. Wrong or right, that was how things were.

“Please don’t punish him this time,” she said. “Not for this. It was my fault.”

Malsha relaxed his grip on Tilrey’s hand. “Believe me, I don’t want to. But I can’t punish you, and how else can I stop this from happening again?”

“It won’t!” Images and sensations jumbled in Vera’s brain. She saw the two sunlit afternoons they’d tangled in her bed; she heard Tilrey’s coaxing murmurs; she felt his skin sliding against hers, smelled the sharp scent of his sweat. The softness of his hair, his teasing tongue, his cock burgeoning against her thigh, the way she’d arced her back and left her body for an endless moment—it had all felt so right, but it had been wrong. It can never happen again. Never.

“I promise you,” she pleaded with her grandfather. “It was my idea, all mine, not his. I practically forced him. I won’t touch him again. Ever.”

She didn’t know what “punishment” might entail, and she didn’t dare ask. It was unbearable to think of Tilrey being hurt and unbearable to think of her grandfather hurting anyone. “I swear,” she said. “Please don’t make him suffer because I’m spoiled and selfish.”

She had been selfish. When they met by chance in the Library and she proposed going back to her room, Tilrey had hesitated. Not for long, but long enough. Then, in her room, she was the one who’d touched him first, who’d kissed him, who’d begged him to take her virginity. And again he’d obeyed.

Before Vera could continue with her begging, the server brought glasses and cider. Her grandfather released Tilrey’s hand and poured for the three of them. Vera saw it all through the tears that rolled down her cheeks.

When the server was gone, Malsha said, “Drink up, my dear. This isn’t worth all the theatrics. Since you’ve acknowledged your mistake, the boy won’t be punished.”

Vera gulped and swabbed at the tears with her napkin, feeling lighter and heavier at once. “You promise?”

“I promise,” said Malsha solemnly. “And I understand if you’d prefer to leave now.”

Released, Vera sprang to her feet; all she wanted was to put miles between herself and the two of them.

But she was weak. Before turning to leave that hateful room, she looked back once, just once, at the man she had until tonight considered her lover.

For the first time, his eyes were on her—his beautiful layered, intelligent eyes—and they were shining with his own tears, and they were speaking to her. For years afterward, Vera would try to tell herself Tilrey’s silent message had been Thank you. But she had a feeling it was more along the lines of Damn you.

“It was a bad time,” Tilrey said. “For both of us.” He’d closed the distance between them and was holding her hand, but there was nothing amorous about his grip. Vera realized she was shaking.

“I didn’t do the right thing, did I?” she said. “I should have insisted Malsha let you speak for yourself. But you wouldn’t speak.”

“Before you got there, he told me that if I said a single word to you, if I even looked at you, I would regret it.”

Vera nodded, sad but unsurprised. For years, even after her grandfather had been exiled as a traitor, she’d wanted to remember him as the man she’d adored as a child. “I should have told him off. Done something.”

Tilrey released her hand. “What would be the point? You know, Fir’n, I was a silly boy myself back then, and I almost thought I was in love with you. I think Malsha knew it, too. He did us both a favor by nipping those feelings in the bud.”

Vera didn’t think it was a favor, but she said, “Yes.”

“And now you come to me because you want . . . well, what do you want?”

Shame rose in Vera’s throat and choked her. But when he looked straight at her and said, “You want to be taught how to come so you can do it with your husband,” she nodded.

After a moment, Tilrey smiled radiantly. There was no malice in his eyes. “I guess I’ve developed a reputation as some kind of sex doctor.”

Vera grinned back because if she didn’t, she might cry. “I know how it sounds. But it would be only a few times, and only . . . well, sex. I wouldn’t ask anything else from you. And I can give you something in return. My allegiance to Gersha’s faction when I enter the Council, and maybe Tollsha’s allegiance, too. I think he’d be open to leaving the Island Party if I just gave him a push.”

I want more than that. So much more. But she was past her days of making reckless demands on anyone.

Tilrey’s smile didn’t fade; it was starting to edge into mania. “And if you gave Tollsha a mind-blowing orgasm and the satisfaction of knowing he’d given you one, I’m sure that would put him in the right mood for a little political conversion. Yes, Vera. You’ve come to the right place. I can help with this sort of thing.”