Miriam would never forget the look on her father’s face, the agony he endured before his head lolled forward and his crown slipped. “Training?” she queried, beginning to quiver. “As a sex slave,” Renaud told her, roughly fondling her backside. Why couldn’t she learn to keep her mouth shut? “Do I get a choice of instructor?” she queried, and was unprepared for the reply. “No, but it’s someone you know very well,” the Masked King sneered. Miriam wondered how he knew, seeing as he had only been in the territory for a very short time. Or had he? Maybe he’d camped a few leagues distant and had been plotting this for weeks? The same applied to Renaud. Had someone betrayed her? She wouldn’t put it past Daphne, or maybe even the late King Gregory. Numbness was all she could summon when she thought of her father and the horrible way he’d died. Perhaps she was still in shock. She ought to be upset, enraged, and worried about her own circumstances, too, but it felt like all those emotions

The room was square in shape with mirrors on the ceiling and at various points on the wall. There was even one beneath her feet. At least, it would have been had she not stepped over it.“Is this what you do to supplement a mercenary’s meagre income in a time of peace?” she asked, in case anyone was listening.“What do you think?”If she was honest with herself, she couldn’t see him in such a role at all and yet, here he was. Here they were.“So what happens now?”“I further your education,” he told her, peeling himself away from the back wall and advancing towards her like a predator.“Did you volunteer, or did he insist?”“Be quiet, Mimi, and get down on your knees.” That was when he took out his cock. “Open your mouth, wide.”She tried to remember her first time. Sanctioned by King Gregory and done to save her sister. Some of the women had gossiped about this sort of thing, comparing experiences with lovers, husbands and demanding palace guards. Maybe she should touch him first, as

Miriam was learning a very different type of dancing under the eunuch’s watchful gaze. It involved sensual movements and rippling the belly in a way which was supposed to delight and entice. As was customary with her, she closed her eyes and thought of Ketil.In some ways he was her lodestone, the talisman she used to get her through the tough times.Not that she was suffering hardship. She had enough to eat and drink, though was becoming fed up with the sweetmeats which had been such an unexpected treat in the beginning.Oh, for the hours of boredom when she indulged herself by reading under a tree, having escaped the confines of the palace.Dreading the day when she would have to endure the attentions of the Masked King, she counted on her fingers and realised this whole torrid situation had taken place in just over a week. It was hard to believe.Miriam had to admit it hadn’t been all bad spending time among the mercenaries. The fate she had dreaded on leaving the Great Hall had no

Ketil was amazed yet again by Miriam’s selflessness. He hadn’t even spared a thought for the jester and yet, here she was, wondering if he had survived the attack. Though she didn’t spell it out, her fear for him was very real. It was one more indication of why she would make a good queen, yet she needed someone to temper that kind heart.Unpalatable decisions were sometimes required of a leader. He knew that at first hand and, having been groomed to become Jarl from birth, it was something intrinsic to his nature, even now, when there was scant chance of that in his homeland.Resolving to make it his personal mission to find out about the jester, Alaric, when he was in a position to do so, he rose early while Miriam was still sleeping and went to wash in a nearby pool.Sigurd joined him without a word, which was unusual for him. He had to find a way to break through that wall of ice.“Say something,” he urged, before submerging himself once more.“She is changed.”“No more than you.

It was so easy to mortify his lady, even when he assumed she would take his comments in good part. Astrid would have, but she had been raised in the Viking way where modesty was usually mocked and men and women alike were comfortable with their nakedness. Though, he had to admit, his half-sister and Sigurd would need some time to adjust to their new relationship. Were it not for her unfortunate past he might have bedded her already, but the easy jokes had not returned and his face was serious more often than not, which added up to only one thing: they hadn’t yet consummated their love. With Miriam, he had simply assumed it would never happen. Loving her from afar as he did was enough, until she fell into his lap because he could not allow anyone else to buy her. He had been so angry; he still was. Rumours abounded about the Masked King, claiming he dined regularly on human flesh and tore apart the women unlucky enough to find favour in his eyes. Had he spread those himself or was some