A Malazan Book of the Fallen Collection 3

But I have changed all that.' He drew back a step, although she still held him with one hand. 'Mayen, my wife.' He began undressing her.
    Realities. Moments one by one, stumbling forward. Clumsy necessities. Rhulad's dreams of this scene, whatever they had been in detail, were translated into a series of mundane impracticalities. Clothes were not easily discarded, unless designed with that in mind, and these were not. Her passivity under his ministrations added to the faltering, until this became an event bereft of romance.
    Udinaas could see his lust fading. Of course it would revive. Rhulad was young, after all. The feelings of the object of his hunger were irrelevant, for an object Mayen had become. His trophy.
    That the emperor sensed the slipping away of any chance of interlocking desires became evident as he began speaking once more. 'I saw in your eyes how you wanted me. Now, Mayen, no-one stands between us.'
    But he does, Rhulad. Moreover, your monstrosity has become something you now wear on your flesh. And now what had to arrive. Letherii gold yields to its natural inclination. Now, Letherii gold rapes this Tiste Edur. Ha.
    The emperor's lust had returned. His own statements had convinced him.
    He pulled her towards the bed at the far wall. It had belonged to Hannan Mosag, and so was crafted for a single occupant. There was no room for lying side by side, which proved no obstacle for Rhulad's intentions. He pushed her onto her back. Looked down at her for a moment, then said, 'No, I would crush you. Get up, my love. You will descend upon me. I will give you children. I promise. Many children, whom you will adore. There will be heirs. Many heirs.'
    An appeal, Udinaas could well hear, to sure instincts, the promise of eventual redemption. Reason to survive the ordeal of the present.
    Rhulad settled down on the bed. Arms out to the sides.
    She stared down at him.
    Then moved to straddle this cruciform-shaped body of gold. Descending over him.
    A game of mortality, the act of sex. Reduced so that decades became moments. Awakening, revelling in overwrought sensation, a brief spurt meant to procreate, spent exhaustion, then death. Rhulad was young. He did not last long enough to assuage his ego.
    Even so, at the moment before he spasmed beneath her, before his heavy groan that thinned into a whimper, Udinaas saw Mayen's control begin to crumble. As if she had found a spark within her that she could flame into proper desire, perhaps even pleasure. Then, as he released, that spark flickered, died.
    None of which Rhulad witnessed, for his eyes were closed and he was fully inside himself.
    He would improve, of course. Or so it was reasonable to expect. She might even gain a measure of control over this act, and so revive and fan into life that spark.
    At that moment, Udinaas believed Mayen became the empress, wife to the emperor. At that moment, his faith in her spirit withered – if faith was the right word, that singular war between expectation and hope. Had he compassion to feel, he might have understood, and so softened with empathy. But compassion was engagement, a mindfulness beyond that of mere witness, and he felt none of that.
    He heard soft weeping coming from another place of darkness in the chamber, and slowly turned his head to look upon the fourth and last person present. As he had been, a witness to the rape with its hidden, metaphorical violence. But a witness trapped in the horror of feeling.
    Among the crisscrossing worn paths of faded colour, one led to her.
    Feather Witch huddled, pressed up against the wall, hands covering her face, racked with shudders.
    Much more of this and she might end up killed. Rhulad was a man growing ever more intimate with dying. He did not need reminding of what it cost him and everyone around him. Even worse, he was without constraints.
    Udinaas considered walking over to her, if only to tell her to be quiet. But his eyes fell on the intervening expanse of rugs and their images, and he realized that the distance was too great.
    Mayen had remained straddling Rhulad, her head hanging down.
    'Again,' the emperor said.
    She straightened, began her motions, and Udinaas watched her search for that spark of pleasure. And then find it.
    Wanting good, yearning for bad. As simple as that? Was this contradictory, confused map universally impressed upon the minds of men and women? That did not seem a question worth answering, Udinaas decided. He had lost enough already.
    'Shut