Page 1 of His Realm

HIS REALM

On their first meeting, Varic Maedoc, prince of the vampyrs, told Jason Thorpe that loving him was not for the faint of heart. He wasn’t kidding. In the past two years, Jason has been kidnapped, lived through several attempts on his life, and foiled a coup. Now, his new life as the prince’s consort and adviser to the king is made even harder by Varic’s prolonged absence. With his prince off hunting down a traitor, Jason must fend for himself.

While the separation doesn’t last, even Varic’s return won’t stave off the wicked plotting of others, and Jason soon finds himself—again—fighting for his life while navigating ancient betrayals and revenge put in motion before he was even born. And he must prevail because his prince needs him to bring a place without honor back into his realm.

But what festers in rage and bitterness is something Jason never expected, and nothing he’s experienced in his human life, or in the decadent court of the king, could’ve prepared him for the wrath that’s about to be unleashed.

Varic needs both his crown and his consort to be the king he’s always wanted to be, and it’s up to Jason to make sure their bond never breaks.

ONE

As prince consort, I was betting that those who didn’t know me thought I led a life of leisure. They would be wrong. In fact, leisure, or more accurately, rest, had not been a part of my life since I met Varic Maedoc, Prince of the Noreia, of the vampyrs, two years ago.

Most days, I barely had time to breathe, especially lately, completely entrenched in my role of cadeyrn, or majordomo, both ancient titles that meant the same thing: that I basically wrangled cats for the king. I oversaw all the work that had to be done in the palace and on the palace, as in construction and restoration. Since the bones of the king’s home, most notably the hypogea and catacombs beneath it, dated between late third century and early seventh century, to say that it needed updating was an understatement. There was still damage from bombs dropped in the Second World War that had destroyed underground areas of the palace that no one had ever attempted repairing. Clearly, what was cosmetic, what could be seen of the palace, had been the main concern. That was all well and good, but without reinforced support, the whole thing could, someday, drop into the catacombs. At the moment I was in charge of shoring up the foundation, making sure everything remained standing. I was responsible for vampyr history that most of humankind had no idea existed. The irony was not lost on me.

Having been placed in my new post a little over a year ago, working seven days a week, twelve to sixteen hours a day, with spotty time off, I was beat. And now I was mere hours away from leaving on a well-deserved vacation. Just the fact that under my leadership the palace was no longer going to slide into the sea deserved at least a celebratory lunch. Not that vampyrs ate lunch. They ate nothing at all, only drank. This was a lot of the issue.

I got tired after spending the better part of twenty-four hours on my feet. Not them. I got the feeling that many of the people who worked for me thought I was a slacker when I was asleep on my feet at one in the morning. But that didn’t matter right now, nothing did, because the following morning I was flying back to New Orleans for a much-needed visit with my best friend Ode and to check in with her about the state of our business in the French Quarter. I could barely wait. To shed all my responsibilities and simply be myself, just Jason Thorpe, a nobody in a sea of humans, was something I’d been looking forward to for the last month. I needed to recharge, and without Varic here, without the man I loved, the loneliness, coupled with all that was expected of my station, had been slowly strangling the life out of me.

Not that I was complaining, merely fading. Quietly. Because along with work, there was being a member of the royal family. From the outside looking in, being prince consort would appear to be endless parties and being surrounded by beautiful people, but that wasn’t all there was. There was so much to know—etiquette that could mean the difference between life and death, and ancient grudges that made no sense to a human in the world of vampyrs. After the events of the previous year when the king lost his most trusted adviser, Gideon, his rajan, he looked to me to take on the position of adviser as well, which I now knew meant fixer more than anything else. Being the man who cleared the road for the king was not a small task. Looking back at all the nefarious plotting Gideon had done, I had to wonder when the man had the time. Keeping the king on task was a full-time job in and of itself.

If His Majesty decided to waste away the day in bed with his courtiers instead of receiving visitors—and there were always visitors—it fell to me to make excuses for him not being in attendance. If the king was supposed to spend time with the children of one of his courtesans but got caught up with another, literally, that was also up to me to convey his apologies. I had a lot of gifts delivered to the palace and sent in his stead. This was on top of my regular duties, which included settling disputes between lords, new titles to approve or decline, courtesan contracts to manage, funds to transfer, who was allowed to travel and where, and overseeing the security of the palace.

When I was first given my new title, I had joked with Varic: who told him, or the king, that I wanted to work? Didn’t being engaged to a prince entitle you to days of doing nothing but walking on the beach? Really, though, I had to work. I would have gone crazy doing nothing. But there was working, and then there was the never-ending to-do list from hell. Between the administrative tasks and pageantry, I fell into bed in the wee hours of every morning. Facedown. From a standing position.

I was a social worker, diplomat, liaison, and dress-up doll all rolled up into one. I was tired. Leaving for a month sounded heavenly. Best of all, I had made certain to catch the king in a moment of distraction, and asked if I could travel with only my champion and one other.

“Of course, Jason,” the king had replied, on his way to speak to a stunning woman whom he’d offer to be yet another of his courtesans.

Initially, I thought that when the king released all the concubines from his service, no longer having a harem that entertained him and the others, gone would be the days of him collecting beautiful men and women. I had no idea why I ever thought anything so stupid.

Now, instead of having a harem that served for an agreed-upon amount of time and then left, giving the king a revolving door of new blood, his only allowance to them being room and board, now each person signed a contract that promised money and property when they wanted to leave.

What was worse was that he’d grown tired of many of the older courtesans, those women and men who’d been with him for centuries. And now, with a reason to remove them from the palace—“space concerns” was what he told me—they were being relocated in droves.

Was it a lie? Of course it was. The palace was enormous, and the wing Messina Maedoc inhabited was the biggest part of the whole.

It was so sad. Many of the courtesans wanted to be the king’s one and only love, spending days and nights alone with him. I wondered how they could be so obtuse. They could plainly see how many of them there were. How in the world could there be an expectation of exclusivity? How could they ever imagine they’d captured his special interest? Young and beautiful was what he wanted, not companionship. If he wanted to be with someone he actually loved, he would send for the queen, or leave the palace to visit her on her island in Greece. I was always taken aback at their surprise that he’d grown tired of them. I always wanted to say, really? You thought you were the one? It was mind-boggling.

They reminded me of mistresses who became wives who were then astounded when their husband ended up having an affair, except that what the king did couldn’t even be classified as cheating. Our monarch was allowed unlimited bed partners, so for them to think they were more was heartbreaking to witness. Their crestfallen faces when I had to unceremoniously ask them to leave the palace killed me.

Every day I would receive a list of names from the king, those of courtesans who were to be removed from the royal abode. Each of them was given an exorbitant monthly allowance and an opulent residence, here in Malta or abroad. The issue was, most of them had only known life within the walls of the palace and serving Messina Maedoc, their king. Worst of all, once he decided he wanted them out, he refused to see them again. He would not receive them in his chambers, only wanted all trace of them removed.

Those who had produced offspring, at last count sixty-three, were allowed to remain in the palace until the children themselves were ready to leave. The moment they left for school or to travel or simply to follow their dreams, their mothers were given their stipend, the choice of where to live, and were banished from the palace. The children were allowed to return whenever they wanted, to visit their father, but many did not. If I were them, I wouldn’t have either. Screw him. Centuries of devotion from their mothers, only to be cast aside for a new pretty face? Were he my father, it would have been a cold day in hell before I went back. The older male courtesans were dismissed in the same way, though without children, they were culled far more quickly but with the same amount of tears.

I had to stand in front of wailing, heartbroken men and women, and my only words of comfort to them were about being provided for monetarily. There would always be lavish clothes, jewelry, material things, as well as homes to call their own. Honestly, I was thinking that were I a courtesan, I’d take the exit package and be thrilled. I’d buy an apartment in Paris or a cottage in the English countryside or a darling home in the French Quarter, make friends, fall in love… It could all be wonderful. Unfortunately, they all felt about the king the way I felt about Varic and were utterly heartbroken. Though if the prince ever took another lover, I would not stick around. It was why I thought of my friend Nerilla often, the dowager princess who died. The woman who’d stepped aside when her own prince chose a courtesan over her. I couldn’t do it and had informed the present heir to the throne of that fact. The men of the Maedoc line, those who were kings, did as they wanted with those they claimed to love, and they had all been the same, taking what they wanted…until Varic. Until my Varic. The one I loved, loved me back just as fiercely. I had to remind myself of that, as he’d been gone now five months.

That evening, walking through the great hall, milling with others at yet another party hosted by the king—this one a masked ball to welcome a delegation from Geneva—I realized I was tired down to my bones. But still, even as weary as I was, I noticed people moving near the king that seemed out of place. I went on immediate alert over the perceived threat but second-guessed myself just as quickly because I’d been told a million times over the past few months that I was being absurd.

I’d noticed strangers, but when I pointed them out to others, they were gone. Doors were left unlocked that I myself had made certain were secure. Curtains were drawn at odd times of the day, in what I saw as patterns. Two were pulled to the right, one in the middle, one to the left. I saw signals, communication to those outside the palace, looking in possibly through scopes or binoculars. I was certain there was a secret dialogue going on.

“You need more rest,” Dae-Jung, my confidant and personal chef, would tell me.

“I’m not crazy,” I always insisted.

“I didn’t say you were,” he’d reply indulgently.

I was being placated.