My Father's House
"They… they raped me," Arruth sobbed to the little pinch-faced healer as he finished Reading her. Solance wore black robes, which made a soft swishing sound as they brushed the tops of his tall boots. He sashed the robe with a length of magenta silk in a curious bow to vanity while his purses and pouches hung from a narrow leather belt beneath it. He was the only healer available in the infirmary annex so early – dawn was still an hour away. His examination room smelled of oleander, caster beans, and rhododendron, although no greenery was present.
She gripped the wooden edges of the plain, unadorned chair until her knuckles whitened, her legs curled tightly around the bottom, ankles hooked together as if her body could deny the violation by clutching itself. The chamber was cold, sterile, and efficient. A desk and several tables with odd alchemist's equipment covering them: crystals for preserving tissue samples; bottles and beakers and tubes; a small oil burner for heating his concoctions. Many shelves of herbs, chemicals, bottles of powders and books lined two walls. All of it made Arruth that much more uncomfortable. Had any other healer been available she would have gone to them. But only Solance had been present in the healers' ell.
"Oh, I rather doubt that," Solance said, casually indifferent. "You broke the rules in the first place. Your reputation is well known. I doubt there is a male in Ishladrim citadel you have not at least brushed your lips across. You've enticed them all."
Arruth choked, stunned by his attitude. In Shaurone they would have placed a mace in her hands and gone after him, watched as she beat his head in and then cut his ears off so that she could wear them on a cord around her neck along with the tanned sack his balls had hung in. They would never have placed the blame on her. When Talons warned her that Creeya was different, she had never dreamed – never in her darkest nightmares – that it could be this different. This was what Talons had meant by 'the rules.'
"Considering your reputation. All you Sharani are whores and sluts," he said distastefully, staring down at her. "Lord Wrathscar can have any woman he wants. All of his mistresses are far prettier than you are. Why should he go to the trouble of forcing an over-sized ox like you?" He took a jar of cream from a shelf. "This will take the tenderness out, help the tissues to heal. Try acting like a proper woman and this will not happen again."
Arruth shrank away from him, her thoughts whirling in terrified, humiliated patterns. A proper woman. Broken the rules. Broken the rules. Broken the rules. A proper woman. I'm not a proper woman.
"You do want this, don't you?" he asked. "It will make it feel better."
Arruth snatched the jar from him and fled with a sob.
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