City of Stairs (The Divine Cities, #1)(110)

What a wonderful thing it was, Shara thinks, to feel common.

Mulaghesh is snoring in her chair in the violet hours just before dawn. Vohannes has to help Shara up the stairs. She stops for breath beside the wide stairway windows. The stars rest on a blanket of soft purple clouds, supported by the walls and cityscape of Bulikov; it is scenic to the degree that it could be the work of a sentimental, tactless painter.

Vohannes slowly limps up behind her, suddenly quite frail.

“I’m …” Shara knows she is about to say something she shouldn’t, but she’s too inebriated to stop herself. “I’m sorry about your accident, Vo.”

“It’s the way things are,” he says softly. If he knows she knows how he really got hurt, he does not show it. “I only ask your help in changing them.”

When they finally make it to her room, she sits on her bed, holding her forehead. The room spins and sways like the deck of a ship.

“It’s been a while,” says Vohannes’s voice in the dark, “since I’ve been in a woman’s bedroom. …”

“You and Ivanya … ?”

He shakes his head. “It’s … not quite like that.”

She falls back onto the bed. Vohannes smirks, sits beside her, and leans back on one hand so he’s hovering just over her, the sides of their hips kissing.

Shara blinks, surprised. “I didn’t think,” she says, “that this was something you were interested in.”

“Well, it’s … not quite like that, either.”

She smiles a little sadly. Poor Vo, she thinks. Always torn between two worlds …

“Don’t I disgust you?” she asks.

“Why would you think that?”

“I’m not doing anything you want. I’m not helping you, or Bulikov, or the Continent. I’m your enemy, your obstacle.”

“Your policies are my enemy.” He sighs. “One day I will change your mind. Maybe I will tonight.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. Do tycoons such as yourself often take advantage of drunken women?”

“Mm. Do you know,” says Vohannes, “that when I returned, there had been rumors that I’d found myself a Saypuri mistress? I was reviled, you know. And, I think, envied as well … But none of it meant anything to me.” His eyes are lacquered: could he be crying? “I was not drawn to you for some exotic fling—I was drawn to you because you were you.”

What right does he have, thinks Shara, to be so pretty?

“If you don’t want me here,” he says, “say ‘no,’ and I’ll leave.”

She thinks on it and sighs dramatically. “You always do cause such difficult conundrums. …”

He kisses her neck. His beard tickles the corner of her jaw.

“Hm,” she says. “Well … Well.” She reaches up, grabs the corner of the bedspread, and flips it back. “I suppose”—she suppresses a laugh as he kisses her collarbone—“you had better get in.”

“Who am I to deny an ambassador what she wants?” He shrugs off his white fur coat.

Was his council meeting so important, Shara wonders, that he had to change?

She must have said it aloud, because Vohannes looks back and says, “I didn’t change. I’ve been wearing this all night.”

Shara tries to hold onto a thought—That’s not right—but then he starts unbuttoning his shirt, and she begins to think about many different things at once.

*

“How would you like me to lie?”

“How would you like to?”

“Well, I mean … because of your hip …”

“Oh. Oh, yes … Right.”

“Here … Is here good?”

“There is good. There is very good. Mmm.”

This is a bad idea, Shara thinks, but she tries to ignore it, and lose herself in this small joy. …

But she can’t. “Vo …”

“Yes?”

“Are … ? Are you enjoying yourself?”

“Yes.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

“I only ask because …”

“I know! I know … It’s … Too much wine …”

“Are you sure I’m not hurting you?”

“No! You’re fine! You’re absolutely … You’re fine.”

“Well … Maybe let me shift to … There. Is that better?”

“It is.” He sounds more determined than amorous. “This is …”

“Yes?”

“This …”

“… yes?

“This should not be so … so difficult. …”

“Vo … If you don’t want to …”

“I do want to!”

“I know, but … but you shouldn’t feel like you have to—”

“I’m just … I’m just … Gods.” He collapses next to her.

Seconds tick away in the dark room. She wonders if he’s asleep.

“I’m sorry,” he says softly.

“Don’t be.”

“I suppose I am not,” he whispers, “the man I was.”