Chapter 19
The Rage Runs Deep
Instead of having Favel and Rossi as dinner guests for Fallcet’s visit, Jenna decided to have Celestina and Josh. Josh was not normally a guest at dinners. He was usually either absent or circling the diners with a camera while they ate. Jenna wanted Josh there particularly because Celestina had already married him in a very private ceremony as soon as it became clear that no one cared if she took her third husband first. It was Jenna’s understanding that Celestina wanted any man who married her to know that Josh was part of the package.
Jenna wanted Fallcet to meet Celestina especially because she was such a great cheerleader to advocate becoming a diplomat. Jenna still hoped to convince him to forget about her and take the crown.
Privately, Jenna found Fallcet loathsome, but she thought his background made him a good choice for a diplomatic position especially if he was able to smooth things over with the AAMC. She didn’t like the idea of marrying him, but as she watched him arrive in the dining hall, watched him take his seat, and watched him give Vash instructions, she found herself questioning what the benefits of a marriage to her might be for him. Why did he want to marry her as her first husband rather than be a third husband or become a diplomat? What was in it for him?
Jenna got Celestina talking about her life and how it was improved by becoming a diplomat. She had always been a spoiled rich girl, but becoming a diplomat had been an excellent move that brought her into the limelight for something important that no one could joke about. She spoke eloquently as her charm lit up the dining hall like fairy lights.
Jenna listened with only half an ear as she pieced together Fallcet’s intentions. It was clear as a bell once she had a minute to collect her thoughts. He was after the crowns on behalf of the AAMC, though not for himself. There were stacks of them and he thought if he could weasel into her good graces, get close to her as her husband, she’d tell him where she’d hid them. He’d betray her in a flash and send the AAMC the crowns with his compliments. With his job complete, he could make up some lame story about how their love hadn’t worked out and Jenna had forced him out. He would ruin her reputation and steal all her authority.
Dinner arrived.
Since Jenna was still not eating food and sipping on an enormous milkshake was inappropriate for a formal dinner, Smoothie had made her something special.
It was bubbles of gelatin filled with a variety of nutritional supplements. They were all the colors of the rainbow, though not organized like a rainbow. They were eaten using a pipe-like object called a fluit. One put the empty fluit to their mouth, sucked the air out, and then stopped a valve in the pipe with a finger to prevent the air from refilling the space. Then one placed the thick end against one of the gelatin balls. The miniature vacuum inside the fluit sucked up the ball and a needle inside punctured it. Then the liquid inside came down the pipe and the person could drink it. It was surprisingly elegant because it was only slightly more busy than a woman smoking a long-stemmed cigarette. Each ball was approximately three sips.
“You don’t eat?” Fallcet asked as he cut into the thick mantle of a portobello mushroom
“How exactly did you order that?” Jenna asked, keeping the revulsion out of her voice. “We don’t serve mushrooms here.”
“I brought it with me. I’m a vegetarian,” he said righteously.
“You asked my cook to prepare that for you?” Jenna asked airily.
“Indeed, I did. She did wonderfully. I’d like to personally thank her afterward if I could.”
Jenna sucked on her fluit and gave herself a moment to think. He was casing her palace. It was entirely possible, from the records she’d seen regarding the night the AAMC stormed her palace, that the AAMC majors didn’t know who or what had attacked them that night. They had their suspicions—very reasonable suspicions—that the reason they’d failed was that Jenna had a Shushfief on staff. Fallcet had brought the mushroom to bait Jenna and confirm their suspicions.
“My PA says your kind regards have been received by the cook and she’s most delighted with your praise,” Jenna said with a smile, lying through her teeth.
“As long as she knows she’s appreciated.”
Jenna nodded. She hoped she’d given him nothing—not a single look to betray how much she wanted to splash water in his face.
“I missed hearing the answer to your question,” Fallcet said, leaning toward Jenna. “Don’t you eat?”
“No. I gave up eating.”
“But you have that delightful pink streak in your hair,” he observed playfully.
Jenna leaped to have a conversation with him about liplo fruit seeds and it was his turn to act like her wild behavior didn’t bother him. His act wasn’t very convincing. Apparently, Excelyn had been right and most Adamis people thought eating them was outside the lines for a proper lady. It made Jenna want to do it again next year to make her hair a warning of what she was willing to do. No one should mess with her.
“Hey, you there,” Fallcet asked, suddenly turning to Josh. “What’s your name again?”
“Josh,” he said, keeping his habit of only speaking in single syllables unless he was talking about filming or photography.
“You’re not wearing a crown. You’re not a diplomat?”
“No.”
“Then why are you here?” Fallcet asked, chewing noisily.
Josh refrained from answering while Celestina took the question. “Josh is my head cameraman. I’m sure you’ve seen the footage that my network plays of the palaces. He directs the camera work.”
“That makes him sound more like a director than a cameraman,” Fallcet said condescendingly.
But he was no match for Celestina who was used to people who would say or do anything in front of a camera. She was unflappable. “He’s very talented. He knows how to do everything and yes, he’s been a one-man media team, but now that everything has gone so well, he has a team working under him.”
“Quite the step up in the world,” Fallcet said in a quasi-flattering tone that seemed to hint that Josh ought to have aimed much higher than to be Celestine’s cameraman. Fallcet’s ambition was on full display. He thought everyone should seek as much power as possible.
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“Aren’t you thinking of stepping up in the world by becoming an Octavian diplomat?” Celestina asked with a wicked little smile on her face. “Don’t you need to impress Jenna to accomplish that?”
Celestina wasn’t going to let anyone act like they did everything themselves. She had fifty people who worked for her and she wouldn’t even be a diplomat if it wasn’t for Jenna. The idea that a person did not need to be cordial to those above them and beneath them disgusted Celestina. The fairy lights around her were turning to lights glinting off dagger blades.
“I was hoping to marry Jenna. I came here saying I wanted to be a diplomat to get my foot in the door.” He was trying to be charming. It wasn’t working.
Celestina made a repulsed sound, halfway between a titter and a snort. Then she turned to Jenna and made a subtle cut sign across her neck.
Fallcet noticed. “What does that mean?”
“She wants to talk to me later,” Jenna said, sounding like the whole thing was tiresome. So tiresome in fact that she had lost interest in dinner all together. “Fallcet, I don’t mind telling you this in front of Celestina and Josh because we have no secrets here. We live in a tight community, and new people who do not carry their weight do not belong here. My focus is not to find a first husband. My relationship with the AAMC can be repaired only through their providing me with decent candidates that I can crown as diplomats. Having considered your proposal, I have to put your plan on pause. I cannot accept a first husband until my duty to the Octavian/Adamis Alliance has been discharged.”
“You have to crown four more diplomats before you can get married?” he asked in disbelief.
“Among other things. I will allow you to spend the night in the Sand Palace, but in the morning, I must ask you to return to Magma Prime. If you do not want to be a diplomat, then you are wasting my time. I will not allow you to stay here as I contemplate whether or not a union between the two of us would be beneficial. In the morning, you can tell me if you have changed your mind about becoming a diplomat. If you haven’t, I think it wise to refrain from having a formal engagement. We’ll speak of the marriage again when I’ve finished filling the seats.”
“I don’t like this decision,” he said in a way that suggested that people often cared whether he liked things or not.
“I’m not particularly interested in what you like,” Jenna said. “I was crowned as an infant. Your squeamishness regarding a diplomatic position strikes me as weak. You said you chose a different path. You thought you could serve others better. I think you seek power without seeking responsibility. That makes you completely different from me. It also makes you seem like you’d be better suited to being a third husband.”
“I won’t consent to that,” Fallcet said without hesitation.
Jenna shook her head wearily. “I didn’t ask you to. I already have a third husband in mind. For the time being, his support, along with Favel, is really all I need. Give it some thought. I’ll talk to you in the morning.” Jenna called Vash. “Please escort Fallcet to the Sand Palace after he finishes his meal. I’m tired. I’ll retire to bed early.”
Celestina and Josh rose from their places at the table.
“You’re all just going to leave me here alone before I’ve finished eating? That’s terrible manners.”
“I’m not going to leave you here alone. I’m going to sit here with you until you finish your food. However, it’s fine with me if Celestina and Josh leave early. They have a very full schedule. It’s a wonder they could join us for the half-hour they spent with us.”
Once Celestina and Josh were gone, Ryatt and Vash stood on either side of Jenna and watched Fallcet finish his dinner. Jenna didn’t look at either of them. She knew Ryatt was irritated because everything was irritating him lately and she could feel Vash’s sensitive heart bleed for Smoothie, who had to prepare a mushroom for dinner.
After Fallcet swallowed the last mouthful, he turned to Jenna. “I feel that I’ve been treated most unfairly. I feel like you’re not even listening to my proposal.”
“That’s funny. I feel that it’s unfair that you were dishonest with your purpose for coming here in the first place. I also feel that if the AAMC thought that I was a real threat to them, you would have become my third husband last year. Instead, I haven’t been as easy to work with as they’d hoped and so now you are here scratching at my door.” Jenna leaned forward and got his full attention. “Listen to me. All the AAMC has to do is provide me with decent candidates and they’ll get crowns. If they provide me with really good candidates, I’ll crown more of them. There is no reason for me to be their enemy.”
He ground his teeth together. “From what I’ve seen, there was nothing wrong with the six majors that came here before. You just didn’t give them a chance.”
Jenna smiled, enjoying herself in a twisted little way. “Because I wanted to talk to them for more than a few hours before giving them a permanent diplomatic appointment? I don’t know what you’ve been told about the incident, but they left the Sand Palace, entered the Dahlia Palace, and barged into my bedroom after they had been on Octavia Prime for less than a single day.”
“That can’t be true,” he spat back.
“It is. The truth is that I’m being more than reasonable. They’re such a large organization in the Adamis Alliance and their weight makes them worth listening to, which is why I gave them an opportunity to make amends. I’m still willing to, which is why I’m letting a candidate come for an interview next week, which I’m sure you’re aware of.”
“They need a stronger voice than one vote. One vote in a vote of eight does not signify power.”
Jenna smiled. “I only have one vote. Look at how much power I have.”
“But you’re choosing everyone!” he retorted hotly.
“I might have been willing to choose you as a diplomat, but that ship has unfortunately sailed. Look, your views and behavior have helped me to make up my mind early. There’s no point in letting you think that I’d be interested in a match with you in the future. I will never marry you. Instead, I think it might be better if you packed up your belongings and got on a pod tonight. I’m not interested in you as a husband or a diplomat.” Jenna got up to leave.
He stopped her with his words, “But I was one of the eleven.”
“Beg your pardon?” she asked over her shoulder.
“The universal matching algorithm. It gave me thousands of matches. It only gave you eleven. That test is flawless. I have fallen like a ton of bricks for every woman on my list. You must feel something for me.”
“How many of those thousands have you met?” she asked, giving into her morbid curiosity and refraining from giving him more of a cold shoulder.
“At least a hundred.”
“And how many wives have you had?” she asked, turning her body toward him.
He suddenly realized he had her attention in a way that he’d not had it before. He seemed like he wanted to hold out on the answer, but he would have also known that if he refused to answer, Jenna would simply ask her PA what information was on public record. “None,” he finally replied.
“So out of thousands of women who were listed as potentials, and the hundred you met in person, you didn’t see anyone who you wanted to pair up with?”
“I have to save that position for a political match,” he explained coldly.
“Ah… I see. You know, I think there’s a reason why so few men showed up on my list. At first, I thought it might be because I am dangerously unlovable, both that I can’t love and that others can’t love me.”
“Seems like a reasonable explanation to me,” Fallcet said almost under his breath.
“I don’t think that’s right,” Jenna said slowly, measuring her tone. “I think there’s another reason. I think the men I match up with best are mostly not allowed to take the test.”
Fallcet cocked his head. “Really?”
“Yeah.” She clicked her tongue against her front teeth. “So, it’s really no skin off my back if things don’t work out between us. It’s none off your back either because, apparently, you match well with thousands of women. I’m sure one of them has enough political clout to assuage your ego.”
Ixy’s voice sounded in Jenna’s earpiece. “If you’re through telling him off, Celestina and Josh have finished packing Fallcet’s things and they’re at the dock with a pod waiting.”
Jenna squashed a chuckle. Celestina and Josh had done that?
“It’s time for you to go,” Jenna said to Fallcet.
He glanced between Ryatt and Vash, both of them were larger men than him.
“Please escort Fallcet to the dock. His pod is all ready for him,” Jenna ordered.
To his credit, Fallcet did not say or do even one more thing. He stood up and allowed the two men to walk on either side of him as they escorted him out.