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Sometimes Kaddar wonders how he should feel about almost every eligible male in his Court lusting after Kalasin. He admits that it's slightly unsettling, after a while—she's married and his, and while there is the whole people-wanting-what-they-can't-have issue, he can't understand why else anybody would want to put up with her every single day of their lives.
Which might just be a little exaggeration, but part of him is still bitter about how the women stopped throwing themselves at him after the first two years of being sole Emperor.
"You encourage them," he tells her, darkly.
"I do not!"
"When that squire something-or-another wrote you a poem, you smiled at him the next day at dinner."
"Kaddar, I was just being pleasant."
"He was so lost in your beautiful sapphire eyes, blue as the depths of the ocean, if I may quote, that he didn't notice that he had overfilled my cup of cordial and was spilling it all over the table. And my clothes."
Kalasin blushes. "Yes, well…"
"And you were flirting with those mages, last time," he accuses. "I saw the look on your face. That was no academic discussion and you know it."
"But Kaddar…"
"What?" he glowers, crossing his arms. "Don't tell me that you like being flattered and having poems written to your left toenail. Or…or…having people salivate over you."
She glares right back at him. "Has it occurred to you that I just might enjoy the attention?"
That floors Kaddar for a few moments, before he retaliates, lashing out in revenge for his wounded pride. "Why do you need the attention? I give you attention. Unless you're just one of those women who needs a harem of male slaves to make her feel—"
"Do you ever think that sometimes I might want realattention and affection and adoration, and all those nice things?" she asks breathlessly, her cheeks flushed with anger. "Don't blame me because—"
"Just go," he tells her bitterly.
Kalasin gives him one last furious and despairing look, before fleeing the room, leaving him sitting alone, with nothing but one of her romance novels and the echoes of their words to keep him company.
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Rawr! Kaddar vs. Kalasin, fight of the century!
Thoughts?
