KINGDOM OF THE STONE -- a Wattpad featured novel

Chapter Twenty One

Amantis made a point of staying home to eat supper and not going out to the ale house afterwards.  He kept paying Charissa little courtesies, broadcasting by barely subtle means his intentions of spending the evening with her.  He felt he had been very patient with her through the long months of her pregnancy, but now that it was over, he intended to claim his rights as her husband.

After she had finished her bowl of cabbage soup, she rose, picked Garanth up and announced she was going to take him into the other room to nurse.  He knew she intended to quietly crawl into bed afterwards and hoped to be asleep before he came in.  It had become almost a routine with them, but as bed was where he wanted her, he simply poured a drink and sat watching Apaidia clean up, giving Charissa a head start.

It irritated him that Charissa still insisted on calling the baby Garanth.  The appropriate time for the name-day had come and gone at least a fortnight ago without the ceremony.  Ponta had been quite distressed about the situation and when he had explained that they still could not agree on a name, she had suggested "Amantis Garanth" as a compromise.  He had repeated the conversation to Charissa, expecting her disapproval, yet was still surprise at the fury of her wordless glare. 

He didn't much care what the child was called.  What irritated him was her unwillingness to acknowledge his rights as the father.  It was almost as if she wanted to pretend that Karux was the baby's father.

That was a name he hadn't thought of in a while.

He hadn't thought of that witless goat-turd in months.  He wondered if she now did.

Amantis sighed and poured himself another drink.  He had accomplished everything he'd set out to do so far and yet somehow failed at all of them.  Their marriage had been a quiet shameful affair instead of the raucous village-wide party it should have been.  Even the naming ceremony where friends and family would offer piles of blessings on the child was denied him.  He seemed fated to always being denied the opportunity to bask in the simple glow of the community's approval.

Garanth made little fussing noises in the other room then quieted down.  It seemed feeding time was over.  Wishing Apaidia good night, Amantis went into the bedroom.  Garanth lay sleeping in the middle of the bed, Charissa curled around him on her side. 

Amantis carefully lifted the child from the bed and put him in the rarely used cradle.  Garanth stirred, but thankfully stayed asleep.  Removing the pouch with its stone from his belt, he put it on a shelf by the bed and removed his clothes.  He slid under the covers, curled up next to Charissa and touched her gently on the shoulder.

Without opening her eyes, she turned away.

He sat up in bed, staring down at her, rage flooding through him.  She just pulled up the covers over her shoulder and pretended he wasn't there.

How dare she, he thought.  He had half a mind to beat her and take her by force.  Who knows, he thought, she might even like it that way.  She sure seemed to like it rough back in that stoma a year ago.  He'd had to cover her mouth to keep Pronos and Somek from hearing her pleasure as she kicked and scratched that day.

No, he thought as he lay back down in the darkness too angry to sleep.  He would somehow make her want him.  She would forget her anger over being forced to leave the village—it was those senile old elders' fault anyway.  Someday she would recognize her spousal obligations and then she'd realize how patient he'd been with her.  He glanced at the stone in its pouch on the shelf.  He'd consulted it before on how to make her want him, but it seemed the stone was powerless in matters of the heart.

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Amantis tossed and turned all night and got almost no sleep.  He woke in a foul mood and stormed out of the house the next morning, marching down to Straton's field where he'd forced his reavers to sleep in tents.  In between the two lines of tents was a vast muddy expanse that got churned every day beneath hundreds of feet as his spearmen, divided into two teams, competed violently for wreaths of laurel, for bragging rights and the joy of watching the losing team get extra duties.