Free Pet's Pleasure by Zenobia Renquist Page A

“Your Majesty?”
    Bekion didn’t stop walking or turn back. “Yes?”
    “Would it not be better for the replacement to be Starling’s guard while I return to my normal duties?”
    Bekion turned and pinned Nausic with an annoyed look. “Are you questioning my orders?”
    The man stopped short, surprise making his eyes wide. “Never, Your Majesty.”
    “Do you dislike your assignment? Do you think it’s beneath you to watch over my pet?”
    “No, Sire. But I—”
    “Then I suggest you return to your post before I interpret this line of questioning as a resignation from my employ.”
    Nausic snapped to attention. After sketching a quick bow, he returned to the bedroom and closed the door. Several of the servants inched toward the exit as though sensing Bekion’s bad mood. The room emptied quickly and quietly except for Bekion’s guards and one other.
    Vieve asked as she walked toward him, “Would you truly relieve such a valuable man as Nausic of his duties?”
    “Don’t be stupid, Vieve. It doesn’t become you. I won’t have him thinking his current duties are any less important than his previous.” He frowned at her. “Why have you returned? You said you had nothing else for me.”
    She held out a tablet. “A report request from Gorov about your new acquisition. It arrived a moment ago.”
    “It was too naïve to hope the supreme emperor would take longer to notice, wasn’t it?”
    “Stupidity doesn’t become you either, Bekion.”
    He sighed. After a moment to think about it, he handed the tablet back to her. “I’ll handle that after dinner. What else?”
    She held out another tablet after taking back the first. “A somewhat incomplete report of all present at the pet auction, provided by Lukacht.”
    “Lukacht? My mother’s bodyguard?” He took the tablet and stared at the list of names.
    “The same. He handed this to one of my aides with a message for you.”
    He looked up and got the feeling Vieve had been waiting for him to do so.
    She smiled. “He said he knew you would ask, so he saved you the trouble.”
    Bekion perused the list of names again. The number of nobles and affluent merchants surprised him and yet it didn’t. Who else but those individuals could afford the poachers’ auction? “So Tinette was there.”
    It was a safe assumption to make. Lukacht was Tinette’s shadow at all times. His unwillingness to leave her side even as she slept had caused many rumors to start about an illicit relationship between the two. Bekion knew better. Tinette loved his father too much to betray him for a moment’s pleasure, even after so many years without him.
    Vieve said, “Now, now, Bekion. There is no way to know for sure if Tinette was there. We know Lukacht was there. He could have been under orders to observe the illegal auction and its patrons with the intentions of giving you this list.”
    “Your grasp and use of gray-area logic astounds and amazes me at times, Vieve.”
    “I do my best to prove useful to you in all matters.”
    “Good.” He tapped the first tablet she’d given him. “Make sure Supreme Emperor Udo’s report is finished by the end of dinner. I’ll review and sign it before I retire for the night.”
    She inclined her head to him. “Do you require anything else of me before I take my leave?”
    “Have you discovered a way to clone me and thus lighten my workload?”
    “I don’t remember that listed amongst my duties. Should I start that research?”
    Her serious tone mixed with the mischievous look in her eyes made Bekion laugh despite his fatigue. “Absolutely not. I fear you would succeed. I shall see you at dinner.” He relieved Vieve of the last four tablets she had for him before she left the room.
    With a single gesture from Bekion, the remaining guards exited with her. Bekion looked at the four tablets with disinterest—another border dispute, a revised trade proposal from one of the far-off colonies for the acquisition of prize soil, a