"Begin with the royals and nobles," I said in lieu of a greeting.
Isolde nodded, and her head remained ducked as she led me to the head of the table.
"Prince Dmitri of Quintaine," Isolde said as we stood by a very handsome young man with a stare that fastened to me and a lovely swoop of dark hair. "He ranks a five."
Ah, pity. Fives were the worst on the scale, small and not very girthy. Whoever had designed the rankings had decided it was better to place the worst in the middle and mix the rest up in a complicated code, so as to confuse the numbers and not to bruise the feelings of the men too much.
"Under two minutes, and remained uninspired," Isolde murmured.
So good looks weren't everything then. "Dismiss him," I answered softly.
Isolde crossed his name off her list. There were twenty nobles in total, and I realized they seemed to be a generally uninspired lot according to our statistics. Based on the criteria of penis size, stamina, and refractory period, only five so far met Grandmother's standards, and I'd happily dismissed the rest. We reached the last of the nobles, and I wondered if I could break my own promise to please Grandmother and simply keep him for aesthetics.
He was beautiful in an artful way. His shoulders were strikingly broad, and he remained bare-chested at the table, revealing an exquisite collection of tattoos on his tan body, done as carefully as paintings. His hair was sleek and black, and he was obviously from the Menarry Isles, with dark eyes and full lips.
"Prince Thao of the Menarry Isles, rank three." Three was good, nice and middle of the range. He might be long, or girthy, or average. Nothing too much or too little. An everyday cock by my grandmother's reporting. "His family line are all tiger shifters, but they took special note to say he prolonged for over twenty minutes, and was ready in under that."
The men were instructed not to acknowledge me as I learned their statistics, but Prince Thao glanced up and caught my eye. He didn't smirk, as many of the other nobles did. He looked…nervous. I wondered if it was because he didn't expect to be chosen, given his double nature. Shifters had a kind of magic that resisted our Hunger and was considered a poor choice for Chosen. If the prince were a commoner he wouldn't have been allowed to attend, but exceptions were made for royalty. He probably wasn't expecting to become my Chosen, but I found his nervousness called to me, in sympathy if nothing else.
"He will stay," I said, holding his gaze.
Isolde made her notes, and we moved to the next man.
"This is our ambassador to the Mennary Isles, Wendell Pope. He's a…" Isolde cleared her throat, cheeks flushing. "He's a nine, and he…prolonged for almost an hour."
I blinked at that. Would I even want to be made love to for an hour? Perhaps…if I had the Hunger. I was tempted to dismiss Wendell Pope simply to avoid such a possibility, except that he was so handsome, and Grandmother would probably disinherit me if she learned his statistics.
"We didn't have time to test him again," Isolde whispered.
Wendell Pope's cheeks flushed, and so did Prince Thao's. Was Thao jealous of Wendell's performance? Would that be some of the good tension or the bad tension?
"He will stay," I said.
I hadn't realized how many of my own people I had plucked from the lines, but it was more than double the number of nobles. I decided that if I kept five out of twenty nobles, I would keep twelve out of fifty commoners as if that might make it fairer. Having criteria at least made it a little easier to decide.
For the most part, the commoners favored much better by the statistics, and I let myself grow picky. That one was a two, which was quite good, but he was slurping. This one had a refractory period under ten minutes but only lasted five.
My rakish look-a-like from the great hall was named Cosmo Pianetta, and he ignored the rules in favor of looking back at me.
"A two at thirty minutes and refreshed in about that much," Isolde said, and then added to me, "But they noted that he watched the others as he did it."
I opened my mouth to ask—had the other men inspired him, or was he only prone to staring—and then snapped it shut again. "He will stay," I said, deciding that I could ask him later.
We moved on to a man who winked at me as he ate a chicken drumstick, red beard shining with grease.
"A twelve," Isolde informed me.
"Dismiss him," I said quickly. Anything above a ten was sure to injure me.
I kept a small few of the others, halfway through the group when we reached the older man I'd defied Grandmother to keep.
"Aric Martin, minor magician, an eight. He refused to perform," Isolde said, plenty loud enough for him to hear.
He ignored her and cut carefully at the meat on his plate, taking a bite and then reaching for his wine. Despite being instructed to ignore me, this man somehow made it feel like a defiance. The queen's line didn't usually take Chosen with magic, either mages or shifters, their magic supposedly clashing with the Hunger. Technically, a low magician wouldn't pose much threat, and would still be expected to arrive to the ceremony, but no one would expect me to choose one.
"He will stay," I said, finding his rudeness a strange relief in this situation.
"But, princess," Isolde hissed.
"I have asked for the facts on your list, not your opinion, Isolde. I might as well read it myself," I snapped back.
I was tired. I was anxious. I was a little bit frightened of what came after this. I didn't want to know which of the men Isolde thought would be good bed partners when I wasn't prepared to sleep with any of them yet.
I held my hand out for Isolde's list, my shoulders back and spine pin-straight as I stared up at her. She handed it over with a dark flush on her cheeks and then moved quickly to stand at the wall. When I glanced back, Aric Martin was staring at me, and this time his gaze was ice cold.
I pulled the list up, read the numbers in front of me, and called out my decisions for the table to hear, listing every name I'd marked to stay. Fuck decorum.
"The rest of you are dismissed," I said. "I will see my Chosen in the Rose Room."
From here on out, I would be alone with the men, permitted to do exactly as I pleased with no one to watch but the entire mess of them.
I strode out of the dining room, my hands clenched to fists, ignoring the dozens of eyes on my back.
2
Bryony
I'd stalled, just a little, to change into a new dress. If I'd been like Camellia or Grandmother, I probably would've removed all my clothes and waited in the Rose Room, ready to let the men race to impress me. The Rose Room was a sitting room attached to my own private rooms, although on the opposite side of my own personal sitting room. In the past, I had entertained the daughters of visiting diplomats over tea in that room. Now I was intended to host an orgy there.
Or at least, that would be the expectation.
I stood on the opposite side of the heavy door, listening to the low voices of the men waiting for me, some boisterous and taunting, others only murmurs. I stroked down the silken fabric of my gown, a looser and thinner dress than I was accustomed to wearing. I was grateful to be out of the corsets and ties and layers I'd been bound into as a princess, but it left me with an especially vulnerable feeling to know there was only my slip and this thin gown between me and the rest of the world. Suddenly, the boning of a corset sounded like a reasonable form of armor.