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And then she said, “He has nothing to do and he’s a gossip. He’s probably beside himself, all these goings-on happening in the city where he’s been assigned.”
That brought forth an interesting point.
“Do you know why a Go’En of his stature was assigned outside the Dome City?” I asked. “It’s unusual. A high priest of his standing, they normally reside permanently in the city-state.”
“I’ve no clue and I don’t care,” Melisse answered. “The machinations of the Go’Doan have never been of much interest to me.”
I wished I could agree.
For my part, I found them fascinating, but sometimes not in an enjoyable manner.
However, there were more important things to discuss.
“We must speak of Mum.”
She patted my elbow where her fingers were still wound.
“Not to worry. I’ll take you to your tent, then go back and talk with Lucinda and Agnes. I’ll make certain they find a way to cut the Go’Doan’s visit short. I’ll see to it she has a potion. She’ll be refreshed by tomorrow.”
I stopped us and turned to my mentor, my mother’s most trusted lieutenant, as well as her, and my, most trusted friend.
“The maneuvers she’s designed—” I began.
“She’ll be fine,” Melisse assured.
“She simply watches them, but we’ll have an audience of tens of thousands, and she’ll—”
She rolled up on her toes and captured my eyes with her astute hazel ones.
“Be fine, Elena. Do not worry.”
“It’s impossible not to worry about my mother,” I muttered.
She started us walking again. “And this is but a part of the plethora of beauty that makes you.”
I wanted that compliment—a rare one from Melisse, who preferred to allow actions to speak louder than any words—to make me feel better.
But I did not feel better.
Tomorrow, for the first time, I would meet my future mate.
But before that, myself, and my sisters (but it was worth repeating, myself) had to put on a show for tens of thousands of people, including queens, future queens, princes and kings.
I cleared my throat and asked, “Do you know much of Prince Cassius?”
“I know he’s a good strategist. I know that his father, like your mother, but for reasons not like your mother, protected his sons so if one was off to battle, the other was not. This he did to protect his heirs, not his sons, not his family, as your mother does when Serena goes to battle, but you patrol. Your mother knows Serena was built for battle, and you for patrol.”
She stopped speaking as she often did during our talks to ascertain her point was made.
I nodded my understanding as I often did during our talks to assure her of that.
Only then did she speak again.
“I have also heard tale that his men are loyal to him, very much so, like blood brothers.”
As we walked, she purposefully bumped into me.
“And I have heard he is extremely handsome,” she finished.
I bit the inside of my cheeks.
Her tone gentled.
“You must let go your feelings for True,” she advised.
“I’ve already done that,” I told her what was mostly the truth, (actually, more like partly the truth). “I have meditated much on it, but as things stand, the simple matter of fact is that I have no choice.”
“You don’t, my sister-daughter,” she whispered. “For that I am sorry. But I must say, as fine of a male as he is, I never thought he was right for you.”
That made me stop us again.
“Truly?” I asked.
She nodded. “He is gentle. He is good. He is,” a small, sad smile, “true. And because of that, there is no balance.”
“But, we agree on all things,” I told her.
At that, she shook her head. “I do not know. I take men for pleasure. I took them to have my daughters. I did not take one as mate. But I would think, especially for you, it would be most boring to spend your days with a mate with whom you agree on all things.”
She started us walking again and kept speaking.
“You are Nadirii. You embody who and what we are, not simply because you are our princess, but because you are you. You are warrior. I know you and I know there will be times you’ll wish to put your feet up and enjoy a glass of wine and harmony. But it is in your blood to fight for what is good and right and just and to know those around you know and respect your mind. And so I do not think an eternity of peace is what would fill your heart with gladness.”
“I’m not like Serena. I don’t need to be at odds with everyone around me.”
“But you are like Serena in that you need things that you find challenging. True would never be a challenge to you. I fear, with the Dellish prince, you mistake friendship for passion.” She paused before she concluded, “I also believe you will discover the difference very soon.”
She couldn’t be more correct in her thoughts.
For I had no choice.
“All will be well, my sister-daughter,” she assured me. “And you will be happy.”
I thought of the Unicorn card I had turned some weeks before.
“How can you know?” I asked.
I looked at her through the cool night air as she answered, “For you are you, Elena. I know you. You will find a way.”
It was that compliment that penetrated.
And thus, we walked in silence the rest of the way to my tent.
Though the air was not silent as we approached.
What rose from my sister’s tent, set not far from mine, could easily be heard.
Womanly laughter. Manly laughter. Groans. Grunts. Moans. And whimpers.
I looked to Melisse to see she had her brows drawn as she studied my sister’s tent on our way to mine.
“It sounds, as ever, that your sister is seizing the opportunity afforded her,” she murmured.
My sister, yes. As well as, from what I could hear, her lieutenants, Heloise and Genia, her mentor, Darma, with a few more Nadirii included.
Hours before, when we’d arrived at the area where we were to make camp, we found the King of Firenze had provided us a welcome gift.
Dozens upon dozens of baths set in crimson tents attended by Firenz men (or boy-men, for not a one of them was probably less than seventeen, but not a one of them was surely older than twenty).
These baths had clean, but fragrant milky water floating with petals and there were a plethora of jars and bottles of oils and lotions and salts and elixirs for skin and hair.
Precisely what a man would think a woman would want after a long ride.
It was true, of a sort. And because it was, I took a bath (without using the male servants to wash my hair, scrub my back and…other) and it felt nice. The selections I used smelled lovely, worked beautifully and helped to relax my muscles and take the tightness of the sun out of my skin.
But…
Please.
“I bid you goodnight here, sister-daughter,” Melisse said on a squeeze of my elbow.
“Goodnight, my mother-friend,” I murmured.
We touched cheeks and she gave me a small smile before she wandered away.
I watched her for a moment before I turned my attention to Serena’s tent.
I had a mind to march over there, enter, and remind her I had an eight-year-old girl in my tent and I was not best pleased this was the lullaby she was hearing in a foreign land the night before we were all to enter a foreign city and attempt to win entire realms with drills and magic.
But I not only did not want to see my sibling as she likely was now.
I did not think I could keep my temper.
And my mother, and Melisse, had taught me well.
Therefore, I went to my tent and threw the flap back, only to have my own lieutenant, Hera, immediately approach me.
“Would that we were engaging in games on the morrow, not drills,” she h
issed. “I’d select her, unseat her and humiliate Serena in front of Firenze, Airen, Wodell, Mar-el and the bloody Go’Doan.”
“How long has it been lasting?” I whispered back, my gaze flicking to the lump under the quilt on the pallet.
“An eternity?” Hera questioned in her sardonic answer.
“I’m sorry,” I replied.
“You attended our queen,” my friend said on a sigh. “And she is fine. She feigns sleeping, but Serena’s ways are not unknown to her.”
They were not, for the most part.
Though perhaps not these ways.
“Go, my beloved friend,” I urged. “Sleep. I’ll see you on the morrow.”
Hera glared at me, glared at the pallet, glared at the tent wall beyond which was Serena, and then she nodded and took her leave.
I discarded moccasins, casings, tunic, arm shields, and body suit before I slid on a pair of panties and a shift.
I then climbed under the quilt with Dora.
She rolled and burrowed into me.
“My love,” I whispered as I wrapped my arms around her.
“I’m never taking a man,” she whispered back. “I’m going to be like Hera and find a sister to love.”
Hmm.
“I’m not sure that’s a choice, Dora, but if it is as you are, then I’ll be glad for you and wish for you that you find your truest love and she has the truest heart,” I said.
“All that grunting. And the cries,” she said.
The damage was done. I could do naught about it now.
I still would have words with my sister tomorrow.
Theodora’s next was tentative. “Does it hurt?”
“I don’t know, sweets,” I said. “Though Jasmine tells me it feels quite lovely and if times are right, it can be profound.”
“That doesn’t sound profound. It sounds painful and…arduous.”
I listened for a spell.
It did indeed.
I sighed, pulled her closer with one arm and tugged the quilts over our heads with another.
Then I did what I never, ever would do.
Unless it was for Theodora.
I disobeyed my queen.
In so doing, I expended a little magic to drown out the noise.
And to add to it, I started humming, then singing.
I started with the sad notes of the “Song of the Lost Sons.” The song about the Night of the Fallen Masters when our ancestors fled into the night, taking only their daughters with them, for their safety, and freedom, needing to leave all things male behind.
And when that seemed too melancholy to help my Dora sleep, I started to sing the “Hymn of The Enchantments.” The story of my many-times-great grandmother raising The Enchantments in the forest we claimed that was surrounded to the northeast by Airen, the south by Firenze, the northwest by Wodell, and at its northernmost tip was the city-state of Go’Doan.
It told of how the trees in the forest grew ever taller, ever wider, the branches stouter in order that we could build our homes in them.
It told of the shimmering veil that could not be seen by man, only by woman. On horse or in carriage, a man could ride a straight line and not know it was not straight, but was bordering The Enchantments, for he could not come in or even know where The Enchantments began. But a woman, if her heart was pure, and her need was deep, could see them and beseech them for entry, relief and liberty.
Dora fell asleep during the fourth verse, and when I was assured her sleep was deep, I dropped my magic.
It took some time for my sister and her companions to cease their play.
Even when they did, I held my Theodora close.
But I did not sleep.
For the morrow would be busy.
And I had much responsibility.
Last, and weighing most heavily on my mind, on the morrow…
I would meet my mate.
13
The Reason
Lady Silence Mattson
Entryway, First Floor, Catrame Palace, Fire City
FIRENZE
“It is not you, piccolina,” Farah said to me in a low voice as my future mother-in-law moved stiffly away after bidding a chilly goodnight.
We’d gone into the city with Queen Elpis, Sofia (Farah’s lovely (but very sad) mother), my mother and my aunt, Queen Mercy.
As well as a guard of Dellish and Firenz.
We’d dined in an establishment where we sat on cushions on the floor (which I had discovered made up most of the seating options in this land) and women in much skimpier attire than Farah normally wore undulated around us with sheer veils over the bottoms of their faces. They did this while ringing little cymbals together on their fingers.
It was extraordinary and held much beauty, even if it made me feel fidgety in a way I didn’t understand.
And the succulent spiced meat, flavored couscous, roasted vegetables, and flat pies filled with ground beef in a dense, tangy gravy were delicious (as all food in this land, I had discovered, was delicious).
I turned to my new somewhat-friend (only somewhat seeing as she and I had dined together every night since I had arrived, but other than that, I did not see her).
This night was the first with only the women (save Queen Ha-Lah, who had been invited, but word came from her husband that she declined).
The first night was the only night I dined with my future husband.
Though, on that night, he sat away from me, with his mother, and his friend, Prince Cassius, and totally ignored me.
Last night, and tonight, he dined alone with his men, Prince Cassius (and his men), Prince True (as well as his men) and King Aramus (and his men).
Indeed, in the three days I had been there, I had only seen King Mars four times (not including the throne room debacle).
That first dinner.
Once, when he had been standing down one of the long corridors of his palace, his head bent and listening to four men who looked much like him (but they were not as tall nor as handsome), Prince Cassius and some of Cassius’s men.
He had not even noticed I was there.
But the next time I saw him was the worst.
I was coming up after dinner, alone, leaving my mother with Farah, Sofia, my father, Queen Mercy, King Wilmer, and my future mother-in-law, who was no less remote, and thus I felt the need to escape all of them (most especially King Mars’s mother, who really did not like me).
Upon making the top of the stairs and before turning left to go to my rooms and Tril (who thankfully did like me), I had looked right.
Only to see King Mars striding down the corridor toward me in nothing but a pair of black silk pants that seemed to be made of flowing sheets wrapped around his legs and attached to his waistband…
And nothing else.
The colossal, defined wall of his chest was exposed. As were (obviously) his immensely broad shoulders. Equally obvious, his strapping arms and sinewy, veined forearms.
I could do nothing but stare.
It was true, I had seen men on our estate, workmen and farmers and Father’s guard sweaty and dirty after being done with a day of work, and they’d pull off their tunics or shirts to dump a barrel of water over their heads.
But I’d seen nothing the likes of that.
When I felt something start burning deeper into my skin, I lifted my gaze from his chest and caught his black eyes searing into me.
It was then I rushed quickly to my rooms (trying not to look like I was rushing).
I shut the door…
And I bolted it.
He had not (thankfully, or perhaps…not, though I wasn’t quite certain why I thought the latter) come after me.
The next day, I saw him again only for him to introduce the formidable and commanding King Aramus and his beautiful Queen, Ha-Lah. He did this in a way that indicated he was very annoyed with me when that could not be, for I hadn’t been around him to do anything annoying (maybe he’d noticed I was, indeed, rushing to be away from him and
his…chest).
And that was the last I’d seen of him.
One could say things were not going well at Catrame Palace for me.
Farah was lovely. Her mother as well (although, it was worth repeating, she was sad, and I felt this sadness had many facets, and part of it had to do with Queen Elpis, which was, from what I knew about that sorry situation, understandable).
And I could forget all of this during the excursions my mother, Mercy and I took in the city, which had proved to be full of wonderful smells, lively, friendly people, and fantastical happenings, not to mention enthralling goods and wares for sale, homes, tents, gardens, awnings and everything. All of it I could not hide my utter fascination with.
But back at Catrame Palace, even with its beautiful, exotic opulence, things were dreary.
“Pardon?” I said to Farah.
“It is not you she is being cold to,” Farah said to me. “Her son has forgiven my mother and me. She is finding this more difficult.”
This was confusing.
“Forgiven you?” I asked.
Her head tipped to the side and her demeanor grew wary.
“You do not—?” she began.
I lifted a hand. “No need to speak of it. I know.”
And I did know.
Mother whispered it to me while we wandered a bazaar in the city the day after we arrived.
It was shocking, but I’d heard my father speak (and sometimes rant) often about the intrigues and violence of politics.
So it was shocking and it was sad, but it was not unusual for a plot to be hatched to assassinate a ruler (Mars himself (and I shuddered to think about it) had thwarted three such coup attempts during his short, five-year reign).
It was just unusual for it to come to fruition.
And obviously, I’d never met anyone even remotely involved in such goings-on.
Further, it was wretched when I met such persons, they were Farah and Sofia, who had not been involved, but they’d been swept up in the treachery all the same.
I dropped my hand and carried on speaking.
“But I hope it is not gauche, or offensive, for me to speak of it, fair Farah. I only do so to say I understand it, of a sort, for I do know my father would think the same, as would my king. This being that anything my father did was some extension of me, when it is not. He is his own being with his own thoughts and actions. But they do not reflect who I am and shouldn’t for they are not my own.”