Mother of All

by Jenna Glass

  “On the day my mourning should officially have ended,” she said, “my lady’s maid thought to dress me in a gown of deep blue so dark it might almost be mistaken for black. She’s been with me a long time and knows me very well, so she thought I should gently transition out of my mourning attire rather than casting it wholly aside. But when she approached me to attach the bodice, I…” She swallowed hard. “Well, let’s just say I panicked.” She looked up once more to meet his kind eyes. “If I cannot face a dark blue dress without panic, then I cannot entertain a marriage proposal. I’m very sorry.”

  He waved the apology off, finishing his cold tea and setting the cup aside. “That’s quite all right,” he said. “I meant it when I said I had no intention of pressuring you or of demanding an answer. If and when you are ready to entertain marriage proposals, I hope you will keep me in mind. And I hope that you will allow me to visit again and perhaps even bring Shalna so that you might meet her.”

  Alys took a deep breath, hoping in vain that it would steady her. Thanmir might not be overtly pressuring her, but there was no question in her mind that he hoped meeting Shalna would help sway her to accept his proposal. However, there was no good reason to deny the request, and it was actually a relief that she could so gently refuse his proposal without slamming the door on future possibilities.

  “You and your daughter may visit anytime you’d like,” she said.

  The mingled hope and desperation that momentarily flashed in Thanmir’s eyes reminded her once more that there was more than her own life and happiness at stake, and she halfway hoped that somewhere down the road she would find the courage and strength she needed to put aside her mourning and fully rejoin her life.

  * * *

  —

  Delnamal slipped quietly into the servants’ quarters in the dead of night. Back in the royal palace in Aalwell, he’d been only vaguely aware of where the various servants’ quarters lay, and he never would have deigned to set foot in them. Even now, he considered it unseemly—almost unclean—but he stuffed that discomfort and distaste into the same coffer within himself where he confined all of his other inconvenient and unwanted emotions.

  Although he was the lord of this manor and had every right to treat even the servants’ quarters as his own property, he had no desire to draw any attention to himself. Instead of bringing a bright luminant to light his way, he made do with a pathetically small candle.

  If the manor house were fully staffed, as it ought to be, even the most senior staff would be sharing rooms, but it was convenient to the night’s experiment that King Khalvin had insulted his sister and his nephew by granting them only the barest minimum of servants to run the house. The housekeeper and the most senior of the housemaids each had her own room. Delnamal, naturally, did not know who slept in which room, but luckily no one woke when he oh-so-quietly opened bedroom doors until he found the maid he sought.

  He couldn’t remember the woman’s name—it was something like Hope or Faith or Charity or somesuch nonsense—but she was clearly near the end of her serviceable days. It was even possible that she’d been rousted out of peaceful retirement to serve him.

  After his discovery of the mysterious and impossible element that filled his blood and resided in the breast of his mother’s songbird, Delnamal had surreptitiously opened his Mindseye to examine some of his servants. His observations had shown him that each servant had one of those faceted spheres in his or her chest, as did birds and animals. He’d sneaked a chicken out of the henhouse to confirm to himself that what had happened with the songbird had not been a fluke. It hadn’t, and Delnamal had helped himself to two more chickens since—the servants thought they were contending with an especially clever fox.

  But as satisfying as those chickens were, he couldn’t help wondering whether the experience would be more intense and long-lasting if he could pluck one of those motes from the breast of a human. He’d stifled his curiosity for a couple of days, but it kept eating at him. And then he realized that the household’s most senior housemaid was just elderly enough that her mysterious death would not raise too many eyebrows.

  When he’d examined the housemaid with his Mindseye, he’d seen that her sphere did not look like everyone else’s, for a fragment of its outer shell seemed to have broken off and was hovering just above her shoulder.

  There was no reason Delnamal should expect to be able to see feminine Kai; however, women’s Kai was said to take the form of a solid black crystal, and that was clearly what he saw clinging to the housemaid.

  He slipped into the room, carefully and quietly closing the door behind him and setting the candle down. He looked at the sleeping woman with a shake of his head. From what he knew of women’s Kai, it was an entirely new element that had not existed before the casting of the Curse. Which meant only women who’d been raped since the Curse was cast possessed it. Delnamal couldn’t imagine being desperate enough to take a shriveled old woman by force, but clearly someone had done so. And clearly, like men’s Kai, women’s Kai was not in fact created but was, at least in a manner of speaking, there all along.

  Opening his Mindseye he looked once more at the chipped, faceted orb in the housemaid’s chest, feeling a longing that combined the sensations of hunger and thirst and lust.

  This isn’t just stupid, an annoying, weak little voice mumbled in the back of his mind. It’s wrong! She’s an innocent old woman who’s done nothing to deserve this.

  Delnamal noted the voice—and the rush of guilt and horror that accompanied it—with a thread of mild interest. Intellectually, he knew the voice was right, that killing an old woman just to satisfy his unwholesome curiosity was an abhorrent sin. He had to admit that he had never been the most moral and righteous of men, but even when he had engaged in acts of cruelty, he had always felt—at least at the time—that his act was justified. This time, there was no question of that being the case. But it was strangely easy to shunt aside his natural human inhibitions, to lock them up with the rest of his emotions where they wouldn’t bother him.

  He took hold of the mysterious mote, his fingers lightly brushing the old woman’s chest, and she gasped in what he assumed was pain and fear. Luckily, she was not as loud as the chickens, and he very much doubted anyone nearby would wake at the sound. Reverently, he pulled the mote from her chest, holding his breath in anticipation.

  As with the motes he had stolen from the songbird and chickens, this one burst apart the moment it left the old woman’s body. The black outer layer broke away to reveal the core of Rho motes along with a mote of Kai in shades of red fading to pink. He felt a moment’s surprise that apparently masculine Kai was not present only in men. Then a rush of indescribable strength and pleasure and emotion flooded him—far stronger than anything he had felt from killing the birds—and his mind was swept away on a wave that left him incapable of thought.

  Eventually, he regained control of himself, once again stuffing the excessive emotions away and merely reveling in the feeling of strength and power in his body. He felt better than he had since the accident at the Well, and it was all he could do not to let out a whoop of joy.

  Before he closed his Mindseye and slunk out of the room, he noted that the aura of Kai motes that hovered around him now had a new addition—a mote of red fading to pink that looked exactly like the Kai that had resided within the old woman’s chest. Instead of drifting away, as the birds’ miniature Kai motes had, this mote of Kai had joined all the rest in Delnamal’s aura. If taking the faceted mote from the breast of people meant he could add even more motes of free Kai to his own aura…

  Delnamal stifled a laugh of pure delight, reminding himself to keep quiet and not wake anyone. It would not do for someone to find him hovering over the corpse. The servants already eyed him with superstitious dread. He felt as strong and vital as he did directly in the aftermath of one of his fits, and he had yet another mote of Kai at hi
s disposal—without having to sacrifice one of the mysterious motes in his blood.

  Nearly giddy with the rush of possibilities, Delnamal slipped quietly from the room.

  CHAPTER TEN

  Tynthanal was shown into the dowager queen’s parlor and was surprised to find Oona holding the infant king in her arms when he entered. Over the last couple of months, Oona had lost some of the aura of fear and wariness that had emanated from her when he’d first arrived. However, he knew that she still feared his intentions and worried that he might harbor ill will toward his half-brother’s son, and she had assiduously avoided allowing him to set eyes on the child.

  Oona rose to her feet and approached, four-month-old King Tahrend fussing softly at the movement. She smiled down at her son while still giving the impression she was carefully watching Tynthanal’s expression, searching for some sign that he was a danger.

  “I thought it was time you meet your nephew,” she said.

  Tynthanal had come to the dowager’s apartments with his emotional armor firmly in place, for he meant to question her once more about what had happened on the night of Delnamal’s disappearance. Now that he had tangible evidence that his half-brother might have survived the disaster at the Well, he hoped Oona might be more forthcoming about what had truly happened that night. He did not for a moment believe she did not know at least some of it.

  But he had not been prepared for the sight of the infant Prince Tahrend nestling in his mother’s arms. The knowledge that, any day now, Chanlix might give birth to his own son struck him with such ferocity that it took an effort of will to suppress a gasp. It hurt more than he could have imagined to think of Chanlix going through that ordeal without him, and he longed with every fiber of his being to see the woman he loved holding their baby as Oona was holding the infant king just now.

  Oona chuckled softly, misinterpreting the emotions that were no doubt written on his face. “I gather you’ve never been this close to an infant before? I promise he doesn’t bite.”

  Tynthanal tried to pull himself together. If anyone in Aaltah was aware that he had a bastard child on the way back in Women’s Well, they had not remarked upon it. He did not feel inclined to explain himself to his half-brother’s wife, so it was best he put his emotions aside for the moment. “On the contrary,” he said, forcing himself to see the child that was before him instead of the child he imagined soon being born. “I met and held both Jinnell and Corlin within days of their births.”

  Of course, thinking of the moment he’d first held little Jinnell in his arms while his sister beamed with pride did not help him keep his emotions at bay. A lump formed in his throat, and it no doubt showed in his voice.

  “May I hold him?” he asked, unsure of the wisdom of the request when he was already feeling so…overcome.

  Oona’s arms briefly tightened, hugging the baby closer to her breast as if to protect him from some danger. Tynthanal doubted she did it consciously, and he tried not to feel insulted by the gesture, though he did not entirely succeed. He did not try to coax or reassure her—in part because he did not trust himself to speak.

  Oona let out a quiet sigh and bit her lip. Then, as if steeling herself for some terrible ordeal, she shifted little King Tahrend into position to allow Tynthanal to take him.

  It had been many years since Tynthanal had held a baby, but his body remembered how, and soon his youngest nephew was resting comfortably in his arms. Tahrend stared up at him with large hazel eyes, and Tynthanal felt sure the baby was about to let out a yowl of protest at being handed over to a complete stranger. But Tahrend must have liked what he saw in his uncle’s eyes, for instead of crying, he let out a contented coo and smiled.

  Tynthanal could have sworn he felt his heart melting right then and there, and he once again remembered the swell of love he’d felt when he’d held each of his sister’s children for the first time. Perhaps some of the warmth he felt now was colored by those memories—or by the yearning to one day hold his own son like this—but for the first time since he’d received word of Tahrend’s birth, he was entirely certain that no hint of the hatred he felt for his half-brother would taint his affection for his latest nephew.

  Oona hovered anxiously and looked half-inclined to snatch the infant from Tynthanal’s arms.

  “He has your eyes,” Tynthanal said, for it was true. He also had a round face that was uncomfortably reminiscent of Delnamal’s, but that observation he would keep to himself. He smiled briefly at Oona before looking back down at the infant in his arms.

  “Hello, Nephew,” he said softly, to which the baby cooed again. “I’m very pleased to make your acquaintance.” Tahrend looked delighted, and the innocent joy in those eyes smoothed over the rough edges of Tynthanal’s mixed emotions. Tahrend reached out an inquisitive hand to pat Tynthanal’s face, melting his heart just a little more.

  “He seems to like you,” Oona said almost reluctantly. “He’s usually fussy with strangers.”

  “But I’m not a stranger, really,” Tynthanal answered. “I’m family, and he can sense that. Just like he can sense that I love him already.” He met Oona’s gaze, holding her eyes firmly with his. “He knows that I would never allow harm to come to him if I can help it.”

  A little of the tension eased out of Oona’s shoulders, and he hoped she heard the sincerity in his voice. He had never thought of himself as a lover of children—his sister’s being the only children he’d spent any significant time around—and he had approached fatherhood with a great deal of ambivalence. But holding Tahrend now, he knew that he would love his son with every inch of his heart. And that he would do everything in his power to find a way to return to Women’s Well long before Tahrend came of age to hold the throne in his own right.

  Tahrend’s eyes drifted closed, and Oona smiled indulgently. “It’s past his nap time,” she said.

  “Thank you for letting me meet him,” Tynthanal replied, handing the sleepy baby back to Oona with a surprising degree of reluctance.

  Oona settled the little king in his curtain-draped crib, and Tynthanal wished he could leave on this note of pleasant accord. But while meeting his baby nephew had been a happy surprise, he’d come to Oona’s apartments with a much grimmer purpose in mind.

  When the baby was comfortably settled and Oona turned back to him, Tynthanal broached the purpose of his visit.

  “I know that Delnamal is alive,” he said, and watched the warmth leach out of Oona’s face. He presented it as a certainty, although he was fully aware that Alys’s test on the blood he had found outside the Well chamber only suggested the possibility.

  “Y-you are mistaken,” Oona stammered, but the alarm with which she had received his statement was almost as revealing as a confession.

  “I’m afraid the evidence is on my side,” he said, trying not to sound more accusatory than necessary. “And if he’s alive, then you must know where he is.”

  Oona shook her head and looked on the verge of tears. “He isn’t. I don’t. I—”

  “I will not ask you to betray him,” Tynthanal reassured her, and it was true, at least for the moment. “I imagine Xanvin took him to Khalpar and they have taken refuge with King Khalvin. But I don’t believe the two of them left Aaltah without confiding in you. And if you know anything about what happened down in the Well chamber, then I need you to tell me. The kingdom needs you to tell me.”

  Oona shook her head again, but there was no conviction to the gesture. She was well aware that her denials would not convince him.

  “Please, Oona,” he said more softly. “I have to find a way to repair the damage to the Well. And I’ll have a better chance of doing that if I know what actually happened there.”

  Oona chewed her lip for an impossibly long time, and Tynthanal allowed her the freedom to think.

  “I…I don’t know much,” she finally admitted, now staring at the floor
. “I know that my husband thought the Abbess of Khalpar could reverse the Curse by casting some spell on the Well, but everyone knows that.”

  “He told you nothing about what happened, even once he knew it had gone horribly wrong?” Tynthanal asked with infinite skepticism. If nothing else, his half-brother would have been spewing justifications for what he’d done, throwing blame around to anyone he could think of except himself.

  “He couldn’t,” Oona said simply. “He was unconscious, and did not wake up at all before we parted ways.”

  “Tell me what happened. Anything you know might be helpful.”

  Oona moved restlessly over to the crib, peeking through the curtain to ensure that Tahrend was sleeping peacefully. Or perhaps merely taking a moment to gather herself.

  “Xanvin and I found him in the Well’s antechamber,” she said in a voice little above a whisper. Even with her back turned, he could see the chill that shivered through her. “He was unconscious, and his hands…” She hiccuped and sniffled, discreetly dabbing her eyes. “He was hurt very badly,” she finished. “We had a healer see to him and repair his hands as much as possible, but it is unlikely he will ever regain full use of his fingers. The healer had no explanation for why he did not regain consciousness.”

  Oona finally found the courage to face him once more. The remembered horror in her eyes made Tynthanal regret forcing her to relive those terrible moments.

  “Even though he was unconscious, he vomited periodically,” she continued with a shudder. “The healer said…he said he saw what looked like tiny shards of Kai in the fluid that came up. He said he’d never seen anything like it and he didn’t know what to do for it.”

  “I need to speak to this healer.”