Mother of All

by Jenna Glass

  “So you have not heard of the murder of King Khalvin? Or of Prince Draios’s seizure of the throne and the man who helped him accomplish it?”

  She gasped, sharing an astonished look with Jaizal. “I assure you, I know nothing of any of this. I cannot even fathom—”

  “You had better not be lying to me,” he interrupted, those eyes still locked on hers, keeping her pinned in her seat when she wanted to jump to her feet and pace in agitation. “There will be consequences if you are.”

  Leethan held up her hands in a gesture of innocence and surrender. “If any of this happened before we fled the Abbey, word had not yet reached us. And who do you imagine we might have encountered since then who would think to tell us about any upheaval in Khalpar? And what does any of that have to do with my dream?”

  Jaizal’s arm tightened protectively around her. “And why have you gone from inquiring politely after her dream to accusing her of lying and threatening her with punishment?”

  Leethan would have smiled at the ferocity in Jaizal’s voice if she weren’t so disturbed by Zarsha’s reaction to her dream. Even her sleep-deprived mind could work out that something in her dream struck him as being connected to the upheaval in Khalpar.

  Zarsha let out a long, hissing breath. “Forgive my discourtesy,” he said, but his voice was still tight and his expression still forbidding. “But if you truly have heard nothing about Draios and his rise to power in Khalpar, then I very much fear Lady Jaizal may be right when she suggests the dream is prophetic.”

  Leethan might have thought he’d called her friend “Lady” Jaizal instead of “Sister” Jaizal by mistake if he and his queen hadn’t done the same with Leethan when she’d first met them. Whatever their fate was to be, it seemed unlikely they would find themselves confined to the Abbey of Rhozinolm. She was much more eager to think about the deep meanings of his chosen address rather than the implications of his words. Jaizal, however, was braver and bolder.

  “Why do you say that?” Jaizal asked.

  Leethan and Jaizal listened in horror as Zarsha described the murder of King Khalvin and the role former King Delnamal of Aaltah had played in it.

  “Delnamal is now very much the power behind the throne in Khalpar,” he said. “He has convinced Draios that he is an instrument of the Creator, sent to wage a holy war in an effort to undo what he and his supporters call the Curse. And according to the reports we have received, Delnamal’s face and body were ravaged by the accident at the Well, and he therefore wears a dark cloak and hood whenever he is seen in public.”

  Leethan felt as if all the blood had drained from her body, her head suddenly swimming so that she had to grab the arm of her chair lest she fall out of it. “That cannot be,” she whispered harshly, shaking her head. She closed her eyes as if somehow that would allow her to escape the truth.

  “If you’ve had dreams of a skinny man wearing a dark cloak and hood over mail facing off against a woman in a crown, and you’ve been having them for many years, then…”

  “It cannot be,” she tried again, shaking her head harder.

  Jaizal patted her shoulder comfortingly, although her voice had a touch of bite in it when she said, “Yes, I’m sure it’s just a coincidence that you’ve dreamt of a man like that and one should happen to be rising to power right now.”

  Leethan opened her eyes and gave Jaizal a gently scolding look even as she tried to absorb the enormity of the revelation.

  “I will have to tell the queen about this,” Zarsha mused, a haunted look in his eyes. “I can’t claim I know what to do about it, but we will have to act upon the assumption that it is not just an ordinary dream.” He rubbed his eyes as if this new information had suddenly made him tired. Then again, it was late at night, when sensible people would already be in their beds.

  “I must return to the palace now,” he said, rising. “We will have to talk about this some more, of course, but first I must inform the queen.”

  It looked for all the world as if he was planning to turn around and immediately hurry off. Leethan stood, perhaps a little too suddenly as her head swam again.

  “Your Highness,” she called, reaching out to him although he was well out of her reach. He turned back to her, his impatience to be on the move painted across his face. “You came here for some reason other than to hear about my dream.”

  A hint of color warmed his cheeks, and he looked quickly down at his feet and shook his head. “My apologies,” he murmured. “I came to ask if you would obtain for me a small sample of Princess Elwynne’s blood, such that we might determine for certain whose daughter she might be. Prince Waldmir claims he has tested her and she is his, but…” He shrugged. “He cannot use women’s magic himself, and since you consider Elwynne’s paternity to be in doubt, it seems he did not engage you or one of your abigails to perform the test.”

  Leethan sighed, happy to think about anything other than the potentially prophetic ramifications of her dream. “He would most likely have engaged a foreign source to perform the test. While we do perform some magic in the Abbey of Nandel despite the law, we don’t have the breadth of experience that might be found outside of Nandel. Also, he likely would have sent the samples anonymously so that whoever tested them would not understand the ramifications of their verdict.”

  “So you think he’s likely telling the truth?” Zarsha looked crestfallen, and Leethan realized for the first time that he’d truly hoped the girl was his own.

  “I wouldn’t go that far,” she hedged. “I imagine under the circumstances he is claiming certain paternity in order to pressure your queen for Elwynne’s return. He would most certainly lie if he felt it expedient. I will obtain a sample for you.”

  She could see by the look in his eyes that Zarsha was inclined to believe his uncle’s claim, and that he was saddened by it. “Will you send her back to Nandel if Waldmir is her father?” she asked.

  Zarsha huffed out a breath. “Not if I have any say in the matter. He’s already made it more than clear that he considers her tainted by her mother’s infidelity. I will protect her to the best of my ability, one way or another.”

  He left unspoken the reality that the decision was not his to make.

  * * *

  —

  Alys plucked the mote of Rho out of the talker, and Queen Ellinsoltah’s image dissolved before her eyes. She had every intention of doing the same with the talker linked to Tynthanal’s, but he had other ideas.

  “Alys, please don’t read too much into all of this,” he implored her, and she cursed him for his powers of perception. When Ellinsoltah had told them of the recurring dream that had plagued the sleep of Nandel’s former abbess, she had done her best to treat the news with an air of polite skepticism. She did not claim to disbelieve Leethan of Nandel, but she had—she’d thought—kept her expression neutral.

  “What do you mean?” she asked, hoping her face revealed nothing but perplexity.

  Tynthanal’s eyes narrowed, and the tone of his voice turned nearly accusatory. “I saw the look on your face when Ellinsoltah described that final confrontation.”

  It took every ounce of Alys’s courage not to avert her gaze like a guilty child. Ever since she and Chanlix and Rusha had begun working on the purgative spell that would hopefully remove the stolen Rhokai from Delnamal’s body, Alys had been trying to fight off the idea that the spell would need to be triggered by sacrificial Kai. More specifically, her own sacrificial Kai. But she had sworn to Chanlix that she did not believe a sacrifice was necessary, and her rational mind had accepted that as the truth. Right up until the moment Ellinsoltah had recounted Leethan of Nandel’s dream.

  “What look are you talking about, Brother?” she inquired. “You cannot deny that if the dream is indeed prophetic, it shows a distinctively frightening future.”

  “I saw you make the same connection that I did—and
that likely Ellinsoltah did, as well. If Leethan has recognized herself facing off against Waldmir and has also seen a figure that we all recognize as being Delnamal, there is only one logical conclusion as to the identity of the crowned woman who faced him.”

  Alys leaned back in her chair and sighed. Yes, it was fairly obvious that if the cloaked and hooded figure was Delnamal, then the crowned woman must be Alys. Just as there was no missing the similarities between what had happened in the dream and what had apparently happened on the night their mother had led the casting of the Blessing. Three women had—apparently of their own free will—slashed their wrists and given their lives to enact the Blessing. And now Leethan dreamed of three women—including herself and Alys—slashing their wrists and thereby defeating Waldmir and Delnamal and an unknown third man. A man who, based on circumstances, was likely Draios.

  “Yes,” she admitted reluctantly. “I can see that I must be the crowned woman.” And it seemed very much like a confirmation that she would be required to use her own sacrificial Kai to trigger the purgative spell, although she knew better than to say that to her brother. “But I have learned enough about visions in the past couple of years to know that this dream is not at all the same as a vision. Visions show a tangible reality, and this…” She shook her head. “Well, I’m quite certain the scene Leethan described is not something that will happen literally.”

  Her reassurance did nothing to calm the worry that Tynthanal made no attempt to hide from her. “So you are not now taking the dream to mean you must kill yourself for the greater good.”

  “Of course not,” Alys lied, although considering the way her brother was looking at her, it seemed unlikely she would convince him. “I take it to mean that I will have an important role to play in the war that will come, and that it will be up to me to stop Delnamal. But I was already assuming that anyway, so this dream tells me nothing new.”

  “Uh-huh,” Tynthanal said with a heavy dose of skepticism. “So Chanlix is wrong to be worried about you?”

  Alys blinked in surprise, though of course she was aware that Chanlix and Tynthanal had been talking more frequently since the birth of their daughter. She’d known Chanlix was worried about her, but she hadn’t thought she was so worried that she’d mention it to Tynthanal. She wondered if Chanlix had also mentioned the courtship of Duke Thanmir, but it was a topic she herself had no intention of bringing up.

  “Chanlix is a dear friend,” Alys said, “and I know she is concerned. She thinks my reluctance to shed my mourning attire is unhealthy, and she is most likely right. But just because I am not yet ready to come out of mourning does not mean I’m looking to throw my life away.” She rolled her eyes as if the very thought were ridiculous, as if the image of ending her own suffering for a heroic cause weren’t disturbingly seductive.

  “I’m glad to hear that,” her brother said with a sigh of relief, although she did not think she had entirely quelled his worry. “I hope you remember that you have people who love you, people who will always be there for you when you need them.”

  Alys’s eyes suddenly stung with tears, and her breath seemed to stick in her throat. She could not respond one way or another, or she felt she might shatter into a million pieces.

  The expression on Tynthanal’s face softened. “I can’t remember the last time I put it into words, but I love you, Alys. None of the troubles that came between us ever changed that.”

  The ache in her heart was more than she could bear. When she had allowed both Tynthanal and Corlin to leave for Aaltah, she had known it would hurt, and that it would continue to hurt for a long time. But she had not fully appreciated how deep that ache would run, how much damage it would do to her psyche. How deeply, terribly alone she would feel.

  She drew in a steadying breath through her nose, closing her eyes and focusing on forcing that air past the tightness in her throat. How she hated these feelings that plagued her, that distracted her from her duties and kept her awake at night. She was a sovereign princess, with a whole principality counting on her to keep a cool head and make the right decisions at all times. She had not the luxury of giving in to despair or wallowing in her own maudlin grief and loneliness.

  “I love you, too,” she managed to force out, opening her eyes and proud of herself for not crying, though she suspected she would lose the battle with herself the moment she cut the connection. “Please don’t worry about me. I promise I’m not reading too much into Leethan’s dream. My guess is that the three women will play a crucial role, and that our role will likely involve a sacrifice of some sort. But I will not leap from that to the idea that we must all slash our wrists on the battlefield. There is more at work here than we yet know.”

  She did not think Tynthanal was entirely reassured—and she suspected Chanlix might be even less so, when she learned of the dream—but after another long, searching look, he finally let the subject drop.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  Ellin embraced her husband, knowing even her love wouldn’t be enough to ease his pain. “I’m so sorry, dearest,” she murmured against his shoulder. A part of her marveled at her tightened throat and stinging eyes, for when Zarsha had first told her Princess Elwynne might actually be his daughter, she’d been so jealous and angry she’d contemplated changing her mind about marrying him. Now, when they had the test results that confirmed that Waldmir had told them the truth when he’d claimed Elwynne as his own, she was on the verge of tears.

  Zarsha gave a shuddering sigh as he held on to her. “I always said she might be my daughter,” he said hoarsely, “but I think on some level, I always believed she truly was. Certainly I loved her as if she were my own.” Another sigh. “And I still do, no matter what the test says.”

  Ellin patted his back. “Of course you do,” she murmured, for that had been obvious to her from the moment he’d first told her about his affair with Elwynne’s mother. Zarsha had loved the child and done everything he could to protect her, even not knowing if he was the father, and even though he’d spent very little time in Nandel since her birth. Princess Elwynne was a virtual stranger to him, and yet he still felt responsible for her.

  “I told you before that it didn’t really matter to Waldmir which of us was her father,” Zarsha continued. “The results of the test don’t change that.”

  Ellin might have argued—after all, Waldmir had tested the girl’s paternity, which suggested it mattered at least a bit—but the argument seemed to have little bearing, so she kept her silence.

  “He will never forgive her for her mother’s infidelity,” Zarsha continued, his voice full of anguish. “If we send her back to him…”

  His voice choked off, but Ellin didn’t need to hear the end of the thought. Waldmir had firmly established that Zarsha would do anything to protect Elwynne, regardless of the girl’s true paternity. If Ellin sent her back to her father, Elwynne would be held hostage against Zarsha for as long as Waldmir lived.

  “We won’t send her back,” Ellin said, the words rising from her throat before she had a chance to put much thought into them.

  She felt Zarsha’s whole body start, and he pulled away from her to look down into her eyes. She read in his expression grief and hope and fear.

  “If we send her away at all, it will be to her mother. You said she was living in Grunir, didn’t you?”

  Zarsha shook his head. “That would be sending her back to Waldmir. There is no question that he knows exactly where Brontyn is living and will be keeping watch. Our choices are to hide her or to send her to Waldmir.”

  “Well, that decides it,” she said firmly.

  “You are the Queen of Rhozinolm. It can be of no possible benefit to your kingdom to keep Elwynne here now that we know I’m not her father. And we have no legal standing to keep her.”

  She reached up and cupped his face with one hand. “I’ve done a great many things I didn’t want to do
for the sake of my kingdom,” she told him. “But I will not send a helpless little girl back to Nandel and a father who cares so little for her that he sent her to ‘visit’ the Abbey at the age of five.”

  “But—”

  “And I could argue that sending her back to Nandel is not in the best interests of Rhozinolm, since her father can use her as a hostage against us.”

  It was a weak argument, and the look on Zarsha’s face said he knew it. He was right, and her duty was to put the needs of her kingdom above all else. But Zarsha had already lost so much when she’d bargained with Waldmir for their marriage agreement. So many people he’d cared for had already suffered, and no matter how much she tried to convince him he was blameless, he carried that responsibility on his shoulders all the time. She could not send the girl he loved as a daughter back into Waldmir’s clutches.

  Zarsha turned his head and kissed her palm, his eyes closing. “I love you,” he whispered, causing her to smile fondly at him. “And I’m more grateful than you know that—”

  “Zarsha, I’m not sending her back,” she said firmly. “We can continue insisting that they never arrived.”

  “Your council—”

  “Has already actively supported the lie, even if not all of them believe it. As long as they have no concrete proof that Elwynne is here, they will not contradict me.”

  He shook his head. “That cannot last. It’s a miracle we’ve kept it secret as long as we have.”

  “Not a miracle,” she corrected. “We’ve just chosen the right people to trust.”

  He pinched the bridge of his nose. “Have you considered that Leethan’s dream seemed to suggest that Waldmir might be involved in the battle she spied? And that he clearly stood in opposition to her and to Alysoon? He is nominally our ally at the moment, but it would hardly be surprising if our kidnapping his daughter was the reason he chose to ally with our enemies instead.”