The Destined Queen

by Deborah Hale

  “Make fun of my innocence, will you?” Maura rinsed her hands, then let them stray down his body to torment him further.

  When she had him writhing beneath her touch and a low growl of desire rumbling in his throat, she rose from her perch on the edge of the bed. She trimmed the lamp as low as it would burn yet still cast a faint light. Slowly, she removed her clothes and wiped a damp cloth over her naked body. It did nothing to cool her desire, but the sight clearly stoked a hotter blaze in Rath’s flesh.

  “Come to bed, aira,” he pleaded. “I am sorry I picked that fight with Gull. It was a daft thing to do. I should have known such a little fellow could never command the way he does without being able to fight like a demon. I swear I’ll beg his pardon the next time I see him.”

  “I suppose…” Maura circled the bed, draping the fine netting back over it. “Will you promise to make better use of your wits after this before you let your fists fly?”

  “Aye!” He held out his arms to her. “You have my word.”

  “The word of a king?” Maura lifted the edge of the canopy and slipped under it. “Or the word of an outlaw?”

  “Why, the outlaw, of course.” Rath reached to caress her bare breast as she crawled toward him. “He’s the one who needs your help to mend all his wild ways.”

  Maura gave a deep, purring chuckle. “I am not sure I want all his wild ways mended.” She straddled his hips, bearing her weight on her outstretched arms to hover over him, inviting his touch. Then she leaned toward him, grazing his chest with her breasts, but sparing the sore muscles of his belly.

  Nuzzling his ear, she whispered, “I will make you a bargain.”

  Rath arched his hard, lean body toward her. “Anything!”

  “If you will promise to play the king in the council chamber,” she vowed, “I will let you play the outlaw in the bedchamber.”

  Play the king in the council chamber. Play the king in the council chamber. Rath repeated the words over and over in his mind like an incantation for one of Maura’s spells. He feared it would take stronger magic than hers to turn him into a king.

  Would the sages of the Vestan Council think so, too? He could feel the weight of their curious, uneasy stares resting upon him while Lord Idrygon explained how the Hanish Ore Fleet had come to flounder in their warding waters.

  After a miserable night’s sleep, Rath had woken with a headache so fierce none of Maura’s remedies could do more than blunt it. All their preparations for this appearance before the Council of Sages had not helped his head…or his temper.

  He craned his neck and twisted it, trying to relieve the pressure around his throat. Though Vestan tunics flared out below the waist, the chest and arms were close fitting, as was the high collar. The one Idrygon had lent Rath fit very snug on his muscular torso, and like a noose around his neck.

  Maura caught his eye and flashed a reassuring smile. She looked every inch a queen in her loose, sleeveless gown of pale blue-green linen with slender filets of matching ribbon twined through her hair.

  She’d admired his hair, too, after Idrygon’s mother-in-law had washed it and cut it in the Vestan style. Rath had no illusions this short trim suited his shaggy mane the way it did Idrygon’s straight hair or Delyon’s crisp curls. But he’d stopped fretting about his hair when the forceful old lady had proceeded to shave him so close he feared she would scrape all the skin off his lower face.

  No question—this being a king was an uncomfortable business. Rath wondered why a war-leader needed to look well groomed any more than an outlaw did. But Idrygon had insisted with some confusing talk about Council factions and support for an invasion. Though Rath had not warmed to him since their first meeting, he knew enough to respect Idrygon as a man of ability, drive and vision. The kind of man who might be able to make the dream of a free Umbria come true if he put his mind to it.

  “To conclude—” Idrygon’s words drew Rath’s attention back to the council chamber “—we cannot hold Captain Gull and his men responsible for what happened when they acted on instructions from this Council. How do we know the storm that blew the Ore Fleet toward our coast was not the Giver’s will at work?”

  Though Idrygon spoke in a tone of hushed reverence, Rath questioned whether the man felt any more true belief in the Giver than he once had.

  “Your pardon.” A voice of quiet authority drew all eyes to a tiny old woman sitting three places to the right of Idrygon. “I am not aware of any instructions from this Council that might have summoned Captain Gull to our shores at such a hazardous time. I hope you have not taken it upon yourself to act in the Council’s name without our knowledge or consent, Idrygon.”

  Her cheeks were sunken, her dark hair heavily frosted with white and she looked as though a hard gust of wind might blow her off the island. But her penetrating gaze and regal bearing told Rath she was not someone a smart man would cross if he had a choice. He wondered if anyone else on the Vestan Islands dared address the forceful Lord Idrygon in that chiding tone.

  “I protest, Madame Verise!” Idrygon looked so offended, Rath knew he must be guilty of whatever the old lady had hinted at. “My aim has always been to serve this Council, the Vestan Islands and the kingdom of Umbria.”

  This, Rath sensed, was altogether true.

  Madame Verise must have known it, too. For she waved a withered hand. “Oh very well, then be plain, lad. What summons of ours brought that ship from the Dusk Coast? And while you are at it, who are these guests you have brought before the council?”

  She did not sound as though Rath’s sacrifices in the cause of good grooming had impressed her much.

  “How astute of you to pose those two questions together, madame.” As Idrygon looked around at the council, he did not rub his hands with glee at the opening he’d been given. But Rath sensed he wanted to. “For they are inextricably bound.”

  Rath wondered if inextricably meant what he thought it did.

  “The summons,” said Idrygon, “is one we have sent out so often, in vain, that some here may have forgotten we do it. While others, including me, to my shame, may have come to believe it was all a fool’s deed and that those messages would never be answered.”

  A fevered whispering broke out around the Great Circle. By watching who whispered to whom, Rath could guess which side they supported. Idrygon’s talk of factions, which had only aggravated Rath’s headache first thing this morning, suddenly began to make sense.

  There seemed to be two generations of sages—elders like Madame Verise, roughly the age Langbard had been. They made up the majority of the council. Perhaps a third were closer to Rath’s age, including Idrygon and his brother, Delyon.

  According to Idrygon, many of the older generation had become content with their peaceful, prosperous life on the Islands and were in no hurry to go to the aid of their suffering countrymen on the mainland. When pressed for action by younger members of the council, they urged delay until the coming of the Waiting King and the Destined Queen.

  Well, the Council of Sages was in for a surprise today!

  As Maura listened to Lord Idrygon speak, she felt as if she were teetering on the edge of Raynor’s Rift, with that terrifying chasm gaping before her.

  “Every year, spring and midsummer, we send out those messenger birds.” Lord Idrygon looked around the Great Circle, fixing each of the sages with his forceful gaze. “‘Her time has come. Come at once. Gull of Duskport will bring you.’ Only the name of the captain has ever changed with the passing years. We have never known where these birds were bound, nor had any assurance they did not simply fly away to become food for hawks.”

  Maura’s heart sank. She had thought herself special…chosen. Her fears had eased as her faith in their destiny had taken root. Now she wondered if that destiny had all been an illusion. As she remembered the disasters she and Rath had so narrowly escaped, all the times they had poised on the brink of death and worse, she grew dizzy and bilious with fear.

  She could not sit s
till or remain silent a moment longer.

  “I don’t understand!” She leaped to her feet, not caring that she had interrupted Lord Idrygon and drawn the stern gazes of more wizards, healers and scholars of the Elderways than she’d ever imagined could exist. “The first messenger bird found its way to our little cottage in Norest a few months ago on my twenty-first birthday. Langbard told me it had come from you. He told me you had studied the ancient writings and determined the time had come for me to begin my quest. Now are you saying it was all a mistake?”

  If Lord Idrygon’s words had shaken her world, Maura’s outburst appeared to shake the Council of Sages even more. The great chamber buzzed like a wasp’s nest under attack.

  Maura braced for a stern rebuke from Lord Idrygon. After his first hostile exchange with Rath, the man had extended them every courtesy. But she suspected, if she turned quickly enough, she might catch him wrinkling up his well-bred nose at the smell of them. Now he stood silent and calm, at the center of the tempest she had created, looking strangely pleased with it.

  Maura turned toward Rath. He replied with a look that told her destiny might let her down but he never would.

  Before Maura could say anything to him, the tiny woman who had spoken so sharply to Idrygon appeared before her. “My dear, you mentioned Langbard a moment ago. My sister, Nalene, is his wife. Are you…their daughter?”

  The anxious glow in the woman’s eyes made Maura wish she could say yes, for both their sakes. Growing up with only Langbard, she’d secretly yearned for parents, but never thought of a wider family…aunts, uncles, cousins.

  “Though I loved Langbard as dearly as any daughter, he was my guardian. My mother died when I was very young and she entrusted me to his care.”

  The woman’s eager gaze faltered when Maura spoke of Langbard in the past.

  “I call for silence!” Idrygon’s tone of authority quelled the tumult of voices. “We all have questions that want answers, but we will never hear those answers if we do not listen.”

  The Council appeared to see the wisdom in that. Many who had risen sat down. Several who had moved from their accustomed places returned to their seats, including Madame Verise.

  Once quiet and order had been restored to the chamber, a stout wizard with a wild shock of red hair cleared his throat loudly.

  Idrygon motioned for him to rise. “You wish to speak, Trochard?”

  “So I do. I believe there is one question most pressing on all our minds.” He swung to fix a stern gaze upon Maura. “Young woman, do you mean to tell us you are the Destined Queen?”

  His tone of disbelief shook Maura. She’d expected it from Rath and people like Captain Gull. But the wizards of the Vestan Islands were the ones she believed had sent her on her quest. The ones who had summoned Rath and her once she’d completed it. If they did not believe…?

  “Am I the Destined Queen?” She looked around at them. “I thought I was. I did what she…what I…was meant to do. Yet everything I have heard today makes me question if it can be true.”

  “By what you were meant to do,” said Trochard, “I take it you mean finding the Waiting King?”

  Before Maura could reply, Rath rose and stood beside her. “Why?” he challenged her inquisitor. “Is there some other quest the Destined Queen was supposed to undertake?”

  “Please, Rath…” Maura begged him through clenched teeth. Had he so quickly forgotten his promise to play the king in council chambers?

  Well groomed and wearing the regal Vestan garb, which forced him to stand tall, he looked more like a king than she had ever imagined possible.

  In a few blunt words, he told the Council of Sages how Maura had found and rescued him within hours of the messenger bird reaching Langbard’s cottage. He went on to speak of Langbard’s murder and their flight to Prum, where they had discovered Exilda, the guardian of the map, murdered, also.

  He cast a challenging glare around the Great Circle. “The Echtroi seem to place more faith in this legend than the lot of you.”

  Trochard’s face flushed redder than his hair and others among the older sages betrayed similar signs of chagrin.

  While they chewed on that tough crust, Rath went on to recount the rest of their adventures. As he spoke, Maura noticed how the older members of the Council winced and paled at the dangers they had faced. Meanwhile, younger members like Idrygon hung on every word, an eager glow in their eyes. All looked equally perplexed when Rath told what he and Maura had discovered in the Secret Glade.

  “So you are the Waiting King?” murmured Madame Verise. “How can that be? You did not lie sleeping in the Secret Glade for hundreds of years.”

  Rath shook his head then cast a sidelong glance at Maura. How could he explain what they had not fully fathomed?

  Then Delyon rose from his seat. “I believe I can answer that, if I may speak.”

  “Go ahead.” Rath tried not to let his relief show, but Maura could sense it as he sank into his chair beside her.

  “As most of you know,” Delyon looked around the Great Circle, “I have worked for several years to decipher our oldest scrolls which are written in a language that predates twara. I believe that language may have been spoken by the Great Kin before the Sundering, which divided the children of Umbria from the children of Han.”

  “Speculation!” muttered Trochard, loud enough for all to hear.

  Delyon pretended not to. “My study of these works leads me to believe that Queen Abrielle used the Staff of Velorken to work her enchantment upon King Elzaban.”

  Trochard leaped to his feet. “We asked for answers, not startales, upstart cub! Everyone knows the Staff of Velorken was destroyed during the Sundering.”

  Delyon ignored him. “Abrielle was a powerful enchantress, wise beyond her years, having served as apprentice to the Oracle of Margyle. I believe she knew or discovered the whereabouts of the Staff of Velorken and used it to keep Elzaban’s spirit alive in this world. When a young child or a pregnant woman entered Everwood, Elzaban’s spirit might be reborn within that body, waiting to be fully woken by a future daughter of Abrielle.”

  A fresh buzz greeted Delyon’s explanation. The tone of some comments sounded doubtful and hostile, but more sounded guardedly accepting.

  Maura was not certain what to think. Did this mean there had been other men who’d lived and died, never knowing the spirit of the Waiting King slumbered within them? Other women, destined to call forth that fallow potential for greatness, only to fail? The possibility chilled her.

  “I smell a conspiracy!” Trochard pointed a finger at Delyon. “This research of yours everyone thought so harmlessly foolish has been nothing but a ploy to justify your brother’s machinations!”

  “Enough, Trochard.”

  Madame Verise fixed him with a reproachful stare as she rose from her seat. “We may question young Delyon’s scholarship, but I am satisfied as to his integrity. And I can vouch that the man who raised this young woman…”

  She glanced toward Maura. “Your pardon, my dear. I do not believe you were properly introduced to us.”

  “I am Maura.” She rose and made a self-conscious bow to the Council. “Maura Woodbury, ward of the wiz—”

  But she did not get to finish, for the Vestan Council of Sages suddenly erupted in a more fevered clamor than before.

  Maura cast a questioning look at Rath. He only raised his brows and shrugged, clearly as puzzled as she. When she shifted her gaze to Idrygon, hoping for some explanation, he replied with an approving nod and a cold smile that did not allay her confusion…or her misgivings.

  7

  “I finally have Trochard where I want him!” Idrygon beamed at Rath and Maura as they ate their evening meal in the fountain courtyard of his villa. “Exposed to the Council for the carping old hypocrite he is.”

  “Explain this faction business to me again.” Rath took another big bite of a tasty dish of eggs, cheese and vegetables. Now that he had seen the Council in session and knew the nam
es of some members, it all might make more sense to him.

  “With pleasure, Highness.” Idrygon raised his wine goblet in a salute that made Rath almost as ill at ease as Idrygon’s use of the title. “It is quite simple. As you saw today, many among the Council are elders. Some made their home here before the Hanish Conquest, others fled here to escape it. The years since have been full of trouble and danger, but the elder sages provided prudent, cautious leadership that has served us well.”

  “But times have changed,” said Maura.

  Idrygon looked surprised by her comment. His wife and mother-in-law were eating in silence, which Rath guessed was their custom when Idrygon started on this subject. Delyon had a scroll draped over his knees. Reading while he ate, he scarcely seemed to notice the conversation or the food that he popped into his mouth at regular intervals.

  After an instant’s hesitation, Idrygon recovered his composure and nodded to Maura. “True, Highness. Times have changed. In recent years, younger members have joined the Council. Members who grieved the oppression of our kin on the mainland and who believed we should take measures to aid them.”

  Rath raised his goblet in a salute to Idrygon. So there had been folk on the Islands who thought beyond their own peace and comfort to care what happened in the rest of the kingdom. That came as welcome news.

  Idrygon shook his head. “I regret, our efforts have been thwarted by Trochard and his followers, always protesting that we must take no action until the coming of the Waiting King.”

  Beneath the table, Rath clenched his fist. He’d once despised the whole notion of the Waiting King for just that reason—because his countrymen might linger idle and passive in their misery waiting to be delivered from the Han, rather than seizing the chance to rise up on their own behalf.

  “To be fair,” said Idrygon, “some of the elders, like Madame Verise, were sincere in their beliefs and would endorse necessary action if and when the Waiting King answered their summons. I suspected all along that the others had no true faith in…you. All they wanted was to protect their own interests.”