Amid the Winter Snow

by Grace Draven

  And he couldn’t do it. He couldn’t leave her, not even when the most logical part of his brain insisted that she would be safe with a dozen fighters surrounding her. So he dealt with it. While the future might be a wide-open, unpainted canvas upon which they would make a multitude of other choices, for now the ones they’d made on that day were okay.

  Even in the best scenario, the aftermath of battle was difficult. There were prisoners to control and question, the wounded and dying to tend, and, inevitably, they had casualties to identify.

  Like their fighters, the abbey’s healers worked side by side with the Braugne army doctors. Wulf knew they got lucky, and the casualty list was going to be as good as it got in times of war, but that didn’t ease the stricken look on Lily’s face as she dove into helping the healers.

  Finally he couldn’t stand it any longer. Pulling her away from the triage station, he said gently, “Go back now, love.”

  She gripped his shirt. “I can’t just leave.”

  “Yes, you can. You can’t be everything to everybody all the time, so don’t even try, otherwise eventually it will kill you. Let everyone else do their jobs, and at least go back to one of the inns. I’m going to get a few questions answered, and then I’ll meet you there.”

  She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “All right. I’ll see you back in town.”

  He kissed her lingeringly, right there, in front of his people and hers. Without looking, he heard everything around them grow quiet.

  She sucked in a breath, but she didn’t pull away. In fact, rather uncertainly, she kissed him back, and he counted that as a win too.

  “Bold choice,” she murmured against his lips. “Unexpected.”

  “Advance communiques are effective at disseminating new policy to a populace,” he whispered, letting his fingertips linger on the soft curve of her cheek.

  “Oh dear goddess, did you just say that to me?” Pulling back, she eyed him askance. “Was that remarkable sentence your way of flirting?”

  He narrowed his eyes. “Of course not. The chocolate and the terrible orange food were my way of flirting. This was me making a public statement of intent. You’ll know when I’m flirting again.”

  “Will I?” One corner of her lips tilted up. “What were you doing when you climbed my tower?”

  He paused to consider. “Yes, that was flirting too.”

  “Re-eally. I thought that was you looking for an argument.”

  “It was an arguing kind of flirting,” he told her. “Remember, I brought the orange food and the chocolate with me. And since you’re going to bar your windows anyway, that was a singular event.”

  “I’m not going to bar my windows,” Lily told him.

  His voice hardened. “Unacceptable.”

  “Isssss it?” Her eyebrows rose slowly to her hairline. “Tough. That’s my decision to make, because nobody in their right mind would make that climb, Wulf. Nobody except for you. And for your information, I was firm but very nice when I talked to Gennita this morning, and I offered her beautiful solutions to resolve our conflict. So you go ahead and do what you do, but you leave me to do what I do.”

  He had already recognized he wanted her, but that was the moment Wulf fell in love. Because he might take her, and she might give in to him, but he knew he would never succeed in conquering her.

  Laying his hand against her cheek, he whispered softly, “Lily.”

  That was all, just Lily.

  He knew his expression transmitted everything he was feeling, because he made no attempt to hide it. Her gaze softening, she put her hand over his.

  When they finally drew apart, Margot swooped down on Lily like a bird of prey and bore her away, and that was a conversation Wulf was perfectly content to avoid. He plunged into work, and much later, he went to find her in town.

  She hadn’t been idle, he saw as he walked down the main street. The doors of several homes stood open, and from the glimpses of the interiors and the activity in the streets, the houses were being turned into temporary hospitals—an idea so superb and obvious he should have thought of it himself.

  He found Lily in the Sea Lion, drinking wine and picking at a plate of food, with Defenders strategically placed throughout the taproom. Her tired face lit when she saw him.

  Deliberately he walked over, bent, and kissed her on the lips. All movement and discussion in the room stopped, then slowly started up again.

  “There,” he said with satisfaction. “Now I’ve declared my intentions to your bodyguards and the townsfolk too.”

  There went those slender, expressive eyebrows again. They were excessively talented at telling him off, those eyebrows. No words were necessary, although that didn’t stop her.

  “You haven’t declared anything to anyone, not least of all to me,” she retorted. “All you’ve done is kiss me, and…” She held up both hands and laughed. “So what?”

  “If I did not have a healthy self-esteem, I might take that the wrong way,” he told her. He sat on the bench beside her, close enough their hips brushed, propped his elbow on the table and rested his head in his hand, and angled his body toward her.

  When she laughed harder, he smiled. Then she sobered. “Estrella has already given me her report. She said the weather mages were all dead, and that the attacking party was so large because they had been the focal point for the weather mages. The mages would split away from the main group to cast their spells and then meet up with them again afterward. That’s what I know. What else do you have?”

  “Your priestesses did well. After comparing accounts from several different prisoners with our own head count, I’m pretty certain we either captured or killed everyone in their group, which was what I was hoping for.” After a brief pause, he added, “They’re Guerlan, of course.”

  “Of course,” she muttered. She shoved her plate of food over to him, and he ate hungrily. Shredding a heel of bread with restless fingers, she said, “Anything more?”

  There was no way to make the next part easier. “From what we can gather, word was sent to Varian as soon as the first weather mages fell. He’ll know soon enough that Calles was involved. They fought so hard to take your party before it got back to you because they didn’t want Calles to know it was them.”

  “Everything he’s done, he’s tried to do in an underhanded way.” Her mouth tightened.

  “Yes,” he said. “He’s tried to take gold that wasn’t his, and then he killed my brother in an attempt to cover it up. He’s spread rumors about me and my troops, and killed people and set fire to their homesteads to create terror and resistance in every land we’ve passed through. He’s poisoned my troops to slow us down and tried to assasinate me, and the weather mages were meant to either finish us off or drive us back to Braugne to wait out the winter.”

  Brushing aside the shredded crumbs of bread, she murmured, “He’s working hard avoid meeting you on the battlefield.”

  “That’s because he’ll lose,” he said flatly. There was not a shred of doubt in Wulf’s soul about that. “Varian’s living on borrowed time, and I think he knows it. Enough about him for now. I want to talk about you.”

  The wary look came back into her eyes. She said, “All riiiiiigght. What do you want to talk about?”

  “Winter solstice is only a few days away now.” Capturing one of her hands, he played with her fingers. “My men have marched across a continent. They’ve fought off magical attacks and poison, and they need a break, with something to look forward to. Does Calles celebrate the Masque?”

  “We do,” she told him, smiling. “In fact, there would already be decorations out in the streets except everyone evacuated to the abbey. Why, would you like to celebrate the Masque with us?”

  Let Varian stew for a few days over the disappearance of his mages and troops. In the meantime, Wulf wanted to conduct another campaign that was of the utmost importance.

  He returned her smile. “Yes, I would.”

  ~ 11 ~

&n
bsp; In many ways, it had been a grim day, but sparring with Wulf had made Lily feel a little bit better.

  That evening, he escorted her back to the abbey despite her insistence that it was not necessary and that the half a dozen people who accompanied her were more than enough of an escort.

  Halfway across the frozen strait, his gloved hand reached out and took hers. They walked the rest of the way hand in hand.

  Once they arrived at the bottom of the stairs at the dock, he tugged her around to face him and kissed her. And kissed her.

  And kissed her.

  As he pulled her hood up around them, it gave them a sense of privacy that simply wasn’t real, but she did appreciate the gesture.

  His lips were so warm, and she knew them so well. She had kissed them in a thousand dreams.

  As he drew back, she whispered, “If this is another advance communique to disseminate a new policy to a populace, I might smack you.”

  He gave her a shadowed grin. “No, love. This is me flirting again. Sleep well. I’ll see you soon.”

  With reluctance obvious in his body language, he finally let her go and headed back across the strait. She watched his strong, solitary figure for a while, then peeked around the edge of her hood at the Defenders who guarded the open doors.

  They stared straight ahead, expressions rigid. One particular Defender’s eyes bulged slightly, clearly from some kind of internalized pressure, while his psyche rolled around and laughed.

  Facing Margot had been difficult enough. Deciding she didn’t have to emerge from the depths of her hood if she didn’t want to, Lily hid from curious gazes as she hurried up to her tower where she slept like the dead the entire night.

  The next morning, before Lily’d had a chance to drink her first cup of tea, Gennita found her and said she and her husband had decided to stay. While the older woman was awkward, Lily could see that Gennita’s psyche had softened significantly, so she accepted the news gladly.

  A few hours later, after interviewing Dulcinda and Evie, she appointed Dulcinda as her second secretary, dumped the budget into her hands, and said, “Please come back to me with this pared down to the bare essentials. We’re going to hold on to as much coin as we can in case we need to buy more food before the next harvest.”

  “I’d be delighted to, your grace.”

  After delegating the budget to someone else, Lily felt like such a renegade she scooped up the rest of the requests for priestesses and put those on Prem’s desk.

  “I want your best recommendations for these,” she told Prem.

  “Yes, your grace!” Beaming at her, Prem got to work.

  Your grace. It made her feel so old. Just as she turned away, Estrella strode into the outer office. While the captain of the Defenders wore an entirely appropriate expression, her psyche was tinged red with anger as it glared at Lily.

  “Good morning, your grace,” Estrella said. “Your invader is here.”

  “My… invader.” With an effort, Lily forced herself to stop staring at the area over Estrella’s head.

  “Yes, your grace. You know, the one who killed his brother and burned farms and murdered families, then marched his army unasked onto our land and started kissing you. That one.”

  Breathing deeply, Lily rubbed her face. Calm, be calm.

  She told Estrella, “He didn’t kill his brother. The king of Guerlan did. He didn’t do any of the other things either. Well, he did march his army unasked onto our land, and… he did start kissing me. But the rest of it isn’t true.”

  Some of the anger in Estrella’s psyche faded. Frowning, she asked, “Are you sure?”

  “You know how good my truthsense is. Yes, I am.” She looked over her fingers at the captain. “What does he want?”

  “He has requested an audience with you. After yesterday, none of the Defenders are entirely sure how we’re supposed to respond to his presence. He walked across from the mainland by himself, so he doesn’t pose an immediate threat—”

  “Captain, he’s not a threat to us, not unless we do something stupid like endanger him or any of his men, and we’re not going to do that.” She drummed her fingers. “I have invited him to stay through winter solstice. The Braugnes are to be treated with courtesy and welcomed to our Masque. Please tell the townsfolk they are still welcome to stay at the abbey, but those who wish to return home may do so with my blessing.”

  The tension in Estrella’s shoulders eased. “Yes, your grace. I’ll see that word gets out to the evacuees. About the invad—about the Protector of Braugne. Shall I turn him away?”

  “No, please show him to my office.” As Estrella left, Lily looked at Prem and said, “He promised me flirting. This should be good.”

  Glee danced in Prem’s eyes. “Oh, your grace, that’s amazing. Do… do we welcome it?”

  “That depends entirely on what he does.” Shrugging, Lily walked back into her office and waited.

  She looked out the window until, behind her, Estrella said, “The Protector of Braugne, your grace.”

  Lily turned, but the words she had prepared in greeting died unspoken as Wulf strode across the room to her. He looked the same, a powerfully built, hardened man wearing armor, cloak, and sword, but in one hand he held a large bouquet of vivid red roses.

  For a moment the illusion held perfectly. She even caught a whiff of scent that smelled like roses. Then, as he drew closer and she stared, she realized the bouquet he held was made of the velvet roses from the shop he had broken into.

  Smiling, she held out her hands for them. “They’re beautiful—thank you. I swear I even smell roses.”

  “I sprinkled perfume on the blooms.” As he gave them to her, he bent in to steal a swift kiss. Warming with pleasure, she kissed him back.

  “I take it you added more money to the jar behind the counter.”

  Smiling faintly, he said, “Did you doubt me?”

  “Not at all.” She buried her face in the soft velvet blooms, inhaled with pleasure, then set them aside. “I also checked the shop yesterday afternoon when I returned to town. It was exactly as you had said. The coin has remained undisturbed. In fact, I think there was even more than what you originally put there.”

  “Of course.”

  Leaning back against her desk, she asked, “What can I do for you, Wulf?”

  “If you can spare an hour, I would like for you to give me a tour of the abbey. From all accounts I’ve read, it’s a beautiful place. I’d like to hear the things you love about it.”

  She lit up even further. “Let me get my cloak.”

  They walked through the grounds and the temple while they talked. He tucked her hand into the crook of his arm, and she allowed it.

  Not everyone welcomed the sight of them together. While they were greeted with infallible politeness, the psyches of some glared at them with fear and hatred because people were people, and even though Wulfgar was not responsible for the violence that had come to Calles, it had still come because of his presence. And change was hard.

  At the end of the hour, they paused at the top of the steps that led to the dock. Looking down at her, his expression serious, he said, “It’s as beautiful as everyone said.”

  “I think so.” She frowned as she tried to gain clues about his change in mood. The wolf in his psyche had turned away from her, head down.

  Kissing her mouth and then her cheek, he told her, “I’ll see you soon.”

  When he left, he took the brightness out of the wintery day and what warmth there was with him. She watched him walk back to the mainland where a cadre of his soldiers stood vigil. Once he joined them, they moved away, back to the army camp.

  That set the pattern for the next few days. The next day whenWulf returned, he brought ancient manuscripts.

  “Ooooh, the ancient manuscripts,” Lily said while she rubbed her hands together in delight. “Wait, those were supposed to be a bribe.”

  “They were not a bribe! They were a gift. You were just too afraid of me to a
ccept them.”

  “I wasn’t afraid of you! I went into your army camp all by myself, didn’t I? It was the politics, the appearance of supporting one side over another.”

  He laughed. “Well, that ship has sailed, hasn’t it? Take them, love, and enjoy them with my welcome.”

  That ship had, indeed, sailed.

  “Thank you.” Smiling, she accepted the gift. “I will.”

  He always kissed her in greeting, and he never failed to kiss her when he left. It made her happy, but restless too. A hunger for him developed. It scratched at her underneath her skin and made her toss and turn at night.

  Once, she opened up the window with the broken latch just to glare down at the pitons that ran down the side of the tower and were clearly not used enough.

  Meanwhile, many of the townsfolk migrated back into town, and decorations began to appear. Calles was beautiful in midwinter, with the lights glowing in the houses and shops and brightly colored banners and ribbons festooning the doors and windows of every building.

  The abbey decorated for the holiday too. It was always such a deep pleasure to pull out with reverence the ornaments and decorations that were generations old. The Masque was a celebration of all the gods—those that were called the gods of the Elder Races on Earth—and not just Camael, so they set up representations for all seven.

  As god of the Dance, Taliesin always came first. Half male and half female, Taliesin was first among the Primal Powers because everything dances, the planets and all the stars, the other gods, the Elder Races, and humans. Dance is change, and the universe is constantly in motion.

  There was also Azrael, the god of Death; Inanna, the goddess of Love; Nadir, the goddess of the depths or the Oracle; Will, the god of the Gift; Hyperion, the god of Law, and, of course, Camael, goddess of the Hearth.

  As she helped set out the decorations, Lily fussed extra long over Camael’s arrangement in the temple, whispering to the goddess, “Because I’m partial.”