Prince, Prelude-Legend

by Claudy Conn

  Then all at once Maxie saw a vision of blood oozing from Lamia’s lips and bolts of flame in the depths of Lamia’s amber eyes. Repelled, she clutched at the silks of her skirt as though to claim reality. What was this? An illusion, yes, but oh so real!

  * * *

  Lamia felt a piercing pain shoot through her body. She was ill. She had to leave. She stood up. “Well, I am sure you must be busy. I must go and leave you to yourselves! No doubt your…” She felt sickened and refused to call him Maxine’s betrothed. “…Julian will be walking through the door presently, and you will want to freshen up for him.”

  Her eyes raked Maxie as though to imply that she looked like nothing more than a country chit, but at the hard look in Maxie’s eyes, she frowned slightly in surprise. Perhaps she should revise her opinion of the chit.

  “There is plenty of time, and we are very informal and comfortable here at Reigate,” Maxie said on a quiet note.

  So then, Lamia concluded to herself, he wouldn’t be coming any time soon, and she could no longer endure this girl and her mother and their awful, bright, and shiny home! She would have to depart for DuLaine Castle without even a glimpse of Julian Talbot. As she looked at Maxine, she was startled to find that she was reminded of something—someone from a long time ago…

  All at once Lamia felt as though she were suffocating. She couldn’t breathe. She had never felt this way before, not in hundreds and hundreds of years. Her throat constricted, and she nearly gasped for air. She needed air.

  The sun? Gone. Thank the stars! The afternoon had progressed into a bleak, dusky late afternoon. What then? It wasn’t the sun. What could be affecting her this way?

  Lamia was swept with a wave of violent nausea. Her head was throbbing. She felt her blood thin to a dribble in her veins…

  She had to escape. Escape. That was the notion, the word that came to her mind. She had to escape Reigate!

  She scarcely was able to keep her wits about herself as she searched for an easy exit. Distractedly she glanced across at the clock on the hearth mantle. Her voice came as a whisper. “Well then…I must rush, as we leave for the New Forest and DuLaine. However, I hope, Maxine, you and I might find an opportunity to ride together and further our new acquaintanceship upon my return.” Lamia managed a hurried smile, dropped the silky black veil once more over her face, and started towards the door. An inner voice yelled for her to run, but she controlled herself. She never heard Maxine’s polite rejoinder.

  * * *

  Delia and Maxine eyed one another. The entire episode should have been laughable, but they both knew this was no laughing matter.

  Maxie said softly, “Explain, Mama.”

  “Truly, I cannot. All I know is what I feel, and I feel the DuLaine woman harbors some wicked secret…”

  “Mama, she harbors more than a wicked secret. Of that I have no doubt. I shall take it further. The woman emanates evil. From her eyes to her toes…evil.”

  Delia eyed her daughter thoughtfully. “Yes, I agree. It is more than selfishness. It is more than the usual greed, misuse of power, thoughtlessness…there is something deep in her soul…”

  “No soul, or so corrupted that it is beyond saving, Mama,” Maxine returned thoughtfully. “And there is something else at work here, and, Mama…it is all around me and Julian. Now tell me about what I am.”

  Delia sighed. “Maxine, I will not deny that I am aware…your father and I are aware … that you have a gift. Your intuition is far more than that, isn’t it?”

  “You know that it is, Mama.”

  “Yes. We have avoided speaking of it for so long, but you have the gift of knowing…seeing things beyond your ken.”

  “Yes,” Maxine answered gravely. “You and Papa warned me to keep still about it and to suppress such sensations…you said only harm could come of it. You said if people noticed that I possessed such a gift they would shun me…or worse. But Daniel told me when we were children that if I worked on my abilities, I would be able to control them when we were in company. I want to know what I am. I want to know why Daniel and I can see and feel things before they happen…just as they are about to happen.” She took her mother’s hands and squeezed. “Now is the time, Mama. Tell me what Danny’s letter means, but start with the why…why did you throw Danny’s letter into the fire when that woman was announced?”

  Delia sighed. “Everything is unraveling—I don’t know what to do, my child. I am not like you. Sometimes I act on intuition without understanding the why of it, but I don’t have your gifts. That is the truth, my darling.”

  “Listen to me, Mama. I have known for years that…you and Papa are different…in many ways from your peers. It is there, under the surface. I feel it—more, I see it.”

  “So we are,” Delia answered simply, almost sadly. “So we are, but not quite like you and Danny. It skipped our generation. We were meant to bring you and Daniel into the world you were born to rule. We should have trained you—that was our destiny, and we made a conscious decision not to, may the Realm forgive us.”

  “What are you talking about—what is the Realm?” Maxie was wide-eyed now. “What a strange thing to say. What can you possibly mean?”

  “For that, we must wait for your father.”

  “This is ridiculous—just tell me.”

  “No, that wouldn’t be right. We must wait for your father—then you will understand what we wanted to shield you from.”

  “Just tell me, Mama.”

  Delia stroked her daughter’s black locks. “You and your brother have the potential for enormous power—handed down from both my family’s ancestors and your father’s. However, your abilities, if allowed to grow—if you were given the required training—are so much more complex than even Daniel’s.”

  “Ancestors? Yours and Papa’s? Explain?”

  “Now, why do you two have your heads together like that?” Julian asked from the doorway. He had not allowed Kettles to announce him. Indeed, he was already considered a family member, and so he had just walked into the morning room on his own.

  Delia and Maxine parted guiltily, but Maxie jumped to her feet and rushed to him, was in his arms and kissing his face while her mother clucked at her in the background.

  She whispered his name and kissed him full on the mouth, heedless of her disapproving parent. It pleased him and worried him all at once. There was something desperate in her movement. Something had distressed her…greatly. “What is it, Max? What has you two so off kilter?”

  She tried to make light of it. “Ha, wouldn’t you like to know.”

  “Indeed, I would.” He grinned and dropped a quick kiss on her cherry lips.

  “Then I shall tell you, but not until I make you beg and beg.”

  “Hoyden,” he whispered affectionately.

  ~ Eleven ~

  LAMIA LAID HER head back against the luxurious squabs inside the protection of her coach. Shamon sat across from her with his head bent and in both of his hands. She frowned to hear him groan and called to the coachman to hurry the horses.

  They rounded the bend in the road and followed the finger-post sign that would eventually take them to Post Road and to DuLaine Castle in the New Forest.

  The queasiness that wrenched at Lamia’s stomach and reached up to choke the air from her throat suddenly subsided. Just like that…she was feeling better. The haze of the fog wavering around her head seemed to lift. Her mind cleared, and her many scrambled thoughts became coherent and whole. She looked at Shamon. He was sitting upright and looked much more himself.

  “How are you feeling, dear?” she asked as her mind started working again, running with a certain knowledge.

  “Better, m’lady.” Shamon eyed her. “And you?”

  “Better as well, yes, much better.” She frowned in puzzlement as she attempted to understand the conclusion she had drawn from this experience. Something at Reigate, she knew not what, had made them ill.

  Shamon had been affected because she had recently
given him her blood. That would subside in time. He was not subject to daylight’s ill effects. The transference would not diminish him in that way. She could not give him that much of her blood. His body would reject it. Even if she could—she wouldn’t. What use would he be to her then? She needed him to walk amongst the humans and carry out her needs and her wishes.

  No, Shamon would have to retain most of his human frailties in order to serve her in all ways. What she could give to Shamon was time, just a little more time. In the end, Shamon must die…

  That was difficult to contemplate. She would of course replace him, but that was not something she wanted to think about now. For now, she had Shamon. He was her darling, and like a favorite pet, she would keep him safe for as long as she could. Now, she had to concentrate on another problem.

  What was causing her illness? What was causing her dizziness? Why had it all become worse at Reigate, better when they were well away? Had that part been coincidence? Possibly—after all, she had been ill before she had arrived at Reigate.

  She eyed Shamon moodily. “Damn them all! Shamon, I never even got a glimpse of Julian. Damn their eyes, damn them for thinking he is theirs…hers! I shall see them all dead before I allow it.”

  “Hush, my lady,” Shamon soothed softly. “You will see him soon…”

  She made a snarling sound. “You don’t understand!”

  “No, my lady, I don’t suppose I do,” Shamon said sadly.

  Dusk had engulfed them. She felt the night’s soothing dimness ease her tension. The coachman had slowed the horses to a walk as he could no longer see up ahead and would have to trust them to steady on.

  Lamia sighed. She had always loved the night, even as a girl, even before…the change. Still, the night posed problems. She had to deal with servants and their limitations. Night travel for one. No doubt, soon her driver would need to pull into a respectable posting house.

  Humans did not see well at night. The full moon would help, but eventually she would have to permit her coachman his rest. Appearances were always important.

  If the following day turned out gray enough, she would veil her face and keep the dark curtains of her coach tightly drawn. In that way they might continue their long journey to the New Forest. In the meantime, she would rest. The mysterious ordeal of her day had left her greatly fatigued.

  “Shamon, come…stroke my neck,” Lamia said softly, smiling in response to the glint of pleasure that came to his adoring eyes. Yes, she would keep Shamon for as long as it was possible….

  * * *

  His lordship, Julian Talbot, was asleep in the guestroom at the opposite end of Maxine’s chamber on the second floor, and Maxine was all too aware of his nearness (or lack thereof). She had been thinking about his kiss, his tongue, the feel of his large hands on her waist, her back, and then on her breast earlier in the evening when they had stolen a moment alone together.

  She had paced in her room. She had jumped into bed and tossed and turned and then paced some more. She wanted him. She wanted to touch him, feel him touch her, but something else was gnawing at her.

  Secrets! They were everywhere in this house. She didn’t want to start out that way with Julian. It was eating at her. She had to tell him what was happening. She wanted everything about their relationship to be open and honest. But first, something needed her attention. Then she would tell him what she knew, which wasn’t much. She still had more questions than answers!

  Julian was her beloved. He was her only one. She knew what they shared was almost as pure as a love could be between a man and a woman. It would be very bold of her to go to his room. She shrugged this piece of etiquette off and decided that was just what she would do. But first, she was going to invade his privacy. She needed to, just this once, and not so very much. Just a little, just so she could accomplish her goal.

  Thus, Maxie did something she had not done for some time: she concentrated her mind in a manner that allowed her to focus all her nerve endings and her sensibilities on one subject—Julian.

  She could see him in her mind. The vision came in a hazy wave and then cleared. He was lying on his side, curled up under the covers, sleeping peacefully. She could hear his deep breathing as though he were beside her. Oh, how she wished he were beside her. The wedding was still too far away.

  All right, he was asleep, good. Right then; she would go to his room after she was done with her investigation. She needed the cover of night; she needed to do this alone.

  Maxie moved hurriedly out of her bedroom and down the long, wide corridor to the master suite her parents occupied. She stopped. Hmmm. She couldn’t be too careful. She allowed her mind to probe and found her mother was also deeply asleep.

  So far, so good. She wasn’t waiting for her father to return from his journey. She meant to know what the family secret was now, right now, and there was a way to do this. To the attic!

  Maxie was determined to discover what her brother wanted her to know, but beside that, there was something else…

  Maxie was responding to a call. A call that resounded in her brain. A call that insisted she go to the attic. A voice that wasn’t the sexy prince’s voice but another familiar voice whispering her name, calling her. She couldn’t put a face to the voice, and still it was strangely familiar, soothing. She grimaced as she thought about that. Soothing? She was hearing voices in her head for goodness sake—what the deuce was soothing about that?

  Quietly she took the short flight of steps to the third floor. She padded down a narrow corridor to another short stairway, taking that to yet another door. She found it locked but had anticipated that—her mother would have locked it after finding her there the other night.

  No one had ever told her that the key was hidden in a nearby wall cupboard, but without thinking she retrieved it.

  A wave of static electricity rushed through her fingers as she slid the key in place and opened the door. Darkness welcomed her, as did a certainty that somewhere in this room lay the answers she needed. She held her small lantern ahead of herself and looked into the room as she took her first steps into its confines. Oddly, the feeling that engulfed her was an inexplicable sense that finally she would be confronting herself.

  It had been cold away from the warm fire that glowed in her room. She had expected the attic to be colder still, but it wasn’t. It felt warm and inviting. The air seemed to caress her, welcome, enfold her into a soft embrace.

  Maxie found herself in the middle of the room without having any clear memory of walking that far into the attic. She held her lantern higher and studied the low rafters of the ceiling. She took a turn around the room with the lantern and noticed that the attic door was closed. She was sure she had left it open.

  She was being nonsensical. This was an attic, merely a storage room, naught else. It held only stuffy ancestral keepsakes, old furniture, old clothing, nothing sinister, and nothing that spoke of secrets. A nervous shiver tickled her spine. What was this? Why should she feel suddenly nervous when at first she had felt quite the opposite?

  A memory gently took shape in her mind. It took on a life, vivid and almost real. It was the one time she and Danny had clandestinely followed their father into this room. He had not noticed them. She and her brother had nearly burst out laughing to watch him walk up the stairs and into the attic as though he were in a trance.

  He had left the door open, and they quickly slithered in and hid. They watched the door close on its own and had looked a question at each other.

  Their father had been so absorbed, so determined in his search for something…

  He had mumbled to himself and obviously had no notion his two children were watching from a dark corner. And then he had started to chant.

  Brother and sister had nearly lost themselves to laughter as they held their hands over their mouths, but as their father continued this way for a time, they grew quiet and concerned. Who was this? It was as though their father had become a stranger.

  The squire knel
t next to a trunk, and they heard him ask for guidance.

  It was Danny who gave their game away. He moved backwards and hit a piece of furniture. The bump made a loud sound, causing their father to spin around on them. The shock had left all three momentarily speechless.

  The squire was the first to recover and pointed an affronted finger at his children. Although he wagged this extremity disapprovingly, he appeared only mildly annoyed as he shooed them off and away. After that, the attic had lost its allure.

  After all, it was only a dusty old room full of dusty old things, and they had a great many other things to occupy their time. Hence the attic had been forgotten, until recently.

  Maxie put a hand to her forehead. What in heaven’s name was wrong with her? What had compelled her to come here in the middle of the night? Was she imagining things? Was she, indeed, having a breakdown? Going mad? After all, she was hearing a voice in her head. Didn’t people who went insane hear voices? She was seeing the Fae in the flesh, and a royal Fae at that! What would Julian say to all of this?

  Every fiber of her being shouted that she wasn’t insane. She was perfectly rational, and there was a perfectly logical reason for all that was happening. Fine. Here she was in the attic, yet what was it she was really looking to find?

  She moved about restlessly. She touched an old, torn winged chair. She went to an ancient chest of drawers…nothing. Absolutely nothing.

  She took the lantern across the room and looked through another set of drawers. Tablecloths…only tablecloths and linens inside.

  Again, the soft caress, the welcoming warmth, and she found herself standing in front of an old trunk. Of course. The sensation that swept through her caused her body to tremble. She stood mesmerized by feelings, conflicting feelings that seemed to bounce off one another. Her fingers were shaking as she reached for the handle of the trunk.

  “Steady,” she whispered to herself as she lifted the lid.

  Light! It exploded into the night. Everywhere there was light!

  The white light engulfed her, and the voice softly, so strangely familiar, was back. Yes, the same voice she had been hearing, sensing, was back, but this time it was there…taking on an ethereal form. He was scarcely visible, but he was there, not in her head anymore, but right in front of her!