by Cara Coe
She paused now and assessed Amelie’s hung head and distant expression. In the end, Millie chose to stuff the last of her bread in her mouth and say nothing.
“Get some rest, Millie,” Amelie said breaking from her faraway thoughts. “We ride hard tomorrow. I must get this note to Sir Duncan as soon as possible.”
The girls turned into their tents for the unusually warm night.
Chapter 3
Seth
Seth sat on the fence post outside the stables staring into Draeden’s blue gray sky in the early morning. Only the cooks were up. He could see the orange glow of the fire in the stone building off the castle as they prepared bread for the day.
He heard a giggle from the stable and a hurried “Shhhhhh!” in response. Seth suppressed an affectionate sigh. No, not only the cooks were up.
“Why must we be quiet at this hour when there is no one to hear us?” a woman’s voice asked punctuated with more giggles.
To alleviate any embarrassing declarations not meant for his ears, Seth loudly cleared his throat. The giggling ceased immediately. Sounds of panicked rustling ensued followed by a light laugh.
“That is why, my dear,” answered Talon, the prince’s sharpest archer and loyal solider. Both Talon and the woman emerged from the stable, their scandalous engagements evident in their disheveled clothing and grassy hair.
“Your Highness,” the woman said, her voice dripping with embarrassment. Seth recognized her as one of the new cooks in the galley. Without waiting for a response from him, she scurried toward the stone kitchen, pulling at her skirts while she ran.
“She’s only been here a week, Talon,” Seth said in amazement.
Grinning, Talon hopped up to the fence and settled himself next to the prince. “My fastest conquest,” he confirmed.
“You need to stop sleeping with the kitchen staff. You anger enough of them and I swear you’ll be poisoned before your twenty-fourth birthday.”
“Luckily that’s almost a year away. Plenty of time of run through the rest of the castle staff.”
“Why do I even waste my breath?” Seth muttered. “You’re not hearing me.”
“Oh, I hear you. I even believe what you say. But have no worries. I’ll die a happy man. And no one will even miss me. We have the same birthday. We are the same age. And we get the same amount of attention from the ladies. But while you shun all of them, I’m left to pick up the slack and bed your share as well. And if I just so happen to die on our birthday, it will be as it is every year. The kingdom will throw a big party in your honor and I will sit outside and smoke a pipe. And wait for the poison to kick in.”
Seth nodded slightly. “You always did prefer the pipe to the party.”
Talon slapped him on the back in return. “As do you. Unfortunately, your appearance is always required.”
Seth grimaced. “Don’t remind me. But we get a respite for a few weeks at least. Another disappearance. Near the Candor border in the Gershuit village.”
“A confirmed mage?”
Seth nodded. He was the younger of the two princes and did not require as much time present in the palace as his other brother, Kernan. Though the two were only three years apart, Kernan was being groomed to succeed to the throne and Seth felt with each passing year that the gulf between them widened. With his mother passing ten years ago and his brother further entrenched in palace dealings, Seth felt the urge to roam the kingdom on missions more and more. Which suited Kernan just fine. In the last several months, mages throughout Draeden had gone missing. Though being a mage is illegal in Draeden, the brothers turned a blind eye to their existence and silently worried at this new development. Kernan often sent Seth in search of answers under the nose of their father to find out what he could.
“We leave tomorrow,” Seth said, climbing down from his spot on the fence. “So, make sure you say what you need to say to the cook you bedded last night so that we’re not dodging pots and pans when we ride back in.”
He walked back towards the palace with Talon’s laughter floating behind him in the morning sky.
Chapter 4
Amelie
Amelie woke several times during the night unable to maintain a decent sleep. The magic was sweeping from her, leaving her mind hollow and her limbs cold. This happened every time she concentrated her abilities and she despised the weakened state it left her in. But she had needed to get that message. They’d been tracking the rider for weeks and she was road weary and impatient. Learning of his stay in the village for the night made her heady with desire to end this and head home. She paid for it now and she gathered her cloak closer to her even though it wouldn’t be able to cure this kind of chill.
Millie slept as she always did on warm nights, splayed about the tent with some piece of her body determined to jut into Amelie’s own space. Her golden hair followed suit, laid out wildly about her small face. She looked so angelic. Not only in slumber but also when awake in the way she moved, in her wide, searching blue eyes, and the high pitch of her voice. Her outward appearance made her a deadly and effective companion.
Millie had been assigned to Amelie soon after the Princess left the palace to reside with the nuns in the small convent tucked away in Crescent Forest – a full day’s ride from the castle. Millie was the daughter of a successful farmer. His crops were plentiful enough and their lord gentle enough on taxes to keep Millie and her parents comfortable. But when a soldier came for her with a royal assignment, no one in the family could produce enough logic to turn him down. In exchange for the young girl becoming a companion to the eldest princess, the family would receive a yearly purse of more than her father could ever hope to reap from his harvests and Millie would be trained alongside the princess in noble formalities. A noble marriage would become a possibility, if any lords or royalty were so obliged.
“The rider. Did you kill him?” Millie’s voice came out muffled into the crook of her arm and her eyes never opened.
“I did.”
“I’m sorry.”
“It was orders, Millie. He has been doing damage to the crown for months. His messages arrange assassination attempts.”
“I’m sorry,” Millie repeated.
“Good night, Millie.”
Amelie rolled herself into her cloak and closed her eyes.
* * *
The ride back from Draeden was quick and hurried. Camping so close to the border fueled them. The girls traveled hard, ready to sleep in their own beds, wash away the road grime, and “feel like a woman again” according to Millie. Days were spent pushing the horses and the nights were short; sleep sacrificed for speed. Amelie found Sir Duncan as soon as she pulled her steed up to the castle gates.
Amelie nodded briefly to Millie. “Will you ride on or stay?” she asked. It was mid-morning. If Millie pressed on at even half the speed the women employed traveling back into their kingdom’s borders she would reach the convent by nightfall.
Millie glanced at the castle. Though she’d stayed there several times, she was still a modest soul from farmland grounds. Her home and where she longed to return was the convent where she could settle herself back into her routine. Amelie took one look at her and smiled.
“I will follow you as soon as I am finished here,” she said. “Do not wait for me.”
Millie grinned. “Wasn’t going to, Princess.” She nudged her horse forward and left with a gallop. “I’ll keep dinner warm for you!” she called as she rode away.
Amelie dismounted and held up a palm to the stable hand who had been ambling toward them. He stopped his progress and leaned against an oak, out of earshot of Amelie and the king’s advisor. She withdrew the message and slipped it into Sir Duncan’s papery hand. He was wrinkled and gray from his forehead to his fingertips and Amelie was certain it extended beyond that into the swaths of robes he always wore. His mind was sharp, however, aging much more slowly than the shell of a body that contained it. Sir Duncan had been a fixture in Amelie’s life since she could r
emember and he’s always looked this way.
“No eyes but yours has touched these words since I took possession,” Amelie stated as she always did while he skimmed the message. Her work included keeping information private until Sir Duncan could ascertain its impact and she did not exclude herself from this practice. Sir Duncan, however launched into a verbal reading as he did each time she delivered any intercepted material. He kept nothing from her.
“The message is to Rankor.”
“Another?” Amelie didn’t bother keeping the surprise from her face. “That’s three now this season.”
“Yes,” Sir Duncan also made no attempt to hide his disdain. Rankor was rumored to be a mage in the deep southwest of Draeden. There was little importance to that region. It was mostly made up of sheep and lamb farmers who crossed the divide over the tail end of a great mountain ridge to deliver dyed wools, cheeses, and fresh meat during the festival seasons.
It was Rankor’s location to the mountain ridge that troubled Sir Duncan. North of the ridge through the deadliest of the passes was a mythical land of mages where the magic was fluent and strong. Their existence was the stuff of fairy tales in the five kingdoms, as the only ones who’d ever seen them were neighbors who’d heard from neighbors who’d heard from travelers and so on. Amelie didn’t trouble herself with things beyond her reach. But the few times she’d traveled near the mountains in Draeden, she’d sat up and stared at the ridge at twilight or early dawn and the wind always blew her tendrils towards the peaks. Her fingers plucked the grass next to her knees, itchy and restless. Sir Duncan wasn’t one for tales either, but his gray eyes held pools of interest when they met Amelie’s while contemplating a land of magic.
There were a handful of mages in the kingdoms and it was still a bitter war with the royals between despising them and prizing their abilities and sometimes both. They were weaklings in comparison to the accounts of Rankor’s wake with the exception of Amelie. No one outside Candor’s highest royalty knew firsthand her influences and she was tucked away at their emergence which also painfully coincided with the death of the crown Prince Phillip. Years of isolation led people to believe she too had passed or gone crazy or perhaps never existed at all. Whispers now circulated throughout the kingdoms regarding the Hidden Princess but many believed them to be as credible as the so-called magical land in the mountains.
“Apparently there are more lords who believe he is a powerful mage from the mountains, from the White Forest. A true mage. These rumors are gathering a following. This message details plans to meet at the Spring Festival in Draeden.”
“Where it won’t be unusual to have that many lords from multiple kingdoms in one place,” Amelie mused inwardly. Sir Duncan gave a sharp, grave nod. In any other setting, it would border on an act of treason. There hasn’t been an alliance between any kingdoms in over a hundred years and short of stark trading lanes and Draeden’s festival, there was no mingling of the people.
“It’s addressed to his main contact, Lord Hector in Grantham. He is to start a chain with the same message to various lords. To spread the message in time, I imagine.”
“But what does he want?” Amelie pressed. Sir Duncan shook his head.
“That realization will come to pass in future missions,” he finally answered. “The sooner, the better. While I’m not inclined to believe all the accounts I hear of this Rankor, if he is powerful enough to amass such a brazen gathering I want to know his intent. And how Candor fits into it.”
Sir Duncan pocketed the message and Amelie glanced at the stable hand.
“My sister?” she asked Sir Duncan.
“She waited, dearest. You are later than expected. She had to travel north with delegates from the Forest Ball to settle disputes on territories. She kept them nearly three days after the ball’s conclusion.”
Amelie gave a quick shake of her head in the direction of the oak and the stable boy straightened himself, tipped his hat, and ran down the direction of the lake.
“Then I shall not stay any longer, Sir Duncan.”
“Your mother awaits you in the study.”
“I shall not stay any longer,” Amelie repeated coldly. “Give the queen my best.”
“If I gave the queen your best, I’d be imprisoned for attempted murder.”
Amelie returned the comment with a dark smile. “Then give her your best and say it was from me.”
She mounted her horse and squeezed her thighs, sending her mare flying in the direction of the convent.
Chapter 5
Amelie
Phillip’s face flashed in Amelie’s mirror. She stopped brushing her hair and turned to look at him with troubled eyes. They had always been close, but fear still pinched her stomach.
He stood in the middle of her chambers, not moving any closer, not moving at all. He’d been in there countless times as they grew up: letting her win at wrestling matches, reading her stories from the Mage Tales book she cherished so much as a girl, and sneaking pastries from the King’s balls when she was too young to attend. But now his demeanor was off. She had chills on her neck. The wrongness in the air choked the room.
“He’s dead,” Phillip said flatly. Amelie closed her eyes in an overwhelming wave of sorrow.
“No,” she breathed.
“What happened?” Phillip demanded. “He was crazed! What did you do?”
His look of disgust pierced Amelie’s heart. “Nothing!” she insisted. “I swear it!”
His head shook slowly from side to side. “Not nothing,” he spat. “Because you’re doing it to me.”
His eyes clouded darkly and a scowl twisted his lips. He crossed the room and seized the wrist that held the hairbrush. Amelie screamed.
“Hush!”
Millie clutched Amelie to her and rocked until the trembling stopped and the dream evaporated into the chilly night.
“You’re going to get that nun in here jabbing us with the broom again,” Millie scolded, but she was smiling. A bubble of hysterical laughter ripped through the last of the terror as Amelie wiped her wet eyes, embarrassed. It had been eight years and she still had the same nightmare several times a month. When they first started soon after her brother’s death, it had been every night. Years in the company of the nuns have eased her troubled sleep somewhat but Amelie feared the night terrors would never cease.
She enjoyed her quiet existence at the convent. The lack of men and the routine of humble tasks suited her and kept her limbs moving and her mind free. The nuns did not treat her like a princess and in fact hemmed and hawed about her presence when she first arrived as a sullen, bratty girl of thirteen, confused and angry at the world for what she was.
She had stood in her simple room with the straw-stuffed mattress and puffed her cheeks. Everything was stone and sparse - there was nothing to destroy to alleviate her frustrated energy. She chose one of the few targets in her space and threw an elbow into the simple oval mirror hanging above her wash basin. Sister Patrice, the head of the convent and the woman who had just deposited Amelie in her room, came rushing back in at the sound.
Her sharp eyes took in the shards of glass and the lines of blood dripping from her elbow. “Just as well,” she said curtly. “It was put in for you because you are a princess, against my wishes.”
“I don’t want it.”
“Nor shall you have another. We do not keep mirrors at this convent. You’ll find no vanity here.” She turned to leave, but paused to take in Amelie’s appearance once more. “You will clean the mess and your wounds for I’ll not have blood at the dinner table. Or you don’t eat.”
Amelie didn’t eat that night. Or for several nights after that. Finally, out of fatigue and hunger from her measly breakfasts of oats and eggs in the kitchen each morning, Amelie arrived at the dinner table, eyeing Sister Patrice warily.
Sister Patrice nodded to the empty seat briskly. No words were spoken, but Amelie kept a careful watch on Sister Patrice and the five other nuns with each bite. They c
ontinued their chatter like she wasn’t there. No one scolded her. No one mentioned her absence from the table the last few nights or the mirror incident. No one looked at her like she was a thing to be rid of. She relaxed her shoulders and helped clear the table at meal’s end. And when Sister Yona showed up at her door after breakfast the next morning to introduce her to her chores, Amelie followed without complaint.
“Sister Patrice thinks you are ready,” Sister Yona said quietly as they departed. And she was.
Despite figuring out how to coexist peacefully with the nuns, Amelie could not contain her horror at finding out she was to be provided a companion by order of the king. Millie was not the first to be chosen. Amelie had already cast aside two previous attempts at companionship before her future best friend arrived.
“Too apologetic,” she hissed of the first girl who feared everything she attempted, worsened by Amelie’s sour mood. The poor girl often followed up her attempts with a desperate, “My apologies, my lady.”
The serving of uneaten food. “My apologies, my lady,” said the young girl as she cleared the full plate.
Braiding Amelie’s hair. “My apologies, my lady,” she whispered under her breath as she took out the plaits in response to Amelie’s unsmiling face.
Choosing a dress.
Remarks on the weather.
Reading a passage from the biblical text.
“My apologies, my apologies, my apologies…”
Amelie did not remember the young girl’s name. Only the shock of her red hair and her smattered sprinkles about her face survived in her memories.