by Cara Coe
Amelie concentrated on their path, memorizing the passages as she was trained. “Uh, yes,” she answered absently.
“And this whole time you’ve been in the human world. I’ve never been to the human world. We aren’t allowed to leave here. Is it much the same, the other realm?”
“Angels, no,” Amelie answered. “There’s no magic. Not really.” Another turn. Was there no end to this white maze?
“But you were there. You had magic.”
“I was a bit of an oddity.”
They arrived finally at another set of plain double doors. Once opened, they revealed a cavernous room with a tall-posted bed, plush rug, and silky curtains. All the fabrics were crisp white with powdered blue accents. One wall was mostly windows which let through sunlight that played with the blues in the room giving them a glittery quality. Another wall was almost entirely lined with books. Fairy tales, mage spells, and lore. The sight of it made Amelie’s curiosity water.
“Is it to your liking?” Lotis piped up.
Amelie shook herself out of her stupor, realizing the quiet that had descended as she took in her room. “Oh yes, very much,” she answered breathlessly. Too much, she thought in her mind wondering what all this finery would cost her.
Lotis beamed. “It’s my favorite room in the castle,” she admitted. “It belonged to a fire mage who moved last year to the Heather Village when she mated a shapeshifter there. My aunt used to serve her and I loved coming in here when she asked for my help. To think I finally get to stay here. It will be wonderful.” Lotis busied herself with pulling frocks out of a standing wardrobe.
“Stay?” Amelie asked, puzzled. She had little experience with palace life other than a short childhood but she could never remember quartering so close with the servants. Even with Henna’s hovering at Draeden’s castle, the chambermaid never actually roomed with her charge.
Lotis turned in her work to briefly send Amelie a puzzled look of her own. “Of course,” she answered. “I’ll be in the cove off to the side over there.”
Amelie turned to look where Lotis gestured to and saw behind a set of silk curtains a hint of space where she thought more windows had been at first glance. The room wound around slightly to the right creating a thin privacy between the cove and the rest of the chamber.
“I won’t ever be in the way,” Lotis said quickly. “I know a small chant for a silencing wall if you ever need to entertain guests. All the soulgaurds do.”
“Soulguard?” Amelie’s voice filled with tremors.
Lotis nodded with furrowed eyebrows. “Yes, miss. I’m your soulguard.”
Chapter 13
Amelie
Amelie was still shaken a few hours later as Lotis dressed her for dinner. Memories of her mother haunted her, watching her soul slip out of her so Amelie could once again be whole. The thought of witnessing that exchange for life a second time made her sick to her stomach.
Lotis nearly cried when Amelie insisted she be freed from her duty.
“I don’t need a soulgaurd,” Amelie insisted.
“I’ll be demoted back to the kitchens for angering you,” Lotis sobbed. “What I have I done wrong?”
There was no comforting the girl. Apparently, it was a privilege to stand ready to forfeit one’s life for another in this realm. Amelie relented to appease the young girl and allowed her to begin dressing her hair. The activity put Lotis in much better spirits. Amelie would just have to take care that she didn’t cross a dark fate. Not with someone’s life in her hands.
Lotis chattered about the eligible mages as she worked curls into Amelie’s hair. Though it had grown considerably longer in the last year, it wasn’t the flowing mane the women here typically liked to keep and Lotis kept pausing in her assessment of handsome males to mutter curses at a wayward ringlet.
“Everybody’s been talking about you,” Lotis said around a mouthful of hairpins. “You will have plenty of dining cards to choose from for each course.”
Amelie sighed. “So which course is the most important?” she asked.
Lotis had explained how dinner would work tonight. Leading up to the White Court Ball, the queen hosted a series of banquets, each several courses long. The men requested the company of the women through the presentation of dining cards in each course. Lotis was trying to coach Amelie on which courses to be polite and accept any dining card presented and which courses to maneuver out of unwanted company.
“The first course, the dinner course, and the final course,” Lotis reviewed patiently. “The first course sets the tone for the night. If someone powerful requests to dine with you, the mages can’t help but shove each other for the biggest conquest. The dinner course is the longest, so choose someone you are actually considering to mate at the White Court Ball. To mate with someone else’s dinner partner is frowned upon. And the final course is the one who escorts you back to the Throne Room at the end of the banquet. Many times it’s the same mage you sat with at your dinner course, but not always.”
“Well, this is all very helpful information for someone but of little use to me. I couldn’t begin to tell you who is worth dinner and who should be demoted to soup.”
“I will not be far from you. I can help you. Her majesty is the only royal in the land. So anyone with the title of lord is a good match. From there, you have several mages who would also be good. Some powerful with coveted abilities, some rich that don’t have or don’t want a lordship.”
“I’ll just go find a healer since I can’t seem to heal myself. That would make a fine mating. We can spend our days growing old in perfect condition.”
“No healer will want you,” Lotis replied, missing the flippancy in Amelie’s tone.
Amelie drew her eyebrows together. “Why not? I can heal just as well as the next mage, half human or not.”
“Because a mating is a joining of powers. After you go through the magical binding ceremony of marriage, you take on one another’s power when you mate. A healer would gain little since he already heals. He’d only gain your lesser power.”
Amelie bit her lip. Healing was her lesser power. She didn’t know how many people beyond the White Guard and the queen knew of her persuasive powers.
Lotis sighed. “That’s why I’m not allowed to mate. The joining of powers strengthens the mages but when the power is used, both mages feel it. Soulguards are forbidden to mate since using the power means killing your mate as well as sacrificing yourself. A soulguard may be willing to give up her own soul, but not her mate’s. They were letting their charges die.”
“That’s terrible!” Amelie exclaimed and immediately thought about her mother. The more time she spent learning about mage ways, the more she understood her mother. What helplessness she must have felt serving Princess Elmeda. No wonder she was always obsessed with power, determined to give her daughter what she was denied.
“It’s all right with me,” Lotis assured her, smiling shyly. “We still fall in love. We just never go through the binding ceremony. But you will mate well. Word is more mages are attending the White Court Ball than ever. And I know it’s because they want to see the half human for themselves. We’ll find you a wealthy, powerful, unattached mage. Mark my words.”
Amelie turned, interrupting Lotis in her work. “Like Simon.”
The idea came to her suddenly and lifted her spirits. She was already in love with Simon in the eyes of everyone around her. She could suffer through these dinners next to him while working out a plan to get out of this mess. They didn’t actually have to mate.
Lotis mistook the gleam in Amelie’s eye for infatuation with the gatekeeper.
“Oh, you are smitten,” she said, giggling. “He is a good looking mage. Women have been trying to land him for years but he’s determined to remain unmated. It will be a feat if you finally break his rogue ways.”
Amelie’s eyebrows rose in surprise. This was news to her. Yes, she had noted his age when she first arrived in this realm. In her own kingdom a man o
f his maturity was already settled by now, even the soldiers who were often the last to do so. However, she hadn’t thought to question it. Everything had been too new, too sudden, there was too much information to absorb.
“Indeed,” Amelie murmured in response. “Indeed it will.”
Chapter 14
Talon
Talon fingered the brown curl, inspecting the hair as if it might produce a name. Remnants of ale still clouded his mind. With a small sigh, he dropped it back onto her bare shoulder. The action caused her to stir and she turned her sleepy face to look up at him.
“Hmmm,” she purred. “You’re up.”
He managed a smile. “That I am.”
“If you still have some more of that milkseed drink, we can continue what we had last night.”
“It was the last of my supply,” Talon lied. “And since you and I only just met, it would be unwise to risk bringing a child into this world together.”
She laughed lazily. “I don’t know. You are very handsome.”
So the ale still had its effect on her as well, it seemed.
“A beautiful child is still a lot of work and dedication,” Talon replied dryly, pushing up from the bed. She could sleep off the rest of her grogginess but he needed to clear his head outside. He told her as much as he shrugged on his boots and belted his tunic before stepping out into early morning air.
When Seth had asked him to track down any and all men associated with Rankor, Talon had readily agreed. He knew Seth would be here doing it himself if he weren’t about to wed Claudia. And quite frankly, the weight of Amelie’s secret pushed on him so heavily it felt like a reprieve to be away from Seth’s melancholy eyes.
But nine weeks and countless taverns later, Talon felt no closer the satisfaction he sought in this mission. He’d found a few scattered accomplices, but none had much information and most were so far removed from Rankor, simply employed to deliver a message or collect supplies, that it didn’t warrant being run through by a sword.
And the nights when he drank and brought a woman back to share his bed he felt a hollowness inside him the next morning that drove him to walks like this.
He contemplated following an impossible trail. A few weeks earlier, one mage who’d been sucked dry of power and left blabbering in a stone cottage outside one of the southern villages kept insisting that Rankor lived in the village. He said the same line over and over again. “He took it all, he did. Took it all and laughs at me every day when he walks by. Doesn’t even use it. Just holds onto it, laughing and laughing.” Talon kept trying to get useful information out of the man, but he just kept rocking and staring off into the distance and sputtering the same words over and over.
Talon wondered if he should stop back by the village. His leads were dried up and he spent more nights of late getting drunk and laying women than collecting information.
He shook his head in an attempt to clear it from the desperation. He would think of something. He wanted something of substance to present to Prince Seth upon his return.
“You’ll be wanting bread for your breakfast?”
A woman’s voice broke into his thoughts and he paused in his walk. She smiled her old woman smile at him, gaps in her teeth stealing the pleasantness from her looks.
“Aye, thank you.” Talon stepped forward, pulling his money sack from his pocket. The bread smelled wonderful. He’d leave some for the woman in his room before he departed.
“You must be proud indeed. Serve the prince, do you?” the woman asked, recognizing the green and white seal on his coin purse. Talon turned over a few coppers and tucked it away. He gave a slight nod before biting into the warm bread. He would be leaving this village by hour’s end. It would not hinder him to have one old baker know his identity.
“So does my son now,” she continued. “He left only yesterday to Candor. To escort them home.”
The chunk of bread nearly lodged in his throat. “Home?”
“Yes. You haven’t heard? The prince and that Candorian princess were wed and he’s bringing her back here to Draeden. Apparently, there’s all kinds of upheaval in that kingdom. She’s not safe there anymore. My son dispatched with more of the royal guards to escort them back.”
Talon lifted his breakfast in hurried gratitude. “The bread is wonderful. Thank you,” he said. His feet were quick to start moving in an effort to keep up with his mind. He walked brusquely away from the food stand, the woman calling out after him but he didn’t hear what she said. His mind was a blur. It was happening. Candor was unraveling. Someone needed to get word to Amelie but how the hell was he supposed to find a magical forest filled with mages, much less get into it?
He climbed the steps to his borrowed room two at a time. He was going back to that village. He had seen Amelie break through to an empty soul like the half gone man he had come across on the street. He would just have to do the same. He didn’t know how, but he’d figure it out. Amelie needed to know what was happening to Candor.
It took restraint, but he managed not to burst into the room. He didn’t want to frighten the woman. Instead, he cracked the door silently, slipping in and latching it without a sound before turning towards the bed.
The woman was gone.
In her place sat a silver-haired man. The planes of his face were smooth, joining together in sharp angles. His eyes were lit with curiosity and he studied Talon as he stood in shock in the middle of the room. The man sat leisurely on the small bed, leaning back on his hands, feet crossed at the ankles as if he belonged in the space. After several long beats of silence between them, he produced a wide, menacing smile.
“Looking for me?” Rankor asked.
Chapter 15
Amelie
If Amelie thought the palace entrance was grand, then the throne room had to be made for the Angels themselves. So bright, so colorful, so inviting it was with its silver, pink, and icy blue tapestries lining the walls. Fire mages hung upside down from long silk cloths with their feet intricately tangled in the billowy fabric as they put their talent on display with lines of flames in every color. Large cherry blossom trees anchored the room at four corners. Their branches reached for the middle of the floor, dipping low and brushing the guests with their pale, delicate flowers. High above their heads, rows and rows of chandeliers caught the light and splashed it across the space in dappled bursts.
And the guests did not hold back in their appearances. They answered the beautiful décor with garments and hairstyles that glowed, sparkled, swished, and shone. Their movements around the room were a delight to the eye. Perfect accessories to the White Queen’s throne room.
The first course was her beloved chocolate.
The servants were orderly and swift in their preparation of the chocolate course. Platters of the sugary brown dessert in the shapes of stars, bells, and crescent moons were placed on circular silver tablecloths around the perimeter of the marbled center floor.
“There is no detail missed,” Amelie murmured, taking all of it in. Next to her, Lotis grinned.
“None, my lady,” she agreed. “This is my first time seeing a banquet from inside the room.”
Lotis absently fingered her lavender gown. It was a light color and simple cut, chosen to pay compliment to Amelie’s deep purple folds of soft fabric, but Lotis wore it as though she was draped in fine silk. Amelie couldn’t help but smile. If this tedious dinner brought this much pleasure to the young girl, then at least something could be gained for it.
There was no magic here, save for the guards stationed at the doorways and the mages brought in for entertainment. Amelie could see ivory bracelets identical to her own on the arms of most of the guests. She had expected this. Lotis explained this safety precaution before they arrived. And it wasn’t limited to events. Apparently, Amelie’s bracelets were not for her alone. All mages must bear them inside the castle, except for a trusted few.
“Over there is Lord Hensley,” Lotis whispered, interrupting her thoughts and gesturi
ng to a stout, bearded gentleman. Though she was in awe of attending this banquet, Lotis would not fail on her promise in guiding Amelie. She had to stand on her tiptoes to whisper close to Amelie’s ear. “He owns the most land of all the attendants.”
“Hmmm,” Amelie answered noncommittally. She picked up a goblet from a passing servant and sipped the sweet nectar wine. Though Lotis was determined, she did not care about the occupants in the room. Her eyes scanned for Simon but she could not locate him. She hadn’t seen him since entering the palace with John this morning.
Lotis eyed her charge thoughtfully, taking in Amelie’s wandering eye and bored response.
“He isn’t much to look at,” she acquiesced in a reluctant tone. She bit her lower lip in contemplation before her expression brightened. “Look. To your left. That’s Damion Creed. He’s not a lord but his flame power is unmatched. He can put a single fire out with just one touch. Absorbs it all. And his fireball displays are a sight.” She grinned encouragingly before adding, “And he’s quite handsome.”
Amelie was about to answer with her rejection when a voice behind them spoke up. “Who is quite handsome?”
Both women turned at the sound. Before them stood a man just taller than they in a crisp white suit and slicked back dark blonde hair. A light green vest brought out the specks of similar color in his amber eyes. His smile was wide. His dimples were deep. A knife with an intricate pattern on its hilt sat in a sheath on his side. Amelie’s eyes moved with boredom over the mage’s features and rested with interest on his weapon. Lotis’s slight gasp indicated he was an important man whom she felt too far from reach to mention before.
“I overheard your discussion and thought surely you must be mulling over my handsome good looks.” His eyes twinkled mischievously as he bowed slightly. “Lord Gershan Thorne,” he introduced.
Amelie gave a polite curtsey in return. “Amelie.”