by Jenna Glass
The farther from the capital she traveled, the less that was the case. Few people in the countryside recognized her on sight, but she was forced to identify herself at the inns, and there was no missing the animosity there. She dared not venture into the common area for her meals, and for the first time in her life, she was grateful for the honor guardsmen who surrounded her.
The influence of Aaltah’s Well stretched for great distances into the countryside, creating fertile farmland and majestic forests filled with the famed Aalwood trees that grew nowhere else. Aalwood was Aaltah’s most prized export, as the wood was naturally infused with Aal. The wood was hard and dark and lustrous enough to be valued all by itself, but its abundance of Aal was its greatest selling point to kingdoms and principalities that had little or no other access to that vital element. Practically every spell that required any kind of movement required Aal.
The farther from the Well they traveled, the less lush the land became. Forest gave way to plains, and those plains grew less and less green with more patches of sand and bare dirt. Miller’s Bridge, the town in which Alys and her party spent the final night of travel, was a sad little place where the tiny town center had a single market and a single inn. Small houses were scattered about the dry plain, the land so flat and bare that even the most distant residences were easily spotted from the road. Tiny herds of goats clustered around intermittent bursts of green where grasses were fed by underground springs, and there was a strip of lushness on each side of the river by which the town was built, but it seemed to Alys a hard life. The thought that her half-brother had sent his best company of soldiers and a bunch of innocent women to live out beyond even this meager bounty made her angry all over again.
Although Alys did not sense the same open hostility here that she had in the previous towns, she chose to take her dinner in her room anyway. The innkeeper’s wife served a thick, gamy-tasting stew made up almost entirely of root vegetables with the occasional shreds of dark, tough meat that Alys presumed was goat, having not seen any larger animals around.
“Forgive the meager meal, my lady,” the innkeeper’s wife said, worrying at her apron and frowning fiercely. “We’ve had more travelers in the past month than we had in the past year, and it’s all we can do to keep them fed.”
Alys smiled at her reassuringly. “You have nothing to apologize for. It’s a lovely meal.” She scooped up a mouthful of stew and nodded as she chewed, trying to convey her appreciation. The stew was nothing she would serve at home, nor anything she would be eager to eat again, but the taste was not unpleasant, and it was nourishing. “Why have you had so many travelers?” she asked between bites. It seemed like this little town was on the edge of nowhere, and there was little reason for anyone to travel through it.
The innkeeper’s wife looked surprised at the question. “Because of Women’s Well, of course.”
Alys blinked at her. “Women’s Well?”
“Yes. Isn’t that where you’re heading to?”
“I’m bound for the new Abbey.”
She nodded with satisfaction. “Yes. We call it Women’s Well. Or had you not heard that there was a new Well there?”
Certainly news of the new Well had traveled. The unheard-of discovery of a new Well would likely have drawn a great deal more attention if not for its remote location and its failure to produce elements men considered useful. But though word of the Well had spread, this was the first time Alys had heard anyone refer to a place called Women’s Well.
“Women’s Well, eh?” she asked with a smile. It sounded like a bona fide town, rather than some half-hearted encampment. Perhaps Tynthanal’s letters hadn’t been as thorough as she’d thought, for though she knew to expect more than a gathering of tents, she certainly had not expected a town with a name. “And people are traveling there?”
“Oh, yes. I was out there myself last week. Never had much access to potions before, and never could have afforded them even if I did, but I bought me some lovely ones for my garden.” She indicated the bowl of stew with a jerk of her chin. “Was plumb out of carrots, but a little sprinkle on my garden and I have a fine new batch a week later.”
Alys smiled again while inside she felt a prickle of unease. Delnamal—and the lord high treasurer—would not be pleased to know the women of the Abbey—of Women’s Well—were producing potions inexpensive enough for an innkeeper’s wife to afford. She imagined when the king had first sent the women out to the edge of the kingdom, no one had expected the Abbey to generate income anymore, not with elements so sparse and the nearest ragged town half a day’s journey away.
In the first light of morning the next day, Alys climbed into her carriage once more for the final leg of her journey. The road had supposedly come to an end in the town, but the innkeeper’s wife had clearly been telling the truth about the increase in travel. Where once the carriage would have bumped over unmarked desert, there was now a clear, hard-packed path leading out of town toward what should have been the Wasteland. The trail was thin and dusty at first, but a little bit more than an hour after they left the town, Alys noticed the color of the soil changing and darkening. Less sand and dust, and more earth. And the patchy grasses were bigger, more frequent, and more green.
With every mile they drove, the land changed. Her guardsman and Honor were both gazing out the carriage windows with rapt attention, but for safety’s sake, Alys covered her eyes with her hand on the pretext of blocking the bright sunlight and opened her Mindseye. As she suspected, the air was alive with elements, many of which she’d never seen, and Alys knew she would have to spend some time with her nose in her mother’s book to identify what she was seeing. Most of the elements she recognized were feminine, but there were also a reasonable number of neuter elements and she could even pick out a couple of masculine ones. She was delighted to see that the Women’s Well produced a fair amount of Tyn, which had proved invaluable for creating her special sleep spell and with which she very much wanted to experiment some more.
Alys closed her Mindseye and sternly ordered herself to curb her enthusiasm. She itched to reach out and touch all the strange new elements she’d spotted, to crack open her mother’s book right then and there and explore all the new possibilities. Her pulse was racing with excitement as she wondered what spells she could devise with the bounty of the Women’s Well, but she was not here to play. She was in a race against a deadly clock, and no matter how tempting the abundance, she had to focus all her efforts on finding a way to save Jinnell from the fate Delnamal had in store for her.
Three hours after their day’s journey had begun, their destination came into view. The trail the carriage followed was now lined with bushes and young trees, so it was no longer as easy to see over long distances as it had been in the plains and desert they’d been crossing the last couple of days.
A wooden archway had been erected over the trampled trail that might almost be large enough now to label a road. WELCOME TO WOMEN’S WELL was burned into the top of the wooden archway, and when the carriage passed through the archway, the town that had sprung up in the scant time since the women of the Abbey had been banished here stole Alys’s power of speech.
This was no ramshackle collection of lean-tos and huts and tents, as she’d been expecting. Although the women had been sent here with only the most limited supplies and with only a company of soldiers to help set up their camp, they had clearly enlisted additional help and expertise. All along the main road were orderly, small wooden houses, and there were multiple smaller roads leading off in both directions. In the distance, Alys spotted the framework for a barn, outside of which was a large corral containing an impressive number of horses. On the far side of the corral, a young girl was tending a small herd of goats as the animals munched contentedly on the leaves of a lush, low bush with yellow-green leaves.
She had kept Tynthanal apprised of her progress via flier, so she was not at all su
rprised when he strode out of one of the houses and came to meet her carriage. She was out the door practically before the carriage came to a stop, not bothering to wait for the coachman to hand her down. She flung herself into her brother’s arms and gave him a rib-crushing hug.
Tynthanal laughed as he returned the hug, lifting her briefly and easily off her feet before setting her back down.
“One would think you hadn’t seen me for a year,” he teased as she pulled back and looked up into his face.
She made a gesture encompassing the town. “One would think this place had been standing at least that long.”
He grinned with apparent delight and looked around proudly. “You would, wouldn’t you?”
The town was bustling with activity, and though many curious looks were tossed Alys’s way, no one but Tynthanal seemed inclined to halt their labors to investigate. Though all the buildings within her immediate view were completed, the sound of hammers filled the air, a constant, low percussion.
She looked at her beaming brother and shook her head in wonder. “How?”
“Let’s get you settled, and then we can have a long talk.”
* * *
—
Ellin sighed contentedly and snuggled closer into Graesan’s arms. Her breath still came short, and the hand that stroked over his skin came away damp with sweat. She patted his bare chest, feeling the hurried thumping of his heart behind his ribs.
“You’ve let yourself grow soft since you left the guard to become my secretary,” she teased. “Where is your stamina?”
He grunted softly and rolled her over onto her back, his naked body a delicious weight pressing her into the bed. “I’ll show you stamina,” he panted, and took her mouth with a searing kiss.
She wrapped her arms around him and arched her back, but he had brought her to release three times already tonight, and they both needed a break before trying again—or falling asleep in exhaustion, as might be more likely.
Breaking the kiss, Graesan flopped over onto his back once more with a groan. “Okay, you win. I have no stamina.”
She laughed and propped her head on her hand, enjoying the sight of him lying naked among the sheets in the flickering light of the fire. He was a beautiful specimen of manhood, lean and strong, with hard, corded muscles and sensuous lips that had kissed every inch of her body.
“Weren’t we supposed to be discussing tomorrow’s agenda?” she asked him.
His eyes twinkled in the firelight as he turned to look at her. “Council meeting. More meetings. Then lunch, and afterward…a bunch of people want to talk to you about stuff.”
She laughed. “Yes, that about sums up my usual day-to-day schedule. Thank you for the detailed report.”
“You’ll be unsurprised to hear you have a full schedule.” Some of the humor faded from his eyes and his lips tugged downward in the beginnings of a frown. “Zarsha of Nandel has an audience right after lunch. I’ve successfully put him off for two days, but he is getting most insistent. We can, of course, make something else pop up ‘unexpectedly’ if you don’t wish to see him.”
She had neatly avoided any private contact with Zarsha since his rather unusual proposal, although she saw him socially practically every day. So far, he had not pressed her for an answer and seemed perfectly content to wait as long as necessary. Whatever he wanted to see her about, she doubted it was to pressure her to marry him, or she would have sensed some impatience from him by now. Most likely, he wanted to give her his personal report on his observations of her courtiers.
“No, no,” she said. “I’ll happily see him. He is quite the fount of information.”
Graesan’s frown deepened. “You have an entire royal council to give you advice and information. Why do you need some foreign princeling? Shouldn’t he have gone home by now?”
Ellin was taken aback by the sharpness of Graesan’s tone. He had, of course, never been fond of Zarsha, just as he would have naturally disliked any man Ellin was slated to marry. She had expected that over time, some of those hard feelings would fall away now that the engagement was no more. But if anything, Graesan’s dislike of Zarsha had grown stronger.
“He doesn’t seem to be overfond of his homeland,” she said, trying to keep her own tone casual. For all that her relationship with Graesan felt refreshingly open and honest when compared to all her other court relationships, she had chosen not to share Zarsha’s proposal unless absolutely necessary. Why distress Graesan and raise the tension level when she still felt reasonably certain she would not marry Zarsha? “And as a foreigner, he has a unique perspective.”
“As a spy, you mean. You know that’s what he is, don’t you?”
Ellin sat up, wrapping the sheet around herself and peering down at Graesan’s face. “He’s Prince Waldmir’s nephew!” she protested. “Not a spy.”
Graesan sat up, too, his square jaw taking on a mulish cast as something that looked suspiciously like jealousy flared in his eyes. “The two are not mutually exclusive.”
“Members of royal families don’t work as spies.”
“Says who? There has to be a reason he’s sticking around here now that the wedding is unequivocally off.”
Ellin’s heart skipped a beat, and she wondered if Graesan had somehow gotten wind of Zarsha’s proposal, though she didn’t know how that could be. Zarsha would certainly not have mentioned it to anyone. She rubbed a hand over her face, suddenly tired.
Graesan didn’t have to know about the proposal to be jealous, though of course he would never admit to it. Only a blind man would fail to see how her relationship with Zarsha had thawed since she took the throne, and Graesan was hardly blind. Add to that Zarsha’s famed good looks and charm, and it was hardly surprising Graesan would see him as a rival. She itched to tell Graesan he had no cause for his jealousy, but she sensed saying so would further fan the flames.
“You should send him home,” Graesan concluded. “You’ve been more than generous in your hospitality, and he has no business being here. Not anymore.”
The pulse of resistance that rose in Ellin’s breast took her by surprise in its intensity. Regardless of whether she chose to accept Zarsha’s offer or not, she didn’t want to send him home. Dear as Graesan was to her, he had little understanding of—or interest in—the machinations of the court, and all her other advisers were either actively hostile, like Tamzin, or at least twice her age, like Semsulin. Zarsha might have ulterior motives for being a confidant, but at least he was honest about it, and his insights were keen. He had grown up a major player in a royal court, and he understood her position in a way that Graesan never could.
“I can’t do that,” she said, but she wasn’t about to mention any personal reasons for her refusal. “I can’t risk insulting Prince Waldmir by sending his nephew away.”
Graesan shifted uncomfortably, perhaps because he understood the reasoning and didn’t like it. “All right, then make yourself less available. I will shift your schedule so you don’t have time for him tomorrow. It wouldn’t be hard to do that continually. If he has no access to you, he’ll eventually give up and go home.”
She smiled faintly, and Graesan’s expression darkened even further. “You underestimate the depth of his stubbornness. He will never just give up and go home.”
“You don’t know him well enough to be sure of that.”
“Yes, I do.”
Graesan’s hands were clenched into angry fists, and the muscles of his jaw stood out in stark relief as he ground his teeth. Ellin cursed herself for speaking without thinking, for emphasizing her easy familiarity with Zarsha when Graesan was already struggling with jealousy. Zarsha had offered to let her keep Graesan as her lover if she accepted his marriage proposal, but based on Graesan’s fiercely territorial behavior, it seemed unlikely he would accept such an arrangement.
“It isn’t safe to cu
ltivate a relationship with a spy, no matter how useful you might find his insights,” Graesan persisted. “Especially when you have your own dangerous secret to hide. Imagine what a man like him would do if he ever found out about us…”
“He’s known for quite some time,” she told him, hoping to calm his fears with this evidence that Zarsha had not used the knowledge for nefarious purposes. The expression on Graesan’s face said her words had had the opposite effect.
“What? How can he possibly…?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. He claimed it was just an educated guess, but of course I gave everything away because I was so shocked.”
Graesan swallowed hard. “Has he made any demands?”
So much for her hopeful assumption that Graesan would attribute Zarsha’s failure to reveal what he knew as a sign of trustworthiness. His natural dislike of Zarsha made him jump to the immediate conclusion that she was being blackmailed, which made a tidy explanation for her failure to send Zarsha away.
“It’s not like that,” she said, but saw little hope Graesan would take her word for it.
“You cannot convince me that a man like him would not take advantage of knowing a secret so dangerous. Is that why you haven’t sent him away? Because he’s threatened you?”
Ellin groaned and rubbed her eyes. The only way to allay Graesan’s suspicions would be to tell him the truth about Zarsha’s proposal—and her refusal to dismiss it out of hand, just in case. She would rather have Graesan be angry than hurt.
“He’s made no threats,” she said, “and he promises he would never use the information against me. But…” She let the thought trail off, knowing Graesan would come to exactly the conclusion she intended. She was being a coward, running from an argument that was likely unavoidable, but she already had enough troubles in her life. When she tumbled into bed with Graesan, she wanted nothing but heat and comfort and support, and if she had to impugn Zarsha’s character to bring this argument to a conclusion, then so be it.