by Jenna Glass
In his seat against the wall Kailindar sat up straighter, his own eyes alight with expectation. In seconds, Tamzin would say something even his admirers would admit was treasonous, and Semsulin would move that the council vote to arrest him. His followers would be loath to do it, but faced with the alternative…
Kailindar could fill the lord chamberlain’s seat “temporarily,” until Tamzin could have a full trial and be found guilty, and Ellin’s throne would finally be secure. As long as the council realized the only way to secure the trade agreements was through her marriage to Zarsha, they could not allow Tamzin to shove her aside.
Tamzin ignored the chancellor’s warning, not so much as flicking a glance Semsulin’s way. Instead, he fixed his gaze on the lord commander. “We have ten times as many men as Prince Waldmir. Why should we have to bow and scrape and beg and,” he sneered at Ellin, “whore ourselves to gain the bastard’s favor when we can simply take what we want?”
In all her plans for today’s confrontation, Ellin had never once seen that absurd suggestion coming.
“Are you mad?” Kailindar shouted. “The Keep is the only city in all of Seven Wells that has never been conquered!”
“Sit down, Uncle,” Tamzin snarled. “You have no voice in this council and no place in this room.”
“I move Lord Tamzin be removed from this council effective immediately,” Semsulin said. His face might have turned to stone for all the expression in it, and his voice was steady and sure, as if he actually believed his motion would be heard and fairly considered.
But everyone was staring at Tamzin, considering. He was a self-declared military hero, after all. Would reminding everyone that his great conquest had been over a ragtag band of bandits rather than over a well-trained, well-supplied army bring any of the councilors to their senses?
“And I move that we remove that whore from the throne before she damages the credibility of our kingdom any more than she already has!” Tamzin shouted.
It was Ellin’s turn to leap to her feet, her heart pounding in her throat. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw both Zarsha and Kailindar also stand, their hands straying toward weapons that should have been merely ornamental. Soon everyone in the room was on their feet, looking back and forth between Tamzin and Ellin. With a sickening lurch, Ellin saw that in just a few heartbeats, this meeting had devolved to a point where it could only end in bloodshed. It only remained to be determined whose blood.
“I am the rightful Queen of Rhozinolm,” she said, hoping her voice was firm and steady though her knees were weak. “I am doing what is right for my kingdom, and you are nothing more than a power-hungry bastard who would plunge us all into a war we cannot win simply because you lust for the throne.”
Tamzin spat on the table. “What do you know of war? Tell me of all your great victories on the battlefield, and then perhaps I will listen when you speak of wars we cannot win!”
The sickening lurch in her stomach became stronger when she saw both the lord commander and the lord high treasurer nodding in agreement. Worse, except for Semsulin, none of the other council members seemed inclined to stand with her.
“You defeated a pathetic collection of bandits,” she said, trying to mimic Tamzin’s disgusted sneer. “That doesn’t make you the one military expert in all of history brilliant enough to win a war with Nandel.”
Ellin’s mind spun frantically as she looked around the room and assessed the expressions on her council’s faces. She saw the fervor—and ambition—that entered the lord commander’s eyes, saw the vision of overflowing coffers that made the lord treasurer’s heart beat faster, and she knew that she was about to lose.
Any moment now, Tamzin would call for a vote—and he would have enough votes to win. He would have Ellin and Semsulin and Kailindar, and probably even Zarsha arrested and thrown in a dungeon, and he would plunge the kingdom into war.
Ellin reached into her reticule, finding the simple gold ring that was among the spells she had received from Alysoon’s flier. She had planned to present these spells—and Alysoon’s proposal of exclusive access to them—after she had won her battle with Tamzin. And she had hoped to keep this ring—and the spell it contained—a secret, for she had told neither Semsulin nor Zarsha about it.
Her heartbeat slowed, and a strange sense of calm descended on her as she donned the ring and opened her Mindseye. She heard the murmur of shock and disgust that went around the table as she plucked a mote of Rho from the air and fed it into the ring, activating its spell.
Closing her Mindseye, she pointed the finger with the ring toward Tamzin, though Alysoon’s instructions had not specified a need for specific gestures to trigger the spell.
Ellin didn’t put any great thought into her actions. Didn’t weigh the consequences or consider alternatives. Later, she would be horrified by how easy and effortless the decision was.
“Tamzin Rai-Mailee,” she said simply, naming the spell’s target and then waiting.
Tamzin took a staggering step backward as if someone had shoved him in the chest. His look of righteous anger and disgust changed to one of puzzlement as he looked down at his chest, perhaps expecting to see someone had put a hand on him. But no one was touching him.
Ellin’s heart rate sped up again as that blissful moment of numbness wore off, and she began to think about what she had just done. Everyone was looking confused, and she might have thought the spell hadn’t worked except for that telltale backward step. Alysoon had warned that the first few moments would be uneventful as the spell burrowed into the victim’s body.
The first sprouts are so small the victim does not immediately seem to feel them, Alysoon’s letter had explained. Of course we have not tested the spell on a human, so it is hard to know for sure what it first feels like. I can only imagine it starts with a mild upset, but that it quickly accelerates from there.
“What the fuck did you just do?” Tamzin roared at her, the vulgarity so out of place in a council chamber that, even under the circumstances, a few of the council members gave him reproving looks.
“You’ll find out sooner than you’d like,” she said, and was amazed at how calm and cool her voice came out. Inside, her heart was tripping over itself, and her every muscle was tensed in dread. Alysoon had shared few details about the effects of this spell, but she’d made it very plain that they were terrible to behold.
“I’ve been in contact with Sovereign Princess Alysoon,” she said. “She and her brother have been developing some new spells out in the town they call Women’s Well. She has sent me a few in case we might like to enter into an exclusive trade agreement with Women’s Well. This is one of them.”
Tamzin winced, and his hand flew to his belly. “What—” The word choked off in a cry of pain, and he doubled over. The lord commander, who was closest to him, put a hand on his arm to keep him from falling.
Tamzin raised his head to glare at her once more, and Ellin tried to remember how to breathe. Everything within her wanted desperately to escape, wanted to flee the room so she wouldn’t have to see what she had just done.
Another cry of pain rose from Tamzin’s throat, and this time the lord commander’s support wasn’t enough, and he fell to his knees, both arms wrapped around his belly. His face was drenched with sweat, his skin leached of all color.
It was then that he began to scream in earnest, his body thrashing about on the floor. No one knew what to do, some backing away, some reaching for him then drawing their hands away. Ellin swallowed hard, as the lord commander looked at her with wide, frightened eyes.
“What did you do to him?”
“It’s a growth spell,” she said, and her mask of calm was still in place. Afterward, when she was alone, she would allow herself to acknowledge her feelings. For now, her blood had to run cold as ice so that no one in this room would ever accuse her of being weak again. “Something they devel
oped in Women’s Well with a new feminine element that was previously unknown. It can make seeds grow at enormous speed. Anywhere.”
Tamzin’s back bowed, and Ellin could see his doublet straining outward, the belt barely holding. Then, there was a sickening tearing sound, and the front of his doublet burst open in a rain of blood.
Even those who’d been reaching to help him backpedaled, knocking into one another in their haste to retreat as leafy tendrils shot up through the bloody flesh and torn cloth. Tamzin was still screaming, though his throat was so ravaged the screams were becoming horribly hoarse. And now wet-sounding, as blood filled his mouth and trickled down his cheeks.
The plants—unrecognizable through their covering of blood—continued to grow, and his body made sickening squelching sounds.
Zarsha shoved his way through the circle of men who stood watching as Tamzin continued to writhe and struggle. He’d drawn his sword from its drab black scabbard, and holding it with both hands, he swung it downward with all the strength in his body.
The sword sliced easily through Tamzin’s neck, silencing his screams and clanging loudly against the stone floor beneath.
* * *
—
Ellin was still cold and numb when she finally escaped the council chamber and retreated to her private study. She desperately wanted to be left alone so she could finally release all the emotions that roiled within her. Emotions she’d kept under brutally strict control as every surviving member of her royal council had stared at her with wide-eyed shock—and undisguised fear. The sound of Semsulin retching would haunt her, as would the mingled scents of blood and the contents of Tamzin’s stomach. And the screams. Those screams would feature prominently in her nightmares.
She shuddered as she stepped into the room, her tight control already slipping. Thanks to that demonstration of power and will, she still wore the crown of Rhozinolm, and her chief rival was dead. She’d asked the council if they wished to vote to unseat her. Not surprisingly, they had to a man acknowledged her right to the throne and agreed that there was no lawful requirement that her husband be named king.
Ellin tried to close the door behind her as her whole body began to shake. She’d been so desperate to escape she hadn’t even noticed Zarsha trailing behind her. The door hit his outstretched hand. She wanted to tell him to get out, to leave her alone, but she knew that any sound escaping her throat would turn to a wail, so she said nothing as he stepped into the study and closed the door.
Another shudder shook her as she saw the blood that spotted his cuffs. There were brilliant red stains on his white collar as well, though his doublet hid the worst of it, and he had at least wiped the blood from his face. Ellin’s stomach churned as she remembered the sound of his blade striking the floor, and the room swayed. She closed her eyes and pressed her hands against her belly. She had never in her life fainted, and she was not about to start now. At least so she told herself.
She didn’t open her eyes when she felt Zarsha’s hand on her arm. She allowed him to guide her into a chair as she concentrated on breathing. One breath in, one breath out. Over and over, until the worst of the nausea receded and the floor no longer seemed to buck beneath her.
She opened her eyes to find Zarsha propped on the arm of the chair beside her. The pose might have looked casual and relaxed, if it weren’t for the careful blankness of his handsome face and the haunted horror in his eyes. He, who had urged her to arrange Tamzin’s quiet murder, was struggling to cope with what he’d seen her do.
“Are you afraid of me now, Zarsha?” she asked quietly.
He blinked, and she suspected he was trying to school his expression, though he met with little success. “Of course not. You did what you had to do. Many more would have died if Tamzin had succeeded in bullying his way to the throne. You and I doubtless among them.”
She nodded, for that was all true. Any application of cold logic would find no fault with her actions and lay no blame on her shoulders. But cold logic was cold comfort.
“I killed him,” she whispered. “Horribly.”
“Well, technically, I killed him,” Zarsha said. He made a try at a rakish grin, but the expression was more of a grimace.
“Thank you for that, at least.” Zarsha had been far from the only man in that room wearing a ceremonial sword, and yet he’d been the only one with enough wits—and mercy—to use it.
“That spell,” he started, but his voice choked off.
“Alysoon told me it was terrible,” she said. “She told me they’d tested it on a horse that had to be put down and that it had given her nightmares.”
“I’m sure today’s demonstration has spawned nightmares for all involved. I’m also sure we cannot afford for the King of Aaltah to have access to such a weapon.”
“It is not a battlefield weapon,” she said. “There need to be undigested seeds in the victim’s stomach for the spell to work.” Zarsha gave her another sharp look, one that told her he had noticed the platter of seed cakes on the table. She braced herself for his condemnation, but he offered no comment on her obvious premeditation.
“I still would not want to meet it on the battlefield. And in the hands of an assassin…”
Ellin swallowed hard. The spell had been frighteningly easy to invoke and to target. King Delnamal was under the impression that the magic of Women’s Well was small and unimportant. Barely worth noticing, until the people of Women’s Well gave shelter to traitors. But if its spell crafters could create a weapon like this with so few people and resources and so little time, it was perhaps the most strategically vital Well of them all.
“At tomorrow’s council meeting,” she said, “I will bring Alysoon’s proposal to the table. I think after what they saw today, they will be amenable to recognizing the sovereignty of Women’s Well in return for exclusive access.”
Zarsha glanced at the plain gold ring on her finger. “As long as you wear that, they will agree to anything you propose.”
Ellin slipped the ring off her finger and tucked it back into her reticule. “I don’t want them agreeing with me out of fear. I need advisers who will tell me what they really think, not tell me what they think I want to hear.”
“You will have them,” Zarsha assured her. “No one who knows you would think you’d cast that spell on them in a fit of pique.”
Ellin wished she had that same confidence. “You know me. Did you think I would kill my cousin in cold blood and in front of everyone?”
He rubbed his hands together, not looking at her. “I had never seen you backed into a corner like that before, so no, I did not expect it.” He looked up and met her eyes. “That doesn’t mean I’m now afraid of you, nor does it mean I think you’ll become a tyrant. I swear that I will still give you honest advice when you ask for it.” He managed a half-hearted grin. “And likely even when you don’t.”
That brought a faint smile to her lips. It was true that she couldn’t imagine Zarsha—or Semsulin, for that matter—mincing words with her. “And you’re still willing to marry me?”
Zarsha rose from the arm of the chair and came to kneel in front of her, taking one of her hands in both of his and looking up into her eyes. She tried to focus on his face, to ignore the spots of blood that served as continual reminders of her capacity for brutality.
“I’m far more than willing to marry you,” he said, squeezing her hand. “I’ve wanted to marry you from the first day I laid eyes on you. That is as true today as it was yesterday and the day before that.” He raised her hand to his lips and planted a chaste kiss on her knuckles.
The touch of his lips to her skin made her heart race for entirely different reasons than it had earlier. There was still a part of her that doubted his sincerity, that wondered if it was truly her he wanted, or if it was merely the power and prestige that marrying her would bring him. But maybe it was enough either way. Royal
marriages were rarely affairs of the heart, and at least in Zarsha, she would have a husband she liked and respected.
Yes, it would be enough.
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
There were no buildings of more than two stories in Women’s Well—yet—but Alys did not need any great elevation to see the army that was encamped not far from their outskirts. The flatness of the desert landscape afforded her an excellent view of all those banners and pavilions and columns of men, horses, and chevals. She held the talker in the palm of her hand, facing outward as she looked out the window on the second floor of the town hall. Ellin’s image became indistinct with the talker facing away from Alys, but she heard the other woman’s soft imprecation at the sight.
Turning the talker back toward herself and moving away from the window, she shook her head at Ellin.
“I had hoped your declaration of allegiance would convince Delnamal to turn back, but it seems that is not the case.” Alys tried to project an image of stoic calm, though in reality she felt only one step removed from panic. She had put all her hopes into an alliance with Rhozinolm, but if her half-brother’s hatred of her was stronger than his love of his kingdom, then by this time the next day, every man, woman, and child in Women’s Well might meet their deaths.
“I cannot believe he means to ignore the threat,” Ellin said, though she looked worried. “I am certain he has spies and informants in Zinolm Well, and those spies will surely have reported the massing of warships in our harbor and the mustering of troops. He has left Aalwell all but undefended, and my navy can reach the city far faster than his army can. All of which I have pointed out in my correspondence with him.”
“And yet here he is,” Alys said with a sweeping gesture toward the window. “No matter how powerful our magic, we cannot defend ourselves against that many.”
“I realize it is of little comfort at best, but know that if he moves on Women’s Well, he will lose his kingdom. But for all that he is a spiteful brute, he has not struck me in our correspondence as stupid. I cannot but think that his presence on your doorstep is an attempt to intimidate you into surrender, rather than a prelude to an attack.”