Ashes of Dearen: Book 1

by Jayden Woods

  A strange feeling was coming over Eleanor.

  She couldn’t say when it struck her, exactly. It must have been some time during the feast in Friva’s Hall. But when the feast began, she felt in full control of her logic. Even when the princess ran off and Leonard Khan returned to the table with a terrible gleam in his eyes, Eleanor handled herself quite fastidiously. The greatest challenge came in the form of Archon Picard, who engaged her in conversation despite her attempts to ignore him. He even took a seat next to her when Prime Synergist Deragon arose from it, having finished his dinner and feeling inclined to dance.

  Eleanor looked to Rebeka, who sat to her left, and tried to think of something to say to her. She didn’t speak quickly enough, however, for Picard beat her to it.

  “I say, King-wife Eleanor,” drawled the fellow, “you truly are an exceptional woman.”

  “I beg your pardon?” She reluctantly turned to regard him. “What do you mean?”

  His blond curls bounced against his dimpled cheeks as he smiled. “I mean you are such a calm and resourceful woman, always behaving, never indulging yourself like the rest of us. It is really quite remarkable.”

  “Well … thank you.” But Eleanor did not feel very grateful. She picked at her food, tasting the sweetness of the safra on her tongue. It had been many hours since she last drank some Discipline. She probably needed more soon. But Discipline tasted so bad, and this safra-covered food tasted so delicious. Somehow, it tasted better with every bite.

  “I’d love to know how you do it,” pressed the wily politician. “It is almost as if the safra does not affect you. Do you think that is the case?”

  Eleanor sighed and considered how to respond. She might as well tell him the truth in the hopes of getting him to stop pestering her. After all, it was no great secret. Rumor had it that Fayr suspected the khan of being more closely related to the Wolven assassin than Eleanor, and rightly so. She had nothing to fear from the truth. “You are correct,” said Eleanor. “I use a potion called Discipline to keep my head clear of safra. My country has used it for years.”

  Picard cried out with delight. He covered his mouth, as if to stifle laughter, but could hardly restrain his glee nonetheless. “Forgive me,” he said. “I am not as immune to the safra as you, in that case. And the truth is, I had already suspected your use of the anti-safra. I simply did not expect you to admit it.”

  “Anti-safra?” Already, he made her regret her candidness. “I did not call it that.”

  “Forgive me again. But it does serve that purpose, clearly. It makes one immune to pleasure. Does it also numb one to pain?”

  “Of course. It numbs all emotions entirely, leaving one free to think without the distortion of feelings.”

  “Oh.”

  Picard sank back a little. His smile drooped and even his shoulders slumped. Why would this disappoint him so much? People usually objected to the numbing of pleasure more than that of pain. He was a strange man, indeed.

  All too soon, unfortunately, he recovered. “This drug fascinates me, nonetheless,” he said. “I would like to learn how to make it.”

  “Making this drug requires extreme diligence,” she explained. “One might say that discipline itself is the primary ingredient. It is a long and complicated process. Somehow, I doubt you have the necessary fortitude.”

  Picard was quiet a moment, then burst into laughter. “You’re absolutely right about that. Besides, with this hand of mine ...” He lifted the glove and flipped a switch on it with his other hand. The fingers curled together, snapping into a fist. “I could not make it, no. Fortunately for me, I’m an archon, and I can get other people to do it for me. So I wonder if you’ll tell me how it’s made, anyway?”

  His tone had changed. He did not seem like a violent man, yet something in her brain alerted her to danger. “You are free to purchase some of the drug, if you wish,” she said. “I am afraid I can’t help you any more than that.”

  “Aren’t you the one who created the formula?”

  Her heart skipped a beat. It had been too long since she drank Discipline, indeed. But she did not have any on her, and so she kept eating the safra-laden food. She did not like how this man made her feel. If he knew she invented Discipline all along, then why did he toy with her so? She took a deep breath, feeling better as the safra slid down her throat. “Yes,” she said at last. “I did invent Discipline. As such, I own the patent on the formula. And I do not wish to give it to you—for business reasons, you understand.”

  “Patent? What the fuck is that?”

  Eleanor blinked back at him in surprise.

  “Listen.” Picard’s tone sharpened further, even though he plastered a smile on his face. “I don’t think you realize that I can offer you something in return. The two of us can help each other, you see.”

  “I don’t need any help from you.”

  “And what if I told you I knew how to make safra?”

  “That’s ...” Eleanor looked down at the glitter on her fingertips. “That is hard for me to believe.”

  “And you are right to doubt me. For I don’t know how yet.” He chuckled. “Nonetheless, I think I’m close to finding out. And when I do, I may be willing to share some of my knowledge with you. That is, if you do the same for me first.”

  Eleanor’s stomach churned. How did this man continue to torment her? She simply couldn’t figure him out. “I’m not interested in making safra,” she hissed at last.

  “Oh? That is a surprise. I thought Yamairans were interested in making anything. I understand why you might dislike the general purpose of safra, but it can still be a useful tool, can it not?”

  Eleanor didn’t want to admit it, but he had a point. The formula for safra would be valuable information, at the very least, and perhaps she was wrong to disregard its worth based on her own dislike of the substance. In that case, she was letting her emotions get the better of her, after all.

  And so what if she was? Her thoughts kept spinning and they seemed to make less and less sense with every passing moment. Right now she wanted to eat this delicious food, enjoy the jovial music, and cease to question every aspect of its origin. But Picard had a remarkable ability to keep her from enjoying anything. “What are you really after, Picard?” she asked.

  “Well ...” He drew back a little. “That’s a very fine question.”

  “If you’re not looking for joy, if you’re not looking for reason, then what are you looking for?”

  A strange look came over the archon’s face. Eleanor felt as if in one moment, his eyes had been like flat blue canvas. Now they opened up into a bottomless sky. “What, indeed,” he said.

  Rebeka leaned forward and struck Picard with her fierce green glare. “The King-wife has made herself clear,” said the Scholar. “If you want nothing else, then leave her alone.”

  “Not alone, it would seem,” sneered Picard. “In any case, it’s true, we have nothing else to discuss until you change your mind, Eleanor. Until then, ladies.”

  Then he got up and wandered away.

  Eleanor let out a breath of relief. Then, to her surprise, Rebeka erupted with giggles. “We showed him, didn’t we, eh Eleanor?”

  Rebeka prodded Eleanor with her elbow. For whatever reason, Eleanor found herself laughing as well. It felt so very good to laugh after what she had just endured. “I suppose we did.”

  “ ‘Until then, ladies.’ ”

  “You sounded just like him there!”

  “Oh my, is that an insult?”

  “I don’t know; maybe so!”

  And the two of them just kept laughing. “You scared him away,” said Eleanor. She watched him push his awkward body through the crowd. “Look, he’s leaving!”

  “What an odd one.”

  “Careful now, you wouldn’t want his father to hear you.”

  “I think he’d agree with me.”

  Eleanor’s sides hurt she was laughing so hard. She didn’t even care who heard her. It didn’
t matter anyway—she realized that only a few people remained at the royal table besides Rebeka and herself. “Where did they all go?”

  “I guess some of them are dancing.”

  “Oh.” Eleanor’s smile waned.

  Rebeka leaned against her. “I’m sorry. You must miss Byron.”

  “Do I?” Eleanor pondered this a moment. “I suppose that depends on how you define ‘miss.’”

  This got Rebeka laughing again. “Perhaps I was wrong, then.”

  “No, seriously,” said Eleanor. “I’m not sure how much I miss him. Do you think that’s strange?”

  “Not really, considering that potion you keep drinking.”

  The King-wife almost reprimanded her for saying such a thing. She also might have mentioned that she had not drunk any for several hours, so the effects were probably gone by now. Instead she let out another chuckle. “God help me! However you look at it, I just don’t miss him as much as I expected to. At least now that I’ve realized I can do things on my own.”

  “Listen to yourself!” cheered Rebeka. “You’re like a whole new woman.”

  “And you brought her out of me.”

  They both became silent. Suddenly they couldn’t look at each other. The thrumming of distant harp strings shook Eleanor’s eardrums.

  “Well, whether you miss him or not,” said Rebeka, “it’s a shame that you don’t have a dance partner.”

  “Perhaps.” Eleanor watched the men and women writhing against each other on the dance floor. “But I’m not sure it’s for me, anyway.”

  “Nonsense.”

  “I don’t care to dance with any of them.”

  “Then what about me?”

  Eleanor looked at Rebeka and her body flushed with warmth. She had subconsciously known that Rebeka would ask this, and she hoped for it as much as she feared it. If there was any sanity left within her, she would make the obvious choice.

  “No. That’s ridiculous.”

  The words left her mouth in a hurry. She backed away from Rebeka while she still possessed the willpower. She dared not stare into those beautiful green eyes as she pushed away her plate, sipped the last of her safra-laden vino, and shuffled away from the table.

  “I must go now. There’s no reason to stay here. I must ... go now.”

  So she did, but she knew that Rebeka watched her go with a smile on her face, and this set her heart pounding all the more furiously.