“I don’t know if it worked,” I muttered. “I don’t even know which power I’m using.”
Fallon shrugged, put the two bottles at my feet, got up, and went into an adjoining room before returning with his bow and a single arrow that he held in the fire. When it caught, he went to the window and fired it. A few moments later he turned back to us and gave Remi a confident nod.
“Thank you, Ella. I’m sorry to have disturbed you. I will deliver a report in the morning before I retire, but now I must relieve Daniel.”
I smiled up at him and said, “Thank you, Remi. For everything.”
He seemed surprised I’d thanked him, but didn’t say anything, instead he bowed and headed for the door.
Fallon was looking down at me. I knew that expression, I’d seen it before and I smiled, patting the couch. His answering smile made my stomach flip. My skin tingled as he sat, draping his arm around my shoulders, and I snuggled into his side. He opened a bottle and drank with me, not trying to communicate, not wanting anything from me but my presence. It was nice. I felt safe watching the fire and drinking mead, and I fell asleep on his couch hoping that tomorrow would be a much better day.
Chapter 19
Lips against mine woke me. A tongue traced my bottom lip, teeth nipped, and I groaned and pressed into him, welcoming the contact, and opening my mouth to allow him inside. As his tongue danced with mine, his arm tightened around my waist and my eyes fluttered open.
I expected Fallon, but that wasn’t who had their lips pressed against mine.
“Sayer?”
“I missed you,” he murmured against my lips, pressing for another kiss, a deeper kiss.
But the hand was still there. The body at my back was still there, so it couldn’t be his.
I pushed him away, my face coloring with shame, and rolled away from Fallon and onto the floor, sending empty bottles rolling.
“I…” I started. Sayer held out a hand, but I ignored it, hauling myself to my feet. “How did you get in here?”
He wiggled his fingers at me. “Magic.” He looked over my head and grinned. “I told you Fallon would look after you.”
Scrambling to my feet, I looked from Sayer to Fallon and back again. “Why are you here?”
“You don’t have to be pleased to see me, but I sort of hoped for a better reception than this,” he teased, swatting Fallon’s feet and making him sit up.
“I’m pleased… I mean, you took off back to Glinda, Sayer. I wasn’t expecting to see you again for… well, I thought she kept you close?”
“Oh, Glinda. She’s down in the reception hall.”
Glinda was downstairs and he was up here kissing me? Shit… I glared at him. “How long did it take you to get back to her palace?”
“Two days. I walked through the night. She insisted we come here this morning. I couldn’t buy any time.”
My head was all over the place. I’d barely eaten the day before and the mead had left me with a headache. Add to that sleeping on the couch with my head on Fallon’s arm, my shock at waking up to Sayer kissing me, Glinda being in my hall when I was supposed to have set up a protective charm and monkey watches to keep people out, and I think I could be forgiven for staring at him wide-eyed. Fallon walked around the couch to stand behind me, and I moved away, walking toward the window.
“Seriously, this is messed up.”
“What is?” Sayer asked.
Fallon’s expression mimicked Sayer’s question.
I looked from one to the other, wondering what the hell I was supposed to do. “You… he… we…” I rubbed my eyes with my index fingers. “I can’t handle this right now. Why is she here?”
Sayer got up and moved toward me. The only place I could go was out the window, and I didn’t feel like flying right then, so I looked past him to Fallon, measuring his reaction.
He didn’t have one. Unless a half smile counted.
“Ella, you need to calm down,” Sayer insisted in a soothing voice, reaching out a hand. He took mine, rubbing the back of my palm with his thumb as he raised it to his lips. “You read my note. I was worried about you. I’m sorry I couldn’t buy any extra time, but you know what Glinda is like by now. She wanted to check on your progress and insisted we come straight back here this morning.”
A lump formed in my throat and I tried to swallow it away. I was so confused. He’d been so caring, and I didn’t want him to go, but Glinda was waiting and we had to keep up the act. He was doing that to help me, and me to help him—at least that’s what he said.
But then he came back and found me asleep in another man’s arms and all he had to say was he missed me. It was weird. At least, I thought it should have been. “I…”
“You left me.” I didn’t know how to handle this.
Fallon arrived at my other side, stroking a hand down my hair. I glanced at him, scanning his face for a suggestion of how he felt, of what he was thinking, but all I saw was his reassuring smile.
He leaned in and kissed my cheek, then turned and disappeared into another room, leaving me with Sayer. I felt awkward. I wanted to say something, but couldn’t find the right words. I wanted to explain, except I didn’t understand it myself. I mean, Sayer and I weren’t an item… were we?
He seemed to sense my unease and gave me an out, saying, “She’s waiting.”
I closed my eyes and sighed. She was waiting. Glinda. The reason I was here dealing with all this in the first place. She was part of the problem and she was here to make more demands of me.
When I opened my eyes he was grinning at me. “Your confidence is growing. That’s good,” he commented, then he turned around and strolled to the door.
I followed, looking down at myself as I walked. I was wearing skinny jeans and a black tee, with glimmering silver ballet slippers just like the ones my grandma made for me. Weird.
The doors were wide open, leaving the reception hall, as Sayer called it, bright and airy. Or it would have been if the place hadn’t been so badly kept. Glinda was tapping her fingers against the flat of her stomach as she stood rigidly and waited, glancing out of the corner of her eye now and then at Remi, who had taken it upon himself to stand by the door.
Sayer announced our arrival, stating, “Lady.”
She looked up as he spoke, her face beaming. “Ellana. I’m so pleased to find you well. How have your first few days been?”
I tried not to scowl. “Well, there was the initial obstacle of getting inside. That was fun, wasn’t it general?”
He noted I wasn’t using his name and I silently begged him to play along. Thankfully, he knew better than to answer a rhetorical question, simply giving me a curt nod in response.
“Then there was the whole Sayer leaving me here with a complete stranger and an angry mob of monkeys when I was still only semi-conscious thing. Again, fun.”
She looked at Sayer. “That was not mentioned.”
“Apologies, Lady,” he said solemnly. “My instructions were to return home as soon as possible. I left her in the care of—”
She cut him off, looking past me and at the stairs. “Fallon, dearest boy, how are you?”
He was dressed in black pants and a black shirt, his hair was wet and combed back, and he descended the stairs slowly. He did not look pleased.
He reached the foot of the stairs and stopped by my side. Glinda stepped forward and stroked his face with her pale, manicured fingers—a strangely intimate gesture that seemed to make him uneasy. “Still not speaking? My sister has a lot to answer for. You see why we need you so, Ellana? The damage that awful woman has inflicted upon my poor people cannot go unpunished.”
“Yeah. She’s a delight,” I muttered, stepping closer to Fallon, feeling protective.
Her poor people? What about the people of the West? The monkeys were entirely unruly, terrorizing the Pumpkinheads, while Fallon was left in this fortress for who knew how long, alone, and unable to communicate… And that was a story I needed to hear. What had happ
ened there? He’d made himself scarce when Tatiana turned up, but that was nothing compared to the way he was reacting to Glinda. I didn’t like it.
She moved back with her brows raised, her forehead wrinkling. “You’ve met?”
I shrugged. “Yeah. She dropped by with her legion of Lioneag yesterday morning. Threw her weight around a bit, killed a bunch of monkeys. You know, the usual welcome to the neighborhood stuff. I got rid of her, but I could have done without it.” I tilted my head and frowned. “That brings us to how you got in here. There should have been security measures in place.”
She looked from me to Remi. “Your guard was down. But never mind that,” she said, wafting a hand in the air dismissively. Sayer stepped forward and bowed, and then out of nowhere a fully set, circular table appeared in the middle of my hall. “Let’s have breakfast.”
I glanced to Fallon. He inclined his head—in thanks, I think—and stepped forward to pull out a chair. Sayer did the same and we each took our seats.
“Sit down, Fallon,” I requested when he stood behind my chair.
Glinda gave me a curious look and smirked. “Soft spot for the boy, Ellana? While it isn’t usual for us to, ah, befriend the help, I can’t say I blame you. He is incredibly handsome,” she commented in a loud whisper over the table, as though he wouldn’t hear. I didn’t miss her obvious side-glance to Sayer either.
My stomach turned with her ridiculous girlish giggle and I had to work very hard not to let my disgust show. I noticed she failed to invite Sayer to sit with us.
I helped myself to what looked like scrambled eggs, toast, bacon, and pancakes, topping the lot off with syrup before Sayer stepped forward and reached for the teapot. I got there first, knocking his hand away with the back of mine, and proceeded to pour for Fallon and myself, then the empty place at the table, then Glinda.
“Join us, Sayer,” I offered, replacing the teapot and smiling at him.
He looked uncomfortable, staring down at his feet.
I glanced at Glinda.
It took her a minute, but then finally said, “Yes, do.” Her clipped tone gave her away. I smirked and shoved a forkful of bacon into my mouth.
“You must be glad of the company after all these years alone,” she mused, looking at Fallon.
I saw him shift a little in his seat before nodding and taking his cup.
I reached over and started piling food onto his plate. “Eat up, Fallon. We have a lot to do today. Yeah, we seem to get along okay. Seeing that it’s only been a few days and I was knocked out for the first of them, wasn’t I, Sayer?”
He was watching me with his eyes narrowed. “Yes. That was unfortunate. Thankfully, Fallon was able to help restore you to health and… where did the general go?”
Remi had gone. I wasn’t concerned, he must have been exhausted, but Sayer changing the subject annoyed me. “He was due to change over with the next watch. I’d rather he got on with his work than stood eavesdropping at the door,” I replied coolly. “Tell me, Glinda, now that I have the fortress, what do you propose I do now?”
Her eyes brightened. “Well, the next logical step would be for you to take the East. Such a shame Tati discovered you, but it shouldn’t pose too much of a problem if you came up against her yesterday and saw her successfully across the border. Well done, by the way. She’s usually much more difficult to placate.”
I shrugged. “Wasn’t that difficult when I figured out how to tap into this power. It’s a lot, isn’t it? I have to admit, I’m excited to see what I can manage when I have the power of your other sister too. I haven’t had much time to practice, but the things I’ve managed were enough to see Tatiana off.”
There was a warning there. If she noticed then she wasn’t giving it away.
Fallon shifted again, and I looked at him with my brows pulled in. “Is something wrong?”
He shook his head and took a small bite of scrambled egg, before flicking his eyes to Glinda at the very moment Sayer put his cup down noisily, causing Glinda to scowl in his direction.
“So,” I continued, waving my empty fork around, “I thought I’d sort this place out first. I need to work on my defenses since you managed to just stroll straight in, there’s a serious lack of a kitchen, and I haven’t explored yet. Then, I should think in a couple of weeks, I’ll be able to take a trip east. What do you think?”
She had just popped a grape into her mouth and was still chewing when I looked at her. I put down my fork and sipped my tea, waiting.
“Well,” she began eventually, “I had hoped it would be much sooner than that, but if you need time to acclimatize, I am certain we can work things around.”
Her expression suggested she wasn’t happy having to wait, but I had her figured out, and knew she wasn’t likely to protest.
“More tea, Lady Glinda?” Sayer asked.
“No,” she snapped, then seemed to catch herself at once. “Thank you. One cup is enough for now.” She turned her attention squarely on me, her bright blue eyes piercing. “You can’t possibly begin to comprehend how important it is that you claim the East, Ellana.” Her voice wobbled and I managed not to roll my eyes, finding her feigned concern annoying. “Without you, we’re done for. Oz is absolutely doomed. The people, our poor people, under her rule, I dread to think what will become of them. You’ve seen firsthand the tyranny she’ll inflict.”
I drained my cup and put it down on the saucer. Sayer automatically picked up the teapot and refilled it, as I replied, “I’ll get around to it. Right now, this fortress is my priority. You’re talking to me about the people, Glinda, but there are people here who lost family members because of your sister. The place is a mess. I have to make sure the people are safe. I haven’t even seen where the monkeys live yet, and I have to make sure they’re comfortable. Who knows what they live like, if this is what they’ve been defending. I can’t just run off and conquer the East, leaving this behind for Tatiana to attack.”
She opened her mouth to reply but I cut her off. “And I don’t know my way around. Sayer got me here safely, after a run in with a Hopper and some Horners, not to mention me being attacked by my own monkey minions. What am I supposed to do without him?”
She blinked, apparently surprised at the change in my tone. “But you have Fallon now. He can guide you.”
“And who looks after the fortress if we’re both off in the East?” I challenged.
“What about your general?” she countered testily. “Surely he can be trusted to protect your lands in your absence?”
She had me there. I should have known I was pushing my luck. I smiled, then responded, “Probably, he seems to be incredibly driven. Still, it’ll take time to perfect the protections I need in place to keep her from attacking again. I don’t want her swooping in and wiping out half my army.”
She nodded her head, her blonde hair swaying around her shoulders. “Of course. I could help with that.”
Fallon shifted again and I glanced over. His plate was still full and he had only drank his tea. I put my hand on his shoulder and said, “Yeah. That would probably speed everything up.” I pushed my chair back as I stood up. “Shall we start now? You two stay where you are, have more breakfast. We’ll be back later,” I stated, leaving little room for negotiation in my words. If Glinda was so certain of the next course of action, then she could help.
Sayer looked to Glinda, about to stand up, but she waved her hand at him. “No, no. As Ellana said, finish your breakfast.”
It was a fight not to smirk, and I made a point of patting Fallon’s shoulder as I left the table and walked toward the door. Her skirts rustled as she got up and followed, and I allowed myself a victorious smile. We were in my house now and we followed my rules. If she didn’t like it, she could leave.
Chapter 20
It was warm outside, the sun was shining, and there were a few new additions flitting happily over the fortress. It wasn’t until I saw them that I realized there had been a serious lack of birdlife around
the fortress. I assumed it correlated with the fact that there wasn’t a single flying monkey to be seen. I didn’t understand why, since Daniel and Marlon should be around somewhere, but I wasn’t disclosing that to Glinda.
I could hear the whisper of her skirts on the ground as I walked toward the gate, but she wasn’t making too much of an effort to catch up to me. Eventually, I stopped and waited, taking the opportunity to look back to the fortress. There was no movement near the door or the windows. I wondered what the guys were doing, but them staying out of the way was good. I had something to say and didn’t want to implicate Sayer in any way.
“Sorry, I forget you wear those heels,” I said when she reached me. “These seem to be choosing comfortable styles for me now.” I turned my right foot to the side, drawing her attention to my flats, the light catching the red gems and making them sparkle.
Glinda shifted her gaze from my feet to my face, then lifted her chin and pulled back her shoulders. I looked down at her and frowned. “Something wrong?”
“Your behavior is improper,” she scolded.
I brushed my fingers through my hair and shook it out as I decided how to play it. She was in my home now, speaking to me like I was a recalcitrant youth when she needed me to help her? I knew precisely how to handle her.
I raised my brows and wrinkled my nose. “That’s rich coming from the woman who was touching up the man who’s supposed to be acting as my steward under the tablecloth. Where I come from that’s harassment, Glinda.”
Whether it was shame or fury, or a nice mixture of the two, I had no idea, but the shade of red that crept up her neck and reached her cheeks was incredible. I kept my voice light and added, “I’ll let it go this once. But believe me, if you touch him again without his invitation, I’ll throw you out myself.”
It was anger. She confirmed it by opening and closing her mouth a few times, and looking to the gate and back to me. I wondered if she was going to storm out, leaving Sayer behind, but there was no such luck. Eventually, she managed to clench her teeth and mutter, “A misunderstanding, Ellana.”
The Ruby Fortress (Kingdoms Of Oz Book 1) Page 14
