by C. K. Brooke
The leader gave her a long look. “I have your word, then.” He was telling her, not asking.
“Well,” said Hoste, brushing his hands against his knees and grinning as he rose. “That is all, then. No more threats shall be made upon you and your friends. So long as each of you keep out of Jordinian territory, all will be quite well.”
“Quite,” sniffed Dainy.
“I knew we would come to an agreement, Comrade Ducelle,” Hoste told her, as Jon frowned. Dainy stiffly shook his hand once more, and the leader departed them, surrounded by his men.
The moment they were gone, Mac slammed the door and rounded on her excitedly. “Jordinia is yours for the taking, Dainy. And Hoste fears you!”
“It is your rightful empire to seize,” Bos told her, and Selu nodded eagerly.
Dainy looked at them, uncertain. Jon stroked his chin between his thumb and forefinger, evidently thinking.
Slowly, he smirked.
“Oh, come now. Don’t be absurd,” she argued. “I’m nothing but an eighteen-year-old girl. How could I reinstate an empire?”
“With an inheritance, you could’ve hired an army of your own to wage war against the New Republic,” said Mac, “like your uncle was planning. If all wasn’t lost, I’d have gladly helped you, sister.”
Dainy gave a start at the last word. She was still coming to terms with the fact that Mac was, indeed, her half-brother. Not only that, but a half-brother she had in common with Jon—although she and Jon, of course, shared no blood.
“Ah, but not all has been lost,” said Jon. “Have you thought to open that box yet, my love?”
Dainy had almost forgotten. She reached into the folds of her dress for the trinket Jon had salvaged from her vault, all that remained of her family’s treasure. “This thing?” she asked dubiously, handing it over.
Jon held the box to his ear and gave it a rattle. “Something is inside.” He passed it to Mac.
Mac turned it over. “I don’t know how to open it.” He shrugged, giving it back to Dainy.
She sighed and re-pocketed it.
It was probably nothing.
SELU WAITED BY THE FRONT door.
“Leaving so soon?”
She turned to see Jon Cosmith approaching, hands in his pockets.
“Bos and I are headed back to Gatspierre’s stables to fetch the horses.” Selu pulled up her hair and twisted it into a knot. “We must return them to the trader.”
“And will you be coming back?”
She donned her cap. “Perhaps.”
“Or perhaps,” supplied Cosmith knowingly, “you both might just settle down somewhere in the south, purchase a fine estate together with all that gold, and elope.”
Selu felt her mouth stretch into a smile.
“Well, before you leave us for good, do me one small favor.”
She lifted an eyebrow.
“Bring back my hat.”
She laughed. “Just your hat?”
He grinned.
“Jon Cosmith, you vain creature. I suppose we can make one small detour,” she assented, “for the man to whom we owe so much.”
DAINY PACED THE COURTYARD. THE sun took its place overhead, warming the sky around her. With a sigh, she sat on a white wooden bench tucked beneath a copse of trees.
“Mind if I join you?”
She turned to see Mac in the archway. She shook her head, and he took his seat beside her.
“To think,” he said, glancing down at his boots. “This whole time….”
“We’ve been siblings,” Dainy finished for him, meeting his eyes. Slowly, they smiled at each other.
“Fancy that,” came a familiar voice, and her heart gave a tremor as Jon stepped into the summer morning, a gust of wind rippling his hair. He sat down at Dainy’s other side, and Mac fell quiet.
Dainy struggled to break the mounting tension. “Where is your mother, then?” she inquired. “Perhaps you two ought to spend some time together with her?”
Mac swallowed. “She left already.” He gave Jon an apologetic glance. “I think…it was all too much for her.”
Dainy was sorry to have asked.
“That doesn’t surprise me.” Jon sighed, and Dainy’s heart tore for him. How could his mother abandon her firstborn yet again, when they had finally been reunited?
Dainy took his hand and held it. Jon may not have been a perfect man all his days. But she knew he was brave for opening his heart to her, after everything he’d endured.
With the two men for whom she cared most at her side, one her brother, the other her lover, Eludaine Ducelle was no longer a mere duchess lost or found, but at last, a woman loved.
DAINY QUILLED A LETTER TO her aunts, Paxi and Priya. It pained her to write out the devastating news of Uncle Pascale. She was already sorry for the tears the women would shed for him. But they needed to know that their brother and fiancé, respectively, had died nobly. She finished the scroll and addressed it to the Beili Bungalow, and a messenger soon departed with it.
Returning to the courtyard, Dainy withdrew the little box Jon had found in her vault. She turned it over, running her fingers along the engraved wood, and shaking it by her ear as Jon had done. It did sound as though something loose jiggled inside, but she couldn’t determine what.
“Here.” Jon’s voice made her jump. She looked up to see him and Mac stepping through the archway. She handed it over.
Jon set it to the ground. Then, he crunched it beneath his boot.
“What are you doing?” Dainy exclaimed. “That’s all I had left!”
“Cor, Cosmith,” chided Mac, equally dismayed.
“Relax,” Jon assured them, inspecting the shattered wood. “I had a suspicion it was one of these.” He took something from the pile of shards. “Indeed….”
“One of what?” asked Mac, craning his neck to see.
“These are not too common in West Halvea,” explained Jon, holding something unidentifiable. “But there’s a type of box from the east, which must be broken in order to be opened.”
“Sounds rather wasteful to me,” muttered Mac.
Jon handed Dainy a silver triangular item. She held it up to the sunlight. “What is this?” she wondered, as Jon grinned knowingly.
“Don’t look so pleased with yourself,” Mac told him.
Dainy furrowed her brow. “But, Jon, this looks like—”
“A key.” He nodded.
“Let me see that!” Mac snatched the triangle from his sister, squinting down at the tiny engravings upon it. “There’s writing,” he exclaimed. “But what sort of runes are these?”
“Not runes,” declared Jon. “Characters.”
Mac and Dainy regarded him. “Characters?”
“The writing of Asiotica,” he explained, “where I’m assuming this key’s from, judging by its trademark triangular shape.”
“Asiotica?” said Mac. “You mean, the east?”
“The farthest country east on the Great Continent, brother,” Jon affirmed, and Mac gave the key back to Dainy.
She looked between them, her eyes aglow. “And what,” she asked softly, “was a key from Asiotica doing inside my vault?”
Jon leaned in, moving his lips against Dainy’s neck as she spoke. “Perhaps your inheritance has not been lost after all, my lady.” A frisson ran down her spine at his irresistible touch.
“Well, it’s not only my inheritance,” Dainy nodded at Mac, “but that of all the emperor’s children.”
Mac hesitated. “I don’t think illegitimate children count, Dainy.”
“Nonsense. We’re the only ones left. That counts to me.”
He beamed at her. “Are you proposing, then, that we travel all the way to Asiotica to find where this key goes?”
“Well.” She looked him over appraising
ly. “I do think that sounds like another rather exciting adventure.”
Her brother broke into a grin.
“Of course,” she added, tapping her chin and pretending to contemplate. “I believe we need someone fairly clever and resourceful to assist us in such a quest.” She glanced pointedly about the courtyard. “Someone charming, able to beguile his way out of every impossible situation.”
“Hmm.” Mac turned to his brother, playing along. “What do you say, Jon? Do you know of any such person?”
Jon returned their grins. “You’re looking at him.” He hooked an arm around Dainy’s waist, his eyes dancing as they met hers. “And he intends to marry the duchess of Jordinia.”
TO BE CONTINUED IN BOOK II
My heartfelt gratitude to Juanita Samborski, Michele DeLuca, Denise DeSio, R. A. Sherwood, Sami Stoddard, my parents and siblings, Jeff—my Bos, and Victor—my little firecracker. Special thanks to Amanda L. Matthews and Lyndsay Johnson for the beautiful artwork. Thank you all for your tremendous support in helping to make this impossible dream inevitable.
C.K. Brooke lives in Washington, Michigan. She is the author of over a dozen fantasy and romantic adventure novels and novellas, including the Jordinia series with 48fourteen and the American Pirate Romances with Limitless Publishing. Her debut novel, The Duchess Quest, was selected as a Shelf Unbound Notable Indie Book of 2015 and was awarded five stars by Readers’ Favorite Book Reviews & Awards Contest. When she isn’t blissing out with books, you can find her immersed in her music, chasing her five-year-old around, and geeking out over Star Wars and Marvel movies with her husband.
For more about C.K. Brooke,
visit her at:
http://CKBrooke.com
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THE VILLAGE INN’S FRONT DOOR burst open, and a young woman bounded forth. Jon Cosmith’s heart trembled to see Eludaine Ducelle jogging toward him, her short black hair delightfully disheveled. But she darted straight past him to the ebony stallion, Spitfire.
With affection, she threw her arms around the beast’s neck. “Dear Spitfire, if only I could keep you for myself,” Cosmith heard her whisper. “But Bos and Selu must take you home now.” She lifted her head, catching the man watching her. “One of my fondest memories of you is riding together upon this horse,” she admitted shyly.
He grinned at her. “My fondest memory of you did not take place upon any horse.”
“Jon.” The young woman blushed, although the corners of her mouth were upturned.
He was pulling her into his arms when their companions’ voices drifted nearer. Regretfully, Dainy slipped from his hold and made her way toward them, joining in their chatter.
“Your hat, Cosmith.” Seluna Campagna tossed the familiar brown cowman’s hat across the threshold. He reached up and caught it.
“And your satchel.” Boslon Visigoth held out the tan bag, and Cosmith thanked him, receiving it.
“Well.” Selu craned her neck to look up at the giant. “Time to say goodbye to the Emperor’s children, then?”
Cosmith started. This was a rather odd way of referring to Macmillan and Dainy, although the violet-haired woman was entirely accurate. He was simply unaccustomed to the notion that Marley Macmillan and the Duchess of Jordinia shared the same father: Jordinia’s former Emperor, Dane Ducelle. Not to mention, Cosmith now knew that he and Macmillan shared the same mother.
He wasn’t one for farewells, so he lingered by the borrowed steeds—Storm, Folly Silver, and Spitfire—whom Bos and Selu planned to return to their owner in southern Häffstrom.
Dainy squeezed Bos around his enormous middle. “It’s not goodbye forever,” the giant assured her. The girl wiped her eyes, and Cosmith watched her, longing to take her into their room and comfort her as soon as the others were gone.
“That’s right.” Selu smiled. “You’ll certainly be invited, should there be any,” she cleared her throat, “upcoming celebration of sorts.”
At first, Dainy beamed at the insinuation of Bos and Selu’s matrimony. But slowly, her fair countenance fell. “Oh. Well, I’m not sure if we’ll be around here for much longer.” At their curious expressions, she reached into the folds of her frock and extracted the silver triangular key they’d recently unearthed. “This was in the little box we found in my treasury vault,” she divulged.
Selu held the object up to her oblong eyes.
“Jon thinks it’s from Asiotica,” explained Macmillan. “We intend to travel there, and find what it goes to. Dainy’s inheritance—”
“Our inheritance,” she corrected him.
He smiled at her. “Our inheritance,” he amended, “may not be lost, after all.”
“You’re going to Asiotica?” Bos and Selu appeared taken aback. “But when?”
“I know not.” Dainy shrugged. “Perhaps soon!”
The giant frowned. “I should accompany you. It shall be a tremendous voyage from here to the Great Continent. You’ll need a grander escort than merely Cosmith and Macmillan.” The other two men glared up at him, indignant, but Bos only grunted. “No offense.”
“Oh, no.” Dainy shook her head at once. “I’ll not make that mistake again. Uncle Pascale did not live to see his wedding day, because he insisted on escorting me here first. Nay, you mustn’t come with us, Bos. Stay here, and begin your life with Selu.”
Bos made to object, but Macmillan asserted himself. “You know full well the Duchess shall be perfectly safe with me. I am her brother, after all.”
Selu placed a hand on her partner’s hulking arm. “We must heed Macmillan, dear,” she reminded Bos. “As Dainy’s elder brother, he speaks for her now.”
At this remark, Dainy furrowed her brow, while Cosmith—Dainy’s intended—slowly clenched his jaw. He had not thought of that…
Bos reluctantly relented, and at last, he and Selu departed with the horses. Pulling down his hat to shield from the sun’s glare, Cosmith hitched his satchel over his shoulder and turned back to the inn. They were still exhausted from the journey behind them and the trying events of Dainy’s uncle’s betrayal and her subsequent rescue in the previous days. All they wished to do was rest in preparation for their next voyage. Which, Cosmith noted, had better be soon, before autumn should fall, bringing hurricanes with it.
Although the sun still shone, he led Dainy to their rented chamber. Patiently, she waited as he pulled down the shades and slid off his boots.
The door rolled open behind them, however, and Macmillan stepped in, yawning and stretching his arms. “Can you believe my feet still hurt from walking through the Bainherd Plains?” He collapsed onto the mattress unceremoniously, hazel eyes staring up at the rafters. Dainy cast Cosmith an uncertain glance.
“Mac.” Cosmith beckoned him.
The lad looked up, puzzled.
“Is it not time you rented your own room, brother?” suggested Dainy carefully.
Macmillan looked between them, eyes narrowing. “Oh,” he said at last, an unpleasant smirk creeping across his features. “I see what you two are intending. And I’ll not hear of it.” He lay back on the bed, sprawling out his limbs with a contented sigh. “You are not to lie with my little sister again, Cosmith. Not on my watch.”
Cosmith tensed.
“This isn’t funny, Mac.” Dainy frowned.
“I’m not jesting,” he contended. “You heard Selu. As your elder brother, I speak for you now. And I say you two may not share a bed until you’re wed.” He shrugged. “It’s only proper.”
“Unbelievable,” muttered Cosmith, as Dainy looked to him imploringly. Flustered, he steered her back to the door.
Macmillan sat up. “Where’re you going?”
“The Duchess and I have better things to do than hang around with you,” Cosmith snapped, guiding Dainy from the room.
IN THE RURAL VILLAGE OF Solomyn, Häffstrom, Selu and Bos found a quiet farm for sale, resting peacefully between two streams, with brown hens strutting through the tall grasses and a milk cow lowing in the barn. The wooden house was sturdy and comfortable, a fine place to share a simple, peaceful life together.
With a portion of the gold winnings that Cosmith and Dainy had generously given them, they purchased the property. Each day, Bos felled trees and crafted furniture from the wood. Selu marveled at his capabilities, never having realized her beloved was such an artist.
On their first night in their new home, she made to share his mat. But Bos gently pointed her away. “We are not yet wed.”
“What do you take me for? A virgin?” She laughed. “You know I’m a widow. Not to mention…” Her voice faded at the dark memories of her youth in Jordinian prison, where she and her mother had suffered the rebel soldiers’ abuses.
“Still,” he insisted. “It is not right.”
“We’ve shared a mat before,” she argued. But even as she spoke, she knew that occasion had been different, as nothing of an intimate nature had transpired between them.
Bos smiled, blue eyes glowing. “I shall build us a bed for our wedding night,” he promised. “Which,” he reached into his pocket, “may be as soon as you wish.”
Selu’s breath caught to see the delicate wooden bracelet resting in his enormous palm, as he lowered himself onto both knees and presented it to her in the traditional way. He slipped the band around her left wrist, and Selu admired the meticulous rose- and leaf-like designs carved in the wood.
Examining the base, she noticed he’d etched a succession of runes, spelling out two unfamiliar words: Hazja Lӕnde. “What does this mean?” she asked, brushing her thumb against the foreign engravings.
“It is Old Jordinian, meaning eternal love. Do you like it?” He suddenly looked apprehensive. “I made it myself. If you prefer, I could buy you someth—”
