by C. L. Wilson
As Teleos led Rain around the room, introducing him to each of his guests, Rain began to understand the reason for that satisfaction in Teleos’s gaze, and his appreciation for his new friend grew exponentially. He’d underestimated the man, thinking his Fey appearance would make the other nobles less likely to trust him. Instead, it was plain the Teleos family had carefully built and maintained a powerful network of allies within their homeland.
This small gathering of lords represented some of the most strategic estates in Celieria as well as half a dozen industries of key military importance: Great Lord Darramon, the fifth most powerful lord guarding the Eld border; Lord Fann, famous for his Swan’s Bay shipyards; Lord Nin, a celebrated naval hero, whose mighty Queen’s Point fortress guarded the mouth of Great Bay; Lord Clovis, a captain of industry, whose coal-and-iron-rich lands supplied more than half of all Celieria’s steel and iron; Great Lord Ash, a southern border lord whose handcrafted bows and superior bowmen rivaled even Elvish perfection. Teleos and his wise ancestors had established long-standing ties with all the powers necessary to build and equip an army for the defense of Celieria.
«An impressive network of friends.» Rain commented. «Shanis would be proud.»
Teleos smiled. «It was his idea. When the Faering Mists went up, he said one day Rain Tairen Soul would return and that when he did, House Teleos should be prepared to aid him.»
«Shanis arranged this?» Rain’s gaze swept the room again at the network of Teleos’s allies, and he realized he was looking at a gift from a long-dead friend.
Teleos met Rain’s gaze, his Fey eyes steady. «Tairen defend the pride.»
The familiar Fey maxim had been Shanis’s favorite. Sudden emotion surged, and a muscle worked in Rain’s jaw. «They do indeed, my brother.» He took a deep breath and donned the familiar mask of stoic Fey calm as he turned to meet the guarded, suspicious gaze of the nobleman standing nearby. “Lord Darramon, a pleasure to meet you again.”
The Great Lord arched a dark brow. “Is it?” The man’s gray eyes grew flinty. “I’m here purely as a favor to Teleos. If not for our long-standing friendship, I wouldn’t have come. The Lords of Celieria are not toys for your amusement, My Lord Feyreisen. Either you honor our right to free will, or the Eld won’t be your only enemies on this continent.”
Rain bowed. “I apologize for what happened last night, Lord Darramon. I can assure you it was a complete accident.” He kept his gaze focused on Darramon, though he could feel the scrutiny of the other lords and ladies and knew they were listening intently to the exchange. “When a Fey discovers his truemate, as I have done, his emotions—and his magic—are not as settled as they usually are. It is a hard thing for a Fey to admit his discipline is not as strong as it should be, but there you have it.”
Darramon gave a short laugh. “So you apologize and expect all to be forgiven?”
“Not at all,” Rain replied soberly. “I accept full responsibility for what happened, and I will accept any consequences of that responsibility. But do not, my lord, accuse me of intentionally spinning that weave to control Celierian minds. Using magic to usurp another being’s free will is an Eld tactic, not a Fey one, and that’s exactly the sort of abuse of power I’m here to caution you all against.”
Darramon’s wife, a frail beauty with brilliant blue eyes and dark russet hair, put a hand on her husband’s arm.
The Great Lord’s eyes flickered towards her for a moment, and then he gave a curt nod. “I will hear what you have to say, My Lord Feyreisen. But what was done was done to my wife as well as me, and that trespass I find much harder to forgive. She has not been in the best of health.”
Instantly solicitous, Rain turned to Lady Darramon with sincere concern. “My lady, if you will permit, Lady Marissya would be honored to be of service to you. There are no better healers among the Fey. Teska, please. It is the least we can offer.”
Marissya stepped forward, scarlet silks rustling. “Indeed, my lady. If Lord Teleos would offer us a private chamber, I will attend you immediately.”
“Of course,” Teleos said. He gestured to a nearby manservant. “Marton, please show the ladies to my mother’s suite.”
“Basha—” Lord Darramon began.
“No. It’s all right,” Lady Darramon told him. “I have never doubted the Lady Marissya’s goodwill, and I won’t start now.” The Great Lord’s wife gave Marissya a wan smile. “I would appreciate whatever aid you can provide, my lady.”
Darramon watched his wife go with a troubled frown, but his expression hardened when he looked back at Rain. “Don’t think this will make me listen with a more favorable ear.”
“My lord, I would not dream of it.” Rain gave a final, precise bow. “An open mind is all I ask for.”
Lord Darramon wasn’t the only guest who responded coolly to Rain’s overtures, but to his surprise, numerous couples welcomed him with warmth. That baffled him at first, but as the evening progressed and Rain watched those same couples exchanging long glances and subtle touches and smiles before dinner, he began to understand.
He glanced at Dax and saw the same amused realization in the Fey lord’s eyes. «Perhaps we’re going about this the wrong way,» Rain suggested. Despite the earlier tension with Lord Darramon, a thread of laughter tinged his weave. «Maybe Rowan was right and we should be approaching all the elderly lords who might swap a vote in exchange for a bit more…rejuvenation.»
Dax choked on his pinalle.
Swallowing a grin, Rain plucked a bite-sized morsel of roast quail in pastry from a passing tray and popped it in his mouth. If nothing else came of tonight’s dinner, at least he could give Ellysetta the relief of knowing that not all Celieria’s lords had found her weave an unwelcome enchantment.
Marissya and Basha Darramon returned before the guests were called to dinner. Darramon’s wife, while still frail, had much better color, and she walked with a surer step.
«A malignancy,» Marissya informed Rain and Dax as the guests followed Teleos into the dining room. «She will require far more than a few brief chimes of healing. I soothed her fatigue and did what I could to help her body fight the advance of her disease, but unless she comes to the Fading Lands or half a dozen of our strongest healers go to her, she will be dead this time next year.»
«Well,» Dax said. «Cruel as it sounds, if we want his vote, that seems one sure way to get it.»
The shei’dalin’s spine stiffened. «Shei’tan, I know you cannot be suggesting we bribe him with his wife’s life.»
«Marissya, you accepted long ago that you can’t heal every dying mortal. We’re in a fight for our lives. If the promise of healing Lady Darramon helps secure Lord Darramon’s vote, we would be fools not to consider it. Besides, if the Eld gain free access to Celieria, she’s dead already—or worse, used as a tool to force her husband to comply with the Mages.»
Rain gazed across the table at the tender concern and open love stamped on Lord Darramon’s hard face as he bent his head to murmur something to his wife. What if Rain were in Lord Darramon’s place and Ellysetta were the one dying? What wouldn’t Rain do to secure her health? What wouldn’t he give?
Tension coiled in his gut at the mere thought of it, and the tairen growled a fierce warning. Dax was right. The promise of healing Lady Basha would secure Lord Darramon’s vote in an instant. A man who loved his wife as deeply as Darramon clearly loved Basha would never let something so trifling as the cast of a ballot stand in the way of her health.
A wily king would use that leverage to his own advantage.
After dinner, the guests retired to Teleos’s conservatory. Servants bustled around offering tea, keflee, and a selection of flavorful liqueurs, and the discussion turned in earnest to the Eld Trade Agreement.
Great Lord Verakis, holder of a very large and strategic West Midlands estate, was a sober man, thoughtful, educated, and deliberate in his thinking. His lands lay directly in the path of the Garreval. If war came, the Eld would march through Verakis
on their way to the Fading Lands, and luckily for Rain, the lord knew it. The calm, well-reasoned discussion provided the impetus Rain needed to draw even the more reticent lords into discourse.
“My lands are nowhere near the Garreval and of little strategic importance,” objected Lord Dunn, a small central Celierian landholder.
“Perhaps not strategic by location, Lord Dunn,” Rain corrected as he recalled the information Master Fellows had imparted to Ellysetta this afternoon about the House Dunn, “but even Eld armies need food. The quality and abundance of your crops make Dunn a ripe prize.”
“My lord, really,” Lord Nevis Barlo objected. The man was another small landholder with estates located south of Celieria City. “You’re talking as if Mage conquest is a certainty—when in fact no proof exists to support your claim.”
“I know the Mages, Lord Barlo,” Rain replied. “I am intimately familiar with what they will do for power. If the Mage Council has been reconstituted, have no doubt about it, conquest is a certainty. Perhaps not this year, perhaps not the next, but it will come. Mages are patient adversaries. They will wait until you grow complacent, and then they will strike.”
“My Lord Feyreisen.” Lord Callumas Nin, the Great Lord and naval hero who held Queen’s Point, cleared his throat. “All of us are here because we are willing to listen to what you say. But let us talk facts, not conjecture—no matter how well-founded you believe that conjecture might be. You want our votes to keep the Eld out of Celieria. The Eld want our votes to let them in. We know what the Eld are offering: gold, trade, an unlimited supply of keio to cure any future outbreaks of plague. What is it the Fey are offering?”
Rain nodded, pleased by the glimmer of progress—even though what mortals called diplomacy was just a polite term for bribery. “A good question, my lord. As your ancestors learned long ago, the Fey have much to offer, and our gifts come with none of the strings the Eld attach.” He accepted a small goblet of pinalle from a passing servant and leaned forward. “We have warriors of a skill no mortal will ever match, my lord, swordsmasters to train your men and fight alongside them should the need arise. Healers to tend your sick.” He met Lord Darramon’s eyes. “Magic to help ward your holdings. Sails that amplify the wind to make ships move faster.” He took a sip of his drink. “Does any of that interest you, my lord?”
Lord Fann, the shipbuilder, sat up a bit straighter. “Magic-enhanced sails?”
Lord Nin’s response was more reserved but no less interested. “Tell us more.”
Rain signaled to Dax. The Fey lord launched into a detailed discussion of what the Fey and their magic could provide. As he spoke, Rain caught Lord Darramon’s gaze and wove a private thread of Spirit between them. «Your wife is dying. Without healing, Marissya says she will be gone this time next year.»
The goblet of pinalle in the Great Lord’s hand trembled, and sweet blue wine splashed over the rim to run, unnoticed, in rivulets over his shaking hand. His face turned pale beneath its tan. He had not known. Suspected, perhaps, but not with certainty.
Rain felt sorry for the man. The news was clearly a terrible blow. «I will not risk the safety of our women by sending them far from the Faering Mists, but if you bring your wife to the Garreval, I will arrange for our healers to tend her there.»
If I grant you my vote. The response was a thought unbacked by power but easily read.
«I would be lying to say that did not cross my mind,» Rain said, «but nei, this a Fey gift, offered freely as a gesture of our goodwill, no matter how you cast your vote. I will post a quintet at the Garreval to wait for you. You have two months from today to bring your wife to them. If it is within the power of our healers to cure her, they will do so.»
The border lord’s lips moved, forming a single word. Why?
«Just bring her,» Rain answered brusquely, «and do not delay. If you do not come within two months’ time, we will assume you have declined our offer. The quintet will return to the Fading Lands and your wife will live or die as the gods see fit.»
Ellysetta sat on her windowsill, looking up at the waning Mother and Daughter moons as they crawled across the night sky. Within the visibly shimmering twenty-five-fold weave surrounding the house, the world seemed utterly tranquil, yet tension still coiled inside her. The house was quiet. Mama and Papa had turned in earlier, and though Ellie could feel the press of weariness urging her to bed, she was afraid to sleep. What if she dreamed again? What if she dreamed worse than she had last night?
Bel had assured her that the twenty-five-fold weaves would keep out all known magical attacks, but her disquiet would not settle. Last night, the Shadow Man had found her. Who knew what terrors he might now unleash? Behind her, three lit candle-lamps cast bright circles of golden light around the room, chasing shadows to the darkest corners, but the flickering lights offered little in the way of reassurance.
Was it her imagination, or had the room grown colder? Ellie shivered and pulled the knitted shawl closer around her shoulders.
Suddenly her entire body went tense. What was that moving in the courtyard? She cupped her hands around her eyes and peered through the window, then sat back with a groan as she realized it was only Kieran, practicing his bladework in the moonlight.
“Oh, for the Haven’s sake, Ellysetta, you’re being ridiculous.” She scrubbed her hands over her face and jumped to her feet, snatching up the heavy volume of Tarr’s History of Celierian Noble Houses from the pile of books on her nightstand. After Master Fellows’s lessons on the peerage this afternoon, she’d had Bel escort her to the library to fetch a selection of books that she hoped would help her build a better rapport with the nobles next time she met them. Since she wasn’t getting any sleep tonight, the least she could do was spend the time doing something productive.
Crawling into bed, she propped the pillows up behind her, set the heavy book on her thighs, and began to read about the exploits and achievements of the past lords and ladies of Celieria. Unfortunately, Tarr’s writing style, while a perfection of detailed accuracy, was lamentably dry. Triumphant victories—dizzying, incredible feats that had left her breathless when she’d read about them in volumes of Fey poetry—became about as vivid and engrossing as watching plaster set when recounted by the erudite scholar Master Tarr.
She persevered, determined to become an asset rather than a liability to Rain, and hoping to take her mind off her fears. Perhaps if Tarr had been a more engrossing writer, it would have worked. As it was, she jumped at each rattle of the windowpanes and creak of a floorboard, and every flicker of a shadow on her bedroom walls made her heart pound with fear. Halfway through chapter five, “The History of Great House Orly,” a noise outside brought her rigidly alert. She stifled a scream as a shadow passed over her window.
“Shei’tani?” Rain stood on the small patch of shingled roof outside her window. Glowing green threads of Earth spun out from his fingertips and her window swung inward. Fresh night air, crisp with the scent of magic, wafted in on a cool breeze. He leapt with graceful catlike ease over the windowsill and landed without a sound in the center of her room.
Ellie clutched a hand to her throat, feeling the rapid beat of her heart beneath her fingertips. “What are you doing here?” She set her heavy book on the nightstand beside her. “I thought you were with Lord Teleos this evening.”
“Bel told me you were still awake, so I left early.” Two steps brought him to her side and he caught her hands in his, lifting them to his lips. “Fly with me, shei’tani?”
His long dark hair spilled over his shoulders, and his Fey-pale skin shone against the inky blackness of his leathers. Her heart pounded faster, but this time not from fear. Would there ever come a day when the sight of him did not leave her breathless?
Without hesitation, she went. Out the window, up to the rooftop, without a care for her bare feet or nightgown, she followed him.
“Trust me?” he asked when they stood on the crest of the roof, looking out over the sleeping city.
>
She answered without hesitation. “Of course.”
He smiled and it was as if clouds parted before the sun. His teeth gleamed dazzling white, and his perfect masculine beauty softened to stunning appeal. When Rain smiled, even Lightmaidens would weep with joy.
He drew her to him and his mouth covered hers in a long, sweet, melting kiss that made her legs fold beneath her and her hands clutch the broad strength of his shoulders to keep from falling. He laughed softly against her skin and tracked kisses up her jaw to her ear, then whispered in a voice of pure enchantment, “Don’t be afraid.” That was all the warning she received before he flung her skyward.
She soared up as if she were weightless, spiraling on a column of Air, breathless but unafraid. The twenty-five-fold weaves surrounding the Baristani house peeled back before her like the petals of a blossoming flower. Her arms flung out, and she turned her face up to the sky, letting Rain’s magic carry her as high as it would. As she reached the apex of her ascent and began to gently fall back to earth, Rain’s tairen form rose up beneath her and she landed neatly in the cradle of the saddle.
Magic spun around her in velvety clouds, and when it cleared, she looked down and laughed in delight. He’d changed her cotton nightgown to long, flowing robes that looked as if he’d woven them from starlight. Each whisper of movement made the cloth shimmer and gleam.
«I was feeling romantic,» Rain said with a chuff of tairen laughter. «Hold on.»
Ellie’s hands gripped the pommel as his wings spread wide. Together, they soared skyward, into the dark heavens.
They flew for nearly a bell, for no purpose except the joy of flight, soaking in the silent beauty of the night, basking in the silver light of the Mother and Daughter moons. They skimmed effortlessly across the moonlit waters of Great Bay, dipping down so low Rain’s wingtips slapped the water, leaving a symmetric trail of rippling circles behind them. They soared across the rolling vineyards on the north coast and over the dark, forested hills. They flew until the restlessness deep inside Ellysetta faded into peace and her fear of nightfall was a forgotten memory.
