Mistweavers 01 - Enchanted No More

by Robin D. Owens

  The queen nodded and glided from the room.

  Staring at the door, Jenni stiffened her spine. She’d not only reacted, but had acted, too. She had freed her brother…she had formed a circle and influenced the second creative bubble, had used her gift, had said goodbye to her old home—all actions she could be proud of.

  Aric squeezed her hand, then dropped it and moved to the center of the room. There he began a slow-moving dance involving wide gestures and stamping feet. The atmosphere seemed to thin and clear. She could almost feel listening spells sliding off the walls.

  She scrambled to think of other spells she could add to safeguard the place from words wafting through the cavern to waiting ears, images coalescing in the flames of the fire and being shown to watching eyes. Nothing came to mind. She would have to rely on Aric.

  Something else she’d been doing the past two days.

  Her life had changed and with all that had happened to her, it seemed like hours had lengthened into weeks. She was out of her home, her sanctuary where she’d lived with her guilt and grief. Now forced to interact with those who knew her, her family, her history, her brother. Those who had lived through the same frightening and wrenching event.

  The queen hadn’t said, but Jenni knew to the last drop of magic in her cells that the djinnfem had lost friends she’d cherished during the ambush, maybe even family…as had the other royals. A fact that Jenni should consider.

  “Done, now,” Aric said, and came and drew Jenni into his arms.

  Startled, she looked up, only to see his head bend, his deep green eyes glitter with intent. His lips touched hers, pressed, and she opened her mouth on a gasp and breath passed between them, infusing her, touching her with nearly unbearable tenderness. The deliciousness of his magic, his power, his virility.

  Then his tongue slipped between her lips and greedy craving tore through her like a firestorm. All the past and present need for this one man coalesced in her. Her arms came up and wrapped around his shoulders, she leaned against him until she could feel his every hard muscle. His body was tougher, more honed than when she’d kissed him last. Incredible. Wonderful. Fabulous.

  His arm was a bar behind her waist as he curved her into his body, bent her back. There was nothing but the sensation of the kiss, heat warming her from her core to every nerve ending as her body readied. He tasted of wild forest, deep woods where anything could happen. Where they’d made love the first time.

  The door slammed and the chatelaine with five keys marched in with a stack of books. She let them fall thumping onto a sturdy table.

  Dazed, Jenni’s arms dropped and Aric took a pace away from their embrace, looking amused.

  “Written and translated to English.” The dwarfem tapped five large, leather-covered volumes. She slid the five aside with easy strength, then curved her fingers around five much thinner books. “Spoken word, with a spell for English.” A sniff.

  Jenni blinked at the final books, much thinner, before she realized they appeared like a Lightfolk version of video, only insert and bound like books.

  Sure enough, the woman said, “Video.”

  Were they 3-D pages? Projected holograms? Jenni wasn’t sure she wanted to open one and find out.

  “Thank you, Druka,” Aric said, bowing.

  “Thank you, Lady Chatelaine Dwarfem of the Granite family.” Jenni hastily remembered her manners and bowed deeply, too, a little more deeply than the chatelaine’s rank demanded, but Jenni was sure that she didn’t want to make an enemy of this woman.

  One more sniff, then a smirk and glinting brown eyes at Aric. “Regarding the princess’s previous lodging. A brownie was suborned to carry a message to one of my assistants. The message stated Jindesfarne Mistweaver should be put in the weeping-wall cave. Some like that ambience.” The housekeeper clucked her tongue and her round cheeks hardened, looking menacing instead of cheery. “The brownie has been dismissed and banned from working in any palace….”

  “What?” Jenni asked. That sounded bad.

  The dwarfem ignored her, still focused on Aric. “The brownie was bribed by the djinnfem Synicess,” she said with gleeful malice. “Word is that djinnfem princess is not happy at being abandoned. Again.”

  “Again?” Jenni frowned.

  “Her parents were the old fire royals who left for the other dimension.”

  The chatelaine turned and her long skirts twitched as she headed for the door.

  “A second, please!” Jenni said. “What was the brownie’s name?”

  “Fritterworth.” One. Last. Sniff. “And he lived down to his name.”

  “Names are powerful things,” Jenni said, but the dwarfem was gone. Running her hands through her hair, Jenni scanned the room for a crystal-ball communicator. She didn’t see one and an itching between her shoulder blades told her time was important—and short. She strode to the center of the room, where a wheel was woven into the thick hand-knotted silk rug, and flung out her arms. “Hartha!”

  The brownie woman popped into existence, frowning. “And what would you be wanting with me that is so urgent that you must call me so rudely?”

  “A brownie has been dismissed and banned from the palaces. I want you to take him under your wing.”

  “I am not a wretched sprite. I don’t have wings to travel quickly, I have to come through earth and use much magic to do so.” Hartha’s arms were crossed, then curiosity shone in her eyes even as she frowned. “Which brownie?”

  “Fritterworth.”

  “Fritterworth!” Hartha rolled her eyes and threw up her hands. “Fritter worthless, more like. What did he do now?”

  “Please, Hartha, he needs a home, like you and Pred did….” Jenni hesitated. “And a new name.”

  “I’m not naming any browniemen. You name them and they are yours.” Her chin jutted. “And you can’t name him, ’cause you don’t know him, and can’t meet him here.”

  Jenni glanced at Aric. He shook his head. “No. I do not care to be responsible for the creature.”

  Hartha sniffed. “Creature.”

  Jenni said, “Take him home. Chinook can name him.”

  “Chinook, the cat!” Hartha laughed. “Fritterworth owned by a cat.” She grinned.

  “Please tell Chinook to be kind, to give him an honorable name to live up to. Maybe you could suggest one?”

  Hartha was shaking her head, still smiling, but Jenni knew she’d get her way. She lowered her voice. “And maybe, if all goes well, I can name him something even higher after all this is done and send him to my brother Rothly.”

  “You are one optimistic fem,” Hartha said, and Jenni understood that the brownie woman had already heard about Rothly’s healing and his continuing grudge against Jenni.

  “Fritterworth, hear me!” Jenni shouted, hoping the brownieman could.

  Aric moved over and joined hands with her, squeezed her fingers. “Say again.”

  “Fritterworth, hear me.”

  “I hear,” sobbed a small voice. “I was wrong. I did wrong. I didn’t think. I threw the gold away. Bad gold.”

  Hartha flinched at that. Minor brownies or major dwarves, Earthfolk hated losing gold.

  “I give you conditional house space in my home,” Jenni said.

  “Who?” The voice sounded perkier.

  “Jindesfarne Mistweaver.”

  “Oh! I accept.” There came a short pause and the joy in the voice soured as if the impulsive brownie had recalled something. “Hartha.”

  “That’s right. You will be renamed. Hartha will join you and show you the way.”

  A huge sigh. “All right.”

  “Fritterworth!” Hartha said sternly.

  “Thank you,” said the brownieman.

  With a huff of breath and a scolding glance at Jenni, Hartha said, “I hope you don’t regret this.” Then she vanished.

  Jenni stumbled back and sank into the plump love seat. It had cost her power to call Fritterworth, and both Hartha and Fritterworth had used some of
Jenni’s magical energy to transport themselves.

  Aric was watching her, head tilted. “You have grown…matured…and are not as bitter as I’d thought.” He ran his tongue over his lips. “Not as sweet as you were, but some sweetness left…spicy…nutmeg and raw sugar.”

  A ripple of sensuality flickered through her. She lifted her chin. “We’ve just seen the consequences of being together. We’ve made an enemy of a royal djinnfem.”

  “Say thank you to the compliment, Jenni.”

  “Thank you. But I don’t think—”

  He sat down opposite her, lounging against the corner of the love seat. “Let me worry about Synicess.”

  Jenni stared at him—he was revealing that same manner he’d used when she’d met him. Was the sympathetic and tender man his true self, or the more confident warrior-businessman? “The consequences—”

  “You were slighted and given a poor room.” He lifted and dropped a shoulder.

  She narrowed her eyes. “Slighted enough that I considered abandoning this stupid mission.”

  He sat straight at that, his hands clasped between his knees, and leaned toward her. “How can you say that? You experienced the bubble event yourself.”

  She’d been too focused on herself and Rothly to ask about his family. She clutched Aric’s forearm—it was ridged steel. “Your mother?”

  “She has survived.” He shrugged again with a casualness she knew he didn’t feel. His feelings for his family had always been mixed.

  “And your sisters?”

  “Which ones? Of my three full sisters, one is missing. Who knows? Of my twelve half sisters, three have lost trees and have pined to death, one fought the shadleeches and lost and she and the tree are dead.”

  Jenni gulped. “You tried to send the creative elemental energies of the bubble to the dryads and redwoods.”

  His hand fisted. “Someone has to do something. I have been talking myself green to have the Eight act for the redwoods.” His lip curled, he shook off her hand, stood and paced. “Just like the human logging situation, no one acts, not soon enough, not directly enough.” His gaze bored into her own. “Do you think I like working at the beck and call of the Eight?”

  “Yes.”

  His head tipped back in a laugh that released some tension. “Perhaps you are right. I like the favor of the royals. The work is interesting.” He sent her a look under lowered eyelids. “Especially this mission…and the Meld Project.”

  “The merging of human technology with magic?” she asked.

  “Quantum physics. I don’t know much about that.”

  Neither did Jenni, but she’d seen for herself that it worked, had had a brief hand in developing a storage battery spell. Even that few minutes had given her a taste for it, an itching to get her hands on one of those magical computers.

  He stopped and stood in the middle of the floor, hands on lean hips, and stared at her. “No one thinks of the dryads—silly dryads, thoughtless dryads, heedless dryads—but without the dryads the forests of Earth and all they support, including Lightfolk, would be worse off than they are. No one gets that.” His smile was grim. “I want to be able to change that. To be able to say send resources here, to the redwoods—there, to the spruces on the mountains…and to do that, I need the ears of the Eight.”

  “I understand.”

  “Do you?” He looked at her and she felt his concentration. Now his smile held the faintest edge of ruthlessness. Jenni wasn’t proud that she felt a flicker of attraction. She’d been playing too many computer games where males were action heroes.

  “I want to have control of my own life, and I want it to be a life worth living,” he said.

  “You’ve developed expensive tastes? And most lives are worth living.”

  “That’s where you’re wrong, Jenni, still-optimistic Jenni.” His tone was a caress. “Most people have little control of their lives…they work for someone else in a job they endure. Lightfolk and humans alike. You don’t, you enjoy your work, don’t you? You are very valuable to your game developers. I want my life to be the same, under my control, with power enough to save what must be saved, what few others cherish.”

  “You want to be a noble of the Lightfolk.”

  “I will be.”

  “Which is why you courted Synicess.” A thought that had occurred to her slipped from her lips. “And do you want me more than Synicess now because I’m a princess, too?”

  He glared at her. “I have some honor.”

  “But that is a consideration. We have a history. Maybe you think I’m easier to manipulate.”

  He snorted with amusement, holding his stomach until huge laughs rolled from his mouth and he stumbled to a chair and fell into it. “Jenni…Mistweaver…easy…to…manipulate.” He gasped and hooted.

  Jenni glared at him.

  “You are sitting in the finest guest suite in the Mid-North American Earth Palace because the Fire Queen, your kin, needed somewhere to talk to you, to convince you that this mission is important.”

  “Which she didn’t.”

  “Yet.” After dragging in a deep breath, he stood. “But you should know that this mission is very important to me. I convinced you to accept it.”

  “You blackmailed me into it.”

  He waved a hand. “I told you of the circumstances of your brother.”

  The anger that the Eight had sent Rothly rose, tasting like ashes in her mouth.

  “I knew you wouldn’t let Rothly die.” Aric walked over to sit next to her again. “And you were the only one who could save him.” His gaze, when it met hers, was sincere. “We might have tried, but no one else can go into the interdimension.”

  “No one else?”

  He shook his head. “The elemental balancing gift has not been found in any other lineage, any family, any individual, and believe me, the Eight searched. The Eight themselves can adjust and balance the energies of an area…like this palace, but not calibrated to the exactness that you did this morning. Though now since Rothly has healed…”

  Jenni studied Aric and decided to tell him her conclusions. Word would get out soon enough. “Rothly doesn’t have elemental balancing powers anymore.”

  Aric’s eyes widened. “But he was healed. I felt some of the creative energies flow through him, changing him.”

  Jenni hadn’t paid much attention to the different aspects of the bubble event. When she had a moment alone, she’d try to remember everything, moment by moment. What had Aric experienced? And the guardians? Aric might actually tell her if she asked. She filed away the topic for later. “My brother’s magic is not as fractured as it was. He may have another strong gift, but I don’t know what it is except that I doubt he’ll ever be able to access the interdimension.”

  Again the ruthless smile curved Aric’s mouth. “Then perhaps I should pass the information on to the Eight that Rothly’s magic should be tested.” Aric stood and crossed to the door.

  “Rothly won’t like that.”

  “Being treated as if he were a young child? But he’s acted as such for a long time now,” Aric said and Jenni wondered how old she’d been acting, how old Aric thought she’d been acting. That didn’t matter.

  He bowed to her and Jenni thought there was just the faintest hint of mockery in his action, but couldn’t call him on it. “I will be here at eight forty-five to escort you to the Emberdrake suite.” His gaze slid over her, from head to toe. “The queen said informal, but I doubt you have a gown in your bags, you might want to contact your Hartha for that—and you should take advantage of the bathing pool.”

  “Are you saying I smell?”

  He kissed his fingers like a chef. “Essence of Jindesfarne. I’ve always appreciated the scent, but I’m not sure of others.”

  Leaving her speechless, he opened the door and walked through, then closed it softly behind him.

  For a suite decorated in air colors, it had a large bathroom dedicated to water play. The tub was more like a spa pool and of
gorgeous blue tile with flecks of gold. Jenni chose the shower stall with three jets on opposite walls, stood in the center and let the water pound her and steam rise, until every pore felt clean. Then she dressed in clean, comfortable clothes—red cashmere sweater and thick black sweatpants of heavy cotton, nice soft socks—and went back to the sitting room to stare out the window. It rose from floor to ceiling, and was not symmetrical, but roughly a half circle. She wondered what mountain it was a part of, and what range it looked out on. Surely well-disguised to mortal eyes. Aric was right, the suite was magnificent, no doubt usually housing guests of much greater magic and rank than she.

  She glanced at the books on the coffee table. The day had been too stressful for her to want to open them. Besides, now she was warm and safe and clean, sleep was dragging her eyelids down. She crossed to the buttery leather couch facing the window and sank onto it, plumped one of the accent pillows under her head, pulled a down comforter—surely priceless elven work—over her. She stared at the dark skies bright with constellations she couldn’t see in Denver until her eyes closed and she fell asleep.

  And the memories she’d been fighting for the last two days attacked her.

  CHAPTER 15

  SHE KNEW SHE’D BEEN CATAPULTED INTO THE past, knew she dreamed, but her innermost self wouldn’t let her wake, forced her to relive the worst moments of her life.

  The dream started soft and mistily and wonderfully, as if all around her was an impressionistic picture painted with joyful brush strokes.

  Just as the past morning had begun, but now dread was in her heart, in every droplet of blood.

  Aric’s lazy voice said, “Stay with me.” As she looked at him, redwood-skinned against the white sheets, her heart thumped with renewed desire. They’d loved most of the night, slept little, and now the sun was up and it was time for her to meet her parents to prepare for the Lightfolk ritual in an hour and a half. She hesitated.

  Aric sat up, took her in his arms, kissed her, and the feel of his body against hers increased the longing to find ecstasy again. Surely she’d dance a ritual better, draw the sheets of elemental energies faster if she were happier. “My family is expecting me.”