Queen of the Unwanted

by Jenna Glass

  It was hardly unusual for Delnamal to speak to his personal secretary in private, so presumably Melcor noticed something in his tone or expression that piqued his interest. For just a moment, Delnamal wondered if he was being foolish to put so much trust in an underling. But then he remembered Melcor stepping into the path of the flier that had been sent to attack him, putting his own body at risk to protect his king. It was true that Melcor had already been struck by one of those insidious Kai fliers sent from the witches of Women’s Well, and that perhaps he might have thought that being struck a second time would have no further ill effects. Still, he couldn’t have been sure what spell that flier carried, and he had risked his own life to intercept it. If that didn’t make him trustworthy, then there was no such thing as a trustworthy man.

  “I have an unusual request for you,” Delnamal said, and saw that Melcor’s curiosity was even further aroused. Possibly by the thought that Delnamal would ever bother to request something from him when he could simply order it. The last time he’d made an actual request had been shortly before then-Lady Oona had suddenly and unexpectedly become a widow.

  “I am always at your service, Your Majesty,” Melcor said. “You know I am open to…unusual requests, even when they might have unpleasant consequences. Just as you know I can be relied on for discretion.”

  Delnamal experienced a surge of gratitude that was almost enough to make him weep. There was not one other person in his life who showed him the kind of loyalty that Melcor did, not even his wife or his mother. Certainly not the eunuchs of his royal council. Melcor’s usefulness as his secretary made him irreplaceable, so Delnamal could not bestow on him lands and titles that would make him too grand for the position, but he vowed that one way or another, he would reward the man for his selflessness and dedication.

  Delnamal swallowed the lump that was forming in his throat as he realized he should not have had that last glass of brandy. It was making him maudlin. But it had also given him the courage and the cunning to craft this brilliant and elegant solution to his problem with Prince Waldmir.

  By all rights, Waldmir should be falling all over himself at the prospect of seeing his daughter married to Delnamal’s son, even if the wedding might not occur within his lifetime. Especially after Delnamal had given him the generous gift of an entire caravan of trade goods from Women’s Well with no strings attached. But for all that Rhojal of Nandel had communicated Waldmir’s intense interest in the potential match and had dangled the possibility of exclusive trade agreements before Delnamal’s nose, there had been no progress whatsoever in getting those agreements made. And Zarsha of Nandel was still in Rhozinolm, by all accounts courting Queen Ellinsoltah.

  It seemed that Delnamal would be forced to make yet another gesture to entice Prince Waldmir into choosing Aaltah over Rhozinolm. A personal gesture, from one monarch to another, reminding Waldmir how much more they had in common with each other than with any female pretender with delusions of grandeur.

  Delnamal smiled warmly at Melcor as he imagined just how wounded Alysoon would be by the gift he intended to deliver to Prince Waldmir. “Might you still have ways to contact those most excellent mercenaries you hired for me before?” he asked.

  * * *

  —

  Norah had grown increasingly insufferable with each passing night as she saw Mairah’s deadline looming with seemingly no progress. More than once, Mairah had had to stop herself from blurting out the truth about the unique seer’s poison she had invented, knowing full well that if she did so, their delegation would leave Women’s Well the very next day.

  She had thought long and hard over Kailee’s proposal, and slept scant hours the last two nights in her attempts to figure out how to do the impossible. She’d begun exploring ways to change her appearance, using a few of the most common beauty spells as a jumping-off point, but she needed more time than she had. Kailee had suggested Women’s Well could hide her while she—and perhaps even Alysoon and Tynthanal—worked on a solution, but Mairah didn’t have as much confidence as Kailee did that she would be offered asylum. She had not in any way demonstrated her magical abilities during her stay at the Academy, so it might be hard to convince anyone but Kailee that she would be an asset. Perhaps if Kailee were willing to show Chanlix the potion Mairah had made for her, it would make a good impression, but Kailee was still undecided about it. The only advantage Mairah had was Kailee’s advocacy, and she did not know if she dared put all her faith in that.

  Escape from the Abbey seemed at the tip of her fingers, just out of reach. The Trapper spell Kailee had given her meant that surely she could avoid the guards. They no longer spent every night posted outside Mairah and Norah’s door; however, there were always two of them stationed in the inn’s common room throughout the night, and Mairah could not exit the inn without passing in front of their noses. The Trapper spell would allow her to pass by them unseen, and from there she trusted she could slip out a door unnoticed when someone else opened it.

  Escaping the inn seemed entirely doable. It was what came after that still gave her pause. The guards would practically tear the town apart to find her, and though thanks to the Trapper spell, they would fail, Mairah had no doubt that they would lay the blame of her disappearance on the people of Women’s Well. It wasn’t worth risking everything to stay here if her actions might trigger a war that destroyed her hiding place.

  No. She would have to disappear without allowing the blame to fall on Women’s Well, and that meant she needed someone else to take it. Luckily, the Mother had—for reasons that defied logic—chosen to send Mairah to Women’s Well in the company of someone who would be only too happy to see her dead and would therefore be the prime suspect if she were to meet with some mysterious accident. So, all she had to do was escape the inn using the Trapper spell, find some way to convince everyone she’d been murdered, frame Norah for it, remain in hiding until the delegation left, and then hope it was somehow possible to invent a spell or potion that would permanently change her appearance so that she would not be recaptured. If Princess Alysoon could be persuaded to shelter her in the first place!

  To say the task was daunting was a massive understatement, and when Kailee gently pressed her for an answer, Mairah had said only that she was still thinking about it. She wanted to stay more than she’d ever wanted anything before in her life, but the risks…

  If she went back to Khalpar with her new version of the seer’s poison, she believed she could craft a convincing argument that it might lead to the reversal of the Curse, and that dangling that hope before King Khalvin’s nose would secure her place as abbess. She would be safe and comfortable and, especially with Jalzarnin on her side, she would enjoy a reasonable amount of power. If she attempted to escape and she failed or was later recaptured, she faced a traitor’s death. What possible reward could be worth that risk?

  The combination of indecision and outright terror that consumed her gave Norah a great deal of pleasure, for the other woman assumed Mairah was thinking about her future in Khalpar as an abigail serving under Mother Norah.

  “You needn’t worry so much, Mother Mairahsol,” Norah taunted, the expression on her face so smug Mairah wanted to scratch her eyes out. “I would never dream of treating you as you treated me when our positions are reversed. The Mother of All teaches us kindness and forgiveness.”

  “Yes,” Mairah snapped back. “That was very obvious when I was serving under Mother Wyebryn. My days were filled with kindness.”

  Norah sniffed disdainfully. “Had you shown a modicum of respect or humility, your time at the Abbey would have been very different. You earned every punishment you ever received. Perhaps you have learned from all your failures, and I will not need to punish you so very often when we return.”

  Mairah ground her teeth, wishing she could school her expression so that Norah could not see how much the words rankled. It occurred to her that if
she found the courage to attempt to stay in Women’s Well, it might be easier to frame Norah for her murder if the two of them had a spectacular row. Better to engineer it in public than within the walls of their room, but Mairah’s blood was boiling, and she’d never been good at suffering in silence.

  “Even if you were going to become abbess when we returned,” she sneered at Norah, “you would never dare punish me again. Not when I still hold your fate and that of all your fellow heretics in my hands. It’s probably just as well for you that I will continue in my current capacity, for you’re too spiteful and stupid to restrain yourself if you had the power to hurt me, no matter what the consequences.”

  Norah’s face flushed with heat at the insult—until she absorbed the implications of Mairah’s words. They were—naturally—unable to speak freely of Mairah’s true mission when they could not be certain they would not be overheard, but there was only one way Mairah could stay on as abbess.

  The angry color drained from Sister Norah’s face, and she sat abruptly on the edge of her bed as if her knees had gone weak. The bleak despair that filled her eyes was almost enough to make Mairah feel sorry for her, but all she had to do was remember the malicious glee of moments ago to chase that pity away. She crossed the room and leaned over until she was whispering in Norah’s ear.

  “It seems your Mother of All wants me to be the Abbess of Khalpar after all, else she wouldn’t have sent us here.” She put a hand on Norah’s shoulder in a gesture that might have been comforting under different circumstances and had the pleasure of feeling Norah’s whole body tense. “Perhaps that will give you something to contemplate and pray about during the journey home.”

  “You lie!” Norah spat, glaring up at Mairah with undisguised hatred.

  Mairah stood up straight and smiled. “Tell yourself that if it makes you feel better,” she said. “You won’t know for sure until we are back within the walls of the Abbey, now will you?”

  Norah, the poor dear, was shaking with fury and fear and perhaps even a sense of betrayal, for if one believed in the Mother, one would have to believe She’d sent that vision with this very end in mind. Tears shone in the old woman’s eyes, and when she climbed shakily to her feet, the droop of her shoulders made her look shorter and more frail than usual.

  “I-I will go inform our escort that we will be traveling tomorrow,” Norah rasped through her tears, then hurried to the door and slammed it behind her. No doubt escaping the room so that Mairah would not have the satisfaction of watching her weep. Norah would be in no more of a hurry to return to Khalpar than Mairah was—not if she believed Mairah might have invented a spell that would lead to reversing the Curse—and Mairah highly doubted the woman was truly speaking with the guards.

  Having Norah flee the room in tears was actually a nice touch, Mairah decided. Even if their argument hadn’t been observed or overheard by spies, anyone in the common room would see Norah’s distress and remember it when Mairah disappeared.

  She was going to do it, Mairah realized. She was going to stay in Women’s Well. There were still many details to work out in a very short time—even if Norah didn’t tell anyone that Mairah’s mission had succeeded, their delegation was scheduled to depart in two days—but perhaps once Kailee brought her proposal to Princess Alysoon and Lady Chanlix, those three clever women could help Mairah hone her plan into something that could actually work.

  Tomorrow morning, Mairah would give Kailee her answer. And hope against hope that Kailee was right and she could convince Princess Alysoon to offer Mairah a place here in Women’s Well.

  * * *

  —

  Norah had stormed out of the room with no purpose in mind but to escape Mairahsol’s loathsome presence. She certainly had no plan to run to their escorts and tell them their delegation was ready to go back to Khalpar.

  She made it down to the common room still with no purpose or destination in mind, then stopped indecisively at the base of the stairs. The two guards who were on duty at the moment were sitting in a booth. Both looked up when she arrived but quickly lost interest. They had made no secret of the fact that Mairahsol occupied most of their attention. Decades of life in the Abbey had taught Norah how to put on a show of meekness and pliability around men, and her advanced age also encouraged the guards to all but ignore her.

  Was it truly possible that Mairahsol had succeeded in her mission? Although the odious woman had never given Norah a detailed accounting of her nighttime experiments, Norah knew she was working on some kind of modified seer’s poison that would—supposedly, at least—allow her to trigger visions of the past. If she could somehow see how Mother Brynna had cast the original spell…

  Norah shuddered with dread and wandered over to the bar so that the guards wouldn’t become curious as to why she was standing there in a daze. She ordered a tankard of ale that she did not want. If the guards questioned why she was down here drinking ale—she’d always made a habit of keeping to her room—she would tell them she needed time away from Mairahsol, and they would understand, for the false abbess was every bit as haughty and petulant with them as with Norah.

  The Mother of All wanted us to come to Women’s Well, she reminded herself. Therefore, if Mairahsol had successfully invented a new seer’s poison, it was because the Mother of All wished her to do so. As the Mother of All certainly had no intention of allowing Her Blessing to be reversed, the seer’s poison couldn’t work the way Mairahsol claimed or hoped.

  Norah shivered, remembering Melred’s vision of Mairahsol being confirmed as abbess. Whether you believed in the Mother of All or merely in the Mother, conventional wisdom said that a seer would only see visions of fates it was in her power to change. The Mother knew what was in the hearts of Her daughters, knew whether Her seers would want what they saw to occur or not. Therefore, the Mother knew Melred would want to prevent Mairahsol from becoming abbess.

  So why had She then shown Melred the vision of Norah and Mairahsol in Women’s Well?

  The answer, when it came to her, chilled Norah to the bone.

  The Mother of All had sent both Mairahsol and Norah to Women’s Well because she had known the danger Mairahsol presented to the Blessing. She had therefore arranged for a way to eliminate that danger once and for all.

  Norah swallowed hard on a suddenly dry throat.

  Even an old woman such as she could manage to kill with a knife in the dark. All she had to do was make sure she ate and drank nothing once she returned to the room for the night—she was fairly certain that several of her suspiciously sound nights’ sleeps had been aided by potions slipped into her drink by Mairahsol. Then, when Mairahsol fell asleep…

  But if Mairahsol were murdered, everyone would know Norah was behind it. Mairahsol had threatened, nay, promised, posthumous revenge should anything happen to her. Norah assumed that it was Lord Jalzarnin who was meant to carry out that revenge. Mairahsol had likely left her lover a letter accusing Norah and her sisters of being Mother of All worshippers, and it would be his duty as lord high priest to have them arrested and punished. Whether Jalzarnin would actually do it or not depended on just how genuinely smitten he might be with the pox-faced bitch. Likely he knew that the discovery of so many heretics residing in the Abbey would reflect very poorly on him. But would he care? Was he as vengeful as Mairahsol, willing to hurt himself as long as his perceived enemies were hurt more?

  Norah didn’t know, and she hadn’t the courage to find out. She had to do everything in her power both to stop Mairahsol and to protect her sisters.

  Princess Alysoon and Lady Chanlix obviously suspected that their delegation had come to Women’s Well for reasons other than to cure the plum blight, but they probably did not know Mairahsol was trying to undo the Blessing, and they surely didn’t know she had a chance of succeeding. If they did, they would never let Mairahsol leave Women’s Well with the formula for her potion. Mairahsol—
and, more importantly, Lord Solvineld, who was the highest authority in their delegation—was convinced they could not sneak any elements or potions out of Women’s Well when they left. They would be too carefully scrutinized, their every possession examined in Mindsight, likely by multiple people who between them could see every unique element in Women’s Well. But as long as they had the formula, it would be a simple matter to hire an outsider to purchase or steal the necessary ingredients for them once they were gone.

  Mairahsol had to be stopped, one way or another, and whoever stopped her would no doubt face consequences. But if Norah played her cards right, it need not be she and her sisters who suffered.

  Taking a small sip of her ale, she glanced at the bored and sleepy guards seated in the booth. Each had a tankard of ale in front of him, though they were conscientious enough not to overindulge lest they fall asleep. Even so, they would be unlikely to refuse if Norah gifted them with the rest of her ale before she retired, and Mairahsol was not the only one who knew how to formulate a sleeping potion.

  Resting her hand over her eyes as if in fatigue, Norah opened her Mindseye.

  * * *

  —

  When word first got out that Shelvon and a handful of other women were learning swordplay from Falcor, they had drawn an audience of curious onlookers. The whole process was embarrassing enough as it was—not one woman in the bunch had any previous experience, and each was painfully conscious of her awkwardness. It was a strange feeling to be the most confident among any group of women, but her previous lessons with Falcor—and what he continued to insist was her natural talent—put Shelvon in the unfamiliar position of offering comfort and encouragement to everyone else.

  When the onlookers dared jeer or laugh, Falcor would chase them off, but even so, the classes dwindled in size as one by one the women decided their dignity was more important than learning to swing a sword. At which time Shelvon had decided all lessons—and her own practices—would occur at night, when there were no casual observers out and about to make everyone nervous and clumsy. Falcor had further decided that the lessons would encompass both swordplay and more general self-defense for women. Sexual violence against women was much less common now that men were aware of the existence of women’s Kai. But less common was not the same as nonexistent, so it was still worth a woman’s while to learn any self-defense skills she could.