“The library was a little crowded.” Elizabeth imagined the twins with their sharp weapons and magical fog.
Jill blinked. “Maybe classes are safer.”
“Don’t use your imagination. The king is supposed to be here, Wicked,” Jill sent out along her thoughts.
“The only thing I might die from in curtsy class is boredom,” Elizabeth complained out loud.
Jill looked a little desperately at the coiffed and jewelled ladies. “Just behave,” she told Elizabeth. “The princes are likely getting daily reports and we can’t have you causing mayhem because you’re bored.”
“I’m civilized,” Elizabeth snootily replied. “I grew up in a castle, after all.”
“Not for long enough,” Jill retorted.
Elizabeth had spent more time in the forest surrounding their modest cottage on the edge than even their home in the human realm. The castle really had been destroyed, back when they were young toddlers. Only, their father hadn’t burned it down.
She had to admit Jill was right. Being back inside a castle, with all of its trappings, was chafing at her wild side.
It was so stifling.
“Were we supposed to bring a fan to this thing?” Elizabeth asked, changing subjects. Her sister didn’t need to focus on their troubled past right now.
“Mom thought it prudent,” Jill replied. “Why are you here? I thought I had to do the court protocols classes alone since I’m the only one being considered for a prince’s harem at this time.”
“Special exemption,” Elizabeth answered.
“Do you know who—?”
“Prince Daemon.” Elizabeth plopped down on a window seat, her simple court slippers inelegantly displayed with a bit of ankle. “A couple of footmen woke me from a nap and insisted that I had to attend this and the other class by order of the demon prince.”
Jill checked that no one could overhear her sister disparaging the eldest prince out loud.
Elizabeth rolled her eyes at her concern. They were being given wide berth after Jill’s blue fire display of temper.
“What other class?” Jill asked.
“Didn’t Mom tell you? The demon doesn’t think I get enough exercise. He wants me to run laps and learn to hit a few things.”
Jill blinked. Elizabeth smirked.
“Shouldn’t you be doing something more ladylike? Crocheting or painting with watercolours? All that exercise is bad for you,” Jill said.
Elizabeth was supposed to be a recluse, easy to overlook. She could see how Jill would be confused.
“The demon mistook delicate for sickly. Mom and I had to set him straight.”
The chatter in the room suddenly buzzed.
“Please stand for King Nicholas.”
Elizabeth was the only one sitting when the announcement rang out and she hastily got to her feet.
The king looked more like Daemon than Elizabeth had expected. They hadn't seen the king before, and the mere arrival of noble ladies to court was not enough to merit an audience with him.
It was likely only because the ladies gathered here, after the tasting ball, were potentially going to be permanent additions to the royal harems of his sons that the famously monkish king was making an appearance.
Everyone straightened and tried to unobtrusively primp, except for Elizabeth. At least, she stood up and her dress was clean.
Jill hid her singed fan in the folds of her gown.
“Welcome.” The king’s voice suitably boomed against the high ceilings.
“Do you think he has someone use air to amplify, like the Wizard from Oz and the megaph—?”
“Try to listen for a few minutes,” Jill hissed, cutting her off. “He’s the boss of you and me and every other elemental. It’s kind of a big deal,” Jill stated.
Elizabeth didn't respond well to authority, especially male authority. Father issues and all that emo stuff she shoved into a dark spot in her heart and never examined.
She couldn’t resist another poke. Jill had to be surprised at the elderly looking match to her youthful sensei. This was Kim’s husband, once upon a time.
“Do you think the demon prince will get a royal paunch, too?” Elizabeth asked.
The king did have a bit of a belly. It was disappointing to think this was the vampire they had been sent to protect. He didn’t inspire sacrifice and heroism.
Kim could take him blindfolded and with one hand tied behind her back, using the martial arts she had taught Jill.
Well, that was if the magic was off. The king was supposed to have lightning.
“Demon metabolism burns through everything fast,” Jill whispered back, in regards to Daemon.
Jill read too many demon bodice-rippers.
“Maybe, Daemon will be a monk like his father. All meditation and no action,” Elizabeth retorted.
“The king has dedicated himself to raising his children—”
“Probably the paunch gets in the way,” Elizabeth interrupted Jill. “What kind of position do the witches of his harem take? Lady on top, and the belly as a pommel? Probably not able to do good oral with–”
“Shut up,” Jill muttered out of the corner of her mouth. “It’s like imagining your parents—”
“More like grandparents,” Elizabeth said, getting in the last word.
The king sat down after his greeting. His eyes travelled over all of the room, rheumy and unfocused, but they still sent a shiver of unease her direction as his gaze passed over her.
He was supposed to be in his prime. This old man didn’t fit her expectations. He was more in keeping with what the one demon, who she’d staked in the park, had said of the king.
Did the king know what was going on?
Would he care?
Made an Impression
The king was here for show.
He was quickly forgotten as he took a seat on his throne. Now that he’d greeted them, there were others to direct the proceedings.
A vampire lord with a very long, hooked nose stood up and gave a speech about the great honour the ladies were doing the royal family as they contributed their strength—“suck and fuck the princes,” Elizabeth whispered to Jill, already bored with this—and then had moved on to introduce their tutors.
The next speech came from someone who could only be described as a school matron.
“All of you privileged ladies have been raised with the protocols that keep our magical society running. At court, there are so many powerful witches, vampires, and demons together that special rules have been set up to keep courtships from becoming—”
“—an orgy,” Elizabeth whispered.
Jill blushed, and Elizabeth wondered again what had happened after they had left Jill alone at the tasting ball.
“Pay attention,” she teased as Jill kept staring ahead stiffly.
“Let the sorting begin!” the school matron announced.
Crap, Elizabeth should have been the one paying better attention. Were they about to be split off into their primary power groupings? That would separate her from Jill.
The king had been seated at the front of the room. Tea service for him was set out on the table to his left. A couple of well-dressed feeding servants kneeled on the floor behind him, to his right.
More servants were carrying around trays of dainty, pastel-coloured bottles. They were spritzing the ladies on their necks and wrist pulse points, after approval from one of the tutors.
The ladies would laugh and give each other pointers on just how to flutter their fans for maximum effect.
“I’m not letting them spray Kool-Aid on my neck,” she told Jill.
Jill snorted at her. The unladylike amusement escaped the notice of the tutors, still too far away.
“It doesn’t look optional,” Jill warned.
“I don't have a fan,” Elizabeth reminded her.
“We can share,” Jill offered.
If only Elizabeth had her air charged, it wouldn’t have been necessary.
This looked like more than a simple tutorial on fan technique. The school matron that had given the speech was watching as some ladies were able to use magic on the bottle to get the coloured mist out and others were simply spritzed by the servants.
She heard a few comments about ladies being drained by all the tastings and feeds last night. Jill could have fed Phillip—and all his brothers—and still burned blue, with power to spare.
There were few uses of the red fire bottle, lending credibility to the rumours that there were not enough fire witches left in the younger generation to support the royal family.
Darker rumours stated it was the soul-sucking sacrifices of so many fire witches to create demons, particularly for the army, which had led to this dangerous imbalance.
“Lady Jill,” a chilly voice called.
Protocol dictated that the eldest should be addressed first, but Elizabeth had been a last-minute addition to the class, and everyone knew Daemon didn't have a harem.
“Yes,” Jill answered. She didn’t offer any of the other social niceties. The slight to Elizabeth had been returned.
Jill couldn't help but see the coloured bottles wafted under her nose by the servant accompanying the tutor, but her sister waited to be invited to partake first.
“I am Lady Velaries. Would you like to be misted or try to apply the scent-enhancement yourself?”
Lady Velaries nodded at the servant to apply the earth bottle to Jill, without really waiting for a response. The green-tinted bottle had only clear liquid inside that misted onto her skin. Not Kool-Aid, then.
Jill made a polite cough, smothered into her elbow, at the overdose of mist. It didn’t seem to have a scent to Elizabeth, but she wasn’t the one swimming in it.
Lady Velaries quickly looked over to the king and then waved the servant onto the red bottle.
Jill grabbed at the bottle with her fire before the servant could spritz her again, her magic latching onto a clever little flint mechanism sectioned off in a false bottom of the bottle.
A tiny spark sent a little flame glowing in the base as mist gently sprayed forth.
Lady Velaries smiled like the Cheshire cat.
Oh, no. Jill was getting the attention they couldn’t afford. It was getting more and more obvious that blue level fire was rare. They did not need to draw the king’s direct notice.
“Liz Norwood,” Elizabeth said sticking her hand out at Lady Velaries to shake. It distracted from the sudden attention to Jill, as Lady Velaries had to accept Elizabeth's enthusiastic greeting. “I’ll take a dab of the white bottle. I do hope it has been distilled because you know how sensitive us air types are to additives. In fact, I should say your perfume kind of sucks ‘cause I can't smell a thing.”
The servant sprayed a liberal shot of the white bottle and then another at Elizabeth's neck, almost getting her in the face when she tried to open her mouth to speak again.
It felt cool for a moment before it heated up as her magic came to the surface of her skin.
What the heck was this?
“It doesn't have a perfume. It enhances your own magic’s scent. Only vampires can smell it,” Lady Velaries explained. She was definitely a tutor, her voice losing some of its ice as she imparted her knowledge. “The stronger the male elemental in similar magic, the more nuanced scent of that power he can pick up. A strong enough lord can even pick out the subtle scents of a pregnant witch’s fetus and sort out the future infant’s magic,” Lady Velaries said, pausing as she gave Elizabeth an assessing look before adding, “Perhaps, it could even bring to the surface dormant magic.”
Hell, no!
That comment had been directly aimed at Elizabeth. They had let the rumours of her dormant fire go without comment because nobody really believed she had a power she never manifested. It was hiding the truth in plain sight.
This scent-enhancer was a disaster! It must have been a new invention because it was her first time hearing of such a magic revealing potion.
Panic made Elizabeth consider employing her lightning to illusion the colours of the bottles, so she would get sprayed with harmless earth or water instead of fire.
The servant didn’t give her a chance to mix them up. He still held the red bottle that had been used on Jill and redirected it towards Elizabeth.
Jill suddenly flicked her singed fan out. She wafted it dramatically up and down, knocking the tray and the red bottle out of the servant’s hands.
Everything hit the floor almost simultaneously, creating an explosion of tiny, coloured glass shards and a slippery floor.
Jill looked horrified.
Lady Velaries yelled at them not to touch anything.
Jill backed up. Her sister stood ramrod straight, her face made of marble.
Although servants started mopping up the mess with cloths immediately, the king quickly exited, with a handkerchief held to his nose.
Jill suffered the worst damage with pretty much the entire red bottle splashed on her. It was probably what drove the king out like a hound ruined for the hunt.
Her sister’s powerful magic was amplified throughout the room. There would be no hiding it now!
Elizabeth grabbed Jill’s hand and squeezed it tight, in thanks for her quick thinking and sacrifice.
Lady Velaries advised Jill to practice her fan skills, preferably in her room.
Jill tugged Elizabeth behind her as they quickly exited.
“Don't those heels have a speed limit on them,” Elizabeth complained as she hurried, dragged behind by her earth-strong sister. “Especially the corners,” Elizabeth added as they careened around another blind turn in the hallway.
“I have to show you something,” Jill said without slowing down.
They were in Jill's room moments later, practically plowing through the door. Jill started stripping off her dress immediately.
“I’ve seen you naked. We used to bathe together and fight over the same squeaky duck, Mister Donald.”
Elizabeth still looked away, examining the exact replica of her guest bed down to the pink bows on the bed curtains. The girly room suited Jill much more than her.
“It was Mister Duck,” Jill retorted. “And I need this dress off. I don't think you're supposed to bathe in that stuff.”
Elizabeth picked up the flames under Jill's skin as they shared thoughts.
She rushed over to help, the dress tearing a little under their frantic hands. The blistered skin on Jill’s legs where she’d been splashed had Elizabeth cursing.
Thankfully, the castle had somewhat modern plumbing. Jill was quickly in the ensuite tub.
Elizabeth couldn't heal, but her magic could fool Jill's body into not perceiving pain.
“Let me call Mom,” she told Jill.
“N-n-not yet,” Jill chattered, shutting the cold tap off. She quickly towelled and let Elizabeth slip a silk nightgown over her head. “I can't let her see . . .”
Elizabeth gasped as Jill slid the nightgown down on her right shoulder.
A tattoo of a snake-wrapped rose showed. It was tiny and easy to miss when blistered legs were the concern.
Nonetheless, it was an unauthorized claim.
“Mom is going to bury you!”
“He told me to keep it hidden,” Jill said. “It was special.”
“Vampires will say anything to get under your dress. What were you thinking? Prince Phillip never claims any of the witches in his harem. You were supposed to blend in, so he would only call on you once or twice before you became another witch of many under his protection.”
Phillip kissed Elizabeth’s lips for a stolen taste, knowing his claim was also on her younger sister’s shoulder. It seemed completely tomcat, although harems were a thing in Maeren.
Phillip had said he didn’t care if Elizabeth went to his bed with another’s claim on her shoulder. It must be a two-way street.
Did he have his dick buried in another meaningless witch right now?
Elizabeth didn’t hide her furious thou
ghts from her sister.
“It wasn't Prince Phillip.”
Oh? Oh! The real vampire to mark Jill’s skin was another unexpected shock as she read his name from her sister’s thoughts.
“Willy, the safety mascot? Seriously?” Elizabeth nearly screeched.
She yanked Jill’s nightgown back up on her shoulder and went to the closet for a robe.
Jill had everything unpacked and neatly organized, already moved in.
“Mom really is going to bury you—if you let her see that—or heal your legs and lecture you about making a spectacle of yourself if you keep it hidden. I vote for the latter.”
She handed Jill a robe.
“I wanted to tell you earlier,” Jill quietly whispered in her thoughts.
Good idea, to stop talking out loud. They should stick to telepathy for this conversation. Who knew if their rooms were being spied upon?
“Why didn't you?” Elizabeth asked. Her sister had plenty of opportunity before breakfast.
“Mom interrupted me with Phillip—thanks to you—and I couldn't reveal that William came to me later and made the claim. It was supposed to be Phillip,” Jill explained.
Avoidance of something unpleasant was a typical reaction for her sister.
Ugh. What a situation, though. Mom was going to flip when she found out.
“It's just so unexpected. William doesn't even have fire. And he gives me the creeps,” Elizabeth said.
She kept quiet about Phillip’s indiscretion. What did it matter now?
“William has strong earth. Maybe more than Mom.” Jill shared.
Both sisters were absorbed with the thought of someone with stronger earth than their mother.
Elizabeth helpfully imagined an imploding planet at the same moment that someone rattled Jill’s door on its hinges with a knock.
The effect was like being abruptly woken from a nightmare.
“W-Who’s there?” Jill asked with a stutter.
“Open the door, sweetlings. Mommy is here.”
Well, it was their mother’s voice—and the feel of her mind—on the other side. The words, however, were from a stranger.
“Sweetlings?” Jill repeated.
“Play along. Act sweet and helpless,” Elizabeth instructed. Her mother had sent the demand to her telepathically.
Every Witch Demon but Mine (Maeren Series Book 1) Page 21
