by Ann Denton
Bloss—
I’ll find a way to get you released from that spell. I promise. Just give me a few days—
Bloss—
I— my thought was cut off. Because suddenly, Quinn’s lips skimmed mine. My heart galloped like a war horse. WHAT?
He gave the slightest peck at the corner of my lips and pulled back to meet my eyes. I don’t want to be released from that spell.
If he hadn’t been holding onto me, I might have fallen to the floor. His words left me dazed. So much so that I forgot to speak in my thoughts. “Oh. Really?”
You’re adorable when you’re flustered.
Queens aren’t adorable.
You aren’t a queen yet, Dove. You’re just my reluctant princess. Now, go turn down Willard. Tell him four husbands are more than you can handle. But do it politely, please. Make a concession or two.
Quinn pulled open a door handle I hadn’t even noticed because I’d been so trapped by his damn irresistible eyes. He opened the door and released my arm in the same moment.
Don’t you have to come in? I cocked my head.
Just stay near the wall so poor Willard gets the illusion of privacy. I think he might be about to piss himself. An image of Willard in bright red breeches with a wet spot over his crotch popped into my head. Willard reached his hands together to cover it and his lips popped into a little surprised circle.
I bit my lip and shook my head, but my eyes danced with mirth. You’re awful, I told Quinn.
I know.
Willard was already in the room and he stepped forward to bow and kiss my hand. He was wearing bright red breeches. I had to swallow a smile. Quinn was on point.
“Your Highness, thank you so much for taking the time to see me. My mother was so pleased when you agreed to this meeting the other day,” he mumbled, coming forward as Quinn pulled the door shut behind me.
I noticed his hair was thinning as he bowed over my hand. Not that thinning hair mattered in arranged marriages. But, my mother had seemed to happen to find handsome men for me. I’d never thought too much of it, busy as I’d been planning my escape. But, for a second I wondered how many other candidates she’d turned down. I was sure Lady Agatha had approached her. Willard was the lady’s only child. She’d never been able to carry to term again. This couldn’t be Willard’s first attempt to attain knighthood. So … why now?
“Lord Willard, we’ve known each other since childhood.”
“Yes, Your Highness,” he squeaked. He looked to his left, away from me. A bead of sweat rolled down his forehead. And he breathed through his mouth.
I blinked, reminding myself to keep my face neutral. “Your family is very important to this kingdom. You’re very important.”
“Thank you,” he gritted his teeth together, and his face turned an odd blotchy red.
Was he embarrassed by a compliment? I wouldn’t have been surprised if Quinn’s prediction about the piss came true. I tried to take a surreptitious step back. “Your mother has suggested you be added to my contingent of personal knights.”
“Yes,” Willard wheezed.
“This suggests your family has needs of a very delicate nature, that you’d like the crown’s help, but perhaps … you feel those needs won’t be met by someone who is only your monarch. Are your lands in danger?”
I said be polite!
I ignored Quinn and focused on Willard’s uncomfortable fidgeting. His eyes flashed to mine only briefly. Defiance and a bit of anger seemed to flicker there, though his nervousness quickly outpaced other emotions.
“Willard. I’ve been married four years and have obligations to my current knights. They have been kind enough to wait for me as I tried to put the country’s needs before our own. I cannot accept you into my contingent—”
Willard gulped and wiped his forehead with a handkerchief.
I took his hand and continued, “But I would like to offer you something else. Something that will allow you to trust me. I’ll offer a mage oath.”
Willard gasped.
Inside my head, Quinn swore. I said turn him down gently, not offer the kingdom’s secrets on a sarding platter!
Good thing I haven’t been to any briefings yet to learn those secrets, I replied. I’m four years behind on confidential information.
A picture of a dog and her suckling pups popped into my head.
I hope you mean clever bitch, I shot to Quinn.
Was that dog doing tricks? He sent a new image of a dog with glowing red eyes.
Ass.
Never said I don’t like evil bitches.
I focused back on the paunchy man in front of me. Willard pulled out his handkerchief again and patted the rolls in his neck. I think the kerchief might have stuck inside one of the rolls for a moment. I averted my eyes and waited for his response.
“I … I will have to ask—”
He was going to ask his mother. Adrenaline flooded me. I couldn’t let him do that. Lady Agatha would be furious. We’d end up with a rift between the crown and one of our major nobles. I had to get Willard to agree. Sweeten the pot, as the whores would have said. Or ‘Make the offer irresistible, so they can’t see the consequences for the glittering gold beneath their eyes.’ Those were Mother’s words. I moved until Willard met my eyes. “Truth for truth, Willard. You and I. No mothers involved. We can go before the palace mage and have him bind us. Right now. And after you reveal whatever truth you need my help with, I promise, I’ll do whatever I can to help seek a solution. And I promise to be discreet. No one else need know.”
The breath whooshed out of Willard. “Oh, thank God.” He squeezed my fingers and dragged me into a full body hug. That was when I could finally smell the stench of his nervous sweat. “Thank you for saying no,” he whispered.
“Um … any time?”
He chuckled and released me. “I do apologize, Your Highness. I meant, thank you for finding an alternative.”
I shrugged and smiled. “Well, our tutors did always call me a little genius.” The term they’d actually used was gnat.
But Willard coughed out a polite laugh.
I held out my hand so Willard could escort me to the mage’s tower. “Shall we? I hope you don’t mind, but one of my husbands will probably escort us to the tower … they’ve been a bit attached since I’ve returned.”
Willard took my arm and for the first time since I’d known him, puffed his chest. He pulled open the door and led me into the hall. “Well, now, seeing as they married the class genius, they should be.”
I genuinely laughed. I think it was the first joke I’d ever heard from Willard.
Quinn pulled himself away from the stone wall he’d been leaning against. He let Willard continue to escort me, giving the man a respectful nod. Willard doddled along with a grin, content to show his family’s solidarity with the royal family via a public stroll through the palace.
Quinn flanked my other side, obviously staring me up and down despite the other nobles hovering nearby. Dove. I didn’t know you were a genius. I’d love to pick your brain later. His gaze landed on my ass.
His naughty implication sent a rush from my nipples to my mound. Who says my brain is open for business?
The catch in your breath and the look in your eye, he countered.
I shot him a naughty grin, elation bubbling in my stomach. This was what I’d always hoped marriage would be. Banter and inside secrets. And laughter. But then I wondered … was it a trick? Was Quinn toying with me? Was he going to turn angry like the others? Get me close only to push me away? Show me what it had been like for him? Being abandoned?
Quinn’s fingers brushed mine. No tricks, Dove. I promise.
I stared up into his grey eyes. Really?
Really.
My knees went weak. My heart went haywire. And my feet gave out. I tripped on the edge of a rug. “Oh!” I nearly pulled Willard over with me. Luckily, Quinn grabbed me and yanked. Willard’s weight on my other arm nearly ripped me in half until Quinn reached
over and helped Willard to his feet too.
I turned to the pudgy man, whose waistcoat had rolled up over his middle. “I’m so sorry, Lord Willard. I wasn’t watching where I was going. It was completely my fault.”
Willard only smiled as he struggled to straighten his waistcoat. “Perhaps your knight should escort you, Your Highness. Since you can’t seem to take your eyes off him.”
I blushed scarlet, particularly as two noble ladies nearby craned their necks to listen to our conversation. Quinn just grinned and tugged me closer until I fit under the crook of his arm.
“Sorry, Lord Willard, I can’t help it. He’s been rather obsessed with me.”
If only you knew. Quinn jerked his head toward a stairwell and the three of us began to climb.
Quinn and I quickly outpaced the portly Willard and when we had rounded yet another bend ahead of him, Quinn pulled me roughly against him. His hand traced down my back, and then he squeezed my ass.
“Whoa!”
Shhh. Quinn grinned, running his hands back and forth over my hips. He glanced over my shoulder and must have seen the top of Willard’s head, because he led me into another sprint up the stairs. The next time he stopped, I was breathless.
You’re insa—
Hush. He grabbed my face in both hands and bent until our eyes were level. His eyes … my chest got an airy, restless feeling. Like the wind was dancing between my ribs. I clung to him. I think I’m hallucinating again.
He smiled, his eyes simply flickering back and forth between mine as if he were drinking in every fluttering, girlish beat of my heart.
Can you feel what I feel?
Do you feel like you’re flying?
I nodded.
Willard’s head poked around the spiral staircase and Quinn yanked me upward once more.
You didn’t answer, I scolded.
How would I know it felt like flying? Unless I felt the same thing.
I was already breathless from climbing. But his answer took my breath away.
Two seconds later, before I could process what anything might mean, we stood in front of mage Wyle’s door. Quinn rapped smartly and then stood aside to let Willard and myself in. I went first, seeing as Willard was heaving like a messenger horse that had rushed down from Macedon.
“Hello, Wyle,” I strode toward Wyle’s project table before he could even take off the oversized goggles and gloves he had on. The table just stretched the limit of my distance spell with Quinn. I reached but couldn’t quite rest my hand on the table.
“Your Highness,” Wyle carefully set down the glowing orange beaker he’d been holding. He pushed his dark goggles up into his skull, which was lined with perfectly symmetrical white braids. His pointed elf ears twitched. His large, almond eyes blinked as he adjusted to the daylight.
“What lovely concoction are you making there?” I asked, nodding toward the beaker.
“Not making,” he sighed. “Extracting. Declan’s asked me to help with research he’s been doing into water contaminants.”
“Oh,” I quickly switched off that deadly boring topic. “Well, if you have a moment, Willard and I would like a thirty-minute mage oath binding.” I turned to Willard. “You think that’s enough time to explain everything?”
Willard, who had bent over and used a table to help support his gasping, just nodded and waved a hand.
“I, oh, well, it’s been some time since … I’ll just need to grab the book, Your Highness. Reference a few things.”
“Absolutely,” I followed him as Willard sunk into a wooden chair by the window. Luckily, the bookcase was right by the door. I heaved a sigh of relief.
Wyle hummed as he looked through his handwritten tomes, until he noticed I was right behind him. “Your Highness?”
I leaned close to him, pulling a book from the shelf to cover my intentions. I flipped the book open to a random page. An anatomical drawing of a penis, with all parts labeled. How fitting, seeing as I what was about to ask Wyle to do. “I want you to lift the spells my mother put on my husbands.”
“All of them, Your Highness?”
“All … what do you mean all?”
“Long life, virility, good vision, safety—”
“Okay, fine. Not those. The one where they have to be within five feet of me. And the one where they can only physically be intimate with me and no other woman.”
Wyle raised an eyebrow. “Really?”
I did not answer. I was not going to explain myself to the castle mage. “This is confidential, correct, Wyle? She still has the spell set on you so you’ll explode if you betray the royal family’s secrets?”
“I—I … she put a spell on me?” Wyle sounded indignant.
“Of course, she does it to all of us,” I patted his hand. “Are there any other controlling spells on my husbands that need to be lifted?”
“Does a spell compelling them to forgive you count?”
Disgust flooded me. My hands fisted and I accidentally ripped the penis page. “What?! Yes. Yes, that would count, Wyle. Please dispose of that one, too.”
“I might need to consult the Queen.”
I tilted my head. I gave him the look I’d perfected to fend off every farmhand for three miles when I’d worked in a field three summers past. A look that had sent the farm boys running back to their mothers. “Or, you could undo them without telling her.”
“Or that. Of course, that.” Wyle gently extracted his precious book from my hands. He eyed the page I’d ripped and gave a tiny moan.
“Sorry I ripped your penis. I’ll get it fixed.”
“No need, Your Highness. I have a spell for that.”
“Of course you do.”
He petted the page gently, muttered something, sprinkled a bit of ash, and the book repaired itself. I only hoped his skills would be as successful with my husbands.
Wyle tried to hustle me over to the chair where Willard was sitting. But my mother’s distance spell-curse wouldn’t let me walk that far.
“Do you mind if we do this over here?” I smiled.
The two men blinked at me dumbly, though it should have been obvious to Wyle why I couldn’t move.
“My skin has just been really sensitive the last few days. I don’t think I should be standing in direct sunlight.” I fluttered my eyelashes, feeling like an absolute idiot.
I bet you look like an absolute idiot.
Shut it.
Of course, the two men complied with the request of the crown princess.
Willard dragged his chair over and sat next to where I stood, absolutely reeking of sweat.
I secretly wished I’d also asked for a spell to deal with that scent. If I’d been my mother, I probably would have.
As it was, I watched Wyle link our hands. He squeezed two lemons and trickled the juice over fingers. Then he lit a rose on fire and blew it out before the flames reached the stem. Finally, he muttered a few words in a language I didn’t know.
“Is that all?” I asked.
Wyle nodded, his goggles falling down his face to thunk against his chest.
I turned to Willard. “I’m the youngest daugh—” I couldn’t lie and say I was Avia. The mage oath must be active. “Try to say you are from Sedara, please.”
“I’m from—I can’t,” he marveled.
“Good. Now, Wyle, please leave us. Take whatever you need to complete those tasks I’ve given you.”
Wyle’s eyes opened wide, His mouth gaped. With his beaky nose and wild hair, he looked like a startled bird. But he knew better than to protest. He gathered some books and ingredients and was on his way.
I turned back to Willard. “You have the floor.”
He gulped.
I shook my head. “We were in class together ten years, Willard. Just tell me.”
“We aren’t getting enough rain.”
“Okay.” I waited, carefully blinking away the ‘sarding idiot’ face my tavern wench persona would have given him.
“A lot of ou
r herds—they can’t breed without enough water. The grass doesn’t grow without enough water.”
I nodded. Alright. The magnitude of the problem was starting to make sense.
“We’ve asked Declan for some assistance. But the balance … we lose too much soil in return.”
“And what are the astrologers predicting this winter for you?”
“They say it’s unseasonably warm. They predict a dry winter.”
So, the situation was only likely to get worse. “I am aware that your livestock provide a good deal of your income. Would you mind telling me what percentage?”
“I … my parents have found it the most profitable avenue. In the past.” Willard couldn’t make eye contact.
I sighed. “All of it, Willard?”
He looked up. His lower lip trembled a bit. “All of it.”
Shite. I tried to keep a neutral face. “Any areas worse than the others?”
“Grazing lands near the Purl Mountain range.”
“Near the border to Cheryn then?”
Willard nodded.
“Okay, start moving your herds south if you haven’t already. I’ll talk with Declan. See what we can do.”
Willard nodded again.
I put a hand on his shoulder. “I’ll figure something out. We won’t abandon your family. Though I do suggest you put your foot down and make them diversify a bit.”
He gave a broken laugh. “Put my foot down. Yes. Mother would love that.”
“You’re the heir, Willard.”
“You’re different. Than before you left,” he observed.
I smiled gently. “Better, I hope.”
“You seem more … sure of yourself.”
“If by sure of yourself, you mean mouthy and defiant, then yes. Four years outside these walls taught me that I have to think for myself, stand up for myself. No one else can do it for me. No one else can do it for you, either.”
He mopped his brow once more and stood. “Thank you, Your Highness. If you could help us out of this predicament, it would mean … a lot.”
“I will do everything in my power. And I hope to prove you can trust me with issues like this in the future.”
