Queen of the Unwanted Read online

  Jalzarnin smiled tenderly at her, his eyes soft and warm even at this reminder of her ignominy. “Just because others scorn you for what you did doesn’t mean I have to. High society might see a scandalous slut, but I see a young woman with an iron will and astounding courage.” His smile grew even broader. “The commitment it must have taken…”

  There was no missing the genuine admiration in his voice and face, and Mairah was struck momentarily speechless. She had never imagined it possible that anyone would not condemn her for what she’d done, and the idea that someone actually admired her for it was nearly incomprehensible.

  “You don’t even know why I did it,” she murmured softly, for she had never spoken so openly of her past before, mentioning only that she suspected Lady Linrai of having poisoned her to win Lord Granlin’s hand. Which would certainly justify—in some people’s minds, at least—Mairah’s malice toward Linrai, though not toward Granlin.

  Jalzarnin leaned forward and kissed her lips, a light brush of affection rather than a prelude to sex. “Of course I know,” he said. “Lord Granlin was—and still is, actually, though he struggles to attract prey in his reduced circumstances—a sexual predator of the highest order. You had your revenge on Lady Linrai the moment she bound herself to him as a husband, for I would not be surprised to hear his vows were broken by the time his wedding night was over. It does not take much imagination to think of a reason why you might have wished to ruin him.”

  Mairah chewed her lip, not at all sure what to think of this revelation. Did it make her feel better or worse to know that she was not the only woman to have fallen prey to Lord Granlin’s charm? “But his reputation was spotless,” she protested, thinking back to the shining beacon of propriety and piety he had been.

  “It is easy for a man’s reputation to remain spotless when he preys only on those who cannot afford to reveal what he’s done. He might well have continued on to this day without consequences had he not so badly miscalculated when he preyed on you.”

  She frowned. “But then how do you know about it?”

  “I didn’t at the time of his ruin. I never did like him—and not only because I saw in him a potential rival, though I won’t swear that did not factor into my opinion. But it always struck me that a man as conspicuously pious as he had something to hide. The truly pious don’t feel such a pressing need for public display, you see. So I knew there was something rotten about him. I just didn’t know what. But after his ruin, he developed a habit of drinking too much—and therefore talking too much. Society at large might not know the truth about him, but those of the priesthood certainly do.”

  Mairah shook her head wonderingly. To think that she and Lady Linrai had savaged each other for the great honor of marrying such a man!

  “You did all of society a great service by revealing Lord Granlin for what he was,” Jalzarnin continued. “All of society may not be aware of it, may not thank you for it, but I do. And I also know that someone with such single-minded determination and courage is just the sort of person who will find a way to reverse the Curse.”

  That was a topic Mairah was considerably less enthusiastic about discussing, for when she had first encouraged Jalzarnin to believe she could do such a thing, she had never believed her circumstances could depend on it to such a degree. She’d imagined trying her hardest, but failing, with the only consequences being disappointment and the lack of the generous reward she’d hoped to earn. She had not imagined that failure would see her returned to the rank of abigail after having made such a target of herself. Time was ticking away—far faster than she would have liked—and the “progress” she had claimed so far was not yet enough. She was well aware that her vision of herself sitting behind the abbess’s desk had already come true and that the future beyond that was unknown.

  “I will do everything in my power,” she murmured, hoping to change the subject immediately. But Jalzarnin did not cooperate.

  “You need to start showing signs of progress,” he warned.

  “I have shown progress,” she insisted. “We are still working on that new seer’s poison.” She had feared an official inquiry, and perhaps a command to cease having her abigails trigger visions, when Sister Sulrai had perished in the course of her duties. Sulrai had come from a powerful family who had not completely disowned her despite her disgrace, and it would not have been entirely surprising if they had kicked up a fuss. But when the trade minister had questioned Mairah about the incident, she’d told him that Sulrai had overstated her abilities and had taken a poison stronger than she could tolerate. It seemed the only logical explanation for the woman’s death, and Mairah had let out a sigh of relief when the trade minister had accepted her word.

  “You’ve shown a potential for progress,” Jalzarnin corrected. “And that progress is subject to certain questions.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Jalzarnin rolled over to face her, propping his head on one hand while his other idly stroked her hip over the covers. “Someone sent an anonymous letter to the trade minister, claiming that you are not a genuine seer, and that your abigail died because of your negligence and ignorance. Thankfully, I intercepted it in time, but I cannot guarantee that will always be the case.”

  Mairah’s body went cold, though she attempted to keep any alarm from showing on her face. She hoped the look she cast Jalzarnin was all outrage and offended dignity. There was no hint of doubt or suspicion in his gaze, but she couldn’t help worrying the accusations in that letter might affect him.

  “By ‘someone,’ you mean Norah, of course,” she said with a dismissive sniff. “That woman would stop at nothing to tear me down.” Her heart pattered in her chest, as if her own body was trying to betray her. She hoped he couldn’t feel her pulse through that hand on her hip.

  He kept his expression guarded, hiding whatever he was thinking and feeling from her searching eyes. “There is no proof that the letter is from Sister Norah,” he said, “though of course your assumption is most likely correct.” The hand on her hip rose to her face, caressing her cheek. “You have a unique talent for making enemies, my love.”

  Mairah bit back a defensive reply, but her eyes suddenly stung with tears. “I had friends once,” she said in a husky voice, as the loneliness she thought she’d conquered long ago stabbed through her. “It was only once I came to the Abbey that everything went so wrong.” She swallowed hard as a lump tried to form in her throat. It wasn’t just her life that was unrecognizable in the years after the Abbey gates shut behind her, it was her self.

  “I did not mean to hurt you,” Jalzarnin said softly, brushing a finger across her cheek and catching a tear that had leaked out. “I just want you to be careful. Once you have been confirmed as abbess, you can do whatever you like to Norah and her friends. No one will notice, much less complain. But your position right now is too tenuous for comfort.

  “You can take away all of Norah’s weapons by showing verifiable progress in your mission,” Jalzarnin said. “We need something more than your vision, which, though encouraging, is not provable.”

  “I’ll figure something out,” Mairah assured him.

  Which would be a lot easier to do if the progress she’d reported so far had been anything other than a convenient lie.

  * * *

  —

  When Kailindar was shown into one of the parlors of the royal residence, he looked as concerned as Ellin had felt when he had paid his surprise social call, watching her face far too carefully as they exchanged the expected pleasantries. The moment word of Lord Creethan’s assassination attempt had gotten out, the entire court had been abuzz. She wondered how many of her courtiers—and how many of her council members—were disappointed the attempt had failed. And she knew Semsulin was far from the only one to speculate about Kailindar’s potential involvement. Just as she knew some of his detractors were gleefully rubbing their hands together
in anticipation of his arrest.

  Discreet investigation had shown that Lord Creethan had indeed been far more dependent on his income as trade minister than had been apparent on the surface. He’d made a brisk business of accepting bribes, and had become so accustomed to the arrangement that he did not bother to wait until he had delivered to spend his ill-gotten gains. Losing his position would have meant having to return money he had already spent to certain unsavory characters who would not have taken his changed circumstances as an excuse.

  It was enough to convince Ellin that Creethan had been acting alone—a desperate and angry man who saw Ellin as the sole cause of his downfall. She had hoped that inviting her uncle for a meeting in the residence would put to rest any fears he might have that she was about to accuse him, but his obvious nerves said that hope had been in vain.

  She offered him a glass of brandy, which she thought might put him more at ease, but though he accepted, he seemed to eye the fine liquor with suspicion.

  “I haven’t poisoned your drink, Uncle Kailindar,” she said drolly, and at the informal address some of the tension finally left his shoulders.

  He harrumphed, and if he smiled at her wit, his droopy mustache hid it. He took a polite sip of his drink, then set to swirling the liquid around the glass. “Excellent brandy, Your Majesty,” he said.

  Ellin rolled her eyes, though Kailindar was too entranced by the brandy to notice. She had never had an especially warm relationship with her uncle, but it had never felt quite this awkward before. She had planned not to speak of the assassination attempt, but it seemed perhaps it would be best to clear the air.

  “Can you look me in the eye, Uncle,” she asked, “and assure me that you had nothing to do with Lord Creethan’s actions?”

  He looked up from the brandy then and responded with no hesitation. “I swear to you on my life and my honor that I had nothing to do with it. I told you before that I do not lust for the throne, and I meant it.”

  She nodded. “I believe you,” she said simply, and it was true. Both Zarsha and Semsulin had urged her to do away with him while she had the chance, and she knew both of them still harbored a suspicion that Kailindar might have had a hand in the assassination attempt. But though she sometimes distrusted her judgment about people, she was convinced Creethan had been acting out of his own rage alone.

  “But…?”

  “There is no ‘but.’ I believe you, and that is that. If there were more to it than that, you would already be before the magistrate.”

  His hand tightened on the glass, and she saw a rare hint of fear in his eyes. Clearly he understood the difficult position the assassination attempt had put him in. Just as he knew his continued existence would always pose at least some level of threat to her. Which meant she posed some level of threat to him.

  “I did not ask you here to talk about Lord Creethan’s treason,” she said. “I had a rather more cheerful topic of conversation in mind.” She motioned him to a chair, and he sat. That he was still ill at ease was evident in every nuance of his body language.

  “I may have found a suitable match for Kailee,” she said, hoping her decision to tell him about her proposal was not premature. Alysoon hadn’t actually agreed to it, but Ellin thought it best that she plunge ahead anyway. If the arrangement fell through, she would have to more seriously consider Semsulin’s plans to eliminate Kailindar’s threat, but for now she could at least try to mitigate it with hope.

  Kailindar frowned and set the brandy aside. “And who might that be?” he inquired with undisguised wariness.

  “Sovereign Princess Alysoon has an unmarried brother,” Ellin said. “She and I have agreed that Lord Tynthanal might be a suitable match for Kailee. As I’m sure you know, he was once the Lieutenant Commander of the Citadel of Aaltah, and he is now Princess Alysoon’s lord chancellor. He is very possibly the most eligible bachelor in all of Seven Wells.”

  Kailindar laughed at the admittedly hyperbolic claim. “If one discounts the fact that Women’s Well is always one step away from being obliterated. And that he is the son of the witch who cursed the Wellspring. Aside from that, he is, I agree, eminently eligible.”

  “He’s the brother and lord chancellor of a sovereign princess,” Ellin argued. “He is the firstborn son of the late king of Aaltah. And while it might not matter so much to Kailee, I can assure you after having met him via talker that he is handsome enough to make girls of her age swoon. They would make remarkably beautiful children together.”

  Kailindar winced ever so delicately.

  “Kailee would like to have children someday, wouldn’t she?” she asked gently, knowing exactly what her uncle’s wince had meant. He’d imagined a life of perpetual spinsterhood for her and had likely never allowed himself to think that she might one day have children of her own.

  He groaned and blew out a breath that made his mustache flutter. “Of course she would.”

  “If you aren’t going to send her to the Abbey, and the nobility of Rhozinolm will not offer for her, then her choices in life are…slim.” It was nothing he didn’t already know, but he winced again. “If she is to have children, she will have to marry someone well beneath her. Someone who would likely only take her because he needs the money from her dowry, and who might well mistreat her—or even send her to the Abbey himself, once he has the money.

  “Or, she could marry Lord Tynthanal, who is every bit her social equal. And who lives in the one place in Seven Wells where she need never fear being sent to the Abbey.”

  “There are worse fears she might face living in Women’s Well,” Kailindar said darkly.

  Ellin met his eyes. “Not as long as they have the full and unwavering support of Rhozinolm.”

  Kailindar lowered his gaze and shook his head. “Ah. Of course. You would reduce my attractiveness as a rival by tying me to Women’s Well.”

  She raised one shoulder in a subtle shrug. “We both know there are other very much less pleasant ways I could neutralize the threat you pose to me. I can’t claim Kailee will be in no danger living in Women’s Well—and it will be very important to her safety that we get those trade agreements with Nandel renewed—but she will have hope of a better life there.”

  There was a haunted look in her uncle’s eyes that Ellin did not like, one that told her he was focusing more on the dangers than the rewards.

  “It’s also possible that the magic of Women’s Well can give her sight,” Ellin suggested, and for the first time saw a flare of hope in his face. “Do you not think it worth some degree of risk to give her a future that includes a husband and children and even, potentially, eyesight?” She did not put into words the flip side, the side of which he was clearly already aware: if there was ever any hint of a rebellion brewing in his name—even without his participation and knowledge—Kailee’s future would be destroyed. Kailindar would be attainted and executed as a traitor, and all his worldly goods—any money that might support his family—would be forfeit to the Crown. Ending up in the Abbey would be the least unpleasant fate that might befall her under those circumstances.

  “I will not command you to send her to Women’s Well, nor will I command her to marry,” Ellin said. “But I do ask you to consider sending her there to meet Lord Tynthanal and decide for herself if the match is worth the risk.”

  He picked up his glass of brandy and took a healthy swallow. More, she thought, to give him a moment to think than because he wanted the drink so much. She sat in silence, trying not to hold her breath.

  Finally, he nodded, not looking at her. “I will talk it over with my wife,” he said. “And with Kailee. But if you believe that Princess Alysoon and Lord Tynthanal are agreeable to the match, then it is my duty as a father to send her.”

  Ellin smiled to cover her own unease and hoped that whatever impediments stood in the way of Princess Alysoon officially approving the match woul
d be swiftly and decisively taken care of.

  * * *

  —

  Mairahsol had spent an astonishing proportion of her life as an abigail slinking around the Abbey’s hallways at night—it was amazing how much useful information an enterprising abigail could discover when all her sisters were snoring in their beds—but this was the first time she had done so as the abbess. Most of her information gathering was now done through her small coterie, but tonight’s excursion suggested she actually missed the work. Her heart raced with a thrill of adrenaline, just as it used to in her earlier days, and yet this time she had nothing to fear. No one would dare challenge her or ask her what she was doing, even should she be seen. All the excitement, without any of the terror and risk.

  The Abbey’s halls were darkened for the night, all the luminants—which would have been considered an extravagance at any other Abbey, but which were one of Khalpar’s primary exports, and therefore relatively commonplace—extinguished. She carried a small, dim luminant in one hand, giving herself enough light to see by, but—she hoped—not enough to draw attention to herself.

  Not, she reminded herself yet again, that she was in any danger, but she had hopes of catching her quarry by surprise.

  She smiled in satisfaction. All those years she’d been shunned by her sisters, and now some of them would happily claw one another’s eyes out to curry favor with her. Sister Zulmirna had turned out to be quite the accomplished sneak, and though Mairah had never instructed the woman to spy on Norah and her friends, she’d been pleasantly surprised when the young abigail had come to her with the news that some of her sisters were secretly worshipping the Mother of All.

  “It’s disgusting,” the abigail had said with every semblance of truly believing it. “How can anyone question the presence and power of the Creator?”