Queen of the Unwanted Read online

  Kailee smiled again. “In that case, it’s a good thing you did not invite my stepmother.”

  Alys stifled another laugh, inspired more by nerves than humor. “So it seems. I don’t know how much you’ve been told about…well, anything, really.” Alys found herself picking at one of the seams on her skirt and clasped her hands together to suppress the nervous gesture. Not that Kailee could see her tension.

  Kailee bit her lip. “I do know that there would be some risks involved if I were to marry your brother and live here. My father explained the potential difficulties, but he swore to me that Queen Ellinsoltah will see to the protection of Women’s Well. I am not afraid.”

  The girl’s face was possibly more expressive than she knew, for Alys could see the doubts that belied her confident words. It was no small thing to leave the safety and security of one’s home to take up residence in a land that ran the risk of being torn by war.

  “Neither your father, nor your queen, nor I can guarantee you safety from war,” Alys said, “though of course we will all do our best to avoid it.” Alys wondered what Corlin would say if he heard her say that, for it was abundantly clear that he both expected and wanted war with Aaltah as only a sheltered fourteen-year-old boy could.

  Kailee nodded in acknowledgment. “I understand. But whether it comes to war or not, I have…prospects in Women’s Well that I do not have in Rhozinolm. At home, the best I can expect is to live as a pitied spinster who must take pains not to be seen in public any more than absolutely necessary to avoid bringing shame upon my family. The other, perhaps more likely option, is life in the Abbey.”

  Alys shook her head bitterly. Her mother’s spell had in so many ways changed the lives and prospects of women, freeing so many from the specter of forced marriages and rape. But it would take a great deal of time—likely generations, at least—before women would gain anything like the same freedoms as men. A blind nobleman would face a certain amount of pity and discomfort among his peers, but he would not be shunned, and would likely find a wife and a comfortable existence.

  “It is worth a great deal of risk to me to escape the specter of the Abbey,” Kailee said with a brave raise of her chin. “If anything were to happen to my father, I have no doubt my stepmother would send me away immediately. Not through any ill will, but because she believes that is where I should be.”

  Alys was already developing a thorough dislike of Lady Vondelmai.

  Kailee bit her lip, then asked in a rush, “May I share with you a shocking and wildly inappropriate secret?” She appeared to hold her breath, her whole body taut with tension.

  Alys blinked in surprise and no small amount of curiosity. She had a great fondness for women who spoke plainly, but it struck her as almost painfully trusting and naïve that Kailee would offer to share a secret of any sort with a woman she had just met. Both curiosity and statesmanship demanded she accept any secret being freely offered, and yet she felt honor-bound to protect this young woman who reminded her—rightly or not—of Jinnell. “I am honored by your confidence,” she said carefully, “but I hardly feel I have had time to earn it.”

  “You are to be my sister-in-law,” Kailee said. “I would not have you accept me as a suitable bride for your brother without knowing the whole truth. Whatever my father and my stepmother might wish.” Her chin lifted with defiance and courage. Courage that made Alys feel doubly guilty for her own lack of honesty.

  There’s still a chance a fertility potion will work, Alys counseled herself to stifle her urge to admit the false pretenses under which she had invited Kailee to visit.

  “It is no sure thing yet that we are to be sisters,” Alys said instead. “I have promised all involved that you and my brother must enter into a marriage of your own free will, and it remains to be seen whether you will find yourselves compatible.”

  Kailee lowered her head demurely. “This marriage may well be my only chance to have anything resembling the kind of life I’ve long been told was impossible for one such as me,” she said. “If your brother is anything less than an ogre, then rest assured that I want to marry him. And yet even so, I cannot do as I’ve been told and stay silent. I do not require my future husband to love me, but I want to have at least the chance of friendship and cordiality. A chance that will be destroyed if he later learns I have lied by omission.”

  Her chin came up once more, and though it was hard to read the expression on her face with those eyes, Alys was sure she saw both determination and trepidation.

  “I was born with my Mindseye fully developed and open,” Kailee said, “and I cannot close it. That is why I cannot see. So now you know the full reason why my stepmother is sure I belong in the Abbey.”

  Alys sat back in her chair and found herself at a loss for words. She had never heard of such a thing.

  Kailee took a shaky breath. “I hope that here in Women’s Well, where you seem to have a very different attitude toward women who practice magic, my condition will not be considered so shameful that I must keep it hidden from all.”

  “You practice magic,” Alys said, certain her guess was right. How could Kailee not practice magic when she was surrounded by the elements all the time?

  “A little,” the girl admitted shyly. “I have no training, naturally, and the one time my stepmother caught me doing it she fainted dead away. Then she and my father had a terrific row about it and I thought surely he was finally going to send me away after all.” She shook her head. “I don’t think I could endure it if Lord Tynthanal were to learn the truth of my condition after we are married and revile me for it. Even if there is no Abbey to which he can send me here…” Her voice caught, and she let the words trail off.

  In the face of Kailee’s honesty, Alys impulsively decided that she could not continue to keep her own secrets. She took a deep breath and hoped she was not making a terrible mistake. “Neither your Mindseye nor your magic is an issue of any consequence to Tynthanal or myself,” she said, choosing her words with perhaps a little too much care.

  “Ah,” Kailee said softly. “But there is an issue.”

  Alys nodded, then abruptly remembered the girl couldn’t see. “Yes, as of now, at least.” She shifted in her seat, as she always seemed to do when speaking of Tynthanal’s condition. “I am hopeful we will soon find a cure with our unique magic. But as of now, it seems my brother is unable to father children.”

  Kailee looked so stricken that Alys almost regretted the impulse to tell her. If one of the potions worked, she could have avoided the unpleasant revelation altogether.

  “I see,” Kailee said softly, closing her eyes. She seemed to gather her thoughts and regain her equilibrium swiftly, her lips turning up into another rueful smile. “I have always heard that when something sounds too good to be true, it usually is. Now I see that it is the case.”

  “I truly am hopeful that we can cure his condition,” Alys said rather desperately. “I will do everything in my power to make certain that you did not get your hopes raised in vain.”

  Kailee started to say something, then stopped. A frown darkened her pretty face, only to be quickly dispelled. “One consequence to my blindness is that people often act as though I can’t hear, either. Perhaps they are trying so hard to ignore me and avoid any discomfort that they simply forget I am present. But I am not deaf, and I am not stupid, either. There are important reasons why this marriage should happen, none of which have anything to do with creating a blissful union.

  “I do not blame you for the deception, any more than I blame my father and my stepmother for theirs, despite my decision not to go along with it. I swear I will not tell anyone what you have told me, and I will endeavor to give you as much time as possible to craft your cure. But as I suspect you know, my father will not agree to the marriage if your brother cannot give me children, even if I might be amenable.”

  “I suspected as much,” Alys
admitted. “Though after what you’ve told me, it seems there are more reasons than one why Women’s Well would be the best place for you. The place where you could have the greatest freedom.”

  Kailee smiled. “You’ll get no argument from me. But my father is far more concerned with my safety than with my freedom. I had to plead with him more than once to keep him from cancelling this visit because he is afraid for me. The only reason he finally relented was because he saw for me the chance to lead a normal woman’s life here, to have a husband and children. Taking those possible children away would tip the scales once more.”

  Alys, of course, did not know Lord Kailindar, but she saw no reason to disbelieve Kailee’s claim. Even with Rhozinolm’s full and enthusiastic support, there was no denying that Women’s Well would remain frighteningly vulnerable to attack, and a loving father would be justified in fearing for his daughter’s life if she married into this particular royal family.

  And, she realized with a sinking feeling, it was unlikely to matter how much Kailee might love Women’s Well and want to stay. If her father saw danger in her future with too little potential gain, he would command her to return to Rhozinolm and safety.

  The future of Women’s Well rested firmly on Alys’s ability to create a successful fertility potion. She grimly resolved that she would forego all but the absolute minimum of sleep to get that done.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  Delnamal’s relationship with the dowager queen had not fared especially well since he’d ascended the throne. She blamed him for the destruction of his first marriage, insisting Shelvon would have borne him an heir if only he had treated her better. And she could not disapprove more strongly of Delnamal’s second wife, her Khalpari sensibilities insisting that kings must only marry virgin brides. The Devotional that was her constant companion did not specifically insist that widows never remarry, but it was nonetheless viewed as improper in the most traditional households. And of course many were scandalized that he had married her so soon after her husband’s death, not allowing her to observe the customary year of mourning. The people of Aaltah might not obey the Devotional as slavishly as those of Khalpar, but there was no denying the wedding had offended a great many. And he could no longer be in the dowager’s presence without seeing maternal censure in her eyes.

  Accordingly, Delnamal spent as little time in her company as possible, but his choices right now were to speak with her or speak with the Khalpari ambassador once more. Figuring he was marginally less likely to murder the dowager queen with his bare hands than he was the ambassador, he chose to brace his mother in the dowager’s apartments. There was a line of supplicants in the hallway outside her receiving room, for though she had no formal position of power, she took on her expected role of people’s champion with the same dedication she showed for any of her other duties.

  Delnamal ignored the bows and murmured greetings, his temper too brittle to deal with any unnecessary interactions. He did not wait to be announced, and he did not knock, and when he entered the room to find his mother gently rubbing the back of a sobbing pregnant woman, it was all he could do not to snarl. Belatedly, he thought that he should have sat down and had a drink, given his temper time to cool, before marching to his mother’s receiving room. But the moment he’d read King Khalvin’s sanctimonious message, he’d stormed out of his office—leaving his flummoxed secretary to stammer in helpless confusion.

  The crying woman did not look up when Delnamal entered—perhaps she was blubbering too loudly to hear him—but his mother did. Her expression was that all-too-familiar look of disapproval that set his teeth on edge, and he wondered if he should have taken his chances with the ambassador after all. But no matter how much he might disappoint his mother, she could not do him political damage, which was more than he could say of the ambassador.

  “I need a moment of your time,” he said in a tone that made it clear he was not asking.

  “Of course, Your Majesty,” Xanvin said, putting her arm around the woman and helping her to her feet. “We will finish this conversation as soon as I am able,” she said with infinite gentleness. The pregnant woman snuffled and nodded as Xanvin guided her into an adjoining room.

  Delnamal frowned. It was plain to see by the woman’s dress that she was a commoner, and it seemed to him unwise to allow a commoner to sit unattended in the dowager queen’s apartment. “She should wait in the hall with everyone else,” he said, but his mother closed the door behind the woman as if he hadn’t spoken.

  “What is it you need, my son?” she asked when she turned to him. As was often the case, she was wearing a miniature Devotional on a chain around her waist, and her fingers stroked its cover absently as she faced him.

  It was not as warm a welcome as Delnamal had hoped for from his own mother, and he stood briefly on the precipice of losing his temper once and for all. But the dowager queen’s serenity had a certain contagious nature, and he found himself calming almost against his will.

  “I need you to write to your brother on my behalf,” he said. He had not intended to put it so bluntly—the idea that a king should ask his mother for help with diplomacy was an embarrassment he could barely stomach, and if any of his courtiers should realize he’d done it…Well, he could only imagine how they’d snicker behind his back.

  Xanvin’s surprise showed only in a quick widening of her eyes. Then she cocked her head with curiosity. “There is a problem of some sort, I presume?”

  Delnamal grunted in affirmation and glanced around the receiving room, hoping his mother had some brandy or cordial sitting around to ease the distress of distraught supplicants. Not that he was either distraught or a supplicant himself, but he needed a drink. Inconveniently, there did not seem to be any available.

  “The problem is that Khalvin is a self-righteous prick who does not seem to understand what it means to be an ally.” Which, he realized after it was too late to take the words back, probably wasn’t the best choice of words to use with the self-righteous prick’s sister. He expected an immediate rebuke, but his mother only smiled.

  “I know how my brother can get when he feels he has the moral high ground,” she assured him. “After all, I grew up with him. Now tell me what has happened.”

  “I asked him to lend us some naval support in the event that tensions with Rhozinolm should boil over. He wrote back to say that I should be spending my time on trying to find a way to reverse the Curse rather than preparing for war. As if he thinks we haven’t tried to figure out how to undo it. And as if readying our kingdom for attack somehow makes us incapable of doing anything else.”

  “Do stop pacing, my son,” Xanvin said, startling him.

  It showed something of his mental state that he hadn’t even realized he was pacing the room while he spoke. He came to a stop and blinked as if rousing himself from sleep. He looked all around once more, hoping to spot a decanter he’d missed, his need for a drink getting stronger with each passing minute. He suspected his mother knew perfectly well what he was looking for, but she did not acknowledge it.

  “Khalvin is not like your grandfather,” Xanvin continued. “If your grandfather had not been a king, he would have been a soldier. If Khalvin were not a king, he would be a priest. His focus will always tend toward questions of morality and piety. The Curse is an insult to the Creator the likes of which the world has never known, and Khalvin will see your difficulties with Alysoon and with Queen Ellinsoltah as petty squabbles of little importance in comparison.”

  Delnamal blew out a gusty sigh, for that was exactly the message Khalvin’s letter had delivered. “But he’s supposed to be our ally!” he protested. “That was the whole purpose of your marriage to Father.”

  Xanvin shook her head. “That was our father’s purpose for contracting me to marry your father, but Khalvin was not party to that agreement.” Delnamal stiffened and opened his mouth for an outraged exclamation, but
she continued speaking without giving him the chance to interrupt. “I am not saying he will disregard the alliance our father made with your father. All I’m saying is that he has different priorities.”

  “Don’t you have anything to drink around here?” he complained, for anything else he might have said would have been even more inappropriate. If he didn’t get a drink soon, he was going to do something rash like wreck his mother’s receiving room.

  When Delnamal had been forced to march home with his army in shame, he had comforted himself with the thought that it was naught but a temporary setback. He’d imagined that within six months’ time, he would have raised a sufficient force to crush Alysoon’s supposed principality while still protecting Aaltah from Rhozinolm’s retaliation. But so far, his royal council had seen fit to raise the Citadel’s budget by such a pittance that it hardly mattered, Nandel was still playing at being insulted over his divorce of Shelvon—despite his efforts to make reparations—and his closest ally seemed entirely uninterested in lending him any aid. Not to mention the never-ending whining he kept hearing over his cancellation of one silly trade agreement with Rhozinolm.

  His mother gave him a disapproving frown, and for a moment he feared he was in for a scolding after all—which would have tipped him into a full-out rage, he was sure. Luckily, she thought better of it.

  “I’ll have some brandy brought in,” she said, ringing a bell to summon a servant.

  Delnamal turned his back on the door, going to stare sightlessly out a window so the servant would not see whatever dreadful expression he was sure he wore on his face. He heard the murmur of voices, but his blood was pulsing so loudly in his ears he could not make out the words. Bad enough that his mother was seeing this pathetic demonstration of his weakness, but he could not bear to have the servants gleefully discussing it, spreading the word until he was a laughingstock. A grown man, a king, shouldn’t need a drink; not the way he needed one right now.