Queen of the Unwanted Read online

  For three days, she’d managed—for the most part, at least—to keep herself so busy and distracted that the only time she thought about her heartache was when she laid her head on her pillow each night. It helped that Zarsha made himself scarce, considerately giving her time and space. Just as it helped that the marriage negotiations were currently at an impasse, though she would have to decide soon whether to prod Kailindar into making another overture.

  But the moment she’d set eyes on him at the night’s gala ball—an event the special ambassador from Nandel could hardly be expected to miss—she’d lost her equilibrium. She’d put her foot in her mouth more than once, and her attention had wandered dangerously. She’d finally decided that for once, she would allow herself to bow out a little early, no matter how undiplomatic her exit might seem.

  Star’s eyes were full of concern. “Are you feeling ill, Your Majesty?” she asked. “I can send for a tonic if you’d like.”

  Ellin forced a smile. “No, no. I’m fine. I’m just tired tonight.” Her yawn was as forced as the smile, and it was instantly clear Star was unconvinced. Hoping she could avoid any further questioning, Ellin quickly exited the sitting room and headed for the dressing room so that Star could begin the long process of preparing her for bed.

  Of course the hasty exit gave Star further reason to believe something was wrong.

  “I’ve known you for a long time,” Star said as she began unpinning her bodice. “You are quite adept at hiding your feelings from others, but you can’t hide them as easily from me.” Star’s attention seemed entirely focused on her work as she spoke, and Ellin ordered herself not to be fooled by the evident lack of scrutiny. Star could read her reactions perfectly well without having to peer into her face. Ellin was actually surprised that Star hadn’t noticed her turmoil over the last few days.

  “I’m fine, Star. Really.” But even she could hear the faint rasp in her voice that made a liar out of her.

  Star laid aside a length of lacy trim she had removed from the bodice. Still she made no attempt at eye contact as her deft fingers removed even more pins. “I know there are things you can’t talk to me about.” She frowned. “Many things. But you know I can be trusted with secrets.”

  That was certainly true, for Star had actively helped Ellin arrange her trysts with Graesan, and Ellin had never once worried that her secret would be betrayed.

  Ellin gave her lady’s maid a wan smile as Star finally finished detaching the bodice and set it aside. “I would trust you implicitly with my own secrets,” Ellin said. “But some secrets aren’t mine to share.”

  This secret was definitely one of the latter. No matter how angry she might be with Zarsha.

  Star patted her shoulder affectionately, then began unlacing her stays. “You can tell me about it without sharing details. Something’s been eating at you for days. I didn’t ask because I assumed it was affairs of state that troubled you. But I recognize that look on your face tonight. If Zarsha has hurt you somehow, I can assure you he will still bear the signs of my wrath when he is old and toothless. If I allow him to live that long.”

  Ellin swallowed a laugh, even as she winced at the thought that she was so transparent.

  “Don’t worry,” Star soothed. “I can only see it because I know you so well. The men of your court likely haven’t noticed anything’s wrong, much less attributed your troubles to Zarsha of Nandel.”

  “So you mean to tell me I have a particular expression on my face reserved entirely for the troubles Zarsha causes me?”

  Star gave her a droll look. “Let’s just say I know troubles of the heart when I see them.”

  “Zarsha has no claim to my heart,” she protested too quickly, insisting to herself that it was true.

  “Yours may not be a classic romance, but I can plainly see you’ve given him at least a sliver of your heart over the course of your acquaintance. And I’d say that was only right and proper, seeing as he’s the man you’re going to marry.”

  Ellin shook her head. “That may no longer be the case.”

  The stays came free, allowing Ellin to draw in a deliciously deep breath. She closed her eyes and put her hand on her belly, concentrating on filling her lungs and finding her composure. Star respected her need for quiet, stifling the curiosity that no doubt had her burning to ask questions. Instead, she carefully removed Ellin’s skirts and underskirts, leaving her dressed in only her chemise.

  Star slipped a robe over her shoulders, and Ellin obediently slid her arms into the sleeves, shivering slightly as the cool silk settled over her skin. Her composure was still deeply hidden, but Ellin opened her eyes anyway and took her seat before the dressing table so that Star could begin working on her hair.

  “Is it an affair of state that has you questioning your future with Zarsha?” Star asked, removing the headdress and snood that had covered Ellin’s hair for the evening. “Or is it something more personal?”

  “You are very persistent,” Ellin grumbled, sure Star already knew the answer to her own question.

  Star laid her hands gently on Ellin’s shoulders, and their eyes met in the mirror. “You are very dear to me, and I don’t care if it’s improper for me to say so. I can see that you’re hurting, and I can’t pretend not to.”

  To Ellin’s surprise, there was a sheen of tears in Star’s eyes. Her heart squeezed with affection for her maid, who had at times during her youth served almost as a surrogate mother, when Ellin’s own mother had lacked sympathy for her daughter’s heartaches. Not that Star would be flattered by such a statement, as she was nowhere near old enough to be Ellin’s mother.

  Ellin reached up and covered one of Star’s hands with her own. “You are one of the most kindhearted people I’ve ever known,” she said, her own voice growing hoarse with tears she refused to shed. “I can’t tell you what happened between Zarsha and me, but I learned something about him that I’m having a hard time swallowing.”

  Star began unpinning her hair, perhaps hoping the semblance of normalcy would calm both their emotions. Then she asked exactly the question Ellin least wanted to face.

  “And if he had no claim on your heart, as you said, would whatever you’ve learned be hurting you quite so much?”

  A hint of a sob rose from somewhere deep in Ellin’s throat, and it took all her will to keep it contained. She knew Star would think no less of her if she broke down and cried—it wouldn’t have been the first time Star had comforted her through a bout of tears—but she refused to let Zarsha have that kind of power over her.

  “Maybe not,” she rasped. “But he has made it abundantly clear only a fool would trust him with her heart. I refuse to be a fool!”

  Ellin wanted to scream in frustration, as much with herself as with Zarsha. It was ridiculous of her to be heartsick over a relationship Zarsha had had in the past, even if that relationship had produced a child. Did she really expect a man of his age to be the male equivalent of a virgin bride? And it wasn’t as if she’d believed him when he’d claimed to love her.

  “I can’t pretend to be an expert on the subject,” Star said as she began brushing Ellin’s hair, “but from what I can see, love makes fools of us all, men and women alike. You can’t have all the pleasures of love without risking its pains.”

  Ellin crossed her arms. “I’ve had my fill of the pains already.”

  In the mirror, she saw Star shrug. “Did you prefer it when you were contracted to marry him against your will?”

  “Of course not!”

  “So you would prefer a husband to whom you might give your heart. Which means you must risk giving your heart if you are to have the kind of marriage you want.”

  Ellin avoided looking at herself in the mirror, not wishing to see the sour expression she no doubt wore. “Or maybe my father was right all along, and I should regard my marriage as nothing more than an affair of sta
te and leave romantic fantasies to those with better taste in men.”

  “Just because things didn’t work out with Graesan doesn’t mean you should give up on romance entirely. I wasn’t surprised that you outgrew Graesan, but Zarsha I thought was in every way your equal.”

  “I didn’t outgrow Graesan,” Ellin said peevishly.

  “He was a sweet young man who doted on you and showed you affection when few others in your life did. But he did not have the keen mind and imagination and courage you need in a husband. Zarsha has all of those things.”

  “And the sordid past to go with it.”

  “Says the queen who was sleeping with her secretary.”

  Ellin scowled, but it was hard to argue Star’s point. Not that that stopped her from trying anyway. “Zarsha knew about my past, but I didn’t know about his.”

  “He knew about it because you told him in the spirit of honesty so that you would not go to your marriage with secrets?” Star asked with false innocence.

  Ellin ground her teeth, for of course she hadn’t told him about her affair with Graesan. He had somehow learned of it on his own, and he had never once thrown it in her face. Then again, she and Graesan hadn’t had a child.

  “My point is,” Star continued, “that if you’re going to insist your husband be perfect, you will go to your deathbed a spinster. You have to know there are few men who would be suitable husbands for the Queen of Rhozinolm. Perhaps you should take another look at Zarsha’s actions with that perspective in mind. You have choices now you would not have had a year ago, but they are not unlimited. Zarsha may have hurt you, but he’s also been a friend, and a loyal one at that.”

  Ellin heaved a sigh, for of course Star was right. Her choices were few, and if not for Zarsha’s help and friendship, she might have ended up forcibly married to her cousin Tamzin. It was not reasonable of her to be so angry or so hurt.

  A little of the tension eased out of her as she decided that just this once, she didn’t have to be reasonable. Maybe tomorrow, or the next day, or even next week, she would set aside her childish hurt feelings and focus on her responsibilities as a queen. But for now, in the privacy of her own dressing room with only Star to witness it, she would indulge in a good, old-fashioned sulk. And she would not feel guilty about it.

  * * *

  —

  Lady Vondelmai had insisted upon overseeing the bloodline test that Chanlix was tasked with performing, but it was clear she had done so out of a sense of duty to her stepdaughter and not due to her eagerness to act as witness. She could not be any more obvious about her discomfort with the practice of women’s magic had she tried. Her whole body was stiff, her arms crossed over her chest and her shoulders hunched as if she was trying to protect herself from some taint that hovered in the Academy’s air. Chanlix would have been amused at the lady’s prudishness had it not been for the tension that roiled in her gut.

  She was perfectly confident in the illusion spell with which she infused the vial that would be used for testing, but she was a great deal less confident in Kailee’s ability to switch out the second sample that Lady Vondelmai meant to send on to Rhozinolm via flier for confirmation of the first test. The girl claimed she could do it, but it seemed a tricky endeavor for any girl who was not a practiced pickpocket—much less one who could not see.

  Then there was the pressure of Tynthanal’s rigid and poorly disguised unhappiness. He made a gallant effort to speak warmly to Kailee despite his turmoil, but Lady Vondelmai apparently feared her stepdaughter would say something inappropriate and spoke over her at every opportunity. Which did no one’s nerves any good, although Kailee endured it with good-natured aplomb, no doubt used to it.

  Hoping to get the procedure over with as quickly as possible, Chanlix beckoned for Kailee to give her her hand. For a moment, it looked like Lady Vondelmai was going to remonstrate, as if the thought of a former abigail touching her stepdaughter would somehow sully her, but she held her peace.

  Kailee obediently held out her hand—drawing yet another scowl from Vondelmai, who had to notice that her blind stepdaughter had seen the gesture thanks to the halo of Rho that surrounded Chanlix’s hand—and Chanlix pricked her finger. Kailee neither winced nor made any sound of discomfort as Chanlix squeezed a drop of her blood first into one vial, then into the second.

  Despite his departure from the military, Tynthanal continued to perform the sword drills that had been part of his daily ritual since adolescence. His callused hands were reluctant to give up the needed blood—and Chanlix was too squeamish to poke him very hard—so he took the needle from her hand and jabbed himself with more force than necessary to get the blood flowing. His blood mingled with Kailee’s in first one vial, then the other. He held one of those vials out to Vondelmai and one to Chanlix. Vondelmai wrapped her vial in a handkerchief for safekeeping.

  Chanlix withdrew a couple of drops of bloodline testing potion from a bottle, then opened her Mindseye to add the Rho needed to complete the spell. She heard Vondelmai fidgeting with the vial and the handkerchief, taking a needlessly long time to secure them so that she need not see Chanlix with her Mindseye open.

  Chanlix suppressed a smile, for she’d been mildly concerned that Lady Vondelmai might notice her reaching for more than one mote of Rho so that she could activate the illusion spell in the vial at the same time as she activated the bloodline spell. Closing her Mindseye, she swirled the potion and the blood around in the clear vial.

  Like all the members of Alysoon’s royal council, Chanlix at all times wore a ring with an active illusion-shield spell in it—it seemed a wise precaution in a land where new illusion spells were developed at such a rapid pace—and so she did not expect to see her illusion work. She fully expected that both she and Tynthanal would see the fluid in the vial remain the stubborn shade of watery red that said the two bloodlines could not form healthy children together, which meant that she had to watch Vondelmai to see when the illusion took effect.

  At Vondelmai’s brisk nod, Chanlix looked at the vial in her hand once more—and almost dropped it. Across the desk from her, Tynthanal’s face lost a touch of its healthy color, and his eyes widened.

  Sucking in a deep breath—and trying for all she was worth to keep her shock from showing on her face—Chanlix stared at the vial full of milky white fluid.

  “I will send the second sample to Rhozinolm immediately,” Lady Vondelmai said. Chanlix had the impression the woman would have been just as happy to forego the second test and have the wedding before the day was out. Mostly because she herself was so eager to leave Women’s Well and return to the world that she knew in Rhozinolm. There was certainly no evidence that she would miss her stepdaughter.

  Chanlix felt the weight of Kailee’s eyes on her from behind her veil and had to remind herself that the girl could not see her face or read her expression. However, Kailee likely could read the results of the test, for the mingling of those blood samples and the bloodline spell would have created a small burst of Rho, indicative of the potential for new life.

  Kailee’s joy was plain to see, as was Tynthanal’s dismay, but Lady Vondelmai was too self-centered to notice the rioting emotions of those around her. She quickly steered her stepdaughter out of the office, no doubt in a hurry to retreat from the den of iniquity, leaving Chanlix and Tynthanal alone together.

  Without a word, Chanlix opened her Mindseye once more, glancing at her illusion-dispelling ring to make certain its spell was active.

  It was.

  Then for good measure, she deactivated the illusion spell in the vial by removing its Rho. She was not surprised when she opened her eyes to see that the liquid in the vial was still white.

  All this time, she had assumed her bloodline tests with Tynthanal had failed because of his condition; never once had she considered that she herself might be the problem. Tears burned her eyes, and her throat closed
so tight she could barely speak. She blinked rapidly and tried not to let her devastation show in her voice.

  “It seems you weren’t the only reason our bloodline tests failed,” she said, then had to swallow hard to keep from crying. “Perhaps I am too old already to bring a healthy new life into this world.” Her monthlies were still regular, but there was no question that she was of an age when children were harder to conceive. Or perhaps she had been barren all her life.

  Tynthanal looked at her with great tenderness and sympathy. He rose from his chair and came around her desk, drawing her to her feet and into an embrace. She clung to him, breathing in his comforting scent while refusing to allow her tears to spill forth. “I’m so sorry, dearest,” he murmured into her hair.

  There was a small, mean part of her that questioned just how sorry he really was—it was clear that he hadn’t much wanted the bastard child she’d been so yearning to give him—but even in her pain, she kept that nasty voice silent. And she reminded herself once again that she was the Grand Magus of Women’s Well, that she loved and was loved by a man whom she never could have dreamed of being worthy of while she’d toiled in the Abbey of Aaltah. In the grand scheme of things, despite her disappointment, Chanlix had very little to complain about.

  But for once, that very reasonable argument did little to ease her soul.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  More than once on the journey to Women’s Well, Mairah had cursed King Khalvin’s impatience. She had not traveled outside the city of Khalwell since she was thirteen, and even then it had only been a brief jaunt to a cousin’s estate, a mere three days’ travel from home. She had never even seen the sea except in paintings and books, much less gotten onto a ship and traveled across it. Never could she have guessed how much she would love the experience, how deeply she would savor standing on the deck while the ship cut through the waves, the wind whipping through her robes as she breathed deep of the salt air and watched the gulls float above them in escort.