Wooing the Witch Queen (Queens of Villainy #1)

Chapter 6

6

Naturally, Lorelei’s fae portals were every bit as sparkly and excessive as everything else about her. Saskia only just managed to hold on to the shreds of her patience as she watched her unwanted visitors ride their haughty gryphon steeds into the rainbow-colored doorway that Lorelei had summoned for their departure. As the portal finally snapped closed, Saskia drew a deep breath of relief—and inadvertently breathed a dozen leftover sparkles into her nostrils.

Ugh! This was why she never invited guests into her home.

Sneezing uncontrollably, Saskia turned away from the final shimmering remnants of the portal and started for the closed parlor door and the delicious freedom of her waiting laboratory beyond.

Just before she could reach for the door handle, she was hit by a deeply unwelcome realization: Mirjana needs to know the news they brought.

Closing her eyes, she rocked to a reluctant halt. She should have ordered more troll coffee after all.

Unfortunately, she’d learned one thing from all those years of trying to avoid her uncle’s assassins: putting off unpleasantness only made it worse. So, she turned her steps and went directly to the tower study she had claimed for those unavoidable moments when she had to either focus on the tedious paperwork that came with rulership or—even worse—face her former lover.

As she rounded the last winding curve of the narrow stone staircase, she reminded herself grimly that she had named Mirjana First Minister of Kitvaria for good reasons. It was only difficult to remember those reasons when she had to endure one of these meetings.

A fresh pile of notices was already stacked on top of Saskia’s heavy oaken desk when she arrived, every one of them marked URGENT in Mirjana’s elegant lettering. Saskia pushed them to one side and flicked open the clasp of the heavy rectangular jewelry case that had lain safely hidden behind that pile. As she pulled the case open, she revealed an oval mirror set inside its lid, as well as the Great Seal of Kitvaria cradled safely within.

“ Finally. ” Mirjana’s face appeared in the glass of the mirror a scant minute later. As usual, her glossy brown hair was upswept in a lovely waterfall arrangement that glinted with tastefully hidden jet beads above her long, creamy neck… which Saskia knew to be just as soft as the silk Mirjana loved to wear. She looked, as she always did, far more queenly than Saskia had ever felt—and her gaze moved with its usual swift appraisal across Saskia’s own rumpled appearance. “Is this the first time you’ve stepped out of your laboratory all week?”

“Actually, I just hosted a royal meeting. The Queens of Balravia and Nornne—”

“Without any cosmetics or jewelry? Not even a necklace?” Mirjana demanded. “You do realize—”

“They weren’t here to trade fashion tips.” Safely out of sight, Saskia’s fingers rattled against the desk. How on earth had she ever imagined Mirjana’s endless critiques to be helpful when she’d been young and in love? Had she simply been so desperate for romance, after years spent hidden with her protectors, that she’d fooled herself into thinking of Mirjana’s lectures as gifts of affection? “They brought news I thought you’d want to hear as soon as possible.”

Mirjana’s perfectly plucked eyebrows rose. “Is it, by any chance, related to any of the urgent missives I’ve sent you over the past four days?”

Swiftly, Saskia slid the unopened pile of letters even farther from the mirror’s line of sight. “It’s related to Estarion. The Archduke—”

“Has talked the Emperor into making your uncle a Knight of the Imperial Order and declared him an official paladin of Divine Elva. I know . Why do you think I’ve been begging you to return to the capital?”

“ What? ” Every other prickling discomfort was suddenly devoured by a raging storm in Saskia’s head. “The Archduke made my uncle an Imperial Knight and a paladin? Blessed by an actual goddess ?”

“We-e-ell…” Mirjana shrugged. “Likely, the goddess herself wasn’t involved. The Archduke is a modern man, you know—if he’s like most politicians, he’ll give more lip service to the pantheon than actual belief. I doubt he bothered to pray to Divine Elva himself before making that public proclamation. Still, religious titles do matter to the public as a whole, so—”

“He just told the world that my uncle is a perfect symbol of manly honor and was blessed by a goddess after murdering my parents. ” Dimly, Saskia was aware that her voice was rising… and it wasn’t alone. All around the office, papers and books were lifting off their surfaces, carried by the surge in her emotions into a whirling vortex centered on her chair. “Over the last eighteen years, my uncle bled Kitvaria’s treasury dry for his own selfish profit. He tried to kill me and everyone I ever cared for, no matter how many times I told him I didn’t want the throne…”

“And now you have it at last, for which we’re all thankful.” Mirjana’s voice cut through the storm: clear, precise, and controlled, as the First Minister of Kitvaria had to be. “But I need you here at the capital to keep it from now on, not hiding from your responsibilities any longer.”

“What are you talking about?” Saskia gave her head a swift shake as she fought for control, breathing hard. She couldn’t quite bring herself to let go of the whirling storm of paper in the air, but she wrapped her fingers around her desk to ground herself, and she forced the curve of flight into a wider arc, pushing the storm out of range of her First Minister’s judgmental gaze. “I’m not hiding from anything! I just spent weeks on the border fighting for our country. The experiments I’m doing now on silversand and hellbane could make all the difference if the Empire ever manages to break through my barrier and invade again.”

“Yes, but the Empire isn’t the only thing you have to worry about.” Mirjana’s voice tightened with barely restrained impatience. “In case you’ve actually forgotten, you have a whole nation of citizens, now, looking to you for direction and protection.”

“Which is why I appointed you First Minister.” Saskia focused on steadying her breathing and slowing the whirl of paper all around her. “We may have had our own personal disagreements”—to say the least—“but I trust your judgement when it comes to politics. You know I don’t need to interfere with every little day-to-day decision. As long as we discuss all of the larger issues, which we can do perfectly well from here…”

“Being an actual queen can’t be done behind the scenes!” Mirjana’s mask of patience shattered as she snapped out the words. “After all these years, you still don’t understand or even care how ordinary, nonmagical humans work, do you? They’re reading your uncle’s weaseling complaints in the newspapers and hearing all about his Imperial honors; they need to see you in public, smiling and waving and keeping them all safe.”

Saskia barely repressed a full-body cringe at the idea. Still, she fought to keep her tone steady. “I am keeping them safe, and I always will. If what you wanted in a queen was a smiling ninny you could tote around like a puppet, merely to wave at the crowds—”

“What I wanted, I gave up on getting from you four years ago.” Mirjana enunciated the words with just as cold a precision as she’d used in the final battle she referred to now—the moment their three-year-long romance had ended with bitter finality. “Yet I still, somehow, keep hoping that you’ll finally start caring enough about your people— all of your people, not only the inhuman ones—to make an effort and become a true queen for their sake.”

Enough. Saskia’s grip tightened around her desk, and the whirl of paper stilled in midair. She wasn’t a teenager anymore, desperate for affection and approval from the most beautiful girl she’d ever met. The vision of herself she’d always seen reflected in Mirjana’s eyes—half-feral, heedless of everything that ought to matter, and always, inevitably, in need of instruction— did not have to be her truth as an adult.

“I thank you for your report,” she said tightly. “I’m sure we’ll meet again soon to discuss other topics.”

Face tightening, Mirjana took a deep breath and lifted her pointed chin. “As you say, Your Majesty. But remember: your uncle has spent nearly two decades telling everyone you’re a monster. Hiding from your own citizens now tells them you think he’s right.”

Argh! Saskia lunged to slam the jewelry case closed… but Mirjana had already vanished from the mirror by the time she touched it.

Panting, Saskia glared at her own wild-eyed reflection as papers and books showered and thumped onto the floor around her. So much for proving her wrong.

She hadn’t even managed to tell Mirjana about the missing Archduke.

… If he even was missing. Could he still be issuing public proclamations if that were true? She should have pressed Mirjana for more details while she had the chance.

She certainly wasn’t about to call back her First Minister now… but fortunately, Saskia had someone else she could consult. After all, why bother to hire a dark wizard without making use of all his skills?

With a determined swish of her crimson velvet skirts, Saskia abandoned the storm-tossed office and started down the narrow, tightly curving tower staircase. She was only halfway down when the sound of commotion and uproar from the library level reached her ears.

Damn it, this was why she’d always hated dealing with dark wizards! Muttering a particularly filthy goblin curse, Saskia lifted her skirts an extra half inch and hastened her steps the rest of the way down and through the richly decorated velvet-and-bronze maze of side chambers. She burst into the library’s antechamber just in time to see Morlokk stepping out of the library itself, a thoughtful frown on his craggy face, while Mrs. Haglitz steamed furiously across the carpet towards it, flanked by two worried-looking kitchen maids.

A mini-flock of Saskia’s crows swirled with cawing impatience outside the Morlokk-blocked doorway, and Saskia gave up the idea of asking her new librarian for help.

“Very well,” she said wearily. “What has he done? And will I need to take care of the body before I can finally return to work?”

“Your Majesty.” Morlokk gave her the same pained and sorrowful look that had reduced her to squirming guilt every single time he’d used it on her as a teenager. Unfortunately, the effect hadn’t softened over the years. “Do you truly imagine your household staff too incompetent to manage a single corpse without assistance?”

“Of course I don’t.” Wincing, Saskia lowered her shoulders, which she had braced for battle, and let the soft, heavy skirts of her gown drop with a whisper of surrender to the floor. “I apologize for the insinuation. I’ve been having a bit of a… discussion with my First Minister ever since my visitors left, and—”

“ Harrumph. ” Mrs. Haglitz rounded on her like a warship abruptly redirected. “If that pert-nosed snip still thinks she can tell you what to do, after all these years…!”

“Everything’s back under control now,” Saskia said with grim determination. “I only came to consult with my new librarian about a small, insignificant matter—but I’m happy to deal instead with whatever trouble he’s caused for all of you this morning.” Really, it would be quite cathartic to let out her raging temper on a deserving source. Remembering some previous dark wizards’ tantrums and the way they’d treated her staff… “It would be a pleasure, believe me.”

“Well, then, you can tell him for me that he won’t be skipping any of my household’s good meals, now or ever!” Mrs. Haglitz crossed her arms, and her kitchen maids leapt backwards to cluster behind her short, broad back for shelter. “ He sent me a note, carried all the way to my office, if you can believe it. A handwritten note, saying Cook and I needn’t worry about any more of his meals today as he was so hard at work!”

“Ah…” Lost, Saskia looked to Morlokk for aid.

He stepped forward, and her crows shot past him, squawking their triumph. “I assure you, Mrs. Haglitz, the Sinistro’s message was not intended as an insult. I believe he was, in fact, attempting a kindness in being considerate of your and Cook’s time and energy.”

“As if we found feeding this castle to be an inconvenience? Or does he think neither of us can manage it?!”

Oh, darkness. “I’ll make sure he understands the truth,” Saskia said firmly, “and I won’t let him offend you again, Mrs. Haglitz. But…” Frowning, she looked past Morlokk to the open library doorway, from which even more squawking from her crows could be heard. “What’s all the rest of this uproar about, then?”

“Ah.” Morlokk frowned thoughtfully. “It’s a technological issue, actually.”

“A what ?” Her eyebrows shot upwards. Since when had any dark wizards cared about technology? Far too much of that was touched with iron for any magical being’s comfort, starting with those giant, malevolent trails of iron that Emperor Otto’s workers were stretching across the Empire for his new railways.

“He has begun work on the cataloguing of your library,” Morlokk said, “and it seems that he’s in need of a particular sort of pen that isn’t available here in the castle.”

“From a particular type of feather, you mean?” Crow feathers were by far the most convenient, as Saskia regularly found them in her flock’s wake—but she wasn’t surprised that a smugly sophisticated dark wizard would demand something more challenging to procure. “What kind of exotic quill does he imagine he needs just to write a list or two? A phoenix feather? Or…”

Wait. Brightening, she glanced around the antechamber. “Would a gryphon feather do?” Surely, after all that earlier grappling, at least one or two feathers must have been shed.

“No, what he wants is called a fountain pen. ” Morlokk sounded just as baffled as she felt. “Apparently, the first model was developed just last year. Sinistro says they’re all the rage in the Empire’s capital cities.”

“Well, he’s not in the Empire anymore, and he’d do well to remember it.” Narrowing her eyes, Saskia started for the library door. “Don’t worry about this problem, Morlokk. I’ll take care of it myself.”

She found her new librarian standing at a makeshift table in the middle of the room, surrounded by the circling and still loudly squawking mini-flock of crows, his face covered by his silver moon-mask but the hood of his cloak tossed carelessly back over his shoulders. Of course, it was impossible to read his expression behind the mask, but his head was tilted with surprisingly courteous attention as the birds all jabbered excitedly at him and showered an assortment of random items into his outstretched bare hands and onto the table before him.

Buttons, ribbons, colorful threads, coins and jewels and… aha. So, that was what had happened to her missing pearl earring!

Mirjana had given that respectably pale and discreet pair of earrings to her early in their courtship, as part of her determined attempt to civilize Saskia’s appearance and manners. Saskia had dutifully worn them to please her lover, at the time, and worn them again at her rare royal appearances on her First Minister’s instructions. However, she certainly hadn’t felt any regret when she’d discovered the loss of one of them from her jewelry box last month.

Respectable and discreet would never describe anything she wanted for herself.

Still, confusion temporarily overtook her ire as she studied the random assortment of offerings. “What in the world did you ask them to bring you?”

The wizard’s shoulders—which appeared to be high and lean—twitched underneath the massive folds of his dark cloak at the sound of her voice. Still, his response was as unexpectedly patient as his attitude towards her crows had been. “I believe they’re attempting to help me build a new pen. It is very kind of them to share their treasures, although I’m not sure exactly how to make use of them.”

“Ah, yes. Because you want a fountain pen, even though no one here has even heard of them before.” Saskia crossed her arms fiercely, remembering her purpose. “You don’t think an ordinary quill pen is good enough for a dark wizard?”

“ Not when it comes to the safety of your books.” Voice hardening, he drew himself up into a looming figure of shadows. “I’m sure you must have noticed how delicate a good many of these volumes really are.”

Saskia had to suppress a grimace as she remembered the way Lorelei had tossed aside that old book earlier, haphazardly scattering pages. “No one has looked after the books in this room in two decades.”

Her uncle had made use of his own hired dark wizards when he’d usurped the throne from her parents, but he’d always made a political point of remaining uninvolved with magic himself. This room had once been Saskia’s most beloved childhood playground, but during the first seven years after Yaroslav’s usurpation, when she’d been held prisoner in this castle, she had been firmly barred from its library. Only her uncle’s dark wizards had been allowed to use it—and they’d never taken any care with their stolen magical resources.

Her new librarian nodded firmly in response. “A fountain pen is far more effective than a quill pen for this sort of delicate cataloguing. It carries ink in its own reservoir, so it needn’t be dipped into open bottles that may be tipped over and spill, ruining your ancient manuscripts.”

“That makes no sense.” Saskia’s brows drew together as scientific curiosity took the fore. “How can it be safe to keep your ink inside the pen? Wouldn’t it fall out and leak all over everything?”

“Ah, but it’s the air pressure inside a fountain pen that holds the ink in place.” As his words quickened, his hands rose to gesture an enthusiastic accompaniment. Free of last night’s gloves, his fingers were long, fair-skinned, and shapely, drawing compellingly graceful arcs through the air. “It’s an astonishing new technological development. I’ve—that is, I’ve heard that some Imperial archdukes have been amassing whole collections of new models produced by various different craftsmen across the Empire.”

“Hmm.” Saskia watched his gesturing right hand arc dangerously close to her youngest male crow, Oskar, who was veering excitedly towards him with yet another useless button offering.

Rather than batting or smacking the bird away as any other dark wizard of her acquaintance would have done, the librarian halted his gesture just in time. He even turned over his hand to offer Oskar his palm in a careful—almost apologetic—gesture.

“Perhaps we can find a way to acquire one of those fountain pens for you after all,” Saskia murmured.

He certainly deserved something for worrying about her books and being kind to her noisy, demanding pets—and Oskar, now perched on the table directly in front of him, was now blatantly nuzzling into his hand in a shameless quest for affection. Saskia’s lips twitched as she watched her new librarian hesitate… and then give in.

How often was any sinister, masked dark wizard approached for cuddling by a bird?

Oskar’s smug gurgle of delight as those long, sensitive fingers stroked gently across his feathers could have all too easily been mistaken for a feline purr.

“Ahem!” Saskia covered her helpless smile with a forced cough. “I actually came about a different matter. I want you to look out for a particular spell as you sort through these old spellbooks.”

“Of course.” His masked head tilted, but he didn’t stop petting Oskar, who was strutting in place with pride while the other crows reacted with outraged jeers. “Does it have a name?”

“Probably.” Saskia’s lips twisted with frustration. It had been far too many years since she’d looked carefully through any written spells—but there hadn’t been any available in her hiding place in the woods, where Morlokk and Mrs. Haglitz had secreted her once she’d finally managed to escape her uncle’s prison. As with most witches, her own magic worked most powerfully on a physical, instinctive level, although she preferred to keep it leashed as tightly as possible. Fortunately, her experiments in blending carefully controlled bursts of her own power with magically viable ingredients in her laboratory had been extremely productive.

Still, dark wizards valued written spellcraft above all, and she hated admitting to ignorance in front of anyone. That irritation lent her words a snap as she continued, “That’s your job to work out. Unless you happen to know this spell already? I’m looking for a way to locate a particular person, without anything useful on hand.”

The wizard’s hand stilled on Oskar’s back. “Anything… useful?”

Saskia shrugged impatiently. “No drops of blood, no hair, no precious belongings, no relatives, none of his most personal secrets to whisper into the wind and track him down… you know.”

“Of course.” Between the silver curve of his round mask and the messily tied knot of his black silk cravat, she glimpsed a flex of fair skin, shifted by his swallow. “Do you at least know this man’s name?”

“Naturally.” But she wouldn’t share that now—not when she’d seen how badly her librarian had reacted to even the slightest mention of Estarion’s hated archduke last night. “I’m sure we can clip a few newspaper pictures, too, if that’s needed for the spell. The man is such an egotist, I can’t count how many portraits he’s posed for across the years.”

Neither, honestly, could she blame the newspapers that splashed those portraits across the continent; that wistful, fine-boned poet’s face was any portraitist’s fantasy. No doubt, more than a few viewers were still foolish enough to sigh over Archduke Felix’s dreamy portraits despite all he’d ordered done since his ascension. Saskia had always found it particularly embittering that so much delicate beauty had been granted to a man with such a vicious will for dominance.

Squirming and hopping on the table with frustration, Oskar loudly protested the cessation of his petting—and Saskia found her lips curving against her will as she saw the gentle way her librarian’s hand still rested against the crow’s back.

“What is your name, anyway?” she asked abruptly.

He reared back as if she’d slapped him, his hand falling away from Oskar’s feathers. “I beg your pardon?”

“I can’t just think of you as Sinistro.” She had, of course, with the last few dark wizards she’d hired—but they had been different. She had never wanted to give them the gift of her attention for long enough to remember their individual, irritating identities.

“Ah. Of course.” That tiny patch of skin flexed again, distractingly. “My name is… Fabian.”

“ Fabian. ” She tested the single name on her tongue. No doubt it was a professional moniker, taken on at the start of his magical career, but it suited him all the same. She nodded as she stepped away. “Well, Fabian, I trust you’ll find that spell for me as soon as possible.”

“Of course.” His chest rose and fell beneath his cloak. “I’ll be certain to keep an eye out for it in the course of my cataloguing.”

“And I’ll ask Morlokk to see about finding you a fountain pen,” she promised, “but now, it’s time for both of us to return to work.”

As she turned away, her gaze fell on the fraying velvet couch closest to the window. A memory flashed across her vision, bright and bittersweet: a long-ago afternoon spent curled up on that vividly blue new couch. She’d been happily playing with her dolls, utterly convinced that she was working just as hard as her mother, who sat on the facing couch with her curling black hair spilling across her shoulders and her wire-framed spectacles balanced on the tip of her nose, surrounded by notes from her many ethnographic journeys and immersed in creating epic new spellwork.

Only a flash, and then the memory was gone, replaced by the faded reality before Saskia’s adult eyes…

But for the first time since she’d repossessed this castle, she found herself thinking that she might not mind spending more of her own time in the library, from now on.