Chapter 8
T o my relief, the banquet ended shortly after the imperial messenger departed. General Clovis commandeered several carriages and drove our little group of travelers to his home in the capital’s suburbs. The other Wind-Walkers were quartered at the legionary headquarters.
Jacinthe, Menelaus, and I were given a carriage to ourselves, in deference to our royal status.
On the drive over, I stressed the need for us to avoid scandalizing the general and his wife. Menelaus and Jacinthe both reluctantly agreed that the men in our party should stay in separate guest quarters for tonight.
After my initial shock, I’d reconciled myself to Jacinthe’s highly unconventional arrangements with her four guardians. But I knew that most people would react badly if they knew the truth.
Of course, the same was true of my forbidden relationship with a Wind-Walker, even if he was a king. We’d have to be discreet in public, a challenge for my impetuous mate.
I wondered how I’d be received at the palace tomorrow when I arrived with my Wind-Walker lover and the granddaughter Mother considered a half-human abomination.
When we arrived at the general’s opulent mansion, his wife, Lady Livia, greeted us with genuine warmth and installed us in a pair of richly furnished bedrooms on the top floor.
While I waited for a promised bath to arrive, I opened the double doors leading from my room out to a loggia. I found Jacinthe leaning over the railing, watching fireworks light up the sky over the river.
This high up, I could see over the mansion’s garden walls to the wide boulevard beyond. Torches and bonfires turned the street into a torrent of dancing gold and orange light, and citizens celebrated Duke Beltrán’s downfall to the pounding beat of drums and wild skirling of flutes.
“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” I inhaled deeply, the mingled scents bringing back memories. “I’d forgotten how much I missed this city.”
Jacinthe turned to me. “Mama, are you nervous about tomorrow?” she asked, reaching for my hand.
It was strange to see how my daughter had turned into a confident and mature woman during our time apart.
“Terrified,” I confessed. Eighteen months ago, I wouldn’t have admitted my true feelings to her. “I never thought I’d see Mother again, much less dressed like… this, ” I added wryly.
I ran my hand down the travel-worn green silk rags that had once been a gown fit for a duchess.
Jacinthe grinned, plucking at the wide skirts of her stained gold velvet. “We’re quite the pair, aren’t we?”
I laughed, but more from nerves than amusement. “Oh, my dearest girl. What will Mother think when she sees us dressed like beggars?”
“She’ll see her daughter,” Jacinthe said firmly. “And, hopefully, her granddaughter.”
I pulled her into a fierce embrace, kissing her braided red hair. “If she doesn’t accept you, then I don’t care if she acknowledges me .”
“We’ll just have to hope for the best.” Jacinthe returned my hug with equal strength. “And if she tries anything we don’t like, remember that we have an army of Wind-Walkers at our back. King Menelaus will burn the capital to the ground if he thinks anyone here disrespected his mate.”
Oh dear . I hadn’t considered that possibility. “Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that. It would be a pity to destroy the city right after we worked so hard to save it.”
“Your Highness,” a maid called from inside my room. “We’ve brought the tub and hot water for you.”
“Divine Mother be thanked!” I exclaimed, and Jacinthe laughed.
She made a shooing gesture. “Go bathe, Mama. I’ll see you in the morning.”
* * *
After scrubbing away the grime of the long flight and the battle, I soaked for a long time before donning a borrowed nightgown and crawling into the welcoming embrace of the soft bed.
Despite my bone-deep exhaustion, I lay awake for longer than I expected in the unfamiliar surroundings. I missed Menelaus. We’d scarcely spent more than an hour or two apart since our reunion, and I’d slept in his arms every night since then.
When I finally fell asleep, I found myself back on Beltrán’s flagship.
The cabin is shrouded in darkness, with only faint light filtering through the porthole. I lay on the hard mattress, stiff with terrified anticipation, every sense on high alert.
Then a sudden creak of the floorboards breaks the silence. A faint reek of musky cologne reaches my nose. My heart begins pounding. I know what is coming next, and try to roll away.
Icy hands clamp around my wrists, pinning them to the bed.
“Jonquil, my sweet.” It’s Beltrán’s voice, but oddly distorted.
I don’t want to open my eyes. But I don’t have a choice.
Beltrán de Norhas bends over me. He’s pale and naked… and erect.
Below his jaw, a wide slash, the edges black with dried blood, gapes across his throat like a second mouth.
“Did you think you could escape me so easily, Highness?” He bends to kiss me with slack, icy lips.
I can’t move. I can’t even scream. When I try, only a faint whimper escapes my throat.
Beltrán puts one knee on the bed. His stiff cock presses against my bare hip.
And I realize I’m naked, too.
“Did you think you could escape me? You’re mine,” he whispers, grinning down at me with blood-stained teeth. “You’ll always be mine.” An icy hand dives between my legs, parting them. “Now, be a good girl and show me you love me—”
“Jonquil!”
Beltrán and the ship both vanished.
I blinked, bewildered, and found myself in an unfamiliar bedchamber with embroidered hangings and the floor-to-ceiling windows.
Where am I? Where did the ship go?
Someone shifted on the bed next to me, and I froze.
“My mate? Are you awake now?” Not Beltrán’s voice, but Menelaus. Relief flooded me.
It took me another moment to remember I was in General Clovis’ guest room. Menelaus sat on the edge of the bed, watching me with concern.
“You were having a bad dream.” His deep voice pushed away the last vestiges of my nightmare. “You’re safe.”
Safe . I wanted so badly to believe it.
But my body still quaked from the suffocating intensity of that too-real dream.
“W-what are you doing here?” Hadn’t the general’s staff housed all the men downstairs?
Menelaus’ thick fingers brushed lightly over my damp forehead and cheeks. “I was outside, guarding your room, and heard you cry out.”
I fought to control my breathing, still fast and uneven, as Menelaus continued to watch me. His golden eyes, so fierce in battle, were tender now.
Beltrán de Norhas was dead . I’d seen his corpse, even touched it. How could he still terrify me like this?
I turned my face away, ashamed. In my adult life before Beltrán, I’d never been the weak one, never the one who needed protecting. I’d been the strong one, who fought for my daughters and sacrificed for them.
Now, as Menelaus lay down and wrapped his arms around me, it was humbling to know that he thought of me as someone weak enough to need protection.
He gathered me close to his bare chest and held me. I nestled closer, fighting the aftereffects of the nightmare and drinking in his strength.
As always, his nearness was a kind of torture. I lay against him, torn between the need for comfort and the knowledge that every touch promised him something I couldn’t deliver.
“You must wonder if you’ll ever have your mate back,” I commented bitterly.
The duke was dead. We’d finally defeated him. So why was I still his prisoner? Even the strength and warmth of Menelaus’ arms couldn’t shield me from my continuing captivity.
Menelaus’ steady heartbeat should have comforted me, but the suffocating weight of panic lingered, curling around me like smoke. “I know I will,” he said. “I’m willing to wait as long as it takes.”
But what if he has to wait forever? How long until he realizes I’m too broken to mend?
Beltrán might be dead, but his vile compulsion still worked its evil, making me panic every time I tried making love with Menelaus. My chest ached with the futility of it.
“His death should have set me free,” I said, my voice breaking. “Instead, he still has me trapped.”
“You will be free,” Menelaus told me. His large hands, hot with the fires that ran through his veins, framed my face. His golden eyes stared deep into mine, willing me to believe. “You just need time to heal.”
But what if I couldn’t? What if nothing could break Beltrán’s last hold on me?
I lay in Menelaus’ arms, even now fighting the panic that gathered at his nearness. “I want to believe you,” I whispered.
His fingers traced my cheek, burning a path of warmth. “You should,” he insisted. “I won’t let anything keep us apart.”
He sounded so sure. So determined. But I couldn’t imagine ever being wholly myself again.
Is this my life from now on? Loving Menelaus, longing for him, yet never able to hold him close?
“I wouldn’t blame you,” I said, my voice thin and brittle, “if you decide you need a mate who can actually function. A mate who will be as loyal to you as you’ve been to me, not someone who married someone else and had three children by him.”
Menelaus’ body turned to granite against mine. It took a long moment for him to reply, and I knew my words had thrust deep, like a poisoned dagger.
When he finally spoke, his tone was sharp with anger.
“Do you really believe I’d abandon you because of what you endured? Because of what you did to survive when I wasn’t there to protect you, my mate?” He rose on his elbow and took my chin in his hand, forcing me to hold his gaze. “Jonquil, my heart. You’re wounded. Wounds take time to heal—you know that better than I. But never think I’d leave you. It insults my honor.”
My heart twisted painfully, and I struggled to swallow past the sudden knot in my throat.
“You’re my mate,” he said. “I’ll never desert you, no matter how long it takes for you to heal.”
I breathed shakily, unable to speak. I hadn’t realized how much I needed him to say it until his words filled the hollow spaces inside me.
Menelaus shifted his hand to cup my cheek. His touch was firm but gentle, and it burned against my skin like lava. “I won’t leave you,” he said again, “so don’t you give up either.”
A tremor ran through me, part anguish, part gratitude. My fingers tangled in the sheets, too shaky to reach for him the way I wanted to.
“I can’t remember what it feels like to be free,” I confessed. “I’m terrified, Menelaus.”
He leaned down and kissed my forehead. “What if you sought a healer’s aid?” His tone was carefully neutral. “There’s no shame in asking for help if you need it.”
Hope exploded inside me like the fireworks from earlier.
“The Temple of Limnis,” I said, thinking aloud. “She’s the goddess of transitions and passages between states of being. She oversees both healing and death, and other kinds of changes as well. Her temple has mage-healers who specialize in unusual injuries, even ones to the spirit. If—if things go well with my interview at the palace tomorrow morning, they might be able to help me.”
I’d visited the temple several times as a student, as part of the mage-healer curriculum at the imperial academy. But I’d never imagined needing the aid of Limnis’ priests and priestesses for myself.
“Yes, visit the temple healers. And don’t worry about tomorrow. All will be well,” he declared. “If your clutch-mother doesn’t welcome you back into her aerie, you have a place in mine, as my mate and queen-consort.”
“I’m sure your presence will make everything better,” I said wryly, trying to imagine Mother’s reaction to my unexpected return with Menelaus in tow.
It would serve Mother right if she saw that her plans to control me and separate us failed.
“I’ll accompany you to the palace in the morning. I won’t let any harm befall you or our hatchling.”
His reassuring words swept away my misgivings and gave me hope. “Thank you, my love.”
“You need your strength for the meeting,” Menelaus said, curling protectively around me. “Sleep, Jonquil. I’ll keep the nightmares away.”
After that nightmare, I didn’t think I could fall asleep again.
But the warmth of his body lulled me. My eyes drifted shut, my muscles uncoiling with relief. I let myself believe his promise as I sank into the warmth of his protective embrace.
I let myself hope I could free myself from Beltrán’s ghost.
No nightmares found me.
* * *
An unexpected wave of homesickness washed over me when we arrived at the Imperial Palace the next morning. It had been twenty years since I stepped through the giant bronze double-doors of the formal entrance, but not a thing had changed.
Thanks to Lady Livia’s generosity, both Jacinthe and I wore fresh gowns, hastily altered to fit and elegant enough to pass muster at court.
Mage Armand, Fernan, and Menelaus also wore borrowed garments.
I wondered where Lady Livia’s staff had found a shirt, doublet, and hose large enough to fit Menelaus on such short notice, not to mention a pair of polished boots.
“This place is overwhelming,” Jacinthe muttered as we entered the vaulted entrance hall. “Did you really grow up here, Mama?”
I looked around with the fresh perspective of twenty years spent in the humble village of Bernswick.
“I never noticed how grand it is, but it hasn’t changed a bit.”
When I’d lived here, familiarity had blinded me to the intricate mosaics beneath our feet, depicting historical scenes with semiprecious stones. Marble columns soared up to a vaulted ceiling adorned with frescoes and delicate gilded plasterwork. Priceless works of art stood in alcoves and hung on walls.
Any of the statues in the alcoves or the hangings on the walls could’ve paid for a new public hospital to replace the old, overcrowded one in Herrewick or any of the other towns in the far-flung provinces of the Imperial Dominion of Human Lands.
As our little group was ushered into the Blue Salon, my heart was pounding so hard that I wondered if Menelaus could hear it.
But instead of finding Mother waiting to receive us, we encountered the hostile stares of three men and two women wearing court livery and the gold badges of imperial household officials.
I recognized the badges of the Imperial Herald’s office, along with the badges for Palace Archives, Imperial Secretariat, Court Inquisitor, and the Palace Chamberlain, but recognized none of the officials wearing them.
“So, there you are at last,” said a portly man with a thin mustache who wore a Palace Chamberlain’s badge.
I noted his conspicuous lack of honorifics. Unease crawled through my gut and joined the nervous churn of anticipation I’d been feeling all morning.
He continued, “Duke Fernan, King Menelaus, please allow us to offer Your Excellencies refreshments in the Red Salon while we question these two ladies .”
He ignored Armand’s presence at my back.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Menelaus stiffen in protest. I put one hand behind my back and signaled him to cooperate.
To my relief, he grumpily allowed a servant to lead him into an adjoining room.
When they were gone, an older woman wearing an Imperial Herald badge addressed the three of us. “Her Imperial Majesty has tasked us with verifying your identities.”
Annoyed, I drew myself up. Didn’t we just save everyone here from the Duke de Norhas?
“I was told we would see Domina-Regent Jacinthe today,” I said icily. “Let my mother vouch for my identity.”
The officials looked displeased at my reply.
The Court Inquisitor stepped forward. She was a woman with graying hair and sharp eyes. “We cannot take the risk of admitting two strangers to Her Imperial Majesty’s presence. Do you have any proof that you are who you claim to be?”
Alarm tightened my chest. Why didn’t Mother send someone who knew me?