Total pages in book: 208
Estimated words: 209645 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1048(@200wpm)___ 839(@250wpm)___ 699(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 209645 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1048(@200wpm)___ 839(@250wpm)___ 699(@300wpm)
“How a powerful witch needs bloody leave from a king, I cannot understand,” Nandra snarled.
“I have magic, but I still need breath in my body in order to use it, and a noose hinders that,” Fern spat back.
“We must not quarrel amongst ourselves,” Rebecca said quickly.
Nandra ignored her and instructed Fern, “Spirit away if they should try to detain you.”
“And spirit where?” Fern demanded. “Wodell, where, if found, they will return me on demand? Mar-el, who do not abide strangers very well? The Dome City, where, if I ask for asylum, I might be pressed into being an acolyte? Or Firenze, who is on the verge of war with just about everybody, including themselves, at any moment.”
“The Enchantments, of course,” Nandra retorted.
“And how do I help my people from The Enchantments, Nandra?” Fern asked. “There is not much I can do, but what I can do, I do it, and it is needed. A little, in a land where there is not much for the sisterhood, is a lot. I toe a line in the Airenzian soil that has not been drawn in your sand and I do it with a purpose. You are not in a position to judge for you know nothing of this. I’m glad of it for you. But in return, it would be nice, if you can’t understand, you can at least empathize.”
Nandra made no response.
Rebecca changed the subject.
“I will speak with Melisse. But for now, without a complete circle, there is naught we can do. We will meet again soon.”
“There is naught we could do even if we had a complete circle. What is taking these warriors and their women so long?” Nandra demanded to know. “It is far from hard to copulate.”
“Matters of the heart are never easy,” Rebecca returned.
“I fight the instinct every day to slip each one of them a love potion,” Nandra muttered.
“Do not do that!” three witches stated sharply.
“It must be natural, organic,” Lena remonstrated.
Nandra sighed deeply for she knew this too well.
“We have felt it in the veil, there is promise,” Lena reminded them.
They had felt it.
There was promise.
What they could not know, was if it would come to fruition.
And if it did…
If it would be enough.
45
The Game
Queen Silence
Fifty Miles Inside the Southern Border
WODELL
I stood in the opened flap of the large red tent I shared with my husband and I looked to the top of the swell of the moor where Mars stood with Farah.
His dark, handsome head was bent to her.
It was night, and although there were many torches around the expansive camp, the distance and the lack of light hid his expression from me.
But he stood very close to her, had his arm about her waist, and that spoke volumes.
My husband had spent a good deal of time with Farah during our journey.
Not to mention, he did the same before it, when we remained in Firenze as the death ceremony for Farah’s mother, Sofia, was being arranged and then carried out.
I knew they were close. She had been sitting at his side on a stack of cushions beside his throne the first moment I laid eyes on him. Their manner to each other spoke of it as well.
However, I was wondering at this closeness now for it did not seem simply close.
It seemed close.
And as was the Firenz way, a man could have a wife and be very, very close to another woman.
Indeed, as close as he could get.
I felt a presence at my side, thus I turned my head and looked up.
Kyril, one of Mars’s Trusted, one of my Trusted, our personal guard, stood beside me.
I had found, on our journey, and even before that Kyril was most often the one who was nearest to me.
I did not know if this was of my husband’s design, or happenstance.
I also did not ask.
I was just glad of it.
Kyril was the youngest of the Trusted and the most jovial. I liked them all. But I felt an affinity with Kyril.
“I’m not sure how my king will get to know my queen better, he on the rise with his childhood playmate, you skulking at the folds of your tent,” Kyril noted, his eyes, too, on the swell of the moor.
“I’m not skulking,” I retorted.
He looked down at me, but said nothing.
“I was refreshing myself after our journey,” I told him.
“We ceased moving two hours ago, and in between time, had dinner, which I will note, you took with Elena and Melisse, not your husband.”
I huffed and looked away in order to stare off into the distance.
“My queen—”
“Silence!” my father’s voice interrupted whatever Kyril was about to say and I felt my guard tense at my side as I turned my attention in my sire’s direction. “Come, sit with your mother and me in our tent for an evening sherry.”