Aurie braced for what Isabella would say the moment her daughter was out of earshot. She had heard of noble women being snide while sounding like they were giving compliments. How they would send servants or others away to make you feel trusting of them when they were trying to manipulate you. Aurie sharpened her senses on the woman. If only she could do to her what she does to Draka. With him, she can walk into his dreams, see his deepest, darkest memories as if she were in that moment with him. If only she could do that now…

  “How is he?” Isabella had let her shoulders sink a bit. The way she sat in her saddle was completely different. She wasn’t straddling it. Instead, she had her legs together and curled to one side as if she were lounging on a pillowed sofa while she directed her horse to follow beside Aurie’s. “Draka, I mean. I know Adrian told him of my husband.”

  “Lord Phillip,” Aurie nodded.

  “Cleric King Phillip,” Isabella lifted a playful brow at her. “Paladin Dowager Regent.”

  Aurie scrunched her lips. “Yes, he told him. And he’s,” Aurie wondered how honest she should be. She decided to be more cautious, “He was saddened by the news, as any man would be to learn of a dear friend who…”

  Isabella stopped her horse with a yank and turned on her. Those eyes were like looking into colored glass bowls and Aurie was lost in them. “You’re known to me, Aurelie Clevlan, don’t convince yourself you’re not. Adrian wrote of you, as well. Not just your daughter, though she and I have become well acquainted over our many letters over these months, who also spoke very highly of you.”

  Aurie flicked her brows. “Good. I have heard many great things about you, as well. Especially when it comes to your love for Draka.”

  That made Isabella lean with a half-cocked smile. “Yes. I do love him. More than the earth and every man placed upon it.”

  “Well,” Aurie shrugged, “that might be a very big problem if that’s what brought you here, because he belongs to another.”

  “I’m well aware,” Isabella straightened. “And I wouldn’t be fool enough to allow my empire to be absorbed into the Paladinate because of my love for a man, regardless.” She looked toward the village. “I’ll leave that to…” She rolled her eyes as if she were searching until they landed on Aurie, “You, I believe.”

  Aurie nearly burst in protest, she just couldn’t bring herself close enough to do it without laughing and ended up stifling both at the same time.

  Isabella regarded her for a moment, “I’m not here to seek his hand again, if that is what you think. I’m here to ensure my investment and proclaim my allegiance to a king. And to mourn with my friend. Now,” There was tremble in Isabella’s deep breath, “How is my Draka actually doing? If he’s adopted your daughter, then that means you are the closest to him without me going to one of his men-at-arms, and he’d rather let his toe rot off than let any of them know he’s in pain.”

  “Please tell me that’s not what happened to his toes,” Aurie was gaping at the thought. One of them did, for certain, rot off. The other was amputated before that point, but also had scarring from rot.

  Isabella grimaced, “I came to the right woman.” She whipped her reins on her horse’s side to start them moving again. Once they had gone a few paces, she said, “It was when we were young. His cohort was escorting my father and I to Aviv from Nazariah. I had never seen such a man in all my life. Barefoot, mind you, in the desert, all furs and burly chest, looked like charred meat.”

  Aurie chuckled. “Was he a Paladin already?”

  “No,” Isabella grinned at the memory with teeth straighter and whiter than any Aurie had ever seen. “They found him while scouting the road ahead of our train, you see. I kept spying on him. He was the first man I ever—you know—saw. And so quiet at first. Couldn’t speak a word of our language. There were some who spoke Polish, Phillip was one of them…”

  “That’s how they met, isn’t it?” Aurie found herself grinning.

  Isabella nodded, “And I, can speak it, too. So, naturally, with my escorts, I would go speak to him once he was dressed proper.” She waved a sparkling gloved hand, fluttering her long lashes, “I’m sorry, I completely trailed off…His toe! He lost the one because we got attacked in that very same train by pagans and, like the fool girl I was—and still am—” Isabella tapped Aurie’s shoulder with a chuckle, “I ran right to this gorgeous Szczecin boy with a spear he must have carved from a stick himself and he turns to me and shouts, ‘What is wrong with you, girl? Run!’ Right as a spear sticks right into his foot.”

  Aurie hissed.

  Isabella rocked in her saddle with a laugh that was a rolling pin of pitches and giggles. She could barely take a breath. “And he stares at it, glares at me as if it’s my fault, and lightly—and I mean lightly—moved me to the side before he yanked the spear up and threw right back at the very rider who threw it. I must have run through half the battle with his toe in the air like a complete idiot, crying out that if he would just stop, we could put it back on!”

  Aurie stared in wonder at Isabella actually waving her hand through the air, laughing, as if she were still carrying that toe.

  “My father brought him to our court for it, of course,” Isabella chuckled. “That was how he ended up with the Holy Sepulcher, you know. They only accept you if you can read and write, and quote scripture word for word in the original Greek. So father had him taught by the very monks who would have to review his entry into the Order.” There was a distance in her eyes in that moment. “I wouldn’t have been able to marry him if he wasn’t a knight.”

  “I didn’t marry the man I thought I was in love with, either,” Aurie shrugged. “But I found that the love I had for my husband was far stronger than anything I could have felt for the former.”

  “Oh, my dear, sweet, Regent,” Isabella warmed to her but blinked that look away, “I wish I could say the same. Phillip certainly loved me. And I cared very deeply for my Phillip. But I never stopped loving Draka, nor will I. But I have an Empire and sons in need of wives without ambitious families to keep that empire intact. I’ve put a lot of planning into your Maudeline becoming one of those wives.” She leaned toward Aurie with a scrunched nose, “Wouldn’t be very tasteful for me to match myself to my son’s father-in-law, would it?”

  “No, I don’t think she’d like that either,” Aurie squinched at that.

  “So, when I ask you how he’s doing,” Isabella’s eyes once again captured Aurie with their depth, her grin all but removed, “I’m asking as one who has seen him grow from a Szczecin wanderer into a Paladin King and has been his friend from day one. How is he doing?”

  “Terrible,” Aurie grumbled. “He’s been getting whipped like stubborn mule for weeks. One thing after another. And, one truly terrible thing that I’m not certain is my place to tell, so I would rather not go into that. But learning of Phillip’s death made his heart stop. Enya had to resurrect him. His wounds from Strasbourg have yet to fully heal…”

  “Christophe von Strasse, that arrogant scoundrel,” Isabella shook her head. “He was a leashed dog, but Baroness Clarissa was a vicious tyrant to her core. I had warned Phillip to have them stripped of their power, at least burdened with taxation, send them on expensive campaigns, anything to bring them to heel.”

  “He nearly killed him, you know. Christophe cut through Draka’s armor and tore most of his shoulder apart,” Aurie felt her mouth run dry at the mere mention. “Maud had to restitch him as they did their surgeries just to keep him from bleeding to death and God refused to allow them to heal him. He had to take time to heal from that.”

  The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

  “The von Strasses tried their best to ruin Phillip on more than one occasion. There was a drought ten or twelve years ago, if I recall.”

  “Yes,” Aurie nodded, “I remember.” It was one of the harder years. It was when the stream had run down to nearly a trickle from how high it is today, feeding the lake. It never rose higher than a few centimeters after that. Maud may not remember them being able to swim in it before, but there was a time when they did. “Lord Taggerty graced our taxes that year because of the failed crops.” Aurie corrected herself, “King Phillip, I mean.”

  Isabella nodded with a deep breath. “They damned the spring that fed it, just past our lands, made it look like it was the Duke of Metz who was trying to sabotage us. And we nearly marched on him had the Great Surge not happened. We were going to take my army and march them straight across Utrecht and carve out a different version of Alcalia altogether.”

  “They did that? Children died that year,” Aurie gasped. “My nephew died that year. My husband and his brother nearly killed each other over how hard that year was for us. And those people caused that?” Her teeth were clicking because she was baring them the way a wolf would. Her eyes were filling with tears from when they burned her nephew’s pyre, from the hate that Balian had in his eyes for Balor in that storm, but she was glaring at Isabella, “And you did nothing once you knew. No, you handed the land to Draka, didn’t you? That was your way of solving that problem. Let him handle it. He nearly died. His spirit broke in that battle. And you put him there.”

  “No,” Isabella returned that glare with one that made Aurie swallow hers down as if she were stashing it away in hopes that it wasn’t seen, “We gave the land to the Church. Draka and my son were in Siberia fighting a war against the Paladins who murdered his sister.” She made her horse sidestep into Aurie’s, her gaze unwavering, “I am Draka’s last true ally in this world, Regent. I love the man who had nothing, was nothing, wanted nothing, and would be glad to have nothing. And I have a million men in my standing army, not including the three hundred Cathredrals within my borders all supported by fully manned Paladinate Cohorts. Had I known he was to be given these lands before they handed them over, I would have removed the von Strasses’ line with a wave of my hand before ever he met them. The only reason I didn’t before is because Phillip considered that too great of a sin. I’m not a member of the Paladinate. I’m the Empress of the Holy Sea and Queen of Anatolia. So, we must become the closes of friends or we will become the bitterest of enemies.”

  Aurie lifted her chin, steeling herself.

  Isabella looked emboldened, vicious as a bear with slanted eyes and olive skin framed by those white furs as she said, “Because I’m not going to allow my power to be lessened when I know he needs it at his side. Not for my heart and certainly not because of yours. Keep that in mind as we go forward. Even after your daughter hopefully becomes mine as well. If not Adrian, then perhaps she will find my Michael pleasing. Paul is far too young. But she will be a Taggerty and she will wear my crown as the next queen and you will help me to accomplish that.”

  “And Draka?”

  Isabella straightened in her saddle with a smooth grin that sent chills down Aurie’s spine. “Consider this the only warning I will ever give you. If there ever comes a time that you think your ambition great enough to force me to choose between him and you…you will lose. Without God commanding your whims, I will destroy you. But bare in mind that also goes for any who will attempt to stand between you and him until that very unlikely moment. You, like your daughter, have a particular crown awaiting you and I intend to be the one helps place it on your head.”

  Aurie crinkled her brow. “You want me to marry him?”

  “Your daughter is adopted by Draka in the same way a bastard is legitimized,” Isabella drew in another breath. “It will look better if it is because he loved her mother so much that he wanted to ensure her daughter would be taken care of in the off chance that her mother didn’t share his love, which fate will naturally show otherwise, won’t it, Aurelie Beauvais Clevlan? Also, he needs trueborn heirs to offset the war of succession that will land your daughter on this throne. If she bears only one child, my Empire would be absorbed into the Paladinate, and that will not happen. It cannot. You can bear children still?”

  “I don’t know, my husband and I…”

  “Do you still bleed?”

  “Excuse me?”

  Isabella was once again moving, but kept their horses rubbing as she said with a darkness in her tone, “If you don’t, then I will be looking elsewhere for his next wife. Someone I can manipulate instead of someone I would look to as an ally. And you, I will push from this court and alienate until the only support you have is within the Paladinate and nowhere else to keep your influence from hindering your daughter in mine.”

  “You’re not doing any of that to my daughter or me!”

  Isabella nodded, “You want your daughter with my son. You want your daughter on my throne. On my throne, she’s safe. Maybe not from what they’re about to be fighting, as we learned when those imps paraded Phillip’s head through my palace, but safe from everyone who would use her as a way to exploit the Paladinate influence out of Alcalia. Safe from those who will want to leverage her against Draka’s pressing for peace in popular wars. And, if you still bleed, then you can still bear children, which means I want you in his bed and at his side as his Queen and,” she looked her over, “In battle the way I never could for him. That way, I don’t have to deal with some ambitious twat that thinks that she has one over on me when she’s the pawn. I don’t like pawns who forget they’re pawns.”

  “I’m a pawn, then?”

  “Any other woman who ends up his wife will be a pawn,” Isabella grinned. “You, I see as my equal. You’re the queen I want at his side. He loves your daughter, therefore he loves you. He must have children, though, and soon. So, we will start simple. I already went through the process, he understands how to court, if you are confused on that. I’ll encourage him as I can. Give you opportunities to provide him with instances of gratification, maybe a few moments to let him see that you’re interested…”

  “That isn’t necessary,” Aurie stretched her neck with a flick of her brows. “Depending on how many Paladins you brought, his dissolution will be signed and he’ll be asking God for his divorce to be given and once it is, he will be mine. So, I’m very glad not to have to see him choose me over you anyway.”

  Isabella narrowed her already narrow eyes with a bite of her lip and a nod, “I misjudged you. Pleasantly. Who is the poor broken-hearted fool he’s divorcing? I’d love to see which wench tricked him into marrying him without his consent. You know, I tried that once. I even had my father there with Cardinal Thomas and everything. That’s how I ended up married to Phillip, who was supposed to be his groomsman. Chased him all the way to Crimea to arrange it, you know.”

  Aurie felt her breath stick in her throat. She said it the easiest way she could, “His wife isn’t dead.” Then, she looked back to the train of wagons and pursed her brow. “Where is Cardinal Thomas? He’s supposed to be with you.”

  “He went to the Abbey. What do you mean his wife isn’t dead? He…I know what happened to his first wife.”

  “No,” Aurie shook her head, “You don’t. Nor did he until last week. Like I said, it’s been one thing after another. How many did you bring with you?”

  “Of my own, only three hundred knights and twice that in men-at-arms,” Isabella didn’t look away from her. “I’m with the vanguard of the Holy Sepulcher. I don’t know the exact numbers, but there’s eighteen Paladins and twelve full cohorts in my train. I think three thousand total or close to, was what Jasmine had told me. In the next three weeks, twenty thousand Paladins, Clerics, and Monastic Knights of the Order of the Holy Sepulcher will be calling Alcalia their home.”

  Aurie’s mouth gaped. “Twenty thousand? How are we going to feed? We can’t have them camping on the farm lands—maybe through winter, but in the spring, where will they live? Twenty thousand?”

  “Alcalia is a Paladinate Kingdom and their King is the highest ranking Paladin of their Order. This is their home, now,” Isabella shrugged. “But they bring livestock and families with them. And they will likely be dispersed to Cathedrals or build some of their own, if need be. Either way, they’re Draka’s army. Not a very big one, really, or I would be protesting them moving from the campaigns to retake Jerusalem. The Holy Sepulcher has become more of a Northeastern Order since it fell and Draka’s crusade into Siberia anyway.”

  “Well, I definitely want to hear more about that,” Aurie was still trying to figure out what to do about twenty thousand men and families coming to Talkro in a matter of weeks. “Let’s see what we can do about getting you a proper room in the—uhm castle.” I’ll give her Maud’s maybe? No, Aurie was doing best not to show how off-kilter she had become after hearing that. It was too many. Far too many.

  She needed to find a way to house them and needed to figure it out quick enough to divert their march to wherever that was. One way or another, it definitely wasn’t in Talkro.