The Vampire & Her Witch

”Lady Adala,” a soft, rich voice whispered next to Lady Adala. ”Her Dominion will take it from here. You should take a seat and leave it to her.”

”Huh?” Adala said, completely losing her usual composure for a moment when she felt the Inquisitor’s warm breath on her neck and his hand gently cupping her elbow to guide her. Her heart was still racing in her chest after revealing her father’s secrets to the entire Great Hall, and her legs were wobbly as she moved, but the High Inquisitor supported her as gently as a lord escorting his lady to a ball.

”You’re safe here,” Ignatious said as he helped her into a seat near Jocelynn and Samira. ”And you’re among friends, even if you don’t know them well yet.”

”Thank you,” Adala said almost automatically as she took her seat. Her eyes were still fixed on Lady Ashlynn as she defied the man who had tried to murder her, proving again and again that Owain’s words meant nothing to her, and that his reputation for violence meant even less.

Lady Ashlynn might be Lord Owain’s wife, and she might be the victim of his attempt to murder her, but she was entirely free of his control.

”I never knew your sister was so impressive,” Adala said softly, speaking as much to herself as she was to Lady Jocelynn.

”Neither did I,” Jocelynn said without thinking before years of reflexes kicked in and she quickly placed a hand over her lips. ”I, I’m sorry,” she added. ”For what she did to your father. I, I’ve never seen her get physical like that with anyone. It didn’t look like your father was badly hurt, but still, I’m sorry...”

”Don’t be,” Adala said, raising a hand to interrupt Jocelynn’s awkward attempt to apologize. It wasn’t an entirely sincere apology anyway. Rather, it was the sort of thing that they’d both been trained to do, offering up apologies as a balm for wounded pride to smooth out friction between noble families even when the other party had clearly been in the wrong.

”My father deserved it,” Adala said. ”I just never expected that Lady Ashlynn would be the one helping me to stand up to him.”

”I wouldn’t have expected it either,” Jocelynn said. ”What happened to you, Ash, to change this much?” Jocelynn whispered as she watched her sister addressing the sitting court and the rest of the Great Hall, asking if this was how they wanted to live.

”You’ll learn about those things soon enough,” Isabell said from her seat beside Samira. ”For now, just watch. What happens next is going to be very important,” she said, adjusting the silver rimmed spectacles she wore out of long habit, even though she no longer needed them to see clearly what was happening at the front of the Great Hall.

The lords and ladies sitting at the High Table looked distinctly uncomfortable after Ashlynn asked them if this was how they wanted to live, and even more uncomfortable as she reminded them of the brutal beating she’d received at Owain’s hands.

For a moment, an oppressive silence settled over the High Table as everyone wrestled with whether or not they dared to speak. Owain’s hazel eyes flashed in the light of hundreds of candles as he surveyed the barons, daring them to accept Ashlynn’s version of what would happen if he obtained the notebooks and proving with the same look that she was right.

One baron, however, seemed completely immune to Owain’s intimidating stare as he stood up and faced Ashlynn from across the High Table.

”Lady Ashlynn, it’s not that we want to live this way,” Loghlan Dunn said, spreading his arms wide and shrugging his shoulders in an exaggerated gesture of helplessness. ”The Lothian Court has the right to stand up to our Marquis, and we’re doing so now,” he said, briefly locking eyes with men like Tybal Aleese, who had fought so hard to claim a seat on the narrowest, weakest fence imaginable.

”A Marquis is not a king,” he reminded everyone present. ”And in the face of unified opposition from his vassals, he must give way. But when it comes to defying the Inquisition, it’s much, much harder,” he said helplessly.

At the Blackwell table, Liam smiled as he watched his father build momentum for Ashlynn, setting up a flimsy position for her to knock down. It was moments like these that reminded him of how much he still had to learn from his father before he took the throne for himself. It was also a moment that made him feel immensely grateful that his father had made the choice to stand with Lady Ashlynn and that Loghlan Dunn continued to reaffirm his position with every action he took tonight.

”Abbot Recared may be an extortionist,” Loghlan continued, looking at the battered Inquisitor held prisoner by one of the Blackwell Templars and Inquisitor Diarmuid. ”As Lady Ragna said, he’s little better than a crime boss. A thief, a murderer, and worse,” he said, not bothering to conceal his opinion of Abbot Recared.

”But so what?” Loghlan asked. ”He’s still the man chosen by the Church to lead the Inquisition in Lothian March. He still commands dozens of Inquisitors, nearly a hundred acolytes at the Abbey in Maeril, and a large force of the Temple Guard as well. He has power that few can resist, and most importantly, he has the full support of the Church and even the Holy Lord of Light.”

”Against that, what hope do we have to stand up against him?” Loghlan asked. ”Even if we move against him now, aren’t we just condemning ourselves to the retribution of the Church and the Inquisition once word of our actions spreads?”

”We’re just humble frontier lords,” Loghlan concluded. ”What can we possibly do against the might of the Inquisition and the will of our Marquis?”

Loghlan didn’t believe for a moment that the forces of the Inquisition in Lothian March mattered to Lady Ashlynn. Unlike the other members of the Lothian Court, he and Mairwen knew just how overwhelming the power Lady Ashlynn truly commanded.

But there were others, like Tyball Aleese, who were still caught in the middle of the tug of war between Ashlynn and Owain... between freedom and their own fears, and even if they were too intimidated to speak, Loghlan gave voice to their thoughts and fears.

Now, it was her turn to burn those thoughts and fears to cinders that could be ground out beneath heels...