The Vampire & Her Witch

Reynold wasn’t the only person to leave their parents behind and come rushing over to Ashlynn’s side of the Great Hall. As soon as the servants began to move the tables, Charlotte Otker all but ran to Adala Leufroy’s side.

”Sweet light, Adala,” Charlotte said as she threw her arms around her slender friend. ”Don’t scare me like that! I can’t believe you stood up to your father like that!”

”S-someone had to,” Adala said, losing all of her composure as she was enveloped by Chralotte’s soft embrace. ”I just, I just couldn’t hold it in anymore.”

”But what are you going to do now?” Charlotte asked, looking around nervously as she pulled back from her friend. ”The way things are going, your family...”

”I don’t know,” Adala said, biting her lip as she tried to recover enough of her composure to think things through. So many things had happened so rapidly that this was the first moment she really had to think about what would happen next.

”Do you think,” Adala said hesitantly. ”Do you think that Lady Ashlynn would take me in? I’m sure she already has ladies-in-waiting and handmaidens aplenty, and if she’s really a Saintess, then maybe she won’t have any use for me but...”

”You showed courage while others cowered, and you risked everything you have to support her when she asked nothing from you,” a gentle, feminine voice interrupted as the silver-haired engineer walked over, along with the heavily pregnant Samira. ”Ashlynn will remember that for years to come, and she won’t forget her debt to you.”

”Then, does that mean she’ll take me on?” Adala asked. ”That I can have a place in her retinue?”

”You can discuss it with her if you like,” Isabell said with a light chuckle. ”But you don’t have to follow her in service. Hugo, over there,” she said, pointing at the scholarly young lord. ”Chose to serve. Ashlynn offered him a home in the city or a farm in the country and enough wealth to live a life of leisure if he chose to, and I imagine she’d offer you the same as thanks for what you’ve done.”

”You could always find a home in Sir Ollie’s village,” Samira added with a warm, inviting smile as Isabell helped her take a seat. ”Lady Rosie is there with her son, Tonnis, now, and there are plenty of others who needed to find a home when they lost the homes they had. It’s rustic,” she admitted. ”If you’re used to city life in Lothian or Leufroy. But it’s cozy, and we care for each other.”

”That, that sounds nice,” Adala said delicately as she tried to imagine herself in a country village where the height of politics revolved around where to place a midden heap or whether or not chickens could roam free from their pens.

”You don’t have to make a decision now,” Isabell said gently as she gestured for the young ladies to join her and Samira. ”Just know that you have a place to go. Your courage may have cost your home and your relationship with your blood kin,” Isabell warned. ”I can’t say how Ashlynn will handle Leufroy after what your father has done.”

”But whatever happens there,” Isabell reassured her. ”You’ll have a chance to live a life of your own, on your own terms, to make of it whatever you wish. I’m sure that Ashlynn will do at least that much for you, and if not her, then I will in her place.”

”Really?” Adala asked as a wave of relief washed over her. ”Then, how about a place for Charlotte too?” she quickly asked, taking her friend’s hands in her own despite the startled look on Charlotte’s face.

”What?” Adala asked innocently. ”Don’t think I didn’t see the look your father gave you when you came over here. He looked like his prize mare had just wandered out of a gate he forgot to lock, and now he’s trying to figure out whether he wants to demand payment from your ’new owner’ or beg for the return of his lost ’property.’”

”He, he’s not that bad,” Charlotte said, turning a brilliant shade of red. ”And Mother told me to go, so Father will have to come around in the end, no matter what.”

”And if he doesn’t,” Isabell said with a rueful laugh. ”Then we’ll have a place for you too.”

”But, only if Lady Ashlynn wins, right?” Charlotte said, looking in Ashlynn’s direction. ”I, I’ve only seen Lord Owain fight at tournaments, but his reputation isn’t an exaggeration. They say that no man in Lothian is his equal, and even at the larger events in Keating and Trevarthen, he hasn’t known defeat in years.”

”I won’t deny that Owain is fierce,” Isabell admitted. ”I’ve known men like him, and even fought beside some of them in the Emerald Kingdom across the sea,” she explained. ”Even if he’d been a commoner, his skill alone would have earned him the position of First Sword in the Court of the Emerald King.”

”But skill with the sword is only one part of a person’s strength,” Isabell explained. ”And since Lord Owain demanded a duel in armor, he’s entered a contest of tenacity and endurance. He thinks he has an advantage there, because heavy armor wears away at a person’s reserves. He thinks that Lady Ashlynn will exhaust herself first, and that it’ll be easy to finish her off once she’s overheated and fatigued.”

”You’re saying he won’t?” Adala asked hesitantly, uncertain how Lady Ashlynn could overcome such a stark disadvantage.

”Lord Owain beat her half to death on their wedding night, then had his men bury her alive,” Isabell said as her silvery gaze hardened behind her spectacles. ”Despite that, she pulled herself out of her own grave and fought her way all the way back to the heart of Owain’s stronghold.”

”If it’s a contest of iron will, endurance, and the ability to suffer unbearable pain while continuing to struggle,” Isabell said, shaking her head at Owain’s foolishness. ”Then Lady Ashlynn outclasses him by ten to one.”

”More than that,” Isabell said with a smile that held no warmth. ”The fact that Owain demanded his armor says something else important about this fight.”

”Owain Lothian is afraid... and he knows that he may lose.”