The Vampire & Her Witch

Outside the Gilded Horns, Micheline waited near the handsome, flame-haired knight... No, flame-haired witch, she reminded herself, as he leaned casually against the front door of the restaurant. It seemed that he intended to allow her aunt, Maela, to reunite with her daughters privately, and even though it was cold outside, Micheline couldn’t find any reason to protest.

”Sir Heartwood, was it?” Micheline said in an awkward attempt to make small talk. ”Which, um, which barony of Lothian do you hail from? I confess, I don’t know the western baronies that well. Might it be Hanrahan?” she asked innocently. ”Or Dunn?” Micheline added in the hopes of teasing out more information about the apparent rise of the Dunns’ station within her cousin’s empire.

”I was born here,” Ollie said politely, pointing at the towering edifice of Lothian Manor on a nearby hilltop. ”In the manor. Until recently, this was my home.”

”Oh,” Micheline said, hesitating a moment before pushing further forward. Maela had asked her to keep her eyes and ears open, but beyond that, if she didn’t learn as much as she could about the people important to Ashlynn, she’d be letting more than just her aunt.

”I don’t, um, I don’t suppose you’re a relation of Lord Bors then?” Micheline asked delicately, searching the young man’s gentle features for anything that reminded her of the late Lothian Marquis. Ollie was taller than Bors or Owain, but he cut a similarly heroic figure with broad shoulders and a trim waist. Depending on his mother’s looks, it wasn’t impossible that he could be a half-brother to Owain and Loman Lothian...

”Why would you think that?” Ollie asked, cocking his head to one side. ”I wasn’t born to be a knight or a lord. I was born in the servant’s wing,” he said, pointing to one side of the manor. ”I grew up in the kitchens. That’s where I met Lady Ashlynn,” he added. ”In the kitchens of the Summer Villa.”

”Oh,” Micheline said, carefully keeping her tone to one of pleasant surprise. ”So then, my cousin made you a knight?”

”It was supposed to be a reward,” Ollie said, nodding. ”For helping her in the Summer Villa when she was spying on Owain, and then escaping after she killed Sir Kaefin,” he explained. ”But I...”

”Ollie,” Ashlynn’s voice called from inside the restaurant. ”You and Micheline can come in now,” she said. ”I could use your help for a moment or two before you go.”

”Sure,” Ollie said casually as he opened the door, gesturing for Micheline to precede him before following after her and closing the door behind him.

Inside, Maela stood with Ashlynn and Jocelynn, all three of them close enough together to keep a light touch on as if they’d finished a fierce hug but weren’t yet entirely willing to let go. All of them sported eyes that were slightly red and puffy, and there were stains on their cheeks that caught the light of the chandeliers overhead.

The instant Micheline saw Ashlynn, she knew her cousin had changed. It wasn’t the casual outfit she wore, more suitable to merchantmen than a monarch, or the subtle shifts in her physique that were visible even beneath her clothes. It was the way she stood, even here and relaxed among her closest kin, that had changed in ways few would notice.

Ashlynn reminded her of Crown Prince Henri.

There was a weight resting on her shoulders that her head refused to bow down to and a sense of alertness and command of her surroundings that never went away. It was the bearing of a ruler who could never be anything else, even in the most intimate of gatherings.

Few people ever saw royalty away from their courts and the courtiers, where the masks could come off and the royal family could be themselves. Micheline, however, was a person who had had that privilege, and she knew how monarchs carried themselves, even away from their subjects.

King Thibert had that bearing, always. Henri had it too, though it wasn’t as strong of a presence as his father projected. Still, over the years she’d attended the Royal Academy with the prince, that sense of presence had grown firmer and sharper, like a sword being tempered and forged.

But Ashlynn... Ashlynn put both men to shame, radiating a sense of not only unassailable confidence but projecting a feeling that everything would be all right, as long as she were present. It was a powerful, intoxicating feeling and one that Micheline only belatedly realized might also be witchcraft...

”Micheline,” Ashlynn said, letting go of her mother and sister long enough to cross the few paces of space between her and her cousin before gathering the younger woman into a warm embrace.

”I’m so glad you were willing to come, and that you were able to keep Mother company on the way,” Ashlynn said as she gave Micheline a squeeze that felt very... restrained, as if she were holding back for fear of hurting her cousin.

”I know it’s been frightening,” Ashlynn added softly. ”You can relax; I promise that you’re safe here.”

”Listen to you,” Micheline said, finding her voice unexpectedly hoarse as the edges of her vision grew misty. ”Reassuring me. You’re the one who’s come back from the dead. You, you must have been through so much,” she said, pulling back to look at the cousin she’d once thought was lost forever.

In the midst of everything else, the politics and the plots, her fear of the vampires and witches and demons... Somehow, Micheline had distracted herself from the most precious thing of all.

However it had happened, the cousin she’d always looked up to, the one who had helped convince her mother to let her attend the Royal Academy where so many important things had happened, was alive... and however it had happened, it was miraculous enough to set aside other worries, at least for the next few hours, and just be family.

”We’ve all been through a great deal,” Ashlynn said, giving Micheline one last squeeze before stepping back. ”And there’s so much still to come,” she added, unknowingly echoing her cousin’s thoughts. ”But for now, Jocey and I have prepared a feast to welcome you both,” Ashlynn said with a bright, shining smile.

”It’s my first time doing so much work in the kitchen,” Jocelynn added, tightly holding on to her mother’s hand. ”But I think you’ll like the surprise we made for you, Mother,” she said, giving her mother a fragile smile.

”You helped in the kitchen?” Maela said, blinking in surprise. ”Now this, I have to see...”