The Queen's Mage

Chapter 130: Care That is Not a Trap

When Serali stepped into the bathing room wrapped in a robe, the air was warm enough to fog the mirror. The tub stood full, steam rising in pale layers. Lamps burned low in glass sconces, and the scent of rosemary and mineral salt had softened the sharp edges of the room.

Mara stood beside the tub with her sleeves rolled to the elbow.

That should have looked strange.

It did not.

Maybe that was stranger.

Serali removed the robe and lowered herself into the water.

Heat closed around her.

For one second, her whole body tensed.

Then the shoulder loosened by the smallest possible measure.

She exhaled despite herself.

Mara did not comment.

Excellent.

The water was deep enough to cover her chest, hot enough to matter without scalding. Serali leaned back against the sloped end of the tub, left arm held awkwardly above the water.

Mara took up the little ceramic cup of oil. “I will start with the top of your shoulder. Over the muscle here.”

She touched her own shoulder to demonstrate.

“Not your back unless you ask. Not below the collarbone. No sudden pressure. I will use my right hand first. You will feel the oil before my hand because it is warm.”

Serali’s throat tightened.

Detailed.

Practical.

No mystery for fear to occupy.

“Very well,” Serali said.

Mara came to stand slightly behind and to the left of the tub, still in Serali’s line of sight through the mirror.

Clever.

“Ready?” Mara asked.

No.

“Yes.”

Warm oil touched the top of Serali’s shoulder.

Then Mara’s hand.

Serali went rigid.

Mara stopped immediately.

“Too much?”

“No.”

“Do you want me to stop?”

Serali breathed.

Her body was shouting old things. Hand. Behind. Neck. Vulnerable. Water. No clothes. No weapon.

But Mara’s hand was still. Not gripping. Not taking. Waiting.

“No,” Serali said. “Continue.”

Mara began again.

Light pressure. Slow. Broad enough not to tickle, firm enough to feel purposeful. Her thumb worked along the ridge between shoulder and neck, stopping before the places Serali had not approved. The first pass hurt in a way that made Serali’s jaw lock.

The second hurt less.

The third found a knot so deep that Serali hissed before she could stop herself.

Mara’s hand lifted. “Stop?”

“No.”

“Less pressure?”

Serali considered lying.

Then did not. “Yes.”

The pressure eased.

“Better?”

“Yes.”

The word came out rough.

Mara continued.

For several minutes, there was only water, steam, and the quiet movement of Mara’s hand over sore muscle. It was not like Serali had imagined. She had imagined a hand would feel invasive because it belonged to someone else. Instead, this particular hand felt like information. Pressure here, pain there, warmth moving into places Serali had locked down without noticing.

Her shoulder began to give up its war.

Bit by bit.

It was humiliating.

It was wonderful.

Serali closed her eyes, then opened them quickly.

Mara noticed in the mirror. “You can keep watching.”

“I am.”

“Yes.”

“I do not like not seeing.”

“I know.”

Mara shifted so Serali had a clearer angle in the mirror. Not so close. Not farther. Just enough.

The adjustment did something to Serali’s chest.

Not heat.

Not desire.

Trust, perhaps.

A terrible word. Too simple for something that hurt this much.

“You are good at this,” Serali muttered.

“Bathing or massage?”

“Accepting praise poorly.”

Mara smiled faintly. “Thank you.”

“That was not praise.”

“No?”

“No.”

“Then I accept it poorly anyway.”

Serali almost smiled.

The water lapped softly against the tub when Mara changed the angle of her hand.

A line of pain ran up Serali’s neck.

Then loosened.

She breathed out.

Too deeply.

Mara’s hand slowed. “There?”

“Yes.”

“Painful?”

“Yes.”

“Helpful?”

Serali hated that the answer was obvious. “Yes.”

Mara stayed with that place, careful and methodical, until the muscle finally softened beneath her fingers. Serali felt it happen like a knot in a rope giving way.

Her eyes burned suddenly.

Not from pain.

Ridiculous.

She stared at the bathwater.

Do not cry because your shoulder hurts less.

That was not a dignified category of tears.

Mara’s hand stilled. “Serali?”

“I am fine.”

Mara did not say liar.

Wise woman.

“I mean it,” Serali said.

“I know.”

“No, you don’t.”

“I know you mean it.”

That was worse.

Serali swallowed.

Steam blurred the edges of the room. In the mirror, her face looked softer than she liked. Wet hair clung to her neck. A scar along her collarbone showed above the water, pale in lamplight. Mara’s hand rested on her shoulder, still and warm.

Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

Serali waited for shame.

Some came.

Not enough to make her move away.

“I thought I would hate it,” she said.

Mara’s gaze in the mirror remained steady. “Do you?”

“No.”

The answer was so quiet it nearly disappeared.

Mara nodded once and began again, even lighter now.

Serali leaned back by a fraction.

Not much.

Enough.

There was no victory in Mara’s face. No triumph. No indulgent softness that made Serali feel like a skittish animal finally eating from someone’s hand. Only concentration. Care. A little warmth at the edges.

“Do many people do this?” Serali asked after a while.

“Massage?”

“Yes.”

“Yes.”

“Voluntarily?”

Mara’s mouth twitched. “Yes.”

“Hm.”

“Many people enjoy being cared for.”

“That sounds suspicious.”

“It can be.”

Serali opened one eye.

Mara met her gaze in the mirror. “Care can be used badly. So can food. So can clothing. So can rooms. That does not make all of it a trap.”

Serali closed her eye again.

Unfair.

Mara had become very good at unfair.

“Did Lia tell you to say that?”

“No.”

“Verya?”

“No.”

“Then stop being independently wise.”

“I will try.”

“You won’t.”

“No.”

The last of the tension at the base of Serali’s skull loosened.

She did not quite sigh.

Almost.

Mara moved to her upper arm, still careful. “Here?”

“Yes.”

“Too much?”

“No.”

“Tell me if that changes.”

“I know.”

Mara’s hand paused.

Serali opened her eyes.

In the mirror, Mara looked back at her.

“Yes,” Serali said, with a small roll of her eyes. “I will tell you if that changes.”

Mara’s face softened.

Only enough.

“Good.”

They stayed like that until the bath began to cool.

Mara did not push. She did not suggest the other shoulder, or the back, or anything beyond what had been offered and accepted. She finished with one last slow pass over the sore muscle, then lifted her hand away.

“Done,” she said.

Serali opened her eyes.

The absence of touch felt strange.

Not bad.

Strange.

Her shoulder was no longer trying to kill her. It still ached, but distantly, like a defeated enemy muttering in another room.

Mara handed her a cloth. “Do you want privacy to finish?”

“Yes.”

Mara stepped back at once. “I’ll be in the sitting room.”

She gathered the oil, the salts, the small towel she had used beneath her hand, and left without making anything of it.

The door remained half-open because Serali preferred it that way.

Serali sat in the cooling water for another minute.

Her body felt heavy. Not trapped. Heavy in the way tired things became when they were permitted to be tired.

It had been nothing like kissing Allandra.

Nothing like lying beside her beneath warm blankets while the bond hummed quietly between them.

That had been frightening because she wanted it.

This had been frightening because she didn’t know whether she could bear it.

They were different fears.

Both had become smaller.

She looked at her shoulder. Same shoulder. Same scars. Same history.

Less pain.

That seemed impossible enough for the evening.

When she finally rose, dried, and dressed in the dark robe she still claimed to hate, Mara had tea waiting in the sitting room.

Serali sat in the good chair by the hearth.

Mara poured.

Neither spoke for several moments.

The quiet was not empty. It had structure now. Familiar corners. A place for pain to recede without being interrogated.

Serali took the cup.

Her shoulder twinged.

Only a little.

“Mara.”

“Yes?”

“I did not hate that.”

Mara’s hands paused on the teapot.

Then resumed. “I’m glad.”

“I may hate it next time.”

“That is allowed.”

“I may say no next time.”

“That is also allowed.”

“I may say yes.”

Mara looked at her then.

Not smiling too much.

Perfect.

“Yes,” Mara said. “That too.”

Serali looked into her tea.

The fire moved warmly in the grate. Rain ticked against the window. Somewhere in the study, Everly’s correspondence box sat with judging cards and spider letters and a place now reserved, apparently, for evidence that Serali had survived another form of kindness.

She took a sip.

Then said, very quietly, “Thank you.”

Mara inclined her head. “You’re welcome.”

“Do not make it important.”

“Of course not.”

Mara sat across from her with her own cup, and for once, Serali believed she might actually obey.

Chapter 131: Beloved

The problem with Princess Everly, Serali had learned, was that everyone loved her.

This seemed charming at first.

It was not.

Charming implied a manageable problem: a child with bright eyes, a clever mouth, and a talent for extracting cakes from adults who should have known better. Everly was certainly all of those things. She also possessed the terrifying political gift of making hardened councilors soften visibly in public.

Yvander, Master of Granaries, had once attempted to scowl at her and ended by giving her a honey roll from his own plate.

Harrek, Commander of the Watch, addressed her with the stiff terror of a junior officer summoned before judgment, then melted whenever she asked whether his boots were “for stomping or only standing.”

Marielle let her touch models.

Verya corrected her grammar.

Daravan allowed himself to be used as furniture.

Allandra pretended not to notice all of this, which meant she noticed it very much.

That afternoon, the trouble began in the eastern gallery, where the court had gathered for what Allandra called a civic reception and Serali privately classified as a decorative ambush.

It was not a full court function. That distinction had been explained to her three times, which meant it mattered to people with too many categories of suffering. A full court function required formal seating, heraldic announcement, and clothes that made everyone look as if they had been sewn into obedience. This was merely a “small reception” for the temple school children who had spent the morning touring the palace gardens and presenting drawings of Myrae’s protective walls to the queen.

There were only forty people present.

Apparently, that counted as small.

Serali stood near the outer edge of the gallery, where she could observe without becoming furniture herself. The room was bright with winter sunlight, the tall windows looking out over gardens trimmed back for the cold. Bowls of late pears and sugared nuts had been set on low tables. Courtiers drifted in polite clusters, their voices soft and edged.

Serali disliked every part of it except the pears.

The children were the least terrible. They moved in nervous little knots, dressed in temple-school blue, clutching rolled drawings tied with string. Their teachers hovered with the expressions of people trying to prevent historical incidents.

Everly, by contrast, looked as if she had been born to host.

She wore a pale gold dress with a green sash, her hair braided with tiny white ribbons, and a face of solemn responsibility that fooled absolutely no one. She was standing beside Allandra near the center of the gallery, greeting each child with the gravity of a monarch receiving ambassadors.

“This is my mother,” Everly told one boy.

The boy bowed so hard he nearly dropped his drawing.

Allandra inclined her head. “Welcome to the palace.”

“And this is Captain Daravan,” Everly continued, gesturing to Daravan, who stood behind Allandra’s shoulder in formal dark blue. “He is very tall and good at doors.”

Daravan’s face did not change.

The boy looked up at him with awe. “All doors?”

“Most,” Daravan said.

Everly nodded. “Some doors are secret.”

Allandra said, “Everly.”

Everly blinked innocently. “What?”

Serali took a sugared nut and considered whether four was old enough to understand state security.

Probably.

From the far side of the gallery, Hagen laughed.

He had come uninvited, which everyone had expected and no one had successfully prevented. He stood near a marble column with a glass of spiced wine, dressed in amber and black, watching Everly greet the children with an expression Serali could not quite categorize.

Affection, certainly.

Amusement, yes.

Something else beneath.

Something like hunger, but not for the child. For the room’s reaction to her.

That made Serali uneasy.

Everly turned as the next child approached, then spotted Serali across the gallery.

Her face lit.

“Serali!”

Several heads turned.

Serali closed her eyes for one brief moment.

So much for observation.

Everly waved with both hands, which nearly knocked over the paper wall model a nearby teacher was carrying.

Allandra caught the model without looking.

That was infuriatingly impressive.

“Come here,” Everly called.

The room noticed.

Of course the room noticed.

Serali walked across the gallery because refusing a princess in front of forty people seemed politically worse than obeying one.

Also because Everly was waving harder.

When Serali reached them, Everly seized the hem of her own sash instead of Serali’s sleeve, visibly remembering the rules about touching. That, somehow, was worse.

“Serali, this is Taven,” Everly said, pointing at a boy. “He drew the north wall. It has birds.”

Taven stared at Serali with wide eyes.

Not fear exactly.

Recognition.

Children had been told stories too.

Serali looked down at the drawing. The north wall stretched across the page in blue crayon, enormous and uneven, with red flags and several birds the size of houses.

“The birds are a useful defensive addition,” Serali said.

Taven’s mouth fell open. “Really?”

“No.”

Allandra made a soft sound that might have been warning.

Serali added, “But they are well-drawn.”

Taven beamed.

Everly looked triumphant. “See? Serali knows walls.”

“That is increasingly my curse,” Serali said.

Daravan covered his mouth with one hand.

A girl beside Taven looked up at Serali. “Are you the shadow mage?”

The teacher inhaled sharply.

The courtiers nearby went still.

Allandra’s face did not change.

Serali looked at the child.

“Yes,” she said.

The girl’s eyes widened. “Can you make a shadow?”

“Not indoors.”

Everly sighed, long-suffering. “Because of Marielle’s rule.”

Marielle, who had been inspecting the children’s paper walls with professional intensity, looked up. “My rule is sensible.”

“You have many rules,” Everly said.

“Most are sensible.”

“Some are loud.”

“Also sensible.”

The girl looked disappointed but not frightened.

That seemed useful.

Everly tugged her own sash again. “Serali made a shadow-bird when she was hurt.”

The room shifted.

Serali felt it.

So did Allandra.

Everly did not, because Everly had the political subtlety of a falling chandelier and the moral conviction of a temple bell.

“She was still good at magic even then,” Everly continued. “Now she is more good.”

“Better,” Verya said from nearby.

Everly turned. “What?”

“Now she is better at magic.”

Everly considered this, then looked at Serali. “Are you better at magic?”

Serali’s mouth twitched. “Unfortunately.”

“Then Lady Verya is right.”

“Frequently,” Verya said.

Everly looked her up and down. “Your dress is sad.”

Verya blinked.

The gallery froze.

Marielle’s shoulders began to shake.

Verya looked down at her dove-gray gown, then back at Everly. “It is appropriate.”

“It is sad appropriate.”

Hagen pressed his glass to his mouth.

Yvander coughed into his beard.

Allandra closed her eyes for one second.

Serali looked at the ceiling.

Verya said, with immense dignity, “I will take that under advisement.”

Everly nodded, satisfied. “You could wear yellow.”

“I could not.”

“You could.”

“I will not.”

“That is different.”

Verya paused.

Marielle whispered, “She has you.”

Verya looked at her. “Do not.”

Everly was already turning away, her work complete.

Serali watched the room recover around the child.

The remarkable thing was not that people laughed. It was how they laughed. Carefully at first, then with an affection that softened shoulders and loosened mouths. Verya’s expression remained severe, but Serali saw the faintest warmth in her eyes as Everly moved on to tell Harrek that his sash was crooked.

Harrek immediately looked down.

It was not crooked.

He adjusted it anyway.

The child was beloved.

Genuinely.

Widely.

Dangerously.

Serali felt the thought settle coldly beneath her ribs.

Because love did not always protect.

Sometimes it made people more willing to arrange the future around a child without ever asking what the child might become.

Everly skipped toward Yvander, who stood beside the refreshment table with a plate of pears and the resigned look of a man about to be robbed.

“Lord Bread,” Everly said.

Yvander sighed. “Your Highness.”

“You said I could see the honey rolls.”

“I said no such thing.”

“You said grain is important.”

“It is.”

“Honey rolls are grain.”

“They are a misuse of grain.”

“Can I have one?”

Yvander stared at her.

Everly stared back.

After three seconds, he took a honey roll from the covered dish and placed it on her plate.

“One.”

Everly smiled magnificently. “Thank you, Lord Bread.”

“I have a title,” he muttered.

“That is your title.”

Serali leaned toward Allandra. “Does he allow this?”

Allandra’s mouth curved faintly. “He claims not to.”

“Convincing.”

Hagen appeared at Serali’s other side, because apparently summoning demons was not necessary if one attracted princes by thinking poorly of them.

“Lord Bread has been his title for six months,” he said. “The man has surrendered to it with remarkable grace.”

Serali did not look at him. “Was surrender the official report?”

“No. The official report says he resisted valiantly and was overcome by superior charm.”

“Ah. A military defeat.”

“Total.”

Allandra looked at Hagen. “Are you enjoying yourself?”

“Immensely.”

“That concerns me.”

“It should.”

Everly carried her honey roll to Daravan next, holding it up. “Captain Daravan, do you want half?”

Daravan looked at the roll, then at the queen, then back at Everly. “That is very generous, Your Highness.”

Everly broke off a piece that could charitably be called symbolic and handed it to him.

“There.”

Daravan accepted it gravely. “Thank you.”

Hagen murmured, “A feast.”

Daravan ate the crumb with solemn discipline. “Excellent.”

Everly glowed.

Serali watched him.

Daravan, who had faced down riots, border raids, hostile nobles, Allandra’s temper, and the horror of mate-bond etiquette, stood there chewing a honey-roll crumb as if it were a sacred duty because a four-year-old had given it to him.

Beloved.

Yes.

Very much.

And still not enough, perhaps, for old families who preferred heirs to daughters and options to trust.