To the Count and Countess Casteris From Lady Maren Casteris

Dearest Mother and Father,

Life at the palace is simply delightful. Everyone has been extremely kind. I spend most of my days in the gardens or the library, or, I am sure you will not be surprised to hear, the stables.

Mother, I think you would adore the gardens. They are massive and have the loveliest flowers and fountains I could have imagined. I would happily draw dozens of pictures for you, but as you know, my art skills are rather lacking. I will see if I can find someone more talented to make some drawings for you.

The horse master, a most exacting man, has been very welcoming, for which I am relieved. At first, he was skeptical that I could actually groom a horse and maintain tack, but he was soon convinced through my expedient seizure of a grooming brush. I expect he might even allow me to ride one of his lovely creatures eventually if I pass his muster.

The royal family has all been so welcoming, and I had the honor of attending a small dinner party at the King and Queen's residence. Prince Donovan, has proven to be a fine companion and excellent conversationalist. We attended a beautiful ball together not long after my arrival and had a fabulous time.

I do think of home often and miss you very much. I hope all is well at home. I love you both.

Maren

Maren surveyed the letter. It had numerous omissions and some gross exaggerations, but no outright falsehoods. Reading it over, she hoped it might assuage some of her parents' concerns. They had no idea the Prince knew about her, and she had no intention of telling them. It would just worry them needlessly—it wasn't as if they could do anything to help her in any case.

She had very much exaggerated her views on the Prince, but she couldn't really complain too much about him. He still was frequently rather rude, but he mostly left her alone. He paraded her in front of the Court every few days and occasionally invited her to dinner, but apart from that, she rarely saw him.

Maren sealed the letter and left a note to the staff directing them to mail it to her parents. It would take at least a week to arrive, but the post was fairly reliable. She checked the time and realized she needed to go to dinner as she was meeting the Prince in his dining room.

When she arrived, they performed the various ritual greetings and sat quietly sipping wine and waiting for dinner to arrive. They normally had little to discuss, but Maren didn't mind — silence was far superior to rudeness.

Eventually, dinner arrived. It appeared to be some sort of roast beef, which Maren generally enjoyed. They had only been eating for a minute or so when the Prince began to cough. First, he just cleared his throat a few times, but it rapidly turned into a fit of coughing.

"Are you all right?" Maren asked, alarmed. The Prince's face was turning bright red. Then he began to wheeze and gasp for breath.

Clearly, something serious was happening.

"I'll go get help," she said.

Maren leapt up from the table and was leaving the room when she heard the thump that could only be the Prince falling from his chair.

She cursed loudly and turned on her heel. He had collapsed on the floor. Maren knelt beside him, checking to see if he was breathing.

He wasn't.

She cursed again.

Should she perhaps run and find help? Would they make it back in time? She had absolutely no idea how to reach the Court Physician, and it would take at least a few minutes for her to summon a servant and then for the servant to find help. She didn't think the Prince had that kind of time.

There was only one option.

"Dammit," she muttered.

"If I get executed for this, I am going to haunt you for all eternity!" she yelled to his unconscious body.

No help for it, though. Being found with a dead prince would not improve her circumstances. As quickly as she could, she rolled him from his side to his back, tore off his tie, and ripped open his shirt, allowing access to his chest.

Maren took a deep breath, cleared her mind, and placed her hand on his chest. She allowed the Light within her to rise and directed it through her arm and into the prince. Her hand glowed, as did the Prince's chest beneath her hand. She closed her eyes and willed the Light to heal.

After what felt like hours but was probably less than a minute, she felt the Prince begin to breathe again. 

She sighed in relief and let go of the Light.

She hadn't been sure it would work—she had never healed anything more significant than some cuts and scrapes and, once, a broken bone. Maren wasn't even sure it could heal something as serious as whatever had happened to the Prince.

She still wasn't quite sure it had worked. The Prince was breathing but unconscious. She hesitated, unsure if she should get help. She was still kneeling beside the Prince, trying to decide what to do, when he inhaled hugely and opened his eyes.

It had worked.

Maren sat on the floor, reeling. She was suddenly more exhausted than she had ever been in her life, and didn't notice when the Prince sat up.

"Gods above, what's happened?" he asked.

"Hmmm?"

She was having difficulty keeping her eyes open. Healing the Prince had taken far more out of her than she would have thought.

"Lady Maren, are you all right?" he asked, alarmed.  Apparently, he had noticed she was not exactly herself. She was vaguely annoyed that she was now in some distress after saving him.

She shook her head as if to clear it and said, "Mmhmm, very fine, thanks, just...ah...just a bit tired."

The Prince stood up and offered a hand to assist her off the floor. She took it and then stood up, swaying slightly.

"Are you quite sure you're all right?" he asked again.

She blinked at him, feeling entirely too tired to be concerned with whatever the Prince was saying. She needed to get away from him fast.

"Quite all right, but I think I shall go to bed, good night!" and she hastily left the room, bumping into the furniture as she went.

Maren rushed to her suite and barely made it to her bed before collapsing.

—

The next morning, Maren woke up feeling rather refreshed, although she cringed to consider how odd the whole evening must've appeared to the Prince. She was still wearing her dress from the day before, and changed into her dressing gown before leaving her bedroom in search of coffee.

She found her usual pot of coffee on her dining table, but also a note with it.  Breakfast, usually present along with the coffee, was notably absent.

Sighing heavily, she read the note.

Dear Lady Maren,

Please join me for breakfast in the dining room at your earliest convenience.

D. M.

Maren sighed again. She had hoped the Prince would be content to ignore the admittedly unusual events of the night before, but no such luck.

She had tried to come up with some sort of plausible explanation of events that did not involve her using highly illegal magic, but also had no luck on that front. The best she had was something like the Prince suddenly and unexpectedly collapsed (tearing his shirt in the process) and then Maren, having witnessed this but inexplicably not sought help, got very sleepy.

It was a very shoddy explanation.

She had to admit it was possible he would be more grateful for her saving his life than angry she had done it with the Light, but she didn't want to risk it. Besides, after years of hiding her power, she was extremely uncomfortable with the idea of discussing it with anyone, much less a member of the royal family.

Could she skip breakfast altogether? Probably not. The note that the prince sent was not the sort of thing one ignored. Besides, he clearly intended to hold the food hostage, and she was starving.

Perhaps she could stall. She knew he usually attended a meeting of the King's Council in the morning. If she had to guess—and she did—she'd say that likely started at nine o'clock. It would take him at least ten or so minutes to get to the other side of the palace that was devoted to the business of running the kingdom. She checked the time, she had slept in later than usual, it was already fifteen past eight. If she waited to go to breakfast until a quarter to nine, he would probably only have a few minutes to talk to her before he had to leave. So much the better.

She therefore went about the business of having coffee and dressing without any urgency. She found she actually enjoyed the leisurely pace of the morning rather than her usual more efficient routine. By the time a quarter to nine rolled around, she had just finished fixing her hair and felt reasonably prepared to meet the Prince.

She took a deep breath and left her room, striding towards the dining room. The Prince was sitting at the table at the opposite end from the entrance, reviewing a sheaf of papers. He looked up when she approached.

"My lady, good morning," he said, rising from his chair.

"Good morning, Your Highness," she responded with a curtsy.

He pulled out the chair just to the right of his own at the head of the table, and she sat in it. Maren was somewhat suspicious. Gentlemen did pull out chairs for ladies, but the Prince had not performed that particular act of chivalry for her before.

He sat down and looked at her, a pleasant expression on his face. "Did you sleep well?" he asked.

Now, Maren was very suspicious. That was a far more intimate question than he had ever asked her before.

"Quite well, thank you," she said, which was true, she had slept like the dead. And then she added, "I do apologize for the lateness of my arrival, I'm afraid I unintentionally slept in very late."

"It's no matter, I have cleared my schedule this morning," he said, still looking at her.

Damn, she thought. No luck today at all.

"Please, do have something to eat," he said.

Well, whatever the Prince was up to, at least there was food. Their end of the table was covered with a pleasant looking array of pastries and eggs and sausages, and Maren filled her plate.

"Coffee?" he asked, gesturing at the pot on the table.

Maren nodded, and he smiled, pouring the coffee into her cup.

"Thank you," she said, trying to ignore the way he was staring at her. He seemed to have already eaten, so the entire affair was extremely awkward.

"Tell me, my lady, do you happen to recall anything unusual occurring yesterday evening?" he asked with the air of someone who had no real interest in the answer.

For want of something more useful to say, Maren lied, "No, not at all, Your Highness."

"Hmmm," he said dubiously.

She kept eating, making a point not to look at him.

"You know, it's terribly strange, but I do happen to remember something unusual occurring yesterday evening," he said.

She feigned a look of surprise. "Really?" she said. She was trying to sound like the Court ladies who seemed to always adopt a tone of complete ignorance when talking to men.

"Yes, indeed," he said seriously. "I'm afraid though that my memory is a bit spotty on some particulars from the evening, do you suppose you could assist me?"

"Well, as you may recall, I retired for the evening rather early, so I'm afraid I'll be of no use," she said.

"I am fairly certain you can assist me," he insisted.

She actually looked at him that time. His dark eyes were studying her, but his face held no indication of malice or anger.

She put down her utensils. "Very well," she said.

"Let me tell you what I remember. We sat down for dinner, and then we started eating, and that's where my memory begins to falter. I think perhaps I had some sort of coughing fit and then the next thing I remember was waking up lying on the floor, my shirt torn open and next to you," he said.

Maren paused for a moment and then said, very carefully, "I do recall those particular events."

He sat back in his chair and looked at her for a few moments. "Do you have any allergies?" he asked, seemingly at random.

"No, not that I'm aware of," she answered.

"I do. I am extremely allergic to almonds," he said.

"Are you?" she asked. That did explain a lot, though. She had thought the Prince had had some sort of allergic episode the night before, but having never seen one, she wasn't sure.

"Quite so," he confirmed. "When I was a child I was given an almond cookie and after just one bite I started coughing and wheezing, and then I stopped breathing altogether. Fortunately, the Court Physician at the time happened to be nearby and happened to have a syringe of epinephrine and saved my life."

"My goodness, that sounds serious indeed," she said.

He nodded and then continued. "So you see, I am perplexed. I am fairly certain I was exposed to almonds last night, which caused a coughing fit that escalated to me stopping to breathe altogether and should have resulted in my death. And yet here I am."

He paused, continuing to look directly at her. She did not say anything.

"Do you have any idea what intervention might have saved my life?" he asked.

She didn't want to answer. She really didn't want to answer.

"None whatsoever," she said in the haughtiest Court tone she could manage. She wasn't sure feigning ignorance would work, but it was the best idea she had.

"None at all?" he asked. "I know it couldn't have been Alec, since he would currently be clucking over me like a mother hen. In fact, I don't think it was epinephrine at all that saved me. Which leaves me with two alternatives: either I have developed some sort of mysterious ailment that causes me to have the appearance of an anaphylactic attack that stops short of actually killing me, or, you did something to intervene."

Maren sipped her coffee, resisting the urge to bolt from the room.

"Perhaps you should visit the physician," she suggested.

He put down his coffee and looked at her. It was the sort of look a stern schoolmaster gives a naughty child, and she resisted the urge to shrink away in response.

"Lady Maren, I have been very patient with you this morning," he said very seriously. "But I am beginning to run out of patience and I would very much like to know what happened, and I would very much like to accomplish that without resorting to less than gentlemanly behavior."

Maren pursed her lips. She was fairly certain she was stuck. She thought for a moment, trying to come up with a way to convey the satisfactory information without actually telling him what had happened. But she had to tell him something.

"Allow me to propose a hypothetical situation," she tried.

He looked skeptical, but gestured for her to continue.

"Suppose you had the ability to mend something that was broken, and there was a broken thing before you that needed mending rather urgently. You would mend it, yes?"

"I would," he confirmed.

"Now suppose, hypothetically of course, that your ability to fix broken things was somehow problematic. Perhaps you wanted to keep that ability private for some reason...any reason...perhaps the ability is embarrassing or shameful or illegal," she went on.

He nodded, his eyes narrowing in thought.

"So, in this hypothetical, you would most likely be hesitant to discuss your mending abilities and probably quite reluctant to acknowledge that you had been the one to mend the broken thing," she concluded.

She sat quietly, watching him process what she had said. She wasn't sure her "hypothetical" would work. It wasn't particularly subtle, but the Prince also seemed determined to get the whole story out of her.

Then, she saw his eyes go wide when he figured it out.

"Are you saying —"

"It's only a hypothetical, Your Highness," she insisted.

He looked at her for what seemed to be a long time before finally saying, "Well, if you happen to recall anything, do let me know. I would very much like to thank the person who saved my life."

She nodded, relieved. "I certainly will," she said.

"More coffee?" he asked, and they returned to their breakfast in silence.

—

Donovan was not sure the words existed to describe his surprise properly at the revelations from his breakfast with The Girl — no, Lady Maren, he corrected himself. It had been several days since then, and he was no closer to understanding either matter. He also couldn't decide if he was more surprised at discovering that the Light had the ability to heal people, or that the lady had actually saved his life. In truth, both findings were shocking.

In fact, he had spent the majority of his time since the incident and currently was still locked in his study trying to make sense of things. He had made little progress.

Not once in twenty-eight years, and that was twenty-eight years with considerable access to information related to the running of the kingdom, had he ever heard so much as a hint of a whisper about the Light having any ability to heal. He should tell...no, he should not tell anyone. But Alec would be fascinated.

Donovan marveled at the notion that not only could the Light heal, but it had healed him of a mortal injury! This was no broken bone or cut finger; he was certain he would have died had the lady not intervened.

And of course, he couldn't think about mortal injuries without running headlong into the fact that Lady Maren had saved his life. Voluntarily. And at great risk to her own person.  She would have been executed had she been caught. He had absolutely no idea how to make sense of that.

She had no obligation to save him. She actually had excellent reasons not to save his life. If he had died, she would have most likely been sent back home to her parents. True, she might have done it because being found with a dead prince would subject her to unwanted scrutiny, but he wasn't sure that was reason enough for her to save him—at least not in the way she did.

In the last few weeks, they had reached something like civility, where they could generally conduct the business of being in one another's company with minimal strife. However, there was absolutely no affection, platonic or otherwise, between them. Any gestures of kindness he had made towards her had been more about assuaging his guilty conscience than anything.

Really, despite a fair bit of time together and living in the same apartment, they barely knew each other. He knew she was from the North, liked horses, and was a witch—that was about all. And, truth be told, she probably knew even less about him.

So, why save him? Was it just basic human decency? Witches were never described as having that. In fact, the Light was largely viewed as being corruptive, turning the women who wielded it into something evil.  And he had reason enough to believe that description.

But witches also were never described as having miraculous healing abilities. That was astounding.  He had thought perhaps the official pamphlets and the like were prone to exaggeration, but he hadn't imagined they would have outright falsehoods or gross omissions.

He found that disturbing. What else was wrong or missing? Did anyone else know? What did Kieran know?

She supposed it hardly mattered who did know what about witches. Lady Maren had obviously healed him. He was still unable to make any sense of her saving him, but he was sure of something: he owed her a great debt.

Donovan felt rather guilty. He had not been kind to her since she arrived. He had been so absorbed in his own problems that he saw her as little more than a burden. Not only that, but he had paraded her around the Court for his own purposes and dragged her to dinner just so he could have something like entertainment. That was a particularly poor way to treat her.

He had been careless and cruel.

Careless and cruel were qualities he associated with Kieran, and not qualities he wanted associated with himself. Kieran, he had no doubt, actually liked the work he did.

Donovan had had the chance to lead the Trackers. Several years ago, his uncle had decided he wanted to step down from overseeing the organization. As it was a position that reported directly to the King, it usually fell to whichever prince was available. Donovan had been offered the position, but declined. He told his father that he was more interested in military and economic affairs, which was true. One day, Donovan would be king, and he felt that taking on a larger role in the military and in matters of commerce would be more beneficial. He also thought handing the role of leading the Trackers over to Kieran might build some goodwill between them.

But, another large part of the reason he did not want to take on the job was that he found the work of the Trackers rather distasteful. He had no interest in hunting down his own subjects and executing the ones who were—or might be—witches. It wasn't that he liked witches, it was more that he didn't feel he had the stomach for the job. He thought it required a sort of ruthlessness and cruelty he liked to think he lacked.

But he had to admit, he had been cruel to Lady Maren and without cause. Apart from a small usage of her powers at the Selection, which he had to assume was accidental, the absolute worst thing she had done was tell him "no." (She even did nothing when he lost control and called the Darkness to his hands right in front of her.)

He was still considering what sort of king he might be, but he was quite sure he wanted to be the sort to whom people were allowed to say "no." He wanted to surround himself with people like Alec, who would tell him when he was being cruel or stupid. And in this instance he had been both. That was not how he wanted to behave nor how he normally behaved. So, why had he done it? Now that he saw things more clearly, the reason was obvious, even if somewhat painful to admit.

He was afraid.

Not of the lady and her powers, although he was quite wary of both, but of Kieran. Kieran was terrifyingly powerful, far more powerful than Donovan—who was no slouch. Donovan had spent much of his teenage years practicing his power over the Darkness. There weren't many people to compare himself to, but he felt confident that he was quite competent, perhaps even better than average, at wielding the Darkness. But Kieran... he could knock Donovan out in half a heartbeat.

Kieran was also up to something. He had no idea what his brother was plotting, but he felt certain it was something—and something dangerous at that. Not only that, but Kieran had plenty of goons.

Kieran first gained followers after Donovan turned eighteen and was no longer spending time around the youth at Court. Some of the more ambitious young men who had never gotten close to Donovan (which was most of them) latched on to Kieran. Kieran had never been popular before and seemed to relish the attention.

Then, when Kieran was given control of the Trackers, he already had a group of people loyal to him who he could put in leadership positions, even if they had no experience.

He swiftly and ruthlessly taken control of the Trackers. He immediately removed the entire leadership, promoting successors who would be loyal to him and bringing in some of his own people.

Then, he began moving his own people back to the palace. Trackers became palace guards and drivers. Kieran had not been subtle about it. He made a fuss about "giving his best people to the palace for the safety of the Court."

As a rule, Donovan assumed that anyone associated with the Trackers was loyal only to Kieran. He also was cautious around the place guards and drivers. Apart from Alec, Donovan felt he could not trust anyone.

And then there had been the attempt on his own life, in addition to the incident with the almonds, of course. Donovan was unable to prove that his brother was behind it, but besides The Girl—the lady—Kieran was the only person he knew of who might harbor ill will against him. And it had happened before the lady had arrived at the palace.

The combination of his brother's supernatural powers, vast network of lackeys, and his apparent complete disregard for Donovan's life—or anyone else's for that matter, was terrifying. Donovan had not realized it had affected him so strongly until now.

It wasn't Lady Maren's fault. It was wrong of him to make her suffer for it. She had saved him—and at no small risk to herself. If a servant or someone else walked in at that very moment, she would have been arrested and executed no matter what.

He would need to make amends and repay the debt he owed her, both of which had to start with telling her how much danger she was truly in.