Page 75 of Never the Roses

“Your Highness,” Stearanos began, not at all sure what he would say next. All he could think of were Oneira’s bitter words.It’s all dick-swinging. All men wanting to be the herd bull.If ever there was a herd-bull wannabe, it was the crown prince, forever fighting to escape the immense shadow cast by his father. “There are good reasons I have never been pitted against the sorceress Oneira.”Because I love her.He shook that thought away. “I don’t know that I can defeat her.”

“Nonsense, Your Eminence,” Mirza said with a winning and practiced smile. “Iknow you can do it. Everyone in this room knows, don’t we, gentlemen?”

The other men agreed with a semblance of enthusiasm, the dread in their haunted gazes mirroring his own.

“My father didn’t have faith in you, Stearanos,” the prince continued, “not the way I do. I believe in you as he failed to do. In theend, he lacked the courage of his convictions. Age will do that, make cowardly dotards of those once-stalwart rulers, reducing heroes to frightened fools. But never fear! I am the leader you’ve needed. I am not afraid! In time, we shall rule all the known world. And to think it began here.” He actually teared up a bit, gazing out the window. “I have been chosen for a great destiny and I shall not falter.”

General Khanpasha and Admiral Bartolomej slid Stearanos discreetly pleading looks of utter panic.

“Your Highness,” he ventured. “What says His Majesty of these developments? I designed my strategy based on the assumption that the sorceress Oneira would not be a factor in the equation. Perhaps we should revisit—”

The prince glowered, his mood darkening instantly. “I believe inyou, Sorcerer Stearanos. Do you fail to return me the favor?”

Stearanos could not think of any possible way to answer that question with any level of honesty. Fortunately, the prince spared him, drawing himself up with self-importance and assuming a mask of grief. And here came the distressing news. Stearanos braced himself, reasonably certain of what it would be.

“Unfortunately,” Crown Prince Mirza said, looking from one face to the next, “I must share with you, my trusted advisors, the truly distressing news that my father recently experienced a seizure. Only his personal physicians, myself, and now you, are aware of this terrible event.” Mirza cast down his gaze, his shoulders sagging. “His Majesty has entered into a state of unconsciousness from which the physicians say he will never recover. His mind is gone and his body will soon follow.”

The murmurs around the table were sincere in their aghast sorrow. Stearanos grimly reflected that under no other circumstances would this assembly have experienced such authentic anguish over the incipient fall of a tyrant who’d made all their livesa misery. To think that Stearanos had once looked forward to this day with a sense of optimism. Of course, once upon a time, Mirza had been a charming and enthusiastic boy, not the hubris-filled young man who now stood before them, so pumped up with his own vision of himself that his pretense at grief frayed at the edges after only moments. Very likely he’d conspired to murder his father, and none of them could do the least thing about it.

The old king had been right in his foresight and wrong in his solution. There seemed to be a great deal of that going around.

“Enough of this sadness,” Mirza abruptly declared. “Father wouldn’t want us to grieve.”

Absolutely untrue, as His Majesty would expect the entire kingdom to mourn for at least a year. He’d probably left precise instructions to that effect. Not to mention that the man wasn’t even dead yet. Stearanos had never imagined he’d feel sorry for Uhtric, but hecouldimagine what manner of dire magic Mirza had employed to fell the king with a debilitating stroke that not even the best physicians in the entire realm could mitigate. Trapped within an unresponsive body would be a nightmare of epic proportions.

“Stearanos,” Mirza said, “you will rework your strategy to account for the influence of Sorceress Oneira and present it to the council tomorrow.”

Stearanos didn’t bother to argue that it wasn’t enough time. No amount of time would allow him to develop a way to counter Oneira’s unique skills. He only hoped that she would find a way to nullify Mirza’s conquest without destroying them utterly—and shattering her barely mended heart in the process. Whatwouldshe do? For all that he’d confidently declared his knowledge of her, he found he had no idea. If only she would come to him in dreams, then he could pass along this devastating news.

Their plan had failed. Not only that, but he’d dragged her intothe middle of a war where they might yet be pitched against each other.

“I want the sorceress in chains, too,” Mirza added with a light laugh, all pretense of grief fled. “They’ll make a nice set piece, that pair of women who dared to defy the natural order. It will be a pleasure to teach them their proper place in the world. Don’t you agree, Your Eminence? Perhaps I’ll gift you with the sorceress after you break her, to keep as a pet.”

“I’ll begin reworking my strategy, Your Highness,” Stearanos said with perfect honesty, as a plan had already occurred to him. There was one way to ensure this war would fizzle before it began, one person without whom it could not happen.

Stearanos had to find a way to tell Oneira to kill him. The sooner, the better.

37

Oneira stepped out of the Dream and into the grand throne room at the citadel. Might as well make an impressive entrance. It would help create the appearance of a free agent granting Her Majesty a boon, rather than the refugee returning to the scene of her shame with her ears down and tail between her legs.

The queen was holding court—Oneira had peeked ahead of time, to ensure the effectiveness of her grand entrance—and Zarja sat upon her throne in all the radiant glory the riches of multiple kingdoms could provide. Funny how Oneira’s time away had changed her perceptions. The queen looked more like an ordinary woman dressed up in jewels and finery than anything more potent than that. The queen’s court, too, looked smaller than ever, packed to the gills with richly dressed people, and stinking like old fish.

All of them gaped at her like those stranded fish. Gaping most outrageously of all was Yelena. Oneira gave the other sorceress a jaundiced eye, not at all surprised to see that the woman had jumped at the opportunity to take Oneira’s vacated place at the queen’s side, but somewhat surprised that Yelena had clearly beaten the quite stiff competition for the plum position. Not everyone hated the job like Oneira did. And now Yelena, recovering from her shock, but not her long-established enmity, glared at Oneira like a teenager suddenly realizing their crush’s long-lost love had returned and would take them away.

To extend the analogy, Queen Zarja was gazing at Oneirawith the incredulous hope and starry-eyed happiness of that long-lost love. Then Oneira saw who stood at the queen’s other side and her heartbeat faltered.

Tristan.

The young poet regarded her with a woeful look of puppyish regret, essaying a smile full of both wistful charm and tentative apology. Oneira realized she’d said his name aloud. She also realized, far too late, that Yelena’s expression of outrage had morphed into one of vicious delight. Far, far too late, Oneira remembered Yelena’s skill with psychic magic. No wonder Tristan had seemed so merrily uncomplicated. Yelena had made him that way, the perfect tool of sabotage.

The other sorceress had struck a blow that Oneira had yet to fully register.

Tristan bowed, deep and with courtly elegance. “My name is Leskai Orynych, Sorceress Oneira. I beg your forgiveness for my pretense with you about my identity on the grounds that you did the same with me.”

Oneira tore her gaze from the young man she’d so underestimated, Stearanos’s scathing words about the pretty poet’s convenient arrival on her doorstep ringing in her ears, and focused entirely on the queen. “Your Majesty,” Oneira said, mustering a polite tone and inclining her head. She need not bow, not any longer, nor would she.

“Sorceress Oneira,” the queen breathed, life and hope flooding her face with color. “Dare I believe you’re here because you’ve changed your mind about aiding me in the war?”

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