“Don’t you have a hat?”
“Yes, I have a hat, but . . . You’ll laugh at my hat.”
“I won’t laugh,” Gray said quickly, putting one hand over his heart. Then he thought for a moment and added, “I’ll try not to laugh.”
Good enough.
She called in her gardening hat and plunked it on her head. It was a simple straw hat with a wide brim that kept the sun off her face and neck.
Gray didn’t laugh, but his smile kept getting wider and wider as he studied her hat.
“Why does it have a chunk missing from one side?” he asked.
“Because my brother was teasing me last summer and holding it behind his back—and didn’t notice when the goat snuck up behind him and took a bite out of it.”
His smile got even wider. “Shouldn’t it have ribbons?”
“I use Craft to keep it in place.”
Nodding, and still smiling, he handed her one of the short-handled claws. “I’ll show you what doesn’t belong in this garden.”
Where in the name of Hell did she go? Theran scanned the weed-tangled mess of raised beds that framed a terrace before he headed for the rest of the formal gardens.
She’d said she wanted a little air and would be back shortly. That had been over an hour ago. A meal, and the men, were waiting for her return so they could get on with the rest of these meetings.
Considering how bad everything looked, what could Lady Cassidy find out here that would amuse her for so long?
The answer punched his heart. He lengthened his stride as he headed for the big stone shed. It had held the groundskeeper’s office at one time, but had become a catchall for unwanted tools. He’d helped Gray clear out the smaller room in the shed and put in a cot, a small chest of drawers, and a bookcase.
Gray was used to living rough. So was he. But here, with the mansion in sight, it seemed . . . meaner, coarser.
It was all Gray could tolerate.
If Cassidy thought she could play with a damaged man just because Gray wasn’t able to fight back, she’d find out the truth quick enough. He, Theran, wasn’t fifteen anymore, didn’t—wouldn’t—hide anymore. And Gray wasn’t standing alone anymore, facing something that terrified him.
He spotted Gray and hurried toward his cousin, no longer caring if he found Cassidy. A wheelbarrow full of weeds was on Gray’s left and someone—he caught a glimpse of a straw hat—was on the other side of the wheelbarrow.
“That’s called pearl of wisdom,” Gray said, pointing to a plant. “See? The flower has a sheen like the inside of a shell, and the seedpod looks like a pearl. The flower only blooms for a couple of weeks in the spring.”
“Gray,” Theran called, wondering what servant had befriended his cousin.
Gray looked around, a queer wariness in his eyes before he spotted Theran.
“Theran!” he said happily.
From the other side of the wheelbarrow, a husky voice said, “Oh, shit. Theran.”
When she popped up, it took him a moment to recognize her. She was the only person in Dena Nehele who had red hair, but it still took him a moment to recognize her.
Not a Queen. Despite her caste, she was not a Queen.
“Has an hour gone by already?” Cassidy asked.
“And then some. We’ve held the midday meal, thinking you would be back soon.” He couldn’t keep the tightness out of his voice, couldn’t even keep it on the right side of respectful.
“My apologies, Prince Theran.” There was a tightness in her voice too as she stood up and vanished that stupid hat. “I’ll wash up and join you as soon as I can. Please tell the men not to wait for me. They shouldn’t have to eat cold food just because I lost track of the time.”
“We live to serve,” Theran said.
She winced and wouldn’t meet his eyes as she hurried back to the mansion.
Theran watched her for a moment, then looked at Gray. “Are you all right?”
That queer wariness was back in Gray’s eyes. “I’m fine.”
What did she do to you? He couldn’t ask, but he knew something wasn’t quite right.
As he turned to go back to the mansion, Gray said, “Theran? She knows the land needs to be loved. The Queens who have been living here haven’t cared about that.”
A message there, but Gray had always had a sensitivity to the land, being more aware of it than the people around him were. That sensitivity had heightened after he’d been rescued.
I’m glad you’re not afraid of her, Gray, Theran thought as he walked back to the mansion, but what kind of Queen cares more about digging in the dirt than taking care of the people?
It took most of the afternoon to meet the Warlords who wanted to be considered for the court. Three belonged to her and were suited to serve in her First Circle. The others wanted status, safety, something else. Whatever it was, they wouldn’t find it with her.
Several Warlords who lived in the town of Grayhaven would be an asset in one of the other twelve circles that made up a court, and she hoped they would accept the offer when the Steward made it on her behalf.
Once she found a Steward. And a Master of the Guard.
And with every man who wasn’t accepted, Theran tensed a little more.
Toward the end of the afternoon the first, and only, Prince arrived. A middle-aged man whose skin sagged as if he’d once been hefty but hadn’t eaten well in quite some time and whose left hand had been broken and badly healed.
“What do you want, Powell?” Archerr asked in a challenging voice.
“I would like to be considered for a position in the court,” Powell replied courteously, looking at Cassidy. “I’m good at organizing schedules and duties.”
“You’re also good at skimming off a percentage of the Queen’s tithes,” Archerr snapped.
“That was never proved,” Ranon snapped in return.
Why would Ranon defend a man accused of stealing from a Queen? Unless the Warlord Prince knew, or suspected, something about Powell that the rest of the men didn’t know.
“Did you steal from the Queen you served?” Cassidy asked.
“Yes,” Powell replied.
Mutters from the Warlords and Warlord Princes who had remained in the room. Snarls from several of the Warlord Princes who were in her First Circle, but she couldn’t tell if they were snarling at Powell or at one another.
“Why?” Cassidy asked.
“The Province Queen I served liked luxury,” Powell said. “Well, they all did, didn’t they? And it was the tithes from the District Queens that had to support those luxuries. It was hard to walk through the town where the Queen lived and see children who were hungry or who were wearing clothes and shoes too patched and torn to be useful. So sometimes a few coins would find their way back to a family for food or clothing.”
“I see,” Cassidy said. “Is that why your hand was broken?”
Powell nodded. “Most people were careful to spread out the spending. One man was not. I claimed to have given the man some coins from my own wages, and the Queen couldn’t prove otherwise. That’s why she had my left hand broken instead of maiming the right hand.”
In Kaeleer, a tribunal of Queens would have known you were lying within minutes, Cassidy thought. But their wrath would have been aimed at the Queen who had mistreated her people and not you.
“I have to trust that the people who serve me will work for the good of Dena Nehele,” Cassidy said to Powell. “I understand your reasons, and I can’t say you were wrong. But everyone is going to be living lean for a while, and tithes will be necessary to support the court and take care of the expenses that come with the court. If you think someone is being tithed unfairly, I need to know. But the amount of the tithe, unfair or not, will be my decision. Is that understood?”