Daughter of the Disgraced King (15 page)

The amount of splashing seemed almost sacrilegious to Ailsa.
 She just couldn’t understand how anyone could be so cavalier about water. But
. . . they did seem to be having great fun. She put her foot back into the
water and took several steps away from the shore. Once she got used to it, the
squishiness of the mud wasn’t really unpleasant, just unexpected. And it was
cooler. She bent down to cup some water to wet her face.

The bottom wasn’t just squishy, it was slippery too. She
slid forward a little and had to stand up and thrust her arms out for balance.
Ailsa stood still for a moment, too afraid to move either forward or back. The
bottom seemed to slope downward here and it was hard not to keep sliding
farther away from the shore. If only she was closer to those lily pads floating
maddeningly just out of reach. At least she’d have something to hold onto.
Maybe . . .

She jumped at a whoop behind her. Arrigo’s voice. He dashed
past her and dove into the water just a few feet away. Ailsa windmilled her
arms frantically, struggling to maintain her balance. The muscles in her legs
and torso locked as her world narrowed to just the slippery mud on which she
couldn’t find purchase. She cried out as her feet slipped out from under her.
She gasped and swallowed water as she went under. Even that didn’t stop her.
She kept sliding down the slope until the bottom fell out from beneath her. She
kept falling into the depths, watching the sunlight slowly grow fainter above
her. She had no way to stop herself. Her lungs ached.

Somewhere in the distance, muted by the water, she heard a
sharp cry. Or was that just an echo of the scream that fought to escape her
throat? She was so deep already. Even if the others had heard her choked-off
cry or seen her fall, what could they do? She was going to die here, in this
lake.

Ailsa’s flailing hands brushed against something. She
desperately tried to grab it, but her thrashing only succeeded in pushing her
away from whatever it was. She couldn’t see it in this dark water. She gasped
and sucked in more water as something grabbed her. Hands. Ailsa grasped back so
hard she felt bones moving under her hands. For a moment, it seemed that both she
and her rescuer would continue falling to the bottom of the lake, but he kicked
hard and they spurted upward. Jathan. It was Jathan. He didn’t stop until he’d
gotten her back to the shallows and on her feet.

“There. You’re safe now,” he said.

Ailsa continued to hold onto him for support as she coughed
on the water she’d swallowed.

Jathan turned back away from the shore, toward the deep
water again. “Arrigo, you idiot! She’s from the
desert
. She doesn’t know
how to swim. You could have drowned her with a stunt like that. Hells, you damn
near drowned me going after her.”

Arrigo waded up to them, holding out his hand. “I’m sorry,
Princess. I didn’t know.”

Ailsa flinched away from him, holding Jathan still tighter.

“Leave her alone, Arrigo. You’ve done quite enough,” Mayra
said sharply.

“I’m sorry,” Arrigo repeated before retreating.

“You should be,” Mayra muttered. “Are you all right, Ailsa?”

Ailsa nodded helplessly, still coughing.

“She will be now,” Jathan said. “You go on, May. I’ll take
care of her.”

~

Jathan held Ailsa until the coughing fit eased and her death
grip on him began to loosen. Even though he was still quivering with rage at
his thoughtless brother, he was also aware of the sensation of holding Ailsa
close and having her hold onto him. The hammering of his pulse wasn’t all due
to anger at Arrigo.

Gradually, Ailsa’s breathing eased and she stood up
straighter. He kept a hand on her elbow to steady her. She needed something to
make her feel more secure. Jathan looked around and decided on the nearby water
lilies as a way to distract her from her recent terror. Ailsa resisted his
first attempt to move in that direction. He kept his tone light. “Let’s just go
over here and look at the lilies. Come to think of it, that’s probably one of
the habitats your grandmother wanted us to investigate.”

She drew in a shuddering breath. “All right. For a moment.”

Jathan guided her hand underwater to a lily stem. “These
lilies are old. The stems are strong and the roots are large and solid. Feel
that?”

Ailsa smiled unsteadily. “Yes.”

A tiny green frog jumped off the nearest pad at their approach.
Farther away, a small water bird ran across the tops of the lily pads.

“See, the lilies can support that bird. If you need it, they
could support you, too. You can’t tell me you couldn’t make them do that, and
you an eighth-level green mage.”

Ailsa kept one hand on Jathan’s arm as she ran a finger
around the edge of a lily pad.

“You feel safer here, don’t you?”

Ailsa nodded. “Yes. I wished I was closer to the lilies
right before . . . right before I fell.”

Just like that, anger nearly choked him again. Jathan
gripped her arm, surprised at his own rage. He couldn’t remember ever being
this angry with any of his stepbrothers, even Arrigo. That was saying
something. “Right before my dim-witted stepbrother almost pushed you in, you
mean.”

That raised a soft chuckle from Ailsa, though, and Jathan relaxed,
blowing out his breath.

“All right, now you feel better, let’s try something. Just
lay back and let the water hold you up.”

Ailsa tensed and shook her head. “No. Just let me get out
and dry.”

Jathan gripped her hand. “No.” He searched for something she’d
understand. “It’s a little like learning to ride. If you fall off the horse,
you have to get right back on. Otherwise it’ll just be harder, later.”

Ailsa pulled away from him, toward the shore. “That’s all
right. I don’t need to swim.”

“But you do. How else are you going to investigate what else
lives among the lilies? Or over in the cattails, for that matter?”

Ailsa chewed her lower lip. “From a boat?”

Jathan laughed. “All right, I’ll grant you that. But what if
the boat capsized? Or sprung a leak? Or if you just leaned out too far and fell
in? You’d need to know how to swim, then. Or at least how to stay afloat. Look,
I’ll be right here. I’ll keep my hands under you to hold you up. And the lilies
are right here, too, for you to draw on if you need to. Nothing will happen to
you this time. Just try it. I won’t let you go under.”

Ailsa stood stock still, biting her lip so hard he thought
she’d draw blood. That dunking really had terrified her.

Jathan ran his hand up from her elbow to her shoulder. “Don’t
you trust me?”

Ailsa shivered and looked up and studied Jathan’s face for a
moment. “Yes, I trust
you
.” She looked down at the water. “Are you sure
this is necessary? Really?”

“Yes. If you’re going to be around water much at all—and you
are, at least for the next couple of weeks. You’ll feel safer if you know you
won’t sink like that again.”

Ailsa drew a deep breath and leaned back. Jathan put his
hand beneath her to support her. When she was horizontal on top of the water, he
moved his other hand under her legs. Good thing, because at first she was stiff
as a board and would have sunk without him.

“Put your hand out to touch the lily pad. Feel its life.
Feel it respond to your magic,” he advised.

She did and gradually he could feel her begin to relax. He felt
the trickle of her magic tingling against his skin, but that wasn’t all he
could feel. The thin fabric of the swimming costume, soaking wet as it was, was
no bar to his imagination. He could guess what it would feel like to touch her
skin along her back and on her thighs and it thrilled him. The wet fabric clung
to the curves of her body on the part of her that was above water. The strands
of her hair that had escaped from her braid floated around her head like a
golden crown. Jathan swallowed hard.  He was going to have to swim out to the
deepest—and coldest—part of the lake before going back inside. But he wouldn’t
have traded this moment for anything.

“I’m sorry to be spoiling your fun,” Ailsa said.

“You’re not.” Jathan’s voice sounded strangled even to him.
He cleared his throat. “If I was out there with my brothers right now, I’d
probably be too tempted to try to drown Arrigo. Then they’d probably gang up
and try to drown me. So, you see, you’re actually saving
my
life.”

Ailsa chuckled, which seemed to help her to calm down a bit
more. As she finally relaxed, Jathan felt Ailsa float free of his support. He
lowered his hands away from her. “You’re floating on your own, now. See, all
you have to do is relax and the water will hold you up.”

Ailsa tensed at this and Jathan quickly repositioned his
hands to hold her up.

She chuckled. “I was, wasn’t I?” She relaxed again and
sighed with pleasure.

Jathan smiled. “All right, then. Let me just teach you one
thing and then I’ll let you go back to the inn, if you want.”

“All right.”

“Just as when walking, your legs are most important when
swimming, although your arms can help, too. But one thing at a time. We usually
swim face down, but you might be more comfortable with your face out of the
water at first. If you just start kicking your legs, you’ll find you can move
through the water a little.”

Ailsa kicked a little, which caused her to sink a little
lower in the water, but she did move a few feet on her own.

“That’s good. Do you want to practice some more?”

Ailsa tilted herself to stand on the muddy bottom again. “No,
thanks. You’ve spent enough time taking care of me. And I think I’ve had enough
for now. I’ll let you go back and enjoy yourself.”

Jathan watched her as she stepped carefully back to the
shore, keeping one hand on the lily pads as she went. “It was no trouble.”

As she reached the shallower water, the wet fabric clearly
showed the curve of her buttocks. He probably shouldn’t be noticing that. Ailsa
was a princess—not someone he could just . . . play around with, even if she
was willing. Almost certainly destined to marry a real prince somewhere. More,
she was going back to Far Terra when her training was done. Far Terra, the last
place he had any intention of going, ever. Jathan let out his breath in a long
sigh and turned to swim with swift strokes out to where the water was really
cold.

Arrigo swam closer, smirking. “You’re paying quite a lot of
attention to
Princess
Ailsa, aren’t you?”

Jathan balled his fists, fighting to restrain the impulse to
really try to drown his stepbrother.

“Oh, give it a rest, Arrigo,” Rishiart said, swimming
closer. “You’re just lucky Jathan was quick enough to rescue her. Or would you
rather try to explain to Father how you drowned our guest on the first day?
Lucky, too, that she trusts him enough to let him calm her down. Wouldn’t
exactly be a feather in your cap if you’d frightened her enough to ask Father
to just send her straight home, either. All in all, I think you owe Jathan a
thank you, at the very least. And not to try to needle him into another fight.”

Jathan clenched his jaw and swam a little farther out. He
hadn’t needed Arrigo’s reminder to know his attraction to Ailsa was doomed.

~

Jathan stopped just inside the door. As usual for their
stay, one of the larger rooms on this floor had been refurnished as a private
dining room. Ailsa and Mayra weren’t there, yet, but what arrested his
attention was his brother Arrigo standing across from their parents, head down.

“I understand that you have given yourself cause to
apologize to our guest, Princess Ailsa
again
.” Father’s voice was full
of reproof.

“I said I was sorry. How was I to know she couldn’t swim?”

“You might have asked,” Mother said with deceptive mildness.

Color rose on the back of Arrigo’s neck.

Father heaved a sigh. “Just make sure not to make a fool of
yourself for a third time.”

Standing by the door, Jathan heard the voices of Ailsa and
Mayra as they came down the corridor. He cleared his throat to alert the
others. There was no point at all in embarrassing Ailsa any further. He made
sure that Ailsa was seated between Mayra and himself, insulated from any of his
stepbrothers—especially Arrigo.

Early in the morning, Ailsa came downstairs to find Jathan
already mounted on his roan and holding the reins of both Diamond and Silver.
She stepped forward to take Diamond’s reins and the horse tossed his head and
lipped her hair in greeting.

Arrigo rode up on a prancing bay. “You can’t mean to let
Ailsa ride Diamond, Jathan. He’s not nearly steady enough.”

“Mind your own business,” Jathan growled. “You have no idea
what kind of rider Ailsa is.”

Arrigo reached for Diamond’s reins. “At least let me work
him for you a little.”

Ailsa jerked the reins out of his grasp. “I don’t need your
help.”

Jathan leaned out of his saddle toward his stepbrother and
said in a low voice, “Remember what Father told you last night? Don’t make a
fool of yourself again so soon, Arrigo. Apparently they don’t swim out on the
desert, but they do ride. Very well.”

Ailsa smiled into Diamond’s shoulder before putting her foot
into the stirrup and swinging up into the saddle in one fluid move. Diamond
pranced in place and tossed his head, eager to go. Ailsa reined him back and
turned him toward the currently-empty road. The emperor and empress weren’t
downstairs yet. There was time for a short run. She grinned at Jathan. “I’ll be
right back.” Then she leaned low across Diamond’s neck and turned her heels
into his sides. Diamond took off like a bolt of pure white light, down the road
to the first bend. Ailsa turned him and held him to an easy canter on the way
back. She patted Diamond’s shoulder as he trotted up to stop beside Jathan’s
gelding. She ignored the look of disbelief on Arrigo’s face.

Jathan laughed. “Told you.”

“I regret doubting your ability,” Arrigo said, executing a
slight bow from his saddle.

“What are you apologizing for now?” the emperor asked.

“Only underestimating Princess Ailsa’s riding ability,
Father,” Jathan said with a wink in her direction. “Nothing worse.”

The emperor paused, seeing Ailsa seated on Diamond and the
young stallion apparently well in hand. “Well, to be truthful, I would never
have suspected it, myself. I’d been prepared to give up on that horse and hope
he would do better as a stud. Perhaps get a more manageable foal out of him for
Mayra.”

Ailsa gave Diamond another pat. “Oh, no. There’s no reason
he can’t do both. He’s actually a very good horse, once you let him blow off some
steam. That’s all he really needs.”

“Ailsa’s been riding Diamond since the Solstice Ball. After
the first time, he’s never given her any trouble,” Jathan said. “And he didn’t
give her much, even then.”

Ailsa gave Diamond another pat. “He’s a good horse at heart,
just a little high spirited. In fact, I feel a little guilty continuing to ride
him. There’s really no reason Mayra couldn’t—”

“No,” Mayra interrupted. “I don’t think I could handle him
with as much confidence as you. At least not yet.”

“Well, I’m glad to see he’s getting some use,” the emperor
said. He and the empress mounted their horses and the whole group, including
the guards ahead and behind, started out on a little-used trail that wound up
the mountain slopes. Riding between Jathan and Mayra, Ailsa looked back. Behind
the last group of guards, teams of horses pulled three narrow wagons carrying
their trunks and supplies. The emperor’s family traveled with a lot of baggage.

Ailsa, Jathan, Mayra, and the other princes had soon
outpaced the emperor and empress, who rode at a more stately pace. A half dozen
of the soldiers reformed to surround their smaller group as a matter of course.
Probably this happened every time the imperial family rode into the mountains.

The others chatted as they rode, but Ailsa was soon lost in
the experience of the forest. The Terranion parks through which she’d ridden
with Jathan and Mayra were landscaped and carefully managed to seem like
natural woodlands, but they weren’t. The Far Terran forests she’d been
accustomed to were among the first things her ancestors had nurtured six
generations ago. They’d always felt old to Ailsa, but this forest . . . this
was ancient.

Some of the trees were so big around that three men couldn’t
join hands around their trunks. Farther back, she glimpsed some that were still
bigger—huge trees with trunks covered in shaggy reddish bark. Awesome giants,
easily imagined as the sentinels of the forest. Beneath the canopy of
interlacing branches, the tree trunks stood far enough apart to see well into
the forest.  The litter of leaves and pine needles on the ground must be at
least ankle deep. She breathed in the sharp, clean smell of the pines, accented
with other, earthier scents and felt the buzzing energy of green, growing
things all around her. In this place, she could believe anything was possible.

Their troop made enough noise that Ailsa couldn’t see many
of the creatures that must live here other than the birds and squirrels that
flitted from tree to tree, scolding them. Periodically, the trail crossed on
stone bridges over deep ravines cut into the mountainside, not unlike the
ravines that cut across the Far Terran plateau. Water ran down the bottom of
the canyons in swift-moving streams. So much running water was a wonder in its
own right—and in the middle of summer, too.

With her senses open to the forest around her, Ailsa felt
something ahead. To the forest, it felt like an open wound. She pulled Diamond
to a stop. “What’s that?”

Jathan seemed to understand what she meant, even though the
others were confused. The crease between his eyes deepened. “I don’t know. It
feels . . . wrong.”

“What are you two talking about?” Rishiart asked.

Ailsa shook her head.

Jathan paused as if trying to formulate an explanation for
something he didn’t fully understand himself. “We’re green mages, Rish. We can
. . . feel the trees, even without really trying to. It’s . . . it’s like
smelling the pines. You’re aware of the scent even if you’re not paying
attention to it. Something up ahead . . . feels different. Wrong. Like . . .
like a wound.”

Rishiart replied with a grunt.

“Well, let’s go see,” Arrigo said and spurred his horse
forward.

The others followed, with Jathan and Ailsa lagging behind.
Ailsa was half afraid of what they might find and from his expression she
thought Jathan was, too.

They stopped at the edge of the next ravine. The landscape
before them was a blackened, burned over ruin. Black spikes stood out at
intervals—all that remained of the majestic trees that had once stood here.
Only the little brook still ran at the bottom of the cut. Everything else was
still and lifeless. The sight made Ailsa’s stomach clench.

“Forest fire,” Artair said. “Probably a lightning strike.”

“Or a poorly managed campfire,” Arrigo added.

Rishiart looked up and down the ravine. “Probably started
below. This canyon would act as a chimney, drawing it up.”

Arrigo nodded. “Lucky it didn’t spread beyond the canyon.”

“What are those men doing?” Mayra asked, pointing down slope
to where several men seemed to be building a stone wall. A small collection of
houses could be seen just beyond.

“Building a dike,” Artair answered. “When the rains come,
all of this,” his gesture took in the barren soil of the whole canyon, “is
going to be washed down onto the village below without something to hold the
mud back.”

Rishiart shook his head, taking in the volume of soil in the
ravine. “That dike isn’t going to be enough. We should evacuate the village.”

Jathan threw his reins to Rishiart. “It doesn’t have to be
that way.” He walked toward the edge of the ravine.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Artair asked.

“I’m a green mage. A pretty powerful one. And there are
seeds out there—fireweed, grasses, even sumac, manzanita, and pine. If I can
get them started, their roots will hold the soil against the rains.”

“You’re not even half trained, yet,” Artair said.

Jathan turned on him. “I’m a Prince of Terranion, if only by
adoption, and a green mage. Those are our people, our responsibility, and they
have a serious problem. Are you telling me that I shouldn’t at least try to do
what I can to help them?”

Artair blinked. “No, of course not.”

Ailsa turned Diamond toward the bridge.

“Where are you going?” Arrigo asked, exasperated.

Ailsa looked at Jathan as she answered. “You can’t span that
whole distance by yourself. I’m a green mage, too. As powerful as you. Two of
us can do more than either of us alone.”

Jathan nodded. “We don’t need to pull the plants too far out
of the ground. It’s the roots we want.”

Ailsa made a face. “I know that.” She allowed Diamond to
pick his way across the stone bridge at his own pace, but it proved stable
enough. When she reached the far side, she dismounted and threw Diamond’s reins
over a nearby branch. Then she picked her way to the edge of the ravine until
she stood opposite Jathan.  With a nod, they both raised their hands and called
to their magic. With the dense forest behind her to draw on, Ailsa felt the
magic surge to greater levels than she’d ever experienced before. The sheer
power of it made her feel as if she’d been lifted off her feet. It sang in her
blood like riding Diamond running full out. She held that magic for just an
instant, tasting the euphoria of it, before sending it out across the chasm to
waken the seeds and start them sprouting.

The exhilaration of the magic diminished only slightly as
she pushed the power out across the ravine. Then it met Jathan’s magic coming
from the other side and built to a new and intoxicating high. She’d worked
green magic beside Jathan before, even while he was also working green magic.
She’d never worked green magic
with
him ‘til now. This was so much more
exciting than making a rose seedling grow and bloom.

The electricity of that single, brief kiss was nothing to
it. The magic tingled across
all
of her skin like a caress. More than
that, much more, in some sense his magic was Jathan. She felt she knew him,
knew his heart, in a way she’d never come close to knowing anyone else. It was
like she’d known him forever. She grinned across at Jathan and caught his answering
wink. Of course he’d wink. That was so
Jathan
.

When a green fuzz covered the barren soil, they both began
moving down slope, calling to more seeds as they went. This was tricky because
there was no clear path. In fact, the sides of the ravine were choked with
waist-high manzanita bushes and scattered rocks from boulders to pebbles. She looked
up when Jathan’s magic faltered. He’d slipped on loose rocks, but one of his
brothers—Rishiart, she thought, though at this distance they looked
interchangeable—steadied him. Ailsa was dimly aware that another of the princes
was shadowing her. That was good, because she couldn’t take her concentration
from her magic to worry about her footing.

Ailsa slipped twice and was caught both times before she
reached the half-built wall across the ravine. She leaned against it, trying to
catch both her breath and her balance. She hadn’t been this dizzy even after
dancing all night at the Solstice Ball. Jathan approached her, leaning heavily
on the wall as he came, and they both started giggling as if they’d had too
much to drink.

“That was unbelievable,” Jathan said. “The magic has never
felt like that before. I actually think I’m more drunk on it than I’ve ever
been on wine.”

Ailsa could only nod, holding her sides as she gasped for breath.
The giggling fit had stolen what little breath she had left.

Jathan’s brothers gathered around them.

“I’ve told the villagers to see that this slope gets some
water until the rains come,” Artair said. “They wanted to thank you both in
person, but I told them you needed to rest. Now, let’s see if we can get you
two back up to where we left the horses.” He looked up the slope. “Fortunately,
the lodge is not much farther, now.”

Somehow, the three other princes managed to pull or push
Ailsa and Jathan up the slope. Ailsa remembered little of the rest of the ride,
lost in the fog of fatigue and the lingering elation of the magic.

~

Ailsa paced around her room. The energy that charged her now
had nothing to do with magic—or, well, not directly, anyway. It was all
conflicting emotions and the need, finally, to come to some resolution. This
afternoon had proven one thing to her without doubt. There was no way she could
even consider renouncing her magic. Not even for Sav. She couldn’t even pretend
that any longer.

This wasn’t growing radishes or rose bushes. This was real
work that made a difference in people’s lives and even when the euphoria faded,
that felt good. Satisfying. Fulfilling in a way that far outlasted the thrill
of the magic.

So where did that leave her and Sav? After talking to the
emperor, it was hard to feel optimistic about Grandmama’s ideas for changing
the way Far Terrans thought of mages and political power. It had all sounded so
good—almost inevitable—when Grandmama laid out the possibilities, but there
were hard political concerns that she hadn’t taken into account.