Sharon Shinn - Reader And Raelynx

“Yes,” Jerril said, “Senneth was always good at knowing what was valuable. She just didn’t used to be so good at keeping the things and people that mattered to her. I am glad to see that she has learned to hold on.”

Cammon laughed. “Or maybe we’re the ones who’ve learned to hold on to her.”

Jerril smiled. “The result is excellent, either way.”

ELLYNORhad been at the palace for just over a week before she had an audience with the king. Justin told Cammon that Baryn always made a point of introducing himself to the Riders’ brides because, as he said, “If these women are competing with me for my Riders’ attention, I should at least know what they look like.”

Justin escorted Ellynor to a semiformal room, all dark blue and bright gilt. Cammon followed, curious to see how the meeting would go. The king waited in a high-backed chair only a little less imposing than his throne, and Valri and Amalie sat on either side of him. Baryn and Amalie wore welcoming smiles, but Valri looked brooding and just a little on edge.

Justin shepherded Ellynor to the king’s chair and offered a Rider’s deep bow, right fist to left shoulder, and pulled Ellynor down in a curtsey beside him. Ellynor looked particularly pretty this day, Cammon thought, for she was wearing a midnight-blue dress that matched her eyes and her face was flushed with color. Her black hair was unbound and flowed down her back so that everyone could see those stylized clan markings dyed into it. Coming to a halt behind Ellynor, Cammon studied the pattern, which looked a bit like a flower, a bird, and a scythe, repeated in rows down the whole river of her hair.

“Liege, may I present to you Ellynor Alowa, of the Domen sebahta and the Lahja sebahta-ris , and lately made my wife,” Justin said, rising. Cammon had heard Justin rehearse this about a hundred times last night, and he didn’t mispronounce a single syllable now. “I hope you will welcome her to Ghosenhall.”

“And so I do,” Baryn said, holding out his hands. Ellynor stepped forward and laid her hands in his, and he kissed them before releasing her. “How is it that you found a way to tame my most ferocious Rider, Ellynor Alowa? I didn’t think Justin would ever be won over.”

Ellynor blushed and glanced at Justin. “He’s won me over, sire.”

“Ah, well, there is no resisting Justin,” Baryn said with a smile. “If he set his heart on you, you would have no choice in the matter.” Justin laughed aloud and Ellynor blushed even more deeply. His smile broadening, Baryn made a graceful gesture at Amalie. “Let me also introduce you to my daughter, Amalie, who is just as pleased to meet you as I am.”

Ellynor made another curtsey, but Amalie drew her forward and kissed her on the cheek. “I think you’re brave to marry a Rider,” the princess said. “They’re very fierce.”

“Justin isn’t always fierce,” Ellynor replied, and then she blushed again.

Baryn was trying not to laugh. “And let me present Valri, my wife and my queen.”

Ellynor’s curtsey to Valri was a little more shallow and she did not drop her eyes as she had when she met the other two. Valri’s own eyes coolly assessed this new arrival. It struck Cammon now-as it should have struck him before, except he always wasted so little attention on people’s outward appearances-that there was a definite similarity between the two women. Not so much their coloring, though they both had black hair, but their essences. They were both watchful and still, secretive and serene. They both looked as if they had been blessed, or burdened, with complex knowledge that was difficult to handle but too sacred to share.

They knew each other. Despite being unable to read either one of them, Cammon could tell that as soon as their eyes met. He picked up a sense of disquiet from Justin, though the Rider kept his face completely impassive. So Justin, too, realized that these women were not strangers to each other. Ellynor had perhaps confided in him something of Valri’s history. Which Cammon would dearly love to know-he had no information beyond the fact that Valri was Lirren and bahta-lo .

“Ellynor. It is good to see you again,” Valri said calmly.

“Yes, and very good to see you, too,” Ellynor replied. “You have traveled far from home, but you seem to have prospered.”

“Though I miss that home, and all my kin,” Valri said. “You shall have to spend an hour with me someday and tell me tales of the land across the mountains.”

“So is the secret to be revealed, then?” Baryn asked his queen in a gentle voice. “No more pretense? I know how much you have missed your family and your friends, and to have another Lirren girl nearby-well. I would imagine you would greatly enjoy a chance to make her your friend.”

Valri gazed over at him with her bright green eyes. The rest of them stayed absolutely motionless, too surprised to speak. “It is up to you,” she said quietly. “Whatever you think is best.”

“We have so little reason to continue any fiction about what your background might be,” Baryn said. “It seems we will have enemies no matter how carefully you are presented. So let us tell the world you are Lirren-born, and let us see what they make of that.”

The permission did not seem to make Valri relax any, Cammon thought. “They will find a way to use the information against you,” she said.

“They’ll call her a mystic, too,” Cammon said, entering the conversation between royals without permission. Justin gave him a minatory look, but Baryn did not seem offended.

Nor did Valri. “They say it already,” the queen replied.

“People in Gillengaria don’t understand the Lirrenfolk or their powers,” Ellynor said. “If some of us have magic, it is not a kind of magic they can grasp. They might call you a mystic but unless you are commanding fire or changing shapes, they will have no idea what exactly you can do. And that may keep you safe.”

“That is very good reasoning,” Baryn said in an approving voice. “Justin, I like this girl already. Plus, of course, I have to commend your good taste in choosing someone from the Lirrens.”

Justin gave the king another deep bow, his right fist pressed to his opposite shoulder. “Sire, I loved her before I knew her heritage.”

Some of the habitual darkness left Valri’s face as she smiled at the newlywed couple. “So tell us the story of your wooing,” she said. “And the happy ending! Such a rare thing for a Lirren girl who looks to take a groom from across the Lireth Mountains.”

This was a signal to bring in more chairs and call for refreshments, and soon Justin and Ellynor were vying with each other to repeat the details of their romance. Amalie loved the tale, Cammon could tell, though she was horrified by Justin’s very near brush with death. Cammon was more interested in the account of their trip across the mountains for Justin to meet Ellynor’s family-particularly her quarrelsome brothers.

Justin was laughing. “Luckily, I had healed up well enough by then, because a couple of times a day someone was challenging me to a duel, or a footrace, or a wrestling match. Ellynor had told me I had to beat everyone at every contest-”

“I didn’t say you had to win every time.”

“So I did, but, let me tell you, I’ve had workouts with other Riders that weren’t as punishing over the course of a week.”

Valri, who had seemed to thoroughly enjoy the tale so far, now grew suddenly tense again, or so it seemed to Cammon. “And your family?” she asked Ellynor in a tight voice. “They are all well?”

Cammon noticed that Ellynor met her eyes straightly, seeming to acknowledge some unspoken question. “All of them-my brothers, my cousins, my parents-all the ones you know, all of them healthy and unchanged.”