Rotharia
576 Words
Rotharia~
Nigel Willoughby
Jorendon
Nigel stirred from a deep and dreamless sleep. Through a gap in the damask draperies, twilight muted the jeweled tones in the rug beneath his four-poster bed. Even such a faint glow stung his tired eyes.
A soft sigh drew his attention. Disoriented, he forced himself awake. The past day’s events came rushing back. The fires, the threats, the choices. He rolled to his side and found his wife sleeping beside him.
They’d shuttered and boarded up the Silver Fox, and divided its strongboxes between the women. Brunet stayed to oversee the packing, tasked with ensuring no evidence remained behind. Peder spoke the words to satisfy the Church and Innish law that Lucinda was his wife, and Pawley drove them to Silveroak in the darkest hours of the night. When Nigel stood in the foyer at dawn and introduced Henley to the new Lady of Silveroak, the poor man’s knees buckled on him.
I really should give the fellow a raise.
After Lucinda bathed and ate, she crawled into his bed and fell into an exhausted slumber. Nigel followed her not an hour later. They must have slept all afternoon. He should get up. He had letters to write and messages to read, interviews to arrange, and investigations to launch.
He closed his eyes again for one more indulgent moment. He opened them again to moonlight flooding the room through wide-opened draperies. Lucinda was sitting upright, kicking him under the blanket, her attention fixed on the foot of the bed. Nigel sat up and followed her scowl.
“Rotharia.” He rubbed his eyes. “You could announce yourself before appearing.”
“You could ask before acting.” A cowl shadowed the face above her smirk.
“We had no time.” Lucinda challenged their handler. “You sent us no warning. Could it be you did not see it coming?”
Rotharia’s smirk thinned. She couldn’t admit a shift in the patterns had escaped her notice, and she would never give Lucinda the satisfaction of being right.
“I studied this latest bit of recklessness on your part,” she said.
“You call it recklessness. I call it knowing what I’m doing,” said Nigel.
Rotharia pursed her lips again and waited for his contrition. It was not forthcoming.
“I traced its impact on the patterns,” she said.
“And?”
“I find no need to make adjustments at this point.”
His instincts were right. Rotharia would allow his adaptation, for now. Perhaps she knew ordering him away from Lucinda would prove as futile now as it had in the beginning. Lucinda rested her hand on his knee, and he covered her hand with his.
“You caused no harm this time, but you must move more cautiously,” said Rotharia. “The winds of change are blowing. There’s been an irregular awakening. A nene-man. Nene through his mother’s side.”
The news was encouraging and alarming at the same time.
“Have the Firstborn caught scent of him?”
“Thankfully, no. He is with us.”
“Willingly?” said Lucinda.
“Willingly.” Rotharia sniffed at the implication. “His mother taught him well. He understands what is at stake.” She folded her hands serenely. “The Joining is quickening its pace. Another hybrid conceived. This time in Gaurenne.”
“That makes three in the past year,” he said.
“That we know of. None carried to term. Hardly a generation of promise, but it bears watching.”
He thought of Jenna’s daughters and of who else was watching them.
“Remember the old words.” Rotharia glided to the open window and sprang to the sill. “A people rise. They multiply. They eclipse the people before them. Between the quickening and the fading comes a brief chance at greatness.”
Nigel rolled his eyes. Rotharia had a flair for the dramatic.
“Take the stairs,” he said. “There’s little you could do to shock this household.”
Chapter 50
- Writer
