(Author's Note: Number one, I thought I was done with these people, but apparently not. One too many mental images came up and made me giggle, until I had to give up and start working them together into a story. Number two, many thanks to my beta-readers for helping me with ideas and polishing. Number three, the person referred to in the title is not Wilhelmina. Fair warning.)
Chapter One
In the Angelline formal gardens, Wilhelmina Benedict took a moment to savor the touch of the early-spring sun on her back. The air carried the smell of new-growing grass, and far away she could hear the boys playing some rough-and-tumble game. But all her attention was focused on the faint psychic scent at the very edge of her perception.
Diccan. Our guest's back again.
Protective suspicion flashed over the link between them. I'll be there to walk with you in a minute.
You'll do no such thing. He has to trust us, and that won't happen with a Sapphire-Jeweled Warlord following me and glowering at everything in sight.
I don't glower.
She waited.
All right, I glower a little. Mostly when my Lady decides it's necessary to leave herself vulnerable near a strange male.
He wears a Tiger's Eye at most. I'm not vulnerable. Besides, one whiff of hostility from us and we'll lose him; we've got to look harmless before we can find out what his trouble is.
The complex blend of frustration, resignation and respect that came back to her - and the memory of more than a few arguments on this very subject - were answer enough from Diccan. Since she was in no identifiable danger, he wouldn't interfere, but she couldn't expect him to take it tranquilly.
It had been several weeks since they'd first noticed the unfamiliar psychic scent; whoever it was did nothing but appear at intervals, watch them - watch her - for a bit, and flee. Diccan had gone on alert from the first, all his Warlord's instincts triggered by the nearness of an unknown male. Wilhelmina had been slower, but sensed nuances that neither Diccan nor Jhaliir were aware of; where they recognized only "strange male", Wilhelmina found considerably more. Young, light-Jeweled, and beleaguered, with fears that were too much for him to fight.
If nothing else, she understood the fear. Dorothea's rot hadn't completely settled into Chaillot, but the Territory still bore scars. Fear and distrust from both genders, a deep-seated wariness of the darker Jewels, and the children in Beldon Mor were paying the price. Those who hadn't lost one or both parents to Jaenelle's purge and the chaos afterward were often neglected by harried adults scrambling to rebuild. Wilhelmina offered shelter to as many as she could, but more slipped through the webs than she could find.
She felt Diccan's presence a moment before he came to join her - a familiar, warm thrum of power that matched and underlaid her own.
Harmless, she reminded him.
He gave her an I'll-be-the-judge-of-that smirk and hooked an arm possessively through hers as she turned toward the kitchen gardens. "Mairin wanted me to ask you if you were planning any large projects that might need the labor of two of the older boys."
She took his cue and spoke aloud for the more mundane - and very, very harmless - matters. "Well...there's ground to be broken for another plot of vegetables, furniture that needs shifting to the rooms we just opened up, and there's always something needing to be done in the kitchens - it's not as if we have a shortage of work for willing bodies."
Diccan grinned. "I was given to understand that willingness didn't much matter."
"Oh. One of those. Who was it and what did they do?"
"Berren and Tris. Apparently there was swordfighting with some kindling in the kitchen."
"Mm."
"Which eventually led to screaming and leaping out of the dumbwaiter."
"Oh, dear."
"Which spooked one of the little witches, who rounded up all the littler witches and barricaded them in the cellar for safety. Which was about when I came through the kitchen on a short cut to you. So Mairin threw the culprits on my good graces-"
"She could find some?" Wilhelmina murmured.
"-and I throw them on yours."
"I don't have any either."
"Exactly. I'm glad to see the boys growing...well, freer...but I won't have them scaring the little witches. Even by accident."
Wilhelmina nodded. So many needs to address, so many wounds of mind and heart that had to be bound while still tending the body's needs, but the youngest witches seemed to be the most vulnerable of all the children. "I'll come up with something suitably exhausting for the boys."
"Knew I could count on you, m'Lady."
She stuck her tongue out at him.
The vegetable garden was just beginning to show a faint green haze of seedlings - weeks earlier than any other garden in Chaillot. Wilhelmina's grandmother had shed her lifeblood on this land, and even three years later, things nurtured here grew healthy, grew strong. Even children. Wilhelmina couldn't heal all the wounds sustained during Dorothea's long, slow siege of Chaillot, but she could provide a safe place and an understanding ear. The rest was just...practicalities.
As dusk settled in over the gardens, though, she spared a thought for the suspicious young boy whose presence she kept sensing. Alone, afraid, and desperate to hide the fear lest it call down worse predators; she knew that feeling well.
Try me, she thought- stronger than a wish but much less than a psychic message. I won't betray you. Try me.