A door chime sounded as Lethelin was finishing brushing her hair. It was indecent the amount of soap she had needed to get the filth out of her hair but it felt so good to finally be clean again. Lethelin looked up and saw it was not Mitchell’s door that had chimed, but the other one. That meant either Allora or Revos.

She tied the robe around her diminutive form and went over to thumb the small gemstone in the wall that would open the door. Despite the locking mechanism being magical in nature, it operated by ordinary touch, sliding smoothly into the wall. Her visitor was Allora, also freshly scrubbed and wearing a more buxom version of Lethelin’s robe. She once again felt a sharp sting of jealousy. As always, the knight had her full lips pursed into a firm line. Was she never in a good mood? The woman could give a rock turtle lessons in brooding.

“Yes, m’lady? If it pleases Stollar, how may I be of service?” Lethelin said, her voice saccharine and obsequious. She could see a tightening around Allora’s violet eyes. The gods-damned elf never rose to the bait but she hated being addressed as a noble and it was fun to needle her.

“May I come in?”

“Sure.”

Lethelin stepped to the side but resisted the urge to bow. That would be a little too much and taunts should be chosen carefully.

Allora strode into the room like it was her own and began to look around as if searching for something. She looked twice at the bed, which was undisturbed and Lethelin understood.

“He’s not here,” she announced playfully.

Rather than answer, Allora turned her piercing gaze on the thief.

“Were there any problems getting here? Did anything happen or did anyone interfere?”

“No one interfered. And… Nothing happened.”

She tried unsuccessfully to hide the little smile at the memory of their kiss in the garden. “Straight here, as the lady commanded.”

Allora cocked her head, not missing the hesitation.

“Explain, please.”

“Nothing! We just had a little moment in the Spire Garden is all,” she hesitated. “We kissed. Just a kiss.”

Allora looked her up and down again, studying her anew. Lethelin saw her purple eyes take in the touch of color to her cheeks and lips that Lethelin had applied from her meager store of supplies. She took a couple of steps closer to her then and inhaled deeply.

“White Lotus,” Allora said. It wasn’t a question.

Lethelin was impressed.

“I keep a little in my bag,” she said with a smirk. “A girl never knows when she might need some.”

“I cannot allow you to bed him,” the elf said without preamble.

“I…” Lethelin sputtered as she felt an instant heat in her face. “You cannot allow? Pardon me, m’lady,” she continued, letting scorn drip off the title. “But I don’t remember asking your permission. I bed whom I please!”

“Mitchell is not just anyone. He is not a toy for you to play with. Until I am certain you can be trusted with him, I will not permit it.”

“The sheer fucking audacity of this stuck-up little elfin princess!” Lethelin said to herself.

But she wasn’t about to back down. It was about the principle of the thing now.

“What’s the matter?” Lethelin said after she had collected her thoughts and squared her shoulders. “You just don’t want to share?”

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Allora’s eyes widened slightly. It wasn’t a lot but Lethelin had learned to read her stone face.

That’s it, isn’t it? If you can’t have him I can’t either?”

“I do not want him,” Allora stammered. “I am here to protect him and see him to the throne. That is all.”

“Jivi piss!” Lethelin spat. She stepped forward and glared up at the taller woman. “Even the clorvol is sick of seeing you moon after him. If you don’t want to share him, at least be honest about it! Or is it just me you don’t approve of? Don’t want him bedding some commoner from the docks? Is only that noble elf pussy of yours good enough for the future monarch?”

Allora visibly winced under the vulgar verbal assault before she seemed to remember herself. Then it was her turn to glare.

“Once he has obtained the throne and bonded with Awen he may have anyone he likes,” Allora shot back, her voice tight. ”Even common dock rat thieves from the sewers of Varset. But for all our sakes, I hope he has more sense than that. I would rather see him bed the ugliest whore in the most disease-ridden brothel in the filthiest port in all of Tewadunn than you!”

Lethelin, deep into her temper now, pulled back to slap the self-righteous bitch before she knew what she was doing. Allora, unfazed, caught her wrist in an iron grip just inches from her cheek and didn’t even flinch.

“But until he is on the throne,” Allora leaned in, her voice cold as the ocean depths, “You will keep your hands off of him!”

Allora accentuated those final words with a shove that sent Lethelin staggering backward and into a chair, almost toppling it over. She was about to stand up and fight, Onyx Knight or no, but a look from Allora’s eyes, and the glow of her krisa stopped her cold. She was holding a spell and Lethelin had no doubt she would use it. What had she been thinking? Fighting her head-on was suicide and her mother hadn’t raised a fool.

“Get ahold of yourself, you silly sea cow!”

Lethelin froze, trying to ignore the ache in her spine where she slammed into the frame of the chair. She would feel that in the morning. Nine hells, she felt it now.

Allora stepped cooly up to her. When she spoke her voice was icy steel.

“Mitchell is walking a knife’s edge. The strain of the magical training alone would break lesser men and women. Revos is doing things to him that would see him imprisoned in most nations. Mitchell has been ripped from his home, yanked from everything and everyone he loves, caged, beaten, starved, and abused. He has been told he is the one that will save a kingdom that he has never seen, rescue a people he has never met, and that he is to learn to command powers he has not even begun to understand.”

Lethelin swallowed and it was a struggle not to look away in embarrassment.

“I worry every day that he will crack under the pressure,” Allora continued, her voice hot. “That he will fail because I–” She cut off abruptly and swallowed what she had been about to say. She closed her eyes, took a calming breath, and then opened them again, focusing those chips of purple crystal squarely on Lethelin’s own. Lethelin wanted to flinch away but Allora’s steely gaze held her fast.

“I have sacrificed more than you can comprehend and I will not see it fail now because some piece of Varset trash could not keep her pants on. If you want to bed someone there are men and women aplenty here that will service you. But if I catch you in his bed, I will kill you. I will not risk all of Awenor because, with everything else he must endure, he must also endure a broken heart when you inevitably betray him. He does not see you for what you are. But I do.”

The silence in the room was so thick that Lethelin thought she could push it around like piles of sea salt. The anger that had been seething inside her began to drain slowly like water through a leaky bucket. Allora stepped back, the glow of her krisa winking out. She’d dropped whatever spell she had been holding and Lethelin felt a little bit of tension release from her shoulders. The fiercely beautiful woman turned away towards the door to Mitchell’s room but for just a moment Lethelin thought she saw something like embarrassment or shame on her usually stoic face.

After several heartbeats, Allora spoke again.

“Mitchell is a good man. An honorable man.”

Allora’s voice had changed, now sounding almost like she was talking to herself.

“He has accepted an almost impossible task and he has not uttered a word of complaint at what he has been asked to do. He deserves someone that will honor him and respect him. Not use him for their own purposes. And you, Lethelin…” That edge came back into her voice. “You made your intentions clear with the ridiculous price you demanded to aid us to save your own people! Your home! We are fighting as much for you as for everyone else!”

Lethelin had no taunts this time.

Without looking back, the elf began walking towards Mitchell’s door. Lethelin watched her, her back as straight and proud as the mast of a royal yacht, and felt a cold knot of shame well up from deep inside her stomach. For a moment she thought she might vomit, the feeling was so intense.

As Allora raised her hand to ring the chime, the thief finally recovered her voice.

“I won’t betray him,” she said to the knight’s back. Even to her own ears, it sounded weak.

Allora’s hand paused, but still she didn’t turn around.

“When I believe that,” she said, her voice quiet. “I will not stand in your way if you wish to take him to your bed.”

Allora thumbed the small crystal set into the wall to ring the chime for Mitchell’s room.