Laera treated her like a little sister. Actually, she treated her much better than she had ever treated her real sisters, for whom she had had very little use. It wasn’t difficult at all to gain her trust. Laera bestowed it freely from the very start. Manipulating her was not even a challenge. She was an innocent, completely without guile. Laera had nothing but contempt for her.
Faelina accepted Gella as her body servant without question, and from the day she arrived to one week prior to the summer solstice, Gella faithfully administered the potion that would prevent her from conceiving. Each night, she poured several drops into her mulled ale, which was Faelina’s preferred libation before bedtime. She even drank like a man, thought Laera. Michael had no taste whatsoever, marrying such a common wench.
Aedan diplomatically kept his distance. When the emperor’s party arrived, he had greeted her very formally and politely, with no hint upon his features or in his manner of what had passed between them. He apparently preferred to pretend it simply had never happened. Laera would have liked nothing better than to plunge a dagger deep into his heart, but that would have been too quick. Besides, his turn would come. He was courteous, but after the emperor’s party had settled in, he avoided her as much as possible. That was fine with Laera. It meant he would not get in the way.
Toward the middle of the month, the army arrived, marching from Anuire for the long-anticipated punitive campaign against Thurazor, planned now for midsummer. There would be several weeks of preparation, and then they would depart around the middle of the next month. It meant that both Aedan and Michael would be kept busy drilling the troops in readiness for the campaign, which Derwyn would be joining with his knights and men-at-arms. Rodric would be going, too. The young fool wanted an opportunity to distinguish himself in battle. It was just as well, thought Laera. He was becoming tiresome in any case. With luck, he would fall in battle, and she would be spared the necessity of getting rid of him.
On the night of the summer solstice, Laera gave Gella the little vial that contained the Gorgon’s seed. She did not tell the girl what it was, merely that it was a new and more efficient preparation of the same nature she had used before. Gella had accepted it without question, then returned later in the evening, as directed, to tell her that the deed was done. Now, thought Laera, all she had to do was wait. The child would quicken, and nine months later, when Summer Court was over and Michael and his party were long gone, the birth would take place.
She felt confident no one would ever suspect the truth of what had actually occurred. Aside from herself, only Gella and Callador would know, and she held both their tokens, giving her power over them. Still, thought Laera, it would be best if Gella were disposed of as soon as possible. Callador was old and had too much to lose to think of betraying her. He was too deeply involved himself, and he needed a patron. Besides, she still had use for him. But Gella was a loose end that would have to be accounted for. She was the only one who could link her directly to the birth.
After everyone in the castle had gone to bed, Laera went to get the small bronze jewelry box she kept beside her bed. In the hidden drawer it contained, she kept the lockets that held the tokens of Callador and Gella, though she wore the one with Derwyn’s hair. She had given some of the lock to Callador so that he could effect the spell that lulled her husband into a deep trance each time the wizard came to her, but she had also kept some for herself. She used Derwyn’s token now to make him sleep, but at the proper time, would use it to effect a spell that would make her a grieving widow. She imagined what it would be like.
When the monster child was born, any effort to keep the birth a secret would be doomed to failure. She and Callador would see to that, though indirectly, of course. The word would spread that Michael’s seed was cursed. The Fatalists would make sure. They were already becoming known for spreading discontent and championing the cause of the commoners.
Michael still enjoyed the favor of the people, but they were growing weary of the years of constant warfare. It was a drain on the resources of the empire, and the long War of Rebellion, as well as Michael’s campaigns of expansion, had left many widows and orphans. Nobles who were more concerned with the upkeep of their lands and their estates had become tired of Michael’s constant demands on them to supply manpower and supplies for the Army of Anuire, and the commoners were starting to grumble that the emperor was more concerned with conquest than he was with improving the lot of his subjects. It would not take much to cause these seeds of discontent to sprout.
A royal birth that had been cursed by the gods would mean the people were cursed, as well, so long as Michael ruled them. There would be calls for his abdication, and if he refused, a rebellion would soon follow. The priests of the temple of Haelyn would support her cause. Her daily attendance at the temple had given Laera a reputation for uncommon piety and goodness. She had carefully reinforced that image by making lavish, regular donations to the temples in Boeruine, and she had sent money to the temples in Anuire and Alamie, as well, where the priests had the most influence. And she always took little Aerin to the temple with her so that the priests would see that the child was being raised in the favor of the god.
But there was still the Gorgon to consider. There was no way of telling what Raesene might do. He was completely mad, of course, of that Laera no longer had any doubt. For centuries, he had waited, slowly but surely building up his powers and extending his domain. He now controlled the entire mountain range known as the Gorgon’s Crown, and he had pushed his boundaries north, into the Giantdowns, east to the Hoarfell Mountains, south to Mur-Kilad and Markazor, and west to the borders of Tuarhievel, an area covering over five thousand square miles.
The traitor prince who had escaped Roele at the Battle of Mount Deismaar was now an immensely powerful awnshegh who controlled a nation in his own right, one that might well be strong enough to attack the empire. Moreover, Raesene would know it was she who had stolen Callador’s token from him, and Laera did not think he was likely to forget it.
She would not wish to fall into his hands again. That one night had been enough. It had been the most terrifying and agonizing experience of her life, and yet, despite the horror if it all, despite the pain he’d caused her, despite her revulsion, there had been an unnatural thrill to it all. What was it about her that made her feel so alive and vibrant whenever she risked disaster? What was it that made even pain seem so exciting?
The thrill of her affair with Rodric, of all her past affairs, which had seemed so dangerous at the time, paled to insignificance after that one awful yet somehow strangely and perversely galvanizing night. What thrill could possibly compare with what she had experienced then? The deposing of her brother and the seizing of the empire? Nothing less would do. After it all came to fruition, she would wear her widow’s weeds and put on a show of grief and lamentation over Derwyn’s death at her own hands, and bravely allow herself to be persuaded to accept the regency for the sake of the people, who would have been primed by then to call for her ascension.
And she would reserve a very special fate for Aedan Dosiere. Over the years, she had contemplated countless times the form her revenge would take. But now that she was a practitioner of the sorcerous arts, there were new and more ingenious ways to make him suffer.
She had waited for this for a long, long time, and now, soon, it would come to pass. She would become a sorcerer-queen, with an empire to rule, and she would gather at her court the greatest wizards in the land to instruct her further until her power was matched by none. Then, not even the awnsheghlien would be able to pose a threat. She would bring even the Gorgon to his knees.