Shalador's Lady

moment later, he signaled the youngster and approached her.
    “Lady, may I introduce my younger brother?” Ranon asked.
    “You may,” Cassidy replied.
    “Lady, this is Prince Janos. Our father was Lord Yairen’s son. Janos, this is Lady Cassidy, the Queen of Dena Nehele.”
    “It is an honor to be introduced to so great a Queen,” Janos replied, bowing too low for the act to be respectful since his Summer-sky Jewel outranked her Rose.
    *You bow too low,* Vae said. *That is rude. Sniffing female parts is rude too. That is confusing because there are good smells there, but it is something you must learn or you will get smacked on the nose. Or nipped.*
    Janos’s face turned dusky red as he snapped upright, making it clear that the insult had been unintentional. Ranon’s coloring wasn’t much better.
    And Gray looked a bit too curious about female smells.
    Thank the Darkness, Cassidy thought when the back door opened and a young woman walked out. Sixteen years old. Maybe seventeen. And beautiful in a way that made the breath catch when she moved. Long dark hair and green eyes. And a Purple Dusk Jewel.
    “What are you doing here, Reyhana?” Ranon growled.
    Surprised by his animosity, Cassidy stared at him. Yes, he outranked the girl, but she was a Queen and should be shown some respect unless Reyhana had done something to earn his anger.
    “I asked the elder Queens if I could work here as a service to the new Queen,” Reyhana replied, her voice a shade too defiant.
    “You’re a Queen. You shouldn’t be doing servants’ work,” Ranon snapped.
    “Why not?” Cassidy asked.
    The silence was more startling than a thunderclap would have been at that moment.
    “Why not?” Ranon said. “She’s a Queen!”
    “A Queen who doesn’t know how to work is of no use to her people,” Reyhana said.
    “Well put, Sister,” Cassidy said. Ranon looked like he’d been clobbered with a fence post, and she was sorry for what she was about to do to him, but the girl was her priority now. “My family is not aristo, Prince Ranon. We never had servants. And even though by caste I am a Queen, I am also a daughter. So when my mother pulled out the rags and mops on cleaning day, I dusted and polished furniture, and mopped the floors right along with her. And when it was my turn to clean the bathroom, I had very bad thoughts about my brother.” She looked Ranon right in the eyes. “Why is it that a man can hit the center of a bull’s eye at one hundred paces and yet can’t manage to get all of his stream in the toilet bowl when he’s standing right over it?”
    Janos and Gray stood there with their mouths hanging open. Ranon, poor man, looked ready to slink away.
    But it was the suppressed snort from the young Queen that told Cassidy she had achieved her goal. She’d talk to the girl later about the proper way to address a Warlord Prince when his Jewels were dominant.
    She smiled at all of them. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I want to take a look at the vegetable garden.” As she walked away, she added on a distaff thread, *Vae, keep an eye on the males. Make sure they’re still breathing.*
    One, two, three . . .
    *Ranon? Ranon! Are you breathing?*
    There, Cassidy thought. By the time Ranon, Gray, and Janos untangled themselves from Vae’s attention, Reyhana would be safely among the older women—the ones Prince Ranon would not dare offend without good reason.
    When she reached the vegetable garden, she stopped.
    It should have been good soil, but it was parched, almost barren, and the plants struggling to grow wouldn’t yield the bounty needed to feed these people. Not parched for water; the ground was still soft, a sure sign that there had been a long, soaking rain sometime in the past day or two. No, it was parched for the connection with a Queen, for that necessary give-and-take that kept the land healthy.
    Why had the Shalador Queens neglected this? Cassidy wondered as she knelt at the edge of the bed. Surely they were aware of the need. Had they been so afraid to call attention to themselves that they hadn’t done this one thing that would have helped so many? Or had they stopped because they realized that if they made this land richer than the rest of Dena Nehele by following traditions, it would have been taken away? Ranon had told them that the reserves were half the size they had been when Lady Grizelle and Lia had established those parts of Dena Nehele as a place that belonged to the Shalador