Snow White and the Seven Dwarves

Author’s Note: Okay, I did it. I apologize, but yes, I deliberately lied to my readers and withheld information. I told everyone that I didn’t have any plans to revisit the Isle of Nightfall and its eight famous brothers; I did it to avoid people pestering me for “sneak peeks” at what I was writing next. But as you can see, I did have plans, muahahahaa! All right, technically this isn’t the Isle of Nightfall . . . but it does take place about half a year after the events at the end of the Sons of Destiny series. Don’t go looking for a lot of action from the Corvis boys and their wives, though; their story is done, and we have tales of new heroes and heroines to focus upon and explore. (I just wish I’d had more room than this to explore the city of Menomon and its culture!)

THEY were at it again. Being unabashedly frothy. She could hear them through the balcony doors.

Well, not all of them, Nevada acknowledged with a sigh. Dar-shem is asleep in the back bedroom because he’s on the night shift, and Rogen is late getting back from his work on the day shift at the desalinator site . . . but there go Cotter and Baubin . . . No, wait, those are Kristh and Talladen. Talladen always does that little wail thing whenever he realizes he’s getting loud. Mainly because it embarrasses him to think of anyone overhearing them . . .

She grinned, thinking of her sixth husband. He was rather cute when he blushed. Actually, they were all reasonably good-looking. Unfortunately, she sighed, looking out over the stained glass waters of the city, they’re all besotted with each other. Not with me. The only man I know who I’m pretty sure likes me in that way . . . doesn’t even live in this city.

Other women might give her arch, knowing looks and sly little winks whenever she went out from the house, but Nevada was envious of them. They had husbands who loved their wives. Nevada—on the advice of her “co-father” Sierran—had taken husbands who were only interested in one another.

Because, “It wouldn’t do for the heir-presumptive of Althinac to marry for the wrong reasons, or to the wrong persons,” she thought, silently mocking her mentor. Even though I had to get married.

Unlike the four lovebirds, paired off in two of the tenement’s handful of bedrooms, the author of that piece of advice was sound asleep in the overstuffed chair by the radiant block prominently placed in the center of the parlor. Life under the ocean meant living with perpetual dampness, and her mentor’s aging joints needed frequent doses of soothing heat.

Nevada loved him all the same; Sierran had literally rescued her from death at the hands of the insurgents. His hands, for he had been the one assigned to kill her and bring her family’s rule to a resolute, final end. Instead of killing her, he had fled with her, escaping across the vast, treacherous waters in a stolen under-wave ship. He had told her that he couldn’t bring himself to kill an innocent young girl just because she had been born a Naccaran.

He had also told her the facts of her family, how her next-mother’s greed and influence on her father had caused the city regent to impose increasingly harsh taxes on the people. Other laws had gradually oppressed their rights, and building projects to “beautify” the city had instead spoiled formerly pristine views. Particularly as some of the land for those building projects had been seized on the flimsiest of excuses, infuriating their rightful owners to the point of fomenting a rebellion.

Moving from the partially underwater city of Althinac to the fully underwater city of Menomon had been a calculated move on his part, or so Sierran had explained. Nevada needed to know what life in an oceanic city was like, since at the time they had left, loyalists were fighting back against the rebels . . . and in the twelve years she had been gone, there were still reports of fighting going on. Until Althinac was politically stable, she had to remain in a safe place. But on the off chance that the loyalists won, she had to remain capable of returning to the city, which meant maintaining no permanent ties to Menomon. And on the off chance that the rebels won, but wanted to make peace with the loyalists, she had to remain politically available for negotiations of one sort or another.

But in the meantime, she had to live in Menomon, under Menomonite customs and traditions. Since she had no magical or medical reason to counter the local customs, the City Council decreed that Nevada still had to get married after she turned eighteen and have three husbands by the time she turned twenty-five, the same as any other woman.

. . . Aaand there goes Baubin. He does that growling thing whenever he and Cotter go at it. Then again, Cotter’s a good lover; he certainly made Rogen happy, at least for a while. She smiled again. First she had picked Cotter for her husband, then Rogen, because she had been best friends with Cotter, and he and Rogen had been lovers. Since she wasn’t interested in Cotter sexually, it made sense to pick a second husband who would keep Cotter happy.

But then Rogen had met the handsome Dar-shem and fallen in love, which meant Nevada had ended up marrying him, too, and cheerful, easygoing Cotter had hooked up with Kristh, who had become husband number four. Only Cotter had met Baubin a year later and decided he was much better off with the short, blond land-butcher than with the tall, redheaded leatherworker. The two were still silly over each other, though it had been two years since they had fallen in love. It was cute. Kristh had wanted to get a divorce after being dropped by Cotter for someone else, but had met Dar-shem’s friend Talladen, who had secretly fallen for him back when he was still with Cotter . . . and there went another heart caught up in the maelstrom of masculine romances filling Nevada’s life.

Dar-shem used to have a thing for Talladen, which makes Rogen irritable from jealousy, she thought, counting out the pairings on her fingers. As their wife, it was her legal responsibility to keep abreast of potential family tensions, so she made a point of reminding herself each day of her marriage’s dynamics. Particularly since they’re on split shifts over at the desalinator and don’t get to see each other as much as they used to. I really should talk to the Aquamancy Guild about getting them reassigned to the same shift. Even if they are really good coral masons, and really good coral masons are rare, they’ll be happier and thus work better if they’re paired together.

Three explosive sneezes made her grin. And there goes Kristh, with his allergies. I always know when he’s having fun . . .

Her smile slipped a little. She didn’t know if she had any little quirks during lovemaking, like Talladen with his shy wailing, or Kristh with his sneezing, or Baubin with his growling. Cotter had gladly shared all manner of secrets with her about the mysteries of what men liked and wanted; they had met in primary school, being the same age, and had made friends with each other as they grew. Cotter worked in the Mage Guild as a generalist enchanter like her, albeit a few ranks lower. But being told what men liked wasn’t the same as being shown what she liked. In that much, Nevada envied her husbands.

A shadow loomed on the horizon, distracting her. Not a figurative one, either; a large ship had drifted into view while she had leaned on the railing of her tenement balcony and listened to four of her six husbands making love back in their bedrooms. It took her a few moments to realize why it looked so strange and yet so vaguely familiar; it wasn’t an oblong, fish-shaped udrejhong, the kind with the raisable fin-sails preferred by the Menomonites around her. No, the long, triangular-hulled ship was starkly Althinac in its design.

Alarmed, Nevada peered through the rippling green-glass light of the ocean, beyond the layers of hydrostatic barriers separating the city from the sea. The sight of several smaller, fish-shaped vessels surrounding the foreign ship reassured her a little. Good . . . the Wavescouts are up there, giving it escort. And . . . yes, they’re docking it at the new Flame Tower. Sheren’s apprentices will be the first ones to examine the newcomers for any potential threat to the city.

Craning her neck, she looked back at the white-haired figure sleeping peacefully in his overstuffed chair. Sierran had negotiated asylum for the two of them twelve years ago; the final word on whether or not their request was accepted had come from the lips of the Guardian of Menomon herself. Even after having studied with the redoubtable woman, Nevada was still a little in awe of the elderly but imposing, formidable Guardian Sheren. She also respected the guardian’s new, official apprentices, but she was more in envy of them than in awe.

Sometimes it seems like all the world is happily married, except for me . . . Talladen wailed a second time and Kristh sneezed twice, then twice again. She smiled wistfully. Even if some of them are supposed to be married to me. If the boys haven’t woken up Dar-shem yet with their fun, I should go wake him up anyway. He’ll have to eat and get ready to go to work soon. Which means I’ll have to start getting dinner ready, since it’s my turn to cook.

I’d better wake up Sierran and let him know an Althinac under-wave ship has arrived. A particularly large one. She gave the large, prism-shaped vessel one last, worried look before moving inside. Normally we get our news from Althinac via mirror-scryings. Something big must have happened to have prompted them into traveling halfway across the Western Ocean without warning. Something most likely involving Sierran and me.

ROGEN came swimming home in time for supper. Pausing only long enough to run one of the suction wands that hung along the balcony wall over his leather clothes in order to eradicate stray drips, he headed for the kitchen and kissed Nevada on the cheek. Then he kissed Dar-shem on the lips and dragged his co-husband away from prepping the rice rolls, hauling the taller, darker-skinned man by the hand to the refreshing room to “help” him rinse off the saltwater that had soaked his skin for half the day.

He banged on the bedroom doors of the other four as he went, ordering them to help set the table, making Nevada smile. Cotter might have been her best friend and first choice in the face of Menomonite custom, but Rogen made the best lead husband.

The long tile table was set in rapid order, the last of the rice rolls fixed by Baubin, and the dishes carried out to the table by Talladen and Cotter. Kristh fetched and poured the drinks, shielding the occasional, lingering sneeze into his shoulder. Once everything was ready, the seven men in Nevada’s life took their seats around the long table, with Nevada at one end and Sierran at the other.

Just as she took her first bite of butter-fried dulse, the reddish brown seaweed cooked the special way Cotter’s mother had shown her shortly after her first marriage, someone rang the bell-chime. Mouth full, Nevada glanced around the table. It wasn’t unusual for such a large family to have visitors, though usually friends and family visited later in the day. The look in Sierran’s eyes echoed her worry that their unexpected visitor had something to do with the two of them.

Rogen set down his fork with a scowl. “It’s probably for me. Yet another problem with wedding the coral seed stock to the base granite, no doubt.”

Dar-shem smothered a yawn and rose at the same time his co-husband did, unfolding his tall, dark brown body from his chair. “I’d better listen in. If it’s something a coral mason has to fix, it’ll be done on my watch, after all.”

Swallowing her mouthful of seaweed, Nevada cut into her pepper-and-onion-smothered halibut. Baubin could and did get them choice cuts of land meat from time to time, since he worked as a butcher and that was one of the perks of his job, but feeding eight people took a lot, and fish was a cheaper protein to cultivate under the sea than birds or beef. Land animals required a lot of feed, and that took a lot of space from the harvest caverns deep below the city.

It was no good. She couldn’t distract herself with thoughts of food. Setting down knife and fork, she strained to hear any actual words coming from the front hall. The only things audible over the sounds of the others eating were the low rumble of Rogen’s voice, the slightly lighter one of Dar-shem, and at least one other, unfamiliar male.

She didn’t have to strain for long. She heard Rogen speaking firmly as they came toward the dining room. “But she’ll finish her meal first, and take the time to properly dress. In the meantime . . . I offer you the hospitality of our family; you may dine with us if you wish.”

“No, thank you,” the gray-uniformed man following between him and Dar-shem stated as he entered the room. Though the upper half of his face was hidden by his guardsman’s helm, the wavescout’s eyes could be seen taking in the number of men at the table. He faced Nevada after a moment and gave her a polite bow. “Good evening, mistress; I am Wavescout Tiels. May I presume you are Nevada of the family Naccara, born in the city-state of Althinac?”

“That is correct,” she agreed, glad she had given up on the pretense of eating, leaving her mouth clear for speech. “What can I do for you, Wavescout Tiels?”

“A delegation from the city of Althinac has been sent to the city of Menomon to speak with you regarding the means to bring an end to the last of its civil war. The Guardian of Menomon and her apprentices have interviewed the delegates and believe it is safe for you to meet with them under their supervision. The city council has generously offered the use of its facilities for hosting this meeting.”

“No doubt they hope to wrest some sort of trade advantage out of this from the Althinac,” Talladen murmured. “Now that they’re finally getting their heads out of the sump pump about keeping in contact with outsiders.”

“Keep a civil tongue in your head, Talladen,” Rogen chastised him.

“I’m a bard; I’m supposed to speak the truth,” Talladen shot back, though he blushed as he said it.

“Gentlemen,” Nevada said soothingly, lifting her hand slightly. That was all she needed to do; both of her co-husbands settled back down.

One of the few reasons Sierran had been in favor of her marrying so many men—for all he had discouraged her from marrying any of the ones interested in her romantically—had to do with the hands-on teaching it would give her in how to manage disparate personalities. Although he had merely been the equivalent of a wavescout lieutenant back in Althinac, the aging man had paid attention to city politics. Nevada had to agree; she had learned quite a lot about how to manage people just from managing her personal life.

The wavescout waited for her reply. Nodding her head, Nevada complied. “I would be honored to accept the council’s generous offer. My lead husband is correct, however; I really should eat and change into something more suitable first. You are welcome to join us, as he offered.”

“Thank you, but it isn’t necessary, mistress,” the wavescout replied politely, giving her another bow. “I ate before coming on duty. I’m willing to wait while you get ready, and will be your escort to the Congregation Halls. Guardian Sheren has sent her personal gourami vessel for your use, to make sure you arrive safe and dry. In the meantime, the Althinac delegation has been invited to enjoy the delights of the Aviary.”

Cotter rose from his seat, giving Nevada a half bow as he did so. “I’ll show him to the parlor, mistress.”

“Thank you, Husband,” she murmured. Rogen and Dar-shem sat back down as Cotter led the wavescout out of the room. Nevada concentrated on cutting into her halibut. Her appetite had vanished from nervousness, but she knew she would need the energy to deal with this sudden visit from Althinac.

A few seconds after they were alone again, Baubin snerked, shoulders trembling with the effort to keep his laughter quiet. “Did you see the look in his eyes? He was clearly wondering what our wife had that his didn’t!”

Rogen jerked in his seat, as did Kristh a moment later; Nevada heard a thump from under the table. She didn’t have to peer under the furniture to know the chain of discipline was being passed from nan to man. As she watched, Kristh twisted and smacked Baubin on the back of his head. “Keep a civil tongue in your head regarding our wife. She’s the one who gave us this lifestyle.”

“That’s enough,” Nevada told both of them. She kept her tone light and was pleased when they settled down. It hadn’t always been this easy, particularly when her co-husbands’ relationships had been breaking apart like a crumbling reef, but she had earned their respect over time. Particularly since all six of them were now very happy with their choice of mates.

“You will wear the blue dress, won’t you?” Baubin asked her. “The one with the bits of lace? The dye in the scales really brings out the color of your eyes.”

“She’s meeting with people who, from the sound of it, are from the other faction in the Althinac civil war,” Rogen pointed out. “Not going off to marry husband number seven. She should wear black, so she’ll look intimidating.”

“Then she should wear a bold red, so she’ll look like a force to be reckoned with,” Talladen countered.

“Black is more intimidating,” Rogen countered back. “With her black hair and a black dress, she’ll look like someone who cannot be easily threatened.”

“Gentlemen,” Sierran interjected, “if this is a chance for reconciliation and an end to civil strife, then she shouldn’t be trying to frighten them out of it. If anything, she should look like a princess, since that is what she is. She should wear gold, to remind them of her heritage.”

“Gold?” both Kristh and Baubin protested. Kristh continued for both of them. “Gold doesn’t go with her eyes. I agree she shouldn’t look quite as beautiful as she does in the blue dress with the lace, but too much gold would make the dress more visible than her.”

“He has a point,” Talladen agreed. “Perhaps a compromise?”

“How about her long gold skirt and one of her blue tops?” Dar-shem offered.

Talladen and Rogen both winced, and Baubin wrinkled his nose. Cotter, coming back from showing the wavescout to the parlor and its balcony view of the city, rolled his eyes. Nevada stepped in verbally before they could continue.

“Your suggestions all have merit . . . but I’ll wear black pants and a gold top for this first meeting. It’ll give an impression that I still have access to wealth and thus power, yet cannot be easily intimidated.”

“Pants? Why pants?” Sierran asked as the others nodded in agreement. “You know as well as I do that noblewomen in Althinac wore skirts, as a sign of their status. Commoner women who had to work for a living wore pants. I’m sure nothing has changed that drastically fashion-wise in the last twelve years.”

“Because it’s a compromise. My good black leather skirt is barramundi leather, and my good gold blouse is stingray. The two scale patterns clash. Not to mention I seem to remember Althinac having a lot more access to land leathers and actual fabrics,” Nevada pointed out. “If I walk into this meeting wearing blatantly fish-scaled leathers, I’ll look more like a Menomonite than an Althinac. I have a pair of trousers made from manta, which is close enough to stingray that it’ll match the blouse. And the blue dress, lovely though it may be, was made from parrotfish hide. It matches the salvaged lace for the trim, but otherwise it looks too Menomonite.”

“Never mind what she’s wearing,” Cotter said dismissively, cutting into his own steak now that he was seated again. “We need to figure out what we are wearing.”

“You?” Sierran scoffed. “This is an Althinac matter, not a Menomonite one.”

“We’re still her husbands,” Dar-shem reminded him. “If these delegates came with an entourage to impress people with their importance, then we’ll need to provide her with one, too . . . or rather, you will. I’ll have to head to work in half a glow.”

Nevada glanced at the clock out of habit. Like the clocks in the other rooms of their tenement, it was crafted from nodes of suncrystal similar to the ones embedded in the ceiling. Unlike the overhead crystals, the clocks weren’t turned off by a switch; instead, spells caused them to light up and dim twice a day on a twelve-hour, twelve-spoked cycle, shining brightest and fullest at noon and midnight. Measuring time was important when one couldn’t always see the actual sun and moons sliding across the rippling waters of the Menomonite sky.

It was her guild, the Mage’s Guild, that enchanted and maintained such things. Her guild that grew the suncrystal towers which brought blessed, necessary sunlight from the wave-tossed surface all the way down to the plants and animals growing in the harvesting caverns at the base of the reef-ringed city. Her guild that had graciously done its best to maintain contact, however sporadic, with Althinac . . . and her guild that hadn’t warned her that a delegation from that distant city was on its way.

Why didn’t we know? Why didn’t Althinac warn us they were coming? Picking at her food, Nevada worried over that point. Even if I don’t have the seniority of some of the others, I’m the one our “informant” has been talking with these last few years. Nor would the others go behind my back; I’m among the top ten highest ranked mages in the guild. I would have known about it even if the message had come during my off hours!

So why didn’t they say they were coming?

THE moment she entered the Aviary, one of the best meeting rooms in the council Congregation Halls, Nevada knew why nothing had been said. Mouth gaping, she stared at the most important man in the room. Only peripherally did she notice the quartet of men and the one woman who accompanied him, distinct in their fabric clothes from the Menomonites in their sea leathers. Mastering her shock, Nevada struggled to adopt a pleasant expression instead of a stunned one as she approached, flanked by her husbands and her honorary co-father.

That approach was masked by the chirps and twitters of the songbirds flitting from tree to tree. Breathable space for animals and plants as well as humans was at a premium, but the Aviary was one of the oldest and fanciest public venues in Menomon. Normally it was only available during daylight hours; with the sun having set during supper, only the residual light lurking in the crystals of the sun towers and the occasional passing of a luminous fish could illuminate the pitch-black depths of the city. Agitated by the extended span of crystal-wrought light, the birds flitted from bush to tree, almost as colorful as the fish residing in the city’s many reefs, and certainly noisier.

Althinac was a city partly on the surface and partly beneath the sea, built as it was around a pearl necklace of coral atolls much older and taller than the reefs sheltering Menomon. They were undoubtedly used to seeing non-edible birds flying about freely, but Nevada could tell the visitors were still impressed. Particularly that one central figure, who was craning his neck so he could peer at the bright yellow and green budgerigar that had boldly landed on his shoulder. The bird finished cleaning its beak with a talon and fluttered off, allowing its human perch to finally notice Nevada’s approach.

The smile he gave her was big, friendly, and unabashed. It made his teeth look very white in his suntanned face. He emphasized his pleasure by breaking away from the others, hand outstretched in greeting as he crossed the brick-tiled courtyard being used as their meeting space. “Nevada! I’m very glad to finally meet you in person.”

“Migel,” Nevada returned, smiling back as she clasped hands with him.

She couldn’t help smiling; for a man raised on the rebel side of the civil war, he had always been very nice toward both her and Sierran. Of course, Migel’s insistence on staying neutral all these years and focusing on expanding his knowledge of training through his contacts in various cities hadn’t hurt. It had given them a non-hostile contact to talk with back home. Now, in person, that warmth in his personality transmitted itself in the warmth of his hand. Part of her just wanted to wrap herself up in his hand. Part of her wanted to wrap herself up in the rest of his embrace.

With the remainder, she managed a coherent question. “It is indeed a great pleasure to meet you in person, instead of via the mirrors . . . but why are you here? They made you the Guardian of Althinac last year, at the start of the truce. Why would they let the Guardian of the City go anywhere?”

“They ‘let’ me because they don’t know I’ve left. They think I’m undertaking a purification ritual in strict isolation; otherwise I would have told you I was coming. Unfortunately, there are still a few radicals on both sides who would not only violently protest my leaving the city, but also the reason why I came here at all.” His eyes, the same cerulean shade of blue as hers, flicked to the faces of the men spreading out to flank her. “Are these your fellow guild members?”

“Only Cotter is part of the Mage Guild. Migel, this is my first husband Cotter, a generalist mage of the fourth rank; Cotter, this is Migel, Guardian of Althinac.” Nevada turned slightly to her other side, ready to introduce the next man in her entourage, but the stunned, crumbling look on the Guardian of Althinac’s suntanned face stopped her. “Is something wrong?”

He shook his head, but not in reply. “This isn’t going to work . . . I came all the way here with what I thought was a brilliant idea, and it’s not going to work.”

Getting the feeling she was missing out on something, Nevada tilted her head. “Mind telling me what’s wrong? And what your idea was?”

“It’s the Convocation of the Gods,” Migel explained. “The priestess picked to represent Althinac during the Summoning of Althea presented both sides of our civil war to Her and asked if there was a simple, workable solution to our ongoing civil war. The Goddess of Waves answered with the statement ‘When the two houses are rendered one, the war will end.’ Or words to that effect.

“Most of the radicals on both sides took that to mean a resumption of hostilities and tried to break the truce. I stopped it . . . barely . . . and said I would meditate on its meaning. But I thought at the time the meaning was very clear. To render doesn’t mean to destroy—that’s to rend—but rather, to render means things like to conform, submit, and represent. So I thought it meant we should make the two ruling houses of the loyalists and the rebels join as one,” he explained. “The loyalists won’t accept anyone but a Naccaran leading the city.

“You’re the last one, unless you count a few embittered, distant cousins among the extremists who have been keeping the loyalist faction firmly alive. The majority of loyalists don’t want an extremist on the city seat, though. They’d rather take their chances on an exiled princess. On the other side of the matter, the rebels won’t accept anyone but an Althec paving the way to a new and better future, because of the excesses of your father and next-mother.

“I’m a first cousin to the idiots who started this mess. Plus I’m the guardian of the city, the only one both sides felt was calm enough to take up the position and enforce the truce. That gives me a certain level of authority to . . . well, to have imposed my will, making everyone accept a marriage of alliance between us.” He paused and shook his head, the ends of his dark brown hair flicking over his shoulders with the quick, negative movement. “But if you’re already married, it wouldn’t work.”

“Why wouldn’t it work?” Cotter asked, giving the Althinac male a puzzled look.

Migel glanced at him. “Because she’s already married?”

“What has that to do with anything?” Rogen asked, folding his arms across his chest. “She’s already got six husbands. One more at this point won’t matter that much.”

Nevada took in Migel’s shocked look and blushed, remembering why he was so upset. It’s just proof of how well I’ve adapted to the Menomonite way of looking at things that I totally forgot about this. “Migel, I’m only married because, under Menomonite law, I had no legal reason not to be married. The law in this city is that unless a woman is willing to pay a very stiff fine, or has a medical or magical reason to sidestep the law, all women have to have at least three husbands by the time they turn twenty-five.

“Given how I’m twenty-four, I’ve never had a great deal of wealth, and I had no clue whatsoever that this solution for ending the war was going to be presented to you before my time limit was up, I went ahead and married my best friend, Cotter, five years ago and then picked out a few more. This is Rogen, who is my second and lead husband,” she added, introducing the two of them. She gestured at the others as well. “I’m also wed to Kristh, Baubin, and Talladen here, as well as to Dar-shem, though he’s not here.”

“Dar-shem had to go off to work the night shift instead of accompanying us to meet your delegation; he’s helping to construct our own desalinator, based on the blueprints of the one on Nightfall Isle, the place which hosted the Convocation of the Gods,” Cotter explained for her.

Nevada gestured at the last of the men in her entourage. “And of course you know Sierran, who is my honorary co-father, since he helped raise me once we settled here. And he did have the wit and the compassion to spare my life as an innocent child.”

Migel nodded politely to each man, but there was still a lurking level of dismay in his deep, Althinac blue gaze. At least it wasn’t quite as strong as the expressions of distaste in the four men behind him listening to their conversation, though the one woman in his entourage was still smiling politely enough at Nevada. The Guardian of Althinac gestured with his hand. “The laws in Althinac are very different from Menomon. We have a one woman, one man policy. Plus there’s the whole question of . . . of paternity, since in order to make the merger successful, we’d have to . . .”

He trailed off when Nevada gaped at him. She laughed as soon as she could catch her breath; a glance to either side showed her husbands sharing her sense of humor. “You think I’m sleeping with them? I’ll admit I’m the envy of any number of Menomonite women for the sheer number of men I’ve managed to fit into my life, but trust me, it’s not at all what you’d think. Ours,” she said, gesturing to include her five present husbands along with herself, “is a true marriage of convenience. I needed to obey the laws and rules of Menomon, and they were willing to oblige that need in return for all the legal advantages of being married. Which they could not obtain any other way . . . because each and every one of my husbands is paired off with one of the others.”

“Paired off?” Migel repeated, flicking his gaze to the faces of the men flanking her.

“Yes. They’re frothy,” she explained. At his blank look, she realized she had used another Menomonite term. “It means they’re only interested in other men, sexually?”

Migel’s lips parted, but for a moment no sound came out. He finally settled on a simple “Ah.”

“Her marriages have simply been a political move,” Sierran offered, speaking up from his position behind the others, drawing the full attention of his fellow Althinacs. “I reasoned that an offer like this might happen someday, among many other possibilities . . . but I also knew we had to be model Menomonite citizens in return for being given asylum here for so many years. I counseled Nevada to take on husbands who were only interested in sexual relations with other men, which would protect her from any questions of paternity in an alliance match with someone from Althinac.”

Cotter wrapped his right arm around Nevada’s shoulders, giving her a little squeeze. “Trust us, she’s more like a sister than a wife, in that regard. Not that she doesn’t know what to do; she got high marks in her sexual education courses, plus I’ve filled her in on a few more things about men since then.”

From the rolling eyes and hastily averted gazes of the men behind Migel, Nevada guessed these Althinacs still didn’t grasp Menomonite culture. And still the one woman in their group continued to smile benignly at her. Migel caught the line of her gaze and introduced them.

“These are Fedor and Ismail of the loyalist faction—I should say rather, two of the levelest-headed members of the loyalist faction I could find to bring as witnesses to my plan. These are Carmen and Lajos of the rebel faction, also the calmest and most trustworthy witnesses I could find. And this,” he added, gesturing for the woman in their group to come forward, “is my cousin Socorro, who is the witness for the Althec family. I, ah, would have sought someone of the Naccaran family to be your witness . . . but you’re the only one left of sufficiently strong enough blood ties. The remaining three cousins . . . they might accept you as a co-leader, but they’d protest the ‘co-’ part, particularly when instigated by the rebel side.”

Nevada lifted her hand, dismissing his subtle apologies for the things his kin had done to hers. The two of them had long since covered such things via their occasional mirror-scried conversations. “That’s all right. My husbands can stand witness.”

Migel blinked. “They can stand witness? Not could ? Have you made up your mind that quickly?”

“Not entirely,” Nevada told him, smiling. “But since I already know you—as much as we could know each other through a pair of mirrors—you’re not the part of this marriage alliance idea I’d object to. What I need to know now is how this marriage of our two houses will be translated into the governance of Althinac.”

“Why don’t we all sit down while we hash out such details?” Talladen offered, playing the diplomat. He gestured at the expensive, wrought-iron chairs clustered to one side of the cobblestone-paved courtyard.

Nevada knew the chairs wouldn’t be comfortable for any real length of time, but she figured that might help speed up the preliminaries. Letting Talladen hold her chair for her, she sat down at one of the smaller grate-topped tables. It was a power move, for it allowed only enough room for Migel to sit across from her and forced both sides to spread out, finding seats a short distance away.

If she had been dealing with Menomonites, she would have picked the largest of the three different sizes of tables offered by the Aviary furniture, but she wasn’t dealing with a committee-minded people. Althinacs were used to being led by a single leader who was supported by a selection of advisors. That meant these negotiations were between herself and Migel.

The table was small enough that when Migel adjusted his position in his chair, their feet bumped together briefly. Migel dropped his gaze to her sandal-clad feet, visible below the soft, sueded, black rayskin of her pants, then pulled his focus back up to her face. “As you may recall, Althinac is ruled in a pyramid fashion; the higher up you go in the ranks of authority, the fewer people you’ll find. At the top are two positions: the guardian and the prince or princess.

“Right now, the city is technically ruled by Prince Alvan, a mutual uncle of Socorro’s and mine. But it’s a precarious perch, because while he’s popular among the rebel faction, he’s a bit too staunchly an Althec for the loyalists to fully accept him. I have more of the effective power, if not the rank, because I have been careful not to offend the loyalist side. Nor have I offended my kin overly much.

“Unfortunately, the Althecs would not accept me as the next prince because I’m the strongest mage in the city. They want me to be the guardian,” Migel explained. “They want both positions to stay as they are, filled by members of the rebel faction, but the loyalists disagree. Because of this, the truce is an uneasy one, held in place more by my agreeability and the threat of my power against both sides than by Uncle Alvan’s leadership abilities.”

Nevada shifted in her seat. That caused their feet to bump together again. It distracted her briefly from the hard, unyielding metal supporting her backside. Migel cleared his throat.

“On the other hand, if you were to take over as princess while I remained guardian, the rebel side would object to having a Naccaran in power over them once again.”

That made her tilt her head. “So . . . are you suggesting that you step up as the prince, and that, what . . . I take over your position as guardian of Althinac? I’m a strong mage, but I’m not that strong. I’m not even strong enough to have been considered a suitable replacement for Guardian Sheren here in Menomon.”

“Not exactly—actually, it’s your own city guardian’s situation that made me think of this solution,” Migel confessed, nodding at the pair of redheads who had taken seats at the edge of the group, watching the proceedings quietly but intently. The man was somewhat tall and slightly exotic, being a foreigner, while the woman was rather short and quite familiar to Nevada. “Her apprentices are weaker individually than they are when they pool their powers together. Together, they will rule Menomon as its joint guardian whenever Guardian Sheren steps down.

“You and I couldn’t pool our magics on nearly the same scale that they apparently can, but we could pool our authority,” Migel explained. “Instead of having a prince or princess at the top, followed by the guardian of the city as their champion and protector, we combine the two offices. We can’t make ourselves a ruling king and queen, since that’s not in our covenant with Althea, but we can make ourselves a ruling prince and princess. Equals, with equal share of the power and equal share of the responsibility. And to make it unshakable, we should probably marry before we return to Althinac. I know it’s rushed, but this way we’d have several days of travel to get used to working together. Except . . . you’re already married.”

His own foot shifted against hers. It shifted and lingered, in fact. Nevada didn’t realize for a few moments what he was up to, until she shifted her foot aside a little and his followed hers. His boot was leather, waxed somewhat stiff, but he still managed to caress her ankle gently with the edge of its toe. A blatant caress. Quirking the corner of her mouth, Nevada lifted her toes a little, returning the foot play.

“That . . . sounds like it’d take a lot of work to implement. Though I suppose I do have more of an advantage than you in that I’ve grown up used to the Menomonite mind-set of committees for this and councils for that.” Bracing one elbow on the table, she rested her chin on her hand, toes rubbing gently against the lower part of his calf. Touching him just felt too good to pass up the opportunity. “But it will still take work on both our parts. Not only will it take work for the people on both sides to accept our joint authority, it will probably take some time for both of us to learn how to trust each other’s judgment enough to honestly share all the powers, privileges, duties, and responsibilities.

“I’m used to sharing power because that’s the way Menomon is run, ruled by layers of committees, guilds, and teams. Can you handle that?” she asked, wriggling her toes subtly behind his calf. The birds were still agitated from the extended light, and they were being watched by the Menomonites and Althinacs around them, but she was fairly sure Migel was aware of her subtext: Can you handle me?

Migel smiled in a way that said he was taking a moment to tactfully phrase his reply. “As part of a team ruling the city, yes, I believe I can handle that. As part of a team married to you . . . Frothy or not, I think I would have to insist that you divorce your husbands before you married me. I’m not inclined to share you.”

“She can’t do that,” Cotter stated. At Migel’s sharp look, he shrugged. “If you want her to get married here, she has to do it by Menomonite law, and there are a handful of indemnity clauses involved. If she divorces us, she is forbidden by law to marry anyone for a full year, plus she must pay us in marriage equity for the loss of access to a wife and all the privileges that entails. If we divorce her, she would be free to marry again, but we cannot marry anyone for three years, and we would lose our marriage privileges.”

“I’m missing something,” Migel murmured, glancing at the other husbands. “You’re frothy men. Why would losing marital privileges be an issue?”

“Not marital privileges, marriage privileges,” Baubin corrected. “Under Menomon law, a woman is allowed larger and better quarters dependent upon the number of her husbands, plus a tax break, rental discounts, and even a larger food budget. With six husbands, Mistress Nevada has one of the best tenements in the upper East Reef zone. Menomon also has a slight housing problem at the moment. We’d have to move out of her nice, large tenement and cram ourselves into three sets of tiny quarters at the base of the city.”

“We can’t expand by very much in size until we have the desalinator up and running, taking from our city protections much of the burden of filtering out freshwater to drink,” Rogen stated, folding his arms across his black-leather-clad chest. “At that point, the magics allocated toward drinkable water can be shifted toward expanding the city’s limits, easing the housing pressures. Until that point in time . . . we are disinclined to divorce our wife.”

Migel looked at Rogen and his co-husbands, then at Nevada. Finally, he nodded his head. “I can understand your point. But we won’t be living here; we’ll be living in Althinac, where polyandrous and polygamous marriages aren’t accepted. I have, however, spotted a loophole.”

His foot moved under the table, sliding partway up Nevada’s calf. She raised her brows as much from suppressing the urge to shiver as from polite inquiry. “And that loophole is . . . ?”

“You and I marry, and then you divorce your husbands.” He turned to the husbands. “Her marriage equity can then give you all the right to maintain your current housing status and location . . . and Althinac will foot the bill in paying for the tenement for the next three years, giving Menomon plenty of time to build your desalinator and begin expanding the city’s housing limits. After that,” he said, spreading his hands slightly, “you’re on your own.”

“Six years,” Talladen counteroffered. “With the provision that we—the six of us—remain housed in the tenement, no more and no less. Or seven, if you care to stay, Sierran?”

“I’d have to think about that. I’m not as young as I used to be,” the former Althinac stated. “My mind is fine, but relocating into a tense political situation is something for younger, swifter reflexes.”

“I do owe you my life, Sierran; you’ll always have a co-father’s rights with me, and a warm welcome in my home. I’ll have to hash out these ideas with the city council,” Nevada warned Migel as she turned her attention back to him, “but I think there’s a precedent for co-husbands getting to keep their upgraded housing for at least a year, and I’m sure we can extend it to three at the very least. Particularly if I point out that they’d be getting friendlier trade relations with Althinac if I’m allowed to divorce with their legal blessing toward the terms. But it may take a few days before they make up their minds, since this isn’t a life-or-death crisis.”

“Hopefully they won’t take forever in reaching a decision. I can fake appearing to still be in Althinac only for so long,” he warned her, and gave her ankle one last caress with his own before rising. “In the meantime, would you be willing to show me—us—more of this city? I’m told it’s just as beautiful at night, lit up by suncrystals and bioluminous plants and animals, as it looked to be by day.”

Rising, Nevada smiled. “I’d be delighted. That is, if you don’t mind getting wet? It’s best seen from above when swimming through the towers outside the main air dome.”

“I don’t mind getting wet . . . if you don’t mind me making you wet,” he murmured, taking her hand and tucking it into the crook of his elbow. “But as I am a mage, I’ll just cast a spell to keep our clothing dry.”

The masculine warmth in his rich blue eyes, coupled with that phrase, made her blush with pleasure. From the moment they had first met via mirror, Nevada had liked Migel. But it had just been liking until now; they lived too far apart and the political situation was too unstable for imagining anything more. But from the moment their hands had first met . . . Nevada could definitely picture more.

“I wouldn’t mind at all,” she promised him, smiling as she guided him out of the Aviary Hall.

“AND then the bladder wrack broke free, but instead of making things better, the long strands got all tangled up in the propellers and I still couldn’t get anywhere!” Migel confessed humorously, gesturing expressively with a hand before returning it to hers.

Nevada laughed and squeezed his fingers. “Menomonites use jets for propulsion more often than propellers, but I’ve been thwarted by clogged intake chutes a time or two. Which reminds me of this time when I—”

“Ohhh, for the love of Menos!” Seated off to the side, on one of the balcony’s padded lounging chairs, Cotter gave the two of them a glare worthy of his lead co-husband. His demand woke up Baubin and one of the Althinac men, Lajos, who had been dozing on two of the other couches. “It’s almost an hour past midnight, and the two of you won’t shut up! Some of us do have to work in the morning, you know—for reefs’ sake, go to bed already!”

Visibly reluctant, Migel sighed and lifted Nevada’s fingers to his lips. He kissed them lightly and gave her a wistful smile. “I guess I’ll have to hear your next story tomorrow morning . . . unless you have to work first?”

Cotter made a rude noise and hauled himself to his feet. “Not separate beds, her bed. Left-hand hall, first door on the left, you can’t miss it. And do remember you’ll have six of her best friends to answer to if you don’t make sure she enjoys it. You are more than welcome to enjoy the hospitality of our home and anything else she wants you to enjoy.”

“Lajos . . .” Pausing to yawn, Baubin scratched his short-cropped head and nodded politely at the remaining member of Migel’s entourage. “It’s a bit late to try and find your way back to your ship in a foreign city. You’re welcome to stay here. The couch in the parlor is more than comfortable enough for napping, so you should be able to sleep comfortably on it. I’ll get you some blankets and a pillow as soon as these two clear out.”

Blushing, Nevada rose from the end of the lounging chair she was sharing with Migel. Cotter snagged her around the shoulders as she started to pass him. He smacked a kiss on her cheek and murmured in her ear before she could move on.

“Just remember all that I told you about men, and you’ll do fine,” he encouraged her beneath his breath. “But don’t use all of it at once, or you’ll kill him.”

Nevada laughed and hugged him back. Slipping free, she caught Migel’s hand and led him to her bedchamber. Finally! My turn to make the others roll their eyes at the noise we’ll be making. I hope. She didn’t want to get this wrong. A glance at the Guardian of Althinac showed his tanned cheeks were a little pink, but he was smiling just as much as she was. Good. He’s not objecting in the least.

She couldn’t remember even half of what Cotter had told her. All her senses were wrapped up in the excitement of finally getting to make love with a man she liked, respected, and found attractive. Touching the crystals just inside the door, she lit up her bedroom and moved to the side, giving Migel room to enter. As soon as he stepped inside, she shut the door and twisted the lock.

Migel lifted one of his dark brows at that, but didn’t protest. Instead, he glanced around her chamber, taking in the mix of colors from the chests, bookshelves, paintings, and scrap-quilts adorning the walls. His gaze fell upon her large bed, and he frowned in puzzlement. “Are those . . . leather sheets? Are all Menomonites obsessed with leather?”

“Hardly. We just don’t have the room to grow fibers for cloth, whether from plants or from animals. Fabric is too rare and costly to waste it on bedding materials, so we usually piece together long strips of eelskin,” Nevada told him. “It’s very soft and supple, and the sueding process helps keep it from sticking to sweaty skin. Or so I’m told. This will be my first chance to find out.”

He looked at her and smiled. “Then I’m honored to help you get . . . wet.”

Grinning, she lifted her hands to his face. He wasn’t too much taller than her, and it didn’t take much effort to tip his head just so and draw his mouth down to hers. His willingness to be drawn into a kiss helped, as did the way he slipped his arms around her waist, pulling their bodies together. With their mouths mating, she tempered her eagerness with a thorough exploration of what kissing was all about.

He detoured after a little while to the side of her throat, nibbling gently with teeth and lips. Nevada reveled in the soft texture of his fabric shirt as he feasted. It was warmer than leather, though not as warm as the skin of his throat. And supple; when she slid her hands to his chest, she could feel the small beads of his nipples beneath it. His own hands played with the fitted leather of her golden rayskin shirt, but the leather was too tough to shift easily, for all that its beaded texture was soft enough to wear.

Taking her turn, Nevada nibbled on his ear, brushing back the exotic, shoulder-length strands of his dark brown hair. It was very unlike hers, which had been cut short in a scale-tooth pattern, with most of her black strands no longer than the width of two fingers. At least he didn’t seem to be offended by the shortness of her hair. Nevada knew that a lot of outsiders didn’t care for women with short hair, but the Menomonite lifestyle demanded it.

Last year, the rage had been stripes of brightly dyed color; this year, some people were attempting to grow their hair long, following the surface-dwelling fashion preferred by the Pyromancer now living in their midst. The rest had gone back to pattern cuts. Since her soot black hair didn’t bleach well and thus didn’t dye well, Nevada had rarely bothered with coloring it. She was glad she hadn’t done so this time around; she didn’t want to scare off the man in her arms. Reclaiming his mouth, she kissed him as best she could.

I’ll have to get used to thinking like an Althinac again, she acknowledged, helping him find the cuttlebone buttons holding her blouse in place as their tongues meshed. I . . . Ooh. Wow. I didn’t know he could make my whole body shiver like that, just from touching my bare skin . . .

Migel broke off from their kiss, pulling back far enough to give her bra a bemused look. “Even your underwear is leather?”

“Salmonskin. It functions as a swim outfit, in case I have to go into the water while I’m on the job but don’t want to get the rest of my clothes wet. Salmon leather doesn’t stretch out of shape when wet, like other leathers usually do,” she explained. “Rogen and Dar-shem wear a lot of it, since they’re coral masons.”

He winced a little at that. “Can we leave the subject of your husbands on the other side of that door?”

She nodded. He kissed her and drew her hands to the ties of his shirt. As much as she enjoyed the feel of all that cloth under her hands, Nevada wanted to touch him when he was naked and eager, too.

Somehow they managed to get from standing by the door to the side of the bed, shedding clothes and footwear with a minimum of fumbling. Nevada didn’t know if he or she was the one responsible for getting them onto the bed, just that they were still kissing and touching when they lay on their sides, legs and arms and lips interlaced.

Migel finally eased back with a humming sigh, his hand caressing the curve of her hip. “You are very beautiful, both inside and out, Nevada,” he murmured, rubbing his thumb gently along her hip bone, making her shiver. “Even if expediency didn’t demand it, I’d still consider marrying you. I’m glad I thought of it . . . if you don’t mind my being practical enough to combine both reasons.”

Nevada smiled. “Believe me, I understand practicality. And I’d marry you, too, I think, under different circumstances. More romantic ones.”

“I think I can make things romantic enough,” he murmured, leaning in for another kiss. Shifting the hand on her hip, he tickled her thighs apart. Brushing against her nethercurls, he eased his way into her folds with soft, slow sweeps of his fingertips.

Her breath caught in her throat when he rubbed her peak with the pad of his index finger. It caught again when that same finger dipped into her opening. She liked it, and sucked on his tongue to show her enthusiasm, since it wasn’t as if she could say anything in the midst of his kiss. He chuckled and shifted his thumb into play, teasing her clitoris in time with the gentle in-and-out pumping of his finger. Unable to stay still, she let her hips move with the feelings he stirred in her, rocking into his touch.

The urge to reciprocate had her brushing her palms over his skin, exploring the crisp hairs on his chest and the muscles lying beneath. She discovered he was ticklish on his lower abdomen; he sucked in a breath when she teased her fingertips around the dimple of his navel. And that he really liked it when she brushed her knuckles lightly against his shaft, so she did it again, then wrapped her fingers around him and stroked slowly. He was already warm and firm, but under her touch his flesh grew hot and hard.

Migel kissed her harder and added a second finger to the first. It was a tight fit, but he didn’t rush, easing his way into her depths. Thumb circling steadily, he kissed his way from her mouth down to her shoulder, then onto one breast. When his tongue flicked out and circled her nipple, matching the movement of his fingers, Nevada cried out. It wasn’t a loud cry like Cotter’s, and it didn’t quite match the bashful wail her bard co-husband gave, but she understood the bone-deep sentiment behind both. Having her breast licked felt just as overwhelming as being shocked by a lightning eel, if one could be shocked in a deliciously pleasant way. Beyond pleasant.

Shifting lower on her body meant shifting out of her grip. Nevada moaned in disappointment, her palms missing the satiny-smooth feel of her new toy. Migel soothed her with little kisses sprinkled across her stomach and nudged at her legs, making room for himself between her thighs. Catching on to what he wanted, she parted her limbs and lifted her knees a little to make the new position more comfortable for both of them.

Murmuring his approval, Migel nibbled on her thighs, licking between nips. His thumb never stopped stroking her flesh. Unable to lie still, needing an outlet, Nevada moaned again. Her fingers fisted in the soft, silvery gray leather sheets, then stroked up her ribs to cup her breasts. The moment he replaced his thumb with his tongue, she cried out, arching into his touch.

Her flesh stung again when he added a third finger. Distracting her with swirling, lapping flicks, Migel coaxed her into arching and moaning more. When he fluttered his fingers deep inside, she squeaked, throat locking in shock at just how good that felt—then cried out when he fluttered and suckled at the same time. Blinded by bliss, she drowned in sensation as he did it again and again until she was weak and trembling.

Warm flesh covered her torso. Prying open her eyes, Nevada met Migel’s gaze just moments before his hair curtained her from the light and his lips blotted out further thoughts. She could smell and taste herself on him, essence of woman mingling with musk of man. Stroking his hair back from his face, she kissed him enthusiastically despite her passion-sated state.

After a few minutes, he rested his forehead on hers while he shifted his weight, bracing most of it on his forearm and knees. With his free hand, he gently prodded his shaft against her flesh, rubbing it through the moisture still seeping free. Nevada smiled at him, pleased he was taking his time with her.

“Do you want me to reciprocate, first?” she asked. Most of him stilled at her question, though a certain part of him twitched against her as he contemplated her offer.

“Later,” Migel decided. A shift of his hips, an adjustment with his hand, and he pressed the tip of himself into her. Her body resisted, making her suck in a sharp breath, but he tucked his thumb between them and gently rubbed. Pleased by his care, she tempered her own touches, soothing him with gentle strokes of her hands on his skin rather than trying to excite him.

Between his soft kisses and his gentle touches, his slow entry into her untried flesh took a while, but it didn’t hurt too much. By the time he was fully inside, Nevada wanted more than this gentle consideration. Cupping his face, she angled her mouth against his and suckled his tongue. He hummed in appreciation, but didn’t move. She tugged gently on his hair. He stayed still inside of her, concentrating solely on their kiss. So she stroked her nails lightly down his back in that stimulating, scratching way her first husband had said most men liked—and he bucked at that. It stung, but it felt good, too.

“Gods!” Head flung back, Migel grimaced, visibly struggling for control. She did it again experimentally, and he swore, panting. “Dammit! Don’t do that!”

“Why not?” Nevada asked. “Didn’t you like it?”

“Too much,” he rasped, shifting to grab her wrists one at a time.

Unable to evade his grasp—not without an actual struggle—she focused on convincing him via words instead. “Well, I liked it, too. Slow and gentle is a good way to start out, and I thank you for it, but I’m interested in something with a bit more vigor now.”

“A bit more vigor?” Migel repeated. She shifted her knees, lifting them higher so that she could tilt her hips up into his a bit more, and nodded. So did he. “All right, a bit more vigor, then.”

He pulled out partway, then sunk back in with a sigh. It stung and soothed at the same time, like scratching a persistent itch. Releasing her arms, Migel braced more of his weight on his elbows, allowing him to withdraw and thrust with a bit more control and speed. Nevada liked that. She liked the feel of their bodies joining and the sensation of his shaft stretching her flesh to accommodate him. She also liked the way he picked up his pace when she lightly scratched his back again, and really liked how a slightly higher hitch of her hips let him rub against that flutter-spot deep inside.

She liked it so much that when he paused to adjust his weight on elbows and knees, she dug in her nails in protest, not wanting the sensations to stop. Migel groaned and lifted her left leg higher, pulling it up with his hand. Weight braced on his other arm, he pistoned into her, thrusting over and over, faster and faster. Raking her nails from his shoulders to his thighs, she barely remembered to be gentle. The feelings built and built, until once more her eyes rolled up in blissful blindness.

Vaguely, she heard herself cry out; it was hard to hear when her whole body thrummed with pleasure. As she drifted down, he bucked against her raggedly, groaning and collapsing on her, though his hips still twitched a little, trying to press into her those last few times before his own climax deflated his ability to do so. As he sagged onto her, sated, she wrapped her arms around him, enjoying the sweat-sticky way their bodies clung to each other.

After a while, he kissed her softly, gently, then eased out of her and shifted to the side. Their skin clung a little, making the movement awkward, but it didn’t matter after she twisted onto her side and cuddled against him. Holding her in the curve of his arm, Migel sighed deeply.

“That was wonderful . . . beyond wonderful. I’d figure out what word would qualify, exactly . . . but you seem to have melted my mind,” he muttered.

Nevada chuckled. “Stupendous. Blissful. Definitely something to be repeated twice, and thrice, and a hundred times more, all over again. Especially since next time it won’t hurt as much.”

He craned his neck, peering at her. “I didn’t mean to hurt you. I thought I was being careful.”

“You were, but first times are inevitably difficult, for one reason or another. I’m glad I shared this one with you,” she stated simply, and got squeezed in return. “So . . . how soon do you think we can try it again? Practice makes perfect and all that.”

He laughed. “I’ll need at least a few minutes more. Besides, he was right . . . uh, the one, Cotter. Some people do have to work tomorrow. I’m presuming that ‘some people’ includes you, so you’ll need your sleep.”

“Cotter and I work in the same guild. He can tell the others why I’m not coming into work for my next shift—the diplomatic reasons,” Nevada clarified quickly, “not the personal ones.”

“Good. I’d rather no one cast a giant, flashing illusion over the city blazing, ‘Migel slept with Nevada!’ It’s bad enough I’ll have to share you with six other men, even if only for as long as it takes us to get married and for you to divorce them,” he said.

“I’ll miss them,” she murmured. “They aren’t husbands in the fullest sense of the word, but they are my friends.”

“Once we get Althinac fully settled down and the people accepting our joint leadership, we’ll be able to come back and visit them. Or they can come and visit us, which would be easier,” he pointed out. “They obviously care about you, and I can’t begrudge them that.”

Pleased, Nevada cuddled closer. “Thank you. I know it’s not your culture, and this one shouldn’t have been mine, but it is a part of my life.”

“I’m just sorry my relatives decided to be so brutal in their objections to your family’s rulings. Your next-mother was a terrible influence on your father and his policies, and I think she got what she deserved for all the misery she caused, but they shouldn’t have tried to kill you. Not when you were innocent of all wrongdoing.”

“I think we should leave discussions of politics and history outside the bedroom,” Nevada decided after a moment. “It sort of ruins the mood.”

He chuckled and pulled her close enough to kiss the top of her head. “You’re right. My apologies. We’ll be all serious and sober tomorrow. Tonight, we make love.”

“Is it love?” she heard herself ask, and flushed at her temerity.

Migel didn’t prevaricate. “I think it is. One of its stages, at any rate. You are a very lovable woman, Nevada, and I do admire you. I have for a long time. This . . . just makes it all the better.”

“I feel the same way. About you,” she added, just in case he thought she was being narcissistic. Squirming up onto her elbow so that she could lean over him, Nevada started exploring the fine, dark hairs on his chest with her fingertips. “I also think it’s about time I reciprocated. Don’t you?”

His grin was answer enough.

“NEVADA? I’m Socorro.” The Althinac woman held out her hand in greeting as Nevada descended the steps of the Congregation Halls, having successfully petitioned the council for the terms of her impending divorce and relocation.

“Yes, I remember,” Nevada admitted, clasping hands. “I didn’t mean to ignore you yesterday. It was rather rude of me, the way Migel and I just kept talking . . .”

Socorro shook her head quickly, making her long, dark braid bounce a little. Dressed as she was in a fitted Althinac gown and corset, both made from fabric, she was drawing a lot of attention from the Menomonites passing them on the steps up to the halls. “No, you had a lot on your mind last night. And a lot in common with my cousin, it seems.”

Nevada smiled. “Thank you. We’ll try not to monopolize everything again.”

“Well, if I could monopolize you for a little while,” Socorro teased, “I have some gifts I promised to pass along to you. Most of them are from the loyalist faction, though a few come from the moderates among the rebels. A set of clothes in the Althinac style, some trinkets and jewelry, that sort of thing. When my cousin told me what he had planned, I didn’t know what sort of culture you’d be living among, and figured you’d want some Althinac finery so you’d feel more like you’d fit in when you return with us. Men don’t usually think of such things, you know.”

“That’s very kind of you. I’d like to see what you brought,” Nevada agreed. “I’ve missed wearing skirts. They’re not very practical here in Menomon, not when the fastest way from one point to another sometimes means literally swimming to get there. Are they on your ship or . . . ?”

“I brought everything down to my guest room in the Flame Tower earlier this morning. I’m told you didn’t have anything like a hotel until recently, just a temporary housing hostel for newly arrived citizens,” Socorro said.

Nevada demurred. “Menomon has had good reason for isolating itself over the years,” she said, turning and heading toward the tower in question. “Which means we don’t have a lot of outside visitors passing through.”

“That’s understandable. I trust you have the same sort of water-breathing spells enveloping your city environs that we do,” Socorro added, gesturing at the hydrostatic dome sheltering the section of city they were in, separating the air-filled spaces of Menomon from the water-filled ones. A second dome was vaguely visible beyond the first, sheltering the city from the sheer weight of all that water overhead.

“Of course. Our water-breathing spells are rather extensive, in fact. This general section of the Sun’s Belt Reefs is easier for ships to traverse than other sections, but easier isn’t the same as easy. Every year, a couple of ships sink as they try to ply their trade routes between the Aian and Katani continents . . . which is why housing is at such a premium right now. This way to the Flame Tower,” Nevada added as Socorro started to turn the wrong way.

“That way? But the tower is visible over this way,” Socorro countered, pointing at the granite edifice on the far side of the plaza from the Congregation Halls.

“If you go that way, you’ll have to pass through a hydrostatic barrier and swim for about fifty lengths,” Nevada told her. “If you go this way, it only adds another hundred lengths to the walk and we’ll stay perfectly dry—Menomon is a bit of a maze, I’m afraid.”

“A bubble-filled maze,” the Althinac woman agreed. “Over half the buildings, I wouldn’t even know they were buildings, if it weren’t for those silvery barriers keeping the water off the balconies. Even that new tower we docked at has coral growths on it, and I was told it was finished only a few months ago. Coral usually takes years to grow just a few finger-lengths.”

“Normally, yes, but Menomonites have learned how to influence and enhance the growth patterns of marine life. A lot of the coral you see on the Flame Tower has actually been transplanted from elsewhere and literally cemented into place,” Nevada told her. “They’re having more of a problem doing so with the desalinator, since the intake tunnels have to be coral-free to allow maximum freshwater processing, yet the exterior of the building has to be merged with the appearance of the rest of the reef, as set down in the city’s construction policies—Where exactly are your quarters? We’ll need to pick the right turning, up ahead.”

“The West Buttress,” Socorro stated, pointing at one of the smaller support towers ringing the spire of the Flame Tower, visible now that they had taken the U-shaped detour of barrier-sheltered streets to get to it. “We couldn’t even see the Flame Tower until we were almost on top of it, thanks to some sort of disguising spell, but now that we’re here, it’s quite gorgeous. Almost reminiscent of some of our Althinac towers.”

“I remember them,” Nevada agreed, smiling. “Just as I remember what it was like to wear a dress made of fabric. I was only a little girl when I left, but I do miss seeing the dresses.”

“Then you’ll definitely enjoy the clothes I brought. We’ll have to gauge sizes, of course; just because you see someone in a mirror-scrying looking about your height doesn’t mean the focal point of the mirror isn’t magnifying the view.” Catching Nevada’s hand, Socorro smiled and led her into the West Buttress entrance. “We can leave the politics to the others for a few hours; for now, we’re just a couple of women about to try on a bunch of clothes!”

Grinning, Nevada followed.

NEVADA politely smiled and waved to one of her tenement neighbors. The older woman was staring at her gown, a rippling concoction of light blue silk cinched by a black stomacher corset. The underbust construction emphasized her waistline, giving her figure more of an hourglass look than it usually possessed. The corset also made her look exotically foreign, compared to the other woman’s sensible salmonskin vest and pants. Then again, everyone had stared at her on the way here, some people even following her a short distance, asking questions about her clothes.

“Lovely, isn’t it?” Nevada asked, setting down her sack of new clothes and twirling yet again to display the gown. The sleeves were fitted down to her elbows, from where they flared out to the cuff in a fluttery, trumpetlike shape. The bodice fitted snugly to her breasts, thanks in part to the stomacher, and the skirt flared out from her hips, slightly longer in the back than in the front, allowing it to trail a little on the ground. Her brown stingray sandals didn’t quite go with the look, but she did have a pair of black ones in her quarters.

“It’s not very practical,” her neighbor muttered, though envy was evident in both her gaze and her tone.

“It’s Althinac. Half their city’s on the surface. They don’t have to worry as much about swimming to every place,” Nevada pointed out. Actually, it was probably only a third of the city that existed on the surface, but it wasn’t necessary to be accurate at the moment. Picking up her bag, she unlocked the door of her tenement and stepped inside.

The moment she shut the door, alone for the first time in several hours, she realized the corset was starting to feel a bit tight. I guess I’m just not used to wearing the things. Not that I wore them this tight as a child, she reminded herself, heading toward the parlor and the hallway to her bedroom. But it’s definitely beginning to get to me . . . I’d better get it off soon, and let my ribs breathe. But first, I just have to show it off. A pity everyone else is still at work at this hour . . .

“Dar-shem?” she called out, checking the glow of the nearest wall clock. The constriction of her corset was really beginning to get to her. “Are you up yet? Dar-shem?”

Guessing he was still asleep, Nevada headed for her bedroom. Her ribs were beginning to ache now, making each breath a struggle. I definitely have to get this thing off. I’ll show it to everyone later. I—Ow!

The corset constricted abruptly, startling and scaring her. Oh, Menos! Ow! I can’t—I can’t breathe! The laces . . . I—OW! Dropping the sack of clothes, she tried to reach the laces before the boned corset could crush her ribs . . . and felt them slither as they tightened further, entirely of their own volition. Gasping for breath, she stumbled against the wall just inside her bedroom door.

“Dar . . . Dar-shem . . .” Chest wracked with compressed pain and vision blurring at the edges from lack of air, Nevada went for the only thing that could help her. With the last of her strength, she stumbled to her vanity table and dragged it to the ground with her in a crashing, tumbling mess.

“EASY . . . don’t move just yet . . .”

Hearing Dar-shem’s voice, low and soothing, Nevada relaxed into the soft bedding supporting her. Her chest ached abominably, but she could breathe freely. Prying open her eyes, she found both him and a purple-clad healer bent over her. The healer was swabbing something along her right side. “You . . . you heard me. Good.”

“I’m glad I did. I thought you were an intruder when I woke up from the noise you made—Don’t move,” her dark-skinned co-husband said soothingly. “That thing that was throttling you broke seven of your ribs before I could get it off. I’ve mirror-called for the Mage Guild to send over a team to investigate it. Cotter’s on his way, too. From the looks of it, there was some sort of spell woven into the cord of the lacings; I couldn’t cut them with my knife, so I had to cut through the corset itself . . . so you also have a long gouge on your side. Sorry.”

“It will heal scarlessly, if you lie still,” the healer added pertly, dabbing on the last of whatever salve she was using. “And no vigorous activity for at least a full day, preferably two. I’ve set and spell-healed your ribs, but they’ll still need time and a couple of bone-healing potions to finish strengthening.”

Nodding, Nevada closed her eyes again. She knew she had almost been killed by the enchanted corset, yes, but she also knew she was safe. At least for now. At some point, she would have to find out who enchanted those laces and why. Socorro didn’t have any magic, at least as far as Nevada had sensed. At the ninth rank, she was strong enough to sense the presence of a fellow mage. So it had to have been the work of someone else. The question is, who?

Besides, she was so nice to me . . . It had to have been someone who enchanted the clothing before handing it over to bring to me. One of the rebel faction.

She felt Dar-shem kiss her on the forehead, and let her questions go. Her ribs still ached, her side tingled from whatever salve the healer had applied, and she didn’t have the strength to worry over what had just happened.

After my nap, Nevada decided. I’ll figure it all out after my nap . . .

ALL six of her husbands rose when she finally entered the parlor. Seven, if she counted her husband-to-be. The eighth man was Sierran, and bodies nine and ten crowding her family’s living room were the guardian apprentices Koranen of Nightfall and Danau of the Aquamancer Guild. After a restful, spell-enhanced nap, Nevada felt better about her ordeal, but the grim expressions on the men and woman in her home reminded her of how close she had come to being crushed to death.

Nodding politely to the apprentices, Nevada took the seat Migel offered to her. “Well. What have you found out?”

“The lacings were enchanted with a Fortunai pattern-woven spell,” Apprentice Koranen stated. “I had to consult with my twin on it, since it’s not too common in this half of the world, but the spell was literally woven into the lacings when they were made.”

“They were set to trigger when the wearer was alone,” Apprentice Danau added, her tone grim. The petite redhead had warmed up a bit—socially speaking—after her visit to Nightfall and subsequent marriage to her singular husband, but she was still cool and unflappable when on the job.

Nevada hadn’t interacted with her overly much, since the Aquamancer Guild handled a completely different set of magical needs for the city, but neither had she shunned the other woman for being born different. It was a good thing, too; combined, Danau and Koranen were at least as powerful as Guardian Sheren. Together, the two of them had enough power and knowledge to dissect the magics involved in Nevada’s brush with death.

She turned her attention to the cause of her suffering. The disenchanted tangle of black threads lay on a silver tray on the low drinks table between them. Next to them on the tray lay a jeweled silver hair comb. The comb was set with beautiful, gleaming rubies. Their red glow compared favorably with the bowl of apples sitting next to the tray, for all that most of the gems were barely a quarter the size of Nevada’s littlest fingernail.

Talladen had brought the apples home with him the moment he had gotten word of what had happened. He was sweet like that, remembering even in the midst of a life-threatening crisis that Nevada liked apples. The hair comb had puzzled her from the moment she had been given it; her hair wasn’t long enough to use it, but Socorro had insisted she accept the gift of it anyway. The comb was the kind that Nevada remembered Althinac women liked putting into their long hair for ornamentation whenever they pinned it up.

She would have tucked it into her hair if she’d had enough to hold it, but she didn’t, so she hadn’t even picked it up. Socorro had tucked it into her bag of things, along with her new fabric clothes. Now, as the shorter of the guardian apprentices continued, Nevada was glad she hadn’t handled it.

“When we checked the bag of clothes for other dangers, we found that. The hair ornament was also tainted with magic. In specific, a spell-trapped poison, which like the corset was meant to be activated once you were completely alone,” Danau explained, glancing briefly at her husband, Koranen, before returning her attention to Nevada. “Had your hair been long enough to tempt you into using it, either one could have killed you swiftly enough, but the combination of poison and constriction would have killed you before anyone could have saved you, even had they been in the next room waiting for it to happen.”

Nevada shuddered. She felt Migel touching her shoulder. At the same time, Cotter reached over and touched her hand, both of them giving her comfort. Of all of them in the room, only Migel and Koranen had hair long enough to have pinned up, though Danau’s hair was almost long enough. But Nevada did remember a time when she, too, had once possessed locks long enough to dress with ribbons, pins, and combs.

“Whoever planned this is a criminal under both Althinac and Menomonite law,” Migel stated. He lifted his chin slightly. “Their opportunity to do so was in part my responsibility, for having had the idea to come here at all. I’ll undergo any questioning you have by Truth Stone, and I’ll command everyone who came with me to undergo it as well. Since the crime was committed in Menomonite territory, we will submit to Menomonite justice. All I ask is, if you’re going to arrest me, let me make a mirror-call back to Althinac to let them know of my absence.”

Strangely enough, it was the normally sober Danau who smiled. “I don’t think arresting any of you would do our political ties any good. At least, not without solid proof first. Even the city council has been forced to admit that total isolation isn’t good for us. But we will question everyone, including yourself. Starting with you, in fact. Husband? ”

Nevada bit the inside of her lip. Danau still sounded a bit smug whenever she said that word, for all it had been months since their return from the distant island of Nightfall. The poor woman had suffered from an excessive affiliation with aquamancy, to the point where she literally had problems regulating her body temperature, making it impossible for her to be intimate with anyone. Her husband had suffered in the same way, only from his affinity for pyromancy, in the opposite direction from the chief aquamancer of Menomon. Together, they made the perfect couple, even if they were rather monogamous about it. Scandalously so, by Menomonite culture.

Fishing a white marble disc from the pouch at his waist, Apprentice Koranen tossed it at Migel. The Guardian of Althinac caught it with both hands. Missing his touch on her shoulder now that his hand was otherwise occupied, Nevada listened to him test the stone’s enchantment.

“I am a shellfish.” A quick check of the smooth-polished stone showed a blackened imprint where his fingers had pressed during his absurd statement. It faded within moments, and Migel nodded, gripping the stone again. “I am Migel of the family Althec, Guardian of Althinac, and I came here to convince Nevada of the family Naccara to wed me and help rule at my side, with the intent that the joining of our two families would convince our war-torn people to join back together. I did not come here with the intent to harm her in any way, nor would I have allowed anyone else to come for that purpose, had I known about it at any point.”

Displaying the Truth Stone showed everyone it was white. His words were true. He handed the stone back to the pyromancer, who nodded and tucked it back into his pouch. “Right. One down, and almost a dozen more to go, including the crew of your ship. The first suspect is your cousin. I’ll—”

The chimes for the front door rang, cutting him off. Kristh shrugged and rose, heading down the entry hall to the right to answer it. A murmur of voices lasted only a moment, then he closed the door and led their prime suspect into the parlor. Socorro greeted everyone with the same friendly smile she had sported from the beginning. “Hello, everyone! Did you get to see Nevada’s new clothes?”

“More of them than we wanted,” Cotter muttered, glaring at her.

“Here, hold this,” Apprentice Koranen told her, pressing the disc into her hand before she could see what he was handing her.

She blinked down at it, then looked up at him. “What’s this for?”

“The truth,” Rogen growled. Like her other husbands, he was still incensed at how close Nevada had been brought to death. “Did you deliberately bring clothing which was enchanted to throttle its wearer? In specific, to choke our wife, Nevada?”

Socorro blinked, her smile wavering with puzzlement. “Why would I do that?”

“Answer the question, yes or no,” Koranen directed her. “Wait, you’re wearing rings. Take them off first.”

“My rings?” Socorro asked, glancing down at the gemmed metal circling three of her fingers. “Why?”

“We had an incident on Nightfall involving rings that thwarted Truth Stone scryings. Migel wasn’t wearing any when we questioned him, but you are. Take them off or be held in contempt of Menomonite law,” Danau ordered.

Shrugging, Socorro complied. Setting her rings on the table, she gripped the truth stone. “I was not aware of any particular item which was enchanted to throttle or otherwise harm a particular wearer.” Unfolding her fingers, she showed the unblemished marble to the others in the room. “Is that your only question?”

“Were you aware of a plot by anyone else to harm Princess Nevada Naccara?” Sierran asked.

Socorro gave him a sardonic look. “I’m an Althinac. We’ve been embroiled in a civil war for the last twelve years, and I’m a part of the family doing its best to overthrow the Naccaran bloodline. Of course I knew of plots to harm Nevada! I’ve been hearing of plots to try and find her and hopefully eradicate her for almost half of my life.”

“I don’t think we need to check the Truth Stone for the veracity of that statement,” Koranen muttered dryly.

“Well, that’s what most of them were. Just plots,” Socorro pointed out tartly, setting down the admittedly unblemished stone and picking up her rings from the table. “I’m sure the rest of you have indulged in idle speculation a time or two. Any other questions? No? Mind if I put my rings back on?”

Yes, I have a question, Nevada thought, distracted by an ache in her gut that had nothing to do with having her ribs crushed by a silly garment. When is dinner?

Guessing that no one had started it while she napped, she sat forward to reach for an apple. Her ribs immediately protested, just as they had protested when she had tried slipping her bare feet into a pair of sandals before coming out of her bedroom. At least Dar-shem had done a thorough job of cleaning up the broken toiletry bottles she had knocked off of her vanity table, so that she didn’t have to. And the healer had done a good job of reknitting and strengthening the bones, though her chest would still be tender for days to come. But she was hungry. She tried leaning forward again and sucked in a sharp breath, sinking back in her seat.

“What’s wrong?” Migel asked her.

“Do you need the healer again?” Dar-shem offered.

“No, no; I’m fine. Or I will be. I was just hungry, and wanted an apple,” Nevada muttered, sitting back.

Talladen got up to fetch her one, but Socorro was closer and faster. Plucking one from the bowl, she turned and offered it to Nevada. The suspicious stares from Nevada’s husbands made her heave an exasperated sigh.

“It is just an apple. She wanted one, so I was going to fetch her one. But if you’re worried that it’s somehow poisoned—see?” Bringing the fruit to her lips, the Althinac woman took a large, crisp-cracking bite out of the ripe red fruit. Chewing, she displayed the fleshy white interior. “Af you can fee,” she mumbled around her mouthful, “it’f perfectly fafe to eat.”

Handing the bitten fruit to Nevada, Socorro folded her arms defiantly across her chest. Nevada eyed the apple warily, but not because she feared it was poisoned. Not after that demonstration. She just wasn’t in the habit of eating fruit which someone else had bitten into. She turned the apple around to the unblemished side and bit into it, enjoying the sweet-tart smell.

Mere moments after she swallowed that first bite, the world went numb. It didn’t hurt, like the corset had. But she was aware of a sudden inability to breathe, of the lax muscles of her arm which let her head loll back and the fruit drop from her fingers. Dimly, she heard her husbands shouting her name in alarm, felt Migel’s hands touching her, scooping her out of her chair. She heard the sizzle and crackle of hastily applied spells, but she couldn’t do anything, couldn’t react, couldn’t even see as her eyelids drooped shut under their own lax weight. Even time itself seemed muddied, bogged down by whatever spell or poison had her in its grip, until every second she lay there seemed to devour whole minutes of everyone else’s time.

Am I dead? she wondered. Or at least dying? Is that . . . Is someone crying?

Lips touched her mouth, as did the salty wetness of tears. She recognized Migel’s touch, though she had only known it for a single night, and she hadn’t heard him sob before now. The world swayed and the noises went away, though she could still feel Migel’s presence at her side.

Someone shouted something close by, startling her. She couldn’t react, but the strong voice did pull at her consciousness, bringing back pain and life as it sucked the numbness out of her. Within a minute, she could draw a deep, rib-aching breath on her own, replenishing her air-starved lungs.

Cracking open her eyes, she found herself back on her own bed, with Migel holding on to her left hand and a stranger with long, light brown hair standing at her right side. A power crystal, of the usual egg-shaped sort used to collect and store magical energy, hovered in the air above his hands. But instead of the brighter hues of pure power she was used to seeing, the crystal was being filled with a sickly, greenish darkness, a darkness that the crystal sucked up out of her body as it slowly hovered its way down her legs. The faint glow of the clock crystals on the wall showed she had been drifting in her strange state of numbness for several hours.

Once the last of that darkness left her, Nevada felt disturbingly light-headed. The last time she had felt this way, she had spent too much of her magic on tasks for the Mage Guild, yet all she had done was lie here, almost dead. The stranger with the light brown hair and the oddly familiar features muttered something to end whatever spell he was using and fitted a thick-padded silk bag around the crystal, moving with deliberate care to avoid touching the hovering, malevolently dark green orb. Before she could summon the strength to ask him who he was and what was happening, he gave her and Migel a polite nod and left her bedroom.

She licked her lips. “What . . . ?”

“We thought you were dead at first. But the healers found traces of life still in your body. You were soul-sickened by a combination of poison and spell, one specifically targeted to the Naccaran bloodline,” Migel told her. His voice was rough and his eyes red, his touch gentle but trembling as he caressed her cheek. He gave her a wavering smile. “The Guardian of Menomon discovered it was a poison meant to bind to your magic and suppress it, mimicking death. But you weren’t dead, just very deeply asleep. Almost in stasis.”

“Sounds . . . pleasant,” Nevada murmured.

“You would have slept for a hundred years while the poison worked its way through your magic, if Menomon’s Guardian hadn’t remembered a description of something similar happening to another mage long ago, in some of the city archives, the story of a beautiful young woman being poisoned by an older rival and cursed to sleep for a hundred years. Guardian Sheren arranged for her apprentice’s twin to come all the way out from Nightfall Isle and clean it from your system, since she isn’t quite as confident of her powers as she used to be, and this other mage apparently has enough power and control to extract the poison without killing you or risking himself.

“But while this Morganen fellow did save your life, he had to drain you of all of your excess magic and a good portion of your life energy, too,” Migel murmured. “I’m afraid you won’t have any energy reserves for at least a week, if not longer.”

“And I’ll be . . . ravenously hungry,” she managed, already feeling her body beginning to shake from hunger.

“Never fear, we have just the cure for that,” a voice from the doorway proclaimed. Cotter came over to the bed, sitting down at her side, a bowl of what looked like mushed peas and other things cradled in his hands. “Raw vegetable pease-pottage, otherwise known as the ultimate in baby food for starving, power-exhausted mages. You’re lucky that most of these fresh, ripe vegetables you’ll be eating for the next three days were ones our kind mage guest brought. Otherwise they’d have cost me two weeks’ pay, given they’re outside the Menomonite harvesting cycle. Open up now, there’s a good mistress . . .”

Too hungry to care what it tasted like, Nevada complied. The mush on the spoon was as messy in taste as it was in appearance, but her body recognized the nutrients it craved even as her tongue rebelled at the texture and flavor. Eating each spoonful her first husband fed to her, she listened as Migel cleared his throat and continued.

“It, ah . . . it turned out my cousin has been hiding the fact that she’s a mage all this time. She had built up a false personality to wear like a shell, which allowed her to successfully lie while using the Truth Stone—as well as some very tight, camouflaging shields to disguise her aura—some of the Althec family mages discovered her aptitude as soon as it manifested, and chose to train her in secret, to hide her abilities so that they could have a hidden weapon in the civil war. Someone no one would suspect as a mage, because she’d never displayed her powers as a mage where anyone outside of a rare few in the family would see them.”

Migel caught a bit of mush that had landed on the edge of her lips and gently scooped it inside. Nevada managed not only to accept it, but to nibble on his finger a little. He blushed, and Cotter cleared his throat.

“Now, now, children; she’s not in any shape for such activities. And certainly not while I’m in the room, thank you. I may be married to her, but I’m not interested in ogling her charms. Time for a sip of water,” he added.

Migel helped Nevada sit up a little more, allowing Cotter to bring a glass of water to her lips. The Althinac mage shook his head as Cotter resumed feeding her. “I shouldn’t have come here. I shouldn’t have put your life at risk . . . It was a stupid plan, and I’ll not hold you to any of it.”

He got up from the bed. With her mouth full of mush-laden spoon, Nevada couldn’t speak. Mutely, she glared at her husband. Cotter nodded, understanding what she wanted.

“If you set one foot outside this bedroom, Guardian, I’ll be forced to challenge you to an Arcane Duel,” Cotter warned the other man just as he started to open the door.

Spinning on his heel, Migel eyed him askance. “You? Challenge me? Even adjusting for the differences between Althinac and Menomonite gauging standards, you’re less than a third my rank!”

“Yes, and I’m barely even half of her rank,” Cotter agreed, unperturbed. “But I am her husband, and since she’s not in any shape to protest this asinine idea you have about leaving her—save your strength, dear,” he warned Nevada as she swallowed, preparing to speak—“it’s up to me to champion her and knock some sense into you. Especially since you were trying to make a unilateral decision about leaving her, when you came here to become one-half of a team. Besides, it’s not always about sheer, raw, magical strength.”

Migel snorted. “In an Arcane Duel, yes it is!”

“Not if you’re a sneaky son-of-a-squid like me: I cheat.” Popping another spoonful into his wife’s mouth, Cotter winked at her. “And I’d involve my co-husbands. Even if they aren’t mages, they won’t let you leave without a fight. You’re the husband our Nevada actually wants, and as far as we’re concerned, whatever Nevada wants, Nevada gets.”

“So, what, I have no say in the matter?” Migel demanded, hands going to his fabric-clad hips.

“Not if you know what’s good for you. Moreover, we took a vote just now, and it’s decided. Rogen and Dar-shem will be staying here, because they’re needed for the work on the desalinator. The rest of us, Baubin, Kristh, Talladen, and myself, will be accompanying you back to Althinac. That way you’ll know Nevada has four bodyguards who are unswervingly loyal to her . . . and by extension to you. But only so long as you keep her happy,” Cotter warned Migel, his expression sober. “Stabilizing the politics of Althinac is an important task, and having a Naccaran back in power—or rather, in co-power with you—will help with that. So no more talk of leaving her behind. Or us. Not even if she does divorce us. Not until the situation in Althinac is firmly stable. Then we’ll consider moving back.”

“Why?” The question came from Nevada, and even she was a little surprised to hear herself ask it. But she was curious and wanted to hear Cotter’s answer.

“Because without you, we wouldn’t have found our own happiness in one another. Even if it took us some relationship juggling at first. Migel makes you happy, and you make him happy. It’s a good match. Now eat your mush.” Cotter looked at the other man in the room. “One more question, Guardian. Do you love her?”

“Of course I do! Why else would I want to avoid endangering her, even at the expense of Althinac’s future tranquillity?” Migel asked.

“And do you love him?” Cotter prodded, tucking another spoonful between his wife’s lips.

Not wanting to choke on a purée of pungent, raw vegetables, Nevada merely nodded.

“Good. All else is just a matter of logistics. Here, you feed her,” Cotter ordered, holding out the bowl. “I’m putting you in charge of overseeing her recovery. Rogen and I need to go start getting our co-husbands organized for the move to Althinac.”

With a polite nod to both of them and an air of smug satisfaction at having settled everything for them, Cotter left the bedroom.

Bowl in hand, Migel sat down on the edge of the bed. He stared at the smeared contents and sighed. “Do I have to be husband number seven even after we’ve returned to Althinac?”

She managed a small chuckle. As unappetizing as the uncooked mush was, it had given her a smidgen of her strength back. “No. You and I will marry, and they and I will divorce . . . and they’ll still come along. As friends.”

“They do make good friends,” he allowed. Scooping up a bit of vegetable paste, he offered it to her lips. She made a face. Migel wrinkled his nose as well, but didn’t remove the spoon. “I know this stuff is awful, but you still have to eat it anyway. That Nightfallite mage was very strict about your diet and recovery schedule.”

“Migel . . . what will happen to her?” Nevada asked after she swallowed the next mouthful.

“Socorro?” He shook his head. “Sheren and I worked it out. She’ll be tried here in Menomon for attempted murder and tried again in Althinac for murder and for breaking the truce, and then she’ll be jointly punished. Even if her surface personality didn’t know there were poisons and spells in the things she gave to you, her true personality planned and executed everything with the intent to kill. We’ll find out who her accomplices were, who trained her, what she has done in the past, and all of them will be dealt with,” he promised. “Even if they’re my own kin. I’m not proud of what my family has done, particularly since I’m the one left cleaning up their messes.”

“You have new kin,” Nevada reminded him, pausing to breathe between sentences. She felt as limp and mushy as the vegetables being spooned into her mouth, but she would regain her strength. “You can be proud of them instead.”

“Ah, yes, six co-husbands,” Migel muttered.

“And a wife—give me a kiss,” she demanded as he lifted the spoon to serve her another mouthful. “I need something sweet to clear the taste from my tongue.”

“You mean you just want to torture me by sharing it,” he murmured. He leaned down anyway, brushing his lips against hers. “Don’t ever leave me again, Nevada. You broke my heart when I thought you were dead.”

“Not of my own free will, Migel,” she promised, and kissed him back as thoroughly as her weakened body would allow. “Never of my own free will.”