The Vampire & Her Witch

Ignatious rose from where he knelt, and for a moment, everyone in the Great Hall held their breath.

”Thank you, High Priest Aubin,” Ignatious said, his rich, velvet voice carrying to every corner of the hall without effort. ”The Inquisition must answer for...”

”You will answer to me,” Owain said from the oak throne.

Now that he sat upon the oak throne, he seemed to have regathered his composure and tamped down on his temper. With a row of Leufroy knights behind him and Gilander and Garrik at his side, he radiated the commanding presence of a warlord even if he couldn’t manifest the majesty of a marquis the way his father had.

Unconsciously, the people in the great hall found themselves sitting a little straighter when he spoke, and a hush fell across the hall as people waited to hear his next words.

”This is my hall,” Owain continued, his gaze sweeping from Ignatious to Ashlynn to the beaten Inquisitors on the floor. ”This is the Lothian March, not Blackwell County. Whatever crimes the Inquisition may have committed, they will be judged by the Marquis of Lothian. Not by some random Inquisitor who turned up with a witch who crawled out of a ditch to play at being my wife.”

”Lord Owain,” Aubin said, stubbornly refusing to acknowledge Owain as the marquis even though he sat on the throne. ”You are the one who ordered the Abbot to attack. Every man and woman in this hall heard you give that command. Can a man sit in judgment over a crime he ordered?”

”And you think that the enemies of the march, a witch and her minions, should be allowed to judge them?” Owain said in a voice dripping with scorn. ”Sir Garrik, the High Priest is clearly confused. Take him...”

”Stop,” Ashlynn interrupted. Her voice was clear and pure, ringing through the hall with a force that startled many, but no one more than Owain, who felt his stomach sink at the power of her single word. Where had this ’Ashlynn’ come from to be so forceful? What happened to the timid woman who sobbed as she pleaded with him to spare her life, even as he rained down blows on her vulnerable body?

”You are a murderer, an adulterer, and a tyrant,” Ashlynn fumed. ”You have your own crimes to answer for, and I will not allow you to commit another one by having your men assault High Priest Aubin,” she said, glancing at Jocelynn.

Her sister clung to Ollie, but her eyes were fixed on the old priest with a kind of deeply personal worry that Ashlynn had rarely seen in her sister’s eyes. Marcel hadn’t been able to gather much information about what had gone on when Jocelynn visited the Great Temple in recent days, but it was clear from the way she reacted to Owain’s order that Aubin had become important to her in recent days.

The Church might be her enemy, but Aubin clearly wasn’t, and Ashlynn refused to see someone who had protected Jocelynn come to harm.

”I came here today to see justice done,” Ashlynn said. ”It starts with holding the Inquisition accountable for what they’ve done in this march,” she continued, sweeping her gaze across the hall. ”And it ends with seeing that you pay for your crimes against me and everyone else you’ve harmed.”

”You may sit on that throne, Owain,” Ashlynn continued. ”But it does not belong to you, and without the support of the people you wish to rule, you cannot keep it.”

”Nonsense,” Owain spat. ”Sir Gilander...”

”I. Wasn’t. Finished. Yet,” Ashlynn said, fixing an emerald gaze on the aging knight at Owain’s side that was so forceful that Sir Gilander took a step back as though he’d been struck. ”Interrupt me again, and I’ll have you bound and muzzled like the dog you are, ’husband.’”

At the Leufroy table, Lady Adala’s eyes shone with a fervent, almost worshipful light as she watched Lady Ashlynn commanding the entire Great Hall with her voice and presence alone. There were armed men at her back, and that lent a certain kind of weight to her words, but at the moment, Adala felt like Lady Ashlynn could command the Great Hall even if she’d been all by herself.

Charlotte Otker was having a very similar experience at her family’s table. She thought she’d known Ashlynn. Each time Lady Ashlynn had passed through Otker Canyon on her way to visit Lothian March or on her way home to Blackwell during the years that she and Owain were courting, she’d had a chance to speak at length with the older Blackwell sister.

Charlotte had always been impressed with how much Lady Ashlynn cared for the people of both Blackwell and Lothian. They’d often discussed ideas she had to help the march prosper once she became Marchioness, but the way Ashlynn spoke now made Charlotte realize just how far Lady Ashlynn was prepared to go for the march.

”Tonight, we will see justice done,” Ashlynn continued. ”And the Lothian Court will sit in judgment. The barons of the march are all gathered here,” she added, sweeping her emerald gaze over the tables filled with lords and ladies of the march. ”Let their voices be heard.”

”I’m confident that by the end of this night, they’ll reach the right conclusion,” Ashlynn concluded, returning her gaze to Owain. ”And the only ’farce’ we’ll put an end to is the one that places a man like you upon a throne.”

”I agree,” Loghlan Dunn said, standing up from his seat at the Dunn table. Whether Ashlynn had planned this from the beginning or not, he didn’t know, but either way, he respected her for choosing this path. Briefly, he glanced down at Mairwen, who gave him a sharp nod of approval in return before he turned back to address the Great Hall.

”A marquis is not the king, even if he rules in the name of His Majesty,” Loghlan continued. ”And Lord Owain, for all he sits on the throne, has not yet been invested with the title of Marquis Lothian. Without Lord Bors’s wisdom to guide us, it falls to us, the barons of the Lothian Court, to mete out justice in matters of high crimes.”

”Lord Owain tried to murder his own wife,” Loghlan reminded everyone. There had been too many shocks delivered one after another to keep them all in mind, and most people were focused on the spectacle of Ashlynn’s conflict with the Inquisition, but Loghlan wasn’t willing to let them forget the other crimes that truly mattered here.

”He stands accused of magnicide,” Loghlan continued. ”And from Lady Ashlynn’s words, many other crimes as well. If she has proof of these crimes, then we should see that proof. Then and only then can justice be served.”

”Thank you, Baron Loghlan,” Ashlynn said, smiling at Liam’s father with a bit of genuine warmth. Near the doors to the Great Hall, where Liam still stood as her herald, she could see a matching smile on the young lord’s lips as he nodded in approval.

”I call on the barons of the Lothian Court to sit in judgment tonight,” Ashlynn said, looking at the other barons one by one. ”Who else will stand with Baron Loghlan Dunn?”