The Heart of a Wielder (Book One of The Wielders Trilogy) ✔️

Chapter Six

Donovan was having a peaceful breakfast when a servant arrived with a note. He took the note and thanked the servant. He knew he would be displeased by the contents as soon as he saw the handwriting on the outside of the note. It was from his mother, and he was quite certain she was summoning him to another family dinner. Reading it confirmed his suspicions.

Dear Donovan,

Please join your family for dinner tomorrow at eight o'clock in the evening. We are excited to further our acquaintance with the newest member of your household.

Mother

The note was the perfect embodiment of his mother. It was addressed informally, as any parent might write to a child, but sent on official Her Majesty the Queen stationary so that he could not forget that saying no to her was also saying no to his sovereign. It was written in such a way that assumed Donovan would bring Lady Maren, so he was unable to claim he forgot or that she was otherwise occupied, which was quite clever of her. The dinner was also scheduled relatively soon after the last family dinner, which Donovan knew was his mother's way of signaling that even if he found a way out of this dinner, she would schedule another next week. And he knew his mother well enough to know she would schedule the dinners every night until she got what she wanted.

And he knew what she wanted was not to "further her acquaintance" with his supposed mistress but find out why, after seven years of abstention, he had taken someone from the Selection. Which, it just so happened, was not something he wanted her to know about.

No, he'd have to make it seem like some sort of last gasp of bachelordom. Which also meant he needed to seem to be enjoying The Girl's company.

He sighed. He hadn't seen The Girl since he had sworn her the oath.

That oath. Gods, what had he been thinking? He must have been the only person in the history of the kingdom to swear an oath to his mistress or pretend mistress or whatever she was to him. Not only that, but it was probably the most begrudgingly given oath since the dawn of time.

He didn't regret it — it didn't change anything after all. Donovan would never force a woman — even a witch (perhaps even especially not a witch) — to his bed anyway. He had apologized and made clear that he would not harm her, but she didn't believe him, and that was extremely irritating. Could he have convinced her not to question his honor in a less dramatic way? Possibly. But at the very least, the oath had been efficient and effective.

He set the oath aside; there was nothing to be done about it, and he had more pressing problems.

Of course, he would have to bring her to dinner with his family. It would be much worse if he tried to delay it. He had planned on another attempt to display her in the gardens that afternoon, and would have to instruct her on the matter then.

When later that day the time came to bring The Girl to the gardens, he found her, as expected, in her rooms. As before, they both performed their expected greetings, only this time she agreed to come with him. (Thank the gods!) As before, they greeted the various courtiers milling about, and then he led her deeper into the gardens.

He decided to take her to an entirely different section of the gardens than he had before, reasoning that the locations they had previously visited were somewhat marred by their disastrous encounters. Of course, if they continued at their current rate, the entire gardens would be spoiled in a few weeks.

He took her to sit by a fountain he rather liked. It was large, almost as tall as he was and had numerous levels stacked on top of one another and the water flowed down the tower making very pleasant splashing noises.