Read Online The Spell-Bound Scholar by Christopher Stasheff - Free Book Online

he managed to escape?!
    Well, there was no point in any further attempt. The man had the potential for lust, but he had quashed it so firmly that there was nothing but potential left! He was a eunuch, not a man, and there was nowhere to catch him!
    It would have been so much simpler if he had been as susceptible as the rest of his sex. She could have married him, enthralled him, warped him to her so thoroughly that he would not even have dreamed of protest when she failed to conceive. She could have guaranteed that he would father no children—though she might have given him one sired by another man; she was curious about the experience of pregnancy and birth. And in addition, she would have been a lady by marriage, a noblewoman of a family close to the throne, where she could take steps to ensure that the royal bloodline would end with Alain, that Cordelia would never carry a baby to term, that Quicksilver would never conceive!
    It would have been so easy, so convenient—but that shell of a man had defeated her hopes! She would have her revenge, revenge on all the Gallowglasses, and when Cordelia

    was dead, she would encounter Alain again. This time, without interference or competition, she would win him and wed him and make sure he never fathered a son.
    Best of all, when his mother died, she would be Queen!
    She burst into a clearing and found a log where she could sit, working to compose herself, to let her churning emotions calm enough to project her coded thoughts out to her lieutenants. They all knew what the message meant—that they should fall upon the enemy at noon.
    One by one, they replied, their thoughts appearing in her mind as her own did, but with different flavors, the overtones of their personalities. When each had confirmed receiving the message and set about his or her task, she sat still awhile, gathering her scattered energies and gloating at the victory to come. In one instant she would be revenged for all the humiliations these Gallowglasses had heaped upon her!
    But one most of all, and that revenge would be the most personal. She would see Gregory racked with agony, as he deserved for having scorned her.

    There was one way in which Gregory still might be vulnerable, one possible Achilles' heel. Since it didn't necessarily lead to bedding and marriage, Finister had ignored it. Now, though, it was certainly worth trying—now, when all she needed was to come close enough to him to slip a knife between his ribs, or to induce him into lowering his guard so she could plant a mental bomb in his brain. She doubted it would do much good, for Gregory certainly seemed to have little of the knight-errant about him, but the damsel in distress might wring sympathy even from such a stone as he.
    Accordingly, she retailored her physical projection to be modest but still alluring (why waste a chance, no matter how slender?). The body's contours were scarcely spectacular and the face was pretty, but neither was striking or fascinating. The gown was modest and serviceable, a green broadcloth with yellow bodice and kirtle. She indulged her dramatic streak and chose a black veil.
    Then she sent coded mental instructions to Lork, who, ever faithful, was indeed not far away. That done, she took up her station farther along the road where it opened out into a meadow. She found a boulder for her seat, rolled a log to its foot, and tied her ankle to it with three feet of rope, then bowed her head in grief and despair, thinking of the horrible fate in store for her, concentrating on it until it seemed real, until she felt the tears welling up in her eyes. She held them there, listening with her mind, waiting for Gregory's approach.
    Gregory rode alert, mind open to receive, though his shields were still in place. He detected the thoughts of despair, sensed

    the sobbing, but also recognized Moraga's mental signature. Doubly wary, he rode through the leafy arch into the meadow and beheld a most touching tableau.
    On a