by R S Penney
A stout matron with brown hair that she wore pulled back in a bun and spectacles riding a little too low on her freckled nose looked up the instant they walked through the door of her little inn. “Travelers coming in at all hours,” she said, maneuvering between the round wooden tables spread across the floor of the saloon.
Marcus stepped forward to meet her, his boots thumping on the wooden floor, and then extended his hand to offer several bank notes. The innkeeper gave them a cursory inspection, then looked up to study his face. “From the Ofallan bank, eh?” she asked. “I suppose they're trustworthy.”
Leaning one shoulder against the door-frame, Miri yawned and then stifled it by clamping a hand over her mouth. “Goodness,” she murmured, ignoring her brother's sad attempts to haggle over the price of a night's stay. “All the time in the saddle does leave a girl worn out.”
Prim and prissy Miss Adele Delarc was waiting just outside the inn with her feet together, toes pointing forward, and her hands clasped in front of herself. She was quite focused on what Marcus was saying. Well, let the fool of a woman fret about it. No doubt she thought she could do better. Perhaps she really could.
Miri turned her back on her brother, pushed past Adele and then stepped out into the open street. Despite its ever-expanding borders, Thrasa felt very much like a quaint little village. Houses made of wooden logs were spaced almost haphazardly on either side of the road.
Tommy was waiting with his hands shoved into the pockets of his trousers, his eyes downcast – as usual – and his shoulders hunched up. “I could use some sleep,” he said in response to her earlier remark. “Suppose I'll be stuck with Marcus again.”
“You could stay with me,” Miri replied with a devilish grin.
The young man looked up at her, and his eyes widened until it seemed as though they might fall out. “But we-” he stammered. “I mean...Men and women...sharing a room together. It wouldn't be proper.”
“Curious,” Miri replied. “You shared a room with your lover in Ofalla, and no one thought anything of it. Why should it only be a problem when it's a man and a woman.”
“I...”
“Don't tell me you and Sebastian never shared a bed.”
Spots of crimson flooded Lommy's cheeks, and he stepped back, pressing a fist to his mouth and clearing his throat forcefully. “We have... I mean...” His cheeks puffed up just before he let out a wheeze. “We have been intimate, yes.”
Miri approached him with her hands clasped behind his back, smiling down at her own shoes. “Well, then I don't see why you would see an impropriety in sharing a room with me.”
“I-”
“Relax, Tommy.”
He swallowed visibly, then squinted at her as if he couldn't quite believe what he was seeing. “You called me, Tommy,” he observed.
Now, it was Miri who blushed. Damn this fool of a boy; it had been years since she had been guilty of that kind of slip. “Yes, I suppose I did,” she said. “Well, take whatever satisfaction you can find in it. It won't be happening again.”
She patted his cheek.
Bendarian emerged from his trance to find his body much the same as he had left it, sitting cross-legged in the grass near a solitary oak tree with leaves that sighed in the cool night wind. The small tent that he would sleep in tonight had been erected, and he could hear the crackling of Morley's fire.
Grunting at the pain in his knees – the man's complaints on that subject had been numerous – Morley sat on a boulder with his elbows on his thighs and steepled his fingers as he observed the flames. He said nothing.
A frown tightened Bendarian's mouth as he unconsciously ran a hand over his bald head. There were still a few stray hairs sprouting from his scalp. He would have to see to that, but he was hoping that restoring his youth would alleviate the need.
The Nether beckoned.
It tantalized.
Licking his lips, Bendarian shut his eyes and then let out a shuddering breath. “She is in Thrasa,” he said. “And the girl is still with her...If I had known Charles Delarac was harbouring a Sensitive. Well...No matter.”
Morley glanced in his direction, a scowl betraying the man's irritation. “And what good does such knowledge do us?” he said. “I'd go back and kill her myself if not for my current...predicament.”
Abruptly, the man stood up, grunting from the effort, then twisted around and lifted the boulder as if it weighed no more than a pebble. He threw it with considerable speed, sending it flying at least two hundred feet before it crashed to the ground and shattered on impact. “Strength and frailty at the same time,” he muttered. “What have you done to me, Bendarian?”
“No more than what you asked,” Bendarian spat. “Show some respect.”
“Respect,” Morley sneered, making no attempt to hide his disdain. “You promised me life everlasting, but all you've done is hasten my journey to the grave.”
With a hand over his mouth, Bendarian shut his eyes and breathed deeply to calm himself. “I have already assured you that I will remedy the situation,” he said. “I granted you invulnerability by tethering your life to mine.”
“And then you made yourself old.”
Bendarian snapped his fingers.
The gesture brought an immediate flash of pain to Morley, who sank to his knees with his fingertips massaging his temples. “Stop,” he whimpered. “Stop please...please. I will obey you.”
“Your life-force is tethered to mine,” Bendarian said. “That grants me certain...Let's just call them privileges.”
Ignoring the pain in his knees, Bendarian rose, then exhaled and shook his head. “I expect a modicum of respect henceforth,” he said. “Unless you wish your eternity to be a most unpleasant one.”
Morley was folded up and clutching his bald scalp with both hands. “Yes! Yes!” he panted. “Whatever you say.”
With a dismissive wave of his hand, Bendarian withdrew the pain from his servent's body, and Morley began to gasp. It was as though the man just couldn't fill his lungs fast enough. “Now, I have work to do,” Bendarian said. “You will remain here.”
Sinking into a deep trance, he stretched out with his thoughts to commune with the Ether. The world changed before his eyes, solid objects collapsing into violent storms of particles. He soaked in the awareness of everything around him. He knew that there was no one else around for miles, not another soul besides himself and Morley.
Being in communion with the Ether of the Earth, its shape and curvature, he knew the exact distance and direction he would have to travel to reach Thrasa. Of course, he would not be able to make the journey in a single jump.
The Nether pounded on his mind like wind trying to smash through a window. It was getting harder and harder to resist that call. Fortunately, he would not have to do so this time. He severed himself from the Ether and let the Nether consume him.
It was so...different.
There was a new awareness, yes, but not the precise intimate understanding of his surroundings that came from contact with the Ether. He did not see the world as a tempest of particles. It was more an understanding of natural laws.
And how he could break them.
Bendarian grinned as a new idea occurred to him. “You will be pleased, my friend,” he said, turning to Morley. The man was still on his knees in the grass, still clutching his head and trying to push past the pain. “I have found a way to regain my youth.”
Morley looked up with wonder in his eyes, firelight casting flickering shadows across his face. “You can?” he stammered. “How...How would you do that?”
“It's really quite simple,” Bendarian answered. “All I have to do is reclaim the life-force that I've wasted on you.”
He raised a hand, palm up, and crooked his finger. Morley screamed and spasmed as his body shriveled up. His skin turned gray, then crumbled to dust, leaving only a frail skeleton in its place. Seconds later, that too collapsed to ash. All that remained of Morley was a pile of tattered clothes.
“Now,” he said. “To end this.”
He drew upon the Nether and ripped his way through the fabric of reality. And rip it did! A crack stretched across the sky from horizon to horizon. The world seemed to blur and split apart like a cracked eggshell, leaving a new world in its place.
He was now standing on the banks of the Vinrella, near the bend where it turned northward toward High Falls. He had traveled a good thirty miles in a matter of seconds. At this rate, he should be in Thrasa by morning.
Chapter 20
Desa reclined in the copper bathtub, submerged to her shoulders in hot soapy water, her head hung back over the edge. Her eyes were shut as she reveled in the blessed joy of tired muscles unwinding.
Mrs. Collins, the matronly woman who had inherited this small inn from her dead husband, had been more than eager to draw the bath herself. “The least I could do,” she said, “for a woman who travels with the likes of him.” She had favoured Marcus with a scowl that intensified with every syllable.
Desa almost laugh.
If the woman only knew...
Marcus was the very least of Desa's worries. Between Tommy's gentle but insistent attempts to ferret out why she was avoiding him and Adele's penchant for making herself a nuisance, it was likely that she would go mad before they found Bendarian. That might be for the best. A crazy Desa Kincaid might actually be able to end him once and for all.
She clicked her tongue in annoyance. When exactly did she start thinking of herself as Desa Kincaid? Martin was a good friend, and their sham of a marriage had alleviated certain legal complications, but she had always been Desa Nin Leean.
Then again, perhaps she no longer had a right to that name. She had turned her back on her Aladri heritage not once but twice. And Martin...Dear, sweet Martin Kincaid. The man had known that Desa would never be able to love him – not as a wife should love her husband – and he had married her anyway.
In their years together, she had seen him look at other women, seen him develop an affection for more than one bright-eyed young lass, but no woman would have him while he was tied to her. She had been searching for a way to free Martin from their marriage.
And then Morley had killed him.
Desa sat up, scooping up water with both hands and splashing it over her face. “He will pay for that,” she assured herself. “Immortality just means that I get to kill him more than once.”
She heard the click of the door opening.
Twisting around in the tub, she saw Adele standing in the candlelight in nothing but a thin white robe, a robe that she unbelted and let slip from her shoulders. Sweet Mercy! Did the woman have to be so beautiful?
Flowing gracefully through the room on bare feet, Adele circled the tub and then smiled for Desa. “I could use a bath myself.”
Desa scooted backwards until she was cramped against the wall of the tub with her legs folded up against her chest. “I'm not sure what you think is going to happen here,” she said. “But what we shared that night-”
“Was exquisite.”
Adele climbed into the tub, sinking to her knees and crawling forward with an almost predatory gleam in her eyes. Long golden hair hung loose and framed her lovely face. “You can't run from me,” she whispered. “No one can run from destiny.”
“I can try,” Desa insisted. “By the eyes-”
Before she could finish that sentence, Adele leaned forward to kiss her mouth, and Desa melted into the other woman's embrace. Despite her objections, she found herself sliding hands over the woman's bare back, pulling Adele close and then kissing her neck.
Mercy save her fool daughter, she thought as she felt Adele's lips on her collarbone. I never did have much sense when it came to women.
Stifling a yawn with his fist, Tommy stepped into the room he shared with Marcus. He took two steps forward, paused and then shut the door behind him with a loud thunk. Almighty, he was exhausted.
The room was much the same as every other one he had seen since leaving Sorla: a cramped space with two beds, one on either side of a square window. One solitary candle on a wooden table provided just enough to see without tripping over his own feet, and the scent of lavender filled the air.
Odd, that...
He had taken the time to wash a week's worth of sweat and grime off his body – it would make sleeping much easier – but he certainly hadn't put on perfume and he didn't think Marcus was the sort of man who ever did so.
The man was already asleep, a lump in the bed on the left. Marcus was a strange contradiction in many ways. The man would spring awake in an instant at any sound that might indicate danger, but he slept like the dead otherwise.
Tommy started forward with his arms hanging limp, his footsteps thumping on the floor. He shook his head. “How did I get mixed up in all this?” he whispered. “Father was right. I really don't have any sense.”
The lump in Marcus's bed moved.
But it wasn't Marcus.
Once she was sitting up, it was clear that he was looking at Miri with her long hair unbound to fall over her shoulders. She held the blankets to her chest, and Tommy was fairly certain that she wasn't wearing a stitch of clothing beneath them.
He felt his face heat up, then covered his eyes with one hand. “I am so sorry!” he blurted out, stumbling backward. “I must have gotten the rooms mixed up! Sometimes, I really am a fool.”
“You didn't get the rooms mixed up.”
Tommy stopped retreating when his backside hit the door. He let his arm drop and then blinked at her. “But I...” he stammered. “Marcus told me...”
He thought the embarrassment might kill him, but matters only worsened when Miri got out and confirmed his suspicions. She moved toward him like a cat stalking her prey, her smile setting his blood on fire. “You're not in the wrong room.”
“I'm not?”
“I spent an hour at the bar, regaling one of the serving maids with tales of my brother's exploits. He will be spending the night with her. I am quite sure that Desa and Adele will appreciate my absence. So...What do you want to do?”
Tommy swallowed, then forced his eyes shut and gave his head a shake. “I...don't think it would be wise to say...what I want to do.” Keeping his hands stilled required a lot of effort. “It wouldn't be proper to-”
Gently, she took his face in both hands, then stood up on her toes to kiss his lips. It was a soft kiss, but Tommy felt himself responding. He slipped his arms around her and pulled her close.
Miri stepped back, smiled and lowered her eyes almost bashfully. “I've never been one who cared much for what was proper,” she said. “So, it's up to you. You can sleep in the other bed, and I won't be offended. Or you can sleep next to me. But if you sleep next to me then you do so without clothing.”
Well, put that way, the decision was easy.
He kissed Miri again, and she responded with such eagerness that his back thumped against the door. Tommy lifted her up, and she wrapped her legs around his waist as he carried her to the bed.
Her hands clawed at his shirt, pulling it up over his head and tossing it to the floor. Tommy kissed her neck, her ear...He felt a little guilty, almost as if he were betraying Sebastian. Which was asinine since Sebastian had betrayed him. For once, though, he pushed that voice away and just focused on the moment.
Adele rolled Desa onto her back, her soft hands gliding lightly over Desa's belly. The woman sat up, and golden hair spilled over her face. “Still think I'm in league with Bendarian?” she panted. “Do you still not trust me?”
Desa shut her eyes tight, gasping for breath. “I think you are a fool of a girl.” Her hand settled onto the back of Adele's head, pulling her close so that she could press her lips to the other woman's neck.
“Why is that?�
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Desa pulled back, blinking. “Because you have lived your whole life wanting for nothing,” she said. “And you walked away from all that to follow some damn fool of a woman on her quest for vengeance.”
She gasped when she felt Adele's touch, and it became very hard to think through the haze of lust. She just wanted to push conscious thought aside and lose herself entirely in the other woman's embrace.
But Adele sank her teeth into Desa's neck, then brought her lips to Desa's ear and whispered, “What if I told you it was fate?”
“There's no such thing as fate.”
“Oh, I disagree I-”
Unable to finish that sentence, Adele cried out as she writhed under Desa's touch. Desa pushed her down onto her back, then kissed her lips with an almost savage ferocity. If nothing else, that would make the fool girl shut up!
Lying flat on his back with his head sinking into the pillow, Tommy shut his eyes and let Miri take the lead. It almost felt as if she were trying to take care of him, as if she thought she could soothe away his pain and sorrow. And...she wasn't wrong.
She bent low to kiss him, and Tommy rose up to meet her. His hands glided over the soft skin of her back. It surprised him when she bit his ear and then rasped. “You're very good at this.”
He froze.
Miri smiled down at him, shaking her head. “Don't lose heart now, Lommy,” she teased. “I meant what I said; you are good at this.”
“I've never done this before.”
Miri nuzzled his nose and giggled. She gave him a light peck on the cheek. “Didn't you tell me that you were intimate with Sebastian?” she asked. “That counts.”
“Well...It was mostly me taking care of him.”
“Why am I not surprised.”
Overwhelmed by a sudden wave of passion, Tommy threw his arms around Miri and rolled her onto her back. His mouth found hers, and then her fingers were grabbing a fistful of his hair. “Thank you,” he whispered.
“You don't have to thank me; I wanted to do this.”