T'Ash sheathed his wicked blade with a rasp and walked over to her. She didn't like him towering over her. Before his hand reached her arm to help her up, she scrambled to her feet.
"My lady."
She sighed. Hiccuped. Hoped that he wouldn't see the tracks of tears from her fear and anger on her face. "Just Miz," she reminded in a quiet voice.
"No. My lady. My Danith. You all right?" He reached out as if to run his hands down her body to assure she was unharmed.
She stepped back. The last thing in the world she wanted was his hands on her body. She feared what feelings they would stir in her. Now time had passed, she admitted to herself that she had responded wildly to his mental touch. Lady and Lord knew what would happen if the mental became physical.
And he still wasn't what her sensible mind wanted. She tried to smile and managed to quirk a corner of her mouth. "I'm a bit bruised but otherwise fine. I got caught between two rowdy bunches of boys, is all." She shivered. "They were surprised to see me. They weren't ready to quit roaming the streets, and I don't think any of them exactly knew what they were going to do with me."
His eyes narrowed as he examined her slowly up and down. "Sure you don't need a Healer?"
Danith thought of the supercilious man who had treated her before and didn't want a repeat of the experience. "No, thank you."
"I follow your wish." His voice was just tender enough to make her weak, make her want to walk into arms she was sure would close strong and hard around her. She glanced at his face, but it didn't seem as if he expected the words of gratitude that she couldn't give him. She adjusted the clothes twisted around her.
"My fault," he said with self-directed anger. "My fault you're bruised. I will—"
"No." It was her turn to deny his words. She straightened her spine. "I was the one who 'ported to your home on a wave of anger. I left your Residence without thought of the consequences, again in anger. My mistakes, not yours. I thank you for your help." There, she'd gotten her tongue around the words.
He met her gaze steadily. "I'll protect you. You trust me for that? To get us home safely?"
Evading the intensity in his eyes and his Downwind short-speech was impossible for Danith. And she literally felt the emotional waves of his sincerity. He'd said he'd kill for her, and abruptly she knew it was the simple truth. She shivered, then jerked her head in a nod.
He glanced up the alley. The night was alive with noise. Strident yells of roving men—nobles and Downwind bands—small explosions of personal fireworks, the clash of blades in a fight or two, even the sizzle of blasers. Danith shivered again. She'd rarely been in this area during the day, never at night.
She took a deep breath and lifted her chin. "I'm lost."
He gave her a dark, brooding gaze. "I'm not." Once more he looked over her head. This time she turned around, only to see red reflected off of low gray clouds. A line of fire.
He stiffened, and for the first time she noted that he wore form-fitting leather trous and a vest that did not cover his muscular chest. She pushed away the attraction.
"I must ask you to teleport us back." She hated doing that, being dependant on him. But though she'd teleported instinctively in anger, she didn't know the real spell to do it cool-headed.
Now his jaw clenched. "I can't. I've used too much power and Flair this evening. I have no reserves."
"I see." She did—the white line around his lips, the underlying pallor of his olive complexion, how he moved with conscious grace instead of the easy predatory suppleness innate to him.
He looked at her again, then the fire again. His mouth compressed. "Don't like fire."
Danith licked her lips, wanting to comfort him as much as she wanted to hit him for all the emotional ups and downs he'd put her through in the last few days. But he'd also let her realize her innermost desire, she now knew she had Flair. And he saved her from an unknown fate.
Again she thought of account ledgers, and though he was still in the red, his unthreatening manner soothed her. "If you know a way back to my house, we can go the long way around, not near the fire."
"Yes," he said softly, and held out one large hand.
She hesitated. She didn't want to take it, but his expression told her that he expected her to reject him, and she couldn't refuse. She placed her hand in his.
His large, calloused fingers closed over hers, gently. With the lightest of pressures he guided her down the alley. She hurried by his side. He shortened his stride and slowed his pace.
"Thank you," she said stiffly.
They walked a few moments.
"Where are all the men and women?" Danith asked.
T'Ash studied her. She saw phantoms in his gaze. "The men are at the bonfires between Downwind and uptown, drinking and taking sex. Or lighting other fires. The women and girls are drinking or taking sex behind locked doors and barred windows. This night, at least, only the boys roam."
He shifted his shoulders as if to rid himself of memories and cleared his throat. "Do you know of HeartMates?"
She flinched.
His hand tightened a little over hers.
"Only what I've heard, or read in tales," she said.
"My parents were HeartMates."
That explained why he accepted the whole matter so easily. But she didn't accept it. Perhaps she never would. She tried to bolster some indifference to him. Why did her anger always fade at the slightest show of tenderness from him?
"You believe in HeartMates, then." She glanced up to see his jaw flex.
"Yes. And you do not. You don't believe in much, do you?"
"Wrong. I believe in what life has taught me, and much of that is good, but you must remember I am simply a commoner. HeartMates and HeartGifts and Flair are all too new to accept unthinkingly. I may hold different beliefs than you, but I'm willing to bet that my outlook is far less cynical than yours."
His fingers tightened a bit around her hand. "I grew up Downwind." His chest rose and fell as he took a deep breath. He slanted her a look. "The HeartBond brings intimate knowledge. Not only joining the bodies, but the minds and souls. Each knows dreams and hopes—and fears and regrets."
Wariness crept up her spine. She didn't want this conversation. She was tired of dealing with new concepts that changed her life in a moment. "So?"
"Tonight. Passage," he reverted again to Downwind speech.
Danith sighed. "I don't know what you're talking about."
"Tonight…"
He ducked into a door alcove, and with one smooth pull of his arm, had her against his strong body. She pressed her palms against his chest.
Slowly he lifted his hand and touched her hair, then smoothed it lingeringly back from her face, his fingers tangling in it and following it down to the ends, causing delightful sensations in her scalp.
She watched his eyes darken, but he made no move to kiss her.
"Earlier. I—ah—was caught in a dreamquest."
She blinked. A dreamquest? Something no one of her acquaintance had experienced.
"I… reached. You came. We… met. Not done on purpose, not." He stopped, and when he spoke again, his tone sounded more cultured, as if he mastered his Downwind tongue. "I did not willfully mentally seduce you. We came together because we belong together."
"I don't want to think of it."
He laughed shortly. "You never want to think of what I tell you."
She tapped his chest lightly with a fist, scowling. "Do you realize my entire life has changed in the last few days? Do you know how hard that is—"
"I know." He pulled her body closer, and she sensed that it was not desire that motivated him, but fear. He didn't want her passion, but her comfort. She looked up. His expression was stark.
"I know. Nobody better. At six my Residence was destroyed in a firebombspell. My Family perished. I escaped, survived, in Downwind. It is difficult when life changes so rapidly, but one survives. I did. You will."
"Six!" How terrible. Her hands went
to his large shoulders and began stroking them in compassion.
Both his arms wrapped around her, and she placed her head against his chest. His heartbeat was fast but steady.
"One survives," he repeated, whispering. "Downwind, time to adjust and think things through is a deadly luxury. You have to act, and act fast and right. I'm used to that. Holm Holly says I push, but it is difficult for me not to do so."
They stood there for a moment, silent.
"Why are you telling me this?" she asked.
"Because you know I have Downwind roots. You need to know why. I was born noble, and have reclaimed my status, but I grew up Downwind."
T'Ash looked down at her lovely face, felt the heat and desire building once again between them, but he needed to focus on her mind, not her body. The night's events and the conversations between him and his lady had been a balancing act. How much to reveal and still hide his deficiencies.
In the short time of contemplation in the HouseHeart after the wringing Passage, he'd understood that to have his magnificent future with his HeartMate, he'd have to share some of his emotions. This wasn't a comfortable notion, and now he tried to limit the disclosures. He wanted to tell her enough to make her sympathetic, to touch that generous heart of hers, but nothing that would make her retreat.
She still didn't trust him. He did not dare tell her the dreadfulness of living in Downwind, how he'd fought and schemed to get out. And he hoped never to tell her of the man he'd become when hunting vengeance. Though he would use the skills that time had taught him, he would never be that man again.
He could divulge his hopes, his dreams, perhaps even a small fault or two, but nothing major on the downside. That would not attract her.
He thought of the earrings he had left in his Residence and how they would win her for him. He could depend upon them. Then, when he and Danith had joined in the HeartBond, and his self was revealed in all his flaws, she would still be his. She would love him despite everything he had done. He hoped. He was sure it worked that way. No need to try and make her love him before the HeartBond.
He shied away from the idea that no one could love him now. After all, even when he was six, he was constantly in trouble, and not quite sure how deeply his Family had loved him. Certainly his mother had not loved him enough to live instead of die with his father. But that was because they were HeartMates, of course. She would only have had a year more of life. But in that year of life, she might have provided for him, and everything would have been different… He pushed the hurtful conclusion aside, as he always did. Soon he would have his own HeartMate, who would love him despite everything.
Me here. Zanth announced, swaggering up. He burped.
"What's that smell?" asked Danith.
"Zanth."
"Zanth?" She left his arms to stare down at the Fam.
Sewer rats fast hunt tonight. Caught a skirrl, too. Fat. Yum.
T'Ash winced. "Do you hear him?"
"Hear Zanth?" she said, with just enough uneasiness that let T'Ash know she just might hear the cat.
"That's right. It isn't unusual for a HeartMate to receive telepathic thoughts from the House Familiar. Not to mention that you're an Animal Healer. I've heard that Animal Trainers are telepathic with quite a few animals, so you should be, too."
"Ah." She shifted from foot to foot.
She hears me when I shout.
"Zanth says you hear him when he shouts."
She looked up and down the cobblestone alley. "Yes. I do. And he understands my words." Now she stared down at the Fam, whose white-furred areas seemed a little slimy. "But if he shouts, he gives me an awful headache."
Zanth plopped down and lifted a hind leg.
T'Ash cringed at the crudeness. A view of Zanth's large male attributes was unavoidable. Danith glanced away.
"Let's go," T'Ash said.
We walk? Zanth stopped his grooming, stood and stretched.
"No power to 'port."
Zanth narrowed his eyes at T'Ash. You do too much tonight.
"Yes, I did too much tonight," T'Ash repeated the Fam's comment for Danith, a habit he'd have to cultivate until her Flair bloomed in full.
Me lead. You not here in long time. You not know best ways, good holes. Zanth sauntered down the alley, tail waving.
"True, I haven't been here in a long time. I've learned to use my Flair and skill instead of having to run and hide." He slanted a look at Danith.
She understood his implication and lifted her chin. "You think I'm cowardly. Perhaps you're right, but I've never had any sort of power before, not even to choose my own job." She shrugged. "By the way, I had a viz from the clerk of the NobleCouncil. I start an apprenticeship with GreatHouse Willow—"
"That would be with the Sallow branch of the Family, animal training," T'Ash nodded. "They are exceptional with animals. You could have no better tutors."
Zanth stopped a moment, scouting the area ahead of them. Sallows good. Caprea likes Me. Good beast-trainer. Talks with horses.
"Zanth says Caprea Sallow feeds him. And that the man is outstanding with horses."
NOT say he feeds Me. Zanth looked over his shoulder with slitted eyes.
Danith rubbed her temples.
"Don't shout. You made Danith's head ache."
Zanth stalked ahead of them, tail waving-haughtily. Not talking more. You don't say My thoughts right.
"Merely a twinge," Danith said, but she felt it every time T'Ash and his Fam mentally conversed. "What did he say?"
"He actually said that Caprea Sallow liked him. It's obvious now that Zanth has a food round."
Danith made a face. "He's nibbled a bit of food that I leave out for the feral cats."
"Zanth also apologizes for hurting your head." He stopped her with a hand on her arm. "As I apologize to you for this afternoon. I never meant to touch you. I lost control. I wanted you, and found you." As her expression remained doubtful, his own temper began to slip. He couldn't lose her. "I didn't seduce you. I reached and we came together. Because we both wanted to. Didn't seduce you. Not deliberate. Not."
Danith looked toward Zanth. He was carefully choosing a side street. "I don't expect an apology from him, not any more than I expect one from you."
Her words hurt. Would this woman always hurt him with her words? He drew a deep breath and pushed the pain aside. He curved a hand around her face. "I am no suave nobleman, but can you credit me with being strong enough to admit an error?"
She smiled crookedly. "I think you're strong enough to do anything you please." Her voice softened. "And that's a problem. You are so strong, and I am no match for you."
"Wrong. You are my match in every way. My HeartMate."
"Speaking of credit, I'm an accounting clerk, and I can tell you that the credit side, of your ledger far outstrips the debit side."
He liked the idea, but she said it with a lightness that he sensed was false. She was being generous. That notion also pleased him, but she'd once again avoided the issue of HeartMates. She had a habit of refusing him, of not believing what he said, of running. Faults of hers he'd already discovered, and though they hurt, he knew they were far less than any faults of his she would eventually know. The ones he hid for now. And he could teach her to master her own faults.
Perhaps he could offer one flaw to her. "I've been aggressive."
Her lips twitched up.
The three of them turned down a wider street lined with empty, decaying warehouses. Again he stopped her. "Tell me the truth. How does my account stand with you?" Gently he touched her chin, hoping she'd raise her eyes. She did, and the honesty and kindness in her gaze weakened him.
"You gave me my fondest dream."
"If you have the courage to go after it."
Now a spark lit her eyes. "You may think I am a coward, and perhaps I am, but I will follow this dream."
He nodded. She had the strength to do anything she wished, she just had to realize it. He'd help. It would be much better to have h
er concentrate that strength on ordering her new life instead of having it directed at fighting him.
He slid his hand down her fine-boned arm and took her hand in his again. "I—"
Shouts bounced off the building walls.
Battered and bloody, Tinne Holly cannoned around a corner. An unruly band of young men wearing purple and white followed.
T'Ash pushed Danith behind him, whipped out his broadsword. These scruffs had taken Danith. Now they would pay.
He smiled.
Chapter Ten
« ^ »
Seeing them, Tinne tried to stop. He skidded on mud and flailed past them. Danith watched as he windmilled and finally found his feet.
Zanth yowled. One young man stumbled over him. It activated his collar.
"You!" shouted the fierce hologram of T'Ash.
The boys lurched back, away from the apparition. T'Ash took advantage of their confusion and joined his image. Danith shivered at the eerie sight of twin T'Ashes.
"Know you that this is my Fam, Zanthoxyl. Harm him and you answer to me!"
The teenagers faced both the holo and real T'Ash. Equally intimidating. The solid one didn't bother with words. Only a growl issued from his lips as he began stalking the group, unaware or uncaring that they outnumbered him nine to one.
The Holly flew by Danith to join T'Ash. He was laughing.
Nine to two.
Steady light from the twinmoons and flickering light from fire gleamed down their naked blades. Both T'Ash's broadsword and the long dagger-sword Holly held were nothing like Danith had ever seen before and they both cut nasty patterns in the air.
Holly danced small steps, ready for fighting. Danith could see a trickle of blood from the corner of his mouth. He licked it away with relish.
T'Ash crouched in a predatory stance. Measuring his bulk, particularly next to Tinne Holly, Danith saw he would have made three of the youth. She glanced at the band of young nobles, now warily treading backward. None of them was much more substantial than Tinne. They were wild boys, in their first flush of youth.
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