Heart Secret

by Robin D. Owens

  “Stop this, Aunt!” demanded Lark Holly.

  “It’s true.” Heather’s voice was smooth, like she was a fighter who knew she had him by the balls.

  Guilt always gnawed. He’d start off as usual. “The Iasc sickness was traced to an unknown fish with an unknown infection that washed ashore on the beach of the Smallage estate near Gael City.”

  “We know that.” Ura Heather’s brows snapped down.

  Garrett angled his thumb at the thick folder. “You know all that I have to tell you.” He put his hand on the door latch.

  “Please, stay, GentleSir Primross. We understand this is hard for you,” Lark Holly said. “We’ll take it in chronological order so you can settle before we ask about the new information.”

  His gut twisted. It was hard for him and he didn’t want any of the women—especially his HeartMate—to pity him.

  Yeah, he hadn’t seen her for a while, a year maybe, since he avoided her. They’d never met. He didn’t think that she knew they were destined mates, and he couldn’t legally tell her and limit her choices. Not that he wanted to tell her anyway. Not that he wanted her.

  Maybe his blood was humming because they were in the same room, but that was his body. His emotions were . . . Who the hell cared?

  “The Iasc sickness was traced to the discovery of the large fish on the former Smallage estate,” Ura Heather repeated.

  There was no more Smallage estate. The house had been demolished, the land sterilized, remotely. There were no more Smallages.

  Garrett stood where he was. He didn’t want to be sucked back into that dark time. But words came from his mouth. “People from the estate got sick, a group went to a research HealingHall on the edge of Gael City for help. By that time, they were sick, too,” he began in a monotone.

  Rushing air pounded in his ears, matching an inward, rumbling shudder. Even if he left this office, memories would slice him. He might fall apart in bits before he left the HealingHall.

  Someone made a soft noise of concern. Not someone. He knew who, the SecondLevel Healer. She was there, standing beside him, her fingers light on him near his elbow, nudging him back to the chair. He picked up his feet carefully, let the pressure on his arm guide him since he was having trouble seeing. Seeing outside. Inside, his mind flashed vision after vision of those terrible days.

  He bumped the edge of the chair, sat back down. His face felt cold. But the memories were fever hot. Like the sickness he’d survived.

  Heather said, “The research HealingHall determined the sickness was unknown and virulent. They took samples and wanted the infected moved to a quarantine clinic in the hills. You were called in to guide the off-road quarantine vehicle.”

  “Me and the driver of that bus, Old Grisc,” Garrett said. Old Grisc had been tough, but not tough enough. “We both knew the rough back trail to the clinic.” Little used, and since one part of the shelf road had crumbled behind the heavy vehicle, never to be used again. The trip had been hazardous. More from the sickness than the rugged terrain.

  “There were twenty-three who left on the journey. It was supposed to take six septhours?” Lark Holly asked in her calm voice. Not as pleasing to his ears as the younger woman’s, who he didn’t want to name.

  Pain razored through him as he was back again in the Gael City HealingHall. He saw the fearful expression of Dinni, his childhood friend. They’d been each other’s first lover. But Dinni was the girl who’d rejected him because he’d had a HeartMate somewhere and Dinni believed in that kind of love. She hadn’t wanted to take a chance on him and the love between them.

  Dinni had cradled her fretful and sick baby. Her son, no more than two months old, his father already dead of the sickness. She had begged Garrett to take the job, to go with them. Had the utmost faith he would save them.

  His Dinni. More memories—sweet, laughing, as sunny in nature as her blonde hair, as a child, a girl. He’d have done anything for her. So he’d agreed.

  “GentleSir Primross?” Healer Lark Holly prompted with an underlying command that greatly Flaired and greatly Noble people used to get results.

  Something warm brushed against the back of one of his fists and he saw it was a steaming mug of caff. Strong and dark. He took the cup and drank and the bitterness of the caff was lost in that of his mouth.

  He cast his mind back to what the woman had asked him. His voice came out like something old and rusty with edges flaking off, gone forever. “Yeah, the trip was supposed to take six septhours. Took eleven.” Hideous trip. “Not many of us made it.”

  “Five,” Ura Heather snapped.

  As if he didn’t recall every individual. Garrett couldn’t prevent the shudder from showing this time, ripping through his body. Hot caff slopped on his thigh. He barely noticed.

  More words spewed. “But your HealingHall in Gael City wasn’t as good as you all thought it was. The sickness got out from there, didn’t it? Despite all your warnings and all your sterilization procedures and everything.” He didn’t care if he sounded harsh. No one knew what had happened on that trip. “One of your own Healers spread it.”

  Heather’s nostrils pinched. “A ThirdLevel Healer.” A sneer from a woman who’d been born a highest Noble with best psi-magic, Flair.

  “She died, too.” Lark Holly sent an admonitory glance to Heather.

  Blinking, Garrett recalled the two were aunt and niece.

  Another concerned noise came from the beautiful SecondLevel Healer he tried to ignore. He made his eyes shift from a frozen stare; his glance swept the file again. How many times had he told this story? So many that the words were the same.

  “The door was first unlocked at thirty-two minutes into the first seventy-minute septhour.” Heather was pedantic. “Does that match your recollection?”

  He leaned forward and glanced at the panel. “Sounds right. First three to die were Brev and Partha Sundew, HeartMates, then Avena Blackoat. I don’t remember after that.” His mouth twisted. No. He would not go through this again. He’d already guaranteed himself more nightmares.

  Plunking his caff down on a table, he set his feet and rose. “Don’t have any more to tell you. You’ve got all the words about this that I have in that thick file. Either take me to the boy so I can give him a transfusion or tell me what you really want.”

  Frustration set on Ura Heather’s face. Too fliggering bad.

  As she met his gaze, her expression smoothed. “We’ve learned a lot about Iasc sickness, enough to enforce certain processes to keep it from becoming an epidemic. It’s not enough. The herb NewBalm helps mitigate the sickness but doesn’t have as good results as your blood.”

  Her words jarred him completely from the past and anchored him in the present and he was grateful. Maybe he would never go back there again.

  A few deep breaths and he could answer her. “What do you want?”

  She smiled and it was knifelike. “You survived the most deadly strain of the sickness, and”—her glance lowered to the now open folder and the sheets inside—“your case of Iasc is believed to have been the shortest on record.”

  He grunted. “Not many records from the quarantine clinic, I’m guessing.” Everyone had perished save him.

  Her lips thinned again. He didn’t like her and he was sure he wouldn’t like what she was going to say.

  She snapped the folder shut, leaned forward. “We need more information on how you—your body, your Flair—combated the sickness. We want to reintroduce the Iasc into you.”

  “No,” he said.

  Lark Holly offered her hand to the young Healer, who looked at her but took it. Together they moved before Garrett. Two gazes to his one. Holly’s violet and the other’s emerald.

  The SecondLevel Healer spoke. “We need your help. A little boy is sick.”

  He flinched and met her
gaze. Soft, tender, deep. And he knew no matter how hard he fought, he would lose this battle. The past and the future demanded his blood.

  Bile seared up his gullet, coated the back of his throat. His pulse hammered in his temples.

  “Yes,” he said thickly. Only then did he recall the prophet T’Vine’s words: You should cooperate completely with the FirstLevel Healers.

  He picked up his caff and drank, keeping his own gaze hard. “Lay it out for me.”

  Three

  We’ll do our best to ensure your survival,” FirstLevel Healer Ura Heather said.

  He believed her. His blood was too valuable an asset to lose.

  Heather pushed his file aside; again she leaned forward, a hint of concern shading her eyes. For the project more than him, he guessed.

  “We don’t anticipate the project will last longer than six days, but we want you available for a full week.”

  Six days of hell, descent into the very Cave of the Dark Goddess and a crawl back up.

  “You will be monitored the entire time.”

  He looked outside at the green Healing Grove, knew he wouldn’t be anywhere as pretty as that in reality or delirium. Here in Primary HealingHall, his body would be cradled in luxury. The rich chamber displayed more wealth than the den of his friend, FirstFamily GreatLord Laev T’Hawthorn.

  Garrett’s brows rose. “Here?” he asked.

  Heather looked startled. “No.”

  “Oh,” Garrett said softly, “you won’t risk this place, your domain, eh? Just like the HealingHall in Gael City.”

  Heather’s eyes should have bored holes through him. Again he moved to the wall and lounged against it, drinking caff. He had the upper hand now and they all knew it.

  “This place is very large and busy,” the SecondLevel Healer murmured. He kept his gaze on Heather, lifted and dropped a shoulder.

  “I live in MidClass Lodge.” He smiled. “That building is even larger and busier than here.”

  “That won’t work as a venue, then.” Ura Heather turned her gaze toward Lark Holly. “Options?”

  FirstLevel Healer Holly cleared her throat. “I’ve contacted the Turquoise House, the House becoming a sentient Residence. TQ is between occupants and has decided to redecorate, so it is empty of all furnishings. It is intrigued with the project.” Her smile showed the pity that he hadn’t wanted. “TQ is also interested in GentleSir Primross himself, as a private investigator.”

  “Huh,” he said, but his curiosity was snagged, too. Not many people were allowed in the Turquoise House. It was more exclusive than the greatest Noble Residences that had huge staffs.

  Heather’s lips pursed, but she couldn’t hide her interest, either. “When will it be available for us four to view it?”

  The younger woman squeaked. As the words sank in, he stiffened. He opened his mouth to protest, then remembered T’Vine’s words and the man’s haunted eyes. Garrett shut his mouth.

  “Surely you don’t want me—” the lower-level Healer began.

  “You’ve already been exposed to the sickness and have shown you’re smart enough to call in better Healers when the diagnosis is beyond your skills,” Heather said. “You’ve followed proper sterilization procedures. You’re SecondLevel and will be an acceptable assistant to us on this. You will monitor GentleSir Primross.”

  Garrett carefully put his cup down on a table, retreated behind an expressionless mask again.

  He didn’t like this, but now T’Vine’s prophecy replayed, echoing in his mind. He wouldn’t stare at the woman, no matter how often his gaze wandered that way.

  Lark Holly said, “Opul Cranberry is Healer Panax’s patient, and needs her.”

  Heather waved that aside. “Panax will be of more service by tending to Primross. You, FirstLevel Healer Holly, can supervise the child’s case. When can we see the Turquoise House?”

  Lark Holly’s sigh was faint. “I’ll scry the House that we are on our way.”

  “Good.” Heather snapped her fingers, then smiled in satisfaction. “The glider awaits us at the main entrance.” She strode from the room.

  The other two Healers fell in behind her, Lark Holly commenting quietly to the younger woman, “I’ll make sure that you take no harm from this project, financially or otherwise.”

  “Thank you,” the SecondLevel Healer said politely.

  Garrett strolled behind them, thinking how he could broach the matter of losing several days’ worth of work to Heather. Did she expect him to donate his time as well as his blood? He supposed so.

  As he brooded, he realized his gaze was fixed to the SecondLevel Healer’s ass. Nice and high and round, though he couldn’t see much because she had on trous and a long tunic over that. He liked the way she moved, gracefully, elegantly.

  Not at all like Dinni’s bouncy step. The Healer had long dark brown black hair tied back in a severe braid. Her face was roundish and he preferred pointed chins. She had a creamy complexion that showed she didn’t spend much time in the sun.

  Not at all like Dinni.

  But SecondLevel Healer Artemisia Panax was his HeartMate.

  He didn’t want her.

  He’d never wanted her.

  Now they’d be together for as long as his sickness ran again. She’d see him at his absolute worse.

  That was good.

  * * *

  Throughout the drive from Primary HealingHall to a mid-Noble-class area, Artemisia’s mind buzzed. From the glare he’d given her, Garrett Primross wasn’t happy with the plan. Who would be? She must have made a terrible impression on him since he’d barely looked at her. His animosity sent a thorn of unexpected hurt into her she tried to shake off.

  She wasn’t pleased, either. Caring for a very sick person developed an intimacy, and her feelings toward him were mixed—attracted but wary. She wouldn’t have trouble being professional but wasn’t sure how he’d react toward her.

  And she’d have to leave her home. She hadn’t lived away from the hidden sanctuary in Druida City since she and her Family had been named caretakers years ago.

  No lover had been strong enough to break those bonds. She didn’t know if that was depressing or not.

  They pulled into the glider drive and the courtyard of the Turquoise House and Artemisia understood why it was called that. The outside walls were a shiny blue green. The door of the sprawling one-floor House was an equally glossy oak with bright brass latch and fittings.

  Lark Holly walked up to the entrance and Artemisia followed. Primross was behind her and FirstLevel Healer Ura Heather brought up the rear. The door swung open and they stood in a bare entryway.

  “Greetyou,” said the House in the mellow tones of a famous actor, lilting with satisfaction.

  Primross stiffened. “You speak with Raz Cherry’s voice?”

  “Yes,” said the House. It—he—chuckled. “We came to an agreement years ago, when I first became aware of myself and wanted a male voice. I am pleased you recognized it, Garrett Primross.”

  Garrett made a half bow and said, “Where would you prefer me to stand so you can scan me?”

  “Very intelligent!” the Turquoise House said. “Very courteous. Please move to the mainspace fireplace, down the hall ahead and to your left, first door on your left.”

  The man took the lead, Lark Holly appeared amused, and Heather reluctant. Artemisia’s shoulders relaxed. She lived in a Residence now, one who was like a crotchety old man who had to be catered to. This House seemed much more cheerful. That would be helpful in the trying days ahead.

  “You and SecondLevel Artemisia Mugwort Panax will stay for a week?” the House asked as they stood around the empty mainspace.

  Artemisia tried not to wince. The Turquoise House had included her real surname. Her shoulders tensed, but a sliding
gaze at the others showed they appeared focused on the bare House. A week seemed a long time to her, though the sickness had lingered and been fatal for as long as three weeks.

  “Yes, a week,” Heather said brusquely. Artemisia wondered if the woman was trying to ease her out of Primary HealingHall. Artemisia straightened her spine. She was sticking. She wasn’t flashy, but she was determined and knew how to do stubborn.

  And she hoped she had a supporter in Lark Holly. Still, there were more detriments to this project than advantages.

  “Ah,” the Turquoise House said in a tone that had her listening closely. “I know of both individuals, Garrett Primross and Artemisia Panax.”

  Now it was being discreet. So Artemisia knew that her home, BalmHeal Residence, had been too chatty with the Turquoise House. How many of her—and her Family’s—secrets did this House-becoming-a-Residence know? How would the House use what it knew? Would it? How ethical was it?

  “You know of me, do you?” Primross said coolly as he stopped near the empty fireplace. He reached into his trous pocket and pulled out a gold coin, rolled it across his knuckles, made it disappear. “You know that?”

  “Sleight of hand!” the Turquoise House said delightedly. “More!”

  “Want to learn more secrets?” Primross shrugged. “Maybe, maybe not.” He left the impression he’d established dominance in the relationship. Artemisia could only envy how quickly and easily he’d done that.

  Ura Heather had stayed near the door. Did the older Healer wonder what her own ancient Residence might have said about her to the Turquoise House?

  Even if Artemisia’s home blabbed of her, it would have been complimentary. It loved her more than anyone else who lived in it, which had also kept her close.

  Staring at the slick-looking walls, Heather said, “You have instituted sanitation, decontamination, and sterilization procedures, I see. Well done.”

  “Thank you,” the Turquoise House said with an edge of irony. “It is very important that the human populace of Celta declines no further. If I can help in that endeavor, if I can save lives, I am well rewarded.” There was a drop in the air pressure in the room as if the House gave a soft sigh. “Unlike any of the HealingHalls, I can monitor all the organisms within me, understand the slightest changes in my walls and beings.”