Resonance. She’d have to ask Jon for resonance. He was finally in a good mood, and she’d have to ruin it.
Not yet. Throwing herself into practiced routine, her wretched heartbeat slowed, even if her face remained hot. The ward laid, she headed for the river to wash up, splash her face, and cool off before helping with supper. The water was clear all the way to the bottom.
She risked a glance Jon’s way. He rolled up the sleeves of his shirt, approached the river bank, and started pulling off his boots and his socks.
“The river’s shallow here, and there’s just enough light to catch fish.” He rolled up the legs of his trousers.
Indeed, the waxing gibbous moon was bright enough to illuminate the night, if not as well as a full moon.
She was about to ask him how he planned to fish without a rod when he stepped in without a sound, hardly disturbing the water, and moved toward the river’s outside bend.
Spellbound, she observed, scrubbing her arms as he slowly dipped his hands into the water downstream from the fish and stood still, an exercise in control. Hours passed, or seconds... she couldn’t discern. Barefoot and fishing with his hands, to her eyes, he was undeniably down to earth and masculine, in ways no mage at the Tower had ever been, and the sight was one she’d not soon tire of.
In his grip, a fish thrashed.
He tossed it past her onto the bank. His eyes met hers, and for a moment, he looked at her with the soft, silvery moonlight and the shadows of the forest canopy playing across his tattooed skin. His gaze tracing her entire form, the sound of the river’s running water hummed between them. An owl called in the distance.
The cool night wind swept a chill caress around her shoulders. Watching him, she could almost feel his hands replace the wind’s coolness on her body with his warmth, and the memory of his embrace in the ruins made it a challenge to breathe.
He took a deep, audible breath and looked away.
Swallowing a lump in her throat, she nodded abruptly in his direction and returned to the fire pit.
She busied herself with writing notes for her report until a frisson fluttered across her ribs—a ward breach. Jon. He returned with several dressed fish that he set to roast. River trout and graylings.
“I’m impressed.”
He smiled and sat next to her. “It’s a strange life that finds fishing impressive and casting spells commonplace.”
She exhaled a half laugh. “Strange to you, maybe.” If he was back to joking with her, then perhaps he wasn’t angry anymore.
He glanced at the knapsack and the belt pouch. “Shall we?”
Let’s see what a mage captain of the Crag Company wanted with us. She grabbed the bags and upended the contents on the ground before her. Littered among various mundane things were some coded notes and a key bearing a hummingbird symbol with a 3 on the back. Jon picked out the key.
“I know that mark,” she said. “It’s a Bournand inn, nestled in the Weave. Cosette’s. A by-the-hour place.”
When he cocked an inquisitive brow, she shrugged. No, he didn’t need to know how she knew.
“A favorite haunt of yours?”
She glared daggers at him. Had her reluctance to broach the subject been in any way unclear?
A sly corner of his mouth turned up. “Why the scowl, witch? I imagine you only enjoy the place for the fine... diversion.” He’d chosen the word carefully and seemed pleased with his choice.
“Don’t spend too much time imagining my enjoyment of fine diversion. You could go blind.”
His eyes widened, but he quickly recovered. “We don’t know how long he had been staying there”—Jon handed her the key—“so we’d best aim to go there soon after we arrive in Bournand.”
“To investigate?”
“What else did you have in mind?” He grinned broadly, that dimple teasing.
She opened her mouth and closed it. Bastard.
“We need to get there as soon as possible,” he said evenly, by all signs letting her off the hook.
We? Did he mean to invite himself on a Divinity of Magic investigation? “We aren’t going there. This is an escort mission, remember? It’s one thing fighting off threats together, but entirely another to willfully invite you to court new threats with me. I’m supposed to keep you safe.”
“You can’t guard me if you leave me behind.” He thrust his chest out. When she shot him a chagrined look, his mouth twitched.
The clever bastard. “You don’t even know he meant to attack you. He could very well have wanted to attack me.”
Jon raised an eyebrow, his eyes lit with a mischievous twinkle. “And why would anyone ever want to do that?”
She folded her arms across her chest. No one but Leigh had ever teased her so mercilessly. Certainly never a charge. She wanted to tackle him for his insolence but was almost certain he’d have her on her back before she could touch him.
Her pulse quickened at the thought. Stop it.
He took two skewered fish off the fire and handed her one.
“Fine,” she said, “we’ll search Cosette’s together.”
With a smug grin, he dug into supper, and so did she, some moistened double-baked bread and nuts added to their meal. Jon glanced at her fingers, and when he raised his eyebrows, she followed his line of sight.
Damn. Her hands had started trembling again. Not now. Not yet.
She clasped them.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
She began to pull away, but he lunged and grabbed her wrist. He held out her hand and watched it quiver.
“Let go.” She tried to yank her arm away.
His stare was unrelenting, his body rigid. “What are you using? Sen’a? Trux?”
Baffled by the accusation, she turned away. She’d been without for three years. But he didn’t release her arm.
“Tell me.”
Relentless paladin to the end.
“Anima withdrawal,” she blurted.
He let her wrist go and frowned. “When were you going to tell me?”
“Tonight.” She looked away. Resonance would shatter this peace between them. “My anima is dim, but as long as nothing major happens before we reach Bournand, I can find someone for resonance there.”
“ ‘Someone’?” His face hardened.
Would he offer? She’d rather have resonance with him than a stranger, but she couldn’t ask, not after giving her word.
If it was to happen, he would have to offer.
She paused. Waited. Her face heated, and her hands shook so badly her arms quivered.
Nothing. She shook her head. It had been stupid to expect anything else. She knew what he wanted—or, more precisely, what he didn’t want—and they’d agreed.
The silence lengthened, and he wouldn’t meet her gaze.
Rejection.
“It’s been a long day. Thanks for supper.” Before he could answer, she rose, stalked toward the tent, and ducked inside. With a harsh breath, she plopped down onto her bedroll. What had all that talk of valuing her life meant when he refused to help her replenish her means of defense? Empty words.
But she would keep hers. Resonance stoked his desire, and she had promised not to use what he felt against him.
So be it. I’ll spend the rest of tonight meditating and pray it’s enough.
A rustle—he entered the tent and sat before her.
“I’ll do it.” Calmly, he shook his head. “We had no warning of Flame’s attack. You may have enough power to fight again, but if one of us is injured, you may need more. I won’t risk your life for the sake of my own... preference.”
She crossed her arms. “I don’t think you understand how an escort mission works. You are not responsible for me.”
“It’s because of my pratfall into the ruins that you had to use healing magic at all, remember? Both inside and when you belly-flopped out and broke your fingers.”
Just when she thought he’d managed to say it all with a straight face, the corners of
his mouth turned up.
“Are you certain?” It couldn’t be an easy choice. “I know that you—”
He rested his hand on hers. “Let me worry about that. Are you ready?”
She had barely nodded when the darkness enveloped her anima, and she descended inwardly through it to the azure pool, brilliantly aglow in the darkness. As soon as she thought of Jon, she felt pulled toward him, into him, and she pulled back, the connection made.
Goosebumps rose on her skin, its tiny hairs standing on end at the tingling of their union. He’d learned quickly, or perhaps it was being her complement that made it so. His presence began to enter her, a smooth flow of anima that sought hers and wrapped around it, just as hers did around his. He was warm—no, hot—and his heat flowed into her, through her, filling her furthest reaches until he brimmed inside her.
The watery surface of her anima began to vibrate with a rhythmic quake, its pulsing flood spreading through her body, her growing need making her shift. Her flesh quivered with the hot vibration, tremors contracting her muscles everywhere. Her entire body tightened, waited, yearned, and she writhed, unable to contain the keen wanting.
His silver built up the blue in her anima, then pressure—fast and overwhelming, filled her with one voluminous wave after another, pouring in, coalescing, surging into her until her anima overflowed, a waterfall of power rolling inside her. It pushed against her inner walls with the delirium of skin against silk, dizzying in its limitless caress. She shivered, trembling, overpowered; and the muscles of her belly drew taut, converging on the primal need springing there and saturating every inch of her until she hurt with desire.
His body collided with hers, sending her falling back onto the bedroll, and that ache exploded. Blossomed. A breath ravished from her chest, and beneath her, the fur blanket tickled in textured delight. Yes. Her head swam with ecstasy—his rough palm had broken her fall. Buttons came undone, her coat open and then cast away, the shirt raised, and his touch found her skin, cresting waves of pleasure. The heat of his breath on her neck made her shudder, frissons of anticipation tightening her skin, and Great Divine, she could hardly wait.
Please.
But he pulled back.
Braced above her, he breathed raggedly. Through the tent’s opening, the wavering firelight cast a lick of illumination upon his face, light pushing against darkness and darkness against light. She froze beneath the hold of his pained, warring gaze, invisible armies battling for control, their carnage a clash of sea blue and shadow in his stormy eyes.
She reached up to stroke his face, and as soon as she did, the pleasant warmth of contact flooded her once more. Still connected, their anima flirted in a pleasurable undulation that swayed from his body to hers and back again.
He closed his eyes, and his breathing eased. Delicately, she ran her thumb over his mouth. He pressed his lips to it in a kiss before gazing down at her.
The tempest in his eyes had settled to still, calm waters, but the surface still rippled. She tensed beneath him, clumsy nervousness replacing the mindless desire of moments before.
He moved to sit and raised her hand to his cheek. His lust had been so keen moments before, but it wasn’t lust animating him now. Not fire and need. It was something else entirely. Something gentle, thoughtful.
She slipped her hand free of his and let it descend along his body until her palm rested against his chest, absorbing the spirited beat of his heart.
He peered down at her. “Rielle, I...” He swallowed.
Her own heart pounded. They couldn’t ignore the—whatever this was—much longer. The wind rustled the tent flap.
He placed his hands atop hers on his chest and threaded his fingers with hers. “I can’t do this.”
She looked from his face to their intertwined hands, perplexed by the contradiction between his words and the rest of him. Can’t. A loaded word. “But you want to.”
That’s what his hands, his body, his heart said to her.
He brought her palm to his mouth and, closing his eyes, kissed it, holding the touch for a sensual moment. “Very much, I want to.”
A rush of heat made her belly contract. She wanted him, and he wanted her. It could be that simple. “Then...”
Pressing his lips together, he gave a faint shake of his head. “To rejoin the Order—”
“Why do you need to rejoin the Order?” Why did he make his life so difficult? “Why deny yourself?”
It had been a long time since she’d risked rejection, but she wouldn’t pretend she didn’t want him any longer.
Gently, he extricated himself from her embrace, the resonance fading as his touch broke from hers. She cooled as he sat next to her and settled onto his bedroll. Her anima bright, swollen to abundance, she waited for his answer.
“I swore vows, Rielle.” He pulled up his knees and rested his arms on them. “Eight years of devotion... I can’t break my troth to Most Holy Terra on a mere whim.” He lowered his chin onto his arm and studied the tent’s opening as it wavered in the night breeze, shifting between darkness and firelight.
“A whim?” She clenched her teeth until they hurt. “Is that what I am to you?” Her voice broke.
His shoulders stiffened, and he looked at her wide eyed. She didn’t turn away, but to wait for an answer was to stare at the sun. Pressure built in her face, and her cheeks burned.
At last, she could bear the heat no longer and shuffled into her own bedroll, turning away from him to the shadows.
He remained silent.
Fully awake, she stared at the side of the tent, trying to ignore the sickly pressure rising in her body.
Chapter 19
Slowing his horse, Jon glanced at Rielle as she squinted into the darkness, her irises spelled arcane green with earthsight. Her eyes widened.
Perhaps Bournand at last? The question lingered on his lips, but he wouldn’t be the one to break the silence. Last night would not be so easily smoothed over.
One last look around, and the magical color disappeared from her eyes. She lowered her gaze.
The Kingsroad had been clear and quiet all day, and so had she. But she’d faithfully done a check with earthsight every half hour and scanned the distance like a hawk, readiness tense in her shoulders. If Phantom and Shadow did lurk in the night, he and Rielle would not be caught unaware.
She did her best to protect him, even if he didn’t need it. Perhaps he’d been too harsh with her. Despite everything, she’d acquitted herself admirably in the duel with Flame, if the body had been any indication. His mouth frozen in a silent scream, Flame had been impaled by two ice spikes in his chest and one in his gut. A decisive kill, and against a notoriously skilled mage, no less.
For a paladin, a pyromancer was an easy kill, but for a mage? Fighting Flame had to have been the equivalent of a paladin like himself fighting Gilles. Odds, experience, and status had all been stacked against her. But to win, she’d been willing to risk more than Flame had. To risk everything.
As Jon had trained this morning, Gilles had figured in his head as he did every morning, the blackguard who pushed his training to the limits. Gilles wouldn’t deign to kill him, no more than a hurricane would deign to blow out a candle, and he certainly wouldn’t risk his life to.
But I would risk mine to arrest him.
He eyed Rielle. In some ways, they were more alike than he cared to admit. He’d risk his life to defeat Bastien’s murderer, and she had risked her life to defeat the man who’d threatened—
Me.
Misguided. Reckless. Foolish. But she’d been willing to die for his sake. For a charge she’d been ordered to protect. Was it only for duty? Or was there something more?
If it was duty, what had earned such loyalty? Divinity mages swore vows, too—obedience, allegiance, piety, and diligence—but had that been all? The Divinity’s mission, something to die for?
She straightened, glanced at him, then turned away, passing the reins through her fingers.
A whim. He shut his eyes, reliving his ill-spoken words from the night before. He’d called her a mere whim. When she’d asked him if that was all she was to him—the look on her face as she’d waited for him to explain had been nigh unbearable. He’d wanted to kiss it away, tell her that nothing could be further from the truth.
The whim was not her. Not to him. The whim was making love.
Mages loved freely. He didn’t know how many lovers had enjoyed her bed—and he didn’t wish to know—but she’d kept none of them by her side. To indulge his desire without first winning her heart would have been indulgence in whim of the most dangerous kind. Sacrificing everything to offer himself as no more than a night’s entertainment... when he would have wanted so much more.
In the tent last night, when he’d found his shirt beneath her mage coat, something of his embracing her, a woman whose heart could be his, that whim had nearly taken over. He had wanted to give himself to her, to keep or discard, to love or to break, to do with as she pleased... He’d wanted to sacrifice all that he’d been for all that she was, to whatever end.
The firelight had caught the arcanir center of his Sodalis ring, and he’d pulled back. Hard. To give himself to her would have been to lose himself, and no matter how much he craved the giving, the loss would leave him gutted.
He could never allow it. The Order meant so much to him, and he could offer so little to her.
His stallion’s hooves crunched softly on the autumn leaves. After last night, she would have no more to do with him. There was nothing left but to let her escort him to Monas Amar. She’d never have to see him again.
The sky-glow over Bournand came into view at last, the city’s torches shining brightly in the darkness. Past the north gate, lamps burned over the streets and in the windows of the few establishments still open to travelers on the main thoroughfare.
The Terran Vindemia festival, to honor the annual death of the Oak King, happened this time of year, but there was little indication of it. Black mourning flags waved in the wind before homes and businesses as they rode through, signs of a city’s quiet bereavement.
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