He debated, then said, “I could. But I won’t. Not yet.”
She twisted, found the arm of the couch, and pulled herself over to curl against it, facing him, arms wrapped around her knees.
After some more silence, Deiq said, “If you recall, I told you once I don’t have homes. I have places I stay. Places that are mine. This is one of my places.” He paused. “Eredion was the last—visitor. I don’t share my places often.”
“So you didn’t bring Fimre here.”
He bit his tongue, counted to five, then said, steadily, “No. I should have. It might have gone better. But I didn’t know if I could—because of the chains. I can move around Bright Bay. This is...a little further than that. I didn’t have time to risk being wrong.”
“Where are we?”
“Near Terhe Port. In the Jagged Mountains.”
Her shocked silence lasted a long time. At last she inhaled, noisily, and said, “I’m at your mercy, then.”
“You always have been, Alyea,” he said as gently as he could.
“Yes....” She dropped her forehead to rest on her knees.
He let out a long breath and wrapped a hand lightly around one of her ankles.
“Alyea,” he said. “The marriage...the binding....” He paused, then made himself say it. “I’m at your mercy now, as well.”
Her breath stilled for a long beat, another; then sucked in noisily. She raised her head and stared blindly through the darkness at him. “What?”
“Anything I do now has limits,” he said. “I’m chained, Alyea. I’m collared, like a damn asp-jacau on a leash.” He breathed through his nose, feeling the thin mountain air, calming himself again. “If it hurts you—I can’t do it.”
The moment of hurling her against the wall had proven that: he’d felt the impact in every nerve of his own body, her pain mirrored and doubled into his own flesh. It had taken every ounce of his willpower not to slide into blood rage at that provocation, but at the same time there had been an odd film over the rage, a restraint that had never been present before: a block, as though even had he desired to let loose, he couldn’t have done so.
“You were able to compel me,” he said into the silence. “This morning. No human has ever forced me to their will.”
“I made you answer me at the Qisani,” she said. “Before we were married.”
“I was weak then,” he said. “This morning I was at full strength. I’m guessing you can still compel me.” He hesitated, weighing risk, then added, “Try it.”
“Light a lantern.”
He inhaled hard, fighting the request; a heartbeat later, a single lantern across the room flared to weak, uncertain life. He sighed and delicately strengthened the flame, then met Alyea’s wide-eyed gaze.
She shut her eyes a moment later and said, in a bare whisper, “Put it out. Please.”
Not a compulsion this time; a simple request. He allowed darkness to reclaim them with a sense of vast relief, and felt Alyea relax as well.
“Evkit never expected this to work,” Deiq said into the renewed quiet. “He expected to have me lose my wits and kill you during the ceremony. There was enough stibik powder there to render me helpless for two dozen years at least.”
“Why would he want to do that?”
“Gods only know,” Deiq said. He ran the back of his hand along her shin. “Evkit has ten different plans for any situation, and anything you do plays right into one of them. He’s supremely dangerous, Alyea. He doesn’t lose. Ever.”
“So what does it mean that we did survive the ceremony?”
“I don’t know,” he admitted. “I’m hoping that was the one wild factor he wasn’t anticipating, but he’s quick enough to have figured out a way to take advantage of it by now.” He paused. “Here’s the dirty little secret of the southlands, Alyea, and something even Eredion—I think—doesn’t know yet: the teyanain and the Aerthraim are behind everything. The other Families follow the path put out in front of them, and never realize they’re being led. Everything that happens in southern politics—everything—benefits one or both of those two at the end of the day. That’s information you’d be killed to get, or for having, by the way, so be damn careful showing you understand that part of the game.”
Alyea sighed. Her head resting on her knees again, she said, voice muffled, “Can’t I just quit?”
He grinned, then let go of caution and allowed laughter to emerge. The release of inhibition prompted him to pull her close; he stopped that impulse as his hand lifted from her ankle, and rolled from the couch instead to lie flat on his back.
“Alyea,” he said. “Come here. Please.”
She settled on his stomach, her back against his bent knees, more readily than she had last time, and with far more understanding.
They sat quietly for a time, listening to each other’s breathing.
“I’ve always hated causing unnecessary pain,” Deiq said at last. “Hurting those who served me. It’s why I left home and began walking the human lands. Something about it felt wrong. But I was taught, and everyone around me, even the humans, believed that it was my due...that it was just the way of things. I was taught that ha’ra’hain don’t...well, to put it in human terms you’ll understand, `ha’ra’hain don’t cry’.”
He could sense her smile.
“Human emotions are a weakness,” he said. “Weakness leads to madness, and a mad ha’ra’ha is killed in short order. I learned that from seeing my brothers hunted down like rabid asp-jacaus. Which they were, in a sense.” He paused, sorting through memories and thoughts, then went on, “If they hadn’t been killed, they would have wiped out the entire world very quickly. They really loved destruction. So it’s good they were stopped; but I didn’t want to end up like that. I wanted to prove I could be different. And I am, but it’s never going to be...a comfortable fit anywhere I go. To a human, I’m too violent; to a ha’rethe, I’m too gentle. To a ha’ra’ha who’s chosen to follow the ha’reye manner, I’m unpredictable and incomprehensible. To everyone, I’m next door to insane. And maybe I am; I don’t know.”
Alyea said nothing for a while. He could sense her thinking over what he’d said and comparing it to what she’d seen of him over the past few tendays.
“To me,” she said finally, “you’re my mentor. Partner. And husband.”
“Even now?” he said in a low voice. “Even now, Alyea? I’ve nearly killed you more than once, and if I’d hit Eredion an ounce harder, he’d be dead.”
“But you didn’t,” she said. “You’re trying.”
He let out a long breath and closed his eyes. “Yes,” he said, and lay still, allowing the tension to ease from his body; comprehensively relaxing, being vulnerable in a way he’d rarely managed in the presence of any human or desert lord.
She sat as quietly, her back heavy against his thighs and weight fully on his stomach, her thoughts rolling in gentle, serene waves.
After a while, he said, “Eredion’s the only one who knows so far?”
“About the marriage? Yes.”
He sighed. “Don’t tell anyone else.”
“What? But—”
“I won’t be around to cause problems to your reputation.”
She stiffened. “Deiq—”
“I have to travel,” he said, keeping his eyes shut. “I have items to tend to that you can’t be involved with, at any level. I’ll be gone years, more than likely, and you’ll need freedom to maneuver. Being known as married will offer too much restriction.”
“The chains,” she said, not quite a question.
“We’ll have to find out.” He slid his hands up to her knees. “You’ll have to trust me. And I’ll have to trust you not to plot against me in my absence.”
“I won’t,” she said, shocked into vehemence.
He smiled without humor. “You say that now,” he murmured.
She leaned forward, her hand landing across his throat in a hard grip. “If I wanted to kill you,” she said, “I�
��d give it a direct try.”
He lay still, no longer surprised by his lack of reaction to her aggression. His smile held real amusement this time.
“I know you would, love,” he said, then slid his hand lightly up her arm. “And I’ll do my best to hold still if you ever decide to try.”
Her grip tightened, then loosened. She leaned the rest of the way forward to sprawl against him, and his mouth found hers without hesitation even as he rolled to put her beneath him.
Epilogue One
Eredion opened his eyes to a hazy impression of blue and white veils draped across his face. Blinking did nothing to resolve vision. He shut his eyes and tried not to panic.
Movement nearby; a cool hand on his arm.
“Lord Sessin,” a soft female voice said. “You’re awake. Good. Headache? Blurred vision?”
“Blurred vision,” he said. “Everything’s blue and white and hazy.”
“No headache?”
“No.”
“Keep your eyes shut for a while longer, then.” A cool, damp cloth scented with ravann draped across his eyes, pressed down with a gentle hand. “Can you feel this?”
Pressure on the toes of his left foot.
“Yes.”
Right foot.
“Yes.”
A light tapping on his left shin, then right shin.
“Yes to both.”
“Good,” she said, sounding pleased. “I’d expected another few days for that. You heal quickly, Lord Sessin.”
“Desert lord,” he said. “Heal from what?”
Her voice slowed to caution: “You don’t remember?”
“I....” He struggled with memory for a moment, then said, “No. What happened?”
“What do you remember?”
“Sitting down to dinner. Then everything goes...hazy.”
Her hand pressed against his shoulder. “I’ll go tell Lord Peysimun you’ve woken,” she said unemotionally. “It’s her place, I think, to explain what happened.”
He watched multicolored patterns flare behind his eyelids, inhaled the calming scent of ravann, and held back panic as best he could. Alyea arrived in what felt like a short time.
“Eredion,” she said as she sat on the edge of the bed. “Kalei says you don’t remember?”
“Sitting down to eat dinner with you, nothing more.”
She exhaled slowly, then said, “Deiq—got upset. You stepped in his way to protect me.”
He shivered all over, panic threading through every muscle. “Gods, and I’m alive?”
“He snapped you over his knee like a twig,” she said. “Broke your spine.”
Bile rose in his throat, scorching; he swallowed it down, breathing hard.
“You’ve been asleep for nearly two tendays. Healing. This is the first time you’ve even opened your eyes.”
“Fimre,” he said immediately, and drew his elbows under him to sit up. Sharp agony flared up his back and out his arms; he hissed and abandoned the attempt.
She laid a hand on his shoulder. “Doing just fine. He learned some lessons of his own recently. Quite the change in him.”
“Must have been some hellacious lessons,” Eredion said sourly. “I didn’t think anything besides a brick to the head and groin all at once would impact that boy.” The pain subsided, leaving a vast weariness in its wake. He yawned hard enough for his ears to pop.
She laughed. “Not far off,” she said. “Deiq didn’t use a brick, though, as far as I know.”
“Oh. Oh, shit.”
“He survived,” she said, more soberly. “And learned from it.”
“Good.” He lay quietly for a few moments, thoughts slowing, then asked, “What happened—where’s Deiq now?”
“I don’t know. He left not long after...your fight. I haven’t seen him since.”
He listened to the tension arc in her voice and said, “You’re relieved.”
“Sometimes. Other times I wish he’d stayed. It’s been...an adjustment, without him around.”
He found her wrist with his hand and pressed gently. “He does tend to grow on you.”
“Nobody knows we’re married,” she said in a low voice. “It’s better that way.”
Eredion squeezed his eyes more tightly shut, sorting through angles. “Yes,” he said finally. “You’re right. It’s much better.” He paused. “Any chance of keeping how I was injured quiet as well?”
“You tripped and fell wrong against a table,” she said. “Officially.”
He grinned sourly. “Nobody will believe it.”
“But challenging it means calling me a liar.”
“Yes....” He rested in the flaring not-darkness behind his eyelids.
“One question I do have for you, while I have you alone,” she said. “Hama finally decided to tell everything she knew to the king, and there were quite a few people Oruen wanted to get his hands on afterwards. Unfortunately, most of them seem to have disappeared. Do you happen to know anything about that?”
She paused. “Just between us,” she added. “I won’t tell Oruen if you need it quiet; but I’d really like to know for myself.”
“No,” he said. “And I’d tell you. No idea at all on that.”
She sighed. “Probably something to do with Deiq, then,” she murmured.
“Probably.” Weariness dragged through him as though he hadn’t slept for days.
After a few more moments, she gave a faint hmph, then said, “That aside, everything’s fine for the moment. Go back to sleep. Kalei says that next time you wake you’ll have your sight back.”
“Gods, it’s nice not to be needed,” Eredion said, and fell asleep to the sound of her laughing.
Brittle leaves rattled along the ground with every gust of wind; skeletal bushes and trees stood stark contrast against a scattering of evergreens. Sun poured through the leafless branches, warming the sunroom far more than the chilly day outside.
Eredion sighed and tugged the heavy blanket more firmly around him. Just the sight of the weather outside was enough to make him feel cold down to his bones. There would be fires lit tonight, with the first of the stores of long-burning eastern peat and northern coal; a few precious logs might be added on here and there. The air would turn thick and rank in short order, and within the next few tendays the entire city would begin to stink of peculiarly earthy smoke. The smell wouldn’t go away until the weather warmed and windows opened to ocean-sent breezes.
No telling when that would be. This cold had already descended much more fiercely than ever before in Eredion’s memory, and the winds gusted more ferociously. More than one F’Heing ship had lately been driven back to its port or onto reefs by unexpected storms. The eastern side of the Horn, by contrast, remained remarkably calm, and ships from Stass, Agyaer, Terhe, and Sand had found much less trouble than usual in their routes.
Deiq had, to all appearances, disappeared. Eredion had made no effort to track him down, and if Alyea knew anything about his whereabouts, she wasn’t saying.
Tanavin and Dasin had been through the city twice since Eredion’s injury. He’d made no effort to contact them, but his watchers reported that the merchant seemed to be doing very well for himself, and Tanavin remained at his friend’s back, a brooding, looming shadow whose presence warned off even the most determined thieves.
Eredion had already quietly pressured aside a few attempts to hook the boys into various political schemes; those had come only from their association with Yuer, nothing to do with Tanavin’s background. As far as most of the relevant people knew, Tanavin Aerthraim had died in his attempt to save Bright Bay; Tank the mercenary had no connection beyond a superficial resemblance.
A light knock on the doorframe brought Eredion’s attention out of brooding; he looked up and said, “Fimre. Come in.”
The young Sessin lord limped into the room, leaning heavily on a cane, and eased into a well-padded seat beside Eredion.
“Damn cold out there,” he remarked as he leaned the
cane against the arm of the chair and settled back. His voice reminded Eredion of Nem’s, but in Fimre’s case the rough slurring wasn’t an act: his tongue was still healing from having been nearly bitten in two.
His hip wouldn’t heal. Fimre didn’t remember the moment, but Deiq must have hit him with real force at some point during their fight. He’d carry the limp for life, and his heavily silver-streaked hair had nothing to do with fashion.
Fimre ducked his head under Eredion’s gaze, a faint wave of color rising to his face. He tugged the blanket from the back of the chair and wrapped it round himself, grimacing.
“You did warn me about the weather,” he said. “F’Heing’s spitting mad over the loss of their ships.”
“What’s the count up to?”
“Three. The Hawk, the Eagle, and the Claw.” He pronounced each one with slow care, grimacing at the still-mangled result, then paused. “Only the Claw actually went down,” he added. “The other two were driven back into port with significant damage. But the Claw had the F’Heing liaison on board.”
Eredion exhaled. “Hard to see that as coincidence.”
“Mm. Prove otherwise.”
“Huh.” Eredion shifted in his chair slightly, wincing.
Fimre’s gaze sharpened. “Still hurts?”
“I broke my damn spine, Fimre. It’s going to take months to entirely stop hurting, and the cold weather doesn’t help much.”
Fimre grinned. “You’re starting to sound like a cranky old man, you know.”
Eredion snorted. “How’s the hip?” he said blackly.
Fimre’s grin faded. “Hurts,” he said more quietly. “Sorry, Eredion. Didn’t mean to mock.”
Eredion looked at lines on Fimre’s face that hadn’t been there on his arrival in Bright Bay, and sighed. “No, you’re right. I’m in a foul mood more often than not these days. Comes of not being able to move around as well as I’m used to doing. So distract me: tell me what’s happening in court. Tell me how you’re settling into my old suite of rooms in the palace. Make me feel useful by asking my advice.”
Fires of the Desert (Children of the Desert Book 4) Page 53