by Sharon Green
“Are you sayin’ you’d … rather lie with Rion than with me?” Vallant asked Tamrissa, sounding more vulnerable and hurt than he had the other night in the coach. “If that’s what your choice is then I can’t argue it, but—”
“Oh, for goodness’ sake!” Tamrissa interrupted, actually sounding annoyed as she looked at Vallant.
“Don’t you understand that I was saving you for last because—”
Her words ended abruptly as color flooded her cheeks, but Vallant began to glow as if strong sunlight shone on him.
“Because after lyin’ with me you don’t expect to want any other man?” he suggested, moving closer to her. “That’s just what I had in mind, and I mean to work real hard gettin’ it done. I don’t want to own you, Tammakins. I mean to make you want to own me.”
Tamrissa blushed again as she looked up at Vallant, his grin obviously adding to her discomfort. But Rion noticed that she didn’t look away again, nor did she even seem to want to.
“This meeting has turned out to be more involved than when we Blended,” Lorand said with a sigh, his gaze on Jovvi. “I didn’t really mean it when I said I was disappointed, love. Or maybe I meant I was disappointed in myself. I shouldn’t have made you feel that no one wanted you, because the truth is that I want you more than anything in the world. If only I were good enough for you…”
“Don’t say that!” Jovvi interrupted sharply, a plea rather than a command. She had left Tamrissa’s side, and now stood in front of Lorand. “Your thinking that is my fault, and I simply can’t bear it. I never dreamed that a man could be as wonderful as you, and if you speak about yourself that way again, I’ll … I’ll…”
The threat trailed off unspoken, and they simply stood there gazing at one another. Just as Tamrissa and Vallant stood doing the same. Rion sighed very softly, then rose and silently left the room. He was truly delighted that his groupmates seemed to have worked out their difficulties, but being among them was a bit on the painful side. If only Naran were there…
Rion headed downstairs rather than return to his empty bedchamber, in no mood for being alone but somehow also in no mood for company. But he made sure to move slowly and idly, as he knew that a servant now seemed to be on the way to the stairs. The human body displaced a certain amount of air, and he’d discovered that he could use his awareness of that to judge if anyone was near or approaching. The four people upstairs needed no distractions, but he could certainly use one.
And sure enough, the servant had crossed half the hall by the time he reached the bottom of the stairs. It happened to be the servant who had sought him out the night Naran had come by to tell him where she would be, and when the man saw him he changed his direction from the stairs to Rion himself.
“Ah, Lord Rion, how fortunate,” the man said with a smile. “I was just coming to look for you. That young lady from the other night is at the door again.”
Rion could barely believe his ears, but lost no time in doubting the marvelous coincidence. He immediately followed the servant to the side door used primarily by servants and tradespeople, tipped the man, then opened the door to see the most beautiful face in the universe.
“Oh, my lord, how quickly you came,” Naran said breathlessly, seeming a bit startled at his sudden appearance. “I would not have disturbed you here again, but I feared that you would search for me at the same house and I’m no longer there. I haven’t as yet found anything permanent, but as soon as I do I’ll be certain to let you know where I am.”
“I live for the moment,” Rion said as he reached out and drew her into his arms. “I worried so about you since the other night—I returned to the house shortly after I left it, and found you gone.”
“Oh, if I’d known you would return, I would have stayed despite the warning,” she said, looking up at him in just the way that Tamrissa and Jovvi had looked up at Vallant and Lorand. “As soon as you were gone, a friend came to say that I might have been found. Men searched the neighborhood, and they could well have been his men.”
“They were in the pay of my mother’s agent,” Rion said, feeling the frown he now wore. “I’d believed I’d avoided them, but it turned out I hadn’t. But who is this person who might be searching for you? You’ve said nothing about another man.”
“He isn’t a man, he’s a beast,” Naran replied with a small shudder, fear showing briefly in her gaze. “I … had business with him some time ago, and he was very abusive. After that I refused to see him again, a decision he, in turn, refused to accept. He’s a very powerful man, but fortunately for me he can’t come after me openly. He’s forced to have his agents skulk about, which has allowed me to stay one or two steps ahead of him.”
“Running like a common criminal,” Rion said, fighting to keep the fury suddenly filling him from exploding in all directions. “Well, that’s all over with now. You’re to gather your things together, and return here during the small hours of the morning. There’s certainly enough room in this house for you, and my friends will help to hide your presence. And if that … beast discovers where you are, he’ll have me to deal with.”
“But, my lord, how can I impose that way?” she objected, disturbance clear in her lovely eyes. “Your friends might not be willing to shelter a stranger, and that man is really very rich and powerful. To put you in his path would be to put you in terrible danger.”
“The danger will be his to fear, not mine,” Rion said so flatly that she gave another delicate shudder. “Perhaps the matter has failed to take your attention, dear lady, but you are no longer alone in the world. Will you return here tonight?”
She struggled for a moment with indecision, her hands flat to his chest while he held her close, and then, reluctantly, she nodded.
“I loathe the idea of putting my troubles on your shoulders, but I truly have no other choice,” she admitted. “He’s managed to find me everywhere else I went, and I’ve now run out of refuges. But when I return, I shan’t come to the door. If your friends dislike the idea of my being here, you need only fail to come out and find my carriage. I swear I’ll understand, and will let you know where I’ve gone once I find another place.”
“There will be no need of that,” Rion assured her. “I will come out at the stroke of three, and fully expect to find you waiting. If you are not, I fear there will be words between us.”
“I can’t allow there to be words between us, so it seems I must be here,” she said with the smile which always melted his essence. “I love you very much, my beloved lord.”
“And I you, my precious lady,” Rion murmured before sharing a kiss with her. Once the kiss ended she slipped from his arms and disappeared, and rather than follow, Rion slowly closed the door. He’d caused his mother’s watchers to fear him, but actually giving them something to report might be too much of a temptation. Besides, he needed to discuss the matter with the others as quickly as possible.
Rion walked back toward the front hall, intending to return directly upstairs. His plans were abruptly changed, however, when that same servant appeared for the second time.
“Ah, how fortunate that I needn’t interrupt you, sir,” the man said at once. “It seems you have another caller, this time at the front door. Another lady, only this one is a good deal older than the first.”
Rion stood rooted to the spot, as this second caller could only be his mother.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
It took a moment for Rion to absorb the news, and then he noticed something odd: the idea of seeing his mother again was distasteful and made him uneasy, but the panic he’d previously felt at the thought of confronting her was absent. Her visit was hardly likely to leave him untouched, but it would certainly not be as disturbing as her last one.
“Did you admit her to the house?” he suddenly found himself asking the servant, his voice calm and unconcerned. “Her last visit here was scarcely so pleasant that any sort of deference would be due her.”
“In point of fact, sir, we’re n
ot permitted to admit anyone to the house,” the man replied politely. “This is an official residence, and as such is considered a shelter for those talents who reside here. Inasmuch as you gentlemen and ladies will participate in the competitions, we on the staff consider it our privileged duty to protect you from any distractions which might disturb you.”
“A pity not everyone on the staff feels the same, but you have my thanks nevertheless,” Rion told him, managing to keep his smile to a minimum. “Let’s go and see how the lady takes to being kept waiting like a tradesman.”
The servant bowed and led the way to the front door, which he opened once Rion was properly positioned to block easy access. The visitor did turn out to be his mother, and once she caught sight of Rion she exploded.
“So there you are!” she choked out in accusation, as though Rion had been deliberately hiding. “Have you any idea how these peasants have dared to treat me? My health is so fragile that I shall certainly take to my bed as soon as I return home, but now I must sit down for a time. Show me to your apartment, and then order the servants to—”
“No, Mother, you aren’t coming inside,” Rion said calmly when both her words and her attempted advance into the house ended rather abruptly. She’d expected Rion to give ground as he’d always done before, but this time he’d stood firm.
“Clarion, what have they done to my darling boy?” she wailed, clearly on the verge of falling to tears. “You’ve never behaved so abominably, and I’m going straight to the palace to speak to the Five. They’ll have you taken out of here, and then—”
“Neither of those will work either, Mother,” Rion interrupted, forcing himself to pretended calm. On the inside it was all he could do not to react the way he always had, flinching and immediately giving in to her desires. “Your crying won’t accomplish a thing as far as I’m concerned, and even the Five have no power over one of their possible successors. If they ordered me taken out of here, the people of this city would riot over the deliberate ruining of a common challenging Blending. And for the hundredth time, my name is now Rion.”
“And what will your name be once you and your little peasant friends lose the competitions?” she asked, dropping the pretense of illness and tears to stare up at him with steel in her gaze. “It will certainly be ‘mud,’ just as theirs will be, and you will also be just as penniless. At that point no one will care in the least when I have you brought to me, and you will spend years doing penance for your present insolence. One way or another you will return to me, Clarion, but please don’t be foolish enough to expect the time to be as pleasant as it was. You will pay for this nonsense many times over, and will certainly end up wishing you had never indulged in it. For this you have my word.”
And with that she turned with her head high, and marched toward her waiting carriage. Rion was able to keep all expression from his face, but once again his insides roiled like a volcano. The anticipatory gloating in her voice had made him ill, knowing as he did that she usually got exactly what she wanted. Right now what he wanted and needed was to be with his own, so he left the closing of the front door to the servant, hurried upstairs, and knocked on Lorand’s door. The babble of conversation inside ceased rather abruptly, and it was Lorand himself who opened the door.
“Rion, where did you run off to?” Lorand asked as he stepped back to let Rion enter. “We really could have used a referee.”
“Again?” Rion asked in surprise as he looked around. “When I left, all you four seemed to need was privacy.”
“That didn’t last long, because admitting the truth changed nothing,” Jovvi replied, staring at him with a frown. “But first you’ll have to tell us what’s bothering you. That agitation inside your head is threatening to knock me over.”
“That part of it is fairly simple to explain,” Rion answered, going back to the chair he’d left and collapsing into it. “Mother came calling again, but the servant who came to fetch me pointed out that this is an official residence. No one who might disturb us has to be admitted, so I didn’t let her in.”
“Good for you,” Vallant said with a grin. “I’ll bet she’s still hatin’ bein’ left standin’ on the doorstep.”
“As a matter of fact, it made her tell me exactly what she plans to do once she has me back under her thumb,” Rion agreed, wishing he were up to a grin himself. “She doesn’t seem to understand that I’d rather starve to death in the streets than let her control me again, but that isn’t why I disturbed your … discussion. It so happens I need to ask a favor.”
“As long as it doesn’t involve Lorand and me lyin’ with you, there shouldn’t be a problem,” Vallant said, making the others—and Rion himself—chuckle. “What did you have in mind?”
“I had another caller before Mother,” Rion responded, distantly able to feel the support coming from all four of them. “Naran came to tell me she was no longer at the house where we met the last time. Some friend of hers saw Mother’s people searching the neighborhood trying to locate me, and thought they’d been sent by the man trying to find Naran. Apparently he’s rather powerful and wants her, but since she wants nothing to do with him she’s been forced to keep moving around.”
“So now you know why she disappeared that night,” Jovvi said, looking oddly relieved. “And why she hasn’t told you where her permanent house is. She doesn’t have one.”
“Nor, it seems, does she have any temporary refuge left,” Rion said with a nod. “She was in the process of looking about for one when she came here, stopping by only to make certain that I don’t return to that house in search of her. I—intruded on the privacy of the rest of you by saying that we would hide her here, in the residence. It should be the one place the powerful man searching for her won’t find her.”
“Well, I should hope you did tell her we’d hide her,” Tamrissa said immediately, actually sounding indignant. “No woman should have to do as a man wants simply because he’s powerful and she isn’t. There are enough empty bedchambers that she can have her pick, and we’ll find some way to make certain she doesn’t starve.”
“I think I’ll be able to help with that,” Jovvi said as she nodded agreement with Tamrissa. “I couldn’t think of a decent way to practice that ability I discovered of telling people what to do, but using it to keep your Naran from starving is a good enough cause. One servant and the cook should suffice, and no one else ought to know anything about it.”
“And having Rion’s lady here ought to keep him occupied,” Lorand added rather dryly. “That will make one less thing for Vallant and me to worry about.”
That comment caused another round of general laughter, which warmed Rion through and through. These people were his and he was one of them, a fact which weakened his mother’s threats all the way down to being negligible. With their support he could do and be anything, even a free, independent man. Rion was about to say just that, when a knock at the door interrupted him.
“Please excuse the intrusion, gentles,” the servant said when Lorand opened the door, the same servant who had advised Rion about his callers. “It pains me to disturb your group efforts, but there’s someone at the door for both Dama Domon and Dom Ro. A gentleman for Dama Domon, and a lady for Dom Ro.”
“You’re mistaken,” Vallant told the servant while Tamrissa paled a bit. “If they’re the people I’m thinkin’ about, they’re neither gentleman nor lady. Tell them we’ll be down in a minute.”
The servant bowed and went to do as he’d been told, and Lorand closed the door before grimacing.
“Has someone declared this an official visiting day without telling us?” he asked. “If so, Jovvi and I are at something of a disadvantage.”
“In my case, happily,” Jovvi returned before looking at Tamrissa and Vallant. “Why don’t you two take care of your visitors, and Lorand and I will make plans with Rion about Naran. Later we can get together again and fill each other in, and then get back to our original argument.”
Tamrissa and Vall
ant both showed brief but odd expressions before agreeing, then they moved toward the door. Rion knew he would have to ask about what he’d missed, but truthfully felt very reluctant to do so. It seemed there were definite benefits in being “innocent,” at least as far as certain subjects went…
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
As I left Lorand’s bedchamber with Vallant, I wondered if there would ever come a time when I didn’t feel a chill at hearing that my father had come calling. All brave words and thoughts aside, I would have enjoyed standing behind Vallant before the door was opened. But then I remembered that that woman would also be there, and made the fastest, firmest decision of my life. Using the power to stiffen my backbone and resolve might not be the same as learning to do it without help, but sometimes it’s downright idiotic to refuse whatever help you can get.
“I wonder what Mirra wants this time,” Vallant muttered as he put a hand to my elbow at the stairs. “And she’s here with your father rather than with her own. She’s got to be up to somethin’, but not somethin’ to do us any good.”
“She can be up to anything she pleases,” I replied, relaxing as the strength of the power flowed through me. “She and my father both. I don’t really care what they want, and I’m not letting them in. If Rion can leave his mother on the doorstep, we should be able to do at least as much.”
“You’re touchin’ the power, aren’t you?” he asked very softly, his glance something I could feel. “Are you sure that’s wise?”
“I have no idea if it’s wise,” I replied just as softly. “All I know is that it’s better than letting my father get the upper hand over me. He’s had too many years of making things go his own way for me to worry about playing fair. If he decides he wants fair play after all, he can go and bother someone else.”
Vallant stayed silent after that, but I sensed that he still felt … uneasy, I suppose you could say. His disturbance seemed to center more around worry for me than anything else, which was really nice but nothing which had to distract me. My father was here, and I couldn’t wait until he met the new me.