Queen of Song and Souls (30 page)

"What is it?" She gasped. "What has happened?" All she could think of was the war threatening Sebourne and Barrial lands. Had their homes been besieged? "Colum ..." She took several steps towards him.

"Pack your bags, Talisa. We leave for home today—and by home I mean Moreland."

Her jaw dropped. "Leaving? But just last night you said we weren't going to leave the city. You and Da both agreed the borders were too dangerous and that we needed to stay here."

"That was before I knew what you were up to."

She blinked in utter confusion. "What I was
up to!"
she echoed.

His mouth twisted in a bitter sneer. "Don't take me for such a fool, Talisa. My father had a visitor this morning before I arrived at Old Castle. Someone who informed him on good authority that your lover—that wife-stealing
rultshart
of a Fey—didn't go back to the Fading Lands. He didn't even go north to your father's lands, which is where I suspected he'd be waiting for you. The thieving
bogrot
has been here in the city all this time."

Her hand rose to her throat, and the sudden, wild acceleration of her pulse pounded against her fingertips. "Are you talking about... Adrial"

Colum's handsome face contorted with rage. "Don't you dare pretend innocence!"

"It's no pretense!" she shot back. "I haven't seen Adrial since he and his brother left with the Tairen Soul and the rest of the Fey over a month ago."

"Lying
petchka!"
His hand shot out.

Talisa gave a choked cry, but he moved so fast she had no chance to duck his blow. Her eyes squeezed shut in an instinctive reaction and she braced herself for the smack of his hand against her cheek.

The blow never came.

She pried open her eyes to find Colum frozen
,
his hand a scant breath from her face, his face purple with rage.

"Colum? Oh, gods." Realization sucked the breath from her lungs, and she gave a short gasp. "Oh gods, he was right. You are here." She turned on trembling legs as the air around her began to sparkle with tiny flashes of light.

Seven leather-clad Fey warriors shimmered into visibility, their pale, shining faces grim, their eyes cold and flat and filled with lethal intent.

She barely saw six of the warriors. Her gaze—her entire being—focused on only one: the achingly beautiful face of the man she'd dreamed of all her life, the truemate she'd never thought to see again. Her heart leapt into her throat, and even though Colum was standing frozen a scant arm's length away, her soul soared with dizzying joy.

"Adrial." She took one step towards him, her shaking hands outstretched. He closed the rest of the distance in a flash. His arms wrapped around her, pulling her tight to his chest, pressing her so close she could feel the hard forms of his Fey'cha daggers and hear the beat of his heart in her ear. Abruptly, the tears she'd kept to herself as she cried into her pillow each night burst free, and she began sobbing as though her heart were breaking. "Adrial... oh, Adrial..."

He bent his head, his black hair spilling over his shoulders to envelop her in fragrant dark silk. He smelled of springtime and warm meadows, of fresh sunlight after a long winter's dark.
"Aiyah,
I am here,
shei'tani
. I never left your side ... and I never will."

"Oh, Adrial." Talisa nearly wept with regret. "You cannot be here. You can't," she said, no matter how much she wanted him to stay. Her hands traced the soft, fine-grained skin of his face. She couldn't stop gazing at him, touching him. "The reasons you had to leave before haven't changed. I cannot go with you."

"You cannot stay with him." Adrial jerked his chin towards Colum's frozen body. "And you definitely are not going to the borders. It is far too dangerous. The real fighting hasn't yet begun, but it soon will, and I want you nowhere near what's coming."

"What choice do I have? Colum is my husband, and he has said we must return to our home."

"Your home is with me."

Her lips trembled. The fingers stroking his face trembled, too. "No. It isn't. Though I wish with all my heart it were."

He caught her hand and pressed a kiss into her palm. "Say the word, Talisa, and I will make it so. Ramiel—the Fey who serves as Spirit master of your quintet—can spin a weave to change diSebourne's mind so that he will agree to let you go."

"That sort of weave is forbidden. If you were caught, the penalty would be death!"

"Then I would take care they didn't catch me." His grip tightened.
"Teska, shei'tani,
let me set you free."

The lure was so powerful, so tempting. But before she could open her mouth and damn herself, she saw her father's face and heard once more his sober lecture on the inviolability of a Barrial's vow and the dangerous political explosion that would ensue if the wife of Great Lord Sebourne's heir ran off with a Fey warrior. She turned her head away, closing her eyes to block out the sight of Adrial's beloved face. "I can't. He's not just some common man, Adrial. He's the heir of a Great Lord, and his father already hates the Fey. You saw it yourself this summer. If I left with you, Lord Sebourne would plunge this country into civil war. Celieria can't be divided that way right now."

"No one needs to know. If Ramiel spins the weave, they'll all think it's Colum's idea."

"Lord Sebourne would know... and so would I." She bowed her head and stared at her tightly clasped hands. "When I married Colum, I swore an oath before the gods that bound my life to his. I cannot forsake my vow."

"He has already forsaken it. Did he not vow to care for you and keep you from harm? Yet he lifted his hand against you. If we had not been here, he would have struck you."

"He was upset."

"He would have struck you," Adrial repeated. The thickly lashed eyes that could be so meltingly warm were hard as polished stones. "If he had, I would have killed him for it."

She pressed her fingers to his lips to silence him. "Don't say such things. Don't even think them."

"There is nothing I would not do to keep you safe,
shei'tani.
No Celierian law I would not break, no enemy I would not kill. Wed to this mortal you may be, but I will not let him touch you. I
cannot."

With those words, Colum's strangely accommodating behavior these last weeks suddenly made sense. She drew back, covering her mouth with a hand to stifle her shocked gasp. "You're the reason he hasn't pressed me to come to his bed. Oh, Adrial, what have you done?"

"I did what I had to do." Adrial gripped her arms. "You are my mate, my
shei’tani
, and our bond is not complete. If he touched you, I would kill him. Since both you and Rain made me swear not to do so, I had no choice but to make certain he never laid a hand on you."

"Bright Lord save me." Talisa began to pace. "You spun a weave on him." When she drew near Colum, who now lay senseless in a heap on a nearby chaise, she gave a small, choked cry and whirled away to pace in the opposite direction. Around the room, Adrial's brother and the other five Fey watched her in silence. "Oh, gods, if anyone suspects—if they find out—you'll be executed."

Adrial rose to follow her. 'Talisa ..."

"No!" She spun to face him and raised her hand. "I'm his wife, Adrial. His
wife
!"

"And you're my truemate!" he retorted. "DiSebourne can get another wife. Mortals often do. There is no other mate for me but you, and never shall be."

"Adrial..." A sudden commotion outside the library doors made Talisa break off. She blanched at the sound of familiar male voices calling her name. "Oh, dear gods. My father and brothers are here. Lord Sebourne is with them. Quickly, you've got to leave! They can't find you here!" She whirled and started to race across the room, only to stop in a spurt of panic. "Wait! What about Colum? You can't leave him like this."

Adrial turned his head and rapped out, "Ramiel." The Spirit master moved to Colum's side, and Talisa saw his hands and eyes begin to glow.

'Talisa?" Her father's voice called just outside the library doors. The crystal doorknobs began to turn.

"Go!" she cried softly. "Hurry!" Tiny sparks of electricity raced across her skin, raising the hairs on her arms. Adrial and the Fey shimmered into invisibility just as the library doors swung inward.

"DiSebourne!" Talisa's father stormed into the room and made a beeline for her husband, who had risen to his feet and was rubbing his temples. "What's this I hear about you planning to take my daughter to the borders? Have you lost what sense the gods gave you? There's a war on, man!"

Colum turned, his brow knit in confusion. "Lord Barrial? Father?"

"Stay out of this, Barrial," Lord Sebourne snapped. "You've done enough interfering as it is. She's a Sebourne now, and Sebourne wives go where their husbands guide them. Colum is going home to our estate to help oversee its defenses—and his bride
will
accompany him!"

Talisa's father whirled on his neighbor. His lips drew back in a snarl, and in that moment, he looked every bit like the wild wolf that dominated the Barrial coat of arms, "You will not endanger my daughter's life just so your son can feel like a man in control of his wife. If he possessed an ounce of regard for her safety, he would insist she remain here, as far away from the conflict as possible."

"Oh, would he?” Lord Sebourne sneered. "You'd like that, wouldn't you? Was arranging for Talisa to be alone here with her lover part of whatever plan you and the Fey were hatching with the king?"

"What in the Seven Hells are you talking about?' Cann exclaimed "Did a week in Old Castle rot your brain?"

"Don't play the innocent. Colum and I know what's been going on here. Don't we, Colum?"

"I..." Colum shook his head and dragged his fingers through his hair.

Lord Sebourne squinted at him and stepped closer. "What's wrong with you, boy?" His brows shot up to his hairline.

Alarmed that Lord Sebourne might discover Adrial had been manipulating Colum's mind, Talisa leapt forward. "Father. Lord Sebourne. Please. There is no need for you to argue." Talisa put her hand on Colum's arm. "Colum has already explained why we must go north with you and the king's army. I was just about to have my maid begin packing when you arrived."

"Talisa!" her father exclaimed. "It's out of the question. War has begun. Every estate on the borders is in danger of being overrun by the Eld. You could be killed."

«Shei'tani, nei! I've already told you, it is too dangerous.»

Adrial's voice was so clear in her head, it shocked her that the others could not hear him. The rich tones shivered up and down her spine like a warm caress, the sound so intoxicatingly sensual it was all she could do not to groan aloud and rush towards the spot where she now knew he was standing.

Her reaction solidified her resolve. Adrial and her father were wrong. The most dangerous place for her wasn't in the north near the battlefront. it was right here in Celieria City— especially if Colum went north with his father and left her behind. Talisa harbored no illusions. If she were left alone with Adrial—honor, marital vows, even duty to the Bright Lord be damned—she would not long withstand the lure of his presence. She would throw away everything to follow him. To be with him.

And that meant she could not stay.

"We're borderfolk, Da. We've lived in the jaws of the beast our whole lives, and we don't run from danger. Colum is my husband, and if he is leaving, then I must accompany him"

"Well." Lord Sebourne regarded her with an expression that flickered between surprise, suspicion, and reluctant approval. "I'm glad to see you're thinking like the wife of a Sebourne. It's about time."

Talisa bit her lip. Shame rode her hard. She wasn't any sort of a proper wife for Colum. She never had been, "Yes, my lord."

"Then see to it my son and you are packed and ready to depart within the bell. We ride out with the king. I’ll send a carriage at half ten to collect you."

"Yes, my lord." Talisa dipped a brief curtsy. "Colum and I will be ready and waiting. Now if you'll please excuse me, I’ll go see to the packing." She turned to exit the room.

At the foot of the stairs, a warm breeze brushed across her face, and Adrial's voice whispered in her ear.

«
I won't leave you, shei'tani.
No matter your Path, I will walk
it beside you.»

Talisa shivered and paused with one foot on the stairs. "You'll do what you must," she whispered in response. "And so will I." And with stoic resolve, she started up the stairs.

Celieria City ~ The Royal Palace

When Jiarine entered the queen's antechambers to prepare Her Majesty for the army's departure celebration, she found Annoura's bedchamber door firmly closed and the space outside filled with Dazzles milling uselessly about.

"What are you doing here?” she cried when she saw them. "Why aren't you helping Her Majesty get dressed?”

The queen has refused to let anyone enter, my lady," one of the Dazzles explained. "She says she's not coming out. She says she will not watch her husband ride to his death,"

Alarmed, Jiarine hurried to the bedchamber door and rapped twice.

"Go away!" a hoarse croak of a voice called from within the room. "I told you, I will not go!"