Shalador's Lady (5 page)

End of discussion, Saetan thought. Except it wasn’t. Not quite. “He’s also concerned about how you’ll respond to him the next time he goes into rut—which will be fairly soon.”

The look in her sapphire eyes sizzled along his nerves. He was her adopted father, and he had never thought of her physically in any other way. But he was also a man and a Warlord Prince, and there was always a sexual awareness between a Warlord Prince and his Queen, even when there was no desire to do anything with that awareness.

When Daemon was caught in the rut’s sexual madness, how much of his relief came from physical sex and how much came from the knife-edged dance of being with Witch in the Misty Place deep in the abyss—of being with the living myth when she revealed the Self that lived within the human body? The Self that was not completely human.

The sizzle faded. He had to clear his throat before he could speak. “I’ll tell Daemon not to worry about the rut.”

*I’ve never worried about the rut,* she told him using a psychic thread.

Now he understood why she didn’t.

Jaenelle closed the distance between them and hugged him. Then she gave him a bright smile. “I’d better get back to the Hall before Daemonar gets his Unka Daemon into trouble.”

“I thought Daemonar had given up the baby talk.”

“Oh, he has for the most part. But he likes the sound of ‘unka,’ and his uncle doesn’t insist that he say the word correctly.”

Saetan smiled. “I see. Off you go, witch-child. Try to keep them both out of the trees, will you?”

“I’ll do my best.”

Later, when he was alone in his suite, preparing to sleep through the midday hours, he allowed himself to remember her in that moment when she showed him a side of Witch a father would never see.

And he allowed himself one moment to envy his son—and to wish he could have been the lover instead of the father.

P
ropped up on one elbow, Ranon watched Shira’s slow return to awareness after the climax that was the finale of a long, slow, intense evening of lovemaking.

Before coming together in Cassidy’s court, they’d had five years of fast, furtive coupling because his interest would have drawn the wrong kind of attention to the Black Widow Healer. Five years when he’d tried to stay away from her and had been unable to resist being with her. Five years of love always being entwined with fear.

Twice that five years, actually, if he counted the years before they became lovers. He had been twenty and still adjusting to the Opal power that coursed through him after he’d made the Offering to the Darkness. She had been sixteen—a young Black Widow, born to the Hourglass Covens, who was just beginning the secret training that would hone the Craft she instinctively knew, as well as the open training required to be a Healer.

They had both been visiting friends in a village that wasn’t home to either of them. They had met by chance when their companions had chosen the same dining house for the midday meal. And that meeting had shaped their hopes and dreams for the next ten years.

Now, thanks to Cassidy, he and Shira could spend time together openly, could spend the night together, could begin to build a life together. That alone would have earned Cassidy his loyalty. The fact that she was proving to be a far stronger ruler than any of them had expected from a Queen who wore a Rose Jewel had earned his respect and a different kind of love. Her will was his life, and he would do everything he could to help her rule Dena Nehele—and by doing so he would do more than he’d dreamed possible for the Shalador people.

“What are you looking at?” Shira asked, her dark eyes reflecting the pleasure of their lovemaking as well as amusement.

His thoughts had drifted beyond her bedroom, but his eyes had been focused on her breasts.

He lowered his head and placed one warm kiss between her breasts before saying, “A Shalador beauty.”

Her response was a little snort. “I know what I look like.”

“But you don’t see what I see,” Ranon said. He was considered a handsome man. The sharp features typical of his people gave his face a rugged handsomeness that went well with a warrior’s lean body, and he had the dark eyes, dark hair, and golden skin that made Shaladorans distinct from the brown-skinned, long-lived races or the fair-skinned races like the people of Dena Nehele.

She had the look of their people, too, and many men had thought the sharp bones of her face and the curves that lacked abundance made her less appealing as a lover—and her sharp tongue and temper discouraged most men from getting close to her. But it was exactly those things about her that excited him in ways no other woman had, and he understood why Gray could look at Cassidy—whom even the most generous supporter could not call pretty—and see a beautiful woman.

Shira turned her head away from him, an evasive movement that wasn’t typical of her.

He considered his words. You don’t see what I see. Then he considered the nature of a Black Widow’s Craft and felt a chill settle in his belly.

“Shira? Have you seen something in a tangled web?”

“I can’t talk about it.”

“Can’t or won’t?”

“Can’t, won’t. The words make no difference.”

They made a difference to him. His voice went flat. “You saw something in a web of dreams and visions.

Didn’t you?”

“I can’t speak of it, Ranon. None of us will speak of it.”

The chill in his belly turned to jagged ice. “How many Black Widows have seen this?”

She sighed, a sound full of exasperation and a hint of anger.

He shifted away from her, sat up, and wrapped his arms around his bent knees. He had no right to push.

If she felt he needed to know, she would have told him. Hell’s fire! She was the one who had pushed him to come to Grayhaven when Theran had first summoned the Warlord Princes to talk about bringing a Queen from Kaeleer. She hadn’t told him anything then, either. She’d just said he had to go.

The Hourglass didn’t divulge what they saw in their tangled webs. Not very often, anyway. And not directly. But a Black Widow never made a suggestion about an action to take without a reason.

“Is it something to do with Cassidy?” he asked.

She didn’t answer.

“Shira . . .” He didn’t know what to ask.

Finally Shira asked quietly, “Who has your loyalty, Prince Ranon? Tell me the list in order.”

His heart ached, but she had asked. Because he would give her nothing less than honesty, the words had to be said. “I love you with everything I am, but my first loyalty is to my Queen. Then you, then our people, then Dena Nehele.”

She sat up and pressed a hand against his face. When he looked at her, she said fiercely, “Remember the order of that list. Hold on to it with everything you are.”

Was she warning him that something might happen to Cassie when they went to the Shalador reserves?

“Hold on to it the same way you’ve held on to your honor,” Shira said.

And that was the answer: Cassidy the Queen came before anything and everything else—his lover, his people, his land.

The visions seen in tangled webs didn’t always come true. Sometimes they were warnings of what might be. Shira was telling him that his choices would make a difference. His choices. And she had told him, without breaking her own code of honor, what his choice had to be.

That night, while Shira slept and he lay awake staring at the dark ceiling of her bedroom, he realized that fear could entwine with hope as well as love, and all he could do was give his best to the two women who were now the center of his life.

D
aemon rounded a corner and let out a roar—which only made his quarry pump those little legs faster.

Hell’s fire. He’d only looked away for a minute while he was packing up the things Daemonar would take home. One damn minute! That’s all it had taken for the boy to shoot out of the bedroom like an arrow released from a bow.

Well, if this was going to be their last pissing contest during this visit, he was not going to lose.

He was going to lose.

When he realized the stairs leading down to the informal receiving room—and beyond that, the great hall

—were up ahead, he ran. The boy was going too fast to get down those stairs without a bad tumble.

Almost in reach. If he couldn’t stop Daemonar . . .

The boy spread those little membranous wings and launched himself over the railing.

Daemon gave a moment’s thought to leaping over the railing and using Craft to make a controlled slide on air, but that wasn’t an easy bit of Craft to do, despite how simple Jaenelle always made it seem, and since it wasn’t something he did on a regular basis—until lately, anyway—a miscalculation could end with a broken leg. Or worse.

At least the door to the great hall was closed, Daemon thought as he pounded down the stairs. At least the little beast didn’t know how to make a pass through a solid object. At least he’d only be chasing a flying boy around a contained space.

Which was when Holt opened the door—and Daemonar dove right at the footman’s head. Startled, Holt dove for the floor, and Daemonar flew past him into the great hall and let out a happy squeal.

Damn! Did someone just open the front door? If Daemonar got outside, it might take hours to catch him.

Leaping over Holt, Daemon skidded into the great hall.

And there was Lucivar, with his arms full of happy boy.

“Hello, boyo,” Lucivar said, giving his bundle of boy a smacking kiss on the cheek.

“Papa! Papa!”

Daemon braced one hand on the wall and sucked in air while he watched the reunion.

“Were you a good boy?” Lucivar asked Daemonar. He gave Daemon what might have been a sheepish look—if it had been anyone else but Lucivar.

“Guess what, Papa! Unka Daemon fell out of a tree!”

Daemon’s face burned with embarrassment.

Lucivar kept his eyes on his son. “What was Uncle Daemon doing in the tree?”

Daemonar suddenly turned shy and began playing with the gold chain that held Lucivar’s Birthright Red Jewel.

“What was Uncle Daemon doing in the tree?” Lucivar asked again.

Daemonar hesitated. “Falling.”

“Uh-huh.”

*Is Marian pregnant?* Daemon asked on a Red psychic thread.

*We won’t know for a few weeks,* Lucivar replied.

You know, you prick, Daemon thought. And Lucivar not giving him a straight answer was an answer.

Lucivar’s gold eyes brightened when Jaenelle stepped into the great hall.

“Hey, boyo.” Jaenelle smiled at Daemonar. “Are you going home without reading one last story with me?”

“No! Put me down, Papa!”

When Lucivar didn’t respond fast enough, Daemonar rammed his feet into his father’s gut and launched himself at Jaenelle.

Too fast, Daemon thought as the boy winged toward Jaenelle. But Daemonar backwinged an arm’s length from his beloved auntie. He dipped and wobbled, but he landed without slamming into Jaenelle.

“Excellent backwinging.” Jaenelle held out her hand as she gave Daemon and Lucivar a warm, amused look. “Come on. We’ll sit in Uncle Daemon’s study and read a story while he and your papa have a little chat.”

When boy and Queen disappeared into the study, Lucivar rubbed his belly. “Well, so much for my minute of being important.”

Daemon didn’t reply. He just crossed the great hall and went into the formal receiving room.

Thank you, Beale, he thought when he saw the tray that held a decanter of brandy and two glasses.

Normally he wouldn’t consider a drink before the midday meal, but today . . .

“You’re looking a bit rough, old son,” Lucivar said as he came into the room and closed the door.

Daemon poured himself a hefty glass of brandy and took a generous gulp. “If you got Marian pregnant, you damn well better have a girl, because if you don’t, I will twist your cock off. I swear it.”

When he didn’t get a smart-ass reply, he turned and looked at his brother—and the look on Lucivar’s face made his heart pound. “What’s wrong? Is Marian all right?”

“She’s fine. She’s good. Father is at the eyrie now, pampering her.” Lucivar made a face. “When I do something, it’s fussing. When he does the same damn thing, it’s pampering.”

“He has a way with women,” Daemon said. “Lucivar . . .”

“Was it that hard?” Lucivar asked. “I know the boy is a handful. Hell’s fire, Bastard, I know he is.”

“We did all right,” Daemon said sourly.

Lucivar sighed. “Look, next time I’ll leave him with the Eyriens and—”

“No, you will not.” Daemon’s voice chilled. “You and I were given a particular code of honor when we were very young—a code that isn’t known by many, if any, who come from Terreille. And that is the code of honor our family will live by. So when your boy needs to spend some days away from you, he comes here. Is that understood?”

“Not all Eyriens view honor as something they can bend to suit themselves,” Lucivar said cautiously.

Falonar. The name of Lucivar’s former second-in-command wasn’t spoken, but it hung in the air between them.

Then the moment, and the tension, were gone.

“Look,” Daemon said, setting the brandy aside. “I’m just pissing and moaning. I fell out of a damn tree.

I’m entitled to piss and moan. And I feel . . . inadequate.” Hell’s fire, it bruised his ego to admit that.

“You’re not Eyrien, old son,” Lucivar said. “You never will be.”

“Yes, I know.”

“No, I don’t think you do.” Lucivar studied him. “We knew Daemonar couldn’t stay with us anymore when I went into rut, and when Marian recognized the signs and got him down to Merry and Briggs before I . . .”

He raked a hand through his black hair. “The boy wanted you. His Uncle Daemon. Who isn’t Eyrien. Who doesn’t fly or fight—at least in a way he understands yet—but who knows lots of things. He doesn’t want you to be Eyrien. He wants to be with you because he loves you.”

Hearing those words relaxed the knot of expectations he’d inflicted on himself—and filled him with warm pleasure.

“I’d better get the little beast home. His mother misses him.” Turning, Lucivar reached for the doorknob, then stopped and looked at Daemon. “You really fell out of a tree?”