Challenges (34 page)

I smiled my thanks without correcting her, wondering if she hadn’t seen my master’s bracelet or simply didn’t know what it was. People with a Low talent in Fire magic usually had very little control, as control took practice and Low talents rarely bothered. I’d never burned anyone by accident in my life, but if I were the group’s protection, I might have to do it on purpose…

“That’s Lorand over there,” I said with a gesture once the two cups of tea were ready. “Rion and Jovvi are already beginning to stir, so let’s get the last of them. I’m Tamrissa, by the way.”

She acknowledged that with a shy smile and a nod, obviously knowing I already knew her name, and started toward Lorand. I took my own cup over to Vallant, who opened his eyes when I sat down next to him.

“It’s almost worth feelin’ like this to have you sit this close,” he murmured, those very light eyes filled with amusement. “I can’t remember you ever doin’ it before.”

“I never helped make you half dead before,” I countered weakly, wishing it were possible to learn how not to blush. “Stop talking silliness and drink this.”

His grin was brief but very amused, and the way he kept those eyes on my face while he drank served to divert me from chilling thoughts of having to burn people on purpose. Instead I was pulled into thoughts of what he and I would soon be sharing, and a shiver of a different sort coursed through me.

“Your excellent idea seems to be working, Tamma,” Jovvi said just as Vallant was finishing the last of the tea. “I think I actually have enough strength now to get the blood flowing in my veins again.”

I glanced over to see that she’d straightened where she sat, and the color had come back to her face. Rion was now climbing slowly to his feet, but only to move to the couch where Naran had been, where he sat heavily. He, too, looked better, and his smile improved him even more when Naran finished helping Lorand and went to sit beside him.

“I’d say we learned an important lesson just now,” Jovvi went on. “We ignored the signal telling us we were overdoing it, and almost caused ourselves serious damage. Next time we’ll have to—”

“Signal?” I interrupted, finding myself lost. “I don’t remember anything like a signal, so you’ll have to explain what you’re talking about.”

“I don’t remember a signal either,” Rion put in with a frown, his arm about Naran’s shoulders. “Were Tamrissa and I the only ones excluded?”

“You can add me to the list,” Lorand said from the chair he still sprawled in. “I wasn’t aware of anything that could be considered a signal.”

“And me,” Vallant agreed. “Nothin’ like a signal reached me.”

“Then the fault was mine alone,” Jovvi said with a frown from her place to my left. “I assumed everyone felt the same, but apparently I’m the one who’s supposed to watch over our well-being. Even simply being a small part of what we were I could feel the strain, the growing demand that we stop and go back. Next time I’ll know enough to let the awareness spread, so … WE can know everything that’s happening.”

“I wish
I
knew what was happening, but I think I’m afraid to ask,” Naran offered in a small voice. “You’re all so close, I can feel that like some tangible, solid presence. Am I intruding here? If I am, I’ll be more than willing to leave again…”

“After what we went through to get you in here?” Lorand asked immediately with a sound of ridicule while Rion showed sudden worry. “If you decided to leave now, I’d probably break down and cry.”

“And I’d be cryin’ with you for sure,” Vallant said at once as he straightened up on the couch beside me. “But we men are the delicate, sensitive sort. I’ve got to warn you that our ladies won’t be cryin’.”

“Stop trying to frighten her, Vallant,” Jovvi said with amusement before moving her gaze to Naran. “Tamma and I aren’t the steel hard monsters he’s suggesting we are, but even more importantly we understand how you feel. We all are closer than any group you’ve ever known, but you have to remember that Rion is one of us. As important as you are to him, that’s almost as important as you are to us. We don’t regret the effort we put into bringing you inside, we just wish we’d been more cautious in the expending of it.”

“I’ve just realized something,” Naran said slowly, her expression odd. “I should have seen it sooner, of course, but you simply don’t expect—That identification Rion wore when he and I first met… I barely glanced at it, but obviously I should have looked closer. You’re all members of one of the challenging Blendings, aren’t you? You might even become the next Seated Five. Oh, my goodness—!”

“Naran, please don’t tell me that it makes a difference in how you feel!” Rion said miserably, flinching at the awed look in her eyes. “We’re the same people we were when you and I last met, so please don’t begin to think that anything has changed.”

“But of course it’s changed,” she denied, now gazing at him longingly. “You’re so very important, and I’m completely insignificant. I’d hoped our time together would be longer, but once you’ve won the competitions you’ll be much too busy to bother with me. I don’t mind that, I really don’t, not when we’ll have each other from now until then. Just … when do the competitions begin?”

“We haven’t been told that yet,” Rion replied with a sigh of relief, pulling her close again. “For a moment of dread I was certain you meant to say you feared me, but happily we’ve been spared that. You simply believe I mean to toss you aside, and time will disprove that more thoroughly than words. But do please note that our winning is by no means guaranteed. Instead of joining us in the palace of the Five, you may well have to join us when we run for our lives.”

“Oh, but of course you’ll win,” she said quickly, putting a gentle hand to his face. “Don’t let that worry you even for a moment… I’m … really certain, so please don’t feel disturbed. It gives me pain to see your face creased with frown lines.”

And then she began to massage his face slowly and gently with her fingers, a fierce look of dedicated concentration on her own face. With the crisis over I tried to exchange a glance with Jovvi, but Jovvi seemed wrapped up in private thoughts. Or in the midst of drifting off to sleep, which was more than possible.

“Now seems to be the time to send all of you back to where you belong,” I announced as I stood. “We have to be as rested as possible when our visitor—or visitors—arrive tomorrow—I mean, later today. Oh, you all know what I mean.”

“What you mean is that you’re almost as tired and befuddled as we are,” Lorand replied as he pushed himself to his feet. “May I have the honor of walking you to your door, Dama Hafford?”

“Only if you expect me sleep at my door,” Jovvi answered dryly as she took the hand Lorand extended to help her off the couch. “I seriously doubt that I can make it all the way to my bed by myself.”

“Then I would be a cad if I left you at the door,” he said, looking down into her eyes. “Perish the thought that I would ever be a cad.”

Jovvi sent a smile to match the one he now showed, and they moved together toward the door to the hall. By now Rion and Naran were also up and moving, his arm around her shoulders as he pretended to lean on her. I say pretended, because she could no more have really supported him than Jovvi or I could have. Naran didn’t seem to know that, though, or maybe she had higher expectations of her physical strength. As they moved out into the hall, I heard her urge him in a whisper to lean on her as heavily as he needed to.

“That was nicely done,” Vallant said, and when I turned from closing the door behind those who had left, I saw that he’d managed to stand. “Now let’s help each other to your bed.”

That stupid blush flamed in my cheeks again, but I had no intention of letting anything interfere with the time I’d so been looking forward to. I approached him slowly and offered my hand, and his bigger one swallowed it up. But gently and softly, like a cotton net over a butterfly. And then I was actually leading him to my bedchamber, just as I’d dreamed about a hundred times.

We paused near the bed to share a brief kiss, and it quickly became very obvious that standing up was far from easy for him. So I suggested that he disrobe while I used the comfort facility, and then he could do the same before we settled down. He agreed with a smile before giving me another fleeting kiss, then began to move around to the side of the bed. At the last instant I grabbed a wrap to take into the comfort facility with me, to keep from having to walk naked to the bed. I still didn’t feel quite up to that, and knew I would probably blush more than enough without adding to the situation.

I would swear it never took me longer to undress in my life, although objectively speaking it probably wasn’t any longer than usual. It was just that all objectivity was well out of my reach, displaced by wild impatience and anticipation. If I hadn’t been so nervously intense I would have been able to forget about emptying my bladder, but that choice simply wasn’t possible. So I waited the months and years it took to relieve myself, rinsed my hands and pulled the wrap on, then
finally
hurried back to the bed.

“Vallant, it’s your turn,” I said softly, climbing onto the bed next to him. He lay on his back under the quilts with his eyes closed, but that broad, magnificent chest was fully exposed. Resting while he was able was a marvelous idea, but the time for rest was over. “Vallant, when you get back I’ll be right here waiting for you.”

I put my hand to his bare shoulder, expecting those very blue eyes to open with a smile, but nothing happened. No smile and no eyes opening, which quickly began to upset me.

“Vallant, please don’t tease,” I asked, shaking his shoulder a bit. “You have no idea how long I’ve been waiting… Please stop pretending to be asleep.”

The shoulder under my hand barely moved to the shaking, and the rest of him didn’t move at all. Instead I noticed how deep and slow his breathing was, adding to the image of a man lost to exhausted sleep. He wasn’t teasing and he wasn’t pretending, he’d really fallen asleep.

I sat back on my side of the bed, bitterly staring at a wall. After all that waiting and anticipating, I now had a dead body sharing my bed. In another moment or two I would replace the wrap with a nightgown, turn down all the lamps in the apartment, then lay down to sleep myself, but first…

First I had to decide between crying my eyes out, and smashing everything breakable within reach…

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

Despite a late night, Delin rose earlier than usual. He sat at his writing desk for a short while, then searched out his carriage driver in the servants’ quarters. Giving the man the sealed envelope he’d prepared and saying it was to be delivered to Timbal was all that was necessary. His driver had done the same more than once before, and had learned long ago not to ask impertinent questions.

The servants were just setting out the breakfast buffet when Delin entered the dining room, so he took a cup of tea to the table to wait for them to finish. The note he’d sent to Timbal, instructing the sleazy little man to see to the anonymous delivery of the letter accompanying his note, would be obeyed without delay—and without the unauthorized opening of the letter. Delin had used the little guttersnipe for years to see to errands he didn’t care to be associated with, and he’d long ago taught the man what would happen if he pried too deeply into the affairs of his betters.

So Delin wasn’t concerned over the possibility of his letter being seen by the wrong eyes, but that didn’t mean he was
un
concerned. The letter contained the triggering phrase that would be used against the first peasants who were to face Adriari and her group, the peasants who had been in blue and silver the night of the ball at the palace. He’d originally meant to send them the triggering phrase almost as soon as he’d discovered it, then he’d found himself with second thoughts.

Second thoughts had led to third, mostly suspicion over how wise that course of action really was. The peasants would be freed of almost all restraint, and the information his own group had about them might prove insufficient when it became time to face them. He’d decided to think about it a bit more, but then his exultation had gotten the better of him. Between the Blending they’d managed yesterday and the elimination of his greatest enemy, Delin had recklessly ignored all thoughts of caution and had sent the letter.

“Which I don’t really regret doing, despite feeling uneasy,” he muttered to his cup of tea. The servants were no longer in the room, so he was able to speak to whatever he pleased. “You can’t keep making decisions then changing your mind, not if you intend to retain the leadership of those around you, so I won’t change my mind. I just wish I were filled with fewer misgivings…”

“Well, good morning,” a voice came, and Delin looked up to see an almost unrecognizably bright-eyed Bron entering the room. “I expected to be first in for breakfast this morning, but you’ve beaten me to it. Even though you haven’t actually taken any breakfast yet.”

Bron’s good mood and gentle humor were almost as shocking as his appearance at that time of the morning. Not only wasn’t the Fire magic user sullen, he was actually dressed in clothing rather than a wrap. Delin sipped his tea, wondering if it were possible for one to nearly burn one’s tongue on hot tea in a dream, and then the situation was made even worse.

“Good morning, good morning,” Homin sang out as he and Selendi entered hand in hand, both of them looking just as wide awake as Bron did. “We decided we wanted to know what breakfast tastes like when it hasn’t been kept warm for hours.”

Predictably, Selendi laughed at that, but unexpectedly so did Bron. That went even further to convince Delin that he was dreaming, but the absence of one of their number kept the dream scene from being complete.

“If this were real, Kambil would have shown up before you three,” Delin pointed out, then had to ignore their renewed laughter. “I’m perfectly serious. Since Kambil isn’t here, I must be dreaming.”

“A servant told me that Kambil left instructions not to be disturbed until twenty minutes before Lord Idian is due,” Bron supplied with a chuckle as he filled a plate. “He was really tired last night, and obviously wants to restore his strength before we Blend for Lord Idian. For the first time.”