Charlotte Boyett-Compo- WIND VERSE- Pleasure's Foehn (19 page)

Seamus was bone-tired as he climbed the stairs to the prince’s chamber. He was in a great deal of pain and his joints protested the long climb. By the time he arrived at the chamber door, his face was white with strain, his bloodshot eyes moister than usual, and he was wheezing for breath. Brushing aside the healer’s steadying arm, he limped 106

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to the prince’s bedside and dropped to the floor, unable to stop the cry that escaped his lips as his knee hit the floor.

“He doesn’t like you to touch him,” the queen said, hurrying over as Seamus reached for Cair’s hand.

Seeing what the old man was doing, the healer rushed forward, as well. “Lord Seamus, you mustn’t undo the strap. He gets more violent and is liable to smash his fist into your face.”

“He won’t,” Seamus snapped as he unbuckled the strap and used all of his waning strength to keep the prince from jerking his hand away.

Growling and grunting as he tried to throw off the hand that had gripped his own, Cair let out a series of vulgar words when he was unable to break the hold around his wrist. He fought having his hand turned over and pressed to the bed, striving to keep his fingers clenched but the painful pressure on his wrist increased until his fingers splayed open.

“What are you doing?” the queen demanded as Seamus used his index finger to tap Cair’s palm.

“Meg, shut the hell up!” Seamus snarled.

The healer gasped and stepped back. No one dared speak to the queen in such a manner and he feared the woman would physically attack the old warrior. He was surprised to see her clamp her mouth shut, though her narrowed eyes spoke volumes. Seamus tapped the same five letters over and over, fighting the hand that tried to close him out, the angry pull that jerked on the old man’s strength. He ignored the vile cursing that came from the prince and kept repeating the same five letters—

Dash, dot, dot

Dot, dash

Dot, dot, dot, dash

Dot, dash

Dash, dot

D

A

V

A

N

Cair hissed and spat. He howled his frustration, his entire body jerking as he strove to snatch his hand from its imprisonment. His head whipped to and fro on the pillow and he cursed a blue streak—so vulgar his mother hid her face in her hands.

“Whatever you are doing isn’t working,” the queen complained and tried to push Seamus out of the way for Cair was becoming more agitated. 107

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Infuriated that the young man wasn’t responding, Seamus pushed himself from the floor with the agility of a man half his age and with a curse of his own slapped Cair Ghrian as hard as he could, rocking Cair’s head to one side and bloodying his nose.

“What the hell’s the matter with you?” the queen shrieked and would have pushed Seamus away but the old man had a death grip on her son’s hand and was stabbing him once more in the center of his palm, over and over again.

“Pay attention, boy!” Seamus shouted and the pressure he pushed into the young man’s hand was brutal.

Cair went completely still, blood dripping from his right nostril. Though he could see nothing, he was staring at the far wall, his forehead crinkled.

“That’s it, son. Listen to what I’m telling you,” Seamus said and decreased the force with which he was stabbing the prince’s hand.

“You aren’t saying anything, you old coot. You’ve lost what little mind you had,”

the healer complained. “Come away, Seamus. You are making matters worse!” He started to reach out for the old warrior’s arm but the queen held up her hand.

“Cairnan is aware of what you’re doing, Seamus,” she said. One final time Seamus went through the sequence of letters that spelled out the one word he hoped would gain the prince’s attention. So exhausted he could barely draw breath, he tapped out the final letter, his index finger still in the center of Cair’s palm, and hung his head.

The queen held her breath for her son’s fingers were curling over Seamus’.

“Davan?” Cair asked, his voice strained.

Seamus gradually raised his head. Cair’s face was turned toward him, the blind stare and hopeful look hurt the old man to the pit of his soul. When the prince called his lady’s name once more and squeezed Seamus’ fingers, the aged warrior groaned.

“No, son,” he said and took Cair’s hand and brought it to his face so the prince could
see
who it was.

Cair’s fingers traced the deep lines on the old man’s face and the hopeful look vanished from his face. “Seamus,” he stated in a flat, dead voice. Seamus brought Cair’s hand down to the bed once more and tapped aye into Cair’s palm.

“Where is she?” the prince asked. “Where is my lady?”

“Don’t tell him,” the queen warned.

Seamus looked around at her. “You want me to lie to the boy?”

“If you tell him she was taken by the Aduaidh, he’ll go berserk again,” the healer said. He was drawing up another dosage of tenerse.

“You keep that shit away from this boy!” Seamus snarled. “You’ve got him so drugged now he doesn’t know which end is up!”

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Cair flinched for a dim shaft of light zipped from right to left across his darkened vision and for the first time in days he heard sound—rumblings he couldn’t make out—

and held as still as he could, hoping both sight and sound were returning to him.

“Tell him we’ve sent a team after Davan,” the queen suggested.

“You want me to lie to him,” Seamus accused. “We ain’t sent no team.”

“Seamus,” the queen said, coming to stand at the old man’s side. “Cairnan is in no condition to know the truth right now. He…”

The rumblings were becoming clearer and Cair could make out words—can’t, doesn’t, won’t, couldn’t—and the negative connotations of those words terrified him.

“Where is my lady?” he repeated.

Seamus locked glares with his queen. “If you want to lie to that boy, you tell him. I won’t!”

“Tell him how?” Cair’s mother demanded. “I don’t even know what it is you are doing!”

As the sound became crisper in Cair’s ears, the darkness before his eyes began to lift. Ebony waves shifting across his line of vision became candescent swirls that lightened to a dark gray ash then finally to a pale silver as colors began to seep beneath the cinereous shadows. He held very still, barely breathing, and as full sound returned, had to force himself not to shout with elation. The first clear words he heard came from Seamus.

“Healer, get the hell out of here until I call you.”

Schooling himself not to show any emotion at all and to keep his eyes steady, Cair was amazed Seamus would speak so to the doctor and stunned when his mother ordered the healer from the room.

At the sound of the door closing, the queen reached out and shoved Seamus. “Don’t you dare give orders like that again, Seamus Rawls!”

Seamus still had hold of Cair’s hand and his fingers tightened around the prince’s.

“For once will you just trust me to know what is best for our son, Meg?”

“Seamus!” the queen admonished. “Be careful what you say!”

“No one can hear us, Meg. We need to let him know what he’s up against.”

Absolute astonishment rippled through Cair and he stared at his mother’s face. It was all he could do not to let his mouth sag open and give away the fact that he could both hear and see—not clearly but well enough. There was still some distortion of sound and blurriness to his vision and now his heart was pounding.

“What can he do, Seamus?” he heard his mother ask. “He can’t see or hear. Knowing his wife is in the hands of the enemy can only hurt him.”

The truth was a wicked barbed arrow piercing his heart and he barely noticed Seamus letting go of his hand.

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“We’ll get her back for him, Meggie,” Seamus said softly, reaching out to touch the queen’s cheek with his weathered palm. “The Aduaidh can’t risk allowing her to be hurt. The Burgon wants the lad, not her.”

The queen covered the old man’s hand with hers. “And if he knows that, he’ll offer himself in her stead, Seamus. We can’t let him do that!”

“Of course, we can’t, but how do you plan on stopping him? As soon as the Aduaidh sends its demands, the boy will do all he can to get the wench back. If you ain’t noticed, he loves that gal.”

“Why don’t you let the
boy
make his own decisions?” Cair snapped, jerking on the arm that was still lashed to the bed. “Undo this damned strap, Seamus!”

Both the queen and Seamus jumped at the demand and stared wide-eyed, guilt written plainly on their faces.

“How long have you been able to see?” Seamus asked.

“How long have you been able to
hear
?” the queen put in.

“Long enough to learn things you two obviously never had any intention of me ever finding out,” Cair answered. He jerked viciously on the strap. “Get this off me!

Now!”

Seamus hesitated for a moment then hurried around to the other side of the bed. He quickly unbuckled the strap that had been anchored to the bed frame. As soon as his wrist was free, Cair ordered his ankles untied and when that was done pushed himself up in the bed—too rapidly and with much force for the world spun around and around him and his vision darkened a bit. He put a hand to his head and closed his eyes to combat the vertigo.

“Cairnan, don’t fly off the handle,” his mother pleaded. “You were—”

“What happened to me?” the prince asked, directing his question to Seamus.

“The Net was compromised,” Seamus replied. “You were in the room with the lady when the Aduaidh shot a pick-up beam in there. We found you lying on the floor unconscious and the lady was gone.”

“How the hell did the Aduaidh get past The Net?” The question was spat out nastily.

“Since only two of us know how the thing works and I know the information on how to disable it didn’t come from me, I suspect you blabbed it to that Iodálach whore at some point when you were foxed,” Seamus snapped back in an equally spiteful tone. Pain moved over Cair’s face and he sat there—his eyes shifting from side to side as clarity of his vision returned—trying to think if he had, indeed, ever boasted of knowing how to disengage the protection arc that covered his home world.

“I’ve changed all the codes and added different directionals to both the high-level and low-level force fields so Amhantar is safe from having its citizens extracted,”

Seamus stated. “I suspect your lady was snatched up by a Wyvern marauder.”

“B’reith Avatás’. The
Kady
,” Cair whispered. “The ship that attacked LeClerc’s.”

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“Most likely.”

“There have been no demands,” the queen said but her son was ignoring her. He didn’t even look her way. “I have sent several messages to The Burgon but he has yet to reply.”

“As soon as you’re able, I’ll put together a team and we’ll go after her, lad,” Seamus said.

Cair narrowed his eyes. “How long have I been lying here drugged to the gills?”

“Three days,” Seamus replied.

“Why haven’t you sent a team before now?”

“I sent Seamus to Mount Ciúin. I had hoped the Brotherhood would allow Bennick to return,” his mother explained. “They wouldn’t but—”

“Your brother didn’t want to return,” Seamus said. “He was a big help, though. I had forgotten about that code until he reminded me. At least we had a way to communicate with you.”

“And bring you out of your hysterical blindness,” the queen put in. “We knew it was only a matter of time before—”

“Why,” Cair said, his lips skinned back from his teeth and his angry glare locked on Seamus, “didn’t you send a rescue team after my lady as soon as she was taken?”

“That was my decision,” his mother said and Cair’s head snapped around and he impaled her with a look that turned her face white. She raised her chin. “You were incapacitated—unable to see or hear—and we needed a man to rule Amhantar. If you weren’t going to be capable of doing that, I wanted Bennick here to do it for you. Securing Amhantar was more important than running after Avatás when we knew damned well we wouldn’t be able to find him.”

“He has chameleon cloaking on the
Kady
, lad,” Seamus said. “That’s how he was able to sneak up on the
Faucon
as he did. Hell, we didn’t pick him up, either, until the moment he de-cloaked and grabbed your woman. By then, it was too late. He shot out of here like a bat outta torment.”

Fury turned Cair’s amber eyes to molten gold. “Get out,” he said, glaring at Seamus once more.

“Now, listen here, Cairnan—” his mother began but her son actually hissed at her, throwing her a damning look that would have chilled any man facing him in combat and she stammered to a halt. Despite the rage being thrown at her, she straightened her shoulders. “I think you forget I am not only your mother but your queen. You will show me the respect I am due, young man, or I will—”

“What?” Cair barked. “Take the scepter from a hand that didn’t want it in the first place? Disown me? Throw me in the dungeon?” He spat out a vicious vulgarity. “Do it. I don’t give a rat’s ass. Just get the hell out of my room!”

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Seamus reached out and took hold of the queen’s arm, pulling her toward the door despite her protests. “Leave him be, Your Majesty,” Seamus said and winced at the hoot of derision that came from the younger man.

“I’ll not have a son of mine—” the queen started to say but Seamus yanked the door open and pushed her out before she could finish what she had been about to say. He glanced back at Cair then closed the door behind them.

The tenerse had dried Cair’s mouth out and he shot out a trembling hand to take up the carafe of water that had been placed on his night table. Distaining the use of the goblet sitting beside it, he lifted the carafe and drained nearly half of it, splashing some down the front of his naked chest. When he had drank his fill, he threw the carafe across the room, annoyed that it didn’t shatter as it hit the wall but rather clunked against it and bounced on the thick carpet.

Swinging his legs from the bed, he sat on the edge and waited until the vertigo passed once more and he was able to stand. Weak from the saturation of tenerse in his system, he felt as though he was walking under water as he made his way to the armoire and jerked the doors open. Without looking to see what he’d snagged, he yanked a pair of britches from a shelf, snatched up a shirt then peeled off the sickbay pajamas they’d no doubt put on him as he lay unconscious. He dressed quickly—