Guardian of Honor (45 page)

She looked up at him. He'd always been honest with her. Luthan had
been a little sneaky, the Singer was an unknown, but Bastien had been brutally
honest.

"Have you had a—" she took care to form the words
correctly "—Song Quest?"

He grimaced. "Yes, when I was nearly a teenager." He
smirked at Luthan. "It was supposed to take place before my first sexual
experience, but no one told me and they were too late."

The Singer raised thin eyebrows. "I remember it well. Do you,
Bastien?" Her voice was smoother and richer than honey.

Bastien gulped. "Ah, no, Singer. Not entirely. My Power was
too uncontrolled. I don't remember the trance."

"Just as well," she replied serenely.

"Trance?" Alexa's voice rose. "A trance?" She
didn't know if she liked the idea. Dreams were one thing, an induced trance
something entirely different.

They reached the Temple's huge oak door. Luthan hurried to open
it. The Singer walked on, close to Alexa, then tripped over the threshold.
Alexa reached for her. The Singer linked hands with Alexa, and she was swept
away into a montage of flowing visions.

Shock stilled her, with her mouth open to protest. Blackness
filled with evil things descended, and the gray edge of death advanced, then
was parted like a theater curtain to show scenes of Colorado! She saw the
mountains outside Denver, the city itself—but changed. She blinked and saw
herself, older, shedding black judge's robes, walking away from an office with
a sign on the door that said, "U.S. District Court Judge, Alexa
Fitzwalter." The scene shifted, zoomed in, passed a huge, beautiful house
to a backyard garden, and a barbecue with many people talking and laughing,
jazz in the background. Several children played, shrieking with glee, and Alexa
realized with shock that two of them, a boy and a girl, were hers. The girl
smiled with a cheeky, missing-toothed grin. Alexa's heart lurched with yearning
and love. A man's deep voice spoke behind her and she knew it was her husband.
A man she greatly cared for.

Chords of music clashed loudly in her head. She thought she cried
out. Around her was Lladrana, deep green fields, misty rain, bodies of monsters
and volarans littering the ground. In the distance was a tossing gray-green
sea. She wiped her arm across her forehead and her sleeve came away bloody. She
hurt. She
grieved for fallen friends. She ached with weariness
from the battle, the one the day before, the one that might come a day later.
Flickering images seemed to telescope a future of endless fighting, from
different angles—on foot, on horseback, on volaran-back. Bastien was always
there, her Shield, her strength, comforting. She loved him deeply, nearly
desperately, with love that grew each day and was returned in kind. Her
friendship with the Marshalls had deepened into love too. When she thought of
her friendships, they were many and complex, encompassing Townmasters,
Chevaliers of low and high degree, the Marshalls, Friends of the Singer.

And along the border glowed a magical boundary between live, new
fenceposts.

Flickering shadows highlighted several other women—Exotiques, like
her. She tried to grasp the images, but they faded too rapidly. The world spun,
shrank, and she saw it—the world of Amee—the continent Lladrana was on, the
seas to the far North, islands to the west. One northern island held a mountain
peak shrouded with dark, evil clouds. She felt a sharp pain in her side, looked
down to see herself dressed in her Colorado winter clothes, and bleeding. A
great light blinded her and she glanced up to see a sunrise of shooting golden
rays above a horizon, heard/felt a great shout from all of Lladrana, from the
world itself, as evil died. A triumphant orchestral march rang out.

Then words echoed hollowly, words she'd heard the first night on
Lladrana and many times since. "Choose, Alexa."

Alexa choked, struggled, came back to herself. Bastien cradled her
in his arms. His face was pale under the golden hue, his eyes dilated and dark.
Her own face was wet with tears...and something else.

"Just pure rainwater to wake you." Luthan bent down and
wiped her face again with a soft, damp cloth, and Alexa figured
out that Bastien sat on the stone bench against the wall of
the Temple and she lay across his lap, her legs stretched out on the bench. The
Singer stood beyond Luthan, her expression serene, her hands folded at her
waist, out of reach. Which was good, because little old lady or not, Alexa
wanted to smack her.

"Are you finished tricking and manipulating me?" Alexa
asked the Singer.

"Thee was working thineself into a state," the Singer
answered in English, and repeated it in Lladranan. "It was best for thee,
this way."

"Huh. I'm very tired of people deciding what is best for me
without consulting me." She struggled against Bastien's hold and he
reluctantly let her sit up, but one of his hands smoothed her hair, pressed her
head against his chest. His heart beat rapidly beneath her ear.

"The greatest decision of all will be thine alone,
Alexa," said the Singer.

Alexa wanted to bury her face in Bastien's chest, inhale the
comforting scent of him, but she met the Singer's cool gaze instead. "I'll
do what's right."

"What is right for Lladrana or what is right for thee?"

Alexa thought of the horror of the battlefields, the comfort of
the picnic in Colorado. Her beautiful estate here, and Bastien, the man she'd
cared for, and children. "The decision is mine."

"That's right," said Bastien. "Leave her be."
His muscles tensed under her. "I shared her Song Quest. Do I need to do
one of my own?" he asked.

The Singer stared at them thoughtfully. "No. The Song Quest
is done. You have seen and heard." She placed her hand on Luthan's arm.
"Shall we go sup?"

"You go on now. We'll follow in a bit," Bastien said,
continuing to stroke Alexa's hair, cuddle her.

After they left, his eyes met hers. "I should have had my own
Song Quest, but I'm glad she spared me. I can imagine what it would show—the
same as it did last time, me and Reynardus. Him looming, me rebelling."

Narrowing her eyes, Alexa said, "You're avoiding the topic of
my Song Quest."

His arms tightened around her. "I can guess at the first
part—that was the Exotique Terre. Lladrana did not seem to compare well."
He grimaced, then his eyes gleamed, lit with sensuality. He placed his hand on
her breast, and it felt fabulous. "But I can try my best to convince you
to stay." He lowered his head, slowly, and his mouth brushed hers, his
tongue sweeping across her lips in a sweet caress that made her heart ache, her
body quicken.

She opened her mouth and let him in. Letting her tongue dance with
his, treasuring his taste, reveling in the comfort of his arms around her, his
strength, his warmth, his hardening body.

His fingers undid the first frog-fastening of her golden gown, the
second, and slipped inside to touch her through the thin silk of her chemise.
The slide of silk against her nipples made her arch, gasp and take his breath
into her, surrender. Feeling was so much more delightful than thinking.

And when he entered her a few moments later and they fell into
ecstasy together, it was the very best delight in two worlds.

T
hat night it was given information and ordered back to the Castle.
To kill the Exotique and drain her of magic. It would be unbeatable, then.

Slowly it coalesced from a huge spiderweb in a crumbling square
tower along the city wall. It had feasted well on its travels, growing strong,
substantive. It could be a nearly solid man-shape.

It had liked the Tower, had been able to call victims to itself
and feed. Some of those had good magic. The city was safe. It dimly
recalled being hurt by the Exotique. Pain enough that it
lingered in the city instead of following her to the Castle.

But more Power flowed to it from the Master and the pain was
forgotten. Only the exquisite taste of the Exotique's magic stayed in its
memory.

T
he next morning they rose a half hour before the chimes for the
Marshalls' meeting, kissed, dressed, and Bastien put the atomball into a
special box that would contain it.

Bastien was checking on the volarans and horses when Umilla handed
Alexa a message. Marwey wanted to meet Alexa in the tiny, wild garden with the
brithenwood, to speak with her about a matter of great importance.

Alexa smiled. She remembered being a teenager and how vital and
significant her emotions had made every decision, every action. And maybe after
she spoke with Marwey, Alexa could grab a minute to herself in the garden.

She
needed
time alone, and the brithenwood tree always provided
solace. Homesickness wasn't too bad, but now and then the press of an alien
culture, of being a stranger in a strange land, weighed on her. She had the
Song Quest to think of—two futures, one on Earth, one here in Lladrana. Which
should she choose? The easy or the difficult? Which would be the most
rewarding? Which would fulfill her spirit?

Before she reached the outside door she met Marwey, who shrieked
with glee and flung herself at Alexa, hugging her tight.

"Pascal has asked me to Pair with him! He received his
volaran reins yesterday from Mace, like you wanted. Pascal asked me to Pair
with him after that. We can make a future together on your land. Pascal said
you gave him the volaran. He asked me to Pair with him!"

"I got that," Alexa said when she could breathe again.

"I am so glad." Marwey looked around the empty corridor,
lowered her voice. "He will make a good Chevalier. I'm not a Chevalier,
but I think I could be a Marshall, a Shield," she whispered, stunning
Alexa.

She couldn't imagine Marwey on a battlefield.

"I will take defensive magical training. I have a dowry of
two volarans that I will give to Pascal. He will Test first, perhaps later this
year. If he passes, I will Test. I think I could call some wild volarans to
work with me, three who will say they'll stay with me for five years, and I can
Test for Marshall."

"You've got it all planned," Alexa said weakly. Surely
as soon as she knew all the ins and outs of the society, she would be able to
strategize as well as the teenager.

Marwey lifted her chin, eyes sparkling. "My plan will
succeed, I know it!"

"Ayes."

"Pascal and I will be a
great
Marshall Pair. Well,
maybe not as great as you and Bastien, but very good all the same!" Marwey
hugged Alexa again, waved, and whirled down the corridor.

In the direction of the guards' quarters, Alexa noted. She exited
through the Keep door, through the maze and continued to the garden.

Pascal and Marwey. Not unexpected, but Alexa would have a new
employee soon, Marwey.

She wanted to think of that happy future today. Didn't want to
think of death and destruction, of choices that would have to be made. Usually
she'd analyze events, experiences, emotions. She'd planned on using time under
the brithenwood to do that. But not now. Now she felt too cheerful. Right this
minute, life was good.

The small walled garden welcomed her. Lush, deep green grass
several inches high carpeted the area between the one door and the lovely
brithenwood tree with a bench around it. That it was
a single tree was uncommon, and it was found mostly near
the magical borders.

The tree was in full bloom, and its fragrance drifted in the air,
along with scents from other gardens, a mixture of herbs and spring flowers and
blossoming trees. A heady combination. The blood sang in her veins. She
chuckled at the thought. If anyone would have such a saying, the Lladranans
would. Perhaps it had come from them to Earth.

She glanced up at the blue, blue sky, as blue as on a winter day
in Colorado. The sight of her tower spearing into the sky made her smile. Today
the sun shone and the Castle's gray stone turned a warmer color, almost golden.
She narrowed her eyes. Did the bricks glow a little, like they were absorbing
and storing the energy? Maybe they did. She'd had so many questions, mostly
about monsters and failing magical borders and bonds and stuff, that she hadn't
asked any about the Castle. She'd find out later.

But she was simply joyful. The day was beautiful. She was alive
and had purpose. The raw grief at losing her friend-sister Sophie was gone, and
Alexa could remember her with love and echoing tenderness. She'd made new
friends. The Marshalls were becoming like a family to her; Thealia, an aunt
with a stern exterior; Partis, a marshmallow surface and steel core. She
grinned. Whatever else her time in Lladrana had been, it was...interesting.

A bird trilled a rippling song that reminded Alexa of the tune
cycling between her and Bastien. Studying it, hearing it in her head, she found
it carried a few of the same notes. A joyful, mating song. She grinned then.
Their lovemaking the night before had been spectacular. So intense, so orgasmic
she hadn't been able to flutter an eyelash for some time after. The man was a
fabulous lover. And he was hers. Too early to think about the "L" word,
but
she'd let it float in her mind. He had become a
Marshall, to protect her. He was her Shield.