Keeper of the Heart (14 page)

“Provide it? As in giving us our own private airobus so we would not have to deal with your Visitor’s Center?”

“Exactly.”

“It is something to—think about,” Falon replied noncommittally.

Dalden nodded. He hadn’t expected an answer. It was something for the two
shodani
to discuss between themselves.

“You chose not to stay at the palace when we arrived earlier, thinking you would not be here long,” Dalden reminded them. “Perhaps you will now reconsider with the meeting delayed—if you still mean to attend the meeting.”

“How long a delay?” Jadell asked.

But Falon waved the question aside. “I am not in such a hurry to leave now, Jadell.”

Jadell chuckled as he noted Dalden’s surprise and explained. “My brother has met a woman here that he finds great interest in.”

“Is this the other matter you were concerned with, Falon?” Dalden asked.

“It is. The woman is a visitor under your father’s protection that I wish to buy.”

His amber eyes widened the slightest bit, yet Dalden was much more amazed than that. This had to be the she-with-the-computer, and she had to be something quite impressive for Falon to actually want to buy her, since Dalden knew how he felt about visitors.

It had been Falon’s own house that had been shamed all those years ago, his own sister who had been stolen by a visitor, kept for several months aboard the man’s ship, and returned with a child in her belly. It had been Falon’s father who had gathered the warriors of Ba-Har-an to ride against the visitors, ready to go to war if the man responsible was not turned over to them for punishment.

This had been the incident, the last of many, that had led to the closedown of the whole planet to visitor travel, and had turned the Ba-Har-ani so against visitors of any kind that they had never traded with them again. And Falon now wanted to take one home with him? But as a slave, Dalden reminded himself, not as a lifemate, and Falon likely wouldn’t want her any other way.

Reluctantly, Dalden had to disappoint Falon. “If she’s a visitor, she can’t be bought.”

“How, then, may I obtain her for my own?”

“In most cases, you have to ask the female herself if she will have you.”

“It is foolishness to leave such an important decision up to a female. Is there no male at all to be dealt with in the matter?”

“In some cases, but not in most. Yet we no longer speak of buying, Falon. If you truly want the female, you would have to take her as your lifemate, and I doubt you are prepared to do that.”

“No, I am not. She would refuse even did I ask, because she fears me.”

Dalden commiserated. “Visitors usually do fear warriors. Our own women fear them when it comes to joining with one for the first time. This is normal.”

“So I tried to tell him,” Jadell said.

“And I told
you
, brother, that her fear came after.”

“You mean you have already had her?” Dalden asked.

Falon’s nod was so curt as to be barely noticed. “Is there no alternative you can offer me?”

“Since you only wish to own her, best you hope she is a Catrateri. They would likely do anything you demand just now, including ordering one of their women to accept you—at least temporarily. Did you happen to find out what planet she is from?”

“No.”

“This, then, we will discover first thing on the new rising. But do you decide you would have the woman as other than a slave, I could ask my mother to speak with her, to ease the woman’s fears. She relates well to visitors, knowing how they think, what their concerns are. And she is a perfect example of how happy a visitor can be in joining her life with a warrior’s.”

Dalden’s mother was the farthest thing from happy as she slammed into her bedchamber late that afternoon—or tried to. The door was simply too large and heavy to close with any speed that would generate a good slamming. But in this case, it was stopped from closing all the way when Challen followed Tedra into the chamber.

He was none too happy himself just then. “Woman, you will speak to me of this.”

“I don’t know if I’ll ever be speaking to you again! How could you? And without telling me!”

Briefly, Challen thought about challenging that High King of Century III for arrogantly claiming that he would defeat the champion of the games after they were over and thereby win Shanelle for himself. Hearing that, Tedra had demanded to know what becoming champion had to do with her daughter, and had been told that Shanelle was the prize being offered for victory. Challen had been forced to explain to the man his misconception. Warriors knew the way the competitions worked. Visitors had to be told that winning didn’t necessarily net the final prize.

But the damage had been done. Tedra had not waited around to hear all of the explanation. She had quietly walked away to return to the palace. But Challen knew his lifemate well. There was nothing of calm in her silent departure. She was on the borderline of committing violence and had wisely left before the committing began in public.

Now he watched her pounce on their bed and attack it with her fists. Usually she had Martha deliver Corth to her when she needed to pummel something, that being one of the android’s uses, to assist Tedra in the exercising of her skills—and the expending of her fury. But Corth was otherwise occupied right now as Shanelle’s protector and could not be taken from that duty.

Challen waited patiently for Tedra to rid herself of the worst of her fury, fully aware that the bed was a substitute for himself, just as Corth usually was. He was touched, as always, that she chose not to attack him instead, settling for only secondary satisfaction in substitutes. Such was an indication of the deep love she felt for him that was stronger than the strongest anger. Ironically, when she was only mildly angry, she did not hesitate to strike him. Yet when what she felt was extreme, she would not take the chance of hurting him with it.

It had become an easy matter to determine the degree of her displeasure in this way, and what he faced now was serious displeasure.

He spoke carefully while she was still pummeling the bed. “I did not tell you the reason behind these competitions because I knew this would be your reaction.”

Tedra glanced up only long enough to growl, “Damned right, but you did it anyway!”

“Yet is the reason no different from what you already knew I faced, finding the proper lifemate for my daughter.”

“My
daughter will have no trouble finding her own lifemate. I’ve told you that a hundred times.”

“And I have told you a like number of times that I cannot release her from my protection to a man who cannot protect her as well as I.” Then, more gently, he added, “This you know,
chemar.
This is why the decision cannot be hers.”

That warrior logic had Tedra gathering the bedding up to her face so she could scream into it before she bounded off the bed and came to glare up at Challen. “You’ve made her a prize, a goal! You might as well have put her up for auction to the highest bidder!”

“I see it differently. What I have done is bring together the finest warriors in the land to determine those with the greatest ability and skill. From the best whom I find approval with, she may then choose.”

“She
may?” Tedra’s eyes narrowed. “Just how many
best
are we talking about? Thirty? Forty?”

“Five.”

“Unacceptable! Make it ten and I might consider it.”

“We do not bargain here, woman. I go against my better judgment to allow her five to choose from when the fifth will have been bested by four others.”

“And what if she wants none of those five? What if she absolutely hates them?”

“You look for difficulties before they arrive.” And then he put his arms around her to draw her flush with his body. “You know I want her happiness,
chemar,
yet must she be happy
and
well protected. You would not want it any other way.”

“It just seems so impossible.” Tedra sighed.

But she was now privy to the fact that Shanelle didn’t want a warrior—and why—whereas Challen was not. Nor would it do to enlighten him on that fact.

She rested her chin on his wide chest to look up at him. Her culture considered him a barbarian, and it wasn’t easy loving a barbarian, but she did. She loved this one to distraction. But she knew his limitations, in particular his lack of understanding a woman’s fears. She was partly responsible for that because she had so few fears herself, and those she did have she merely gritted her teeth at and plowed right through. But Shanelle wasn’t like her in that respect. Shanelle had been so well protected all her life that she’d never had anything to fear as she grew to womanhood. But now suddenly she had a great many things to fear and she wasn’t prepared to face any of them.

“She’s going to be horrified when she finds out all those men are competing for her,” Tedra said quietly now.

“Why should she be? Never did it bother her when all my warriors lusted after her.”

“Maybe because she never noticed.”

“How could she not? It was so bad before she left that we could never get a servant after dark whenever she had been around them.”

Tedra hid her grin against his chest. His grumbling tone was nothing compared to his annoyance at such times, and those times had been many. Tedra had felt nothing but pride and a degree of amusement that so many men wanted her daughter, so much so that each of them was compelled to seek out a Darasha female after merely being in Shanelle’s presence.

She was suddenly understanding Challen’s reason for these competitions a little better. Too many of his own warriors had asked for Shanelle, and although he might have preferred she go to a warrior he knew well, Tedra also knew he had decided he couldn’t play favorites in giving her to one of them. If only there hadn’t been so many offers ...

“Do you mean to tell her?” Challen asked.

“And ruin her homecoming? She’ll find out soon enough when the competitions are over and she has to pick one of the finalists—oh, Stars!” Tedra gasped with the realization. “You’re going to give her away in just a few days, aren’t you? Challen, I only just got her back! Couldn’t you have waited?”

“Too long has this been delayed.”

“So I’m to lose her already?” she whispered forlornly.

“And where do you think she will go?” he chided. “These are Kan-is-Tran warriors who will ask for her. She will not be taken so far that you cannot visit her as often as you wish.”

She was annoyed enough to remind him, “Have you forgotten there are visitors also competing?”

“You were the one who insisted visitors be allowed to participate when they began asking to do so.” And they had asked because Rampon at the Visitor’s Center had somehow found out the true reason for the competitions and the word had spread from there to all the ambassadors, and from them to their home planets. “In fairness did I allow it,” he added, “yet have I no intention of choosing a visitor for my daughter.”

“Not even that High King Jorran who is so confident he can beat the champion of all the warriors?”

“Especially not that condescending High King. Sooner would I—”

What he would sooner do was interrupted by the light rap on the door. “Mother, are you there?”

Tedra pushed herself out of Challen’s arms and started toward the door even as she called out, “Come on in, baby.” But when Shanelle did, Tedra was glad she was blocking her from Challen’s view, and put her arms around her to whisper urgently, “Hide your face in my shoulder and keep it there. If your father sees those swollen lips, he’s going to kill whoever got them that way.” To Challen she said, “How about taking off for a while, babe? I’d like a private mother-daughter chat before dinner.”

“So I am to be kicked out of my own chamber?”

“Humor me and I might play challenge loser tonight.”

He laughed and whacked her bottom on his way out the door. As soon as the door had closed, Tedra hugged Shanelle happily.

“So it’s happened? You found the man you want?”

“Mother... don’t... squeeze!” Shanelle gasped out.

Tedra released her immediately. “What’s wrong? Are you hurt?” And with even more alarm and the beginnings of a new anger, she demanded, “Are those bruises on your arms?”

“I offered to take her right into a meditech,” Martha answered before Shanelle could, “but she wants to enjoy suffering for a while.”

“What in the farden hell happened?”

Martha turned on one of her driest tones. “To hear her tell it, she got run over by a solidite paver.”

“So let her tell it,” Tedra snapped. “Shani? Did someone
beat
you, for Stars’ sake?”

“No—it just feels like it.” Shanelle sighed and led her mother to the backless couches in the center of the large room as she continued. “I really thought this was it, mother. The man was absolutely gorgeous. Once I’d seen him, I couldn’t think about anything else. And he made me feel so— so—”

“He knocked her socks off,” Martha supplied with a chuckle.

With a frown Shanelle turned the computer link off, while with the same frown Tedra took the unit and set it on the large square table that the couches surrounded. “I’ll talk to
you
later,” Tedra told the computer, her tone warning that she was presently blaming Martha for whatever had happened. And to Shanelle, “So if everything seemed right, what went wrong?”