Veil of Shadows (41 page)

Abruptly, she called out, “What does
avi
mean?”

He stilled and glanced back at her.

Syn shrugged. “I understand Anqarian well enough. I’ve never heard that word before.”

“It means soul.” Once more, he began to walk.

Her heart, frozen inside, started to heat, and something began to burn inside her. She thought it might be hope.
Eshera esen avi
.

That was what he’d said to the Warlord.

“What does
eshera esen avi
mean?”

This time, Xanthe didn’t stop. Narrowing her eyes, she glanced at the gatekeeper and shouted, “You open that damn gate, I’ll have your ass.”

That caught Xanthe’s attention. He turned, eying her, his face unreadable.

“Answer me, damn it. When the Warlord was trying to convince you to help capture me—to turn my ass over to him—you said something to him, and I saw the look on his face. I want to know what in the hell you told him.”

Her palms were sweating. She swiped them down the sides of her trousers legs. She wanted to move to him, wanted to lean against him—let his heat warm her body. She was cold again, all but aching with it. Slowly, she walked toward him.

“You said, ‘
Eshera esen avi
.’ I want to know what it means.”

Xanthe’s chest rose and fell on a ragged sigh and he shoved his hair back from his face. “It means,
She is my heart, my soul
.”

“Your soul.”

He gave a short, terse nod. “Damnation, Syn, have you any more questions? Or are you done now? Would it speed things up if I just begged for forgiveness? Then would you leave me the hell alone?”

It
was
hope, she realized. Part of her wanted to laugh. Part of her wanted to dance. But she shrugged and said, “I’m kind of curious if you meant it or if you were just trying to talk him into walking away.”

“If I say it, I mean it,” he shouted. “Are you done
now
?”

“No.” She stepped toward him.

He tensed. He stood so still, he could have been carved from flesh-colored stone. He didn’t blink; he barely breathed. A breeze blew a strand of his long hair into his face, but he didn’t appear to notice.

Syn pushed up on her toes and cupped his face in her hands. She smoothed her palms over the rough stubble, gently traced her finger around the patch he wore over his scarred eye. Staring into that harsh, unyielding face, she murmured, “One more question, Xanthe. If you mean it . . . then why are you leaving me?”

Elina gnashed her teeth as the soldiers filed back inside the camp. So far, no sign of Syn.

She was going to beat the younger woman. Clobber her bloody. Would serve her right, doing something so damned foolish—

Narrowing her eyes, she searched through the milling bodies, but she wasn’t there. Kalen had said she was fine—she’d be there soon. So what was taking so long?

She hid it well, but Elina was massively impatient. For the past thirty minutes, she’d been waiting at the main gate for Syn to return, ready to lash into her. With every passing minute, she got more and more angry—and more and more worried.

Finally, she caught sight of the other woman, just inside the main gates, staring at Xan. They stood in the gallery, obviously intent on each other, and Elina debated on whether to wait or just hunt the witch down later. She had yet to hear all the details—Kalen could give her those just as easily and it looked as though Syn was having some sort of private moment with her sexy, brooding male.

But on rare occasion, curiosity got the better of Elina.

No—very often, curiosity got the better of her. Though not many knew, she was inherently curious, inherently hot-tempered, inherently prone to getting into trouble. She’d just learned to curb those impulses, and save those who knew her closely, most people believed the calm, controlled façade she presented to the world.

Keeping her mischievous impulses under control served her better—as a mother, as a onetime professor of magical theory at a well-respected university, as a soldier in the rebel army. So most of the time, she didn’t let her curiosity lead her around by the nose.

This wasn’t one of those times.

She couldn’t get much closer without being obvious. But she wasn’t going to let that stop her.

Elina strode toward one of the watchtowers and climbed to the top. The soldier on guard blinked, surprised to see her, and she gave him a cool smile—
I dare you to question why I’m here
. He didn’t. After a few seconds, he ignored her and went back to studying his section of the perimeter.

Elina rested her arms against the wooden railing and stared at the two people down in the gallery. She couldn’t hear them, but she didn’t need to hear a single word to sense the tension, the emotion. Xan was busy staring at Syn like she held the keys to his universe in her hands. Syn’s face was unreadable, that carefully guarded expression she always wore when she fought to keep others from seeing her emotions.

Then something changed—Xan turned away and something flashed across Syn’s face—heartbreak. She blanked her expression quickly, then called out to the gatekeeper. Elina just barely made out the words. “You open that damn gate, I’ll have your ass.”

“Playing the voyeur, Elina?”

She suppressed a shiver at the sound of Morne’s voice and glanced to see him standing behind her. She hadn’t heard him climb the ladder.

Realizing he’d caught her eavesdropping, she gave him a guilty smile. Blood rushed to her cheeks and she shrugged. “Yeah. I can’t help it. We don’t get much entertainment around here.”

He moved to join her, also peering down at Syn and Xan.

“So what are you doing?” she asked curiously.

“Playing the voyeur,” he murmured, slanting a look at her and giving her a quick smile.

Elina chuckled. “Morne, how . . . unexpectedly common of you.” She looked back at the two below as Xan’s raised voice drifted toward them.

“If I say it, I mean it,” the dark-haired man bellowed.

Elina’s brows arched. “What in the world is up between them?”

She didn’t expect an answer, nor did Morne offer one.

Her breath caught in her throat as Syn approached Xan, rising up on her toes to cup his face between her hands.

“Oh.” Elina’s heart melted. Misty-eyed, she whispered, “Isn’t that beautiful?”

“You’ve got a bit of a romantic inside you, don’t you?”

Forcing herself to look away from Syn and Xan, she met Morne’s eyes and smiled. “Yeah, more than a bit, I guess. Not something we get to indulge in very often, though.” She sighed and shoved away from the railing.

“Give it time.”

They descended the ladder, Elina going first, with Morne following. Her skin buzzed, having him so close. Keeping her voice level took more of an effort than she would have expected. Keeping her emotions under control took even more effort, but it was a must—she knew too much about Morne’s gift and there was no way she wanted him picking up anything from her.

“It would seem the three of you have found a way to work with the energy again,” Morne said, out of the blue.

She glanced at him. “Yes.” She flushed as she remembered the dream. Doggedly, she forced her thoughts away from that.
A dream. Just a dream, remember?
“We were going about it the wrong way—trying to use the energy the same way we’ve always done it. We had to adjust . . .”

“You needed to adjust.”

They spoke at the same time. Self-consciously, she laughed as the dream edged in on her thoughts again.

But she made the bad mistake of looking at him and realizing he was watching her with a weird look in his eyes.

On any other man, she would have called the expression
stunned
.

“Ahhh . . .” She backed away. “I need to catch up with Lee. There are some things, something, yeah, something—”

He caught her arm.

Under that hard, calloused touch, she froze.

Because she knew exactly how it would feel to have him touching her—
exactly
. Even though he’d never done it before. Not once, in all the years she’d known him.

“The dreams—you had them, too.”

Elina jerked against his hold. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she lied, her voice shaking.

“Liar.”

He reached up, laid his hand against her neck. His dark blue eyes began to glow. Through her shields, she felt him—felt way too much, felt more than she could possibly handle. “Elina.”

Her name was a rough murmur on his lips, and just the sound of it made her tremble. He slid a hand into her hair, tangling it. His face came closer and for one heart-stopping, breath-stealing moment, she thought he was going to kiss her. He was close, so close, she could feel his breath on her lips, feel his warmth.

But then she was cold.

And he was gone, striding away from her, as though he couldn’t get away quick enough.

Confused, she stared at his back.

Elina didn’t know whether she wanted to die of embarrassment or chase him down so she could grab him. She’d been dreaming about him for years, and now she’d finally
almost
had a chance to kiss him, and then it was jerked away.

She didn’t know whether to be glad or furious.

They’d been sharing dreams. She’d heard of such before, although not often, and she’d never thought she might be sharing her dreams with him.

Blowing out an unsteady breath, she muttered, “Well, hell.”

“You just said ‘twins.’ ” Lee looked from Kalen’s face to Laithe, dazed.

Okay, she was still adjusting to the idea of Laithe being around.

Adjusting to
two
brothers, though, she didn’t know if she could handle it.

Adjusting to
two
brothers from
Anqar
.

“And Xan, his name is really Xanthe. And he’s some kind of fucking mercenary. Exactly what does that mean anyway?” she asked, shoving her hands into her pockets to keep from nibbling on a fingernail.

“It means he sells his sword.” Kalen leaned back in his chair, his arms crossed over his chest, his finger drumming out a rhythm against one biceps.

She knew him well enough to recognize the sign of restlessness. It was the only sign that he was as surprised by this twist as she was. Hopefully, it meant he was just as confused.

Laithe looked like he might as well be lounging by a pool with a nice, tall glass of beer. No. Wine. He’d be a wine drinker. He looked unconcerned, unperturbed. Disgruntled, Lee wondered if that was a Warlord thing or if she could maybe figure out how to look that unaffected. Morne was like that, too. So was Xan . . . or Xanthe.

Scowling, she kicked at the floor and muttered, “Should have figured out there was something weird with him before now.
Nobody
can act that . . . stoic all the time. Nobody from this world, at least.”

Sighing, she moved to the window, staring outside. “So where is he, anyway? Shouldn’t we be having some happy family reunion or something?” she asked.

“I get the feeling he doesn’t plan on hanging around,” Kalen said quietly.

It hurt, Lee realized. She knew the man—barely. But she didn’t know her brother. And he wanted to leave. Slowly, she turned and studied Kalen’s face. “Why? I mean, he’s more than welcome . . . Hell, he had
better
be welcome.”

“He is, pet.” Kalen straightened in his seat and shot Laithe an unreadable glance. “Both of them are. Morne vouches for them—as do you. And while I can’t say much about this one, I’ve learned enough about Xanthe to know he’s a good man. He’s welcome here, should he decide to stay.”

Lee forced a smile. “You can’t make everyone else feel the same,” she murmured.

“I know my men, Lee. If I tell them he’s welcome, most of them will accept that. Those who don’t . . .” He grimaced and shrugged. “Well, I’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.”