“Invisibility might get you in, but a whole bunch of hostages can’t suddenly go invisible in a jail without setting off every alarm there is. Nor can you teleport them through walls.”
“We’re working on it.”
“We’ll find a solution, Captain,” M’lani interjected. “Truly we will. We just need some safe place to send the hostages and their families after we get them out.”
Looking grim, Tal shook his head. “Naturally we will help in any way we can. Give us a time and place and our shuttles will be there.”
“And now,” Kass declared brightly, “we also have one other matter to bring up.”
Everyone looked at her. Even the great S’sorrokan seemed bemused, Jagan noted, as if he had no idea anything more was on the evening’s agenda.
“The last time we were here, there was a wedding,” Kass said. “And while the whole family is here, it seems only right and proper that we witness M’lani’s wedding to Jagan.” She gave Tal a fond look and squeezed his hand. “Our wedding was unexpected, you will recall. Conducted expeditiously, but I believe I can safely say for both of us that we have no quarrel with it.”
Jalaine found her voice first. “But the wedding is scheduled for the full of Red Moon.”
“A spectacular event, entertainment for the entire planet,” Ryal elaborated. “A boost to Psyclid patriotism.”
“But of course,” Kass murmured. “Yet that does not keep mother from marrying them here and now. Surely it is only fitting.”
“You think you should be present because you were supposed to be Jagan’s bride,” M’lani pronounced, finally finding her voice.
“I think I should be here,” Kass returned at her most regal, “because you are my sister. Because I wish to be present at your wedding, as you were at mine. You, after all, will soon be having the grand affair I never had. Do not deny me this one small pleasure.”
Trapped. Inwardly, Jagan winced. Marriage at Red Moon loomed, a terrifying spectre. But now? Tonight? He’d been summoned to a nightmare. L’ira’s final revenge for his turning her hair to snakes.
Not that M’lani didn’t have more to offer than he’d expected. A surprising courage to match her intelligence and regal arrogance. Charm when she chose to use it. And then there was her astonishing gift . . .
“M’lani,” he said softly, “if you are thinking of disintegrating any or all of us, may I suggest you reconsider. I think it quite touching that your sister wishes to see us wed.”
Silent, though clearly heart-felt, epithets echoed from his betrothed, who seemed as opposed to this sudden marriage as he. Jagan could only hope her parents couldn’t hear her tirade, but that seemed doubtful as K’kadi’s face was turning crimson. No privileges before Red Moon, M’lani added when her spew of forbidden words ran down.
That’s no fun.
Don’t tell me your bed’s been cold since B’aela left.
You wound me. I’m a changed man.
“Time’s running out,” Tal Rigel snapped, in full S’sorrokan mode.
“K’kadi, how about some flowers?” Kass suggested. “Perhaps an arbor?”
In an open space in front of the room’s entry door, a latticed arbor appeared, its white sides almost obscured by clinging vines boasting a harmonious blend of flowers. To everyone’s astonishment the glorious strains of a solo viol could be heard, sighing its way through music that could bring tears to the most hardened heart.
Jagan, his sorcerer’s brain rocked by the events of the evening, managed to stand, take M’lani’s hand and move toward the arbor, where Jalaine now stood, waiting for them. The ceremony was short, far shorter than the one they would endure in front of the whole nation, including the Regs, but it would suffice. Any ceremony conducted by the ParaPrime was unbreakable.
“Jagan Citric, will you have this woman to be your wife, to love and cherish through good and ill, through joy, pain, and the myriad trials of life . . .”
“I will.” Strong and clear.
“M’lani Sayelle, will you have this man to be your husband, to love and cherish through good and ill, as long as you both shall live?”
“I will.” Resigned, defiant, accepting? Jagan suspected even M’lani was unsure which emotion was strongest. Certainly it wasn’t the euphoria of a new bride.
Jalaine lifted their clasped hands, enclosing them in hers. “Then may the goddess bless you. Go forth as husband and wife, remembering to be kind to each other, and to do good for others as the responsibilities of your positions demand.”
Predictably, K’kadi added fireworks as Jalaine embraced the couple, pronouncing them husband and wife.
A glance at Ryal, and Jagan suspected the king was adding a few prayers of his own.
“Sorry,” Tal said, “we have to go. A swift round of handshakes and kisses, and suddenly only four remained. Ryal, Jalaine, and a couple who had not thought they would have to cope with their personal problems until the Red Moon was full.
“You too may leave us, Jagan,” King Ryal decreed. “It would not be wise for the Archeron Ambassador to stay the night.”
M’lani, shaken by a profound wave of emotions that seemed an equal mix of relief and disappointment, clutched the back of the sofa to keep herself upright.
“My apologies if you had other thoughts in your head,” Ryal continued smoothly, “but times will be perilous enough after the full of Red Moon. For now we must remain blameless and gossip-free, good little puppets moving only in approved directions.”
“Sir.” Psyclid’s Sorcerer Prime bowed to his king. Royan Vivar del Cid, the Ambassador from Archeron rose from the bow. After making polite farewells to Queen Jalaine and Princess M’lani, he strode out, his Archeron bodyguards on his heels.
“You might have given them a moment alone,” Jalaine protested as the door closed.
“I might,” Ryal said, sitting down so suddenly in his throne-like chair M’lani suspected his legs had given way. “But how long has it been since all three of my children were in a room at the same time? You will forgive me if my mind was preoccupied. My apologies, child. I am not sure if I have inadvertently spoiled a romantic moment or saved you from the classic fate worse than death.”
Tears threatening, M’lani ran across the room, dropping to her knees at her father’s feet, resting her head on his knee. “Neither am I, Papa, neither am I.”
Chapter 19
M’lani punched up her lace-edged pillow, rolled from her left side to her right, then back again. She squeezed her eyes shut, wrinkling her nose, as she made a determined effort to direct her thoughts toward L’ira, K’kadi, the rebellion . . . Anything but Jason Mondragon. Her husband.
Useless, all useless. What would she have done if her father hadn’t sent him away? Stood frozen to the floor staring at Jagan in horror? Run screaming from the room?
Pok, dimi and fyd! M’lani scowled. What satisfying oaths the Regs had, though she suspected fyd should never so much as flick through the thoughts of a princess. She had just married her childhood tormentor, her sister’s betrothed, B’aela Flammia’s lover. Psyclid’s Sorcerer Prime, who could call up dragons and monsters, and likely had a soul so dark he might even make the Emperor quake in his boots.
She thought she’d known what she was doing when she so blithely volunteered to wed the Sorcerer Prime, but truthfully she must have been mad, naively innocent, or just plain stupid. This was Jagan, a man who practiced magic with a cool head and no visible sign of a heart. A man to be feared as he seemed to see the world through a veil of magic that made him indifferent to normal human values.
Through the years her feelings for Jagan had undergone many transformations—from adoration and hero worship to sheer terror after the Medusa incident, then back to girlish, if a bit tremulous, admiration for a handsome and dynamic young man with great power. This stage was soon followed by the more mature, and hurtful, reflection that Jagan had not only taken a mistress, he was destined to wed her older sister. Like the sun whose brill
iant rays sent rainbows sparkling off Crystalia’s towers, the Sorcerer Prime was totally out of reach long before he and his followers ran off to Hell Nine. M’lani Orlondami and Jagan Mondragon, separated forever.
Yet now . . . they were husband and wife. Legally married in front of her entire family by Psyclid’s high priestess, her groom immediately banished back to the Archeron Embassy.
And how did she really feel about that?
The harsh truth . . . Disappointment bubbled up through what she had assured herself was only relief. The Jagan she’d seen since his return—particularly the Jagan who visited her bedchamber in the wee hours of the night—was an intriguing mix of the arrogant sorcerer, indifferent to all but his magic, and the Jagan who occasionally made an effort to understand other people, to empathize with their problems. His temper frayed less easily lately, and he seemed to be making an effort to adjust to the responsibility of leading the fight to free Psyclid from the Regs.
Personally, however . . .
His bed had scarcely cooled since B’aela’s departure.
And how much of the visceral reaction she felt when they touched could be attributed to echoes of childish hero worship combined with awe for his skills? Or perhaps what she felt was not desire for Jagan as a man but only a desire to have what had been destined for L’ira.
Yet Jagan had invaded the palace in the middle of the night. He’d come to her. Come for no other reason than because he wanted to. Or simply because he could. Who knew how a sorcerer’s mind worked?
Husband. Oh, blessed goddess, they were married.
After another bout of tossing and turning, M’lani finally slept, only to wake to the now familiar sound of Jagan silently calling her name. A shiver shook her from her toes straight up to the auburn tresses scattered over her pillow. In spite of Ryal’s edict, he’d come back.
It was their wedding night, and Jagan had come back. He was sitting beside her, his dark eyes taking on an almost demonic glow in the light of the waxing Red Moon.
“Shall I go away?” he asked. “Even a fool of a sorcerer can see you have not accepted the concept of marriage to me. Sometimes I wonder why you did it—why you volunteered that night. Sisterly affection? You sacrificed yourself so L’ira could marry Rigel? Or was it rivalry, your chance to have what had been ordained for L’ira? Come, M’lani, explain it to me. For if we cannot find a way through this, we face a lifetime of misery.”
M’lani stared past him, her mind in chaos. She should be accustomed to the intimacy of his sitting on her bed so close she could smell the scent of him—a mix of power, arrogance, and sensuality, enhanced by an exotic cologne with a hint of fire and brimstone.
Jagan.
Jagan Mondragon, Sorcerer.
“You know quite well I was merely doing what was expected of me,” she replied, relieved to hear how cool and composed she sounded.
“M’lani . . .” Jagan shut his eyes, clenched his fist before bringing it down onto the satin coverlet with such great care it barely made a dent. “You did not have to accept me. You could have rejected my expectations of becoming king. You are the Orlondami, not I.”
M’lani turned her head away, the jumbled thoughts that had kept her awake for so long creating a whirlwind inside her head. What to do, what to say, when raw emotion overwhelmed reason?
“Jagan . . . take my hand.”
She gasped as sensation engulfed her, jerking her hand back as if she’d been stung. Why? Why should touching Jagan—the man she could never trust—send waves of cataclysmic emotion crashing through her. She had done her best to analyze what happened the night of the Tri-Moon Festival—the breathlessness, dizziness, an inability to think. Burgeoning hope, but most of all, lust. A driving need to fling away every last fragment of royal dignity and embrace passion ’til long after the sun rose to bathe Crystalia in the sparkling light of morning.
It was unnatural. Almost as if someone had cast a spell—
“Did you do this?” she demanded. “Is this some nasty little spell you cast to make sure you had a compliant bride?”
“Me? Cast a spell over a woman?” Jagan’s dark brows rose all the way to his hairline.
Oh dear goddess, she was such a fool. Jagan had no need of tricks. Women threw themselves at the Sorcerer Prime. Why should he think her any different—had she not volunteered to take L’ira’s place? And yet . . . pride demanded she remember she was now the Princess Royal.
“You feel it too, don’t you?” M’lani asked, her green eyes narrowed to slits as she caught Jagan’s reluctant nod.
“Jalaine?” he suggested.
M’lani frowned. “She’s certainly capable of it, but Mother is too honorable to try any tricks, at least not before we’ve openly demonstrated we are wholly incompatible.”
“Ryal?”
Her lips quirked into a smile. “I’m not sure love spells are part of Papa’s repertoire.”
“Agreed. I doubt he ever needed them either.”
M’lani shot him a scathing look. “Which is why I thought it must be you.”
Jagan held up a hand, palm out. “No spell, M’lani, unless the goddess herself is sealing our fate.”
“I don’t like to be manipulated.”
“I should tell you I’ve put a special shield around this room—something I should have done before,” Jagan said, deftly turning the conversation in a direction of his choosing. “I doubt even your mother knows I’m here. So we may speak freely, knowing we are private.”
M’lani waited, struggling to accept the inevitable.
“I think,” Jagan said, taking far more care with his words than he usually did, “that the goddess smiles on us. That, in spite of all that has gone before, we are fated to share dushani. The goddess is making it possible for us to adjust.”
“The great magician daring to speculate about the goddess?” M’lani mocked.
Jagan shrugged. “In the past five years, it seems as if I’ve been confined to a giant die box, tossed this way and that, and finally turned topsy-turvy and rolled out into an inimical world I am somehow supposed to fix. Truth, M’lani? The sorcerer is humbled. I need all the help I can get. Whether it’s the goddess, T’kal Killiri, or a wife who’s even more scary than Hell Nine.”
“Oh.” It was the best M’lani could manage as she digested Jagan’s confession. Jagan Mondragon, showing vulnerability? Not an easy concept.
Jagan bent down, his face hovering above hers. Even without touching, when he was this close, M’lani’s thoughts shut down, her body lost in a swell of sensation that left her breathless. “Perhaps we should hold hands again,” he murmured, “and allow our minds to accustom themselves to the emotions of the heart. Surely there must be something between us if we feel so much from a mere touch.”
“I’m afraid,” she whispered. “Surely this isn’t how marriages should begin.”
“I fear it’s how arranged marriages have begun for millennia, but believe me, I have no desire to be among the bridegrooms who rape their wives on their wedding night.” Jagan waggled his black brows at her, looking about as far from a sorcerer as a man could get.
A nervous giggle swept past her fear. After a moment’s hesitation, M’lani held out her hand.
Jagan squeezed it tight. No letting go this time. Excitement, heat, bright color washed over her. A sense of well-being, of coming home. Tendrils of something glorious found their way down from her head to her breasts, her belly, her female parts crying out for wonders she had yet to know.
“Uh, M’lani?” Jagan sounded as if he were strangling. “If I let go long enough to get rid of my clothes, are you going to run?”
Was she? M’lani wasn’t sure. Whatever was happening was wrong. Jagan didn’t want her. Had never wanted her. As for her own feelings? They were closer to fright than passion. What she was experiencing was too sudden, too much. Inexplicable. It could not be natural, she would not believe it. “Can you shield us from this?” she asked. “From being thrust at each ot
her as if we were puppets on a string?”
Slowly, Jagan sat up, eyes closed. She could feel him reaching out, searching, struggling to find the source of what had to be emotional manipulation. “M’lani . . . there’s nothing there. Nothing at all. Not even K’kadi playing one of his childish jokes. And, besides, what does he know about passion?”
M’lani scowled. “Then you lied. It’s just another of Jagan Mondragon’s little tricks.”
“Dimi, no!” On the blood of my ancestors, I swear it.”
Profound silence. M’lani could feel her heart thudding in her chest, blood pounding through her veins, almost drowning out the conflicting whispers in her brain.
Believe.
Liar.
Believe.
Sorcerer!
Believe. This was meant to be.
“Jagan . . . even if you didn’t do it, surely you can block it?” Blessed goddess, keep me from sounding as lost and frightened as I feel.
Jagan heaved a long-drawn sigh. “Think, M’lani. Do you really want me to do that?”
Unfair! But she could not wiggle out of a reply. “Yes,” she said at last. “I will not begin our marriage with a lie.”
“Do you really dislike me so much?”
M’lani cringed. That was the implication, of couse—that she cared for him so little, any feelings of attraction had to be sorcery. “No! It’s just . . . “She huffed a breath, tried again. “What woman wants to be no higher than third on her husband’s list of favorite females? Maybe lower, like near the bottom?”
“M’lani!” Jagan plunged his head into his hands, fighting for words that would not come.
“I beg your pardon, I should not have said that. It’s far too late for regrets.”
Jagan finally managed a cohesive thought. “M’lani, I suspect what we feel when we touch isn’t a lie, just a tantalizing glimpse of an undiscovered country. It’s possible the goddess is trying to tell us that we are each other’s destiny. Giving an assist, if you will, to help us make the best of it.”
“Absurd.”
Sorcerer's Bride (Blue Moon Rising Book 2) Page 15
