“Flameblast you, Gwynn. You did it!”
With a proud grin, the poor boy did faint.
* * * *
“Thank the lords of the sea,” I muttered the next day, wrapping my cloak tight as protection against the cold air blowing in from the Skandar Sea. “Another mile and a comfortable, warm bed.”
“Getting soft?” Anders didn’t hide his amusement. “I always forget how Rosanna coddled you.”
“I’m only thinking of your old bones.” I stopped to stare beyond the Port Alain guards riding ahead of us, a knot forming in the pit of my stomach.
“Trouble?” Anders peered intently as Jules rode his mount forward to confer with his guards.
“Queen’s troops.” Although I managed to keep my tone flat, Anders shot me a warning glance. Aware of Gwynn at my side, I bit back a cruel comment. As we neared the Ardenna troops, I saw there were not as many as I feared, nor was Elena in their midst.
Their captain approached me as we came to a stop. “Mage Champion?” He cleared his throat, face flushed, looking very young and nervous, and started again. “The queen has sent a message for you.”
“Go on.”
“She’s found evidence in Edgecliff, from a captured mercenary that the late Duke of Barrow’s Pass and Charlton Ravess were conspiring with mercenaries to make it seem that folk from Glynnswood were behind the trouble in the forest and the attacks on you. She’s sent word along to your father to warn him.” When I stayed silent, unwilling to comment, he added with open disgust, “The mage sightings in Edgecliff, though none of the duke’s doing, were ignored by him when he’d promised to handle the matter. It was another way for him to harm the queen, by letting it appear she was unable, or unwilling, to protect her people.”
“I remember when he offered to investigate the matter,” I said, recalling the day Anders and I eavesdropped on that particular audience. “So he’s guilty of letting wild magic go on undetected and uncontrolled.”
“Yes, an act for which the queen, wrongly, Mage Champion,” he said with earnest loyalty, “holds herself responsible. In any event, she sent us” —the captain indicated his small band of crown troops with a wave of his hand— “to offer you assistance.”
I started to refuse her help, but Anders caught my pigheaded expression and intervened. “Thank you, Captain. We’ll need all the help we can get.”
* * * *
I snuggled deep within the heavy blankets, enjoying the decadent feel of the soft bed as I stretched my legs in bliss. Finally in Bitterhill, we’d taken several rooms at the inn along the northern fringe of town. Eyes closed, as my legs wandered onto the far side of the mattress, I absently wondered into what hole Anders had disappeared. On the point of sleeping, I was jolted awake by a brisk repeated knock on the door. “Lords of the sea.” I moaned in despair. “Who is it?”
“Jules.”
Jules. I pulled the covers over my head, reluctantly remembering Rosanna’s request to knock some sense into her son’s foolish head. “It’s late.”
“I know. I’m sorry.”
He didn’t tease about a midnight visit. Hell. I shrugged into my wrinkled tunic and trousers, fumbling for a lamp. Disheveled, I yanked open the door.
“May I come in?” Jules looked so forlorn that I almost pitied him. Almost. Not quite. “Please, Alex.”
“I’d rather you didn’t, but I’ve been accused of being uncivilized once already today.” I edged back from the door and sat on the bed, legs crossed beneath me, trying very hard to be patient.
Jules ran a hand through tousled brown hair as he sat on the edge of the chair by the shuttered window, ready to bolt. “I spoke to Elena before she returned to Ardenna the night you came after me in the hunting lodge.”
Across the bridge. Twice.
“Jules, I’m tired. What do you want?”
Miserable green eyes met my own. “I wish you didn’t hate me.”
Stifling a sigh, I admitted, “I don’t hate you. I’m disappointed in you. I’m angry, no, I’m furious, with you. I want to rip out your heart and feed it to the seahawks. But I don’t hate you, Jules.”
“Well, that’s a relief.” A trace of amusement flickered in his green eyes.
“All I keep thinking about is Lauryn. You don’t deserve her.” I clenched my fingers into a fist and banged it against the bed. “But it’s your problem. Face the truth. Elena doesn’t want you as a lover,” I said with intentional cruelty, steeling myself against his anguish. “Only as a friend. Be thankful she doesn’t hate you, particularly since you tried to step in so soon after Erich was dead at her hand. I can’t imagine what you were thinking.”
“I wasn’t thinking.” He bowed his head in shame. When he spoke, I strained to hear him. “I told her that, admitted the truth. Alex, it’s not that I don’t love my wife.” Green eyes bright with tears stared at me. “I do. Honest. I just don’t know what was in my head, except that Elena was free.”
“Besides the fact that you weren’t free, Elena doesn’t want you the way you want her,” I said quietly. “Let her go, Jules.”
“I will. I can. I have no choice.” He nodded in mute agreement. “But how do I stop Lauryn from despising me?”
Odd that I felt compelled to comfort him. “The first thing you have to do is bring the boys home.”
“And then?” A flicker of hope shone in his eyes.
I reached out to touch his cheek with a gentle caress, disturbed, more than I cared to admit, by his surprise. “And then we’ll see. Let’s get past that step first. It may be the hardest.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Now that we were inland, Gwynn was more subdued. I thought I’d lose my mind, or he’d lose his tongue, from spending too much time with Anders. Back in his home element, the boy took the lead with confidence from the Port Alain and Ardenna guard, guiding us toward Edgecliff, north of Bitterhill. That was where most of the sightings had been witnessed and Elena had found evidence of conspiracy or, at the very least, negligence.
“You’d better know where you’re going,” I threatened my brother, brushing a willful strand of hair from my eyes as I resettled my backside in the saddle.
“You have admitted I am an excellent guide.”
“Good. Not excellent.” I eyed Jules, who brought his mount closer.
“Have we far to go?”
“No, my lord.” Gwynn turned to Jules and answered with quiet courtesy. “We should arrive at Edgecliff by nightfall.”
“And then?” Jules wrapped the reins around his hand to keep his horse abreast of Gwynn’s.
“If you’re asking how we find the mage, I have to confess, I’ve no idea,” I answered, glancing around at the troops surrounding us. Anders gave me an odd look as Jules and I spoke in a civil manner. I hadn’t told him of our midnight conversation.
“Alex.” Gwynn looked back over his shoulder. “I have an idea.”
“I can’t wait to hear it.”
He grinned as I pushed my horse forward to match his pace. “Edgecliff is on the borders of Glynnswood. The town itself is not very large, nor friendly to strangers,” he explained, “especially uniformed strangers.”
“And you’re not a stranger?” Anders prompted behind us.
“No. They would talk more readily to me.”
The late afternoon sun caught the gray streaks in Anders’s black hair. “He’s right, you know.”
“Just this once,” I muttered. “Don’t encourage him.”
“I don’t have to. He’s got the same blood in his veins that you do. Only his disposition is more pleasant.”
“Are you implying that my mother was unpleasant?” I pulled my horse almost to a standstill, daring Anders to make a snide comment.
Anders laughed and tugged at my reins. “Of course not. Emila was sometimes stubborn, often willful, but never unpleasant.” He narrowed his eyes. “Maybe you’re some kind of changeling.”
“You’ll regret your words, old man.”
�
�Anders,” Gwynn interrupted; a neutral look in his eyes as he avoided mine. “Father told me once that from what Lady Barlow told him, Alex was nothing like her mother.”
“That’s it.” I slapped Anders’s hand from my reins. As he yelped, I urged my horse to the side, away from them all, still protected by the flanking guards, who looked uneasy at the disturbance I created. “I’ve heard enough.”
“He didn’t say you were unpleasant,” Anders argued reasonably as I ignored him. “Only that you’re different.”
I shook a fist at Gwynn. “You’ll regret your words, too.”
“Don’t threaten the boy,” Anders scolded.
“It’s bad enough you threaten the rest of us,” Jules said dryly, daring to enter the conversation.
“Feeling better, Duke Barlow?” I snapped, honestly glad to see color in his cheeks and a little backbone in his spine, even though it was at my expense.
“Yes.” He met my gaze, echoing my thought. “As long as it’s at your expense.”
“You’ll—”
“Regret my words, too.” Jules laughed softly, finishing my threat.
“Alex, don’t you find it odd that you have a distinct habit of threatening all the men in your life?” Anders arched a brow, but kept a safe distance between our horses.
“Don’t you find it odd that they all come back for more?”
“Maybe we men should reconsider.”
“I should be so lucky.”
“You’d miss me.”
I rolled my eyes skyward. “Don’t flatter yourself.”
“You would,” Gwynn said with such conviction that I laughed aloud. “You would miss all of us.”
“You, little brother, I’d miss least of all.”
* * * *
“I would.”
Anders’s sleepy voice was muffled against my hair. “You would what?”
“Miss you.”
“Ah,” he murmured, half asleep, tugging at a strand of tousled curls. “I did hope you would.”
Caught in a peculiar bittersweet mood, I turned to face him and leaned up on an elbow. Moonlight caught the flash of silver in his disheveled hair. “You’ve made an amazing difference in my life.”
Andres blinked in surprise. “No. You’ve made an amazing difference in your own life.” He yawned and nuzzled my neck. “When you decided to open your mind and heart, Alex, I was just lucky to be there.”
“Anders.” I bowed my head, leaning it against his warm shoulders. “This isn’t easy for me.”
“Keeping me awake when it’s hard enough to sleep on a frosty ground?” He tugged at the strand again, wrapping it around a finger.
“No.” I laughed and shook my head. “I’ve never really told you how much I love you.” There. Not as hard as I feared. Not when his eyes warmed with open, steadfast affection.
“And I’ve never really told you how much I love you either,” he admitted with ease, “maybe because I’ve been afraid to scare you away. Nevertheless, we’ve managed to get the message across in a hundred thousand ways.” Anders smiled, tracing the lines of my cheek, and just as suddenly, his eyes went abruptly grim. “What is it? What’s wrong? You’re trembling like a newborn colt.”
“I’m frightened,” I whispered, trying hard to banish the terrifying images that kept appearing in my imagination. “I don’t know what we’ll find in Edgecliff and how we’ll deal with it.”
“We’ll do what we’ve done these last months.” His even, white teeth shone bright against the shadows of his face as he grinned. “We’ll create a marvelous plan and discard it as soon as things start happening. And then we’ll muddle through and do precisely what we have to do precisely when we have to do it.” He kissed the tip of my nose with a dramatic flourish. “It always works.”
“The renegade mage is like me.”
“We don’t know for certain.” He waved at the sleeping bodies surrounding us. “You’re not alone. And even if you were, you’re so angry at the twins being kidnapped, you’d manage to handle her all by yourself.” He kissed my lips and then my neck. “Now, since I’m completely awake—”
“Completely?”
“Yes.”
“Every bit of you?”
“Every bit that counts.”
“Then we should take advantage, I think.” I wrapped my arms around his neck, enjoying the touch of his fingers on my back.
* * * *
Edgecliff was just what its name implied. A dirty, barren town perched at the edge of a cliff, a very small cliff facing across the Jendlan River, the fringe of the Glynnswood forest and the Bitteredge Mountains beyond. The town was so unattractive that we skirted around it and camped beyond its borders.
“You didn’t tell me about the bridge,” I complained to Gwynn, trying to keep my tone light and nonchalant, “if it even deserves to be called a bridge.” I’d never admitted to Anders about my midnight dash to the hunting lodge, nor did I intend to mention it now. I wondered, though, whether Jules had considered what I’d done that night to find him.
Solemn eyes met mine. “You did not ask me.”
With a melodramatic sigh, I slumped against the damp log at my back. “I liked you better when you respected me.”
A horrified expression came into my brother’s eyes. I looked around, thinking my father had somehow appeared. “I have always respected you.”
“Wretched liar. I also liked you better when you were afraid of me.”
An eerie Anders-like neutrality settled in the boy’s eyes. “I was never afraid of you. I just did not want to trouble you.”
“I never liked you.”
Neutrality vanished, replaced by an open grin. “Lady Barlow said I could always tell when you like someone because you give them a difficult time.” Pride and smugness overcame his usual common sense and training, as Gwynn forgot to dodge my fist as I shoved him backward.
“How dare she?” Another playful shove and Gwynn fell back on his heels. “That old witch lied about everything.”
“She did not lie when she said you were a good person, Alex.”
I snapped my head around at the utter sincerity in his voice. “You’re serious.”
“Yes. Of course.”
“May the lords of the sea protect me from adoring little brothers.”
Gwynn reached out a hand to touch my arm. “You are a good person, Alex. You did not have to like me, or accept me so easily. But you did.”
“I couldn’t help myself. Even though you’re a pest, you were completely irresistible.” I stretched to ruffle his hair and tugged at the rebellious lock of hair. “Now, tell me about that tiny, narrow make-believe bridge.”
“It is narrow.”
“Do we have to cross it?” I glanced over Gwynn’s shoulder to see the bridge, but darkness had fallen. “Is there no other way around it?”
Gwynn shook his head. “It is the only way. And it is only on the other side that recent mage sightings have occurred.”
“Just my luck. You’re sure?” When Gwynn nodded, I turned to Anders, who had just joined us. “Remind me to complain to Elena about this travesty. I’m sure she collects enough taxes to have her bridge repaired. If I’m her Mage Champion, how can I protect her if I’ve broken my neck or worse on a collapsing bridge?”
“It’s not that bad,” he said, tossing some twigs my way. “You’ll see.”
I didn’t broach the subject of the bridge until Anders and I snuggled close in our bedrolls. Actually, Anders mentioned it, and I defended my honor.
“Jules suggested that you, ah, might have a slight problem with the bridge.” Anders tugged a strand of hair when I didn’t immediately respond. “I know you’re awake because you’re not snoring.”
I turned to face him, and hid my face in his chest. “He’s being kind, for once, if he described it only as a slight problem. Anders, I’d really rather not go across.”
“We have to, if we’re to get to the other side.”
“I can’t. You don�
��t understand.” I’d already started having nightmares.
“No. I suppose, I don’t. Would it help if you were blindfolded?”
I punched his chest lightly. “It’s not a joke, Anders. I’m terrified of bridges. Don’t you remember how Elena told you she and Jules used to hide across the bridge by Jendlan Falls when we were children, knowing I’d never have the courage to follow them.” Not until I had no choice but to find Jules and drag him home to his wife.
There was a long pause, and then, “All right. But wait until the morning,” he tried to appease me. “You’ll see, Alex. It won’t be that bad.”
It was worse.
The cliff wasn’t that high, so the span wasn’t that high. And the river wasn’t that wide, so the span wasn’t that long. But it was weather-beaten wood, with holes where the wood had rotted clear through. Nightmare enough when I trembled at the sight of a solid, well-maintained bridge, but this disaster brought involuntary tears to my eyes and stole the breath from my lungs.
“What are you looking for?” Anders asked as I peered up and downstream, trying to shield my reaction.
“A boat.” I crossed my arms. “I’m not crossing that.”
“A boat won’t help in the turbulent water. We’ll tie a rope around each other’s waist and—”
“All right. Go ahead.” I waved him away. “Let me know what happens. I’ll be waiting right here.”
Anders gave me a very peculiar look, though he didn’t comment on the now-obvious terror in my eyes. “So,” he drawled, “are you going to act like a coward in front of your little brother?”
“Coward?” I blurted, before hastily regaining control. “Not me. I’m just showing common sense.”
“Gwynn will be disappointed in you.”
“He’ll get over it. I won’t. I’ll be dead. That thing,” I pointed at the bridge, ashamed at the way my hand was shaking, “is suicidal.”
“The twins will be disappointed when they know you didn’t have the courage to save them.” He turned his back on me and walked away.
And I was seething with anger and sheer terror.
“Alex.” Jules came to tug at my cloak. “You don’t have to do this. We’ll manage without you.”
Mage Resolution (Book 2) Page 15
