Where Light Meets Shadow

by Shawna Reppert

  Until Kieran saw with Alban’s memory Brona, sitting in a chair by the hearth in Alban’s room, a cloak he recognized as Alban’s wrapped around her shoulders, warming her hands on a mug of tea.

  “We could present the marriage as though it was your people’s idea, part of the bargain for my return,” Brona said.

  He felt Alban’s appalled embarrassment war with his reluctance to hurt her feelings. “Not that I’m not flattered, your majesty, but my feelings for Kieran—”

  She laughed lightly, and Kieran and memory-Alban were both glad she had warmed enough for mirth, though memory-Alban was still confused.

  “At the last minute, when it is too late for anyone to object without starting a war that most Leas and most Scathlan want to avoid, I will present a proxy for the marriage.”

  “Kieran,” Alban breathed. “But will your people accept this?”

  “Grace willing, I hope so. If they see that I can forgive him my mother’s death, perhaps they will as well. I think that many Scathlan realized that there was something not quite right with their queen.”

  Kieran felt memory-Alban’s desperate hope, his desperate fear for him, and Kieran squeezed the real Alban tight, sending a torrent of love through the link.

  Brona spoke again in the memory. “I just need to get my people behind the idea of the union, and the peace, to get them behind me as a leader. I need that before I can challenge Riagan over Kieran. And the more public that challenge, the better the chance of it succeeding.”

  She put down her tea mug. Memory-Alban refilled it and urged her to eat something from the tray on the small table beside them.

  Alban, always the caretaker. Kieran thought fondness through the link, and Alban squeezed his hand.

  “The question is,” Brona continued after finishing a bite. “Will the Leas accept it?”

  “They will if we can convince my father.”

  The memory blurred and then reshaped. Brona and Alban stood before Toryn in Toryn’s study. The Leas leader looked tired and careworn. Shouldn’t he be relieved and happy? At that point in time, the Leas had peace once more, and he was free of a troublesome bard his people did not care for.

  Toryn’s face went from surprise when he realized who Brona was to thoughtfulness as Alban and Brona explained their plan.

  “I see,” Toryn said.

  Kieran felt memory-Alban’s nervousness and hope.

  “There are some flaws in your plan.”

  Memory-Alban’s heart dropped to his stomach.

  “If the Scathlan think that we have forced this alliance as a condition of returning their queen to them, they may release Kieran to us, but there will hardly be a lasting peace. I suggest that we align the public story a little more closely with the actual truth.”

  Alban slipped them out of the memory, and took them back to a lighter level of link. “Sorry, but that’s hard to sustain. What your people know is that your queen, in the interest of a lasting peace, bravely presented herself to the Leas as a hostage for the return of their bard, so that she might have a chance to negotiate the marriage. My father wisely realized this version would make the agreement more palatable and the peace more sincere.”

  “And your father, how does he feel about all of this? On a personal level, I mean. I know he is glad for the alliance. He was kind enough to me last night and welcomed me into the family, but surely he must have hoped for more for you than a Scathlan stray of no rank that you found wandering in the snow. Surely he must have hoped for grandchildren?”

  “Rank means less among the Leas than it does to the Scathlan. My own mother came from what your people would deem a family of no importance. And as for grandchildren, yes, I’m sure that’s a loss to him, though he’s been kind enough not to say so. What matters to him is that I am happy.”

  Kieran pulled him close and kissed him deeply, pressing their hips together so that Alban could feel his renewed arousal, feeling Alban already hard against him.

  “Then I will spend the rest of my life ensuring that you are happy.”

  Thank you for allowing me to share this world with you. If you like this book, please consider posting a review on Amazon and/or Goodreads and giving me a shout-out on Facebook and Twitter. Word-of-mouth really makes a difference in an author’s career.

  Also, keep reading beyond my bio page for a teaser of my award-winning urban fantasy, RAVENSBLOOD.

  About the Author

  Shawna Reppert, an award-winning author of fantasy and steampunk, is proud of keeping readers up all night and making them miss work deadlines. She believes that fiction should ask questions for which there are no easy answers, while at the same time taking the reader on a fine adventure that grips them heart and soul and keeps them turning pages until the very end

  Her debut novel, The Stolen Luck, won a silver medal for original-world fantasy in the Global Ebook Awards and an Eppie for fantasy romance. The first book of her Ravensblood urban fantasy series won a gold medal for contemporary fantasy.

  Her current four-footed children are a Lipizzan stallion and a black-and-orange cat named Samhain who occasionally takes over her blog. Shawna can sometimes be found in medieval garb on a caparisoned horse, throwing javelins into innocent hay bales that never did anything to her.

  Shawna lives in the beautiful wine country of Oregon.

  Visit Shawna at

  www.Shawna-Reppert.com

  Also Available

  Ravensblood

  by

  Shawna Reppert

  First book in a compelling urban fantasy set in the Pacific Northwest

  In a life of impossible choices when death magic is sometimes the lesser of the evils, can a dark mage save the world and his own soul? Corwyn Ravenscroft. Raven. The last heir of an ancient family of dark mages, he holds the secret to recreating the Ravensblood, a legendary magical artifact of immense power.

  Cassandra Greensdowne is a Guardian. Magical law enforcement for the elected council— and Raven’s former apprentice and lover. She is trying to live down her past. And then her past comes to the door, asking for her help.

  As a youth, Raven wanted to be a Guardian but was rejected because of his ancestry. In his pride and his anger, he had turned to William, the darkest and most powerful mage of their time. William wants a return to the old ways, where the most powerful mage was ruler absolute. But William would not be a True King from the fairy tales. He would reign in blood and terror and darkest magic.

  Raven discovers that he does have a conscience. It’s rather inconvenient.

  He becomes a spy for the council that William wants to overthrow, with Cassandra as his contact. Cass and Raven have a plan to trap William outside his warded sanctuary. But William is one step ahead of the game, with Raven’s life, his soul, and the Ravensblood all in danger.

  I

  Cass raised her glass defiantly to her absent mentor, the man who had taught her the difference between single-malt and blended whiskey, who had taught her to appreciate fine port, the same man who had taught her more dark magic than any Guardian should ever know.

  The air was heavy with the warmth of too many people and the clashing scents of perfumes and colognes. She settled further back into the faux red leather of the booth, angling for a better view of the door.

  Crossroads’ self-conscious trendiness tried to appeal to all three Communities— Art, Craft and Mundane. The décor was almost enough to distract her from the task at hand. The black-and-white harlequin diamond pattern on the wall border repeated on the dance floor to her right where college students and art-school drop-outs milled, waiting for the band to finish its break. The gilded sunburst mirror stood out dramatically against the deep red walls. Garish, but fun.

  She sipped again at her neat scotch and welcomed the burn on her tongue. Raven had also taught her the little charm she’d used to limit her absorption of the alcohol. As a young apprentice fresh out of General Academy, she had been a lightweight in every sense of the word. The charm h
ad helped her adapt to his elegant and alcohol-soaked world of cocktail parties, balls, and late dinners after evenings at the symphony. She used it now so that she could drink enough not to arouse attention and stay sober on the job.

  With her history, she had to be twice as sharp and work twice as hard just to be given half a chance. Her eyes slipped over the crowd, taking in the scene. Picking up guys at bars wasn’t her thing, and there was more at stake than a night’s hook-up. Then again, she was here to pick up a guy. Just not in the normal sense of the phrase. Most of the crowd wore the short, economical jackets and jeans, durable, practical, inelegant denim, cotton and leather favored by Mundanes and by much of her generation in both Art and Craft. Here and there she spotted the sweep of more drapy, old-fashioned clothing and bits of velvet and lace.

  Her own garb this night was a compromise chosen to blend in, a silky hip-length tunic bought in a store on the Art side of town, but batiked in purple-and-blue in a fashion that would have pleased a younger member of the Craft or even a more bohemian Mundane. Her snug denim jeans were pure Mundane, though, as were her kicky purple boots, low-heeled and comfortable for dancing.

  The rain-streaked glass door swung open. She came alert. Four or five young people bounced through, jostling one another like a pack of tumbling puppies. More college students, by the Reed sweatshirt the short one wore. Not so much younger than her in years, maybe, but with an innocence she would never have again. Mundanes. She could tell even from this distance. No tell-tale thrum to resonate against her own power. Clearly not their target. Cass relaxed.

  Probably the one in the school sweatshirt was a freshman, as an upperclass Reedie wouldn’t be rah-rah enough to wear a school shirt, but underage drinking was none of her concern.

  The solitary young man who arrived moments later was not a Mundane. She focused, reading his energy, the feel of him. A warmer, softer feel, like sunwarmed earth. Not a mage. Wiccan or shamanic maybe, she couldn’t tell, but clearly Craft and not Art.

  A strong male hand, tanned and slightly freckled, fell on her shoulder. Cass startled.

  “Buy you a drink, luv?”

  Cass relaxed at the unmistakably Aussie accent and turned to smile up at Zack, her fellow Guardian and assigned partner.

  Zack slid into the seat across from hers and leaned across the table as though flirting. “Bet you a bottle of Glenfiddich that the tip is a dud and we’re wasting our time here.”

  His voice was low enough not to be heard beyond their table.

  Cass shook her head. “Why take a bet I’m sure to lose?”

  Zack reached over and took her hands, playing the part of a barfly trying to get lucky. His normally sandy hair glowed with an odd red-and-blue miasma from the Mundane colored lights. The slowly changing patterns of lights were supposed to create a mood, though what mood she couldn’t say. She would have preferred the honest soft-white glow of charmed light globes.

  Zack was the kind of handsome that the advertising agencies used to sell SUV’s and camping equipment. His accent was charming but she kept the admiration strictly to herself, along with any appreciation of the way his sandy-blond bangs swept his forehead or the way his hazel-green eyes squinted just a little when he laughed.

  Guardian brass frowned on romantic relationships between partners, although they didn’t strictly forbid them the way Mundane law enforcement did. No sense risking her working relationship with the only partner she’d kept for more than a week in the three years she’d been a Guardian.

  Zack knew her past, of course. But he hadn’t been in the country when the scandal had been all over the media. Maybe that was why he could accept her for what she was now.

  “So, tell me why you think we’re pissing in the wind.” Zack’s voice was a sultry whisper.

  “Probably the same reasons you do. Crossroads hardly seems the sort of place that William’s followers would frequent, for one. And we don’t exactly have a history of getting good information on anything William’s up to, not until the blood is spilt and the bodies are cold.”

  Since the end of the Mage Wars, the Three Communities had lived with the same uneasy detente. William, with much of his power locked into a symbiotic link with his own wards, dared not leave them. But lately, William’s followers had been more active. Random, gruesome violence was meant to keep the Three Communities on edge, meant to destabilize the elected government that he abhorred.

  Fear crept through the Northwest with the rumor that William had a plan to overturn the Joint Council in favor of a return to the old ways when the most powerful mage was ruler absolute, and the rest of the world watched with trepidation.

  “The captain wouldn’t have assigned us to the mission if he thought there was any hope of success,” Zack said.

  Diplomatic of him, that ‘us’. The captain didn’t have a problem with Zack.

  Still there was a chance, always a chance they’d show here, and they couldn’t afford to ignore it. Their snitch hadn’t even told them which of William’s followers they were looking for. Please, let it not be Raven.

  The perky red-headed waitress came by, put a hand on Zack’s shoulder, and cooed an offer to get him a drink. Zack asked for a Kaliber. The waitress rolled her eyes a bit at the non-alcoholic beer.

  “Love Guinness, you see.” He gave her a winning smile. “But I pulled a muscle playing rugby, and with the pain meds. . .”

  Cass thought for a horrible moment the waitress was going to offer to kiss it and make it better, but she settled for a murmur of sympathy before leaving to get his pint.

  A skirl of bagpipes and the answering whine of electric guitar drew her attention to the stage. Magical Blend, a loud, spirited celtic-folk/punk/pop fusion band held court on stage. They were like nothing she’d ever heard before. She kind of liked them. The dance styles of Magical Blend’s fans were as varied as the band’s musical influences. There were a few scattered step-dancers, some quite talented, and about a dozen or so twenty-somethings flailing about in joyous and unstructured abandon. A good half-dozen danced a creative mix of the two styles.

  Her first boyfriend, a Mundane she’d dated while she was in General Academy, had taught her how to get down to classic rock. Raven had taught her how to waltz, to foxtrot, even to tango (and she couldn’t quite suppress a small thrill at that memory). He’d taught her every ballroom dance she might need for any formal occasion. None of which would help her dance to what currently blasted from the Crossroads’ sound system. She’d give it a try, anyway. Someday. Maybe even tonight, if the band was still playing after their lieutenant had given up and called off the operation.

  At the bar, Lieutenant Gray was trying to get the attention of the bartender, a slender blonde who looked barely legal. She seemed more interested in the scruffy, bohemian young man on the stool to his left. The lieutenant had his share of success with the ladies, Mundane or no, but Cass was betting on the bohemian tonight.

  Gray really didn’t have his full attention on the blonde, anyway. From where he stood at the corner of the bar, he had a perfect view of the door, and he was watching each new arrival.

  The waitress arrived with Zack’s pint and earnestly asked if she could get him anything else before sashaying on her way. Zack took a sip of his pint, and grimaced.

  “I’d rather be drinking Bushmill’s.” He took another cautious sip. “But I’ve never been able to stomach olive oil.”

  Olive oil did keep you from getting drunk, but it had certain unpleasant side effects even if you could keep it down. Cass hid a smile. She couldn’t share the sobriety charm without facing questions about its origin. But Zack had never thrown her past in her face. Perhaps she could someday teach the charm to him in private.

  Two tables away, another of her colleagues sat with her own partner. Jackie looked a bit green under her expertly applied foundation. Using the olive oil technique, no doubt.

  Jackie noticed her gaze, and gave her the plastic smile of a runway model. Her lips were painted the re
d of a fresh-fed vampire’s in a Mundane’s late-night horror flick. Jackie had been one of her first partners when Cass had joined the Guardians. The partnership had lasted less than a week.

  Jackie leaned in to whisper something to her current partner. Cass caught the words “Raven’s whore.”

  Cass did not feel the least bit guilty about not sharing Raven’s charm with her.

  “You all right, luv?” Zack asked.

  Cass shook her head to clear the dark thoughts, and smiled. “Fine.”

  Once the mere thought of Raven would have been a knife twisting in her gut. Now it felt more like an old wound, poorly healed and still tender.

  Zack nodded and leaned back in the chair to watch the band, but she caught him studying her out of the corner of his eye.

  Over at the bar, the lieutenant was still trying his luck with the blonde bartender. Suddenly, he stiffened like a sight hound spotting a deer. She followed his gaze to two new arrivals standing by the door and caught her breath. Two mages, dressed almost identically, with long gray frock coats trimmed in velvet, gray slacks, white shirts with lace at the throat.

  She recognized the older of the two men. Eric Blanchard, William’s cousin, wore his chestnut hair in long, loose curls down to his shoulders. He had a soft, full, sensual mouth, a poet’s mouth, but the hard, black ice of his eyes gave lie to that romantic promise.

  Cass shifted in her seat, using Zack’s broad shoulders to block Eric’s line-of-sight. It had been three years at least, and probably more, since she had danced with the man in the ballroom of Raven’s manor. And it had been nearly that long since her face had graced the front pages of tabloids. He might not recognize her. She might not have known him, if she hadn’t seen his face on a recent wanted bulletin.