Biondine, Shannah

by Shadow in Starlight(lit)

  "We do not feel bound to honor such rituals, but neither do we disrespect the traditions of other races. The woman claims dual status: both wife and lifemate. Lifemating requires a...private ritual performed where none other can witness or later speak of it. Would the female and the Waniand man you speak of have had the opportunity to perform such an intimate act?"

  The little monk flushed to the tips of his ears. "They had a chamber above-stairs. I slept in the common room below and left at daybreak. They had not come out of the chamber when I departed, but I believe their union was consummated. It is the way of our people also, for physical intimacy to follow ceremonial vows."

  Copulating was copulating - no matter the formal speech used to describe it. Taroch felt the net around him close and grow denser. "The hour grows late. Your party may remain here in the castle this night. A suitable chamber shall be prepared for the lady. After breaking your fast on the morrow, I command you carry my message to your abbot and make a copy of the marriage record of the man called Preece."

  The monk bowed and hurried out, only to return a scant moments later. "I humbly beseech your pardon, King Taroch. My brethren from Axcroft are here and grateful for your hospitality. However, the lady was overset and has already fled the castle grounds."

  Taroch dismissed the monk, and gave orders for a page to send riders after the woman. He commanded them to fetch her back, could they manage the feat without creating a public disruption in the outlying town, or follow to learn her whereabouts. The young king stalked off to his chambers for another discussion with Vulpina.

  The debate and confusion over marriage and lifemates had given him a ferocious headache. Which eased only marginally by supper in the great hall.

  Taroch and Vulpina had just convened the evening meal when Preece entered and took his accustomed seat at the right hand of the king. "You are hale once more?" Taroch asked, tearing the leg off a stuffed pheasant to pass it to his cousin.

  Preece still looked oddly pale and sweaty. For a man who'd been resting quietly in his chambers alone, he had dark circles beneath his eyes and seemed edgy. He'd just taken a bite of the bird when the clutch of monks entered and were shown to a trestle table. "I thought they'd have gone by now," Preece said, dropping the leg back to his plate.

  "Fense," the king called loudly.

  One young monk glanced at the head table and gaped in astonishment. He rushed forward and extended a hand toward Preece. "You are proof of the power of faith, good and noble sir! I told your monarch I'd been certain you were dead, but my fervent pleas were answered."

  Preece frowned, but shook the cleric's hand briefly. "I cannot imagine that you should care, but I accept your good wishes on behalf of my cousin, the king."

  Taroch glared at him. "Preece! You border on discourtesy."

  "How so? A stranger professes to prayer on my behalf. I accepted his hand in friendship. What more must I do? I did not ask him to pray for me."

  "Are you saying you do not know this holy man, either?"

  Preece hesitated to reply, thinking his supposed restorative nap had only set him further adrift. He'd lain hot and hard and sweating in his bed, able to think of nothing but the freakish appearance of the purple demon here at the keep. Amid a band of religious men. And the strange tale that she avowed carnal knowledge of him, knowledge supposedly sanctioned by a recognized union.

  Oh-ho, they'd had carnal experiences aplenty, he and the female demon! But only in his wicked visions.

  He cleared his throat and made a safe observation. "You say he's Dredonian. I passed through that miserable realm more times than I care to count. Our paths may have crossed."

  "Indeed they did, at a tavern operated by a man who seemed a friend of yours," the monk pronounced. "Tiversham, I believe his name was."

  "Tivershem," Preece corrected. Why did the mere mention of that name start up that niggling itch again? That maddening sensation there was something critical Preece should know...He tried again, as ever when the itch struck, but couldn't lay a finger upon a specific occurrence or face. "I've stayed in his tavern many times."

  "But you were only wed there once," the monk argued. "By me. To the Yunish woman who was here earlier. A rough place for such a ceremony, that. Your cohorts were none too pleased by your choice of wife, as I recall. Well, mayhap the drunken fellow had no strong feelings either way, but the other one...that young one, with the unruly brown curls, was wroth with us all. For good reason, it seems, when I later learned your act of defiance brought about arrest for the lot of you."

  Preece bolted to his feet and speared the fellow's woolen robe to the table with his meat dagger. "You pious little fool. Do you seek my liver on a lance, enter the tournament Thursday next, like any other challenger. You defile this hall with your slanderous lies."

  "But - " - "

  "Return to your chambers, cousin," came Taroch's soft warning. "At once."

  Preece was only too glad to oblige. He couldn't have eaten another morsel with that bald-faced liar in their midst. A marriage ceremony at Tivershem's! Any fighting man knew the place. Tivershem poured watery ale liberally, leased out serving wenches for a pittance, and hosted the dregs of every realm's population. His customers were cutthroats, mercenaries, thieves. He operated an alehouse one step shy of a brothel - not a chapel!

  Preece stormed into his chamber and began ripping the linens from his bed, flinging his belongings to the polished floors, and cursing fluently in a smattering of different tongues. He'd never been so foully frustrated in his life. It was all he could do not to take up both swords propped in a corner and slay both the evil sorcerer posing as a monk and his gullible cousin. Mayhap there would be an end to his madness, did he eliminate the fools and enemies pressing him from every side.

  "Cousin, try to calm yourself and listen to us," Taroch said, gesturing toward the little monk, who'd accompanied him.

  Preece snarled and grabbed for his broadsword. When he turned around, Taroch held a short sword against Preece's belly. "I asked you as your kinsman. Now I command you as your sovereign. Disarm yourself and sit!"

  His chest heaving, Preece perched on the edge of his bed, glaring hotly at the pair of them. Why hadn't Taroch simply slit his throat while he slept? Once Preece had secured the keep, Taroch had no further need of him. The post of high chancellor was a tawdry jest, and both of them knew it. This heinous pretense galled and deeply infuriated Preece.

  To cut a man during a fair fight was one thing; to slowly drive him mad while pretending friendship, quite another.

  "I do not know this stranger," Preece seethed. "And he cannot know my face, for I kept it covered." He glowered at his cousin. "You know as much."

  "But not then," the monk smoothly disagreed. "Moreya Fa Preece abhorred that you'd done so before. She spoke of cruel rumors that you were deformed, some ghastly misshapen fiend, but - " - "

  "She's the fiend, and you're in league with her! I never set eyes upon her afore today. I have no wife."

  Taroch spoke quietly. "You know I can learn the truth easily enough, Warmonger. I have only to give her royal and clan permission to speak your sacred name. If she can, that will serve as proof enough. You would not tell any but your chosen lifemate the sacred name first spoken by Queen Sarent. The name was part of the prophecy. I am the only living Waniand who knows it."

  "I have lost my mind." Preece announced it, clearly and succinctly, then waited to see what the two men would do. If gaining such an admission was the final pronouncement that would bring about Preece's demise, Taroch now had what he wanted. Before a credible witness.

  "Er, methinks nay," the cleric said with a cough. "Not lost, so much as had it beclouded." Both Waniands turned hot eyes upon him. He made a helpless gesture towards Preece and spoke again, with increasing certainty. "From what I understand, you truly were about to be executed when firedrakes attacked. Somehow one of the reptiles took you far away, to a realm across the Great Seas."

  "Ataraxia," Preece verified,
tilting his head to indicate the king. "Where he and the others had an enclave on a small island. That is how I met my cousin. My father and his were brothers, offspring uniting previously separate clan lines."

  "Lady Moreya says you'd been tortured and beaten afore your scheduled beheading."

  "Cronel and I were never on friendly terms."

  "He was beaten badly," Taroch confirmed, nodding. He appeared deep in contemplation.

  "Considering a chain of such extraordinary events, I do not find it strange you would forget having met one unassuming monk," the cleric asserted with a humble smile. "One can even excuse your lapse of memory as it extends to the young woman. Torture, shame, the misery of such nearness to death can be buried away, deep within a man's mind. So deep he cannot easily recall it...or his own recent past. Might that not explain his lack of recollection, Sire?"

  Taroch studied the monk a moment longer, then glanced over at Preece. "Indeed, you may have hit upon the root of our problem. I could not fathom how both could speak truthfully, yet remain so far apart in their assertions. I believe you must grant the lady private audience, Preece. That is the only equitable way to settle this dispute."

  "Taroch, she may have come seeking coin or the prestige of an acclaimed union to your high chancellor. Demote me to common knight and see how quickly she makes her retreat."

  "Actually," Taroch sighed, "she's already departed these walls. I tried suggesting that many men here are of the clan Preece. I did not admit any was referred to particularly as Warmonger, but I suspect she knows better."

  Preece was burning to ask the monk if he'd noticed a purplish halo about the female in question. If she'd ever spoken of . . .

  "Did she reveal details of our supposed union? Did she, a proper noblewoman, perhaps bemoan consummation of the ceremony you say you performed? Accuse me of mistreating her, subjecting her to carnal excesses which might have driven her to confess her sins to you?"

  Taroch's eyes widened. The outward appearance of congeniality vanished from his features. Clearly Preece's questions offended the king. Good. Preece was insulted that Taroch seemed willing to accept the assertions of the monks and the woman. Yet they'd brought no proof. And now it seemed Taroch suspected his cousin was a witless buffoon.

  Of a certainty Preece could not openly admit to engaging in depraved fantasies about a glowing woman with silky violet-hued fur covering her -

  "She seldom spoke of you," the cleric replied with dignity, "except to ask if I'd received word from Ataraxia that you were safe. She often sat in the abbey garden, gazing at the night sky and the stars. She wondered if you felt the same sadness and longing. She never spoke directly of marital intimacy between you, yet I believe she loves you as only a wife can love her husband."

  Preece cleared his throat. Certain words and phrases he'd heard troubled him. The mention of the girl staring up at the stars at night...the term "love." Why such points should deepen his distrust and unease, he couldn't readily explain. But he wanted to understand more of what this holy stranger seemed to know that he himself did not.

  "How does a wife show evidence of this deep feeling? By sharing her flesh and bearing a man's offspring? Has she birthed my get, then?"

  "Nay, by the Good Lord. 'Twould only have increased her hardship."

  Taroch spoke now. "We do not have a word in our tongue for this term you use, to 'love.' To what does it specifically refer?"

  "We use that word to indicate many forms of endearing attachment. I feel a great love for my chosen work, for the holy faith. A man feels love for his native land, his people, his kith and kin. Between a husband and wife, it often takes the form you describe. Physical desire."

  "Then you believe I mounted her, but do not know her?" Preece rose and moved to confront the cleric.

  "First Preece - " - "

  "Nay, Tarochin, I asked him," Preece snarled, pointing at the solemn little cleric. "He says he was there, that his words joined us before the Creator. In the way of Glacians, we would next have joined our flesh. In the way of Waniands, we would have joined our flesh yet again and performed the lifemating ritual."

  "You took her alone into a bedchamber," the monk replied. "It stormed fiercely that night. The tavern was filled with the sounds of snoring travelers and I sleep heavily. I cannot claim I saw or heard what took place abovestairs." He paused and smiled indulgently at Preece. "However, the lady has very rare violet-blue eyes and tresses. She is among the sweetest females I have ever known. I am sure you would have found husbandly duty no hardship."

  A hot spurt of jealous fury told Preece what all the theories and rationalizations had not.: He'd tasted her flesh, reveled in it. Not just in dreams, but in truth. He hated the thought that any other male knew of those unique tresses. In his night visions - memories? - he'd felt them wrapped like silken threads around his naked chest and stiff cock.

  He nearly groaned aloud at the very thought.

  Taroch folded his arms. "There is a record of the marriage at the monastery. I've asked Brother Fense to make a copy. And I've sent someone after the girl. I shall ask for your sacred name. We will put this matter to rights with all due haste."

  "You reign supreme," Preece said.

  The cleric shuffled out of the chamber, Taroch on his heels. But Taroch paused in the chamber doorway and turned back to Preece. "This has troubled you for some time, I think. You could have confided in me, cousin."

  "What? That your chief advisor, your Lord High Chancellor has a lifemate he no longer knows? If indeed she is my lifemate and bride, I denounced her, Taroch."

  "I am the only one of the blood who knows that," Taroch replied softly.

  "So you will begin a just reign by hiding my sacrilege?"

  "I will do what I must. For the nonce, I must unearth the truth. There may yet be some mistake. As you have said, and Vulpina cautions, we cannot take the word of strangers in such matters. The realm is yet rife with rumor and murmurs of potential unrest. Which is why we have a tournament to stage...and win."

  "Aye. Good night."

  Preece stared thoughtfully at the closed double doors after the king departed, reluctantly considering he might have been looking at this from the wrong angle. Taroch's concern proved this was most likely not a personal attack against Preece himself. More likely, Preece was a pawn in some larger scheme. A plot to discredit Taroch and Waniand leadership.

  Forsooth, that was far more likely than a warrior losing his memory because he'd been tortured. Waniands did not buckle and crumple from physical pain and abuse. They were raised to expect and welcome it. 'Twas part of their nature to be fierce and ruthless, to expect like treatment by their enemies in return.

  And Preece knew far better than his kinsmen how sentiments ran here. That Waniands had rightfully ruled here for long ages did not mean all accepted Waniands holding reign again now. Their arcane ways were misunderstood and still gave many Glacians pause. What they did not understand, humans often feared. What they could not defeat outright - like an armed Waniand in direct combat - they sought to undermine.

  Was it not significant that whoever plotted against the king sought to drive the king's advisor mad with sexual visions? The sexuality of Waniand males had ever been at the core of Glacian and Dredonian hatred toward them.

  Preece stretched out on his bed, actually welcoming sleep. Let the sensual delights come. He no longer feared the woman...and that's what she was, not Lucifer's sister come to steal his soul. She was human, thus could be defeated.

  Whatever false documents she and her clerics produced, it would not gain them what they truly sought. Did she try tears, drag out some bastard get, scrape and beg, 'twould gain her naught. He would get to the root of her duplicity. There had to be an explanation. Some evil spell or trickery, and Preece would find it, seek whatever method necessary to destroy her and the men she conspired with.

  Aye, he would destroy her.

  She would not break him.

  * * *

  CHAPTER TWE
NTY-THREE

  Moreya had been too mortified to think what to do - beyond getting away from the royal castle as rapidly as possible. She'd muttered some vague excuse to Brother Wickham about having to water her donkey at the well at Inner City. He'd naturally pointed out the castle bailey itself had a well. Pretending she hadn't heard him, she dug her heels into the sides of her mount and called back over her shoulder that the monks should meet her in the market square of the realm capital.

  She knew Fense had lingered behind.

  Brother Wickham said Fense had received a belated summons.

  Moreya did not care. She couldn't tarry. She couldn't spend another second anywhere near the royal residence.

  She'd overheard a hushed conversation on her way out of the great hall. Several courtiers dallied near the main doors, openly staring at her and the Axcroft monks. She'd noticed them and the curious looks thrown her way upon her arrival. But now, as she'd taken her leave, she noted the same men now gazed at her with something like derision...or pity.

  When she heard an overdressed Aldean talking to the knot of men around him, she discovered why they stared at her so.

  What King Taroch had not said was that Preece the Warmonger, erstwhile outlaw, was the monarch's first cousin. He served as primary military advisor, as well as Lord High Chancellor. The chancellor had spied upon the party of visiting clerics as they waited in the solar, and a castle page reported the chancellor patently denied ever having laid eyes on Moreya before!

  Preece - her Preece - was here in Glacia, very much alive and well.

  Cousin to King Taroch. As rumors had forewarned, his powerful right hand and chief advisor.

  Undoubtedly now a man of wealth beyond the average mercenary's wildest dreams. Now also privileged resident of the royal keep. With unlimited access to its bountiful feasts and numerous humble servants.

  Moreya had been standing right in the very building that housed her missing husband, pleading, her heart in her eyes, while he disavowed any relationship with her. He'd been too craven to even face her as he disowned her!