Heart Fortune (Celta)

by Robin D. Owens

  “And you like me asking for help.”

  “Also true.”

  Her chin came up, her eyes deepened into darker brown. “The ladies Comosums are . . . haughty. They will expect exceptional food. My friend, Camellia Darjeeling D’Hawthorn is sending me a food chest with temporary no-time spells. And the cost of that is because she loves me.”

  And me! Lepid said.

  Glyssa’s face softened. “Yes.” She smiled slyly. “You are still welcome to eat whatever you like.” With a chuckle, she said, “And fast.”

  “I could give a couple of meals to Myrtus Stopper for being kind to Zem,” Jace said.

  She nodded. “That would be good.”

  “And Symphyta.”

  Glyssa’s mouth tightened, could she be a little jealous? “That would be very kind of you. She likes sweets, so maybe the desserts especially. If you want to keep some of the food from the contents, you’re welcome to do that, too.”

  He didn’t have anywhere to put it.

  “Right.”

  “You won’t be leaving?” she said, then frowned as if she hadn’t meant to ask.

  “I have the pay, from working with you and Maxima”—and from the damned digging, though that was the minimum—“to return. I’m not going,” he answered roughly. “But the Elecampanes were right before. This smear on my name could follow me wherever I go. I’ll be investing.” If he had enough gilt.

  He looked at the cowards and the bored and the stups who’d gathered around the owners, taking them up on the return trip. So many other exciting options right here!

  Across from them, Funa stamped her foot and appeared a little sulky, then perked up when Symphyta teasingly bumped her with a grin. “Guards, new blood. New men.”

  “Oh, yes,” Funa hissed.

  * * *

  That evening after dinner, Jace and Carolinia fed Zem and Jace stocked the new no-time with very warm kills. The cat ate some of the good human food and then had taken herself off with a high and waving tail. Zem himself appeared better already since the cat and a competitive Lepid had made sure he was fed throughout the day and brought food for his no-time.

  Lepid scratched at the dirt outside Jace’s door. The FamFox’s ears flattened to his head. FamWoman is sad.

  Now that he mentioned it, Jace realized some of the depression that pervaded him came through the bond from Glyssa.

  Lepid fox lay down on the ground, and put his forepaws over his muzzle. Water is leaking from her eyes.

  Jace winced. His shoulders twitched.

  Come help! Lepid rose slowly to his feet, walked toward Jace with an ingratiating expression and licked his hand. Help!

  Jace actually shifted from foot to foot, one of the first things anyone taking self-defense or fighter training was told not to do, and he could usually control that. Not this time. “What makes you think I’d know what to do?”

  Plleaaasssee. Lepid sounded pitiful. We helped you and Zem.

  The FoxFam was good with laying on the guilt. I’m sure Zem’s and your problems are worse than Glyssa’s. Lepid let one ear stand up and rotate. I am well, Glyssa is well. She is just sad.

  Nothing Jace liked more than jollying up a crying woman.

  You can help, I’m sure!

  That’s because the fox was too young to know any better, Jace figured. He didn’t think the young fox had the patience to pester him until Jace caved. But the Fam was right, Glyssa had gone out of her way to help him.

  Not as if Jace would be welcomed around the campfire, anyway. He rubbed his chest. “All right.”

  I will stay here, Zem said, eyes already closed.

  Lepid ran ahead. Jace plodded after. When he got to Glyssa’s pavilion, he couldn’t see a thing, privacy spells shielded the windows and door. He paused.

  Jace is here. He will help you! He will help us! Lepid said along the bond that the fox and Jace shared with Glyssa. No choice, the fox had committed him. Jace knocked on the door. It took Glyssa a moment to answer—maybe she was cleaning up her tears? Maybe she was considering whatever problem she had and deciding Jace couldn’t help?

  He became aware of the soft dark, the chirping of insects, the singing of night birds. Tonight the sky was clear with the galaxies that painted the Celtan sky bright and close, the twinmoons brilliant. Maybe there wasn’t a better place to be.

  Glyssa opened the door, a figure in a thin summer robe with the light behind her outlining her body. He caught her fragrance and he knew he was in trouble.

  Here he is! I brought him! I am a HERO and he will be a HERO, too!

  She looked at Jace with an expression as doubtful as he felt.

  Clearing his throat, he said, “What’s the problem?” He’d meant to be brusque but his mouth had gentled the words, pushed more after them. “How can I help?”

  With a frown, she shook her head. “I don’t know if you can.” She stepped aside and let him in, gestured to the desk with Hoku’s journals spread out, sheets of papyrus and a writestick. Messy as he hadn’t expected her to be. Almost looked as if she couldn’t accomplish something.

  Stupid idea.

  “I don’t recall. Do you know the terms of my fieldwork? What I must accomplish to advance in my career?” she asked.

  “No.”

  “Oh. I didn’t discuss them with you as well as Maxima?”

  “No.”

  She scrubbed at her puffy face. He didn’t comment. With a sigh and drooping shoulders she walked over to one of the chairs at the far end of the sitting room, pointedly ignoring the desk.

  “I have to record what’s going on in camp, and transcribe Hoku’s journals . . .” Glyssa was reluctant to tell Jace her failings.

  He can HELP! Lepid pressed, then went over to Zem’s chair and hopped up on it, tongue hanging out, encouraging.

  “Looks like you might have a problem,” Jace said, took the few steps to the desk and stared at her and the mess of papyrus and writestick. “Huh. Thought you were expert in everything.”

  Too tired to snap at him, she said, “No.” If she let it, panic would eat at her that she might fail, fail her fieldwork, and remain a SecondLevel Librarian.

  He rolled the writestick and smiled angelically. “Whatcha doing?”

  “Writing a paper.”

  His brows wiggled. “Writing, huh?”

  “All right, trying to write.”

  Tilting his head, he whisked a sheet of papyrus from the table, read, and winced. Glyssa sat in stiff mortification.

  Jace grabbed a legged chair with his ankle, dragged it over, and dropped into it. “This doesn’t read like a scholarly paper to me, GrandMistrys Librarian.”

  And more tears came and everything poured out, Camellia and her need to have her ancestor vindicated, wanting Glyssa to write a popular piece instead of a restrained research monograph. Glyssa’s review with her Family, how she felt set up for failure.

  He listened. More, he patted her back . . . and that simple touch of affection sank into her, warming her all the way to her heart. Yes, he was her HeartMate, and his touch helped.

  “Just tell the story,” he said. Leaning back, he closed his eyes and folded his hands over his flat stomach, stretched out his feet and began . . .

  The blood pulsed hot and fast through him again. He lived. He’d survived, and he was on his way to a new home and future. Even with his eyes shut in the cryonics tube, Netra Sunaya Hoku sensed the thrust of the starship through endless starry space . . .

  Glyssa stared. “Where did you learn to do that?”

  He shrugged. “When you’re in the wilds around campfires with folk, most don’t carry vizes or recording disks. We tell stories.”

  She could feel her eyes round. “Saved! I’m saved!” Hopping up she hugged him hard, noted he stiffened and withdrew, too happy to care that he hadn’t wanted her touch.

  “Will you help me? I’ll give you the recording of the transcription of his journals. You can tell the story, and I can write it.” She glanced at h
is surprised face. “I’ll be deeply, deeply grateful. And, of course, I will give you credit as the author.”

  “Of course you would.” His brows lowered as if in consideration. He shifted, shook his head. “I don’t know how to write, either.” His hands flexed, then he shook his head. “I don’t think I want people thinking I wrote stuff. I don’t want the credit.”

  Lepid whined.

  Jace said, “But I’ll help you. Show me what you’ve got.”

  She handed him the first pages of the transcription of Hoku’s journals to read and he moved to a more comfortable chair.

  She went to her desk and wrote down the first lines he’d reeled off.

  When he looked up again, she read them back. “Sound good?”

  He shrugged. “I guess.”

  “You don’t think he’d be lonely? He signed on alone, none of his family came with him, whatever family he had.”

  “Why would he be lonely? It’s an adventure! A damn fine adventure and away from those fliggers on Earth who wanted to kill people with psi . . . Flair.” Jace’s eyes gleamed.

  Glyssa tilted her head. She read Hoku as a quiet, precise, serious sort of man, especially after the deaths he felt responsible for. But giving him a little of Jace’s joie de vivre . . . why not? . . . especially in the beginning. Who’s to say he didn’t have that quality? Her own writing didn’t completely reflect her, either.

  “As for family,” Jace said. “Plenty of time for that later. Right now he’s concentrating on being a starship pilot.” He smiled and his expression looked distant again.

  “Yes,” she said. One last time she read Jace’s opening aloud. “It is good.” She aimed her writestick at him. “Tell the story.”

  He did and she wrote it down. Then she sighed. “I can’t pass this off as my own work for the FirstLevel PublicLibrarians.”

  He sent her an unbelieving stare, narrowed his eyes. “You said that earlier and you believe that.”

  Offended and sitting up straight, she said, “Of course I do. Besides, your style isn’t mine. Everyone would know that.”

  He shook his head, then rubbed his temples with his hand. “All right. Then tell the story yourself. You’ve got a mouth on you,” he said. “I’m thinking you’d feel better if you recorded the story.”

  Her spine stiffened more. “I’ve tried and tried and I can’t. You can help me.” She wouldn’t mention Zem.

  She didn’t have to. “You saved Zem’s life.” Jace nodded. “I like telling stories. I’ll do it.” He rolled a shoulder. “You tell your folks or not, as you please, and your friends, but nobody else needs to know I did this.”

  After nibbling her lower lip, she said, “Maybe I can convince my Family to accept this, even though it isn’t solely my work. I know Camellia and Laev will.” She pushed the dark threat of her Family’s disapproval at her failure away. “We can do this.” She hoped.

  * * *

  He came to her that night in her lucid dreams, setting a hand on her shoulder and awaking her. She glanced up, saw him dressed only in a loincloth. She, of course, had her long sleep tunic on, old and soft.

  “Glyssa,” he said.

  Nineteen

  Glyssa,” he repeated.

  At least he knew who she was in dreams now.

  He reached over and took a handful of her hair, fisted his fingers around it as if savoring the texture of the springy stuff.

  “Your hair feels like no other’s.”

  Since even in dreams grimaces weren’t romantic, she fixed a pleasant expression on her face. Her smile curved naturally as she noted his sex stirring. Old nightrobe or not, she tossed the sheet away and stood before him, thinking she could smell the spicy musk of him as if this was no dream.

  He looked down at her, his smile spreading as he touched one of her tight nipples beneath the sagging cloth. He took a step back to scan her and her nightwear. She’d always come to him in the sexiest clothes that she thought would arouse him.

  “Interesting,” he said.

  She would not blush in her own dream—all right, their shared dream.

  Now he cupped her breasts, his big hands covering her modest gifts. She shifted as her lower body began to ache for completion. She wanted sex. She wanted loving, too, but she’d settle for fiery sex.

  She wanted him.

  “Are you sure you want to lay—play with me?” she asked softly. “You’ve been angry with me.”

  He shrugged. “That doesn’t seem important now.”

  Letting her vulnerability show, she said, “I don’t want you to regret this.”

  Another shrug. “Too much talking.”

  All right, then. He’d been stroking her breasts. Her turn. She reached out and laid her hand on his shaft.

  Jace jerked, probably because she’d never done that before. Giving him one long stroke, she stepped back and whipped off her sleepwear.

  He liked her in clothing, seemed even interested in her regular night tunic. She preferred naked herself, but there might be something in this idea of arousing one’s partner while he was dressed. He wasn’t wearing much, but she was pleased to work with what she had.

  Unable to stop her grin, she came in close, very close, until their bodies touched, her hips pressed tightly to him, her breasts flattened against his chest. She slid her arms around his neck, found his skin slightly damp. Even better.

  He set his hands on her hips, didn’t go for squeezing her derriere. That would change soon. She took his mouth, running her tongue over his mouth and when he opened his lips, she plunged her tongue in to taste him. Nothing was like the taste of her man. She sucked his tongue, tangled her own with his, thrust and withdrew as she slowly rubbed her body against his, feeling his sex stiffen, enlarge. His hands moved to her bottom and she broke the kiss, took a pace back.

  His pupils were dilated, lips redder from their kiss, his fingers flexed. Again she glided forward, reached for his cock behind his loincloth, stroked hard, down, then up, then down and cupped his balls.

  Jace picked her up and threw her on her bedsponge, whipped off his loincloth and pounced.

  Her body was ready, needy. She arched up, waiting for his first lunge, and his face set, his eyes wild, he thrust into her.

  The race to the shattering ecstasy was on.

  No. He stopped. No!

  Her nails dug into the back of his shoulders. “Move!”

  “Not . . . yet.” His gaze was steady now. “Slow. Love being in you. Here. Best. Slow, slow, slow,” he chanted softly, propping himself on his elbows and withdrawing incrementally.

  She grit her teeth, closed her eyes, experiencing all the incredible sensations of her man moving inside her.

  He pulled nearly out, and she whimpered at the loss, her desire ratcheted up.

  Then he thrust hard, going deep, she cried out.

  He halted and she panted. So delicious, this filling! This connection. She wrapped arms and legs around him, tried to pull his torso closer for a kiss, no go. Tried to arch so he would move. Nothing.

  “Open your eyes. Look at me. I don’t want you thinking about anyone but me. About Andic.”

  She followed his demand, lifted her eyelashes. Jace was blurry. “Andic who?” she slurred.

  He laughed and sensations rippled through her. They groaned together. He took a couple of short breaths, the cords of his neck showed strain. “Too good. Dammit. Too damn good.” Lowering himself, he kissed her, her forehead, her cheeks, her lips.

  “Jace!” she cried when his mouth left her own. “I need you.”

  “Glyssa,” he groaned and then he was moving in her like she wanted. Her mind vanished and she clawed at him, moaned, whimpered, demanded. Only craving existed. Only the shattering was necessary.

  Her lover would give her that, and she would empty him.

  Her HeartMate.

  And then she reached the cliff of rapture and held him close and jumped off it and soared and glittering fireworks exploded around her, through her.
>
  His body tensed against her. She felt the rumble of his release, his moan leaving his chest on a long breath, and his weight settled against her.

  She recovered quickly, too quickly, as was usual in this dreamtime. In reality, her body would be languorous for long minutes. She said nothing, wanting to prolong the time together, wanting him to stay.

  Wanting him to walk—run!—from his tent to hers so they could make love in more than dreams. Eyelids cracked, she looked at his face. Satisfied. Soon he would leave like usual, just vanish, sliding deeper into sleep or waking in his tent.

  Her breath sighed from her as she closed her eyes again, looking internally for their bond. Huge and pulsing red, changing to orange as passion subsided, soon to return to the standard yellow. She searched her mind for the golden HeartBond, the connection that would forever tie them together. Nowhere.

  Like always, it didn’t appear in dreams. Now she quietly bit her lip in heartache, and held her arms loose around his back and shoulders, not trying to trap him here, with her, in sex or in a relationship.

  He grunted, said hoarsely, “By the Lord and Lady, that was good.”

  “Yes.” She held her breath. He didn’t leave. He was communicating after sex. She stroked his back, long sweeps.

  “Always good with you, Glyssa.” He kissed her, a soft touch of lips, then he was gone.

  * * *

  Jace’s eyes popped open, adjusted fast to the filtered twinmoonslight and brilliant starlight sifting through the vents in his tent. He smelled of sex. Naturally. Glancing over to Zem, he saw the hawkcel hunched away from him on his perch, and enveloped in a blue white Flair aura. The sight interested, embarrassed, and reassured him all at once. His Fam had the energy to use his Flair and encase himself in—Jace studied the field—a soundproof bubble.

  He cringed, rose from the bedsponge, took off the sheets and dumped them in the cleanser along with his loincloth. They’d be pristine by morning.

  He waved a hand to freshen the sponge, and suffered through a thorough scrubbing himself. Not so quick as a whirlwind cleansing and dressing spell. The thought made him smile. Andic might have seen Glyssa nude, but Jace knew how she looked in the throes of passion.