Hearts and Swords: Four Original Stories of Celta

by Robin D. Owens

  Walker outlined a regular pointed shape with cutting edges, then concentrated on the handle. There had been a winged beast—neck wrapped around the hilt. Instead of a heart pommel, he made it the head of the beast. The wings angled down—

  T’Ash’s finger tapped at the blade. “What kind of blade is this?”

  “Any kind, it doesn’t mat—” Walker caught himself, smiled. “The best blade. My skill doesn’t do justice to it. I’m not good with blades, so I will leave that totally in your hands.”

  T’Ash grunted. “Uh-huh.” But his brows lowered in concentration, so he’d already shrugged off the half insult. He’d conjured another piece of papyrus, and began drawing rapidly. “State of the art,” he murmured. He measured Walker with his glance, then shook his head. “Too many different body types in the Clover Family. Hard to judge. Can’t forge it just for Walker, but as a race, we are becoming taller...”

  Walker focused on trying to get the beast handle right. T’Ash was done with his beautiful blade before Walker had finished his hilt. Now he tapped his drawing, the wings. “These are the most important, looking like, um, long scales and curved down for quillions.”

  T’Ash stared at them. As his finger traced up from the quillions to the grip of the twined neck and the pommel, his brows went up and up. When he met Walker’s eyes, his own held humor. He clapped Walker on the shoulder again. “Walker, my friend, what were you drinking?”

  Walker felt himself reddening, couldn’t help a stiff tone. “Passage, T’Ash. I had this sword in Passage.”

  “That explains it. I’ve never seen such a fantasy hilt.” T’Ash gathered the papyrus, studied it. “What say I refine this the way I think you meant it to look, and what I know I can craft? Get it back to you in a coupla septhours. That do you fine?”

  “Very fine.” Walker offered his arm for a noble arm-to-arm clasp. T’Ash gripped hard but not with all his strength. More than Walker could have managed before his training, though. “Thank you, T’Ash.”

  “’Welcome. I’ll let the Hollys, the FirstFamilies, and the NobleCouncil clerk know that Clover Family will have a sword and you were tested and certified to carry.” T’Ash still frowned at the drawing, angling it back and forth as if that would make Walker’s lines clearer. Maybe it did—in T’Ash’s brain.

  “Wait,” Walker said.

  “What?” T’Ash asked.

  “Let me send you an image.” Walker gestured to the chairs.

  Again T’Ash’s brows winged. “All right.” He settled in with a grin.

  Walker went back to his chair, too, leaned against the tall back. He closed his eyes and visualized being atop the mountain again, the sword needing to be claimed. The gleam of the sun on the golden handle, the beast...The blade was too shiny to show forging marks. He sent the image to T’Ash. It was easier than he’d anticipated to connect with the man.

  “No engraving on the blade?” T’Ash asked. He sounded disappointed.

  “No,” Walker insisted. There had been Flair, but that wouldn’t apply. The vision dissipated and he opened his eyes.

  “All right.” T’Ash stood. He shook his head. “Passages. Very strange things.”

  “Yes.”

  Again they clasped arms. Without another farewell, T’Ash teleported away.

  Walker was left in the empty room that showed incredible wealth in every detail, a chamber where the highest of the high planned on guiding their society. He couldn’t say that he felt easy or that he belonged—but he thought he could come to feel that if he continued to associate with his allies.

  If they didn’t throw him out of the club and cancel their contracts because he wouldn’t do what they wanted him to.

  He drank down the last of his ale, and ’ported to the corner of Uncle Pink’s office.

  Where things got worse.

  Pink was there, so were his parents, and his cuz, FirstFamily GrandLady Mitchella D’Blackthorn.

  Argut had told Walker he preferred to play in the courtyard. They have a new plan. Those haven’t been good for us. Walker could only agree.

  Mitchella seethed with excitement. Before he found his chair, she said, “I’m giving you a ball.” She beamed at him. “T’Blackthorn Residence is the most beautiful FirstFamily Residence. We haven’t had a fine ball for several years. It will be the winter ball, talked of all Yule season. With Straif’s Flair, we can pull it off in four days. That’s fast, but everyone is curious about us Clovers, so I don’t think anyone will send regrets. Clover colors, silver and green...” She stared into space.

  “All the ladies of all the Families who have contacted us about marriage proposals will be there.” Pink was beaming, too. And rubbing his hands.

  “I don’t want a ball.” Walker’s voice was louder than he’d anticipated and jolted Mitchella out of dreams of decorating and success. He glanced at the stacks of papyrus on Pink’s desk. The pile of marriage contracts had gotten larger. The first couple of days, he and Pink had “discussed” each one, but then he’d been avoiding them. The rest of his life was devoted to being a GrandLord. He didn’t want his marriage to be business.

  He continued, “I especially don’t want a ball if it’s going to be like I’m a glittery Yule prize.”

  Mitchella was flushing.

  “I’m sorry, Mitchella, but that’s how I feel. You got to wed your HeartMate.” Walker gestured widely. “Everyone else in the Family married who they wanted.”

  Pink scowled. “And you’re having an affair with Sedwy and want to marry her?”

  Walker straightened to his full height, taller if not wider than Pink. “That’s my personal business. Not any Family social-climbing business.”

  “I think I’ll be going now,” Mitchella said brightly. At the door, she turned and said, “Sorry, Walker, but the invitations have gone out. A couple of septhours ago. We—I—we didn’t know you would dislike the idea.” She hurried from the room.

  Rage splashed in his brain, turning his vision red. He shook his head to clear it.

  “Walker,” his father said quietly, reaching up to put a hand on his shoulder. Walker was taller than his father, too. “It could be just like my affair with Latif.”

  “No,” Walker said flatly, shrugging his father’s hand off. “From what I understand about that, neither of you were serious.”

  “Oh, Walker. You shouldn’t have gotten serious about Sedwy. You know she loves her career. And she travels,” Fen said.

  Walker found himself clenching and releasing his jaw muscles. Bad habit. New bad habit. One that was visible. He’d think about that later.

  Pink sat behind his desk. His manner was calm, but Walker knew he was flustered from his high color. He said, “I grant you that Sedwy Grove is the daughter of a former Captain of All Councils, but D’Grove’s influence isn’t major. T’Reed, the financial wizard, has expressed interest in marriage between you and his Daughter’sDaughter. And Sedwy’s reputation is smirched and will always be so.”

  “She was used!” Walker said.

  “Doesn’t change appearances,” Pink retorted.

  “I won’t make an alliance based on what you want.”

  “No? What will you do? Leave? You’ll never leave the Family, Walker. Never shirk your responsibilities.”

  “And you think you can control me that way?” Walker jutted a chin at the papyrus. “I’m sure that you will need my signature on any contract, my willing permission for any marriage.”

  “Don’t issue ultimatums to me, boy.”

  “You were the one who began the escalation of this argument.”

  “Don’t you see,” Pink said, his eyes clear and matching Walker’s gaze. “The higher you look for a bride, the more solid the marriage, the more solid our status as a Family. You know as well as I do that people resent us—Commoner and noble. You owe this to us, to your Family.”

  Walker wanted to say that his allies were already the best, but he couldn’t, not now when he didn’t know they’d stay his allie
s.

  “No,” he said. He wanted to teleport away, had the energy to do so, but that would be another strike against him in this battle with his elders.

  “No.”

  He went straight to his rooms, stripped, and put both his fighting clothes and his new, rich casual clothes in the cleanser, trying to keep his mind blank. Under the waterfall he acknowledged the threats on two levels. The one with the nobles gnawed at his gut, the one from his elders shot splinters into his heart.

  When he entered his bedroom, he was dismayed to see that Sedwy wasn’t there. He yearned for her. But he also wanted to keep this new mess with the nobles to himself.

  He didn’t want to share with her. Why?

  Because she’d want him to go with that crowd?

  Would she really?

  He didn’t know.

  Sinking down onto the bedsponge, he stacked his hands behind his head and stared at the mural of his ceiling—the deep blue of the night sky and the discreet sparkle of the galaxies that wrapped around Celta. Closing his eyes, he questioned himself, his relationship with Sedwy.

  Did he love her?

  Yes, but he wasn’t comfortable talking to her right now about the problem with the nobles.

  If they’d been wed, would he confide in her?

  Yes. So he had a conundrum. He didn’t trust her to take his side right now. But if they’d both committed to marriage—and he could visualize that, wanted that—he expected that they would be a unit. They might be at odds with each other, but they’d present a united front to anyone else.

  He felt that.

  The difficulty was getting from here to there. They had some problems to work out. Probably on her side, too.

  And that conclusion made him feel worse than he had with his friend T’Ash and his parents.

  A knock came at his sitting room door and he rose, snagged a robe, and shrugged it on. He opened the door to a smiling Sedwy. She wore a lounging robe, too, and held a wine bottle and two glasses in her hands. “So how did your first meeting with your allies go?”

  “I survived it,” he said lightly.

  She laughed as he’d meant her to. Her mother would be in the older contingent, might not know what T’Ash and the others were planning.

  “I met T’Willow for the first time.” He took the bottle and glasses from her. Going over to the sideboard, he uncorked the bottle and poured the wine. It shone a deep red, the color if not the consistency of blood. He cleared his mind of the meeting, cast his thoughts back to the sword testing, and grabbed the feeling of triumph.

  Smiling, he offered her the glass, made sure their fingers touched as she took it. Her eyes gleamed. Then he tapped her glass and grinned.

  “To being awarded the right to carry a sword.”

  “Fabulous!” She lifted her wine in a toast to him and drank. The wine made her lips darker. “Let’s recapitulate,” she said as she sauntered over to the couch.

  It occurred to Walker that the large furrabeast couch hadn’t been broken in with lovemaking. Yet.

  She sat and the robe fell open, revealing a leg all the way to her hip. His breath clogged, he inhaled enough to be able to drink, though the wine lay flat on his tongue. Licks of fire sped through him, hardening his body. He dragged his mind back to the topic. “Recapitulate?”

  Sedwy laughed low, shifted a little so the top of her robe gaped. Walker’s gaze went from her leg to her cleavage. Very satisfying.

  She wiggled her fingers, and he caught the motion and looked at them, then at her face again, and smiled.

  Holding up her index finger, she said, “First, you weather Passages and develop a strong Flair.” She raised another finger. “Second, your Flair is one that the councils prize and may lead to you becoming Captain of All Councils.” She smiled at him and let her gaze slide over him, short brown hair to arched feet. She could see him as the Captain. He had the innate dignity, and he listened. He’d only appear more thoughtful and wise as he aged. Yes, in a few decades, she wouldn’t be surprised if he was elected to the highest office. Her heart picked up a beat. So sexy in a quiet way.

  “Third”—she ticked off on her ring finger—“you passed your written exam. Fourth, you’re allies with the greatest up-and-coming group of nobles. Fifth, you’ll give your Family a sword, and the status that comes with it, and can carry a sword yourself.” She set down the glass and now her hands were open and too empty. She hopped off the couch and lunged toward him, sliding her fingers into that hair, bringing his mouth to hers. Just before she kissed him, she stopped. “GrandLord Walker Clover, you have done your Family proud. You will raise them to the highest level.” She pressed her lips on his and tasted them, the droplet of wine that had lingered at the corner of his mouth. Wonderful vintage. Incredible man.

  She let her body lean against his. Was pleased that his arousal was strong and evident. Her own body readied for sex. This time they’d take their time. This time she’d explore him with her hands, maybe her mouth. The notion had pleasure shuddering through her, or maybe that was his hands as they caressed her bare bottom. Very, very nice.

  Sensational.

  His scrybowl lilted, and when he didn’t move—couldn’t move because he was exhausted from three bouts of sex—Uncle Pink’s voice came as the man left a message in his cache. “Walker, Mitchella has forwarded me the guest list for the ball. Come get it in the morning, please.”

  Sedwy stretched, and since she was next to him, she rubbed against him. He appreciated the touch of her body against his but was beyond sex by now.

  “A ball? Hosted by your cuz Mitchella D’Blackthorn? That should boost your Family, too. The Clovers are really on their way.”

  “She and Pink are inviting all the people who are interested in marriage contracts with the Family,” Walker said baldly, waiting for her reaction.

  Her eyelids lowered, and her smile remained, so he checked the bond between them. She wasn’t as calm as she seemed. Good.

  She rose and picked up her robe. Before she could don it, he stood and took it from her and gathered his own. Throwing them over one arm, he held out his hand. “Come to bed with me, Sedwy.”

  Her gaze was cool, but she clasped his fingers. “How many statements of interest have been received for you, Walker?”

  He shrugged as they crossed from the sitting room into the bedroom. “None that I’m interested in.”

  “How many? I believe I heard your father boast that T’Reed would like you to marry one of his Daughter’sDaughters.”

  “Maybe.” He picked Sedwy up and spun her around until she was laughing and twining her arms around his neck. “But Walker likes Sedwy Grove.”

  “I want a figure, Walker,” she said, amusement lacing her voice.

  He dropped her on the bedsponge, followed her down. “I don’t know a current figure.”

  “Aha.” Her fingers found his ribs, tickled.

  He gritted his teeth and claimed her hand to nibble on the fingertips.

  “Last known figure of marriage proposals, Walker?”

  “Nine, perhaps. Or maybe ten. Not all were FirstFamilies, of course.”

  She sighed and he could feel her shake her head. “Of course not.”

  Pulling the covers over them, he drew her close. “Stay with me, Sedwy.”

  “For tonight,” she murmured, and he knew she was slipping into sleep.

  “And I heard that you had an excellent research offer in Chinju.”

  “Oh.” She yawned. “Yes, it’s quite magnificent. All I could want.”

  He hoped not.

  That night, he dreamt of climbing the mountain and claiming his sword. But when he wrapped his fingers around the grip, it seared his hand and he couldn’t let go. The flesh itself melted away, tendons curled and snapped as they burnt, and his very bones charred until his black skeletal hand held the sword.

  Cheers came from the Family, watching him.

  Sedwy shook him awake. “Walker, you’re having a nightmare.”

>   “Yes,” he said starkly and buried himself in her.

  She was wet and welcoming, and her mouth and hands pleasured him.

  Everything would turn out all right.

  Perhaps.

  Fifteen

  Later the next morning, while he and Sedwy worked together in his office, the girl he’d sent to pick up the list from Pink strode importantly into the room, announcing, “I have reports from the Hollys.”

  “Thank you.” It was a large packet, and Walker was glad of that. He’d have time to figure out how to divert the nobles’ intentions or find a solution.

  “And here’s cuz Mitchella’s guest list for the ball. Lots of people are coming! Will it really be ready in three days?”

  “I think our cuz is a very efficient and impressive woman,” Walker said, pulling papyrus from an envelope. There was a list of FirstFamily rituals and council meetings and a roll call. That shouldn’t tip Sedwy off that anything important was going on.

  It wasn’t so much that he thought she’d tell her mother. As far as he was concerned, she could do that. He simply had the feeling that Sedwy wouldn’t be pleased to know that he was considering alienating his new allies.

  “Sedwy, do you really think Mitchella can get a ball together in three days?” asked the girl.

  “Yes, of course,” Sedwy answered. She’d been staring at him but now switched her attention to the girl. “Mitchella is an expert planner. She’s done wonderful balls before.”

  “But she doesn’t have that much Flair. Not nearly as much as Trif or Walker.”

  “That’s true, but her husband has great Flair, and, of course, she can also draw from the Residence. The Residence has seen many balls over the centuries.”

  “Oh, yes. Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  Walker looked up from thumbing through the pages, none of which had D’Yew’s name on them. “Thank you for the delivery.”

  “You’re welcome.” Another bright smile and a wave of the hand and the girl was gone.

  Sedwy scanned his face. Her brows dipped and a line appeared between them. Then she propped her chin on her hands. “There’s something you aren’t telling me.” She watched him for another moment or two, then sat straight. “You’re concerned about your allies. What’s wrong?”