She floated through gray mists, remembering them from before. Which helped her not fight them. Instead, she accepted the way the mists wrapped her in cocoons of enshrining silk that healed her, as if she were a butterfly, soon to emerge with damp wings and no more duties than kissing flowers. That might be lovely—a life of nothing but the sugar offered by flowers and the sun on her colorful self, bringing a sigh of joy to someone’s lips.
“Until a bird snapped you up.”
She knew that wry mind-voice, too. Chuffta, her Familiar. Memories came back faster this time, too—good. Cracking open dry eyelids, she squinted at his triangular face, the large eyes green as new leaves in spring, his white scales shining iridescent in the rising sunlight.
“Welcome back to the land of the living,” he said.
She tried to think back, recover more from the blank mists. “Did I break again?”
“Well, really you just chipped a little. Juli patched you up so the cracks don’t even show and you only slept a good long night rather than days.”
“What happened? Did the—”
A jagged snore interrupted her and she flipped her head on the pillow to take in the darkly haired and burly Destrye on the other side of the bed. Lonen. Her—
“Husband. Congratulations on your felicitous union. Worst wedding night in history, however.”
“Oh hush.”
It was good to see him again with her physical eyes. Lonen lay on his back, face relaxed so the scar that cut from his forehead, over one eye and down his cheek didn’t pull to the side as it did when he was awake. More scars criss-crossed his chest and concave belly—funny that her sgath didn’t show them. She tried looking with both sights at the same time, something she hadn’t quite mastered the trick of. The overlapping images tended to make her dizzy. No one else admitted to it, but she nursed a theory that the temple had developed the custom of the masks exactly because they helped prevent that sort of double-vision.
Relinquishing sgath sight again was far more restful. Besides, she liked seeing Lonen with her actual eyes. Her husband. The bond resonated in the deepest part of her. Unreal.
His black hair curled in wild disarray, a dark contrast to the pale silk of the pillows. Dressed only in light trousers, and with one arm flung over his head, his body looked long and powerful—and his manhood tented those trousers dramatically, making her yank her gaze away again.
Something else to put on the list of intimidating things about him.
Just then he drew in another rumbling snore, which cut off in a mutter of blurred words, and she rolled her eyes at Chuffta. “I slept through that?”
“He didn’t do it all night. He’s been making more sounds and thrashing around just in the last little while. Dreaming, maybe? It seemed to be what woke you up.”
As if to verify the words, Lonen kicked at something, then shouted. “Go on! Get out of here!” The hand flung over his head clenched into a fist, his muscles flickering, though the arm barely moved. He shouted again, anger and fear coiling around him, his words unclear, as if he spoke through deep water. Then he growled, more like a beast than a man. His eyes rocketed under his lids and he made a strangled cry.
Not knowing what to do, Oria sat up and reached out a tentative hand. She’d touched his hair before—and he hers—without any effect, but she could hardly tug on that to wake him. It seemed far too callous.
“What should I do?”
“I wouldn’t want to be having that dream, whatever it is.”
Okay then. “Lonen,” she called softly—and with no result. He tossed his head on the pillow, crying out broken, inarticulate sounds, that pierced her heart. Jagged images of blood, death, and pain danced through the turmoil of emotions. Those dark things didn’t belong in the dancing light of morning. “Lonen…” she tried louder. To no avail. Could he even hear her?
“Lonen!” she nearly shouted, layering in imperious command. “Wake up!”
His eyes flew open, seeing the dream still, one hand snapping to his side, before he went entirely still, the hard granite of his gaze taking in the ceiling, then landing on her, and softening while a smile spread across his face. “Oria.” He breathed her name like a meditative chant. “You’re better.”
His gaze dropped to her breasts, making her realize she wore nothing but her very thin chemise. Juli must have taken off her priestess robes and loosened the ties of the undergarment, because the neckline gaped open, showing a substantial amount of skin. Self-conscious, she drew the cloth together and pushed her hair back from her forehead, snagging it in the tangled braids. She’d slept in them, which would make them an unholy mess to desnarl.
The least of her problems, really.
Giving it up, she drew up the sheet higher, using the movement to scoot back a little from his rapidly intensifying sexual energy. “You were dreaming.”
He grimaced, then sat up, too, and scrubbed his hands over his scalp. The curls sprang back in the same bountiful disarray as before, but he didn’t seem to notice. “Yeah. I do sometimes. Sorry if I disturbed you.”
“More like you disturbed yourself.” She wasn’t sure if a hard man like him would welcome comfort. “It sounded bad.”
“Sometimes they are.” He shrugged it off, chagrin and irritation both rippling off him with the gesture. “Made Natly crazy. Said she couldn’t sleep with me fighting golems all night. Yelling and kicking and such like.”
Ah, so she’d shared his bed. Though, of course Oria had known that—had glimpsed their lovemaking in Lonen’s head, much as she hadn’t wanted to. Of course they’d slept together afterwards.
“So she stopped—sleeping with me, I mean.” Lonen watched her with gray eyes gone clear and calm, now that the dregs of the nightmare had left him. “And I didn’t much care, I found.”
Curious. “Why not?”
“Because a lot of those dreams weren’t fighting golems, but were having sex with you.” He grinned. “It kind felt disloyal to be longing for you and keeping her from a good night’s sleep while doing it. Ah, there it is. I like being able to see you blush again.”
She clapped hands over her cheeks, which did feel hot. “I should put on my mask.”
He stopped her as she reached for it, carefully catching the trailing cuff of her undergarment. “Don’t. Not yet. During the… ceremony, or whatever in Arill you’d call that thing we endured, Febe said I alone get to see your face, something about a husband’s privilege.”
Of course that would be customary. Her own parents had always removed their masks once private with each other, and with their children. She hadn’t thought of that aspect. She and Lonen would not have children to share her face with, but she would have him. She drew her hand back, leaving the mask where it sat, though she felt exceptionally exposed.
The wedding ritual had been something to endure, for sure, and she wouldn’t blame him for being unsettled, even frightened by it. Much as in her own testing, something in the binding light had looked out at her. Like the Trom and yet not. It spoke to her without words, though she imagined the hissing voice. Princess Ponen. She shuddered at the memory and Lonen tipped his head, studying her. “Cold?”
As if. The morning heat already sat heavy on the day, not a breeze stirring. “We should get up.”
“Should we?”
“I should summon Juli. We’ll need to eat.”
“We have time for that. The council meeting isn’t until this afternoon, right? And Juli said you were to rest.”
Well, yes. But it felt… dangerous to be in bed with him, with his masculine exuberance sizzling hot on her skin and his gaze wandering over her, seeing more than anyone ever had. She wasn’t at all sure how to handle him, what one did with a husband in one’s bed in the morning. When one couldn’t do the normal thing. Even then. “Do you want to tell me about your nightmare then?”
He gave her a curious look. “I figured you would have seen it in my head.”
“No. Just fragments and … feelings.” She fidgeted with the sheet. “I really do try not to prowl about in your mind. It’s more that you sometimes project images rather forcefully—as you know, since you’ve discovered how to do it deliberately.”
He grinned, unrepentant. “Seems only fair, to balance out the power. But I don’t project the same way when I’m asleep and dreaming?”
“Perhaps it’s the nature of dreams—nothing coherent came through.”
“I have some privacy there then.”
“Yes.” She twisted the sheet in her fingers, choking back the apology that wanted to spill out.
“I was fighting the Trom,” he offered. “They were at the door, trying to get in and I was afraid they’d get to you. And then I turned, and you were one of them, coming at me with your hand upraised, and I knew you’d kill me.”
By Sgatha’s light, it wouldn’t be so. “It was only a dream,” she managed to say around a tongue gone thick and dry.
“I know that. And still it seemed—I don’t know. During that ritual I thought I saw something odd about your eyes.”
“I barely remember anything about that ritual.” She laughed, but it came out far too ragged and breathless.
It worked well enough to distract him, though, because he smiled with her. “That was a hell of a thing, wasn’t it? You’ll like our wedding in Arill’s temple much better. It will actually be pleasant. Fun even. I have to tell you, Oria—you Bárans do not know how to have a good time.”
“Yes, well, dealing with the magics that we do, we have to be a disciplined people. The temple and its rituals safeguard us in myriad ways. We observe rules to make sure the magic doesn’t destroy us, or that we don’t destroy each other.”
“Disciplines like hwil.” He studied her face intently for a reaction and she regretted that her mask sat so far away.
“What do you know about hwil?” She sounded, and felt, stiff.
“Juli told me some, last night when I brought you here.”
“Juli shouldn’t have—”
“Juli realizes that I’m going to need to know some of these things that you think to withhold from me. This is an important aspect of your life—and of any possibility that we’ll be able to touch each other—so I think it’s obviously valuable for me to be aware of its properties.”
“Understanding hwil won’t change anything, Lonen.” She realized she’d clenched her hands into fists by the bite of her nails into her palms. “I can’t just learn to bear someone else’s touch.”
“How do you know—have you ever tried?”
“What I’ve tried is to explain that I haven’t had much opportunity to practice any of this!”
“Don’t get all huffy with me.” He pushed a few pillows into a better position and leaned back against them, stretching lazily and then putting his hands behind his neck, displaying his furred chest to excellent effect. “Tell me what hwil feels like.”
“How am I supposed to do that?”
“First of all, relax. We’re just having a conversation.”
“In bed.” Practically naked.
His smile stretched across his face as lazily as the rest. “A good place for it. How about this—do you have a hair brush?”
“Why?”
“Your braids are all messed up and it looks uncomfortable. Maybe you’ll feel better if I take them down for you.”
“You’re obsessed with my hair.” Though the snarled things were pulling uncomfortably.
He shrugged a little, gray eyes dancing with that mischief that sparked in blue stars from him. “I can’t deny it. Get your hair brush, Oria.”
She huffed out an impatient sigh, but got out of bed to retrieve the thing—though taking a moment to tie the neckline of her undergarment closed. The man was as relentless as Chuffta chewing a bone.
“Hey!”
“You know you are. Speaking of, have you hunted recently?”
“Want some alone time with the new mate, huh? I can do that.” The derkesthai stretched his wings, yawned mightily, then took off out the open terrace doors.
“Where’s Chuffta going?”
“To hunt. Since we’ll be here for a while.” She stood uncertainly, holding the brush, arrested by Lonen’s intent expression and a wave of particularly intense desire from him. “What?”
“With the light behind you like that, your gown is nearly transparent. I can see all the lines of your body.”
She grabbed up her gown, wrapping it tight around her.
“Don’t do that, Oria,” Lonen coaxed. “You’re so beautiful. I love seeing you.”
A whisper of pleasure ran through her at that. Ah, vanity. “Well—I shouldn’t give you … ideas.”’
“I’ll tell you a secret.” His smile went crooked and he lowered his voice to a loud whisper. “I already have the ideas.”
She had no response to that, so she indicated a chair with the brush. “Want me to sit here?”
Lonen spread his legs and patted the sheet covering him between them. “You come here.”
“I can’t—”
“I won’t touch your skin,” he said, calm and insistent, but a challenge glittering in his gaze. “Trust me.”
“Fine.” Aware she’d huffed again, making him laugh at her, she smacked the glass handle of the brush into his palm hard enough to sting, then climbed onto the bed to sit cross-legged between his spread thighs, carefully adjusting the long chemise so it covered her. He waited for her to settle, then began carefully plucking at the braids, unwinding them and undoing the ribbons that held the ends.
“My mask knife is right there,” she said, “if you want to cut the ribbons instead.”
“Why not just untie them? It’s wasteful to be cutting them all the time.”
She didn’t have a ready reply. “I never thought about it. You think about wastefulness more than I do.”
“A Destrye trait, I suppose. We don’t have all the riches you do in Bára, so we’re careful of what we do have.” He had one braid unplaited already, picking up the brush again to smooth it through the loosened locks. “I’ve never seen hair like yours before. It looks like metal, hammered to a bright polish. I’d like to have your beah made of copper just like this, to match, if that’s all right with you.”
Uncomfortable, she shrugged a little. “It doesn’t matter to me.”
“It matters to me.” His voice stayed even, but annoyance seeped from him.
“Lonen…” She tried to think of a way to explain without making him angry. “I see what you’re trying to do here and—”
“What am I trying to do?” he interrupted. Not irritated, but drawing her out with the teasing tone.
She pressed her lips together. She would not amuse him further by huffing. “You know perfectly well.”
“Yes, but I want to know what you think I’m doing, as I’m not able to read your thoughts and emotions.” He had more braids undone, and worked at a stubborn one, tugging a little. “Sorry—these are very tangled.”
“I’m sure. I don’t usually sleep in them. I can call Juli. You don’t have to do this.”
He kept a hold of the braids when she started to move away. “Oh no, you don’t. You’re not wriggling out of this so easily. Besides, I’m enjoying myself.” He was good at it, too, surprisingly deft.
“I wouldn’t think a man like you would want to tend a lady’s hair.”
“A man like me?”
“You know. Big, strong warrior.”
His amusement went sharp, desire heightening. “Not any woman. You. What do you think I’m trying to do?”
“You never give up, do you?”
“No, so you might as well capitulate, my captive bride.”
That shouldn’t give her a shiver of answering desire. Likely it came of being so close physically, surrounded by his feelings, his usual intense sexuality more sensual, echoing his lazy mood.
“I think you’re trying to seduce me,” she finally said.
“Of course I am.”
“I can’t believe you admit it.”
“Stop wiggling—I don’t want to cut your hair by accident and this ribbon is too knotted to untie. There’s no ‘admitting’ to it. You’re my wife, Oria, I want us to be easy together. I want you to trust me.”
She sighed for his obstinacy. “It’s not a real marriage. Ow!” She clapped a hand to the braid he’d tugged sharply.
“Then don’t say untrue things. You were there for that Arill-cursed ceremony. I might be mind-dead but I can feel the bond to you inside me. We’re married as married gets and I’m not spending the rest of my life tied to a woman who dances around me like a deer darting into the shadows at every movement.”
She wanted to protest that she didn’t do that, but she probably did. “It’s not you, though. It’s because of how I am.”
“You said I intimidate you.”
“Badgering me into staying in bed with you and letting you brush my hair while we’re both nearly naked is not making me feel less intimidated,” she snapped.
He laughed, a low and sensual sound. “Yes it is, because you’re all imperious princess again instead of skittish doe. Besides,” he leaned close enough that his breath wafted over her ear as he spoke, “we could be a lot more naked than this.”
“No, thank you,” she replied, making herself stop knotting her chemise, deliberately smoothing it out.
“Nothing to make a person less intimidating than the intimacy of nakedness,” he murmured, his voice doing strange things to her.
“There’s no point in it,” she protested, but she didn’t sound nearly firm enough.
“Sure there is. You’re a beautiful woman and you’re mine. I want to be able to see you in all your loveliness. It will be an enduring delight to me.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Oh, I have a pretty good idea.” He nearly purred with sensual confidence and her body seemed to hum along.
He’d gotten all the braids undone and slowly dragged the brush through her hair with one hand, combing the fingers of his other hand through it in alternating strokes. So soothing. How it could feel totally different than when Juli performed this service, she didn’t know. But it did. Determined to stay on point, she ignored the melting sensations.
“I understand that you’re determined to find a way to have sex with me, but this will only lead to frustration and heartbreak for us both. You saw for yourself what happened from only holding hands with me.”
He was quiet a bit, the only sounds the hiss of the hairbrush and the ebullient morning songs of the birds in her garden.
“Juli said it wasn’t as bad this time, that you’re stronger than you were.”
“Obviously not strong enough.” The bitterness crept into her voice, curse it. So much self-pity. “Believe me—I don’t like being this way.” Worst wedding night ever.
“Then we find a way to make you stronger.”
“Things aren’t that easy, Lonen. I can’t just wish up being like your copper metal instead of badly blown glass, riddled with flaws. Magic doesn’t just make things appear from thin air.”
“How does it work?”
“It depends on the kind of magic.”
“What kind do you have?”
“My kind.” Princess Ponen.
“You’re avoiding answering my questions.”
“Yes. You’re not the only stubborn person in this bed.”
He burst out laughing, the rush of delight showering around her like a cooling rain. “I’ll tell you a story then. When we left Dru to come to Bára and try to end who or what had sent the golems to attack us, I figured I’d never make it home. None of us did. We barreled up all the food and water we had left—which wasn’t much—and sent it with everyone who wasn’t a warrior on what we called the Trail of New Hope. Mostly the women and children, but also our scholars, artists, scribes, and a few fighters in case the golems pursued them.”
“Where were they going?”
“Somewhere new.” She felt the shrug in the rhythm of his hands. “We couldn’t stay in Dru any longer, so they went in hopes of finding a place where they could live. My father, brothers, and I took all the warriors to Bára, certain that we’d die trying to fight you. Theirs was a journey of hope and ours of hopelessness in the face of an impossible task. Our main goal was to maybe take enough of you with us to ensure the others could escape.”
“I’m sorry,” she whispered, daunted by the waves of remembered angry despair coming from him.
“Don’t be,” he said, sharply. Then the strength of the emotion dimmed. “Is that better?”
“How did you know I was feeling it?”
“You get all tense in your neck and shoulders, and flinch away from me. I’m trying to learn to notice when I’m affecting you and pull it back. Did it work?”
“Yes,” she answered, surprised. “Much better.”
“See? There are many ways to undo knots. Now, I didn’t tell you that story so you’d apologize, yet again, for something you didn’t do. I told you so that you’d understand that I already accomplished the impossible. I not only lived, but the Destrye emerged victorious from our hopelessness. My people returned to Dru and we have a fighting chance at surviving the winter. Well,” he amended, “we will when my brilliant and powerful sorceress queen makes sure of it.”
“You put a lot of faith in me.”
“Yes,” he replied, in that implacable tone. “And in me. Because, my lovely Oria, I no longer believe in the impossible. I’ve already seen it shattered. So, I do believe that, while it may not be easy, you and I will find a way to be husband and wife in truth. We will put you on the throne of Bára, save the Destrye, and go on to live long and happy lives, with many copper-haired children to dote us on us in our old age.”
“And the drought? Will you also command the monsoons to return?”
“Of course not. That’s your job. Mine is to keep you safe while you work your sorcery.”
She had to laugh. “Not to mention tending my hair.”
“It’s like silk—and now it’s all kinked from being in those braids, so each little bump catches the light. I’m torn on whether your beah should be plaited copper or smooth like when your hair is straight.”
“A grave dilemma indeed.”
“Very much so. I will have to see your hair both ways, many times before I can make such an important decision. I’ve discovered that’s what being king mainly involves—making good decisions.” His breath whispered over her ear again. “I intend to make very good ones with you, Oria, which means I’ll tend you with great diligence.”
Despite herself, she giggled at this playful side of him. “Well thank you for this. I do feel better having the braids out.”
“You’re welcome. Want to do me a favor in return?”