Protector of the Flight (23 page)

He’d
been a refugee, tolerated as part of the staff of a large, noble estate, a lost
child. He and Calli could do better in raising lost children.

“The
Song,” he forced the words from his mouth. He should be so grateful this morning,
dreams coming true. “The Song would not have paired me with you if I couldn’t
accept you with all your…all of you.” He needed to believe that.

She
glanced up at him now, wariness in her eyes. “With all my flaws.” Her fingers
brushed his cheek and he felt the Power of them surge straight to his groin,
deeper, sink into his bones. She was
his.

“And
the Song chose me for you, despite…” Her lips curved slightly and he realized
she was teasing, and
that
slammed into him with crushing tenderness. No
one had teased him since he’d been a child with his own family. After that,
he’d always taken life very, very seriously and people had respected that. When
he’d been noticed, as if his moods had ever been of the slightest
consideration. Not often. He dropped his head to her shoulder and smelled the
sweet earthiness of her, of their pairing.

“Yes,”
he ground out the words. “I have flaws, too. Many.” Fear had driven him when he
was a teen. He’d chosen to serve under Lady Hallard when she’d visited his old
master and offered him a place. He’d striven to become a Chevalier instead of
working in a stable all his life. That climb had taken longer than he’d
anticipated, and along with the battles, had simply worn him down. For a while.
But he’d taken the defection of the volarans as his own personal alarm. It had
scared him to the bottom of his soul. He’d be
nothing
without Dark
Lance.

Correction.
He’d
have been
nothing. Now he’d risen to the heady top of the status
ladder overnight. Was the fact that he’d rediscovered his ambition, his fight,
one of the reasons that the Song had gifted this woman to him? He thought so.

Awkwardly,
he picked up their joined hands, turned them over and pressed a kiss into her
palm.

Her
head lifted and she looked at him with wide eyes, as if she’d rarely received
affection. Perhaps despite their appearance, they were two of a kind. “We’ll
adopt,” he said roughly.

When
she smiled, their shared Song rose inside him, beautiful and potent, and
brought with it the sound of volaran wings and the whisper of long, verdant
grass from a place that could be their home.

He
glanced away, cleared his throat. “I think we should bathe and eat,” he said.

She
glanced at him and nodded. “Let’s face the Marshalls and whatever else we need
to do—choose the land.”

“Very
well.” He tugged on her and started walking toward a door. “We must dress.”

Calli
saw the shreds of his clothes tossed around and her beautiful blue dress. She
liked it, but didn’t want to slither into it for breakfast.

On a
chest were folded clothes; pants easy to get into, and special sleeveless
shirts that buttoned on the shoulders and along the sides. They were the
Exotique color of purple.

Another
short interval of humiliation and they were dressed and ready to go.

She
opened the door to find Alexa and Marian lounging in deep chairs set in the
semicircular entryway.

“We
want to bathe,” Calli said.

“Where’s
Luthan?” Marrec asked.

Bastien
strolled up the stairs and into the room. Grinning wickedly, he said, “My
upright brother didn’t stay long. Just long enough to hear screams of delight,
by which sound—and the Bonding Song emanating from the suite—he cannily deduced
that the consummation of the marriage had occurred.”

Heat
crawled up Calli’s neck, bloomed on her cheeks. She tugged on Marrec’s arm. “Let’s
go now.”

They
walked together, passing the other three to the stairs.

“Calli?”
Alexa said.

Calli
turned her head to look at the woman. “Ayes?”

“You
walk well with Marrec. In step. You look good together.”

“I
always was good in a three-legged race.”

“What’s
a three-legged race?” asked Marrec and Bastien together.

Watching
her step down the long flight of stairs, Calli said, “It’s a race people play
during, um, picnics, holidays.” She waved her free hand.

Marrec
frowned a little, as if accessing her memories. That was a little creepy, so
Calli said, “Let’s go.”

17

A
fter a quick
bath in the public pools that left Calli red from more than the heated water,
she and Marrec ate a late breakfast with a few of the younger Marshalls in the
fancy dining room. Everyone at the table spoke more than he, and Calli sensed
he was wary of those who had had great power over him just the day before. He
wasn’t a talkative man, so she figured she’d be relying on the memories that
continued to roll from him to try and understand him. But that was a blessing.
It wasn’t often that a woman had so much information about her husband. At
least, that’s what Calli was telling herself.

As
she and Marrec walked across the courtyard to the Map Room to choose their
land, a group of Marshalls and top-ranking Chevaliers surrounded them. With
each step, tension built and cycled back and forth. She’d try to take an easy
breath and relax and niggling anxiety from Marrec would destroy her calm. He’d
shove nervousness aside, boxing it away in a safe place and the strain of the
unknown would flip from her to him and pop the lid off the box.

Then
they were there, standing before the great, animated map of Lladrana.

People
pressed around them. Calli thought that everyone’s gaze had gone to the northern
border just as hers had done. The room itself wasn’t large, so others must be
lining the cloisters and lingering in the courtyard.

Marian
and Jaquar and Bastien and Alexa were there, of course, some of the older
Marshalls and the two feycoocus in the shape of red birds with long tails
perched on the top frame of the map. It comforted Calli that Alexa had done
this same thing.

And
Calli had Marrec. His Song resounded in her head, strong with excitement. His
arm against her was tense as he focused on the map. Her fingers fisted as she
realized he wanted the land as much or more than she did.

Swordmarshall
Thealia raised her hands and the babble died. “These are the current vacant
estates.” She gestured.

The
map, which had been topographical, showing the greens of rich farmland and
brown of mountains, turned to a dark gray background with splotches of yellow.

To
Calli’s way of thinking, there was far too much free land, obviously because
the owners had fallen in battle and left no heirs. Chevaliers, like her;
Marshalls, like Alexa; nobles, like Lady Hallard and Faucon, who winked at her.

Marrec’s
excitement reached a shrill pitch, subsided. She saw a real smile on his lips.
He stepped forward, concentrating on one dot in particular, a place that had
been in the richest green, not too far from the southern border.

He
gestured. “Here—”

Ttho.
Calli grabbed
his arm.
Ttho.

He
looked down at her, frustration leaped from him to her, through their
connecting Songs, through their blood.

Ttho?
It’s rich. The richest we could get. Big. Close to the Shud border and good
trade. Far from the north. We’d never be in danger. Never.

I’m
a
mountain
girl. I want mountains.
She waved vaguely to the north.

He
stiffened into rigidity. His glance flicked up and to the northwest. Where his
village had once been. He had few and indistinct images of the massacre, but so
terrible that Calli had locked them away. When his Song went ragged, she shoved
them away from him, too.

His
expression was impassive, but she knew his inner struggle.

I’m
a mountain girl,
she repeated, putting her free hand on their linked arms.

A
neigh came from the courtyard outside. She didn’t recognize it, only knew
Thunder’s and her horses’ calls.

Volaran
Valley.
The equine voice came to Marrec first, then through him to her.

Dark
Lance,
Marrec said.

Together
they stared at the map and Volaran Valley, northeast of the Marshalls’ Castle.
To the west of the valley the land rose.

“Topographical
map, please,” Calli said, a little surprised that she knew the words. But languages
hadn’t been too hard for her, and she could pluck phrases out of Marrec’s head
since they were bound so closely.

The
map changed back to the blue of the sea, greens and browns, and the white of
the tallest peaks in the north. Those were too dangerous, Calli knew.

Marrec
pointed to where the land he wanted was.
It’s perfect,
but his
conviction, his lust for this particular place had slightly faded.

Near
Volaran Valley!
came, and it was a swell of Song so strong, from every volaran in the Castle
that it staggered her. Marrec stood rocklike, absorbing the shock of her body,
the volarans’ minds. His lips thinned.

“May
we see the free estates, please?” Calli said, and as the map faded to gray and
yellow, she kept the image of the mountain ranges in her mind.

She
angled her chin.
The spur from the north. Near the end of the spur, on the
eastern slope, closer to Volaran Valley. See? There’s a place. It would be a
good place for volarans and horses, wouldn’t it?

“Must
we choose now? Can’t we look at the land?” Marrec asked.

Thealia
frowned. Lady Hallard snorted. “Calli must be trained as soon as possible.”

Calli’s
turn to tremble.

Marrec
stared at her, this woman who had shattered his old life with her choice of
him. Yet, she hadn’t chosen blindly. The drugs had freed her mind, emotions,
Power for the Song to guide them together. He had, quite simply, been the best
fit for her. He shifted from foot to foot. She still stared at the map.

He
wanted a rich estate that would always support them, their children…no children
from his body, but the lost children they’d adopt. They could make a large
family. A rich estate would ensure their children would never go hungry, never
be poor. An estate in the south would be best.

Throaty
coos impinged on his hearing. He looked at the two feycoocus who perched with
curled claws around the top frame of the map. They had wanted Faucon for her. A
snap of jealousy whipped through him before he recalled that Faucon, rich noble
that he was, garnered much of his wealth from his seaside estates and ships.

Marrec
was landless, could be more flexible in the matter of property, could give her
a mountain estate. The gleam of Calli’s hair tempted him, golden, like freshly
minted coin. He stroked her head. Her eyes, blue as the sky, met his—filled
with tears.

Merde!

She’d
broken his old, grinding life, given him new hope. Through their blood flashed
images of her lost home…in the mountains.

They
could build a good life together. They would have to learn each other’s
rhythms, make adjustments, when they became a fighting team. He rubbed his
chin. “We’ll take the land on the east side of the Eperon range, the little
circular valley.”

Gratitude
flooded Calli, her body softened, she folded into him. The volarans outside
trumpeted.

Well
done,
said a voice in his head and he looked to the map—where the land had already
shaded into the purple of an Exotique estate—and upward into the beady yet
fathomless eyes of Alexa’s feycoocu.

“Thank
you,” Calli said it in her own language, then set her head against his heart
and looked at the map. “Merci.” She sniffled, swallowed. “We must choose our
colors. That purple has got to go.”

“What
about black edged with silver, like Dark Lance?” he said.

She
smiled up at him and it was free, and easy, and nearly…loving. “Done.”

Shades
of gray would be good,
her volaran said.

“Bo-ring,”
Calli said in her old tongue.

Thunder
grumbled in her mind.

Calli
nodded to the map. “Look.”

Their
land had already changed to a black shield edged with silver. “A silver-gray
volaran, flying,” she murmured. The shield took on that symbol. Again she
looked up at him. “You agree?”

“Ayes.”

Thealia
clapped her hands. “It is done. The Gardpont colors and heraldry are noted. The
estate will be logged in the Lorebook.”

Bastien
laughed, put one hand on each of their shoulders. “You do know that you’ve
chosen colors like a black and white.” He touched his striped hair that marked
him as one with wild, fractured Power.

Calli
frowned, glanced up at Marrec. “Perhaps one of our children will be a black and
white.”