Surreal sighed. How could you argue with a woman who, just by standing there, was proof of how doing the work could help a body to heal?
She studied Jaenelle’s face, looked into the eyes that saw too much. It wasn’t just her body that had been damaged and felt weak. Her heart, too, hadn’t healed since she left Falonar’s eyrie and Ebon Rih. That was almost a year ago. Wasn’t that long enough to let go of something other women could have shrugged off in a few weeks?
“Give me a half an hour to work on Rainier’s leg and go over a few things with Lucivar,” Jaenelle said. “Then you and I can take a walk around the village. That will give me a better assessment of what your lungs can do in this weather and in this valley.”
“Lucivar is downstairs now, waiting for a report?” Had the prick been sitting there a few minutes ago when she had contacted him?
“Of course he is,” Jaenelle said.
“Shit.” She wasn’t ready to deal with Lucivar. Not yet, anyway. Meeting him tonight to discuss The Tavern was one thing; meeting a bossy relative when he had nothing to do except keep an eye on her was quite another matter. “I’ll meet you downstairs after your chat with Lucivar.”
“Smart plan,” Jaenelle said. “Now shoo.”
A friendly dismissal was still a dismissal. Surreal scurried to her own room and looked around again. No clock. She called in a one-hour hourglass that she carried with her, turned it, and set it on the dresser. Meeting Jaenelle a few minutes late wouldn’t matter. Being a few minutes early and running into Lucivar . . .
As a way to pass the time, she pulled out the stack of books and took a better look at them. Some she put aside, having no interest in them; others she set with the Tracker and Shadow books to read in the evenings. Maybe she would find a story in one of the collections to share with the rest of the family during one of the evenings when they gathered together for a story night.
She looked at a story, read a few paragraphs, then glanced at the hourglass to see how much time was left before she could go downstairs and not run into Lucivar.
And wondered when she had become a coward.
Rainier hobbled around the room, putting the rest of his things away as he tried to ignore the pain in his leg—and the deeper pain in his heart.
As a Healer, Jaenelle wasn’t pleased with him. As a friend, she was furious with him. And he didn’t want to think about how she would have responded if she’d still formally been his Queen.
He didn’t want to talk about this. Not with Jaenelle, not with Daemon Sadi, and certainly not with Lucivar. He didn’t want pity. He’d had a bellyful of pity when he went to Dharo to visit his family. Worse than the pity was the unspoken hope he’d seen in too many of their eyes that a crippled leg would somehow diminish the nature of a Warlord Prince so they wouldn’t feel as uncomfortable being around him. He was less now. He had no future now. A dancer who couldn’t dance? He’d need to depend on his family and take whatever pity-work they could find for him to help pay his way, since, of course, he would have to return to Dharo and live with one of them.
They didn’t understand the depth of their cruelty. He’d seen that too when he’d talked to them. They did love him in their own way, but they saw his being born into the caste of aggressive, violent, dominant males as a failing of the bloodlines instead of seeing him as strength. He wasn’t like them. Had never been like them. Had never fit into the family. Different tastes, different temperament—and a difference in caste that had made him an outsider even as a child.
He didn’t know what to do. He was too damaged to go back to the life he’d known, but he wasn’t damaged enough for his family to feel safe in his presence. He’d never done anything to harm any of them, but they couldn’t quite hide their regret that his power hadn’t ended up as crippled as his leg.
He loved them. He truly did.
And he never wanted to see them again.
Which left him wondering what a maimed Warlord Prince was supposed to do with the rest of his life.
A hard rap on the door. Before he could respond, Lucivar walked into the room.
How was he supposed to explain to an Eyrien warrior like Lucivar what his leg couldn’t do? He’d seen Lucivar on a practice field, and he’d seen him in a real fight. The Prince of Ebon Rih was another kind of dancer, and he was brilliant on a killing field.
Right now, that fact scared the shit out of Rainier because, for the next few weeks, Lucivar controlled his life.
“You need to understand a couple of things about your stay in Ebon Rih,” Lucivar said as he walked up to Rainier.
Rainier saw Lucivar’s mouth curve into a lazy, arrogant smile. He never saw the fist that smashed into him so hard the blow knocked him off his feet and tossed him on the bed. While he lay there, struggling to breathe, Lucivar leaned over him and pressed a hand against his painfilled ribs, pinning him to the bed.
“Listen up, boyo, because I will only say this once,” Lucivar said. “I don’t know what’s riding you, and I don’t care. From now on, you work it out some other way than damaging that leg. I know exactly the condition you’re in right now. I know exactly what you need to do to heal and bring that leg back to the best it can be. And that’s what you’re going to do. But if you need to be a cripple, I will help you be a cripple. I will shatter your other leg into so many pieces, even Jaenelle won’t be able to give you back more than the ability to hobble around with a pair of canes and spend most of your life in a chair. Do you understand me?”
“Yes,” Rainier gasped.
“Do you have any doubt that I will do what I say?”
“No.”
Lucivar eased back. “There are places an easy walk from The Tavern where you can get breakfast. Think of not dealing with the little beast first thing in the morning as a reward for sincere effort in the training. You start getting sloppy . . .”
Lucivar using breakfast with his boy as a threat made Rainier curious about what really went on in the Yaslana household in the morning.
Then again, Lucivar didn’t bother to bluff, so it probably was a real threat.
“I’ll see you on the practice field tomorrow,” Lucivar said as he walked to the door. “Don’t be late.”
A bitter anger filled Rainier. “You don’t know what it’s like.”
Lucivar stopped. He turned and gave Rainier a hard stare. Then he was gone.
Rainier waited another minute before he struggled to sit up. Hell’s fire, he hurt. He pulled his shirt up and gathered his courage before he looked down.
A fist-sized bruise was already rising dark along his ribs, but there was nothing broken. Nothing even cracked, if his timid probing could be believed. A punishing blow, but Lucivar must have done something to temper that blow to avoid breaking bone.
Still hurt like a wicked bitch.
Rainier lowered his shirt and carefully stood up to finish his unpacking.
But if you need to be a cripple, I will help you be a cripple.
Lucivar Yaslana didn’t bluff, and he rarely gave second chances.
How was he supposed to explain to such an active, physical man that there were things he could no longer do?
“I’m trying to decide how hard I should kick your ass,” Jaenelle said pleasantly as she and Surreal strolled down Riada’s streets.
Mother Night, it was
cold
in the valley. Surreal felt the burn in her lungs, and she couldn’t hide the raspy sound of each breath. She began to dread the time she’d have to spend higher up in the mountains, not just because she’d be around the Eyriens, but because of how hard it would be on her lungs.
“Doesn’t bother me much when I’m inside,” she said. Unless the fire was smoky. Which wasn’t a concern at the family’s town house. Helton dealt with anything that might delay her healing by the tiniest bit, whether it was a smoky fire or a potential draft. “I’m drinking the healing brew you made up for me, three times a day. I’m resting. I’m keeping my chest protected and warm. I’m doing everything you told me to do in order to heal. Do you think I want to feel like this for the rest of my life?”
“No, you’re smart enough to take care of yourself, if for no other reason than to keep Lucivar and Daemon from breathing down your neck every day and challenging everything you want to do.”
“Damn right.”
Jaenelle smiled. “That’s enough fresh air for today—and enough information about your physical health to give Lucivar firm boundaries for what you can and can’t do for this training he’s inflicting on you.”
“Thank the Darkness.”
Laughing, Jaenelle raised a hand to catch the attention of the driver of a horse-drawn cab coming down the street. The driver nodded and pulled up next to them. A Warlord got out and smiled as he helped them into the cab and asked their destination. After conveying the information to the driver, he closed the door and stepped back.
“He’s going to walk the rest of the way to wherever he was going or catch another cab, isn’t he?” Surreal asked.
“Yes, he is,” Jaenelle replied.
“Was that for my benefit or yours?”
“Mine. I think.” Jaenelle sighed. “When I was still healing, you did me a favor—you convinced Lucivar to stop coddling me and help me get stronger. I’m going to return the favor. I needed to work; you need to be able to step back, especially now when we’re still in the sharp edge of winter.”
“Meaning?”
“More private instruction rather than the public training that could expose you to a chill.”
The look in Jaenelle’s sapphire eyes told her she wasn’t talking about just the weather.
“Thank you.”
Jaenelle hesitated. “Lucivar is worried about you. Take care with his heart, Surreal. You’re not the only one here who can get hurt.”
She nodded and looked out the cab window.
Backwinging, Lucivar landed on the road near a large, three-story stone house on the outskirts of Doun, the Blood village at the southern end of Ebon Rih. He hesitated. Then, swearing at himself for that hesitation, he went through the gate in the low stone wall that separated two acres of tended land from the wildflowers and grasses now buried under knee-deep snow. No vegetable garden had been planted last summer. Marian had cleaned up the herb garden, flower gardens, and rock garden, letting the plants reseed themselves. Making use of the labor portion of the tithes owed him, he’d had some of Doun’s residents keep the beds weeded and the grass trimmed. A few of the women came twice a month to give the house a light cleaning.
Empty rooms, cleansed of psychic scents and memories.
It had been Luthvian’s house for a lot of years, a place Saetan had built for her as a courtesy to the woman who had borne him a son. A Black Widow and a Healer, she had earned her living teaching Craft to the girls in Doun, as well as being one of the village’s Healers.
Never content, she hadn’t appreciated the house or the man who had built it for her, had never appreciated the son who would have loved her if she’d shown him any affection instead of hating him for the very things her own bloodline had given him—the wings and the arrogance inherent in an Eyrien male.
She had died in this house, killed by Hekatah SaDiablo shortly before Jaenelle unleashed her full power and cleansed the Realms of the tainted Blood.
A young Warlord named Palanar had also died here at Hekatah’s hand. He’d been at the service fair, along with many other Eyriens, hoping for a better life. He’d barely had a taste of that future before it had been taken away from him.
The only consolation was that Hekatah and Dorothea SaDiablo had finally been destroyed and couldn’t take anyone’s future away again.
Lucivar released his breath in a white-plumed sigh.
Land and house no longer held any memories of those deaths, or the violence that came after, but he did—and always would.
He didn’t bother to circle the house. If something needed fixing, he wouldn’t see it in the dark. So he tramped through knee-deep snow to the corner of the property where a stand of trees whispered
forest
. Dark, bare limbs entwined with the night sky until it looked like stars were caught in the branches.
His house now, one of the properties his father had assigned to his care after Saetan stepped back from the living Realms and retired to the Keep. He could sell it. Hell’s fire, he could burn the damn thing to the ground and no one would challenge the choice.
Maybe that was why he could keep it.
He sensed Surreal’s presence the moment she took the first step onto this land, but he decided not to notice until she told him she was there.
“Do you have any happy memories connected to this place?” Surreal’s voice came out of the dark a few heartbeats later, enhanced by Craft to reach him.
“None, actually,” he replied, also using Craft. “Luthvian and I rarely remained civil to each other through a whole visit.”
“Then why keep it?”