Wolfblade (72 page)

“I found her! I found her! I got there first!” the demon cried excitedly as he righted himself on the ground.

“Where?” Brak asked.

“Follow me.”

The child was lying beneath a massive elm almost half a mile away, but close enough to her village that they could smell the wood smoke from the cooking fires. Obviously she’d almost made it home before exhaustion overtook her. She was unconscious and blue with cold, a pretty, waif-like little thing with dark hair and long slender limbs. Brak examined her gently then looked up at Wrayan. “She’s suffering from exposure, but she should be all right.” He smiled down at the little demon and rubbed his head fondly. “You did good, Elebran.”

“Does that mean I can stay?”

“No.”

Brak’s eyes darkened and Wrayan felt him drawing on his power. While he was wielding magic, Brak looked as Harshini as Lorandranek, his eyes totally black and alien. He placed his hand on the child’s forehead and slowly her colour began to return. After a few moments her eyes fluttered open. They were an unusual shade of violet, and when she stared at him Wrayan felt she was seeing beyond his flesh and blood outer skin and into his very soul.

“Are you the fairy people?” she asked, unafraid. Wrayan supposed they must look odd to a child in their dark dragon leathers.

Brak smiled at Wrayan and nodded to the little girl. “I suppose we are. Your name’s J’nel, isn’t it?”

She nodded, sat up and looked around the clearing. “Where am I?”

“On your way home,” Brak told her. “It’s just down there. Through the trees.”

“Did you want to come with me? Aunt B’thrim makes a really good rabbit stew.”

“Thanks, but we’ll be fine, J’nel. Besides, your aunt might not like the idea of entertaining fairy people.”

She climbed to her feet and brushed the leaves off her skirts before leaning forward and placing a kiss on Brak’s cheek. “The shining soldier was right.”

“Shining soldier?”

“The one in my dream. Last night, when I couldn’t find the village, I started to cry and then I went to sleep, I think, and the shining soldier came and told me the fairy people would find me.”

Brak frowned. “Did he have a helmet on? With tall red plumes?”

“And a golden shield,” she confirmed. “Do you know him? Is he one of the fairy people, too?”

“Oh, yes, Zegarnald is most definitely one of the fairy people.”

“Well, he said the fairy people would find me and help me get home safely. And he was right.” She glanced up at the rapidly darkening sky with concern. “I should be going now.”

“Goodbye, J’nel.”

“Goodbye.”

The child darted off between the trees and was lost to sight within moments. Brak stared after her thoughtfully and then turned to look at Wrayan.

“Did she really dream about the God of War?” Wrayan asked.

“Sounds more like Zegarnald appeared to her,” Brak replied with concern, shouldering his pack once more.

“Why would he do that? He’s more interested in killing than saving lives, isn’t he?”

“Usually,” Brak agreed. He turned and started walking back towards the game trail they’d been following before meeting the woodsman. Their plan was to circle around the villages in the mountains as much as possible. Strangers were too often remarked upon out here where there were so few of them. Besides, now the Karien priest was dead, until they reached the more populated areas of Medalon they were free to use as much magic as they wished, so food, shelter and warmth were hardly a problem.

“Zegarnald is up to something,” Brak added after a while.

“That’s probably not a good thing, is it?”

“Definitely not,” he said, leading the way. Elebran had disappeared, presumably to find his companion and brag that he’d discovered the little girl first. “And where does he get off calling us ‘fairy people’, anyway?”

“It’s better than ‘pretty city boys in fancy dress’,” Wrayan pointed out as he followed the Halfbreed into the gloomy trees. It was almost completely dark. He hoped J’nel had found her way home safely.

“I think I’m starting to actually
like
‘evil creatures of the night’,” Brak grumbled in reply. “At least it’s got a bit of dignity.”

“It’s scary, too,” Wrayan agreed with a smile.

Brak strode on ahead, irritation driving him, it seemed. Before long the darkness enveloped him completely, only the sound of Brak angrily muttering, “
fairy people, indeed!
” guiding Wrayan in the direction he should go.

N
ash used the slaveways to visit Marla after she had Elezaar deliver a message, asking him to meet her in private. She had every intention of making her lover stand on the other side of the room while she delivered her news, and then inform him dispassionately that he had until she returned from Bordertown, in about ten days time, to make up his mind regarding what he planned to do about it. He could claim the baby or not, she intended to tell him. It wasn’t too late to say Laran had left her with child. Perhaps only Elezaar could accurately bear witness to the last time Marla had lain with her husband, and she was confident he would lie for her if she asked him to.

It wasn’t what she wanted, of course, but under the circumstances, she had little choice but to honour the God of Liars if Nash let her down.

The decision about her unborn child’s fate had to come from Nash. She would offer him a chance, just once, to claim his child. After that . . . well, if he didn’t want her or their child, she’d deal with that when it happened.

But Marla’s good intentions remained just that. Nash was in her room and she was in his arms and they were on the rug in front of the fire, tearing at each other’s clothes, before she got a word out. It was only later—much later—after they had moved to the bed and made love a second time, that Marla got a chance to tell him why she wanted to see him.

She was lying in his arms in the darkness, the room lit only by the dying fire, exhausted and replete, her guilt, for the moment, fading into the distance, drowned out by her love for this man. She remembered what he’d said the night she found out Laran was dead, when he’d come through the slave-ways the first time.

Kalianah doesn’t punish lovers
.

Perhaps
, Marla thought, in a rare moment of cynicism,
she leaves that job, not to Death, as I thought the night Laran died, but to Jelanna, the Goddess of Fertility, instead
.

“I’ve missed you so much, Marla,” Nash murmured into her hair as he held her close, his finger tracing a line between her breasts and down to her navel and then back again to circle her nipples.

“I’ve missed you, too.”

“Don’t make me stay away so long again,” he begged, taking her breast in his hand and bending down to kiss it. “I couldn’t bear it.”

“I’m pregnant, Nash.”

He stilled warily and let her go, propping himself up on one elbow to stare at her thoughtfully. “Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

“Is it Laran’s child?”

“No.”

A slow smile crept across his face. “It’s mine?”

“No, Nash,” she snapped impatiently. “I’ve slept with so many men since my husband died that I’m working my way through them alphabetically until I come up with one willing to take responsibility!”

He laughed delightedly. “You’re pregnant!”

“I just said that.”

“But that’s marvellous!”

She was shocked by his obvious delight. “It is? I thought you’d be . . . a little . . . I don’t know . . .”

“But I’m thrilled!” he cried, placing his hand on the round mound of her belly. Although the child didn’t show yet, after having Damin she’d never fully regained the flat stomach she’d had as a girl. Not that she minded. The faint lines of faded stretch marks and the curves of womanhood were a thing to be prized in Hythria. It was proof a woman was favoured by Jelanna. “Can you feel him yet?”

“You’re assuming it’s a boy.”

“Of course it’s a boy!” He placed his ear on her belly and smiled. “I can hear him calling me . . .
Daddy . . . Daddy . . .”

“You’re an idiot, Nash,” she said, pushing him off and struggling to sit up.

“But I’m the idiot who loves you,” he reminded her. “We’ll have to get married, of course. Right away.”

“I can’t marry you, Nash! My husband has been dead for barely two months!”

“Which is scandalous, I agree, but not nearly as scandalous as it would be if he were still alive,” he pointed out reasonably. “My father adores you. He won’t mind.”

“What about my brother?”

“He adores you, too. Anyway, if you can negotiate a treaty with the First Sister of Medalon that means he doesn’t have to stay away from his playground in Greenharbour for a moment longer than necessary, I’m sure he’ll give you anything you want.”

“And my son?”

“Damin? What about him? I love the child like he’s my own.”

“But he’s
not
yours, Nash. He’s Laran’s son and heir to the throne of Hythria. I won’t marry you unless I know that you’ll respect that.”

“Laran was my best friend, Marla,” he reminded her. “I would never permit any harm to come to his son.”

She allowed herself to start hoping, at that point. All the terrible futures she had imagined were suddenly no longer going to happen. Nash loved her. He loved their child and had sworn to protect Damin as if he was his own. He wanted to marry her.

Things didn’t get much more perfect than that.

Things stayed perfect for the rest of that night and right up until she spoke to Lernen the next day, who flatly refused her permission to marry anybody, let alone another Warlord or his heir.

“But
why?”

“I only let you marry Laran because Kagan forced me into it,” the High Prince reminded her, as they walked arm in arm through the gardens. “I’m not going through all that again, Marla.”

“But you made a fortune from my marriage to Laran. You told me that yourself.”

“That doesn’t mean I’d be as lucky a second time. What happens when you have another child? There’ll be another contender for my throne, for one thing.”

“
Damin
is your heir, Lernen,” she told him firmly. “There is no question that any other child I have will be anything other than his father’s son.”

“You say that now,” he grumbled. “But a few years from now . . .”

“I won’t let that happen, Lernen. I give you my word.”

He patted her forearm paternally. “And I’m sure you mean it, dearest, but what is it worth, the word of a woman?”

“That’s not fair, Lernen! Why is my word any less valuable than a man’s?”

He smiled at her ignorance. “You wouldn’t understand. dear. Now put this silly notion out of your head. You weren’t all that thrilled about being married off to Laran Krakenshield, as I recall. Well, the fates have seen to it that you’re rid of him. Be thankful for it. You have your son. You must settle down and enjoy a quiet life from now on, and put all these notions of remarriage aside. It doesn’t suit me to have you married again so soon.”

“You can’t be serious! I’m only
eighteen
, Lernen! And you’re telling me that’s
it
? Settle down and raise my son? That’s all that’s left to me?”

“Don’t raise your voice, Marla, it’s unseemly.”

“I’ll raise my voice as much as I want!” she retorted, and then, realising
she sounded like a testy child, she hesitated. What was Elezaar always telling her?
Don’t look for the plot before you’ve eliminated the obvious reason
?

“You want the bargaining power I represent,” she concluded after thinking about it for a moment.

He looked at her in alarm. “What?”

“That’s why you don’t want me to remarry,” she explained. “You learned the lesson very well when I married Laran, didn’t you? While you have a sister you can dangle as a prize, you can wheedle and deal and get whatever you want out of men who think that if they pander to your bizarre tastes enough, there’s a chance you’ll make them a member of the High Prince’s family.”

“Marla, that’s a callous thing to suggest,” he said, refusing to meet her eye. “Do you honestly believe I would use you in such a manner?”