Steal the Dragon

11

“A horse trainer?” questioned Winterseine, smiling. “Well, who would have thought it? Leath brought a Sianim spy with him to his brother’s castle.”

“As you are contemplating the murder of your son, I don’t think you have the purity of soul to pass judgment,” commented Rialla dryly as the rain began to fall.

“Ah, my dear,” Winterseine said, shaking his head sadly as he picked up a nearby stick and used it to knock the knife out of the fire. “Familial elimination is an old Darranian art form. Spying, on the other hand, is a betrayal that is much more difficult to overlook. Ah well, with you dead, there is no way to prove Laeth’s espionage activities—and I need you dead.” As he spoke, he made a faint motion with his hand and the compulsion to pick up the knife returned.

With Tris to strengthen her, Rialla didn’t even sway. Winterseine’s lips tightened with annoyance. “When did you become a magician, slave?”

The power that Tris had poured into Rialla to let her escape Winterseine’s spell was as effective as a drug—and as dangerous. Even as she warned herself to be cautious, a smile stretched its way across her face and she heard herself answer, “As I said earlier, though perhaps you did not hear, I am not a slave. I have not been one for a very long time.”

She touched her cheek with her hand. With magic-heightened senses she could feel the scar where she’d sliced her cheek, despite Tris’s spell. Almost without thought, she strove to dismiss the magic that marked her as Winterseine’s possession.

Lightning illuminated the dark forest momentarily, followed soon after by the reverberation of its accompanying thunder.

As soon as Rialla sought his help resisting Winterseine’s spell, Tris slid off the horse. He pulled the bridle and saddle off, setting the animal free to go or stay as it would.

He knew he wasn’t going to find Rialla in time to help her directly; the bond would have to serve them. He wasn’t sure how much he could help her over such a distance, but there was green magic in the storm that had awakened in the night. Tris drew it to him ruthlessly, ignoring the rains that began to pour from the heavens.

He thought only to keep Rialla out of Winterseine’s control; he hadn’t considered the possibility that she could use the magic that he gave her. When she began to dispel his illusion, Tris stepped in delicately to guide her manipulation.

This way, he said. It doesn’t waste so much magic.

Rialla accepted his help gratefully. The kidskin fell into her hand, the shadow of the tattoo fading away, but Tris’s magic, under her control, had chosen to do more than that. Under her fingers her cheek was smooth, without scar or blemish. Her smile widened as she met Winterseine’s gaze fully.

“I’m neither slave nor magician.” She took a step closer and gripped his left hand firmly in her right. “Have you forgotten? I am an empath.”

The unexpectedness of her move kept Winterseine momentarily motionless, and then it was too late. Rialla caught him in a maelstrom of emotion.

This time there was no room full of people for her to draw upon, only Winterseine himself. She ignored her instinctive revulsion and sought the faint trails of destructive emotion that he kept hidden from himself in the far recesses of his mind. She ignored the rage that had more than a touch of insanity in it: it would merely strengthen him. She found instead all the fears that had been growing since his son had discovered that the god of night still lived.

She took his fear, strengthened it with doubt, and pulled it closer to his conscious mind…

Winterseine ripped himself free of her hold. She could see the sweat that stained his shirt in the light of the fire.

“Bitch,” he said. His left arm, the one she’d touched, hung limply at his side—a reflex only; she had done him no physical harm.

He motioned sharply with his right hand. This time the hand motion was no arcane move. She saw the flash of silver and dodged to the side.

Rialla had trained almost obsessively at Sianim, struggling to rebuild her confidence. The knife Winterseine had produced from a hidden sheath on his arm merely slipped across the skin of her upper arm before landing in the dirt behind her.

Resting her weight lightly on the balls of her feet, she flexed her knees slightly, looking for the opening that would allow her to touch him again. Not over his clothing—that would diminish the effect; she needed to touch him skin to skin.

Already the terror that she’d pulled to the surface of Winterseine’s thoughts was receding as the slave master replaced it with rage. Though she couldn’t feel his anger, she could see it in his face.

Careful, warned Tris without disturbing her concentration. He’s getting ready for something. Can you feel the magic he’s amassing?

Winterseine smiled and stretched his right hand toward her. He made a grasping motion, and Rialla felt pain explode in her chest. She fell to her knees, gasping for breath that wouldn’t come. Tris’s warmth spread slowly across her chest, and with it the ability to breathe, though the incapacitating pain remained:

Rain began to fall, pounding the ground with the force of its descent.

Winterseine had stepped closer. Rialla rolled, extending her arm; she touched his boot for an instant before he stepped away. In that moment she took the ache in her chest, and Tris’s empathetic pain, and thrust them at Winterseine. Even through the heavy leather, the contact broke his concentration and Rialla’s agony faded.

Rialla rolled to her feet, panting with the triple effect of her own pain, Winterseine’s and Tris’s. The hurt faded rapidly. Without Winterseine’s magic to interfere, Tris quickly repaired the slight damage that had been done.

“There it magic in you,” accused Winterseine. “I felt it.”

In the few naked moments she had touched Winterseine, she’d discovered the fear that haunted him. The moment had come to take advantage of it.

Rialla shook her head and then slanted a glance at Terran, ensuring that the slave master saw the adoring expression with which she regarded his son. In a soft voice she said, “No. It is in him.”

A touch of fear crept back into Winterseine’s face. “You only slept with him. He’s slept with many women.” There was defensiveness in his voice.

Rialla remembered then that Winterseine had objected to his son’s relations with an empath. She smiled slowly, to make him nervous. “They weren’t like me.”

“If you are so ensorcelled, why did you send him to sleep?”

Rialla noticed that he wasn’t paying as much attention to what she was doing, and she inched herself closer to him. She shook her head. “He is not like you. He would have objected to your death.” She amplified his fears with words instead of empathy. “He knows it is the best thing to do, but he is too honorable. It is unfortunate that you didn’t eat that stew. Your death at my hands would have been much less painful than the one that Altis has planned if I failed my task.”

For an instant Winterseine’s fears caused him to freeze. In that moment Rialla pounced. With a move she had practiced countless times, she gripped his wrist and twisted, locking his elbow. Stepping to the side, she placed her free hand on his shoulder blade, pushing him forward and down. When she knocked his feet away, she held him pinned face down in the mud with her foot on his shoulder and his arm twisted painfully behind him.

Wearily, she turned her face into her shoulder to wipe away the sweat and rain so she could see.

Tris, she said, you’ll have to break the connection that binds us together. If you don’t, you’ll get caught up in the backlash. I can’t protect both of us.

Rialla! he said urgently, but she pushed him away.

Assuming Tris would heed her warning, Rialla turned to Winterseine. He’d quit struggling as soon as it became obvious that the only thing he could accomplish was dislocating his shoulder. Rialla’s hand was on his bare wrist.

She began with his fears, the ones that were readily apparent. Winterseine would know what she was trying; his mind was disciplined, orderly. Only the touch of insanity—the rage fueled by the fear that his son was controlling him—gave her the means to defeat him.

She tried to ignore the stray thoughts that crept in; emotions were her weapons. She found his first fears: his son emerging from his room, white and shaken, glowing with power… the first time Terran stood up to his father and Winterseine backed down, knowing without a doubt that in a power struggle the son was stronger … and presented those feelings to Winterseine. Her own heartbeat picked up in time with his. These were the fears spawned by his memories; because she used his own emotions, Rialla couldn’t step away from them as she had managed to when she’d killed the empathic feeder the night Karsten died.

Rialla took his reaction to the old thoughts and reinforced them, driving him deeper into his own nightmare. She reached further, for older hurts and uncertainties. She reached the boy he had been, vulnerable to taunts and shame, and presented those voices to him again.

Only when she heard him cry out did she fan the flames of his rage. Earlier his anger had been a focused flame, protecting him from the fear; with Rialla’s intervention it became an overwhelming wave, drowning out coherent thought.

It wasn’t enough.

She added her own terror, the memory of the battle with the swamp creature, the horror of becoming a slave again. She reached deeper and found the terror of being helpless at the mercy of ruthless captors, the sick fear of being beaten, knowing just how much it was going to hurt… deep, soul-eating sorrow of living alone among strangers with no family bonds, and no chance of it changing … Some part of Rialla knew that the last thought wasn’t hers or Winterseine’s, but she was too preoccupied with what she was doing to search out where it came from. Even as she worked to project her emotions, she felt Winterseine fighting for control.

If she didn’t take Winterseine out now, he would kill her, but it wouldn’t stop there. Tris would hunt Winterseine down, and she was afraid that the healer wouldn’t stand a chance against Winterseine’s magic.

Shuddering, she reached into herself for the small place she kept hidden for fear of her sanity. It was here that the emotions and last thoughts of her family dwelt with the death of Jarroh’s child-slave and a hundred others. She drew the veil of shadow aside, pulling a thread of the tangled horror and thrusting it at him viciously. She struggled to keep aloof; knowing what was to come allowed her to deal with the pain and fear faster than Winterseine could.

She fed her horrors to him one by one, and slowly she could feel Winterseine weakening. She had to break him and get away from the campsite before Terran woke up.

Momentarily distracted by her fears, she reached for one last memory, searching deep.

This time she lost the small thread of calm that allowed her to maintain the distance from the pain, and became tangled in the morass of emotion. It wasn’t until she fought her way through that she realized why it had been so hard to maintain her distance.

Alone, even among his own kind. Set apart both by his refusal to let fear dominate his actions and by the kind of ability that had been dying from his race for a long time. Another man might not have been banished for saving the human child, but he was different, with no one to speak for him.

Rialla was caught up in Tris’s memory.

Frantically, she fought to free herself of it and the others that were beginning to seep in through the breach of her defenses; she needed to be detached or she would be swallowed in the tempest she’d created in Winterseine’s mind. To do that she had to find Tris and get him out.

At that instant, when the last of her bastions against pain and fear were failing, Winterseine lost his battle. The growing miasma of terror and anguish that he’d been holding back hit Rialla with the force of a blow.

Almost without thought, she abandoned her efforts to rebuild her shields and tried to protect Tris long enough so that he could leave her. Apparently he knew what she was doing, because just before she lost herself in the storm of emotion, his words echoed to her.

Sorry, love. His mental voice was ragged with the same pain that was ripping through her. / tried to tell you earlier; I can’t leave you anymore.

On the edge of the forest, Tris fell quietly to rest on time-faded leaves from autumns past. The gelding, too well trained to leave its rider, nudged gently at Tris’s cheek, then began to graze as the rains poured down and lightning flashed in the sky.

Rialla cried out as she lost herself in the storm of emotion. Something hit her hard on the shoulder, throwing her away from Winterseine’s jerking body. She hit the ground and collapsed into a fetal curl, whimpering with the pain in her head. She was too close to unconsciousness to appreciate the difference between a bad headache and the much more harmful torment that had been tearing her apart.

Lying on the ground, Rialla listened to Winterseine’s hoarse moans and started to shake as her body responded to the stress of the battle. Some part of her recognized what must have happened: Terran had knocked her away from Winterseine in the moment before she would have joined him in perpetual madness.

The emotional torment she’d just been through precluded any sort of emotion at all. She couldn’t even manage to be worried about Tris. There would be time enough for that, she supposed, if Terran allowed her to live long enough to discover how Tris had fared.

She could hear Terran mutter over his father, but she didn’t think that even the power of the gods could restore Winterseine’s reason. It would have been kinder to kill him, but she’d failed.

Winterseine’s noises quieted, and Rialla heard Terran get up and move to the supply packs. He came back and picked her up with a grunt. If it had been anyone else touching her, he would have fallen to the ground screaming; she hadn’t even begun to restructure the shields to keep her emotions from others—but she still couldn’t touch Terran with her mind.

Air hissed involuntarily between her teeth from the pain in her head when Terran set her down on one of the blankets. He wrapped it securely around her and braced her in a sitting position. With one arm around her chest, he pressed a cup against her lips and half-forced several swallows of spicy alcohol down her throat.

She choked and gasped, but the alcohol did its job, and her tremors slowly subsided.

“Better?” asked Terran in a neutral tone, giving her the half-full cup.

Rialla nodded warily, and he backed away until she was supporting herself. He got to his feet and fed the dying camp fire until it was dancing merrily. She couldn’t read anything on his face.

From nearby darkness came a choked-off cry, and she saw Terran momentarily tense, but he didn’t look toward his father. Instead he turned to face Rialla fully. The fire was behind him, allowing night to shadow his face, while he could see her clearly. She didn’t know if she showed anything beyond the distant numbness that protected her.

“The damage to him is permanent?” Again his voice was detached.

Rialla nodded. She paused and said in a voice that matched Terran’s, “He hasn’t been totally sane for some time. He would have reached this point eventually regardless.”

Terran nodded. “I know.” He studied his foot as if it had some sudden significance. “I owe you my life, Rialla. Thank you.”

She hadn’t expected gratitude. Rialla eyed him warily and inclined her head.

Terran sighed. “He would have killed me. Tamas warned me that my father had approached him. I took Father aside and explained what would happen to anyone who attempted to harm me—I thought it would be enough to stop him.

“It started when I caught him using Altis’s name to gain willing slaves. Altis isn’t opposed to the natural order, but he has no need of slaves, and dislikes having his name used frivolously for personal gain. When I explained this to Father, he reacted badly.

“I think he made his decision to kill me after I tried to save Karsten. I liked Karsten, and his death wasn’t necessary for Altis’s purposes—just Father’s. I thought I could take care of the spirit-eater, the swamp beast Father intended to kill Karsten. He thought that such a creature would fan Darran’s fear of mages and stop any alliance with Reth. But once it touched you, killing it would have killed you as well, so I gave you the chance to defeat it. Father was right: it didn’t occur to me that he would kill Karsten himself.”

Rialla sat mutely through his speech, nursing the remaining drink and gradually recovering from her efforts as her headache eased. When Terran stopped speaking, she thought of something that bothered her.

“How is it that you recovered from the sleeping draft that fast?” she asked.

Terran shrugged and said, “Poisons and drugs affect me only as much as Altis sees fit to allow. I was never really asleep, but I couldn’t move. Altis wanted Father rendered harmless and he chose you to do it, because I would not.”

Rialla jerked her head back at his last statement, her anger outweighing her fatigue. “No,” she said firmly. “I chose to attack Winterseine on my own. Altis may rule your life, but he does not rule mine.”

He smiled then, a tired and sad smile. “Doesn’t he?”

Rialla set aside the blanket and stood, turning away from Terran.

“Where are you going?” There was no threat in Terran’s voice, but Rialla stopped, turning back to face him.

“Where I belong,” she replied.

“To Sianim?” he asked. “You could stay here, with me. Altis appreciates beautiful things, as do I. He will rule this world, you know; it will be a wondrous place. He will allow no violence, no wars or hatred; people will worship him and have no need for power or gold. They will hold to Altis’s purposes and be at peace.”

Rialla met his gaze steadily. “Your Utopia cannot exist when humans are given the right to make their own decisions. People can always find something to disagree about.”

Terran shook his head. “In Altis’s kingdom, people will be granted the wisdom through Altis, to make correct choices.”

“I understand now why Altis does not object to slavery,” commented Rialla quietly, “as that is what he is proposing for everyone. A slave is still a slave, even if she is well treated. I will never willingly be a slave again, Terran. I would die first.” There was peace in that knowledge, a peace she hadn’t known before.

“So be it.” Terran nodded, stirring the fire with a convenient stick.

Rialla waited. Terran watched her a moment and then smiled again. “Go back to Sianim, Rialla. You have served Altis’s purposes this night.”

Rialla wasted no time escaping the clearing where Terran sat with his father. As soon as she could no longer see the light of the camp fire, she stopped and searched with her weary empathic talent for any hint of Tris’s presence.

Rialla?

She could tell that he was exhausted and in pain, but she was so happy to find him alive she didn’t care.

I’m coming, she told him. Wait there.

No, he replied shortly. I’m fine, and I can come to you faster than you can travel here.

Rialla found a comfortable place to sit, under the shelter of a large tree where the rain didn’t fall as hard. She waited.

It took Tris less than a third of the time it would have taken a human to find Rialla where she slept on the wet ground.

She stirred briefly when he wrapped the saddle blanket around her, but she didn’t really open her eyes until he started cooking over the fire—it smelled good.

“I had to leave the horse when I came,” he said, stirring the small pot suspended over the fire, “but I brought the saddlebags with me.” Without pausing in his speech, or looking away from his cooking, he continued, “I believe I owe you an explanation.”

Rialla sat up and rubbed her eyes. Though the rain had stopped, it was still dark; she hadn’t slept long. She felt surprisingly good for the brief rest—but that was one of the benefits of traveling with a healer.

“I believe you do.”

He set the long-handled spoon on a rock and left his stew. He crouched on his heels in front of her. He called a magelight to him, giving Rialla a clear view of his face. “Among the sylvan, the bonding I set between us is used to mate pairs for life,” he said baldly.

She stared at him. “You mean we’re married, and you didn’t tell me?”

She surprised a laugh out of him. “I suppose you could look upon it so, yes.”

“Why did you do it?” she asked.

“Before I met you, the woman who called me to Tallonwood gave me a seeing. Such things are unclear by their nature, but from what she said I knew that I would meet the one with whom I could bond.”

“You mean that you could not bond with anyone you pleased?” Rialla asked.

“No. I have never met anyone with whom a bonding would work. There are so few sylvan now, fewer still ever find a bond mate.”

Rialla thought about what he had said. “You formed the bond between us because a seer told you it could work?”

“No,” he said. “I did it because I finally found someone with whom I could belong.” He stood then, going back to the food, but he didn’t pick up the spoon.

Instead he bowed his head and said softly, “I’m sorry.”

Deep in her own thoughts, Rialla only dimly heard him continue. “I thought at first that I could break the link, if you didn’t want it. It isn’t supposed to strengthen as fast as it did. In the old days, when my people were many, the initial ceremony lasted for three months. If the couple were unwilling to continue so bound, the link was removed. Trenna told me we could bond. She didn’t say that you’d be willing.”

Rialla remembered the things she’d learned about him last night, remembered the soul-eating loneliness and found its echo in herself. If she’d known of such a bond, she would have moved mountains to achieve it. When she considered it, the bond didn’t frighten her—not at all. She hugged her reply to herself for a moment, then said softly, “I’m not.”

“I know,” said Tris, misunderstanding. “But there’s nothing that I can do about it. It’s been too late since Winterseine put you on the water wheel.”

“No,” said Rialla, lifting her face so he could see her smile. “I meant that I’m not sorry, not that I’m not willing.”

Tris whirled to face her, and gave her the autocratically displeased look that she’d seen him turn on Winterseine. Rialla bit her lip, knowing that he’d be offended if she laughed. Half her euphoria was caused by fatigue, so she fought to keep properly sedate.

“You let me grovel,” Tris growled.

Rialla buried her face in her knees and lost the battle, giggling helplessly.

Tris’s magelight faded into darkness.

“Theft,” purred Tris, sometime later.

“Thief,” acknowledged Rialla with sleepy laughter.