Kay Hooper - The Wizard Of Seattle

"Kerry, why don't you run over to Dara's house and play now," Roxanne suggested slowly. She was very still suddenly, and Tremayne knew she was aware of his presence.

But the little girl had seen him, and her eyes widened uneasily as she stared at him.

He stopped no more than two steps from them and smiled at the child. "Hello, Kerry."

Never having spoken to a male wizard in her entire life, Kerry seemed at a loss, torn between natural childish curiosity and the wariness drummed into her by her elders. "Hello. Who're you?" she demanded finally.

"My name is Tremayne. I'm a visitor in Atlantia." He thought it was very important to make that distinction; he wanted Roxanne to know he was not one of the Mountain Lords, who had so tormented the female wizards here. She wasn't looking at him, but he knew she was listening.

"Where do you come from?" Kerry asked. She had also never spoken to anyone born outside Atlantia.

"A place called Europa. It's across the sea."

"I've never seen the sea," she told him somewhat indignantly. "They won't let us cross over the mountains, and that's where the sea is. Does the sea have a Curtain?"

"No," he told her gently. "Only Atlantia has a Curtain."

The child's wide blue eyes lifted toward the mountains, and she said wistfully, "I'd like to live in a place that didn't have a Curtain. I don't like the way it makes me feel at night." Then she looked back at Tremayne and frowned. "I guess you heard her say I'm Kerry. And she's Roxanne."

"I'm most pleased to meet you, Kerry. Roxanne."

Tilting her head to one side, Kerry said, "You sounded funny when you said Roxanne's name. And you looked funny. Does your tummy hurt?"

Tremayne cleared his throat, not surprised that the child had interpreted what she saw and sensed as pain; it was a fairly accurate assessment. "No, Kerry, I'm fine. Do you… live around here?"

"Over there," she replied, nodding toward across the street. "My mommy died when I was born, so I live with Felice. But Felice is trying to have a baby. She goes to the breeding house almost every day, so Roxanne looks after me sometimes. She's my very best friend. She lives here."

Roxanne spoke for the first time since Tremayne had introduced himself, her voice low. "Kerry, I want you to go and play with Dara now. I'll come and get you for lunch."

"All right, Roxanne." The child started to back away, her bright eyes fixed on Tremayne. "You'll come back, won't you? An' tell me more about the sea?"

"Of course I will, Kerry."

"You shouldn't have told her that," Roxanne said as Kerry disappeared around the corner and out of sight.

"Why not?" Tremayne knew his voice was husky, but he couldn't seem to control it. He wished Roxanne would look at him, wished it so fiercely that it hurt. "I'll tell her anything she wants to know about the sea."

"So she can long for what she can never have?"

He took a step closer so that he was standing directly in front of her but with a careful distance between them. "I'm sorry-that was thoughtless of me."

"Thoughtless, or deliberately cruel?" She didn't raise her eyes from their contemplation of the middle of his chest.

Tremayne drew a breath and spoke evenly. "After what I've seen in Atlantia, I can't blame you for disbelief and suspicion; all I can do is tell you that I'm not like the male wizards here."

She met his eyes finally, her blue ones as turbulent as the sea during a storm. "No?"

"No. I… I've been searching for you since the day I first saw you. I wanted to talk to you, to know your name. That day, the day you looked up at me, I felt something I'd never felt before, and I saw it in your eyes-"

"Wariness," she said.

"No, it was something else."

"It couldn't have been." Her voice was growing strained. "You're a wizard. I'm a wizard. There can be nothing else between us."

"I think you're wrong. I know you're wrong. Roxanne, I'm no boy to be deceived by hopeless fantasies-"

"No," she cut him off flatly. "You're a wizard. Wherever you're from and whatever you call yourself, we both know that your kind has the power here. At night you can escape above the Curtain. You can escape Atlantia. You have no reason to be afraid."

Tremayne wanted so badly to touch her, but he dared not; he knew he was under observation, probably from at least one of the windows on the street, because that was the way of Sanctuary, and he knew that if he broke any of their laws, he'd be lucky to get out of the city with his life. All he could do to sway her was to use his words, his voice, his intensity.

"You're wrong, Roxanne, when you say I have no reason to be afraid. This valley scares the hell out of me, because the very earth groans of power misused and hatred and violence. Do you think I find it pleasant to walk the streets of Sanctuary knowing I'm loathed?" He held up his right hand, the back toward her, and the mark of power was an ugly red against his tanned flesh. "If I were like those of the mountains, bent on conquering, do you really think I would allow myself to wear a mark of shame?"

"It isn't-"

"Of course it is." He let his hand fall to his side.

"Roxanne, if you haven't realized yet that the society within these walls is as unnatural as the one high in the mountains, then it's time you did."

"And whose fault is it?" she demanded. "Who started the war that destroyed the Old City and scattered the women of power throughout the valley? Who made the powerless men believe they had only to rape a female wizard to gain her power? Who steals powerless women to be their concubines and slaughters their female children?"

"Not I," he said quietly.

That stopped her, but only for an instant. "Perhaps not. Perhaps outside Atlantia things are different. I-I hear that's so. But it doesn't matter."

"Yes, it does matter, Roxanne, because knowing there's a possibility that the society of wizards is different outside Atlantia should tell you there's another possibility-that male wizards are different, too. I'm not your enemy. I could never be your enemy."

"You can never be anything else."

"I have to be. There isn't much time for me to make you believe I speak the truth, because I'm due to leave Atlantia in a few weeks, but I have to find some way of convincing you I'm not your enemy."

She shook her head a little helplessly. "I don't know what you want of me."

Tremayne spoke slowly and carefully, trying to weigh each word. "What I want… is anything and everything you'll give me, Roxanne. I knew that the instant I laid eyes on you."

Through stiff lips she said, "I know one thing of the male wizards outside Atlantia. They're mad. You're mad. If you want a concubine, go steal some unfortunate powerless woman to satisfy your needs."

"I don't want a concubine." He hesitated, but the sense he had of time slipping from his grasp made him uncharacteristically terse and utterly graceless. "I want a mate."

Shock wiped the color from her face and made her eyes huge with incredulity. "You are mad," she whispered, and without another word she backed away from him, turned, and went into the house, closing the door with a thud.

Tremayne stood there for a moment, silently cursing himself. He glanced up and down the street. It looked deserted, but he could feel eyes on him. If he pounded on the door or, God forbid, tried to get in, he wouldn't last two minutes.

After coming to that realization, he marked the location of the house in his mind and then walked away, automatically heading for the cafe and his meeting with Merlin. He had invited the Master wizard to meet Varian, which meant he'd be in the mountains for the next few days. And away from Roxanne.

His natural impatience urged him to change those plans, to remain in or near Sanctuary and seize every opportunity to see her again, talk to her again. But the voice of reason prevailed eventually. If he tried to persuade her now, he would be fighting her instinctive shock; far better to give her a few days to think about what he'd said. She would see the sense in his contention that he was different from the male wizards she had known.