Anne Bishop - Twilight's Dawn

“She’s not Eyrien, and she’s not male. Surreal doesn’t play by those rules.”

“Sometimes she does,” Lucivar said. “Sometimes she’ll draw the line, and there’s no mistake she’s looking for a punch-and-roll brawl. But she wasn’t interested in giving a warning this time. She went for him, Daemon. If I hadn’t been there, she would have killed him before he’d realized that was her intent.”

“Are you sure that was the intent?”

He nodded. “If I hadn’t been swinging her away, she would have been in position to drive that knife right through his heart. Even if he realized the intent at the last moment, Sapphire shields wouldn’t have stopped a blade backed by Gray power. Didn’t stop a blade backed by the Gray.”

“Do you want to know what I’m wondering?” Daemon asked. “Surreal has a tendency to kill a man in a way that balances the harm he did to his prey. She hid a physical knife. What kind of blade was Falonar hiding—and who was it aimed at?”

Before he could think of an answer, Jaenelle walked into the room.

“Kindly inform Prince Falonar that if he gets near Prince Rainier again, I will strip his legs, muscle by muscle, until there is nothing left but skin and bone.”

Hell’s fire, Mother Night, and may the Darkness be merciful. The look in her eyes made Lucivar shiver, made his knees weak. This was no idle warning, no embellished expression of anger. Jaenelle meant exactly what she said, and though she no longer wore Black or Ebony Jewels, there was more than enough power in Twilight’s Dawn to deal with a Sapphire-Jeweled Warlord Prince.

Daemon rose, a deliberate move to draw her attention, for which Lucivar was grateful.

“How is Rainier?” Daemon asked.

“He tore muscles that were already held together with healing spells and spider silk, and the bone is broken all the way through,” she snapped. “How do you think he is?”

They said nothing.

Jaenelle closed her eyes and took several deep breaths. When she looked at them again, sharp temper was still there but so was the usual control. “My apologies, Prince Sadi. You don’t deserve my anger.”

“No, I don’t,” Daemon replied, “but I’m not feeling polite right now either, so I understand.”

“Rainier wants to see you. I suggest you go now. He won’t be awake much longer.”

Lucivar waited until Daemon left the room before asking, “Will Rainier be able to walk on that leg?”

Jaenelle rubbed her hands over her face. When she let her hands fall, he saw the frustration and regret in her eyes. “He’ll walk. I’m not sure he’ll be able to do more than that at this point, but he should be able to walk.”

Sorrow burned in his chest. “I’ll work with him. Whatever it takes, I’ll work with him.”

Jaenelle sank into a chair. “I meant what I said about Falonar.”

He looked at her—and remembered that some of who and what she was had also come from the Dea al Mon. “I know.”

Rainier drifted, fighting the sleep he needed, fighting the healing spells and the healing brew for a little while longer.

He heard no sound, but he felt the dark power when Daemon walked into the room and sat beside the bed.

“I feel like something that had been hidden and festering got lanced,” he said. “I know if my leg wasn’t wrapped in numbing spells, it would hurt like a wicked bitch, but I feel better. Does that make sense?”

“It makes sense to you,” Daemon said. “Maybe it’s easier to accept when there is no longer a possibility of taking up the life you had.”

“Maybe.” Was Sadi weaving a soothing spell in his voice, Rainier wondered, or was it the healing spells that made him feel like he could float on the sound?

“Would you like me to read to you?” Daemon asked.

Rainier laughed. It sounded like heavy syrup. “I’d be asleep before you read the second sentence. I don’t want to waste the offer.”

“All right. Another time, then.”

His arm was so heavy. He wasn’t sure he’d actually moved it until Daemon took his hand.

“I want to stay in Ebon Rih. Have a reason to stay now. Jaenelle won’t like me staying, so I need you to stand for me.”

“Why do you want to stay?”

Something he’d seen in Falonar’s eyes, something he’d felt when Falonar’s Sapphire and Lucivar’s Red powers had crashed into his own effort to keep himself upright, leaving him vulnerable in too many ways. “I’m not sure. . . .”

“Whatever you tell me now will stay between us,” Daemon soothed.

As I was falling, I felt Falonar ram against my inner barriers, and with all the power slamming around me, I couldn’t keep my mind shut tight, couldn’t keep everything private. Might not have been intentional. He could have been flung against me by the Red, but intentional or not, Falonar grabbed at the chance to find something, anything, I might know that he could use against Lucivar. Some secret, some weakness. The pain in my leg . . . I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to protect a confidence, so I floated a lie near the surface where it would be easy to find that Lucivar’s left ankle was badly damaged when Yaslana first came to Kaeleer, and even now it’s weak and wouldn’t support him if it received a couple of hard blows in a fight.

Did he say the words? Did he voice the suspicion of what Falonar had hoped to achieve by causing him to fall?

“Shh,” Daemon said. “Rest now. I won’t act on what you’ve told me unless I have proof that it’s true. And I’ll talk to Jaenelle so that you can stay in Ebon Rih for a while.”

Having those assurances from the Prince he served, he drifted off to sleep.

Lucivar found Falonar at Nurian’s eyrie. Not unexpected since they were lovers and she was the Healer the Eyriens around Riada and Doun came to when they were injured or ill. The Eyriens who lived in camps in the northern end of the valley complained about having to see one of the Rihlander Healers in Agio because there wasn’t another Eyrien Healer in Ebon Rih, but there wasn’t anything he could do about that. He would have accepted another Healer if one had been willing to sign a contract with him and had the disposition needed to settle comfortably in Kaeleer, but Nurian had been the only one who had been willing to settle in Ebon Rih and live under the rule of a man most Eyriens still thought of as a half-breed bastard despite his bloodlines.

She looked tired. That wasn’t unexpected either, considering the number of people who had become ill recently, but he didn’t think the strain he saw in her face was due to fatigue.

Falonar was settled in her parlor, his left arm shielded and wrapped to protect the fragile, newly healed muscle and skin. He looked comfortable, but his eyes were yellow stones filled with anger.

“Will the Dharo man prance again?” Falonar asked.

“No,” Lucivar replied. “But we’re hopeful he’ll walk on that leg again. You should be hoping that too, because if he can’t walk, neither will you.”

“Is that a threat, Yaslana?”

No title, no courtesy in the voice. More and more, Falonar seemed to be forgetting who ruled and who served.

“That, Prince Falonar, is the message from an enraged Queen drawing a line and stating what the blood debt will be for damage done to one of her court.”

Falonar paled. “There is no court. Hasn’t been one for almost two years.”

Lucivar huffed out a laugh. “You be sure to explain that to Witch while she’s stripping all the muscle out of your legs.”

Falonar paled even more.

“Stay away from Rainier. You won’t get another warning. And if the Queen has a reason to go after you, you won’t find anyone strong enough to stand in her way who will stand in her way. Is that clear?”