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Part Eight

"Sire, I will not be your whore."

I was reasonably taken aback by this. No one had spoken to me thus, ever, and I was unsure how to respond. I opened my mouth to say some platitude, but for once my eloquence deserted me. But she surprised me once more, reaching a hand to my face, then drawing a finger across the coronel near hidden in my hair.

"But you have been in my dreams, Sire. Only if you are true to yourself and to me shall I consider this. I want your word, your cabien, or I shall kick and scream and bring your reputation down with the walls of this room. And you know I do not lie."

I gazed down at this little girl, this slip of a peasant, staring up at me with hands on hips and eyes blazing, and lost my heart to her right there. She was something real in a world of pretense and a whiff of true romance in a foul place. And I had yet to learn her name.

"The cabien, Sire. I will not, unless you give me this protection."

"Demanding, aren’t you? Aye, lass, come here. You shall have the cabien, and be the only such graced since I have worn the coronel." I said it lightly, but there was a tremor in my voice I could not control. It was true; she would be the first I had connected with since I became the Zitan. I would be sharing my life with a stranger, a peasant, one whom I had just discovered could hold the key to my heart. I felt justifiably afraid for a moment; then I touched her.

*****

"Zaria," I breathed. Perfect. Her name, a match of mine.

"Sire?"

"You’re beautiful." The cabien still raced in my blood, bringing an almost painful awareness of her to my senses.

"So you keep telling me, Zan." I bristled for a moment at the use of my given name by a peasant, but I quickly quenched that emotion. After that connection she was anything but a peasant.

I glanced out the window, and gasped. The moon was high, which meant I had managed to sit mindlessly at the high table for longer than I thought, or the connection had lasted too long. I had been lost in her for quite some time.

"Zaria, I must leave you. I must return to that boring table and be kingly. But do this one thing for me. You saw the private entrance, did you not?" She nodded; the cabien hid nothing. "Please, find me, m’allia. I must see you again." I grasped her hand as I stood; her wet eyes almost stopped me, but I could not stay another moment.

*****

"Milord, I heard you were looking for me."

I turned to see Lady a’Vere. Hardly the one I was longing for, but she mustn’t know that. As I looked into her eyes, however, I realized how beautiful she was, how perfect an example of our species she was, how the light scintillated off her blond hair. How her shape seemed to be made to fit mine. I tried to fight the compulsion, to resist the desire to kiss her, the baron’s own relessa, knowing, even with my considerable powers, this one was my match. My last horrified thought before she captured me utterly was hers: why be a baroness when you can be a queen?

*****

Liz tossed in her sleep in revulsion, hardly able to bear seeing through Max’s eyes, Zan’s eyes, as he was sucked into T’arin’s/Tess’ lies. Every night, a new segment of this dream. She could barely stay awake at school, and every night, before she could sleep, Max had come by and called up to her as he tried to talk to her at school. She knew he needed her, and deep down she knew why. But she also knew what his destiny was supposed to be, even if in that past life Tess had been a traitor. He made it so hard to be strong, but she knew she had to be. There was a reason they were apart; she could feel the shadow of horrible things to come if they screwed destiny.

But every night, she was subjected to another lie. She saw T’arin’s insidious suggestions, the goading of the king who believed he loved her and she loved him back. She saw the sham marriage as Lady a’Vere became Lady a’Rosschil and the murmurs of power to gain if the baron were to take on the king. She saw the first strike and the call to war. The king’s first year bearing the coronel would be the only one of peace; he never gave another ball. And Lari’ing’s company never served at the palace again. The palace was guarded tightly as the war raged outside the walls; the secret entrance was blocked at Rath’s suggestion. His own marriage to the king’s sister was delayed as the king insisted on this costly war; costly to the kingdom and the lives of those in it.

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