The Barbed Rose. Gail Dayton

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      What did she mean by—? Oh. He remembered then, how for weeks the Tibran couldn’t get more than twenty paces from her without collapsing in a fit. Joh sank back down, perching this time on the edge of the chair so he could stand more quickly if need be. He was well and truly bound to her. Trapped by his own will. If he had not offered himself to the One, he would not have been accepted, and now he could go nowhere but at her side until the link between them was fully forged. And she terrified him.

      Captain Varyl had pulled paper from a nearby desk and was scratching out a message with the poorly trimmed quill left on the desktop. A moment later, she thrust the message at Sergeant Omvir. “Take this to the Reinine. It’s a request for transfer orders.” Her eyes flicked toward the lieutenant. “Take it yourself, Torchay. Don’t hand it off to a servant. Obed can stand in as bodyguard. His skills are almost the equal of yours.”

      “Better, in some things,” the sergeant muttered, tucking away the note, then reaching up to gather back his hair. He tied it, rather than braiding it properly, but it helped make him look a bit more military. “Maybe we ought to see about getting Obed a set of blacks.”

      “I have my own blacks,” the dark man spoke, seeming to appear from nowhere, dressed in unrelieved black; a loose, foreign-looking robe over Adaran tunic and trews.

      The captain’s bodyguard looked him up and down. “So you do. But there’s nothing about them to show who you serve, is there?” He spun on his heel and departed, leaving Joh feeling caught in undercurrents he could not map.

      “Please, Lieutenant, sit.” The captain’s military mien faded a bit and she gestured at the chairs, playing hostess. “Obed, ring for refreshments, if you would.”

      “My presence here is for duty, Captain,” Lieutenant Tylle sneered. “Not pleasant diversion.”

      “Sit.” The steel in Captain Varyl’s voice had the lieutenant plopping down hard on one of the spindly armed chairs.

      “You think I know nothing of duty?” The captain snarled, bracing her hands on the wooden arms, her face inches from the guard lieutenant’s. “There is a rebellion in Adara. These rebels threaten to destroy everything we hold dear. But rather than stay and see my family—our pregnant ilias and my children—to safety, I obeyed my Reinine’s orders. I left my babies—twins, just ten weeks old.

      “Ninety days, lieutenant—that’s how old my little girls are. But I rode to Arikon with half our men because Serysta Reinine commanded it. Only two of the men in our ilian stayed with the babies—and one of them is blind. We did not know about the assassins’ attacks on the army and its naitani until we arrived. We did not know whether our iliasti still lived. But my Reinine commands and I obey.

      “We rode eight nights through the rain to get here. We have not had anything to eat since we arrived, but went straight into conference with the Reinine, then directly here to deal with Lieutenant Suteny’s godmark. And you dare snivel at me about duty?”

      “I—I—” The lieutenant gabbled, opening and closing her mouth, her face gone pale in the face of the captain’s anger.

      Joh glanced at the man with the tattoos on his face. Obed. Joh remembered him and the spectacle he had created with his first appearance in Arikon. Now Obed glared at the lieutenant, as angry with her as the captain was. Joh would find no help in calming the situation there. He had to do something. It would not go well for his captain if she did what she seemed to be considering. Striking the lieutenant once as she had was bad enough. Striking her again, like this, would be far worse.

      He touched her arm, cringing inwardly at the rattle of chains as he did. Goddess, he hated that sound. “Captain. You’re tired. Perhaps a bit—overwrought? I am sure Lieutenant Tylle didn’t mean anything by her words.”

      “And I am sure that she did.”

      “I—I apologize,” the lieutenant managed to stammer. “I did not know. That is, I—”

      Captain Varyl glared a brief moment longer. “You see the folly of assuming what you do not know?” Then she sighed and allowed Joh’s touch to move her back. “Apology accepted. Goddess knows, I’m exhausted.”

      She straightened, closing her eyes with another long sigh. Now, finally, her tattooed ilias came to urge her into a chair. Then servants arrived with food and the small crisis was over.

      The captain and her ilias ate. The lieutenant nibbled. Joh refused refreshment. He was a prisoner, a convicted felon who should be in prison rather than here in luxury. Besides, the chains would rattle and clash every time he brought the food to his mouth, and though he deserved it, he could not bear that humiliation.

      Sergeant Omvir returned from his errand, saluted sharply, handed over the papers he held, saluted again, then collapsed gracelessly into the nearest chair. He dropped a cloth bag at his feet with a faint clank, and began stuffing himself with the food that remained. “Goddess, I’d forgotten how good the cooks were here.”

      “Is that a complaint about my cooking?” A fond smile curved the captain’s mouth as she lounged back in her chair.

      “Saints, no. It’s a complaint about my own.” He bit off a chunk of bread. “Mine and Obed’s here. And Stone’s. That lad can burn water if he’s no’ careful.”

      Joh watched their easy familiarity, greed and envy burning holes in his heart. He wanted that. With a desperation that made him pull back inside himself where it was safe. He couldn’t have it. Not after he’d come so near to destroying it. The sergeant should have killed him when he’d had the chance.

      Lieutenant Tylle stood, papers in hand, and saluted. “Captain, I am at your command.”

      She removed the key to Joh’s chains from her belt where it hung with her service awards, and laid it on the table, sliding it across to rest in front of Captain Varyl.

      The captain returned the salute from where she sat. “You’ll forgive me if I don’t stand. There are quarters for you and your men just outside the suite, where Lieutenant Suteny was quartered last year. And I think you won’t take it amiss when I say that I desperately hope you do not return in another year’s time bearing your own godmark.”

      “Goddess, no!” Tylle’s face paled in horror and Joh hid a smile. He felt much the same, and he was marked.

      “Captain,” she went on, “I hope you won’t take this amiss, but think again about removing the chains. This man is not an officer in the Adaran army. Do not call him ‘lieutenant.’ He is not. He’s a convict. The only reason he was not hanged for murder is that his victims chanced to live.”

      The captain’s gentle smile stabbed Joh to the heart. “I know, Lieutenant. We are the ones he almost killed. I have my bodyguards and my magic. All will be well.”

      The lieutenant did not look as if she believed it—Joh did not believe it either—but she saluted and left the room. Joh had done the exact same thing many times last year, his curiosity to know what happened behind the closed doors burning him whole.

      Now, he was left behind, his curiosity about to be fed, and he remembered the sergeant’s words. Beware what you ask for. Joh was not certain he wanted to know what would happen now that the parlor doors were closed.

      CHAPTER FIVE

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