Bloodkin (Jaseth of Jaelshead) (41 page)

I poured the two glasses and handed one to her. She tucked her long hair behind one ear and pointed at the paper.

“Look at this, more Mingles have gone missing. And there’s been an assassination.”

“What? Who?”

“Oh, some anti-Nea’thi government guy, pretty minor by the sounds of things.”

“There are anti-Nea’thi people in government?” I was shocked, why would anyone be anti-Nea’thi?

“Well, duh. They can do magic, you know. Spooky shit,” she told me facetiously.

“Was it, um…”

“Aӣấ?” She snorted. “Hardly. Arrow right through the eye.” She seemed to take some grim satisfaction from this.

“So?”

“So that’s not how Лấ Ұaßaлioӣ operates. Don’t you know anything? They create accidents, normal, everyday deaths, like heart attacks, brain aneurisms, that sort of thing. And no matter how much of a ςuӣßts this guy might be, he’s still government. Aӣấ wouldn’t touch a contract like that with a barge pole.”

“Oh.”

I sipped my wine in silence and waited for the Queen, as Lux did her best to ignore me. Finally Jeetz poked his head into the kitchen.

“We’re all finished now, Jaseth, thank you.” As I gratefully got up to leave, Lux didn’t even acknowledge me, so I shrugged and met the Queen in the hall. She was quiet the whole trip down in the gondola, lost in thought. When we finally reached the bottom and disembarked, I offered her my arm for the walk back to the castle. I thought I would try her questioning technique.

“So… What’s with the disguise?” She chuckled, that warm, low sound that sent fire running to my crotch.

“Oh, this? Do you like it?”

“Um, well, of course. It’s… different.”

“A small security precaution. You were fooled there for a second by the bridge, weren’t you?” I nodded. “Good!”

“So why did you have to get me to organise the meeting?”

She smiled patiently at me. “Well, Myr Jeetz deals in information among other things, not strictly legal. I thought it would be more productive if a trusted friend made the introductions.”

“But how did you know I knew Jeetz?”

“Ha, that’s what spymasters are for, yes?”

“Oh, well. You could have asked Hanniash,” I said, trying to shock her, but she laughed again.

“I could have, but this was much more fun.” I felt myself blushing furiously. The Queen thought I was fun?

“So, did you, ah, get what you came for?”

Thaelique hesitated before answering. “Well, yes and no. Jeetz claims to be as much in the dark as anyone else about this recent spate of attacks. The theft of the Black moss concerns him greatly. Do you know much about it? The moss, I mean, not the theft.”

“Well, only what they’ve taught us in the Academy. It’s highly potent – can drive a man crazy…” I thought of Joey and Lux. “It’s used to help you access your Hầұeӣ, it gives you more power.”

“Have you used it yet?”

“Oh no! I think it’s part of our Graduation or something, but we’re forbidden to use it until then.” The Queen considered this.

“So why would someone want to steal so much of it?”

“I don’t know!”

“I’m asking this seriously, Jaseth. Think about it.”

“Um, I suppose… Well, I know of a guy, a long time ago, who stole a little bit, but he just went crazy. I suppose if you were trying to access more of your Hầұeӣ then maybe…”

“Exactly.”

“What? You think someone is planning to… But with who? And
why
?”

The Queen sighed. “The why I don’t know, but where do you think all those Mingles are disappearing to?”

Oh hell.

“But who would do that?”

“Another thing I don’t know. I thought Jeetz might have some answers, but whoever they are, they’re being extremely cautious about secrecy.”

“This is bad?” More a statement than a question, but Thaelique nodded.

“It could be, but we don’t know yet what they’re planning. Jeetz will do his best to find out, but until then we just have to wait.”

When we reached the bridge she disengaged from my arm and looked at me closely.

“Thank you for this.”

“I, um, you’re welcome, your majesty.” She smiled, amused at my reluctance to let go of her title.

“Look after yourself, Lord Jaseth.” That slight emphasis on the “Lord” again. “And look after your friends. I heard what happened on Samhain.”

“Oh, did you? That was nothing, really.”

She raised an eyebrow. “Still, I’m pleased you came to no real harm. Farewell Jaseth, I hope our paths will cross again soon.”

As the last of the light fell from the sky she stepped onto the bridge and left me. I hurried home to my dinner with an awful lot to think about, not least her parting words – she wanted to see me again!

pring slowly crept its way through Lille. Up on the hills, the bright, shiny green of new growth splintered the gullies between the mansions, and trees on the quad at the Academy burst into bud. One Monday morning at class we were greeted not by Myr Billy, but by Aliakh. It would seem that our sex education was about to begin.

Now, I’m pretty sure we all knew where babies came from, and stuff about diseases and infections, but Aliakh’s classes proved most instructive on the things they don’t teach you at regular school. After meditation, instead of sitting at our desks, she had us relax on the couches down the back. The first thing she explained was the use of contraceptives, and other safe-sex devices that were constructed from a Nea’thi-made rubber substance. She handed around condoms, which everyone blew up into weird, elongated balloons much to everyone’s hilarity. Then she showed us the sheets of thin rubber called dental dams. Telgeth elbowed Lolitha as Aliakh passed them round for us to inspect.

“That’s what you and Coco need, eh ‘Litha?” She blushed bright red but Aliakh pointed a finger at him sternly.

“These are not just for use by lesbians, Telgeth, although with that attitude you might find it difficult to find a girl to enjoy using one with!” Everyone laughed as Telgeth slumped back in his seat.

“Ouch! Oh Aliakh, I am sorely wounded!”

After the physical prophylactics, Aliakh moved onto the Hầұeӣ ones. These involved creating fluid-proof shields in the air directly around one’s genitals, or “penises and cervixes” as Aliakh insisted on using the medical terms for them. She warned us that these Hầұeӣ contraceptives took a lot of practice and were not a replacement for physical ones, especially until we had undergone a Black-smoking ritual. Still, that afternoon we had to practise creating these shields. Aliakh thought it prudent for us to do this in private, so after lunch we got to stay in our rooms.

The next day and for the rest of the week we concentrated on something more surprising. As we had all found before coming to the Academy, Nea’thi-Bloods tend to set things on fire when in a heightened emotional state. Needless to say, having sex constituted a heightened emotional state, and we spent the next few days learning how to effectively “turn off” our Hầұeӣ, so we could be intimate with someone without burning them to death. At the end of the week I reckoned I had got my Hầұeӣ under control, and Aliakh was satisfied with our progress.

“Now, there are a lot of other things you can do in the bedroom with Hầұeӣ,” she giggled quietly and wrote the name of a book on the board. “It’s deemed inappropriate to teach these things in such an esteemed educational facility as this Academy, but I’ve made sure the bookshop in the Quarter has at least eight copies of this, if you are interested in further reading.” She tapped the name on the board. “Thank you everyone, I hope you have had an enjoyable week. But please remember, now that you
can
have sex, doesn’t mean that you
have
to. There is a right time for everyone, and I hope you will all trust your instincts and wait until then. Have a good weekend!”

When we got outside, Telgeth raced off. “I’ve got the longest legs, I can get to the bookshop before it closes!” he yelled over his shoulder.

He returned with a huge shopping bag as we all hung out in the common room, deciding what to do with our Friday night.

“Got them!” he cried gleefully, handing them around. “And you’ll never guess who it’s by!”

I looked at the front cover of my copy.
Sex and Hầұeӣ
by Aliakh of Lille! Inside the front cover was a reproduction of a portrait of Aliakh by none other than Ashlu. She was sitting up in a bed strewn with pillows and was smiling that coy, dimple-cheeked smile.

“Telgeth, how did you pay for these?”

“I, uh, put them on the Hall account. I figured if Myn Eve complained when she got it, we could pay her back then.” Thomas only had to raise an eyebrow at his Bloodkin. “Fine, fine, we’ll pay it now. The price is on the front, minus the Hall’s 10% discount, so I guess you have to give that to Myn Eve… It
is
an academy expense Tommo!” he grumbled, in a last half-hearted attempt to get out of paying for the book. Then he brightened, seeing the picture of Aliakh on the inside cover.

“Shit, I dunno about you guys, but I’m off to bed!” He galloped from the room and Lolitha wrinkled her nose.

“Ew.”

It was, kind of, but I was half-inclined to follow his lead. I was intrigued by what techniques there were for making love, I could imagine using them on the Queen…

Oh hell, stop it! I already had a girlfriend, I should be thinking about
her
. But I simply couldn’t get Thaelique out of my head, and if I was totally honest, I didn’t want to try.

In the weeks that followed, I felt myself pulling away from Sallagh, and she must have felt it too, because as a result she clung tighter to me. Walking to and from class, at mealtimes, she even came to try and study with me at nights. Once or twice she had shyly suggested that maybe we could try out one of the techniques from Aliakh’s book (which I had already read, cover to cover, twice) but I managed to fob her off with one excuse or another. She told me she loved me a few more times, and while I reciprocated in kind, she must have sensed that my heart wasn’t really in it.

Things came to a head one Saturday in early April. Spring had finally chased winter completely away, and while it had rained a fair bit, the days were getting noticeably longer and there were a few sunny, warm days, like this particular Saturday, when Sallagh came to see me in my room.

Charlie had taken Anna on a picnic to Nallow that morning, so we didn’t have our lessons with her. They were going “just as friends” but I knew he was hoping for something more, just as I knew he wouldn’t be back until much later that evening. I was sure Sallagh was going to ask me to sleep with her, and I was fully prepared to accept, but she had something quite different in mind.

“Jaseth, I think we should go up to my parents’ place for dinner tonight.”

“Um, I can’t, I’m going with ‘Litha and the boys to the Thistle.”

“Oh, but Mama will have bought all the food already!”

“What? You organised it without telling me?” This was not good. This was
so
not good. I didn’t really care about going out with my friends, but I definitely
did
care about meeting Sallagh’s parents properly, and her having organised it without telling me!

“Well, yes, I didn’t think there would be a problem!”

“You can’t just… Just organise stuff without telling me!”

“Well I’m sorry! Don’t you want to meet my parents?”

“No, it’s not that. It’s just…”

“Well what’s the problem? Don’t you love me?”

“No, I—” and there it was. My opportunity. Come on man, grow some balls! “Look, Sall, you really are an awesome girl, but…”

Her head snapped up. “But what?” she said very quietly, the glimmer of unshed tears beginning to swell in her eyes.

Argh! Oh sweet Lilbecz, this was
hard
. Deep breath.

“I don’t think we should be together anymore.”

“What?!” she almost shrieked and stepped towards me. “How
dare
you?” And then before I knew it she pulled her hand back and slapped me. “You effing khunst! After everything, you’re dumping me!
You’re
dumping
me
!”

“I’m sorry, I really do like you, but…”