“I must prepare for tomorrow,” he said, after a time. With a small grunt, he rose to his peds, robe rustling into place. “I am to embark on another diplomatic mission.”
She remained where she was, but performed a seated bow. “Fair journey then, high one.”
“Fair evening, scholar.”
“You and the Paran, finally?” On the tablet, Marianne’s face glowed. “Joy of the bond!”
Laura lifted her eyebrows. “This, from the woman who took eight years to figure out the Sural loved her.”
The young woman stuck out her tongue. “You won’t regret it.”
“Getting through the rest of the day, that’s the hard part.” Laura leaned back in her chair at the desk in her sitting room. “Is it really so different, being bonded?”
Her friend gave a solemn nod. “Like… like… I don’t know.”
Laura snickered. “At a loss for words?”
Marianne smiled and shrugged happily.
“You’re in good company,” Laura continued. “The Paran says Tolari can’t find words for it either. Oh, and before I forget, I want to show you something. The last time the Paran took me into the city, an old artisan gave me—you have to see it to believe it. Here.” She turned her tablet toward the whale sculpture sitting on her desk.
“What am I looking at?”
Laura turned her tablet around. Marianne stopped squinting and opened brilliant blue eyes. Those eyes had generated no small amount of discussion, back on the
Alexander
, before Adeline Russell’s scheming had gotten the ship kicked out of Tolari space. John and Smitty had come to an agreement that someone took the summer sky and turned it into glass, then broke it and formed her irises from the shards. Marianne sometimes commented that her eyes were so unusual no one noticed the rest of her.
The Sural had, though. The evidence of
that
lay sleeping in Marianne’s arms. What she saw in the man—Laura cut off the thought. There was no accounting for taste.
“You didn’t see the sculpture?” Laura asked.
“What sculpture?”
“All right, let me try again.” This time, Laura put the whales in front of her face and positioned her tablet as normal.
Marianne’s eyes grew wide, and she whistled through her teeth.
“You can see it now?”
“Oh yes. But why turn your tablet around when you can set the view?”
Laura straightened. “I can set the view?”
The younger woman quirked a grin. “Someone there will have to show you how. But Laura, that sculpture is incredible. And he gave it to you, just like that?”
“He said if it called to me, it was mine. And it did.”
Marianne shook her head in wonderment. “What are you going to do with it? Does the Paran have an art collection?”
“Yes, but I want to keep it where I can see it every day. Right now it’s on the desk in my sitting room.” She moved away from the desk and flopped into a chair. “So how’s little Rose?”
“Sleeping all day and keeping me awake all night. I should come to Parania. Maybe if day and night were upside down, her schedule would be right side up.”
Laura snickered. “I told you so. Now you learn the true meaning of sleep deprivation.”
“You can’t blame a girl for hoping.”
“No, but—” The guard by the door to the hall flickered. Laura groaned. “Listen, I have to go. My language tutor is waiting for me.”
“Have fun!” Marianne reached, and the screen went blank.
Laura chuckled to herself. Marianne, a gifted linguist who spoke seventeen languages… no eighteen… or was it nineteen now?—anyway, the young woman
would
find it fun. Laura pocketed the tablet and headed for the family library. When she arrived, Kellandin began, with great enthusiasm and a number of small wood tiles inscribed in Paranian syllables, a lesson she decided to call the Attack of the Pronouns. Symbols moved across the library table like military markers. Masculine, feminine, and… and… whatever it was. The whole concept made no sense. People were
he
and
she
. Things like chairs and tables were
it
.
When Kellandin finished with her, the Paran was nowhere to be found. Laura took a meandering stroll around the stronghold grounds, picking at autumn-blooming flowers. She took refuge from the sun in a corner of the Paran’s private area of the gardens, under a tree and against the cool stone of a shaded wall, and pulled out her sketchbook.
It fell open at the Boston summer house.
“I wonder where my stuffies are,” she murmured to herself, slipping the stylus from its sheath in the book’s back cover. A few strokes added a hint of drapery to the windows of her rooms. Then her gaze fell on the hand gripping the stylus, and the deep groove on her ring finger. She stopped sketching to stare at it.
The government thugs had ripped even the wedding ring from her hand when they abducted her, tearing her from home and family and leaving her with not a shred of evidence of her forty-one years with John. Not a single gift or personal item. Nothing that had been theirs together. No keepsakes from their children’s lives. Yet the crowning masterpiece of an artisan’s life sat in the sitting room of her quarters, the gift of a man she’d met only once.
“My love.” The Paran’s soft whisper cut through the welling grief. He had joined her under the tree and wrapped his senses around her, offering love and strength and support.
She dragged her gaze from her hand to the Paran’s face. His smooth, brown, interesting,
beloved
face.
“I love you,” she whispered. Her eyes slid down to the groove again.
“My heart is yours.” Long fingers covered hers and curved into a gentle squeeze. “Have you changed your decision?”
“Changed?” She sucked in a breath. She could…
see
, in a way, the edges of the Paran’s empathic senses curling around her. Her eyes went back to his, then to his hair. Servants had woven it, all of it, into a multitude of thin braids, which they then worked back into ruler’s knots. It must have been where he had disappeared to all afternoon. The braids would minimize the snarled mess that three days or so of no brushing would make of his ankle-length hair.
He squeezed her hand again, still waiting for an answer.
“No, I haven’t changed my mind. I think—I think John would want me to seize the day.”
Tiny lines of tension in the Paran’s face relaxed, and he wrapped his arms around her. The grief and heartache and sorrow that had been roiling around in the pit of her stomach began to ease.
“We go into seclusion tonight?” she asked.
“After the evening meal.”
“How long till it’s served?”
“It has already begun.”
She ventured a smile and found it didn’t shatter her face after all. “We’d better get to it, then.”
* * *
The heavy, ornately-carved door of the Paran’s private apartments closed behind them. Laura’s heart sped up. Now that they stood on the brink of it, all the reasons he might regret bonding with her raced through her thoughts. A small voice in the back of her mind wailed,
What if he doesn’t like what he sees?
Beside her, the Paran was breathing faster, too. “We are alone,” he said, unnecessarily. The extra guards around the outside of his quarters shone like beacons to senses heightened by anticipation. None stood their usual watch inside. “Are you certain of your choice? Once we start, there is no going back.”
“I know,” she murmured, turning to face him. “How do we do this?”
His face lit. “Come.” He took her hand and led her to the sleeping room. Pots of blooming flowers lined every wall, and their fragrance filled the air. “The servants are well-pleased.”
“You didn’t order them to do this?”
“No.”
She took a deep breath, savoring the floral scent. “Your servants love you.”
“Perhaps it is you, also, that they love.”
He shrugged out of his robe and trousers and lowered himself to the blankets, pulling her down with him.
His fingers worked at the fastenings of her robe. She grinned as her robe slid off her shoulders. “What do we do now?”
A gentle smile played on his lips. “Reach into me with your senses,” he said, taking her hands. His eyes closed, and a soft radiance grew around her, white in the dim light. Though she couldn’t see it with her eyes, it obscured her vision. His heart unrolled like a tapestry before her. Nothing surprised her, but she saw… all the things he wanted her to know, and all the things he didn’t, the dark corners and childish fears offered up along with the strengths. It took her breath away.
Her turn, now. The blood ran from her face, and her skin tried to shrink. As much as he loved her, as much as they’d shared, her sensitivity permitted her to see more deeply into him than he ever had into her. Parts of her still lay hidden, and the time had come to reveal them.
His eyes opened. “Have no fear. You have nothing to fear.”
“What if—”she swallowed “—I am not what you think I am?”
“Impossible.” He leaned forward to nibble soft kisses across her lips. “Show yourself to me, my love. Open your heart.”
His love surrounded her, warm and soft, like a blanket. Something in her relaxed. “I love you,” she whispered, and lowered her guard.
He pulled her close against his chest. They remained wrapped in each other’s arms for she didn’t know how long, their senses swirling against each other, radiance filling the air, until… until something that separated them dissolved.
Closer. She needed to get closer. Her skin tingled, and suddenly the Paran covered her mouth with his, urgent and demanding. She pressed against him, skin against skin. Hands stroking, mouths sealed, she straddled his lap, their bodies locked, the ancient rhythm carrying them. Pressure built.
At the still point on the brink of ecstasy, she could see the way.
Reflex, instinct, compulsion drove her. She reached out, wrapping her senses around his heart. At the same time, his wrapped in a layer around hers and sank in. The world shifted. She was inside him inside her, feeling him feel her. Her body—his body—she couldn’t distinguish between them. They convulsed into rapture, each crash of ecstasy lifting the next to a higher peak, together.
Awareness returned, finally. The radiance dimmed. Ragged breaths puffed on her face. She opened her eyes to meet an ebony gaze filled with wonder.
“Beloved,” he whispered.
She leaned her forehead against his cheek, chest still heaving. His emotions streamed through her. Comforting. Real. She lowered her head to his shoulder and closed her eyes, diving into the flow from his heart.
His arms tightened. Nuzzling his neck, she watched him marvel at her, then slid out of his lap to lie back on the blankets. After a moment, he flopped onto his back beside her. She found her voice and whispered, “No wonder no one has words for this.”
He didn’t reply to that, but a sense of agreement filled her. His fingertips found her hand and drew lazy circles on her upturned palm. She shifted closer, molding herself against him. The circling stopped, and his fingers laced through hers. Warmth flowed through him, toward her. She planted a kiss on his shoulder. A gentle smile curved his lips, and a pulse went through him. Her core throbbed in response. His smile deepened.
“I can’t keep anything at all from you now, can I?” she said.
“It would seem not.” His eyes crinkled.
She grinned. “Want to do that again?”
* * *
Laura floated in a sea of contentment, her body thrumming with energy. In the two days since they’d closed the door behind them, she hadn’t slept at all, and neither had the Paran. They ate, and they talked, and they bonded, while outside their quarters, the stronghold’s routine continued. Most of the staff slept now, except for the night shift of guards and a few servants moving about.
The Paran lay on his stomach beside her, propped up on his elbows, reminiscing about his boyhood. The sound of his voice caressed her ears and riveted her attention.
“We were born in the same season, the Brial and I,” he said, “and we met as small children, while his father served as ambassador for Brialar. Our nurses took us to the beach to play while his father and my mother negotiated trade agreements.”
“And you got in trouble together, I imagine.”
The Paran grinned and flipped onto his back. “Of course. The Brial loved to trick his nurse.”
“Don’t tell me you didn’t.”
“I did not say otherwise. However, he never lost his delight in such things. In truth, it makes him a more cunning negotiator.”
“Can’t trick the trickster.”
“Indeed.”
They fell silent, and her attention shifted to the presences in the stronghold. She could feel them.
All of them.
She set her senses free to roam down the corridors of the massive keep. After several heartbeats, he whispered, “Where are you?”
“In the kitchens,” she murmured.
“You are remarkable.”
She snorted at him and carried on with her exploration, roaming through the staff wing, following the empathic resonances that outlined every object in the stronghold. Most of the occupants slept. Some dreamed, their emotions scattered, dictated by whatever images played out in their minds. She recognized none of the sleeping souls, until she came upon Meilyn, curled around another presence.
Heat rising in her face, she pulled back into herself, shutting out anything farther away than the next room.
“What did you find?” the Paran asked.
Her cheeks warmed a little more. She knew so little about Tolari customs. She’d ask the Paran… but not tonight. She rolled onto her side and snuggled into his shoulder. “It’s so peaceful, at night.”
He let out a deep sigh. “Garden of my heart,” he murmured.
“Beloved.” She propped herself on his chest to look down at him. Heat flared in his eyes, and he pulled her mouth onto his, as the urgent need to get closer shot through them both.
* * *
Laura’s stomach growled.
The Paran laughed. “You will find that the servants have left a meal in my sitting room.”
“I eat a ridiculous amount of food,” she said as she clambered off the sleeping mat. Unmentionable things began to happen, and she raced into the bathing area.