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“I thought you were too noble to use my magic?”
“I won’tuseyou. Iwillwork with you. We can combine forces. You can still be head of a house, run its lands and businesses. You can be exactly right for that life. But it has to be what you want.”
~19~
Nic tried topicture this life Gabriel described—and it looked surprisingly close to what she’d envisioned at the beginning of the Betrothal Trials. Except that she’d planned to seize power gradually, through manipulation and guile, exert her influence to create a place where she could make choices about her own life. Of course, all that had depended on having a wizard master she could hate enough to conspire against, possibly hurry along to his death.
She couldn’t hate Gabriel. She never had been able to, and she couldn’t, especially now that he freely offered what she’d planned to take. It was still galling, that he’d have to give it to her—and he’d retain the power to take it away if he chose—but that was still better than the alternatives. She clearly wasn’t doing a great job of resigning herself to her fate as a content and biddable familiar if she was contemplating having a Hanneil trainer do it for her.
No, Gabriel was right. That would be the worst possible fate. She’d rather be miserable and know her own mind than blissfully no longer herself. She shook that thought away.
“Gnats?” he asked with a slight smile. “Biting flies?”
“Cute,” she acknowledged. “So, if you’re not going to turn me over to the Convocation, that leads us to the next knotty problem: that Iblis wizard and awful Cousin Jan are going to report that I’m with you.”
“I’m expecting as much. I’ll explain that, by the Convocation’s own laws, you belong with me.”
“It won’t be that easy. If you don’t turn me over to the Convocation or my family, you could well have a war on your hands.”
“I’m willing to face that eventuality, because I’m not risking what they’d do to you.”
She appreciated that he wanted to protect her, but she knew a great deal more about the Convocation than he did. One wizard could hardly fight off their combined forces. “Can House Phel withstand a war—against very likely overwhelming odds?”
“We’ll find out,” he replied grimly. “If it comes to that, I’ll accept the consequences.”
“Gabriel, I don’t want to be the reason you end up at war with the Convocation.”
“Don’t worry about that.” His expression hardened into granite lines. “I have my own reasons.”
And though she pressed him, he wouldn’t say more.
The landscape changedas they rode toward the rising sun, the hills flattening out and growing less rocky. The trees grew taller and more graceful, their network of branches overhead showing the green fuzz of budding leaves. Birdsong filled the morning air and flowers bloomed amid the lacy ferns and tangled grasses of the undergrowth.
They’d spent the night at an abandoned cabin, which hadn’t been exactly comfortable, especially since they gave Narlis most of the blankets. The old woman had been quiet, not saying anything except that Gabriel was a good boy. Nic privately worried that, though Narlis hadn’t been bonded to the Iblis wizard, the separation from close connection to the wizard’s magic had eroded her reason. The stories certainly liked to show as much. When Lyndella was abducted by Sylus’s nemesis, she’d gone mad, locked in a cell while Sylus searched frantically for her. When he finally found her, she was too far gone. Lyndella died in his arms, insane and broken beyond repair. Then Sylus used all his magic wreaking revenge on his enemy, killing himself, but taking his nemesis with him. Thus ended the tragic tale of Sylus and Lyndella.
When Nic described those stories to Gabriel, he only shook his head in disgust. “Aren’t there any tales where the wizard and familiar triumph and live happily ever after?” he demanded.
Nic rolled her eyes. “Believe me, there are plenty of those, and they’re even more obnoxious.”
“Why obnoxious?”
“Don’t get me wrong, I loved those books—read every one I could get my hands on, especially when I was younger—but after a while in the Convocation, you figure out that very few wizard–familiar relationships are based on love. Or rather,” she amended, “it’s not the hearts-and-flowers kind of love.” Maybe it was more this grinding, burning, endless craving she felt for Gabriel. Unhappy thought.
“What kind of love is it, then?” Gabriel watched her so intently that she wondered if he’d gathered something of her thoughts from her expression.
“One-sided,” she replied crisply, knowing he wouldn’t drop the subject at that, but still unwilling to explain just how fully he held her heart in his grip. Just because he hadn’t clenched his fist to crush it yet didn’t mean he wouldn’t if he knew what kind of power he held.
“Because familiars hate their wizards too much to ever love them,” he said with certainty.
Surprised enough to glance at him, Nic wondered how he’d decided that. He caught the look and nodded to himself. “I understand. I saw your parents, remember? Your father treats your mother with apparent affection but controls her ruthlessly. And poor Daniel, he could never love someone as cruel as Jan.”
Daniel the spaniel.He did love Jan, with hopeless devotion, but Nic didn’t tell Gabriel. They rode in silence after that.
The path grewnarrower, the foliage lusher and denser, and the air warmer—and dense with moisture. It felt soft, nourishing in a way, not cutting like the coastal humidity. Nic shed her furry cloak, still almost too warm in her velvet riding habit. By midafternoon, she realized that the sound of the horses’ hooves had changed. Peering down, she saw that the surface they traveled was higher than the surrounding ground, which seemed to be all grasses, but that wasn’t ground between the tall stalks, it was water.
“Are we in a swamp?” she asked incredulously.
Gabriel flicked her a wryly amused glance. “After all of your needling remarks about Meresin being a swamp, I don’t understand how you can be surprised.”
