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Coffee cups slammed onto the table, and his family sprang from their seats to crowd around. Their familiar voices washed over him, their fury and empathy filling the Union until it shook.
“Get Annassa Soteira,” he pleaded.
His mother stepped away. His father pressed his wrist to his mouth. Lio drank deeply, feeling his chest knit together and more of the poison fade from his blood. His magic revived and flowed into the channeling, and Cassia’s heartbeat grew louder. He would need all his bloodline’s strength for her tonight.
Uncle Argyros’s magic touched Lio’s mind, the gentle probe of a thelemancer checking for damage. He could surely sense the ghosts of tonight’s duels.
“Where is the battle?” Aunt Lyta demanded.
Patria. Paradum. None of that was Lio’s focus now. “Inside of Cassia. The letting site didn’t awaken her magic. The Lustra asked me to save her.”
Queen Soteira’s presence filled House Komnena up to its vaulted ceilings. As she touched Cassia’s head, the warmth of her healing enveloped her and Lio both. “So it has come to this.”
“Is she strong enough for her Gifting?” Lio asked.
“I will make her as strong as I can. You and Hespera must do the rest. Drink from your mother.”
Lio accepted his mother’s wrist. She stroked Cassia’s anxious dog with her free hand, her voice calm as always in a crisis. “The sucklings are with Kadi and Javed at House Argyros tonight. I’ll take Knight to them.”
“Thank you,” Lio said, when he had completed the Ritual Drink.
“Your crates are in your residence,” she said. “There are sheets on the bed, and the spell lights are on.”
Goddess bless his mother for thinking of such things at a time like this.
His father clasped his wrist. “You know what to do, Lio. Everything Cassia needs is within you. Go and do what Hespera has meant for you two all along.”
His uncle embraced him, touching a hand to Cassia’s medallion. “Send up a spell light when she comes through safely, hm?”
“We will pray through the night,” Aunt Lyta promised.
“May the Goddess’s Eyes light your path,” said Queen Soteira, “and may her darkness keep you in Sanctuary.”
With that benediction from one of their Queens, he stepped Cassia to their residence. The Sanctuary ward over their bedchamber closed around him. That, at last, convinced him they had escaped.
Their Sanctuary was still here. The four stained glass panels in the peaked windows filled the room with color. Beyond the empty window frames, the waxing crescents of the two moons shone their portents over Cassia’s Gift Night.
“Stay with me, Cassia,” he said. “You have to stay to see the moonflower window I want to make you next.”
Moving quickly, he lay her down on their big, round bed. The roses growing up the bed posts shivered and turned their faces toward Cassia, as if sensing that their Lustra mage was in distress. So did the moonflower that had bloomed early, which someone had set on the beside table.
“Stay with me. I want to see your face when you wake and look at these flowers.” Lio pricked his hand and clutched at the glyph stone set in the wrought iron headboard. The Sanctuary ward pulsed with renewed power. They would need it.
He had no idea what her magic, or lack of it, was about to do when he gave her his blood.
“Don’t be afraid.” He peeled her out of her ruined clothes. “I’ll give you a cleaning spell to calm your nerves. I know you need to feel clean when you’re frightened.”
He banished the odor of death from them both. He would not let any foul remnants of Miranda pollute their Sanctuary—or risk getting poison residue into Cassia’s bloodstream as he transformed her.
Remembering his warded earring, he flicked it off, then tossed his tattered robes onto the floor. With levitation, he threw back the crimson bedspread and settled them on the black silk sheets. Such foolish, romantic luxuries he had chosen for this room, when he had thought they would spend her Gift Night in peace.
“I won’t let the Collector take that from us. I swear to you, I will make this the best night of our lives.”
Even if it was her last.
No, he could not allow any doubts within himself. She needed his faith.
At last he pulled off their ambassador medallions and her ivy pendant. There was no artifact that could guide them through this. All the magic must come from within themselves.
