A Kiss of Magic: A Kiss of Magic Book One (27 page)

She watched as Haner readied him for a shave. He sat down in a chair and tipped his head back. The valet mixed his soap, and then using a shaving brush applied it liberally to Dendri’s beard, softening the whiskers. Once he was done, he ran the blade of the razor up and down the strop to sharpen it.

“They see us and our civilization as a sign of weakness, thinking us easier to overrun and control. We have been proving them wrong out on the front. The battles have turned in our favor. Enough so that the Kiltians have decided that maybe talking can get them something of what they want.”

“Can it?”

“Perhaps. That is entirely up to the triumvirate. But they need me not only to read the intentions of the others, but to protect their minds from the probes of their telepaths. The talks would be over quickly if they knew exactly how far the triumvirate is willing to go.”

A few minutes went by as she watched Haner skillfully remove his beard. Once his face was clean-shaven and washed free of all remaining soap, he stood up and slipped his shirt on over his head. He tucked in the tails and buttoned it at his throat as Haner draped his cravat on either side of his neck. Then, in a few economical and precise movements of his long-fingered hands, Haner had tied an intricate knot in the cravat, leaving it to puff out slightly.

“You’d better go,” he urged her.

“Oh! Yes. I’ll be right back.”

Yasra hurried down the hall to her rooms and found Bess reading a book on the bed.

“Bess, help me with my hair,” she said as she whipped off her shirt and wriggled out of her breeches.

She was ready in record time and when she breathlessly arrived back in Dendri’s bedroom, he was sitting at the small table in his sitting room and there were two trays with silver domes resting over the food beneath. Haner removed the lids as Yasra sat down to her tray.

They ate in relative silence, Dendri taking some time to read the paper that had been brought in with his tray. She had noticed that he did this every morning. It was, she realized, important to him to remain abreast of current events. Their newspaper, the
Capitol Crier
, was dependable and thorough, the only exception being the gossip columns. The sensationalistic view of the world through the pomp and fanfare of the gossip columnists was, to say the least, subjective to what those columnists thought their readers wanted to hear.

Dendri had often been the focus of those columnists, his fame and power making him a prime target. He did not sit for photos, however, so they were unable to capture him and publish his image. She had always put that down to him being a very private man.

“Is there news?” she asked.

“There’s an article about the talks for today. And another about Delongo’s defeat. The army left behind is apparently in chaos. There isn’t too much detail otherwise.”

“I know Ky and Jal are planning on going back and picking off more of the rogues, to bring them to justice. Apparently there are several other rogue hunters that want to go with them.”

“Good. But they should be careful. They’re still outnumbered tremendously.”

“You can tell them as much if you like. They’re in the morning room.”

“Perhaps I will. Come, eat your breakfast.”

She did, but she hardly tasted anything. She was worried for Dendri. She could see the weariness in his eyes already. Just the act of getting ready and eating breakfast was taxing him. She didn’t know how she was going to convince him to leave when the time came. He was so stubborn. But if determination alone could see him through, then he would make it. However, she didn’t think that determination was going to be enough in this case.

Before they left Yasra saw to it that a fresh bandage was wrapped around his left arm, protecting it from outside dirt and contaminants. It might hurt to take the bandage off later, but it was better than leaving it open to infection.

When they appeared in the morning room, Ky and Will both leapt to their feet to see him dressed and apparently ready to leave.

“Dendri! What are you doing out of bed?”

Dendri set his jaw and began to argue with his friends, defending his reasoning and putting his foot down when they threatened to knock him out and tie him to the bed. When they saw he could not be persuaded or even bullied, they changed tactics.

“We’ll come with you,” Wil said.

“No. Bringing one person who is not otherwise invited is bad enough,” Dendri said. “The only reason I think they will allow Yasra is because of the Gestalt, otherwise she couldn’t even dream of getting that close to the triumvirate and these talks.”

“Should you be exposing her to the Kiltians? They might take this advantage to rid themselves of a potentially powerful enemy,” Jal said.

Yasra frowned at Jal, but he ignored the warning disapproval of her expression.

“This is true,” Dendri said, hesitating as he looked at Yasra with renewed concern.

“I can protect myself,” she insisted. “Sitting within your strength, I can protect myself.”

Dendri pulled on his gloves and smoothed the lapels of his coat as he considered her for a moment. She waited with anxiety for him to make up his mind.

“Keep me out,” he said at last.

“What?” she asked dumbly.

“Keep me out. I’m going to try and read your thoughts. I want you to keep me out. If you can do it to my satisfaction then I will allow you to come.”

“No! I’m not going to play games with you!” she said stubbornly.

“Then you can’t come,” he said grimly.

“You’re not going without me,” she warned him. “Either I go or you stay.”

“Keep. Me. Out.”

He dropped every word as a single sentence, a light in his eyes telling her he would not be swayed. She bit her lip indecisively a moment, then reaching out to touch his hand, she slammed her mental dome down over herself.

“Hardly fair touching me,” he said dryly. “It increases your power to use the Gestalt.”

“So you’ll have to hold my hand throughout,” she said stubbornly. “The reverse is also true. You’ll have access to power that you wouldn’t have without me.”

He thought about that for a moment, then with a nod of his head he focused on her. She could feel him this time. Probing at her defenses. Perhaps because they were touching or perhaps because he was tired. She didn’t know which. On the one hand she was hoping he was too weak to penetrate…on the other he needed all of his strength in order to face the coming hours and be of any use to the triumvirate.

After a moment he looked at her. He looked distinctly impressed and…proud.

“Very well done,” he said. “I wouldn’t have thought you’d come so far in so short an amount of time.”

“I’ve been practicing,” she said, preening a little.

“To good effect. I was able to break through of course, but it took some effort.”

Again, she didn’t know if that was such a good thing. He was so burned out.

“I suppose you will be fairly able to keep their mind majji at bay,” he said carefully. “And I don’t feel up to fighting all five of you to get out of the house.” He swept his eyes over Wil, Bess, Ky and Jal.

“Good idea,” Jal said. “Because I still think we should take you back to your room and tie you to the bed.”

Dendri gave him a mirthless smile.

“That would force me to exert my will over you. And for the sake of our friendships I’d rather not.”

Ky snorted out a sarcastic laugh. “That’s provided you have the strength to face us down. I’m willing to bet you have about as much strength as a newborn pup.”

“You would lose that bet. Now, we have to go. Come along, Yasra,” he said, still holding her hand as he led her to the carriage waiting outside.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Yasra fidgeted with the lace on the cuff of the breast jacket she had bought with Wil that day on Haverton Street. The velvet was warm, but not warm enough for the chill autumn air it seemed. Or perhaps the chill was coming from inside of her nervous stomach.

She would have never thought she would ever have met the triumvirate in person in the whole expanse of her life. The triumvirate moved in social circles far above even her parents’. Truth be told they were a social circle just amongst themselves. Hells, she had never thought to be anything other than a non. Now here she was, about to walk into the capitol building as if she belonged there. She was about to insert herself into dramatic current events.

What if she truly wasn’t strong enough for this? Dendri had been impressed with her ability to keep him out, but how much of that was her true strength and how much of it was his current weakness? And keeping him out for a few minutes was much different than keeping others out for hours.

She knew very little about the Kiltians. She knew that they did not have majic houses like the Sarens did. Their structure of majic was completely unknown to her. Were the abilities of the Kiltians the same as theirs…only they simply referred to it differently? Or were they truly so alien in ability that even Dendri would be challenged to understand them? To resist them?

“Having second thoughts?” Dendri asked her.

He was sitting across from her, looking like a powerful gentleman, his pristine appearance as he sat back against the red velvet upholstered seat of the carriage a thing of beauty. He was dark and handsome, looking perfect save for the peek of the bandage on his arm and the bloodshot background of his eyes. Unfortunately, the state of his eyes would be readily apparent to anyone with sight, and it could hint at his weakness, inspiring the Kiltians to take advantage of it in some way.

“No,” she replied, not knowing if it was a lie or not. “I’m just worried about you.”

“Try not to be. Any majji with mind reading abilities could take that worry from your thoughts and then see me as a weakness for the triumvirate rather than a strength.”

Yasra swallowed, her nervousness increasing tenfold.

No
, she thought firmly to herself,
you can do this. You have to do this. You have to protect Dendri at all costs!

The barouche pulled up to the vast marble steps to the capitol building and the footman came to open the door and drop the step. Dendri alighted first, and then turned to offer his hand to her. She took it, but as soon as she was on the step he reached to enclose her waist in his hands and helped her to the ground. She caught his wince as he did so but she was afraid to call him on it in public. She would not argue with him in front of others.

The capitol building was made entirely of white marble, with twelve columns all along its front and an endless amount of stairs leading up from the drive. The capitol was not only the place where the triumvirate and the heddah gathered to conduct political business, but it also served as the residence of the triumvirates and their immediate families.

At present none of the triumvirate was wed or had children, so they were each leading a bachelor’s existence.

Dendri held out his hand to her, and when she took it he tucked her hand onto his arm as he led her up the steps. She was aware of him reading her every expression, so she strove to keep her face still. She did not wish to reflect just how intimidating this enormous building and the things it represented were to her. She firmly focused on keeping him out of her mind. Him and everyone else.

Still, she felt gauche as her eyes went wide over everything she was seeing. She had been raised in one of the more affluent sections of Captiol City, but it had been distant from the actual capitol building. And when she had become old enough to move out of her parents’ influence, she had moved out of the city itself to one of the smaller villages just on the periphery of the city, preferring a country life to a city life.

She had preferred attending a country school, attempting to test out from there rather than one of the crowded city schools. At least then her abject humiliation would have been limited. And yet Dendri had found her there. Had attended a simple country test. For reasons even he did not understand. Fate, it seemed, had forced their hands together.

Now she was on his arm as he led her into the capitol building, its soaring marble columned atrium making her look up about three stories to the glass rotunda letting the midday sunlight into the building. Each level of the atrium had a ring of marble and columns. There were more stairs inside the building, curved ones leading around the inner edge of each ring as the climbed upward.

They walked up to the second floor and Dendri led her into a vast room with a long table made of mahogany wood and matching ornately carved wooden chairs with gold upholstered seats. There was a large hearth, large enough to stand in, with an intense fire built up in it. It was warming the room that might otherwise have been chilled by the marble floors and walls. A midnight blue rug with gold scrollwork ran the length of the room beneath the table. The table itself had to be at least twenty feet long, taking up the entire room.

There were liveried footmen, dressed in dovetail coats and a pale gold and midnight blue livery. The colors of their country. Gold and midnight blue draperies hung at the floor to ceiling windows on the right side of the room. There was a gold runner down the center of the table upon which was two trays of crystal goblets. There was a sideboard on the left side of the room, filled with decanters full of wine of varying degrees of color, from golden warm to violet. The lighter colored wine decanters would be chilled, the others would be at room temperature. There were also decanters of water.

There were Kiltians in the room.

The men were large, as tall as Dendri or taller. But they carried far more weight on their frames than Dendri did, and most of it appeared to be muscle. They wore simple clothes, and they dressed nothing like the Sarens. Whereas the Sarens were fond of tailored clothing and elaborate layers in a variety of fabrics, the Kiltians wore mostly leather. The pants they wore were made of a thin leather that looked to be butter soft and they wore tooled leather vests painted in colorful designs. The largest male in the room was black haired and black eyed…or so it appeared. Their oval pupils were so wide and the dark brown of his irises were so dark that it appeared as though his eyes were entirely black. He wore a full beard, the tip of which had been drawn into a point and threaded with small colored beads. The ear on his left side had been pierced with a piece of carved ivory, the hole clearly having been stretched over time to accommodate the quarter inch thick ornament. There was a beaten gold cuff around his right forearm that was about six inches in length. It was simple and unadorned with any designs or gemstones. He also wore a gold torque around his throat, the gold thick and twisted.

The other men in the gathering were similarly ornamented, but that one dark male radiated far more power to her. As Dendri led her to one of the seats, there was a commotion at the door and then three confident people strode in through the doorway.

The triumvirate.

The one who stood out to her first was the female of the group, if for no reason other than the virtue of her hair. She was a brilliant hued redhead, her titian curls piled high on her head with one or two left to strategically slide down the length of a long and graceful neck. She was slender, her gown accenting her breasts, as most of their gowns did, flattering her charms there. Her long slender arms were pale and perfect, as were the elegant length of her fingers.

Ariana Colla.

On either side of her were the men. To her right was Jutsin Felone, noted by his arresting green eyes, a more startling emerald than Dendri’s. His black hair shone like a raven’s wing and was caught back into a longish tail. Longer than was fashionable, but clearly that did not matter to him. He was a stunningly handsome man, almost too pretty with fallen angel features. He was a head taller than Ariana and like Dendri wore a cravat and a velvet coat.

To her left was Mason Hittite, easily recognizable by his shock white hair and silvery eyes. She had never met any of them before, but they had been described enough in the papers to make them easily identifiable. Mason Hittite was beefier than either Dendri or Felone, weighing in more like the Kiltians in the room. He was dressed in a black jacket, and a white linen shirt, but wore no cravat. His shirt was opened at the throat revealing glimpses of tanned skin.

“Greetings,” Ariana said to the Kiltian delegation. She did not offer her hand to them, but she did dip into an abbreviated, graceful curtsy. “I am Triumvir Colla, this is Triumvir Felone and Triumvir Hittite.”

“I am Raja Sin,” the largest Kiltian introduced himself. “These are my aides, Hundor, Lindo and Graf.” The Kiltian took in Triumvir Colla with a steady, devouring gaze. He raked his eyes over her body and both of the women in the room knew there was not even the tiniest detail that he missed.

“Shall we get started?” Triumvir Colla suggested, gesturing to the table. Sin nodded and there was a shuffling of people as they all found places at the table. “This is Dendri Adiron, one of my advisors,” Colla introduced him.

“And the woman?” Sin asked, his eyes picking her apart.

“Yasra Desro,” Dendri introduced for the triumvir since she didn’t know exactly who Yasra was. The introduction was met with a single raised brow on the part of Hittite, but other than that they took her presence in stride.

Dendri pulled her chair closer to him and gently picked up her hand. As the talks began, she was aware of everything in the room, but not half as aware as the feeling of Dendri’s hand toying with her fingers. He didn’t just hold her hand, he stroked her palm, caressed each finger with his. It was very distracting.

“We will annex the Triagle Territory,” Sin said brusquely. “We will use it for our own.”

“You think we will simply hand over the territory?” Colla asked, her eyes wide and shocked.

“You will give it or you will face more war. War is costly. In money and in lives. We need territory. The Triagle Territory is a good sized territory that will serve us well, and it has no large cities in it so you will not have to move out many of your Saren citizens.”

“So not only do you want the territory, but you want to boot out those who are already living there?” Hittite asked.

“Exactly. We need the territory for our people. We need room. Your country is large and can afford to lose a little land.”

“The Triagle Territory is not a small piece of land,” Colla said with a harsh frown. “It’s nearly the size of your entire country!”

“And yet only a quarter of yours,” Sin said.

“So you double your territory and we lose a quarter of ours and you call this a fair negotiation?” Hittite snapped.

“You will negotiate or you will return to war.”

“A war you are currently losing,” Felone said.

“So you say,” Sin said dismissively.

Yasra felt the tempers flaring up around the table, the weight of them ebbing into her. She felt Colla struggling to cap her outrage at his outlandish desires. At the sheer nerve of the man. It was obvious even to her nascent senses that Sin rubbed Colla the wrong way.

Dendri was aware of it too it seemed for the next moment a wall of white noise fell over the room, humming in Yasra’s ears. She realized then that Dendri was masking the triumvirate’s thoughts from the Kiltians. Because they were not Aspano, they could only do so much to protect themselves. It was up to Dendri to do the rest.

And act that would wear him out quickly unless she missed her guess.

The fact is, the Kiltians are savage fighters
, Dendri said into her mind.
Both with majic and with physicality.
We are making headway at present, but that could easily change tomorrow.

“And what would you give us in exchange for this territory?” Colla asked, her voice becoming even.

“We have many riches in our country. Riches we can use to fight a prolonged war. Gold and gemstones are most abundant.”

“Gold and gemstones only go so far,” Hittite said. “We need the same things you need. Grain and crops to feed the people. Taking that territory will rob us of a great deal of farmland.”

“You have leagues of farmland here in Saren. More than enough to feed your people. Also, with treasure you can import what you need.”

Colla exchanged a look with Hittite and then Felone.

“Say we annex this territory to you. What is to keep you from wanting more a few years from now…only now you will have grown new resources and more people to fight a war.”

“It would take generations for us to outgrow this new land. We would sign treaties to the effect of promising no more war.”

“We had a treaty before this war began. You broke it,” Hittite said sharply.

“We had no choice. Our people are starving and you would not let us take the land we needed otherwise.”

“Surely we could have saved many lives if you had just come to the table before this. Instead you attacked us in force. You cost us those lives, not the other way around,” Felone said. “As it is you have taken many border villages by force, killing anyone you came across to make them your own. You have already been increasing your borders. But you should know we will take back every inch of land you have won,” Hittite said darkly.