Bloodchild (17 page)

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Apart

For most of his life, Bradan had
trained in combat with his brother. Being part of a fencing club back on Earth
had helped, of course, but it was when he visited Foh’Ran that he’d learned to
wield a real sword, to attack for more than points on a scoreboard, to defend
his very life.

An old sword master had taught
Aedan to fight with a sword in his teenage years, and everything he’d learned,
he had taught Bradan in return. Later, when Aedan had joined Rhuinn’s guard,
the lessons had been more infrequent but also much more challenging. Fighting
against a vampire who used knives rather than a sword, Bradan had learned to
adapt to the strengths and weapons of his adversary. It had been what he needed
to prepare him to be a guard.

Being unable to train with Aedan
now might have been the hardest part of Bradan’s decision to remain with
Ciara—that, and being away from Vivien, of course. Coming home to Foh’Ran,
Bradan had had it in mind that all these years of being apart from his brother
were finally over. Being wrong was heartbreaking.

It didn’t help that Ciara was…
Ciara.

Aedan had never said much about
her other than the fact that she was a strict task-mistress, and after one day
she had proven that. She pushed Bradan to train until he was exhausted and
couldn’t move any longer, and then pushed him a little further still. That
wasn’t all, though.

Training with his brother, Bradan
had received his fair share of minor injuries and inflicted as many in return.
Whatever cuts they gave each other, he and Aedan had always healed one another,
Bradan with the use of the Quickening, Aedan with his blood. Ciara had no
qualms about drawing blood and didn’t even flinch when—once—Bradan’s knife
found her skin. Healing cuts, however, whether they were simple grazes or
deeper wounds, was not part of the way she taught.

“If you don’t want to bleed,” she
railed when he mentioned it, “fight better.”

Tonight, he had five cuts to clean
before he could get in bed. Four were superficial and would be gone by morning,
but the fifth one, straight across his thigh, was deeper. He knew it’d heal on
its own like the other ones would; he and Ciara had been training with steel
blades, not silver, which meant that the wound only needed time and Bradan’s
body would take care of it on its own.

As he washed it, however, and
wrapped a towel around it, he couldn’t help but wish he knew a channeler in the
castle. It would have taken a second of work with the Quickening and he’d have
been as good as new, ready to train again come morning. As it was, he was sure
he’d still feel the wound tomorrow.

He was about to get into bed when
the door opened without warning and in came Ciara. Startled at the intrusion,
he froze and could do nothing more than watch when she closed the door again
and sauntered to his bed, dropping her dressing gown to the floor on the way.
She wasn’t wearing a stitch of clothing beneath it.

Bradan dropped his gaze at once.
Had he still been human, his face would have been flaming by now.

“What…” His voice gave the most
embarrassing squeak. “What are you doing?”

Ciara’s laugh sounded like church
bells. “What does it look like I’m doing? Surely I don’t need to teach you
this, too. Or do I?”

He heard the rustling of sheets
and chanced a glance up, hoping she’d covered herself. She hadn’t. Instead,
she’d pushed the sheet down to the foot of the bed as she lay there, her head
propped up on her hand, watching him with a predatory expression.

Keeping his eyes on her face, Bradan
cleared his throat.

“I apologize if I gave you the
impression that I wish to share your bed,” he said in a formal tone he didn’t
often use. “I am exhausted and wish to sleep, nothing more.”

When she didn’t move, he added,
“Alone, please.”

She raised her eyes to the
ceiling.

“Don’t flatter yourself, child. I
didn’t succumb to your charm. This is part of training a Bloodchild.”

He didn’t quite see how sleeping
with her would help his training in any way, but even if it’d been obvious, his
response would have been the same. She was attractive, that much was true, but
that didn’t mean he was attracted to her.

“Well,” he said cautiously, intent
on not offending her, “we’re already breaking tradition by having you train me
rather than my Maker, and I’m afraid we’ll have to change that part of
training, too.”

Ciara laughed again, but this time
it was mocking.

“Are you saying you'd rather it be
Aedan in your bed? Now that would be an interesting spectacle.”

He refused to even dignify that
with an answer.

“I'm in love,” he started, but
Ciara interrupted him with a too-wide grin.

“With Aedan?”

No longer worried about offending
her, he rolled his eyes at her.

“Thank you for the offer to train
me further,” he said coolly. Walking over to where she had let her robe fall to
the floor, he picked it up and held it out toward her, “but I have to decline.”

For a long moment, she remained
still and observed him, no longer grinning, although she didn’t seem all that
upset. At last, she slipped out of bed and, rather than taking the robe from
him, held out her arm, demanding to be dressed. If it meant she’d be out of his
room faster, Bradan was happy to oblige. He opened the robe and slipped it over
her arm, then held it as she threaded the second one through.

“She's your dame,” she said as she
drew the belt closed. “Love doesn't factor here. You’ll understand that soon
enough.”

He said nothing as she left,
although he knew she was wrong. Love was the one and only factor.

* * * *

Vivien ran.

It was the same dream again, the age-old
nightmare she’d had for as long as she could remember.

In her dream, she ran, and tonight
the moonlight guided her, filtering through the woods, casting shadows
everywhere, telling her which way to go to get out in the open. She ran as
hard, as fast as she could, but it still wasn’t very fast. How could it be when
she was so small, when her legs were so short—when the
thing
that
pursued her was so much bigger than she was?

But no, that wasn’t right. She
frowned in her dream, looking at herself without ever stopping to run, thinking
that this was wrong. So very wrong. She wasn’t a child anymore. She was a grown
woman. A woman who’d been running for exercise for years, building up both
endurance and speed.

As she thought so, she changed.
Between one stride and the next, she went from small child to adult, one second
barefoot in the cool, wet grass, and the next wearing her running shoes. A
feeling of elation flashed through her. Now she could escape. Now she could be
safe. Now—

Something brushed against her
back, and she whimpered. It was catching up with her. She was close to the edge
of the woods, and she knew safety lay there, but
it
was so close, too
close…

With a defiant cry, she crossed
the last few yards of underbrush and burst out into the open. The moon shone
wide and round above her, casting enough light that it was as bright as day so
that she could see him, standing straight ahead of her, his hand already
outstretched toward her as he urged her on.

“Run, Vivien,” he called out, and
she could have wept at hearing Brad’s voice again.

But… was it Brad?

As she grew closer to him, every
last inch of her focused on taking his proffered hand, she could see his palm,
and the symbol that gleamed like silver in the moonlight. But that was wrong.
The tattoo was on Brad’s wrist, not in the center of his palm. It wasn’t Brad,
she realized at the same moment his hand closed around hers and pulled to draw
her into his arms. And if it wasn’t Brad…

“Aedan?” she murmured, and opened
her eyes.

With her heart still beating much
too fast, she lay there, her legs tangled in the sheets, her eyes fixed on the
canopy above her.

It wasn’t the first time details
of the dream had changed. For years, it had always been the same, but since she
had come to Foh’Ran, details had sometimes shifted. Night or day, whether she
was a child or an adult, even the identity of the man waiting for her outside
the woods.

It had been Brad before, but now
she wasn’t sure it had been him—and she wasn’t sure it had been Aedan, either.
Aedan didn’t have the QuickSilver tattoo on his body. Then again, Brad didn’t
wear it on his palm. In the original dream, the one she’d had since a child,
the man’s tattoo was on his palm, though she wasn’t sure who he was.

That dream, she’d come to think,
was probably one of her repressed childhood memories. But what did
this
dream mean? What was her subconscious trying to tell her?

She wasn’t sure she wanted to
know.

With a groan, she pushed herself
out of bed and walked over to the washroom. The stones were cold under her bare
feet, but she couldn’t be bothered to channel and do something about it. Cold
water, on the other hand, was a different matter.

After washing up, she pulled a
simple dress from the wardrobe, something that wouldn’t get in the way of her
training. She had only a day left before she had to go back to Rhuinn’s castle
for the first duel. As she brushed her hair, her reflection in the mirror
looked worried already.

Could she do this without Brad
there?

Or maybe he would be there—on
Rhuinn’s side. The thought froze her down to her bones.

But no, she reassured herself at
once. He might be in Rhuinn’s castle right now, but he wasn’t on Rhuinn’s side.
He would never be. He would never break his oath, not when it meant so much to
him.

With that thought in mind, she
slipped on sandals and walked out of her room, her mind set on going to hunt
down some coffee before starting her day. It had to be very early still since
Doril hadn’t brought it up.

When she stepped through the study
and into the sitting room, she was surprised to find Aedan there. Usually, he
stood guard in the corridor, not inside her suite. He stood in the middle of
the room, his hands clasped behind him and his back to her, and she knew what
he was looking at so intently on the floor.

Could he see Brad’s dying body
there, blood pooling under him, the same way Vivien did every time she walked
through this room?

He started at her approach and
turned to face her, offering her his customary bow.

“Blessings, Dame Vivien.”

“Good morning,” she said, and
couldn’t bear waiting to ask, “Is something wrong? Is it about Brad?”

Aedan shook his head.

“Nothing’s wrong, and I have not
heard from him, no.”

“But you can… feel him, right?”
she insisted, stepping closer and wrapping her arms around herself. “Through
the bond? You can tell if he’s all right, can’t you?”

A pained look crossed Aedan’s
eyes.

“He’s fine,” he murmured absently.
“He’s not… happy, but he’s fine.”

She wanted to say something, say
she was glad he was okay, sad that he wasn’t happy, thank Aedan for telling
her, or ask him to tell her if anything changed, but her throat felt too tight,
and she couldn’t manage to say a word. Without thinking, she went to the
closest armchair and sat there, her gaze finding the very same spot on the
floor Aedan had been staring at.

“Sometimes,” she whispered, “I’m
almost sure I can see his blood there. Or him. I was so sure I’d lost him, and
then you gave him back to me, and now I’ve lost him again.”

“You haven’t lost him. He just
wants to be sure he won’t hurt you. When he trusts himself again, he’ll come
back.”

She looked up at him, wishing he
sounded more convincing.

“How long did it take you to trust
yourself around humans?” she asked.

For a few seconds, Aedan seemed
flustered. Finally, he glanced away with a muttered, “I don’t remember.”

Vivien’s throat tightened again.
Did Aedan truly not remember, or did he not want to tell her? What if Brad
needed months, or even years before he could control himself? What if Rhuinn
killed her long before Brad was ready to return?

The thought threatened to paralyze
her. She pushed it away, closing her eyes tightly for a few seconds.

“Dame Vivien, I’m…”

Aedan fell silent when she opened
her eyes again. He’d stepped closer and his right hand fell back to his side as
though he’d been raising it toward her.

“Your new guards,” he said after
clearing his throat. “They asked… They want to swear the oath to you. Formally
join the QuickSilver Guard.”

As soon as Aedan pronounced the
word ‘oath,’ Vivien let out a quiet groan. She’d suspected this might happen,
but she’d hoped it wouldn’t be so soon. She was as reluctant as ever to have
anyone swear their life to her. It still felt strange, even if she realized it
was a cultural thing and she had little right to tell anyone their view on the
world was wrong.

“They’ve only known me for two
days,” she protested. “For all they know I’ll lose my duel tomorrow, and the
next one too, and what will happen then?”

What
would
happen? She’d
tried very hard not to think about it, but the possibility was there that she
would lose. If she did, her possessions would be forfeit, her life would be in
the hands of Rhuinn, but what about the people who followed her?

The question was enough to twist
her stomach. When she’d decided to challenge Rhuinn, her guard, as far as she
knew, amounted to one person only: Aedan. He had supported her decision while
knowing better than she did what would happen if she failed. But if she allowed
more people to pledge themselves to her…

“Dame Vivien.” Aedan set a knee to
the floor in front of her and looked up at her with a slight shake of his head.
“If I may, you can’t let yourself think like this. They believe in you. So do
I. But it’s about more than that, too. If they bear the QuickSilver mark when
we return to the palace, others will see it. It's still all about appearances.”