The Fire Prince (The Cursed Kingdoms Trilogy Book 2) (48 page)

Cora said nothing for several seconds. “Why?”

I could lie. I could say it was to protect him
. Innis clenched her fingers more tightly together. “We share dreams. Dareus said healers sometimes do it.” She risked a glance at Cora.

Cora’s expression was grave.

Innis looked down at her clenched hands. “When I was his armsman, we shared dreams almost every night. I missed them, so... I broke the Law.”

Justifications bubbled up on her tongue.
It’s a Law I broke every night I was Justen! You and Dareus gave me permission to sleep in a shape not my own, remember?
But that permission had been for the sole purpose of protecting the prince.

Cora quenched her firelight.

The night was dark, but not silent. Water burbled. Frogs croaked. Insects sang. Voices murmured at the campfire.

“Explain to me what you mean by sharing dreams.”

“It’s like... there’s him and me, and we talk and... and he tells me things, and I can feel what he’s feeling—his emotions, I mean—and...” How to explain? “It’s like we
share
who we are. Sometimes we argue, but mostly we just talk and... and stuff.”
Sex
. But she couldn’t quite bring herself to tell Cora that. “And we feel happy. Both of us. Happier than I’ve ever been before.”

How lame that sounded: happy. As if happiness justified breaking a Primary Law.

Cora exhaled, a sound like a sigh. “It sounds very complicated.”

Innis nodded miserably. “Dareus said it happens sometimes with healers who share a strong bond. So he must be a healer. Flin, I mean.”

Cora was silent for a long time. Innis sat with her head bowed and her eyes closed, listening to the river and the frogs and the insects.

“Does Flin know the dreams are shared?” Cora asked.

“He thinks I’m something he imagines.”

Cora sighed. She snapped her fingers and set a piece of driftwood alight.

Innis shrank back. She wanted to stay hidden in the dark. She forced herself to meet Cora’s eyes.

“There are several issues here, Innis. First, you’ve been breaking a Primary Law without prior permission. Second, you’ve been sharing dreams with someone who has no idea it’s happening.”

“But—”

“For you to share dreams with Flin and for
you
to know what’s happening, and
him
not to, is... it’s a violation, Innis.”

Innis closed her mouth.

“If you were to continue sharing dreams, he would need to know what’s happening. And he would have to agree with it. And as for breaking that Law...” Cora sighed again. “We’re partly to blame for that, Dareus and I. We’ve asked a lot from you, and it’s not unnatural that boundaries between right and wrong should blur. If you’re breaking several Laws a day, what’s one more? At least you recognized your misjudgment and corrected it.”

Innis looked down at her hands again. “Petrus caught me. He said I had to tell you.”

“Ah...” Cora said.

“You have to send me home, don’t you? I shouldn’t be a Sentinel. I need to be punished.”

Cora uttered a sound that was part-laugh, part-sigh. “I’m not going to send you home, Innis. We need you here. And I’m not going to punish you. The culpability for this must be shared. Your youth and inexperience and the demands we’ve placed on you...” She shifted her weight on the log. Her tone became matter-of-fact. “When this mission is over, I’ll have to report this... this error. It will go before the Council, but I’m sure they’ll not be too harsh, given the circumstances. A comment on your record would suffice, I’d think. That’s what I’ll recommend.”

Innis stared down at her hands. For the first time in her life, she was glad her parents were dead.

“You made a mistake. Which you have now corrected.” Cora’s voice became more gentle. “We all make mistakes, Innis.”

My parents never made mistakes
. They’d be so disappointed if they knew, so ashamed of her. A tear trickled down her cheek. Innis wiped it away with her sleeve.

“Innis...” Cora reached out and took her hand.

“You never make mistakes,” Innis said, her voice wobbling. “My parents never did.”

Cora gave a half-laugh. “I most certainly make mistakes. Flin caught me out in one this evening. And your parents made mistakes too, for all they were good Sentinels. Everyone does. It’s part of being human.”

More tears spilled from her eyes. “They had such high hopes for me.” Everything she’d worked for at the Academy had been in her parents’ memory, been done
for
them. “And now I’ve ruined it.”

“Hardly ruined,” Cora said. “And I would hope you chose to be a Sentinel for yourself, not for your parents.”

Innis blotted her eyes with her sleeve.

Cora released her hand. “Innis, look at me. This is serious.”

Her tone pulled Innis’s head around.

“If you’re a Sentinel because you think it’s what your parents would have wanted, that’s the wrong reason to take the oath. Why did you become a Sentinel, Innis? Because they wanted it, or because you did?”

“Both.”

“Innis... do you truly
want
to be a Sentinel?”

Innis hesitated, and turned the question over in her mind. “Yes,” she said with certainty. “I do.”

Cora looked at her for a long moment, and then nodded. “Good, because you’re a good one, and this mistake you’ve made—whether you believe me or not—will make you even better. We learn a lot from our mistakes.” Her lips twitched wryly. “If they don’t kill us.”

Some of the tight knots in Innis’s stomach began to unravel. She dried her face.

“I’m glad you listened to Petrus.”

Hearing his name made Innis’s chest squeeze painfully. His expression this morning, the tone of his voice...

“Back in Osgaard, when Dareus asked me to be Justen, I was afraid. I asked Petrus to watch me and tell me if he thought anything was going wrong.” She closed her eyes. Petrus had done as she’d asked, but his face—

To lose Petrus’s friendship was worse punishment than being dismissed as a Sentinel. He was her brother, for all they shared no blood. Her closest friend.

“You had good reason to be afraid. Being someone else for so long... it was bound to have an effect.”

“I feel more comfortable in Justen’s body than my own,” Innis confessed in a low voice, not looking at Cora. “I like it better.”

“Ah.” Cora sighed. “That’s worrying.”

Innis nodded.

“This is why we have the Primary Laws. Asking you to break them was dangerous. It’s just as well we’ll be getting reinforcements shortly. Justen needs to cease to exist.”

Innis nodded again, miserably. She stared at the little fire Cora had lit.

“These dreams of yours. What did Dareus tell you about them?”

“He said it happens when healers share a strong bond. And that it’s rare. He didn’t know much else about them. It was just after the prince had burned that assassin and I realized the dreams I was having weren’t... ordinary. So I asked Dareus.”

“Did he say anything else?”

“He wanted to know how the prince was feeling.” Innis looked down at her cuff, rubbed the dampness from the tears with her thumb. “If you could have seen inside his head then, Cora... He was terrified.”

“I’ve no doubt. To grow up as he has, thinking mages are monsters, and then have this happen to him... Given his background, he’s dealt with it remarkably well. I’m impressed with him.”

Innis glanced at her, startled. “You are? But I thought everyone thinks he’s prickly and bad-tempered and—”

“There’s a lot more to our Flin than his temper,” Cora said. “He has the makings of a good Sentinel.”

“I’ve told him that. In the dreams, I mean. But he’s so stubborn.”

Cora uttered a laugh. “Yes, stubborn. But also determined. He doesn’t do things by halves. And he has a lot of courage.”

“And if he thinks he’s made a mistake, he always apologizes.”

“Yes. I’ve noticed that.”

“He thinks you’re a good teacher. I don’t know if he’s told you, but he said it once, in a dream.”

“No.” Cora studied her face. “You like him, don’t you?”

Innis felt herself blush. “Yes.”

But Cora didn’t pursue this line of questioning. “Have you asked Rand about the dreams?”

“No. Do you think I should?”

“Dareus was primarily a fire mage. Rand’s knowledge of the intricacies of healing magic will be much broader than his was.” Cora tilted her head to one side. “Would you like to ask him?”

Innis nodded.

“Now?”

She hesitated, and then nodded again. Cora stood and cupped her hands to her mouth. “Rand! Can you come down here, please?”

A few moments later, Rand joined them. He sat on Innis’s other side, his face lively with curiosity.

“Have you ever heard of healers sharing dreams?” Cora asked.

Rand’s eyebrows rose. His gaze fastened on Innis. “You’re sharing dreams? With...?”

Innis felt herself blush again. “Flin.”

“What do you know about them?” Cora asked.

Rand answered her, but his gaze stayed on Innis. “They’re rare. Incredibly rare.”

“What else?”

“They’re intense. Usually extremely intimate. Exhilarating. Euphoric.”

Innis looked down at her hands. Her cheeks felt hot.

“Forgive me for asking, Innis... but are the dreams quite passionate?”

Innis’s cheeks grew hotter. “Sometimes.”

There was a moment of silence, and then Cora asked, “Is Flin a healer?”

“He’ll have some healing ability, yes, but not necessarily great. Innis, you sense your patients’ emotions and personalities when you heal them, don’t you?”

“Yes.” She risked a glance at him. “Is that why it’s happening?”

“One of the pair must be that strong a healer, yes. The other one...” Rand shrugged. “Some have been that strong, but many aren’t. The most important thing is the bond between the dreamers, the emotional connection. I might be a much stronger healer than Flin, but you’ll never have those dreams with me, because we don’t connect on that level.” His eyes narrowed as if a thought occurred to him. “You haven’t finished your training yet, have you, Innis? You’re still a virgin?”

Innis nodded.

“Then I imagine you’ll be told all this during your sexual training. I’d certainly tell you, if I was your instructor. You’re one of the few mages who has a chance of finding this kind of connection with someone.”

“Hmm...” Cora pursed her lips thoughtfully. “Is there anything else you know about sharing dreams, Rand?”

He shrugged. “It’s meant to be a remarkable experience. The dreamers develop incredibly strong and long-standing attachments.”

“You mean... they marry?”

“There was a pair of siblings who shared dreams, oh, last century, but other than that, yes. The bond between dreamers... this isn’t something casual, Cora. They’re inside each other’s head. They know each other better than most people ever will. It’s intense, powerful. If Innis is sharing dreams with our Flin, then they’re both exceptionally lucky.” Rand paused. “I take it Flin doesn’t know what’s happening?”

“He thinks Innis is something he’s made up.”

“Ah...” Rand said. “Do you plan to tell him?”

Innis glanced at Cora.

“A connection this deep between two people is rare,” Rand said. “It’s not something to be dismissed lightly. In my opinion, he needs to know.”

Cora rubbed her forehead. “He’ll have to be told at some stage. But not now. Definitely not now.” She grimaced. “There’s the problem of Justen, you see. Flin will be sure to wonder why he’s sharing dreams with Innis when it’s actually Justen who’s been sleeping in his tent.”

“Oh, of course.” Rand grimaced too. “That’s a complication.”

“Just a small one,” Cora said wryly. “I’d like to avoid him discovering
that
deception if at all possible. He’d be furious.”

More than furious
. But it wasn’t the prince’s outrage that Innis feared. It was how humiliated he’d feel. She laid her palm on the log they sat on and sent out a prayer:
Please, All-Mother, let him never find out
.

“And he should also be told he’s a healer,” Cora said. “It may influence his decisions about his magic. Thank you, Rand.” She stood and took Innis’s hand, pulling her to her feet. “Bedtime.”

“Thank you,” Innis said.

Cora smiled reassuringly. “Don’t worry. We’ll work this out.”