The Marann (29 page)

“What do I do?” she asked,
breathless.

He pulled his scattered thoughts
together. They should go to his sleeping mat and remove their
robes, but that was almost certain to terrify her. Better to leave
it until their hearts had begun to join, when he would be able, to
some extent, to dilute her fear.

“Open your heart to me,” he said, his
voice low and ragged, “and look into mine.”

He dropped his barriers.

Marianne drew a sharp breath. His
radiance burst around her as she sank into him, and he was
glorious. Strong, determined, caring... but parts of him were cold,
calculating, and manipulative. A part of him stretched out over his
province—his ruling bond. Near it lay a scar and a tight ball of
grief connected to yet more griefs.

“My father,” he murmured. “He died
before our bond had faded. And... the sons I lost to the great
trial.”

“My heart grieves for your pain,” she
whispered, turning her empathic gaze away from the sadness, toward
the more passionate side of him. Panic threatened to overwhelm
her.

“Do not fear me,” he said. “I am not
enslaved to desire. I will not hurt you.” He held her, his arms
gentle, as she fought down the fear yet again. “Show yourself to
me, beloved. I want to know you.”

He wouldn’t hurt her. He would
not
hurt her. Marianne forced herself to calm and relaxed
the walls around her feelings. The Sural reached into her with his
senses, gentle, tender, seeing everything… and didn’t recoil. The
fear, the pain, even the aching, pulsing part that she wished she
didn’t have—he took it all in and lit up with joy and
wonder.

He loved her. He knew what had
happened to her, and he could see what it had done to her, and he
still loved her. Her heart burst from the cage she’d built around
it and soared, the Sural’s happiness soaring with it. Time seemed
to stop as they shared the radiance. The Sural sought her mouth,
and this time, she met his questing tongue with her own.

Like a bursting dam, something between
them dissolved, and their hearts crashed together. Marianne and the
Sural gasped. The radiance flared and filled the night. Euphoria,
rapture, the
need
to be closer, to be inside each other,
blazed through them, pounded in their loins. Marianne pressed into
the Sural. He kissed a burning trail across the empathic nerves in
her forehead.

“Take joy in me,” he said, his voice a
rasp.

“Yes,” she whispered. She clung to
him, her kisses hungry.

“You will never be alone again.” He
swept her up into his arms and carried her inside.

<<>>

Marianne basked in the moonlit
sleeping room of the Sural’s apartments, every inch of her skin
tingling. The Sural lay on his side next to her, propped on one
elbow. With her eyes closed, she could see him glowing like a sun,
feel
his gaze on her face, the playfulness sparking through
him, the joy lighting him, as if all of it were her own.

“I will never be able to hide from you
again,” he said, as he traced the line of her jaw with a finger.
“You will always be able to close your eyes and know where I
am.”

“Fair’s fair,” she murmured in
English. “I couldn’t hide from you anyway.” He gave a soft snort of
amusement. She opened her eyes and smiled up at him, touching his
face with her fingertips. “I never, ever dreamed it could be like
that.”

“Nor did I.”

She stared at him, searching for words
and not finding any.

“Yes, I have coupled many times,” he
said. “For pleasure, for lust, to father heirs, often when I was
young and learning to control my heightened appetites. Never before
with a woman who possessed my heart, never with the
bond.”

“But you’ve had so many—”

He smiled in the moonlight. “Beloved,”
he said, “before you, there was no one.”

“And then you showed me a
flutter.”

“You were the most beautiful creature
I had ever seen. And then,” he added, twining his fingers with
hers, “I held your hand with the hevalrin—do you remember I did not
take my hand away? From that moment, my heart was
yours.”

A lump rose in Marianne’s throat.
“Beloved,” she whispered. “I must have broken your heart so many
times.”

“I regret nothing.”

<<>>

In the morning, Marianne lay on a bed
in what she thought of as the infirmary—a screened area in what
would have been the sitting room of the head apothecaries’
quarters. She trembled under the blanket covering her, though not
from cold. The procedure to remove the locater chip from her brain
would begin as soon as the head apothecary came out of her study.
She took a deep breath, trying to calm herself. If she
died—

The Sural approached, camouflaged, his
barriers shut tight to prevent anyone else from sensing him. He
appeared next to her.

“Beloved,” he greeted her. Joy turned
his dark eyes into pools of molten mahogany.

“Beloved,” she said, taking his hand,
her heart glowing. “What are you doing sneaking around?”

“My head apothecary would not approve
of my presence here,” he replied with a crooked grin. “I thought it
best to give her no reason for further displeasure. But with
bonding—this interruption is difficult. Normally we would remain
secluded together until the bond is fully formed.”

“Maybe we should have waited until
after this procedure,” she said.

He laid a gentle hand against her
cheek. “But you came to me, after so long, and I could not imagine
being with you any other way.”

“If I don’t wake up—”

“You will. My apothecary is the best
in Suralia.” He bent to press his forehead against hers. She gasped
at the raw lust that pulsed through him. “When you wake, I will be
here,” he whispered, and disappeared.

The head apothecary rounded the
screen. She stopped and frowned, then focused her attention on
Marianne. “Are you ready, high one?” Other apothecaries and nurses
came in behind her.

“Yes, apothecary.”

The apothecary placed a now-familiar
device on Marianne’s forehead. “Let us begin,” she said, then
pressed a button. Marianne slipped away.

<<>>

Adeline poured her husband a
drink—whiskey—well-aged. “John got the authorization to pull
Marianne out,” she said, handing him the glass. She curled up next
to him on the sofa in their sitting room. “They’re almost finished
repairing the phase platform.”

Smithton grunted. “You just made my
job a whole lot harder, Addie.”

“That’s what I’m here for.” She gave
him an apologetic smile.

He grunted again and knocked back the
whiskey rather than sipping it. “Why are you doing this, Addie?
First you talk the Admiral into it, then you try to talk Marianne
out of it, now you’re pushing to get her pulled off the mission
altogether. What’s in this for you?”

“Nothing, sweetheart—I’m just trying
to follow my conscience,” she answered, resting her head on his
shoulder.

If Central Command is your
conscience
, he thought.

<<>>

“Lock on to her signal,” the Admiral
ordered the phase tech.

“Signal is acquired... an-n-nd...
locked.”

“Engage.”

“Yes sir.”

The Admiral walked over to the phase
platform, prepared to face an angry schoolmarm—or perhaps a
half-dead, unconscious one. The air over the platform
shimmered.

No schoolmarm.

He looked down. There, on the
platform, in what had to be a surgical tray, lay a tiny locater
chip.

He swore and raced for the
bridge.

<<>>

Marianne stirred and opened her eyes.
Her head throbbed.
This must be what a migraine feels like
.
An apothecary she didn’t recognize stood over her, but she could
feel the Sural nearby.

“Do you desire something for pain?”
the apothecary asked.

She rubbed her face. “No,” she said.
She didn’t want to take a potion that would make her sleep again,
not with her whole being yearning for the Sural. She could feel him
aching for her. “It’s just a bad headache.”

“As you wish, high one.”

“You got it out?”

“Yes, high one. Moments ago, the chip
was phased away. We removed it with little time to
spare.”

Marianne’s stomach quivered. That was
too close. “Have there been any communications from the ship?” she
asked the Sural.

“No,” he answered, flickering into
view. He nodded at the apothecary, who bowed and left. “I suspect
they are spending their time composing an abject apology—which I do
not plan to accept.”

“They’ll just keep sending
it.”

“Of course. And I may even relent.
Someday.” He shifted his shoulders, as if the robe irritated him.
“But not today. I want every human on that ship replaced before I
will accept an apology from Earth.”

“All for one insignificant
schoolteacher from Iowa?” she asked.

He smiled down at her and pulled her
hand to his chest. She felt his heart flow into the bond between
them. “Yes,” he answered, fire lighting in his eyes. “All for one
beloved schoolteacher from Iowa.” She started to pull him down
toward her.

“You may take the Marann back to your
quarters, high one,” the Sural’s head apothecary said, entering the
room to interrupt them. She nodded to Marianne, and then spoke to
the Sural. “I am not pleased to see you initiated your bonding
before the procedure. Her body is flooded with the bonding
hormone—I had difficulty keeping her unconscious.”

The Sural straightened and bowed an
apology. The healer’s face softened a little, but when she spoke,
her voice was dry. “I do understand the circumstances. Joy of the
bond, high ones. I would tell you to moderate yourselves for the
sake of her recovery, but bonding pairs are renowned for
their—single-mindedness.” Her voice became even more dry. “Bonding
is as effective a relief for pain as any I can provide.”

The Sural laughed and slid his arms
beneath Marianne to pick her up from the bed, blanket and all. She
squeaked and giggled, holding the blanket up with one hand and
clinging to his neck with the other as he strode out the
door.

“Make sure she drinks sufficient
fluids, high one,” the apothecary called after them.

Back in his quarters, he lowered her
onto the sleeping mat and tore off his robe and trousers. Sighing
with relief, he lay on one side next to her. His skin looked
irritated. She stroked a reddened area on his neck.

“An effect of the bonding hormone,” he
said. “Clothing chafes.”

“Your poor skin. So what did she mean,
bonding pairs are renowned for single-mindedness?”

“It requires three or four days to
become fully bonded,” he said.

“Three or four days of
just—”

“—
bonding,” he finished.
“It is best we remain here in my quarters.”

“Oh my.”

He chuckled. “In truth, the need is
more emotional than physical. We will not sleep until our bond is
mature. It is how we will know it is over—when we fall
asleep.”

Her stomach clenched.

“Beloved—do not fear. The compulsion
is strong, but we are not enslaved to it. If you become afraid, we
can guide the process.” He gazed into her eyes and let his heart
flow into her through the bond. His radiance burst into her
awareness. “It is past time to bond again,” he whispered. Her heart
reached into him.

<<>>

“I’ve changed my mind, Addie.”
Smithton called. He stood at a mirror in his bedroom, adjusting his
cravat.

“About what, darling?” she asked from
the sitting room.

“You wouldn’t make a very good
spook.”

She joined him at the mirror. “Well
then,” she said, untying and retying his cravat for him, “it’s a
good thing I’m not a spook.” With a bright smile, she kissed his
cheek before returning to the sitting room. Smithton watched her
go.

“Yeah,” he muttered in a low voice,
reaching for his tailcoat and following her.

She made room for him on the
divan.

“Marianne isn’t answering her comms,”
he told her. “It’s been four days since we phased up that chip.”
Adeline remained quiet. “We assume the Tolari knew we wanted to
phase her off the planet and somehow got it out of her head. It’s
still operational—the failsafe hasn’t been triggered. How they
managed that, we don’t know, because their neuroscience can’t be
much more advanced than trepanning, but it means there’s a chance
she’s still alive. John’s trying to get the go ahead to send down a
shuttle to find out what’s going on, but she could be a vegetable
for all we know.”

A signal beeped from Smithton’s desk.
He left the divan to answer it. “Russell here,” he said.

“Sir,”
said a voice,
“the
Admiral wants to see you in his private office ASAP. He says
Marianne Woolsey is on the comms.”