“Did I do well?” Lucivar asked.
“Jaenelle thinks so. She would have intervened if you’d been in danger but thought it best to let the two of you work it out on your own.”
He’d wondered why she hadn’t appeared. He and Daemon had been in the part of the Keep where Witch’s Self could take on form. Not substance. They could see her, talk to her, feel her touch but not be able to touch her. That much presence was enough for him, who had been her brother. He wondered if, sometimes, that inability to touch her was a torment for Daemon.
Torment or pleasure didn’t matter. Daemon needed Witch’s hand on the leash to stay whole and sane, and Sadi would cherish every moment he had with any part of her.
The sky started to lighten by the time Lucivar flew home to catch a couple hours of sleep before facing the day’s work—and to begin preparing himself for his daughter going to school in Amdarh.
FOURTEEN
Enemies didn’t announce their presence, didn’t give any warning before an attack, but Daemonar couldn’t make a surprise attack that much of a surprise. Not with Titian. So he scuffed his boot to make a sound before he sprang at her, a wooden club raised to strike.
Titian yelped, dropped her drawings and the wooden box Uncle Daemon had given her to carry her supplies, and formed a Summer-sky shield before his club could touch her. As he beat on one shield and felt it start to break, she formed another one a finger length beneath the first and another one behind that.
He yelled. She shrieked. Instead of moving and trying to maneuver, she foolishly held her ground to protect her drawings.
He broke her second shield and raised the club to strike the third when a hand closed on the club, stopping his swing. His father dropped the sight shield that had kept him hidden and gently pulled the club out of Daemonar’s hand.
“Enough,” Lucivar said. “Titian, you can lower the shield now.”
She gulped air and looked so distressed, Daemonar felt like a knife had been slipped into his gut and twisted.
“Titian?” he said, glancing at Lucivar. “It’s okay now.”
Two Warlord Princes waited for her to regain enough control to drop the last shield. Then Daemonar scrambled to collect her drawings, hoping the box, which was one of her prized possessions, hadn’t been damaged when she dropped it.
“Three shields correctly made that held long enough for someone to reach you,” Lucivar said quietly. He called in one of those large envelopes that usually contained official documents and held it out to Titian.
“What’s that?” she asked, sniffling and rubbing tears off her cheeks.
Daemonar hoped they were angry tears. He could deal with angry tears.
“The paperwork for your enrollment in the school. Information about your lodgings. You like your quiet time, so I arranged for you to have a private room. And there are the lists of books and supplies we’ll need to purchase before classes begin.” Lucivar cleared his throat. “Your mother and Jillian are going to Amdarh on business in a few days, so we’ll all go and stay at the town house with your uncle while you gather your supplies. Then we’ll take a look at the school and help you and Jaenelle Saetien get settled.”
Titian blinked at her father. “I can go?”
“You can go.”
To Daemonar’s eyes, Lucivar’s smile looked forced, but he doubted Titian noticed as she threw herself into her father’s arms.
“Thank you, Papa. Thank you.” She stepped back. “Does Mother know?”
Lucivar shook his head. “I thought you should tell her.”
She turned to gather her drawings, but Daemonar said, “I’ll put these in your room.”
She rushed into the eyrie, shouting for Marian.
Daemonar picked up the box and the drawings and then looked Lucivar in the eyes. “Knowing how to shield isn’t enough.”
“You think I don’t know that?” Lucivar snapped. Then he shook his head, blew out a breath, and stared at the land beyond their home. “We have to let her go—and hope.”
Maybe there is a way to do more than hope, Daemonar thought as he took the drawings and art supplies to Titian’s room.
He found Lucivar in the weapons room, honing his Eyrien war blade.
“I’m going out for a while.”
Lucivar gave him a long look. “Be back for dinner.”
No demand to know where he was going. Maybe Lucivar didn’t need to ask.
He slipped past the kitchen, where the female voices sounded tearful and happy. As soon as he was outside, he spread his wings and flew to the Keep. It wasn’t his afternoon for a lesson, but that didn’t matter. Couldn’t matter when he needed to talk to Witch.
He landed in a garden close to the Queen’s private area of the Keep, then strode through the corridors until he walked past the ornate metal gate that was the boundary. When he reached the sitting room where he usually had his lessons, he said, “Auntie J.? Auntie J.! I need to talk to you!” He waited, feeling his heart thump against his chest. Seven, eight, nine, ten. “Lady?”
“What’s wrong, boyo?”
He turned, shaking with relief. “It’s Titian.”
It poured out of him—Titian’s art, which she’d been working on for years now; her desire to go to the private school in Amdarh; her finally creating shields that Lucivar deemed sufficient to allow her to leave the safety of her family.
He paced, unable to sit still. His throat hurt with his effort to tell Witch everything without shouting at her. When there was nothing more to say, all he could do was stare at her.
“What, exactly, do you want, Prince Yaslana?” Witch asked.
“Shields won’t be enough if no one comes to help. I’d like some way for Titian to let me know she’s in trouble and needs my help.”
“Just your help?”
Something that would be a call to battle for his uncle and father would be better, but they would kick his ass if they knew he was asking Witch to become a little more entangled with the living. “Just mine.” If necessary, he would give the call to battle.
“When does your sister leave?”
“We’re going to Amdarh in a few days. The whole family.”
“I’ll consider your request. Come back in two days.”
A plain white mug appeared on a table beside him.
“A tonic,” Witch said, “with honey and lemon. It will help the soreness in your throat. Drink it before you go.”
“Yes, Auntie. Thank you.”
She vanished.
Daemonar drank the tonic slowly.
Had he asked for too much? That Witch still existed in some way was a closely guarded secret held by his father, his uncle, and him—and Lady Karla. The Keep’s Seneschal and historian/librarian knew, of course, but they knew so many secrets. He suspected they were, in their way, secrets themselves.
He finished the tonic, then left the mug on the tray where he usually left dishes when he’d been given something to eat during his lessons.
Then he flew home and spent an hour sparring with his little brother to keep his and Andulvar’s attention away from their sister.
Karla entered the Queen’s suite and waited.
She’d observed the boy as he grew into a young man who showed promise of being a powerful Warlord Prince with a hot temper like his father’s but more control. Even now there was more control—because someone he trusted held the leash. The man Daemonar Yaslana had become knew that if the person who held the leash threw him into a fight, it was for a reason, and he would step onto that killing field without hesitation.
That kind of trust had to be nurtured carefully.
“You know what he’s asking?” Witch asked as the shadow of her Self took shape.