CHAPTER FIFTEEN #2
Deckard forced a smile to his lips, deflecting. “And I can feel that you’re tired.”
“Any idiot could tell that I’m tired,” she teased, then took his right hand in both of hers. She ran her fingers along the back, lightly tugging on the moonstone ring. “What is it?”
Seeing no point in lying, Deckard set his worries free. “This isn’t what we agreed to,” he said.
Evylin’s touch stilled, and a subtle spike of anxiety reached him.
“I’m not disappointed in the Bond, Evylin,” he promised. “I’m happy with that. But . . . I feel like Ilain and the Alliance tricked us. Once again.”
Staring at their hands, Evylin considered her words before speaking.
“I’m not exactly thrilled with them myself,” she admitted.
“However, I will say . . . I don’t think they meant it that way.
And I think the pledge might have been more Ilain’s doing than the Administration’s.
Fishere seemed sufficiently uncomfortable when he learned we didn’t want it. ”
Deckard nodded, glad to hear she was as against assuming a leadership position as he was. “He did seem repentant. But that doesn’t ease my concern.”
Evylin met his stare, listening.
“We are highly valuable to the Alliance’s aims,” he explained.
“You, as a female Warrior, and, to my great shock, me as a Space Mage. It’s no secret that we are extremely rare.
In order to achieve their goals, they need a Bonded couple of each resource, and they only have one other Space Mage, who is also a male.
As we also learned, the last remaining female Warrior unspoken for in the Alliance is Brea.
If she isn’t willing to Bond with that Space Mage, what then?
Do we truly believe their goodness will extend to the collapse of their plans? ”
Chewing on the inside of her lip, Evylin’s apprehension leeched through her touch. “You think they’ll press us into service at the end of this?” she asked.
“They’re a government,” he replied. “Why wouldn’t they?”
“They’re a religiously motivated government,” Evylin corrected. “If they believe their tenets, they are morally obligated not to use force.”
“Religion rarely overcomes necessity.”
She raised her brow in surprise. “You’re sounding rather cynical. That’s not like the man I married.”
He drew away, not wanting to face that accusation, no matter how lighthearted its intent. “After everything we’ve been through,” he muttered, “I find I’m unrecognizable to myself these days.”
Evylin sat up to scoot closer. She set a hand on his cheek, drawing his gaze to her tender smile. “Don’t be so dramatic,” she said softly. “You’re you. You’re just an unmatched magical being now too.”
Taking heart in her comfort, Deckard leaned into her hand. “And I have you.”
The dimples in Evylin’s cheeks appeared. “You always had me.”
He kissed her palm. “It’s a little different now.”
“It is,” she agreed.
He leaned closer. “It’s good,” he whispered, “this Bond between us.”
“Very.”
“I just don’t want them to use it against us.”
“They can’t.”
Deckard fixed her with a serious stare. “They can,” he said, imploring her to caution. “At the end of this, if they truly succeed in bringing down two countries, two monarchies—if they have all eight Relics at their disposal, who is going to stop these people from doing whatever they choose?”
A small smile quirked up the corner of Evylin’s mouth. “You?” she suggested.
He gave her a flat stare.
She chuckled. “Jonn, if they’re a tyrannical government bent on controlling the world, why would they want two individuals opposed to their schemes set in a place of leadership, holding an all-powerful Relic?
You made your position quite clear at the meeting two nights ago.
We distrust them. So even if they are tyrants, why would they press us into service? ”
Deckard’s brow pinched in thought. He tried to work out an argument.
If they were tyrants, they’d do whatever it took to reach their own ends.
They could threaten Deckard’s or Evylin’s families or split them up.
But in his heart, he knew that wasn’t who the Calders were, and they wouldn’t support a government that used such means of coercion.
With a sigh, Deckard said, “I don’t like it when you’re logical.”
Evylin’s grin grew sly. “Would you like me to be illogical? Very well.” She slid closer, draping her arms around his neck, and whispered, “Let’s run away together.”
“Where shall we go?” he asked, encircling her waist.
She made a grand show of consideration. “Mm. Perhaps we could visit Schon.” Her eyes crinkled. “Then you could get drunk on Schonese wine each night, and we’d dance until morning.”
“Sounds delightful. But what would we do about the hangovers?”
Evylin shrugged merrily. “Then we’ll go to the southern continent, Matra-something.”
“Matteire,” Deckard corrected, rather proud of his appropriately airy pronunciation of the continent’s name.
“Know-it-all.”
“I was a good student.”
“Of course you were.”
Deckard laughed. “And what would we do there?”
“I don’t know,” she admitted. “I wasn’t a good student.”
His smile grew. “I hear they have lovely beaches with white sand.”
“White sand?” Her eyes grew wide then. “Like in the Time Keep?”
“I suppose. The descriptions I’ve read say that it isn’t like our sand, not so coarse and gray but white and powder-like.”
“Sounds lovely,” Evylin said wistfully. “What else do you know about this place?”
A bashful smile came to Deckard’s lips, and he looked down. Her nightdress had slid up, pooling around her legs carelessly. “Well, I once read that the women of Audis, the capital of the southern country in Matteire, swim the southernmost beaches entirely naked.”
Evylin immediately guffawed. “My, my, Colonel Deckard!” she exclaimed amusedly. “How scandalous. Are you suggesting you’d like me to swim naked in the company of others?”
“I said no such thing,” Deckard replied. “You asked what I know, and I told you.”
“And this was part of your studies as a good student, was it?”
“It was extracurricular.”
“Mm-hm.” She drew herself closer until she was seated on his lap. “Well, if you want to take me to these beaches, you’ll have to teach me how to swim.”
“I’m not interested in visiting those beaches,” he said. “But I’ll still teach you how to swim.”
“Is that a promise?”
“It is.” Deckard set his hand on her thigh, brushing his thumb across her skin.
“My life is yours, Evylin. Anything you ask of me, I’ll do it.
Anywhere you want to go, I’ll go. Whatever will make you happy, say the word, and I will give it to you.
Three months ago, I promised to serve you until my last breath.
Today, knowing our lives will last centuries, I promise you that again.
If you said the word, I would leave with you right now—I would take you to the vineyards of Schon, to the beaches of Audis, even to the frozen mountains of Estenoye in the far west.”
Her happy smile twitched at the last one, betraying her lack of education about their surrounding continents.
Deckard took her face in his hands then. “Say the word, Evylin,” he whispered. “And I will abandon this mission; I will cast aside everything for you.”
Drawing in a long breath, Evylin’s head tipped forward to rest against his. A full, heart-deep emotion pulsed in the air between them, revealing her joy to Deckard. Her lips parted, brushing his as she replied softly, “Liar.”
Abruptly pulling back from her kiss, Deckard stared at her. “What was that?” he asked incredulously.
Unabashed, Evylin smirked. “You are a liar,” she said, pronouncing the words with deliberate enunciation.
Hurt by the allegation, Deckard felt his brows draw low. “I am not.”