Chapter 23
Ispent the rest of the reception talking and drinking with the guests, congratulating those who had received medals and promotions, and accepting congratulations on my own appointment as graciously as I could.
But the moment everything was over, and Iannis and I were back in his suite, I rounded on him.
“How could you stick me with a huge responsibility like that in front of a bajillion people?” I shouted, jabbing him in the chest with a finger.
“Without even asking me first!” Now that I no longer had an audience to hide from, all the outrage and shock at being blindsided came pouring out of me.
I fisted my trembling hands at my sides and glared up at him, resisting the mighty urge to punch him.
“Do you think that just because I’m your fiancée, you can just tell me when and where to jump, and I’ll obey without question? ”
“No,” Iannis said calmly, completely unfazed by my anger.
“But now that you no longer require frequent magic lessons, you’ll need something else to keep you occupied.
And you really are the perfect person for this particular job.
You brought up some excellent ideas about restructuring the enforcer pay system when we talked the other day.
Nobody else would approach the problem with as much verve and insight as you. ”
That took the wind right out of my sails. “What…what do you mean I no longer need magic lessons?”
Iannis smirked. “Did you really think I wouldn’t notice Fenris had gifted his knowledge to you?
I knew for sure when you sent me that ether pigeon the other day, after you had so much trouble with them earlier.
” He shook his head. “It would be just the kind of thing Fenris would do with his dying breath—he would have considered it sacrilegious to waste all the knowledge he’d gained over a lifetime of study without passing it on to someone. ”
“Oh.” I let out a little sigh. “So, do I seem…different, to you, at all? Like I’ve become more like Fenris?
” I had been worrying about that possibility, putting off confessing to Iannis what we’d done.
I didn’t feel any different, but knowing I had all those extra memories might seem weird to Iannis.
Iannis shook his head. “You are still my Sunaya.” He took me by the shoulders, drawing me closer to him.
“Still the same passionate shifter-mage hybrid I fell in love with,” he added, smiling softly.
“And now that Fenris has given you such a precious gift, I see no reason why we must waste the scarce time we have together with basic training and Loranian grammar.”
I arched a brow, even as the pain of Fenris’s loss lanced through me. “Is that your way of saying we’re going to have more sex instead?”
Iannis threw back his head and laughed, his broad shoulders shaking. By Magorah, I thought, watching the way his teeth flashed, and how the firelight flickered across his sculpted face. He really was such a beautiful man.
“No,” he finally said, stroking the pad of his thumb along my cheekbone.
“Though that is certainly an enticing thought. But we will be able to move onto more advanced lessons. Fenris’s repertoire of spellcraft was impressive, but I am three times his age and have far more practical experience.
” His expression sobered then, and he searched my gaze.
“How have you been dealing with Fenris’s memories?
It can’t be comfortable, having the sum of someone’s life experiences crammed into your consciousness. ”
I shrugged. “I’ve put them in a sort of box so that they don’t pop up unexpectedly.
At first, it was overwhelming every time I opened the box to reach for a spell, but it’s become a lot easier.
Now I just leave the box kind of propped open, and whenever I need a spell I don’t know, it pops into my mind. ”
“Excellent,” Iannis said, his voice filled with pride. “Someone with a weaker will or fewer memories might have a hard time dealing with such a gift, but it seems you have instinctively figured out how to handle them.”
“So, what does this mean, in regards to my apprenticeship?” I asked. “Do we graduate me now, or wait the full ten years?”
“I do not think we need to wait ten years,” Iannis said, “but we should keep up appearances for a few years longer. We don’t want to risk accusations of cheating, and nobody is supposed to know that Fenris was a mage.
Besides, you may have inherited all Fenris’s knowledge, but you still need practice in actually applying all those spells. ”
“Do you see it as cheating?” I asked, more anxious than I wanted to admit. “I don’t think I could have made it out alive, or saved Com’s daughter, without the techniques that Fenris gifted me.”
“Both of you did what you had to do.” He stroked my hair. “Don’t worry about that. Some mages might be suspicious at your sudden advancement, but they cannot prove that you are anything other than a very gifted student.”
“Plus, I can always say it’s because you are a more than gifted master,” I pointed out.
“Part of me wishes I could give Fenris the credit.” I sighed, sadness filling me again.
“He did some great things that we’ll never be able to tell anyone about, and it sucks.
Hell, we couldn’t even bury his body.” It had never been recovered, and we could only assume it had burned to ashes in the fire.
Iannis had commissioned a gravestone in the Palace cemetery, where Solantha’s important figures were buried, but the plot beneath it was empty.
“The only credit Fenris would care about is that which you and I have already given him,” Iannis said, pulling me against his chest. “He cared deeply for you, Sunaya, more than you may have realized. It was he who drew my attention to your case and prompted me to bring you to the Palace for further examination. The scholar in him wanted to know how you could have escaped detection for so long, and the shifter in him hoped for a kindred spirit in you.”
Tears spilled down my cheeks, and I tucked my face into Iannis’s shoulder. “He saved my life that first night in the Palace when the guards nearly killed me,” I muttered into Iannis’s robe. “He always looked out for both of us.”
We stood there for a long moment, grieving in silence and taking comfort in one another’s presence.
And then, Iannis gently tipped my tearstained face up to his and pressed his lips against mine.
I kissed him back on a long sigh, twining my arms around his neck.
Desire slowly unfurled its tendrils, warming me up, pushing out the heavy sorrow that had taken up residence inside me.
It seemed like forever since Iannis and I had last made love, and I reached for the sash around his waist, tugging it open so I could run my hands over his hard, strong body.
He inhaled sharply as I lightly scraped my claws over his pale skin, and then he was working at the ties on the back of my dress, loosening the bodice.
“Yes,” I whispered as his hands glided down my exposed back, pushing the skirt of my dress down and baring my body to his hungry gaze.
He shrugged his robes off his powerful shoulders, then picked me up and carried me into the bedroom.
The satin sheets caressed my skin as he laid me down, and then it was his lips gliding over my skin, sending sparks of desire through me as he gently kissed and nipped, tracing patterns and paths over my curves with his talented mouth.
I lifted my head to watch as he spread my legs, then buried his face between them, using that wicked tongue to find my sweet spot.
My hips arched off the bed, pressing myself against him, and I buried my fingers in his long, dark red hair as I moaned my encouragement.
But Iannis took it slow tonight, gradually lifting me higher and higher until the pleasure crested, and I cried out his name.
And he did it again, and again, and again, drawing out the moment, savoring my moans, my trembles, my need.
And when he finally lifted his head again, the hunger in his shimmering violet gaze was tempered by a tenderness so profound I thought my heart might burst with love for him.
“A ghra,” he whispered against my lips as he slid into me, the word as much a prayer as it was an endearment.
I wrapped myself around him, and we rocked together, holding tight to each other as we gathered our love around us like a kind of armor, a balm that soothed our wounds and strengthened us.
I wanted to hold onto this moment forever, to cocoon myself in love and sensation, but need took over, that fierce edge that pushed us faster, made our skin slick with sweat and our lungs short of breath.
“I love you,” I gasped, arching my hips as he thrust into me, hard and fast. And then I came again, holding on tight and using Iannis as my anchor as I was tossed into a storm of pleasure.
Afterward, Iannis pulled my back against his chest, then tucked his face into my shoulder and fell asleep.
As I listened to his slow, deep breathing, savoring the feeling of being cradled by him, my thoughts drifted back to Fenris again.
The pain of his passing was dulled by the afterglow from lovemaking, and with Iannis’s love wrapped around me, I finally gathered my courage and checked Fenris’s memories from his last few days.
I focused on the week before the quake, watching his last conversations with the people he cared about, his long hours in the library and his room, poring through books in search of useful spells, and his sparring sessions with Rylan.
It was painful, looking at them, but somehow comforting as well to know that even though Fenris was gone, I would always have him with me.
Feeling sleepy, I pushed Fenris’s memories back into the vault, intending to drift off.
But one popped back out, and my mental eyes flew wide as I watched it unfold.
Fenris was in his room, a stout, waterproof leather pack open on his bed.
He was packing clothes, a few knives, his coded research notebook and golden pen, a water filter and canteen, and a heavy purse of gold coins.
He put the pack on his back and left the Palace, and I watched him catch a cab all the way to Downtown before trekking far out of the city on foot.
Soon, he was in the redwood forest on Solantha’s outskirts, a good five miles south of where we’d set up the temporary shelter tents.
I could feel his sorrow keenly, but also his sense of acceptance, as he searched the trees for an acceptable hiding spot.
He eventually found a trunk that was hollowed out and tucked the pack inside, making sure it was hidden deeply enough that no one passing by could see it.
“Iannis!” I shook him awake, my heart hammering. “Iannis, I saw something in Fenris’s memories!”
Iannis listened intently as I told him about what I’d seen. “We have to go and get that pack,” I said urgently. “Fenris’s most prized possessions are in there. He wouldn’t want them to end up in the hands of some random stranger.”
“We’ll go tomorrow,” Iannis promised, kissing the top of my head. “I will make sure Fenris’s research notes are properly preserved. And we can donate the gold to the homeless quake victims in his name.”
Satisfied, I snuggled back down into the comforters. And, feeling lighter than I had in weeks, I slipped off into a peaceful sleep.