Wilder Mage (9 page)

Justus growled under his breath when no one spoke. “What is
that
doing here?”

He pointed at her shoulder, where Zephyr was perched like an angry parrot. He dropped his hand hastily when the cat growled and lashed her tail.

“Zephyr? She’s okay. She won’t get in the way,” Sable said, rubbing one finger under the half-grown kitten’s chin. Her purr rumbled, but she kept her narrowed eyes on him just in case. “She’ll behave.”

“Don’t waste your time with logic. He’s totally harsh in the mornings,” Bert said cheerfully.

Sable laughed, and Bert rubbed one finger under the kitten’s chin, causing her blue eyes to close in bliss. “By the way, nice to meet you,” Bert said. He grinned back at Sable. “And you too, girl.”

“Sable, Bert. Bert, Sable,” Justus said, crossing his arms. He tried to keep irritation from spilling into his voice, but with Sable’s narrowed eyes, he knew it was an epic failure.

Emmett looked up from his newest find, a box of ancient kitchenware. “School’s out, then?”

“Yep. The boy’s on his own for the summer,” Bert said. “And I’ll be parking my butt here whenever I can.”

“What? No girlfriend? No dates?” Sable said. She looked bright-eyed at Bert, and Justus laughed at the sudden tinge of red in the teen’s cheeks.

Bert huffed. “Gotta play the field, you know,” he said.

The kitten took that moment to trill, crouch, and then leap to the sunny window seat. Sable rubbed her shoulder where the cat had been.

“Hurt you?” Justus asked.

“No.” Sable watched Zephyr as she delicately avoided the hanging crystals. “She didn’t use her claws.”

The cat gave a snort. Her tail curled around her front paws as she sat in the sun.

They went back to digging into the boxes, and Justus watched their progress without comment.

One shoebox, lidded and taped shut, sat at the end of the row. He kept his eye on it, judging Sable would get to it first. He tried to hold his anticipation, but a smile kept pulling at his mouth.

As Justus hoped, Sable came to the shoebox before the others. In the sunlight, she pried off the top and squinted as prisms of light splashed onto her face in sparkles and rainbows of color. Justus grinned when she gasped.

Dipping one hand into the box, she brought out a dangling crystal, and the glinting sunlight revolved around the room with the movement. Next, she cupped a long spear of glass that chimed in angelic music when she pulled it from the box. It added its brilliance to the dance of light on the walls and ceiling. The room went silent as her audience watched her progress.

Justus felt as if his smile would split his face as she turned to him with the look he had been waiting for, that dazzling smile she so seldom used. Something turned inside him, and for a moment, he forgot why he shouldn’t be looking at her as he was. She met his eyes, and he saw warmth to match what he felt, and he felt a strange desire. When she looked at him as she was now, he wanted nothing more than to make Sable happy. He wanted to see that smile always.

Her fingers twitched, and the long crystal spear slipped through them.

He almost reached for the simple magic to catch the crystal before it smashed to the floor, but a flare of magic erupted and stopped him. The Air element cradled the crystal, and it settled into her hand.

Sable gulped noisily. “Almost dropped it,” she said.

“Yeah, good catch. A regular Mauer,” Bert said.

She gave him a confused look.

“Mauer. Joe Mauer. Catcher. American League.”

“Oh. Okay.”

Bert rolled his eyes. “Girls,” he said.

The moment was broken, and Justus smiled thinly and turned away, fighting his inclination to watch her unpack the crystals. Every box held something different, and they each found a treasure they liked. Maggie discovered the estate jewelry and squealed like a girl. The box of rocks with the now-unoccupied moonstone became Emmett’s focus. Bert lost his teenage apathy and dug into a box of model train parts.

Their enthusiasm was contagious, and it pulled Justus away from his obsession of Sable. It was time to get back to reality and away from these strange hungers caused by the
tener unus
magic. But repeatedly, he caught himself eyeing her figure, thrilling to her voice.

He sat on the window seat by the kitten that graciously stepped aside to give him room.

“Truce?” Justus murmured.

The cat stirred and watched the commotion with him.

He ignored the other adept. Or tried to until he caught himself eyeing the curves of her shapely leg. The kitten flicked an ear at him when he ground his teeth together, but otherwise did not acknowledge him. She chose that moment to leap to Sable’s side and paw at her leg. The young woman bent and picked her up.

The front door opened, and a sprightly gray-haired lady stood at the entrance. “My goodness, boy. Looks like you outbid everyone.”

“Mom!” Justus laughed. “It’s been forever since you’ve been here.”

His mother seemed to look everywhere at once, a huge smile on her face. Her navy blue slacks and flowered top set off her figure, trim despite her years. Her iron gray hair framed her face in short curls. He took her hand to help her over the scattered contents of boxes and litter. The McIntyres came to her aid, one on either side of her, and Justus released her hand as they led her away from the clutter to a padded chair.

She shook her head and looked at him. “So. Got some good bargains? Treasures?”

Justus raked his hand through his hair and studied the mess on the floor. “I think so,” he said and nudged a box of china with his toe. It had a pattern that was in demand, a valuable antique. “I got lucky this time. It was raining, nobody wanted to postpone the sale, and there weren’t a lot of buyers. The estate was selling everything.”

“Sad,” his mother said. Her dentures clicked as she spoke. She waved her hand. “Leaving everything to relatives who attach no sentimental value to stuff like this.”

“That’s how estates sell sometimes, by the box. Not by the memories.” Justus picked up a blue and gold cup, the raised figure of a dragon on the side. On the bottom was a date and name, obviously written by the owner, a keepsake to remember the giver. Now, all the memories were in a stranger’s hands. They would wash away the bits of dust caught in the crevices and the handwritten legacies of someone’s life. It would be gone.

The money from the estate auction went to the inheritors, used for rent or cigarettes or at a fast food place. Just like the spidery handwriting, the money would be gone. He would resell the pieces to collectors to begin the process again, with new owners acquiring the new keepsakes.

Sable bent for a closer look at another box, and his mother turned to her in surprise.

“Well, hello. Who are you?” She cocked her head and waited, her eyes suddenly sharp.

Sable smiled and stepped around another box. “I’m your son’s newest slave, of course.” The McIntyres snickered, and she stepped forward to take his mother’s outstretched hand.

They shook, and just when Sable started to pull away, his mother gripped her hand tighter. For a moment, his mother stared at her, then with a quick, easy smile, released her hand and turned away. Sable stared with her brows furrowed, scrubbing her hands together.

“She always does that with the people she meets,” Justus murmured quietly to Sable. “She says it fixes their face and name into her head and it helps her to remember them.”

“That’s okay. Not a problem.”

“Hey, Mrs. Aubre, did you see her cat?” Bert asked.

“Cat?” she said. She turned back and peered at the kitten clinging to Sable’s shoulder. Its eyes narrowed as it stared back with glittering blue fire.

“Oh, a cat,” she said.

The cat didn’t move, barely breathing.

“A cat,” she repeated. The old woman turned away.

All of them jumped when the kitten snarled with ugly malevolence.

Except for his mother. She ignored the cat’s snarl as if she didn’t hear it.

Chapter Seven

“I
s not,” Dayne said, laughing as he stroked Macy’s hair. “It’s more honey-blond, not ‘dishwater’ blond.” He smoothed the long curl over her shoulder, taking time to caress her collarbone and arm. He hesitated, as if considering, furrowing his brow. “But you know, those roots could use a touch-up…”

His laugh ended in a pained grunt when she elbowed his ribs. Macy pushed on his chest and then struggled to sit up. The blankets tangled around her legs.

“Dayne, you nit. I do not color my hair,” she said archly, emphasizing each word clearly. In feigned horror, she patted her hair, smoothing it back.

Dayne caught her hands together in one of his and pinned them over her head, pushing her back down into the mattress as he did. She struggled, but without much effect, twisting the sheets more. He laughed and cuddled closer, his other hand around her waist and his bare chest against her. When she sighed and appeared to give up the fight, Dayne felt disappointed.

Her resistance had been rather intriguing.

“Sorry, sweetie. I must be mistaken. No, now stop,” he said as she renewed her struggle to break free. It gave him a chance to press closer.

“Lemme up,” Macy said.

But then his mouth muffled her next words, and he decided a draw was a wonderful way to end a conflict.

Later, she narrowed her eyes against the morning sun streaming through the bedroom window as Dayne searched for his shirt among her clothes and the tangled sheets.

“Sock, sock,” he muttered. “Ah, okay, there it is.” He bent, snagged the other black sock, and looked down at her.

“You’ve made me late,” he declared somberly. “No more showing off your black underwear when I need to be somewhere.”

“Yeah, it was an epic battle. You fought me off like a tiger.”

Dayne snorted and began to button his shirt. He gasped and waved his hands over and around his ribs frantically. “Ack. Stop!”

She chuckled and dropped the fingers of Air she had wriggled over his ribs.

She rolled over and laughed at the ceiling while he muttered all kinds of threats. “Yeah, yeah, I’m really scared,” she said, snickering.

He began tucking in his shirt, eyeing their small black alarm clock teetering precariously at the edge of the nightstand. He pushed it back. “At least you kept the Earth element down to a minimum this time. Hardly any quakes.”

He paused and arranged his face into a brooding look. “Or else I’m losing my touch already,” he said, looking at her with a worried frown.

Macy chortled and wiggled her body like a snake. “Or maybe I am learning to control it better,” she said.

“Control? Damn, is that what you call it?”

Dayne grinned, took a half step to the bed, hesitated, and shook his head, muttering,

“I think you only rattled stuff in the bedroom that time. Maybe the house. At least it wasn’t a six point something or other like the first time.”

She growled in a deep tone that nearly curled his toes and made him fight again for control. He could not be late.

“That first time…” she said, looking at him with fire-hot eyes. She made another sound deep in the back of her throat.

Dayne grinned. “Yeah,” he said. “I have the same reaction when I think of it too. That was some quake. Who knew you would be so strong in Earth
and
in Air?”

Macy’s smile lasted a few seconds more, then she looked down at the tangled sheets and fingered the fleece blanket under her arm. The rest of the mauve blanket was on the floor. Dayne saw her jaw flex, and he waited for what he knew was coming.

All his playfulness vanished.

She rubbed the soft material between her fingers and smoothed it back over his side of the bed, hesitated, and said quietly, “She’ll be calling for me soon, won’t she?”

The name was always there, if not in their conversations, then somewhere in the room. Hovering over them like an ephemeral specter.

The consequences of Tiarra’s attention, no matter whether desired or not, was a part of their lives. And there was nothing either one of them could do, not when the head of the Imperium was several times more powerful in all the elements than they were put together. Their talents would not come to a tenth of Tiarra’s skill and innate ability in magic. Whatever she wanted, she took. And she wanted Dayne for now. There could be no argument or recourse to prevent it.

His concern was for Macy, and as he watched, she seemed to focus all her attention on the edge of the blanket now showing a frayed edge. His stomach twisted into a knot.

She blew out a quick breath, smiled at him thinly, and shrugged. “Oh well,” she said.

“Oh well,” he agreed.

They stared at each other, all the love and anxiety written in their faces for each to see.

“Better get to your meeting,” she said, her eyes looking at the little black clock. “You don’t want to keep that big, fat insect waiting.”

A faint, mirthless smile appeared on her face.

Dayne bit the inside of his cheek and then nodded. He bent and took her face into his hands, looking at her as if it was the last time. Or the first time.

“Your eyes, like a blue-eyed china doll,” he said quietly. “Can’t think of anyone less likely to have eyes like you.”