~6~
Gabriel felt Nic’smagic tense and recoil, withdrawing in apprehension, though she was far too well trained and regally composed to reveal anything in her manner.“An Elal wizard, come to Meresin,” she mused.“And they said it could never happen.”
Gabriel hugged her arm to him, relieved she could retain a sense of humor.“I think you should go hide in the arcanium.Let me take you there, and I’ll deal with our visitors.”
She lifted her chin in that obstinate tilt that told him of her refusal even before she spoke.“Absolutely not.I refuse to cower and hide away like a criminal.You’ve made it clear that you stand behind me as Lady Phel.I’m not undermining that now.”
The woman picked the entirely wrong things to be stubborn about.“You could be in danger.”
She shrugged that off, squeezing his biceps and fluttering her lashes.“My big, strong wizard will protect me.”
If he could.“I would feel better if you were safe in the arcanium.”
“I would feel better if I’m at your side, where I belong, in case you need my magic.”
“I could make it an order.”
She gave him a steady green glare.“You could, but I wouldn’t forgive you.”
“You like it when I give you orders,” he coaxed, lowering his voice to a seductive purr.
“Sexy orders, yes.But unless you plan to strip me naked and chain me up while you stay to do dastardly things to my helpless body, I willnotbe pleased with you.”
He grumbled low in his throat, firmly setting aside the enticing image she evoked.“You will be the death of me,” he said, resuming the walk to the closed front doors.
“Possibly, but you’ll die happy,” she chirped, then she lost some of her bravado.“Can you tell… is it Jan?”
The Elal wizard enforcer had nearly captured Nic in Ophiel when they first made landfall.He concentrated.He was getting better at using his wizard senses at a finer level of detail, but he had a long ways to go.The exercises Asa had shown him would be helpful, but they also made his head hurt.Using power in broad sweeps the night before, instead of painstaking and meticulous increments, had been almost a relief.
“I don’t think so,” he finally answered.“The wizard is recognizably Elal to me, but not someone I’ve ever met.I feel sure.The magic, though…” Robust and fiery, richly redolent of summer roses and sun-warmed wine.“The magic feels a lot like yours, though definitely belonging to a wizard.”And wasn’t that interesting that he could discern the difference so decisively now?“But a wizard more like your flavor of magic than your father’s.”
Nic’s Magic faltered infinitesimally.“It couldn’t be…” she murmured under her breath.Before he could ask, she asked more loudly.“A lone wizard, no familiar companion?”
“Oddly enough, there are two familiars.”He concentrated a bit more.“Neither bonded to the wizard, I’m quite sure.”
“You can determine that from this distance?”He’d opened the door for her and stepped out onto the wide front porch behind her, while Nic scanned the long road that circled the lake and ended at the house.Mist rose from the still waters and wafted over the lawn, thick enough to shroud anything beyond a certain distance.“I don’t see anyone yet.”
“I don’t think they’re coming up the road,” he said, looking off to the orchards lined in their neat rows past the north wing.
“Hmm.That’s a bit odd.”
“Everything about this is odd.”And he didn’t much care for it.He took her hand, partly to be ready to access her magic in case of an attack, but also to keep track of where she was—and the better to thrust her behind him, should that be necessary.“But yes, now that you taught me what to look for, I’m much better at discerning the wizard–familiar bond.”
“No surprise, as you’re—” She broke off, stiffening.
“What?”he demanded, marshalling his moon and water magic, extruding a silver sword for his free hand.He should have made her go to the arcanium.
“A spirit is here,” she replied under her breath.“Small, tasked as a scout.”
He sensed it now.He’d encountered those spirit spies before, most notably the first time he crossed the Elal border.Pulling mist, he condensed it around the spirit, delineating its cautious exploration of the environs.Sensing his magic—or realizing their presence for the first time—the spirit halted, then vanished.Gabriel cursed quietly.
“Went back to inform its wizard,” Nic explained unnecessarily.
“Should I—”
“No, let them come.I think I know who it is, as impossible as it seems.”
“Who?”