Echoes in the Dark. Robin D. Owens

hurting Calli and Marrec.”

      Luthan closed his eyes.

      Bastien said, “It was more than a year ago, give it a rest. And he made a mistake, didn’t you?” he asked Luthan.

      Luthan opened his eyes and stoically met Alexa’s frowning gaze. “No. It wasn’t a mistake. I followed the Singer’s orders.” He walked to a table and poured himself a short brandy, downed it. His jaw flexed. “I am sorry for any upset I caused—”

      “To Marian and Jaquar and Bossgond and me and Bastien—” Alexa obviously still kept a list and a grudge.

      “I didn’t upset Bastien,” Luthan protested.

      “You upset me. My upset disturbed Bastien,” Alexa ended frostily.

      No way to escape this. Again. “I am sorry for the upset I caused, but looking back, I believe that Amee, and destiny, was well served by my actions.” He sank into a large, comfortable chair. “The Singer was right in that instance.”

      “I don’t think so,” Alexa said. “I think that if she, or you, had considered the matter, you’d’ve found a better option.”

      Luthan shrugged. “I don’t know. Perhaps.”

      “It’s past,” Bastien said.

      “But, I am done with being her representative,” Luthan said.

      Both Alexa and Bastien straightened. Bastien nodded. “Good.”

      “Good!” Alexa echoed.

      “When she first requested I become her liaison to the Marshalls and other segments of Lladranan society, I thought it was good the Singer and Friends would be less isolated in the Abbey. At first she kept me well informed and I knew why she gave the orders she did and followed them, even if I did not agree totally with her. The past year or so, though…” He shrugged. “After that last illness…she’s become secretive, autocratic. I’m done with her, and will tell her so…soon.”

      “Hmm.” Alexa finished her tea and set the cup on a side table. “Now the new Exotique will be the one to integrate the Singer and her Friends into the rest of Lladranan society. What did you say her name was, again?”

      They hadn’t been introduced, but Luthan thought back, recalled the trilling of the bird’s mental voice. “Jikata.”

      Alexa gasped. Her mouth dropped open. She put a hand on her heart. “The Jikata?”

      Luthan frowned. “It’s a title?”

      Alexa was shaking her head. “No. She’s a singer.”

      “Of course,” Luthan said.

      Alexa hopped off of Bastien’s knees and strode over to Luthan. “I mean she’s a popular singer in our world.” Her hands waved. “A local star going national—international.”

      That was gibberish to Luthan.

      Alexa began pacing again. “A…a well-known troubadour?”

      Luthan shared a glance with Bastien, for Alexa to be impressed meant the lady was someone.

      “Wait, wait,” Alexa muttered. “Didn’t I hear…yes!” Her eyes went bright. “I read that she had a four-octave voice.”

      This time they all shared a glance.

      “The requirement for the City Destroyer spell while unloosing Marian’s weapon knot,” Bastien murmured.

      “Wait ’til I tell the others! Especially Marian.” Alexa settled onto Luthan’s lap, looked up at him with a winning smile. “She’s from Colorado, too. How did she look? Tell me all about her.”

      He met Bastien’s gaze over Alexa’s head. His brother smiled and raised his mug to him.

      So Luthan told Alexa all he knew of the Summoning.

      Luthan waited up after Alexa and Bastien went to bed, prepared to convince Circlet Marian and her husband Jaquar that Jikata should remain with the Singer.

      He sat in his firelit study. Like all the other rooms in the small manor, it was comfortable but worn. The walls had faded to an even duller color than the original beige. The sturdy wood and leather chairs showed nicks and scratches. Occasionally there was a settee or couch with a dim pattern reflecting his great aunt’s taste.

      He still liked this place. Couldn’t imagine living in the great, cold castle where he and Bastien had been raised by a whining, disinterested mother and a dictatorial father.

      Since Bastien had formed an unexpected bond with their father before his death and told Luthan about their father’s foreknowledge of his own death, Luthan understood the man better. Luthan didn’t despise his father anymore, but he would never be able to respect his sire.

      Tonight the Sorcerers—Circlets—would come, Exotique Marian and her bondmate Jaquar. Since the weather was clear with only a few drifts of mist, they wouldn’t ride lightning, but fly on volarans. He didn’t know what experimentation they might have been conducting when they felt the Summoning, but they’d been on their island in Brisay Sea. His stable master had been alerted.

      Luthan would wait for them, get the confrontation out of the way when there were only two of them, no matter how formidable. Taking the Exotiques one at a time was the best strategy.

      Besides, he didn’t want to go up to bed. Bastien and Alexa tended to be noisy in their lovemaking. He didn’t begrudge them that, but it did remind him of his loneliness, his single state. The invasion of the Dark’s Nest was preliminarily scheduled for less than three months from now, perhaps as little as a month, determined by the building of the Ship and the trip. Though they hoped they’d survive, they were all prepared to die.

      He’d never thought he’d die single, always had believed he’d find a bondmate—was that fantasy or wishing or a vision that had gone awry?

      It was near midnight when the doorharp sounded. He rose from the chair where he’d been dozing and went to the door. Beyond the thick wood he sensed great Power. Marian and Jaquar were here.

      With a low whistle, he set the spell torches lighting around him in the entryway, then opened the door and bowed. “Salutations.”

      Marian, the Exotique Circlet, was tall and voluptuous with long, dark red hair, blue eyes and a slightly olive tone to her complexion.

      “Salutations,” Jaquar said. He was tall with silver streaks of Power at both temples and eyes a little darker blue than Marian’s. Some old strain of Exotique blood was in his background.

      Neither of them appeared angry, but both looked as if they had prickly questions.

      “Come into the sitting room,” Luthan said. “I have brandy and mead.”

      “Prepared as usual,” Marian murmured. “I don’t sense the new Exotique here.”

      The skirmishing had begun.

      Luthan continued to the sitting room, poured brandies for Jaquar and himself—he was drinking more tonight than he did in an entire month—and Marian the mead she favored. As the couple sat together on a loveseat, Luthan caught a half smile on Jaquar’s face. The Exotiques’ men were enjoying him trying to handle their women, and Marian could literally be a force of nature. She was a weather mage like her husband.

      Thankfully, she began sipping her mead. She leaned against Jaquar and closed her eyes for an instant. Like the new Exotique, Marian had shadows under her eyes. Ayes, she was interesting with her blue eyes and red hair, but not lovely like the new Exotique. Jikata’s delicate features, long dark brown hair with black, tilted brown eyes and complexion close to the golden of the Lladranans appealed to Luthan more.

      Best to begin. “There are many reasons why the Singer Summoning the last Exotique was best. Time is of the essence and the Marshalls were not prepared to do the Summoning, since they’d lost Partis.”