Healer's Heart
Section 10
by
Ann Marie Olson
Story © 2002 Ann
Marie Olson
Chapter 52
Dimitri couldn't help but feel the selyn threatening to burn away the last of his life. It ate at him with claws sharper than Mitka's.
Mitka hovered over both of the, selyn draining from his venom ducts fast enough to nearly drown him. Or maybe that was his own need making roniplin rich saliva flood his mouth. "You're going to have to take Tami down again, soon." Dimitri couldn't forget the state she'd been in when they'd left her for more than a day before.
"Aliana's going to do it." Danyel countered. It was a lousy counter.
"She can't!" Dimitri struggled against his bonds. Danyel usually stripped her at six-oh-three. It was nearly five-thirty-one now. "We have to get to her."
"No," Danyel resettled his seatbones on Dimitri's ribs. They didn't creak. Danyel weighed almost nothing. "You're going to relax, forget all those things, and enjoy this transfer."
"You can't make me." Dimitri felt a few threads give in the linen.
"We can." Danyel held up his hand. Mitka landed on it, his eyes glassy with denied need. He was panting, even as more selyn streamed from his open mouth. His venom fangs were extended, making his need painfully visible. "I don't want a Donor, Dimitri, I want you."
"Then do what I wanted." He felt a few more threads give.
"If I let you go, you'll try to control this transfer. I can't let you do that." He slipped his hands over Mitka's fangs, drawing more selyn from them, now slightly pink. Mitka closed his eyes and sagged slightly. "You're destroying all of us, Dimitri."
"Then take the selyn you need and let us go." If they all hurried, Danyel could get to Tami in time for her strip. "Aliana shouldn't be doing anything with her laterals but getting her own selyn."
"She's going to shunt Tami's into her private system." Danyel didn't know what he was talking about. "We decided she could do a better job with Tami than Vanesa."
"The risk is too much." Dimitri finally found the split in the linen. He widened it with his fingers. "Vanesa could end up aborting just being exposed to Tami."
"Sevrin said as much." Danyel's face had taken on an ashen cast. "None of the rest of us knew so much."
"When did you do all of this?" Dimitri couldn't remember any time Danyel'd been out of his sight in the past week, not since he'd collapsed with Jarmin.
"Sevrin came to me when Jarmin and I were trying to find an earring for Aliana." Danyel shook his head. "He'd been waiting for a chance to catch the three of us alone."
"I bet." Anger bitter enough to taint roniplin flashed through him. "He had no right to interfere."
"He has every right in Kaon, Dimitri." Danyel's dark eyes went hard. "You've been growing steadily more irrational since you got here. Ever since you met me, as a matter of fact."
"I was already crazy." Dimitri waved aside this objection. "It has nothing to do with you or Kaon."
"The latter, perhaps, me, I don't know." Danyel's shoulders slumped, as if under an impossible burden. "You've denied yourself constantly since you got here. There's more to life than your work, Dimitri."
"We had two days, completely to ourselves."
"Yes, and then we haven't stopped running since!" Danyel added a bounce on Dimitri's ribs. "This is the first time we've really had a chance to talk for over a month."
"We talked before turnover." Dimitri knew his memories weren't false. They were the only thing he could actually rely on in this mad world. "We talked last week."
"About who was going to be on top!" Danyel stroked Mitka's swollen jaws with a damp napkin, adding to the soggy mess forming on Dimitri. "All you could talk about was sex and how we weren't doing it right. I don't fucking care, Dimitri. All I wanted was your love and attention." His jaws tensed. "Last week you were so exhausted it was all I could do to try to get you to eat and sleep."
"I gave it to you." Dimitri flushed as Danyel's hits went home.
"Never all of it. There were always issues, as you call them." He sighed. "I've thought of going back to the Techton. I don't know if I can do this, with only having the least part of your attention, Dimitri."
"I love thee!" Dimitri wailed, forgetting all about anything else.
"Until something else catches your wrists." He bit at his lips. "And that's all that happens. You get pulled away by the slightest distraction. All I want is this time, for us, no one else."
"I can't betray everyone who depends on me."
"You are!" Danyel grabbed his chin, forcing Dimitri to look at him. "You've been running from me for the last twelve hours. I can't take that, Dimitri. Its not something I can tolerate. I've tried to be the sort of Sime you want, strong, someone who can protect you and then get out of your way. I can't do it. I'm not that strong." His eyes glittered with unsheddable tears. After a moment he went on. "I love thee, as I've never loved anyone or anything else in my life. I've given everything I have to give. I can't give any more."
Danyel's words, straight from his heart, struck Dimitri dumb. He stopped struggling to get loose, even though all it would take was one good tug and he'd be free. Then a single tear fell from Danyel's cheek to burn Dimitri's skin.
"I think I can get Sevrin to let us go." He stood, slowly, as if he were ancient, not barely thirty. "I'll find my selyn somewhere else."
"Don't go." He pleaded, feeling his heart shatter in his chest. "I want thee."
"As I want thee." Danyel backed away, still holding Mitka to him. "I'll miss thee." He kissed Mitka's head.
"Bad aim," Mitka growled, writhing around to face Danyel. "I love thee too, Danyel Ferris, with all my heart, even though there are those who'd say I didn't have one." He lisped around his fangs. "Kiss me one last time?"
"I wish it weren't." Danyel's tears shone in the bright sunlight streaming through the blinds. He reached out and shuttered them, darkening the room. Danyel always liked the lights low, as if he were trying to hide from something, maybe even himself. "I wish I could have you to myself."
"You can." He glanced at Dimitri, still lying on the floor. "I'll go with you." The scorn in his voice was plain.
"Mitka!" Dimitri screamed, feeling the bond fall away between them. It was as if someone had wrenched at his heart and mind, tearing them in two.
"I can't do that." Danyel whispered. "You can't leave each other."
"He's sick." Mitka sneered. "I'm better off without him."
"You can't live without him." Danyel protested.
"I can't live with him." Mitka's sibilant whisper had faded, or maybe Dimitri's hearing. "He's cruel."
"No, he's human." Danyel came back with the pattering, quick stride of a Sime. "You must stay with him."
"I'll die first." Mitka writhed once against his chest, then slumped. "I don't want him."
"You must." Danyel's voice cracked. "I won't have you dead. There will be someone for you. Dimitri's said as much."
"I want thee!" Mitka's wail rattled the blinds.
"Dimitri doesn't." Danyel sighed. "I thought I could change his mind. Make him see. I was wrong."
"No, my beloved," Dimitri forced out through numb lips. "You weren't, either of you. I can't give you what you need."
"You mean you won't!" Danyel unlocked the shackles on Dimitri's legs, then unbound him. "You could have freed yourself."
"I could have." He whispered, unable to force tone into his voice. "I didn't."
"Why?"
"Because I wanted another chance."
"I've been giving you chances." Danyel stood. "You keep running off to do something else. I know I don't have much of an attention span, but I never even get yours in the first place. You're always thinking of someone, anyone else. I can't reach you, Dimitri, not through the walls you've placed around your heart.
"Everyone tried to warn me." Danyel turned toward the door. Mitka crashed to the floor. By the time Dimitri picked him up, he was a shadow of a shadow, weighing nothing.
"You're killing him." Dimitri held the wrath of his best friend, his other half, to his chest.
"Heal him, healer." Danyel turned away from the door.
"I can't." He bowed his head over Mitka. "I can't."
"You can." Danyel's face was drawn into a mask by emotion warring with need. "All you have to do is care, about him, about yourself. I can't live without a transfer. I have to go."
"My selyn isn't good enough?" He held out his hands, heartstones mocking him. "You swore to me."
"I swore to Dimitri, the man I loved, and his beautiful nager, Mitka. Not this creature who can't feel, can't give, can't see anything within himself, only others." Danyel's hand tensed on the doorknob. "If you find him, let me know."
"You said the door was barred." Dimitri struggled to sit.
"I can augment." Danyel took a deep breath.
"And you'll be in attrition." Dimitri struggled to his knees. Need burned in his lungs, stealing the energy to rise. "Without a partner."
"I can go to any center and get selyn."
"Lorn has proclaimed you junct." Dimitri swayed to his feet. "You can't go back there."
"I can go to another center." His ice black need crackled between them, tempting Dimitri to violence. He'd never come so close to taking without permission in his life. He put his hand over his bracelet, heartstones warm beneath his fingers. "I won't kill."
"No, you'll die." With the distance formed between them, Dimitri could see through the Veil. "My God, Danyel, by all that's holy, don't go through that door."
"More of your prophecies?" A corner of Danyel's lip turned up in a sneer, one he'd never before used on Dimitri.
"The truth," he cradled Mitka in his arms. "You go out that door to your death, we'll follow you."
"What about Tami, Lisa, Larin, Aliana, Lira, Marc, Miran everyone in Kaon, the local center, Vera ..." Danyel went on and on, the endless list of names beating at his ears until wanted to cover them.
"What about Cami, Volen, Juju?" Dimitri could never forget the dead, ever, for any reason. "I can't run from them either, but I will to follow you."
"They're dead, Dimitri." Danyel's pulse was plainly visible at his throat. Dimitri could stop it, knock him out long enough to force his selyn on the Sime. It would work. They'd both live through it. Live for another month, at least long enough to try to repair the breach between them. Mitka's now fragile wings fluttered in the air, like a moth's.
"For Mitka," he held him out, loosing his last battle with himself. He crashed to the floor, as heavily as a felled tree.
Danyel shoved the table out of the way before Dimitri's head hit it then had to dive to catch him anyway. Mitka was nowhere to be zlinned. Then he zlinned Dimitri.
"NO!" He screamed, hammering on his chest. His heart had stopped, with it all vestiges of selyn circulation. He couldn't be dead. Not like this. Not so stupidly. "You aren't going to give our assassin this win." He struggled to remember what Dimitri'd done for Larin. It was something having to do with pressing on her chest and breathing for her. Danyel'd never done any such thing.
He ripped open Dimitri's shirt and struggled to find enough selyn differential to restart the selyn in his body. It pooled, cooling, even as he zlinned. The door crashed open behind him.
"What are you doing here?" He protested as Sevrin shoved him aside.
"I was listening in." He muttered, fingers running over Dimitri's chest, then his face, as if Sevrin were seeing with his hands. "You fucked up, Danyel."
"I know it." His heart struggled to keep going. He too was in desperate need, but he didn't dare distract Sevrin. Not right now. He could last. Danyel backed toward the door, then remembered Dimitri's last warning. A shiver ran up his back, then the knowledge of Mitka's disappearance struck home. "You can't get selyn into him without Mitka!"
"I know." Sevrin held Dimitri's head in his hands. "I can't reach him."
"He's gone." Danyel turned to the door. He'd fulfill Dimitri's final prophecy. He tried to leave. Vanesa shoved him back inside. Now that he knew, he could zlin her pregnancy as if it were a brilliant star circling her.
"Get back in there and do something." Her field blazed, shoving him back as much as her hand.
"I can't." He knelt opposite Sevrin. "He's no longer here."
"Which of them?"
"Both of them."
"Then go after them." Sevrin shoved him down toward Dimitri's face.
"What?"
"Go into the world of selyn. Do it, now!"
"I don't know how!"
"You will." Sevrin wrenched his face around. For an instant, which felt like an eternity, those indigo eyes focused. Danyel screamed, in that instant, lost in the pain of a torment greater than any he could even comprehend. Then it was all gone, all but the memory. "Damn you're strong, Danyel."
"I know it." Vanesa knelt at Danyel's side. "Now, do you know what you're going to do."
"Yeah, I'm going to battle Azrael." He looked into her eyes, even as sweat streamed into his own and blurred his vision. Nothing could have ever prepared him for the overwhelming power of Sevrin's mind touching his. Danyel grasped Dimitri's wrists in his hands, holding his bracelets still. The heartstones beneath his hand burned as hot as selyn.
"You are mine!" Danyel screamed, demanding Azrael release his prey. When he touched Dimitri's lips, as cold and unresponsive as any Donor's, the world dissolved around him.
Mitka loomed larger than Danyel'd ever zlinned him behind a huge winged figure with a scythe and book. He was black, from head to foot, veiled as Cadek had been veiled the first time they'd met him. His veil shivered in an invisible wind, beginning to part starting the floor before Dimitri's knees. Dimitri's gaze followed the growing split.
Danyel tackled him, rolling him out of Azrael's spell. Mitka's strike was louder than thunder. Dimitri lay, as cold as this whole place, unseeing in his arms. He was still dead, a modern martyr to the one billion. "But I'm not Zaor." Danyel refused to let Dimitri go, no matter what he'd done, at least not like this.
"You are coming back with me." Danyel grabbed him and dragged him away from the insane battle between the dragon and the angel. He'd thought he'd seen almost anything, with such illusions reserved for people like Tami, the completely insane. Finding himself inside a delusion like this made him wonder just how sane he was.
When he got both of them out of any reasonable, if such a word could be used here, danger zone, he studied Dimitri's slack features. Danyel tried zlinning him, and desisted at the pain centered behind his eyeballs. "OK, you idiot, what do you do now?" He put his hand on Dimitri's chest. It rose and fell. He heart beat. There was just no response.
Danyel struggled with the fabric of this place and finally managed to wedge a hole through to reality. There Sevrin was doing arcane things to Dimitri's body, keeping it alive. Well that answered an unnecessary question. He had time to think, at least, now. Mitka's scream brought him back to reality, or at least one of them.
The great angel had his scythe against Mitka's throat. The blade gleamed in the directionless light. Mitka's fangs dripped black selyn across the silvery surface.
There was nothing Danyel could do to save him, either of them. Neither could live without the other, no matter how hard they struggled against their bonds. "I love you." He spoke to both of them. Danyel kissed Dimitri's lips, wishing with all his heart he could do more, even just feel his true breath one more time, even tickling the backs of his knees.
With the touch, his tentacles lashed out, binding them together. Danyel's laterals made contact, against his will. If he stripped Dimitri, he didn't stand a chance. And he couldn't strip Dimitri without Mitka! Danyel tried to pull away. A second thunderclap threw him onto Dimitri. Mitka's fangs, sharper than even Azrael's scythe, slammed home. This time Danyel hadn't had time to prepare. All he could do was open his need to Mitka's strike.
Pleasure as great as his earlier pain held him bound. Mitka reset his huge jaws, another impossible wave of pleasure seized him. Breath, heartbeat, everything had frozen to Mitka's demands.
The only thing left to his control, was his mind. Inside, he opened his self to Mitka, giving over every last vestige of the control he'd had to learn to survive. Selyn slammed into those places in his mind once blocked. Pain, nearly impossible to discern from pleasure, opened those channels to their greatest expanse.
Mitka vanished. Danyel turned on Azrael. Centuries of nightmare swarmed his robes as fantasies of heaven encircled his veiled brow. The battle between him and Mitka had not changed him at all, but for parting that veil. Danyel saw himself, eyes black with need in the parted cloth.
"I am you." Azrael's voice echoed in this place. "I am all of you." He raised one eyebrow, a gesture Danyel'd never learned to make. It looked ridiculous. "You've won, yet again. Your enemy grows frantic. She'll soon demand I take you."
"Do your best." Danyel raised his fist to the apparition. Azrael threw back his head and laughed, a frightening sound, as dry as the rattle of long dead leaves and as promising as the thunder of a summer storm.
"I hope she doesn't win." Azrael vanished, leaving nothing behind but a black rose, so black it was sheened with blue.
Chapter 52
Dimitri recognized the headache. He wished he didn't. "Danyel?" He'd meant to shout. It came out as a feeble whisper. Something was gluing his eyes shut. When he opened them, it didn't help much. He'd gotten used to not being able to see very far, but right now all he could see was a blur, even right in front of his nose.
"Are you sure you want me here?" Danyel's voice was as chill as his need had been. To Danyel's equally blurry inner vision, he was a blaze of fulfilled Sime need.
"I wish I hadn't missed it." Dimitri moved his rock of a tongue around in his mouth. "OK, second important question, where's Mitka." A sudden chill gripped him. He didn't want anything to happen to Mitka. Not just for his own sake, but for Mitka's. He'd hoped they could become friends again, not the near enemies they'd become. He'd not felt desertion at Mitka's desire to leave with Danyel, only a sense of loss.
"He's right here." The blur before his eyes tried to resolve into form. Splitting pain blinded him completely. "You can't see?"
"Not really," he admitted, panting to try to get through the incredible ache in his skull.
"Diomid!" Danyel shouted. This was the last person Dimitri wanted to see. He struggled back against the pillows. Where were they? Everything was a haze of pain.
"I can hear him." His sire's voice only brought back dozens of equally painful memories. "Be still."
"How's Aliana?" Dimitri fought to blink the haze from his vision.
"Quit," Danyel put Diomid's hand on Dimitri's chest, then recaptured Dimitri's hand. "She's fine. Or at least as well as can be."
"The babies?"
"You're babbling." Diomid's expression of annoyance was so familiar Dimitri could pull it out of his memory. "Oh, I know you're not well. You're very lucky to be alive, again." He took Dimitri's hand from Danyel. Dimitri didn't really approve, but wasn't up to fighting with his sire at the moment.
"I died?" Dimitri could remember collapsing, after giving Mitka to Danyel, and that was it.
"Mitka fought Azrael for you." Danyel said. There was something different about him. Dimitri tried to reach out to him, but his hand refused to move from the sheets. "So did I." His hand moved up to Dimitri's chest, then traced his shoulder.
"You can't!" This time he managed a forceful croak. This hurt his ears. Knifelike threads of linen dug into his skin. It would have been better if they hadn't put him on a bed and pillow of stone. "How did you get to him?" Vague memories of kneeling at Azrael's feet returned, along with the sense of being unable to do a shenned thing about it.
"Sevrin showed me how." Danyel's voice was as flat as the world of selyn or dreams. "I couldn't let you go."
"I thought you wanted to leave." Dimitri panted. "Not that I blame you."
"I did." His hand, burning hot, held Dimitri's wrist for a moment. "I couldn't."
"Why?" Dimitri wished he could see.
"We were tricked." Danyel recaptured Dimitri's hand and kissed the back of it. "She almost got us, Dimitri."
"What happened?" He could at least hold Danyel's hand. There were even hotter lines on it, where Mitka'd slashed him.
"She, our enemy, caught you off balance, right before transfer. She drove a wedge of discord between us." Danyel turned over Dimitri's arm. "Right here." He brushed a spot inside Dimitri's arm.
Dimitri fell back against the bedding, closing away the nightmare of his last hours before transfer. "How?"
"A topical and then she injected you with a quarter of harilin."
"Shen!" Dimitri flexed his free hand against the bedding. It was the best he could do. He wanted to slam his fist through the wall. "Why didn't I notice?"
"Because you'd never taken harilin." Arkay's rasping voice came from the doorway. "Nashen and I came with Diomid."
"Who else?" Dimitri couldn't believe this was all for him. For them, really.
"Your sire asked me to come along, since I'm the only relatively sane person who's taken the drug, and knows what it does. Jarmin's had it, but he doesn't understand it." Arkay, from the voice and scent, sat on the edge of Dimitri's bed. "If someone gives it to you in your sleep, you can't tell the hallucinations from nightmares."
"Who did it?" Dimitri took Arkay's hand as well.
"One of the Veiled. That's all we know. And a gender. Azrael called the person 'her'." Danyel said. "I'd never thought to meet the Angel of Death, Dimitri."
"We all have." Nashen came in. The tiny room was full to overcrowded, but all Dimitri could see was the shadows moving around. "It was part of why I came, despite the fact I never wanted to know why the only person who ever could stand teleportation was another Fatima Lord." His shudders passed through his partner, Arkay. "My sister."
"What about Tzanya?" Dimitri asked the forbidden question. Diomid's smack was expected. He threw Dimitri's hand back down on the bed and stomped away. "Well? She fits."
"No, she's not female." Diomid growled from the doorway. "And she's dead."
"So's Tzarya." Nashen's tone was nearly as sharp. "I thought of her, though. We're still bound, Diomid. You may not leave in a fit."
"What?" Dimitri wished he could see the look on anyone's face.
"Diomid and I are hand bonded." Nashen sighed. "Its often enough been a burden, although even more often its been wonderful, even when he couldn't remember a thing."
"Oh, I knew there was something between us." Diomid's voice was still tight. "Although the way you treated me until I bonded Kirina was a hint."
"I'd think so." Nashen, or at least the shadow that sounded like Nashen, closed the door. "We don't require Sevrin or Vanesa sticking their nagers into this."
"They're affected." Dimitri reminded them.
"I'm Kaon." Danyel said.
"What?" Dimitri's head spun, taking his stomach with it.
"I swore to Kaon." Danyel said. "I didn't know if you'd ever speak with me again."
"Of course I would." Dimitri flailed about with his free hand until it connected with Danyel. He grabbed, getting a handful of cloth. His tug was pretty worthless, but it was a hint. "Why wouldn't I?"
"Because I almost walked out on you when you needed me most." He sat on the bed. "I thought about what happened, for hours and hours. I couldn't think of anything else. I killed you, Dimitri. Not by taking your selyn, but by refusing to. I left you to die of attrition." His voice cracked, along with his nager, but he didn't cry. Instead his hand shook against Dimitri's. "I'm a lorsh, the worst kind of person, someone who'd leave their best friend, their only friend to die of attrition. What kind of person am I, Dimitri?"
"Someone pushed past human limits." Arkay said.
"I'm Ferris, not human." His voice cracked again. "I should have known. I should have been able to zlin something wrong. I should have seen the needlestick." He turned Dimitri's hand over again and brushed the spot on the inside of his elbow.
"OK, time to get off the sword." Arkay growled. "My son has a very nice one if you want to do it for real. Or I can do it for you." His voice held more steel than Dimitri'd ever heard. This was the man who'd lead Russia for decades, until his own son had taken Her from his hands. "I didn't think you'd do well by him, but I'd hoped you would. You've exceeded all my admittedly impossible expectations for Sergei's firstborn and heir."
"You tried to separate us."
"I thought he wasn't ready." Arkay's breath cooled Dimitri's skin, making him shiver. "I wasn't ready."
"oh" Danyel's familiar half smile was locked into Dimitri's memory. It fit the tone of his voice perfectly. "He was."
"No, I wasn't." Dimitri took a deep breath. "I don't know if I can give you what you need, Danyel."
"Shut up." Danyel put his hand over Dimitri's mouth. "Last time he got out of hand I used a ball gag."
Arkay laughed, rocking the bed. "I approve." He said at last.
"Now, where is Tzanya?" Nashen asked into the ensuing silence.
"Shen, I don't know." His sire's heavy footsteps echoed in the room. "She, she's dead. I couldn't keep her at Sergei."
"You couldn't or wouldn't?" Nashen growled.
"She was a year older than Dimitri and showed no signs of ever maturing beyond change over."
"Aliana was older." Dimitri struggled to sit. "I thought she was with her Aunt." Tzanya had always spent a lot of time in the Fatima sharm, particularly once she'd grown old enough, or stubborn enough, to make some of her own decisions.
"She'd changed over two years ago and never started menstruating" Diomid said into the writhing ambient. "Natasha Fatimanovna died."
"Shen!" Dimitri clenched his fists. He knew exactly how she'd died. "Who's watching Natanyel?"
"Tzer and Mikhail."
"They have another little boy?" Danyel asked.
"I meant who's nursing him?" Dimitri tried to still the ambient as best he could, completely stripped of selyn. It didn't work very well.
"He's dead." Diomid's lie was enough to get Dimitri up.
"You lie!" He screamed. "Natanyel's alive. Mikhail couldn't let him die."
"How do you know?"
"Because I was there." He sagged back against the sheets. "A Veiled Sharm Lord told me."
"They didn't see his rejection."
"Mikhail rejected him twice, not three times." Dimitri sweated like a foundered horse. "Where's Tzanya?"
"Dead," Diomid insisted.
"She's not of the Fellowship." Dimitri knew this much. "I'd have felt it if she took the Veil." He'd not spent a lot of time with Tzanya, but he liked Kirina a lot, and they'd been inseparable at the main Sergei townhouse. "If nothing else because Kirina wouldn't have allowed it."
"Tzanya was not fully female."
"She's nursing him." Dimitri's eyes widened. "They took Tzanya and gave her shelter. She's repaying them both in caring for Natanyel. That's how he survived. What in shen are you doing messing with them?" If she could nurse a child, she was plenty female by Dimitri's standards. And he'd be the one to set them if he Challenged his sire. Although it would probably help if he waited until he could see his sire.
"I was roused out of my bed, in the middle of the night, to go deliver a child who'd killed both its mother and the midwife. I delivered him, so I couldn't condemn him. Tzer was hysterical. He hadn't know Natasha was his sister. He hardly remember bedding her. Mikhail took over. He isn't one of us."
"No, he's one of us." Danyel's ring glinted through he shadows as he held it up. "I helped raise him. I'm proud of him."
"Natanyel is Gen."
"So is Miran." Dimitri closed his eyes, trying to close away the memories, which were so sharp they cut him inside to ribbons. "He's Fatima."
"He can't be."
"That's why he ran!" Dimitri pushed himself upright. He wasn't going to take this lying flat on his back, no matter how bad he felt. "He ran because he knew what you'd done to Natanyel."
"I told no one." Dimitri harsh breathing echoed in the tiny room. "He'd left before Natanyel was born."
"No," Dimitri stared at his sire, a haze of shifting light in his white kador. "Natanyel was born last fall, since he'd been conceived while you were here at Kaon and Mikhail didn't have your guidance. How could you have left him so adrift."
"I was distracted by a certain son of mine who was threatening to kill me in Challenge."
"Only because you wouldn't back down or even shut up!" Dimitri screamed.
"OK, enough," Arkay put his hand over Dimitri's mouth. He thought about biting him, but decided he probably shouldn't. Nashen hit hard. He'd found that out enough times getting paddled as a child.
Diomid's return shot was muffled as another black shadow appeared in front of all the white. "Don't say it, Diomid." Nashen's pleasant voice purred into what could almost be a caress. "I know what you're going to do. You're going to try to wreck any chance of keeping any little sliver of trust you've ever earned from your firstborn. You're Sergei, of course you're going at act like an ass when you're excited."
Arkay snorted.
"Now, you're going to go lie down, put some scented water on your wrists and listen to the birds for a while." Nashen steered Diomid out the door. Diomid was still sputtering.
"Is that how its done?" Danyel murmured into the silence.
"Yes, exactly," Arkay lowered his hand. "Are you done?"
"Yeah, I think so." He licked his lips. They were horribly dry and cracked. "Can I get something to drink?"
"I think we all require a drink." Danyel sagged against him. "How do you live with that?"
"With which?" Arkay's voice came from the table. A clink of ceramic on glass made him think of how good some tea would taste right now.
"The mood swings and tempers?"
"Its invisible from the inside." Arkay held a tube to his lips. He'd have rather drunk from a glass, but wasn't going to complain. This way he couldn't spill anything. The liquid that filled his mouth had a bit of honey and lemon added to it. Dimitri loved sour things as much as many liked sweet. "We can't see or zlin it."
"We?" Danyel asked.
"You should have seen me thirty years ago." Arkay set the glass down, long before Dimitri was done. "You can't drink a whole lot right now. You'll make yourself sick."
"I'm already sick." He muttered, but knew Arkay was right.
"Nashen is very good at dealing with Sergei in a fit of temper. Having three in the same room, with two of them being temperamental is unhealthy." Arkay held something to his lips. Dimitri sucked it in, then greedily ate the tangy, sour, bitter, savory olive. He loved olives and Fatima always got the best ones, although Mir occasionally got a really good barrel or two.
"I'm not upset now." He fiddled with the olive pit, wondering if he could manage to crack it in his current condition, probably not.
"As you can see, and have probably observed, our tempers flit off about as fast as they appear." Arkay took the pit from him and offered him another olive. Given a choice between defending the undefensible and an olive, the olive won. "All you have to do is give us a chance to regroup."
"I tried." Danyel licked his lips again, his gesture of stress and nerves. Not that Dimitri couldn't tell he was nervy from his handling tentacles, all eight of them, wrapped around Dimitri's wrist.
"That was because he was crashing." Arkay fed him an olive. "Where did you get the harilin?"
"Miran," Dimitri wasn't going to lie to Arkay. They were too close, in too many ways, for lies. "He brought over ten kilos with him."
"Ins'Allah," Arkay breathed. "And I suppose its too late to get any of it back?"
"Not against my little brother." Dimitri shook his head. "Miran's got this thing for money, you see."
"Yeah, he's had it all his life. What went wrong with the Sergei kids, Dimitri?"
"I turned out the best of the lot, I think." Dimitri sighed. "But then I had great parents."
"Sergeis make lousy parents."
"Oh, you did great except with Vayer. One out of fourteen isn't too shabby a record." Dimitri was too tired and wasn't watching his mouth. Not that he could see much of anything at the moment.
"Lets stop right there." Arkay offered him more to drink. This time Dimitri sipped at it, letting the moisture soothe his dry throat. "I think some of it is because we're so wrapped up in our work unless our partner or partners are able to take the Gen's share of parenting, the kids get left out. I was lucky, the only child I tried to raise on my own was very easy, and I had the help of all the servants I could want. I was richer than Sharmiz when I raised Valentine."
"I wish I had money." Dimitri grimaced.
"We do." Danyel chuckled. "I couldn't deposit all that cash. Where would a second order channel have gotten so much? So I let Sevrin deal with it. We were moderately wealthy before. Sevrin's current project, which we're bankrolling for him, should keep us in beans and boots for the rest of our lives."
"How often does he fail?" Arkay asked.
Dimitri tried to choke back hysterical laughter and failed.
"I didn't think it was that funny." Arkay's hand froze out of range, holding an olive. Dimitri could see that much. Or at least the fuzzy dark spot between his fingers. Dimitri snagged it with a lunge. "Don't bite!"
"Its an olive." Dimitri mumbled around same.
"Oh, Sevrin warned me about the possibility of loosing our capital." Danyel snorted. He picked up something out of a bowl and stuck it in his mouth.
"Are you stealing olives?" Dimitri cleaned the olive pit he held in his mouth with finicky precision.
"They're good." Something went crunch. "Although I'm not used to pits in them."
"Oh, pitted olives don't keep as well." Arkay squeezed Dimitri's shoulder. "They have to, since we stash them here at Kaon."
"Where?" Dimitri spit out the now scoured clean olive pit.
"I'm not going to tell you because then we wouldn't have any here for us." Arkay replaced the pit with a fresh olive. "You might be my son, but I'm not going to tell you where I stash my olives."
"Think you might tell your son-in-law?" Danyel's tentacle traced the bracelet on Dimitri's wrist.
"I might, if he tells me about my son's investments." Arkay had become so Fatima in his years with Nashen.
"Did someone say investment?" Nashen reappeared at the door. "Your sire is resting calmly in our suite, with his feet up and a damp, scented kerchief on his brow."
"How very Gen." Dimitri sighed. "And yeah, we were talking about Sevrin's investing style. Danyel and I are his current backers, for what, I'm not sure."
"Its a hospice." Danyel's words stilled the whole room, seemingly even the world, for even the birds went silent. "A place where people who are terminally ill or truly desire peace can go."
"Did you recommend it?"
"Yes," Danyel took a deep breath. "I couldn't afford to do it myself, unlike the D. Ferris center, but I'd been thinking of it for years, ever since, well, since a good friend was killed in a bungled disjunction attempt."
"So you'll take in juncts, as well?" Even if he could, Dimitri would never forget the hell Cami'd been condemned to. A life of agony, even if she'd managed to disjunct.
"Yes, in a high security setting, but not tortured. They'll be given all the things they require, and when they choose, peace." Danyel's dark hair shadowed his face. "They won't be chained, shackled, tortured as we've been tormenting our juncts since Unity, but they will never leave the complex alive, either."
"Wise," Arkay sighed. "I've wanted to do such a thing here since I first talked with Mikhail about death and dying in the West, but even Fatima doesn't have so much money."
Dimitri was confused. They'd not had so much either.
"This is part of a much larger Kaon program, but Sevrin couldn't justify his or Vanesa's name on it." Danyel's tentacles twined around his wrist. "Its illegal."
"Not for me." Dimitri took a deep breath. "I'm Sergei's heir. There will be no other. My sire is conflicted between his role with the Veiled and Sharm Lord Sergei."
"You could take his place with the Veiled." Nashen said, silver hair veiling his black clothes.
"Not with Danyel on my arm." He swallowed down the lump in his throat. Then all the clues came together. "My gods, yes, no one in the Fellowship wants me dead, the Fellowship itself, wants me Dead!"
"What?" Danyel grabbed his wrist.
"They haven't actually killed anyone, or even murdered them. I did, or heroin, in Juju's case. Actually, no one has even been injured. We're being herded. Herded into the Veil, which we call death. I won't do it!" Dimitri screamed, as loud and hard as he could.
Danyel'd always been afraid of old Sharm Lord Fatima, Sharm Lord Arkay, or just the great eagle, as some around Kaon had referred to him. Danyel could zlin decades of training in his nager, not the flat, affectless discipline of a Donor, but a power and pure strength greater than any other human being he'd ever zlinned. When he threw himself on Dimitri, however, Danyel didn't hold back.
"What can I do?" He held down the one hand in his tentacles. Dimitri's lunge, however, he could do nothing about.
"Get me more harilin." His field knocked Danyel on his ass, halfway across the room. "An eighth!" He shouted. Danyel had no idea where he was going. An image of Arkay's room, with the location of a vial and syringe flashed into his mind. It ripped open the barely healed mental scabs from Sevrin's lessons.
Something grabbed him, as if he were a puppet, and shoved him into the hallway. It wasn't that he was protesting, but it was fast. Was this what he had to look forward to with Dimitri? He sure hoped not. Finally on his own two feet, Danyel cheated and augmented up the stairs at the end of the hall. Arkay's rooms were right next to Sevrin's.
Danyel paused at the door long enough to zlin. He didn't know where Nashen was and figured it would be a really bad idea to startle him. If nothing else, his heart, like Arkay's, was very worn. Nashen waved him in.
"What are you looking for?"
"Don't grab." Danyel waved him away. He smacked right into Diomid's field, trying to get into the bedroom. His headache exploded. Without Mitka's active assistance, which he couldn't use until he'd healed, he was painfully vulnerable to any of the Russians. "Harilin, an eighth." He panted, clutching at his skull on the floor.
"You look like shen." Nashen bolted past him, ignoring Diomid completely. "You're staying put." He shoved the very heavy Sharm Lord back on the bed.
"He's my son." That wild field whipped out again. Danyel rolled into the dubious protection of a desk. Someone had shielded the footwell with metal plates. A snicker echoed off the peeling metal sheets. Someone had not wanted to be zlinned below the waist at work. Dimitri could guess why. He had a lot of theories, actually.
"Oh, my aching head." He leaned against the cool metal, trying to pull himself back together again. Nashen leaned over the edge of the desk. "You want to go back with me?"
"Just don't try to teach me anything." He got to his feet, swayed, didn't throw up and didn't pass out. All of these were an accomplishment. Then Nashen slapped him on the back. Danyel doubled over the desk. He managed not to pass out, everything else was a loss. "You are going back to bed with Dimitri." Nashen set the syringe down on the desk. Danyel caught it before it could hit the floor.
"Then get me there." He wiped the back of his mouth with his hand. He'd always been susceptible to transfer shock and not yet had the chance to completely recover from his last. Nashen took his hand and tugged him to his feet, without a dynopter of augmentation.
"I feel like a fucking child around here." He shook his partially crushed hand. Nashen was how old?
"Not with language like that." Nashen winked at him, then scooped him off the floor. "Don't worry about it, I don't like Simes in my bed."
"I don't care at this point." Danyel almost wished he did. Right now he'd have given almost anything for an honest hug. He'd come out of what Sevrin called the world of selyn with a frantic desire to screw anything that moved. Then his headache had moved in when he realized Dimitri wasn't going to be up for anything before turnover.
"With your headache?" Nashen bent down and kissed Danyel's brow. "You're going to have to brush your teeth before I do anything more."
"Would you?" Danyel narrowed his eyes.
"Oh?" Nashen blinked at him. "Arkay and I were about to go into seclusion when we got called in here."
"Teach me." He met those silver eyes. They reminded him of Miran's, far more than he would have guessed.
"You haven't?" Nashen stopped on the threshold.
"Get your lazy, soft ass in here!" Arkay shouted. "Oh, sorry, I didn't mean you, my love." He winked at Nashen.
When Nashen dropped him, literally, Danyel did his best to miss the floor. It didn't work. He landed, half sprawled over Dimitri's flank. He was shaking all over, as if chilled, while sweat streamed off him. Danyel'd seen this too many times before, but didn't know, quite, what to do about it.
After having watched Dimitri do it so many times to Tami, Danyel figured he could cope. He cleared the tiny air bubble from the needle, used his tentacles as a tourniquet, they almost didn't reach, and stuck the needle in himself. Danyel froze. He didn't know what this was supposed to feel like.
"Up a little." Arkay guided Danyel's hand with his fingertips, not touching his mind, or at least not hurting him if he were. Then he felt something give and could sense the tip of the needle enter the blood vessel. "Pull back the plunger to check."
Danyel did so and was very glad he'd already been sick. Dark, almost black, sort of blue blood pulsed back into the syringe. It looked diseased, even though Danyel could clearly zlin the selyn rich fluid, far more than any other blood he'd every seen.
"Its going back to the heart, so it has selyn in it, the waste product of a Gen. If this were a Sime, it would be darker than the blood you usually see." Arkay explained, to his unspoken thoughts. Sevrin had warned him he'd be broadcasting for a while, if not exactly why. "Now push it back in."
"This is awful." Danyel had to protest, even as he pushed on the plunger. Before he finished, Dimitri slumped back onto the pillows. A trickle of blood ran from the edge of his mouth. Afraid of the worst, he gently opened it. There was a tiny cut along the edge of his tongue, already healing as he watched.
He turned back to see Arkay staring at the syringe and needle. Danyel hadn't quite emptied it. Arkay's hand shook as grasped the thing, as if to use it. Danyel grabbed it out of his hand, removed the needle and removed the plunger. Arkay exhaled, slumping over his now empty hands.
"Bless you, Danyel." His chest heaved, as if he'd been running a marathon. Which Danyel wouldn't have put past him, despite his age.
"Why do you carry this stuff if you can't resist it?" Danyel found himself panting as well.
"You're quick." Nashen commented, then helped Danyel onto the bed, properly this time.
"Finally found someone faster than you are." Arkay rubbed at his face. "That was too close." He took a deep breath. "I carry it with me because if I have to use a painkiller, its the only one that works on me."
"Oh," Danyel scrubbed at his own hands, still able to feel the greasy slick glass against his fingers. "Thank you for your help."
"Your heart's in the right place, in your chest." Arkay patted him on the shoulder. His hand, while not as big as Dimitri's, was still broad and strong. Danyel fell over. "You're also post as shen and more than half dead yourself."
"Sorry," he blinked his vision clear. "Give me five or six minutes here and I'll be fine."
"So quickly?"
"I'm usually back on my feet in one or two." He stared at Dimitri's shoulder, pressed against his nose for that long. "Although I think if one more Sharm Lord messes with my brain its going to dribble out my ears."
"Probably so." Arkay sighed. "You're incredibly flexible, but sensitive all the same."
"I'm Ferris." He muttered, managing to pry himself off Dimitri's side. "Although at the moment, I'd rather be Tegue, thanks."
"You wouldn't have fascinated Mitka like that." Arkay stroked him. Mitka purred, rattling Danyel's loose brains. He stroked Danyel's ear in apology. They'd learned, early on, anything Mitka said echoed in Danyel's mind until he thought he'd go mad. So Mitka'd become very quiet. It was a change, to say the least. "Although I've never, ever seen him so quiet."
"His speech echoes in my mind." Danyel thought about getting up to get something to drink. When he moved, his head tried to fall off and roll under the bed. He wasn't getting up for a bit. "Is there some way to put up a do not disturb sign?" He went on quickly. "Not to say I don't appreciate your help, but I don't know if I'm ever going to heal like this."
"How long has it been since your transfer." Arkay's hand was warm on against his skin. Danyel stared at it, then made the mistake of zlinning. Razor sharp knives slipped into his brain.
"I've been through this, Danyel." Nashen sat at Danyel's back. His tentacles kneaded the back of his skull. Danyel sighed, letting him. "Is there anything we can give him?"
"Any other symptoms?" Arkay asked.
"Yeah, nausea and vomiting." Nashen snorted.
"Let me guess, he didn't miss the rug."
"No," Nashen kept rubbing, so Danyel kept melting, even though he knew he was also blushing. "Oh, its quite understandable. You've been knocked about quite a bit."
"Could you ask Pyotr or Tanya to clean it up?" Arkay shook his head.
"Good idea." Nashen stopped what he was doing. Before he could prevent it, he heard a whine come from his own throat. "I'll be right back." His footsteps were heavier than any Sime's Danyel'd ever heard, except perhaps Vanesa's when she was pregnant. For some reason, she turned into a draft horse every time.
"You're projecting, Danyel." Arkay said, with an upward quirk of his lips.
"I'm what?" He put one arm over Dimitri's chest. Even with the smells of sickness on both of them, he wanted to be close. Although he could have done without his body getting enthusiastic with his headache fading. It only raised his blood pressure, which brought the shenned headache back.
"I can hear your thoughts." Arkay's sunk in before his words did.
"Ow," Danyel winced. "They're probably pretty sticky."
"A bit," Arkay's lips twitched again.
"How are you so cheerful right before transfer?" Danyel wished he had thought to tug a corner of a blanket up before he fell down.
"Age and absolute trust in my partner." Arkay wrung out a cloth and put it over Danyel's eyes, all without touching him once. "Its also why I'm not touching you while he's not here."
"Don't want to make him jealous?"
"Don't want to make myself unpresentable." He grinned. "You're a beautiful young Lord, Danyel Ferris."
"What did you call me?" Danyel pressed the cloth tighter against his swollen, aching eyelids.
"You're a Lord." Arkay's strong voice made Danyel wish for earplugs, as well. "He ascended you."
"Mitka did, most likely." Danyel swallowed heavily. "That's what he did."
"Talk to me, or at least think about it." Arkay commanded.
"I felt something give way, the second time Mitka struck. I don't have enough personal need to take all of Dimitri's selyn. We'd been fighting over my taking a partial, for him, alone." Danyel licked his lips. They were particularly awful tasting. Arkay brushed another rough cloth over them. Danyel let it scrape the worst of the junk off his tongue as well, even though he gagged a bit at the sensation. "It was like when, during first transfer, my Donor began filling my public field." For the first time, he noticed the change in syntax between Simelan and Russian. Another oddity to file away and forget. Arkay chuckled softly.
"It was as if he were filling another field, one I didn't know I had." Danyel started to reach for those new areas, but they were as raw and sore as the rest of his mind, if not more so.
"Yeah, he ascended you." Arkay sighed, his breath cooling the cloth over Danyel's eyes again. It felt great. "I don't blame him, really. He'd probably been teased past all control, but its another complication."
"As if we don't have enough." Danyel managed something like sitting when Nashen returned. It was crooked, and he'd probably fall over if anyone sneezed, but it was better than horizontal, barely. "Welcome back."
"Pyotr doesn't like you right now." Nashen sat at his side and rubbed his neck again. His head tried to fall off. Although this time it felt good. "Although he relented some when I said you'd babysit."
"Really?" Arkay's field flared actinic white. Danyel struggled not to throw up again, or even heave. "Oh, I'm sorry." The light faded as fast as it had come. Danyel fell over. "Oh dear." This time there was no hesitation. Arkay stripped Danyel's filthy clothes off his body and slipped him in next to Dimitri.
"You used to work in a hospital." Danyel guessed.
"For many years, and I'm not saying how many." Arkay replaced the damp cloth over Danyel's eyes. "You're going to stay right there for at least an hour."
"What about something to drink?"
"Right here." A straw touched his lips, probably the same one Dimitri'd been drinking from. The closeness eased him, in a way he wouldn't have guessed.
"Can I call you papa?" He joked.
"Of course," Arkay's voice quavered a bit. "I'd never thought Mitka'd take a partner while I still lived."
"Only because you try to scare them all off." Danyel growled, hoping his field would be zlinnably teasing. "You nearly scared me off."
"But you didn't." Arkay offered him another sip. "If you'd scared, we'd have been sad, but also glad Dimitri hadn't been trapped by a Sime after his selyn alone. I've seen it too often."
"He has so much more than I could ever need, its ridiculous." Danyel knew he really wasn't good enough for Dimitri. One look at their compatibility ratio would prove that. It was skewed almost off all the charts.
Arkay poked him in the chest with one finger. "Stop. Right here. Mitka loves you. I've never been able to shut him up. He's quiet, for you, out of love. I couldn't think of any greater proof."
"What of Dimitri?"
"I meant both of them." Arkay sighed again. "Although I wish I knew how to bring him out of this without hurting him."
"Is there anything that can calm the mood swings, even for a short period of time." Danyel figured Dimitri could heal, if they could either get rid of the addiction or the mood swings, but not both at the same time.
"Not for a Sharm Lord." The sound of Arkay scratching his head was clearly audible. "At least not any drug, or drug combination."
"What about other things?" Danyel scowled. There had to be more to the fabled Russian medicine than drugs and cutting people open.
"Oh, I could change the chemical imbalances in his brain."
"Why don't you?" Danyel didn't want to think about the implications of this.
"Because he'd never be the same person afterward." Arkay's voice had gone as quiet as the breeze. "He'd no longer be Dimitri Sergeyevich."
"If it saves his life?" Danyel fought back tears, then gave in beneath the cloth.
"He won't die, Danyel." Arkay took a deep breath. "Hopefully."
"Then do it." Danyel held him as close as he could. "I want him healthy and happy. He's been so unhappy since he got here." Probably because of me, Danyel knew.
"Its a noble thought." Arkay stroked Danyel's bare shoulder. "But we have other options."
"Possibly leaving him crippled and insane?" Danyel'd never really gotten on tentacle on what made Dimitri say he was crazy. "I'd rather have him hate me than that."
"Mental surgery is never a sure thing. If I slip, if I make one mistake, he'll never be able to heal again." Arkay gave Danyel's shoulder a gentle squeeze. "And he probably wouldn't be able to heal at all, even if everything goes for the best."
"Even without healing?" Danyel forced his eyes open. Arkay nodded, deep lines carving into his features. "I'll give him peace then."
Arkay slipped a perfect, brilliant green emerald from his ear. "I want you to wear this. Avilan gave it to me, the most empathic person I've met until now." He put it on the table. "When you're well, after Nashen and I have had our transfer, I'll put it in myself."
"I don't know if I'm so wonderful." He looked at Dimitri's slack features. His eyes twitched behind his eyelids, with dreams or nightmares he didn't dare zlin. "All I know is I love him and would do anything for him."
"Even kill?"
"He'd not want to live without being a healer." Danyel wished he'd given in to Dimitri's request. Perhaps, in another month, or two, when things had settled down, they could have tried a full transfer again. "I've destroyed him."
"No," Arkay caressed Dimitri's face. Danyel saw the thick, ropy scars covering them from fingertip to his cuffs. They probably went far further up his arms. Arkay unbuttoned the cuffs and rolled back his sleeves. The heavy scars went all the way up his arms, nearly to his shoulders from how they only began to taper off past his elbows. "If Valentine and his family had given up on me, I'd have been dead decades ago. Never give up, Danyel."
"I won't." Danyel knew the sort of pain burns like that must have cost. He also knew the nerve damage beneath them had to be equally extensive. "If you can still give transfer, then I can learn to."
"Oh, I don't know if Mitka will ever want any other Sime." He grinned up at Nashen. "Some people like strange things."
"Even someone with southerner's?" Danyel used the Russian term deliberately.
"To the right set of laterals, anything can be attractive." Arkay stood, slowly, and with a huge chorus of creaks and pops. "I sound like I've been dipped in ice."
"The trip," Nashen wrinkled his nose. "I'm not feeling too spry myself."
"You carried me down here." Danyel put his hand on Dimitri's chest, feeling for his heartbeat, since he couldn't zlin it.
"Ah, but I wanted to be back with my beautifully adorned partner." Nashen gave Arkay's arms a heavy lidded glance.
"If you like, I can put you in what you'd call a menar sleep, both of you, actually."
"Please," Danyel begged. "I have to recover, sometime."
"Another Sime with sense." Arkay smiled. "Being Ferris has not addled your mind one bit, Lord Danyel Ivanovich."
Danyel winced a bit. He knew what Ivanovich meant. Then he smiled. "Yes, I am Ivanovich, free to make my own way in the world."
"Good," Arkay touched his forehead. "Are you completely comfortable like this?"
Danyel settled himself a bit better, resting his head more on Dimitri's shoulder.
"When you wake, thirty-six hours will have passed. You'll have no memory of anything anyone does to make your rest more comfortable. This won't hurt, or it will and you won't be able to remember it." Arkay winked. The last thing Danyel remembered was Arkay's hand brushing Danyel's eyelids closed.
Arkay wished he had someone he could trust to watch over the boys' sleep. Diomid was about to collapse, himself, and would only cause more problems. "Do you mind if we check on them?"
"Arkay, my love, I knew you were a healer when I bonded you." Nashen's smile had only grown richer through the years.
"You didn't have a whole lot of choice in the matter, when it came down to it." Arkay didn't have the Sergei memories, but he could remember every moment of that fateful night outside Jaffa.
"I did." Nashen winked at him. "I had choices to make and I made them."
"As usual, you humble me with your wisdom."
"Hey, I have to have something to keep up with your brains." He reached down and captured the end of Arkay's braid. "I saw you scratching in there."
"Its gotten really long." He looked at the coils of gold and silver Nashen held in his hands, now more silver than gold, far more silver than gold.
"Heavy, too," Nashen made short work of the tail end, then threw it over his own shoulder. It slid down his back and tangled with his own, waist length silver braid. Arkay couldn't grab Nashen's and unbraid it as they walked, unfortunately.
"Where are we going?" Arkay looked around. He didn't really recognize this part of Kaon. Although he didn't notice a whole lot when he was running anymore, so that didn't mean a whole lot.
"Tzer and Mikhail's rooms." Nashen opened a non-descript door. "They have a hot plate, a big nest of cushions, and are kept clean at all times, since Mikhail comes back on an irregular schedule."
"What if they show up while we've taken over?" Arkay smiled at the other reasons Nashen'd picked this room. The coffee pot, silk wall hangings and thick window coverings could have been anywhere in the world Southerners or children of Fatima lived. There was even a simple, quite beautiful sketch of Mecca on the appropriate wall.
"Do you think anyone here understands?" He pointed at the picture.
"Probably not." Nashen grinned. Arkay grabbed the end of Nashen's braid and slipped his fingers through the silky silver strands. "It feels more like home here, though."
"Even more than our rooms, really." Arkay rubbed Nashen's scalp for a moment.
"Oh, that feels good." He leaned back. "I don't know how you stand having all that hair."
"Because I know you like playing with it." Arkay shook out the last of his own braids. His hair was now so heavy, and so long, he had to be very careful not to step on it. Nashen helped as well backing up against the wall to get the last of it. Arkay looked back over his shoulder at his lover.
Nashen lit a couple of clean burning oil lamps, then turned off the overhead light.
"More flattering?" He teased.
"Oh, I can zlin." Nashen winked. "I don't have to see."
"You're still as beautiful as the night you stole that kiss from Avilan." Arkay slipped his fingers into Nashen's tunic, unbuttoning it and his shirt at the same time.
"And you're still the same flatterer as the night you seduced me in Jaffa." Nashen's silver eyes gleamed.
"I did no such thing." Arkay wanted to hear about this again. He'd never had anyone so appreciative of a little attention.
"You primped and preened all day for my return." Nashen slipped the side laces on Arkay's overtunic and stopped. "You're not wearing any underwear?"
"Didn't have time." He licked the tip of Nashen's nose. "Besides, I'm not so saggy as to have to wear it. My balls won't fall of if I don't wear underwear."
"I sure hope not." Nashen slipped his long fingered hands down Arkay's flanks. They were thickened with age, and all the food Nashen teased him into eating, but still solid. "You're too gorgeous." He tried to slip into Arkay's kador with him.
"Sorry," Arkay knelt and helped Nashen with his boots. "How did you manage court garb?"
"You were the one staring at my wrists." Nashen still teased him as if he were thirty. Although he often felt thirty around Nashen, so it was probably a fair jibe.
"I had better things to do than get dressed."
"Are you trying to tell me I wasn't zlinning you drooling all over me?" Nashen returned the lick, at the corner of Arkay's mouth.
"I also forgot to shave." He gave Nashen a sheepish glance.
"I can tell." The lines at the corners of Nashen's eyes crinkled upward. "Do you want to shave before or after?"
"I think before." Arkay considered all the ramifications. "I'm doing fine so far, but I'm not going to want to stop."
"When have you ever wanted to stop?" Nashen followed him into the bathroom. Tzer'd left a razor behind, as most men did when they visited some place a lot. It was easier than realizing you'd forgotten one half way around the world.
Arkay had to think about this question, so he quickly lathered up his face. Nashen lounged against the side of the door, naked but for his wonderful silver hair and his jewelry. "I think I'll get a bit cleaned up as well." He ran the shower. The platinum rings he'd given Nashen in Jaffa flashed in the low light when Nashen extended his tentacles to clean them.
"Have any plans for those tentacles?" Arkay asked when he'd finished the first pass with the razor.
"No fair, you never answered my first question." Nashen winked at him. He did have plans. The sensitive skin on the inside of Arkay's wrists tightened with the first flush of true need.
"No, I can't think of a time when I'd actually wanted to stop." Arkay leaned on the 'wanted'.
"Oh, but there have certainly been times when we've had to." Nashen sighed, drying his wrists on a threadbare towel someone had forgotten. "Hopefully not tonight."
"We have to check on the boys in the morning." Arkay reminded him.
"Oh, I'm usually at least presentable after about twelve hours now." Nashen yelped. "At least when you're not grabbing me." He danced out into the other room.
Arkay quickly rinsed off the razor, dried it, and put it up. He'd learned to pay attention to the details long ago. At least the ones that could eventually get him even more time with Nashen. He finished slipping out of his kador and tossed it onto the valet. It wasn't one of his good ones.
With a huge growl, Arkay tackled Nashen into the heap of cushions. Something cold hit his hip. Arkay fished through them and came up with a huge bottle of almond oil. He showed it to Nashen.
"Danyel asked me if I'd teach him about sex." Nashen asked, a big grin showing over the oil.
"They haven't figured it out on their own?" Arkay blinked. "I would have thought the 'care package' we left would have been enough of a hint."
"You never gave it to them."
"I thought you were going to." Arkay glanced at the door. "Well, we can't do anything about it now."
"No, we can't." Nashen tugged Arkay into his arms. "Although did you see the size of him?"
"Yeah," Arkay blinked. "I did. I'm not surprised, now that I think of it."
"They're going to have to have a lot more trust than most." Nashen sighed. "Danyel'd been raped, as a child, from what I could zlin."
"Oh shen," Arkay rolled back for a moment and stared into his lover's eyes. "Are you ready for this?"
"No," he admitted. "Tzer almost murdered me."
"Yeah," Arkay sighed. "And Diomid tried to teach Mikhail."
"What are we going to do?" Nashen asked, of course. He always did.
"We're going to wait until they've healed, at least physically, and then we're going to teach them."
"What about Avilan?"
"He won't come out of Russia." Arkay sighed.
"Even for Aliana's baby?" Nashen returned.
"Even for," Arkay pulled Nashen in close again. "He hates airplanes."
"I'll take airplanes after getting here the hard way." Nashen said quickly.
"Me too." Arkay hugged him tight. He'd never, ever forget the horrible mind twisting sensations of teleportation. Arkay knew there were some people who were relatively immune to the effects, but he wasn't one of them. "I'm never going through that again."
"Are you thinking of staying through winter?" Nashen hit the nail on the head.
"No," he held Avilan's image in his mind, as beautiful as always, but growing more and more frail, physically, with every year. "We're going back. We're also taking everyone with us."
"Even Danyel?" Nashen's silver eyes were shadowed. He was thinking of something, as usual
"Especially Danyel." Arkay realized Nashen must have looked a bit like Danyel as a child, before he'd established.
"Did you note Vanesa's son?" Nashen stalked the answer he wanted from Arkay.
"Yeah," Arkay closed his eyes and tried not to growl. "No wonder Dimitri's such a shenned up mess. He's been trying to deal with all of this on his own ... since we left!"
"And we didn't exactly give him the most support we could." Nashen set the barbs. Arkay'd earned them.
"I didn't." Arkay growled. "Shen."
"I want to take only Danyel and Dimitri with us." Nashen met his eyes. He was dead serious.
"Leaving Diomid here on his own?"
"He'll have plenty of use for his selyn. Lisa's due any time now and doesn't have a partner at all." Nashen reminded him.
Arkay thought about it. The idea of leaving Diomid, on his own, without any support here in the West did not sit well with him. In some ways, Diomid was more his son than his nephew or half-brother, both of which were true by blood. Nashen didn't move.
"He'll be so alone." Arkay pointed out.
"As he's pushed away Diomid?"
"Yes, shen you." Arkay gave in. "We leave him here to try to cope with the impossible problem he'd pawned off on his son and just take the boys." He'd hoped to be able to see Aliana's child, his first blood grandson, born, but didn't know if she'd be up for the long flight. He'd probably have had to miss it anyway. "Shen and shidoni, Nashen!" He pounded on one of the cushions, jarring his arm badly.
"Why are you swearing so much?"
"Because I feel like I've just ruined two young people's lives. People who depend on me and look up to me as family. Danyel asked if he could call me papa." Arkay bit at his lower lip. Nashen tugged it loose.
"Think you're up for another generation?"
"I think I don't have a whole lot of choice." Arkay felt the years deep in his bones now, not just his joints. He still ran ten klicks every morning and spent at least an hour in the weight room, when he wasn't chasing after Nashen or their children. The running wasn't optional, though.
"I can understand if you're too tired." Nashen slid up next to him.
"Oh, I'm tired, but ring the ambient and this old war horse will still run to the front." Arkay let himself focus on the sleek Sime he held in his arms. "Right now, however, the only running I want to do is to tease you on."
Chapter 53
Dimitri stared out the window. With his glasses, he could see again, but anything beyond arm's reach was so hazy it made him nauseous.
"This wasn't what I expected." Danyel's hand reached for his. Dimitri took it, astonished Danyel would still want to touch him.
"Me either." He took a deep breath of the dry, ozone scented air. "I hate airplanes."
"Better than how Arkay and Nashen got to Kaon, from what they've said." Danyel looked over Dimitri. "For the record, I agree with you." Kilometers below, the clouds formed a rough imitation of land. "This is not something I would have ever chosen to do."
"You weren't one of the channels fighting to go to the mysterious East?"
"Not me," Danyel grinned at him. He'd regained a lot of the color he'd lose at their disastrous last transfer, but there were still shadows deep in his dark eyes. "I leave such nonsense to Lorn and his cronies."
"Don't tell me, Lorn is going to be controller?" Dimitri fought down the urge to run up front and tell the pilot to turn around.
"Yeah," Danyel sighed, leaning back in his seat. Mitka slithered down off his shoulder and curled up in his lap. Their fellow passengers, an odd collection of third order channels and Donors, were babbling in the back in an odd dialect of English and Simelan. Dimitri didn't have the energy to pick out more than a handful of familiar phrases, most of them having to do with building things.
No one in Russia had built something entirely new in generations. Dimitri could probably track down some texts, in the hands of the Veiled, which did no one any good. As the Techton was always building new things, the mysterious 'they' had decided to build something new for the center that was to go up. It was probably better than the original plan, of housing the center in Mir, he supposed.
"You're supposed to be resting." Danyel complained. Mitka glared at him, then put his chin back on his hands.
"I can't help thinking about things." Dimitri took a deep breath. His scalp stung as he began sweating, despite the cool air.
"You really are addicted to that stuff." Danyel pulled out what was left of the harilin. "There should be more in here."
"There should." Arkay growled from across the aisle. "Dimitri, tell me the truth, have you been taking more than you should?"
"Yes," he leaned back against the seat. "I have."
Arkay shook his head and leaned back as well. "I'm not going to chide you for it, like a child, but you're going to have to deal with it yourself. I can't tell you to stop and make it work." Nashen reappeared out of the forward bathroom. He'd been gone in there for hours. "Although if you're willing to give me a hand here, I won't mind." He nodded to Nashen.
"As you wish." Dimitri couldn't help but feel twisted up inside as seeing Nashen so debilitated. Normally he seemed as strong as granite and nearly as indestructible. "What can I do to help?" This came out better.
Nashen hesitated, then tried to turn back to the bathroom. Dimitri caught him, with one of the airsick bags. Arkay slid a shielding curtain between them and the back of the craft. Nashen crumpled, heaving even though nothing was coming up.
Dimitri fought to stabilize him, a futile battle against Nashen's ears telling him one thing and his mind another. Danyel'd been a little bit queasy when they'd been rising to altitude, but it had passed as soon as they'd leveled off. Finally Dimitri clamped down on Nashen's balance centers, forcing them to the same stillness Nashen's eyes saw. Nashen slumped against him, sodden with sweat. Dimitri stripped off his shirt and covered him in a thick wool blanket. There was nothing he could do about Nashen's pants.
"What did you do?" Arkay knelt at his side. Nashen stared around, as wide eyed as a first year Sime.
"I clamped his motion sensors." Dimitri knew he sounded like someone was trying to throttle him. "It takes a bit of concentration."
"I could never do that." Arkay was staring at him. "You're strong."
"Well, I do what I can." He helped Nashen to his feet. "I'm going to have to stay right with you."
"Whatever you're doing, don't stop." Nashen's voice was rough. Dimitri turned his face. His eyes were bloodshot with repeated vomiting.
"You look like shen, papa." Dimitri smiled at him, turning it to a jest.
"I know." He managed a grin back. "I really don't like flying."
"Do you usually get so sick?" Dimitri studied Nashen's middle ears, trying to figure out what was at the root of all of this.
"Not quite this bad, actually." He tucked the blanket around his shoulders a bit more firmly. "I think its because of the people in back."
"Quite likely." Dimitri glanced at the curtain. More than a few of the other passengers had been sick as well. Dimitri'd been able to teach their motion sensors to ignore the violations. When he tried the same trick with Nashen, he instantly turned a pale green and nearly heaved again. "I'm sorry." He kept a firm grip on Nashen.
"Oh, you had to try." His mouth worked a few times. "Is there any fresh water around?"
"I have something better." Arkay held out a bottle of the lemon/honey mixture he'd blessed Dimitri with when he'd been so sick.
"Oh, bless you." Nashen folded into his seat and sipped at the drink. "Oh, don't worry I'm going to try to drink too much. I've done this before."
"When you've sailed?" Dimitri asked.
"Yes," he nodded, then flinched. Dimitri waved down the lights and then stared at them when they responded. "Not used to them anymore?"
"No, I'm not." He wondered what else had changed. "When did we build an airplane?"
"The front section of this one was refitted when the Techton center project was finalized." Nashen settled back into his seat. "Its frivolous but I do appreciate the gesture."
"Who put the sensors in?" Dimitri had to kneel in the aisle to stay close enough to Nashen to do him any good.
"The Veiled, of course." Nashen shrugged. "No one else knows, exactly, how to do it anymore."
"Are they going to put sensors in the new building?" Dimitri had seen the floorplans. Then he'd ripped them up and handed the project to Lukus. The second set didn't resemble the first at all, other than the icon for the Techton in the upper right hand corner. With said plans approved, within days, not months, of their creation, their creator got himself a billet in the building of the new center. He, Kreg and Tami were all in back, with the rest of the core construction crew, most of whom had worked with Lukus on his projects. Often enough as foremen, but a handful as skilled technicians. Unfortunately, they couldn't bring over any of the common laborers. They'd all been, to a man and woman, ren.
"Yes, and translate," Nashen tensed. "I don't like bringing all these people in."
"Better them than a bunch of renSimes, or worse, renGens."
"I know it." He leaned back. "I'm too old to see the world turned upsidedown."
"It won't be, papa." Dimitri held Nashen's long fingered hand in his own. "Although I do hope we'll be on the ground before I hit turnover."
"Why didn't you tell us earlier?" Arkay thumped him on top of the head.
"Because Danyel doesn't slow down." He looked up at him. Danyel sat in front of him, cross legged on the floor. Dimitri got off his knees and sat down as well. "I can't let my Sime do something I can't."
"Oh yes you can." Arkay rolled his eyes. "Let him do the work. Its your selyn."
Danyel flicked his hair back, showing off his new earring. Dimitri knew he didn't want to know the reason Arkay'd given it to him, and so had never asked. It was beautiful, though, particularly against Danyel's dark skin. "I already do plenty of his work. 'Can you carry this bag, Danyel? Could you get that window, please?'." Danyel's mimicry made Dimitri chuckle.
"Now you laugh." Danyel sighed. "I don't mind, really. Although I'm not the one who lifts weights. If you could lift a few more boxes, now, that would be some help."
Dimitri caught Danyel's hand and twined his fingers with Danyel's tentacles. "Don't you want me to be able to keep myself for you?" He winked.
"What about Mitka?" Danyel continued to hold him. Mitka dealt with air travel about as well as Nashen did. His only advantage was that he could put himself to sleep, and had done so. Although if Danyel let go of him, he wailed and cried until Danyel picked him up again. It was a small price to pay for quiet.
"Oh, Mitka can take care of himself." Dimitri tried to shake some sort of odd buzzing from his ears. He rubbed his arms with his hands. There seemed to be some sort of crawling something on them.
"Now, Dimitri," Arkay pointed to the plastic case Danyel used to carry the harilin.
"Ah, yes," he didn't want to let go of either Sime's hands. In a very awkward crossing over reach, Danyel managed to get the stuff. Dimitri was sweating almost as much as Nashen had been by the time Danyel had the syringe loaded. The tiny amount would never do.
"Stop," Arkay snapped, holding out his hand. "Stay still." He checked the syringe.
"I'm going to have to move." He prepared to let go of Nashen's hand.
"No you don't." Arkay's field was harder than Dimitri'd ever seen it. Dimitri's heart thudded deep in his chest. Nashen leaned back as far as he could go. Dimitri's hand was on top and Arkay seemed intent on sticking one of the veins on top of it. With the deftness of what had to be an incredible amount of practice, Arkay slipped the tiny needle into one of those veins and injected the drug.
Dimitri's back arched this time as it hit, a pleasure second only to transfer wiped away all traces of pain he might have once had. His breath hissed between his teeth as he reveled in knowing this incredible glory. No longer did he loose time to fantastic dreams, having learned to enjoy the wealth of pleasure he could only know under the influence of the drug.
"You've got it bad, Dimitri." Arkay sighed, wiping away the spot of blood. "I don't know what you're going to do."
"Neither do I." He couldn't meet Danyel's pitying gaze, or Mitka's brief glance. "I will quit." He promised Danyel. "I can't keep doing this to you."
"I want you happy."
"This isn't the answer." He spread his fingers for a moment, the single drop of blood crimson on the back of his hand. "Its no kind of answer."
"Its a temporary one." Danyel recaptured Dimitri's hand. "Besides, you kept Nashen stable through it."
"And I felt it, too." He winced, "Not just the needlestick, either."
"Oh?" Dimitri's curiosity banished some of the worst of the drug fog from his brain. He didn't like the way it numbed his wits. Oh, certainly Dimitri knew how it worked, as harilin dulled everything but its own pleasure, but that didn't mean the dulling was pleasant in and of itself.
"It was overpowering, like transfer, but without the personal aspect." He cringed. "I wouldn't want it."
"The addiction, however, is more than the sensation." Arkay stripped down the syringe. Dimitri didn't require a sterile set up, but it made him feel better. As if he were closer to normal than he really was. "Its physiological in nature, which is why withdrawal is so painful."
"Why is it so random?" Dimitri knew it would be far easier to quit if he could simply make a schedule and stick to it.
"Because harilin is used by the body only as it perceives pain. If there is no painful stimulus, the dose can last a long, long time. If then something triggers the release of that harilin, and most of it has simply drained away, then the withdrawal symptoms can be catastrophic." Arkay sighed. "I speak from experience."
"What about dosing to a schedule?" Dimitri glared at the vial, now safely in its case.
"That's what we do in terminal cases, along with keeping a log of pain levels." Arkay grimaced. "Unfortunately, many people who start taking harilin quit the hard way."
Dimitri saw Danyel's confusion immediately. "They die." Danyel's mouth formed an 'o' of shock and surprise. "I don't want to."
"Then we'll beat this thing together." Danyel shook Dimitri's hand with his tentacles. "I'm not going to let anything take us down."
Dimitri bowed his head to his partner's never failing attitude. If it hadn't been for Danyel, he'd have given up months ago. He'd failed in everything he'd gone to Kaon to accomplish. He'd been yanked off the Techton center project, taken away from even what little healing he was allowed to do at the center, sequestered, sick as shen at Kaon then sent back to Russia an addict. Even still, Danyel believed in him. It was enough.
Danyel reached back and checked to make sure his knife was still in place. It had come a long way. So had he. The door of the plane opened. He held out his arm and found Dimitri doing the same. They traded a quick grin.
"Welcome to Russia." Dimitri put his hand on Danyel's arm, his fingertips caressing the inside of his elbow. Danyel'd chosen to wear a plain shirt and some pants that fit. Nashen had fumbled a clean shirt and tunic out of the bag he'd brought with him. Now there was someone who'd come prepared for the worse. Danyel hoped for the best. Mitka roused in the fresh breeze, spreading his wings wide and catching one wingtip on a seat.
"I want to fly." He leaned toward the door.
"Lets get outside, first." Danyel's heart was pounding in his throat. He'd seen a few glimpses of dark green through the clouds, but that was it. A whiff of fresh growth and rain wafted in through the open door. When he got to it, he stopped dead in his tracks.
Mitka launched himself into the misty drizzle, making the fantastic city look like something out of a fairy tale. He spiraled upward, whistling as he went. For a moment, Danyel could see through his eyes. Bright colors, even in the mist, gleamed on open shutters, lintels, awnings, even posts outside the two and three story buildings. Everything else was stone, polished until it too gleamed.
"Would you move!" Nashen shouted. Danyel stared, instead.
"You're going to catch flies." Dimitri murmured in his ear. He'd put on one of Arkay's long vests, even though it probably wasn't long enough, from the way Dimitri kept tugging it down. "I want some decent clothes."
"Then move!" Arkay bellowed. This, as well as his nageric goose, was enough to get Danyel down the stairs. They too were wood, with the hand rail carved into leaves, vines, even, when he looked closely, a few small creatures looking out at them. He didn't know if he wanted to touch it.
Then he set foot, for the first time in his life, on alien soil. The cracked and crazed paving had a few shoots of grass growing through the gaps. It was the same dark stuff found on some eyeways in the West. The whole area was covered in the stuff, like some of the ancient ruins Frihill had dug up. Dimitri deftly steered him toward one edge, away from the plane.
Danyel glanced back over his shoulder to see a similar pileup at the other door to the airplane, as people stopped to stare, rather than making way for the others. Finally someone slipped under the blocker's arm and bounced down the stairs. "This is amazing!" She shouted, turning around.
"Let me see!" One said.
"I want to zlin!" Another managed to slip out. Then they were all charging down the stairs, laughing like children. Danyel knew he felt like laughing, singing, anything to possibly show his wonder at all of this. A handful of other people were hurrying across the tarmac, with an outrider or two chasing strays. At the far side, Danyel could see a thick stand of trees through the mist.
"Avilan!" Arkay shouted, dropped everything, and ran for a tall, blond figure striding out to them. Danyel recognized the incredibly beautiful man who'd given Sevrin his impossible good looks. Avilan grabbed Arkay and kissed him.
It was not the kiss of old friends. Not unless those old friends were also passionate lovers. Karola smiled at them, hands on her hips, obviously used to this sort of reunion. Arkay had opened his mouth to Avilan and it looked as if they were trying to devour each other, tongues dancing and hands sliding all over each other's bodies.
Danyel found himself entranced. He'd once worried about loosing his libido as he aged. He didn't any more. Arkay hooked one ankle around Avilan's legs and was sliding it upward.
"You're giving everyone a show." Nashen's field was as bright as the colors on the building. Both Avilan and Arkay seemed to be hard of hearing at the moment, which wasn't too surprising given their clutch.
"Are they usually so enthusiastic?" Danyel asked the empty air.
"No quite this bad, usually." Nashen sighed. "Although they are still both post." He stepped up and tapped Arkay on the shoulder.
"You want to step in?" He asked, eyes heavy lidded and lips red.
"Not on the tarmac." Nashen pointed out.
"Yes, right," Arkay blinked, looking around as if waking from a solid sleep. Danyel rubbed his nose, hiding his grin, at least from sight. He knew his field was too bright to miss. Half the construction crew had stopped to stare.
"Its too hard and lumpy." Avilan murmured, pressing his hips against Arkay's. "This isn't though."
"I am both hard and lumpy, I'll have you know." Arkay grabbed Avilan's butt. The gesture was painfully erotic, particularly as they'd made it here before turnover.
"You're also giving the best show of perverse behavior I've ever seen." Karola seemed to be having a hard time with her own grin.
"Why didn't you tell us where you went?" Avilan lost his good cheer for a moment. "I've been afraid for years I'd wake one morning and you'd both be gone. When it happened, I didn't know what to do!" Tears streamed down his face. "I love you Arkay. Don't scare me like that. At least leave a note, a message, something!" He wailed, seemingly entirely unconcerned about splashing the ambient with his emotions. Danyel had to duck into Dimitri's arms, to keep from getting flattened.
"I was not impressed, I'll have you know." Karola glared at Arkay, then at Nashen, then back at Arkay. "I can understand Nashen not leaving a note. He's horrible about writing. But you, Arkay! How could you leave Avilan in such a state? Didn't you even think about his feelings at being abandoned like this?"
"I didn't know what to do." Avilan rubbed at his face with the back of his hand. "Now look what you've made me do."
"I wasn't the one who made you wear makeup out here." Arkay brushed the worst of the tears from Avilan's cheeks. From Avilan's heaving chest, there were more to follow.
"I wanted to look my best for you." He sniffed, then bawled. "You're back, you're back," he pounded on Arkay's back, as if wanting to make sure of the fact. Danyel was frozen to the ground in shock.
"I hope you aren't disgusted." Dimitri's voice was hardly loud enough to carry over the drizzle, and Avilan's crying. Although Arkay joined him, also pounding on his back. Then the leaned back a bit, looking into each other's eyes. "Its a bit much even for me, and I grew up with their relationship. Arkay, and Avilan both, seem to have given up on any concept of propriety."
"Karola seems to keep it." Danyel watched quietly as she traded glances with Nashen. They were the same ones Danyel'd traded with a few men when their lady friends had gotten all excited and had to retire to the restroom to patch things up.
"Oh, I'm talking about the fact they're both Gen." Dimitri shrugged. "Not the emotions." He put his arm around Danyel's shoulders. "I actually find it quite arousing." He nibbled the edge of Danyel's ear.
"I can see." Danyel glanced down, then placed himself in front of Dimitri's enthusiasm. Not that he could keep from looking as bad. Although his pants did nothing to hide him from public view, unlike the heavy overtunic Dimitri wore. "I just wish it had come up earlier."
"Yeah, me too." Dimitri adjusted himself in his pants. Danyel did the best he could.
When he looked back at Avilan and Arkay, they'd returned to their fervid kissing, this time hot enough there should have been steam rising from them both.
"Sharm Lords, both of you, I think I'd like to go find some place to sit down." Nashen's amusement seemed to be slipping by the moment. Danyel wondered if he could possibly be any help. He led Dimitri forward, slowly. It was like walking into a furnace, with both Gens wide open with their emotions to the ambient and the primary emotion being lust.
"Let me." Karola sighed. She stood on her toes and murmured something in Avilan's ear. After a moment, he pulled back. He and Arkay grinned at each other, fields still so hot Danyel couldn't get near them. Mitka's whistling warned him to brace. With a heavy thud, Mitka made a crash landing on Danyel's shoulder. He rocked under the impact, even though he knew it wasn't physical.
"Would you be willing to find your repose tonight at Sergei?" Avilan's field was low, but even so it outshone any normal Donor Danyel'd ever zlinned. When he'd first met the Russians, he'd found their conflicting fields so overwhelming, he'd not learned anything about what they'd zlinned like. Afterward, he'd avoided them as much as possible. Probably wise in the circumstances, given the fact they were so free with their nagers, although now he regretted it.
"Who's Sharm Lord Sergei?" Arkay glanced around. "We left Diomid at Kaon." This sounded almost like a ritual set of questions, or leading ones.
"Then its Dimitri." Avilan turned to him, eyes hot with lust, but a wisdom beneath it Danyel couldn't hope to match. Everyone turned and stared at Danyel's partner.
"With a Ferris on his arm?" Karola's brows arched. Her hair was silvered with more than the mist. "I don't know if Sergei's children will accept him."
"They have no choice." Dimitri brought him right into the heart of that fire. Mitka guarded him as well as he could, but even still, Danyel felt as if his nager were about to be seared to ash. "He's my bonded partner." Dimitri held out their hands, showing everyone the bonding bracelet Danyel'd given him.
"Can he even stand on the dias?" Karola stared down at him. Danyel was not used to feeling like he was standing in a hole.
"I want to sit down, Karola." Nashen sighed. "I'm very tired and it was a difficult flight."
"Everyone else seems fine." She barged on.
Avilan swatted her one with his field. Danyel cringed away from the blow, the splashover searing at his field. "I would like that bath you promised." He raised an eyebrow.
"Its certainly cool enough for one today." Danyel tried adding something to the conversation. He was holding his own until Karola focused her attention on him.
Chapter 54
Dimitri closed the blinds. He'd ended up with enough headaches from being nagerically overwhelmed to sympathize with the one Danyel'd be waking to. Bright light would only make it worse. Not that there was anything like a sun out there today. He'd forgotten how dark and soggy Moskva could be. Although it seemed as if Danyel'd been entranced by the scenery until he'd gotten hit.
"Oh, my aching head." Danyel blinked his eyes open. "Could you turn down the lights?"
"Certainly," Dimitri waved them as low as they'd go. The fire in the corner was brighter, even though it was low as well, just enough to drive away the dampness. This room, all of them, had once been occupied by his grandfather, Vanya Sergeyevich Sergei. There were many times, like now, when he wished he could actually talk with the man. He'd lived through so many changes. Trying to put someone with southerner's on the dias at Sergei probably wouldn't have made him blink twice.
"I remember Karola turning to me and that's all." Danyel's tentacles clutched at the bedding, kneading it like a cat.
"Byela!" He called out, wanting to be sure he had everything ready before calling her in.
She bounded into the room, making a complete lie of her age, then stopped. Her fur fluffed up, making her look almost twice her normal size.
"Oh, sweetie, pretty one, he's not a bad Sime." Dimitri cooed. Byela didn't believe him. She sniffed the air, then glared at Danyel. "You're on her side of the bed, I'm afraid."
"Should I move over?" He scooted up onto some pillows.
"Then she'll have to claim the other side." Dimitri kissed at her. "I might have to bribe her."
"Is she usually so standoffish?" Danyel wiggled a tentacle in her direction. She stretched, as if she could smell it from a distance.
"Khristov didn't like her." Dimitri got her brush off the table. "Come here, my pretty one." He crooned, stroking the brush. She relented and jumped into his lap. "She's a total slut for being brushed." Dimitri grinned down at her. "I admit, I am too."
"Your hair is nowhere near as long." Danyel pointed out.
"It will be, eventually, maybe." He ran the brush through Byela's long, white hair. It stood out horribly against his borrowed overtunic. Although just walking into this suite would probably have been enough. "She's been with me since I moved to Sergei the first time, right after I established."
"She fits in." Danyel sat up the rest of the way and offered Byela a tentacle again. She licked it.
"She bites." Dimitri warned, a bit too late. Dimitri cringed at she nipped Danyel's tentacle. Danyel chuckled and slipped it out of her mouth.
"Was that why Khristov didn't like her?" Danyel slipped a finger under her chin. Byela's purrs doubled in volume.
"Someone's been neglecting you." He stripped the first bunch of hair from her brush then flipped her over. "Your pits are a mess." Dimitri worked at them patiently. "No, I think Khristov considered her to be a bother. I don't think he'd ever had a pet."
"I tried to." Danyel stroked Byela's throat. Mitka streaked through the window, his outline in raindrops showing against the curtains for a moment. How he pulled that stunt Dimitri was probably never going to figure out. Although the fact the curtains were in large part silk probably had something to do with it. Even though in winter it was even more interesting, as he then brought a huge gust of cold air in with him.
"Keep this one." Mitka did a barrel roll and crashed headfirst against Danyel's chest, to land on his lap, belly up, just like Byela.
"I think that's a hint." Danyel's shoulders shook as he laughed at Mitka's antics. "Although the curtain trick is interesting."
"He's usually pretty indifferent to physics." Dimitri got out the 'brush' he'd cobbled together for Mitka. It was a loosely stuffed tube covered in chamois on one side, silk on the other. "I got tired of his jealousy."
"Would you be jealous of a cat?" Danyel stroked the odd thing over Mitka's scales. It did polish them to a deep gleam, or maybe it was because the attention felt good and so Mitka shone from the inside. Dimitri wasn't always sure how such things went with him.
"Yes," Dimitri tugged a little too hard on one snarl. Byela nipped him. "I'm sorry." He scritched her throat for a moment. She went back to resembling a hairy dishcloth. Danyel was staring at him.
"Its nothing." Dimitri looked at the pinch. "She's very direct."
"I can tell." Danyel went back to stroking Mitka with his 'brush'. "I wish I'd gotten to see more of the city."
"You will." Dimitri promised. "Ah, before I forget." He slipped Byela off onto the bed. She stood up, turned around, then curled up with her tail over her nose. She was old enough to know better than to vanish just because her own personal brusher had decided to leave for a little bit.
He went into the other room, noting no one had been in here since he'd left. This had once been Vanya's office, with a small section behind a curtain wall with his safe and files.
Dimitri knelt in front of his grandfather's safe. It was matte black, appearing to suck the light in the room into the depths of the metal. It also showed fingerprints. A number of people had tried to open it, with little success, most likely.
"What are you doing?" Danyel followed him, bare feet making no noise on the soft floor. It was tile, of a sort last made centuries ago. Only this suite and one other at Sergei had the old tiles. Dimitri loved them, particularly on cold mornings, as they would soak up all heat in the winter, including any excess from the tiny cooler and hot plate in the kitchenette.
"The lost treasure of Sergei." He wiggled his eyebrows at Danyel. "I want to do this before turnover. I don't know if I'll be able to do it afterward." Dimitri closed his eyes, searching back through his memories.
The problem was that the combination to this safe wasn't a series of numbers, per se. It was actually a series of very specific gestures, as the tumblers were not only mechanical, but selyn sensitive.
Even with his Sergei memories, it took him four tries to get the shenned thing open. At last the final tumbler clicked into place. He tugged at the handle. The metal split, literally, with a hiss of protest. "Its probably been twenty years or more since anyone's gotten in here." Dimitri blinked at the light lining the deep cavity.
Gems of all eras were packed into silk lined shelves. Dimitri flipped through the little packages. There was billions of days worth of precious stones alone in here. "Why have all my ancestors been such pack rats?" He asked Danyel.
"Didn't want to sell off stuff that once meant something to someone?" Danyel gave a nageric shrug. "They're pretty rocks, I have to admit."
"Here, hold this." Dimitri handed him the first box.
"You're handing a known thief more wealth than he's ever seen in his life." Danyel sounded like he was about to faint.
"Don't drop it, please." Dimitri grinned up at him. "Oh, I probably won't sell any of them off either." He shrugged. "I feel as if I'm their keeper, not really their owner." He'd not thought as much before he'd opened the safe. It was far bigger inside than he'd thought, originally, but then the walls were very thin, hardly more than a cent, just enough to protect against fire.
Dimitri pulled out a slender case far at the back. There were scuff marks on the lid and catch, as if someone had tried to force it open. He tried the catch and it didn't budge. "Could you zlin this for me?" There was something odd about the latch.
"Yeah, sure," Danyel set down the box on the curtain wall and knelt next to Dimitri. The odd blue-green light made Danyel's heavy features look demonic. "Oh, its a selyn lock." He grinned. "I didn't do all my thieving before change over."
"I didn't think so." Dimitri chuckled softly. "So, can you open it?"
"I don't know." Danyel ran his fingers and tentacles over the latch. "Its very strange, as if there were some sort of self referential series to the pattern."
"There may well be." Dimitri took a deep breath and sank himself back into his memories. Century after century passed through and beneath his mental fingertips. Finally, back before the founding of Sergei, Dimitri caught the first reference to the case. "Its a bloody stasis case."
"Is that what I think it is?" Danyel looked like he was about to drop it.
"Don't drop it, and don't set it off." Dimitri whispered. "It'll make an implosion bomb look like a firecracker if you do." He wondered if he should stop, turn around, put it back in the vault and forget he'd seen it. That's what centuries of his ancestors had done.
"I want to zlin." Danyel's eyes glittered in the dim light.
"Then don't disturb me for a moment." Dimitri went back farther and farther, until all he could get were generalities, never specifics, back to the second century after the founding, when Rodina had been so very young and fair and strong in her children. When the Demenses were almost countless and new ones forming every day. It was the time of myth, for everyone but Sergei.
Dimitri finally tracked down the craftsman who built the box. He watched her place the stasis unit, with its logic violating self feeding power supply. Then the catch. "You wily old bitch." He laughed. "I would have never, ever guessed that."
"What?" Danyel asked, looking at him as if he'd gone mad again, or required another of his shots.
"The catch is simple. You can't open it if you aren't Ferris." Dimitri shook his head. "There were a lot of people with southerner's syndrome when the Demense were founded. There's also a reason why that case can only be opened by someone with southerner's. Open it." Dimitri gave him the combination at one/one-hundredth speed.
"If you're sure." Danyel flicked the latch. It popped open, as if waiting for him. With the odd way Sergei memories worked, it may well have been. Dimitri wasn't going to go fishing for that useless piece of information.
"Open it," Dimitri murmured. Danyel did and gasped. "I've never, ever seen them before." The pure nageric beauty of the selynstones took his breath away. Distant relatives of the other living stones, these had a purpose.
"What are they?" He held up the earpiece.
"A handfasting gift, for a Ferris." Dimitri supplied, unable to turn his eyes away from the shimmering, light absorbing gems.
Mitka came up to them and sniffed the air. "Cold!"
"Can you touch it?" Dimitri asked.
"No," he shook his head, backing away. "Those are wrong. Those are very wrong. They shouldn't be here. They're bad."
"Hush," Danyel put the ear piece back in the case. Mitka was still backing away, his tail wrapped around his body and wings tight to his sides. "Its gone now."
"Are you going to wear it?" Mitka panted.
"No," he met Danyel's hand as they closed the box together.
"I wouldn't do that to you." Danyel added.
"We'll get through this together, the three of us." Dimitri took his shivering nager into his arms and tried to calm him back down. "Do you want to look at the other pretties?"
"There were no other kinds of stones in that case. Just the black ones."
"You can't keep anything else with selyn stones. They will destroy them."
"They destroy people, too." Mitka shivered violently, as if freezing cold.
"By greed," Dimitri put the case in the back of the safe, this time covering it with a bit of white silk, so it faded into the background. "If anyone knew Sergei still had some living selynstones, they'd take the Demense apart stone by stone until they got to them."
"Do you think the Veiled know about them?" Danyel's hidden question of why he didn't destroy them was as plain as his nager.
"Yes and I'm not going to be foolish enough to put even the smallest of those under a hammer. Only an ancient could destroy a selynstone and live to tell of it."
"What about leaving them out of the case?" Danyel asked.
"We'd go with them." Dimitri closed his eyes against the call of the beautiful, deadly stones. "Mitka's right, they're the most dangerous things I've ever seen. I'd never thought to learn about selynstones, since it was said the last ones died out at with the rise of Maryam." He wondered if there were any in her vault, which his father had never been able to break into. "Shen, I don't know Danyel, I hadn't expected to find anything like those in here."
"Why was the case locked to anything but a Ferris?"
"They were created to allow people with southerner's to walk freely among the rest of us. They guard their wearer against all non-physical attacks." Dimitri stared at the square of white. "You could take Cadek's or Sevrin's strongest high field blows and shrug them off as if they were nothing."
"Which was probably quite valuable at one time." Danyel pointed out.
"I just hope my finding them doesn't mean we'll need them again." Dimitri felt the chill in his hands, even still. "There is a huge mythology surrounding all three of the living stones."
"The one who wears them all shall be Lord and Ruler of the World. All shall bow down before his invincible might and give over their nations to his dominion." The tones of the Veiled, in Fellowship, were unmistakable.
"Get out of here." Dimitri would have slammed the safe shut if it hadn't been for the fortune in gems out of it. "This is no place for thee." He let the Fellowship touch his own mind, showing them he would never give over the stones.
"Then your heir shall wear them." The Veiled one snarled. "For you shall die!" This time the strike was no threat. A slender, cream colored box flew through the air between them. Danyel yanked him down. Mitka covered them both with his wings. Even so, the implosion blew out Dimitri's eardrums and nearly sucked his lungs out through his nose. As it was, by the time he caught his breath, he had to mop a good sized pool of blood off his shirt.
*I'm glad you can hear me like this.* He didn't dare turn around.
*Me too* Fortunately for Danyel, despite the fact his mind voice was faster than any other Dimitri'd ever heard, it didn't squeak. Except for times like right now. They turned in unison to face Mitka's trembling body.
"Are you going to be all right?" He asked with his mind, but didn't see any harm in speaking. At least once the bleeding in his sinuses had slowed to a trickle. He wiped the blood from his ears as well.
"Nasty, nasty," Danyel shook his head, then sagged against Dimitri. "Why am I still conscious?"
"Because the trap is a physical one." Dimitri coaxed Mitka into lowering his wings. The contents of the case had survived, obviously. Problem was, the case hadn't. The selynstones hadn't been physical enough to be crushed with half the room.
Danyel held Mitka as tightly as he could. "I'm so sorry." He wished there were something he could do for him. Mitka was shaking all over, staring at the jewelry on the ash gray rug.
"You did what you had to." His gave one last shudder, then licked Danyel's face. The familiar gesture reassured him in a world gone completely crazy. The whole room was freezing cold, far more so than the chill of the day. A piece of green glass was frosted so thickly he could barely see the original color.
He tapped it with his toe and it shattered into countless pieces. "I think I prefer explosives." Danyel looked at all the gems he'd so thoughtlessly left out, now scattered all over the floor.
"You did what you had to." Dimitri repeated Mitka's words, as a kind of rote saying. "You saved all our lives."
"What was that?" He shook his head. Danyel was getting really tired of headaches, although this one had a distinctly different cast to it. As if someone had physically turned his brain insideout. He removed the kerchief from his nose, hoping the bleeding had finally stopped. When he looked at Dimitri he didn't pay a lot of attention to the mess underfoot in getting to him.
"It was one of the Veiled, I'd guess their most recent leader." Dimitri ran his hand through his hair, dislodging bits of plaster to join the gray ruin of the rug. With each step, Danyel left deep footprints crushed into the pile.
"Not anymore." Danyel gave a thought to displaying need and then discarded it. "Dimitri, first priority ..."
"Yes," his eyes were so bloodshot they zlinned boiled.
"Get the shenned gems and get out of here." He held Dimitri's battered face in his hands.
"I have a better one." He leaned down and licked Danyel's lips open. It didn't take a lot of persuasion. He hummed and melted against Dimitri's massive strength, giving to him as he'd wanted to for well over a month now. It wasn't a long kiss, as he couldn't breathe and kiss at the same time, but his field and soul twined with Dimitri's long enough to banish all his fears, for at least that moment in time.
Dimitri's eyes shone, despite the massive bruising already making an appearance around them. "You're a mess, Danyel Ferris."
"I've been hanging around you, you big bad Sharm Lord." He hefted Mitka onto his shoulder, where he belonged. "I'm glad you were here." Danyel didn't want to think of what condition they'd have been in without Mitka's protection.
"I couldn't stop the vacuum effects." He slumped, cooling in his upset. Danyel didn't want anything else cold around him.
"You stopped the cold." He dug his fingers into the back of Mitka's neck, right where the muscles were snarled the hardest. "We'd have been in far worse shape without you."
"You also saved us from the nageric component from the master's attack." Dimitri stared at the selynstones for nearly as long as Mitka had. "They're so very beautiful." He knelt. The floor warped and cracked beneath his weight. "This room is going to be useless for a decade." He glanced back at the desk.
"Can any of it be salvaged?" The workmanship of the huge carved desk was exquisite, as had been all the furnishings, most now splinters scattered throughout the room.
"Some," he pulled a square of cloth from his pocket and scooped up the bracelet and earring. "Why both, I wonder."
Danyel took th