a hot cup of sweet tea just now.
He carried the other cup over to Jermayan.
'Drink this. You'll feel better.'
'My thanks.' Jermayan took the cup from Kellen's hand. His fingers were icy where they brushed Kellen's own, and his hand trembled.
'You should come over by the fire where it's warmer,' Kellen said. 'You've lost a lot of blood, and you'll be cold.'
'Soon,' Jermayan promised. He drank, eyes closing.
'We ought to have died back there,' he said after a moment.
'I nearly got us killed,' Kellen said bitterly.
'No.' Jermayan reached out his hand with an effort and placed it on Kellen's arm. 'It was I who nearly got us killed, riding bareheaded and unshielded as if I went to bring in the spring-tide, though knowing that I rode through unfriendly lands with an unblooded Knight-batchelor who had not yet won shield or spurs. Against six men and two Centaurs… it is only because you are what you are that we are here now, Kellen Tavadon. And beyond that: you have put yourself under obligation to the Powers to ransom my life from Death's cold halls. That is a gift of which I am unworthy.'
Kellen wasn't really sure what to say to that. 'Well, it's not like I could just go back and tell Idalia I'd misplaced you,' he said awkwardly. 'She wouldn't like that.'
'There is much of your sister in you,' Jermayan said mournfully. 'Her grace, her nobility of spirit. From the moment I first saw her in Ondola-deshiron I knew it was she for whom my heart had waited through all the long decades of my life. Love among the Children of Leaf and Star is no light thing. It is for ever and always. I would not have troubled her with the burden of my heart, did I not know that hers inclined to me as well. Yet she denies what we both know to be the truth.' He lowered his head and sighed deeply.
I don't want to hear this, Kellen thought uncomfortably. And yet—
I want them to be happy, and I know damned good and well that neither of them is ever going to be happy without the other.
'I understand that she does not wish to leave me alone and forsaken when the brief span of her mortal years is run, but cannot one so wise understand that I am already alone who has once gazed into violet eyes the color of evening mists? I shall be forever alone without her, my Idalia—would she deny me even the memories of the brief summer's afternoon of our love to warm me through the long cold winter I must spend without her?'
Uric. This was getting more uncomfortable by the moment.
'Every moment we spend apart is filled with thoughts of her,' Jermayan continued, with a curiously restrained passion. 'It is she who completes me, Kellen—would she be so unfeeling as to refuse me the transfiguration for which her own soul must cry as well? Without love, all the treasures of the world are ashes, and the Children of Leaf and Star know that true love comes only once into every life. How is it that she cannot see that, who can see so much else so clearly? We are meant to be together. It matters not how brief the time, only that it is filled with joy.'
'I think the soup is ready,' Kellen said hurriedly, scuttling backward toward the fire.
He didn't know if Jermayan had ever said anything like that to Idalia—if he had, it would be just one more good reason for her to not want to have anything more to do with him, by Kellen's reckoning—but he was completely sure he didn't want Jermayan saying anything more of it to him. It was bad enough having to read things like that in wondertales— and Kellen didn't; he skipped over those parts—but it was a thousand times worse having to hear someone saying them about your sister.
Grace —nobility of spirit—soul must cry—filled with joy — I didn't think anybody really talked like that! Kellen thought in disgust. He must be running a fever from that healing I did.
He glanced up and saw Shalkan watching him. From the expression on the unicorn's face, Shalkan thought something was pretty funny, and Kellen didn't want to inquire too closely about what it might be, Kellen thought in acute discomfort. He'd have been disgusted if it had been another human who was blathering on like that, but, well—Elves just seemed to talk like that naturally.
Like that kind of thing can be spouted off casually.
As he filled the bowls, Kellen cast about in his mind for a subject that would distract Jermayan from the topic of Idalia.
When he had Jermayan comfortably seated in front of the small fire, Kellen deftly took control of the conversation before Jermayan could start talking again.
