Magic's Promise

Lores should see him now, he thought grimly, putting his arm around Tashir's shoulders and letting him weep himself out with Vanyel supporting him. His own anger was quite gone, and he was recalling his desire to make Tashir hurt as much as he did with a sick, shamed feeling in the pit of his stomach. Then Tashir turned to cry on Vanyel's shoulder, and it was all Vanyel could do to keep from losing control again, this time for a very different reason.

Finally the youngster pulled away, and Vanyel let him go. He walked back to his former seat or. the bench at the farther side of the porch and slumped there, his head in his hands, not really thinking, only aching.

Because Tashir was so like Tylendel.

Holding him while he wept had been like reliving the past. The dead past. ...

Hesitant footsteps behind him, and a shy sniffle.

Vanyel wished with all his heart that the boy would go - find Jervis, go back to his room, or seek solace at the festivities, anything but stay here with that far-too-familiar face, providing a ready - made knife to the heart, and not even knowing that he was doing so.

'Vanyel?' came the halting whisper. 'Vanyel, who was that man? The one that disappeared when I startled you? I thought it was me, at first, but he was different.'

'It was just an illusion,' Vanyel replied, rubbing his temples, staring at the dark blot of his own feet against the gray stone. 'I was practicing.'

The youngster hovered just beside him. 'But who is it?' he persisted. 'It wasn't me, and it wasn't Uncle Vedric. And why were you casting a seeming of him?'

'Tylendel,' Vanyel replied shortly. 'His name was Tylendel. He's dead. He-was-my lover.'

And half of my soul and all of my heart.

Tashir started back at that, out of touching distance, projecting clear revulsion and fear so clearly that Vanyel felt it like a blow.

Vanyel's temper snapped.

“Dammit,” he snarled, rounding on the youngster, 'will you not act like I'm going to pounce on you and rape you? I don't make a habit of hitting attractive young men over the head and dragging them off to my bed, no matter who they look like!'

Tashir put out a hand as if to keep him away.

Vanyel could not longer control his temper or his words. “You came to me not all that long ago,' he snarled, 'and I'll thank you to remember that I didn't take advantage of the situation! So you've changed your mind about being shaych; fine, I have no quarrel with you or with that, that is your decision and yours alone to make. I have no intention of making you change your mind. But kindly remember that I'm a human being, and I lost somebody -'

He fought the words past the grief. '- lost somebody I loved more than anyone else on earth. He was my lifebonded, and I will be without him for the rest of my life. You're not the only one in the world who's alone! You're not the only one who's suffered!'

He turned away abruptly, got up, and stalked stiffly to the stone railing, staring out into the lattice of bare tree branches and trying to keep from breaking down completely. Behind him he could hear Tashir shuffling his feet, the sound betraying uncertainty.

Go away, boy. Leave me alone. Leave me to mourn my dead, my beloved, and go chase my niece. Just leave me.

But the footsteps shuffled nearer, hesitated, then came nearer still, until Tashir stood at his right elbow. Vanyel stared out ahead of him, at the branches, and the stars that seemed to be caught there.

'Was he a Herald?' The voice was timid.

'No. A trainee.'

Stop driving knives in me. Go away.

'How long ago?'

'Twelve years, tonight.'