calling up his courage, and spoke the words he had come to say. 'I want you to run away with me.'
For a long moment she didn't react, not in her face, her posture, or even her mood. Then her emotions flooded over him. He couldn't sort it all out, but two responses came through strong and clear: She both feared and hoped he meant what he said.
'It's true.' He could hardly believe that he had actually asked her. 'Come with me.'
'But we can't.' She drew his hands together and held them as if they were a treasure. 'Your parents will bring us home. With their magics, they will easily find us.'
Vyrl had long ago given up trying to convince his friends that technology had nothing to do with magic. 'I know they can find us. But I have a… well, a — a solution.'
'Solution?' Her emotions were clearer now: apprehension that she would lose him; uncertainty in how he felt about her compared to the mysterious adult who had trespassed in their midst; a desire for him that she didn't fully understand; and the shyness that came with that desire, a self-conscious recognition of Vyrl's masculinity, an awareness she had hidden this past year by tormenting him with mischief.
Emboldened, he plunged ahead before he lost his courage. 'By the time they find us, we will be married.' Then he stopped, terrified. What if she refused him? He would die of shame, curl up into a ball the size of a bubble pod and blow away on the wind, never to be heard of again.
Lily stared at him. Then she gave an uneasy laugh. 'You're teasing me.'
'I'm not.' Vyrl raised her hands and pressed his lips against her knuckles. He spoke with all the persuasion he could muster. 'Be my wife, Lily. You're the only one I've ever wanted, the only one I ever will. Say yes.' He had gone too far to turn back now. 'Tell me you will marry me. Tonight.'
She let go of his hands and covered her cheeks with her hands. When she said nothing, he added, 'I would court you, but we haven't time, I'm afraid. You have to decide now.'
Instead of accepting or refusing him, she just lowered her hands. He could no longer catch individual emotions in the tumult of her thoughts. Why wouldn't she speak? Had he offended her? Maybe he had been a fool, presuming where he had no place. Chagrined, he felt his face heating.
'You're always so impatient,' she chided, her voice quavering behind her bravado. 'This is worse than the time you pushed me into the lake.'
'You would have taken the entire summer to jump if I hadn't pushed you.' His voice softened. 'Be brave now, Lily. Say yes. We may never have another chance. Everyone is busy arranging my marriage. General Majda needs heirs and she's thirty-eight, so she can't wait much longer.'
Lily's face changed slowly, her expression unlike any she had shown him before. No imp this, no child. This Lily looked… older. When she spoke, her voice caught. 'Then, Havyrl Valdoria, I–I would be honored to marry you.'
Yes! She had said yes! He wanted to shout her answer to the sky, and he would have if it hadn't meant her father would come thundering in here, threatening to skewer him for invading his daughter's bedroom. He took her hands again and spoke in a low, intense voice. 'I will make you a good husband, I swear it.'
Despite her best intentions to look somber, naughtiness crept into her voice. 'But how do I know? You must give me a sample.' She put her arms around his neck and tilted her pretty face to his. 'Unless you're afraid to kiss me…'
He grinned, rubbing his hands along her back. 'I'm not afraid, you rascal. But we have to leave. We need to cross the Backbone Mountains tonight and find a Bard in Rillia to marry us. If we ask one in the Dalvador Plains, he will probably recognize me and refuse to do the ceremony without talking to our parents. But I look at least two years older than I am, Lily, and that's old enough for us to marry without parental consent. If we go to the Rillian Vales, we can have it done.' Vyrl didn't care that in the interstellar culture of his mother's people, he was many, many years away from the age of majority. On Lyshriol, he was almost an adult. Lily nodded, her eyes glimmering. 'Then let us go.'
The war-lyrine raced across the plains, thrilling in its speed, releasing its pent-up energy much as Vyrl did when he ran through the endless grasses. Unlike the graceful, slender lyrine he had shown Devon yesterday, this powerful animal had a massive build and a violet coat, almost black in the moonlight. Its muscles rippled as it ran. The Dalvador Plains spread everywhere, an ocean of translucent reeds blued by the moonlight, as if enchanted. Behind them, the village of Dalvador dwindled in the plains; ahead, still a ride of a few hours, the Backbone Mountains speared into the sky.
Vyrl sat astride the lyrine with Lily in front of him, his arms around her waist, his hands gripped on the reins. The Lavender Moon rode high in the sky, bathing them in violet radiance and drawing glints of light from the lyrine's horns. The crescent of the Blue Moon hung above the horizon.
Moonglaze had the full liquid gait of a well-bred lyrine, his muscles bioengineered to even out his motions, making his run so smooth that Vyrl and Lily could speak in full sentences even with their mount racing across the plains. Vyrl's mother had expressed surprise to his father at the poetic names his people gave their war mounts but it made sense to Vyrl, who had been raised on Lyshriol. His mother's people seemed overly pragmatic to him.
Leaning against Vyrl, Lily pulled her cloak tight. 'I've never ridden on such a glorious animal before.'
'I'm not surprised. The great stallions like Moonglaze let few people touch them.' Vyrl didn't want to think what his father would do when he found out his son had absconded with his best war-lyrine. But Moonglaze had always taken to Vyrl, and tonight he needed the animal's strength.
Moonglaze had gone to 'war' only a few times; conflicts on Lyshriol were minor, more like arguments than combat. But beyond this simple world, an interstellar civilization teemed with life and violence, caught in a world- slagging war that most people here could never comprehend. Vyrl knew that to survive, his mother's people needed military leaders much as Devon and Althor.
Vyrl had no wish to fight; he wanted only to raise crops and babies with Lily. Although his father had trained him in the use of a sword and bow, he seemed content with Vyrl's preference for farming, certainly the most prevalent lifestyle in Dalvador. However, Vyrl was the only farmer here who wanted a doctorate in agriculture. He could do it without leaving home, as a virtual student, if he could just buckle down to his studies. Lily would help in that; she always seemed to settle him.
As Devon's consort, he could earn as many doctorates as he wanted. And then? Skolian nobility didn't farm. He might like research; he didn't really know. But it wasn't his dream. He had no grievance with Devon; she seemed an honorable person. Even so, he could never imagine life in the Imperial Court. She wanted the innocent farm boy, but if she took him away from the land and life he loved, it would destroy him.
If he hadn't loved another woman, perhaps he could have accepted the arranged marriage. It would have given him a great gift, freeing him to pursue a life he had never dared imagine could be his. He loved to dance and had trained all his life, but only in private where no one except his family and off-world teachers knew. It wasn't accepted among people here that men dance, not under any circumstances, not even at festivals.
It didn't matter. Without this woman in his arms, his life would be infinitely poorer. By the time their parents learned what he and Lily had done, it would be too late; they would have consummated their marriage. Their wedding would be public knowledge. Devon could no longer wed him even if his parents annulled his union.
Vyrl pulled Lily close, and she settled against him. He knew he had made the right choice in asking her to marry him.
He just hoped it didn't cause an interstellar crisis.
Snow pummeled Vyrl and Lily as they rode through the mountain storm, an unexpected tempest after the clear weather down in the plains. He kept his arms and cloak protectively around Lily. His backpack, their most valuable possession right now, was securely lashed in the travel bags Moonglaze carried.
'— there!' The wind caught Lily's voice and tore it away from his ears.
He leaned his head over hers. 'What?'
'Need shelter… we could be…' Gales stole the rest of her words.
'Be what?'
'Hurt,' Lily said.
Vyrl clenched the reins. Inside his gloves, his fingers had gone numb. Had he brought his love out here only to lose her to the fury of a blue storm? No! He would never let it happen. He would die first — yes, he would — before he allowed anything to hurt Lily. Not that he was sure how his dying would help matters, but that was how he felt.
Lily was right, though; if they didn't locate shelter, they could find themselves in serious trouble. He couldn't
