Almost, he asked if she wished to go there—to her office—but it seemed to him that she had something more to say on her topic, and held his tongue.
“My brother,” she continued, after a moment. “Ran Eld had used to . . . find pleasure . . . in coming into my room after the house was asleep, and, and emptying my drawers and shelves. Of course, fragile things broke, and books were sometimes . . . damaged. Those things that remain are clothes, and—easily replaced,” she finished resolutely.
Anger tightened his fingers on the stick, and a sad pity it was that Ran Eld Caylon's throat did not rest beneath his hand. He took a breath, calming himself, and glanced aside, seeing wide green eyes watching his face carefully.
“If a copilot may be so bold,” he said, keeping his tone cool in consideration of her concern, “your brother was a monster.”
There was a pause, as if she weighed this judgment. He waited, wondering what the outcome of her thought would be.
“Yes,” she said eventually, turning her head to study the passenger's viewscreen. “Yes, I fear that he was.”
“Do you wish to go to your office?” Daav asked, eying the readout on the driver's screens. The deciding turn was two blocks distant—right for Chonselta Technical College, left for the spaceport.
“Not today, I thank you; it is the long break, and what is there is safe enough for now.”
He nodded. “We to the spaceport, then, Pilot.”
“That sounds—excellent,” she replied and fell silent once more.
Daav did not press her, having thoughts of his own to pursue. The more he heard of Aelliana's life, clan-bound, the more he wondered that she had managed to survive at all. All very well for Master Kestra to praise her strength, but the horrors under which she had struggled to thrive—surely, he thought, she might have been given some small comfort?
Instead, she had been given a kinsman bent on doing her what damage he might, and who reveled in her pain. She could count on no moment of privacy; hold in fondness no fragile geegaw; be certain that a walk down the main hallway of her very clanhouse would not result in bruises—or worse.
His anger was building again. Grimly, he brought his heartbeat down, smoothed his breathing.
Small wonder she had spoken so distantly of her daughter, he thought, remembering how cold she had seemed, entirely unlike the woman he knew. With her brother on the lookout always to harm her, how could she regard her child? The best she might do for the girl was disdain her, and hope that Ran Eld Caylon never looked in her direction.
“Daav?” Soft as it was, Aelliana's voice jolted him.
He turned his head briefly and offered her a smile.
“Aelliana?”
She extended a hand, rested it on his arm; withdrew with a sigh.
“You—I feel that you are distressed. I regret it. If it had been possible, I would have gone alone, but—” She gave him a smile, well-intended, but wavering visibly at the edges. “Truly, van'chela, it was only the knowledge that you were in-house that gave me the courage to resist Mizel.”
He blinked and glanced over to her, meeting eyes in which worry was plain. And yet—she felt? Had she informed herself of the state of his unruly emotions through that fleeting touch? Hope rose, twined with confusion, and a measure of disquiet. Perhaps Master Kestra's estimation of her results had been pessimistic? Perhaps Aelliana would, after all, know him as her lifemate? Yet, to subject her—or anyone!—to an intimate knowledge of his thoughts and feelings . . .
“Daav?”
“Forgive me,” he said. “I am stupid today. Notwithstanding, I think we came away from Mizel as gracefully as possible. It was well done of you to invoke Guild law.”
“It was all I could think to do, though it cannot, you know, stand against kin.” she said, sounding rueful. “Cat- ice, I thought it, even for Sinit.”
“Thin as it was, it bore us up, and no one's melant'i has taken harm.”
“Excepting Mizel's.” Aelliana sighed. “She offered me nadelm's duty.”
“You should have been nadelm all along!” he said, more sharply than he had intended.
“Yes, my grandmother thought so, as well. But you misunderstand, van'chela. She offered the duty; I did not hear that she offered the rank.” Abruptly, she pointed at her screen.
“Daav—the turn for the ferry station!”
“Ah, but we have no need to depend upon public ferries.”
She turned to him, lips parted. “You have a ship here?”
“Korval has a yard here,” he said, shifting for the turn.
“It keeps slipping away from me,” she said, slowly, “that you are Korval.”
“Yes, but just at the moment, I am your copilot,” he answered, guiding the car through the gate and gliding to a stop before the yard office. He powered the vehicle down, and pressed his thumb against the ID screen. “Master Fis Lyr was kind enough to lend me the use of the yard's car. Now, if you are game for a small walk?”
“Even a long one,” she said, suddenly gay. “So long as we need not walk to Solcintra.”
“Now, that is too long a walk,” he said, popping his door.
