HM02 House of Moons by K.D. Wentworth

marry a son of that House. He had to find her and make sure she was safe.
    He stripped off his sodden breeches and shirt and threw them in the corner, then pulled on a loose robe. Kneeling, he started a fire in the small hearth. Once it was properly kindled, he crossed to the narrow bed that had been his ever since he had first come to Shael’donn, a frightened Lowlands boy of seven. Although he’d rated more luxurious quarters as he’d moved up through the ranks, he’d retained this room, preferring its familiarity.
    He pulled a fine-linked chain over his head and fingered the gold ring threaded upon it, an ancient signet of the House of Tal: oak leaves of solid silver, chased with gold and studded with tiny green koral stones. His face warmed as he remembered the touch of her fingers as she had folded his palm around it in return for his gift—the Monmart emblem of flying caestrals, though his had not been half so fine. Try as he might to feel differently, it still rankled him that Tal’ayn was one of the Highest Houses while Monmart’ayn was little more than a Lowlands farm. Despite the fact that Haemas never seemed to care, he had always felt the distinction standing between them.
    Stretching out on his back on the bed, he closed the ring into his fist for a focus and shut his eyes. Letting the sensations of his body fade from his awareness, he began to count each breath, setting his mind adrift. With each breath, he let more tension drain from his body, soaking up the faint emanations of her that still permeated the ring: her strength, her determination and stubbornness, and still, even after all this time, her sorrow. He pictured her somber expression ... the sense of duty that ruled her even when he would have had it otherwise ... the steady regard for him that he had come to count upon.
    Finally he loosed his mind into the gray betweenness, seeking the bit of brightness that would signal his quarry. Time passed unnoticed as he spread himself over the Highlands like a sheet of water, growing thinner and thinner until his energy reserves began to fail and he knew he would have to either give up or face the consequences of overextending himself.
    He wondered if she had gone to the Lowlands, perhaps to visit the ilseri, in which case he would have to follow her over the mountains in order to find her.
    Then he caught something, the barest whisper against his mind, a faint glimmer of her familiar silvery presence, but muted or altered in some way. Something was wrong. He concentrated on following that slight contact through the grayness, holding on as if it were his own life-force.
    She was there, still in the Highlands, but off in a remote corner, far away from the House of Moons and Shael’donn. Holding on to the tenuous line, he gathered the shreds of his remaining energy and emerged from the nebulousness of Search. For a split second, he had the impression of a tall house, crumbling gray stone, and fear mingled with mocking laughter, then a bolt of lightning flashed, shearing the precarious link. Suddenly adrift, he cried out, then spun off helplessly into blackness.
    * * *
    “I won’t go!” Axia rubbed her arms, then knelt to shove another log onto the guttering fire. “If you want this information so damn badly, go yourself!”
    Diren tipped the heavy mug up and drained the last of the mead, then held the pewter up in the firelight to examine it more closely. “Such fine work,” he murmured. “What do you suppose it cost?”
    “More than we’ll ever have!” Axia grimaced at her younger brother’s strange expression, remembering another golden-haired man who had sat in that same seat and stared off in much the same bewildering manner; sometimes Diren reminded her too much of their late father for comfort.
    “Not after tomorrow.” Diren nodded at the flames dancing over the logs. The light played on his fair hair. “Not after you go back and learn more about the latteh.” His eyes left the fire