geyser, hitting his face as Julija retaliated by splashing him. Her laughter teased at his senses. He loved the way it made him feel. He had gone through his life occasionally hearing laughter, but not really understanding it. He was far too old to remember anything about his childhood or life in their village before he’d gone on his first hunts as a slayer.
“I love your tattoo, Isai,” she informed him. “It’s beautiful. All the other writings on you? What are they?”
“Silliness on my part,” he said hastily. “And for another day.”
“Which only makes me more curious.”
He sent her a small grin. “We really have to get after Iulian. We do not want any member of your family to find him ahead of us.”
“Anatolie has said he will send Barnabas.” All playfulness was wiped from her face and tone. There was fear there, although she tried to hide it from him.
“I hope Barnabas does come,” Isai admitted freely. “I wish to meet this man.”
She gave a delicate little shudder and wrapped her arms around herself. “No, believe me, you do not. He appears to be quite the virtuous gentleman. Very scholarly. In fact, he’s almost beatific, but I can assure you, he’s the devil himself.”
“He is still Anatolie’s puppet, Julija,” he pointed out, keeping his voice deliberately mild. Every instinct told him to hold her, but her expression was too still. Too frightened.
“Please don’t underestimate him, Isai. Please, when you meet him, and you will, don’t fall under his spell. He’s very good at fooling people. I’m not easy. I see through illusions as a rule. He made me doubt myself.”
“That was his purpose, sívamet. That doesn’t make him more powerful than you. It makes him cunning. You also have to remember, you were set up beautifully. Your father went so far as to include your brothers in that class. Had he not, you might have been much warier, but the fact that he wanted all three of you to take the class caught you off guard.”
She rinsed her hair one more time, more he knew to give herself time and separate herself from the conversation than because her hair needed it. Anytime Barnabas came into the conversation, she retreated. Isai would have to find a way around that.
“You said there was one more thing. I said two and you answered my questions,” Julija said as she once more sat across from him. “What was important to discuss before we go find that book?”
He nodded, studying her face. She was still holding herself very stiff. He shrugged. “We can talk about it later.”
She shook her head. “Not if it matters to you.”
“It matters,” he admitted. “I think it is very important.”
“I’m listening.”
He saw that she was. “As a rule, Carpathians do not scar.” He plunged right in. “The wounds must be deep for that to happen, but I have scars everywhere. I have lived a long time and been wounded countless times. Some were wounds that would have killed others. I survived, but those times remain on my body. Do you mind the scars?” he challenged. “I need you to tell me the truth. Do you find them abhorrent to look at?”
She looked shocked. “No. Absolutely not. They’re part of you. Part of who you are. Your past shapes you, Isai. You might not think so because you didn’t feel anything at the time, but your emotions were there, buried deep, and you were affected by every single thing that happened. If you weren’t, you would never have entered that monastery. Why would you think that? Have I done something to make you think I can’t look at your scars?”
“You seem to think your own scars are so repugnant that you need illusion to keep me or anyone else from seeing them.”
She had half risen out of the water, but she sat back so that the water rocked back and forth in the small basin. “It’s different.”
Isai studied her face. Color had swept under her skin, leaving her naturally pale face a delicate rose. “Why? I do not understand. Those scars are part of you and your past, the past that shaped you, just as mine are a part of me. What would be different?”
She was silent a moment, flicking her fingers in the water so little drops shot in an arcing bridge from her side of the pool to his, almost as if she was flicking him away, or at least his words. She was so close he could