again.

"Magelia!"

* * *

Chapter 1

Magiere sensed the instant of dawn, though the inn's small room was dark and shuttered. It called her from sleep. This first night with Leesil in her arms lingered in her memory, his shoulder beneath her cheek and her outstretched palm on his chest beneath the blankets. She still feared for him, but perhaps if she kept him always this close, she could keep him safe even from herself.

A more troublesome thought wormed into her awareness. She fought it down, recalling the scent and taste and touch of Leesil in the night, until they'd settled into warm slumber. But the thought wouldn't leave, and perhaps in part it was Leesil's closeness that fed it strength.

Magelia—and Nein'a.

Two mothers waited. One dead, but the second still lived, or so she hoped—for Leesil's sake.

Magiere opened her eyes to see her fingertips peeking from beneath the blanket's edge across Leesil's chest. When she lifted her gaze past his shoulder, still bandaged from their battles, she found his amber eyes looking down at her.

"You're awake, " she said.

"I like watching you sleep. It's the only time you're peaceful. "

Did he always have to make jokes? Magiere tried to sit up, but his arms closed around her.

"Not yet, " he said. "It's early. I don't think the sun is even up. "

"It will be soon, " she lied, and relaxed back against him.

Her dhampir nature had grown more pronounced in recent days. She felt the sun's presence even when indoors. In the night, the heat Leesil stirred in her made her heightened senses open wide. With only a sliver of moonlight through the window's shutter crack, she'd clearly seen his white-blond hair, narrow face, and lithe body. His amber eyes, almond shaped from his half-elven heritage, were locked upon her. At most times, her unnatural senses frightened or sickened her for what they revealed, but in that night, she hadn't cared so long as all she sensed was him. She was in Leesil's arms, and little else mattered.

Except for two mothers, who'd each left her child with a dark and bloody heritage.

"Did you sleep all right?" she asked.

"A little, " he answered.

She knew he might be lying. He often had trouble sleeping, now that he'd stopped drinking. This, as well, was linked to a mother he'd thought dead for years. Magiere peered about the room.

"Where's Chap? Did he stay out all night?"

Leesil smiled. "For once, he showed some manners. "

Magiere scowled. She rolled over to reach for the sulfur stick on the bedside table and lit the one candle resting there. The night before, they'd taken this room at the first inn outside Bela, the capital city of Belaski. The three of them had often slept outdoors in past years. Their dog, Chap, would be well enough on his own, but it bothered Magiere that she hadn't thought of him all night.

She rolled back to find Leesil leaning up on one elbow above her. He slid his fingers between hers, a striped pattern of flesh in the mingling. Half-elf and half-undead, they were a strange contrast with his golden-brown skin and white-blond hair and her blood-tinted black tresses and pale flesh. A mischievous smile crossed Leesil's lips, and Magiere lost all concern for the moment. Chap could wait a little longer.

The candlelight revealed their surroundings more clearly.

It was all simple, neat, and pleasant, but it wasn't home— wasn't the Sea Lion tavern in Miiska. Her falchion leaned against the bedside table, close within reach beside the bed on which they lay. Their travel chest and belongings sat under the window, reminding her that soon they would be on the move again.

"What?" he asked.

"Another journey, " she answered.

Leesil settled back on the bed, comfortably close as he brushed stands of hair off her face.

"The sages gave me some supplies, but as we get farther north and into the Warlands, restocking could get difficult. More so as we move on to the northern mountains and the Crown Range between there and the elven lands. We'll need more before we leave. "

Magiere hesitated. How could she make him face her new choice?

In youth, he'd fled from slavery as a warlord's assassin, knowing his escape would cause his own parents' execution. For years afterward, he drank himself to sleep each night to smother guilt-spawned nightmares. Even Magiere hadn't known, until he'd confessed but a few nights ago. Then an assassin named Sgaile—one of the elven anmaglahk—had come to take Leesil's life. Leesil's mother had betrayed her own