“Mmmm…” Rejar rubbed his chin against Lilac’s shoulder.

The soft nap of her cotton chemise, not the velvet skin he anticipated, brushed his jaw. He frowned. “Why are you wearing this?”

Lilac yawned sleepily, tucking her derriere closer to the warm of the male body behind her. “I’m chilly.”

“With me keeping you so close?” He tease-kissed the nape of her neck, drawing her tighter into the circle of his arms.

Lilac smiled. “I suppose it was all that dampness yesterday; I feel a bit achy as well.”

Concerned, Rejar raised up on one elbow. “Was I too rigorous for you?”

Lilac gazed at him over her shoulder. “No, Nickolai; not at all—you were very gentle.” She patted the hand still curved around her waist.

Rejar was not convinced. He cupped her chin, examining her closely in the morning light. “You look pale, souk-souk. Are you sure I have not worn you out?”

Lilac giggled. She couldn’t help it. Imagine a man being concerned he had been too satisfying! “Well, if you did, I can’t think of a better way to wear oneself out, can you?”

Chagrinned, Rejar smiled softly in agreement.

She sat up in bed, stretching. “I feel deliciously weary. In fact, I think I shall go out to the garden in this glorious sunshine”—she gazed at him coyly from beneath her lashes—“unless you have something better for me to do?”

Rejar laughed. How pretty she looks, he thought, with her hair tumbling over her shoulders and those forest green, Aviaran eyes twinkling at me…

“Best you go out in the garden; I must be careful how ‘delicious’ I make you feel.” He planted a smacking kiss on her shoulder, grazing her with the edge of his teeth.

“If you insist.” She threw the covers back, trying not to wince as she made her way to the dressing room.

“Lilac?”

“Yes?” She paused in the doorway.

“Think about the story I told you last eve.”

Her back stiffened slightly. Without responding to him, she closed the door softly behind her.

She couldn’t think about anything right now; she was terribly achy. She hadn’t been this sore since the morning after her wedding night. Although…Nickolai had been very gentle with her last evening.

Come to think of it, she wasn’t at all sore down there. Shrugging, she decided a morning outdoors in the sunshine could only help.

It did not help.

In fact, by the afternoon, Lilac had a distinct sore throat to go along with her sore muscles.

By evening she had taken to bed with a fever.

“What is wrong with her?” Rejar stood over the bed, a worried expression marring his sultry face.

“She seems to have an ague.” Agatha fussed over her niece, lifting the covers to her chin. Lilac had fallen into a troubled sleep.

“What is that?”

“I’m afraid she is ill, my boy.”

“I am too much for her,” Rejar sadly said.

Agatha had a coughing fit.

Rejar lightly tapped her on the back. “Are you all right, Lady Agatha?”

“Yes, of course I am all right!” Impatiently, she waved his hand away. “This has nothing to do with you, my dear boy! Lilac has a disease of some kind.”

He did not understand. “What is disease?”

Lady Whumples looked at him rather strangely. “It is a sickness which is contracted in some unknown fashion.”

He thought about this a minute, suddenly going pale. “This is like the pox Jackie warned me about? He said that women called doxies—”

“Young man.” She reached over and smartly boxed Rejar’s ears.

“Ow!”

“I will not have that kind of talk in this house! This is nothing of the kind!”

Rejar rubbed at his stinging ears. “Lady Agatha, I do not understand.”

“Lilac has a fever. We do not know what causes these sicknesses of the body. There are those who liken it to a poison in the blood.”

“Is there nothing we can do? Can we not get a healer for her?”

“You mean a doctor? I must tell you, your Highness, that I am not one to subscribe to those quacks; it is my opinion that they cause more harm than good. My advice is to let Lilac try to rally on her own. We will do our best to make her comfortable, of course.”

“I will take your advice. Lady Agatha.”

But Lilac did not seem to rally.

Over the next several days her condition steadily worsened. Her fever rose, she went in and out of lucidity, and an ominous rattle sounded from her chest while she struggled for each breath she took.

Concerned over this strange malady which had suddenly afflicted his mate, Rejar did not leave her side.

Distraught, he sat by her, trying to get her to drink some water, to swallow some broth. He bathed her forehead with cool cloths, covered her with more and more blankets to stop her chills, and paced and paced and paced.

None of it was helping.

“You must rest or you will be no good to her.” Traed rose from his chair on the other side of the bed. He had stayed close to Rejar for the past several days, his calm presence offering immeasurable support.

“I cannot.” Rejar ran a weary hand through his long hair.

Agatha watched him from the corner of the room. If she had ever had any doubt as to the depth of his feelings for her niece, his behavior these past days would have laid those doubts to rest.

However, Agatha had never had that uncertainty with Prince Azov.

She, who trusted few and liked even less, had taken to this man immediately. His brother she regarded just as highly. She had always had very good intuition when it came to people. If only that same intuition could be applied to help her niece. Agatha sighed mournfully; Lilac was not doing well.

“Nickolai…Nickolai…” Lilac called to her husband, her voice sounding weak and thready.

Rejar abruptly stopped his pacing to go to her. “I am here, Lilac.” He smoothed back a few strands of hair which had fallen over her forehead. The skin there was dry and very, very hot.

She did not seem to hear him.

She just kept calling his name in a voice growing fainter and fainter.

He could not take anymore. “Send Emmy for a healer,” he said to Agatha.

“Your Highness—”

“Do it!”

Against her will, Agatha went to the landing, telling Emmy to go quickly and get a doctor.

Within the half-hour the doctor arrived. He was filthy and stank of death. Under normal circumstances, Rejar would not have even let the man into his home, but he was desperate. He did not believe Lilac would last the night.

“Can you help her?” he asked him.

The doctor walked around the bed as if looking at the patient from differing angles would help him assess what was wrong with her. Then he bent over the bed, lifting her eyelid to peer into her eye.

Rejar could barely stand the sight of that filthy hand touching her. “Well?” He was losing his patience.

“Yes, I believe I can help her; although there is no guarantee.”

Rejar breathed a sigh of relief.

“You must leave me alone with the patient for several hours.”

Rejar hesitated. “Why?”

“The procedure can be upsetting to those of the family, I insist—”

“Ask him what he intends to do, your Highness!”

“Lady Agatha is right. I am afraid what you ask is not possible. I would never leave my wife alone in a situation such as this; she is depending on me to watch out for her.”

The man drew himself up. “If you insist, that is your right. I must warn you it is not for the faint of heart. These illnesses must be tackled with vigor else they will not be driven from the body.”

“I understand.”

Agatha began sobbing into her handkerchief. Using the Prince’s name for the first time, she implored him, “I beg you, Nickolai! Don’t do this. If my niece is to die, let her go in peace.”

Rejar rubbed his eyes, fatigue, sorrow, and worry claiming him equally. “What is the procedure?” he asked, resigned.

“Well, first we must bleed her, then—”

Rejar’s eyes snapped open. “What do mean you ‘bleed’ her?”

“It is how the disease is removed from the body, through the blood. I must open a vein with this lancet,” he removed a dirty knife from a case in his pocket. “Leeches”—he held up a jar of disgusting, squirming creatures—“are applied to the spot to further aid in the procedure.”

Rejar staggered back, collapsing into a chair.

“If this does not work, we may try blistering. Along with purging her system, a caustic liquid is poured onto the skin in an effort to boil the illness away. As a matter of course I’m afraid her Highness will be hideously scarred.”

“Get out,” Rejar whispered.

“I’m sorry?”

“I believe my brother has told you to leave.” Traed took the man by the collar and the seat of his pants and tossed him out the door.

“Have a spot o’this, yer Princeship.” Dazed, Rejar felt Jackie tug at his sleeve. He took the glass the man gave him, gratefully swallowing the brandy.

“I could not bear it if you allowed him to continue,” Agatha sniffed.

“Nor I.” He pulled the chair up to the edge of the bed, preparing for a long vigil.

His gaze went to the bedside table spotting the books there. Picking one, he faced it on its side, reading the title. Songs of Experience, he read, by William Blake. Lilac so loved to read.

Carefully, he opened the book of poems, remembering the many times she had comforted him by reading aloud. Maybe this time he could bring a small measure of comfort to her. He began to read haltingly,

“Tyger, Tyger, burning bright

In the forests of the night,

What immortal hand or eye

Could frame thy fearful symmetry?”

Rejar took a deep breath, his emotions on the verge of spilling over, then continued:

“When the stars threw down their spears

And watered heaven with their tears,

Did he smile his work to see?

Did he who made the lamb make thee?”

Rejar threw the book aside and, placing his head on the bed, wept.

He wept for Lilac; he wept for the fear that prevented her from truly having known him; he wept for his onesided love, and he wept for all that would never be.

After a time he felt Traed’s hand on his shoulder. “I am sorry for you both, brother.” This kind of pain Traed knew well.

{What kind of a world is this Ree Gen Cee Ing Land, Traed? I vow I cannot understand it. Horror and beauty…where a man can illuminate the soul with the gift of simple words yet an unknown illness can steal life away without warning.}

“I know not,” Traed said quietly. “Surely it is a poison.”

Rejar looked up at his brother, his sensitive face tear-streaked. “Poison?” he whispered. Agatha had said the same; this thing called disease was likened to a poison.

He blinked, a recollection forming in his mind.

“Traed! When we were on Ryka Twelve, on our way to Zarrain to see you, Lorgin was poisoned by a xathu beast.”

Traed had not heard this before. “Such a poison is deadly! How did he survive?”

“Yaniff had an idea. He believed that if I passed through Lorgin in the midst of my transformation—while I was still in my energy state—I might take the poison with me.”

Traed rubbed the back of his neck. “It was very risky; you could have been poisoned as well.”

“Not as long as I was able to disperse the poison from myself before I imbodied.”

“There was no danger to you?”

“No.” Rejar did not quite meet Traed’s eyes.

Nor did he tell his brother of Yaniff’s prophecy to him. The wizard had warned him against it. At the time Rejar had scoffed at his words, saying he would never be tempted to do such a thing again. How little he understood.

“You wish to try this with Lilac?”

“Yes.” He faced Lilac’s aunt. “Lady Agatha…Agatha. You are going to see something which might upset you; I hope you will find it in your heart to have understanding. What I am about to reveal to you, I do for Lilac’s sake.”

Then he began to metamorphose.

He started to glow from within. Streams of light flowed and arced around him. His form shimmered and started to melt into a gleaming phosphorescence.

“My word!” Agatha gasped.

“Blimey!” Jackie’s eyes bulged as he chomped down on the stem of his pipe.

Traed stood by, an uneasy feeling settling in the pit of his stomach. Something Lorgin had said about Rejar’s superior ability to defend himself teased at his mind. Suddenly, Yaniff’s words came to him out of nowhere…His kind heart will get him into trouble…

Instantly, Traed realized this was where the real threat to Rejar was! Not Rotewick; it was never Rotewick. “Rejar, wait!”

It was too late.

The Familiar had already attained his energy state, a state no Familiar ever holds for more than a moment.

Traed watched transfixed as Rejar passed through the body of his wife, pausing that extra fraction of time to make sure he cleansed the “poison” from her. That extra fraction of time that would cost him dearly.

With his passing, Lilac was already breathing easier. She opened her eyes in time to see an amorphous frame of light hovering near the bed. She knew exactly what had occurred; she had felt him slide through her.

Traed observed the glowing configuration barely pulsing, getting weaker and weaker. It was obvious Rejar could not regain his corporeal form; he did know how to draw the energy to himself. Soon his strength would wither and his life would dissipate. He would die.

Unless…

There was only one way to help him.

Traed would have to break a solemn oath he made to himself. An oath never to unleash the awesome power contained within him.

All his life he had seen the destruction that followed in the wake of such terrible power. His own father, Theardar, had destroyed so many lives, including his own, because he could not control the raging force in him.

It was the same power which flowed through his son, hidden all these years only by his strength of will.

The glow was very faint now; his brother was hanging on to his last shred of life.

Rejar.

There was no choice. There never had been.

Closing his eyes, Traed stood away from the walls as he called forth the latent ability that flowed through his veins.

Small arcs of lightning started to flash around the tips of his fingers, traveling up his body. Soon he was engulfed by the arcs circling around him, growing in strength and number.

Once released, the power rose up in him greedily.

“My word!” Agatha croaked.

“I’ll be laying off the gin, I think.” Jackie gulped.

Outside, clouds began to converge over the house; the sky blackened and thunder sounded. A howling wind shook the house. Lightning traveled all around him now, from his fingers outward.

The keening wind reached a crescendo as the energy surge amplified over the room and him. Wind swirled about; it was an uncanny storm. The crystal chandelier bounced against the ceiling, delivering eerie chimes.

Lilac would never forget the way Nickolai’s brother appeared just then. His eyes were closed in concentration, his long hair, freed by the wild wind, swirled around him as he stood with clenched fists fighting to contain what he had unleashed.

With a roar of thunder and a crackle of energy, every window in the room blew out.

The chandelier crashed to the floor.

“My word!” Agatha clutched the wall for support.

The Aviaran opened his green eyes, which were now shot with sparks of incandescent lightning. Across the room the faint glow of Rejar’s life force was all but dissipated.

Traed sent him a powerful burst of energy; it flowed from the center of his chest directly into the waning phosphorescence.

At first, nothing happened and Traed feared he was too late. But then, the glow grew a little brighter.

Rejar was fighting to live!

Traed was proud of the Familiar’s strength of will; another would not have lasted this long. He sent him another strong jolt. The glow grew brighter still.

Stay with it, brother, do not give up…

Traed drew yet more power from his seemingly unending reserves and began sending a steady flow of current directly into his brother’s being. The blood-tie connecting them aided his task.

A shape began to coalesce in the pulsing phosphorescence. His brother’s corporeal body was trying to form! Encouraged, he continued to send him his power.

Rejar metamorphosed out of the light.

He collapsed onto the floor, naked and barely alive.

Everyone was silent for a few seconds, obviously shocked by what they had witnessed.

Sadly comprehending the debilitated state he was in, Traed joylessly hoisted Rejar over his shoulder and lowered him onto the bed next to his wife. His brother would not last long.

Knowing none of this, Lilac bent over her husband, overcome by relief. Clutching his shoulders, she bowed her head against his chest. He did not even have the strength to embrace her.

Traed straightened, his sights meeting Jackie’s. The man gave him a frightened look and bolted out to the hallway and down the stairs.

“Jackie, stop!” Traed raced after him. He caught up with him in the downstairs foyer.

“I—I think it’s best I take me leave, sir.”

“Wait! You do not understand, Jackie—”

“I don’t want to understand!” Traed tried to interrupt but Jackie held up his hand. “Listen to me, sir. I’ve seen a lot in me day. I’ve seen things no man wants to see and I’ve seen things I shouldn’t ’ave. But I ne’er seen nothing like that! There are some things in this life it’s best not to be knowin’ about. Now I like yer fine, sir, but this is one o’ them times.”

“I see.”

Jackie nodded. He gestured up the stairs with his pipe. “Will ’is Princeship be all right?”

Traed exhaled heavily. “I do not think so.”

“I’m right sorry to be ’earing that.” He puffed on his unlit pipe pensively. “Is there nothing’ you could do, sir? I mean—what with what I saw in that room…”

Traed stared at the floor in silence.

“I see. Well, as I said, I must be gettin’ along now. It’s best I see no more o’ this. A man can’t speak about what he doesn’t know, now can he?”

“I understand. Can we give you anything to ease your way?”

Jackie rolled his hat in his hand. “Nah, ’is Princeship ’as been more than generous wit’ the likes o’ me. I’m set, I am.”

“Will you not stay to say goodbye to Rej—the Prince?”

“I best be goin’ now.” He started to leave, then stopped at the door, turning around. “Whatever the outcome, I’m sure a fine bloke such as yerself will do the right thing.”

He put his pipe in his mouth and closed the door behind him.

Traed heard footsteps approaching behind him in the hall.

“Is everything all right upstairs, sir?” Emmy asked worriedly. “There was a sudden terrible storm, but it’s blown over now.”

“Everything is fine, Emmy.”

“And Lilac, I mean, her Highn—”

“She is fully recovered.” His dull response did not register on Emmy. The longtime servant was just happy the little miss was all right.

When Traed walked into the room. Lilac was leaning over Rejar anxiously. She had covered him with a blanket.

“What’s happened, Traed? What’s wrong with him? He can’t seem to move. His mind seems clouded and his speech is all muddled.” Her anxious green eyes beseeched him for reassurance.

Traed wished he did not have to tell her what was to come. However, the task fell to him. “He is weak, Lilac. He passed his life energy through you, cleansing your spirit of the illness. He could not stand to see you suffer, could not bear to watch you perish.”

“But why is he so weak? He can barely breathe.”

“He has the ability but not the knowledge. Once, he saved his brother Lorgin’s life with this technique—I believe he must have had the help of a powerful mystic named Yaniff.” An expression of overwhelming sorrow came over him. “Yaniff tried to warn me; I did not understand what he meant.”

“Wh-what do you mean?” she whispered.

“The danger to my brother was himself.” Traed’s face saddened. “It was his kind heart which led him to disaster.”

Lilac stroked her hand gently down Nickolai’s face. “When will he feel better?”

“He is not going to get better, Lilac.” Traed said the words quietly.

Her head snapped up. “What?”

He could not meet her devastated look. “He is dying. He cannot maintain his life force.”

“Dying?” Lilac blinked back the unacceptable truth. Nickolai could not be dying! He had…he had…saved her life at the cost of his own.

Lilac choked back a sob. All this time her aunt had been right; she had said he was a man who would willingly give his life for those he placed under his protection. A man of substance, she had called him.

And he was.

A man who cared enough to sacrifice his own life, who was gentle and kind, noble and honest. A man who possessed not only physical beauty but also inner strength.

The truth hit her then.

His beauty was of his entire being. What else could he be but good? Regardless of where he came from or what special abilities he had! He was not something to be feared.…

He was something to be loved.

With her realization came understanding. What he must have gone through! Cast adrift in a completely foreign environment, the horror of discovering he was in a place where he would never be accepted, indeed, where he might be destroyed.

Everything had to be strange and alien to him.

She recalled when he had told her his “story” that he had mentioned something about entering the whirlpool in order to help his brother. How very like him, she acknowledged.

Oh, she had treated him so dreadfully! And still he had pursued her despite her blind resistance to him. A man of fortitude. Auntie had been right about everything. How could she have been so unaware?

A chill of foreboding raced down her spine. Her revelation came too late.

“No—no!” She grabbed her husband’s hand in her own, bringing it to her lips. She spoke his name for the first time, admitting who and what he was. And more.

“Rejar, Rejar, I love you. Don’t leave me!”

Rejar opened his eyes slowly. “How it pleases me to hear you speak my…I want you to know…” The hand she held weakly stroked her face.

“My heart,” he whispered, “I have had many women…so many women…but you are the only…the only one…” The blue and gold eyes suddenly glazed over. “Yaniff, you must…tell Traed…there is no weakness in love; tell him…”

He did not seem to know where he was.

“Rejar!” Lilac shook his shoulders, willing her husband to come back.

“Yaniff rails at me so…He wants me to join them.…I vow I am tired of it.…” His incoherent rambling faded out along with his consciousness.

Lilac fell on top of him, sobbing.

Traed clenched his fists. No weakness in love? How wrong his brother was. There was every weakness in love! If there were not, would he even consider doing what he was about to do?

A weighty feeling descended upon him. Could he let his brother-of-the-line die? He had taken care of him as a child, guided him, laughed with him, watched over him. He had given his oath and even if he had not—this was his brother. Whom he loved.

There was someone who could possibly save him.

Yaniff.

Traed would have to call forth his old Charl master. To do so, of course, would uncloak him to the Guild; for only the highest level mystics had the ability to send an arc through time, space, and dimension.

Rejar did not have many breaths left, he knew.

There was no choice; he would expose his power and sacrifice himself so his brother might live.

There would be no escape from the High Guild after this. They would demand him in the name of his family honor. He was bound by the blood tie oath of Chi’in t’se Leau. The wizard Yaniff had cunningly said to him, ‘Your life for his.’

Well, now he had it.