Heir to the Shadows

for Jaenelle's familiar presence, he felt the pain and fear of the wounded landens sitting against the walls or lying on the floor. The pain he could handle. The fear, which spiked in the ones who noticed him, undermined his shaky self-control.
    Lucivar started to turn away when he noticed the young man lying on a narrow mattress near the door. Under nor' mal circumstances, he might have assumed the man was another landen, but he'd seen too many men in similar circumstances not to recognize a weak psychic scent.
    Dropping to one knee, Lucivar carefully lifted the side of the doubled-over sheet that covered the body from neck to feet. His eyes shifted from the wounds to the still, pain-tight face and back again. He swore silently. The gut wounds were bad. Men had died from less. They weren't beyond Jaenelle's healing skill, but he wondered if she could rebuild the parts that were no longer there.
    Lowering the sheet, Lucivar left the room, his curses becoming louder and more vicious as he searched for some empty room where he could try to leash a temper spiraling out of control.
    Randahl hadn't said any of his men had been wounded. And why was the boy—no, man; anyone with those kinds of battle wounds didn't deserve to be called a boy—kept apart from the others, tucked against a shadowed wall where he might easily go unnoticed?
    Catching the warmth of a feminine psychic scent, Lucivar threw open a door and stepped inside the kitchen before
    he realized, too late, the woman trying to pump water one-handed wasn't Jaenelle.
    She spun around when the door crashed against the wall, throwing her left arm up as if to stop an attacker.
    Lucivar hated her. Hated her for not being Jaenelle. Hated her for the fear in her eyes that was pushing him toward blind rage. Hated her for being young and pretty. And most of all, hated her because he knew that, at any second now, she would bolt and he would be on her, hurting her, even killing her before he could stop himself.
    Then she swallowed hard, and said in a quiet, quivering voice, "I'm trying to boil some water to make teas for the wounded, but the pump's stiff and I can't work it with one hand. Would you help me?"
    A knot of tension eased inside him. Here, at least, was a landen female who knew how to deal with Blood males. Asking for help was always the easiest way to redirect one of them toward service.
    As Lucivar came forward, she stepped aside, trembling. His temper started to climb again until he noticed the bandaged right arm she held over her stomach, her hand tucked between her dress and apron.
    Not fear then, but fatigue and blood loss.
    He placed a chair close enough for her to supervise, but far enough away so that he wouldn't keep brushing against her. "Sit down."
    Once she was seated, he pumped water and set the filled pots on the wood-burning stove. He noticed the bags of herbs laid out on the wooden table next to the double sink and looked at her curiously. "Lord Randahl said the wise-woman died along with your two physicians."
    Her eyes filled with tears as she nodded. "My grandmother. She said I had the gift and was teaching me."
    Lucivar leaned against the table, puzzled. Landen minds were too weak to give off a psychic scent, but hers did. "Where did you learn how to handle Blood males?"
    Her eyes widened with anxiety. "I wasn't trying to control you!"
    "I said handle, not control. There's a difference."
    "I—I just did what the Lady said to do."
    The tension inside him loosened another notch. "What's your name?"
    "Mari." She hesitated. "You're Prince Yaslana, aren't you?"
    "Does that bother you?" Lucivar asked in a colorless voice. To his surprise, Mari smiled shyly.
    "Oh, no. The Lady said we could trust you."
    The words warmed him like a lover's caress. But, having caught the slight emphasis in her tone, he wondered whom the landens in the village couldn't trust. His gold eyes narrowed as he studied her. "You have some Blood in your background, don't you?"
    Mari paled a little and wouldn't look at him. "My great-grandmother was half-Blood. S-some people say I'm a throwback to her."
    "From my point of view, that's no bad thing." Her naked relief was too much for him, so he began inspecting the bags of herbs. She'd be too quick to think she was the cause of his anger, so he fiddled with the bags until he had his feelings leashed again.
    In his experience, half-Blood children were seldom welcomed or accepted by either society. The Blood didn't want them