Perian could only laugh. “What are you most looking forward to reading?”
“There’s so much! Some of the old histories are in the Old Tongue.” She made a face. “But they’re a bit boring sometimes. All the best books about magic are in the Old Tongue, though.”
“Really?”
He had to confess his reading time had diminished with all his other activities here at the castle. If he eventually wound up back on his estate by himself, he was going to haveplenty of solitary reading time then. If he had the opportunity to fill his days at the castle with so much more, that’s what he’d do, and happily.
Renny nodded. “The people who wrote them are kind of full of themselves.”
Perian snorted a laugh.
Renny shrugged, not looking at all apologetic for her global slandering of the good name of all Mages and Mage Warriors who had ever penned a book on magic.
“Magic does sound more interesting than history,” Perian confessed.
“Right?” she agreed.
She tilted her head like she was listening, then made a disgruntled face, and relayed, “Kee says history can be really interesting too, and also that some of the most interesting magic isfromhistory.”
Perian nodded consideringly. “The doctor said Life Magic was lost during the Great Cataclysm.”
“What’s Life Magic?” Renny asked, perking up curiously.
“Apparently, it let Mages heal people,” Perian told her.
Renny was quiet for a moment. “People like me?”
Fire and water. Perian should have thought of that.
“I’m not sure,” he admitted quietly. “The doctor didn’t go into detail, and I’d never heard of Life Magic before then, either.”
Renny squared her shoulders. “I’m going to get so much better at the Old Tongue.”
The last thing Perian wanted to do was curb that enthusiasm, but he also didn’t want her to be disappointed.
“I think you should study and learn absolutely anything you want to learn, but it’s been over three centuries since the Great Cataclysm. We’ve only got elemental magic now, and I don’t think that’s going to change.”
She swallowed. “It can’t hurt to look, can it?”
Perian shook his head, smiled at her. “No, of course not.”
Hope was very powerful.
Chapter Two
Two nights later, Perian and Brannal were having dinner with Molun and Arvus. Molun was horrified because there wasn’t any dessert, but he made them all laugh by relaying the disaster that had apparently befallen the kitchen. None of them were surprised he’d heard all the rumors: a full menagerie of animals, children, and a Mage Warrior run amok, thrown trays, a small fire, a minor explosion, and someone tripping and taking out a full table of sweets.
Most everyone had therefore gone short, but that didn’t prevent Molun from protesting.
“My meal doesn’t seem done without a little something sweet afterwards.”
He was pouting. Arvus patted him consolingly on the arm.
Rather than suggesting a drink or telling the other man to behave, Brannal said, with a gleam in his eye, “Something sweet, is it?”
Then he lifted Perian’s chin slightly with his finger and seized his lips in what Perian had to acknowledge was a very sweet—and very hot—kiss. He kept it relatively tame, pulling back a few moments later to ask, “How was that?”
Perian wasn’t sure whether the question was meant for him or Molun, but the other man said, “I’m not sure yet. I think I need to see it again.”
