“Oh, honey.” He reached over and patted her hand sympathetically. “You are an innocent. No. That’s not why I’m here because you don’t need to be convinced. If Katica decides Jadren will bond you, he will. But don’t fret—it’s painless. I’m here because Jadren thought you might need a friend and us familiars have to stick together.” He brightened. “If Jadren decides to marry you, maybe you can call me ‘Dad.’ I would like that,” he added wistfully.
Over my dead body, she vowed to herself. Or, perhaps, over Lady El-Adrel’s.
~ 11 ~
“Gabriel,” Nic said, trying to restrain her impatience and only partially succeeding, even to her own ears, “you are overthinking. This should be easy for you.”
From his cross-legged position seated under the luminescent lens of the moon window that topped the uppermost curve of the arcanium dome, Gabriel cracked open one wizard-black eye and glared at her balefully. “Just because I have the boost of your magic, plus the arcanium doesn’t mean I have the power to reach as far as wherever Selly and Jadren have ended up.”
“You reached across the valley to House Sammael to affect a physical object. This requires less punch.”
“But I could see what I was—”
“No!” She paused in her pacing to stomp her foot. “Stop thinking in terms of your body. Use your wizard senses to look. And this is about finesse. You’re good at the heavy-lifting stuff—probably better than any wizard in existence—now you need to get good at refining, narrowing, using less magic and more control.”
He dropped his face into his hands, scrubbing his fingers over his scalp. “Maybe we have to face that I’m that I’m too old to learn finesse. I never thought I’d regret not attending Convocation Academy, but maybe if I’d learned these lessons when I was younger…”
“Gabriel.” She dropped to her knees in front of him, easing his grip from his hair and combing her fingers through the sole black streak in the moon-silver white. That lock at his left temple matched the wizard-black eyes that gazed at her soulfully. “My only love,” she added more softly, “you are perfectly capable of learning this. Very few wizards, if any, have the problem of too much power. No one at the academy would’ve been capable of teaching you this anyway.”
He grimaced wryly, leaning into her caress, taking her other hand in both of his. “Except for you.”
She wrinkled her nose. “I am no doubt a terrible teacher. We both know I lack sufficient patience. Besides, I never learned the advanced wizardry stuff, so I can only help so much.”
“Maybe it’s time to call in Alise. Your sister can send spirits looking for them.”
“Alise doesn’t have the power for that, full stop.”
“She would if we let her use the arcanium.”
Nic was already shaking her head. “No, no, and no. Never let another wizard use your arcanium.”
“Your father got in here and it didn’t cause any lasting damage.”
“First, we don’t know that. The arcanium still isn’t quite the same and you don’t know what an additional personality will do. Second, Alise will refuse. She’s not confident in her skills yet and has a lot of growing to do. Quit ducking the problem and apply yourself. I know you can do this.”
Leaning in, he kissed her, the brush of his sensual lips sending a dark flutter through her. It didn’t help that they were in the arcanium, the silver bed with its alluring chains so nearby. They didn’t need sex magic, however. Quite the opposite. So she pulled away, releasing him and scooting back. “Again,” she prompted briskly. “Connect to the moon, or whatever it feels like to you, and look through its eyes.”
“The moon doesn’t have eyes,” he grumbled.
“Then pick the metaphor that works for you.”
With a sigh, he complied, closing his eyes again. Along their intertwined bond, Nic followed the silver-bright thread of his moon magic as he reached for its source. “Finer, thinner,” she murmured, pleased when he complied. “Good. It’s stable, precise, resilient.”
He connected to the moon, the radiant source of magic like a vast sea of argent brilliance. Nearly overwhelming. “Steady,” she coaxed. “Skim the surface. You don’t need all that power.” But, oh, what he could do if he did find a way to use that source without turning himself into solid silver or something equally disastrous. She kept that notion to herself, in reserve for the future. “Let the moon find them.”
“Like riding a horse, in a way,” he said, almost to himself.
“Yes, just like riding Vale, responsive to your guiding hand. Faithful to you, eager to take you where you need to be.”
With pride and vindicated delight, she felt him indeed ride that wave of moonlight, some of his water sense giving him the balance and control. She couldn’t follow all the way, couldn’t sense what he did, but she felt the moment he found what he sought, and his explosive reaction. The bolt of terror and incandescent rage shattered his control, flinging him back to his body with an impact that made her wince in sympathy. She caught him by the shoulders, bracing him with her magic while he reeled in reaction. Though she’d naturally never experienced this herself, she’d witnessed plenty of her wizard classmates losing the reins on their magic and fainting from the crushing backlash. Their professors hadn’t even needed to chide those unlucky sorts—the pain was punishment enough.
Fortunately, she and Gabriel had built up enough trust between them. Their reciprocal bond, stronger and more braided than ever, allowed her magic to flow into him with bolstering effect and little to no effort on his part. He recovered, steadied, raised his hands to grip her forearms with fierce intensity, eyes flying open. They were starkly black in his whitened face. Though she desperately wanted to know what he’d discovered, she also knew prompting him before he’d settled enough into his body to find his voice would only stress him more. So, she waited, letting her love and magic flow into him, relieved when a semblance of humanity returned to his being.
“Brilliantly done, my heart,” she murmured. “Take all the time you need.”
“There is no time,” he croaked, as if he hadn’t spoken in a hundred years instead of less than an hour. “They’re in House Sammael.”
Well, shit. She offered a crooked smile. “Well, then. I suppose this calls for a strategy session.”
