“Perhaps it came from further inland and I was just out of range. We can ask theCalbernariin the village tomorrow if any of them heard anything. For now, let the other officers know to keep their ears open. If there’s a female here with the gift ofsusirena,we don’t want to return to Calberna without her. And we will want to trace her lineage, find out where she comes from.” If there was somewhere else in Mystral wheresusirenawas manifesting, theMyerialwould want to know about it, and Calberna’s sons would most definitely want to seek wives from such lands. “For now, let’s head back to the party. I don’t want our hosts to think we are unappreciative of their hospitality.”
The three of them slipped back into the crowd on the terrace with casual ease. It was 3a.m., and the sun was already rising, but the party showed no signs of stopping. Dilys had to hand it to the Winterfolk. They certainly knew how to host a celebration. He couldn’t remember ever partaking in such an extravagance of feasting and entertainment. Food and alcohol flowed with never-ending abundance, and the music and dancing continued without cease.
If the celebration was a test—if the Winterfolk were expecting the Calbernans to descend into drunken revelry—they were disappointed. Calbernans, with their extremely high metabolisms, rarely became intoxicated. Alcohol and drugs of any sort burned off so quickly as to render them ineffective. Even had that not been the case, Dilys and his men had come to Wintercraig to find wives, a task no Calbernan undertook lightly.
Though Dilys and his men remained alert and watchful, the woman who had uttered that whisper ofsusirenadid not use her Voice again. Finally, around six in the morning, the revelers began to seek their beds. Dilys waited until he received word that all his men had made it safely back to their ships before he retired to the rooms provided for him in the palace. There, he drew the blackout shades and poured a veil of water over every door and window before curling up on the bed for a few hours of sleep.
His sleep was not restful. He tossed and turned, his dreams plagued by images of golden eyes, sunlit seas, and a song that wound around his heart, filling him with desperate yearning and a sense of loss he couldn’t shake off.
He woke about half past ten to find the bedsheets twisted around his body and his hand wrapped around a huge erection.
“Sweet seas, Merimydion,” he muttered. “They tell you some woman whisperedsusirena,and you dream of Sirens all night.” With a pained laugh, he freed himself from the sheets, took care of the erection, then treated himself to a long soak in the spacious, claw-footed tub in his suite’s bathing chamber.
Winterfolk, thankfully, were of similar height and build to Calbernans, so he was able to stretch out to his full length in the tub and completely submerge himself, a rare treat for a Calbernan away from home. A collection of fragrant soaps and bath salts had been set out on a table beside the tub. He sniffed them all, then chose the ones that suited his mood. He poured the salts into the water and submerged himself in the tub, enjoying the sensual, silky feel of the water against his skin. Water was the lifeblood of Calberna, as essential to its people as food and love.
As he lay cocooned in luxuriant, wet warmth, he tried to plan the siege and conquest of Spring and Autumn, but his mind rebelled, coming back again and again to the mystery of woman who’d Spokensusirenaand also—inexplicably—to the elusive third Season, Summer Coruscate.
That he kept thinking about a female with the gift of a powerful Voice made sense, but Summer Coruscate? Why couldn’t he stop thinking about her? And why did her blatant desire to avoid his company bother him so greatly?
He massaged his left wrist and pondered the mystery of the gentle Season’s apparent dislike of him. It was possible that something had happened to her to make her leery of men. He’d met more than his share of abused women over the years. One didn’t sail the oceans of Mystral for more than a decade, visiting some of the most dangerous ports and grimmest slave markets in the world, without having seen the hollow-eyed casualties of Mystral’s darkest shadows. In fact, given the way Verdan Coruscate had tried to murder his own daughter last winter, Dilys wouldn’t have been surprised to learn that the late king’s cruelty had extended to more than his youngest child. And yet, Dilys was fairly certain no such mistreatment had ever occurred. First, because had anyone ever dared hurt the gentlest and most beloved of the Seasons, the whole of Summerlea would have been up in arms. And second, because Summer herself had avoided no man last night but Dilys. Not even Ari—who was as close to Dilys’s identical twin as a Calbernan could get.
Yet she acted as though Dilys were a wolf, and she a helpless lamb he would devour if she strayed from the safety of the flock. He didn’t understand it. He was a big man and as fierce a son of the sea as any ever born, but he would never harm a woman. Especially not a woman he’d come to court.
Especially nother...
The mere thought that she might consider him capable of such a thing made his battle claws pop out and his fangs descend, ready to shred whatever demons had instilled that fear. He snarled, releasing a string of air bubbles that floated up to pop on the surface of his bath, then he sat up so abruptly that water sloshed over the tub rim.
“You’re being an idiot,” he muttered to himself. “Why does it matter whether she likes you or not? Or fears you, for that matter? She is not the one you’re here for. She’s nothing to you.Nothing.”
What man, when presented the opportunity to court two lovely, compelling women who welcomed his suit, would tie himself in angry knots over a third who obviously didn’t?
Only a narcissistic fool.
Dilys was neither narcissist nor fool.
Whatever this mad obsession for Summer Coruscate was, it ended now. He was here to wed Spring or Autumn, and that was exactly what he was going to do. What did it matter that for all Autumn’s stunning beauty and all Spring’s brilliance and regal reserve, nothing inside him cried, “She’s the one!” about either of them. He was a Calbernan. No matter what woman he married, once wed, she would become the center of his life and he would devote himself to her happiness for the rest of his days.
And his inexplicable fixation with Summer Coruscate?
He reached for the sea sponge and soap.
Best forgotten.
Thirty minutes later, garbed in a bright blue-and-whiteshumasecured in place with a belt encrusted with foaming waves fashioned from sapphires and diamonds, Dilys had put his disturbing thoughts of Summer Coruscate firmly behind him and focused his mind on the task at hand. He had come to claim a worthy,strongwife, strengthen Calberna’s ties to Wintercraig, and forge business alliances that would benefit both their countries.
Time to get to it.
He’d already concluded that the fastest path to Spring’s heart was through her love of horticulture and intellectual pursuits. Since agriculture was one of House Merimydion’s main industries—shipping being the other—there was ample room to find common ground and establish a friendly rapport and a solid foundation of mutual respect.
Autumn, he would continue to entertain with laughter and a little adventure. As was only natural for a woman who’d been sought after by men her whole life, she wasn’t particularly forthcoming with insights on how to engage her interests, but what bird in a gilded cage did not long to fly free? He thought she might enjoy sailing and hiking, pursuits that got her away from the court where she was always being observed and emulated and pursued by hopeful suitors.
He also hadn’t missed the admiring glances both princesses had given him and his men. That was why he’d chosen the blue-and-whiteshuma,and why he’d exchanged yesterday’s belled ankle-rings and golden armbands for ones of beaded platinum that sported the same cresting-wave pattern as his belt. The pale metal, brilliant diamonds, and pure white cloth contrasted dramatically with his dark bronze skin and the long ropes of obsidian hair spilling free and unadorned down his back and over his shoulders.
He looked exactly like what he was: a rich and valorous Sealord of Calberna, strong, powerful, battle-tested. Confident in all things and easy on the eye. A man even a wealthy, beautiful, magically-gifted princess would be pleased to call her own.
With a wave of his hand, Dilys removed the water veils from his doors and windows and exited his room.
He met Ari and Ryll coming out of their own rooms, freshly bathed, sharp-eyed and smiling.
