"Blaine! You don't ask people you hardly know when they had sex." Milot narrowed his eyes and contradicted himself by asking, "Was it long enough to get the mark?"
Lian shook his head. "We had sex this morning and yesterday."
"Ahh, so there's still time to find out. What's his name?"
Lian tore apart the roll and glanced around the room. "I'd rather not say. I don't want him to get in trouble because I'm hiding out."
Milot shook his head. "My boy, the last thing anyone in this room will do is snitch you out. Now tell me." Lian couldn't ignore the order.
"Nevair Dragonfang," Lian mumbled.
Milot jumped to his feet. "We've got to return you."
"Hey! I thought you said it didn't matter!" Lian scowled.
"I thought you were going to mention some lesser noble or maybe even a half breed with an optimistic spirit, but you can't just ditch Dragonfang." Panic crossed Milot's face.
"I didn't ditch him. I'm going to return as soon as my medical team arrives in two days," Lian said in a soothing voice.
"And if your mark shows up before then?" Milot challenged.
"Then I'll cope. Besides, with or without a mark, I'm going to return to Nevair. I like him." Nevair had a sweet vulnerability Lian found irresistible.
"He could tear this building apart," Milot glanced around as if expecting Nevair to arrive any minute now. "You're the one he destroyed the bar for, aren't you?"
Lian shrugged. "It isn't my fault he lacks control. It will be a good test for him to acquire some."
Two servers brought out the rest of the food. Lian smiled at the little woman who put a plate of roasted meat and some sort of tuber in front of him. "It looks delicious," he told the woman.
She curtseyed before walking away.
"Is it poisoned?" Milot snapped. "If you're going to endanger out lives with your stubbornness, you can at least see if the food will kill me before the Pontifex does."
Lian laughed. "You'll be fine and the food is not poisoned."
The same server poured Lian a glass of water.
"Thank you," he said.
"You're welcome sir." The server bowed.
Lian absent-mindedly picked up the glass. Tipping it to his mouth he looked down at the surface and spewed out the liquid sending droplets everywhere.
"The water. It's the water that's poisoned." Lian announced.
"What? That's ridiculous," Milot snarled. "I only buy imported off-world bottled water."
That didn't make sense. "Off-world from where, and who imports it?"
Milot snapped his fingers at one of the guards. "Find out who distributes our water."
The guard nodded and quickly left the room.
"If it's coming from off-world, maybe someone who doesn't want the dragonkin to breed is tampering with the water. Since you're mostly a desert planet you need to import most of your water, don't you?"
Milot nodded. "Yeah two-thirds of our water comes from someplace else. I thought it was supposed to be safer. There are all kinds of restrictions on it."
"But restrictions occur at the water's source. If they put the poison in the bottles, then testing the water before its bottled won't show the poison," Lian reasoned.
