The Perilous Sea (The Elemental Trilogy #2)

She was taken aback, but it almost made sense—the Sihar were known for their enthusiasm for and mastery of blood magic. “You think you are Sihar?”13

“I have not the slightest idea. I just did not want to be one of those people who lose their memories and decide they must be the Master of the Domain.” His brows knitted together. “On the other hand, night before last I set off two beacons. Two huge phoenix beacons. And the phoenix does stand for the House of Elberon.”

She put away all the remedies and rebandaged his back. “Maybe you were a lowly stable boy in one of the prince’s households, where you acquired a love of phoenixes. Having had enough of shoveling muck day in and day out, you set out on an adventure that took you across oceans. You slew dragons, met beautiful girls, and won accolades for your courage and chivalry—”

“And ended up half-crippled in the middle of a desert?”

“Every story must have such a terrible moment, or it wouldn’t be interesting.”

He blew out a breath of air. “I think I have had quite enough of adventures. In the last thirty-six hours, at least three times I thought I would expire of fright. I am ready to beg His Highness to take me back into his employment, so I can shovel muck out of his stables in peace and quiet for the remainder of my natural life.”

She grinned. “I love a man of ambition.”

He smiled again. And again she was quite, quite distracted.

“I have to admit,” he said, “the desert night sky is stunning. I would not mind an opportunity to enjoy it without Atlantis on my tail—a campfire, a cup of something hot, and the entire cosmos for my viewing pleasure.”

“A man of ambition—and simple tastes.”

“What would you do, if Atlantis were not chasing us from one end of the Sahara to the other?”

She thought about it. “You might laugh, but if Atlantis weren’t in the picture, I’d wonder whether I am falling behind in my classes by being in the Sahara in the middle of an academic term.”

He did laugh.

“Laugh all you want. I am not going to apologize for my burning desire to succeed in my studies.”

“Please do not. Besides, I will wager that is what your beau loves most about you.”

She sat back on her haunches. “How do you know about him?”

“The hidden writing on the strap of your bag.”

She grabbed the satchel. “Revela omnia.”

Words appeared. The night you were born, stars fell. The day we met, lightning struck. You are my past, my present, my future. My hope, my prayer, my destiny.

Her protector.

“The man is mad about you,” said Titus.

She looked back at him, the grime, the exhaustion, his lips cracked from the sheer desiccation of the desert. Her own lips were in nowhere near as terrible shape—he had taken better care of her than he had of himself.

“You could be him, for all we know,” she said, securing a new piece of bandaging to his person.

He shifted. “I could not possibly write anything like that. I am sorry, but there ought to be a law against such sentences as ‘The day we met, lightning struck.’”

With a wave of her hand, she got rid of the grit that had become stuck in his hair. A few other cleaning spells and he was almost spotless. “Maybe you were too busy packing for every eventuality to polish your words.”

“We former muck-shoveling stable boys can pack and produce deathless prose at the same time.”

The mage light caught a few specks of discoloration on his shoulders: a smattering of freckles, which she had not noticed before. Quite an appealing detail on an otherwise strong, tight frame, like a constellation for the fingertip to explore, to move from point to point and—

The texture of his skin—and the fact that he started—made her realize that she was touching him.

“You skin is a bit sticky,” she said quickly, though it wasn’t at all. “All that perspiration doesn’t come off just with spells. Let me wash you with some water. You’ll feel more refreshed.”

“That might be too much trouble. You should take more rest.”

“Fortune shield me, I have literally been sleeping for days.”

The globule of water she summoned spun furiously in the air, reflecting her agitation. What was the matter with her? She should take the excuse he offered her and leave him alone. But she couldn’t seem to stop.

She wetted his hair and used the washing bar from the satchel, which produced a soft, fat lather. Her fingertips pressed into his scalp, working the lather into every strand. She summoned more water to pour over his hair. The water that sluiced down she sent back out of the tent, toward the center of the nearby dune.

When she was done, she drew out the water that still clung to his hair and waved it away. With her fingertips, she patted his hair, making sure that it had dried properly.

And now, she would lift her hand and tell him, All done.

Instead, her palm slid down to his nape. Then, as she watched, half horrified, her fingers spread out where his shoulder joined his neck.