Nothing happened. Just an itchy sort of tension building.
He gave up trying to concentrate, got up and went to the sideboard for a glass of wine; he needed to get centered and calmed, and a little less sensitive, and he wasn’t going to be able to do it on his own. The only wine left was a white, and it was a bit dry for his taste, but it did accomplish what he wanted it to. With just that hint of alcohol inside him, he finally managed to relax and get intothe blasted book.
He got so far into it, in fact, that when the first simultaneous blast of wind and thunder came, he nearly jumped off of the couch.
Half the candles - the ones not sheltered in glass chimney-lamps - blew out. Wind whipped through the suite, sending curtains flying and carrying with it a welcome chill and the scent of rain. The shutters in Mardic’s and Donni’s room banged monotonously against the walls; not hard enough to shatter the glass yet, but it was only a matter of time. He dropped the book and got up to head for their door just as Vanyel stumbled in through the corridor door and into the brightness of the common room.
The boy stood as frozen as a statue, blinking owlishly at the light. Tylendel’s stomach gave a little lurch; Vanyel looked like death.
It was bad enough that the boy was light-complected; bad enough that he was wearing stark black tonight, which only accentuated his fair skin. But his face had nocolor at the moment; it was so white it was almost transparent. His eyes looked sunken, and his expression was of someone who has seen, but been denied, the Havens.
“Vanyel - “ Tylendel said - whispered, really - his voice barely audible above the banging shutter and the sound of the storm. He cleared his throat and tried again. “Vanyel, I didn’t expect you back so - uh - soon. Is something wrong?”
For one moment - for one precious moment - Tylendel thought he had him; he was sure that the boy was going to open up to him. His eyes begged for pity; his expression, so hungry and haunted, nearly cracked Tylendel’s own calm. The trainee made a tentative step toward him -
It was the wrong move; he knew that immediately. Vanyel’s face shuttered and assumed his habitual expression of flippant arrogance. “Wrong?” he said, with false gaiety. “Bright Lady, no, of course there’s nothing wrong! Some of the Bards just came over from their Collegium and started an impromptu contest; it got so damned hot in the Great Hall with all those people crowded in that I gave up - “
Just then the shutters in both the lifebonded’s room andSavil’s crashed against the walls with such force that it was a wonder that the windows didn’tshatter.
“Havens!” Vanyel yelped, “She’ll kill us!” and dove for Savil’s room. Tylendel dashed into the other, mentally cursing his own clumsiness, and cursing himself for letting hisreaction to the boy cloud his reading of him.
By the time he got everything secured and returned to the common room, Vanyel had retreated into his ownroom and the door was firmly and irrevocably shut.
“Vanyel,” the trainee said, softly, his eyes dark with compassion and understanding, “Is something wrong?”
“I - “ Vanyel began, then closed his eyes as a jit of trembling hit him. ‘ ‘I - the music- I- ‘‘
Suddenly Tylendel was beside him, holding him, quieting his shivering. ‘ ‘It’s all right,’’ he murmured into Vanyel’s ear, his breath warm and like a caress in his hair. ‘ ‘It’s all right, I understand. ‘‘
Vanyel stood as unmoving as a dead stick, hardly daring to breathe, afraid to open his eyes. Tylendel stroked his hair, the back of his neck, his hands warm and light - and Vanyel thought his heart was going to pound itself to pieces. ‘ I understand,’’ he repeated. ‘ ‘I know what it’s like to want something, and know you ‘II never have it. “
‘ ‘You - do ?’’ Vanyel faltered.
Tylendel chuckled. It was a warm, rich sound.
And his fingers traced the line of Vanyel’s spine, slowly, sensuously. Vanyel started to relax in Tylendel’s arms - and his eyes popped open in startlement when his own hands at Tylendel’s chest encountered, not cloth, but skin.
The trainee was starkly, gloriously nude.
“Then again, “ Tylendel whispered, looking deeply into Vanyel’s eyes. ‘ ‘Maybe I will get it. ‘‘
Vanyel made a strangling noise, wrenched himself away, and fled into darkness, into cold -
Into the middle of his old dream.
First there had been the snow-plain, then as he walked across it, the teeth of ice had begun poking their way up through the granular snow. They’d grown higher as he walked, but what he hadn’t known was that they were growing behind him as well. Now he was trapped inside a ring of them. Trapped inside walls of ice, smoother than the smoothest glass, colder than the coldest winter. He couldn’t break out; he pounded on them until his arms were leaden, to no effect. Everywhere he looked- ice, snow, nothing alive, nothing but white and pale blue and silver. Even the sky was white. And he was so alone- so terribly alone.
Nothing soft, nothing comforting. Nothing welcoming. Only the ice, only the unyielding, unmoving ice and the white, grainy snow.
He was cold. So appallingly cold - so frozen that he ached all over.
He had to get out.
Hoping to climb over the barrier, he reached for the top of one of the ice-walls, and pulled back his hands as pain stabbed through them. He stared at them stupidly. His palms were slashed nearly to the bone, and blood oozed sluggishly from the cuts to pool at his feet.
There was blood on the snow; red blood- but as he stared at it in numb fascination, it turned blue.
Then his hands began to burn with the cold, yet fiery pain of the wounds. He gasped, and tears blurred his vision; he wanted to scream, but could only moan.
Gods, ithurt, he’d give anything to make it stop hurting!
Suddenly, the paindid stop; his hands went numb. His eyes cleared and he looked down at his injured hands again - and saw to his horror that the slashes had frozen over andhis hands were turning to ice; blue, and shiny, and utterly without feeling. Even as he gazed at them, the ice crept farther up; over his wrists, crawling up his forearms- and he cried out-
Then he wasn’tthere anymore, he was somewhere else. It was dark, but he could see; by the lightning, by a strange blue glow about him. Lightning flickered overhead, and seemed to be controlled by whathe did or thought; he was standing on a mound of snow in the center of a very narrow valley. To either side of him were walls of ice that towered over his head, reaching to the night sky in sheer, crystalline perfection. Behind him - there was nothing- somehow he knew this. But before him -
“Vanyel!”
Before him an army; an army of mindless monsters-creatures with only one goal. To getpast him. Already he was wounded; he twisted to direct the lightning to lash into their ranks, and felt pain lancing down his right side, felt the hot blood trickling down his leg into his boot and freezing there. There were too many of them. He was doomed. He gasped and wept at the horrible pain in his side, and knew that he was dying. Dying alone. So appallingly alone-