“Wanted me to worry about that, did he?”
“I believe so. Lily, Robert Friar is your dielgraf. Your soul-enemy.”
“That sounds about right. Is that all of the agreement?”
“Oh, no. Robert Friar was meticulous in his terms. Neither I nor my people can in any way reveal your situation, either while you are my hostage or after you become his, to anyone who is not sidhe. When Robert Friar tells me he is ready to take possession of you, I must make the exchange promptly and without attempting to alter or add to the terms of our agreement. At that point, if we have both honored the terms of our agreement, we are mutually bound not to act against each other, or allow our agents to so act, for twenty-four hours.”
“Is that the exact wording? You can’t reveal my situation to anyone who is not sidhe?”
“That is the wording. However—” She held up a hand, stopping Lily before she spoke. “You have hinted that someone in your realm is sidhe. While speaking to such a one would be allowed under one of the terms, it violates another. I vowed to hold you. Were I to reveal your presence while you are in my custody, I would be acting against that vow.”
“After I’m not in your custody anymore…?”
Alycithin smiled. She all but purred. “I did not agree to see that you remained in Robert Friar’s custody. Only that neither I nor my agents would act against him for twenty-four hours.”
Lily wasn’t purring. This, she wanted to say, is your solution? Your deal?
From the halfling’s perspective, maybe it looked like a good deal. Maybe Alycithin would have gone happily to torture and death if she knew she would be avenged. Maybe Lily would think so, too, if killing Robert Friar were her only goal.
Problem was, she really wanted to be alive and at least mostly intact when Rule came racing to her…which he would do long before the twenty-four hours were up. Once Lily was away from Alycithin’s Gift, the mate bond should work fine.
Alycithin didn’t know about the mate bond. That was the important takeaway from her offer. She didn’t know about the bond, so she wasn’t honor-bound to keep Lily from using it. Lily spoke slowly, as if reluctant. “You have my phone.”
“Yes.”
“You know how to use it?”
“Of course. I do not understand how the device works, but from what I have seen, most people in your realm do not understand it, either, yet they operate phones without this understanding.”
“One of the contacts on my phone is for a sidhe who passes as human. Will you take my word for this?”
“Do you give me your word?”
“I do.”
“Then yes, I accept that this is true.”
“Will you call this person and reveal what you can, in honor, speak of concerning my situation?”
“Twenty-four hours after the exchange, yes, I will. But you have not yet told me this person’s name.”
Lily looked up at the ceiling. Drummond was still all misty. She looked down at her hands. “I have a question about your code. Does it allow you to give me aid in pursuing my spiritual needs?”
It was Alycithin’s turn to be puzzled. “It would depend on the type of aid, but if it does not violate the terms of my agreement, then yes.”
“I am facing either death or torture or both. I need to meditate to strengthen myself for the coming ordeal. It would be a great aid to my meditation if I had my ring.”
She shook her head. Her sadness seemed genuine. “I am sorry, Lily. The charm on your ring holds arguai—which, by definition, means I cannot measure or judge the nature of the power it holds. I cannot be certain you will not somehow use it to escape.”
“If by arguai you mean that something’s there, but it isn’t exactly magic, then that’s what I’ve sensed about the charm. I don’t know how to use the whatever-it-is, or even if I could. I’m a sensitive. I can’t use magic. I simply want the ring as a focus for my meditation.” If she’d broken through briefly to Rule using a crude drawing of the toltoi…and she had. She was sure of that, even if she didn’t know if he’d “heard” a single word. If a crude drawing helped enough for that, having the real thing on her hand ought to let her do a lot more.
Alycithin’s eyebrows lifted in polite skepticism. “Most objects containing arguai are used as foci, and usually in spiritual practices. You…oh. You truly do not know what you were entrusted with, do you?” She sighed. “I am sorry. I still cannot allow you to have it. Arguai acts unpredictably. It might choose to reveal its nature to you, or act through you even if you do not consciously will such action.”
Strike three and you’re out. Good thing she wasn’t playing baseball. “In that case, may I have privacy and a candle?”
“Of course.” Alycithin seemed glad Lily had asked for something she could agree to. “My people, too, sometimes use a candle as a focus. This is specifically allowed in the code. I will have to enspell the flame, of course. It will burn long if you do not move the candle or attempt to use it to burn anything else.”
That sounded like tricky spellwork. Cullen could do it, Lily felt sure, but not casually. Alycithin seemed to consider it a minor task. “Thank you.”
“And if I may know the name of the person you wish me to call when it is time?”
“Arjenie. Arjenie Fox.”
Several minutes later, Sean had been invited to join Alycithin in the main room. Lily sat on a pillow on the floor of the bedroom where she’d awoken. The walls were playing chamber music, a piece Lily didn’t recognize. Alycithin brought the candle in herself while the armed elf—Dinalaran—kept his SIG trained on Lily. She chanted softly with her hand hovering over the candle’s wick. A flame popped into being there.
The elf and the halfling left, closing and no doubt locking the door behind them. Lily tried to settle. Her heart was racing. She felt halfway nauseous. Drummond, she said.
Nothing happened. No white mist. No annoying yet reassuring ghostly shape.
She swallowed. If she couldn’t even reach Drummond, how was she going to…Try again, she told herself. This time she spoke his name. “Drummond.”
And this time it worked. He shaped up pretty quickly. And he was grinning. Actually grinning. “We’re at 1132 North Bretton. The neighbors ordered pizza and gave the address. 1132 North Bretton.”
Hot damn. She sent him that along with a quick, fierce grin. Now I have to make use of what you learned. You need to go in the other room or something so I can concentrate.
He seemed to notice the candle for the first time. “What the hell are you doing?”
Trying to mindspeak someone else. Someone who can send help to 1132 North Bretton.
He hesitated, then jerked a quick nod and went misty. He didn’t go in the other room, though, but drifted up to the ceiling.
She’d just have to pretend he wasn’t there, watching. Or whatever he did when he was misty.
Look into the flame, Sam always said. Find me there.
One more thing Alycithin didn’t know about Lily. Her teacher, her grandfather-in-magic, was the black dragon…who was currently about five hundred miles away. Who approached teaching in a toss-the-kid-in-the-water-and-see-if-she-drowns sort of way. And Lily was really bad at mindspeech and had little to no chance of reaching that far…
Don’t think about that.
She might suck at mindspeech, but Sam was very, very good at it. He mindspoke across the entire damn continent—five hundred miles was no problem for him. But it might not be five hundred miles. He overflew San Francisco regularly; it was part of his territory, one of the cities he’d agreed to patrol to sop up excess magic. He didn’t keep to a strict schedule, but this was the right part of the week for his overflight. He might be at Laban Clanhome right now, chowing down on a couple cows.