Sword of Darkness by Kinley MacGregor Page B

himself across the room to stand just to the right of Kerrigan’s chair. The mandrake leaned down to speak softly. “It feels good, doesn’t it?”
    “What?”
    “To do something decent for another. You’ve never done that before, have you?”
    Kerrigan reached up and grabbed the mandrake by his throat. He pulled him down until he was sure the creature could see him. “You overstep your bounds, servant. Do so again and perish.”
    He released Blaise, who stared at him unblinkingly. There was a perfect outline of his hand against Blaise’s skin, and still there was no fear in the mandrake’s expression. “As you wish, my king.” The words were spoken with a degree of sarcasm.
    Kerrigan flung his hand out and used his powers to banish the beast from him before he did something more permanent to Blaise.
    He should see the creature punished for his insubordination. It would serve him right.
    But as he sat there alone, the mood passed and he considered what the mandrake had said. He’d made Seren happy. In all these centuries, Kerrigan had never made anyone happy before.
    Not even himself.
     
    Seren sang quietly to herself as she sat on the floor of her room working. How she wished she knewKerrigan’s measurements. But it was too late now. The cloth was already cut. Not that it really mattered, she had an uncanny ability to always make clothing to fit. It was something Master Rufus commented on constantly.
    She didn’t know why. She just seemed to know when something was right and when it was wrong.
    Blaise, who had been kind enough to get her the shears, needle, and thread, had warned her that Kerrigan would most likely spurn her gift.
    He might at that. But it felt right to do this. He was the only one she knew who held a high enough position that he could wear the color of her cloth, and it would look good on him. The deep red would accentuate his dark coloring.
    And it would match his eyes when they burned…
    Seren!
    Well, it was true. His eyes did burn almost the same exact red.
    Dismissing those thoughts, she fell into what Wendlyn called her working trance. Every time she wove on her mother’s loom, something strange happened to her. It was as if time stood still. She could work endlessly without tiring.
    If only the same could happen while she worked Master Rufus’s looms.
    “Seren?”
    She heard the sound of Blaise’s voice as if he were a great distance away. “Aye?”
    “I’ve brought your supper to you.”
    “Please set it aside. I’m not hungry yet.”
    Blaise did as she bade while he watched herwork. He could tell that she was only vaguely aware of his presence. There was an odd aura around her…one he’d only seen a few times in the past.
    It was something that only his magical sight could pick up on, not his true eyesight. He listened to the beauty of Seren’s voice as she sang an ancient lullaby under her breath. Her hands worked the stitches on the tunic in an effortless beauty. There was no snarled thread, no misstitching whatsoever.
    He’d never known anyone to work faster, and at the rate she was going, she would have the tunic ready in only a few more hours. He was impressed.
    But more than that, he was suspicious. He’d been around enough magical beings in his life to recognize the species, and as he watched Seren working, he was beginning to understand why she was so important to Morgen.
    There was much more to this “simple” peasant than what met the eye.
    “Seren?”
    It took her several minutes before she realized he’d spoken. “Aye?”
    “Who were your parents?”
    He could tell by her face that the question surprised her. “My mother was a weaver and I know nothing of my father. He died shortly before I was born.”
    “And your mother? Where is she now?”
    Her green eyes turned dull as a deep, heartfeltsadness filled them. “She died not long after I was apprenticed to Master Rufus.”
    A chill of foreboding went through him. “How did your parents