moment Raeche needed to reveal herself to Lanus, though she had long been laid bare for him. She needed to make a confession. “There have been many times, Emperor, that I have succeeded in leaving you to your own devices. Times when I have longed to bedevil you and yet have sat at my window watching the shadows of the forest. Yet even when we are parted, I think of you. I seek you with my Spirit.”
Her husband traced the curve of her throat with a light stroke of his fingertip.
Raeche shuddered before moving away from the touch. “As you have sought me out.”
“No–”
“Do not lie to me, Lanus. Even in the long rings when you were absent from my bed, you found a way to always be in my sight.”
Silence remained. He seemed to hold his breath.
“Is there truth in the songs, husband?”
Raeche had seen his face darken with rage but never, in all their rings together, with embarrassment.
“Is it true that you are forlorn when too long without my company? Do you seek danger in the South to see if I will come?”
“You did come.”
Raeche found herself smiling. It was as much of a confession as she could hope to get. The Spirit of Confidence rode her–which had never led to peace. Though she longed to stop the words in her throat, they had formed in her heart and were released. “Is your Spirit mine or the Empire’s?”
“We are the Empire.”
She wished to be still. Instead she pressed. “When we were born we were destined to become the Empire. We are now the Empire. When Rucha comes of age we will no longer be the Empire. We are also Lanus and Raeche. We are the Empire, my love, and we are not. Five hundred rings ago, when Trubius and Alblana descended from the throne, they parted and never saw each other again. What will happen when we descend?”
“You will not escape me,” he answered coolly. One of his hands flexed around her wrist.
Raeche’s eyes rolled close for a few seconds. Then she smiled. “I will escape you, Lanus. As a man, I will expect you to drag me back and remind me why I have no desire to escape.”
His body stirred against hers.
“You must answer me,” she urged, though her own body answered his. She found herself lying atop her husband. She kissed his throat. “What will you want from me when I am no longer the Empire, you are no longer the Empire, and you have no need to prove that you wield the Spirit of Might as well as the Spirit of Cleverness?”
“You will always belong to me, Raeche. There will never be another for you or another for me.”
“Prove it to me then,” Raeche dared him.
The Emperor relinquished his hold on her, then stood. A slight and enigmatic smile curved his mouth.
“Prove it to me,” she repeated.
“I will, little dark one. We will say the Amu’Wey.” He moistened his lips and waited for her response. It was almost immediate.
Raeche came to stand before him. She craned her neck to look into his eyes. Her next declaration was true, though she had not known it until that moment. “I have wanted the vow for some time, for as long as I can remember.”
Lanus seemed surprised.
Raeche’s face crumpled a bit as she was assailed by a thought. “Perhaps not that long, but you know I have wanted it”
His lips grazed her forehead. His green eyes darkened with concern as he watched her hesitate.
Raeche stirred, then pushed herself up so she could be eye to eye with her husband. “Lanus, I have only ever belonged in two places in my life. One of them is here, or wherever I find myself in your arms. Saying the Amu’Wey will ensure that that is where I will always be.”
“And the other?”
“The other was at a vanity–”
“You are very lovely,” he offered.
“You misunderstand. It was not just any vanity, but one the likes of which I have never seen again. It belonged to my mother. She locked it behind a closet door and forbade it to me. I saw it, touched it, sat at it but once when I was nine. On it were a mirror, a brush,
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