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"We tell," I said I broke through the master&039;s stance and touched him hard over the heart with the tip of h" gesture I stepped back as well and crossedthe end of the match

"Rupert and Jacey, both," Audric said

"Yeah" And if they hated us for it, we could run But if they wanted us to stay, it would at least be with full knowledge of the consequences "I like the staves Well balanced Sh for lad you approve" He looked down at his broken finger "Nicely done,incantations?"

I shook icy water from my hair and picked up the bowl that had once heldknocked to the floor The food hadn&039;t been so lucky Applesauce and cottage cheese were all over the place, ground into the boards by our feet "A couple of healing chants are in my repertory You clean up the porch I&039;ll heal your hand"

"Done," he said "And after that, we tell our friends e are Then we&039;ll go up on the mountain to find the rest of the a your Hand of the Law What?" he said when I flinched slightly "I have no doubt you can control your peculiar reaction to the stone and your attraction to the kylen We need to find the ed to keep the , in Audric&039;s case, and with ribs taped, in my case - ere in the shop with Jacey and Rupert I had a rune of forgetting ready just in case they decided to turn us in, but I hoped I wouldn&039;t have to use it

While Audric poured and served tea in the shop&039;s tiny salvaged porcelain teacups, I started the confession "I have so I haven&039;t told you Soer if it was discovered" Not able to stay seated, I stood and paced in front of Jacey and Rupert Jacey orking on a bracelet of green and brown yarn and tuets, her eyes on her work Rupert sat back in his chair, legs outstretched, and watched me as I paced, speculation on his face "If you want erous forwhat I&039;n over one by nightfall"

"You&039;re a e?" Jacey said

I stopped so fast I nearly tripped over e Probably a stone hed, the sound of his chuckles low and astonished I looked from Rupert to Jacey She raised her head at last and stared at me "We talked about e&039;d do if it was true What we&039;d do if you were caught and us with you Rupert saw your scars No human would have survived the venom and viruses froe or a mule" Jacey placidly returned her eyes to her work as she spoke "It&039;s not like we&039;re orthodox"

"My uncle on my mother&039;s side," Rupert said "The one as elected to Congress? If we ever need to run, I can call him and request sanctuary in an Enclave somewhere We canin the storeroom, of course "Thorn&039;s Gems as an Enclave business would increase our value a hundredfold If we could advertise that all our stock has e-stones, ould be rich in five years and could live anywhere anted Jacey already talked to Big Zed, and he agreed So Are you aZed was Zedikiah Senior, Jacey&039;s husband Which meant he now had an idea what I was too And because I hadn&039;t been flayed or tortured this , it appeared that he hadn&039;t turned me in to the AAS "Yes," I said, the word a breath without tone Tears sprang to my eyes "Really? You really don&039;t want me to leave?"

"Really," Rupert said He stood and set down his eathered me in his arms "We&039;re family When ht, they dumped h you weren&039;t a , you acceptedZed, you and your foster father took et the paperwork done to getZed was a ith kids and the elders didn&039;t want to approve it" She sot me that dress That beautiful white dress"

I sobbed once into Rupert&039;s shoulder

"Because of you, I gotdress, with an elder to officiate, even if he was ain his boots In spite of their feelings towardto do with that We&039;re faahest coive She turned to Audric "And you?"

Audric went still, his eyes on Rupert "I&039;m a half-breed Humans call us mules We call ourselves the second-unforeseen"

"That explains a lot," Rupert said, his words heavy withHalf-breeds were seldoenitalia

"Our tiether isn&039;t as complete, as what you would experience with a human," Audric said "You may not choose me for partner now that you knohat I aureested"

"Sex isn&039;t everything," Rupert said, his hands, but it felt good onsound, a steady double thuured," he said to Audric "Never have Stay As long as you want Forever As a half-breed, you&039;ll outlive h tione"

Audric&039;s body loosened as tension eased out of hih it&039;s in abeyance at the moment We may be discovered You still want us to stay?"

"Yep," Jacey said "We do"

I pushed Rupert away and bent over Jacey, hugging her

She hugged back one-handed, holding her work in the other, patting ht one of her children

As I stood,in the frontIt was a businessman in suit, hat, and periwinkle blue scarf He had beautiful eyes like labradorite, clear and blue-green, like the gulf He bowed slightly when he saw me and walked away He looked fa before dark, Rupert, Audric, Thaddeus Bartholomew, Ciana, and I headed up the ether fro traded in his juray horse for a calm, barrel-chested bay with a black blaze and four black stockings, was dressed as before in jeans and several shirts A tan cowboy hat hid his reddish hair, and the layered shirts hid his now-deforlanced at me beneath the riood in jeans, sitting on a horse I hated it almost as much that he seemed to have come to some sort of acceptance of me and our bizarre situation He tipped his hat, eyes rueful I had presus, but it seenized it wasn&039;tpregnancy, and then lied to him for his whole life I didn&039;t want to like hi to

I had taken time to research incantations for emotional calm and found two that claier and the passion of jealousy I had instilled two aventurine donuts with the incantations and noore them in my bra While not intended to stop or control lust, passion was passion, and they see pretty well Even when the cop sat a horse like he&039;d been born in the saddle, butt gripped tight against the cantle, thighs wrapping around the fork, boots solid in the stirrups I wasn&039;t ignoring hi his bones in public, so things weren&039;t too bad

Ciana - who couldn&039;t be left alone, not with a daywalker, spawn, and a blood-demon loose - rode pillion behind Audric on his Clydesdale The palomino, like my Friesian, had been bred to work Clyde had been stable bound too long and was raring to go, bringing excited squeals froht the bit Audric, dressed in black deniave the horsehappily when Ciana shrieked We ht Audric was psyched

Rupert, goaded with liberal a us, sat on a slum but still made a fashion state his boots I was dressed in dark green, the layers calculated to pered stones, along with a generous handful of the a rod I had secured all s in case of a second accidental drenching The walking stick went into a loop near ot lucky and had to dig

The ground was nearly free of snow, and according to local radio, the ice cap was beginning toit for stability Melt ran in sheets If the te until so up on the Trine would be fatal if the cap shifted and created an avalanche We&039;d be buried Of course, the toould be inundated a half h Either e&039;d be dead

Everyone in the group except Ciana kneas a e, so I didn&039;t have to pretend I opened ato stay on Hoo hit Knohat to look for, I spotted the lightning and sparkles that had attractedmy virtual trip into the Power&039;s domain The aies If the stone had been alive, I&039;d have said it was excited Dropping the scan, I urged Homer to the head of the row "I&039;ll take point Take our backs, Thadd?" When he raised a thumb, I slapped Homer&039;s withers with the reins and let hiht uphill

The ride was fast, wet, and exhilarating Openingride caused e attributes to slip, and by the tilowing faintly Audric, who frowned at s to the sides so she wouldn&039;t notice

By late afternoon, e reached the place that had drawn my attention, ere all mud caked and tired, and solen on the mountainside was rass peeking through The land to the east fell away in a long gulley, and the trench was running with a waterfall full of debris To the as atrumpet vines, honeysuckle, and ferns It was an idyllic spot, and boulders protruding fro power I rode Horown, shattered granite It had to be a ree attributes and tossed the reins to the ground, sliding after the stick, one in each hand Homer looked down at me and snorted into my hair "Thanks," I said "I really needed a head full of horse snot" Taking ar cube frolen, their horses neighing softly, the people talking, I left Ho stick into a loop on lowedpulse answered from my pocket I was pretty sure I&039;d found thesnow, ice, and detritus away, I positioned the shovel and put htly packed, but it was heavy with snow ice I felt the activity in hs I knew the instant Thadd joined me He put his shovel on the north side of thein the same piece of real estate Audric joined us with his own shovel Rupert, co about saddle blisters, pulled Ciana to a pile of rock and watched

I uncovered the first cracked fragment of amethyst, a shard about the size of Hoh-grade quartz It was dae-vision, its rhythlow that pulsed from the earth But it still contained power, oddly undiroundwater I set it gently aside, knowing it hly Audric placed a brittle shard beside mine

As he set it down, a rumble sounded We all turned our eyes uphill and froze A loud crack, like cannon shot, echoed through the nearby peaks; a groan followed it, tortured, as if the earth itself were in pain, the worrisons of avalanche But they faded, and silence settled in Sloe returned to the backbreaking work From the corner offroed by a shard, this one a perfect crystal

We began to uncover a the ser ones out by hand This was not a typical stone forether Whatever it was, it wasn&039;t a mine

An hour later, I took a water bottle and a fist-sized hunk of rock and walked to the top of the ht, I marked a small circle in the soil and sat on a dry boulder in the center of it I&039;d be drunker than ten otten Lucas orthe new stone, freshly dug froround, in front of me, I set a tiny shard coated with Lucas&039; blood on top and drew on the a softly, "Show me Lucas Show me Lucas Show me Lucas ShowI felt a sensation of falling swiftly, then, with a jerk like a prisoner at the end of a hang above Lucas in his cell He was eer had stripped away fatty tissue, leaving well-developed , his eyes closed, but he still breathed Again, I srene, and saw a place on his neck where so We had to find him soon I knew from personal experience that once spawn started to feed, dinner died I used my newfound ability for a blended scan to pinpoint Lucas&039; whereabouts He was deep inside the left peak of the Trine The s that the entrance to the pit was nearby But Lucas was far, far underground And he was still in the claw of a Power

I opened the charmed circle I was useless to help , I stood, surprised at how steady I felt I had used the a why

Hairs along