And here I wanted to drop a mountain on them . . . sighs oh well. I wasn't doing the happy-dance over the last chapter, but it was decent, though short. I'm glad you all liked it. And I can still drop a mountain on someone else.

Fireblade K'Chona: Yeah… you can thank the fact that the laptop came with Microsoft Works for that, but I fixed it. Thanks for telling me.

Laureline: "The bright young seven year old had attached himself to Rowen for reasons unknown, and made Rowen his proxy older brother." Rowen is like Nadar's role model/older brother, since the little moody brat only has sisters.

Thanks to AikoNamika, Tatsukitty, Coral, Fimbrethil, Indigo, Shadowfax, and Wizard116. And the real-life Shored for nagging me. I love you, dude. And I also love MischaKitsune.

Notes: I've been getting a wee bit of chastisement from a few people outside of the site about my use of the word 'alright,' and I'm sure it must have confused a few of you, too, so I'll clear that up now. 'Alright' is just a shortened term of 'all right,' as I'm sure most of you have figured. Its use is way more prominent in the U.K. than it is in North America. I honestly have no idea where I picked it up, but to me it just sounds better. Sorry for the confusement.

And… I know no oneis going to be happy with what happens in this chapter, but it was a loose end that I had to take care of.

See if you can find the WAFF in this chapter. If you can. . . well. . . joy for you.

Unashamed Pluggage: Please read and review my original short story, Savior of Stone, which can be found in the Fairy Tales section or in my profile. Thanks.


When the dark wood fell before me
And all the paths were overgrown
When the priests of pride say there is no other way
I tilled the sorrows of stone

I did not believe because I could not see
Though you came to me in the night
When the dawn seemed forever lost
You showed me your love in the light of the stars

Dante's Prayer by Loreena McKennitt

Chapter 28: Light of the Stars

For a long, long time, Rowen just held Julian, breathing into the silken blonde mop of his hair, confused at what he'd done, hovering in that strange calm he knew was shock, but also strangely happy.

Lifebonded. With Julian. Ye gods, could this situation get any more confusing? He felt inside himself for the lifebond, and found it clear and strong, pulsing confidently. A link that would connect them for the rest of their lives and beyond. He noticed that he hadn't thought of it as being binding, and realized that not only was he at ease with the lifebond, he wasn't bothered by the thought of spending the rest of his life with Julian. The only thing that worried him was—

"R-Rowen?" Julian asked, voice still slightly hoarse.

Rowen stiffened, then winced and hoped it hadn't been noticeable. "Yes?"

"Where—what do we do now?"

How can you expect me to know that? Rowen thought.

"I just—I don't know," Julian said, and Rowen felt a wave of unhappiness mixed with contentment well up from somewhere deep inside him. "I never really considered that you might find out, and never thought that this would be the result. I don't—I didn't—I still don't know what to do about it. I know my feelings on the matter," he said suddenly, seemingly changing the topic.

Feel. . . . he means 'do I love him', Rowen thought, chest tight, and nearly panicked. Do I? Do I? Can I?

Indecision shook him, and then hope steadied him and showed him the way.

Without saying anything, he reached down and tipped Julian's head up. "I don't know if what I feel is love," he said slowly, "but I'm willing to think so, and I'd. . . that is, if you're willing. . . I'd like to give it a try."

A smile spread across Julian's face like the sun, and then Rowen smiled, too.

Then it started to rain, and still they stood there, letting the rain wash away all fears and doubts.

When the sun shone again—brightly now—for it was after dawn, they went inside quietly, avoiding any passing pages or early-rising courtiers. The one thing they could not avoid was the kyree and ratha. One of each saw them passing in the hall, and Rowen would swear that the ratha smirked at him as they walked past quickly. The kyree just gave them a knowing glance and nodded at them before silently slinking off down a side hall.

When they got to Rowen's door, instead of asking to come in, Julian merely placed a hand on Rowen's arm. "I'm sure you still need some time to digest this," he said quietly. "And Kernos knows we both need sleep. I'll leave you to that then. You can come find me when you want to, alright?"

Gratefully, Rowen nodded. It wasn't that he hadn't wanted Julian to come in, he just wasn't sure of how things would have—progressed—from there. . . He didn't really expect it to have degenerated into bedplay, but he was just unsure of what to say. "So we're lifebonded, eh?" "Seems that way." "Ah…"

He snorted. If it had gone into bedplay, he'd have been completely lost. Human/horse intercourse was not something he wanted to contemplate while still comprehending the lifebond. He'd never been very intimate with anyone—scratch that, been intimate at all—and how exactly—No. He was not going to contemplate that right now.

Julian turned away as if to go, and on impulse, Rowen leaned down and kissed the musician gently again. "I will see you later," he murmured, then went into his suite.

§

Julian collapsed onto his bed, feeling dazed. Who could have thought that there was even a chance that Rowen could have felt the same way?

Certainly not Julian himself. He admitted—perhaps he had been a bit hysterical, but—no. Certainly he had acted the fool, but the act itself had seemed to spur Rowen to decide—wait. His head shot off the bed. What if Rowen had been faking for Julian's sake?

Hesitantly, he reached inside himself and touched the lifebond—something he had been yearning to do since learning of its existence, and Felt only surety and hope shining from it.

It wasn't a lie, then. Relief flooded him, and he abruptly felt dizzy and laid his head back down.

Rowen did care. He did.

Cautiously and ever so carefully, Julian fed a trickle of joy down the link, half-hoping Rowen would notice.

There was a surge of surprise, and then something that Julian could only describe as a warm and fuzzy feeling came rushing back through the lifebond.

Delighted, Julian laughed—the first cheerful sound he'd made in quite some time.

§

Melles growled. Not only had that fool Tremane survived his attack, he was now conscious and once again leading his—his!—Kingdom. The Emperor cursed under his breath. There had to be some way of getting rid of that meddling fool forever. There had to be.

§

Frowning, Nadar toyed with the long dagger. Would Rowen like it?

The hilt was wrapped in plain twisted iron, and there was nothing etched on the blade, though there was a small rowan leaf on the tang—a play on Rowen's name. It was pure, clean, and simple, just like Rowen.

Pral, where are you now? he wondered as he balanced it on the tip of his finger.

His beltpouch was very full today, thanks to the pocketchange that his parents had been sending him that he hadn't been spending, and when he thought of Rowen's face as he would hold up the dagger, Nadar smiled and decided to buy it.

As he moved to attract the merchant's attention, however, a commotion broke out behind him, and when he turned around he was confronted by a wide, curved blade and a sneering face.

The slash of a mouth opened, revealing rotting teeth. "Gimme yer money."

Without giving the man any time to realize that he was not just some young teenager looking for a fancy blade, Nadar drove his knee into the man's stomach and followed it with a swift blow to the side of the head with the pommel of the dagger he was still holding.

The man doubled over gasping, and Nadar kicked him aside when he heard a scream from across the street. A man was backed up against a wagon, struggling for breath and trying to pull a knife out of his side, but the three young men surrounding him didn't give him the chance; they swarmed him and in mere seconds the man was on the ground in a pool of blood, and the youths were gone in the crowd.

Nadar made to follow them, but something tugging on his stomach stopped him. He looked down and felt like the world was shaking in its foundations as he realized there was a long, curved blade protruding from his stomach, and that there was blood on it. Only after he had registered that then it started to hurt. He dropped to his knees, gasping, and felt Rowen's knife slip from his grasp. Then he toppled backwards onto the handle of the blade—Scythe, he thought numbly—and it really hurt. He couldn't breathe, and every attempt made the pain worse. He closed his eyes, and everything receded into a sea of black.

When he thought again, it was only to wonder why he couldn't breathe, and why his mouth tasted like he had been sucking on a copper.

Something green filled his vision, and the absence of something that was both white-hot and deathly cold in his abdomen made him cry out briefly. He felt a gush of something warm on his hands, and briefly remembered—Rowen's dagger—and reached for it. If he could only grab it, everything would be okay. The knife seemed both farther away and closer, and more intricate than he remembered, but he managed to close his sticky hands over it with a smile of triumph.

Then the darkness returned.


I was feeling happy-go-lucky when I wrote this, and even though I'm not anymore, I figured I might as well throw it out there anyway.

The scene is a dark alley near Exile's Gate. Chiming on stone is heard, and a ghostly white figure glides into view. A small whinny sounds through the clear, cold air before a Companion materializes completely. Bright blue eyes look from side to side shiftily, and the Companion snorts. Its white body gleams against the dirt of the alley, and it shifts nervously before tossing its head up to look at the sky, as if to ask, 'Why me?'

It glances downward, and involuntarily, one hoof starts beating the cobblestones in a Mr. Ed-esque fashion. The Companion sighs gustily, and then its other hooves start chiming of their own accord. Looking annoyed, the Companion starts tap-dancing in the middle of the alley, going right and left helplessly as its hooves go tap-chime, all the while bearing an odd resemblance to a certain red-headed child who constantly leaps out of her deathbed and dances with her butler.

When it's finished performing a rather skewed-chime version of what at first appears to be a severely distorted Riverdance—which then changed into one of the worst carillion-sounding performances ever heard—it sidles into a side entrance to a building, only to find that the door is locked. It squeezes itself into the opening, and then pokes its head out, as if to say 'Go Away.'

To prevent more erratically-dancing Companions, please review.