hey everyone! thanks for the reviews… very encouraging! (well, most of them…)

to irked and annoyed citizen: yes, I do have a brain, and yes, I do use it. im sorry if I don't have time to read through the two thousand nine hundred and eighty seven stories under the tamora pierce category of fanfic and make sure I didn't use an idea someone had already used…….. so my advice would be if you find my story annoying, don't read it anymore.

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Alanna smiled at Buri as they met in the practice yards one morning.

            "You don't know how good it is to see someone who's not demanding a queenly duty out of me," Alanna muttered as the two picked bows and arrow to shoot at targets.            Buri gave a short laugh. "Glad to be of service. You're doing the same for me."

            Alanna glanced sharply at the small K'mir, who was calmly letting fly an arrow that hissed through the air and embedded itself in the center of the target.

            "What was that supposed to mean?" Alanna demanded, sending her own arrow flying; it landed a hair away from the center of the bullseye.

            Buri shrugged. "Thayet's not the easiest person to be around these days, is all. I just need a break from her once in a while."

            Alanna paused to stare at Buri. "What? What's the matter with Thayet?"

            Buri shrugged again. "She's just moping around all the time, it seems. I know she's happy to be here, but she really has nothing to do… and even though she'll never say it, I think she misses being royalty. She's just so used to it, and she always took it for granted that she would be part of the ruling family of K'mir."

            Alanna sighed. "I'd give almost anything to switch places with her," she mused wistfully, hardly even aware that she was speaking out loud until Buri agreed quietly,

            "I'd guess she's feeling the same way."

            Abruptly Alanna started, and Buri waved the statement away. "Never mind that, Majesty! Just foolishness, that's all…" she trailed away, looking uncomfortable.

            Alanna shuddered. "Please, don't call me 'Majesty'—it's enough to make me sick, at the moment."

            This brought a wry grin to Buri's face. "All right, Lioness. But really, don't worry about Thayet. She'll be fine, she just needs some more time to adjust. And I'll be fine too—I just have to deal with a grump until then."

            Alanna nodded in agreement, thinking contradictorily to herself, It's not them I'm worried about, it's me!

            Just then Alanna saw a tall figure clad in elegant silk step onto the courts, deeply engaged in conversation with another figure. Shivering, she pulled Buri off the archery field and they ducked into one of the rooms where extra weapons were kept.

            "Sorry," Alanna responded to Buri's questioning look. "I just feel so uneasy around Roger… maybe it's unreasonable, but…"

            Buri shook her head firmly. "Unreasonable, nothing. Men returning from the dead are bound to make you uneasy—especially if you're the one who killed him!"

            Alanna just shook her head again, thinking in silence for a moment before suddenly remembering—

            "Buri! I'm sorry, I completely forgot that I'm supposed to be back in the palace! I told Thom I'd meet him today…" she trailed off, worry for her twin clouding her face.

            Buri nodded understandingly. "Don't worry about it, Maj—Alanna. Go see your brother. I believe I'll go back upstairs, too… back to my grouch of a mistress." She looked back at the practice courts, indicating the Duke of Conte and his companion, Alex, with a hand. "I don't think I'll stick around here right now."

            Alanna nodded, but her thoughts were already on Thom as the two headed back to the palace and parted. Thom had been looking terrible since he brought Roger back from the dead, as if his Gift were suddenly turning on him and burning him away from the inside out. Alanna hadn't been able to see him very often since returning to the palace, especially not after marrying Jonathan, but it seemed that every time she visited him he looked worse.

            As Alanna reached Thom's rooms, Faithful darted out of nowhere and raced away down the hallway, yowling, Teach that dragon of yours some better manners towards cats! Alanna allowed herself half a grin; ever since Faithful had aided in putting a sleeping spell on Liam, who was scared to death of magic, he had shunned the cat and thrown kicks at the animal if he got too close. The grin dissipated, however, as she knocked on Thom's door and was received by her brother.

            Alanna couldn't help but gasp when she saw him; in a week, Thom had gone from being a bit on the skinny side with feverish headaches and dry skin to cracked, dried white parchment stretched over brittle bones. Alanna instinctively reached for the ember-stone that hung at her throat, a token from the Goddess that she had received years earlier, and gasped again as the stone revealed a blood-red aura surrounding Thom.

            "Thom!" She reached out for him, and he drew back, his face turning dangerously angry as he said heatedly, "Don't!"

            The warning came too late, for her fingers had already brushed his cheek when she drew back, alarmed. His skin was burning hot to the touch!

            Alanna clutched her hand in shock, the ember-stone revealing traces of red fire fading from it before she let it go.

            "Thom, you're… you look…"

            "Terrible. Horrendous. A monster," Thom replied acidly, "Half dead and good riddance." He turned away, leaving his bitter words to rain down on a stunned Alanna.

            She reached for him again in a gesture of comfort, then remembered and snatched her hand back just as he turned to face her again, his violet eyes too large in his bony face.

            "Go ahead, say it. Everyone else does! I have no right to live, it's only just that if I mess in affairs not meant for human hands that I take the place in the Realms of the Black God for the one I brought back…" he trailed of desolately, again turning away.

            Nonplussed, Alanna stumbled weakly to a chair and fell into it. Thom stood staring into the fireplace, watching flames dance before his eyes with his back still turned to Alanna. After a moment, Alanna got her emotions under control and said flatly,

            "Look, Thom, you've got to get help! You can't keep going on like this, you'll waste away to…" she broke off as Thom heaved a ragged cough. "You see?"

            Thom turned to glare at her. "You think I don't know myself how bad I'm doing? But what can I do?"

            "Find a healer, anyone!"

            Thom laughed harshly. "First find me a healer who'll come near me—none of them want to risk staining their Gifts with mine! And then, when you've found some healers who'll even touch me, try narrowing the list down to ones who actually know what's wrong with me and how to cure it. I guarantee, there aren't going to be very many healers responding to a request like that! Even I don't know what's wrong with me!"

            Alanna opened her mouth to respond but hastily closed it again, finding it empty of words—after all, what could she say? He spoke the truth.

            Thom laughed again. "No names to roll off? I thought not!"

            Alanna sucked in a breath, feeling all the worse because she knew that if Thom were well she would be angry at him for speaking to her so, while now she was not able to find it in her heart to do so.

            Thom turned back to look at her, every inch of him obviously in agonizing pain—a pain both mental and physical, and all the more hard to bear for being a blend of two kinds. "Look Alanna, I know I haven't got much time left, and you know it too. So let's not waste it like this."

            Alanna burst into tears. Thom reached out awkwardly to embrace her, then remembered and pulled his hand back as Alanna flinched unwillingly.

            Swiping at her face with the sleeve of her blouse, Alanna blinked back any more tears that threatened to fall and turned abruptly. "All right, Thom. But let's start with my next visit… you know we won't be able to start over from here." She looked back at him to see him give a tight nod of agreement as she managed a weak, crooked half-smile.

            She left and closed the door, unable to know that as soon as she was gone Thom flew into a crazed fit, his violet eyes gleaming dangerously as he hurled things around the room and finally tried to magically lift a chair too heavy for him to move with his hands alone—he succeeded only in setting it ablaze, the flames of magic burning red rather than the normal purple of his and Alanna's magics. Seeing this, he desperately uttered a quick, sharp word that was half sob, and immediately water that seemed to come from nowhere doused the fire, leaving only a smoking and wet charred piece of wood. However, even this didn't go right—the water continued to fall, gushing out of the air in a huge waterfall long after the fire was out, and obviously long after the cursing Thom had intended it to. It was too much—the young lord threw himself onto the couch, crying out tears of rage, confusion, and most of all, fear. He, Lord Thom, who had once in his short career been considered the most powerful mage in all the eastern lands, couldn't even perform a simple lifting spell without causing disaster to strike. What had he been reduced to?

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so, hows everyone liking it so far? good, I hope!

btw: if anyone has any ideas as to how this story should go, I really have no idea!! I kind of made it really complicated for myself by putting in all the probs of Lioness Rampant… I guess I just wanted to see how an A/J monarchy would handle all of the problems a J/T monarchy did… but HELP!!!!!