A.N Okay so the Ship was overrun by a swarm of flat tailed horned lizards. They took all the rum. So the captain is out in the desert right now tracking them down, documenting the bazaar incident, and retreaving the rum. We don't exspect to see her until late august but for now the Cat and I are on our own. There will be spelling errors. And now Chapter 34

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Chapter 34: You want me to do what with my hips?

Honeyfeather sighed as the magic of the music released her. It was a beautiful piece, and it put her in mind of the beautiful harmony of the elements and of nature. How could she ever hope to impress Con'rart? How could she ever get the man to see her as anything other than a child?

Every time she'd tried anything he let her down –

- Gently

As if, he was letting down a young girl with her first crush.

It was damned infuriating!

Suddenly she smiled as inspiration hit. She knew exactly how to win his interest, and possibly how to entice him to her bed. It was quite simple really, all musicians valued music. She didn't quite know how Con'rart was able to make that thin metal flute create that eerie soul piercing undertone. It somehow simultaneously sang to her soul making her feel invincible, while forcing her to acknowledge her own inadequate mortality.

She suppressed the urge to shudder, at the memory of how she'd felt while he played. She'd felt like a small child before the wisdom of adults.

It was hard to stomach.

But at least now she knew how to impress him.

She was a musician, a natural one - they'd called her a prodigy - and still did.

She'd show him how to properly play that instrument.

They would bond over music lessons.

Yes that's it.

He would be hers within the week.

Graceful as a cat she rose to her feet and crossed the clearing to stand in front of the Herald. She offered him a saucy smile and pulled the flute out of his hand. "Let a true prodigy show you how to play that." She said impishly then added in a husky undertone, "If you ask nicely I'll even give you lessons so you can get rid of the weird undertone. Who wants to be reminded they're mortal, when I can make you feel like something more?"

As she said that last bit, she 'accidentally' brushed his thigh, in a tenderly sensual caress.

Con'rart only raised one sculpted eyebrow. His reply however truly startled her.

"You are mortal, and Hōzukimaru is not as easy to play as it looks." He replied in an entirely unfazed manner.

Hōzukimaru?

He'd named his instrument Hōzukimaru?

That sounded like a disease!

She shrugged off the odd name and brought the truly beautiful, if oddly heavy for how thin it was instrument to her lips and began to play.

It took her exactly two cords to realize no sound was coming out of the flute, and a full six minutes after that to produce a small squeak! Infuriated she blew harder, and Hōzukimaru produced an ear piercingly shrill squeal that made her entire world spin.

Honestly she was surprised her ears weren't bleeding!

Disgusted she looked out at her audience, and noted that the only one not clamping their hands over their ears was Con'rart.

As ever, the infuriating and drop dead gorgeous man looked entirely too serene!

His only response was to tuck one errant lock of mahogany hair back behind his ear. She couldn't help noticing the fact that the little lock of hair was quickly becoming a ringlet.

A beautifully sunlit ringlet

Damnit!

Desperate to actually produce music and not an ear piercing shriek, she blew into the mouthpiece once more.

But again all she produced was a horribly shrill cry.

Infuriated she raised the flute over her head, prepared to throw the infuriating thing, only to realize at the last second that that would most defiantly not impress the flute's owner. Glaring at the instrument she roughly shoved it in the direction of Herald Con'rart.

"It's defective." She said tartly, watching the man take back his instrument almost reverently.

Annoyed she stalked off in a huff, leaving the vale behind entirely and never once noticing her silent stalker.

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Holly sighed as she quietly followed Honeyfeather. She honestly didn't know why the woman had set her sights on Conrart and clung to the clearly irrational idea with a tenacity that would be the envy of any terrier. It was clear the young man was not interested. And honestly judging by the armband the man slept with it was quite clear the man had his own sights set elsewhere. Frankly she was beginning to suspect he might be Shych to begin with.

However the boy was so jumpy, and yet timid when it came to people propositioning him that she suspected some sort of trauma.

She'd spoken with the boy's adoptive elder brother's mate, the Kestra'chern Silverfox and discovered that the man shared her suspicions. She had every intention of trying to get the boy to open up to her on their journey. However if that didn't work she'd talk to her friend Ambermoon and schedule the boy regular appointments for the duration of their two month stay at White Griffin. He obviously needed help moving past whatever had made him this shy, timid and jumpy. The incident with Forestblade couldn't be repeated. While it had been very funny – it hadn't been particularly Heraldic.

She hoped that she could get him to open up to her so that she could help him to deal with whatever emotional scars he bore. However she was confident that even if she couldn't get the boy to open up to her or if she couldn't handle his problems, Ambermoon –at least – would have no problems handling him.

After a while she caught up to Honeyfeather in a small clearing deep in the heart of the forest, outside the Vail. The girl sat curled up at the base of an enormous tree, sobbing quietly into her arms. A relatively small sparrow hawk sat on her shoulder, franticly preening her midnight black hair. Holly sighed, and after quietly settling herself down beside the girl – she waited.

It didn't take long.

In typical teenaged fashion, the girl soon started to rant.

It took her the better part of an hour to calm the hysterical teen down.

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Herald Kerowyn sighed and swung up into her companion's saddle. The Crown was sending her lifebonded lover on a diplomatic mission to Shin Makoku. However since the crown didn't know exactly how a Lifebond would respond to being stretched across two worlds, she was being sent along as well. Basically she was being sent on this mission to keep Eldan sane, and Eldan was being sent along to make sure she didn't start a diplomatic incident.

Quietly she stroked the crest of her Companion's mane. Sayvil snorted and stomped one foot in a manner eerily remnicent of a horse. Kero could sense the mare's ill ease.

It made sense, she was going on a diplomatic mission to another world, and both of her foals where currently out on their internship year with their own Heralds. That had to be hard.

Eldan's Ratha nuzzled Sayvil gently, offering words of comfort that Kero heard only as a slight buzzing in the back of her mind. She wished she could do more for her companion but for now there was little she could do. They were going to be in this other world for a year by their time; apparently it was only 6 months in Shin Makoku.

Sayvil straitened clearly ready to do her duty to Valdemar.

"Are you all right?" she asked the mare quietly.

Sayvil sighed, :I have always worried after Vanyel, when he's away. The same is true of Jissa, however I will be fine Chosen. Ratha reminds me that they are no longer youngsters. They will both be fine, and when we return Jissa and young Yozak will have returned from their first Circuit. And Vanyel will be on his way back home by then as well, I can handle this. Thank you for your concern.:

During their conversation they had been slowly approaching the gate that would take them into the other world. Kerowyn rubbed her temples as they passed through the gate, she was given the Mazoku language just hours before and her head still throbbed.

She blinked and shielded her eyes at the abrupt change in light. In Valdamar it was early morning, here it was a little past noon.

:Am I really seeing a flying Skeleton?: Sayvil asked abruptly.

Kero's head snapped up and she gazed up at the winged skeleton flying over head in utter shock, her mouth hanging open. "Yes," she replied "that is defiantly a flying skeleton."

"They're members of the Flybone tribe." A voice said from just behind them, in oddly accented and slightly archaic Valdemarian.

Sayvil and Ratha reared up onto their hind legs, and pivoted around on their hooves to face the possible threat. Kero's hand dropped to the hilt of her sword, just in case, absently she noticed Eldan doing the same thing at her side.

The boy in front of her raised his hands in a show of good intent and she let go of her sword despite the small troop of men mounted on horses behind him. She recognized him from Elspeth's and Conrart's descriptions. Black hair and black eyes, marked him as one of Shin Makoku's celebrated double blacks, but the glasses, identified him as Murata Ken, Great Sage of Shin Makoku.

She offered the boy a polite bow, idly wondering about his actual age, he looked to be about 16 but that was no guarantee. She'd learned that when she'd assumed Conrart was 19, only to discover that he'd actually been about 135 at the time.

The boy inclined his head and introduced himself as Murata Ken, she was glad she'd been correct in her assumption of the boy's identity.

"Come," Murata said after a moment's silence "We will escort you to Covenant Castle."

Conrart Weller gapped at his 'adoptive older brother' in utter shock. "You want me to do what with my hips?" he demanded, completely aghast.

Firesong sighed, and slid behind him grabbing his hips in a way that would have seen anyone else (Yozak included) thrown into the nearest wall. Conrart clamped down on the burning need to put the other man through a nearby tree only by the exertion of an extreme amount of self-control.

"Move your hips in a figure 8, by the Star Eyed Goddess you're wound tighter then a lute string." Firesong instructed attempting to steer his hips.

Conrart pulled away, and crossed his arms in a defensive position. "Exactly why do you want me to learn how to dance? I know how to dance. I've been dancing since I was 3."

"The dance of the water is a great dance, a good way to relax and enrich your soul. I'm not asking you to learn or the dance of flame or the dance of earth, or even the dance of wind. I want you to learn this dance because you are an elemental and you should respect and pay homage to that element now try again, and this time be sensual."

"How exactly dose undulating my hips and ribcage and acting like a … like I grew up in the pleasure district have anything to do with honoring the element I'm contracted to? My Lady mother would be appalled if she ever saw me standing on a table thrusting my hips for an audience. It's not pri – proper."

Firesong raised an eyebrow, he got the feeling that 'proper' had not been what the boy was actually going to say. In many ways Con'rart reminded him of Elspeth when he'd first met the former Crowned Princess of Valdemar.

The only difference was he was a lot more reserved, actually at times the boy was downright conservative. Oh well the clans would fix that. There had to be a way to get the man in touch with his inner element to make him stop seeing this dance as something that was 'unseemly'. He'd seemed to enjoy watching him and other members of the Clan perform, but he couldn't seem to get over – what Firesong had decided was 'over-breeding' to actually relax and enjoy himself enough to just be.

He smiled as an idea came to him. "Come here," he said, quietly. "I will help you, but you need to relax."

Con'rart walked over to him quietly.

Goddess he was so tense, Firesong could see the boy's muscles quivering. Idly he wondered just what had happened to the boy to make him this way. He wasn't uptight like most of the higher nobility he'd met. It wasn't that he was solely concerned with propriety. No there was very real fear in the way he interacted with people and in his desire for personal space.

Idly he wondered what the boy had been like before he was chosen; Aya had once told him that Vanyel had said he'd loosened up considerably since he was chosen. So what did that mean for Con'rart?

Firesong gently placed his hands on the other man's hips. "Close your eyes, and just feel." He told his little brother as he resolved to send word on to the rest of the clans. "Relax and feel the water in the air. Feel it against your skin, and let that water flow through your very being. You are water, as an elemental you can be nothing else. Let yourself be the water."

As he spoke he gently moved the relatively younger man's body through the steps of the dance. Finally after about an hour he took a step back and watched. He'd noticed the slight movements of the water in the hot pool they were standing by, beginning to mirror the boy's movements about a fourth of a candle-mark ago. Now as he stepped back he picked up an instrument and began to play, changing the tempo and noticed with glee that the boy instinctively changed his steps to match the tempo of the music.

He also noticed that the water itself was undulating, rising and falling in time with young Con'rart's steps.

Half a candle-mark later Firesong stopped playing and Con'rart slowly stopped dancing, noticing only then how the water had twined around him like living snakes of water and ice.

"Congratulations." He said softly with a small smile on his face. "Now just hold on to that freedom, and let it grow. You're still young, act like it."

A.N. I don't know if I've been doing it the whole time so I'm noting it I spelled Herald Eldan's name Alden and had to go back and fix it so if I've been referring to Eldan as Alden please forgive me and note that from now on his name will be spelled right. Any way sorry for the delay, please read and review.