Healer's Touch Read Free Page B

relief. He was sure his parents were angry about being forced to move to the Imperial Palace, and perhaps a bit frightened as well, but at least they would have each other. “What about me?”
    “I thought you were single.”
    “I am,” said Marius. “But will I be expected to make a political marriage?”
    “Let’s put it this way,” said Lucien. “I would like you to make a marriage that befits your station. But I won’t force you into anything. I want to bring this family back together, not tear it apart.”
    A marriage that befits your station. What did that mean? What station did he possess, as a half-commoner, half-imperial with no education and no magic?
    Never mind. He wouldn’t worry about that now.
    At Lucien’s gesture, he climbed into the carriage. His mother and father were already within, sitting on the backward-facing seat. His mother looked furious and his father terrified. Laelia sat beside them, red-faced and teary-eyed, but there was no Gratian. Apparently her live-in lover had chosen not to come, or perhaps he was not invited. Laelia might be upset about that now, but Marius was secretly relieved. He had never liked Gratian, and his sister had changed a lot when she’d gone to live with him. She’d become quiet and distant, not the young firebrand he’d known all his life. Perhaps now the old Laelia would re-emerge.
    The forward-facing seat was empty. That was presumably where Lucien would sit. Marius could sit with Lucien and make the numbers a little more even, or...
    He sat beside his parents. Awkward as it was, it gave them solidarity. His mother reached over and squeezed his hand.
    Lucien climbed into the carriage, eyed the four of them sitting together for a moment, and sighed as he sat alone on the opposite seat. “Found this,” he said, handing a box to Sabina. “Were you going to leave it behind?”
    Sabina snatched it from him and placed it on her lap.
    Marius had never seen the box before. “What’s in it?”
    Sabina did not answer, but after a moment Lucien did. “It’s her riftstone. She’s a mind mage.”
    “ What? ” Marius stared at his mother, whom he thought he’d known all these years and clearly hadn’t known at all. Not only was she educated, she was magical. And powerfully so.
    His sister gasped as well. “You mean all this time ...?” She did not finish her thought but shook her head and leaned back against the seat.
    “Brace yourselves. We’re going to Riat.” Lucien knocked on the roof, and the carriage lurched into motion.

Chapter 3
     
    Isolda repeated the code words in her head as she approached the dock at Cus, the Sardossian port city. They were her mantra, her magic words. Used properly, they could change her life.
    Her legs shook with fatigue and more than a little fear. She’d never been this far from home, and she had no husband with her, no protection of any kind. A weight dragged at her shoulder, and the suddenness of it almost pulled her to the ground. Her four-year-old son, Rory, had collapsed on the wooden planking of the dock. She picked him up and heaved him into her arms.
    “Wan’ go home,” he sobbed into her shirt. The boy was exhausted and out of sorts. If this day had been remotely normal, he’d have been in bed hours ago.
    She said nothing; it was impossible to explain the situation to a child his age. He’d understand when he was older that they had to leave. Someday, she hoped, he would be grateful that she had undertaken this journey from Sardos to Kjall on his behalf. Rory had no future here. Few children did, now that the blood wars had begun. She was not going to see her only son recruited as a child soldier in some Heir-hopeful’s army and end up spitted on a bayonet.
    A man guarded the ship’s gangway, and Isolda did not like the look of him. Dirty and rough, with uncombed hair and sun-darkened skin, he was clearly a stray, nothing at all like the respectable men at home. She hesitated, considering the many