20.8

When the unexpected caravan of food from the North arrived at Castle Baaldorf, Erik Greystone conferred with King Baaldorf for over an hour, weighing whether to accept it. They had only recently learned that Dirk Blackpool's marauding troops had slain every man, woman and child along the border in retribution for the southern attacks in the vicinity. This unexpected new message of peace from Blackpool made no sense.

"We should meet with him and hear what he has to say, Erik," Baaldorf suggested, rubbing his thick, gray beard as he pondered it.

"He's a liar, Sire. Everything he does is a lie."

"What if this is real?"

"It would mean countless people might live through the winter and avoid starvation," Erik admitted reluctantly. Every instinct told him not to believe Dirk this time. For the thousandth time this week, the prince wished the Wizard Traquil were still around to provide advice and watch over the kingdom.

"What harm can there be to sending word that we'll agree to talk with him about a truce?"

Justin Greystone stirred from his position leaning casually against a wall. Erik had thought his brother had given into a fit of daydreaming about tavern wenches and card games. He was surprised when Justin spoke up suddenly.

"Ya know, it might just buy us some time to get our troops back together to kick his tail out of Tronin, come Spring." Justin shrugged affably, "Our men are scattered here, there and everywhere. A few months' worth of truce would give us time to reorganize 'em."

"Let's distribute the food to those most in need," Erik suggested wearily.

Baaldorf nodded wisely, "I'll have a messenger take word to Blackpool that we agree to talk to him."

Erik's vassal, Marko, pressed his lips together. He still had bad dreams about the demon woman. She had nearly killed him in Mora Valley. Marko's shoulder had healed, thanks to the Wizard Traquil. His loathing of her, though, mended less easily.

Marko mumbled, "The offspring of those two is going to be pretty scary."

"Maybe now that Blackpool has a family to think of, he'll grow up and start thinking about something other than war," Baaldorf hoped grimly.

"It didn't work that way with Saris," Erik reminded him.

A shadow passed over Baaldorf's expression as he thought of what might have been, had Saris been around to make peace. He missed Dirk's father. He always knew what to expect from old Saris. The former king of Karteia was a wily fox, but a fox Edwin Baaldorf knew well. Saris' son was unpredictable. He was merciless in ways that would have shocked his father. Saris had been a warrior who fought honorably; his son was simply a psychotic madman. Aperans had never seen so much suffering in such a short time. Edwin prayed silently that the dark days were over.

"We need to know where Blackpool is getting all his food and wealth," Edwin announced thoughtfully. The king rattled his scepter on the marble floor of the throne room as he turned over the impending peace talks in his mind. "When we talk to him, we need to have a clear picture of his real strength, and any weaknesses we can exploit in the negotiations."

"Maybe he wants to talk now because he has some sort of trouble brewing at home," Erik suggested hopefully. "It would be just like him to try to deflect attention from it!"

Baaldorf nodded, "Marko, I want you to head north. Go to that new city and see what you can find out."

"Geshna. A stone's throw away from Castle Blackplool," the vassal replied, dread creeping into his expression. He bowed obediently, "Yes, Your Majesty."

"Erik, you'll be needed here to make sure they don't launch any sneak attacks during the peace talks. Now go feed those people out in the courtyard!"

20.9.1

It seemed half the kingdom had taken shelter within the castle's walls. Refugees displaced by the plague in Baaldorf, the earthquakes in Camerand and the floods in Rysland had long since converged on the only symbol of safety and stability left in the realm.

The Yule gift from Blackpool could not have come at a better time. The castle's larders were nearly empty. What little the king had left, he had to ration among the soldiers garrisoned here, and the royal family. Though he could offer shelter to the refugees, Baaldorf no longer had the food to sustain them.

Hundreds of starving peasants and soldiers watched the food arrive in a lavish caravan. They even eyed the well-fed Karteian horses hungrily. The Northerners who delivered it left at once, as they had been ordered. No one thought it odd that servants of Blackpool would choose not to tarry long inside these castle walls.

Once the refugees sighted the wagons overflowing with an abundance of foodstuffs, Baaldorf's castle guards had to take action to prevent the hungry mob from making off with every morsel. Many of these people had not eaten in days.

For a brief moment, they all dared to hope that Dirk Blackpool had finally seen the light. The man was married now, after all. Maybe, just maybe, he had found something in the world worth caring about other than himself -- even if the woman was not really human. For all they cared, she could be a bone-crack demon - so long as she could keep Dirk busy at home in Karteia. Anything that could keep the enemy distracted while southern warriors pushed the Northern army out of Tronin could not be all bad.

Erik personally oversaw the distribution of the bounty to the waiting peasants. He held nothing back. These were the people in need, the people who had most suffered from the famine.

He truly hoped Dirk meant it this time. He firmly believed that people could change. Love could change them most of all. After all the suffering his enemy had caused in the South this past year, Erik prayed the man's reign of terror was at an end.

A warm smile lit up his face for the first time in days. Things certainly seemed to be looking up. The freakish natural disasters had finally stopped. Even the pirates who had been raiding Camerand's sea coast seemed to have settled down. With the arrival of the food and news from the North that an end to the war might be on the horizon, the mood at Castle Baaldorf was jovial.

20.9

Zyrdicia sat on the warm, polished, black stones front of the roaring fire in her quarters. After a hot bath, she liked to let the flames' heat dry her hair. Until winter arrived, she had not fully appreciated how drafty and cold the living quarters were. It lent credibility to the popular rumor that the Blackpools had ice in their veins.

Already she was dreadfully bored. That happened immediately on the rare occasions when Dirk left her alone. She could think of no way to occupy herself tonight in Castle Blackpool without him. Were her magic reliable, she would have gone to Camerand and uprooted a forest with a windstorm. Between the blood hunger and magical imbalance, though, she was at a loss to entertain herself. She had no desire to leave the castle on her own just yet.

Dirk left her here when he had things to take care of that annoyed her - ministers reporting from his conquered provinces, for example. For now, she was biding time until dinner. Her playmate would come then. Then they would spend the rest of the evening in the dungeon, as they did every night now. Zyrdicia smiled dreamily, looking forward to it already. She had come to crave it.

Portia had forced her way in see her briefly a short time ago with irritating news from Lyr. Zyrdicia could not have cared less about the problems there. She rewarded Portia for the bother by sending her back to Lyr to solve it all herself. If the servant thought the problems were so important, she could deal with the mess herself. Portia's shock at being sent away had left her speechless. Not only had Zyrdicia utterly forgotten about the servant's plans for a holiday with Cai, she had dismissed any possibility they would have meaningful time together in the foreseeable future.

Outside, it was sleeting -- a precipitation phenomena Zyrdicia found miserable. The storm seemed to last for days. Unlike snow, this had no redeeming qualities. The courtyard was already ankle-deep in slush. As the temperature dropped tonight, that slush would become a mass of ice, too slippery for men or horses to cross. In the morning someone would salt it, and by mid-day the ice would become a filthy mass of slush again. It would be swept against a wall, then eventually shovelled into the moat. The residents of the castle regarded it as commonplace. Zyrdicia, however, found it abysmal.

Behind her, she heard the latch on her chamber door. A familiar heartbeat and mortal scent identified the intruder even before he had entered.

"Hi."

"That took forever!" Zyrdicia pouted, annoyed by the extended isolation.

Dirk's indigo eyes twinkled in amusement. She had become remarkably dependent in just a few short weeks. It pleased him. By now he had already learned from Cai that she had sent Portia away again. The news brought a smile to his lips.

He crooned, "I've only been away less than an hour, my impatient one."

Zyrdicia sat up and shook her long mane of damp, raven locks, then reached for a nearby silver hairbrush. "Well, it seemed like much longer."

"Of course it did," Dirk purred smugly, taking the hairbrush from her hand when she held it out to him. He turned it in his hand, then moved the implement's flat, metal surface beneath her chin. He turned her face upward with it, so that she would look at him as he towered over her place on the floor in front of the fire.

He stared at her intently as he said, "When I am away from you, it is fitting that you should think of nothing else but my return."

Zyrdicia smiled mischievously as she regarded him, then leaned forward against his leather-clad thigh. "You only say that because you think of nothing else when you are away, and you hope it's mutual."

"Hardly," he replied quietly, pulling the brush through her hair slowly.

She sighed happily, delighted to feel his touch. She had always needed a great deal of attention and affection, but since the coma, it had become almost as necessary to her as breathing. She needed it to feel anchored in reality, to know the barrier to her dreamworld remained intact during her waking hours until she could escape to his dreamworld during her sleeping hours.

"My man arrived with word from Baaldorf this afternoon," Dirk informed her casually. He watched a wicked, knowing smile illuminate her face, where it still rested against his thigh.

"How many dead?" she asked, her eyes filled with child-like glee.

"Hundreds."

"Everyone?"

"Greystone escaped. He gave the food to the starving peasants and soldiers. Which means he has to live with their deaths on his conscience," Dirk chuckled, almost more pleased with this outcome than the one he had originally hoped for. He tossed the hairbrush aside. "The fool is beside himself with grief."

"Does this mean the castle is unguarded?"

"Not entirely. A castle like that is designed to be defended with a few score men if need be. But they won't last long without food." His hand settled on the nape of her neck so that his fingers could entwine absently in a large handful of her hair.

"Wouldn't this be a good time to finish them off, then?"

"Soon."

"But you said we were going to leave for Kirilia to move your troops weeks ago," Zyrdicia reminded him, a hint of petulant whine tainting her tone.

"There's more to deal with here than I had first thought. I cannot depart for the South until my domestic affairs are well in hand."

"Nothing remains here to be taken in hand!"

Dirk gazed her silently for a long moment. Without warning, he jerked her head back by the handful of hair he still held. A cold gleam sparkled in his eye as he hissed, "You remain to be taken in hand, my pet."

"Me?"

"I do not wish to depart until I am satisfied your blood craving is adequately contained - and I can trust you to control your magic."

Zyrdicia frowned, wishing she had not asked.

Seeing his point register, Dirk's grip softened into a caress on the back of her head as though the momentary harshness had been illusory. Like lightning striking on a cloudless day, it vanished as quickly and inexplicably as it appeared.

A charming smile replaced his sneer. "But you've made tremendous progress the past few nights. So much so that I have other plans for you tonight. We are going to Geshna to celebrate the deaths in Baaldorf."

Zyrdicia's purple eyes glittered in excitement. She had forgotten the city even existed. "My temple! I haven't seen it in over a month! It must be finished now."

"No, work in Geshna stopped after you left. The civil unrest unleashed by your sudden disappearance destroyed a large section of the city. You'll be lucky if the temple is still standing."

He added caustically, "When you closed the trade gates to Lyr, and cut off the city's food supply, there were riots. I had to station several hundred soldiers there to put an end to the chaos."

"Why didn't you tell me sooner?" she murmured, alarmed.

"Portia reopened the trade gates. The situation is well under control," he answered impatiently. He ran his hand along the silk of her bathrobe, up her spine up to the place he knew bore a faint, new scar between her shoulder blades. "I had no intention of tempting you to leave the castle until I was certain you had fully recovered."

Despite her own awareness of the vulnerabilities that concerned him, his words nipped at her ego. Anger short-circuited the power game. Certain challenges could never go unanswered. She threatened, "I am recovered. You know, I could prove that and kill you in the blink of an eye if I wanted to."

"You most certainly could not," he scoffed as though the notion were ludicrous.

"I could send you crashing through the far wall with a single thought, Dirk, shattering every bone in your body without lifting a finger."

"That would pain you more than it would me," he retorted, unimpressed. "My passing would torment you more than anything I could ever dream up. You are not that masochistic, dearest."

"You are so fucking arrogant!"

"Oh, come now. We both know how terrified you are of killing me," he smiled cockily.

Grimacing in frustration, she conceded reluctantly, "Killing you would be disappointing."

Pleased with the admission, Dirk snatched her up in his arms deftly, intending to kiss her. Before he could complete the gesture, she turned her face away from him abruptly.

She mocked, "But then, you have ample experience with that sort of terrible disappointment yourself."

"What?" he frowned, irritated by the inappropriateness of the comment's timing.

She smiled knowingly, certain she had him trapped. He should know better than to take stabs at her ego by needling her about her loss of control over the magic.

"You told me once that you thought I had died the night I returned from the Astral Plane. You must have been terribly disappointed too," she whispered. She could not resist adding acidly, "How many tears did you shed?"

He glared at her icily. He would as soon cut off a swordhand as admit to her the involuntary effect the dream of her death had upon him that night. He jeered, "Actually, I was relieved to be rid of you."

She shook her head astutely, staring deeply into his eyes.

He inhaled deeply then forced himself to look away. It was as though she already knew somehow - and was using his deepest secrets to belittle him. His eyes widened in outrage at her tactic.

Zyrdicia smiled wryly and whispered intimately, "You deserved that. If you provoke me with insults about the secrets I've entrusted to you, don't underestimate my capacity to use your own secrets the same way."