Read Nightrunners 03 - Traitor's Moon for Free Online Page B

lesson.
    Seregil chuckled; you seldom had to teach him anything twice, especially if it had to do with Aurenen. "My father was the khirnari for Bokthersa, just as my sister Adzriel is now. The khirnari of all the principal clans and many of the lesser ones came together with the Zengati. The tents covered acres, a whole town sprung up like a patch of summer mushrooms." He smiled wistfully, remembering kinder days. "Entire families came, as if it were a festival. The adults went off and growled at each other all day, but for the rest of us, it was fun."
    He rose to pour fresh wine, then stood by the hearth, swirling the untasted contents of his cup. The closer he came to the heart of the story, the harder it was to tell.
    "I don't suppose I've ever said much about my childhood?" "Not a lot," Alec allowed, and Seregil sensed the lingering resentment behind the bland words. "I know that, like me, you never knew your mother. You once let slip that you have three sisters besides Adzriel. Let's see: Shalar, Mydri, and—who's the youngest?" "Ilina."
    "Ilina, yes, and that Adzriel raised you." "Well, she did her best. I was rather wild as a boy." Alec smirked. "I'd be more surprised to hear that you weren't." "Really?" Seregil was grateful or this brief, bantering respite. "Still, it didn't much please my father. In fact, I don't remember much about me that did, except my skill at music and swordplay, and those weren't enough most days. By the time I'm speaking of, I mostly just stayed out of his way.
    "This gathering threw us back together again, and at first I did my best to behave. Then I met a young man named Ilar." Just speaking the name made his chest tighten. "Ilar i Sontir. He was a Chyptaulos, one of the eastern clans my father hoped to sway to our side. My father was delighted—at first.
    "Ilar was ..." The next part came hard. Just speaking the man's name aloud brought him back like a summoned spirit. "He was handsome, impetuous, and always had plenty of time to go hunting or swimming with my friends and me. He was nearly man grown, and we were all terribly flattered by his attention. I was his favorite from the start, and after a few weeks the two of us began to go off on our own whenever we could."
    He took a long sip from his cup and saw that his hand was trembling. For years he'd buried these memories, but with a single telling the old feelings surfaced, raw as they'd been that long ago summer.
    "I'd had a few flirtations—friends, girl cousins, and the like—but nothing like this. I suppose you could say he seduced me, though as I recall it didn't take much effort on his part."
    "You loved him."
    "No!" Seregil snapped, as memories of silken lips and callused hands against his skin taunted him. "No, not love. I was passion-blind, though. Adzriel and my friends tried to warn me about him, but by then I was so infatuated I'd have done anything for him. And in the end, I did.
    "Ironically, Ilar was the first to recognize and encourage my less noble talents. Even untrained, I had clever hands and a knack for skulking. He'd devise little challenges to test me—innocent at first, then less so. I lived for his praise." He glanced guiltily at Alec. "Rather like you and me, back when we first met. It's one of the things that made me keep you at arm's length for so long; the fear of corrupting you the way he did me."
    Alec shook his head. "It was different with us. Go on, finish this and be done with it. What happened?"
    Older than his years, Seregil thought again. "Very well, then. One of my father's most vociferous opponents was Nazien i Hari, khirnari of Haman clan. Ilar convinced me that certain papers in Nazien's tent would aid my father's cause, that I alone had the skill to sneak in and 'borrow' them." He grimaced, disgusted at the green fool he'd been. "So I went. Everyone else was off at some ritual that night, but one of Nazien's kinsmen came back and caught me at it. It was dark; he must not have seen that it was