Page 158 of The Demon Tide

Trystan’s eyes widen, and Vothe’s lips lift in response. He knows that Trystan has been here long enough to know what “find the moon” means on this night.

“It’s your festival now too,” Vothe insists as a raw longing for Trystan rises.

“Is it?” Trystan throws back, the words breaking with emotion as turbulent power jostles through his lines.

“Yes,” Vothe answers emphatically, willing it to be so, the moon making him bold. His feelings for Trystan making him bold.

“I want to belong here,” Trystan says in a rough whisper, a trace of fragile hope in the statement. Trystan’s lips part as if he’s about to say more, then close again as his power shudders around him in fitful arcs.

“You belong,” Vothe says, knowing that if they were anywhere else, he’d pull Trystan into his arms and kiss him right now. “And this is your moon too.”

“Howdareyou wear Xishlon clothes!”

Vothe and Trystan both turn, the angry, female voice like a hammer to glass as Vothe scents Heelyn’s hatred, hitting them both like an incoming cyclone.

Ire sparks in Vothe and he glares incredulously at Heelyn as she strides up to their table, three of her friends behind her, all dressed in their Wyvernguard uniforms and glowering at Trystan. There’s an indignant fire in Heelyn’s eyes, her hawkish face twisted as she halts, one fist on the hip of her Vu Trin tunic, the other around the hilt of her curved rune sword, her fury as brittle as her close-shorn black hair.

Oh, Sweet Holy Vo, are you honestly doing this now?Vothe seethes. Can we not have one night free of this?

But it’s increasingly inescapable. Even after Commander Ung Li publicly threw her support behind Trystan, the hatred continues to fester and grow, emboldened by the majority of the Wyvernguard doggedly wanting Trystan out.

Trystan doesn’t look at Heelyn, doesn’t respond. He keeps hold of his perpetual calm as he goes still as a windless lake, his gaze on the table. But Vothendrile can sense Trystan’s storm-magic rising, and even the slim edge of that power dwarfs the ferocity Heelyn is attempting to intimidate him with. Heelyn waits, fist to hip, but Trystan does not apologize for his deep purple civilian tunic.

Careful, Heelyn, Vothendrile almost wants to warn her.You’ve never fully appreciated what you’re dealing with here. He’s leagues more powerful than you are.

“Heelyn,” Vothe says, dangerously calm. “He’s in Noi lands. What exactly do you expect him to wear? I challenge you to make a clothing purchase this time of year that isn’t purple.”

Heelyn rounds on Vothe with a stare that would intimidate most of the Wyvernguard, especially since she’s got quite a bit of runic power to back it up. But she’s outmatched here. Seriously outmatched.

“Was I talking to you?” she snaps, dark eyes blazing.

“You seem to be talking to every last person in the restaurant,” Vothe blithely replies, keeping the anger that’s rising within him firmly in check.

Heelyn sets her blistering glare back on Trystan, who continues to stare at the table with that unblinking calm of his. Jaded calm.

“Wear your own clothes from now on,” she seethes. “Not ours. And notpurple. Xishlon is off-limits to you. And you have no place in Vo’s temple.” She lurches forward and hooks her finger under the Vo’lon religious necklace that’s visible at the edges of Trystan’s collar, yanking it into full view.

Lightning spits through Vothe, silver flashing through his vision as he suppresses the urge to leap over the table and throttle Heelyn. But Trystan doesn’t react. He just stubbornly keeps his eyes focused on the table before him, even as fire scythes through his lines.

“You’reGardnerian.Not Noi.” Heelyn venomously insists. “Get back in your blacks. Your kind arereviledby Vo.”

“You think I should wear Gardnerian clothes,” Trystan says quietly. A statement, not a question. His tone is neutral, but Vothe almost draws back from how intensely his waterline is now storming.

“Yes,” she sneers. “Stay in your own culture.”

“You think that’s my culture?”

“Of course it is!”

Trystan’s expression has gone very cold as he continues to stare at the table, and Vothe is momentarily overwhelmed by the sense of just how much power Trystan is holding back.

“Heelyn, leave it...” Vothe cautions.

“No, Vothe.No.” She swings back toward Trystan, like a torch leveled, her eyes glazed with outraged tears. “My parents werekilledby your grandmother!”

Trystan winces. “So were mine,” he says, almost inaudible.

Heelyn’s mouth turns down into a trembling grimace. “I don’t believe you!” she hisses. “And now your sister might be here in the Realm, as well. Where is she, Crow? Where is the Black Witch?”

---