Read Online Into the Labyrinth by Margaret Weis, Tracy Hickman - Free Book Online Page B

in astonishment; then she fell to her knees. Her fists clenched, she bowed her head. “Lord, I am not worthy of this honor.”
    “Yes, Daughter. Most worthy.”
    She remained kneeling before him, lifted her face to his. “Then, yes, Lord, I will rune-join with you, and count it the greatest joy of my life.” Reaching to the open-necked blouse she wore, she ripped it open, laying bare her rune-marked breasts.
    Over the left breast was tattooed her own heart-rune.
    Xar brushed back Marit’s brown hair from her forehead. Then his hand sought her breasts, which were firm and small and rode high upon the strong muscles of her chest. His hand moved down over her smooth, slender neck to cup and fondle her left breast.
    She closed her eyes and shivered, more in awe than in pleasure, at his touch.
    Xar noticed. His gnarled hand ceased its caress. She heard him sigh. “Few times I regret my lost youth. This is one.
    Marit’s eyes flared open. She burned with shame that he should so mistake her. “Lord, I will gladly warm your bed—”
    “Ah, that is what you would be doing, Daughter—
warming
my bed,” Xar said dryly. “I am afraid I could not return the favor. The fire died in these loins of mine long ago. But our minds will join, if our bodies cannot.”
    He placed the point of the bodkin on the smooth skin of her forehead and pricked her flesh.
    Marit shuddered, though not at the pain. From the moment of birth, Patryn children are tattooed at various times throughout their lives. They not only become accustomed to the pain but are taught to endure it without flinching. Marit shuddered at the rush of magic into her body, magic which flowed from the lord’s body to her own, magic which would grow stronger as he formed the sigla which would bind them together—his heart-rune, entwined with hers.
    Over and over he repeated the process, inserting the bodkin into Marit’s smooth skin more than a hundred times until the complicated pattern was completely drawn. He shared her ecstasy, which was of the mind rather than the body. After the ecstasy of rune-joining, sexual coupling is generally a letdown.
    When he had finished his work and set down the blood-and ink-stained bodkin, he knelt before her and took her in his arms. The two pressed their foreheads together,sigil touching sigil, the circles of their beings closing in one. Marit cried out in gasping pleasure and went limp and trembling in his grasp.
    He was pleased with her and held her in his arms until she grew calm again. Then he put his hand on her chin and looked into her eyes.
    “We are one. No matter that we are apart, our thoughts will fly each to the other as we desire.”
    He held her with his eyes, his hands. She was transfixed, adoring. Her flesh was soft and pliable beneath his fingers.
    It seemed to her as if all her bones had dissolved at his touch, his look.
    “You did once love Haplo.” He spoke gently.
    Marit hesitated, then lowered her head in shameful, silent acquiescence.
    “So did I, Daughter,” Xar said softly. “So did I. That will be a bond between us. And if I deem that Haplo must die, you will be the one to slay him.”
    Marit lifted her head. “Yes, Lord.”
    Xar regarded her doubtfully. “You speak quickly, Marit. I must know for certain. You lay with him. Yet you will kill him?”
    “I lay with him. I bore his child. But if my lord commands, I will kill him.”
    Marit’s voice was calm and even. He would sense no hesitation, feel no tension in her body. But then a thought came to her. Perhaps this was some sort of test …
    “Lord,” she said, clasping her hands over his, “I have not incurred your displeasure. You do not doubt
my
loyalty—”
    “No, Daughter—or, I should say, Wife.” He smiled at her.
    She kissed the hands she held in hers.
    “No, Wife. You are the logical choice. I have seen inside Haplo’s heart. He loves you. You and you alone, among our people, can penetrate the circle of his being. He would trust