Free The Storm Witch by Violette Malan Page A

one?”
    “ ‘Partners are a sword with two edges.’ ” The words from the Common Rule came easily to her lips, but she knew they wouldn’t satisfy the captain. How to explain it? Even Mercenary Brothers who weren’t Partnered found it hard to understand. She snorted. Then again, it couldn’t be harder to explain than the Crayx.
    “We are life Partners, but we’re not wed, or mated, or whatever you call that relationship here on the Long Ocean. It means . . . we live and fight together. We would always go into battle on the same side.” She paused groping after the words. “There is a ceremony. Afterward . . . when we are in the same room, or near one another, we know it; our hearts may even beat in the same rhythm.” She looked away from the captain’s eyes. “Every Mercenary hopes to die in battle, on our feet, sword in hand. The best we hope for is to die at the hand of one of our own Brothers who fights for the other side. But Partners will never die at each other’s hands.” Not by my hand, she thought. Not by my hand. “It’s something like being a twin. Impossible to explain to someone who isn’t one, and no need to explain to someone who is.”
    “Twins don’t bed with each other.” It was half a question.
    Dhulyn smiled and gave him half an answer. “I only said it was something like.”
     
    “I would rather give you a child.” Parno Lionsmane had never said these words aloud, but he got the reaction he expected from his Partner.
    Dhulyn smiled the smile she saved only for him and shook her head. “We’ve been Partnered, what, seven years? If you were likely to give me a child,” she pointed out, “it would have happened already.”
    “You’ve never Seen anything?” He’d never wanted to ask, but now that they were talking about it, he had to press his advantage. He might not ever have another such excuse. She had been behaving oddly the last few days, but he’d put it down to nostalgia, being at sea reminding her of the childhood she’d had on the Black Traveler once Dorian the Schooler had rescued her from the slavers.
    “Once I thought so. I Saw myself laying out a game of Tailors with a young redheaded girl. Not so dark as I, but not so golden as you.”
    “And you thought . . .”
    “And I thought. But it turned out to be the young woman who is now Queen of Tegrian.”
    Parno laughed out loud. “You’re right. She could have been ours, if we went by coloring alone.” He frowned. “I’ve never fathered a child, that I know of.”
    “Well, I’m sure I would have noticed if I had ever quickened.” She have him such a look of wide-eyed innocence that Parno cuffed her shoulder.
    “How is it you think that it never happened?”
    “I was given enough potions and drugs in the years between the breaking of the Tribes and the time Dorian rescued me. I always assumed that had something to do with it.”
    “Shall we ask a Healer, the next time we run across one?” This time Parno thought he might have gone too far. There again was that white stiffness in Dhulyn’s face that he’d seen in the hold of the Catseye, when they had first met the Nomads. Her eyes narrowed, and she seemed to be looking within.
    “We’ll still look for a Seer to train you,” he assured her, more to break the silence than for any other reason. “That’s still our first goal. I’m just saying, if we should happen to meet with a Healer, that’s all.”
    “Yes,” she said. Then she cleared her throat and said it again, more naturally this time. “Yes, why not? The next time we run across a Healer, we’ll see what can be done.”
    “After all, you still have your woman’s time, that must mean something.”
    She nodded. “But being that you cannot give me a child,” she said. “What are your thoughts about giving Darlara one?”
    “I have no objection, in principle.” Parno cleared his own throat, half-surprised to find that he did not. “Even if you and I have a child together,” he