Free Moving Targets and Other Tales of Valdemar by Mercedes Lackey Page B

audience. You haven’t heard her stumble over chords in class.”
    His face had a stubborn set. “There’s always been Bards who need someone to sing to.”
    Breda nodded. “I know Dionne is one of your best Healers this year. But how is she when Rhiannon is off on a field trip?”
    His silence was enough answer. In the salle, the two started bashing each other equally, so it looked like one girl fighting herself in a mirror. Breda continued, “Healers and Bards are more than their Gifts. It’s all right that they’re stronger together, but don’t you think it’s time they learned to live without each other, too?”
    “What do you suggest?”
    “Send them to separate places. Make them live on their own for a whole year. I’ve talked with the Bardic Council, and we don’t feel we can give Rhiannon her Scarlets until we know she can survive without Dionne.”
    “Seems cruel. I’ve never seen two people so connected, even lifebonded couples.” Gavin watched the two girls move in unison, balance a mirror of each other, staffs up, staffs down. He waited a few long moments before speaking.
    Did old men lose all their backbone? “And?”
    “I guess it couldn’t hurt.” He blinked as if maybe he’d gotten something in his eye. “But she’ll hate it. I won’t want to tell her.”
    Breda grunted. “Their safety’s more important than their happiness.”
    “I know. But I still think there’s something here we aren’t seeing.”
    What could that be? As Gavin walked away, Breda felt her own age in the slow, measured steps he took. Maybe she should have told him she’d lost sleep over this very conversation last night. A Healer should be able to spot a clearly unstable emotional situation. So was he just getting old? Or was she?
     
    Dionne bit her tongue for distraction as Rhiannon clambered aboard an old roan mare assigned by the Bardic Collegium, her gittern in a leather case over her shoulder, a leather pack full of clothes and picks and paper for composing tied to the back of the saddle. A strong arm steadied her briefly. She mumbled, “Thank you,” but didn’t look at Mari, the journeyman Healer she’d be spending her year of living alone with. She didn’t want Mari to see her weak. Or more accurately, since Mari had Empathy, Dionne didn’t want to provide an opening to get probed through. Instead, she shouldered her own pack full of Healer’s herbs and apprentice Greens, turning back for one last sight of Rhiannon, only to find her well and truly gone.
    Rhiannon was off to join Bard Lleryn to ride the southern border circuit near Rethwellan. They’d been tasked to help Bard Stefan with his quest to convince the still-healing kingdom that Heralds were as capable as Herald-Mages—now all gone—had once been. Rhiannon and Lleryn weren’t likely to actually see Stefan; a full quarter of the younger bards were part of the vast project.
    Dionne and Mari would ride northeast, toward Iftel, but only about halfway to the border. Even as a child, she’d never been more than a few miles from her twin. Already they were that far apart, and the gulf felt like a hole in her very self. As soon as Mari laid a fire by their first night’s campsite, Dionne collapsed and cried. Mari sat beside her, rubbing her back in great big slow circles, whispering that it would be all right.
    But it wouldn’t. Not until the whole year passed. And that might take forever.
    The next morning, and the morning after that, and every morning for another three weeks, Dionne woke from dreams of Rhiannon. In the crack between night and day when the summer sun was just starting to warm her cheeks, she’d see her twin’s face behind her closed eyes, as clear as if Rhiannon were right beside her. She’d know how Rhiannon’s day had been. Dionne would know if Rhiannon had been rained on, if she was weary, if she’d practiced her scales enough or started a new song. She also knew that Rhiannon missed her.
    Or maybe she was making