Page 16 of The Thief’s Lord (Catkin Trilogy #3)

There had been times in our conversation or walks in the forest when Dorset would pause and tilt his head, when his eyes would wander unfocused as though listening to something.

On occasion, he’d mutter to himself. When I questioned him, he’d just shrug and duck his head.

I’d not pressed, figuring that it was a puzzle I’d unravel at some point.

Either way, if Alan was correct, whoever it was, I could not hear them. Dorset, on the other hand, could.

“The call of Lady Meryn,” Alan’s quiet voice broke the silence. “You are a Voice, aren’t you?”

“Dorset?” I could scarcely recognize my own voice.

“What’s a Voice?”

“Good Gods, Hugh.” Aileen glanced up at the taller tomcat and shook her head at his ignorance. “A Voice is not unlike a Seeress, but being male, well… Yes. Quite rare, quite rare, indeed.”

Aileen was correct. I wasn’t well-read on all of magick and its workings, but I knew enough to recognize the momentous nature of this revelation.

Seeresses were more common. Powerful mollies linked to the gods could provide wisdom in times of danger.

Corrin’s mother was one such seeress. On the other hand, Voices were male.

As a Voice, Dorset was no more gifted than a Seeress, but it was a rare ability to find in a tom.

Even Alan had to resort to arcane magicks to directly speak with the gods.

Practice would enable Dorset to achieve that even more easily.

“Ordinarily, someone like you would be found by the Tower,” Alan said. “You’d be brought there and raised and taught…”

“He’s mostly Munni,” I said, voice hard as flint. “They might not have considered him worthy.”

“Ah… yes. I could see that.” Alan’s violet eyes flashed. “The… the…”

The white-haired mage visibly ground his teeth.

His white slender ears flicked back and forth in tandem with his tail.

Then, visibly calming himself, Alan closed his eyes, inhaled, and opened his eyes again.

He removed his spectacles to clean them, mind clearly wandering.

Putting his spectacles back on, his eyes met the wide-eyed gaze of Dorset.

“My name is Alan.”

“ The Alan Carwick, High Mage of Rimefrost and best mage in the land,“ Hugh added.

Dorset nodded slowly, green eyes glued to Alan’s own peculiar violet gaze.

“Thank you, Hugh,” Alan said mildly before continuing on. “I think Meryn wanted Dorset to come here.”

“Why?” Aileen shifted nervously. “Is something about to happen?”

“I don’t know,” murmured Alan. His unnaturally colored eyes flared with power, but Dorset didn’t back down. Alan smiled. “We can only follow the hints they lay for us, right, Dorset? The rest is up to us. It is our choice.”

“My choice,” Dorset echoed, dazedly.

“For now, you need rest. Soon, we will talk and discuss what happened. I’m certain Gareth has some questions—“

“I couldn’t see their faces.” Dorset blurted out. “They had hoods and masks.”

I mentally swore at the revelation. But of course. Whoever had sent them had ensured the ruffians would take precautions.

“Well, there is also the matter of your training,” Alan continued, undeterred.

“M-my training?” Dorset squeaked.

“Later,” Alan repeated, rising to his feet. “That is another discussion for another time.”

Finally alone, I sat down on the bed by Dorset’s side.

We both leaned against my small mountain of goose-feather pillows and the sculpted wood headboard, contemplating the room, the four poster bed, and the rich furnishings.

Dorset seemed to drift away as though he were listening yet again to whatever voice whispered to him.

Meryn, Lady Goddess of the Night, of the Munni. Of Love.

There is so much I don’t know about him , I mused.

We shared so much and yet so little at the cottage.

It will take me a lifetime to learn all there is about Dorset—and then some , I imagine.

A lifetime. The thought of spending my future with Dorset had my heart beating.

The thief of the shadows, Meryn’s night mouse, had stolen the heart of a lord. Did he know it?

Instinctively, my left hand found his. For a second, Dorset’s fingers bunched with tension beneath my own. He glanced up at me, but I kept my gaze riveted on the fire place opposite the bed with the cozy armchairs drawn up close by.

“It’s my fault,” I finally said. “For that, you have my apologies. I should have taken the danger more seriously. I should have tried harder to release you into my own care—“

“It is no matter, Gareth,” Dorset said.

“No matter?” I half-turned then.

My right hand rose to cup his face gently, turning him to me. I gazed into those brilliant green depths and wished I could share with him for a moment the burden of regret that I carried.

“It matters the world over,” I breathed.

Dorset’s rosy lips parted. His cheeks flushed a little under my touch, and he half-jerked away, shaking his head in denial.

“Does it? D-do I?” His voice caught with the barest tremble. His free hand bunched in the blankets. “I don’t matter, Gareth. I never did. I’m simply not worth the trouble, so you don’t have to pretend any more. We’re not at-not at Baywaters with your family looking on.”

“I don’t care about what my family or the court thinks,” I said.

“What we spoke about was real. What I feel sitting here next you and what I felt when I saw you… That is real. I made a mistake, Dorset. One that I will not repeat again, and I apologize for it, expecting no forgiveness in return. If there is any blame, it is mine.”

“Why do you care?” whispered Dorset huskily.

The edges of his eyes glimmered with a faint silvering. My thumb rose to brush away a single tear that had escaped.

“It’s hard to explain,” I replied in hushed tones. “I scarcely know the answer myself. Yet… whatever this is, it feels right. It’s more—It’s almost like you are family.”

“Family…”

Dorset’s eyes dulled a little, and a bitter smile crossed his lips. A dark memory. I had to know what could sour such a word as ‘family’.

“What happened to your father and mother? You remember them from long ago, but you didn’t say—“

“Mother died of the ague. Father…” Dorset’s lips quivered, pressed together, and he gulped.

“He changed after that. He could barely look at me. Perhaps I reminded him of mother. One day, I woke… and he was gone. They said he found another molly. I don’t know.

I was such a young kit. The landlord evicted me, and I wandered the streets looking for my father. I never found him.”

The fukken bastard. My vision turned red as I imagined a tiny version of Dorset as a kit, wandering the streets without a home. Without food and shelter.

“That’s when the Night Blades found you.”

Dorset nodded jerkily, tears now flowing freely.

Silently. Instinctively, I drew him into deep embrace, allowing him to sob quietly into my shoulder.

I inhaled the scent of bath salts and Alan’s workshop, and the other scent that was distinctly Dorset.

Cold steel and honey wax. I never wanted to let him go.

He would understand this. Somehow. Someday.

“I-I’m so scared.” Dorset mumbled into my now rather damp jacket. “I followed my heart, but I cannot find the way.”

“We will find it together,” I promised him.

He tilted his head back to look at me, searching for reassurance. Something in my gaze settled him. Dorset wiped his face with a shaky hand.

“I’m not a kit,” he said. “It is simply fatigue.”

“Yes.”

“I must look a sight.”

“You look as delectable as ever, Little Mouse,” I assured him.

At those words, Dorset blushed. Despite the red puffy look about his eyes, I could see that he had regained some of his original sparkle. His cheekbones flushed under my considered gaze, and his pink tongue flicked out to wet his lips. They trembled a little even as they opened.

“Kiss me?” he asked, voice pitching a little higher.

“My pleasure,” I rumbled, leaning in to taste his sweet delights.

With each press of my lips against his, I repeated the refrain. You are loved. You are wanted. You are home.