Total pages in book: 162
Estimated words: 165618 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 828(@200wpm)___ 662(@250wpm)___ 552(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 165618 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 828(@200wpm)___ 662(@250wpm)___ 552(@300wpm)
“No,” Mangold said.
I threw up both hands. “Okay, so this place is awesome, but to be stuck here all the time? No family trips to the beach. No weeks at Culpepper’s Land of Wonder. Am I believing this? No!”
“Miss Truelock—”
“It’s Catla,” I snapped. “Or Cat. This is a family home. There is no protocol here.”
He pressed his lips together, clearly in an effort not to smile in the face of my fury.
I was not finding a thing to be happy about.
“I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised Arnaud was such a piece of shit, since his father was the original,” I declared.
“We were happy here, Catla,” Mangold said in a conciliatory tone.
“I can tell. But you could have been more happy,” I shot back.
“It’s in the past,” he said softly. “There’s naught we can do about it, except make happier memories now and in the future.”
That shut me up.
Except to say, “I’m sorry I took that out on you. I just…got overwhelmed.”
“Understandable.”
I struggled to get a lock on it, and succeeded, mostly because I felt better having let some of it go, and asked, “Did you need me for something?”
“Well, I picked the short straw on this, but I’m sensing now I actually didn’t, when I share that I came to ask if you’d be…careful with Tanyn when you go visit the lynx.”
I comprehended this request immediately, and as such, nodded equally immediately.
And my tone was most modulated when I queried, “Has he been back since…?”
He shook his head sadly. “No.”
It was careful when I inquired, “Was it you who found…?”
I couldn’t finish.
He comprehended me and nodded his head, now mournfully. “Yes.”
“I’m so sorry, Mangold.”
“And yes. Agreed. This is a family home. So please call me Manny.”
“Manny,” I mumbled, once again feeling that weird feeling that I supposed was shy.
“She was an extraordinary woman,” Manny stated.
“I’m scared to ask him too much about her,” I admitted.
His features softened. “This is understandable too. Zyr and I have been equally cautious. He was undone when we commed with the news.”
He shook his head again, and his gaze drifted to the windows before he continued speaking.
“He’d always been such a winsome, animated lad. Every day was a new opportunity. A new adventure.” He came back to me. “Sometimes, Zyr and I wondered if it was a show to make Darynda feel better about the circumstances. But in the end, we don’t believe it was. This”—he held both hands up at his sides—“was all he ever knew. He loved being out, fishing, trekking. He could happily pour over a thousand-piece puzzle for hours. He didn’t care that his only friends were canines, because he didn’t know what having a friend was. Even when he went to the academy, since his life was so physical here and he’d learned to entertain himself, and learn quickly with few distractions, he excelled. We were surprised he made friends, but not surprised that his group was few, though close. But when she passed…”
I watched how difficult it was for him to swallow, and my heart lurched.
“All that used to be him just drained out of him,” he finished.
“I thought it was his father passing and Arnaud succeeding.”
His shoulders straightened. “Make no mistake, Darynda raised a king. Although she knew Riland intended to try to circumvent succession, his whole life, Tanyn was in no doubt that his mother expected him to assume the throne, and she trained him to do so. So, yes, when Riland died and Arnaud became king, Tanyn assumed a certain determination to right that wrong. But how he is now, so austere, that was never our Tanyn.”
Our Tanyn.
He’d told me they’d been here around thirty years.
Tanyn, I knew, was thirty-six.
Mangold had known him, probably, his entire life.
Oh yes.
This was a family.
“I’ll keep an eye on him when we’re with the lynx,” I promised.
“Thank you, Catla.” He tipped his head to the side, and a small smile hit his lips. “Now, is there anything you need?”
I shook my own head.
“Would you like me to set you up with the screen while Tanyn sees to whatever business he’s seeing to? It’s old, and doesn’t respond to voice commands, but a remote.”
How interesting.
I couldn’t concentrate on anything on screen, but I wanted to see this remote business.
So I said, “That’d be great.”
We went to the family room.
Mangold showed me how to use the remote.
He left and I fiddled with it, not watching anything, just changing channels, adjusting volume, forwarding and rewinding.
After a while, I heard a Heli-Craft approaching.
My boots.
Excellent.
It was time to play with the kits.
This.
Was not.
Okay.
Sure, I was astride the SnowSprint, my front plastered to Tanyn’s back, my arms cinched tight around his trim waist, Hurley joyfully chomping at the air, sitting in a basket behind us.
And all that was lovely.
But we were speeding along the landscape on a snow version of a moto-bike, open to the elements.