"Tell me."
I sighed, cuddling Uther's arms around me like a blanket. "It's possible that the sidhe that injured you could call the dragon out of your back or force you to shapeshift into one."
Jeremy's eyes widened. "You can do that?"
"I can't, but I'm not a full-blooded sidhe. I've seen similar things done."
"Will the warding hold?"
I'd have liked to have simply said yes, but it was too close to a lie. "It will hold for a
while, but if the sidhe that did the spell is here, he may be powerful enough to breech my magic, or he could simply keep hitting the ward with his own power until he wears the magic away. The chances of the same sidhe being on this hunt are very slim, Jeremy, but I couldn't let you help me, and not ward it."
"Just in case," he said.
I nodded. "Just in case."
"I was very young when this was done, Merry. I can protect myself now."
"You're a powerful magician, but you're not sidhe."
"It makes that big a difference? "he asked.
"It can."
Jeremy fell silent and turned in his seat to help Ringo find the quickest way to the airport.
Uther said, "You are tense."
I smiled up at him. "And you're surprised?"
He smiled, that very human mouth under the curved bone of the tusks, the piggish snout. It was like part of his face was a mask, and underneath was just a man, a big one, but just a man.
He ran thick fingers through my still-wet hair. "I take it Branwyn's Tears were still active when Jeremy went up?"
I'd have never taken time for a shower otherwise, and Uther knew that. "So Jeremy told me." I sat up so that I wasn't soaking his shirt with my hair. "Didn't mean to get you wet. Just forgot. Sorry."
He pressed my head, gently, back to his chest with a hand as big as my head. "I was not complaining, just remarking."
I settled back against him, my cheek resting on his upper arm.
"Roane left just after we arrived. Did he go for help?"
I explained about Roane and his newfound skin.
"You didn't know you could heal him?" Uther asked.
"No."
"Interesting," he said. "Very interesting."
I looked up at him. "Do you know something I don't about what happened?"
He gazed down at me, small eyes almost lost in his face. "I know that Roane is a fool."
That made me stare at him, searching his face, trying to read what lay behind those eyes. "He's a roane, and I've given him back the ocean. It's his calling, his heart of hearts."
"You're not angry with him?"
I frowned, shrugging awkwardly in his arms. "Roane is what he is. I can't blame him for that. It would be like yelling at the rain for being wet. It just is."
"So it does not bother you, at all?"
I shrugged again, and his arms settled around me, cradling me almost like a baby, so I could gaze up at him more comfortably. "I'll admit to being disappointed, but not surprised."
"Very understanding."
"I might as well be understanding, Uther-I can't change things." I rubbed my cheek against the warmth of his arm and realized what part of Uther's charm was. He was so large and I was so small, it was like being a child again. That feeling that if someone could hold you in their arms completely, nothing could hurt you. It hadn't been true when I believed it as a very little girl, and it certainly wasn't true now, but it was still nice. Sometimes false comfort is better than no comfort at all.
"Damn," Jeremy said, raising his voice for our benefit. "There's a wreck up ahead-looks like Sepulveda is completely blocked off. We'll try to take side streets around it."
I rolled my head back against Uther's arm to see Jeremy. "Let me guess, everyone else is trying to exit here, too."
"Of course," he said. "Settle in. It's going to take a while."
I moved my head so I was looking up at Uther again. "Heard any good jokes lately?"
He gave a small smile. "No, but my legs are going to fall asleep if I must keep them tucked under like this for long."
"Sorry." I started to move away so he could adjust.
"No need to move." He put one arm under my thighs, kept the other arm behind my back, and picked me up. He held me like a baby, effortlessly, while he straightened his legs out in front of him. He settled me onto his lap, one arm behind my back, the other lying loosely across my
legs and his.
I laughed. "Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to be... big."
"And I wonder what it would be like to be small."
"But you were a child once. You remember what that was like."
He gazed into the distance. "Childhood was a very long time ago for me, but yes, I do remember. But that is not the kind of small that I mean." He looked down at me, and there was something in his eyes, something lonely, needy. Something that pierced that calmness in him that I valued so much.
"What's wrong, Uther?" My voice was soft. There was something very private about us being back there alone with no one in the middle seats.
His hand rested lightly on my thigh, and I was finally able to read the look in his eyes. It wasn't a look I'd ever seen in Uther's face. I remembered his comment when I was getting fitted for the wire, how he'd wait in the other room because it had been so long since he'd seen a na**d woman.
The surprise must have shone on my face, because he turned his face away from me. "I'm sorry, Merry. If this is completely unwelcome, tell me so, and I will never mention it again."