"Yes," she said, grudgingly. "You have a decent eye. I'll mix these and then pack them for my cave. I have someone picking them up."
"At your cave?" David shifted his attention to his first priority. "I don't think that's wise."
"You chose to provide me protection," she snapped. "I didn't ask for it; I don't want it. If you don't wish to accompany me, it means nothing to me."
The seawitch who just wanted to be left alone. Pushing away his guilt, David sent a mental message to several of his platoon who'd been willing to lend reconnaissance support to the protection detail, asking them to run surveillance on her cave area to ensure he and Mina weren't walking into a trap. It didn't mean one couldn't be sprung after they got there, though. He didn't like it, but he preferred it to destroying the fragile trust he might be building with her by forcing a physical confrontation over her movements to and from her home.
Putting out a hand, he followed the nose bone of a tall stallion, feeling the residual energy. "It's no wonder the Dark Ones keep finding you. Maybe you should tone it down a little."
"They don't frighten me. If that overgrown bat hadn't gotten in my way, I could have taken care of the last attack. If nothing else, I could move with stealth. With an angel entourage, you might as well put a neon sign over my head that screams 'something worth protecting.' "
"Neon sign? How do you know about those?"
"I'm not ignorant of the land ways," she said shortly.
His brow furrowed. Anna had felt fairly certain Mina rarely, if ever, went on land. "Well, perhaps we're learning," he said at last. "This time Jonah did send just me, one lowly lieutenant."
Giving him a deprecating look, she produced a clean square of cloth from a closed container and spread it out on the oil drum lid, clearing the shells away. Then she drew a cutting knife from the folds of her cloak and began severing the plants into pieces with disconcerting precision, barely looking at them. "Jonah cares for you like a son. You probably had to nag him for days. He'll wear a hole in the Citadel, pacing and worrying about you."
"I'm sure he has a couple other things to keep his mind occupied. Mina, why don't you think you're worth protecting?"
The knife stilled and she looked up at him. "My opinion is irrelevant. The only reason the angels want to protect me is because of the power I could wield on their behalf."
"That's not why I'm here."
"I know that." She surprised him with the quiet response and began cutting again. "That's the only reason I haven't turned you into a bat as well."
David bit back a smile. Taking a seat on an oil drum near her, he watched her work and idly stroke the foal's nose when it became animated again. The horses started to move, as if a carousel had started up around them.
Was it excess energy? Did she have so much she had to occupy it? Or was it to create a world safe for her to inhabit, creatures to keep her company?
Mulling on that, he watched her cut. Swift, sure slices, making the plants the lengths she desired, then mixing them in a kettle she had next to her now at her makeshift table. He suspected the kettle and cloth might be relics of this ship or ones like it. Most merpeople were creative scavengers, having enough interest in their human cousins to gather what they left behind in the sea, whether by carelessness or mishap. Glancing into the kettle, he saw she'd already had some ingredients gathered, and apparently had been waiting for one of his contributions, the white sea lily.
"What's the potion for?"
"It's a love potion." She gave him a dismissive glance.
"You don't strike me as the romantic type."
She sighed. "It doesn't work like that. The merman drinks the potion, believing it will make the object of his desire fall in love with him. In reality, it neutralizes his sexual urges, taking that out of the equation. Now the potion drinker will only act on his true emotions, thinking sensibly and calmly, and proceed that way. He has a better chance of winning his target's affections, if there's any chance at all. If he doesn't, it won't matter as much anyway. Until the potion wears off."
"That seems to take something out of it."
She gave him a disparaging look. "Easy for you to say. Angels have no need of potions. They can just command anyone to love them."
David raised his brows. "That's news to me. Unless Jonah hasn't told me something."
She rolled her eyes. "Have you looked at yourselves? Your aura pounds out a fall-at-my-feet vibration that could knock any female down at fifty paces."
"Oh, really?" His lips curved.
She narrowed her eyes. "Any idiot female. That's why this type of potion is one I make only for males. Women's infatuations tend to be driven more by emotion than lust. Their potion is different."
"Either way," he reasoned, "to really fall in love with someone takes time. Getting to know them. Getting past the hormones..." At her ironic look, he grimaced. "All right, so your potion makes sense, in a way. But it still takes some of the joy out of it. It's part of the mix... the ingredients of love itself, if you will. Even if an angel could use otherworldly power to overwhelm someone, command her affections, he'd miss out on the excitement and uncertainty of falling in love. Physical attraction is part of that."
"For some people, that's just a torment, particularly if the other person doesn't reciprocate. It makes them do insane, ridiculous things that might put themselves or others at risk."
"You're far more conservative than I expected you to be." Cocking his head, he reached out to examine a plant with an interesting seedpod, and got his hand smacked by the flat blade of the knife.
"Don't touch," she snapped.
Knuckles stinging, David nevertheless kept his hand where it was, raised his gaze to lock with hers. "Would you like to try that again
?"
Though her lips pressed together, she waited until he removed his hand at his own pace, and then she scraped up the plant, tossed it in. "I'm charging it with intent as I'm preparing it. Your energy could unbalance that intent."
"Wouldn't it have been more courteous to tell me that before assaulting me?"
"Wouldn't it have been more courteous for you to ask before putting your fingers where they don't belong?"
"You practice this," he decided. "Being disagreeable." Unfortunately, it didn't stop her words from planting a provocative double entendre in his mind.
"There's no need to practice or exercise it if I'm left alone," she said.
David settled back. "So I guess you don't want the snack I brought you." At her indifferent look, he rummaged through the waterproof sack he'd put at his feet and withdrew the orange and several foil-wrapped chocolates.
He looked up to find her staring at the food. "You didn't get those in the ocean."
"No." He held up the orange. "Do you know what this is?"
"It looks like a fruit. Anna described the land food sometimes. She never brought me anything. I never asked," she added quickly, but her attention stayed on the objects. "No one's ever brought me anything. From there."
"This is an orange. You're right; it's a fruit." When he offered it, she shook her head, circled around the table and gestured to him to put it down. Curious, he did, and watched her kneel, pushing a loose lock of her still-damp long hair behind one ear to lean forward and take a long sniff. Apparently some of the chocolate he'd put down next to it managed to filter into the aroma, for she adjusted her attention to it, then back to the orange. Carefully, she lifted the fruit in both palms, feeling the weight.
"You peel it to eat it," he explained. "Would you like me...?"
She extended it. "Show me."
Removing the top, he peeled some skin off the sides. When she reached out again, he handed it back, and she duplicated his actions. Only she sat down on the floor, her legs folded beneath her. His brow furrowed as he noted that she apparently had problems with the hip on her scarred side. While the one hand had only three fingers, she used those to steady the fruit on the low table as she peeled with the other.
He didn't speak, though, not wanting anything to break the spell. In a mere blink the bitter-tongued witch was a young woman eyeing an orange for the first time. With an unexpected flush to her cheeks and a brightness to her eyes. When she flicked a furtive glance at him, David made sure to be intrigued with the movement of the cat, the fluid swish of the bony segments of tail.