“They’re called court ladies here,” he told her. “Kallah is smart and observant. You’ll want to be careful about wearing the earrings around her when she has the leisure to notice you, at least until you have some plausible explanation for having acquired them. Other than that, I think you’ll be okay. Everyone knows you don’t have magic.”

“Okay. Let’s try them!” Eager to know what his telepathic voice sounded like, she pulled the small metal back off one of the posts and poked along her skin until she felt it slide into the piercing in her lobe. Quickly, she fastened the back and slipped on the other earring.

“Got it?” he asked.

She nodded. “Got it.”

“Good. Let me know when you’re ready.”

Why did she suddenly feel so nervous? Clasping her hands together, she told him, “Ready. I think.”

He settled both hands on her shoulders. Then a deep, rich voice sounded in her head. Hello, Sidonie.

Gasping, she gripped his forearms and her legs wobbled.

His fingers tightened. Are you all right?

She gasped again, while the world seemed to spin around her. “Yes,” she breathed. “Your voice in my head… it’s so intimate. How can you stand to do this all the time with just anybody?”

A soft laugh escaped him. That’s a perspective I’ve never considered before, he told her. It makes sense now that you’ve said it, but when children use telepathy from a very early age, it becomes just another way of talking.

As she listened to him, she had to clap both hands over her mouth to stifle the incoherent sound of glee that escaped. Listening to his telepathic voice sent shivers down her back. She loved it. Loved!

After a hesitation, he asked, Is it okay?

Should she confess how delighted she was, or that she never wanted him to stop talking to her? She would listen to him say anything. He could read the phone book to her, and she would love it.

Unsteadily, she told him, “It’s great. It’s just a huge adjustment. The last time I tried telepathy earrings, I couldn’t get the shop assistant out of my head fast enough, but you’re different. I… I trust you.” Even though she had said it softly, the last three words seemed to echo in the music hall. He had gone silent and tense. Listening to the implications in what she had just said, she added lamely, “At least, for tonight, I do.”

He released the breath she had sensed him holding. Good. Now, you try talking to me. Just reach out, like you would if you looked across the room and tried to catch my gaze.

She thought that through for a moment. Then she shouted, HELLO? ARE YOU THERE?

He recoiled as if she’d slapped him. Then he burst out laughing. The sound was so foreign to anything thus far that they had shared together, she stared.

Why, yes. His telepathic voice sounded strangled. I am indeed right here, and you just made a hell of a noise. Try to tone it down next time.

Sorry, she said loudly, scowling from the intensity of concentration. Is this better?

He laughed harder. There’s no need to strain, or shout, and for God’s sake, don’t make faces like that! In fact, you can whisper telepathically, and I would hear you perfectly fine.

Her scowl deepened, but she didn’t really mind him laughing at her. It sounded good and healthy, almost as if they were enjoying themselves as they carried on a normal conversation about normal things.

God, she wished they could have a normal conversation about normal things. Whatever normal might mean to him. She was sure any conversation she had with him would be as exotic as the ones they’d already shared. She just wanted to talk with him and be easy together without having everything feeling fraught with impending doom. The brief moment of levity made her aware just how starved she was for more.

Heaving a gusty sigh, she whispered, How’s this?

Still intense, but much better, he told her. We can practice as much as you like.

“That would be good,” she said aloud, quietly. “I need to be sure I don’t look like a grimacing fool when I telepathize, but how do I know I’m going to reach you instead of someone else?”

He switched to speaking aloud too. “That’s easier than you might think. If you focus on me, you will contact me. If you focus on someone else—for example, Kallah, Modred, Isabeau, a guard, or one of the dogs—you would contact them. But of course, the dogs don’t have telepathy, so you wouldn’t get a response back.”

“Oh, of course,” she echoed with a touch of sarcasm, when in fact she didn’t know any such thing. As far as she knew, every dog in Avalon could have been a telepathic, talking dog.

“Just remember, the earrings have a range of about twice the size of this music hall,” he told her. “More like the size of the castle great hall. If you can’t contact me, I’m not in range. We can practice as much as you like until you’re completely comfortable with it.”

“Maybe later. I’m getting a headache,” she murmured as she glanced at the lute on the table. Her earlier glee evaporated, leaving her feeling dull and afraid. “The earrings are wonderful, and I’m glad you thought of them, but they’re not going to solve my immediate problem.”

That whole impending-doom thing had to go and rear its ugly head again.

“No, they’re not, are they?” He strode over to the table and fingered the lute. “But I think I know what will.”

She hated not knowing what to call him. It was bugging her more and more as time passed. She even hated it more than not being able to see what he looked like. She had grown accustomed to the play of shadows across his face, attuned to the nuances and shifts in emotion in his body language and in his quietly murmured words.

As odd as it sounded, she had even grown accustomed to touching him and being touched. She had more than grown accustomed. She looked forward to it. She… yearned for it. His touch brought comfort and reassurance at a time when she badly needed both.

Every time his fingers brushed her skin, it was like sunlight and fresh, sparkling water to a dying plant. She needed food to survive, but when he touched her, it nourished her in ways that nothing else ever had.

By comparison, not knowing his name was growing to feel like sand in a shallow cut. It was abrasive and wrong. And assigning an arbitrary name to him didn’t help.

Fred. John. Thomas. They were all empty syllables that carried no meaning.