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He cocked his head curiously at her, a playful smile teasing his lips. "I will. But afterwards, you have to tell me what your eyes are saying. I can get part of it, but I want to know for sure."

He smiled, then looked away to gather his thoughts. "Let's see. Rinaldi found out through his remaining supporters that Colm was an assassin, yeh, who liked to use his fire powers to kill off his targets and remove the evidence all in one go. Only problem is, his flames are tainted with darkness, because of his vampirism. Only two Adepts in the world at the moment are a combination of flame and dark, and the second is out in Water's temples at the moment."

"Basically, after learning about this, I went back to search the room over again, and there was that bloody ozone stench mixed into the charred smell of flames."

Lucas looked at her pointedly. "The only one who could have produced that... was Colm."

He paused and looked up at the clouds for a moment, watching them dance around with some interest. "I think we may have a problem if that turns out to be true."

Lucas' laughter was harsh. "Oh? And who are you to tell me what assassins should do? I lead them, I own them, I make the rules."

His eyes bored into hers ferociously. "Who will tell me not to love? Who can tell me not to want, or care, or desire? No one can command the wind save I."

He leaned in close, his face inches away from hers, watching her eyes intently. When he spoke, his voice still carried its intense command, but it was softer, gentler. "Don't block me out, now. You should know I can protect you."

Another moment passed, and then his hands reached out to her arms and pulled her closer. Anxious eyes flashed across hers, then closed softly as his lips brushed lightly against hers, hesitated, and then bumped against her mouth as lightly as a moth. It only lasted a fraction of a second, but his heart started to race again, a puzzling, delightful sensation. The taste of her blood on his lips made him shiver, and his eyes rolled shut as he processed this idea. His hands clung lightly to her arms, not quite able to pull away, and he sighed thoughtfully.

He opened his eyes slowly, after a moment of consideration, and smiled warmly. "You. You're what I want. You're what I care about. You're what I... desire."

His voice dropped to a sultry, teasing tone on the last word, and his eyes twinkled, laughing. He quickly switched back to a more serious smile, and he spoke in reassuring tones. "I mean that, though. Everything else seems kind of far off. Distant, I guess. I just want to be near you..."

Luke looked down at her fingers, which he held in his own. "I want to protect you and fight with you and go on adventures with you... and I want to be with you. In every way. Is that more than I can do?"

He smiled gently. "I don't care if they find out, but secrecy might be best for now."

His face darkened suddenly. "Especially if Colm still wants to marry you. That could be problematic."

The smile twitched back onto his lips as he leaned back on the balcony railing. "But we don't have to be married anyways. I'd be with you anyhow. Marriage is just another ceremony. One that'd be ill-advised for secret loves...~"

Luke shrugged. "You might be right. I may have misheard. The fact remains, getting married would draw attention to something you want to be a secret. That's all I was pointing out."

He grimaced at the water that was a little bit of everywhere. "Also, I wouldn't have said anything if I knew it'd produce such an explosive reaction."

Luke slipped off the railing and walked over to her side. "We can worry about that if it happens. For now, just relax, or focus on continuing how you would if I hadn't spoken."

He stroked her hair back from her face and smiled, then kissed her cheek softly. His traitorous heart, which had settled temporarily, began to thump away briskly again, and he fought off the urge to bury his face in the hollow of her throat. His fingers fluttered through her hair, then fell away to his side again, and he leaned back, trying to clear his mind of her intoxicating scent.

Luke sat back on the bed and contained a sigh. Back to business, he supposed.

"How do you think we should accomplish that?" He looked at the ceiling expectantly. "Offer protection of their "artifact" in a show of good will? We could do that if you wanted to, though I doubt it's in any danger."

He sat up again and looked at her intently, then looked out the window, hoping for rain, though they were above most of the clouds. Not all, no, but most. He wished for his own chambers, farther down on the mountain, where the clouds were close and he could watch the lightning gather.

He noticed her again and shrugged. "I'll do whatever you think would work best."

"Why do anything, then? Air can remain neutral while the world below crumbles, and then we can sweep in to rebuild and our country will thrive."

He shrugged. "Even if Earth and Fire got together, with our spies and Water's natural defenses, we'd be perfectly safe."

He reached out and touched the map at the edges of the Earth and Fire nations. "These two here are too close to each other for comfort, so even if they became allies, they'd be worrying about getting stabbed in the back. Particularly since Earth has lots of land- good agricultural stock- which Fire is severely lacking."

He pointed to the Water nation next. "They're scared of Fire, even though their element (and home) is natural protection against it."

After a moment, he gestured to the Air nation. "We're stuck in the middle of everything, but at the same time, we're above it all. Literally. We can choose who to side with, if anyone; we can pick where we go in the world with absurd ease, and we have enough power to make even Fire think twice about attacking us."

His eyes chased around the map to make sure he hadn't missed anything. "It almost seems to me like we should just take the vulture's approach to this, and gather up the scraps of the world after they tear each other to pieces. Then they do our work for us, and we don't lose a thing."