Blood Mercy (Blood Grace Book 1)

by Vela Roth

  He thought to slow down now, to ready her still more with caresses. He slid her tunica up past her waist. But when he made to touch her krana, she took his hand in hers. Parting her thighs, she tilted her hips up to demonstrate what she wanted.

  No pain to worry about this time. Only immediate pleasure. With a groan of satisfaction, he slid his rhabdos inside her, giving her neck a long, firm suck.

  Goddess bless, she felt good inside. So tight. The heat inside her sent shivers of pleasure through him. And the way she moved… She rocked beneath him in swift, impulsive motions. He thrust as fast in return, his fingers tangled in hers.

  His magic pulsed in time to their lovemaking. With each surge of power, he felt her shudder. He had to regain control.

  “Lio,” she breathed in his ear. “Your mind magery…”

  He tensed, but he could not still their rhythm, not with her rocking like this under him, not with her blood filling his mouth and his magic striving toward her. He must find a way to slow down, to…

  She nuzzled his ear. “Lio. Will I not…feel you…in my mind this time?”

  Lio pulled back his head, licking her blood from his mouth. He gazed upon her swollen, parted lips and her skin flushed with far-gone pleasure. Somehow he managed to speak. He had to know. “Is that what you want? Every time?”

  “Can we?”

  “Yes.”

  “Please—!”

  Relief and delight seemed to drive his Gift right out of his skin and under hers, and her mind enfolded him. Just as she clasped his shoulders and arched nearly off the bed, he thrust hard between her legs. So right. So effortless. Their thoughts, befuddled with desire, entangled and held tight.

  “Tell me,” she said between pants, “what you want.”

  This was the stuff of fantasies. Long, tantalizing fantasies he had entertained in that solitary room in the fortress. Now he was here in her bed, inside her. “Wrap your legs around me.”

  Her slim legs came around him, her thighs gripped, and he felt her feet tuck against the small of his back.

  “Ohh. Yes. Cassia. Tighter.”

  Her legs closed more firmly about him as she clenched her krana within to hold him tight inside her. His groan turned into a growl. She clenched, released. Again. He spilled hard into her. His power surged out of him and flooded her mind. She clutched him to her with her legs as her own climax clutched him inside, drawing him into her.

  When pleasure no longer hazed his vision, he became aware of the blood still spilling from her throat in a sluggish trail. He lowered his head again and began to close the wound with gentle licks. She sighed under him and caressed his head. She still hadn’t released him from the embrace of her legs, although her limbs had relaxed.

  Her sighing continued at the pleasure his mouth and tongue wrought on her wound. He smiled against her neck. Once merely woke the hunger inside her. It would take at least twice to satisfy it.

  Her thoughts fluttered amidst his own, and images, ideas brushed his mind. He paused to withdraw from inside her, then slid his hand between her legs. He plunged his fingers into her wet krana as she had been imagining. A beautiful, fleeting smile appeared on her face.

  He stroked and probed her, reawakening all the places he had just pleasured. Her eyes slid shut. He slipped one finger deeper inside her. Curling it, he pressed gently up into the roof of her channel and slowly withdrew his hand. Her eyes flew open, and her jaw dropped. He smiled and continued to acquaint her with that particular place inside her. In moments, she was tremoring under him again, this time in slight, soft motions that sent powerful echoes through the Union.

  They lay tangled together, and he rested his face between her breasts. He was sure his power must be levitating him a bit, for she did not complain of his weight. He could give up hope of taming his Gift at a moment like this, when they were both so satisfied.

  So happy.

  He didn’t have the heart to rob her of that. He wouldn’t tell her what his aunt and uncle had said. There was still a chance they might be wrong. And if they were right…Cassia would soon read the signs around the table, and she would not need Lio to be the bearer of the news they dreaded.

  No, there was still hope. Perhaps there were yet strategies Lio and Cassia might attempt together to sway the course of events. They had defeated frost fever. Could they not set themselves against the Summit again?

  Lio breathed in the scent of Cassia’s skin and listened to her heart where it beat beneath his ear. With her, he felt they might take on anyone.

  15

  Days Until

  SPRING EQUINOX

  The Laws of Men

  Never before had Cassia invited an invitation to one of Lady Hadrian’s gatherings, but today it might well prove worth the sacrifice. It hadn’t been easy to drag her achy, unrepentant body to dawn rites. But her reward had been catching Lady Hadrian as everyone left the temple. It had only taken a few words about a disastrous weaving project and a desperate need for expert assistance. Cassia had secured herself and Knight a place in Lady Hadrian’s weaving room for the afternoon, surrounded by the usual devotees.

  “Oh, that is a troublesome snarl.” Lady Hadrian brought the knots in Cassia’s length of tapestry to a swift resolution. “Let us do it again. Once you see how this thread is woven in, you’ll understand quickly, and it will be easy for you.”

  “Thank you, my lady.” Cassia watched Lady Hadrian’s demonstration.

  The other ladies’ hand looms soughed on as they paid more attention to their own work than to the bastard who received their hostess’s generous condescension. Glad the young women’s focus was on their gossip and not her, Cassia listened.

  “Lord Tyran’s guards?” Lady Nivalis scoffed. “His brigands, you mean.”

  Lady Dalia sniffed. “The disreputables he employs would not last a day in Lord Hadrian’s service.”

  “Lord Hadrian would never tolerate such conduct,” Lady Nivalis agreed.

  “Have you heard Lord Tyran at every feast?” Lady Dalia asked. “He goes on and on, bragging about his friendship with Lord Titus’s son. Just another of Lord Flavian’s bootlickers without a scrap of honor.”

  “Of course Lord Hadrian’s man has the right of it,” Lady Biata declared.

  Talk of guards already. It might prove even easier than Cassia had expected to gather the gossip she had come seeking. Everyone here would be interested in a scandal in the barracks. Although the highborn were these ladies’ obsession, no one escaped their notice. In that way, they and Cassia were all alike. They knew how important it was to know. Cassia had once thought what separated them was her use of such knowledge for survival, and theirs for advancement. From her seat at the table, this division did not appear so distinct anymore.

  “How many of Lord Tyran’s guards?” Lady Dalia asked.

  “Three cowards,” Lady Nivalis answered, “against one of Lord Hadrian’s men.”

  “He dispatched every one of them to Hypnos!” Lady Biata exclaimed. “He left two of them to sleep in their own blood near the practice yard and delivered the third to Lord Hadrian’s solar at the crack of dawn.”

  Everyone cast a glance at Lady Hadrian, who continued her silent lesson for Cassia.

  “That must have been shocking.” Lady Biata sounded exhilarated.

  “Imagine that,” Lady Nivalis mused. “Lord Hadrian’s guard marching through the halls of Solorum with the remains of his enemy.”

  “Lord Hadrian’s man was the victor,” Lady Dalia concluded. “In trial by the sword, the survivor is in the right, with the gods as his witness.”

  “Apparently the palace guards think they know better than the gods,” said Lady Nivalis. “They’re calling it murder.”

  “Our men have been at war with Lord Titus’s faction for generations,” Lady Dalia protested, “and it has never been murder.”

  “Do you know how the fight started this time?” Lady Biata asked with relish.

  “I need not ask,” Lady Dalia re
turned. “One man is Lord Hadrian’s. The others serve the Segetians.”

  “But this was not merely your usual feuding,” Lady Biata gushed. “According to the gossip coming from Lord Tyran’s direction—”

  Lady Hadrian lifted a hand from Cassia’s weaving project, and the room fell silent.

  “Dear Bee,” Lady Hadrian said, “how unfortunate that anyone has bothered your ears with the words of such unpleasant men. I can only imagine how distasteful that was to hear, my poor dear. You need not think on it any further.”

  “Oh, yes, it was most distressing,” Lady Biata simpered. She took the hint and refrained from repeating any testimony of the opposing faction within Lady Hadrian’s hearing.

  Lady Hadrian’s expression had grown pinched and grim, although she continued to demonstrate the technique of seamlessly adding a brilliant but fragile color of thread to the weaving. Cassia nodded to show she was paying attention.

  “He languishes in prison awaiting his untimely execution,” Lady Biata informed everyone.

  “How can they believe him responsible, when Lord Tyran’s guards outnumbered him?” Lady Dalia lamented.

  “Lord Tyran claims Lord Hadrian’s guard slaughtered the men without cause,” Lady Biata replied. “Insidious lies, of course.”

  “It’s military discipline. The laws of men.” Nivalis’s tone held a bitter note Cassia recognized. “There’s no thwarting them.”

  “In that you are right,” Lady Hadrian cut in. “That is the sad truth of the matter. Let us speak of it no more.”

  The Way of Things

  Was there still time? Cassia left the weaving party as soon as she could without arousing suspicion, for she did not know if she had fortnights, days or mere hours before the guard’s execution.

  Regardless, it was not much time to convince Perita to go against months of silence and a lifetime of knowing her place.

  Cassia found her handmaiden in her hearth room. Perita sat by the fire with her head bent over the tiny stitches that were coming undone from the blue-gray belt. There was plenty of thread on her needle, and most of the damage still lay ahead of her. One might suspect she had just picked it up.

  “Hello, Perita.”

  “Afternoon, Lady.”

  After a moment of difficult silence, Cassia took Knight into the bedroom and bade him stay on his blanket. The last thing she should bring to this negotiation was dog fur. After she washed her hands and changed into a clean gown, she returned to the hearth room and took her chair across the rug from Perita.

  Moments dragged on. Perita did not speak.

  Cassia cleared her throat. “How much time do we have to find a way to get your guard out of prison?”

  The girl jumped out of her skin, and her finger narrowly escaped a vicious stab from the needle. At last, she met Cassia’s gaze.

  “The more you tell me,” Cassia said, “the better chance we have of seeing that his life is spared. How long?”

  Perita searched Cassia’s eyes. The handmaiden’s gaze was as sharp as that needle. Cassia did not look away.

  Let her look. Let her see all Cassia was and was not. Let her decide for herself why Cassia was doing this.

  Although, it might not hurt for Cassia to make her case in words as well.

  She drew a deep breath and tried, with great difficulty, what always came so easily with Lio. Speaking. If she learned to do it with other people as well, might it do more good than harm?

  In this case, in this one case, perhaps.

  “I haven’t anything to gain by helping you,” Cassia said. “Winning you to my side, you may be thinking, so you don’t report to the king. That would be a useless attempt on my part. We both answer to the king, and we always will.”

  Deliberately, Perita secured her needle in the fabric of the belt. “What is it you want in return then, Lady? I’ll be straight with you. I’m desperate enough. Name your price, and I’m likely to pay it.”

  “I don’t want anything.”

  Brow furrowed, Perita studied Cassia. “If there’s a favor you’ve a mind to call in later, I’d as soon know now.”

  “No. No favors.” Cassia swallowed. “I just want to help.”

  She looked and saw no trust in Perita’s eyes. And suddenly, Cassia thought she could see through Perita’s eyes.

  The tyrant king’s mercenary daughter was coming to her in her hour of despair, dangling hope in front of her, cruel hope, and she didn’t know what new trap might be waiting if she took the bait. What new trial she must find the strength to endure, in order to make something of the lady’s offer.

  “Of course you need to know why,” Cassia said, “when I have never been of any help to you before.”

  “Neither of us can be of any help to the other,” Perita said softly. “It’s the way of things.”

  “No. It is no longer the way of things.”

  Those words, Cassia knew not why, broke the dam. She watched the expressions on Perita’s face. Perita was smart—she never wore a stone face, but she only showed about three of her faces to Cassia, all acceptable ones. Now Cassia saw how much lay beneath. Perita’s confusion gave way to a grimace of anguish and wetness in her large eyes that threatened to overflow.

  “When you say it like that, my lady, I believe you.”

  Cassia had not realized how she’d sounded. So sure. Like someone with authority. Even power. “I will do everything in my power to help the two of you,” she promised.

  Perita clapped a hand over her mouth. Tears traced over her cheeks and the backs of her knuckles.

  Cassia sat with her hands in her lap, feeling unarmed against the girl’s pain. “I’m so sorry,” she tried. Yes, sympathy must surely be what Perita wanted and what would keep her talking. “What is his name?”

  Perita scrubbed her eyes with the back of her hand. “Callen.”

  “He is good to you? You care for him?”

  “We’d do anything for each other.” Perita’s chest shook from her effort to contain her sobs.

  Cassia sought more words. “How did you two meet?”

  “When the court was at Namenti. We girls started going to watch the fellows in the practice yard. We all picked favorites to cheer for. It gave us something to cheer about, and the fellows something to fight for. It all seemed like such a merry game until we came to Solorum.” Her face crumpled again.

  “What changed?”

  Perita sucked in a breath. Then her despair resolved into an iron calm.

  Cassia really hadn’t seen Perita before. She had been looking with the wrong eyes. Otherwise, she would have learned to respect Perita long before this moment.

  “Nothing is a game here at Solorum,” Perita said. “You’d think the guards bring the ghosts of all Lord Titus’s and Lord Hadrian’s ancestors with them into the practice yard. Lord Tyran’s men are the worst. He’s in Lord Titus’s faction, you know, and his guards never let anyone hear the end of it. Especially Verruc. He’s one of Lord Tyran’s ‘favorites.’ He and his two cronies are always bullying Lord Hadrian’s men.”

  “Did Verruc’s band pick a fight with Callen?”

  “You can’t pick a fight with Callen. He’s a steady man, not prone to petty squabbles. He respects Lord Hadrian’s orders not to make the feud worse. He would never do something like this without just cause. He killed Verruc and the other two in honorable combat, then took himself to Lord Hadrian to confess.”

  “Yes, the way Callen turned himself in has made quite an impression on Solorum.”

  “That’s Callen. He doesn’t deserve this. But Verruc’s liege is calling it murder. It’s Callen’s word against a free lord’s.”

  “It is unusual for the palace guard to interfere in trial by the sword. Surely Callen’s comrades vouched that he challenged Verruc and the other two in accordance with honor and won by the will of the gods.”

  Perita’s gaze fell. “There were no witnesses.” Then she lifted her chin. “If you want evidence Callen is in the right, know th
at Lord Hadrian takes Callen at his word.”

  “I will take you at your word, Perita.”

  Perita straightened in her chair. “Thank you, my lady. You’ll find I’m as good as my word.”

  “Tell me, has not Lord Hadrian intervened on Callen’s behalf?”

  “He personally offered Lord Tyran double life price for all three soldiers. Lord Tyran accepted a small fortune for the other two, but he wouldn’t take money for Verruc. Said he wanted ‘justice.’” Perita’s mouth twisted.

  “No doubt the palace guard insisted they had ‘no choice’ but to enact the letter of the law.”

  The king would not intervene. Not when he was secure of Lord Hadrian’s loyalty and struggling to keep Lord Tyran’s. Lucis was the law’s most faithful defender, as long as it was convenient for him.

  “Even Lord Hadrian couldn’t stop the arrest,” Perita said. “Callen went without a fight, of course.”

  “What about Lord Titus?” Cassia asked. “He is usually a reasonable man. He could talk Lord Tyran into a more moderate response.”

  “Lord Titus said he’d have Lord Flavian look into the matter.”

  “Lord Flavian is away on an errand for the king and not due to return for a month. Does Callen have that much time?”

  Perita closed her eyes, then shook her head. “It’s not the headsman we’ve to fear. Callen won’t last till the next execution. It was a dreadful fight. His victory cost him.” Perita swallowed hard. “Yesterday you came upon me when I’d just got back from visiting Callen in prison. I’ve a strong stomach, my lady. But the shape he’s in…”

  “His wounds have gone bad?”

  Perita nodded, her gaze haunted. “But I had to see him. Father officially agreed to our betrothal just so I’d have the right to visit Callen.”

  “You and Callen intend to marry?”

  “Oh, yes. We made a promise to each other on tournament day. My father had the butcher in mind, but when Callen spoke to him, Pa took one look at Lord Hadrian’s colors and forgot to be stubborn. Even so, Callen insisted we should wait till he rose a bit higher in the ranks, so he’d have more to offer. He’s got his mother and sisters to support, so taking on a wife, too…” Perita’s voice wavered. “They can’t…I can’t…do without him, my lady.”