Rogue Within

by Mima

  The priestess hummed beside him. “Peace, warrior. Set the death aside and embrace the life you now celebrate.”

  Acceptance. He was ruined now, waiting for each kill to bring him closer to the one that counted. Donte had never known acceptance. Defiance was what ran through his blood. Acceptance, when used, was merely a tool toward the victory of his choosing. Peace and celebration were odd words indeed.

  Moriko’s parents went down and took each of her hands. Her smile was blinding, tears high in her glowing brown eyes. They walked up the stairs, each hugging her, and then they stepped back to the side. She faced him. The Priestess came to her and he could see they knew each other, for Moriko lit up, her tears spilling over as they embraced. The Priestess threaded her arm around Moriko’s waist and the two women came to him, where he was rooted, braced, fortified.

  He swallowed. She smelled of the same luscious scent of the Priestess, her citrus-leather-woman scent mixing to make it that much more perfect. Lust flared. If he followed his own people’s traditions today, he’d fuck her right here, Bear filling his skin, taking her before his leaders and family. But he was alone. And no one watched them fuck and he liked it that way. His. Won against every law, taken against all common sense.

  She stood before him while the Priestess talked, smiling, radiant. He’d make her look like that again, once he was inside her. He couldn’t stop his gaze from flicking again and again to the tattoo. It was more detailed than his, the lines more precise, the thorns more delicate. His heart still beat too hard and he really didn’t like being stared at by hundreds of people.

  The Priestess reached for his hand and tugged it forward, taking Moriko’s and placing it on his forearm. He closed his grip gently around her muscled arm. The priestess wrapped a blue swath of cloth along their pressed arms, tying them together. For the first time, he saw his tattoo in the clear daylight. It was ugly, blotchy, marred by his scars. It looked like a ragged scab.

  Hers was so new it still had a faint red sheen and he pulsed bodycraft into her at once. Some small tension eased in him when he realized someone other than Mac must have done her tattoo, or at least it had been done with much more care. She just kept smiling like he’d given her a gift. Now he could see the golden strands wound around her ears. He couldn’t give her anything like this dress, or the jewelry she’d known. He didn’t even know where flowers grew here in this place of stone streets and buildings.

  The trumpets blared again and this time he did twitch enough for her to feel it where their arms were bound. The music took up louder than ever and if the crowd cheered before, now they roared. He rotated to face them, angling to make sure he was a half step in front of her. There was a distinct edge of bloodlust in the red faces who shouted for him, fists in the air, flowers floating like snow as they shredded and tossed them.

  More petals were released from the top of the walls and soon the air was thick with the fragrance. Moriko pressed against him, laughing. He looked down at her, her silky bangs boxing in her gorgeous, sparkling eyes. The angle of the sun lit them gold, matching the shine of her smooth skin. Framed by the quiet green of her dress and the fluttering petals, she was like a knife slipped between his ribs.

  Bear. He held to the moment, tightening his grip on her arm. Bear. See her. See this amazing person we’ve stolen. She wants you. I need you. Please. Bear.

  But the petals stopped falling, she turned back to the crowd, waving so hard her whole body swayed. She bounced with joy and her crown slid to the side. With a happy cry, she snatched it off and threw it. A mass horde piled into the location and then one screaming woman waved the crumpled flowers madly. And Bear lay in the blackened, swampy mire of his magescape, still bleeding, still sucking at him with grinding pain. The darkspell yanked at him, calling him east, toward the City.

  The Priestess stepped forward and undid the cloth from their arms, folded it intricately, tucked it into a carved box and handed it to him. She gestured with one arm that he should lead Moriko down. Frowning at the crowd now plastered to the front of the stage, arms reaching, their cries so deafening he couldn’t hear any one person, he shook his head.

  The Priestess chuckled and made shooing motions.

  He looked at the stairs, completely blocked by bodies, at the aisle full of people, and at the far distant door. Dom still waited, arms crossed, in the corner. Donte swung Moriko up into his arms. The crowd went insane, the nearest people pounding on the stage. He leaped to the roof of the small gazebo in the corner.

  “Donte! What are you doing?” Moriko laughed at him, arms choking tight around his neck.

  “Escaping. I’m good at it.” Crouching, he bounced on his haunches to warm up under the weight of his … wife. And then he burst up, making the top of the wall. It was a good jump, considering he hadn’t practiced in a long while.

  The guards up here shook their swords and spears or just clapped. The cheering wasn’t as bad up high as it had been in the enclosed pit of the bailey.

  “We should go back into the large hall for our feast.”

  He sighed. “Is that where you want to go?”

  She took one hand from around his neck and stroked down the side of his face. “I think you’ve used enough of your manners for one day. Take me to our room.”

  He brushed a kiss over her forehead. “Thank you.”

  She twisted her head and caught his jaw for a kiss of her own. “I was sorry not to be there with you during the fealty presentation. Are you alright?”

  He considered. “No.”

  “Well, let’s fix that.” She squirmed.

  He set her down. She took his hand, picked up her skirts with her other and pulled him. He opened his stride as she jogged along the battlements. Taking in the view on both sides, he appreciated he was beginning to orient himself to the castle. There were three rings and then the vast City beyond.

  Considering their direction, he glanced past the tower they approached. That patch of jungle beyond the farthest wall had been his territory as a Lone alpha. He’d lived there for not quite a year, patrolling at the order of the Council and his Alpha. In all that time, he’d fought exactly three fuzzies and one corpux. He’d been angry and bored. He’d been so stupid.

  “Come on!” Moriko pulled him into the shadows of the tower stairs, taking him up instead of down.

  At the top, there was a small room for a guard with a pallet and table. “This is where you want to go?”

  She shook her head. “Up.” She grasped a heavy wood ladder from the wall and spun it, wrestling it over to a door in the ceiling.

  He took it from her and set it in place. She was up it like a monkey, throwing open the ceiling hatch. Setting a warning trap on the guard door, he followed her. The breeze up here surprised him. The air was hot and the ocean oozed across the world.

  “This isn’t the highest platform.” She pointed to a few more distant and more slender towers. “But they’ll all think we went to our room. Idivay will call for us to come to the feast and this will give us a moment.” She whirled, leaning back against the waist-high wall that rimmed the space. Eyes sparkling, she drew her shimmering sleek skirts up with both hands, baring her legs. “Take me here, Donte. Hard and fast and wild.”

  It was only a bodylength square. A pole with a fluttering banner stood in one corner. The long triangular blue cloth snapped in the wind. He kicked the hatch closed, and turned, taking in the great view of the City. It reminded him of being on River Mountain’s heights. Loosening his pants, he kept his gaze on the distant outer City Walls, ancient and powered with unbreakable protective spells that glowed green in the night. The jungle wrapped the City in her clutches. “First tell me who did your tattoo.”

  “A man named Dabastino. He is an artist who works for the Mage Guild. My grandmother knew him.”

  He met her gaze. She stroked her finger into her folds and his mouth burst with saliva, remembering the way he’d fingered her in the baths. He wrapped his fist around himself. “Do you know
what these marks mean?”

  “Rogue.” She gasped, slipping her hand farther down, going deeper inside herself. “Outcast. Unwanted. Like me.”

  He snorted, pulling on his piercing just to give himself some slight pain. “How can you say that, when they’ve just roared for you, all those people?”

  “They roared for you. For the Queen and her executioner, for the increase of the Royal power through sacrificing an undesirable Royal to this marriage. She’s already asked me for replacement names. I won’t be Chatelaine long.” She shook her head, back arching as she worked her hand harder.

  Her scent and that strange new perfume slid inside him, lit through his muscles, and wrapped around his balls.

  “It doesn’t matter.” Her hand worked so hard between her thighs cream began to drip. She looked at him with her sloe-eyes. “I’ll have you.”

  Her words clawed down the raw mess inside him. He stepped up, propped her back against the wall, and entered her. She was entirely slick and he slid in with little effort, although she closed so tightly around him he saw stars. His piercing dragged along her soft channel, resisting his stroke, pulling on his head, snapping pleasure along his spine.

  “Ah! Stars of the Father, you are so special. Donte…” Her head slumped back, her body leaning out into space, unconcerned with the five-story drop.

  The muscles in his back rippled with the twisting emotions inside him. Setting her ass up on the ledge, he gripped her ribs firmly and took her the way she’d asked. He cut loose, free in the moment. Unlike last time, yesterday in her room, when he’d been overwhelmed with doubt, he knew it was far, far too late now.

  Emotions pounded at him, wild and free as they’d never been at the fortress when things were simpler. His strength, his lust, his anger and need, his loneliness … he stroked her hard, slamming her thighs wide. His hips dragged up with every strike, grinding his root across her clit. He fucked her faster after she came nearly immediately, the ripple of her orgasm seizing his cock.

  She laughed and it made him insane, that she didn’t know how close she was to evil, that she would be his final step. Crying out, he crashed into her body, and yet no matter how hard he struck, she met him. She came again, her body so weak she begged him to hold her up.

  Instead, he laid her out along the edge of the wall, perhaps two handlengths wide. She gasped, stiffening, but then he was in her again. He heard her dress tear beneath them as he stroked her, her body rocking with the force of his thrusts. She turned her head, looked across the ocean and moaned his name. One of her arms clutched the inside wall, but the other flopped out into space, lax, fingers bobbing like in an elegant dance.

  Hard. Wild. Fast. He stared down the side of the tower wall, where the people looked so small. Grunting with concentration to keep his balance perfect, her tailbone aligned with the center of the wall and her hips in each hand, he thrust in her, seeking down deep into the warm cream that encased him. She came again, silent hitching in her breaths his only clue.

  He withdrew and leaped down. She cried out, but he had her off the wall before the sound finished. Spinning her away from him and slamming his hand between her shoulders, he forced her torso to bend. The dress was shredded, fabric marred into a fuzzy mess in the back. He gathered up the wrinkled swaths of fabric at the back until her ass gleamed in the sun. Hefting her farther out over the wall, he separated her cheeks and slid in again.

  She dangled down over the distance. He leaned over and stared at her hair flipped loose and hanging between her slack arms. She didn’t even try to fight or brace with her hands. The line of her spine was gorgeous. Her trust as she sprawled there, him working her hole hard, made the heat in his gut expand. The sun beat down on them. The air was clean.

  He held himself buried in his mate’s scalding core, staring at how her body hung down the blond bricks, easy with his hold. He came. Letting himself pulse free through the tingling head of his cock while he was still deep in her body scared his blood cold. For he’d never felt anything so perfect. He wanted to hold her here all day, prisoner to his weight and gravity, while he kept her full, the view calling him to fly.

  Gently, he lifted her up, setting her on her feet. She staggered and he steadied her. The breeze blew her disheveled hair across her face. He pulled the silk strands away, assessing her dazed, flushed face. “Are you all right?”

  “No.”

  Defiance burned. “I’ll take you harder, when I want to. You’re mine.”

  “Yes.” She was breathless, dazed. “Yours. Yours and Bear’s.”

  Despite her painful jab, he gathered her up. For no other reason but that she was precious.

  Her arms curled up around his chest, clinging to his shoulders. “Tighter, Donte.”

  Flexing, he drew her in, squeezing her smaller frame.

  “I feel like you’ve claimed me before the whole City.”

  He paused, considered. Perhaps.

  “Did your stomach just growl? You need to eat! I suppose it’s time we faced my family again.” She stepped back, smiling up at him.

  He fixed her hair, smoothing it into place. “I keep wrecking your dresses.” Now the front of her dress was fuzzed and shredded, from where he’d bent her over the wall. Frowning, he sent bodycraft into her, seeking bruises and sore spots.

  “Stop that. Sometimes a woman likes to be sore. We’ll head to the baths. They have dresses there.” She opened the hatch again and scurried down the ladder. When he came down, she put a hand on his arm. “Did Bear…?”

  Agony sliced across his eyes. “No.”

  “I’m sorry. We’ll work on that. I have an idea—”

  “No, Moriko. I can’t talk about him now.” It was hard to stand upright with the pain draping his torso.

  Her face creased with sorrow. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “For now, I’ll stop. But I won’t let this go.”

  Focusing on taking down the trap took all his effort. He started to shake on the way down the stairs. She noticed, giving him a sad look and taking his hand. He was starting to love it when she held his hand. It centered him, her earthcraft calling to his.

  The baths were busy and he smelled lots of people having sex behind the doors. The attendants swarmed them, bringing several dresses. Moriko chose a tan one, and soon her assistant Avis was there and gone, dispatched for a set of jewels. The casket the woman brought back in moments dazzled even him, who could care less about sparkly stones. When the lid lifted to reveal the mound of gold and colors, Moriko sighed with feminine happiness.

  She put the topaz bracelet on opposite her tattooed wrist, the three emerald rings on one hand and the enormous amethyst ring that stretched across two fingers on the other. The necklace was a twist of thick gold, hanging like a web across her entire upper chest, dotted with gems. One massive sapphire hung between her breasts. There was a headband she fit beneath her bangs, the gleam of a ruby sitting exactly between her brows. An armband glittering with aquamarines sat high on one arm.

  “Ready,” she purred with satisfaction, fingers petting the necklace.

  Feeling like death, Donte took her into the huge room. Braced for a swarm of attention, he was relieved to see that while people greeted them as they passed, most were well into their own amusement. Dancers swirled through the aisles and he grabbed some meat from a passing server.

  Moriko took him around to various people, who all gave him as much room as the crowd allowed. The music and voices were so loud everyone shouted and since he could hear them clearly, he soon had a headache. He’d look over at Moriko, encased in color, and remembered fucking her while balanced on the tower wall. The meat was excellent, the wine pretty good, and the bread the best he’d ever had.

  When he told her that, she took him off to the baker, who seemed terrified at the compliment. Neck prickling over the crowd, Donte continued to eat. He stood next to his woman watching the people whirl around them. The itch soon became clear when he identified the person who was following her. It was a ma
n, large and fit, dressed in a pale orange suit. His hair was dark blond and his eyes blue. Squashing the memory of Thad, Donte bent to Moriko’s ear and ordered her to identify him.

  Skilled in subterfuge, she continued to chatter, disengaged, led him away, and pretended to take him in her arms for a bit of a dance. When she led him up to a table of sweets, he chose a chocolate-covered strawberry.

  “I do not know him, but he is not a Royal, even though he is dressed like one.”

  Donte ate the strawberry and breathed through the explosion of pain when Bear lay silent. He forced himself to swallow it. “Where is Avis?”

  He liked the timid woman. She had a steel core inside her outer uncertainty, whereas most people pretended to be sure when inside they were shifting sand.

  Moriko craned her neck then waved her over. She repeated Donte’s question. Avis, less skilled, couldn’t find him at first. Then she turned back. “He’s Hu-long’s friend, a new guard only here a few days.” She glanced at Donte. “He passed the fealty presentation today.”

  “Avis, stay with Moriko, no matter how she tries to order you.” He stared in her pretty blue eyes. “Do you understand? I am usurping her command and saying my orders overrule hers.”

  She nodded, pale and serious.

  Looking at the nearest marten, he snapped his fingers and pointed at Moriko. The stone-faced man nodded once. Donte turned and threaded through the crowd, but when he saw the blond trying to leave, he gave up politeness. Bellowing, he pushed his way through.

  He had to run once he got to the hall, but he caught the man and shoved him against the wall. The only other couple scurried away. “Who are you?”

  “Dai.”

  “Why were you following us?”

  “My apologies, My Lord. I meant no offense. I am merely curious about the newest—”