Inked Magic

by Jory Strong

  “Yes.”

  “I’ll come with you.” Implacable will set against an impossibility.

  Etaín didn’t confront him directly. “If you do, Denis will insist on being in the room with us.”

  She felt the telltale spasm where his cheek touched her neck and it brought a smile despite what they were talking about. Lord Eamon’s plans thwarted.

  “Tell me how you took her memories, Etaín. Tell me if using your gift always affects you this way.”

  His arms tightened on her painfully for an instant, not threat but conveyed worry. “There was a point when I thought you might slip into death.”

  “Brianna wants to die.”

  “Tell me how you took her memories,” he repeated.

  She hesitated, old caution surfacing before being dismissed. “I took them the same way I always do. I touched the eyes to her skin and asked her to show me what happened.”

  “But you didn’t see it when you were with her.” Not a hard thing for him to guess.

  “No. I never do. The memories come later, in a dream that seems real. Like it’s happening to me.”

  The muscles in his arms flexed against hers. “And the sickness? The weakness?”

  “Usually it doesn’t last. I puke my guts out twice, right after I take the memories and right after I live through them, then I’m okay . . .”

  She almost didn’t add the rest of it, then thought about the mirror demonstration and realized there was probably nothing she could tell him that would seem crazy. “Well, I’m okay after a shower. Usually that’s what it takes to lock the memories away. I know they’re there, but I don’t revisit them because there’s always a chance if I do I’ll relive them.”

  She couldn’t suppress a tremor at remembering what had happened when the captain scared her straight at sixteen. “Reliving the memories is like being trapped in a looping horror film. I can’t alter anything in them. Not what happens, not the thoughts or feelings, or even what was said, everything remains exactly the same.”

  “But something was different this time?” There was only the barest hint of a question in his voice.

  She used humor against her fear at where the changes in her gift might ultimately lead. “I didn’t throw up this morning for a start. The Italian dinner was great, but I’m happy not to have seen it again in a less palatable form.”

  He answered with a bite to her shoulder and another painful tightening of his arms. “Did Brianna resist?”

  “No. She was unconscious and heavily drugged when I touched her.”

  “There’s a sense of guilt in the pictures you drew.”

  Etaín glanced at the sketchbook and shivered. But the touch of his skin to hers and his presence at her back gave her the strength to open the door to Brianna’s reality just long enough to say, “She blames herself for what happened.”

  His question made her think of Tyra lying on the hospital bed, the ceaseless rolling of her eyes only stopping when the horror of being taken by the Harlequin Rapist was stripped from her mind.

  Maybe Brianna hadn’t wanted the peace that came with the loss of her memories. Maybe on some unconscious level she’d fought their removal because she believed she deserved to be punished, and because without the memories she’d lose the will to commit suicide.

  “It felt the same as it always does while I was touching her, but it’s possible she resisted,” Etaín offered tentatively. “That could explain the differences, including why I didn’t see everything.”

  Eamon closed his eyes, savoring the feel of Etaín held safely in his arms. He wondered if this was what it meant to fall in love. To be willing to trade advantage for no gain but to ease the suffering of another. To override personal objections in order to allow another to risk themselves for a purpose they believed in.

  Short of imprisoning her, he couldn’t prevent her from returning to Denis’s home. She’d touch her palms to Brianna’s skin and take the memories even knowing how sick she would become afterward. She’d do it despite learning that he’d feared she might die while she dreamed.

  “Does Cathal mean so much to you that you’ll visit Brianna again regardless of the danger it presents to you?”

  “This doesn’t have anything to do with Cathal now. I’ll finish what I started.”

  Did her gift compel her? Or her sense of honor?

  Both, he thought, fear for her returning at the thought of how many humans might already know of her gift.

  What had her mother been thinking to leave Etaín in the home of a policeman?

  It was only a matter of time now before Etaín came to the attention of other lords, or far, far worse for all of them, the queen.

  His gaze flicked to the sketchbook she’d pushed aside, his mind to the images it contained. Whether the Dunnes ultimately gave their oath and called him Lord or not, he couldn’t fault Etaín’s choice in seeing this through.

  With easy strength he lifted and turned her so she straddled his thighs, facing him. Shackling her wrists, he drew them to his chest, holding her palms to his skin.

  There were no humans in Elfhome, or hadn’t been in the time of his ancestors’ banishment. And those few seidic who’d been born into this world and imprisoned in luxury by the ruling family, would never have been called upon to use their abilities on a human.

  Etaín’s answers only deepened the alarm he’d felt in front of Stylin’ Ink. They strengthened his belief that nothing good could come of her using her gifts on humans, and worse, a great deal of harm could come—to her.

  He pressed against her hands to make her aware of her palms against his chest. “The other morning you hinted that your touch could make me forget you. You said it had happened before. When, Etaín? Under what circumstances?”

  She was silent for so long he didn’t think she would answer. Frustration built, only to dissipate in a wash of tenderness and satisfaction when she allowed him further into her life.

  “Brianna’s not the first victim I’ve worked with. There have been others. Cases Parker or the captain asked for my help on. They call me as a last resort because I take the memories. Not just see them.”

  Her words confirmed his suspicions. Without inherent magic of their own, humans had no defense against hers. Even lower-caste Elves might fall to it without conscious intent on her part.

  Mind thief. Gift thief. They were epithets applied to the seidic.

  “It’s happened with lovers, too,” she whispered. “Though not the same way.”

  He found he didn’t want to hear about the men in her past. Nor did he want to talk about the human in her present, Cathal.

  He leaned forward, his lips claiming hers in a series of tender kisses. And though he desperately wanted to join with her physically, demonstrating on a primal level that she was no longer alone, he managed to keep from lifting her onto his cock.

  “Magic is a thing of will and belief,” he said, glad now for the display of it the night before so this lesson would be easier. “But to make the most of it, to control and wield it, also requires focus.”

  “The questions I ask,” she said, making the intuitive leap. “I speak them. I think them. A part of me concentrates on the eyes, almost as if I can see through them.”

  “Exactly. All of those serve as a focus.”

  Pressing her palms harder against his flesh, he brought to mind the images that had come when she touched her fingertip to the mirror. “See my memory, Etaín.”

  She shook her head in denial of the request. Tried to escape his grip but he refused to release her.

  “You won’t be able to steal from me. Magic flows into the both of us. For the sake of simplicity, believe it is capable of both attracting like and repelling it, depending on the circumstances and the relative strength of those possessing it. Trust me when I say, there is no danger you will steal my memory. Focus, Etaín. See what I’m thinking about.”

  She closed her eyes, yielding, asking a moment later, “Do you want me to tell you what
I saw?”

  “I’ll tell you. That will prove to you I’m still in possession of the memory,” he said before describing the primordial birthplace of Elves without naming their race. “Satisfied?”

  “Yes.”

  He lifted her hands from his chest, kissing each eye in the center of her palm before releasing them in favor of encircling her with his arms and pulling her forward to feel the press of breasts against his chest. “Those without ties to magic have no defenses against you. I suspect one of the reasons you are violently ill when you consciously use your gift is that even as you are taking the memories, you are unconsciously resisting doing it because you understand it’s a violation of another’s mind.”

  “Punishing myself?”

  “Perhaps, though maybe at war with yourself is more accurate. I also believe the nausea serves as a warning, Etaín. You experience these stolen memories as reality, then lock them away afterward. Gift and magic are inextricably entwined. Where the one takes, the other protects you against what was taken. But there are limits, and when they are reached . . .”

  The hard shudder that went through her was acknowledgment she understood his point though it didn’t surprise him when she said, “I’m still going to visit Brianna again.”

  “Here’s what advice I can give you. You can’t let skin serve as a barrier. Use your gift with razor-sharp intention. When you touch the eyes to her, your will should be like the lens of a movie camera focused on the scenes you wish to capture.”

  “Is there a way to see without taking?”

  “For someone like Brianna Dunne, I don’t know. There is knowledge I might be able to access in the future, but there is no guaranteeing the information would be there, and the cost of attempting to find it would be great.”

  “Is there a way to give back what I’ve taken?”

  “The answer is the same. I could offer suggestions if you are willing to experiment.”

  The shiver that went through her was answer enough. He rubbed his cheek against hers. “The person who gave you the tattoos you wear should be able to provide answers.”

  “No chance of that happening.”

  “You sound certain if it.” He let her hear the question in his voice, and choose whether or not to answer it.

  “I am. My mother did the wristbands shortly before bringing me to San Francisco. The rest of it was done by friends, over time, but I made the stencils and provided the ink. I dreamed the tattoos.”

  Her answer sent a ripple of surprise through him. That she’d dreamed them meant something, it had to. Like the inextricable entwining of gift and magic, he believed the inked vines both served and sustained her.

  “Some of the symbols on my arms are carved into the door here. They’re at your estate, too. You know what they mean.”

  “Yes. A lesson for another day.”

  “I should leave anyway. And get this over with. The sooner the better.”

  He couldn’t let her go without joining his body to hers. All it took was the thought of being separated from her and he hardened further, the ache to be inside her intensifying.

  He captured her earlobe between his lips and sucked, pleased at the way her breath hitched and her nipples tightened. He caught her hand and carried it to his erection. “Are you in such a rush you’re prepared to forfeit the chance to have this?”

  Her laugh sent a hot pulse through his aroused cock. “Maybe. Convince me it would be a bad idea to go right now.”

  It was a challenge he felt confident he could win. He cupped her breast, fingers toying with her nipple while his other hand pushed between them to find her clit, her heated opening.

  He kept his movements slow, building the desire between them. Heightening the pleasure with tugs and twists of her nipple as he fucked his fingers into her, rubbing them over her clit.

  Her back arched, her breathing became ragged. She moaned in protest when he abandoned her wet folds and swollen knob long enough to capture her hand.

  She didn’t resist when he guided it so she touched her fingers to her clit, rubbed her palm over it as he forced her fingers into her slit along with his own.

  “Will this be enough for you, Etaín? As it was when you showered last night?”

  She laughed. “If I say yes, will your ego be able to handle it?”

  He bit her neck in punishment though he’d already discovered he loved her provocative self-confidence. Her ignorance of her heritage and the world she would one day be Lady of freed them both from constraint and artifice.

  He rose onto his knees, tumbling her to the mattress and positioning her so she lay on her stomach with the pillow beneath her, canting her hips upward.

  Covering her body with his, he found her entrance but didn’t push into her.

  She tried to move, to take what he wasn’t yet ready to give her. He tormented her, sliding his cock back and forth over her erect clit, wetting himself with the arousal escaping from her slit.

  He relented only when he was ready, and then it was a repeat of what he’d done minutes earlier. A press and retreat as he controlled the depth of penetration. Shallow, slow thrusts.

  She grew more swollen, making him fight for each inch in an ecstasy-inducing battle. Coating his skin with sweat before he finally gave in to her pleas to take her harder. Faster.

  Even then he didn’t allow a rush to completion. Didn’t allow himself release until she lay sated beneath him, trembling in the aftermath of the pleasure he’d given her.

  He rolled them to their sides, arms holding her tight. He didn’t want her to leave at all, but he knew the wisdom of allowing it. For now. And only until after the fund-raiser.

  She hadn’t said as much, but the extent of her efforts for the event spoke of promises made. And though she hadn’t been raised among Elves, he wouldn’t have her foresworn by breaking her oath.

  “Stay long enough for breakfast?” he asked.

  “I’ll want a shower first.”

  He smiled at the prospect of standing beneath the water with her again, of lathering his hands and touching every inch of her skin. Of having her do the same to him until he could no longer prevent himself from lifting and holding her against the wall, their bodies joined again before she left.

  “It will delay your departure,” he warned, caressing her breast, her belly. Cupping her mound. “This time you won’t shower alone.”

  Cathal lay in bed, vivid memories of what it had been like to wake with Etaín assaulting him, carrying heat and blood downward so the sheets tented with his erection.

  He refused to let his hand follow. He wouldn’t give her that much power over him.

  Pussy whipped. That’s what his father and uncle would call him for not being with another woman right now, for wanting Etaín and being willing—more than willing—to keep her with him despite knowing she’d been with another man before coming to him.

  He rubbed his chest, his cock throbbing at the remembered sensation of her lying on top of him like a contented cat, a small smile of pleasure on her face as she stroked her fingertips along the length of his side.

  Fuck, what was he going do about her?

  He closed his eyes, not wanting to see his own defeat even as his hand fisted around his erection.

  It was a poor substitute but at least he didn’t have to rely on fantasies.

  He relived those times she’d been with him. His hand moving up and down on his shaft. His grip tightening, the motion quickening until release came. Hot and wet. A relief quieting the craving for her but not eradicating it.

  He rose from the bed, wanting to get the call over with before stepping into the shower, as if somehow he could wash unwanted reality and the images coming with it away.

  “Bike’s still at Aesirs,” Sean said in greeting.

  His hand tightened on the phone but he refused to allow himself more of a reaction.

  Pussy whipped.

  “Anything on Eamon?”

  “I’m the best in the business but
it’s what, not even nine a.m. yet. Cut me some slack here. A lot of slack. I do need sleep occasionally though I can tell you Aesirs is a huge, hard-to-penetrate shield. That’s bad news in finding out specifics about Eamon but good news in other regards. Anyone who needs to hide like that is going to have some serious stopping power when it comes to applying leverage to your father and uncle. To deaf ears I’ll say again, have a face-to-face with Eamon.”

  Cathal’s mood darkened further at hearing Eamon might be able to do what he couldn’t be sure of managing, keeping Etaín safe from the consequences of involvement with his family. “Keep digging.”

  As he once again stood next to Etaín, straddling the Harley and on the cusp of leaving, Eamon was glad he wasn’t destined to play out this scene many more times, or be required to endure Liam’s mocking smile—though thankfully that was currently from a distance far enough away to preclude hearing any accompanying comments.

  He wanted to press her into a promise to return but accepted it would be a losing battle. With Liam watching her, he wasn’t concerned for her safety though worry from a different source edged in with thoughts of how drained she’d been when she arrived the previous night.

  He didn’t know nearly enough about her gift or her magic. It wasn’t required to be afraid for her. She was a changeling and that was always a dangerous time in this world, more so for her because she hadn’t been raised among her own kind.

  Cupping her cheek, touching his mouth to hers, he strengthened her with one last magic-laden kiss before saying, “Be careful, Etaín. I believe it’s the nature of your gift to want to see everything, to know everything about whoever you touch. You control your abilities now, either by luck or instinct, but eventually you’ll need more than either of those things. You’ll need me. And perhaps even Cathal.”

  “We’ll see,” she said, and he hid his smile until she’d left him, wary of alerting her to just how much progress he’d made with her.

  Twenty

  Etaín let herself into Stylin’ Ink. The light streaming out of Bryce’s office told her the shop wasn’t empty despite the locked front door and darkened interior.