Black Moon Draw

by Lizzy Ford

  Her act of self-sacrifice meant more to him than it should, along with the spike of fear that pierced him watching her plummet to her death. What struck him more strongly: her death had the same impact on him as that of the loyal master-at-arms who had died in his arms, slain by the troll. How did the death of a lifelong friend compete with one of a battle-witch he had only just met?

  The urge to protect her – nay, to possess every inch of her – returned, more powerful than before. The woman foretold to end the curse, who bore the name of the greatest queen of Black Moon Draw, whose touch stopped his racing thoughts and whose body tempted him to stop marching to battle so he could spend time running his hands, tongue, lips over every inch . . .

  “What’re you doing?” she called, interrupting the image he had stored of her body in the moonlight.

  “Go inside,” he directed her.

  “But, why? We were doing so good!”

  There were times when he found her innocence and ignorance of his world fetching, a reminder of why he was slaughtering men left and right to save those who deserved it.

  This, however, was not one of those times. “Keep quiet and obey me, witch!” he returned.

  With a look at the link yawning open three dozen feet above his head, he suspected they were about to embark on a very uncomfortable journey into the bay.

  The sheet went lax, and he risked a look over the edge of the roof to ensure she was inside before releasing it.

  The Shadow Knight balanced himself, allowing his body to sway with the movement of the tower, and gripped the beam under the roof with his wide hands. He did a slow-motion somersault over the edge, instincts and awareness on high alert to ensure he not only maintained his balance but didn’t miss the window below him.

  A moment later, he dropped into the tower and steadied himself against the wall. Trunks and loose items pitched back and forth with the tower’s movement. The battle-witch was sitting on the bed, the sole piece of furniture heavy enough not to be flung across the tower.

  He waited for a pitcher of water and several other loose items to rattle by him before leaping atop a trunk and onto the bed.

  “Why did we stop?” she asked, gazing at him with eyes the color of the sea’s shallows.

  “’Twould not have worked.”

  Her frown was sad. “I guess I’m not surprised.”

  “My plan will kill us.” He waited for the words to sink in. Too shocked to speak, she was staring at him. “The chain is about to snap and send us into the bay. Unless you can save us.”

  “But . . . I . . . how?”

  The Shadow Knight wrapped his arms around her, pulling her soft body into his hard frame. She pushed at him in protest, and he hauled her into his lap in response. If his plan worked, he was not about to be left behind. Her hair smelled good, and he breathed in her scent deeply, ignoring the sensations of rocking.

  “What the hell are you thinking?” she managed at last. Wriggling loose, she shoved him until she was able to see his face. Fear and confusion were on her pretty features.

  “I am thinking you do not want me dead. The last time my life was threatened, you used magic to protect me,” he replied steadily.

  “What is wrong with you? I . . . you just . . . are you insane?”

  “I have been called much worse.”

  “But if it doesn’t work, you die and I get to watch your world implode in two days!”

  “Then so be it.” He refrained from saying what he wanted, that his world was going to implode anyway if she did not unlock her magic. His kingdom died today with him, or it died in three days without her power.

  Holding her gaze, he waited. Emotions flew through her eyes. She sat between his legs, thighs pressed together and palms on his chest. His hands remained on her arms, in case they started to fall, and he studied her feminine features.

  “I wish you hadn’t told me any of this,” she said in a hushed, mournful tone.

  “Because you could walk away if you didn’t know.”

  She nodded. “You aren’t the person I thought you were.”

  “Good. Now get us out of here.”

  “I can’t.” Her eyes watered. She lifted the medallion at her chest.

  The Shadow Knight cupped one cheek in his large hand, marveling at how smooth her skin was. “What do you know of it?”

  “We don’t have time for –”

  “Think, witch,” he growled. “What do you know of the Heart?”

  She blinked back tears. A hot drop hit his thumb and he wiped it from her face. Strands of brown hair tickled the back of his hand, and he waited. His battle-witch had an intelligence in her eyes that told him he was merely scratching the surface of who she was. It had taken some reflection for him to accept that not only was there another world, but she was from it.

  Since accepting it, though, he had found her oddities much easier to tolerate and found her more intriguing than was wise. She needed time they did not have, and he used patience he rarely entertained out of necessity. They were both out of their element and almost out of time.

  “It has a thousand years of magic. The warrior queen Naia used it to curse Brown Sun Lake and everyone else after her husband was killed. She seems to think . . .” She trailed off, nibbling on her lower lip. “She kind of left that part out when we talked in my dream.”

  “’Tis an extension of you, a tool, the way a sword is for a warrior,” he replied. “It wants naught that you do not wish it to want. You can control it.”

  The tower jolted and dropped once more, thrusting her into his arms. This time, the groan of the chain was loud, a grating last breath as it struggled to hold the tower.

  The Shadow Knight circled her body with his thick arms, ready to protect her when they fell. “Quickly,” he urged her. “Devise some spell.”

  “I don’t know how.”

  This was not going quite as planned. He had hoped she would figure it out – before they started to fall. His mind worked fast, and he evaluated the other times the medallion flared to life. The only link: danger and . . .

  . . . emotion. Her emotion. Strong enough to break whatever bonds were preventing her from using the medallion at will.

  Without a word, he lifted her chin from his chest, looking deeply into her pretty eyes. Her face was inches away, and he traced the line of her jaw with one finger before resting his hand behind her neck.

  She had stiffened and was still, her eyes dropping to his lips. A faint flush of pink spread across her cheeks, yet another sign she was aware of him the way he was her.

  For a moment, they were no longer dangling from the skies, moments from their own deaths, with the rattle and smash of things rolling around them. Together, they were safe, wrapped in one another’s arms in their own world, breathing each other’s breath.

  “You have a betrothed,” she whispered uncertainly.

  The Shadow Knight claimed her warm, soft lips with his. To his surprise and satisfaction, she responded the way she had the night she passed out: with hunger and passion. He did not hesitate to deepen the kiss and slid his tongue between her plump lips into the velvety, wet depths of her mouth. She opened to him, her body pressing against his. Her distinct flavor was faint but present, and it spurred the fire in his blood, made him want to conquer something other than his world.

  The spark of need was overpowering, stronger than he thought possible, a reminder she was not a normal woman, a physical acknowledgment he had begun to understand ran much deeper than desire.

  Her arms went around his neck, and he maneuvered her body, lowering her back onto the bed and sliding his knee between her thighs. He rested half his body on hers.

  Another jolt, and their kiss broke off. She held him tightly. The Shadow Knight looked up at the ceiling that would like smash into him soon, once they began falling. He covered her body with his, one arm beneath her to keep them pressed together while the other looped beneath her neck as he prepared to shield her head from hitting anything. />
  “I will protect you,” he reminded her.

  She pressed her soft, smooth cheek to his roughened one, and he dipped his face into the nape of her neck to smell her sweet scent. The pulse in her neck was racing, her breathing shallow.

  “Did your man parts fall off?” she whispered.

  “Nay,” he replied, briefly amused by the question at such a time. “Are you thinking of sweet cakes?”

  “Not this time. I’ thinking . . . I can’t imagine a better way to go than in your arms,” she breathed.

  The words thawed a piece of him he was not prepared to acknowledge. “You will not die, Naia. But I will.”

  The arms around his body tightened in response. “Would you tell me your name then?”

  His breath caught. His name? She dared ask such a sacred question at a time like this? Even his betrothed did not know his name. The odd stirring was back, the instinct that prevented him from being affronted by the request and instead, seemed to confirm an idea he had barely formed.

  His battle-witch could become like the great battle-witch whose name she bore: a warrior queen meant to be at the side of the warrior Knight that united the kingdoms under one rule.

  Rarely did he allow himself to consider what came after he conquered the remaining two kingdoms, especially not when he had a queen in waiting. War and battle required all his concentration, and with time running out, he dared not spare his focus for such fanciful thoughts.

  With her perfect body beneath him and her warm breath in his ear, he began to regard what happened after the fighting ceased as possible, that they defeated the curse and entered into a time of peace. There was no use for a battle-witch once war stopped – and the idea of bonding her off to another man to ensure an alliance sent a streak of anger through him. He experienced no possessiveness at all for the woman promised him and forbidden need for the one loaned to him by another world.

  “If your magic manifests, and we do not die, I will tell you,” he whispered. He kissed her neck lightly and then buried his face in her hair and waited.

  “Prepare to be disappointed like everyone else in my life,” she replied.

  The chain groaned loudly – then snapped. For a horrifying moment, they were suspended in midair, at the height of the pendulum’s swing.

  The Shadow Knight closed his eyes, not yet ready to lose faith in the woman beneath him. He had come too far, risked too much, lost too many, for this to be his end. He was destined to conquer the realm and defeat the curse.

  “I am Atreyu Casamir, the last Shadow Knight of Black Moon Draw,” he said softly.

  They began to fall.

  He held his breath and willed her to use the magic in the medallion trapped between their bodies.

  A flare of heat ignited at his core and flashed through him. It was followed by the sensation of the tide nipping at his boots. Sand squeezed between the fingers of the hand clasping the back of her head while a flavorful ocean breeze ruffled his hair.

  The Shadow Knight opened his eyes and lifted his head, taking in the dried barnacles and seaweed scattered across the sands of a beach lining the bay. Water seeped into his boots and wet his toes.

  The heat inside him subsided, and he rolled onto his side, eyes roving down the battle-witch’s body to ensure she was unhurt. The pulsing purple light around the Heart nestled between her breasts faded as he watched, a sign he had indeed been right about triggering the magic.

  He had gambled – and won. The instincts of a battle-witch were buried beneath her surface; it was her fear standing in her way from accessing it, her belief she had no power over her magic at all. Without it, when she had no time to doubt herself, the magic obeyed.

  She rolled onto her stomach, coughing.

  The breeches hugged her rounded hips and ass snugly, the outline of her thighs and calves hinting at their shapeliness. He had explored every inch of her body while she slept, first to help put her back together and then to ensure she suffered no infection that might prevent her waking as soon as possible. Seeing the taut outline of her backside and thighs stirred the intense desire sparked by the kiss. If he had no war to fight, he would make love to her here.

  “How did I . . . get sand in my mouth?” she gasped. She pulled her knees under her, ass in the air, and sat back on her heels.

  His gaze went from her body to her face. She was pale where she had had a healthy radiance before. The magic took a toll on battle-witches; this much he knew.

  The Shadow Knight pulled his gaze from her face reluctantly, aware he had a world to save before he dared take a moment to indulge his own urges.

  “Your name is Atreyu?” She was staring at him.

  “Aye.” His eyes narrowed. “Why do you react this way?”

  “You don’t have a magic flying Luck Dragon do you?”

  More of her nonsense. “Come, witch,” he said and rose, holding out his hand.

  She shook her head at him and ignored his outstretched arm, climbing to her feet.

  “My plan was sound,” he added.

  “Your plan,” she echoed, hands on hips. She glared up at him. “The one involving letting us both die in the slim hope my magic worked?”

  “Aye.” He gazed down at her, their bodies separated by a foot that was strangely too far. Recalling how she had felt beneath him, and how he could never let them go farther, he clenched his fists to keep from reaching out to her. His man parts had not fallen off after that encounter, either.

  Pink spread across her features once again, a sign she was thinking about the kiss. “It was an awful plan,” she told him. “I still don’t know how to use this thing.” She patted the medallion.

  “I do.”

  She waited.

  “It involves kissing you each time I want it to work.”

  Anger sparked in her eyes. She whirled and started up the beach.

  He watched, amused and grateful she was angry again. Her emotions were too delicate for him to predict entirely. But he knew anger and that it would help them get to where they needed to be as well as encourage her to maintain her distance from him. It was growing more difficult for him not to take an afternoon to slake his desire for her shapely form.

  “I’ll tell you this once, Atreyu,” she called over her shoulder.

  He jerked, not accustomed to hearing his name aloud.

  “If you kiss me again or put us in danger to manipulate my magic, I’ll sell off your name to the battle-witch of Brown Sun Lake.”

  “Brown Sun Lake has no battle-witch.”

  “Then to some other kingdom.”

  He trailed her up the beach. It was a threat by a woman who had no knowledge of his world. Every kingdom but the Red Knight’s, including Brown Sun Lake, had a battle-witch. It was far too easy to dismiss the hollow threat from someone who had proven for a second time she was not about to let him die, let alone betray him to an enemy.

  “You should not use my name,” he said, trotting to catch up and drawing abreast of her. “Someone may overhear it.”

  “That’s your problem,” she said tartly. “I don’t believe this nonsense about names being dangerous.” She glared at him defiantly.

  He did not look at her, gaze on the cliff separating him from the hills that rolled between them and his keep at Black Moon Draw. “You have shown me you will do naught to harm me or my war.”

  She was breathing hard from the march across the beach of loose sand. He motioned for her to start walking, eyes on the sky. It was midmorning – and his time was nearly up. He had given orders for the attack on Brown Sun Lake to start this evening, even if he was not present for it. However, he did not plan on missing the great victory.

  They walked quietly up the narrow trail leading from the beach to the top of the cliff. She went ahead of him, setting the pace, while he cast occasional glances over his shoulder out of instinct rather than belief they were in danger. This was his land; there was no danger to him here.

  Near the top of the cliff, the battle-wi
tch paused and rested a hand against the rocky granite wall on one side of them, panting.

  “I can’t believe that,” she said, twisting to look back the way they’d come. Several more prisons hung in the sky. “How are they suspended like that?”

  “Magic,” he replied, unconcerned. “They have been used by battle-witches serving Shadow Knights for two eras.”

  “Wait, those are your dungeons?”

  “Aye.”

  “So the Red Knight put you in your own prison.”

  “Aye.”

  “Um, isn’t that the biggest insult possible? To trap you in your own dungeon?” she asked, puzzled. “Why aren’t you mad?”

  “’Twas better than being placed in his dungeon,” he pointed out.

  “I really don’t get this world,” she muttered.

  He glanced at her, eyes sliding from her plump lips to the medallion. “Mayhap, if you ceased fighting your fate, ‘twould not be so vexing,” he advised with some impatience.

  She shook her head.

  “I never had the luxury of avoiding mine,” he added. “My father, his father, all the way back to the curse, we have fought to win the kingdoms before all was lost.”

  “I understand why you’re doing it.” Her voice softened. “I can’t imagine what it’s like for you.” Her gaze was torn, her blue eyes searching his features for he knew not what.

  She was expressive, unlike the controlled emotions of his betrothed, a woman raised from birth to manage a court and rule alongside a powerful Knight.

  “I fight. There has never been a choice, and I have never questioned my fate. You need to accept yours at my side.”

  She was watching him, expression growing more troubled. “It’s not that easy to give up everything I’ve known.”

  “Nay, ‘tis not,” he agreed. “But I think, should we succeed in saving the kingdoms, you will find Black Moon Draw a good home.”