WinterofThorns

by Charlotte Boyett-Compo

  She did not know Vindan was standing in the shadows behind her. She did not hear the long intake of breath that signaled the deep hurt her words caused. She did not see him lower his head and close his eyes to that hurt. Nor was she aware of his departure as he left her there to commune with a man he intended to make sure she never saw again.

  * * * * *

  “One hour, brat,” the border lord said firmly. “One hour from the moment you meet with your contact and no more. If you are not back at the entry point at the precise stroke of three, we’ll leave without you.”

  Seyzon stared into the merciless blue eyes that were locked with his and nodded. “I will be there.”

  “Alone, boy,” Dyson said. His thin lips were tight, jaw clenched. “Bring no one with you.”

  “That ain’t negotiable, Montyne,” Hawkins added.

  Though he didn’t, Seyzon said, “I understand.”

  “Make that hour count,” Dyson said.

  “I will.”

  “Then go,” Bray ordered. “What the fuck are you wasting time here for? We’ve got your back.”

  A grin was all Seyzon could give the three men for there was a lump in his throat making further words impossible. His palms were sweating. His heart was thumping wildly. If he got caught, he knew the Reivers would leave him to his fate.

  Idly he wondered how much the postern gate guard had been paid for unlocking the door and looking the other way. Not that it mattered. He was grateful for the man’s greed.

  And the guard’s allegiance to the Reivers for once he was at the gate, Seyzon was greeted with a knowing smile if not encouraging words.

  Slipping inside the fortification, he was struck by the dimness of the interior and realized the guard had extinguished all but a single light at the top of the stairwell. It would have been nearly impossible for any guards on the battlements or upon the barbican to have seen the gate open and an intruder gain entry to the keep.

  “Once you have gained the top of the stairs, turn left and follow the corridor to a Y intersection,” Hawkins had told him. “Take the right branch and continue about thirty feet until you come to an unlit light. It will be the only one in that corridor not working. Just to the left side of it, press the fourth stone from the top and a passageway will open. Take that passageway to where it dead ends. Wait there. A servant will come to fetch you. He will greet you as Marcus. Any other name or no name at all, knock the bastard out and run like hell back the way you came. Understood?”

  So much had gone into this operation. Dozens of people had been employed to give him this hour. All the sorties in which he’d taken part over the last few weeks had brought him here. This was one solitary mission only he could undertake and all the skills he had learned, had honed from the phantom warriors who were the Reivers would hopefully hold him in good stead. He needed to utilize the lessons that had been drummed into his head with every Meiramanian cargo that had been taken, every Meiramanian treasury that had been robbed, and every Meiramanian official with vital information who had been intercepted and questioned. He was on his own but he wasn’t alone.

  His men had his back.

  Locating the hidden panel, he pressed the stone and a hidden doorway swung silently open. Warm air replaced the cold that had been drafting down the corridor and with it came the scent of gardenias. He drew a lungful of air into his body and closed his eyes, savoring the smell for it reminded him vividly of Jana’s perfume.

  Entering into the small room that was no more than five foot square, he felt the door through which he’d entered close quietly behind him. When it did, a soft light came on overhead and he looked up. The hazy glimmering came from a phosphor lamp recessed into the ceiling. It gave everything around him—including his hands—a strange greenish glow.

  “Ah, how do I get back out?” he whispered. He turned to what appeared to be a solid wall behind him and ran his hands over the stone. He sought a panel like the one he’d used to get into the small room but though he pressed every stone he could reach, the door through which he’d come did not open.

  It was really warm in the little room and he was beginning to sweat.

  “Come on, come on, come on,” he mumbled.

  He wasn’t expecting the wall opposite him to come flying at him as the secret panel in that section of the room opened. The portal hit him in the face and knocked him backward.

  “Shit!” he snarled, putting a hand to his nose where he felt moisture flowing.

  “Lord Marcus?” a timid voice whispered beyond the door.

  “Aye,” Seyzon snapped. Blood was dripping through his fingers as he exited the room and walked out into a brightly lit corridor.

  “Oh!”

  “Aye, oh!” Seyzon agreed.

  “Here, milord,” the little man said, reaching into his back pocket for a kerchief. “I am so deeply sorry. I did not realize you might be standing—”

  “Just take me where I need to go,” Seyzon interrupted. “I’ve only got an hour.”

  “Of course, milord! This way!”

  The man took off at a quick pace though Seyzon followed more slowly. He wasn’t altogether sure his nose wasn’t broken and though the kerchief had staunched the flow of blood, it smelled of things he didn’t want to contemplate.

  “Who owns this keep?” he asked the man hurrying ahead of him.

  “Duke Alastair McGiveny,” the man replied. “He is the—”

  “King’s Chamberlain,” Seyzon stated. “I know who he is.”

  They had been winding their way through so many corridors, down so many dog-leg turns he knew he would never be able to find his way back where he started.

  “Where will you be when I’ve completed my mission?” he asked.

  “I will be waiting for you, milord. Have no fear on that account. I am Lord Bray’s man from start to finish.”

  They rounded a corner and the sound of music playing in the distance made Seyzon frown. “Is McGivney having a party?”

  “Aye, milord,” the man replied. “He is giving a reception in honor of Prince Vindan.”

  Seyzon reached out to snag the little man’s arm and spun him around. “The prince is here?” he demanded.

  “Aye, milord.”

  “And the Lady Jana?” Seyzon pressed. “Is she here, as well?”

  The man blinked. “Did Lord Bray not tell you, milord?”

  Tamping down an urge to throttle the man, Seyzon shook him. “Tell me what?”

  “The party is being thrown for the Prince and Lady Jana.”

  * * * * *

  Jana paced nervously as she awaited the arrival of the agent she had been told to expect. Since the morning after her forced Joining to Vindan Brell, she had gone looking for a way to undermine the prince, his father and the men who allowed Seyzon to be cast out of the land of his birth. It didn’t take her long to find like-minded people among those who served Vindan. Chief among them was Silus Murphy, the Castilian of Wicklow Castle.

  ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

  “I need to get a letter out of Wicklow without the prince knowing of it,” she had told one of her maids. “Is there someone in the keep who could help me?”

  The maid had given her a horrified look and she was afraid the woman would run straight to Vindan. Instead, the Castilian had come to her bedchamber door the next morning after the prince had gone down to break his fast.

  “I was told you wanted to send a missive beyond these walls,” Silus said. “May I ask to whom, Your Grace?”

  There was something in the way the man was looking at her that gave Jana the courage to tell him the truth. She had to take a chance on trusting him.

  “I want to contact the border lord. He is holding captive someone very dear to me.”

  “Lord Seyzon Montyne,” the man said. “If you are concerned for him, do not be.”

  Jana reached out to take the man’s hand then drew him into her bedchamber, closing the door behind him.

  “Tell me,” she ordered. “Tell me h
ow he is!”

  “He is well, Your Grace. Truly. No harm will come to him.”

  “He is a prisoner,” she said. “They are holding him for ransom.”

  “That is true, Your Grace, but he is being treated as a guest of Lord Bray and not a prisoner.”

  “Please tell me you can get a letter to my hus…” She squeezed her eyes shut. “To Lord Montyne.”

  “I am the eyes and ears of the Reivers at Wicklow, milady,” Silus informed her. “If I can’t, no one can, but do not address the letter to the young lord. Address it to Lord Bray and bid him only to send you word on your friend’s condition. Should the missive be intercepted, you want no personal message you write to Lord Montyne to fall into the wrong hands.”

  “No,” she said. “You are right. That would be dangerous for Seyzon.”

  “Write your letter and I will see it is delivered. It may take a while for the men move often to avoid being caught. They are rarely at their base camp and not even I know where that is.”

  ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

  She had written the letter and Silus had taken charge of it. Until two days earlier, she did not know whether it had reached the right hands or not. When Silus informed her it had been delivered to the border lord and there was a reply, her knees had threatened to give out beneath her.

  “His Lordship is sending an emissary with news only for your ears,” Silus told her. “He will be at Dungannon on the night of the reception Duke McGivney is throwing for you and the prince. My brother Dunham is Castilian at Dungannon and he will handle the meeting for you.”

  “How—”

  “At nine of the clock on the night of the party you are to excuse yourself and go up to your bedchamber. Mayhap you will suddenly come down with a megrim. My brother will then come to your bedchamber and will take you through the hidden passageways of the keep to your rendezvous with the emissary when he arrives. You will have exactly one hour—no longer—to ask what you will of His Lordship’s man, to give him anything you want Lord Montyne to receive.”

  She had to stop and take a deep, calming breath. Her heart was racing and her palms slick. Afraid Vindan might come up to check on her, she had undressed and put on her nightgown, belted her velour robe around her. It would be strange if she was still dressed in her ball gown should he make an appearance and stranger still if she had donned regular clothing at that time of the evening. Hopefully he would stay below until well after midnight for the party had been to announce her pregnancy. Nearly everyone who was anyone in Meiraman was at the party.

  With the notable exceptions of the king and queen and Seyzon’s mother.

  “He couldn’t be bothered to make the twenty mile ride from Blackhall to Dungannon to celebrate the news,” Vindan had complained, hurt rife in his voice.

  She had hoped the king would attend so she could have a private audience with him regarding Seyzon but that was not to be.

  A discreet knock at the door had her rushing for the portal. She opened it to find a spindly man who bore a striking resemblance to Silus standing there.

  “We must hurry, Your Grace,” he said. “We’ve only an hour.”

  He looked both ways down the hall then motioned her from her room. She followed him—trying to match her shorter strides to his longer ones—down the hallway and to a large floor to ceiling painting of the Cliffs of Gilmore. She watched him touch a hidden button on the edge of the frame. The painting slid quietly to the left to reveal a narrow door. He opened it with a key from the ring at his hip and stepped back.

  “After you, Your Grace,” he said with a slight bow.

  Beyond the portal was unrelieved black and she had to force herself to step inside. But as soon as Silus’s brother closed the door behind him and she heard the lock engage, a faint light came on overhead. The light revealed they were standing in the center of a long, dark passageway.

  “This way,” he indicated with a sweep of his hand.

  Lifting the hem of her robe so it would not touch the dusty floor, she followed him at a quicker pace. By the time they reached an identical door farther down the passageway, she was out of breath.

  “He is awaiting you, milady,” the man said. “I shall return in one hour’s time.”

  * * * * *

  The room to which the servant led him was a surprise. There was a bed, an armoire, a desk and chair, and in the corner behind a screen was a commode chair. Obviously the room was used as a safe haven.

  He heard the shuffle of footsteps outside the door and turned to face it. When it opened and he saw Jana, his heart missed a beat.

  “Milady?” he whispered, unable to believe she was standing in front of him.

  Jana’s face turned white then a smile that could rival the wattage of the sun spread over her lovely mouth and she flung herself into his arms.

  “Milady!” he growled, wrapping her tightly against him.

  Chapter Ten

  He could not get enough of the sweetness of her mouth. She tasted of honey and he was lost within her mouth. His lips plundered hers almost brutally—the kiss deep and filled with weeks of built-up passion. Thrusting his tongue into the soft recess of her mouth he felt his cock grow hard as a titanium spike. Unbelievably his arms constricted even tighter around her until he could feel every inch of her from mouth to groin. Unaware he was doing so, he backed her across the room and to the hard wall, pinning her there with his body as he slanted his lips first one way and then another across hers.

  Her arms were around his neck—holding him to her as though he were a lifeline. She was making little moaning sounds deep in her throat and when she hooked her leg around his as best she could considering the restriction of the long robe she was wearing, he growled fiercely.

  “Want. You,” he mumbled against her lips before plunging his tongue deeply inside her mouth once more.

  “Aye,” she managed to agree.

  And then his hands were all over her as he fumbled wildly to drag the robe—and the confounding gown beneath it—up to her hips. Her hands were in his hair, holding his head tightly to her shoulder as he struggled to get the fly of his pants unbuttoned. Freeing his straining cock, he shoved his left hand under her rump and lifted her, pushing inside her slick heat before clamping his right hand to her cheek as well. She locked her ankles at the small of his back while he rode her hard.

  She clung to him as he rammed into her with such force she knew her backbone would be bruised for she was sliding up and down the stone wall with each hard thrust of his pelvis. His mouth was once more covering hers and the grunts that came from the depths of him as he jacked his hips into hers brought goose bumps to her arms.

  Their climaxes were simultaneously—roaring like a rocket to release. He shoved brutally into her as she came and that only served to heighten her orgasm. The savage taking was completely unlike him but it seemed to her he was like a starving man before whom a banquet had been placed. He could not feast fast enough to satisfy the hunger that ate at him. The strong pulses of her vaginal muscles milking him seemed to spur him and he pumped twice more into her body then stilled as the last spurt of his cum was released. Beneath his shirt, she could feel his heart hammering. His breath was hot and damp against her shoulder where his forehead rested. His entire body shook as she cradled him against her.

  “I love you,” he said brokenly and she smoothed the hair from his forehead.

  “As I love you,” she told him.

  He raised his head, searched her eyes. “By the gods, Jana, I have missed you,” he said and moisture formed around the blue orbs of his own.

  “I have missed you more,” she said, smiling as gently at him as her trembling mouth would allow. “I cannot believe you are here.”

  “We have the border lord to thank. I did not know you would be here. He didn’t tell me who I would be meeting.”

  “Nor was I told.” She stroked his sweat-dampened face.

  “We’ve a champion in him, milady,” he told her.

  “It wo
uld seem so.”

  Her legs were wrapped around him as he pulled her from the wall and walked her to the bed. Gently he eased her down. She stretched out and moved over to give him room to lie beside her. When he was on the mattress, he drew her into his arms and her head went to his shoulder. Her hand went to his limp cock as it lay resting upon the open fly of his pants. She held him tenderly in her palm.

  “You have been well?” she asked.

  “I have been miserable,” he said then hooked a finger under her chin to tilt her face to his. “Without you.”

  “Take me from here, Seyzon,” she said. “Please take me with you.”

  Pain registered in his blue gaze. “Dearling, I cannot. I was warned not to bring anyone back with me and now I know why. The entire keep would be on our heels. I can’t risk being captured until Lord Bray and I have come up with a plan to get you back safely and permanently.”

  “I cannot stand being with him another day,” she said.

  Fierceness replaced the gentle look on his face. “Has he hurt you?” His lips drew back from his teeth. “If that bastard has hurt you—”

  “No, Zonny, no,” she said. “He has not. He’s never raised a hand to me nor treated me with anything other than respect. Truth be told, he has been gentler with me than most other men in his position.”

  “What does that mean?” he demanded, his hand tightening on her chin.

  “He knows I don’t love him. He forced me to marry him but as far as I am concerned you are my husband and always will be. I’ve told him as much.”

  “I will get you away from him, Jana. Before the gods, I will.”

  “There is something I need to tell you,” she said.

  “Tell me later,” he said. “Right now, I need to have you again else I will go stark-raving mad.”

  He pushed her to her back and covered her breast with his hand, flung a leg over hers and lifted his knee until it was the apex of her thighs. Kneading her more roughly than he intended he growled low in his throat then pushed the robe aside, snagged the top of her gown and tugged until he could latch his lips upon her breast. He drew her nipple deep into his mouth then flicked his tongue over it. She arched her hips to meet his tender assault, spiked her hands through his hair. He tore at the sash of her robe until he had it open, flung the far side away then dragged her gown downward to bare her other breast to him. He shifted his attention to it as he moved over her to wedge himself between her legs. Pushing her thighs farther apart with his knee, he settled himself in the cradle of her hips as he feasted on her breast.