Last night had been a mistake. She was certain they both knew it. She was also certain it would be only too easy to make the same mistake again. He wasn’t the same man. She wasn’t the same woman. But their bodies were still drawn together even after all this time.
“Our stalkers are out there. I can pick up a hint of their scent on the morning breeze. But we have time to reach Straluci. If we hurry,” Lev said. “I think.”
Madeline hastened her pace to match Lev’s as his increased. They were practically jogging up the mountain toward the place where she thought she’d seen a hint of tarnished copper towers in the distance last night. The terrain was rough and rocky. They left the scent of flowers behind and walked once more into air tinged with spruce and pine.
But Madeline’s nose twitched occasionally. It was impossible, but she thought she detected a whiff of Ether’s stormy ozone scent every now and then as they hiked. It had to be her imagination, though. She didn’t have Lev’s nose. She only had visions of the attack from yesterday—the wolves leaping on Lev as the Ether forced into them by the Volkhvy drove them mad.
She was being hunted by a pack of tainted wolves and their Volkhvy masters, but it was her thudding heart that spurred her onward. It beat for her baby. Not for the man who led the way toward Straluci. He was once again a stranger to her this morning. His thoughts and feelings were shielded behind his stony face. Perhaps he had loved her and Trevor at one time, but the white wolf had long since taken over his heart. He helped her now because he sought vengeance against the Volkhvy.
His reasons shouldn’t matter. She should just be glad for the aid. This way she could accept his help and easily say goodbye once Trevor was saved.
If only there wasn’t a pang between every heartbeat that seemed to whisper Lev’s name.
Chapter 18
Straluci was a ruin, but everywhere Madeline looked, she seemed to be able to see the past superimposed over the present. The stained-glass windows that gave the castle its name, along with the copper towers because of the way they used to shine, had been mostly shattered. Here and there a gemlike glimmer of remaining glass hinted at the spectacle that might once have been. Was it her imagination that gave the structure four intact towers where it now had only three? Or did she actually remember the fourth stretching high into the Carpathian sky? Was it her imagination that gave each tower a long furling banner that held the striking image of a different wolf—black, red, white and gray?
“There were banners. One for each of you,” Madeline murmured.
Lev didn’t reply. He stood beneath the looming structure, and he seemed as out of place and time as the castle itself. He was too big, too hard and muscular, and far too experienced to be a mere hiker who appeared out of the woods to gawk at a rediscovered piece of history.
Maybe she looked the same, with the sword on her back and centuries of sleep in her eyes.
“The fountain was in the center courtyard in the middle of the keep. When the tower crumbled, it looks like it fell inward. We might find the fountain crushed by rubble,” Lev said.
“No,” Madeline replied. She couldn’t follow Lev as he headed into the arched doorway that had been left uncovered by a wooden door long since rotted away. Straluci wasn’t like Bronwal. It had stood here forgotten for hundreds of years without being unnaturally preserved by Vasilisa’s curse. There was nothing left but metal and stone. The skeletal nature of the small castle haunted her.
She was suddenly frozen. She should be dust. The life she was beginning to remember was long gone. Her memories were as skeletal as the ruin in front of her. She might never fill in all the details she’d lost.
The world opened its gaping maw all around her, full of unfamiliar and alien things, full of people and places she might never understand. She was a skeleton with a dead sword on her back, surrounded by a strange landscape she didn’t know how to navigate.
Madeline closed her eyes and swallowed, forcing the world to narrow once more. She breathed in and out, and listened to the sound of her heart in her ears.
Her heart beat for Trevor and whispered for Lev, so she forced herself to step forward into the future, whatever that future might be. One foot after the other. She approached the doorway and paused once more while she tried to make out which way Lev had headed in the shadows. The ruby sword was in her hand. She hadn’t intentionally meant to draw it from its sheath. The move was comforting because it was instinctive. She wasn’t only a skeleton, after all.
Lev gave away his position by disturbing a flock of doves. They startled and flew up and out a hole in the deteriorated roof in a flurry of distressed cries and fluttering wings. The roof was nothing more than oak beams that had almost petrified before being eaten by beetles and riddled by weather and the passing of years. Sun streamed in through the roof and illuminated the way she needed to go.
Madeline squared her shoulders and stepped into Straluci. If the portal was destroyed, they would find another way.
The swirl of dust motes the birds had left in their wake sparkled in the sunlight, and Madeline was once again caught by a sudden memory: sunlight through the stained-glass windows of Straluci had given the entire castle a multicolor glow on bright days. The castle had shone on the inside as well as the outside. It had been a small fortress used to guard this side of the mountain, but it had also been a spring retreat. Her and Lev’s spring retreat. In between winter and summer, they had spent time here away from the heavy demands of a warrior’s life.
This was where Trevor had been conceived.
One of the windows on the east side of the castle had been protected from breakage. The wall was an interior one that faced the inner courtyard. Madeline stepped into the warmth of sunlight that formed a prism through the windowpanes. Multiple shades of pink, violet and red washed over her just as the memories of making love to Lev blossomed in her mind.
* * *
The first time had been impulsive. He’d returned safely from a terrible battle and found her alone. She’d kissed him, and the kiss had led them passionately into other things. They’d both already known at that point that the sword was Calling her to be Lev’s mate. Neither of them wanted to resist. Her continued work on the tapestry was a declaration. When she’d also been brave enough to touch the white wolf and bold enough to claim their first kiss from Lev’s lips, it was natural for all else to follow.
He took her down to the floor in front of the fire. And then he pulled up her skirts to discover the delicate whispers of silk stockings on her legs. She laid back and watched him as he’d reached higher to find the ribbons that held her stockings in place. But she gasped his name when he inched her skirts even higher so he could lean down and loosen the scarlet ribbons with the grasp of his white teeth. He drew back from her upper thighs, but only to stretch the ribbon free from the top of her stockings. First one. And then the other. Madeline reached for his hair. She fisted a handful of his wild mane in her fingers, just as his mouth had found tender skin instead of ribbons.
“Ask me to stay. Tell me you want my hot tongue, Maddy. Tell me to taste you,” Lev ordered.
Her body had been hot for him when they merely walked together. The whisper of his lips against her thighs as he uttered the erotic instructions caused her to wiggle her bottom against the floor as the heat between her legs turned wet with excitement.
“Stay, Lev. Lick me. Love me,” Madeline said. She’d never made love with a man before. She’d only dared to touch herself once or twice when thoughts of Lev drove her to ease her frustrations alone.
But the budding connection with the ruby blade, and Lev’s encouragement, made her bold. She loved the way the big, muscular man’s hands trembled on her legs when he reached to do her bidding. He pulled her silk drawers loose. They easily drooped down her hips beneath his insistent fingers. She heard the fabric rip, and she blushed with the idea that she might have to explain the tear to a maid.
His hot mouth descending on her made all thoughts of modest
y evaporate. He thrust his tongue on the same spot she’d used to ease herself when thinking of him. Only this time, a hot, wet tongue was a million times more pleasurable than her own fingers. She cried out his name as the sensation took her, and he murmured hers in return against her throbbing flesh.
There was no modesty. He pulled off his britches and showed her how to give him the same pleasure he’d given her. She rose and took him in her hands. He blazed against her fingers. His flesh seemed hotter than the crackling fire. He kneeled between her legs, and she leaned over to lick him the way he’d licked her.
Lev jerked and cried out her name. He fisted his hands into her tousled hair, and she was spurred on by his reaction. She held him and closed her mouth gently over the hard, swollen tip of his erection. He trembled beneath her mouth as she tasted him for the first time.
And then he rocked his hips. Just enough to work the very head of his shaft between her suckling lips. Her body quickened again. She clamped her thighs against the tingling as she grew more bold, taking him deeper and deeper still into the hot, moist depths of her mouth.
“Maddy. I’m going to do this between your sweet thighs. Do you want me there? I tasted your excitement. I want to feel it, too. I want to thrust into you. Like this. But harder. Deeper. Tell me you want to feel me. Welcome me inside you.” Lev gasped as he gently indulged in careful thrusts between her eager lips.
Madeline moaned against the hot, hard, salty skin she pleasured. She did want to welcome him inside her.
“I’ve never been with a man, but I want to be with you,” she murmured as she came up for air.
“Maddy, you’re with a man now. A man and a wolf. To be with me means more than marriage or mating. You’ll wield the ruby sword against the Darkness. You’ll stand by my side and fight for the Light Volkhvy. It won’t be safe or settled. The sword is Calling you. I’m on my knees for you,” Lev said. “But you can say no.” He stilled her head with his hands in her hair. He gently tilted her face up so he could meet her gaze. “I came to you as the white wolf so you would know me. All of me. I’m no ordinary man. And marriage to me will not be easy.”
“I’ve always known you’re not ordinary. Deep down, I’ve always known I was meant for more. I thought the tapestry was going to be you. I’ve never seen anyone like you. You take my breath away,” Madeline confessed. She released him and he lowered himself to press her back against the floor. She wrapped her legs around his hips and cradled his erection between her thighs. But he didn’t penetrate her. He simply allowed his heat to rest against her.
“But when I saw the image I was creating, I realized there’s never been anyone like me, either. I alone can stand with the wildest Romanov. I am unique.”
There was only the slightest pain when he thrust inside her. She welcomed him with her body and her words. She begged him to complete their physical union, even as her connection to the sword became complete.
* * *
The memories were as hazy and soft as the light, but that didn’t make them any less powerful. Madeline trembled. She closed her eyes again and swallowed against the sensations she suddenly recalled—Lev’s taste and touch and his powerful, perfect rhythm matching hers as they claimed each other.
Her eyelids flew open when Lev released a triumphant shout outside in the courtyard. She was forced back to the cold, harsh reality of the here and now. There were no monsters in Straluci, at least none she could slay with her sword. She sheathed the ruby blade and continued on to find the man who had once been her lover.
Lev stood beside the fountain portal they hoped would take them to Vasilisa. Madeline walked toward him. The triumph in his shout had been short-lived. He looked disappointed now. As she approached, she could see why. The marble fountain was a breathtaking work of art. It had been elaborately carved. Its basin curved outward like rolling waves preparing to crash into the courtyard. In its center rose the figures of four wolves, poised as if they were seconds away from leaping onto the crest of the waves. They faced north, east, south and west. Their tails touched as if they had been frozen for eternity in the act of watching each other’s backs.
But the fountain was dry and filled with leaves and debris.
It seemed as dead as her sword.
The courtyard was ringed with overgrown rowan trees. Currently, their branches twined toward the sky and from one tree into the next as if they were joined together. Fresh green buds were beginning to burst open in the sunshine. It was their dead leaves from previous years in the fountain. There hadn’t been anyone here to tend the grounds for a very long time. The rowan trees had reached out to each other as if to hold hands against the neglect and desolation.
“We’ll clean it out,” Lev said. “The bottom of the basin is brass. We’ll polish it and fill it with water once more. Hopefully, it’s still connected to the queen.”
Madeline’s hopes had fallen, but as they got to work removing the leaves from the basin, she watched Lev’s strong back, arms and legs in the act of doing whatever was necessary. She joined him in the task. They weren’t skeletons. They weren’t dust. Not yet. There were still battles to be fought...and won.
* * *
It was the hardest here. Lev’s entire body strained against the need to shift. The Ether taint tried to blacken his blood. It tried to expand within him, reaching icy tendrils closer and closer to his heart. He held out against its cold hunger with as much determination as he used to fight against the white wolf as it tried to claim him.
It didn’t matter that the shift would save him. It would also hurt him because it would hurt Madeline. He’d seen her sketchbook. He’d seen what she thought of the white wolf. But there was more...
He’d known the truth ever since he leaped the ravine, and he’d been fighting the shift with everything he had since he ran away from Madeline once they’d safely reached the other side.
They were still connected. And he’d felt her fear of the white wolf and of the man he’d become.
As he jumped the ravine, he’d rejected the full shift. He’d somehow held on to his human form. For Madeline. The ruby’s penetrating glow had been like fire in his veins. Because he’d rejected it, the power had scorched him from the inside out, shredding his clothes and sizzling his nerve endings.
Even though she rejected the ruby and he rejected the shift as soon as he’d realized he had a choice, they had always been connected. He’d slowly ascertained that she could see and hear and smell things an ordinary woman couldn’t—from the noise of a faraway river to the wolves to the ozone whiff of Ether on the breeze. Her senses were augmented by their connection.
Madeline was still the enchanted mate of the white wolf.
Lev’s mate. Found, but still lost. Lost forever, because now he knew she would never be able to accept the creature he’d become. He knew it because he’d sensed those feelings in her. He’d won. He hadn’t shifted. But Madeline had seen the shift in his eyes.
As they cleaned out the fountain, he ached with the torture of working by her side. They were nothing but a parody of the team they’d once been, because he had become a monster while she was sleeping. He couldn’t blame her for rejecting the ruby, or for rejecting him.
He could have shifted in the blink of an eye. He could have plundered the earth with his rage and pain, as he often had before.
But he didn’t.
He helped Madeline clean out the fountain, though they didn’t know if it would still act as a portal to take them to Vasilisa. He helped, and his body quaked with the need to shift, which he denied.
And the Ether continued to darken his blood.
* * *
They cleared the fountain of debris by evening, and then they took turns polishing the brass they’d uncovered. It was tarnished, but Madeline emptied her canvas backpack and Lev tore it in half, and they used the pieces of rough fabric as abrasive cloths, supplemented by some handfuls of sandy grit Lev scooped from the nearby flowerbeds.
Finally, as the sun
set began to paint the sky with orange and gold and brilliant pink, the brass had reclaimed some of its former gleam. They’d also uncovered and unclogged the natural spring conduit that filled the fountain, the seepage already forming in the basin.
“At this rate, the fountain won’t flow until morning,” Madeline said. She was grimy but satisfied as she looked over the job they had accomplished together. The fountain no longer looked abandoned. It looked like it was only a matter of time before it became a portal again. The water in the basin hadn’t covered the brass yet, but it was rising incrementally as she watched. Once the height of the water reached the base of the wolf sculpture, it would flow up the channels created in the marble when the wolves were carved. When the water reached maximum height, the gentle pressure would allow the trickle of water from the wolves’ snarling mouths.
The effect was of four champion wolves riding the waves they created from within themselves.
“They’re coming, but there’s still time. We’ll rest tonight. And use the portal in the morning when the sun reaches its zenith,” Lev said.
Madeline turned her attention from the slowly filling fountain to the man at her side. He hadn’t said she should rest. He’d said, “We’ll rest.” All afternoon, he’d worked tirelessly without complaint, but now she noticed Lev’s injuries still seeped black beneath his shirt.
“Your wounds need tending,” she said.
“Inside,” Lev replied. His agreement startled and worried her. For the first time since she’d found him in the tower room, she doubted his hard invulnerability. She took a step in his direction and raised her hands toward him before she realized what she’d done. When she caught herself, she lowered her hands and fisted her fingers, hoping he hadn’t noticed her concern. “But first we’ll need wood for a fire,” Lev continued. “And a container for heating water. I think I know where to find an ax.” He looked away from her, but for some reason Madeline thought he hadn’t missed her reaction.
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