"Let yourself live a little, Evalayna. When was the last time you downed a pint in a tavern?"
She laughed as he pulled her into the dimly lit room, his broad shoulders assuring them a place at the old wooden counter. The barkeep eyed the huge Warrior with caution. "What'll ya have, Mate?"
"Draw a pint for my friend," a man's voice suggested softly from the shadows at the corner of the bar. "And a glass of white wine for the Lady."
Roahr shifted slightly, his fingers brushing her arm as they moved to rest over the hilt of his sword. The figure shifted slightly, letting himself be seen in the flickering light of the tavern's smoky oil lanterns.
"Seanen," Evalayna whispered in chagrin.
Yarwyn laughed softly from his elbow. "I thought we were the only ones to flee the hospitality of our fine hosts."
Roahr's laughter made the lantern wicks tremble. "'Tis against my nature to clothe myself in so much civility. 'Twas beginning to choke me more tightly than this damnable tunic. I've no use for silk. Hot in the summer and cold in the winter. Give me linen any day, or better yet the fur the gods cloaked me with."
"What? Doubt you the quality of my tailor's goods?" Mâkakao challenged, reaching automatically for the pint the barkeep slid to him. Cassadara joined her mate at the bar, though her gaze lingered on the spot where Roahr's hand caressed Evalayna's shoulder almost unconsciously. "Would you not have a whole wardrobe of fine tailored silk tunics and smart foppish hats so you might prance about at the fine courts throughout the land?"
Seanen's laughter mingled with Roahr's answering growl. "We are of a build, M'Lord. I will find you a linen tunic before we move out in the morning, though it might be a bit well broken in. At least 'twill not rub your neck raw."
Evalayna relaxed against Roahr's side, sipping her wine as Yarwyn smiled at her from under Seanen's shoulder, losing track of the conversation. Roahr was no longer an outsider, feeling his way back to humanity. Today they had fought together. Tonight they drank together. With the sunrise they would travel together. And no one would ask why Roahr was there, or if he belonged. They would accept him, and in a way she had never been, he would be part of the pack.
* * * * *
They were up again with the dawn, slipping away as silently as they could, yet they had not gone far when another bear joined the pack. Evalayna watched as the two huge male grizzlies sniffed each other cautiously, though no further introduction was made. Evidently several of the party knew the newcomer and were neither surprised nor offended by his presence.
It was not until nightfall, when they camped in another of her mother's circles of tents–Evalayna promised herself that she would learn that spell–that the new party-member revealed himself. She remembered the man. He had joined them on the field yesterday, the first to reach them after Mâkakao sounded his horn, and he had been with Mâkakao on the ill-fated mission to meet with her daughter back in the early part of the year. That seemed like a lifetime ago now, rather than mere months.
"Captain Balthain, if I remember correctly?"
Balthain bowed low over her hand. "Aye, M'Lady. I am honored you remembered me."
Or chagrined, she thought, though she said it not aloud. There was something about him–a half-overheard whisper, a way he had of disappearing when she was sure he had been near–that reminded her of Seanen's guildmates. Evalayna smiled at him, testing her theory. "Since I have no token to pay ye with, I assume ye have joined us purely for the adventure?"
"Token, M'Lady?" he answered with a hint of amusement in his eye. "I know not what you mean. I am here because Lord Mâkakao is here. I am but a mercenary, like all of my kind, traveling where I'm paid to travel."
Evalayna laughed to herself. "Indeed. Well met, then, young man." Mercenary. Well, that was as good a term for the guild with no name as any other.
Chapter Nine
"What troubles ye, Mia~Ell?"
Roahr pulled absently at the neck of the dress cloak Mâkakao's tailor had supplied him with. The garment was fashionable, but much like his tunics, hardly designed for comfort. "I was never one for large cities."
Or fancy clothes.
Evalayna surveyed the City of Port from their position on the last hill above the hard-packed earthen walls. It was hardly worthy of the name. More a squalid hovel of buildings gathered against the water, the wall more to keep in its riff-raff than to keep anything out. "'Tis only for one night."
"Let us hope so."
She was more of a mind to get him into a room away from the crowds on the waterfront than to worry over what he might mean by his cryptic response.
"Follow me," Seanen ordered, taking up point once again. "'Tis not much of a town, but I know where to find the worst she has to offer."
Yarwyn's growl of disapproval met with quiet, easy laughter as they trudged down the sandy hillside, hampered now by their Human forms.
* * * * *
Cassadara watched them together, sometimes so familiar, sometimes like strangers, trying to gauge the man who had given her life. She was reluctant to trust this stranger, yet the effect he had on her mother was so astounding as to shake the foundations of Cass's world. Roahr said something meant only for Evalayna's ears, and moments later Mother was laughing again.
Surely this could not be the same woman who had brought fear to entire armies with no more than her presence alone. This could not be the woman who had held her daughter to the same high standards her own mother Ayailla had exacted from her, reminding Cass always that she was both a Lady and a Shaman.
Not the same woman who was laughing just now because, unless Cassadara was vastly mistaken, the man's sly fingers had reached around when he thought no one was looking to goose Evalayna's butt.
Cass slipped her arm around Mâk, leaning her head on his shoulder.
"Tired, Mia~Ell?"
"Tired, footsore, and confused," she agreed. "Naught is as I knew it to be. My grandmother treks across continents. My mother laughs like a young girl. I begin to feel the old woman of the crowd."
Mâkakao laughed softly against her ear. "Once I get you to myself within the walls of our room, I will massage your tired feet and give you things to think about that will not cause you such confusion."
Cassadara brightened at the thought. "Mayhap ye might convince me I am no' yet an old woman?"
His teeth nipped lightly on her ear. "Mayhap," he teased. "All things are possible, Mia~Ell, to she who believes."
"I believe in thee," she answered. "The rest let us leave until tomorrow to sort out."
* * * * *
"Did ye not enjoy the dancers, my love?"
"The dancers were passable."
Passable indeed. Any one of the scantily clad offerings could have been had for the price of a single gold coin, with change left on the plate. Even the whores in this poor excuse for a town were mediocre at best.
Evalayna ran her fingers through Roahr's long flame red hair, trying not to laugh. "Ye seemed in a hurry to leave the tables. Was the food not to thy liking?"
His voice came in a deep rumble as he took the stairs to their apartment two at a time. "There is only one thing I am hungry for."
"And what might that be?"
"The dancing girl who stole my heart years ago."
Evalayna sighed, remembering the first time she had danced for him. "I fear she is lost with the years, my love. I have no' danced in three decades or more."
Roahr shut the door behind them with one hand and dropped the bar in place as he let her feet find the floor. "Find her for me, my love. Dance for me once again."
The length of his body was hard and lean, the muscles standing out in firm definition under her hands. She was soft, soft with the years that came from sitting behind a desk, writing papers and reading documents and negotiating for more. More power. More money. More of all of the things that had brought her no pleasure. "I –"
"Shhh." He leaned in to kiss her, slowly touching soft, warm lips to hers in the gentlest of caresses
. "You will always be that long ago girl to me. Dance for me, Eva."
With trembling hands she pulled the pins from her hair, letting it fall about her as it had so long ago, a cloak that reached down past her hips, silver now in the moonlight. The faint rhythm of the drummers below reached up through the night, like the beat a dimly remembered song. Evalayna closed her eyes and searched for the girl she had been, swaying softly as the music came stronger in her head, raising her arms now to move with the rhythm. She bent with the music and swayed to its beat, shy at first then bolder, her hands skimming over her breasts as the flames caught her, the hunger in his eyes as he watched a reflection of her own.
The soft shimmering silk robe floated to the floor as she released its clasp, leaving her body naked as she turned and twisted before him, clothed now only in the long cascade of her hair. With a shake of her head and a twist of her shoulders as she turned the silver curtain fell away, leaving her softly rounded curves fully exposed. Her nipples, grown larger from the nursing of their children, puckered up harder now as his breath drew in sharply. Perhaps the moonlight flattered her, for she felt once again that slim young beauty who had shamelessly wooed the fiercest Warrior to treat with her mother, determined to have him for her own.
She watched Roahr's eyes darken with passion as his gaze followed her every move, held spellbound by the beat of the drums as the tempo raised, his body vibrating with every twist and turn. The drums raised to a crescendo as she spun into his arms, trusting him to catch her as she arched back, her breasts lifted moonward as he crushed her against the length of his body.
"You are as lovely as you were the first time I saw you. You still take my breath away. If ever I needed proof of the Divine Mother's blessings, I knew I had found it the day my eyes first rested on you."
She could feel the thick length of his cock, swollen and wanting, as he brushed slowly against her, teasing her body with the feel of his still clothed skin abrading her soft, smooth nakedness. He grasped the two round mounds of her buttocks firmly and lifted her against his raging heat as his teeth closed over her nipple. "Roahr…"
His voice was hoarse and husky with need as his words slipped over the damp tip of her nipple, sending shivers of desire washing over her. "I love the sound of my name on your lips. Say it again for me, Love."
"Roahr…"
"Tell me you want me still, my love. Tell me the years do not matter."
She raked her fingers through the thick masses of his hair, pulling his mouth more firmly against her breast. "Surely it was only yesterday that I first saw ye, a giant among the Warriors, the only man to compete for my hand that I ever would have allowed to claim me. I want ye now as I did then, Roahr, in my bed, in my house, and in my heart."
"Then take me," he offered. "I am yours."
If the fancy cloak lost its clasp as she divested him of it, the sturdy linen tunic Seanen had delivered as promised faired better, slipping off easily under her demanding fingers. The leggings followed the tunic to the floor, hobbling the man as she had not prompted him to remove his heavy leather boots, but she cared not as her hands stroked over the prize she had sought. Roahr managed somehow to kick free of the boots and the leggings, scooping her up into his arms once again as he carried her toward the inn's ancient bed.
Evalayna pulled her knees up self-consciously as he laid her there to stare down at her in the moonlight, but his fingers stroked over her, spreading her so that he might look his fill at the small tangle of curls that covered her aching desire.
"When I despaired of ever escaping the dungeons of Élahandara, I would call up an image of you waiting for me like this, so real I could almost touch you." He dropped slowly to his knees beside the bed, lifting her hips until his breath stirred her curls. Moisture drenched her sheath, her need for him strong enough to make her hands less than gentle as she pulled at him, her fingers finding his ears to stroke over them, first trying to urge him upward, then pulling him closer.
She cried out at the first touch of this tongue between her sensitive folds, her body shaking beneath his touch. His clever fingers spread her fully before him, so that he dined on her like a feast set before a Lord. "Roahr!" she pleaded, without being able to name what she would have. His tongue drove into her, plundering her depths, his laughter vibrating over her exposed skin as he sucked up her juices.
The feel of his tongue darting far into her reaches and his breath blowing over her clit was more than she could withstand. She cried out his name again as she shattered, the pleasure washing over her in waves that her left gasping for air. Her fingers knotted in his hair as she pulled at him, demanding more, wanting, needing, too lost in her ecstasy to voice more than a wordless cry as he pushed her mercilessly toward her limits.
"Roahr," she demanded, riding out the waves. "Roahr!"
His mouth damp with her own juices pressed hard against her nipple as he found her at last, stroking hard into her waiting sheath, burying his thick, hard cock into her fully, the pleasure so sharp it was almost a pain. She raised her hips up to meet him, welcoming his length and his fullness, her muscles tightening to hold him within her as she broke around him again.
Relentless, he thrust against her, his breathing coming as hard as her own, the drums below echoing through the room once more in rhythm to their fierce mating.
"Sing for me, Wolf-Mother," his hoarse voice challenged against her ear. "I want to hear your song once again proclaiming you mine."
The howl broke from her lips even as his hips made their final mad thrust, breaking against her as she tightened around him, tying with him as surely as any wolf mating ever could have claimed her. Her voice cried out her claim to the city, proclaiming him mate to all who could read her scent on the wind.
Through the shutterless window scattered voices returned her call, and Roahr laughed as he tumbled beside her, still holding her locked in his arms. "We are not alone, my love."
Evalayna smiled against his cheek. "Wolves rule the night."
* * * * *
Leadership was not a responsibility Roahr accepted nor a mantle he put on, Evalayna decided. It was in his blood, as ingrained in the man as his need to breathe. She watched with wondering eyes as Seanen, Mâkakao, and Balthain conferred briefly with Roahr, the younger men accepting his leadership as easily as he offered it. Roahr would be good for Seanen, she reflected. Fortunately the fool her sister had married had died before he had a chance to make too much of an impression on the child. The man was grown now, long past a child's need for hero-worship, yet still he looked to Roahr with respect, offering his opinions freely but accepting Roahr's decisions gracefully.
"Why must we wait while the men seek a ship?" Cassadara demanded. "We could question the ships pursers more efficiently if we all had a hand in the task."
"'Tis not safe," Tyrell chided. "Can ye not see that, Sister? How many women do ye see about on the docks? There is a reason."
"Yesterday a dozen Ogres died at my hand and today I must be guarded like chattel? I am no fool of a Human tavern wench. I can take care of myself."
Evalayna sighed as her gaze flicked over her daughters, then back to the crowds below on the docks. There was much her youngest had to learn. Fortunately Lord Mâkakao seemed to have infinite patience with her. "'Tis not our world, Daughter. Those below have an agenda that does not include us. Tranorva alone might be safe striding about these docks. Her axe and her stance both mark her as a Warrior, and the criminals and thugs might respect that. In a city like this gentlewomen would do well to stay out of sight or travel with body guards. Only the whores walk amongst the riffraff unguarded."
"I have less freedom than the whores," Cassadara complained. "I should do well to dress as one of them and wander the streets. Mayhap I might learn something useful."
Evalayna shook her head. "Ye are too tall and too comely to walk these docks unnoticed. Someone would try to snag ye for service in a brothel in some foreign land, and ye would undoubtedly kill that man and his compa
nions, and all those who came to his rescue. While the wharves would benefit from thy cleansing, we would no longer be odd strangers about in an unfamiliar land. We would be marked."
"I should have been a man," Cassadara muttered grimly.
"I suspect Lord Mâkakao would hesitate to agree," Evalayna argued.
The soft laughter that rippled across their small gathering did little to ease the tensions.
"The men do not seem to be accomplishing much," Tranorva noted grimly. "I should have known no task the gods set before me would be so simple. Take him to the place of his birth. That sounds easy enough. I thought I had steeled my mind against failure. I thought I had prepared myself to accept any terms the Faerie King might ask. My life for that of the man I love. 'Tis no' too hard a bargain. For what is my life worth as it is. But this. To have come so far, survived so many perils, and yet find our goal insurmountable, this is worse than any torture the Faerie King might ever have called down upon me. The men have been combing the docks for over an hour now, and still nothing. This waiting shall be the death of me."
The men gathered again, their faces grim as they looked up at the party above, then disbursed after another few minutes of quick consultation. Balthain sprinted up the stairs toward the porch from which Tyrell guarded the women, looking hot and discouraged as he approached.
"M'Ladies. Tyrell. The news is not good. We have tried to be discrete in our questions, yet already the docks grow quiet around us as we approach. Anyone who knows of that which we seek will not talk to us. It is as if there is a prohibition against even speaking of the island. Perhaps it is some sailors' superstition that clouds the land. Yet it is a place, like any other. A people live there. They must have some commerce with the outside world. It is as if there is some code about it which we know not how to break. I fear we may be here for days, perhaps even weeks."
"We have not weeks!" Tranorva exploded. "I feel it. He drifts farther from me by the day, by the hour even. His skin grows cooler to the touch. If it takes weeks to find passage, we will have no need of it by the time it is secured. I will not lose him! Not now. Not after all we have come through."
Way of The WOlf: The Northlanders Book I Page 33