The connection of elements had fragmented at his denial of the mating, Drusal no longer felt
the fire of his female’s passion.
Iscatya’s tender care, the time spent on his wounds, became a devious plot to manipulate his
attraction to a witch, who had insinuated her way into a heart hardened against seductive
ploys. Prowling towards the truth pool, Drusal dipped his snout into the clear water.
The image reflected back, showed him a Sidhe warrior dressed in leathers and armour with
the light of love shining in his eyes. He could not refute what he saw, but he could fight it.
Cat had showered and dressed in a long flowing dress, plaiting her hair in a mermaids tail over
one shoulder, just for something to do. The kitchen was spotless, cleaned under the weight of
a keening howl, that left her breathless with dread. The soft pale green cotton twined between
her legs, emphasising the golden glow of her skin as she paced the patio.
Drusal would have to stay within the confines of the shield, or submit to begging for entrance.
The Lord Vardon would not beg… The confrontation wasn’t over.
Her heart thudded with unease at the stillness of the garden. The sun had dropped below the
horizon in a blood red show that cast a rosy glow over the surrounding woods. He was out
there, stalking a female he believed betrayed their bond. Drusal was right, but blinded by jealousy.
Cat had given nothing but protection to the warriors. Was she really prepared to give her true
mate power nearly equal to hers? The answer was yes, without a shadow of doubt…
She had to find a way to do this, or lose the one man, male who could call forth the dormant
passion, ready and waiting to form an eternal bond. A pair of glowing amber eyes flickered
between a stand of oak trees, a faint growl raised the skin of her arms in a rash of gooseflesh.
Leaving the pathetically inadequate protection of the house, Cat glided over sweet grasses on
bare feet. Moving ever closer to blinking amber eyes, her heart stopped, a shudder of fear
ran through her frame, as a huge wolf bore down on her with frightening speed.
A mass of fur and fangs dropped her to the ground before her heart began to beat again.
Paws spread wide either side of her arms, a mighty jaw locked tightly around her throat.
A stance designed to tear out her life. I could kill you… The mind link remained distinct.
“No… You couldn’t.” Cat breathed out, wincing at the sting of sharp teeth grazing her skin.
The grip on her neck increased infinitesimally.
You think so witch…? This was all the Queen’s Hound, hurt, nasty and deadly in its purpose.
“I could spread your atoms to the wind. I could sink your bones into the earth.” Cat realised
with growing dread, her powers were more than equal to the task of wiping out the male who
held her heart in his hands, if her life was seriously threatened. She had let him take her down.
If he really wanted to kill her she would be dead by now.
“I could immolate your body, and wash away the debris, leaving me unmarked.” A single tear
tracked down her cheek, as Iscatya finished describing exactly what she was able to do to her
enemies. “I never meant to hurt you.”
She cried out in desperation to the male, holding her pinned to the earth.
The grip on her throat eased a fraction. A long tongue tasted the grief in a single tear.
Then why did you? A growl of frustration sent a shock wave of wanton desire coursing out
from the pit of her belly, a complete surrender to his desires.
Drusal felt the arousal of passion and chose to ignore it, locking more firmly on the delicate
neck of a devious female.
“Because I love you, idiot….” Cat writhed beneath him sending out flickers of flame that
singed a coat of white fur.
Backing away from the threat of a fire element he no longer had access to, or protection
from, the wolf form encompassing all Drusal’s anger hunkered down. Long fangs revealed,
he snarled at her easy words of love.
Sitting up Cat wiped a trickle of blood from her neck. The sting of long fangs piercing her skin
forgotten in the face of the Dark Hound’s reluctance to listen to any explanation she had to
offer in solace, at the slight she had cast upon their bond.
“Why do you think I left the safety of my shields to help you?” Casting around for a way to
break through the wall he had built in his mind, Cat gripped at her head.
“You were desperately hurt… Your brothers were in attendance as Dardanos promised to
cow me into submission, to make me take one of them instead of you.” Sinking her fingers
into the soil, Cat absorbed the steady rhythm of the earth.
“The Queen doesn’t care if we mate or not, she only wants to have me in her grasp. We both
know this… Dardanos made sure you were unfit to protect me or our bond.”
Drusal calmed, listening intently to a musical voice that wove its own magic.
“Once the devourer was held immobile, his threats directed toward you restricted, I had to
make an offer, more enticing than securing a reluctant female.”
Creeping closer to the witches feet, Drusal dropped his wolf head, ears flattened to a furry
skull.
“I offered them my protection. In touching them I mate marked them…” Holding up a hand
to still the bass growl emanating from an alpha male, Cat insisted he listen to the rest of her
confession. “I took them as loyal allies, nothing more. Lord Kynthelig understood the
reasoning behind each mark, and applauded my foresight. There were no sexual connotations
in the gift of protection, I gave nothing of myself to them. What I wanted most of all was to
safeguard the life of the male I feared for.”
Coming to her knees, Cat held out her arms in appeal.
“Turi questioned my resistance to the bonding, offering himself as an alternative mate. I told
him the truth. I resisted a male who held my human appearance in abhorrence.”
Hands clasped together, tapping against her mouth, Cat prayed that Drusal would finally
understand why she had taken extreme measures to safeguard the warriors.
“In marking them, I meant only to keep them whole until the day we can bring them home.
They know it was but a means of protection because I told them so. You are my one and
only choice of mate. I sent your brothers back to the Queen in the knowledge that we,
together, would make sure all of the Sidhe had a place to come home to. It was all an
illusion to cloud my Grandmother’s mind. Nothing more than an empty gesture to
undermine her authority. It was my way of saying, I would not be bullied, that I would take
on the threats and return them in kind.” Rising to her feet Cat swayed, tension cramped
the muscles of her calves. A rock steady hand gripped her waist, supporting a wilting spirit.
Brushing off the show of assistance, she walked unsteadily back to the house.
Standing alone and naked, Drusal felt a wash of shame, that he had abused a female whose
sole concern was the wellbeing of his brethren. She had risked her own life in taking on the
Queens Torturer to save a male who had given her no reason to trust him.
Her evasiveness attributed to his single minded designs to be mate marked by a member of
the ruling elite. Iscatya was no fool, her distrust was well earned. She knew all too well how
he would react once he learned the
bond he craved was so easily granted to others.
The compassion in a generous heart had held back the admission of guilt, that promised
to wound his ignoble ego. The Queen’s Dark Hound was a creature wrought from years of
degradation, to become a soulless caricature of the excited youth who had travelled with
his father to aid the mighty Sovereign Court. His name was now feared, even by his brothers.
The male he had become was invincible, his might second only to a sick Mistress. An infant,
newly awakened to her strengths, had shown in but a few days how wrong he was.
Drusal had no idea how to win back the trust Cat had shown in introducing him to her kin as
an intended mate. She had openly admitted to an attachment to him.
Like a jealous adolescent he had spurned her regard, held on to the expectations of his youth,
that any female would gladly bed the son of a Prince of the French Court.
Cat had never lived within the Sidhe realm. Her grasp of an intimate bond had been tainted
by the vampire who held her in thrall, to feed an insatiable lust for Sidhe blood.
He had bludgeoned his way into her life. Treated a Royal female, who fought to overcome
an incubus to gain freedom, as nothing more than an object to be acquired, with no thought
to the trauma to her fragile empathic senses. Iscatya’s short life had been no less demeaning
than his. The Queen’s Hound did not deserve to hold any allusion to a mating, least of all to
be mate marked as a due reward at being the first male to find the lost heir to the throne.
Shimmering into wolf form, remorseful at his lack of compassion, suffering regret for the loss
of binding to a female he craved, Drusal slunk back into the trees. Curled in a ball at the base
of a silver birch, the howl that filled the night air held sadness and unbearable loss.
Cat had fled to the sanctuary of her bathroom spreading a shield over the door. Examining the
wounds on her neck she winced as her fingertips explored the bruising. Any chance of meeting
her friends tomorrow was thwarted. She couldn’t turn up looking like a victim of domestic abuse.
She wasn’t angry, merely saddened at Drusal’s display of aggressive domination at the perceived
betrayal of a bond he had sought so mercilessly. She could never hurt him, but she wanted to
kick his ass physically and mentally. The few moments of intimacy they had shared filled her
heart with wonder and an insatiable desire to know all of him. The Lord Vardon was a potent
force of nature, one that had been relegated to the bidding of a Queen who didn’t have the
sense to appreciate the wealth of loyalty residing in the hearts of her warriors. Her loss…..
One that was going to come home to roost, a reckoning was imminent.
Cat had taken on the mantle of protector when pushed by Queen Grandmother.
Iscatya rock chick was ready and willing to bring the fight for domination to the door of the
Sovereign Court. The task at hand was to soothe the wounded ego of a male, wild, madly
unpredictable and dangerous to her heart.
Ignoring the fact she was battered and bruised, Cat made ready to call her mate home.
Leaning on the wide windowsill of her bedroom she sent out a call. Fur ball come to bed…
There came a flicker of awareness, followed by a keening howl laden with a world of distress
and loneliness.
We are both tired and angry… Setting her earth element free to roam over the woods, she
found Drusal curled at the base of a tree, snout hidden beneath massive paws.
Come home Lord Vardon… I do not expect you to be with me. I want you to have the freedom
of choice, there are many rooms in this house to take as your own. I make no demands of you,
other than you show loyalty to your brother warriors. They have expectations we are soul bound
to answer, anything else is secondary.
That was all she could do to subdue the rage in his heart at the ultimate betrayal of his hopes.
Turning from the window Cat felt rather than saw the shimmer of simultaneous translocation
and shift to Sidhe form. On his knees, head bent Drusal made no move to leave the room.
I will sleep here on the floor, at the foot of your bed, as any servant would. The whisper of a
thought reached her mind tentatively.
“No Drusal… Don’t do this. I don’t want servility I want a partner.” Sinking onto the foot of
the bed Cat felt her heart splinter. Had her threats to wipe him off the face of the earth
reeked too much of her Grandmothers malicious deeds?
Raising his head, Drusal’s eyes pierced the darkness with a warm pearlescent glow.
“In truth Princessin, you wish me as a partner even as I threatened your life?” Shaking his head,
soft copper tinted curls brushed the expanse of wide shoulders.
“What I want means nothing unless you feel as I do. Grandmother gave you no choice.”
Holding out her hands palm up, Cat gave voice to the beat of her heart, a heart that rejoiced
in his presence. “I offer a choice… To become my mate, or a friend I can rely upon to help
me in a quest foisted upon me without regard to my wishes. You have become so dear to me,
I would hate to lose a fine warrior to another Court.” Letting her words sink into the morass
of guilt clouding Drusal’s mind, she wriggled on the bed. Giving a man carte blanche to climb
into that bed was uncomfortable at best. Alex would have given her pointers, if she had
thought to ask. Sliding off a bed that suddenly made her anxious, Cat walked to within inches
of a kneeling figure.
“Show me the male Shayla remembers fondly. The one whose charms stole the hearts of the
females of the Court. I know he resides in your soul, I have seen glimpses of a spirit
unburdened by the guilt you carry. Give to me that male, show me a willing partner
unencumbered by the poison of a Queen who cannot embrace all life on this planet.”
Running her fingers through a wealth of silky curls, she offered him the ultimate prize.
Raising wary eyes to her face Drusal saw no artifice.
Cat smiled, a small shy twist of her lips that gripped at his heart with its uncomplicated
innocence. This female with a human façade, cloaking an untold wealth of Sidhe heritage,
held out a life he thought lost forever. He wanted her with all the misspent passion of his youth.
The caution inbuilt in any wild animal not to be caught in a trap kept him from reaching out to
embrace the promise of a mating that could be his undoing. There had been no lie in all she
had said as his fangs had sunk into her skin.
Drusal’s mental cringe at the description of the different means of ensuring his demise from
the earth, was a painful reminder of how easily he could be discarded.
Wracked with indecision, he leant his head upon Iscatya’s stomach, palms running up the
smooth length of long legs to come to rest on the firm curves of her thighs. Breathing in her
scent, a mixture of all four elements, the aroused male in him gave up the fight.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
“I give to you my mate, the heart beating in my breast, the breath in my lungs, the soul
that longs for a true bonding of our bodies.” Raising his eyes to ones shining with emerald
flares, Drusal paused in wonder at the love shining forth from a face so human, yet so
beautiful. I do so willingly…
The mental reinforcement of his commitment to a true mating, broke down any resistance
bet
ween them to accept the unavoidable attraction of soul mates.
Cat was stunned by a declaration of complete surrender. She had expected some sign of
smugness at her capitulation. Not in her wildest dreams had an avowal of one life to hers
sounded so honest, so giving in its nature. Taking his face in her hands she leant down to
kiss the firm mouth of her mate.
“All that I am, I give to you freely. In giving I share with you the powers residing in this body.
Together we will be stronger, more fearsome than any of the Denizens lurking in the dark to
take possession of all we hold dear.”
Where her fingers touched his cheeks the elements combined in molten threads of gold,
green, blue and white, spreading over both their skins in a glorious display of colour.
Rising to his feet Drusal pulled Cat to his chest, mesmerised by the glow of her skin.
“Iscatya you offer a Princely gift…” Running his hands into her hair to free the braid, each
tangled strand teased him to arousal. Placing his lips gently on her forehead he added
mental thanks.
“I’m a Princess, I make you my Prince. I think that’s a fair trade if we are to be together for
an eternity.” Cat’s heart swelled with pride at the soft glow of happiness in his eyes.
“I promise that I will never hurt or anger you again…” He breathed the promise against her
lips. Breaking away with a chuckle Cat gripped his at face.
“Don’t make promises you can’t keep. I’ll drive you insane at least once a day.” Cat had no
illusions concerning both their stubborn natures, nor was she deluded enough to believe
they would live happy ever after. No such Faerie tale existed.
It was enough for now, to be in the arms of a male who had overcome an aversion to her
human appearance.
Resting his forehead on hers, Drusal inhaled the scent of female arousal.
“I am on the edge of insanity with the need to taste you.” His whisper sent a shiver of
anticipation racing down her spine. Her body ached, gathering in a ball of pulsing pain in
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