by Various
Her hair was a riot of different hues of brown, light as Ursi sugar, dark as deep turned earth and every shade in between. It fell past her waist in a series of tiny braids.
He’d noticed earlier how the secured ends brushed her ass when she moved.
She flicked a glance at him and jutted her jaw slightly as she guided the vehicle into the forest. “What are looking at?”
He smiled slowly. “You.”
She gave him a sidelong look and flushed. He knew he wasn’t the only one feeling the flare of sexual awareness between them.
Cerian stiffened visibly. “Well, stop it. Look at Lympia,” she snapped.
He turned his head and watched the Zaenian woman. She dropped her exotically colored lashes and then looked up with heat in her beautiful light eyes. It was a blatant invitation. Her chocolate-colored skin gleamed soft and supple in the dim light within the rover. He watched the rise and fall of her full breasts.
She was a rare breed, too, on this war-ravaged planet. Gaman was a dumping ground for various races across the universe. They all vied for a piece of this place and fought tooth and nail to get it. Only strict laws, backed up by the threat of unforgiving violence by the Union of Gaman, maintained any peace at all. The Union, the governing 38
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body set up by the strongest of the tribes in order to end the Thirty Year War, ruled with an iron fist and showed no mercy to those who flouted their decrees.
“I haven’t seen a Zaenian in a long time, Lympia.” commented Rhys.
Her pale blue eyes clouded like a storm on a summer’s day and filled with as much volatility. “I am one of the last of my kind,” she answered. “The Thirty Year War decimated us.”
“What tribe waged war on you?”
Lympia focused her gaze past the windshield of the rover and into the darkness-swathed forest. “All of them.” Her gaze flicked back to his. “But I have a special interest in seeing the Sarthes fail in their conquest of the Danaan.”
Still in sitting position, he bowed from his waist in deference to her and her people.
“That is why I am here,” he answered.
He turned back to Cerian. “Why does Ta’bat want you so badly?”
Cerian glanced at him. “Crystals, very rare ones. My people mine them under the mountains where we live. We’ve had several tribes try and take them from us, but the Union has ruled that none can do it by force. However, the Sarthian ruler, Ta’bat, can take me as his consort. That’s the only way they’ll ever get their hands on what we mine.”
“Why didn’t those Sarthes just try and take you back there? Why doesn’t Ta’bat press you into it?”
She shook her head and her braids made a susurrus of sound as they brushed.
“Can’t. The Union won’t let them force me physically, but they will let them cut off our food supply to compel my hand.” She turned to him with desperation in her eyes. “My people are starving, Rhys.”
It was the first time she’d said his name in a nonformal way and it took him aback for a moment. “Why is my Embracing you going to save your people?”
She smiled. “You must know the answer to that. The Sarthes hate the Embraced.
Ta’bat’s people will never allow their leader take one as consort. There’d be a bloody civil war. If I’m Embraced he’ll be forced to leave us alone, at least until he figures something else out. It will depend on how badly he wants our crystal, in the end.”
The lights flickered on and off in the rover as they crashed through the forest. The whole vehicle sounded as if it would fall apart at any moment, creaking and banging and shivering beneath them. Although he didn’t need the bright headlights of the rover to see them, the high beams revealed many large, felled trees. Their upturned roots rotted in a tangle against the riven ground of the old forest. Victims of the long and bloody Thirty Year War, he surmised.
They cleared the trees and Rhys saw a mountain in their path. They seemed to be on a direct collision course with it.
“Caerli vey ia se,” Cerian muttered beside him.
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A boulder on the road in front of the rover rolled away and the vehicle entered a cave. She mumbled more foreign words and the boulder slid back in place behind them.
They bumped and jounced down and down into what felt like the heart of Gaman itself, and finally entered a huge room with rough-hewn stone walls and a high ceiling.
Beautiful crystal dripped from all sides of the cavern. The floor was made of a smooth, opaque crystal. There had been splendor here once, Rhys could tell. It was obvious in the worn wooden tables and chairs scattered through the main residence of the Tuatha Dé Danaan that the wars had taken their toll. Danaan, all dressed in thread-worn clothing, milled the large cavern-room.
They climbed out of the rover and Cerian turned sad eyes on him. “This place used to be teeming with laughter and music.” Her gaze hardened. “I’d have it that way again. On our own terms. Not by the leave of the Sarthes.”
For just a fleeting moment, Rhys loved her. Loved that hard resolve in her eyes and the passion she had for her people. This was a good leader. She had his respect.
He watched her take her pack from the rover’s baggage hold and walk away.
And by the all gods above and beyond, how he wanted her. Images of her fine body moving over his like silk, her skin sheened with the perspiration of their coupling, flooded his mind. How would her cries sound as he thrust into her, holding her wrists captive over her head? Would her hair spread in an earthy riot of color across the pillow?
He stifled a groan. He wanted her long, strong legs wrapped around his waist as he shafted her toward climax. His body thrummed with the awareness of her, attuned to her every breath and movement.
* * * * *
“Go ahead, find yourself quarters. We’ve got enough vacant ones since two-thirds of our people are dead. Choose one.” Cerian slung her pack over her shoulder and headed toward her own room. “Guess you won’t need a ration of herbed flat bread and gruel, will you?”
“No,” Rhys answered. “A willing donor is all I need.”
“I’ll let you feed from me, and you can share my quarters anytime.” Cerian heard Lympia purr.
She chuckled at her friend’s boldness. “Go ahead,” called Cerian over her shoulder as she walked away. “Share Lympia’s quarters.” The sex-starved Danaan females would be all over the Vampir. Funny how that thought made her stomach clench just the slightest bit.
He was at her side the moment she stepped into the shadowed corridor leading to her room. He pressed her up against the wall, his hooded gaze roving almost 40
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territorially over her body. A sexual growl trickled from between his lips. “I’d rather share yours, Cerian.”
Her name on his lips was like a seductive spell that wove itself around her breasts and her sex. She took a careful breath. This was a dangerous man. Very dangerous indeed.
Cerian had been alone for too long, had wanted and needed a consort for too many years. She didn’t have the ability to sleep with this man and not hope for… more. At one time, she could’ve done it without a backward glance, but not now.
That left him with the capability to ravage her body with pleasures and her heart with an elusive, illusory promise of companionship, support…things she wanted so very badly. Then he would leave her with nothing but an increase of the bitterness in her heart after the centuries of the war her people had already endured.
She wanted him badly, but the cost was too high. She needed to stay strong, her emotions unfettered. There would be no way she could take this man to her bed and maintain the cold aloofness she needed to survive and be a leader to her people.
She swallowed hard, masking as best she could the hammering of her heart, the heaviness of her breasts and the slickness coating her sex at the thought of him strong and lean between the sheets of her bed.
“Get off me, Rhys,
” she commanded evenly. “Your attentions are unwanted.”
He slid a finger over the plump of her breast, up to trace her collarbone and let it come to a rest on her chin. He tipped her face to his. When he spoke, she could see the sharp points of his fangs flashing within his mouth. “Oh, I disagree, though you’re a good liar.”
There was an accent to his words, spoken in a thick, aroused voice. Welsh, she supposed. She knew enough about the Vampir to know he was old…very old. The Council had sent a little information on him before he’d arrived. He’d been Embraced in Wales sometime around 1100 A.D. Earth reckoning. Cerian was centuries old, but the Vampir was far older. Cerian wondered if he’d always exuded this confident sexuality, or if he’d honed it over all that time.
“I will have you, cariad.” His voice was like velvet against her skin. “Once I’ve decided to seduce, I seduce.” The dark threat hung in the air between them, pregnant with erotic possibility.
And arrogant presumption.
It was that last that really annoyed her. She brought her knee up and he twisted out of her way at the last possible moment.
She drew a shaky breath and turned on her heel. “If you’ll excuse me, I have a date with a hot shower.” She threw a pointed look at him. “Alone.”
Cerian walked down the corridor to her room. The glow of three lanterns lighted the large chamber. One of the women must’ve flamed them in anticipation of her arrival. The crystals they mined emitted a natural radiance, which was why they were 41
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so coveted. In the bedchambers constant light was not a desirable thing, so regular oil lanterns scattered the rooms.
Flame threw flickering light over the rough-hewn walls and rug-covered floor. It was a simple chamber, furnished with a large bed, a table, some chairs and a wardrobe.
A door off to the left of the room in the back led to her private bathroom. That’s where she was headed. She couldn’t wait to wash the Sarthian blood from her skin.
She threw her pack down on her bed, stripped her rain and blood-soaked clothes off, and headed into the bathroom. She stepped into the shower, turning the knob that let the water from the hot spring deep in the mountain travel down the conduit and pour out of the showerhead. They might be lacking in food, but not water. The mountain was filled with it, both in cool, secret lakes and hot springs.
The warm water sluiced down her body, drawing all the tension out of her muscles.
She braced a hand against the rough rock and rotated her head and shoulders under the massaging stream, groaning. The only thing that could make this shower feel any better would be… She broke the thought off. It had been way too long if she was thinking about the Vampir.
But it had been a long time.
Once there had been Tuatha Dé Danaan males, but the Thirty Year War had taken all but very old and the very young, plus a goodly portion of their females. The last time Cerian had known a man’s hard body moving against her had been nearly five years ago. Could she be faulted for imagining Rhys in the shower with her now? She was a young, healthy woman, not made of stone.
Shivering, she gave in to the fantasy. The heat from his muscular chest would bleed through the skin at her back to her very heart as he pressed her up against the shower’s wall. The firm planes of his stomach and the hard pressure of his thighs would brace her as he spread her legs and drew a strong, sure hand up her inner thigh to hold his palm against her aroused sex.
She cupped her breasts at the thought, running her thumbs back and forth over the sensitized tips. Then she slipped a hand down to her clit and rubbed it until it plumped full and responsive before she sank a finger within her pussy.
She’d part her legs for him and he’d slide his long, thick cock into her, stretching her muscles exquisitely. Then he’d thrust…and thrust and thrust. Giving her no quarter, no time to draw a breath, no time to even think. His dark hair would brush her shoulder as he kissed along her throat, nipping as he went. He’d fist his hand in her hair as he drove into her from behind, drawing her head to the side so he could bite the place where her shoulder and neck met.
The combination of his cock plundering her sex and his mouth drawing on her throat would push her straight into a mind-bending climax. She’d cry out and claw at the walls as the muscles of her pussy contracted around his pistoning shaft. He wouldn’t stop until she’d been well and thoroughly fucked.
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Cerian plunged her fingers in and out of her pussy, and shuddered as her climax hit her. Waves of sensation washed over her, and the muscles of her vagina convulsed around her fingers. She leaned back against the wall and caught her breath.
Dear Goddess Danu, she was in trouble.
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Chapter Two
The next morning, Rhys sat at a long table and considered the people around him.
About four thousand years ago, a part of the Tuatha Dé Danaan left Earth and traveled out here to this fractious planet. They’d been the ones who hadn’t wanted to conceal their natures when the Milesians had come to Ireland and defeated their people.
The Milesians had demanded the conquered Danaan either go into hiding or leave.
These people were their descendants, and were far different from the Danaan who’d remained on Earth. The Earth-dwelling sidhe were a gentle yet commanding race. They loved music and dancing. Their psychic abilities were extraordinary and they could do powerful magic, beautiful spells that could take your breath away.
These Tuatha Dé Danaan were tired, beaten by this cruel planet. It was almost as if war had ground their magic with its boot heel.
Or maybe they were simply hungry.
Rhys watched as a server placed a heel of flat bread and a few spoonfuls of thin gruel on each passing Danaan’s plate.
Lympia had explained that they were not a farming people, instead choosing to barter for their food stores. Ta’bat had intimidated all those they traded with, cutting off the ability of the Danaan to trade their crystal for food, until Cerian conceded to him.
Rhys fisted a hand. He really hoped he’d meet Ta’bat one day.
Of course, after Lympia had explained in full the plight of these Tuatha Dé Danaan, she’d invited him into her bed. He’d declined without slighting her. Lympia was beautiful and would make any man more than happy for the offer—with the exception of himself. His sights were set elsewhere. He looked toward the corridor where he knew Cerian’s room was located.
After a time, she came from the opposite direction, covered in a thin layer of glimmering white crystal dust.
She strode toward him, her gaze sweeping over the rations line. Her beautiful face was set in grim lines.
“Is everything all right?” Rhys asked.
She glanced at him. “No, not really. We found the person who leaked the information about your arrival to the Sarthes. We had to chase her into the crystal mines to finally capture her.”
He stood. “Why didn’t you call me to help?”
She flashed him a look of irritation. “You’re here to Embrace me, not play guardian of the domain.”
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“What will you do with her?”
Cerian shrugged a slim shoulder. “I don’t know yet. I’ve ordered her locked in her room. She can’t be allowed to help the Sarthes any more than she already has, but—”
She pursed her lips together and looked away.
Rhys didn’t press her. Something more was wrong than the obvious. “You need to eat,” he said, motioning at the line. “I will Embrace you tonight. You need to be strong for that.”
She shook her head and walked toward the corridor. “I’m fine. I’ll be fine.”
Gods, the woman was infuriating. He watched her stride into the shadowed corridor and then went after her so he could berate her in private.
When he finally reached her, he took her by her upper arm and spun her around to face him. “
You need to take the Embrace seriously, Cerian. I know you want the food to go to your people, but at the same time, there are risks to even a marked person during the transition to Vampir. You must be strong enough to endure the process.”
Her green eyes flashed with sudden anger. Better that than sorrow. “I will eat, Rhys.
I just don’t want to right now.”
He released her.
“Sometimes…” She dropped her head and her dark brown lashes fanned out over her skin. Crystal dust glimmered on them and on the smooth curve of her cheek. He wanted to brush it away.
“Sometimes what?”
She swallowed and looked back up at him. The naked vulnerability in her eyes socked him low in the gut. “Sometimes I think I should just give in to Ta’bat. My people would have food and protection—”
“At what cost, Cerian? They’d rape you of your crystal and take freedom from your people.”
She smiled sadly and shook her head. Her braids moved around her body with the motion and brushed his arm. “How long do you think we can hold out, Rhys? Most of my people are dead from the wars, nearly all the men.” Anguish tightened her voice.
“We’re weak and highly susceptible to the domination of another Gaman tribe. It will happen eventually. The Sarthes are hardly the worst. We could bear them—”
He wound a finger around one of her braids and pulled her forward gently. He tasted her lips and she stiffened. He closed his eyes and savored her, rubbing his lips over hers slowly. “No more talk of giving in to the Sarthes,” he murmured.
She lifted her gaze to his. Unmistakable sexual heat flared there. Finding that look of desire mirroring his own lust for her tensed his muscles and hardened his cock. What he wouldn’t give to have her sweet flesh envelop him.
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* * * * *
Cerian warred with herself as Rhys lowered his mouth to hers once more, stealing all her words and her breath along with them. She knew this wasn’t a good idea, but a part of her wished for the release she knew he’d bring her and, perhaps more importantly, the blessed reprieve from all rational thought that a long, hard fuck could provide.