Unbound Heart

by Jane Atchley

  The guard scratched the tent flap. “Field Marshal Duncan to see you. Are you decent?”

  Faelan drew in another breath. Calm. She must stay calm. “Let him come in.”

  Duncan ducked under the flap and stopped in his tracks. He stood with his hands clasped behind his back. The faint scent of oranges and chocolate tickled Faelan’s nose and mixed with the perfume of the roses on the table. For a heartbeat, searing sapphire-blue eyes burned into hers. Then his gaze slid to her evening meal, untouched on the table.

  He stared at the table for a long moment. “Garen Nhurstari visited you?”

  His tone was off. He sounded...bewildered…or jealous.

  “What makes you think so?”

  Duncan nodded toward the table. “Roses.”

  How odd. “Roses?” Faelan heaved a deep breath. “Katie brought them to me this afternoon.” She reached out, touching one of the velvety blossoms. “She said Garen made them.”

  Wonder filled her. She turned to Duncan. “It’s true?”

  A small smile curved Duncan’s lips, gone so quickly Faelan could have imagined it. “He made them bloom. It is his talent.”

  “Making roses bloom? What stupid magic.”

  Duncan gave his head a tiny shake. “Garen makes things grow. Not stupid magic during a famine, I think.”

  “Are you always so pragmatic ?”

  He smiled. “A family curse. Do shifters have special dietary considerations of which I am unaware?”

  Months of close observation taught her Duncan didn’t make abrupt topical shifts. He’d come to discuss her diet? The force of his devastating blue gaze focused intently on her face made her mouth dry. Faelan moistened her lips with her tongue. Immediately, all his heated focus shifted to her lips.

  “I have no special needs, Field Marshal Duncan. Thank you for asking.”

  Duncan’s gaze swept the table. He tugged at his jacket, touched his empty scabbard. “The food is not to your liking?”

  He made it sound as though she were his guest, as if her likes and dislikes mattered. Faelan couldn’t follow him at all. “It’s fine, Field Marshal…only…”

  He relaxed a little. “Duncan. If everything is as fine, as you say, why are you not eating?”

  “I don’t know.” But she did. She was afraid and she was alone. “I’m just not hungry.”

  Duncan pulled the chair away from the table and held his hand out. His fingers waggled, inviting Faelan to take his hand.

  “Eat something, please.”

  He wasn’t asking, he was ordering. A small part of her rebelled, another much larger part, longed to touch him. She took his outstretched hand allowing him to seat her. The heat of his touch traveled up her arm and flashed through her body, straight into her womb. Faelan made a half-hearted attempt to eat, but ended up pushing food around her plate.

  “I’m sorry. I can’t.”

  “Why?”

  “Where I come from, evening meals are special. The clan gathers. Everyone talks. It’s the social highlight of our day.”

  “I see.” Duncan dragged the other chair back, sat. “What do you talk about?”

  “Oh.” Faelan slanted her eyes at him. This was not happening. Her beautiful enemy was not sitting across from her speaking to her as if he didn’t think she was a monster. “The usual things people talk about. What we did that day or our plans for tomorrow.”

  His gaze had focused on her hands as she played with her spoon. Now his marvelous blue gaze captured hers with female destroying intensity. She shivered.

  A wry smile touched his lips. “Well…that is out.”

  Faelan burst out laughing. She couldn’t help it. She’d always admired Duncan’s wonderfully subtle sense of humor. An answering smile brightened his face, heated his incredibly blue eyes even hotter, and melted her heart.

  “Tell me more about your homeland, Miss Foley?”

  “If I am calling you Duncan, you must call me Faelan or Lannie, if you like.”

  “Faelan, fierce and elegant. It suits you.”

  Ignoring her fluttering heart, Faelan eyed him suspiciously. “Why do you ask after my homeland?”

  “No reason. I have never seen a desert. Captain Fawr owns a desert-bred stallion—gorgeous animal, fast as the wind. He traveled into the Targa desert to purchase it. There are great cities there, he says, breathtaking white stone buildings with ornate minarets. Is it the same in the Waste?”

  Faelan took a sip of water, reminding herself how very clever Duncan was. Did he hope to gain some advantage with his harmless sounding questions? “Your people call it the waste?”

  “What do you call it?”

  “Eremos, but waste is an apt description. We have no grand cities. We scarcely have villages. We’re a nomadic people, moving our flocks constantly in search of grazing.”

  After a moment, he said, “You are Eremosan?”

  “I am a Descendant.” Faelan raised her chin. “A shifter.”

  Duncan leaned forward capturing her hand. The fire of his touch raced up her arm. Somewhere, in a closed off corner of her soul, her wolf lifted its head.

  “I meant no offense. I hail from a place mainlander’s call the Addir Archipelago. Ergo, I am Addiri. Do you know you are beautiful all bristled up like a she-wolf?”

  Faelan’s stomach did a somersault. He thought her beautiful, fierce, and elegant. Duncan released her hand, and she grieved for the loss of his heat.

  “You would be accustomed to living in tents then.” He tilted his head, dipped his chin, watching her through the sort of impossibly long lashes women would kill for. “I do not care for tents. I find them stuffy, dusty, and uncomfortable.” He chuckled. “But then, I am a soft Holding-born man.”

  His tent was a palace, and the only thing soft about him was his countenance. “I thought Addiri was a title. Ky’lara says it like one. ”

  Duncan looked away. “It is just a…a Maoliou custom. We live on the the same islands and share a common language, but we are not the same.”

  “Now I’ve offended you?”

  He caught his full bottom lip between his teeth for a moment and seemed to gather his thoughts. “Never think it.”

  Leaning forward, Duncan rested his chin on his fist. “Being from a large family myself, I understand your dilemma. One misses banter. At Duncan family gatherings, everyone has an opinion on everyone else’s business, most frequently mine, and they are not reluctant to share it.” He plucked a bit of fruit off her plate lifting it to her lips. “Eat, please.”

  Faelan had seen Duncan feed Ky’lara in this fashion. The native girl told her it symbolized Duncan’s care of his House-holden. Faelan doubted he meant it as such in her case, but she accepted the tidbit, teasing the juice off his fingertips with her lips.

  His wonderful eyes caught fire, his breath hitched, and he did an unexpected thing. He touched the fingers she had suckled to his lips.

  Warmth flooded Faelan’s body, coalescing in a rush of heat between her legs. Field Marshal Duncan wanted her. After months of spying on him this was a revelation. Duncan lived circumspectly.

  He reached across the table, this time nudging her spoon. “Eat, please.”

  Suddenly ravenous, Faelan dipped the spoon into the thick mutton stew. “You have five sisters?”

  A line appeared between Duncan’s brows. “How do you know?”

  Faelan smiled, flashing dimples. Men liked dimples. “I’m a spy.”

  “Ah.” Duncan nodded. “Yes. I have five sisters and two brothers, although the elder is gone now. The sea took him.”

  “I’m sorry. I don’t know what I’d do if my brother died.”

  “Thank you.” Duncan gave her a wistful look. “I loved my brother, but I did not want to live his life. Is your brother with the army?”

  “Yes. Were you expected to?”

  “Good. Good.” Duncan’s gaze drifted over her shoulder. She’d lost him to something only he could see.

  Faelan leaned forward. “Are
you expected to?’

  His attention snapped back to her. “I beg your pardon? Expected to what?”

  “Live your brother’s life.”

  He opened his mouth, closed it, pausing so long Faelan thought he wouldn’t answer. “As the eldest surviving son, I have—certain familial expectations.”

  “Expectations like marrying a two-headed, calf-faced widow.”

  “You heard that?” Duncan laughed. “Of course you did.”

  “Spy.” Faelan grinned.

  “I am not a score and six. Perhaps it will not come to that, but someone suitably placed or well propertied…provided I loved such a woman.”

  Well now, wasn’t this fascinating. “You believe in love?”

  “I must— Do you not? You are not eating.”

  Who could think of food when the most singularly gorgeous man she’d ever met had just confessed he meant to marry for love? Faelan swallowed a last spoonful of cold stew, pushed the bowl aside and reached for the fruit. “I haven’t seen much evidence of it. Why must a man like you believe in love?”

  “A man like me wishes to be valued not for the texture of his hair, or the color of his eyes, or his family’s Holdings, or any combination thereof. A man like me wants a woman who believes in him, loves him.” Duncan leaned back in his chair. “Fortunately for a man like me, my family values love above all other considerations.”

  “And you think such a woman exists?”

  “I know she does.” He helped himself to a piece of fruit. “How about you? Are nuptials in your future?”

  Faelan opened her mouth to deny the possibility, but at that moment an explosion shook the tent. She jumped out of her chair overturning her wine in the process.

  Duncan pulled a fine linen handkerchief from his waistband and mopped up the table. “It is only a bit of blasting powder, Faelan, way down by the river. You are quite safe.”

  “You’ll ruin your handkerchief.”

  “I do not care about my handkerchief.” Duncan refilled her glass and handed it to her. “Drink this, please.”

  “You didn’t flinch.”

  He settled back onto his rickety chair. “Black powder and I are old friends. I have grown accustomed to it.”

  Faelan put her hand to her chest and took a deep breath. She would never grow accustomed to it. “Ky’lara says you’re moving the river.”

  “Does she? I shall have to school her in confidentiality if she’s to keep company with you.”

  Unthinking, Faelan grabbed Duncan’s arm. He went very still. “Don’t punish her. It can’t be a secret. My uncle hears those blasts too. Don’t beat Ky’lara because of me.”

  Duncan’s head ticked to the left as if she’d struck him. “B-b-beat my Hou-House-holden?” His stutter told Faelan how much her words upset him. “Men do not do such things where I come from.”

  He spread one strong long-fingered hand over his chest. “For the love of might, Faelan, I have five sisters. Any man who dared strike one of them would not live long.” He rose prepared to quit the tent.

  “For the love of might?” It was the closest Duncan had come to cursing in all the months Faelan spied on him. He was so angry his eyes practically threw off sparks. They’d been enjoying one another’s conversation. Faelan could not allow him to leave in this state.

  “Where I come from, men do.”

  Her words stopped him cold. He turned, looked at her with fire in his eyes and steel in his voice. “Someone beat you?”

  Faelan met his gaze. “Where I come from, women are property. We belong to our husbands, our fathers, our brothers. We do not read or write or cipher. Men mete out severe punishments for the smallest infractions. I have seen women beaten to death over a burned dinner. When you said you would school Ky’lara, I thought…”

  Duncan closed the space between them in two strides. He knelt and took her hands between his calloused palms. His heavenly orange and chocolate scent filled her head, and the lightning-strike accompanying his slightest touch, sizzled in her blood. Her heartbeat accelerated to an alarming rate. The man was hazardous to her health.

  “Someone beat you?” He repeated.

  Good heavens, he sounded murderous. The intensity of his gaze made her squirm. “Not in a long while. I am a shifter. I can take care of myself.”

  His warm gaze fixated on her lips. “Oh, Faelan.”

  Duncan leaned forward, breathing in her air. Her lips tingled with anticipation, the ground trembled, and the tent shook, literally, their fragile intimacy shattered. Duncan shot to his feet as if the blast propelled him.

  “I beg your pardon, Miss Foley.” Duncan tugged his jacket straight and touched his empty scabbard. “I would never presume upon our relative positions to force myself on you. Please forgive me.”

  Force yourself, do.

  “I know you wouldn’t, Field Marshal Duncan.” Faelan did her best to match his sudden formality.

  His blazing blue eyes blinked at her. “I beg your pardon?”

  Faelan touched her chest with her fingertips, smiling sweetly. “Spy.”

  Duncan shot her the self-deprecating grin she was beginning to recognize as another nervous-tell, like tugging on his jacket. “It is quite hot in here.”

  It certainly was, but not from the heat of the day. The air crackled between them. This crazy attraction which had drawn her to Duncan from the first was not one sided. He felt it too. Felt it and fought it.

  Hoping to ease the tension, Faelan made an all-encompassing gesture. “No windows.”

  Duncan glanced around the tent’s interior, his gaze coming to rest on the bowl of roses, which clearly annoyed him. “I regret I have given no thought to your comfort.”

  “Why should you? I am a prisoner.”

  “But still…” He glanced away. “It is not well done. What do you do all day? How do you occupy yourself?”

  “Captain Fawr’s wife visits, and your Ky’lara when she brings my meals.” Faelan laughed lightly. “They are both difficult to talk with, but I do enjoy their company. Don’t forbid them to come. I’ve never had girlfriends before.”

  Duncan smiled. “I will tell you a secret. I cannot imagine conversing with My Captain’s lady. She is a beautiful woman, granted, but still I wonder sometimes what they—” He shook himself. “Is there anything you want, Faelan? A book?”

  “I cannot read. Remember?” She didn’t know how to respond to the pity in his eyes. Luckily, she didn’t have to, distracted as she was, by the lovely melody suddenly filling up the air. She let her head fall back, closed her eyes, and swayed to its sweet music.

  Duncan sat down across the table. “It astonishes me that your nation keeps half its population ignorant. It is not right.”

  Although she agreed wholeheartedly, Faelan ignored his remark. She did not want to discuss her culture. The inequities made her sad, and she chose to be happy in Duncan’s company. “What is that instrument? It sounds like angels weeping.”

  “Violins do not have to sound so melancholy, but the instrumentalist has a long-standing penchant for mournful tunes.”

  “Mournful?” Faelan sighed. “Do you think so? It’s beautiful. I’d like to meet him.”

  “You have. Do you play an instrument, Faelan?”

  “Mmm…the lute.” She shot him a pointed look. “But not very well. Is it Eoin?”

  “No.”

  “Who then?”

  “You have a fine mind, Faelan. You will figure it out.”

  She fought the urge to preen at his compliment, but then her eyes narrowed. “It’s the kin-slayer captain.” She made a disgusted sound. “Does he do everything well?”

  “Captain Fawr,” Duncan corrected. “Most things yes.” His gaze drifted to the right for an instant, before he leaned forward confidingly. “I can best him at a sprint, and he is not much of a swimmer.”

  Caught off guard, she laughed. “Is that why you are moving the river?”

  He gave her a loopy grin. She didn’t know why. “Do y
ou have any other interests besides a love of music?”

  Faelan made a running motion with her hands. “My brother and I love hunting.”

  “So your brother is a shifter too, a black wolf unless I miss my guess.”

  She had not meant to tell him. What was it about this man that inspired a runaway mouth? “The shifter trait is dominant in the male line. Female shifters are rare.”

  Duncan stared at her for several seconds. “I am sorry Mister Bruin and the twins had to hurt you. Are you still in pain?”

  “It’s strange, not painful.” Faelan swallowed a sudden catch in her throat. His solicitude touched her deeply. She was his enemy, his betrayer, but it did not seem to matter. It was hard to reconcile his caring nature with his profession. “Why are you here?

  If her question surprised him, he did not show it. He favored her with another of his killer smiles. “Here in your tent or here in a metaphysical sense?”

  “You think you’re awfully clever don’t you?” She gave his shoulder a playful little push. “Let me rephrase. Why are you a soldier?”

  “Oh. I fell in love.”

  So they were back to love. Faelan recalled the letters in his treasure chest and swallowed a surge of jealousy. “You became a soldier to impress a lady?”

  “You do not find me impressive? Have you any idea how hard it is to earn this uniform?”

  She was not quite able to hide her disgust.

  Duncan threw back his head and laughed. “Oh, Faelan, you are a treasure.”

  She’d thought him ignorant of his virile beauty’s affect on women. Apparently, she’d been wrong. On the other hand, he called her a treasure.

  “You said you fell in love.” Fishing for the letter writer’s identity, Faelan added. “I just assumed there was a woman.”

  “I fell in love with a lifestyle. When I was seventeen, my father took my older brother and me to Elhar to watch him hammer out a trade agreement. I met Captain Fawr there. He and a handful of troopers were in a courtyard passing around a wineskin, swapping tales of how the captain had delivered the governor of Malachite to the Great Ladies in a gunnysack. They were living the lives they chose, but they were part of something bigger than they were.