Too soon, she withdrew. In the darkness, only he could see the hesitation in her movements as she straightened and he wished the others would disappear. “Rise, King Saeran,” she said, her voice ringing out over the hill. “May your reign be prosperous for all the years to come.”
He obeyed, but he couldn’t make his feet move him from the spot. For a moment they merely stared at each other, caught in an instant of pure magic. It pulsated in the air around them like a heartbeat, making it difficult to breathe.
Another cheer went up, startling them both, and Saeran forced himself to walk away. The bonfire would burn all through the night, and few would leave before the sun rose again to light their way home.
Nia faced the altar and once more raised her arms above her head, her own tribute and offering. She removed the flowers from her hair and placed them on the altar, saying a soft prayer. Then she turned in a circle thrice and dissolved into mist, disappearing from sight.
When she reappeared next to Saeran, her golden mask was gone. Instead of white robes, she wore the blue ones she’d received at her presentation and the wolf skin over it. She watched the celebrations with a smile on her face, though it seemed a disguise for something else lurking beneath her carefully composed mask of calm.
Only those too young or too old stayed to the side; the rest danced around the fire in celebration. The foreigners, Saeran noted, did not dance either. But while four of them watched the revelers, the fifth’s eyes searched through the crowd until they settled on Nia. It was the selfsame knight who had gazed at her in the great hall, the same one who’d presented her with a red bloom and placed it so close to her hand. Arnaud was infatuated with the wizard, and he’d scarce seen her once since he’d arrived.
Lady Brigit spun out of the circle and caught Saeran’s hands. “A dance for the fire spirits, your Majesty?” She pulled him into the throng before he could answer, obliging him to dance. She held him so close he was tripping over her skirts, but Brigit only laughed. Saeran suspected the lady had sampled the mead one too many times. It loosened her tongue enough to say, “A finer king Wilderheim has never had! Maidens are praying for you tonight, that you will choose a wife and make her queen, but each of them wants you for herself.”
It was nothing he hadn’t heard before, but tonight the flattery only served to remind him that he’d already chosen.
Brigit grabbed his waist and spun them around. She leaned in and said, “If you choose me—”
Saeran didn’t hear the end of it because the seamstress sisters, Finna and Maeve, pulled him away, chattering one over the other. He danced around the fire thrice, and each time he thought he was free someone pulled him back into the jig. Saeran heard Nia squeal. The woodsman, Dahl, had picked her up one-armed to dance her around. Like Saeran, she was passed from one to the next, but unlike him, she seemed to enjoy it. The fire illuminated her laughing face as she spun and hopped directly across from him.
Then, out of the corner of his eye, Saeran saw the knight Arnaud step into the fray, following Nia. She was in Hundr’s arms, but before Arnaud could join them, Hundr passed Nia to Geir and away from the knight. Geir lifted Nia by her waist to spin her around while Saeran found himself with the shy Dagmar in his arms. He smiled at her briefly, but his attention was on Nia and the knight following after her from Geir to Konall, to old Sigmarr, and back to Geir.
“Your Majesty!” Brigit called, but Hundr pulled her away as Elsa replaced Dagmar. Maeve caught the knight’s hand, but he shook her off and continued around the circle after Nia like a bloodhound after a scent. Saeran turned Svana around to go the opposite way. Hundr with Brigit danced quicker than the rest, past him and halfway around the circle in a few steps. And just as Nia spun away from Tannir, as Saeran was preparing to switch partners yet again, Brigit stuck her foot out and tripped Nia in the direction of the blazing bonfire. Saeran let go of Svana with gasp and made a grab for Nia as she tipped forward, arms flailing to stop herself.
He caught hold of her sleeve and pulled her upright into his arms just in time, and when her gaze met his, Saeran went deaf and blind to the world. Nia.
She shivered as if she’d heard him speak her name. She couldn’t have. Only in the deepest, most secret corner of his heart would he ever dare to say it that way, with the whole of his soul calling out in anguished longing to the mate it could not reach.
“Lady Nia,” Arnaud said close enough to startle him.
Saeran felt his mouth pull into a snarl. With Nia in his arms, he spun out of the circle of dancers. Darkness pulled around them and a facsimile of them broke off to continue in the current of dancers. The darkness was his; the illusion Nia’s. Taking her hand in his, he pulled her into the woods, far from prying eyes.
He took them so far the massive bonfire was little more than a flicker, but not so far he couldn’t hear the revelers anymore. Only then did he release the shadows around them. “Wait, Saeran—”
He crowded Nia against the trunk of a tree.
“This is not real,” she said in a rush, “It’s Beltaine. It’s affecting all of us.”
“No, Nia, this is us.” His mouth descended on hers before she could say anything else. Too long denied, Saeran gorged himself on the taste of her. He couldn’t pull away and wished with everything he was that he could stop time just one more time, have this much of her at least. As if she’d whispered it in his ear, Saeran felt the same wish in Nia.
She kissed him back, her fingers grasping at his shoulders to hold him close. A strange fervor had them in its hold, demanding they give in to its power. Nia let go of everything. She willed the mischievous sprites away, ignored the shadows that weaved between the trees, watching her, waiting. If this was another test, it was the cruelest one yet. Out here, she couldn’t hold back from Saeran, not even knowing it might destroy her. She yielded to her king, giving herself this one moment because there would not, could not, be another. Nia opened her mind and soul to feel everything around her breathe. The entire forest and all that lived within it leaned and bent toward them, flooding her senses and making her body sing under Saeran’s touch.
She wrapped her arms around him to hold him close and everything else sighed away, leaving nothing but Nia and Saeran. Their feet left the forest floor and this time, she embraced it. Saeran’s hands searched for the fastenings of her robes, slipping inside while the garment fell away. She wore nothing underneath, and his hands slid over her skin, caressing molding, teasing. She moaned, the sound muffled by his kisses.
It was dangerous to feel this way, but she couldn’t stop it. With no more than a gesture, Saeran’s jerkin and shirt disappeared. Her breasts flattened against his bare chest and she shivered, bringing her leg forward to hook her ankle around his calf.
Skin to skin, she could feel Saeran’s mind and soul open, and she couldn’t help falling into both. Joined with him this way they shared thought and sensation, feeling with each other, for each other, in a dizzying cycle. Saeran’s heart beat fast and hard and Nia’s matched it. Blood roared in her ears, yet she could still hear his every breath and all the words he didn’t speak. She reveled in the moment, committed every detail to memory. He kissed her, touched her, gave her all of himself, and she sensed his determination to show her with his body what he couldn’t tell her in words—that she was his and no one else would ever lay claim to her.
It broke her heart.
Saeran shuddered. “Don’t,” he whispered. “Don’t hurt.” But when she looked into his eyes, she could see the same pain reflected back at her. Saeran cupped her cheek, drawing breath to say what was shining in his heart. Nia kissed him, stealing the words from his lips. Words held power and once spoken, they could never be taken back.
Nia caressed his shoulders and back, her nails scoring lightly before she looped her arms around him to bring him to her heart. With one swift motion, Saeran buried himself inside her and she cried out against his shoulder as he tore through virgin flesh.
Saeran moved slowly
, taking his time to bring her pleasure to take away the pain. His thrusts were deep and sure, so deep that she no longer knew where he ended and she began. She felt their souls twine together like sheens of mist over the moors and in a single moment of perfect ecstasy the mists pulled tighter, binding her to Saeran in some elemental way.
As the feeling faded, her awareness of Saeran did too, and within moments she was alone in her mind, as if none of it had happened. They descended back to earth on a current of magic, in a tangle of limbs she didn’t want to leave. Saeran held Nia to him as if afraid she would disappear like so many dreams chased away by the dawning sun. They were so close when one inhaled, the other exhaled, as if they breathed for each other, their hearts beating in unison. “Beautiful Nia,” Saeran said. “Be my queen, beloved. Sit by my side forever.”
His words cut her to the quick, and Nia squeezed her eyes shut. Too far. They went too far. Saeran had not been meant to be hers this night. They’d stolen a moment from time, but that was all they could ever have. She knew what had to be said, though her heart broke to say it. “No,” she whispered and a part of her died.
Saeran didn’t push her away, knowing as well as she that he asked the impossible. Instead, he tightened his hold on her, giving her awhile longer to pretend. As long as he held her, nothing else mattered except that she was his and he belonged to her.
They stayed there until morning light. Cushioned by the soft forest grass, covered by the blanket Nia wove from the plants around them, they didn’t stir and no creature intruded.
When at last sunlight tickled her eyelids and teased her awake, she cursed the light of day. Saeran slept soundly in her arms, her head nestled against his heart, but he woke when he felt her move. He smiled at her and kissed her, squeezed her closer as he stretched.
But his smile died away too quickly. “They will be looking for us,” he said.
Nia nodded and slowly rose, calling for her clothing. Everything fell down from the branches above with a shower of leaves that caressed her sensitive skin. She dressed in silence, trying to ignore the cry in her heart. She had known what would happen if she got too close to the king, but she’d done it anyway. It was her own fault, and she would have to live with the consequences.
When she faced Saeran again, he was dressed, his jaw set and his eyes hard with regret. She held her hand out to him and he came to her, pulling her into his arms. For a moment, she basked in his strength and warmth. For a moment too long she remained in his embrace, wishing.
She couldn’t make herself move away; her very soul protested it. And so Nia did the only thing she could. “Good morning, my king,” she told him before squeezing her eyes shut and sending Saeran to his bedchamber alone.
Left holding nothing but air, Nia stood there until she could breathe again. It was almost noon when she summoned her staff and walked. She wandered the forest without aim or direction until she came to a lake hidden by thick foliage. There, she shed her clothes and stepped inside, wishing the lake could cleanse the grief from her soul.
“Where are you?” she demanded.
Silence answered her. The sprites who’d pulled her and Saeran away from the dancers last night didn’t appear, but she didn’t expect them to. Their mischief was finished; they had no reason to come back again.
Furious, she drew magic from so deep inside she felt it tug on her heart. “Show yourselves!” she commanded, trying to force her will on the Others. “Gods damn you, you don’t know what you have done!”
Nothing stirred, not even the wind.
Nia dropped to her knees in the lake with the water up to her chest and lowered her head until her nose almost touched it. As light played over the rippling surface, images appeared. What should have been. Nia and Saeran leaving the circle in opposite directions to stand watch over the people until morning. Nia leading them all back to the castle as the sun came up and bidding Saeran a good morning by the great hall. They would have parted as friends and everything would have been all right.
Instead the wood sprites had interfered and made the drunken Brigit trip Nia right into Saeran. With the Veil so thin, magic had saturated the earth and air, and everyone capable of sensing it had been drunk on its heady power. Even by the light of day Nia still felt the effects of what the sprites had done and knew there would be no easy way back. Saeran would never be satisfied with only friendship now; she’d sensed it in his heart last night and was even more certain of it today. He would defy everything and everyone for her.
The lake rippled again, and in the light-play over its surface she saw Aegirans gathering in force. If Saeran refused the bride he’d sworn himself to they would stop at nothing to tear him and Wilderheim apart. To the last they would fight and die to avenge such an unforgivable betrayal.
Nia’s tears dropped silently into the lake, marring the vision.
The water embraced her. It warmed to her and grieved with her. Have hope, it said.
“There is no hope, there never was.”
Always hope, it replied. If only she could believe it.
Nia didn’t return to the castle until she was certain she could hold her cloak of shadows and hide from everyone, including the king. Avoiding the great hall, she went to her study instead, finding what little solace there was in her tomes and scrolls.
She picked up one after the other, gazing at the words without seeing them, no matter how hard she tried to make out their meaning. Food held no taste and wine burned like acid as it slid down her throat.
She dared not sleep that night, afraid of what she might dream. When morning found her the next day, Nia’s eyes stung from the tears she’d locked inside. Her jaw ached from clenching her teeth against the pain, and her body was cramped from sitting huddled on the floor.
How she wished her mentor was there to counsel her. She needed his advice, his shoulder to lean on. “Nico,” she whispered brokenly. “Why did you not warn me?”
For the first time, not even the remnants of his power in the walls could console her. Heartbroken, she let the tears come.
CHAPTER 14
The council of advisors met in its entirety for the first time in Saeran’s presence. Nia should have been there, but she had not deigned to appear, just as she hadn’t been there for the last three court sessions. She would not be called, summoned, or brought before him. She was avoiding him, and Saeran had no idea why.
The sun had set long ago, his fire was dying down, and he still couldn’t sleep. Pacing his chambers, he tried yet again to summon his wayward wizard. Closing his eyes, he imagined her there with him and willed it to be so. It didn’t work.
Cursing, he poured water into the scrying bowl and concentrated to conjure a vision of her in its depths. Instead of Nia’s golden hair he saw a dirt road and a caravan of wagons traveling north. Dark skinned men and women dressed in colorful draping attire walked on either side of a closed carriage and armed guards surrounded it from all sides, sharp eyes on alert for any threat.
Saeran swiped the bowl off the table, his heart thudding in his chest. No, it couldn’t be. It was too soon. He raked a shaky hand through his hair, looking out the window, but the breeze blowing in from the south only confirmed his vision. They were close. What few lights still flickered in cottages were going out one by one as the kingdom settled in for the night, but he could almost make out a lighted camp far beyond the towns, and all he wanted to do was disappear.
Storming out of his chambers he ran to the staircase and down to the empty great hall. The guards woke from their half slumber and stood to attention as he passed, but he ignored them. He traced the path he’d walked a dozen times today, out into the courtyard, to the small door and the stairway down to Nia’s underground study. Where he would have stopped and turned back before, he shoved the door open and marched down there heedless of what he would find. If she was hurt or afraid, he could soothe her, but he couldn’t go on this way anymore.
“Nia,” he called, throwing open the door at the botto
m of the stairway without knocking.
Nia looked up from the scroll she was writing on, and it was all Saeran could do not to sweep her into his arms then and there. Passionate words locked in his throat, foolish words.
“Yes?” she said.
Saeran started for her but hit an invisible wall halfway there. “Nia?”
“Your Majesty.”
He frowned. “What is this? Release me.”
“It is a ward,” she said. “You are free to move anywhere on that side of it.”
“Is this a test…or another lesson?” His entire being ached to touch her. Why would she deny him?
“No. The magic lessons have become a detriment to both of us. I will not be continuing your instruction.” Dipping her quill in ink, she bent over her scroll again.
Her careless dismissal shocked him, but if Nia wanted to play, so be it. Saeran placed his hands on the ward and traced it left and right, searching for an edge. The cursed thing was a perfect circle surrounding her with no way in that he could discern.
Oh, but she’d taught him well. Magic was little more than will and determination. He had an endless supply of both where she was concerned. Saeran closed his eyes and listened to the ward humming its own melody. There was a pattern to it, and if he could disrupt it, he knew he could get through. He hummed until he matched the tone and felt it shiver beneath his touch. Smiling a little, he altered the tune and the wall rippled, weakening.
He pushed a hand through, ready to pass completely, but then something changed. The wall bowed inward and solidified again, shoving him away as it flexed back to its original shape. Saeran slammed his fist into it in frustration. “Nia, let me through. Please.”
“If there is anything you require of me you have only to say so,” she said without looking at him.
“I want you,” he said. The caravan had stopped for the night. They had at least a day before the Aegiran princess arrived. He could marry Nia before then and break the arrangement with Aegiros. It would mean war, but he had fought against them before. He knew their weaknesses and no matter how many Aegiran soldiers marched into Wilderheim, with Nia at his side they could beat them back.
The Royal Wizard Page 11