by Brenna Lyons
“Are you all right?” he asked seriously.
Regana smiled. “I’m fine. I was sparring well until the end,” she admitted.
“You have questions?”
“Was my birth really the last they attended?” she asked nervously.
“I don’t remember,” he admitted. “They did attend yours, though. I remember that clearly enough. I was busy with you after that, so I didn’t pay much attention to what was going on outside of it.”
Something in his expression increased her apprehension. “What aren’t you telling me, Gawen?”
He rubbed a hand over the close cut beard on his chin as he considered it. “When I came home from hunting, everyone seemed wary of my presence. At first, I thought that something had happened to you, and I was very angry and distressed.
“You were newly born, so new that no one had even cleaned our mother’s blood from you. Still, you were brought before the men in that state. Marcwi was being tended to by Adalind while they examined you.” He met her eyes.
“Go on,” she breathed.
“Sibold gave you to me. Aside from the midwives and Sibold, I was the first honored with holding you.”
“Before our mother?”
He nodded.
“Why?”
“Sibold gave you to me, Regana. Marcwi and Abbo were your parents in name, but they each relinquished you to me in those first moments. I named you at Sibold’s insistence. Our father did not even question that it should be so. He — left without even hearing what name I chose for you. Sibold told me that it was my duty to keep you always safe.”
He hesitated, looking pained. Regana touched his hand in comfort. Gawen never talked to her about Jörg, but she knew that he blamed himself for not seeing and acting against the other man. He felt he failed her in some way, though Regana knew he never had.
“It was my duty to love and protect you, not just as a woman of my house, but as a sacred trust the stone demanded of me. The fact that you had been born to my house named me as your guardian.”
Regana’s stomach turned.
“Why, Gawen?” Pauwel asked quietly. “Why would the stone demand that? What did they see but a beautiful baby girl with Regana’s coloring that convinced them of more?”
“I don’t know. Whatever it was, I never saw it. Sibold would never tell me. The stone does not tell me.” He shrugged hopelessly.
“Then, Eberhard will have to,” Pauwel decided.
Gawen shook his head sadly. “I tried that when I became stone lord. All he will say is that Sibold would not allow him to tell their reasons. There is little left of his mind these days. Even if he knew it once, all Eberhard knows now is that he must not say. He will never tell us what we need to know.”
“This is ridiculous. There must be someone who knows and who will speak,” he exploded.
“No one,” Gawen replied sadly. “I have tried every road with no success.”
Pauwel wrapped Regana in his arms. “It is not true,” he assured her. “What Riberta said is a lie, and I will prove it somehow.”
Regana nodded as she sank her cheek to the warmth of his chest.
Pauwel was right. There was a way. Regana would handle the matter herself. Perhaps if it were just her and not the house lords asking, Emecin would tell Regana what really happened the day she was born.
* * * *
Jörg watched from the mist, as Riberta stormed up the path. Though her amulet muted her thoughts, she was performing the mental equivalent to screaming in rage. While he had always been careful to keep his vow in the past, he intended to break it tonight — for Riberta.
Jörg always went to ground somewhere near the village, since he could hide himself like no other beast could. That meant he was privy to some of the thoughts and feelings of villagers who wandered near him while he rested — if he chose to search them out.
He tried to be happy for Regana when he learned she carried Pauwel’s child, though the thought was painful to him. Jörg cut off the stream of thoughts from the gossipy woman abruptly, as was his usual course when the thoughts were about Regana. Listening to her happiness or her sadness was equally painful, so he typically avoided thoughts that dealt with her as much as possible. For some months after the day he learned she carried, Jörg avoided thoughts that centered around her completely, hoping to avoid the pain of knowing her life, but he gave in miserably when the separation from her became its own torture.
When the need for word of her finally overwhelmed him again, Jörg was shocked by the dangerous innuendo being spread about his beloved Regana. The stories that she was an evil omen who was somehow responsible for releasing the beasts posed a very real and immediate threat to her. If the villagers acted on that belief— The thought chilled him too much to follow it to its conclusion.
Something had to be done to stop it. After nightfall, he actively searched the memories of several rather glaring individuals about the subject and learned the identity of the one responsible, Riberta of Maher.
Jörg would not have expected to see her walking alone, but her mind’s shouting told him enough. She was hiding from her brother, trying to scare him into an apology — or at least make him deal with the nuisance she was making of herself, upsetting his plans with Evfemia in the bargain. During the latest of many disagreements with her brother, Wil had struck her for bringing yet more shame upon Maher.
Jörg streamed along behind her, listening to bits of her internal tirade. She knew the damage she was causing Regana. She reveled in it. Regana was Pauwel’s lady, a place Riberta had aspired to herself. When Pauwel passed her over at the ceremony, she had been made a joke. Like a child in the midst of a temper fit, Riberta sought to destroy the object of her anger. Destroying Regana would destroy Pauwel, and she would be rid of them both.
Jörg’s course had been determined in that moment. His idea of scaring her or coercing her into submission forgotten, he decided that a permanent end to her threat was called for. Riberta sought to destroy Regana not for some wrong the other woman had done her but because Riberta was a spoiled child who wanted a man she could not have.
For all these months, Jörg had kept his word. Even though Marclef had broken the agreement, Jörg took his blood and satisfaction elsewhere just as he had promised. His ability to fly long distances made this an easy thing for him to do. The other beasts only started doing the same when the hunts started, but to his amusement and dismay, Jörg knew the hunts were the last of their worries, for at least another seventeen years.
He chose his prey well, once he grudgingly moved to human prey. Jörg fed deeply only on the worst of men, sometimes returning to a particularly bad one several times to weaken him or killing him off if the world was better rid of him.
The women he took momentary release in were far from pure and innocent, but Jörg loved them well — better than he had afforded Regana. It was a penance of sorts. He was doing what he should have done long ago, though it was too late to make things right for Regana. All he could do was treat these other women well.
He should have treated Regana in a manner similar to the women he now chose from any night the burn became too much for him. That in itself was torture for Jörg. His beast forced him to seek solace in women, but he could never again touch the one woman who gave him true peace.
Now, Jörg intended to break that vow — for this night only. To protect and avenge Regana, which was his highest duty, Riberta would force him to take this action.
So, he followed as she kept moving steadily away from the village. He’d let her get far enough — and carry her further — that it would be too late by the time the warriors arrived, drawn by the knowledge of what he was doing in their range. Jörg considered, in dark amusement, that he wasn’t really breaking his vow. Riberta was a villager, but he was definitely hunting outside the village. The moon was high by the time he approached her, clothing himself in the illusion of Pauwel.
Riberta looked at him in surprise then took a step ba
ck in confusion. “Lord KreuzStütze,” she addressed him coolly. “You wish to speak to me?”
His smile spread as he raked his gaze over her. “There are many things I wish to do, but talking does not rate high among them,” he drawled suggestively.
She raised an eyebrow in suspicion. “But you are married to another woman,” she observed. “Printed to her.”
“No. Not printed. I married Regana only to claim a son by Gawen’s house,” he lied. “You do not understand the matters of stone bloodlines, but it was necessary to secure a child from her, and I was determined to make it my child. I thought to come for you after his birth. Since he is cursed as I am, he will need my guidance, and Gawen and Thorald will be forced to give him to me after he weans.”
“Come — for me? I don’t understand.”
“Thorald will set aside my marriage to Regana, if I admit printing on another.” Jörg smiled a predatory smile that led credence to the tale.
She smiled coyly. “On me?” she asked.
He raked his eyes over her again, his blood screaming for some release to take the place of the ultimate release he could never have again — in her case, both types of release, he decided. “I cannot wait for you any longer,” he breathed. “This will work out better. If you conceive before I make my proclamation, they will know I am not printed to Regana. A man who is truly printed could never do such a thing.”
“And I would be Lady KreuzStütze in Regana’s place?” she demanded.
“Yes, if you’ll still have me, geliebt.” Jörg’s stomach clenched, as he uttered the endearment, but he reminded himself that it was Regana he did this for, his true beloved.
“You wish to take me?” Riberta offered as she moved toward him.
“Take your amulet off first.”
Riberta looked around in confusion. “But, I would be unprotected,” she argued.
“I will protect you,” he crooned. “You should know that Wil can follow your amulet. He cannot follow me.”
She looked at him in horror. “He can?”
“Yes. Remove your amulet and come to me, so I can claim you properly.”
She pulled off her amulet and held it clutched in her fist. Jörg created the illusion of Pauwel dragging off his tunic and dropping his weapons belt. He ran his hand over the evidence of his arousal slowly, and Riberta dropped her amulet over a bush. Jörg smiled in triumph.
Riberta moved to him and ran her hands over his chest and manhood possessively. Jörg took her mouth hungrily, sweeping her up and moving away, faster than any human or even warrior could travel. Already the warriors would have felt the illusion he was casting, and Jörg had to put more distance between them and the approaching enemy. Riberta was unaware of how far and fast he took her. When he finally stopped and covered her with his body, she was already groaning in her need for him.
Jörg drew her with him into ecstasy, using the kindest touch. When he took her maidenhead, he controlled her mind to erase all pain. As a willing subject, it was a simple thing to do. He waited for her climax to reveal himself to her.
Her eyes widened. Riberta let loose a piercing scream as she tried to beat him off, suddenly aware that she had surrendered herself to a beast and not to the warrior she coveted.
He pinned her arms to the ground and continued his possession of her, rough now that he did not need to be gentle, reveling in the revenge he was taking more than in her tight body around him. The fact that her terror and pain added to his enjoyment should have revolted Jörg on some level, but it was sweet nectar that pushed him toward a release that surpassed anything besides Regana.
When Jörg found his release at last, after what seemed like a very long time of pinning her suddenly unwilling body beneath his, Riberta started to weep. He released her hands, knowing her too traumatized to defend herself against him.
“For Regana,” he told her, drawing his hands over her intimately and extending his fangs to scrape them gently over her chest and throat in an unspoken threat. “You choose your enemies unwisely.”
With her crime against him stated clearly, Jörg began to feed. As always, the memories of his victim took him into as great a pleasure as he had not found otherwise since those final moments with Regana in his arms. Still buried deep within her, he hardened even more as he saw her attempts to bait the warriors to her bed. Jörg started thrusting into her as he fed, feeling her shudder at his touch.
“What’s the matter, Riberta? You wanted a man who was insatiable,” he spoke in her mind. “Perhaps, I should take you far from here and use you every night for as long as you amuse me. You could amuse me for a very long time.”
He bit viciously, as he watched her attempts to harm Regana. As Riberta’s lifeblood flowed into him, he saw every barb, every rumor, every time she made his beloved angry or sad or uncomfortable in any way. Her enjoyment of it was coming back on her now. Perhaps, he would use her for several days. Riberta wasn’t worth so much to him personally, but she deserved to feel that much pain for all she had inflicted.
Jörg pulled back suddenly, replaying the memory of Pauwel’s face as he argued with Wil at her instigation, her lifeblood pouring onto the ground from the ragged wounds he left. Pauwel took Regana before the battle? She carried his child at choosing time, three weeks later?
He looked at the woman beneath him and started feeding again, desperately searching her memories for more information. Jörg needed to work quickly. He had already fed deeply, forcing her blood into his tissues until it made him uncomfortable to do so. She lost still more blood to the soil around them, the ragged bite spilling much more than one of his bites typically would. Riberta would soon expire.
Little more came in the time he had. He pushed away from her in disgust as her heart stopped beating and paced over her, not bothering to clean or clothe himself.
Had Pauwel taken Regana into his bed just after Jörg left? Damn him! Why? Did Pauwel know about their relationship and use it to force Regana to his bed as Marclef and Tilbrand used it to force Jörg to the stone?
It could be a mistake, he reasoned. If he took her later— Perhaps, Jörg could get some idea of the truth by her size. If Pauwel was innocent of what Riberta believed of him, Regana should barely be showing her state. He dematerialized and sped across the night to her. If I do not know, I really will go mad, he decided.
Had he been so intent on his own pain that Jörg left Regana unprotected and open prey to Pauwel? He grimaced inwardly at the possibility. If he found that Pauwel took her by means that were dishonorable, the Lord KreuzStütze would answer to Jörg in his full fury.
He ghosted up to KreuzStütze’s house and scanned the area. Pauwel was off with the others on the trail Jörg left them to Riberta’s body. He could not find Regana because of her amulet, but he assumed that both she and Kethe were in the house somewhere. Jörg streamed through the bedchamber she and Pauwel typically shared, but it was empty. He assured himself that Kethe was asleep in her own bed before moving to the main room.
Regana was there, pacing the floor in worry before the dim light of a dying fire. He surveyed her, but the stage of her pregnancy was impossible to gauge beneath the cloak she had wrapped around her to ward off the chill, night air.
His mind and soul warred between his fascination with her and his anger at what he saw in Riberta’s mind. He had seen her with Pauwel. Could such a man have forced her to his bed? Could Regana love such a man, if that was how he took her?
Jörg shuddered at the memory of his first possession of her. Hazy though it was, he knew how brutal he’d been with her. Regana had an unbelievable capacity to forgive such things. Still, was Pauwel any worse than he was himself, even if he was guilty? Jörg shook his head in frustration. The argument could drive him mad. Better to decide if Pauwel was guilty of anything at all first.
He materialized and crossed to her silently, laying his hand at the base of her neck. The blast of power from the amulet pushed at him, but Jörg took the cloak with him, ripping it f
rom Regana’s body as he moved away.
Regana turned to face him, her eyes widening in fear as she backed away with her hands placed protectively over the baby within her. Placed over a mound much too large for Pauwel to have done anything but take her directly to his bed once Jörg was gone, he noted.
He met her eyes in fury, fisting the cloak in his hand and loosing his claws into the fabric to vent his uncontrolled lust for revenge. “You carry his child,” he spat.
“Pauwel is my husband,” she whispered.
“He took you to his bed before the battle.” Jörg didn’t bother to ask it. It was obvious that he must have. He took a step closer to her, his eyes demanding an answer.
Regana scrambled back another step, keeping the distance between them. She looked away to the door to Kethe’s chamber and back to him slowly. “Yes,” she admitted.
“Why? Did he force you? What did he do to convince you?”
“He did nothing. I love him.”
She said it with a quiet pride that almost defeated him, until Jörg remembered his own printing, his own possession of her.
“It’s not love. It is the influence of printing on a prospective mate,” he thundered.
Regana sank back further. “You don’t know what you’re saying.”
Her eyes pleaded with him. For what? To leave? Not to take the illusion of happiness she so painstakingly cultivated within these walls? To forget whatever wrongs had been committed against her? Jörg could allow none of those things. His blood demanded to know how she had been wronged and to set it right.
“It is not love you feel for him, Regana,” he informed her dangerously. “It cannot be.”
“It is,” she insisted. “I know it is.” Her hands caressed the babe again, as if seeking comfort from the life she carried.
Was that her reason for believing she loved Pauwel? Because he planted his seed in her? She carries his child!
“You drove me to madness. I gave up everything for you,” he roared. “Were you in love with him that whole time?”