Lionheart

by Thea Harrison

  He was actually shockingly sexy, when she thought about it.

  Stop thinking about it.

  “We’re never going to speak of this again,” she informed him before she fell asleep.

  Mmm. Sometime later, she inhaled the scent of sexy male as she rubbed her cheek against her pillow, which was made up of smooth, bare skin wrapped around solid, heavy muscles.

  Sexual images played through her mind. Soon they would really wake up and entwine together, she and… and…

  …and…

  Just exactly who had she taken to bed?

  What the hell. She couldn’t even think of his name, and here she was, wrapped around him like a creeping vine—and she never had sex with a total stranger.

  Bolting to a sitting position, she stared around wildly.

  Oh right. Gotcha. King. Bed. Witchlights burning in their globes, lighting every detail in the palatial room.

  She couldn’t really say there was malevolence to the presence in the room, but it was definitely full of dark, heavy Wyr alpha male. It felt like melted dark chocolate against her skin, and she wanted to bathe in it.

  The thought disgusted her. For fuck’s sake, Shaw. Pull yourself together.

  Dragging her fingers through her hair, she said without looking at the unconscious man beside her, “I am so, so sorry. I did not mean to cling to you like some sort of limpet. That all happened in my sleep. I wasn’t aware of doing it.”

  Her voice was no more than a croak as her abused throat strained to get the words out. Just bloody marvelous. Glancing over her shoulder, she finally assessed Oberon’s still features. He looked so peaceful, yet at the same time his Power had raged out of control and had sent his people running away from this beautiful city.

  Sighing heavily, she lay back down and turned on her side to face him, this time not touching him. The frigid air bit at her cheeks, and she couldn’t lie, it was hard to think about leaving the warmth their bodies had created in this nest.

  “I’m going to put my hand on you,” she whispered. “And I want to scan the interior of your chest. We’ve done this a dozen times already. There’s nothing to it except a little tingle of magic. I don’t need to keep talking to you ad nauseam to get this done, Oberon. Let’s give it a rest, okay?”

  She laid her hand on the hard, broad plate of his chest. So far so good. Then she fell silent as she started to scan him—and his Power surged to knock her magic out of his body.

  Damn it.

  Four damn days. Now almost five damn days of trying every trick she knew and expending every ounce of magical energy she possessed, and she had only managed to move Morgan’s magic needle a few millimeters away from Oberon’s heart.

  That was a long, long way from healing him entirely.

  “I can’t help you if you keep fighting me at every turn,” she ground out.

  And she couldn’t keep healing him if she contracted laryngitis. They were going to lose both those precious millimeters she had gained, because the magic in that needle would never stop, not as long as it remained in his body. It would simply lay dormant until it had generated enough energy to resume its task.

  His strong, blunt profile remained oblivious. Even his short, dark beard was well trimmed. Not bad for a guy who hadn’t shaved for a decade and a half. And that strong, molded mouth… It was as shockingly sexy as the rest of him.

  Later, she could never adequately explain why she did what she did. There was no excuse. It was inexcusable. If she had done it in New York and had been caught, she could have lost her license to practice medicine.

  But she wasn’t in New York. She was alone in this frigid, gorgeous, terrible place, and her heart swelled and ached for a man who was actively destroying his best hope at returning to life. For the goddamn hero who had fallen so long ago and for whom his people had fought so hard, because Kathryn was beginning to believe she would probably never get to meet him when he was conscious and aware.

  Leaning forward, she pressed her lips to his. His mouth was so still, so warm and perfect. Her closed eyes filled with dampness as she lingered over the sensation of touching his lips with hers.

  It felt like saying goodbye to a man she had never met and could barely acknowledge to herself that she had truly wanted to.

  Then he moved.

  He moved.

  His still mouth became mobile, his lips hardening on hers. As she froze in shock, one large hand came up to cup the back of her neck while his long body shifted to align with hers.

  She couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think. Her entire consciousness seized on the warmth of his mouth and the dexterous, hungry way he kissed her.

  He growled quietly. The sound went down her spine, unzipping her. She had remained steady and strong through almost every difficult period in her life, but not this time. This time she trembled everywhere.

  He couldn’t have shocked her more if he had grabbed two defibrillator paddles and zapped her. Meanwhile his mouth conquered the shape of hers—conquered and demanded more. He pressed between her lips, and they parted without her conscious volition, allowing him entrance. When he probed deep inside her mouth, her body pulsed with desire that culminated in a sharp, almost unendurable ache between her legs.

  Consumed with the riot going on inside, she was only half aware of his heavy weight settling over her. He ravaged her mouth, laying waste to her senses, and it was only when she felt the growing length of hardness pressing against her hip that a sliver of sanity managed to wedge itself into her brain.

  He had an erection. And from what she could sense through the layers of their clothing, it was a good-sized one too.

  Not bad for a guy who’d been out of action for fifteen years.

  What is wrong with you, Shaw!

  She had to stop this. Mmm. Holy gods, he really knew what to do with his mouth… They could stop in just a moment, couldn’t they?

  Penetrating her over and over again with his tongue, he cupped her breast in a large, powerful hand as he pushed his hips against hers in a slow, deliberate, sexy grind.

  The sliver of sanity screamed at her. She couldn’t wait until later—she had to stop this crazy behavior right now!

  * * *

  Honestly, this woman. She was driving him mad. Blah blah blah blah blah. How could anybody talk so much?

  There was only one good thing about it. The sound of her voice drove Isabeau from his mind, so he focused on her with equal parts irritation and relief.

  Then a third thing insinuated itself into his awareness: something was wrong. The woman sounded ragged, her voice hoarse with exhaustion. You would have thought that would be enough to shut her up, but no, it did not.

  Almost, he frowned.

  Then her lips touched his.

  And everything in his head lit up. Yes! This solved all of it… The woman stopped talking, and the sensation of her warm, soft mouth covering his drove any thoughts of Isabeau scuttling far into the darkness where they belonged.

  Pleasure cascaded through him, but her touch was light and gentle to the point of being chaste, and he wanted more. So much more.

  He came fully awake to the sensation of raw hunger. Fixing his mouth on hers, he feasted on her like a man who had been starving for centuries. Warm, wet, and sensual, she kissed him back, and when he demanded more, she gave it.

  A wealth of details shouted for attention. She smelled so goddamn good, like everything he had never known to dream about but suddenly discovered he needed more than life itself. Her hair was fine and silken—that meant she would be silken between her legs as well. The thought made him growl, and she trembled all over in response.

  He had to taste her, touch her all over, fuck her. Nothing else existed… Admittedly, her clothes were very strange, he found as he palmed one breast… but nothing else, and no one else, existed in this moment…

  “Stop!” she gasped.

  Well, dammit. Now she was back to talking again. It couldn’t detract from the delectably soft skin al
ong her jaw and neck. He ran his lips along the delicate path where her carotid artery beat underneath the warm silken skin perfumed with the intoxicating scent of aroused female.

  He couldn’t wait to eat her up.

  Something struck his shoulder. Her fist. She had hit him.

  She struck him again, not lightly, then she clouted him over the head. “Oberon, stop!”

  She dared to strike him? He bared his teeth at her in a snarl, and out of the corner of his eye he saw her draw back her fist. Unbelievably, she was going to do it again.

  He hissed, “You do not strike the King!”

  “You’re not my king!” she shouted back.

  He caught a glimpse of her fine-boned features surrounded by a cloud of the silken brown hair spread out on the pillow. Fire flashed in narrowed amber eyes. This time her fist came flying directly at his face, but his reflexes were faster than they had ever been, and he ducked sideways to avoid the blow that landed on his shoulder.

  Outraged, he pulled back his own fist to strike back. That was when he discovered she was as fast as he was and quite strong. For one moment all his weight was poised on one elbow, and with a neat, whole-body heave, she shoved him over, hard.

  As it transpired, they had been tussling close to the edge of the bed. Flipping over, he landed on his back. As the back of his head connected with the hard, frigid floor, full awareness slammed into him.

  “Look,” the woman croaked. “I am so, so sorry for this. There’s been—I don’t even know what to call it—a massive misunderstanding. I’m sure you’ll understand everything once I explain everything…”

  He barely heard her as memories cascaded through his mind. The attack at the masque. The poisonous spell that he could tell was even now still working through his body. Saying goodbye to his court and casting the stasis spell. The slow, raging collapse into darkness.

  He surged upward with an outraged roar that shook the walls, and his anger propelled him into a shapeshift. Changing into a lion, he sprang at the woman. That stasis spell had been the only thing standing between him and certain death. He would disembowel the interloper for daring to disrupt it… for sex?

  He got one glimpse of her mortified expression as he leaped, claws out and ready to strike. His front paws closed on thin air as her slender body melted away.

  There was a rush of wings. He caught colors out of the corner of his eye—dark brown, black markings, and soft, mottled gray and white, as well as the slender, wicked length of a hooked beak and strong, hooked talons. The interloper was a full Wyr, a falcon.

  Cupping his front paws, he twisted his massive body in midair to try to catch her as she flew past him, but she dipped her body so sharply the tips of her wings brushed against his whiskers.

  Roaring again, he leaped and rebounded off the nearest wall, cracking plaster as he lunged for her again. He had speed and power in spades, but she was much smaller than he and could move like greased lightning.

  She flapped around the room so chaotically it was maddening. Growling, he tried to follow, uncaring for how he knocked items over or how the strong, well-built furniture fractured under his weight. For one fraction of a moment he thought he had cornered her—but then she dodged successfully again.

  This time he got the chance to look into the falcon’s eyes as she passed by. She looked as furious as he felt, and as she streaked between his outstretched paws, she reached down to rake the claws of one foot along the tip of his lion’s nose.

  Sharp pain flared along the needlelike scratches. Bloody hell.

  The cuts on his nose were insult upon injury. He couldn’t be in more of a frenzy. Whirling, he watched as the falcon arrowed through the open doors and angled right to disappear down the corridor.

  Silence fell in the aftermath of her departure. Then, with a yawning crack, his large, damaged four-poster bed collapsed in on itself.

  Oberon stared at the shambles of what had once been a masculine, elegant room. In the tussle, they had managed to break every single one of the witchlights stationed along the walls.

  Taking in a deep breath, he inhaled the woman’s scent. It was everywhere in the ruined room. She had been in here more than once. The puck’s scent also saturated the room. Had Robin allowed this, or had she vanquished him in some kind of battle?

  Other details sank in. Various implements lay scattered on the floor. He recognized a scalpel, vials, and other strange items he couldn’t identify, and also a metal box that looked like it would fit into the palm of his hand. There were also broken pencils, and a number of papers littered the broken furniture.

  On one of the trampled pages, a sketch of an oddly shaped oval item was clearly visible. It was labeled in English, OBERON’S HEART. An arrow pointed to a spot on the edge of the oval. That part was labeled MORGAN’S MAGIC NEEDLE.

  The interloper had studied him. She knew what was going on inside his body, probably better than he did. What had she hoped to gain when she had kissed him? As he’d awakened, he’d had only one thing in mind—sex.

  Had she planned on using him to try to get pregnant? The King’s heir would have an unparalleled advantage in Lyonesse. He growled at the thought even as he realized that food had also been strewn everywhere.

  Pieces of dried fruit lay sprinkled over the trampled crimson-and-gold bedspread like confetti, and there was the sharp, aromatic scent of cheese. Curious, he pawed at a small, overturned tub. As he flipped it over, one of his claws sank into soft butter.

  He licked it off as he took in other details. Amid the rubble was a fur-lined cloak and a strange piece of clothing that looked like a formfitting blue coat, and another odd, lightweight sheet of something that looked like metal but was pliable and made of a foreign substance he had never seen before.

  The interloper had planned a ravishment, and she had brought… snacks?

  As he stared around in sharp incredulity, his first surge of bestial rage settled into something calmer, colder, and far more deadly.

  Soundlessly, the lion padded into the wide, empty corridor, his focus coalescing into a single purpose. He had prey to hunt and many questions to ask before he decided how he was going to kill her.

  Chapter Seven

  The falcon’s elusive scent lingered maddeningly in the corridor outside his bedroom. He followed it through the abandoned palace until he reached the Garden Hall, a great room lined with floor-to-ceiling windows along the outside wall that overlooked what had once been an extensive garden.

  Now, as he glanced out the windows, there was nothing to be seen but ice and snow-covered branches of trees, and mounds where well-tended shrubbery had once been. The great room had marble floors that were currently as cold as ice, cracked white molding along the top edges of the walls, a mellow gold paint that had grown faded and blotched with water stains, and vaulted ceilings with arched nooks overhead that were filled with white alabaster statues.

  Outside, heavy, dark clouds hung low in the sky, and the grayness of the day leached all color from what Oberon’s memories told him had once been a bright, airy, and cheerful space.

  Overhead, in the shadow of one graceful alabaster statue, the ruffled shape of a bird huddled. Her previous sleek shape had disappeared. She had fluffed out all her feathers and looked fat as a disgruntled partridge, small head sunk down between her wings.

  It was comical enough to almost make him smile, except his rage still burned too cold to allow humor to set in.

  As he prowled around the empty expanse, the fat partridge shrank back deeper into the shadows, but it was too late. He had already spotted her.

  Restlessly, he sniffed along the floor and the edges of the great arched doorways, but there were no other fresh scents. The place smelled of winter, dry rot, and happier events that had occurred long ago. He and the Wyr female were the only two living creatures he could sense anywhere on the palace grounds.

  She had chosen her perch wisely. In his lion form he had a huge spring in his leap, but the alcove where she hud
dled was still beyond his physical reach. As long as she remained there, he would have to consider his repertoire of magic when he was ready to launch a strike against her.

  While he waited to see if she would speak, he considered the various possibilities. As he seemed to recall, she’d certainly had no problem with talking before he had fully awakened.

  The silence drew out between them, and he grew irritated. The light scratches on his nose had already healed, but he wanted to paw at her, his own claws out, and draw blood like she had drawn his.

  Silkily, he asked, Cat got your tongue?

  If anything, her feathers ruffled further, and that small graceful head all but disappeared.

  Very funny. Her grumpy mental voice sounded much better than her physical voice did. Okay, I apologize. I am so very sorry for what happened—

  An apology wasn’t what he wanted. Whirling to face the shadowed alcove where she perched, he snarled wordlessly. The bestial sound vibrated in the huge nearby windows, and her words snapped off as if he had sliced through them with a sword.

  Come down here and face me properly, or are you too much of a coward to do so? He threw out the challenge carelessly. He had no real expectation she would comply. If they stood face-to-face and she was grounded from flight, he had no doubt he could easily destroy her.

  And she certainly didn’t seem to be motivated to continue the confrontation on the ground. Instead, she told him in a steady, crisp voice, Oberon, you’re going to die unless you consent to medical treatment.

  That voice. That sounded exactly like the voice that had wound through his dreams, interrupting his nightmares of Isabeau. He snapped, I did not give you permission to address me by my name.

  She retorted, I don’t really give a shit.

  Cold fury blinded him. He flung himself at the wall just below the alcove where she sheltered. In his Wyr form, he weighed close to ninety stone, and as his body slammed into the wall, it shuddered. Cracks broke in the plaster, radiating out in a sunburst pattern.

  Is that supposed to frighten me? she said coldly. Because I assure you, it does not. Your temper tantrum doesn’t change the facts. You’re going to die unless you consent to receive medical treatment.