Gift of the Goddess

by Denise Rossetti

  Instead, she’d said she loved him.

  When she’d thrown the link open wide last night, there it was, her love—a gift beyond price, grounding his soul while his heart soared.

  Love might be given, but trust had to be earned.

  What he was going to tell her would destroy that precious gift. By Lufra, she’d risked her life to save his miserable hide! And her only reward would be pain and possibly death. The sheer cruelty of it robbed him of breath.

  Living inside his skin at this moment made him physically ill.

  He rasped a hand over his bristly chin, willing his guts to behave. “Anje, I need to talk to you. About the Day of the Dark.”

  Her smile was wobbly, but genuine. “After I’ve patched you up.”

  “Forget that. Let Trey do it. You sit and listen.” He scooped her up, arranged her on his lap and took both her hands in his.

  As Anje looked at him, her eyes narrowed. “Why are you holding my hands?”

  “I’m not stupid.” When he tried to smile, his lip hurt. “You know most of it, anyway. You know you’re Lufra’s Gift.”

  “So what is that? Your…Bondmate?”

  Facing his tormented conscience, he admitted to himself he’d Bonded her as much for himself as for the Feolin. Life without her was no longer possible.

  He glanced at Trey, leaning against the wall with his ankles crossed, the shaven scalp lending him an edgy air of danger. The challenge of the man called to him irresistibly, to master, to ravish him to his knees. And yet, the hunger was entwined with a depth of tenderness that shook him to the core. Confusing as hell, but he was certain of one thing.

  Life without Trey wasn’t possible either.

  He’d found them. He had them.

  His lovers. The ones he loved with everything that was in him.

  He’d belonged to Lufra, body and soul, since boyhood, given Her everything that he was. How could She do this to him? Gods, it hurt.

  “No. I’m a selfish bastard. I just…took advantage.” He lifted their joined hands to press a kiss to her knuckles, his guts a rigid ball of tension. “Remember I said I dreamed of you?”

  She nodded.

  “Lufra sent me visions, dreams, of a living woman created in Her image. You, Anje.”

  She shifted her delicious bottom on his thighs. “Nonsense.”

  “No, it’s not,” said Trey, crouching to dab at the bandage on Brin’s arm with a damp cloth. “Lufra’s holy fire burns in your eyes, darling, and Her wings stripe the skin of your back.” He frowned over his task. “Let’s get it over with, Brin.” Gripping one corner of the dressing, he gave a swift tug.

  The pain forced a grunt out of him. A welcome distraction.

  “Sorry,” muttered Trey, rummaging in the medical pouch. “Hold still.” He swabbed the wound with cleanser.

  Brin gritted his teeth against the sting. “Haven’t you wondered why Lufra chose you, Anje?”

  “If She did.”

  “Believe it. Everything’s meant.” He kissed her eyebrow, willing her to understand, to forgive him. Knowing she wouldn’t. “You’re a deeply passionate woman who fucks like a goddess.” When he bent his head to nibble her earlobe, Anje quivered. “Gorgeously responsive. Your beauty is Lufra’s made flesh.” He shifted his attention to the soft skin below her ear, inhaling great gulps of that essential Anje smell, fresh and strong and feminine all at once. “You’re exactly what She needs, a woman with the strength and courage to risk her life.”

  Anje snorted. “As if I haven’t done that already.”

  “That’s not the risk he means,” put in Trey.

  “Anje.” Brin stilled, waiting ‘til her eyes lifted to meet his. The connection was a visceral tug, pulling him into the violet depths, tangling him in the white-hot embers of the goddess fire. “On the Day of the Dark, we will perform the Great Rite to please Lufra, you and I.” He became aware of the pulse drumming in his neck like a battle drum beating a death knell.

  “The Great Rite? What’s that?”

  “It’s the last chance for the Feolin to placate the Goddess. Lufra has a long, long memory.”

  “This is about the rape, isn’t it? The long ago one?”

  “Ay,” snorted Trey. He pressed a folded cloth to the cut over Brin’s eyebrow. “My pox-rotted great-grandsire, remember?”

  The wound stung like a bitch, like a whip wielded by an angry goddess. Brin tweaked the cloth out of the other man’s fingers. “Lufra’s justice was terrible. She took the gift of life from the Feolin. Think of it, Anje, fewer babes year after year until there are none at all, a whole people growing old alone, without children. Think of the silence, the tears, the empty arms.” The words hung in the air, stark with loss and despair.

  “That’s cruel,” Anje whispered.

  “So was the offence.”

  Anje licked her lips. “You said there was a risk?”

  “It was done successfully, many centuries ago.” His guts had solidified into a ball of ice. Gods, she was going to hate him. “But no one’s survived in living memory. Last time, the temple exploded in a fireball. Everyone in it died.” Beside them, Trey made a small, distressed noise. Anje paled.

  Brin released one of her hands to sling an arm around the other man’s shoulders, pulling all that warm muscle against his skin, drawing strength from the contact. He held Anje’s gaze. “We’ll be tortured sexually, stimulated to the point of insanity.”

  Her jaw sagged. “What?” she whispered. “But why?”

  “To force our souls to leave our bodies and mate. If we please Lufra…” He shrugged. “Well, no one knows exactly. But we cannot afford not to please Her. Not if the Feolin race is to continue. Children…” He broke off.

  She didn’t have his skill at shielding. The link flinched away from his mental touch as though he’d struck her with his big fists. His stomach turned over so viciously, he could barely breathe.

  Anje was so pale, the shadows under her eyes showed like bruises. She stiffened, the knobs of her spine rigid under his palm. “You weren’t going to tell me, were you?”

  Heat prickled beneath his beard. “I had to get you to trust me first.” Her level gaze shamed him, but the intensity of his purpose drew him forward, until they were nose to nose. “You have to submit during the Rite, Anje. Not just to me, but to many. Strangers’ hands, strangers’ bodies. You’re a fighter, sweet warrior, but if you struggle for control in this, you’ll kill us both.” He gripped her hands hard and was a little comforted when her fingers curled around his. “And if we die, so does the Feolin race. Slowly.”

  “So that’s why Trey…” She was very, very still.

  “Yes, we’d always planned to fuck you together. Though once he saw you…” He glanced sideways.

  Trey smiled, though his face was full of pain. He stroked Anje’s cheek. “He couldn’t have stopped me, sweetheart, not with a platoon of shamans.” His hand slipped under her hair to clasp her nape, while he flung the other arm around Brin’s neck.

  Anje’s mouth twisted. The link exploded, blew up in a storm of baffled hurt and gut-wrenching fear. Before he could master his instinctive reaction, Brin recoiled, and in that instant, she ripped herself out of their grasp and leaped to her feet. She glared.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” Her eyes shone with unshed tears, even as her hands clenched. “Good enough to fuck, but not good enough to trust.” Words strangled in her throat. “Sweet Mother, if you want to die that bad, you can do it without me!” Spinning on her heel, she hit the door at a dead run. Her light tread echoed in the hall as she ran down the stairs two at a time.

  “Anje!” Brin shot out the door. In sheer desperation, he dropped all his shields and let his naked emotions boil over her in a scalding wave.

  She’d reached the ground floor when it her. Her knees gave out and she staggered, clutching the rickety banister. He was on her like a fellwolf on a bunrat, hauling her up into his arms.

  Trey tried to shoulder him aside.
“Here, give her to me.”

  Brin’s lips drew back in a snarl he was powerless to prevent. “No.”

  “You’re hurting her.”

  “I don’t have a choice. You know I don’t.” But Trey refused to drop his gaze and they glared at each other, breathing hard.

  “Stop it!” Something struck Brin’s upper arm a stinging blow. He looked down. Anje’s fist. “Just—stop it, both of you.” But her whole body trembled.

  Taking his time, he set her on her feet.

  She squeezed her eyes shut and dragged in a breath. When she looked at him again, he nearly cried out. All the life had fled, leaving them flat and empty.

  Her hand slid over his biceps and dropped away. “Your precious goddess is going to kill you. Had you thought of that, mighty shaman?”

  He nodded, hating how helpless he felt. “It’s a risk worth taking.”

  “Tell me why I should help you die, Brin. Give me a reason I can understand.”

  “You have to, scout,” he said heavily. “Lufra’s spoken, curse Her.”

  “Not enough,” she said. “Not nearly enough. Lufra’s nothing to me.”

  “The Feolin will die if you don’t,” put in Trey.

  She shrugged. “Why should I care about them? It’s you I know, you I—” She broke off, her features so rigid she could have passed as a statue of the wrathful goddess.

  Brin tugged at his hair. His temples throbbed and his knee ached like a bitch. Then his eye fell on the door to the street and for a moment, he yearned to leave them standing. Just walk away from the whole fucking mess.

  It was the hope of success that held him there. Shining with faint possibility, it elbowed its way to the front of his mind, insidious, tempting, luring him onto the horns of a hideous dilemma, where all his protective instincts stood up and screamed in protest.

  Looming over Anje, he framed her face in his hands. “I’ll keep you safe, scout. On my life, I swear it.”

  Unimpressed, she tilted her chin. Her eyes weren’t flat anymore. They were glittering chips of amethyst ice. “Really?” she said. “How noble. And if you’re so busy rescuing me who’ll save you?”

  But deep in her soul, the link shuddered and wept, inconsolable as a terrified child. Something snapped inside him. He felt it go. Brin clamped his hands around her shoulders and hauled her to her tiptoes. He thrust his face into hers. “Anje, you fool, don’t you understand? I love you!”

  She put both hands against his chest and shoved. “You’ve got a strange way of showing it, shaman.”

  He couldn’t bear to let her go immediately. Instead, he relaxed his grip a finger at a time and she stepped around him, her face cold and composed. “I’ll find another room.” As the two men turned to watch her go, she walked up the stairs, head held high, and disappeared down the passage.

  Trey took a step as if to follow, but Brin gripped his arm. “Stay.” He’d meant the words as a command, but they came out a plea.

  The younger man scanned his face, feature by feature. Strange, he’d never noticed so many flecks of green in the hazel before. Brin wasn’t aware he’d been holding his breath until Trey stepped into his arms and hugged him, rib-crackingly hard. “She had to be told.” He pressed his lips to the pit of Brin’s throat before drawing back. His breath was warm and moist. “You get started on the packing. I’ll make sure she’s all right.”

  He gave a wry grin. “And now she doesn’t trust you anymore, the torque will keep her closer than ever.”

  Brin grunted, because his throat had closed. Words were beyond him.

  “You won’t die, either of you.” Trey’s lush mouth thinned with determination. “I won’t permit it.” He closed in for another hug, patted Brin briskly on the ass and ran up the stairs.

  Brin stared after him, too weary to feel surprise, too fucking depressed for amusement. Thank all that was for Trey—who never changed, who’d face the wrath of the gods armored with nothing but a cocky grin.

  If only he could believe him.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Feolin—Economy:

  The Feolin economy is essentially agrarian. The citizens are ranchers and herders, though they have a thriving industry in luxury art goods like jewelry and fine fabrics. Settlement is decentralized and so is the economy, with no large market centers. The Feolin have a fiercely independent streak which does not lend itself to over-regulation.

  Excerpt from the Great Encyclopedia, compiled by Miriliel the Burnished.

  It was a mad, miserable ride, the first night tense with the need to avoid Hssrda patrols and get Raidle and Braithie launched on their separate routes to Mother’s Hearth. Once away from The Hollows, the journey became a grim test of endurance for the vranee.

  For Anje, it was sheer torture.

  Each night, she made a point of constructing a small scout’s bower, where she slept in lonely, aching splendor, listening to the quiet rumble of male conversation, feeling like a voyeur, wanting so desperately to see, to touch.

  She despised herself.

  And she wasn’t at all sure she wasn’t going mad. Her head whirled with visions of Brin’s strong body twisting in agony, eaten alive by hungry flames. The tips of her fingers tingled, her palms were clammy. She couldn’t eat, she couldn’t sleep. Sweet Mother, she couldn’t think!

  Brin barely looked at her, the link a solid wall of self-loathing, laced with both guilt and resentment. Trey hardly opened his mouth, a worried crease between his brows.

  By the second night, Anje knew she couldn’t bear to be with the shaman for another second. She’d passed through rage, to hurt, and out the other side to rage again. But then the fear began, and each time she looked at him, it grew blacker, deeper. She thought it was like watching a fine building disintegrate, one strong stone at a time. A fine trembling began in the long bones of her thighs and she couldn’t seem to control it.

  Bitterly, she castigated herself as a coward. True enough, she didn’t want to die, but her greatest terror was reserved for witnessing Brin’s death. Which would be followed shortly thereafter by Trey’s, she had no doubt. Her soul hung in bloody strips. Flayed.

  Holy Mother, she’d been cursed! Cursed with love.

  They loved her. She knew that.

  But they didn’t love her enough to save themselves from the anger of their bitch-goddess.

  She blinked. If she wasn’t there—if they didn’t have Lufra’s Gift… Her lip curled with scorn while her thoughts raced on. They couldn’t do it without her. Could they?

  They wouldn’t die if she wasn’t there.

  It was well after midnight by the time she’d brooded herself to the point where she was utterly drowned in the inner darkness. Driven to action by the sucking depths of her misery, Anje snatched up her pack and scrambled out of her shelter, extending her scout’s senses into the quiet of the night. She shook in earnest now, shudders running through all her limbs.

  She heard nothing save the rustle of leaves tossing in the wind, a small creature scuttling in the undergrowth, the sound of even breathing from the other side of the banked fire. Her pulse thundered, sickeningly loud in her ears.

  With one hand curled tight around the Bond torque, she gritted her teeth and slid into the forest.

  Fifty paces. One hundred.

  The tugging began in her head. She pressed her lips together. She couldn’t watch them die, she simply couldn’t.

  Half a mile.

  The warm liquid running down her chin must be blood from where she’d bitten her lip. Her vision clouded. She staggered, leaned against a tree for a moment and forced her feet forward.

  The link burned, filling her skull with pain. Barely conscious, she stumbled on, a litany pounding in her brain. She wouldn’t watch. She wouldn’t watch.

  A bellow of rage came from behind her, the noise of crashing in the brush. Her eyes nearly shut with pain, Anje moaned, lurching on through the forest.

  Hard hands grasped her shoulders and spun her around. Brin li
fted her clean off her feet and crushed her into his chest. “Anje—don’t—”

  The agony in her head disappeared as though it had never been. It was replaced with the rough warmth of overwhelming concern, threaded through with terrible fear. “You fool! You’re not hurt?”

  She ignored it all, driven by her litany of terror. “Won’t watch,” she mumbled. “Won’t watch you burn. Can’t—”

  Brin let out a huge breath. “Then for Lufra’s sake, help me!” he said, low and hard.

  Anje turned her back and his hands fell away. An instant’s throbbing silence and he faded into the darkness without a word.

  “Anje love?” Trey.

  With a sob, she hurled herself into his arms and hung on, shuddering, while he ran soothing hands up and down her spine.

  In the safety of his embrace, Anje’s world truly began to tilt on its axis. All it took was a single question. Trey kissed the soft skin below her ear and murmured, “What if it was the Children of the Mother who’d offended the Goddess?” Then he led her back to her bower, dazed and wrung-out with emotion.

  She fell into sleep as though it was a deep well, his words ringing in her ears.

  Two days later, Brin turned off the trail and nudged Twink up a long, gentle slope. “There,” he said in a dark rumble, his breath stirring Anje’s hair as she sat stiffly before him, held close in his powerful arms. “Home.”

  They were the first real words he’d spoken to her since the night she’d run.

  Anje gazed in silence, leaning back against the shaman’s massive chest.

  Feolin.

  Flutters beat fiercely in her belly. Her destiny lay somewhere there, in that broad, shallow valley.

  The destruction of everything she’d grown to hold dear.

  And her death.

  Though it was still afternoon, shadows pooled in the distance, a gentle blanket laid over a cultivated landscape. She glanced up. A few rays of light poured from the last sliver of the Sun, penetrating the dimness with shafts of luminescence. As if in answer, a solid cluster of lights twinkled at the far end of the valley. All those households, gathering together around the supper table, the lamps lit, the children—