WINDREAPER

by Charlotte Boyett-Compo

  Teal laid a hand on her shoulder. "That is a memory we try to keep her from thinking about. If Prince Conar had lived, he would never have allowed his nephew to be taken from us." He flinched as the man's sharp, cutting words stabbed at him.

  "If Conar had lived," the Darkwind said in a sharp, cutting tone, "his nephew would not have been born!" His disgusted snort insulted Liza as his gaze swept contemptuously over her. "Conar would have seem to that!"

  "If you came here to insult my wife—" Legion shouted.

  "I came here, King Legion, at your request, at great risk to my life and the lives of my men, to undo a wrong. Give me reason to, A'Lex, and I will leave just as I came!" There was hot steel in the rasping voice.

  "Please!" Liza stood, her hands before her in pleading. "We need your help, Milord Darkwind. It matters little how you feel about me or my husband. I will take all the insults you wish to fling at me if you will only help us get back our son!"

  "Liza!" Legion hissed.

  She turned toward her husband. "I will do anything, Legion, anything, to get Corbin back! Let him insult us all he wants." She looked toward Conar. "You were obviously loyal to Prince Conar and you believe he was betrayed in some way. Is that not true?"

  He directed no words to her. Instead, he hunkered by the dog, scratched her behind the ears, mumbled something, then stood. He turned to Legion and sneered. "I will let you know my decision in the morning."

  He spun on his heel and was about to duck through the secret door when Liza called to him.

  "Whatever you want from us—gold, men, arms, whatever—we will see you get it if you bring our child back to us." Her voice broke; she buried her face in her hands. It galled her to beg this man for anything, for she could feel his hatred of her. He had made it clear he thought her beneath contempt. If he had been a friend, a supporter of Conar's, he had been no friend of hers, she was sure.

  "My lady-wife is expecting our fourth child," Legion said through clenched teeth. "This is upsetting to her." He pulled her into his arms. "You have no right to hurt her."

  A tight laugh, filled with scorn, came from the mask. "I have the right to do whatever I want, A'Lex!" He ducked through the door and was gone before Legion could respond.

  "Do you still see him as a romantic figure destined to save our people from Tohre?" Legion asked her after the men were gone.

  Her throat closed with tears, Liza could only shake her head. Although her husband's hands roamed over her back, soothing her, she felt lost, bereft, and try as hard as she might, she could not shake the feeling that a bit of her light had been extinguished when the Darkwind left the room.

  * * *

  "That was a sorry thing you did," Brelan raged at Conar as they settled down for the night in a hidden room just off the unused dungeon. "You deliberately baited her!" He threw a twig on the brazier and leaned against the wall. "It was uncalled for."

  "Don't question me."

  "You hurt her!"

  "No more than she hurt me," Conar reminded his brother as he flung the mask from his blond hair.

  "I don't understand you. Let the past go; bury it! You will only do more hurt to yourself and others if you keep letting it control what you do." Brelan looked to Roget for support.

  "He's right, Conar," Roget added. "You can't go into battle with your mind divided. That's the quickest way to get yourself killed."

  "I'm dead already."

  "But we have no wish to be," Brelan snapped.

  Roget sat beside Conar. "There are a lot of people counting on you. Without your help, they have no chance of winning this battle with Tohre. An army without a leader is chaos. Is that what you want for your people?"

  Conar stood, his hands clenched at his side. Bombarding emotions started to level him. "What is it you all expect of me?" he shouted. "I am only a man! Flesh and blood and muscle. I am no super being who can breathe life into a dying world! I have feelings, the gods help me! Feelings I had prayed, I had begged, to have destroyed." He plowed his strong fingers through his hair. "I have pain like anyone else." He scanned the dark room. "I need a drink."

  "You can do without it," Roget told him.

  Conar turned to glare. "Then get me a woman!"

  "Why?" Brelan shot back, heedless of how the shout would carry in the stone room. "So you can pretend it's another woman instead of the woman you're riding?"

  Conar felt hurt, shame, regret before setting his face into a hard, sardonic sneer. He turned his back on them, walked to the darkest portion of the room, and slid down the wall, his back pressed tight against the moist rock. Then, he buried his face in his hands.

  Chapter 11

  * * *

  She couldn't sleep. Her restless feet took her downstairs to Legion's study. Opening the door that led into the garden, she wrapped her arms around her and started down the flagstone pathways between the shrubs and trees. She glanced at the fleeting glimmer of moonlight overhead. Dark, boiling clouds were heaving themselves across the heavens. It would rain before morning. She had neglected to put on her slippers and felt dew on her bare feet as she trod over the flagstones.

  She pulled a strand of ghostly weave from the graceful willow and toyed with it. Coming to the end of the pathway, where the wrought iron sea gate stood sentinel to keep at bay the outside world, she leaned her hot forehead against the coolness of the railing. Something tugged at her gown. She glanced down at the bramble bush standing to the left of the gate. She had snagged her silken night dress on a branch, but she didn't care. Her heart was heavy, her mind numb with pain.

  Perhaps it was the sixth sense of insight all women possessed that made her turn, or maybe, in her misery, she had detected the pain of another soul piercing her despair. She wasn't surprised to see a tall shadow leaning against the spreading live oak at the edge of the garden.

  He was still, so still he might have been a statue. She sensed him watching her; the hairs on her arms stirred in warning. The very intensity of that stare, although she could not see his face, served to put her on guard. It unnerved her. She saw his hand raise to his mouth and knew for a certainty he must be drinking something.

  "You take chances, Milord," she told him. The moonlight flashed for a fraction of a second and she saw the midnight black of his clothing. "Are you so good at what you do, you have no fear of being caught?" His silence made her more nervous.

  * * *

  The brandy he had consumed in the last hour had given him a terrific headache. The woman Brelan had brought to him, blindfolded the entire time he mated with her, had not satisfied his restlessness. He had taken a bottle of brandy from the study and brought it into the garden, where he blended in with the shadows.

  His mouth felt encased in wool. His hand trembled as he raised the brandy canister to his lips. Continuing to stare at his Queen, he hoped his silence would make her leave him alone. He wasn't sure he could trust himself not to say something that would give himself away. Being this close to her, alone with her, was an agony that made his insides ache with need.

  * * *

  Liza opened her mouth to speak to him again, but he turned away, preparing to leave the garden. She pushed away from the sea gate, but found her gown securely trapped in the dead brambles of the bush. With an exasperated hiss, she bent to pull the material from the branch. As she did, she yelped with pain when a thorn dug a furrow into the back of her hand.

  She brought her hand to her lips and yanked her leg away from the bush. She felt the material tear, but she was still caught. "Damn it." She was about to reach for the bush again when she felt his breath on her neck. She jumped.

  The moon no longer shining through the curtain of storm clouds, she could not see his face as he bent beside her, but she knew he was minus the mask he had worn earlier. She squinted, wanting to see his face, but only his profile, indistinguishable in the remaining skyglow, was in view. She felt his hands brush the hem of her gown and knew he was removing the fabric from the brambles. She backed up to give him
room.

  "Stand still!" he barked. There was command in his oddly-inflected, raspy voice; authority in the way he knelt beside her on the flagstones.

  "I was only trying to help," she said, hurt that he was being so impossible.

  "I don't need your help."

  He snatched the gown, obviously wanting to free it, but also, she sensed, wanting to free himself from her nearness. He sucked in his breath and cursed the thorns.

  "Did you hurt yourself?" she asked with concern. Her hand automatically went to his shoulder. She was a woman of compassion, could not stand to see others hurt.

  "Get your hands off me!" he hissed, shoving her away.

  She fell sideways toward the bush. He leapt to his feet and caught her before she fell into the thorns. His arms were like steel around her waist when he lifted her away from the bramble, ripping her gown in the process. He mumbled a vulgarity and let go of her as though her touch burned him.

  He moved, fading into the shadows, his back to her just as moonlight broke free of the clouds for a fraction of a moment.

  "Wait, please!" she called, hurrying after him.

  He stiffened, then turned to face her.

  "I need to know if you will help us," she said, her voice thick with pleading. She also heard the fear in her tone, fear of what his answer might be. She stopped close enough to him to hear his ragged breathing and wondered why he was out of breath.

  * * *

  His gaze swept over her with a longing he thought had died. Her voluptuous figure was hidden beneath the billowing fabric of her gown, but he knew how small her waist had once been. He knew how firm the breasts, how silken the flesh along the small of her back. He could smell the lavender perfume wafting toward him on the freshening night breeze and breathed in deeply. It was a scent he associated with this woman alone.

  "I know you said you would tell us your decision in the morning, but I have to know, Milord. Have you decided yet?" Her voice was lilting with the rich accent of Oceania, her birthplace. It was a soft drawl, a mystery of sound. With a slim hand, she pushed back a floating strand of rich black hair.

  His fingers flexed. He remembered all too well what the texture of that silken mass felt like. He could almost feel it running through his fingers, cascading over his naked chest, tickling his lips.

  "Only you can help us, Milord," she whispered, coming closer. "We have no one to turn to. I have faith in your ability to help us."

  He had always loved the color of her eyes. They had drawn him into her very soul at times. He could see himself reflected there and know his life was worthy of this beautiful woman. Now, he could no longer see the shine of love in those green depths, only wariness and fear, timidity that tore at his soul. There was no worth he could see of himself now.

  "What you asked can be arranged." He saw her raise her head in hope. "But what you will pay in return for my help?"

  * * *

  Her lids fluttered as though she had been slapped. "I have told you to name your price. We will see that you get whatever you desire." She wished she hadn't used that word—desire—for she saw him stiffen as though he had been insulted.

  He came toward her, his movements as sleek as a jungle cat. She stumbled away from him, her heart thudding in her chest. Her fear seemed to please him. His face might have been in shadow, but she could see the gleam of his white teeth in the darkness and knew he was smirking.

  He gripped her arm. She tried to pull away, but could not. His callused hand was hard, unrelenting. She cringed as he brought up his other hand and touched her cheek. She felt the warmth on her flesh as his thumb soothed the corner of her mouth. She flinched, unsure of his motive.

  He cocked his head to one side. "Are you afraid of me, Queen Liza?"

  "No, Milord."

  "You should be."

  She drew in her breath. "Why?"

  He gripped her chin in his strong fingers and tugged for emphasis. "Because my price may be higher than you will wish to pay."

  A slight tingle went through her flesh where he touched her. It set off an alarm deep within her that she could not understand.

  "What, no ready answer?" he taunted.

  Trembling violently, wishing he'd release her, she answered. "I will give you whatever you want."

  "Anything?" The voice was low, seductive.

  "Anything within reason."

  There was an amused laugh before he dropped his hands from her. "And if my idea of reasonable differs from yours? Whose bidding will be done, then, Queen Liza?"

  "I don't like playing games!" She started to walk away, but found herself once more in his hard grasp.

  "You are more stupid that I thought, woman, if you think I am playing a game!"

  She wouldn't give him the satisfaction of knowing he was hurting her, although he was likely aware of her pain. She ground her teeth together as she spoke. "Name your price, sir. I have told you I will do anything to have my son returned."

  "And if what I desire is you?"

  "You can't be serious!" She shook violently, her body ice cold.

  "I am quite serious. If you want your precious brat badly enough, that is the price you will have to pay!" With that, he shoved her away from him and turned to go. He stopped when her fingers dug into the fabric of his shirt sleeve.

  "I can't do that!" she pleaded.

  He pried her fingers from his arm. "Then the boy stays where he is."

  "Why would you want such a thing?" She followed after him as he made for the study door. "Please. Please tell me why you want me to degrade myself that way!"

  The Darkwind grabbed her shoulders and ran his hands down her arms until he had captured her wrists in his hands. He slammed against the fieldstone wall, pinned her with his body pressed against hers as intimately as her condition and fabric would allow. He ground his manhood against her. She quivered with terror, which seemed to exhilarate him.

  Jerking up her hands, he held them pinned beside her head. "Why, my Queen?" he taunted, shamelessly moving his lower body against hers. "Because I want you beneath me, Elizabeth McGregor!" He pressed harder against her as she tried to escape, ignored her cry of pain and shame. "Be still, woman!"

  When she tried again to break free, he drove his right knee between her legs. He seemed to rejoice at her cry of humiliation and pressed himself tight between her open thighs.

  "Do as you're told!"

  "Please," she whimpered, her shame as great as any she had ever known. "Please don't call me McGregor. The past hurts too much!"

  "I want you beneath me," he repeated as though he had not heard her. "I want to see your eyes the moment I impale you upon me. I want to hear you cry out with pain the moment my seed enters your whoring, faithless body. I will know the satisfaction of humiliating you, you worthless bitch!" His knee raised until she was lifted from the ground.

  Liza couldn't believe what was happening, that he was saying these horrible things. She was more afraid of him than she had ever been of anything in her life. He was insane! Totally insane! What he was asking of her was tantamount to signing her death warrant, and she knew he realized that. Her heart thundered in her ribcage when she felt the stab of his manhood moving along her thigh.

  "You're hurting me," she sobbed.

  "No more than you have hurt me, slut!"

  She was crying openly now. "What have I ever done to you? Why do you hate me so? Do you blame me for what happened to Conar?"

  He stiffened. His grip loosened.

  "You do, don't you?" She thought she understood. This man had been her dead husband's friend. "You knew him. Were you one of his men? His Elite?"

  "He is dead, Queen Liza!" he spat. "Dead and buried along with the past, and there is nothing, nothing, you can do to bring him back. You can't resurrect him. I won't let you!"

  Liza grew steadily more alarmed. His ranting made no sense. Did he think she could raise Conar from the dead? Did he not know that if she could have, she would have long ago? Her heart skipped a beat.
The man was dangerous. "If you were loyal to him, then you know how it was between me and him. He was my husband; my beloved."

  "He was a fool!"

  "Conar McGregor was the greatest man this world has ever known!"

  "He was a stupid, blind fool!"

  "If you have something against me, I don't care, but don't you dare slander him! I will hear no word against him."

  He flung her away from him. His words were clipped and hateful as he spoke over his shoulder. "Let me know what your decision is tomorrow, Queen Liza."

  She watched him go. Her terror faded with each step he took away from her, but the memory of his hands on her remained.

  * * *

  Legion ran his hand over his salt-and-pepper beard and looked at the dark circles under his wife's green eyes. He glanced at Teal and shook his head. He knew Liza had not slept the night before, had heard her moving about the room. He wanted nothing more than to take her in his arms, to soothe her, to chase away her fears, but he knew she would not permit it. He had learned through the years, there were some things she had to do on her own.

  When the armoire door swung open, Teal and Marsh Eden, Master-at-Arms of Boreas Keep, left the room. Standing guard outside the door, they would assure no one could hear the plans, if plans were to be made, for taking Corbin from the monastery.

  Roget and Bent stood to either side of the armoire, waiting for the Darkwind to enter. Just as they had done the evening before, their hands were on their weapons. Although treachery was likely something they did not anticipate here, to guard the man they loved, they took every precaution.

  When the Darkwind entered, his mask was in place. Only the span of his eyes could be seen within the black scarf. He, too, had his hand on the black dagger strapped to his thigh and he gave off an aura of dispassionate calm, contempt of those gathered. Just as on the previous evening, his stare went unerringly to the Queen.

  Legion could feel the electricity sizzling, snapping like a sentient life-form between the two of them. Instinctively, like the male animal he was, he reached for his mate, his woman, his wife, and drew her toward him, to his side, proclaiming her, branding her, his.