Yet that niggling sense of wrongness deepened.
“Oh, that’s right,” she breathed into his mouth, hips undulating against him. “You want me on my knees before you, don’t you, Vengeance? Licking and sucking your man-root, over and over, working you with my lips and tongue until you buck and moan with the pleasure of it...”
The image seared through him, his cock so full he felt like bursting, spilling his seed into his codpiece like a boy with his first erotic dream. Grimly he fought with it, swift-rising lust set against deepening confusion.
Not right, this isn’t bloody right! I don’t want her like this...
Her suggestive little tongue darted deep in his mouth, stroked and tasted hungrily. One knowing hand slipped his codpiece aside and dipped beneath it. Eager fingers closed around his hardened shaft and began working him, swift and skillful as any whore—
“Stop.” Rougher than he’d meant, Beltran pushed her hand away. “What’s happening here?”
Lips cherry-red from kissing, flushed and heavy-lidded with passion, Rhiannon smiled.
“What’s happening,” she said throatily, in that other voice, “is that a princess of Faerie is fucking one of the Christian God’s premier angels—he who watches over thunder and terror and guards the gates of hell with his fiery sword, pitiless as any demon. Is this what He wanted for you, Uriel?”
Beltran felt the ground dissolve beneath him. The world shifted and blurred around him. He thrust free from her and staggered back, winded as though from a blow to the belly. The name she’d spoken was echoing through his skull like the tolling of a great bell, like the blast of trumpets—familiar as his own skin, and not merely because he knew his Scripture.
Uriel was the Angel of Vengeance, known as the Flame of God, one of four archangels in the Holy Book who were closest to God. But why under Heaven should the woman apply that name to Beltran...?
He fell to hands and knees, the earth quaking beneath him. The skin of his back was burning, the cloth of his shirt and doublet splitting wide and falling in shreds around him. For the first time in his mortal memory, unhidden by the bright blaze of holy madness that had protected his conscious mind from the knowledge and thus preserved his sanity, the Presence born to flesh as Lord Beltran Nemesto unfurled the mighty span of his wings. With a single powerful beat, he soared aloft.
Rhiannon le Fay stood beneath the tree, surrounded by blood-red apples, no longer laughing as she stared up at him, bathed in the dazzling light of his transformation.
“Nay, Vengeance,” she murmured, low and thrumming with power, “this is my world. I am the only Deity here.”
Uriel threw back his head and roared. “The only God is—”
“Nay.” The world of blazing fall foliage and crumbling gray castle dissolved around him. “Do not remember.”
Then Uriel was falling through flame-streaked darkness, endless and terrifying as the plummet from grace that had plunged him into this mortal body a lifetime ago. He had fallen before, fallen and then forgotten, fallen like a flaming comet from divinity into the womb of a Yorkshire whore bearing the fragile spark of life.
Now the witchcraft of a woman’s curse was erasing that memory anew, drawing the curtain of oblivion before his eyes.
In an explosion of feathers his wings disintegrated, leaving him flightless and forgotten once more.
Chapter Seven
Slowly Rhiannon returned to her senses, the green English spring coalescing around her. Beltran’s strong arms surrounded her. Gratefully she clung to his powerful shoulders, her face wet with tears, dizzy with the speed of hurtling from illusion into reality in Morrigan’s reckless grip.
Only heartbeats had passed in mortal time. Her lips were still moist and tingling from his kiss. Dear Lady, the way he’d kissed her! Through the thin sarcenet, her nipples brushed his chest. Tendrils of pleasure snaked through her, making her woman’s channel run with honey.
Arousal. This is what makes the troubadours sing. To think she’d lived a thousand years and never felt it, never guessed what she was missing. She sighed and nestled against his hard body.
“Damn it, Rhiannon,” Beltran growled, thrusting her away. His abruptness made her stumble. If he hadn’t gripped her shoulders, she would have fallen. “What are you trying to do to me?”
She raised her face and smiled at him through the tears. “I might ask thee the same, Lord Beltran Nemesto.”
His eyes blazed cobalt in his chiseled features as he scowled down at her, a muscle flexing in his jaw. Against his sinewed bronze throat, a pulse beat hard and fast.
Well, no wonder he was unsettled. Morrigan’s illusions would unsettle anyone. Lord and Lady knew what tapestry of harrowing images her sister must have woven, unspooling the thread from his deepest soul.
“Goddess be praised, Beltran! Thou art whole and well—”
“Don’t speak to me of your pagan Goddess and her wanton ways.” Abruptly he released her, as though he couldn’t bear soiling his hands with her. “How many men have you lured into your bed with your tricks? Your hands, your tongue, your obscene little whispers?”
“I...” Stunned by his sudden wrath, the air of violence barely leashed, Rhiannon dashed a hand across her wet face and struggled to collect herself. “If I’ve wronged thee in some manner or caused some offense, I crave thy pardon. I—I’ve never been—”
His nostrils flared. “You were ready to couple with me right here in broad daylight, Rhiannon. Do you seek to destroy my reputation, so the Church will question my judgment?”
“Why...destroy thy reputation? That is a right dishonorable notion. I vow it never crossed my mind!” Beneath his accusations and his inexplicable anger, a tide of mounting indignation swept through her, obliterating the tingling desire his mouth and hands had roused.
She’d done nothing wrong, as usual. But as usual, he bullied and threatened and accused her of all manner of crimes!
Despite her rising temper, she struggled to see his side of it. “Beltran, what befell thee? My sister Morrigan—”
“Silence!” One hand slashed through the air, the seal of Justice flashing in the sunlight. Again he was the Inquisitor, the stern-voiced enforcer, heartless and devoid of mercy.
She fought down a rising sense of hopelessness and tried again. “Beltran, if thou would only listen—”
“Nay. I’ll listen to no more of your lies and witchery.”
“My lies?” Outrage crackled through her, burning away the last of her patience. “I’ll have thee know I’ve never in my life soiled my tongue with a falsehood! I’m the daughter of the Dreaming King.”
“You’re the daughter of Lucifer,” he muttered, scrubbing a hard hand over his face. Briefly he peered at the green hedges around them, the mass of snowdrops blooming at her feet. A cloud of confusion dimmed his piercing gaze.
He shook his head, as though to clear his thoughts. “There’s something you said...I’m not recalling. God’s Blood, I feel half-bewitched!”
His holy oath made her stagger beneath a surge of weakness—a skipped heartbeat, a breathless moment, the brief dizzying pitch of earth beneath her.
But she’d spoken that Name herself, hadn’t she, to banish Morrigan and shatter her enchantment? She’d done it by instinct, given her mortal blood free rein, cried words no proper Faerie could bear to utter. Now, through the fog of illusion, her sister’s odd prophecy seeped in
to memory.
If you sacrifice your maidenhood to couple with a mortal man, you’ll become one of them forever.
Red is for heartbreak.
Of course, her sister could have lied. Morrigan was always capable of that. But she’d called it a prophecy, and those were Goddess-sent. Her sister was a priestess, among other less savory vocations, and surely would not defile a holy vision by lying about it. When she spoke of divinity at least, Morrigan would have spoken truly.
A clammy tide of fear rolled through her. With new eyes, she watched Beltran’s restless pacing. He could do it, she knew, after that searing kiss. He could seduce her into his bed. He could make her burn for him, until she flung caution to the wind and risked everything—her mother’s life, her mission, her painful hope for acceptance, even her immortality. Until she’d dare anything to feel his hard hands on her body and drink the spiced wine of his kisses, setting her drunk with passion.
What was it Morrigan had crooned? You’ll let him peel those stiff garments from you, caress you and suckle you until you pulse for him, stroke and fondle your little pearl until he makes you whimper and beg him to slide that great throbbing man-root of his between your thighs...
Even now, the image made her woman’s place ache with longing. Oh, she wanted him there, she burned for him there. But not enough, not nearly enough to risk losing her immortality and becoming that thing the Fae despised.
Mortal.
In midstride Beltran halted, tawny head lifting, caution invading his features. She heard it too—the snatch of mortal voices carried on the wind. Sir Henry Bedingfield’s elegant drawl, Elizabeth Tudor’s crisp voice crackling with Faerie magick. Their arrival would mean rescue from this humiliating interview and Beltran’s wrathful presence.
Do I require rescue from this narrow-minded mortal? Her chin tilted proudly.
Snared by her movement, his keen gaze fixed her—so clearly attuned to her nearness, his nerves strung tight with it, just as she was attuned to him.
Rhiannon gathered her wits and dipped him a stiff curtsey.
“If I’m the daughter of Lucifer, the Father of Lies, as I am now named,” she said coolly, “thou should be more than pleased to be quit of me. I’ll relieve thee of my vexing presence, unless that too is forbidden me.”
His jaw knotted. “Damnation, Rhiannon. I know I spoke harshly—”
“As always!” she said lightly. “Why apologize? Passing judgment comes natural as breathing to you. Have I your leave to withdraw?”
“You’re the most maddening woman I’ve ever met,” he muttered. “Withdraw then, if it please you, and stay out of trouble. I’ll send a tray to your chamber.”
“While you feast?” she said pointedly. “I believe Lady Elizabeth mentioned a masque. No doubt I may enjoy the music through the walls.”
“Oh, for the love of Heaven!” he snorted. “I’ll do no feasting this night, believe me. My sins call for Vespers and a vigil—and penance.”
* * *
Pale moonlight spilled through the row of windows across the long gallery of Hatfield House. The light gleamed pearlescent on the watchful faces painted on canvas, mortal art, stiff and unnatural, figures unsmiling and surrounded by symbols of mortal power.
Pensively Rhiannon roamed the gallery, the gay lilt of a galliard floating upward from the banquet hall below. Head tilted, she paused to study another splendid canvas—monstrous and bloated, the ruin of a man glittering with jewels and brocade, sturdy legs braced as though he meant to claim the whole world. Lifting her candle, she peered at the title scrolled across the frame.
Ah, this was Elizabeth’s father, the magnificent Henry. Linnet had spoken of him. The king who slaughtered his own queens when he tired of them, like cattle too old for breeding. The mad king whose own gluttony had driven him to his grave.
Now, eyeing his prim little mouth and the slab of a face quivering above his jeweled collar, Rhiannon shivered. Clearly, whatever Faerie blood coursed through Elizabeth’s veins hadn’t come from him. Her mother must have carried it, the bewitching Anne Boleyn, but Rhiannon knew better than to seek that doomed lady’s image among these hallowed ranks.
In her precarious situation, Elizabeth would do nothing to remind her furious sister of the mother who’d borne her. That upstart Protestant with her dazzling wit and her flashing temper who’d done all within her power to see Catholic Mary and her ailing mother destroyed.
Such heedless passions these mortals had! Such stormy hearts, such violent impulse that flung them into disastrous affairs and wars that spanned continents with a speed and frenzy the Fae—lost in the slow drift of time—could never hope to match.
Beltran himself had been heedless that day, the fortress of his rigid discipline cracking at last. She understood he was spending the night on his knees, doing penance for whatever sins he fancied he’d committed.
If she lived among mortals a thousand years, she would never understand them, or the harsh dictates of their vengeful and pitiless God.
Yet the man called Vengeance was not always vengeful. She’d seen his compassion toward the dying bandit he’d comforted, seen him show empathy and deference to her touchy royal pride when he sliced her bonds and presented her to Hatfield as a noblewoman rather than an ignoble captive. Even after that fiasco in the garden, he’d left her at liberty, trusting her sworn oath to hold her.
The Church might demand ruthlessness from its enforcer, but she knew he was capable of more.
Again she wondered what Morrigan had shown him. Better to wait until he calmed, sometime on the road tomorrow, before she asked. For certain, she dared not venture to the consecrated ground where he kept his vigil—terrain the Fair Folk could never bear to tread.
Sighing, Rhiannon resumed her prowl through the gallery. Tendrils of crisp night air raised gooseflesh beneath her gown and set her shivering.
The scuff of a footfall stopped her in her tracks, heart rearing and racing like a runaway horse. Her mouth dried to dust. If Morrigan descended upon her here, wrathful as any Christian demon from banishment, after hearing the Christian God invoked full in her face...
Clammy with fear, Rhiannon lifted her candle. But the tiny circle of light did nothing to lift the thick darkness surrounding her. Senses honed by a lifetime among the swift-footed forest creatures, she could hear someone breathing in the darkness.
“Who is there?” She assumed her most imperious tone and pitched her voice to carry. If men came running, she’d feel foolish, but at least she’d be safe. “Show thyself!”
“Oh, hush, dearie!” someone hissed. “D’you want to bring half the castle down on our heads? Put out that candle, if ye please.”
Not a chance of it. Stubbornly she held it higher. “I am unaccustomed to disobedience. Show thyself, I say!”
Her unseen visitant uttered a snort. “You’re handy as my mistress hurling commands hither and yon, milady. Maybe she should’ve come herself.”
A stout woman of middle years pushed into the light, round face plain and homely beneath her English hood, her gown of gray damask somber but fine. No servant this, nor any fine court lady.
“Thou art from Elizabeth?” Rhiannon searched the shadows. “And alone?�
�
“Aye and aye.” The woman smiled, brown eyes creasing. “Be a love and douse that light, dearie, unless ye want to bring Sir Henry down on our heads.”
Still Rhiannon hesitated, using ears and nose and eyes to search for treachery, but somehow she couldn’t fear this motherly figure. She blew out the tiny flame, and the velvet night enveloped them.
“There’s a good girl.” A work-worn hand clasped hers. “Come along now.”
“Who art thou?” Curious, Rhiannon followed her through a little door set in the oak-paneled wall.
“Oh, I’m Kat Ashley—Lady Elizabeth’s governess. Just mind yer footing ’round this bend. This stair hasn’t been repaired since before the Great Harry—milady’s father. One of these days I’m afraid I’ll tread wrong and go plunging through to the cellar.”
Despite the peculiar circumstances, Rhiannon warmed to the spirit of mischief she’d seen twinkling from Kat Ashley’s dancing eyes. “Mistress Kat, is it? I thought thee detained over this Dudley business.”
“Oh, that. They’ve not enough to hold me. Sir William Paget will need to rise early to get the better of an Ashley, and that you may tie to.”
“Thou art a redoubtable woman,” Rhiannon murmured, unable to repress a smile.
Kat Ashley halted before a door, barely visible in the darkness. The cold breath of outdoors fluttered her skirts around her ankles.
“Quiet now if ye please, dearie. We’ll need to step quick past Sir Henry’s watchdog, in case that little something I slipped into his ale hasn’t done the trick.”
This nocturnal odyssey had acquired the feel of a forbidden adventure. Beltran would certainly disapprove, but she hadn’t sworn not to walk the grounds. Besides, she was in no mood after his harsh words to pay any heed to Beltran’s preferences.
Daughter to the Father of Lies indeed!
Magick by Moonrise Page 11