by T. A. White
Her arms tightened, and she didn’t hesitate. “I’ll remain.” The ‘with you’ was added silently.
Together they waited as the men completed their task, one shovel full of dirt at a time. Finally, the body was buried and Caden, Darius and the other two departed.
Fallon dismounted and approached the grave. He knelt and bent his head, touching the freshly turned dirt before him.
His goodbyes, if he said any, were silent. After a long moment he stood, grief etched in the way he held his body. Shea knew that had it been any but her there in that moment he would have kept even that hidden.
The sorrow made him seem more like a man, with a man’s emotions, instead of the lofty warlord that all held in high esteem.
Shea’s heart hurt for him even as she rejoiced that the danger Cale presented to the Highlands was ended. There were still the maps to consider, but the immediate threat had been eliminated. All that held her tied to the Trateri now were her own attachments.
Fallon mounted and they rode back to camp in silence. Once they reached Fallon’s tent, he helped her dismount before saying, “There should be a bath ready for you inside. I have a few things to take care of before I join you for the night.”
He was gone before Shea could respond. She was left addressing thin air as he walked away.
She shut her mouth with a click and glanced at the two men standing guard on either side of the entrance.
Back to reality.
Shea sighed and headed inside. The inevitable confrontation she knew was coming would be easier once she was clean and fed.
The warm water beckoned. Shea stripped.
She caught her breath as her arm twinged when she tried to raise it above her head, the skin pulling uncomfortably. It was painful getting her shirt off and the same with her pants.
Only when she was standing naked in front of the tub full of warm water, steam wafting off it, did she realize there was a problem. There was no way she could submerge her arm and leg. Not with the depth of the cuts. The one on her arm would probably be fine. It was shallow enough that it would sting like acid was being poured into it, but the wound on her leg was deep and would probably need stitches.
She settled for stepping inside and scooping the water up to let it slide down her skin. Grabbing a sponge lying next to the tub on a stool, she soaped it up and then lathered it on, wiping away the dirt and blood before rinsing it off.
Once clean, she grabbed one of the fluffy white towels that had been left on another stool and dried off before dressing again.
Fallon walked in just as she was sitting down to eat the food that had been laid out for them. She paused in the act of filling her plate.
He came directly to her, advancing into her space and leaning down. He cupped her head in one hand, threading his fingers in her hair, bending her face back and taking her lips in a kiss that set flame to her senses.
He poured all of the stress, heartache and fury of the past day into that kiss until it fairly singed her lips.
Her hands dropped what they were holding and came up to grab his shirt and pull him down hard, meeting his intensity with her own.
The kiss built and built until the firestorm of passion boiled over and they were clutching at each other. He picked her up and set her on the table, stepping forward and parting her legs with his hips. Almost feverishly he grasped her shirt and eased it over her head, being careful of her wound. She let him, before doing the same to his.
Her pants followed and suddenly his lips were trailing down her neck to pause and nip at the skin on her breasts. They continued their journey, pausing to explore the dip of her stomach until finding their destination at her center.
She cried out and arched as he settled down to play, licking and nipping with a single minded purpose.
“Fallon, please,” she begged.
He ignored her, sucking hard. Just as her body clenched preparing for the avalanche of a climax, he stood, taking away the sensation and leaving her panting with need.
“Damn it,” she swore.
He chuckled and pulled her up, sealing her lips with his. She could taste herself on him before he cupped her bottom and guided his cock to her entrance.
Slowly, unbearably slowly, he sank in. Shea dug her nails into his back and tried to urge him faster.
He grabbed her arms, being careful of her wound. “I set the pace. Not you.”
“You’re going to kill me,” she told him.
The change in pace from fast and urgent to slow and unhurried was driving her mad.
“What a sweet death it would be,” he teased.
She gave a small scream and struggled to move, trying to fuck herself on him. He pinned her, tilting her back and making it impossible to move without risking falling.
She stilled and looked up at him. He looked back, tenderly, fiercely, with just a hint of wicked playfulness behind it all.
He was enjoying this. He was enjoying sending her into a frothing fury of need. The bastard.
Only when he was sure she knew just who was master in this moment, did he begin to move. At first slow thrusts that had her gasping for air. After only a couple, he adjusted his angle until he began bumping a spot inside her that sent every muscle in her body clenching with need.
Her orgasm built quickly as he repeated the thrust, sending her higher and higher. The walls of her clamping down tight until finally, finally he shoved her off the cliff into a mind melding, dizzying climax.
She moaned as her body clenched around his and sparks of pleasure raced up and down her nerve endings. With a low groan he followed her.
When it was over and they were both panting, he released her hands and lowered her fully onto the table, coming down to kneel in front of her and resting his head on her stomach. Shea touched his hair, running her fingers through it as they caught their breath.
She stared up at the canvas, her mind lost in itself, thinking of nothing in particular.
“When Cale made his accusation against you, before my man gave me the maps, you thought I believed him,” Fallon finally broke the silence.
It was unexpected after what they just shared. Enough so that Shea stiffened and would have sat up if his arms hadn’t suddenly tightened around her waist.
She forced herself to relax.
“I thought it was a possibility,” she admitted. “He was your brother. It would have been natural to believe him over a woman you haven’t known for very long.”
He lifted his head, peering at her disbelievingly. “You will have to get over this habit of believing the worst of me and all those around you. It is insulting and unbecoming.”
“What?” she sputtered. “It’s happened before. People naturally side with their own.”
“You are one of us now. Constantly assuming we’re going to betray you belittles us and doesn’t say very good things about you either.”
Shea lapsed into angry silence. She tried to ignore the soothing patterns he was drawing on her skin. He was not going to take the sting out his words so easily.
“What will you do with the maps Cale deciphered?” she asked.
“That’s it. You’re not going to discuss this anymore?”
She shrugged. “What is there to discuss? We are not going to agree on this subject. Might as well discuss something that has merit.”
He blew sharply on her belly, sending pleasure skittering up her front. She wasn’t happy with the way her body seemed to roll over for him so easily.
“Shea, I have already told you that you are my Tolroi. That is something I have never offered to any other. I’ve never even considered it. I would not choose another over you.”
Shea fought the softening in her heart.
He bit her lightly. “Ack, woman, you are stubborn. More so than any I have ever met. Why can’t you see the effect you have on those around you? Your men love you. Even Darius and Caden, my own advisors, respect you. Only you persist in keeping everyone at a distance.”
&
nbsp; Her eyes met his.
He stood and leaned over her, brushing her hair back from her face. “Perhaps this is one of those lessons that can only be learned with time.” He dropped a light kiss on her lips. “I will enjoy teaching it to you until it is one that has been engraved in your heart.”
Shea touched his face gently and ran her thumb along his cheekbone. She wanted to believe him, but didn’t know if she could. A few months wasn’t enough time to undo a lifetime of being on guard.
“Perhaps we can start the first lesson with your maps.” Naked as the day he was born and not modest about it either, he picked up his pants and withdrew the re-creations Cale had made and the originals Shea had left behind. “My men found the originals in one of the apprentice cartographer’s belongings. These should be all of them.”
Shea sat up. Now that he had them, what would he do?
What would she do? She didn’t know if she could stand by if he invaded her homeland, intent on the weapons her people hid. She didn’t know if she could stop him if he did.
This emotion she felt for him. This fragile stirring of love could be crushed if handled wrong.
To her complete shock, he held out both sets to her.
She took them slowly, not quite believing it.
“Do with them what you will,” he told her. “Keep them or burn them. I don’t care. I can’t promise I will never turn my attention to the Highlands, especially if they present a threat to what I am building here. But for now, I need to address the problems in my ranks and focus on strengthening the Lowlands.” He shot her a wicked grin, appearing in that moment carefree and ten years younger. “Besides I have a Tolroi to keep satisfied, and I think such an endeavor will take many, many nights and my entire focus to accomplish.”
She stood and walked to the brazier, holding the pieces in the flame until they caught fire. When they had been reduced to ash, she shot him a coy look. “I wouldn’t be surprised if you’re right about that.”
Discover More by T.A. White
Dragon-Ridden
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About The Author
Writing is my first love. Even before I could read or put coherent sentences down on paper, I would beg the older kids to team up with me for the purpose of crafting ghost stories to share with our friends. This first writing partnership came to a tragic end when my coauthor decided to quit a day later, and I threw my cookies at her head. Today, I stick with solo writing, telling the stories that would otherwise keep me up at night.
Most days (and nights) are spent feeding my tea addiction while defending the computer keyboard from my feline companion, Loki, who would like to try her paw at typing.
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Excerpt for Dragon-Ridden
A woman with no memory. A tattoo with a mind of its own.
Tate leads a life full of secrets. Having dragon tattoo that moves when nobody is looking and no memory of her past makes things challenging. When a momentary impulse leads Tate to return a hairpin to its owner, it sparks a chain of events that soon affects Tate's survival. Now with several people convinced that she holds the key to unimaginable power, Tate’s about to learn how a single action can have unintended consequences.
With no allies to watch her back, Tate’s going to have to move fast if she wants to survive in the city of Aurelia, where people are never who they seem. She’ll find that monsters walk the labyrinth beneath Aurelia’s streets where the secrets to Tate’s past rest. Unlocking her hidden memories might just be the only thing keeping Tate alive and preventing the coming war.
Prologue
It was cold. So cold. The kind that sunk below the skin and dove straight for the bone. So deep she couldn’t even shiver. There was no sense of self or place, just a vast dark nothingness. The silence was so loud it practically screamed.
Ages passed, each moment the same as before. In time, the tiny existence floating through the emptiness became aware of a second presence. It curled itself around her like a shield— unyielding. And silent. Sometimes she’d rail against its silence begging for a word, a feeling, anything. Through it all, the presence was a beacon of light that drew her like a moth to the flame. Sometimes it felt as if that light was simply a shadow on her mind, created to keep her company as the long years passed. Real or not, she watched its glow with the hunger of a woman starved for thousands of years.
She couldn’t tell you her name, what she was, or how she came to be. Her world revolved around that beacon of light. It was a hypnotic and soothing distraction that flickered and danced in the darkness just for her.
Time passed.
Pain ignited along her nerve endings. Startling, after an eternity of nothingness. The ground reeled beneath her as she shivered and convulsed. She prayed for the pain to end. An odd sort of keening began, assaulting ears used to silence. And then there was the thumping beat that was felt more than heard.
Her chest rose and fell. The keening developed into a pattern, one that started and stopped in time to her chests’ movements. The floor beneath her felt hard and unwelcoming. She shrank from it, rejecting the alien sensation. Something stirred against her skin, a gentle kiss of sensation. Air, her mind supplied, it was air.
Her nerve endings were alive with sensation and spots danced across her closed eyelids. Her eyes opened slowly and blinked rapidly against the encroaching light. She held up a hand against the assault. Unable to see anything but a blur, she closed her eyes seeking the relief of the previous dark. But the light was too much. It followed her. Even with her eyes closed, it sunk below the lids and seared her retinas.
Gradually, though, her eyes adjusted, and she stared curiously at the room she occupied. She was lying at the bottom of a glass cylinder, one big enough to accommodate her curled up body. Her knees were pulled to her chest, her arms hugging them close as she hid her face against her knees.
On weak arms she pushed herself upright and propped herself against the glass. The pants and thin shirt she wore did nothing to provide warmth.
What was her name? She couldn’t remember. She was a somebody. Surely. Her mind grasped desperately at a word that might define her. After eons locked inside the emptiness, her mind was slow to provide her information.
Name, she thought. Name. Name. Name.
And then, slowly, a word drifted up from the recesses of her mind. It was a short word, but it was hers nonetheless. Tate, her name was Tate.
Chapter One
The breeze caressed Tate’s face and arms, teasing several copper colored strands from its tight braid as she leaned against the ship’s railing. It brought with it the salty smell of the ocean, a smell she’d become familiar with over the last eight months she’d spent aboard the Marauder. It was a comforting smell, one that invoked memories of being rocked to sleep by the waves and sharing meals with friends.
She rubbed a finger over the weathered wood of the railing and folded her arms over it. It was time to make a decision. She grimaced and plopped her chin onto her folded arms. She’d spent the last week lying awake at night, unable to sleep as she went over every detail of her plan. Even now she didn’t know if she had the courage to leave the ship at the next port or if she would choose the familiar and stay.
“What do you think?” a voice said to her right.
Guilt made Tate jumpy, and she tightened her grip on the rail as she straightened, not wanting her companion to know where her thoughts had strayed. Instead she made a noncommittal sound and hoped he’d move along.
“When I first saw the jewel of the Aurelian Empire, I was in awe,” he said about the city, resting tanned forearms beside hers on
the rail. His tall figure dwarfed her considerably smaller one. Standing straight, she still only came up to his shoulder. “It took a while for me to see that it wasn’t so different from other cities. There’re still murders, double dealings and, luckily for me, work for men intent on skulking about.”
“Is that so?” Tate said, keeping her attention on the city coming into view.
The captain was right; it was a magnificent view. The sun was just coming up and dawn gently cradled the city in its arms, setting it alight with orange and pinks. A slim peninsula embraced one side of the harbor forming a half crescent moon that was mirrored on the other side by high cliffs. It allowed a strip of open water that ships could pass through before deepening into the wide pool that formed the harbor. On one side a tower stood sentry. Its purpose was to house the massive chain that was strung across the harbor in times of siege and would protect the city from a sea invasion. Framed by the tower and cliffs the city sprawled in a maze of buildings and streets. A palace with its majestic towers and gleaming windows, sat atop cliffs formed from a black rock that sparkled brilliantly in the sunlight. It was an architectural wonder, the crowning piece of the city, and people came from all over the empire to see it.
“First time in Aurelia?” he asked lightly.
She kept her sigh to herself. It figured that he’d want to chat right then. He hadn’t had much of a presence on deck for the last few weeks, instead choosing to remain in his cabin and plan the next job. Now when she was thinking mutinous thoughts, he popped up like a bad luck charm. And leaving the ship would mean mutiny in his eyes. Since she hadn’t exactly volunteered to get on his ship in the first place, she saw her departure more as a continuation of her life’s journey. He, on the other hand, would see it as a revolt. It wasn’t that she wanted to leave, quite the opposite in fact. She loved the freedom of being on the open seas and seeing the world one country’s port at a time. But it had been made abundantly clear to her over the last few months that there was only so much weirdness a crew could take, especially from a female. When members of the crew cornered her in her bunk and told her to leave or else, Tate had gotten the message. Being a female on an all-male crew was difficult enough. Add odd things happening when she was around and the situation was impossible. She’d considered telling the captain. He might have even come to her rescue, but she knew that his involvement would only turn the rest of the men against her.