“So, you don’t think we need be concerned that she is a lure for a trap?”
Drake frowned. “I do not trust Artimus as far as I can spit. I don’t think we should dismiss any possibilities. I will turn this in my mind and see if I can think of any possibilities that make sense. Frankly, at this point, it does not.
“I have detected the magic as you did, but it is too weak to concern me. It does not seem to be her magic—which might then explain the allure, but I do not think she is capable of a glamour spell—in fact casting any sort of spell.
“The mark on her hip troubles me. It isn’t impossible that she might be the little princess. I think it doubtful, but not beyond the realms of possibility. She has golden hair and the Belmors were known for it. Why would Artimus claim her as his own, though? He could not have thought to gain anything by that. He must know how universally despised he is and that his spawn would be reviled for that reason alone.”
“Mayhap he thought it would be an added incentive to protect her for him? To inspire fear of retribution?”
“If he thought that,” Drake said dryly, “then he was certainly wrong. It did not prevent the men of the castle from defiling her. There is no innocence in her eyes, poor little morsel. She had suffered much at the hands of her guardian.”
“And will suffer more,” Caelin said pointedly. “You should guard your heart, dragon. Artimus will have her.”
Drake chuckled. “I am a dragon! I have no heart, elf!” Lifting a hand, he summoned Gwyneth. “Sit, child. Are you hungry?”
She blushed, but nodded, and he chuckled again. “Loving vigorously builds the appetite, yes?”
Gwyneth felt her face turn redder, but she smiled at his teasing.
Tearing a piece of meat off of the roasting beef, he waved it around to cool it and finally handed it to her. “What did you see when you and Faine retrieved you gear?”
“Probably much the same as you saw,” Caelin said grimly. “Belmor is still as stirred as an anthill, but it seems clear Gerald intends to move a sizeable army. He has men scouring the countryside for horses and supplies.”
“So—they will be moving soon,” Drake said, lifting his head to study the sky. “It is late to consider moving on today, but we should go at dawn. I believe that I will go up and see what I can see that lies ahead. We need more meat, as well.”
He got up decisively, stripped his clothes off and strode across the clearing, shifting almost mid-stride and taking to the air. Gwyneth watched him with a mixture of awe and uneasiness, reflecting that it was still difficult to wrap her mind around the fact that he wasn’t truly a man.
Caelin was studying her when she glanced back toward the fire. He got up and moved to the pack on the ground not far from the fire. Untying it, he pulled a sword from the bundle and a sharpening stone. Gwyneth studied the sword. It looked like the sort the common soldiers carried and she wondered if he had collected it from the site where Drake had battled the soldiers the night before. Since he settled to sharpen it and clean the rust from it, she decided she was right. She didn’t think that he would leave any sword that belonged to him in such a disgraceful state.
“What do you know of that odd mark on your hip?” he asked abruptly enough that she jumped.
“Nothing,” she responded.
He sent her a look. “You said that it was a birthmark,” he reminded her.
“I can’t see it myself,” she said a little testily. “I’d forgotten it was there, but one of the maids noticed it once. I remember someone remarking on it.”
He lifted his brows. “But not who remarked upon it?”
Gwyneth frowned thoughtfully. “One of the maids,” she reiterated. “I don’t recall who, or even when.”
Caelin studied the sword he was working on frowningly. “No one ever spoke of your sire?”
Gwyneth swallowed a little convulsively. “No one ever spoke of either of my parents.”
“Not even Gerald?”
Gwyneth gaped at him. “He’s the king. I never spoke to him!”
“And you have never heard of the wizard Artimus?”
“I did not say that. I have heard tales of him—very little. People are afraid to speak his name above a whisper, though, and he is not someone they enjoy telling tales of so I have never heard much. I understood that he had been slain.”
Caelin grunted. “Some evil never dies.”
Gwyneth felt her flesh creep, felt the hairs on the back of her neck prickle. “So he is alive?”
“Nay, not in the sense that you think. He is chained—for now—in the underworld.”
“I … don’t understand. How could he be a threat to this world if he is chained there? How could he … do anything in this world from there?”
“More easily than you think,” Caelin said tightly. “He has minions in both worlds—King Gerald for one. There was a time when this realm had a good king.”
Gwyneth stared at him breathlessly. “What happened to him?” she asked when he focused on his sword once again instead of continuing.
“Artimus—and Gerald. I don’t profess to know the entire tale. Ordinarily, we do not concern ourselves with the bickering of mortals. At a guess, Artimus betrayed King John with the intention of setting Gerald up as a puppet king—he was John’s brother, by the bye and Artimus was the royal wizard. Except, Gerald betrayed Artimus. As I said, I don’t profess to know the whole of it. King John succeeded in chaining Artimus—that much I do know—not how he managed it.
“And, unfortunately, it has not stopped Artimus from his machinations. You and I would not be here otherwise.”
“Or Faine or Drake.”
He flicked a hard look at her. “Or Faine or Drake,” he agreed.
Gwyneth considered what he’d told her. “So you and Faine and Drake are his minions?”
His head jerked upwards. He stared at her with such rage that for several moments she thought that he would slay her. “I am no follower of Artimus,” he said finally through gritted teeth. “You may say with truth that I am a slave to his whims, but if you value the life you have left, do not suggest, again, that I willingly do his bidding.”
Gwyneth was still too shaken to move when Faine plodded toward her sometime later and stopped beside the fire. As the last rays of the sun dipped below the horizon, he changed from unicorn to man. He studied her for a moment and finally moved to his pack and extracted his clothes and boots, settling across the fire from her when he’d dressed.
“What, I wonder, did you say to the elf to send him off in such a foul temper, little maid?”
Gwyneth swallowed a little convulsively and looked down at her hands. “If I repeat it, you will be enraged with me, too,” she mumbled.
“I will strive to contain myself,” he said dryly.
She shrugged. “He was telling me that Artimus had minions in both this world and the underworld that did his bidding.”
“Ah! And you concluded that that is what we are because he sent us to fetch you to him?” he said bitterly. “Unfortunately, you are close to right—too close for comfort for either of us—any of us. It is impossible to have dealings with Artimus without becoming tainted by the evil that he exudes. It surrounds him and invades the pores until one feels as if they will choke on it. As it happens, Caelin’s intentions were noble—and Drake’s—they still are. It is what they must do to succeed that twists it, that makes evil of good intentions. Artimus is a master at that.”
Gwyneth studied him curiously. “But not yours?”
“Nay. I came to save my own soul from his foul clutches, only to realize, now, when it is too late that merely by yielding to the vile creature I became what I wanted to escape.”
“I don’t understand.”
He shook his head, staring at the flames. “I am no longer what was mine by birth—what was once as easy to me as breathing—neither pure nor noble of spirit. I thought that Artimus had offered me a way to redeem myself, but in truth it is only the way to descend
to the darkest part of myself. It is a part of me. It was always there. I just did not see it.” He grimaced. “Mayhap it is truer to say that he made me find myself.”
“But … you’re a unicorn.”
“And each day I grow blacker. Soon, I will be as black as sin,” he said, flicking at the shocks of white hair at his temples.
Gwyneth was still confused, but she saw that he was distressed. “I thought you were a handsome creature, the most beautiful thing that I had ever seen.”
He blushed, frowning. “I am black!”
“Caelin’s hair is black and he isn’t evil.”
“It reflects the darkness of my heart!”
“There isn’t any darkness in your heart that I can tell.”
His lips tightened. “Well, you obviously no nothing of the matter,” he said somewhat testily. “I have lust in my heart for you, wench! That is a sign of my loss of nobility!”
Gwyneth blushed. “Do you?” she asked, intrigued.
He stared at her hard for a moment and looked away. “I feel … all the things that men feel! In the beginning it was only when I was forced by the spell he placed upon me to transform into human. Now, I cannot put those things from my mind even when I assume my true form.”
“You feel ignoble because you have bad thoughts?”
“I am base because of the thoughts I have!”
“I don’t believe that. A person cannot help having bad thoughts from time to time. It is acting upon them that makes them bad, not merely thinking about it.”
“I did act upon it! Even when I had pointed out myself that it was an evil thing that Drake had decided to do, I could not refrain from joining them! And it was not even because I wanted to help them. It was only because I lusted.”
Gwyneth thought that over. “Then you were still more noble, because you only acted upon the lust not a willingness to sacrifice an innocent.”
“It was a dastardly thing to do for any reason!”
“Why? You didn’t hurt me. You weren’t trying to hurt me. Men do it all the time.”
“It does not make it right because they do!”
“It doesn’t make it wrong, either—except when they hurt. It’s the nature of the beast.”
“An ignoble beast, man!” Faine said tightly. “I do not want to model myself after them! That is exactly the problem.”
Gwyneth stared at him for a long moment and finally looked away, allowing the subject to drop. Her heart was drumming with hopefulness, however. Faine, of all of them, felt that what they were doing was unacceptable for any reason. Was it at all possible that he might be persuaded to help her, she wondered? Could he help her? Did she have time to try to convince him even if he could?
Chapter Eight
Drake returned with a wildly kicking and screaming horse that was very much alive. If Gwyneth hadn’t been so horrified, she thought she might have laughed at the expressions on both Faine’s and Caelin’s faces.
“By the gods, Drake! What the fuck? A horse? You mean to eat a horse?” Faine demanded, clearly outraged.
“To ride!” Drake roared in his beast voice. “Take the thing, else he will be off again the moment I let him go!”
Faine and Caelin exchanged a glance but finally surged forward to grasp the trailing reins of the stallion. It took both them, using all of their considerable strength and weight to prevent the beast from bolting the moment Drake released him. He bucked wildly, kicking back at Drake as he struggled upward again. By the time Drake had vanished into the night sky once more, however, they had managed to quiet the animal enough to keep all four feet on the ground.
Caelin slipped closer until he could settle one hand on the horse’s face and the other in his mane, speaking to him quietly all the while.
Gwyneth felt so giddy, she couldn’t decide whether she most wanted to weep or laugh. She finally decided that she was so frightened and unsettled by the entire episode that it was hysteria, not amusement that made her feel like doing both.
She could scarcely believe Drake capable of capturing and carrying off such a beast! It was clearly a warhorse, and those were bred for their size and strength and ferocity!
She couldn’t decide why she was so horrified—not the sake of the horse. Not that she would’ve wanted it hurt, but it occurred to her fairly quickly that it was Drake’s battle with the thing that had so unnerved her.
She’d been near hysterical for fear that he would be hurt!
And that Faine or Caelin might be hurt.
It was absurd, she assured herself—especially her fears for Drake—but there was no denying it. From the moment she’d been drawn to search for him in the sky and seen his struggle to keep his hold on the thing and stay aloft, she’d leapt to her feet, clapping her hands over her mouth to keep from screaming.
When Caelin finally managed to calm the beast, she sank weakly to the ground, covered her face and burst into tears. Someone dropped to the ground beside her a few moments later and patted her on the back a little awkwardly. She wept harder at the offer of comfort.
“The beast is none the worse for his flight,” Faine said soothingly. “No doubt it will be a while before he finds his balls again to mount a filly, but he is not hurt.”
Gwyneth choked and uttered a slightly hysterical giggle.
He bent low, tilting his head to try to peer at her face. “Is that more tears? Or a laugh?”
Gwyneth mopped her face off with her skirt and finally lifted her head. “Both, I suppose,” she responded, sniffing.
“Gods! Your face is a mess! All red and puffy.”
Disconcerted, Gwyneth hid her face against her knees.
“You aren’t going to start crying again?” he asked uneasily.
“No,” she said.
“Good, because it won’t stop being red and puffy until you do.”
Gwyneth dropped her hands to her lap and stared at the fire. “It looks that bad?”
He caught her chin and tipped her face up for his inspection in spite of her efforts to elude his grasp. He stared at her for a long moment and swallowed a little convulsively. “It is not nearly ugly enough to suit me,” he murmured, leaning closer and brushing his lips lightly along hers.
Gwyneth’s breath caught in her throat. She stilled, feeling every sense suddenly open and keenly receptive, focused, so that she not only felt the pressure of his lips against hers, she felt the warmth. She felt the faint roughness of his cheek as he rolled it along hers to match lips to lips. She felt the texture of them and the fit against her own mouth. His heated breath stirred the fine down along her upper lip and cheeks, making her face tingle, sending echoes through her that made the flesh of her breasts and her sex contract. It wound its way through her slightly parted lips into her mouth and into her nostrils, giving her just the faintest taste and scent of him, enough to decide she liked both, wanted more.
Her awareness broadened. His nearness and his size gave her a sense of being surrounded and engulfed by him as it measured the breadth of his shoulders, the depth of his chest, the size of his hand. Welcome and anticipation sang through her veins before she had consciously acknowledged that she liked everything her senses had detected.
She sucked in a shaky breath when he lifted his lips from hers after a moment, opening her eyes slowly to meet his gaze. He released a pent up breath and slipped his hand along her jaw, curling his fingers along the back of her head and drawing her close again. “You are far too much temptation,” he murmured raggedly, covering her mouth and kissing her deeply as he dragged her closer, trapped her against him with the hard bands of his arms.
He sank fully into her psyche that time, jolting her senses into a wild scramble to record everything at once and creating chaos. It was no tentative sampling as before, no slow awakening of her senses. His mouth enfolded hers in a blaze of heat. The thrust of his tongue lay conquest to every tender inner surface of her mouth at once. There was ravening hunger in his touch and in his hold on her, a demand for a
ppeasement that her body responded to by yielding at once.
Before she entirely knew what had happened, she felt the ground beneath her and Faine on top of her, felt the pressure of his body digging into hers as he moved against her, the knead of his hand on one breast, at her waist, along her hip as he explored what he could of her through her clothing. Air brushed her legs and then higher as he pushed her skirts upward and for a handful of seconds, she felt a trace of panic as her mind instantly connected with memories far from pleasant.
Even as she felt the hard mass of his erection pressing bruisingly along her thigh, though, he broke the kiss. His harsh pants for breath pelted her with his scent, dragged her back to the present as he began to suck feverishly at her throat and the side of her neck, brushing his face along hers. Moisture flooded her channel as it worked in a feverish anticipation to match his, aching for his possession. He found her already wet for him and it seemed to rip away the last threads of his control. He began to pump his hips to drive into her the moment he found his way. His harsh grunts of effort sent rippling waves of heat through her, stealing her breath, making her drunk with anticipation.
The stark contrast in the need his feverish efforts aroused in her to what she’d felt in very similar circumstances before wasn’t lost on her. It flickered through her mind and left a sense of wonder in its wake and was gone, swallowed by the conflagration that sprang up as she felt her flesh engulf his, felt him claim her channel with agonizing slowness.
He was shaking all over by the time he’d dug into her as far as he could go, seemed too mindless in his quest for several moments even to realize he could go no deeper. For a handful of seconds he continued to strain against the insurmountable obstacle of her womb and then he began to move jerkily, pumping his hips to drag his cock outward along her channel and thrusting in again in frantic haste to reclaim it.
The muscles along her channel contracted, clenching along his length in reaction. She heard him grinding his teeth. A breathless grunt escaped him. “Gods!” he gasped hoarsely. “It feels so good inside of you.”
A Lamentation of Swans Page 10