A Restless Knight (Dragons of Challon Book 1)

by Deborah MacGillivray

  Her mouth compressed in censure. “Stories carried afar by silly nodcock bards before fireside, willing to say aught for coin.”

  “Tales provide a diverting way to pass long dark nights. They say winter nights are near endless in this heathen land, so one would need diversions.”

  “Heathen? Oh, aye. Here the Auld Ones whisper e’er so softly from shadow and mist.”

  Her gold eyes took on a feline cast, sending a shiver up Julian’s spine though he pretended to ignore the reaction. Little triggered fear in Julian Challon. No female―even if she possessed eyes of a cat―would do so either. “Then, a cowardly lot they be, forsaking their children in their dark hour...same as Arthur sleeps undisturbed in a cave near Alderley Edge. No supernatural being, be it blue meagre hag or swart faery, no divine intervention from On-High changes our fates, my fool.”

  “Not even your Christian One True God?”

  He exhaled, exhausted. “Not Him especial. He must be a warrior-god, if He takes a role a’tall.”

  The woman batted her eyes, clearly witnessing the change that must show on his countenance, a reflection of his bone deep fatigue, a weariness of the mind as much as of the flesh. Characteristics of a man, not a legend. That seemed to startle her.

  “Must I continue to address you by that silly appellation?” he inquired. “Since we have shared thoughts on many things, shall you not tell me your name?”

  “Why should you care? Am I not just part of Glenrogha you seek to take and to hold?” She trembled, despite the outward attempt at defiance.

  To take and to hold. Yes, Julian would love to do those things to her and more. So much more. He would bury himself so deep in her woman’s warmth that she might dispel the unyielding cold plaguing his warrior’s soul.

  He would lie upon a sunny hill with this fey lass, feel the kiss of the summer sun as he lazily stroked her luscious body. Listen to the serenades of sea gulls, peewits and whelping curlews. Watch his growing children chase butterflies and kittens. Simplistic tableaux of life, oft thought of little consequence to a veteran knight, now filled his being with a gnawing insatiable hunger.

  Julian wished for a home. He desired a wife and children...a son. He longed to sit by fireside whilst his arms surrounded his woman, as she leaned back against his chest. He wanted—no needed—peace.

  And in those tranquil visions, Julian saw himself holding the woman staring at him with ancient amber eyes. He blinked several times, disturbed how vividly he saw this.

  His mental malaise was staggering. He ate due to his body sickened without nourishment, not because of hunger. Food tasted like wormwood. He slept what few tormented hours he could for night fell, and there was little else to soothe his endless restlessness.

  His lust demanded periodic release—just another physical function, bringing only fleeting gratification. Hasty, dispassionate couplings that left him empty. Hot throes of green youth no longer ruled, barely more than faint remembrances, and dimmed with each year’s passing. Ofttimes, Julian wished to close his eyes and never wake up.

  So much of his life, his soul, had been forfeit for niggardly gain, less now he had drawn Edward’s enmity. This pocket of the Highlands might be pagan, untamed. Even so, the moody, near forgotten valley would be his last bastion. If Julian found no peace here, some important part of him would be forevermore lost, leaving in its wake naught but the cruel, hard-bitten warrior. A man who witnessed scores of battles, endless scorched villages, and far too many men staring up at him with cold, sightless eyes.

  Edward had been right to send him away. The Black Dragon needed to slip into the mists of these Scottish hills, lick his wounds and hopefully heal. Find something in life worth living for. A reason to go on.

  When she remained mute, refusing to reveal her name, Julian rose to his feet. “Then, my fool, the pallet of furs be at your pleasure. There are tasks I needs must sort out.”

  “Such as building siege-engines?”

  Her eyes signaled bravado and resentment—a bad mix. Despite that, hidden in the gold depths were emotions calling to him with a witch’s elemental craft. Emotions too new for him to name, feelings as ancient and enduring as these purple hills.

  Almost echoes from voices of the past.

  Shoving these queer, possessing notions aside, he straightened his spine and raised his chin in a condescending tilt. “Hardly, my fool. Glenrogha’s defenses are feeble. The force so ill-trained, and half gutted since the Earl Hadrian, rallied both clans to his banner. I foresee no need for a waste of time and scarce timber. Matters should be settled anon.”

  She jolted. “Meaning?”

  “By lightbreak my host shall enter the dun—with or without Tamlyn MacShane’s consent.”

  “That you will never get.”

  Her haunting eyes signaled feral panic. Finely-honed warrior’s instincts warned Julian that as soon as he was out of sight she would try to escape, possibly end in harm to herself.

  “My fool indeed.” He laughed softly. Raising the lid of a trunk, Julian removed two thin leather cords. “The Lady Lochshane received my word that you would come to no harm. I think you shall be less the distraction left not to your devices. Your wrists, hold them out.”

  “Och, obliging you are.” Tamlyn backed up as he advanced, stalking her.

  His grin was unrepentant, wicked. “I try. Come, I shan’t harm you, my fool.” In that breath, he recognized he called her my fool and meant the stress of possession. The surge of ownership pulsed in his blood—and painfully in his loins. He was unsure when he began to regard this woman as his property. It just felt...right. “I simply wish you to stay where I put you.”

  “You do no’ want me to slip away. Warn them in the fortress,” she charged, skirting backward with trembling steps.

  “Glenrogha knows we plan to attack shouldst they contest my right to enter. Come, my fool, trouble me no longer.”

  He pounced, grabbing her. Quick as a minx, she dodged. His fingers caught the sark’s edge, the soft material tearing again. “Beg pardon. Surrender before more battles with the English have all your bountiful charms fully displayed. Not that I would voice plaint.”

  “Let go of my hands, Norman muc.”

  “Back to calling me a pig, eh?” He jerked left in feint, then cat-quick to the right, trapping her. “Come, end this game.”

  Seizing her about the waist, his force carried them down. Half on the pallet, he pinned her with his solid weight. Hands freed, he manacled his fingers around her wrists, shoving them above her head, compelling her body to bow. He shifted, stretched until he was hips-against-hips. She snapped at him, trying to sink her teeth into his flesh, but Julian bore down with his warrior’s strength, so it was impossible for her to catch a breath. She had to weaken. There was nothing else she could do, her surrender a foregone conclusion.

  The male urge to dominate surged, the singeing heat washing through his muscles to congeal painfully in his groin. He wanted her. Agonizingly. Possibly, as he never wanted any woman. ’Twas exhilarating to experience such raw tumultuous desire after endless months of apathy.

  “Fine set of long teeth you possess, my fool. Much like my destrier,” he taunted, laughing. By damn, it felt so good to laugh again. “He bites, too.”

  “You compare me to your bloody horse?”

  “You called me a worm and a pig. Besides, I happen to be quite fond of that horse. Go ahead, bite me. I shall bite back.” Julian teased, easily countering with just enough exertion to keep her pinned. “Ah, demoiselle, keep up that wiggling. I enjoy the feel.”

  She stilled, eyes wide.

  His gaze traveled down her body and gradually returned to her face. The line of her jaw was squarish, stubborn, though not so strong as to detract from the earthy sensuality. The effect was softened by the faint cleft in her chin. Her mouth was small, though the lips were full and shaped with high double peaks. A mouth begging for kisses. Her brows and lashes, nearly as dark as his own, provided a striking complement to h
er tawny coloring.

  But it was the eyes that reached into him, held him with their witch’s fire. They demanded a response from him. He drew in a measured breath, trying to slow his thundering heart. Everything about this she-cat called to him to take her, resonated with a violence within him, the likes he had not experienced in so long. Mayhap never. More so, he sensed she possessed the ability, the art to reach him, affect him, change him in ways he scarcely began to identify.

  Julian’s sexual appetites were animalistic, strong. Only of late, his soul cried out in indefinable hunger, yearning for more.

  So desperate for something more.

  She remained motionless, eyes searching his warily, questioning. Frightened, yet intrigued. She was drawn against will, as her body felt the call of instincts older than the dawn of time. He saw it.

  His nostrils flared, picking up her heady female scent. A witch’s potion. His heart lurched hard against his ribs, sending his blood thundering. He lowered his head to hers, his lips brushing the curve of her neck where her blood throbbed strong. Reveling in the sensations, nearly frightened by its intensity, he lifted his head to watch her reaction.

  She sucked in and held it. The pounding of her heart thudded erratically against his chest, vibrating her body.

  To Julian, she smelled of spring grasses, sea-kissed Highland mists and lavender. So clean, so soft, her skin was not pale, but shimmered with a soupçon of golden faerydust. It invited a man’s caresses, his lingering strokes. He nibbled on her unstable pulse. It thrummed under his mouth. He tasted a tangible radiance...as if he drank her very life-essence. The aura spread through him, burned him, overwhelming his senses.

  In gentle nips, his teeth traced the column of her throat. He fought the spinning—fought and reveled in the exhilaration. Careful not to bear down against the faint reddening, where one of his knights had slapped her, he savored the sweet, piquant taste of her skin.

  For an instant, outrage over her treatment reared its head. Savage possessiveness declared this woman belonged to him and none tother had right to touch her. An all-consuming lust supplanted such thoughts.

  His mouth hovered over hers, catching her warm breath as though he needed it to survive. Mayhap he did. Slowly, he fit their lips together. So perfect...so right.

  The world spun as whirling leaves in an autumnal storm.

  She did not resist him. Breaking the kiss, Julian gasped for air. His eyes searched hers before closing to taste her once more. Slanting his head for a better angle, he pressed. Hungry. Deepening the contact, issuing the primitive male demand for her submission.

  Control shattered as the kisses went on. And on. He heard a low moan, felt it through his skin and every drop of blood. Even so, he was unsure whether the sound emanated from her or him.

  Kissing was foreplay, youthful preliminaries in which Julian had rarely indulged or enjoyed. Until now. His body usually pushed for its urgent male release and had little patience for fumblings of his Springtide. Lost to the lure of this pagan Scot, he wanted the kisses to last forever. Never had he experienced such searing satisfaction through the innocent sampling of a woman’s mouth.

  His tongue slid along her lips, seeking, near begging entrance to her honeyed warmth. The tip touched the sharp teeth, outlining their edge. He did naught to compel her to open for him. He wanted―no needed―her to share the turbulent, windswept desires raging in him. She answered. Soft, sweet lips moved under his, matching, mimicking his lead. Finally, she acquiesced, allowing his tongue to dart into her.

  He released her wrists, his left hand slid down the back of her head, fisting in the dark, gold tresses. The other palm spread over her shoulder, tugging the thin wool of the sark down. Vexed the knotted drawstring prevented him from pulling it farther unless he tore it, he settled for cupping his fingers to cover her fullness.

  Proclaiming the depth of her arousal, her nipple thrust against his palm. How he wished to close his mouth upon her supple flesh and suck hard, telling her of his need, coax her to join him in the madness. He craved to see her arch to him with twin hunger and burning passions. Her body shifted, conforming to his; solid planes and rounded softness met and merged to perfection. Julian doubted she was even aware that her arms snaked around his neck, or her legs parted so he could push his thigh betwixt them, riding high against the apex of her female heat.

  Yea, this Scots lass was molded for a man’s pleasure. His pleasure.

  God’s blood, she drove him to folly, the quickening drowning all reason. Was she a witch to bind his senses, ensorcel him with only simple kisses? Sweet, honey-mead kisses. His hand slid into the rip in the sark. Scent of her arousal clouded his brain. She moaned in shaky need as the pad of his thumb circled the distended nipple.

  Yea, his fool followed the dance. Her breathing was hoarse, as her thighs locked hard about his, gripping with amazing strength, near desperation. Shudders ripped through them both, echoing and re-echoing as their pulses beat as one.

  It was more than he had dared hope...everything for which he could dream.

  Never, even in agonizing throes of hot youth, had the primal urge to mate torn through him, clawed at him with such compulsion. As if he did not take this woman he would expire from the yearning. Exquisite, voracious magic encircled him.

  Suffocated him. Terrified him.

  Witch’s spell or not he would take her, possess her—own her. It was not his intent when he kissed her. Fires of damnation! He never planned to kiss the wench! It just…happened. Only, nothing on this green earth would deter him from joining his body to hers with the most primitive, raw, elemental hunger.

  “Julian, Destain wishes to know―” The man entering the tent pulled up short. “Beg pardon.” Just as quickly, he ducked back out.

  They jerked apart, staring at each other, barely able to draw breath, let alone form coherent thought and speak. They were too saturated with the heavy sensual haze.

  Julian’s hands shook as he shoved away from this Highland enchantress. By the Black Rood, never before had he lost sense-of-self and where he was over a female. Dark witchery!

  He had to get far from her, clear his befuddled mind of her pagan magic—tricks to ensnare a man’s soul and weaken him. He was the Black Dragon of Challon, and no woman brought him to his knees!

  Hands jerking in faint tremors, he searched for the narrow strips of leather, resenting his lack of control because of her. Before she thought to struggle, he bound her wrists and then her ankles, leaving the witch trussed up on the pile of furs.

  At the opening of the tent, Julian paused to glance back. Not once had he believed fables about faery queens, witches or Cait Sidhe, nor the mysterious enchantments they wove around mortal men. Yet that, and only that, could account for what possessed his body, banished his mind. He still fought against the siren’s call, evoking the pagan pulse in his boiling, traitorous blood.

  His mouth compressed into a frown as he stared down at his trembling hands...rough hands, calloused hands coming from years of wielding a sword. Hands of a veteran warrior, the Black Dragon of Challon. A man once the king’s champion. Hands suddenly made weak by a mere woman.

  In that instant, he hated her as much as he wanted her.

  Chapter Six

  “Oh, aye, but when I speak of men’s decisions,

  it be you, woman, who quickly and loudly answers me...”

  — Cuchulainn Saga

  “Awaken, my lady.”

  The soft, cracking voice slid through the velvet blackness of sleep. A touch—just a small shake to the toe of her left boot. Then, the words were repeated. “My lady, you needs must awaken.”

  Tamlyn’s eyelids opened to see the pretty squire of the Dragon—the one oddly enough with a Scots name—leaning over her. He wore a bemused expression.

  His smile came easily, lighting his eyes so like Lord Challon’s. When she first laid eyes upon him, she had jumped to the conclusion the young man was likely-lad of the Dragon. The age was right to be his son,
so were the comely features, same wavy, blue-black hair and penetrating green eyes, oft found in descendants of Selkie blood.

  Once more, his fingers worried the tip of her boot. “I touched you farthest from your heart, my lady, so not to frighten you.”

  She struggled to sit up before recognizing her awkwardness was due to being trussed at wrists and ankles. Exhausted, she fell back onto the furs, listening to the erratic thunder of her heart.

  Kneeling on one knee, the young man sliced the leather band about her wrists, then the one binding her ankles. “My Lord Dragon ties a wicked knot, eh?” He blushed from having touched her bare legs, the sweep of the long lashes trying to cover his response. “You must arise, my lady. We leave.”

  “To where?” she asked, waiting for the wool in her head to clear.

  “The fortress, my lady.” He set to gathering his master’s belongings.

  The word escaped on a harsh gasp, “Glenrogha?”

  He nodded. “’Tis what my lord commands, aye.”

  Not pausing for blood to flow through her tingling legs, she exited through the loosened tent flaps, and then froze when she spotted Lord Challon across the encampment. His back to her, he stood by the campfire talking with his knights.

  All wore full battle gear, girded for the coming engagement. Words concerning her were traded, for the Dragon swung around, his unsmiling stare bespeaking indifference. The edge of his sensual mouth pressed into a frown under the raised, disdainful brows. His warlock green eyes glowed with incandescent power as they danced over her body in a careless manner.

  Strangely, he acted as nothing had occurred between them, as if he had never lain upon her body and kissed her nigh senseless. His expression clearly said her presence angered him for some reason, that he now viewed her as the enemy. Oddly, she felt saddened by that.

  The muscles of his jaw flexed, but he made no other response.

  Shame flooded through her, coming on a tide of recollections so acute it was near painful. Her traitorous body throbbed to the pagan magic he had awoken within her. Her heart tightened that he now viewed her in such a hard way. She nervously licked her lips. Furious at him, more so with herself, she straightened her spine, intending to beard the Dragon.