She’d come for the alpha wolf, but she couldn’t help being drawn to the Romanov tragedy, as well. No matter what their father had done, the boys had been innocents caught up in the curse through no fault of their own. Elena had to force herself away from the painting. It was too easy to be transfixed by the younger Ivan and the warmth and ease that was now absent from his green eyes.
She saw the shapes first beneath large sheets in the center of the room. She walked to each and pulled them off, first one and then the other. She found stone carvings of the two wolves she’d already met—the red and the white.
But there was one larger covered form behind them.
Its sheet came off in her hand in a sudden flourish and dust filled the air with motes that rained down over the black marble she’d revealed. The alpha wolf was the size of a great stallion. It wasn’t a pet of the Romanov family. It was the greatest champion just as her grandmother had said. Its purpose was evident in every stone sinew and in its marble teeth.
Where had the alpha wolf gone?
Surely he hadn’t disappeared into the Ether. Not the largest and strongest of them all. She looked into his ferocious maw and her flight instinct kicked in. The sheet dropped from her numb fingers and her breath came quickly.
She risked her life in this place where’d she’d come to try to save it.
Hunting such a creature without its master’s blessing was as suicidal as climbing up the mountain looking for a fantasy castle. She should leave as Romanov advised and never return.
Elena lifted her hand and her fingers hovered near the black wolf’s face. She noted the tremble of her digits and forced herself to touch the cold stone. She cupped beneath the great snarling mouth as if she held the wolf’s head in her hand. She couldn’t leave. The hollow place inside of her where the dance had been wouldn’t allow it. She was here for a reason she didn’t yet understand, but the search for the black wolf was a part of it.
Her silent communication with the statue was interrupted by a clicking sound behind her.
She recognized what made the sound even without turning around.
Slow, stalking claws click, click, clicked on the tiled floor. They approached her from the way she’d come. Elena didn’t turn around. She looked into the alpha wolf’s stone eyes. They were as black as the rest of him, but the midnight glinted in the soft glow of filtered sunlight. Even as her heart pounded and her spine froze, the sculpture’s eyes seemed compelling.
She braced herself. The clicking came closer and closer from two distinct directions. One to her left and one to her right. When the massive creatures she’d met earlier came into her peripheral vision, flanking her on either side, she had the crazy sense that the two other wolf sculptures had come to life. Of course they hadn’t. These were the wolves from last night. And this time their master wasn’t around.
There was no one to call them off.
“You know where I can find the alpha wolf. Take me to him,” Elena said. Her voice didn’t waver. She spoke firmly. The flutter was hidden from view deep in her stomach and her knees. The wolves moved to stand beside the sculpture of the alpha wolf, on either side. They loomed over her and they were no longer acting like gamboling giant puppies. Their eyes blazed with predatory intent. Had they been hunting her while she searched the castle? Had they followed her from room to room at the bidding of their master or for some hungrier cause?
“I came for the alpha’s help,” Elena said. They weren’t ordinary wolves. Perhaps they would be able to understand. “A Dark Volkhvy stalks me. A witchblood prince. No friend of yours. Help me against him,” she urged.
She had no idea if they understood her words, but she had to try. She hadn’t come this far to stay locked in a tower.
First the russet and then the white stepped toward her. Elena lowered her hand from the marble wolf’s jaw. The trembling in her fingers was more noticeable, the better to show the wolves the terror she tried to hide. It was the russet wolf with coppery eyes who lowered his head to her hand first. She cried out softly, certain he would bite off her hand, but then the silky hair on the top of his head tickled the palm of her hand. The white wolf stepped forward to lean and lower and nudge her other hand until it too rested on a monstrous wolf’s head.
“Does this mean you’ll help me?” Elena said. “Will you lead me to the alpha wolf?”
* * *
The courtyard was churned into ruts and packed dirt by frequent use. Considering it was only materialized a month every ten years that meant the sweat that ran down Ivan Romanov’s half-naked body had been well-earned time and time again.
The wolves hadn’t understood her after all.
They’d led her to their master. A betrayal for sure, but she couldn’t blame them. Especially when she was grateful that they hadn’t eaten her for breakfast. They left her and bounded onto the field, chasing each other beneath the rising sun. It was cold in spite of the sun. Snow drifts lay all around. Elena wrapped her arms around herself. The castle walls protected the inner courtyard from excess snow accumulation, but Romanov’s practice field was dusted with white and edged by icy foliage on evergreen bushes. It glistened and dazzled her eyes because they’d grown used to the dimness inside.
Ivan lowered his arms. He’d left a sword embedded in the cross-shaped practice form. It was buried deep in the scarred wood. So deep that she wondered at the force required to leave it there. He didn’t turn around. She could see streaks of sweat on his muscled back and his labored breathing as his broad shoulders rose and fell. A leather cord wrapped the wild hair she remembered from the night before. The thick queue hung midway down his spine.
She didn’t like his hair bound. She wanted to free it. The crazy urge took her by surprise, as did the sudden feeling that everything she’d been looking for was here, in this courtyard, for her to see.
She hugged herself tighter as she waited long heartbeats for him to turn and face her. He expected her to leave today. She hadn’t found the alpha wolf. Grigori would find her, alone and defenseless. There was nowhere she could hide from him. Ivan Romanov couldn’t be her only hope because he was a man who didn’t believe in hope. Not anymore.
“Did you send the wolves to find me?” Elena asked.
Though she’d braced herself, she wasn’t prepared for Ivan to suddenly turn around and pace toward her. She backed away several steps from the ferocity that tightened his face before she stopped herself and stood her ground.
“You weren’t in the tower,” Ivan said.
He came close enough to touch her, but instead he reached for the key between her breasts. He didn’t pull it from her neck. He only held it in his large, calloused fingers. She looked from the key up to his eyes. He loomed over her, but it wasn’t fear she felt at his sudden nearness. No. The thrill in her veins and the rush on her skin was something besides fear. Awareness. Expectation. In the meager sunlight, she noted that his irises were brighter than the snow. His pupils had retracted, allowing lighter green and gold flecks to glow. The lightness softened his otherwise forbidding expression. His hair had been loosened around his face by his exertions, and glossy chunks of it threatened to come free from the leather cording.
If he sought to intimidate her, he succeeded, but only because she was intimidated by his accessibility. Why did she notice indications of softness that were probably a lie? And why did she feel as if she was missing a truth she needed to see?
“You gave me the key. And I chose to unlock the door,” Elena said. She still didn’t mention the call that made it impossible for her to hide. There was something here she needed to find. Something more than a man and a wolf, but they were part of it, she was sure.
“I can’t decide if you’re brave or foolish,” Romanov said. His gaze was intense. His hold on the key between her breasts was tight. She couldn’t back away. She was caught and held—both by his hand and his eyes.
“Careful and brave rarely go hand in hand. Brave is doing what has to be done, no matter the risk,” Elena said. “My mother was brave. She gave her life to call forth an ancient binding spell so that I could live free. I’m only just learning how to be brave for myself.”
He leaned slightly, bowing his head toward her face. At the same time, he pulled the key slightly toward his chest. It was an infinitesimal movement. But the chain definitely tightened against her neck. Her neck and his hand were engaged in a silent tug of war that mimicked the tug of war she was battling between the magnetic pull of his broad chest and her trembling body.
Why did the courtyard seem like the final destination in the long journey she’d taken? And why did she look for softness in this legendary man? Because she wanted him to tighten his grip on the key and tug harder. He was powerful. He could narrow the gap between them without her permission. It would absolve her of the bad decision she suddenly wanted to make.
Because in spite of the talk of being brave, all she could do was lower her attention from his angry eyes to focus on his mouth. Somehow, the truth was there for her to see. The swell of his sensual lower lip belied his talk of her foolishness. He wanted her here. He wanted her close. Deep inside, a liquid tightening coiled and a hunger rose. She wanted to kiss him. Never mind that he was an angry warrior who claimed he wanted her to stay locked away until she could leave. He held her for a reason. He stood tense as their bodies paused in the nearly touching position. Her breasts were inches from the warmth of his chest.
She lifted her gaze quickly to see what he would do. But his eyes were shadowed now by a thick fall of wavy black hair that had escaped its confinement. His irises glittered with an emerald sheen behind those snow-dampened locks. But his expression was obscured. She could only take in the rise and fall of his chest—it seemed slower than it should be, as if he controlled his breathing or even...did he hold his breath? Her own breath was shallow and quick. Her body held still as she waited to see what he would say or do.
“You are brave. Braver than I hope you’ll ever know,” Romanov said. It was almost a growl, uttered past a tense and tightened jaw.
“What is it I should be afraid of? What could possibly be worse than being captured by the witchblood prince who stalks me?” Elena asked. She closed her eyes and willed away the hot moisture that threatened to rise behind her lids. She’d already betrayed too much of her vulnerability to him and he refused to be moved. She wouldn’t give him her tears too.
“I don’t know the prince of whom you speak. And I know many monsters. Some man, some truly beast. The Ether claims more of my humanity with every Cycle. And you ask what you should be afraid of as if a threat doesn’t stand before your very eyes,” Romanov said. His voice had dropped to a low, agonized whisper. It seemed confessional. Yet he told her nothing she didn’t already know. He was dangerous. She could sense it. She could see it. But he was also so much more. Compelling. Alluring. Seductive. More attractive to a civilized woman than he should be.
“I will not give up. I will not go away,” Elena insisted. A sudden persistent pull on the silver chain caused her eyelids to open quickly. They were closer. There was only the slightest brush of contact between them, but the tips of her breasts burned. She did hold her breath then because respiration caused an agonizing allure of friction she couldn’t resist.
But she didn’t pull away.
And she didn’t close her eyes again.
There were no tears now. Only a giddy heated pleasure radiating from her distended nipples to the rest of her body. The glittering intensity of his gaze was locked on hers, but he must have known the chain was indenting the nape of her neck because he allowed the silver links to go slack. Now it was up to her to stay close or move away. He no longer held her in place.
She stayed.
And the attention of his eyes fell to the key in his hand. She watched him as he focused on placing the key against the hollow of her neck. The heat of his hand had warmed the iron. Nevertheless the contact sent shivers down her spine, especially when he allowed the key to fall. It slid down until the hollow of her cleavage caught it. The warmed iron between her breasts caused her to gasp. But then when he lifted his free hand to touch her, the sudden weight of his calloused fingers and palm cupping the back of her neck was so much hotter. Her gasp became a trembling sigh and then a whimper when his fingers brushed under the chain as if to soothe the mark it had left on her skin. He was moved, but she wasn’t sure what to expect. She suddenly feared she’d woken a sleeping giant, one that might consume her body and soul if he decided to stay awake.
“I won’t send you back out into the snow. But you won’t find what you seek at Bronwal. There are no champions here. Only heartache and defeat. Only darkness and danger,” Romanov warned.
Elena breathed freely now. Her whole body burned and she didn’t care. For so long she’d been harassed and harried. She’d been injured, physically and emotionally. Plagued by nightmares and loss. Desperation hadn’t been the only thing that drove her to climb the mountain, but it was desperation—a different kind—that caused her to lift her arms. She placed her palms against Romanov’s sweat-dampened chest. She felt the thudding of his heart, his powerful muscles and his heat. He jerked at the contact. But he didn’t jerk away. He stilled as she slid her hands up inch by inch, measuring his height and his solid reality, until she held a broad shoulder in each hand. She didn’t understand what had called her to Bronwal, but she understood this.
Her hands had been trained to be a graceful expression of her art, but in that moment they were strong. They held a legend. And he was the one who trembled beneath her fingers. His mighty form reacted to the delicate intimacy of her touch.
His hand tightened on the back of her neck. She was held again. And she didn’t mind. For the first time in a long time she focused on pleasure instead of pain. It was warm and immediate and all else fled from her thoughts.
“One word and I’ll let you go. I’m not so Ether-addled that I have no self-control. I will be a man, not a monster, for as long as I’m able. For now, I’m able. Walk away from me,” Romanov said. But as he spoke he pulled her close and it was gentler than she could have imagined. He didn’t crush her against him. He pressed and her curves complied until they were melded together.
She tilted her chin to meet his descending face. And still he paused. Their lips were only millimeters apart. His warm breath tickled her slightly open mouth.
“I’m a dancer. I’ve spent more time as a swan than as a woman,” Elena said softly. The tears were back, burning her eyes. She ached to kiss him. And more. He was big and powerful, and when his other arm came up to press against her lower back the sensation of being held, safe, away from all that had come before, left her light-headed. But she was at a loss off the stage. She didn’t know how to claim a new life now that her old life was over.
“No. I’m holding the woman. Without a doubt, it’s the woman’s mouth I’ll taste,” Romanov said.
Elena drew a shuddering breath of air as he traversed the last distance left between them.
Their lips touched and his mouth moved with eager hunger against hers. In nightmares, she’d endured depravity. This was pure, human and real. She tightened her hands on his shoulders as her stomach swooped and soared and her legs went weak. She also opened to the masculine seduction of his rough, slick tongue teasing between her lips.
Living off the stage was more instinct than practice. She swooned into the kiss without thought to form or precision. Romanov was all heat and pleasure and he consumed her easily. The thrill that rushed beneath her skin echoed the call she’d followed up the mountain. She couldn’t separate the sensations. She’d wanted his hair unbound because she wanted this wildness. He’d seemed to offer it with every glance, with every move, even though he’d withheld it.
Her tongue hungrily licked past his lips and twined with his. He held h
er tight as if he hadn’t been offering to let her go seconds before. She didn’t want to go anywhere. Her search seemed to be over. The call was silenced because it had been answered, somehow, someway, by his lips and teeth and tongue.
“You risk much. This woman is protected by her mother’s spilt blood and claimed by Grigori, the witchblood prince. You might be Vasilisa’s plaything, but that won’t stop him from torturing you for eternity if you despoil his prize.”
Romanov tore his lips from hers and whirled around to face the interruption. A man had entered the courtyard from the keep. Elena immediately found her footing as she was shoved behind the warrior she shouldn’t have been kissing.
Her life wasn’t a life free to indulge in sensual assignations. Especially with the legendary master who refused to help her engage the help of the alpha wolf.
The man who had entered the courtyard cautiously approached them. Of course, he was no man. He was Volkhvy. And judging from his intimate knowledge of her tormentor, he was Dark, not Light.
“You’ve come for the Romanov blade, but you’ll find it buried deep in a cross purified by generations of my honorable men. It won’t come to you easily, and the sapphire has long lost its glow,” Romanov said. He’d placed himself between her and the Volkhvy. But he had no weapon in his hands.
The Dark witch was dressed in black leather from head to foot. He shone like obsidian in the winter sun. His white hair was braided in a thousand plaits and piled on top of his head, and his movements were young and quick. He was at least as tall and strong as Romanov himself. Elena’s heart pounded, overwhelmed with the rude transition from passion to fear. The wolves would come. Surely, the wolves would come.
“Grigori will kill you for taking the taste he hasn’t been able to take himself. He will cut out your bold tongue,” the man said. He laughed when he said it. And he attacked.
Legendary Shifter Page 5