Sabine

by Moira Rogers

  The magic came sluggishly, as it always did when she was nervous about her surroundings. Instinct told her to stay on four legs, to ready herself for danger as a wolf.

  She changed anyway and tugged at the cabin door. The latch turned, but the door didn’t move. “Sealed with magic?”

  A yip. Ciar shimmered, became a man. “I have a token. The cabins are locked with enchantments.”

  Inside, it was neat and clean, meticulously so. Two bedchambers, and Sabine breathed a sigh of relief. “There’s an extra bed.”

  His lips twitched as he closed the door. “Under different circumstances, hearing those words in such a pleased tone would wound my ego.”

  “You know I didn’t mean it that way.”

  “I know.” He nodded toward the corner, where a stove and a few cupboards formed a makeshift kitchen. “Do you feel adventurous enough to cook tonight?”

  “That depends on you. Are you going to hunt?”

  “What would my lady like for her stew pot?”

  His mock formality made her laugh. “Whatever my lord wishes to bring back.”

  “A few bunnies? Perhaps a bird? If this place is properly stocked, there will be a bow and arrow in the shed.”

  “Pheasant?”

  “Done.” Longing unfurled in his eyes as he leaned against the wall and watched her. “Do you ever wish we could have lived like this? Two people, alone in the woods?”

  “From time to time.” A secret fantasy, because it was selfish to want him to love her that much, enough to abandon his life.

  And yet he offered nonetheless. “If it would save you, I would walk away from everything. If you needed me to…”

  It would slowly kill him. He was a leader, the High Lord, and if he couldn’t care for his people, he would die. “No, Ciar. You have responsibilities, ones that make you who you are.”

  “Yes, I suppose I do. It doesn’t mean we couldn’t escape once in a while.”

  He might think the war had changed him, but there was a warmth, a goodness inside him that couldn’t be touched. “I’d like that.”

  His nod sent golden hair cascading over his forehead. “Good enough. I’m going to hunt. No one else will be able to cross the threshold unless you bid them to.”

  “I’ll be fine.” Unless he took to the woods for his hunt and forgot why he was even there in the first place.

  Some fear must have shown on her face. In her eyes. “Do you wish me to stay?”

  It would mean eating dried meat and whatever was to be found at the cabin. “I won’t say I’m not concerned, but it’s silly.”

  “It’s not silly if it vexes you.” Ciar strode closer, then paused. “Is it skin to skin that makes the magic worse?”

  “Anything.” Did that hoarse whisper belong to her? “Any kind of contact.”

  His jaw tightened. “You have no idea how desperately I want to hold you. Not for my own sake, but for yours.”

  Her mother had hugged her, held her as she cried. And then… “No.”

  A sigh left him. “I know. I’ll be back soon. I promise.”

  She wished the curse hadn’t stolen the comfort of that promise from her. But the sincerity of the words humbled her, left her with no choice but to believe.

  When it happened, it was a small thing.

  It wasn’t the loss of his self-control or an act of unbearable hunger. His will didn’t shatter, nor did his resolve waver.

  He reached for the pitcher of water at the same time as Sabine, and their hands touched.

  Just that. One brush of fingers, but he felt magic snap around him like a vise, claws digging under his skin until he hissed in pain.

  Sabine yanked her hand back with a cry and a clatter as she knocked her cup from the table. “Damn it. Damn it.”

  He was such a fool. A blindingly idiotic fool, and the only thought that came to his mind was, It doesn’t matter now.

  The table was in the way, so he flipped it over with one swipe of his hand and reached out, snatching her around the waist. He dragged her to him so fast she collided with his chest, and he didn’t care. Nothing mattered but kissing her.

  “Ciar.” She clung to him, her fingers clenched in his shirt, as if she couldn’t bear to let go. He drew his hands up her back and curled them in her hair with a helpless groan.

  Her lips parted under his. He told himself to take his time, to kiss her slowly, but she was sweet and hungry and his tongue drove into her mouth before he could stop himself, tasting everything he’d missed.

  Sabine growled, her teeth sinking into his lower lip as she tore at his vest. The accidental touch left them free because of their desperation—they had nothing more to lose, and everything to gain from tumbling into one another, even for a little while.

  Ciar tightened his fingers in her hair and drew her head back, breath coming in helpless pants. “Let me mate you. Magic might be stronger than a curse.”

  She shook her head. “I don’t know what will happen to you if we’re mated and—and—”

  He silenced her with a kiss. “I know what will happen to me if I don’t try.”

  She stared at him for what seemed an eternity, her heart flashing through her eyes. Everything from loss to hope and back again, until she finally offered a shaky nod. “All right.” Her hands smoothed up to his shoulders. “Take me as your mate, Ciar.”

  The words he’d wanted for years, and he wouldn’t let the pain of tomorrow interfere. He backed her toward the bed, hating that it was a sparse bunk with a thin mattress and not the silken sheets and luxury she deserved.

  It wouldn’t matter. He’d make sure it didn’t matter. “You’ve always been mine, Sabine.”

  “Yes, always.” She sank to the bed and stared up at him. “There has never been another for me, and there never will.”

  He chose to believe that the words would have been true, curse or no. He touched her cheek, traced the softness of her skin. “Undress me, love.”

  She slid his vest to the floor, and her fingers trembled on the buttons of his shirt. “Love,” she echoed softly.

  The word on her lips could bring him to his knees if he let it. “I may not have the patience for a mating the first time. Perhaps I’ll have to make love to you twice. Or three times, to be safe.”

  “Whatever you need.” She leaned in until her breath blew hot on his bare stomach. “Whatever you want.”

  “I want to please you. Pleasure you. Give you what you need.”

  She rubbed her cheek against his skin and reached for his pants. “You always do. And you will—now, tonight.”

  Ciar put his fingers under her chin and lifted her face to his. “Tell me, Sabine, what you most desire.”

  She hesitated, her blue eyes drifting shut. “Your touch, Ciar. Everything that entails, from having you inside me to—to having you hold me in sleep.”

  That he could provide. The best memory possible, in case—

  No. Tonight was not about just-in-case. It was about her.

  Ciar caught her hands and eased them from his body. His boots were easy to strip away, as was his clothing. He sat on the edge of the bed and pulled her into his lap, the irresistible heat of her cunt rubbing against his cock. “Kiss me.”

  She smiled, a hint of the rebellious, teasing lover he remembered. “And if I won’t?”

  He tightened his fingers on her hips. Smiled. “Then we’ll sit like this, and see which of us gives in first.”

  She tried to move again, and her blue eyes darkened with desire when she could not. “You’re strong enough to take what you want. Does it mean so much for me to give it?”

  “It means everything.” Denial had never been in his nature, but he contented himself with quick tastes, licking her jaw and nipping at her ear, reveling in the quiet ways her body responded. With her like this, alive in his arms, he felt stronger than any curse.

  A tiny shudder rocked her, and she caught his mouth with a moan that sounded like his name.

  Of everything they
’d had, everything they’d been, this was what he had missed the most. Her lips, her kiss, the way he could judge her mood by the tilt of her head or the scrape of her teeth. Soft and slow or hot and needy, and tonight she was all of it.

  More.

  Her hips rocked in his grasp again, and this time she tossed her head back with a gasp. “Let me, Ciar. I’m begging.”

  “I haven’t even tasted you yet.” He licked the shell of her ear. “Haven’t felt you come on my tongue.”

  “If I promise you will before the sun rises, will you let me take you now?”

  “I’ll hold you to it,” he whispered, then released his grip on her hips.

  Sabine tightened her arms around his neck as she lifted her body over his and then down, taking him in with a speed and suddenness that left her choking on a sigh. Her nails pricked at his skin, and a tear slipped out of the corner of her eye. “This. Yes.”

  He had to catch her waist, if only to keep her from moving. She was slick around his cock, gripping him so tightly he couldn’t imagine anything more pleasurable. “You are as impatient as ever.”

  “Hungry for you,” she corrected. “It’s been so long.”

  “I know.” He caught her hair and bent her back over his arm. “I love you.”

  She stared up at him, pleasure and trust shining on her features. “I’ve always loved you.”

  He knew, just like he knew climax would claim him if he let himself think about how good it felt to be inside her. Instead he tasted her skin, licked her collarbone and the beautiful curves of her breasts.

  Her hands traveled up to clench in his hair, and her thighs flexed as she rocked against him. It would be over too soon, and he didn’t care. It would give him all the excuse in the world to start again.

  Everything she’d told herself she could no longer have was in her arms, in her body, and Sabine wanted to weep with the pleasure of it.

  She clenched her teeth and shifted her hips, sucking in a sharp breath when the velvety ridges of Ciar’s cock rubbed her inner walls. “You feel—oh Ciar…”

  “Tell me,” he commanded—and it was a command, for all that it was hardly more than a whisper.

  “I need you,” she told him at once. “I need you like this, forever.”

  “Forever.” It sounded like a promise. A challenge. His teeth closed on the upper swell of her breast with a possessiveness just short of wild.

  She belonged to him, and he belonged to her. Sabine wrapped her arms around his neck and pressed her lips to his ear. “Mine.”

  The heat of his mouth found her throat, and he licked her. Bit her, and rumbled his pleasure against her skin as his hands finally urged her to move. “Show me, sweet Sabine. Show me how you claim your man, and I’ll show you how I claim my woman.”

  Claiming him meant something so different now. Once, she’d planned to do it with the heat of her body, make him crave her touch as she craved his. Now, she needed to imprint herself on his heart and soul.

  She met his gaze and held it. “I no longer have the same claim on you as I once did,” she whispered. “But I can have another. We can.”

  “As a man and a woman,” he agreed. “Not the arrogant, untested High Lord and his wicked temptress.”

  If sexual tension hadn’t been clasped so tight around her, she would have laughed. “Yes. Not as silly children anymore.”

  His lips crashed to hers, hard and hungry. It wasn’t a boy’s kiss, or even a youth’s. It was the desperate, helpless kiss of a man.

  Sabine took his mouth, drank in the need that reflected her own, and began to move again. Slowly, with easy rocking thrusts that belied the way pleasure twisted up tight inside her.

  His hands settled at her hips, his fingers spread wide as he gripped and lifted her. Up, just a little higher, and back down with a rough growl. Impatience laced the movement, as if control slipped from his grasp with every rock.

  “Ciar.” Breathless, aching, Sabine dug her nails into his shoulders. “Look at me.”

  He did, revealing eyes edged in gold. He bared his teeth in a snarl as his fingers dug into her skin. “Don’t stop.” Not a command. A plea.

  The magic was taking hold, turning their encounter into something that would bind them, body and soul. She wanted to cry at the beauty of it, of watching him give in to the mating, but then it took her too, roaring up inside like a wildfire. “Yes.”

  Her world tilted as he moved, surged to his feet in a flexing of muscle and impatience, though he settled her back on the bed with a gentleness completely apart from the feral hunger in his eyes.

  He could take her now, claim her as he’d promised. Sabine drew in a much-needed breath and slid her hands through the soft golden hair on his chest. “Show me how.”

  The low tones of his voice held an edge, rough and wild. “Perfect submission. I can claim you as a mate, but only if you’re willing. Eager. There must be no doubt in your heart.”

  She could not believe wholeheartedly that their mating would enable him to triumph over her curse, but it didn’t matter. She was his, and his forgetting would not change that. “I want to belong to you, Ciar. I have no doubts about that.”

  “Good.” He found her hands and guided them to rest beside her head, fingers twined with his. Then he began to move with long, claiming thrusts that drove deep.

  Ciar, inside her. Part of her. She’d waited so long, yearned for him, and yet it seemed like the first time. As if he’d never touched her before.

  “I love you,” she murmured. “I always will.”

  “Love you.” He rolled his hips, drove even deeper. His lips found her throat and closed in a rough, possessive bite. “Mine.”

  She felt the word in her core, the implications rippling through her along with the ecstasy of his touch. His, and that wouldn’t change. Could never change, not now.

  Mate. It echoed between them, and Sabine surrendered to it, let it pull her deeper into the abyss of sensation that threatened to overwhelm her. She cried out, gripped Ciar’s hands and let go. Gave herself to him.

  Magic flared, the fundamental kind that came from who and what they were. It wrapped tighter around her with every thrust, driving her pleasure higher until he froze against her and groaned her name.

  So close he might as well have been a part of her. Sabine squeezed her eyes shut, but the tears escaped anyway. Now, she would always carry him with her, no matter what happened. She would have the unending magic of their mating—a reminder her heart didn’t need, but one she would treasure anyway.

  His body went lax, pressing down on hers. Ciar nuzzled her throat and dusted soft, apologetic kisses over the spot he’d bitten. “Too hard. I marked you too hard.”

  “No, it was perfect.” She’d never spoken truer words.

  Warm breath tickled against her skin as he sighed and eased from her body. “Only because you’re perfect.”

  Her arms tightened without thought, and she clung to him. “Don’t go anywhere, please. Not yet.”

  “Shh.” He rolled over and hauled her atop him, letting her body rest against his chest. “I didn’t wish to crush you, that’s all.”

  As long as she had his bare skin pressed to hers, she could relax. “I don’t care if you crush me. I never want this to end.”

  “It can’t end. You promised to come on my tongue, and I will taste you.”

  As simple as that, she wanted him again. “I will never tire of having you touch me, Ciar.”

  “And I will never tire of pleasing you.” He gathered her hair by twining it around his hands and smiled up at her. “My beautiful Sabine. What I wouldn’t have given to have your smiles to come home to after long days at war.”

  “I should have traveled with you in the camps.”

  “The camps were hardly safe.” The minute the words escaped, his eyes darkened. “Of course, I did no better at protecting you by leaving you behind.”

  Sabine smoothed his hair back from his forehead. “It wasn’t your fault.”
<
br />   He wouldn’t be soothed so easily. “It was my family’s fault. My mother will not enjoy the conversation I intend to have with her.”

  “I admit, I’ll not try and stop you.”

  “This may be the only topic on which I wouldn’t allow you to sway me in any case.” He tightened his fingers, tugging lightly at her hair. “They hurt my mate.”

  “Yes, they did.” The spell had almost destroyed her, but she was here now, with him. Whole.

  He seemed determined to keep her that way. “In two days, we’ll be at the palace. You’ll enter as my mate this time, and things will be different. You’ll be safe.”

  Nestled in his arms, it was difficult to imagine any other outcome. “Yes, I will.” Secure, comforted, Sabine let sleep claim her.

  Chapter Four

  For the first time in years, Ciar didn’t bolt from sleep already reaching for a weapon—though he did wake with a strange woman draped across his chest.

  Long blonde hair was everywhere, the rich strands tangled around his hands and tickling his neck. Her body felt sweet enough, curvy and lush, but memory refused to provide the details of who she was and when he’d bedded her. He must have, though—their scents were everywhere, mixed with sex and sweat, a heady combination that left him half-hard already.

  She murmured a sleepy protest. “Not yet, Ciar. A little while longer.”

  At least he’d given her his name, though he supposed the days when the High Lord could walk unrecognized were behind him. He must have had too much to drink, to not remember the name of such a beauty. “I’m afraid I need to get up.”

  She raised her head and blinked in confusion. “What’s the matter?”

  How embarrassing to admit the truth. “I’ve forgotten your name, my lady.”

  The woman went still. Pale. After a few moments, she offered him a smile that didn’t reach her eyes. “That’s quite all right, my lord.”

  He’d given offense, unsurprisingly. “Might you be willing to take pity on my faulty memory?”

  She sat up slowly, slid to the bed beside him and reached for the coverlet. “My name is Sabine.” She whispered the words with an odd note of challenge.