by C. L. Wilson
His eyes opened wide in surprise, then narrowed. “I was not—”
“Not that it matters to me,” she interrupted. “I haven’t put any claims on you. And despite the claims you’ve made, you’re free to do as you like.”
His beautiful lips compressed into a thin line. “And this would not concern you?”
“Of course not,” she scoffed.
“You lie.”
“I don’t lie.” But she was lying now. And wretched because of it.
«Shei’tani…Ellysetta…you don’t understand—»
“Get out of my head!” Angry, she wished she had the power to thrust him out of her thoughts, imagined the satisfaction of her anger taking the form of two giant hands that picked him up and flung him out of her mind. A split second later, she felt his surprise followed by a bruising jolt of pain. His pain.
The Tairen Soul staggered.
She couldn’t stop the rush of concern that sent her lurching towards him. “Rain?”
He put a hand to his head. “Flames, woman, you pack a punch.”
“Are you all right?” She bit her lip to stop its trembling, tried to harden her heart against him. She failed miserably.
“Aiyah. Surprised mostly.” He shook his head. “Your jealousy is flattering, shei’tani, but unnecessary, I assure you.”
“Jealousy?” Her spine became a steel poker, her jaw a hard, thrusting rock of feminine outrage. “Jealousy?” She clenched her fists and wished she dared to hit him. Instead, she sniffed and turned away, forcing a tight smile to her face as she met the curious, interested gazes of a dozen or more children. “Come, children, let’s play Stones.”
As his young shei’tani presented Rain with her back, the sound of silent Fey laughter rang in his head. He gave Bel and the others a scorching look, but that only made them laugh all the more. Not that anyone but a Fey would know it. They would not dishonor their King by any outward display of amusement.
He glanced over his shoulder. The Kelissande creature had wisely retreated. She was now ringed by a bevy of panting Celierian fools, dull-witted mortals blind to all but her beautiful exterior. Rain dismissed them. As long as the woman kept clear of his shei’tani, he would not concern himself with her.
He turned back to his truemate. She was smiling at the children, laughing as she played their stone-tossing game, doing her best to ignore him.
How different she was from the dark-souled one. And how much more intriguing than he had first thought. She was one surprise after another. Fey-gentle. Tairen-proud. Woman-passionate. And jealous when she thought her mate’s attention had strayed. He savored that thought. A woman did not feel jealousy if her emotions were not engaged.
And a wise man did not let it fester.
With sudden purpose, Rain shed his Fey’cha belts and the harnesses holding his sheathed swords. Naked of steel, he stepped towards the ring of playing children.
“It would please me to learn this game,” he announced. That earned him all manner of surprised looks, from the children, the Fey, and his shei’tani.
“It is a child’s game,” Ellie told him warily. “Surely nothing that would interest a king.” There was an emphasis on the last word, accompanied by a glance in Kelissande’s direction.
“Ah, but I am tairen as well,” he told her. “And tairen delight in games.” It was true, though he had not indulged in tairen games since the Mage Wars. She was his truemate, and he was pledged to win her. If a child’s game could help him achieve his aim, then play it he would.
He sent a warm, moist weave of Air, Water, and Fire whispering up her throat and curling around her ear. She shivered and gave him a warning look. The fire in her eyes made the tairen in him growl with appreciation. Tairen females were not timid. They were, in fact, often more dangerous than their mates. “Come,” he murmured, his voice low and seductive. “Teach me this game.” Satisfaction rumbled in his throat when he saw her nostrils flare in awareness of his pursuit.
She explained the rules with a quick breathlessness that pleased him. Stones was a game of aim, dexterity, and speed. The object was to make a path from one side of a grid to the other by landing your stones on connecting squares, while keeping your opponents from stopping you and simultaneously doing your best to stop them. If two stones landed on the same square in the grid, the two players had to race to it by stepping only on those squares occupied by their stones; whoever reached the disputed square and claimed the opponent’s stone first won control of the square, while the other player forfeited his stone. The first player to build an unbroken path across the grid won the game.
“Are there any other rules?” he asked, when she was finished explaining. She shook her head. “Good.” Inside his mind, where Ellysetta could not see, Rain smiled. It was a tairen’s smile, full of teeth and cunning. “And will you grant me a boon if I win this game?”
“A boon?”
“Aiyah. Surely there must be some reward for winning.”
“Such as what?”
He ran a finger over her lips. “A kiss, I think.”
She swallowed. “A kiss?”
“I hunger for one.”
She blinked and visibly struggled to collect her thoughts. “And if you lose?”
“Then I grant you a boon.”
“Anything?”
“Anything.” What would she ask for? A shame he would not find out. He raised a brow. “Well? Do we have a wager?” He enjoyed her wary frown. She knew there was some catch, but she had yet to figure it out.
“Yes,” she finally agreed. “It’s a wager. If you win, I’ll give you a kiss. If anyone else wins, you’ll grant me a wish—anything I want.”
And with that, the game began. On all levels.
Ellysetta loaned him a spare bag of stones. His were purple with a gold line painted across the diameter of each stone. The players took their spots along the borders of the grid, four on each side, with Rain standing beside Ellysetta. The game began with each player, in turn, dropping a stone on the grid square at his or her feet. It was simple enough, and if truth be told, rather boring, but within three or four plays, things began to get interesting as throwing distances grew greater, paths crossed, and the play converged on the center of the grid.
To his surprise, Rain truly enjoyed himself, and not just because he was looking forward to his reward once he won. In the Fading Lands, even before the Mage Wars, children had been rare and precious, adored and protected by even the most soul-shadowed warrior. Their youthful innocence and wide-eyed delight in the world appealed to the gentle heart that lay at the core of every Fey. The Celierian children, laughing as they leapt like little goats across the Stones grid, were no less appealing for all that they were not Fey.
Even the other warriors were not immune to the lure of childish joy. Fey laughter rang out across the common mental path, accompanied by the picking of favorites and good-natured teasing. No one placed bets. They all knew Rain Tairen Soul played this game to win.
At last, all the players but Ellysetta and Rain had lost their stones. Rain tossed his stone, deliberately landing it on Ellie’s square. Like two elf bolts fired from an Elvian fingerbow, the pair of them darted across the grid, leaping nimbly from square to square. She was laughing as she raced across the grid, still laughing as she plowed into his chest when she made the jump to the disputed square he had reached first.
He absorbed her weight easily, and when she raised her face and laughed up at him, he was stunned anew. She was a gift from the gods, this woman with her gold-sprinkled skin, eyes clear and green as lush spring glades, and her soul that shone bright as the Great Sun itself.
Aching to kiss her, he instead stepped back and showed her the red-and-green-striped stone in his hand. “I believe your stone is forfeit, Ellysetta,” he told her. He tucked her stone into the pocket on the inside of his tunic, close to his heart. “Do you forfeit the game as well?”
Her eyes had followed the path of his hands and were now fixed on the
small vee of pale flesh revealed by the opening of his tunic. At his question, she blinked and dragged her gaze back to his face, the bright smile on her lips not quite masking the hunger in her eyes. “Me? Forfeit a game of Stones?” She forced a laugh and danced away. “Never!” She raced back to her home position on the grid. Pleased with the exchange, he followed at a more leisurely pace.
As he prepared to throw his stone to win the game, she inched closer to him. “Take care with your aim,” she advised him, smiling. “If you miss, I have a chance to win.”
“I will not miss.”
“Care to wager on that?”
Interested, delighted by her daring, he raised a brow. “What did you have in mind?”
“If you don’t win on this play, I want to go flying.” She paused. “On tairenback.”
“And if I win?”
“Your choice.”
“Agreed.” Rain lowered his lashes over eyes that suddenly glowed with heat and satisfaction. Taking wing with his shei’tani astride him would be no hardship.
Still, no Fey ever lost a challenge on purpose, and he would not be the first, especially not with so many warriors looking on. Taking aim, he drew back his hand and loosed his last stone. At that precise moment, his shei’tani stood on her toes and blew directly into his ear.
His entire body clenched. His throw went wild. Rather than landing with Fey precision on the winning square, his stone hurtled through the air over the heads of squealing, ducking children, skipped three times across the surface of the river, and sank like…well…a stone.
Ellysetta was bent double, laughing. “I win,” she gasped between laughs.
“Aiyah,” he grumbled, eyeing her with new appreciation. That little move was sneaky enough for a tairen. “This wager. But I will win the game.”
She regained her composure and tossed her next stone towards an unoccupied square that would bring her one toss away from winning the game. Her aim was true, the arc of her throw perfect. The stone descended…then hit an invisible wall of Air and bounced back to land on a disqualified player’s square. “What!” Ellysetta exclaimed. “Oh, foul!” She turned to him, laughing all the while she attempted to pretend outrage. “I cry foul!”
“Ha. As if you could.” Rain tossed his last stone with negligent ease, this time using Air to direct it to its proper destination. It landed in the farthest row of the grid, completing his line. “I win.”
“You cheated,” she accused. “More than I did,” she added when he raised a brow.
“Nei, I did not.”
“You used your magic to win.”
“You never said I couldn’t.” His voice simmered with masculine satisfaction. “When you wager with tairen, take care with your words.”
Leaving the children to their game, he led her towards a copse of trees beside the river and pulled her close. Shei’tanitsa need, never far from him, rose up in swift, insistent waves. “I would collect my prize.”
“Now?” she asked nervously. “Here?”
“Now,” he confirmed. “Here.”
Ellysetta’s lips were soft and warm, her eyes solemn, nervous, and wide open. He smiled against her mouth, gently licked at her lips with flickering, teasing touches of his tongue followed by tiny nibbling bites. «You taste of honeyed cream, shei’tani. Open your mouth to me.» His hands splayed against her back, clutching her slender body closer as she hesitantly complied with his command. Triumph, pleasure, desire, and protectiveness swirled through him as he laid claim to the secrets of her mouth. Timid at first, she accepted but did not respond to his kiss.
«Do not fear this,» he urged. «Do not fear me. Feel what you do to me, feel how I need you.» Deliberately he lowered the protective barriers that were as much a part of him as his leathers and steel.
Need and desire poured over her like warm honey, and she gasped against his mouth, closing her eyes against the almost painful pleasure that claimed her senses. He did desire her. Though it made no sense to her, she couldn’t deny it. Kelissande, for all her beauty, couldn’t make him feel what she, plain Ellysetta Baristani, did. The knowledge was heady, intoxicating. There was such longing in him, such loneliness. It was like a void crying to be filled, and she could feel herself being drawn to it, needing to bring him peace.
Opening his senses to her, aware of every nuance of her emotions, of every beat of her heart, every shivered breath, Rain drank in her sweet response. Hesitant at first, she grew bolder as he greeted each tentative stroke of her tongue with a hungry stroke of his own, building her self-confidence, assuring her that she held the same sensual power over him that he held over her. He took her breath into his lungs and gave her back his own. She shuddered and twined her arms around him, clinging tight. His body grew hard as her feelings flowed to him, through him, saturating every cell of his being, just as his desire, his need, his passion flowed to her. Intensity doubled, quadrupled, as their emotions formed a harmonic frequency and amplified each other.
“Disgusting display,” Kelissande’s sneering voice declared. “I’d heard he’d all but mated her in public. I see now the stories were true.”
Ellysetta gasped and tore her lips from Rain’s, a tide of red rushing into her pale face. The banker’s daughter stood on the gravel path beside the river, surrounded by her admirers and sneering at Ellysetta and Rain.
He felt Ellysetta’s shame for having shared in their passion, and it infuriated him. Power sparked in his eyes. The Minset woman had been warned.
Before he could release his weave, Kelissande shrieked and toppled backwards into the Velpin. Thrashing and sputtering, she screamed for help, and four of her Celierian admirers promptly leapt in to rescue her.
Rain followed the nearly invisible trail of the Air weave back to Kieran. Beside Kieran, Lillis clapped her hands, squealed, and threw herself into the Fey’s arms. The young warrior hugged her close and met his king’s stern look with a broad grin and a careless shrug, showing not the faintest hint of remorse. Despite himself, Rain almost laughed. How could he upbraid the Fey for doing something he’d been about to do himself?
Unaware of the silent communication going on over her head, Ellie felt a spurt of wicked happiness as she watched Kelissande flounder her way out of the river. The glee was followed immediately by shame at her unkind feelings. She knew what it was to be publicly humiliated, and to take enjoyment in the humiliation of another made her little better than Kelissande. She tried to free herself from Rain’s arms, intending to go to Kelissande’s aid, but his grip tightened.
He shook his head and cupped her face. “Do not waste your compassion on her, shei’tani. Her heart is hard.”
Ellie blinked. She was aware of that, but Rain was the first man she’d ever known to see it. “Don’t you find her beautiful?” she asked. Surely he did. After all, only a short while ago he’d been whispering sweet nothings into Kelissande’s ear. Hadn’t he?
“She is like a komarind fruit—beautiful on the outside, but bitter inside. Fey do not prize the komarind. We let it rot on the branches.” He touched a finger to her lips. “The Fey find beauty in the soul. That is where true beauty always lies. And believe me, Ellysetta Baristani, your soul is beautiful indeed.”
She absorbed his words, scarcely daring to believe that this man could find her more appealing than Kelissande Minset. She glanced at the other Fey around her. None of them had lifted a finger to help Kelissande out of her predicament. To the contrary, several of them seemed to find the situation amusing. Rain, it seemed, wasn’t the only one unaffected by Kelissande’s perfect beauty. Somehow, that made the possibility that Rain actually preferred Ellie more believable.
As the dripping, disheveled young woman was delivered from the watery clutches of the Velpin, she shot Ellie a look of such virulent hatred that Ellysetta actually flinched and stepped back. Immediately Rain and the Fey closed ranks around her. Faces hard, their eyes cold and lethal, they glared at the soaked girl. To Ellie’s surprise, Kelissande turned pale and
stumbled back into the arms of her rescuers. Fear contorted her face. Ellie followed the girl’s terrified gaze to Rain, who was watching her coldly, his eyes glowing with faint lavender light.
“What are you doing to her?”
“I am making sure she understands what will happen if she persists in this foolish desire to hurt you.”
Ellie frowned. “Well, stop it. You’re scaring her.”
After one last forceful look, Rain released Kelissande and turned to Ellie. “I am your mate. It is my duty and privilege to protect you, even from your own too-forgiving heart. She hurt you, wounded your feelings, made you doubt the bond between us, and now she thinks dark thoughts that give you fear. Such evil I will not allow. Those gentle words you thought I whispered to her were my first warning of what I would do should she persist in wounding you. Now I have shown her what sort of enemy she has made. Should she think to hurt you a third time, it will be the last.” There was no compassion in his eyes, no hint of mercy, just cold, implacable promise. Ellie shivered, and his face immediately softened. “I make you fear me. This is not my intent.” He raised a knuckle to her cheek. “Do not fear me, Ellysetta. Never will I harm you. I seek only to ensure your protection and your happiness.”
“I know,” she whispered, surprised to find it true. Though the cold power and deadly promise in his eyes frightened her, she knew it was not directed at her, and her fear was more for others than for herself. She would not want to be witness to the unleashing of that power. She did not want to think of it being exercised on her behalf.
He held out his hand, palm down in the Fey fashion. She placed her fingers on his wrist the way he had taught her the day before. Now he did smile, the barest curve of his lips, but the warmth of his approval filled her with joy.
In a shadowed alleyway across from the park, two pairs of eyes had watched the passionate kiss, one gaze blazing with hatred, the other glowing black with hints of smug, satisfied red. “You see how wantonly she displays herself? Would the Ellysetta you know do this? He uses Spirit to force her mind to his will. She is his puppet. He has taken your bride and made her his whore.”