by Lora Leigh
“You are scenting me.”
It was not as if he could answer in his current form, but his ministrations increased, his wolf rubbing against every bit of exposed skin she had.
Her neck, her face, her hands, her feet and then he was trying to nose under her shift.
She jumped back. “Stop. What are you doing?”
He made a whining sound again, this time more plaintive.
“I will not take off my shift,” she assured the wolf.
He took hold of the hem in his teeth and tugged, his intent clear.
“Stop that. You are going to rip it.”
The wolf did not appear to care, pulling harder on the fabric.
“You are too forward,” she accused and then realized how ridiculous she sounded.
Telling a wolf, of all things, it was too forward.
Oh, she knew that like other Chrechte, Bryant was fully cognizant as a wolf. But she also knew that like herself, when in his animal form, for the most part his animal instincts ruled.
“You can’t mean to scent me all over,” she said, though she was very much afraid he did.
His only answer was to tug harder on the hem of her shift. The sound of fabric renting filled the air.
She cried out. “Fine. Will you please stop? I’ll take it off.”
He stopped tugging, but did not let go of the shift.
“I promise,” she said, unable to believe her own words, but even more the genuine intent behind them.
She was going to allow the wolf to scent her. His need to do so was so strong, she could not deny him.
She did not understand, but she knew that she’d missed him these past five days and feared never seeing him again.
The ache to be near him had caused her eagle to constantly fight for supremacy . . . she had wanted to take to the skies and find him.
She’d had no thoughts to fly beyond the deepest parts of the forest in five years.
Bryant released her shift and she tugged it over her head, but put her hand up to stop him coming closer. “After you have scented me, you will shift. We will talk.”
He gave a short bark of agreement and she dropped her hand.
He marked her body with his scent, making her giggle more than once as she discovered more ticklish places than she knew she had.
Finally, the wolf seemed satisfied and lay beside her on the furs, a strange rumbling sound much like a purr, but not, coming from deep in his chest.
Mayhap it could be described as a happy growl?
Regardless, ’twas more than apparent the beast was appeased.
She let him bask in his contentment for long minutes before reminding him that he needed to shift.
He gave another bark of acquiescence and she turned her back to give him privacy for it.
“You no longer fear me,” he said by way of telling her it was done.
She turned to face him, curiously unashamed of her nudity. “There is naught to fear in you.”
He was the only man who would ever see her thus. Of that she was certain.
“Some have reason to refute that statement.”
“No doubt, but they are not me.”
“Nay, they are not you.”
She swallowed, finding it difficult to form the words she wanted to say, but she forced them out. “I missed you.”
“And this surprises you?” He did not sound happy by the prospect.
“It does.”
“Why?”
“I do not know you.”
“You know me too well.”
“But . . .”
“In the dreams we shared—”
“They were not dreams; I explained when we were together in the land of Chrechte spirits.”
“Call them dreams, or a different place our spirits go, but we shared our time there, aye?”
“Yes.”
“You allowed me to kiss you.”
“I have courage there I do not usually enjoy.”
“You have a sense of safety there you do not feel when you are awake.”
“I felt safe when you held me in my parents’ hut.”
“That is good to know.”
“Is it? Why?”
“You know.”
She shook her head, even as her eagle whispered a word she’d been sure the bird would never utter. Mate.
“Tell me, Una, who shares dreams among our people?”
“Our people?” she asked.
“Yes, our people. We are all Chrechte. You are an eagle. I am a brown wolf. Others among my clan are white, grey and black . . . some with differing gifts merely because of the color of their fur. In your own tribe you have ravens and eagles.”
“And hawks.” Though their numbers were even less than the eagles, as both protectors of their people had been hunted near to extinction.
“I did not know.”
“They are so few, we protect their numbers by never exposing them, even to the humans in our tribe.”
“It is a hard way to live.”
She nodded. No use denying the truth.
“But sometimes even a very difficult life comes with blessings.”
“Most times, yes.”
“Like finding your true mate.” The expression in the wolf’s eyes filled with meaning.
Una shook her head, not so much in denial as incomprehension.
“Una, sweeting . . .” He moved forward until the heat from his body called out to hers. “What does it mean when two Chrechte share their dreams?”
She opened her mouth to tell him that they hadn’t been dreaming.
But he laid his finger against her lips. “Or are called together in the land of the spirits?”
“I don’t know,” she whispered. “Only those of royal blood, or who are called on a quest can visit the spirit plane.”
He was of royal descent, but that didn’t explain her being there with him. And in each sojourn, she had only ever seen someone else that first time.
“Or sacred mates.”
“It cannot be.”
“It is.”
“But . . .” She was going to argue that she was afraid of him, that they could not be mates because she could not share intimacy with him.
Only it would have been a lie. Una no longer felt even a trickling of anxiety in Bryant’s presence.
“They didn’t violate me,” she said so quietly, she was not sure he would hear.
“They tortured you.”
“I have scars.” Faded in five years, but still there.
“I see nothing but marks of strength and courage on a beautiful body.”
“I . . .”
“You belong to me. With me. Now and always.”
“I can’t.”
“You do.”
Her gaze rose to meet his. “Can a wolf love an eagle?”
“Aye.”
Her breath stuttered and she waited for him to say more.
“How could I not love you, Una?”
“But you do not know me.”
“I know you in a way none other ever could,” he argued.
She shook her head.
“I have killed for you,” he claimed.
Her body went rigid with shock. “What?”
“Your father told me you wondered where I had gone. He told you I was hunting.”
The import of his words was not lost on her, but it was only secondary in that moment. “You spoke to my father first?”
“It is proper. And he needed to know it was done.”
“What? What was done?”
“The men who hurt you. They are dead.”
TEN
How?” She did not doubt his wolf’s prowess at the hunt, but how had Bryant found the men whom she had not seen in five years?
“Lais helped me. Based on your descriptions and what he knew of his former clansmen, he was able to guess at the identity of the one who did this.” Bryant ran his thumb over the scar on one of her wrists.
“He was Donegal the
n?”
“Aye. Lais did not participate in the kill, but he helped us to track your tormentors.”
“But why?”
“Justice.”
“What of mercy?”
“You were not their only victim.”
“How do you know?”
“They confessed . . . boasted more like.”
“And for that, they had to die?”
“Aye.”
She tried to feel shock, or dismay, but all she experienced was a profound relief. “I am glad.”
“Aye, because they did not break your spirit.”
“My father thinks they did.”
“He knows better now.”
“Because you told him?”
“Yes.”
“Is killing love then?” she asked, not mocking, but trying to understand.
“Let me show you what it means to be mated to the one destiny created just for you and then you will tell me what love is.”
She would have chided him for his arrogance, but could find no breath for words. Not with him standing so close, his sex already hard and kissing her stomach with moisture.
She was a shifter and though she had more modesty than most, she was accustomed to nudity for the shift. But this nakedness with him was different.
It made her feel things her body had not yet experienced, though her eagle told her they were right and true. She wanted to touch, to be touched.
She wanted to join with him as she’d been certain she would never join with another. The thought of her father’s reaction to her mating a wolf came forth to bedevil her, but for the first time in five years the thought of disappointing him was less important than the happiness flickering to life inside her.
And yet, she said, “My father—”
“Has given us his blessing, grudging though it is. If I hurt you, he will dismember me. It was a vow.”
She nodded, unexpected joy surging through her. “My mother believes us to be true mates.”
“She is a wise woman.”
“Aye.”
“The time for talking is past.” His words came out strained and tight and the hardness standing sentinel between them shifted against her skin, leaving a trail of moisture in its wake.
She reached down and ran her fingertip through the viscous fluid. Though her senses were not as sharp as a wolf’s in this regard, the scent of him still drove her near to her knees.
Her eagle cried out to be claimed.
She brought her finger to her mouth, tasting his essence with a delicate lick of her tongue.
Bryant’s eyes flared with passion and a growl sounded from his throat before he yanked her to him, stealing the salty flavor from her tongue and replacing it with the sweetness that was his mouth. The kiss was incendiary, beyond anything they had shared in the spirit realm.
The sensations in the flesh were more acute, sharp with pleasure so great she moaned against his lips entirely wantonly.
His hands roamed over her body; everywhere the wolf had scented, Bryant now touched, making her his before he ever joined their bodies as one.
Spots that had been ticklish before now buzzed with delight at each caress, enhancing her arousal until even she could smell the scent of her body’s preparation for him.
One big hand slid between her legs, masculine fingers delving into flesh that had never been touched. Even by her.
The ecstasy was so immense, her strength gave out. He held her up with no evidence of effort, his muscular arm locked tight around her while his hand touched her most intimate flesh in secret and surely forbidden ways.
It felt too good to be proper behavior.
But then she was an Éan . . . propriety meant little to her people.
This delight, however? It was something too amazing to ever do without again.
Oh, that the Creator would not let her have to do without it again.
The arm holding her up shifted, and suddenly his fingertip was between her nether cheeks, teasing at flesh she never would have suspected had so much feeling.
She tore her mouth from his. “Bryant!”
“Aye, lass?”
“You . . . that . . .”
“Nothing is forbidden between mates.”
Her head came forward, her mouth settling against the join of his neck and shoulder. “Mates,” she whispered before biting him in a way meant to leave a mark.
His entirely masculine groan of appreciation shivered through her, making her thighs clench. “I thought only wolves bit to mark their mates.”
She nuzzled into his neck, kissing and licking where she’d bitten him. “I will scent you, too, though maybe not as thoroughly as you have done me.”
Her eagle only needed this kind of cuddling, head to head, to be satisfied. The feminine Chrechte inside her, on the other hand, wanted Bryant to wear marks of her possession just as she was sure to wear his.
He laid her down on the furs. “This is forever, you understand that?”
She looked up at him in confusion. “Isn’t it always?”
He shook his head. “But that doesn’t matter, because this is.”
“Yes.”
He growled and then devoured her, his mouth following the trail his fingers had blazed earlier.
When he took one of her nipples into his mouth, she arched up off the furs, feeling that right in her core. He continued to caress her body to a higher and higher pitch of pleasure.
She wanted to return the favor, though she had no experience of a man’s body.
He didn’t seem to care, moaning and growling with every exploration of her fingers. She traced the lines of his muscles down his chest, along the tree trunks he called legs and then to that hot, throbbing erection between them.
It pulsed in her hand, her fingers unable to completely encompass its girth.
She did not ask if he would fit in that place inside her. There was no option. He had to fit, because she must have him inside her.
She spread her legs in invitation and his head came up just like a wolf scenting the wind. “You want me.”
Did he need the words? “Yes. Claim me.”
Stillness came over them, the moment profound, where only a second before it had been all heated passion.
He shifted until his engorged flesh pressed against her untried opening. “Do you accept me into your body?” he asked in ancient Chrechte.
“Yes,” she responded in kind.
“Do you accept me into your life?”
“Yes.”
“Does your eagle accept me as her mate?”
“Ye . . .” Una had to swallow back inexplicable and wholly unexpected tears. “Yes.”
“Will you accept my protection, my care and my Chrechte honor as yours?”
“I will.”
He fell silent.
She stared up at him through the candlelight, taking several calming breaths before she asked. “Do you accept my body as your only succor?”
“I do. I will never lie with another.”
Though true mates were not physically capable of doing so, his tone said his promise was deeper than mere physical ability.
“Do you accept me into your life?”
“Now and always,” he promised in their ancient tongue.
“Does your wolf accept me as your mate?”
“Oh, yes.”
She smiled at his vehemence and then asked the final vow. “Will you accept my care and support, the love my heart will have only for you?”
It was not a necessary promise in the current Chrechte ceremonies, but the ways of the ancients were strong in Una’s treetop home this night.
“Always.”
Anya Gra would bless their mating later, speaking the ancient words over them in benediction, and they would receive their mating marks, tattoos of blue ink that would show any who cared to look that she and Bryant were mated for life. The prince would proclaim them man and wife before the entire tribe, but these vows spoken tonight were irrevocable.
None could undo them or deny their validity, though none but the Creator witnessed them.
Neither spoke or moved for long seconds and then he breached her, the pain instant and great. She cried out in shock, but he stopped moving even before she made a sound, remaining still while her body adjusted to the foreign intrusion.
Miraculously, the pain brought back no bad memories and soon was transforming to a pleasure so intense, the world outside the joining of their two bodies ceased to exist.
She shifted her hips, sending pleasure zinging through her. He reacted with a curse in their ancient tongue and she found reason to smile even as she moved again.
The wolf could not stand for her to be in control for long and within a moment he was directing their movements, his body thrusting so his big erection pushed and pulled in and out of her body.
Each tiny increment forward and back brought with it a million sparkles of delight throughout her body. She was soon mindless with the ecstasy of his claiming, her body moving of its own volition in ways meant to enhance the already overwhelming pleasure.
“You are mine,” he ground out as he bottomed out in her, pressing against something inside that was beyond pleasure and not quite pain.
“You are mine.”
“Aye.”
“I am yours,” she agreed then.
His smile was feral.
And then he swiveled his hips on the next downward thrust and she felt the maelstrom inside of her spiral out of control. She screamed as her body exploded with pleasure too great to bear in silence.
“I give you my child,” he promised as his body went rigid and then he cried her name out and spilled his seed inside her.
“You believe we made a child?” she asked in awe, but grave doubt.
Even sacred mates didn’t get with child that quickly, did they?
“I know I did.”
ELEVEN
And suddenly, they were no longer in her bedroom in the trees, but lay together, joined as one beside the bubbling brook in the land of the Chrechte spirits.
“We are not asleep,” Bryant said in awe.
“We were never dreaming.”
“You like to be right.”
“Mayhap.”
He smiled down at her, his hardness inside her not deflating as she’d once been told by her mother to expect.