Tempted By Fae

by Midnight Coven

  “How is he out of reach? If she’s the Queen, she should be able to get to him.”

  “Oh, lass, no. Not here. This is the in-between, a place the fae go when they’ve been banished.”

  This guy is intense. I don’t know how much I should believe. I mean, aside from the glowing stones and the whispers, nothing magical has happened…okay, except the dragon, but that might have been a hallucination. “So you’re banished.”

  “What?”

  “You said this is a place where the fae go when they’ve been banished. Logically, that means you’re banished.”

  “I’m not.”

  I cross my arms over my chest and frown at him. “That’s exactly what a banished dragon would say.”

  He grunts, the sound near a growl. It sends tingles to places that shouldn’t be tingling. “Believe what you want. You’re here, Joslynn. You can’t go anywhere.”

  “How do you know my name?” Fear replaces the arousal I’d misguidedly felt a moment earlier.

  Jutting his chin toward a corner to my left, he says, “I went through your belongings while you were unconscious. Joslynn Nash. You’ve just turned forty years old, hail from some place called Las Vegas, Nevada, and you’re an organ donor. Though I don’t understand what that means.”

  “It means if I die, they can give my organs to some—” I stop myself and glower in his general direction. “You had no right to go through my things.”

  A slight shrug lifts his shoulders before he sighs. “If you think I’m concerned about your privacy, you’d be wrong. You’re the one who looks suspicious. You come into my lands when you shouldn’t be able. Makes me wonder what you’ve got up your sleeve.”

  “Nothing! I have absolutely nothing up my sleeve. I walked up to the stones, then I was here. I didn’t expect to get zapped out of my world and into this one.”

  Another grunt and he turns away, striding toward the darkness again. “Don’t move a muscle.”

  Like hell. As soon as he’s out of sight, I’m on my feet, running for the exit. I don’t have time to grab my bag, not if I want to get away from him. And I do. I want to get back to that spiral of glowing stones to see if I can get home and out of this crazy nightmare.

  It’s fucking freezing outside, even colder than it was in the cave, and part of me wishes for the dragon and his heat. Except for the whole, dangerous dragon thing. I stop at the ridge just outside the cave. Panic sets in as I look down the snowy cliff. That will kill me. I can’t climb down there and expect to survive.

  “Where do you think you’re going?” His voice rolls over me, not terrifying, but in a sensual way.

  “I’m leaving. You can’t keep me here.”

  “I can.”

  I shove my hands in the pockets of my coat, a desperate attempt to find my pepper spray to fend him off. My backpack is nowhere to be seen, and I’m momentarily afraid it fell off me once he had me flying through the air. I’m glad I was unconscious for that part. But he had to have it somewhere, he’d found my identification. Pulling the can out of my pocket, I step closer to him and empty the contents into his eyes. He doesn’t move.

  “What is that? It smells bad.” He wipes the residue off his face and cocks a brow.

  “You…it’s supposed to hurt.”

  “Oh, you’re trying to hurt me, lass. I’m immune to your human weapons. Fae, remember?”

  My fingers inside my other pocket brush the iron fork that crazy old man gave me on my way to the trail. Iron. I could hurt him. I could get away. Grabbing the fork, I free it from my pocket and rush him, shoving the tines deep into his shoulder. He growls in pain as the metal sizzles against his skin, but I can’t get the damn thing out. I tug and tug until his large palm wraps around my wrist and he pulls with me. The fork comes out and blood runs down his tunic.

  “So ye did come armed. You knew exactly where you were going. This innocent little act of yours is not going to work on me.”

  Oh, shit. “I didn’t—”

  “Stop. Whatever you’re going to say, leave it alone. You will not leave this cave. If you try again, I’ll lock you up.”

  “I’ll freeze to death in there.”

  “You’ll freeze faster out here.”

  “And I’ll need to eat, fresh water, a place to…do my business.”

  “Business?”

  “Do faeries not use the bathroom?”

  “Aye, we do. We simply don’t talk about it with perfect strangers.”

  “I’m just saying, a hole in the middle of a mountain is not going to cut it. I’ll die.”

  He shakes his head. “You won’t before I get you to the Queen. We’ll let her decide your fate.”

  My chest gives an uncomfortable squeeze. “Will she kill me?”

  “Depends on how she’s feeling when we arrive.”

  “When will you take me?”

  He glances at the sky, then toward the horizon. “Too many fae saw what happened with you and Percival. We need to lie low for a few days. Then I’ll take ye to Queen Maeve.”

  I shiver uncontrollably, and the man, fae, dragon, whatever he is, pulls me against him even though I just stabbed him with a fork. “What’s your name?” I ask.

  “I was called Valor long ago.”

  “You aren’t now?”

  “Not since the dragon took over and I lost control.”

  That was ominous. “You seem in control now.”

  His long intake of breath reveals a struggle inside him. “I haven’t been able to control my shifts until now. Until you.”

  Chapter Four

  Valor

  My shoulder burns where she stabbed me. I can’t let myself show it though, not right now. She could be either a dangerous creature or a perfectly innocent one, but it doesn’t matter. I need her. I took on a curse to be the protector of the Shadow Queen’s crown, turning me into a dragon, but I didn’t know it would stay with me even after my duty was done.

  “I need an explanation. What do you mean when you say ‘you haven’t been able to control your shifts’? Isn’t that part of the lore of shapeshifters? You choose when and where. Or is this more of a werewolf, full moon kind of thing?”

  “It’s a long story. But the point is, I’ve been a dragon more often than a man for the last twenty-five years. The only other person who’s been able to help me is the Queen, and last year, even she wasn’t able to keep me in my fae form. It’s why I am here. My dragon is unpredictable, a danger. So, I guard the in-between.”

  Cold sweat beads on my forehead as the residue from her iron weapon seeps into my blood stream. I’ll be sick as a dog soon. Unless I shift. But what if I can’t return to my fae form?

  “You don’t look so good.” She steps closer, brow furrowing as she inspects me.

  “Ye stabbed me.”

  “True. You didn’t seem too phased.”

  “Iron is poison for the fae.”

  Eyes widening, she glances at the bloodied tunic I’m wearing. “Shit. It was just a fork.”

  “It was rusted and ancient. I think a piece broke off in my shoulder. It’s poisoning me slowly.”

  Her hands flutter over the wound. “What do you need me to do?”

  I cough, the taste of blood in my mouth not a good sign. “I have to rest, try to force the iron from my blood.”

  She puts my arm over her shoulders in an attempt to keep me upright. “Where do you sleep?”

  “You try to kill me and now you think I’ll show ye where I sleep?”

  My legs threaten to give out, just enough that I’m unsteady on my feet. Bloody hell, I need her to help me.

  “You don’t seem like much of a threat right now. Besides, I’m still armed. Try anything, and I’ll stab you in the balls.”

  “Such things you say,” I mutter. My voice is weaker than I’d like. I don’t want her to think she can get out of here while I’m recovering, but in truth, she could leave me if she wanted. But then she’d be taken. Used. Ruined.

  “Come on, Val
or. Tell me where to put you before I let you fall here in the middle of this cave.”

  I sigh and glance toward the dark path before us. Reaching out, I grab a torch from the wall and call forth my dragon fire. With a gentle puff of air from my lungs, flames burst over the end of the torch and illuminate the path.

  “How far does this go?” she asks.

  “Far enough.” I won’t make it much longer before I’m violently ill from this fucking poison.

  We continue walking until we reach the secret door that leads to my chambers. Chambers I haven’t been able to use more than a handful of times since Queen Maeve created this place for me. I press on the hidden latch, and the door creaks as it swings open.

  Her gasp of surprise is welcome. Especially when I touch the flaming torch to the edge of the ring embedded in the wall. Fire races along the circle, illuminating the round room in a warm glow.

  “This is…”

  “Where I rest on the rare occasion I am in the form of a man.”

  “How often are you a man?”

  “This is the first time I’ve not had wings and scales in over a year.”

  Her eyes widen. “That’s a long time.”

  “Aye.” I can’t control the growl my voice becomes. But I want this to be permanent. I want her to be permanent because of the way she makes me feel. She calms me, even if she frustrates me. My shoulder throbs and burns, the pain radiating down the front of my chest and into my arm.

  “Sit down and take off that shirt. I need to see how bad the wound is.” Her fingers are gentle but her voice is strong.

  “I’ll manage. Don’t trouble yourself.”

  Eyes hard, she stares me down. “If you die in here, I’ll starve to death. In case you missed the whole, we’re up on a jagged cliff with no way down part of this situation.”

  I can’t help my slight laugh at the sternness in her words. “All right, all right, lass.” I move to pull the tunic over my head, but the pain in my chest and arm is so great, I can’t. I feel like an invalid and I hate it.

  “Let me.” With gentle fingers, she grips the hem of my shirt and lifts carefully, maneuvering it off me with the barest bit of pain.

  The color leaves her face as soon as my torso is bared to her. I know it’s not because of the injury she dealt me. It’s the brand in the center of my chest where I’d done my duty and guarded the Shadow Queen’s jewel, the last step in her trial to take her crown.

  “What happened to you?” She traces the scar with her fingertips.

  “The same thing that happened to make me the way I am. I took on a curse to become a dragon for the good of my people.”

  “So…you weren’t born a dragon?”

  I shake my head. “No. There are no true shifters in our world. That is reserved for the human realm.”

  “There aren’t shifters in our realm. That’s fiction.”

  “Oh, is it, lass? Just like faeries are fiction?”

  She opens and closes her mouth as though she’s trying to argue but can’t come up with anything to say.

  Then she sighs. “Well, if I’m never getting home, I guess it doesn’t matter what’s real there. I need to get used to this place.”

  Pain flares in my wound, and I have to hiss as fire races through me.

  “What do you need?” she asks.

  “There’s a stream that runs through this cave, in the back of the room. Fill a bowl with water and help me wash the iron out.”

  Jaw clenched, she nods and walks in the direction I pointed. Even with my body burning with fever, I can’t help but find the way her hips sway enticing. I haven’t had a woman in…well, a bloody lifetime. But this one? This one is everything I fantasize about. My cock stands at attention, pressing painfully hard against my breeches, and my dragon…the beast stretches and tests my control. He wants her just as much as I do.

  Chapter Five

  Joss

  This isn’t so bad. It isn’t. I may be trapped in a dragon’s lair, but he’s really fucking hot. In a, scarred, tortured warrior soul kind of way. My ex-husband wasn’t scarred, tortured, or a warrior. He was a real estate agent who’d rather hire someone to do any kind of manual labor than get his hands dirty. Valor? He’s clearly not afraid to fight for what he loves, to the death from the looks of that scar.

  There’s an alcove in the wall, blending so well I almost don’t see it until I’m right there, walking through. I can hear the water of the stream babbling as I round the corner. This place is so different from everything I know, yet somehow it feels right. Stalactites hang from the ceiling as I step into another small cave inside this one. There’s more than a stream. There’s a pool with a stream feeding into it via a small waterfall, and the air in here is warm. It’s not freezing like it was outside of Valor’s room. It’s comfortable. I could relax in here. I shouldn’t relax. I should be trying to plot an escape and a way home, but if what Valor said is true, that would be fruitless, and I’d end up some sort of sex slave. Even if I want to escape, I can’t let Valor die.

  I catch sight of a set of bowls, all gold so polished, they seem to glow. Next to that is a matching set of a pitcher and chalice. That will do. Rushing to them, I gather everything I can hold before heading toward the waterfall. I fill the pitcher to the brim, then make my way back to where he’s sitting on the bed, propped up by three pillows. His eyes are closed and the rise and fall of his chest is slight. He’s struggling more than he wants to admit.

  Setting everything on the small table by the bedside, I try to stay quiet so he won’t wake. But his low grunt and the shift of his body moving under the silky sheets betrays that he’s conscious and watching me.

  “What should I do?”

  He swallows hard and stares at me. “There are some linen cloths in the wardrobe. We’ll need those to bind the wound after we clean it.”

  Without another word, I grab as many as I can hold, not letting myself wonder why he has so many. But by the scars he wears, I’m fairly sure he’s had his share of fights.

  I sit on the side of the bed and pour water into the bowl, then dip a folded cloth into the water until it’s soaked. Wringing out the linen, I tentatively press the fabric to his skin. He’s burning up, the small punctures black around the edges. “I’m sorry. It’s not going to be pretty.”

  He grits his teeth and gathers the sheets in his fists as I press and release over and over, the linen coming away with a mixture of black and red. “Fuck me, lass, that hurts.”

  An inappropriate shiver of lust races down my spine and settles between my legs. I shouldn’t want him to say things like that to me, and he wasn’t. He was in pain. He wasn’t propositioning me.

  “I think I’m almost done. It’s coming away pink now. No black.”

  He looks better too. His skin not so hot, face not ashen. “Aye. It is. I can feel it healing already. You got all the iron dust out. Thank the goddess you aren’t strong enough to stab any deeper. I’d have been in a bad way with something like that.”

  Setting aside the soiled linen, I grab a fresh one and fold it until I can place it over the four small puncture wounds. Then I unroll more and wrap in around his shoulder, then his chest until I can tie it off tightly. Overkill? Maybe, but I just have to keep reminding myself that if he dies, I’m trapped.

  “Where’d you learn how to do that?” he asks.

  “Outlander.”

  He frowns and cocks his head. “What?”

  “It’s a book. An English woman is transported from the 1940s to 1740s Scotland. She meets a sexy Scottish man and has to marry him, all while on the run from the English.”

  “And why did that teach you healing skills?”

  “Oh, he gets hurt a lot. She’s a trained healer.”

  He sighs as he pushes himself away from me to the other side of the bed. “What else happens in this book?”

  My cheeks heat. “Lots of things.”

  “Do these two…fall in love? You said they had to marry.”

&n
bsp; “Yes. They fall deeply in love. She has to choose between staying with him and going back to her time.”

  “And what does she choose?”

  I swallow through a dry throat. “I can’t tell you that. It’s a spoiler.”

  He laughs and lies back on the bed, the sheets molding over his toned thighs and a suspiciously large bulge between his legs. “Thank you for caring for me, lass. I know the circumstances are strange, but I swear to you, I mean you no harm.”

  I bite my lower lip and nod. “I think I believe you. If you wanted to hurt me, you would have by now.”

  “Aye.”

  Bending down, I unlace my boots, then slide them off, my feet practically sighing in relief. “Can I…do you bathe in the pool?”

  He nods. “The stream stays fresh, and the water has healing properties. If you need to wash yourself, you may.”

  “Do you have something I can wear?”

  Jutting his chin toward the wardrobe, he says, “There should be a spare tunic inside. It’ll be big on you, but it’ll serve.”

  With sock-covered feet, I head to the wardrobe and pull out a white tunic. It’s thin, but he’s right, it’ll serve. “Towel?”

  “Were we in the Shadow Court lands, I’d be able to procure anything you wished, but I’m afraid the linen will have to suffice.”

  “That’s fine. I don’t mind. I’m just glad I’ll be able to get clean.”

  I snag a few of the larger pieces of linen and leave him to rest. The sound of the water rushing into the pool is soothing, and now that I’m sure Valor won’t hurt me, I relax a little. In moments, I’m naked and stepping into the water. It’s cold, but not frigid. I walk in until the water reaches my shoulders before I lie back and let my hair out of the ponytail I’ve been wearing since this morning. God, was it only this morning? I wasn’t sure.

  After floating in silence for a few minutes, I swim over to the waterfall where I let the water fall onto my neck and shoulders. The rustle of fabric catches my attention, sending my heart racing. Valor stands in the dim light, naked from the waist up, proud, and beautiful.