Shifters After Dark Box Set

by S M Reine et al.

  “I wasn’t the one to come up with the wording, he was,” she reluctantly admitted. “Rumpel refused my deal three times before finally relenting and only on the premise that I use his wording precisely.”

  “Huh, that is interesting.” Giles scratched his jaw, staring off into the distance as though he’d suddenly put two and two together.

  “What’s interesting?”

  “He did this on purpose. He knew.”

  “Knew what?” She hugged her arms tighter to her chest, wishing she had the guts to just leave him. These past few weeks had been a mixture of misery and elation and if this was love she wanted no part of it. It was maddening and exhausting.

  “Tell me, what were his conditions of your deal?”

  “In return for killing me”—she snorted; gods, she’d been an ignorant fool to have struck such a bargain—“there would be a specified date and time in the future when a man would come for me.”

  He shook his head. “But it’s impossible that he could have known the future. He’s never known it before. Rumpel only just discovered the possibility of the chalice a few weeks ago,” he murmured beneath his breath.

  She tossed her hands up. “Nevertheless, that was the deal. Written and sealed in my blood.”

  Suddenly he was looking at her differently, gazing at her with something akin to wonder in his eyes. It was a look that filled her with nerves.

  “What?” she snapped.

  “Nothing.” He blinked and shook his head as though coming back to himself.

  Giving him a withering stare, she turned ready to sleep this night away. How could she have gone from such joyous highs to such rotten lows in the span of a few minutes? Life seemed utterly unfair sometimes, but she’d been a fool to even believe it could ever be otherwise for her. Even if only for a second. Reality was cruel and harsh. She’d made the deal; she’d live by its rules.

  “Lilith, I am not of Kingdom,” he said.

  “Giles,” she said on a sad sigh, her anger spent. Her heart was broken and bruised. If he was right, and she could mate with a demone and not incite the curse to react that was great. If they’d fallen in love. But she would not mate for pity, no matter how kindly meant the gesture might be.

  Leaning in, she rubbed his cheek with her palm. “If I didn’t know what I know now I would have jumped at this chance, but worse than being stuck in a marriage with someone I don’t love is being bonded to someone who I do love and who does not feel the same back.”

  “But it could happen.” He grabbed her wrist, but the words were half-hearted at best.

  He was playing hero again. And she shouldn’t be surprised that he was—it was what Giles did. He saved people. He looked at helping others first, always putting himself last. It was why she’d fallen for him as she had.

  But she deserved more than that. And so did he. She may never find her true love with a wolf, then so be it. She’d go through life a merry maid and never give herself a chance to wonder what she was missing out on.

  “I say we focus on getting that chalice to the boy and forget that this night ever happened.”

  “But Lilith—”

  Dropping her hand, she took a step back. “For the sake of what few dregs of pride I have remaining, you will drop this now and never bring it back up again.”

  His jaw clenched forcefully before he finally muttered, “Yes, I will speak of this no more.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  For the entire next week all they did was sleep, eat, and travel with very little conversation to be had in between.

  Giles felt horrible for the way he’d handled himself that night. He’d been confused and unsure how to go about broaching that topic. So he’d bungled it right out of the gates.

  With matters of war, he was a master of precision. Matters of the heart, he was hopeless. It was why in all his years he’d never left his bachelordom—he did not know how to interact with the opposite sex outside of the bedroom.

  Stepping over a fallen log, he watched as she jogged ahead of him. Her pelt was slick with sweat. Lilith had set herself a punishing pace these past few days, as though she were trying to outrun something.

  He suspected that something was him.

  How he wished for a do-over, wished he could summon Rumpel and demand his prince give him the answers. He’d even pay the price if it meant he could figure this mess out.

  It bothered him more and more each day the thought of her plight. He’d run scenario after scenario through his head. Wondering if maybe he could figure out a way to take her back with him to the castle and help her find a mate among one of the other members of the staff.

  But the moment he’d thought it a burning fire of fury had wormed its way through his gut. He clenched his jaw just to think about anyone else touching her divinely soft skin, smelling the sweetness of her earthy scent, discovering the radiance of her beauty when in the height of her afterglow.

  His nights were consumed with thoughts of her. Of what they’d done. How she’d laughed as his fire had swept over her. Only a true mate could walk through the heat of a demone’s flame and not be burned.

  He’d always wanted children, someone to pass his name on to, a small face that he could look at and see not only himself, but his spouse, too. Someone he could teach and pass on his vast stores of knowledge to.

  If he took Lilith as his he’d never know that.

  And yet…

  He glanced back up at her. She was panting mightily as she veered toward a fast-moving stream of crystal clear water.

  The terrain had shifted three days ago. No longer were they in forested land, now they moved through a vast network of rocky mountains. Sturdy trees thin as arrows shot through cracks and crevices in the rock, shooting straight up into the sky.

  They were in the heart of dwarf country. Which was good and bad. So far they’d managed to traverse the landscape without detection, building shelters from branches and twigs to help them blend into the scenery at night. This far north into Kingdom there were no towns or villages.

  Nothing had been brave enough to settle so close to the flesh-eaters. The only good thing about where they were was that as of last night they’d finally spotted the tip of Fyre Mountain poking like a steeple above a bank of ominous gray clouds surrounding it.

  Sitting, Lilith called her shifting light and frowned down at her feet.

  “What’s the matter?” he asked, getting to her side in three quick strides.

  Never glancing up, she grabbed her left one and winced as she pressed down on it. “I stepped on a stone and it hurts like holy hell. I’m afraid I may have cracked something in there.”

  “Here, let me see.”

  Kneeling beside her he attempted to grab her foot, but she wiggled it out of reach.

  “I’m fine,” she snapped.

  “Lilith, don’t be so obstinate. Let me check it.”

  Lips pulling back, she snapped her teeth at him. In her human form it was more adorable than menacing. Her angelic face was covered in sweat and grime, her skin was pinkened from the exercise, and her hair clung to her forehead.

  He wanted to tell her to take it easy. That they were making brilliant time, but she’d probably not believe anything he said now anyway.

  Gods, to do this blasted thing over again. It was beginning to prick at his consciousness how badly he’d messed everything up with her.

  She tucked her foot under her cloak.

  “Please,” he asked again softly.

  He could see her internal struggle and for a second thought she’d tell him no again, but finally she gave a tiny sigh. “I hate you.”

  It wounded him to hear her say it. More than he could have imagined, her silence for the past week had been deafening. To say that he missed her spunk and verve would be an understatement, it vexed him to think he was the cause of it, but all he could do was try to get better.

  “No, you don’t,” he said, giving her a ghost of a grin. “Now, let’s fix this.” Reachi
ng under her cloak where she hid her foot, he pulled it out and winced at the sight of it.

  Not only was it bruised, but it was blistered and weeping. “Lilith.” He inhaled sharply. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  He gently brushed his fingers across her heel.

  She hissed and dropped her head to her chest, visibly trembling from the touch. “Because we need to make haste. I’m fine, really.”

  Disgusted with himself all over again, he gently set it down. “I know of a salve that will work wonders. I’ll need to make it first. You sit here and rest.”

  She stared at the rock face behind him. “I do not like being this close to the mountainside. We’ve done well avoiding them by keeping away.”

  “Aye, but you need to drink, and if you keep walking on this foot you’ll do permanent damage to it. We have no choice.”

  “Giles, I’m sorry for this. Sorry I’m slowing us—”

  “Lilith.” He tipped her chin up, forcing her to look in his eyes. “Never apologize for something like this.”

  Her blue eyes glimmered with unshed tears.

  He felt terrible leaving her there looking as she did, but he wouldn’t be gone long. Her injuries weren’t life threatening, but they were painful. Giving her shoulder a quick squeeze—it was also the first real contact they’d had in days—he turned and walked back down the hill a ways.

  Medicinal herbs were plentiful in the mountains if one knew where to look. Just thirty yards away from where she sat he found a patch of plantain weeds. Ripping off several handfuls of it, he jogged over to the stream and began rinsing the dirt off.

  As a warrior on Delerium he’d had to learn what was good to use in a pinch as field medicine. And old habits died hard; though he rarely did battle on Kingdom, he’d still taken to studying the different flora and fauna of the terrain during his time off.

  Once the weeds were cleared of the debris he shook the water out and jogged quickly back to her side.

  In the five minutes he’d been gone she hadn’t moved an inch. She looked every bit as miserable as she had when he’d left her side and was simply gazing out across the expanse.

  They were slowly climbing their way along the side of a mountain, mere steps away from descending it and finding some shelter a little more private and secluded.

  But this wasn’t necessarily a bad place to stop, either. They had a rock wall on one side, a stream on the other, and beside that a sheer vertical drop that fell to several hundred feet below.

  There were no rock openings or cave entrances dug out of the tough granite. This was probably as safe as any other place they could find to bed down for the night. The sun was maybe an hour away from setting. The last thing they wanted to do was try to build shelter during the dead of night, especially in a place where one misstep could lead to her death.

  “Here,” he said quietly.

  They’d taken to speaking in low tones through the mountain pass. Not that whispering would prevent the dwarves from hearing them if they were close, but it was better to not draw attention of any sort while out here.

  “What is that?” she asked as she reached for it.

  “It’s called plantain. It’s a medicinal weed.”

  She stared at one of the broad green leaves. “Do I eat it?”

  “No.” He shook his head, and gently took it from her grasp. “You chew on it, then you press it against the wound.”

  “Okay.” She nodded and without much emotion popped one into her mouth and chewed it a couple of times before then pushing it against her foot.

  She’d not chewed it near enough; it needed to become more of a paste than a shredded leaf.

  “It’s not the most sanitary of methods, I know. But it really does work. The herbs here are much more potent than they were on Delerium. Within thirty minutes it should do the trick, but you really need to mash it in there.”

  “Thank you.” She chewed on another one, not turning it into the paste it needed to be again.

  Leaning forward, he pushed her hand away. “Lilith, will it bother you if I do it?”

  She shrugged. “If you really want to. But I’m okay.”

  “I’m okay” was becoming her standard answer to everything lately. Taking the last four leaves from her hand, he placed them all in his mouth and chewed for a good long while.

  Though he was a trained fighter, it was the art of healing that Giles had always found most fascinating. It took five minutes of constant chewing before the leaves were at the correct consistency.

  Snatching up a flat rock, he looked at her. “You might want to turn away for this part. It’s a little disgusting.”

  She made a sound that sounded an awful lot like a laugh. It didn’t last long, but it was the first spark of life she’d shown in a while and it warmed his heart to hear it.

  Lilith turned her head to side and he withdrew the pasty substance, placing it onto the flat part of the stone. “Give me your foot.”

  She slowly slid her foot out toward him. Lifting it gently onto his lap, he swiped some of the paste onto his finger and began to work it across the sole of her foot.

  “You don’t seem as repulsed as you should,” he said with a soft chuckle.

  She shrugged. “I’m part wolf. When you see your brothers sniff each other’s asses, what is and isn’t gross takes on a whole new meaning.”

  He laughed. Already he could see the redness of the wounds begin to slowly dissipate.

  A shiver rippled through her and he heard her exhale with relief. The pain must have been excruciating, but she’d not let him close enough to her for him to even notice.

  “I’m sorry.”

  She looked at him. “It’s not your fault. I should have done something about them sooner, I just didn’t wish to slow us down any—”

  “No.” He massaged between her toes, amazed anew at the curative powers of the weeds on Kingdom. Already the weeping blisters were closing up, shrinking in size. The inflammation would be the last to go, but soon even that would be gone. “That’s not what I meant.”

  “Oh.” She plucked at her cloak. “Giles, I—”

  “I’m not going to stop talking about this, Lilith. I’ve had a week of silence, a week to think this over. I was cruel and you deserve so much more than just this weak apology.”

  She still wouldn’t look at him. He waited, giving her a chance to speak. The way her throat was working and how her tongue was moving in her mouth, he knew she wished to say something.

  Finally his patience was rewarded.

  “I was hurt.”

  The words seemed to be ripped from her soul. Her cheeks flamed a rosy color as the breeze picked up and caused the ends of her hair to dance.

  Lilith’s sweet scent saturated his lungs.

  “I’m terrified,” he ruefully admitted, then, tapping her foot, he silently demanded she hand him the other one.

  Sighing with relief, she slid her other foot onto his lap. The second one wasn’t nearly as ruined as the first had been, but he repeated the process anyway. Applying a bit more pressure to help relieve her aches.

  She moaned under his touch and it tugged a smile to his lips.

  “I like to hear that.”

  “What?”

  With his heart in his throat he looked at her silently, long enough that she was finally forced to look back at him.

  “You liking my touch.”

  She covered her mouth with the back of her hand. The act was coquettish and bashful and so breathtakingly beautiful it was all he could do to remain where he was and not seduce her into a wild fit of writhing, excited madness.

  “Liking your touch was never my problem. It was feeling that I was the only one who truly did. What we did the other night, I’ve never…” She glanced back down at her feet.

  Unable to resist touching her as he wished to for another second, Giles grabbed her hands and tugged her gently, until she was sitting on his lap.

  The weight of her, the feel of her lush curves ag
ainst his—it felt so right.

  “Why are you scared, knight?” she asked as she played with the edge of his shirt.

  “Because the sacrifice would be huge.”

  She went immediately rigid, and he was quick to pet her back, hoping to soothe her. “I won’t lie to you ever. It is not in my nature to do so. It’s not that I can’t, simply that I won’t. Lilith, I want you. You intrigue me. What we did the other night, I can’t stop dreaming about it.”

  “Then what is the problem?” She shook her head, clearly befuddled by his words.

  “Because the sacrifice wouldn’t just be my own. Wolves need packs. I could not live away from the castle. My duty is there, to serve my prince. I fear any mate I should ever take would feel ignored and locked away. That is why I chose long ago to wait.”

  As he talked he stroked her velvety cheek. She whimpered into his touch, doing the little mewling noises in the back of her throat he found so endearing.

  “How long have you waited, Giles? A century? Two? Three? More?”

  Framing her face, he smiled against his will. “You are far wiser than you should be for one so young.”

  “Gods.” She rolled her eyes. “Now you’re going to use age against me?” Her words were said in jest. “Years mean nothing in Kingdom. I’m a woman, you are a man. And you’ve yet to give me any sort of valid reason for why we could not work. Age is nothing but a number. In a world where we cannot die of it, what does it matter?”

  “Do you want children, little wolf?”

  “Someday. Maybe. I don’t know, I hadn’t thought that far ahead.” Her grin was sly and her vivid blue eyes were sparkling, it was good to see her acting more like her old self again.

  “If we were mated, I could never give them to you.”

  “What?” She frowned, mouth parting just slightly. “Never?”

  “No.” He shook his head slowly. “The rules of magic concerning our kind are very different to your own, or any other species born on Kingdom. Unless I am with another demone woman, I cannot impregnate anyone.”

  Her tiny fingers clutched at the back of his shirt, but she didn’t say anything.

  Feeling as though he’d crushed her dreams all over again, he gave her a bitter twist of his lips. “I worry that not only could I not please my bride by having the time to devote to her as I should, but she”—he pulled her chin toward his—“would never even get to know the joy of holding her own child in her arms. So answer me this, little wolf, does that sound like much of a fairytale to you?”