Ardor's Leveche (4 page)

At once the lights went out and she was plunged into near-darkness once more.

When his low, throaty whispers came this time, Ardor felt herself begin to tremble. She was terrified he would put his fleshless fingers upon her face.

“My overlord asks,” the first man said in a soft voice, “if you fear him now.”

She knew his fingers were coming toward her face. She could feel the displacement of the air, hear a slight rustle she thought sounded like skin peeling back from bone.

Biting her lip, embracing the pain to keep herself from groaning again, she pressed against the wall of her cell and waited for the touch she knew might well unnerve her altogether.

But when it came, the touch was soft and warm. There was no frigid scraping of bone along her cheek, but rather a slight scratchiness as though the palm of the hand touching her might be rough with calluses. It was a strong hand—a sword hand she guessed—and it was sliding gently down her face.

He moved closer, pressing against her. One hand was on her face and the other came up to mold itself around her breast where it kneaded the full mass as though he had every right to do so. Shocked by such liberties, Ardor opened her mouth to berate him, but the fleshy pad of his thumb slid over her lips to silence her—a warning she had no choice but to heed.

That raspy, throaty whisper fanned across her face and she flinched—expecting the stench of the grave to issue from the man’s mouth—but instead there was the sweet scent of lemon, which surprised her.

“My overlord asks if you want him to allow you to live.”

Ardor felt those words to the pit of her stomach for she thought she knew at what price that stay of execution would come. To be the plaything of a cadaver—at the very least a man whose flesh had been drawn from his bones in some terrible, exacting way—would be a horror unto itself. The mere thought of that skeletal face looking down upon her as his twisted, mangled body drove into hers made Ardor gag.

“Kill me,” she said, turning her head away, pulling back from his soft thumb. “I would die than have you touch me again.”

20

Ardor’s Leveche

A low chuckle came from the man whose body was pressed so intimately against hers. His hand tightened upon her breast then released her as he stepped back, pivoting on his heel as he strode from the room, one last low series of whispers—bitten out in a hard tone—left in his wake.

Ardor couldn’t stop the moan of relief that swept through her when her tormentor fled the room. She stood there quivering like a leaf in the storm, slumped against the wall of her cell, aware of the man left standing off to one side and hoping he had in his possession the means to end her life. “W-what did he say?” she asked, squeezing her eyes shut since the lights were coming up slowly once again.

When her companion did not answer, Ardor opened her eyes and slowly turned her head to look at the man standing in the cell with her. She blinked, unable to believe what she was seeing.

He was strikingly handsome with a dark olive complexion that looked flawless and was complimented by the pale tan of his uniform tunic and trousers. Long, thick eyelashes arched over ebon eyes that were sparkling with what could not be mistaken for anything save humor. His full lips were twitching and when he reached up a hand to sweep a lock of curly black hair from his forehead, he smiled—his teeth very white set against the swarthiness of his skin coloring.

“He said a fitting punishment for a spy sent to kill our king would be to make her his plaything in
La Caverna de la Muerte
,” the man told her.

Ardor’s eyes widened. “The Cavern of Death,” she translated, unaware she’d spoken aloud. That he had read her thoughts didn’t escape her, either.

“Where else would you find the grim reaper, wench?” the man asked.

“Grim reaper,” she repeated, realizing one of Bowen’s worst possibilities had happened. She’d fallen into the wrong hands.

“Aye,” the man said. “After all, that is what Lord Savidos means in the old language of the Storian people.” He grinned. “He’s never even taken me to
La Caverna
de la Muerte
so you can consider it quite an honor, wench.”

“I would rather die than have him on me,” she said and winced at the pleading in her tone.

“I’m not so sure you would,” the man disagreed, “but if you insult him like that again, he just might accommodate you.”

Sinking to her haunches, Ardor squatted on the floor, her head bent and her arms so tight around her chest she was finding it hard to breathe. She pretended she was beginning to hyperventilate.

“Ah, wench,” the man said, hunkering down beside her and putting his hand on the back of her neck. “Spread your knees, put your head between them and breathe slowly.”

Ardor’s mind was working at a rapid pace, her complex Guardian training coming back at her in leaps and bounds. She knew if she didn’t want to find herself stretched 21

Charlotte Boyett-Compo

out beneath the bony contours of the reaper, she’d best make friends—very good friends—with the man beside her.

Allowing her hand to tremble, she pulled one arm from around her and rested that quivering hand on the man’s thigh. Beneath her palm, she could feel his thigh muscle bunch at the touch and the hand he had clapped to her neck tightened just a fraction.

“How did you find me out?” she asked.

“We have spies at Command Central, wench,” he boasted. “There isn’t much we don’t learn about soon after it happens. We knew you were coming, even had a description of you.”

“I was only doing my job,” she said in a soft, feminine voice.

“Aye, well, Lord Savidos doesn’t care about that,” the man stated.

Her hand began caressing his thigh in such a way as to make him think it was a nervous twitch of her fingers but her fingertips were precariously close to a prominence beneath the fabric of his uniform trousers and that prominence moved. Hiding the smile that tried to tug at her lips, Ardor kept her face tilted to one side.

“Breathe,” he said as she continued pretending she was having trouble drawing air into her lungs.

Ardor sagged against him, putting her head on his hard chest and had to bite the inner flesh of her lower lip to keep from laughing as his arm went around her shoulder to hold her to him.

“I am Major Raoul Breva,” he said in a husky voice, though she had not asked his name.

“You are being very kind, Raoul,” she said, putting them on an intimate level from the start. “Thank you.”

Breva frowned, lifting his head as hissing words only he could hear stabbed through his brain. For a moment, his face took on an annoyed look then the lines smoothed out and the man’s natural good nature replaced the irritation.

“He reads minds, wench,” Breva told her.

Ardor lifted her head and looked up into the amused eyes of the man squatting beside her. “What?” she asked.

“Every thought that enters that pretty little head of yours is intercepted by him.” He grinned. “Wanna know what he just told me?”

“I didn’t hear—”

“Oh, you wouldn’t hear him, Ardor,” he said, stressing her name. “And you won’t unless you exchange blood with him.”

Her eyes widening into saucers, Ardor leapt up from the floor, putting distance between them. The man who slowly got to his feet was laughing at her, his eyes filled with mirth. He was standing there with his hands on his hips, his handsome face cocked to one side, one thick black brow lifted.

22

Ardor’s Leveche

“Do you want to know what he said?”

Ardor shook her head. “No, I don’t—”

“He said you were trying to play me,” Breva interrupted. “You were attempting to become—how did he put it?—good friends with me.”

A muscle clenched in Ardor’s jaw for she knew Lord Savidos had read her mind.

“Get out,” she said, backing up until she was wedged in the corner of her cell.

Breva sighed deeply. “It wouldn’t have worked anyway, wench,” he said as though disappointed. “Lord Savidos has claimed you as his own and he’d have pulled out my heart—or torn off my cock—before he’d allow me to touch you.”

“Get out!” Ardor shouted.

Breva shrugged. “I’m going,” he said, sauntering lazily to the cell door. He stopped and stood there for a moment as though listening then turned to face her, a strange look on his face.

“I’m not as intimidated by him as I pretend to be, though, wench,” he said, wincing at the words.

“Shouldn’t you hide your thoughts from him?” she threw at him. “Aren’t you worried he’ll tear off your pecker?”

A look of hurt flitted over Breva’s handsome features. “You think me a coward, wench?” He lifted his head. “I’m not. If I want something, I will stand up and fight for it.”

“Just get out!” she said, sliding down to sit with her back against the wall.

“Since you don’t enjoy my company, I’ll have an escort come to take you onto the

Sangunar
, our ship.” He paused. “Correction. Since you are a Riezell Guardian, I’ll make that a quartet of escorts, but I’ll see that you get more comfortable quarters.”

“Don’t bother,” she said.

“It’s a long trip to Riezell Nine, wench. I don’t think you want to sleep on the cold floor when a warm bunk would be easier on your bones,” Breva said.

His last word triggered a question in Ardor’s feverishly working mind and she looked up from the floor. “What happened to his face? That is a mask he’s wearing to hide whatever is underneath, isn’t it?”

Breva was already out in the corridor but turned back. “Masks—even those as savage as the one he wears—are designed to hide deeper scars, wench. To him, those scars are much worse than the mask that covers them.”

Ardor winced, her active imagination supplying a hideously formed countenance beneath the skeletal mask.

“Don’t worry, Ardor,” Breva said in a low voice. “I won’t let him hurt you.”

With that said, Breva left, the cell door swishing shut behind him.

* * * * *

23

Charlotte Boyett-Compo

“‘Don’t worry, Ardor, I won’t let him hurt you?’” Lord Savidos asked in a mincing tone.

“You think I don’t know what you’re planning?” Breva countered as he poured himself a glass of plum wine.

“You think I won’t slap your scrawny ass in the brig if you don’t stop baiting me?”

Breva made a rude sound. He pushed the skeleton mask lying on the table aside to place his glass on the top between them. “Use me, refuse me or even confuse me,
chanto
, but never accuse me of being dense.” He wagged his eyebrows. “I know you all too well.”

“How ‘bout abusing, bruising or even contusing you, you conceited prick?” Lord Savidos growled.

“Oooh,” Breva said, pretending to shiver. “I’m quaking here!”

“You should be,” his overlord retorted. He leaned back in his chair, the two front legs off the floor. “It’s been awhile since I personally tortured a prisoner.”

Breva took a sip of his wine then put the glass down, rolling it on its round base as he glanced at his companion from under his lashes. “Which of us are you planning on laying hands to—me or her?”

A slow, savage grin stretched Lord Savidos’ lips. “What do you think, Raoul?”

“I think you might be starting a fire by playing with that one,
chanto
,” Breva said, all humor gone from his eyes. “She’s now their Primary.”

“As I am
our
Primary,” Lord Savidos countered.

“She’s dangerous.”

Lord Savidos cocked a brow. “And I’m not?”

Breva sighed. “Why do I bother trying to lecture you?” he asked. “You’ll do whatever it is you wish to.”

“‘You’ll do whatever it is you wish to’,” Lord Savidos repeated, his tone, voice and speech pattern identical to the man sitting across from him.

Grinding his teeth, Breva got up to pour himself another glass of wine. “I wish,” he said, “I had a silver marc for every time you’ve impersonated me and one for every whipping I got when we were boys. Your unnatural gift has stung my backside many a time!”

The Reaper drained his glass then set it aside. Crossing his arms over his wide chest, he studied the man across from him. “And how many times has that unnatural gift gotten your uptight ass out of a sling,
chanto
?”

“Not nearly enough times to warrant all the pain visited on my uptight ass over the years!” Breva declared.

Lord Savidos’ cocky grin remained in place as he lowered the chair legs and stood.

“I’ll try to remember to send you a few mental pictures of how your borrowed ass will be pleasuring our little Riezell Guardian tonight,” he quipped.

24

Ardor’s Leveche

“Oh, please don’t!” Breva insisted with a whine. “I don’t want to know what vulgar things you’ll be doing to that defenseless woman.”

“Me?” the Reaper asked. “I won’t be doing anything to her, Raoul.” He held up his hands and wagged his fingers. “It will be all you.”

“Don’t I wish,” Breva mumbled under his breath. When the man standing beside him did not move, the Storian major glanced up to find steely eyes glittering at him.

Without the benefit of the mask, Lord Savidos’ face was flint-hard.

“When I’m through with her, you can have her,
chanto
.”

“Will you be able to?” Breva asked. “Wasn’t there some restriction about Reapers never mating with a woman they had no intention of staying with?”

“You fuck ‘em and you forget ‘em,” his overlord replied.

“But from what the Mage told you—”

“The Mage had his perverted eyes on me,” Lord Savidos said with narrowed eyes.

“He didn’t want me touching women at all. Believe me,
chanto
, I’ll screw her, and when I’ve had my fill, I’ll turn her shapely ass over to you.”

Breva shrugged carelessly although the hair was stirring on the back of his neck.

“You’d better hope you’ll be able to give her up to me that easily when you’re finished with her,” he said.

Lord Savidos laughed. “That’s something you don’t have to worry about.”

Sitting alone at the table after his overlord was gone, Breva stared across the room, his bottom lip tucked between his teeth. Worry had settled on his handsome face and concern sparked from his black eyes.