Dancing on the Wind (12 page)

The last spurt of juices trickled from him and he slumped against her, breathing

hard, gasping to bring air into his lungs. His heart was racing and he was covered in

sweat.

“Shower,” she mumbled.

“Yeah.”

Without breaking contact and while they both still had a modicum of energy left in

their depleted bodies, he carried her—still clinging to his hips and neck—into the

bathroom and plopped against the wall. With one hand still cupped under her ass, he

used the other to fumble with the shower controls.

“Hot,” she said against his neck. “I like it hot.”

“Me too,” he said, and thought of course that would be the way she liked it for the

Exchange had provided the perfect woman to him for his mate.

He smiled as he nudged aside the vinyl shower curtain and lifted his leg to step into

the tub, still carrying her in his arms.

“Umm,” she said with a sigh as he backed her under the flow of the steaming,

cascading water.

He wanted to bathe her, put his hands on every part of her. He didn’t even notice

he was still fully clothed or that his boots were filling with water.

* * * * *

55

Charlotte Boyett-Compo

“So what was it?” she asked as she lightly traced a pattern upon his naked chest.

“Whatever was out there?”

“I have no idea.” Her head was on his shoulder, his arm around her, his chin atop

the glossy sleekness of her hair. A glance at the clock on the bedside table revealed it

was three in the morning. “I followed it until I lost the godawful scent.” He ran his

fingers up and down her bare arm. “I got the feeling whatever it was it was laughing at

me.”

“Did you get a sense of evil emanating from it?”

“No, did you?” he asked.

“Not really. To tell you the truth, I couldn’t read it at all, but I did feel very

apprehensive,” she said.

“It was whistling,” he told her.

“Whistling?”

“Or crooning. I really couldn’t tell which.” He sighed. “We’ve got enough on our

plate that we don’t need another entity to have to worry about. We…”

The entire room shook as something slammed brutally into the ceiling. There was

another loud hit then maniacal laughter so deafening, so unnatural it made both Fallon

and Keenan slap their hands to their ears in agony. The cottage vibrated, every

windowpane cracked and all the light bulbs as well as the dresser and bathroom

mirrors shattered.

“Holy shit, what the hell
is
that?” Keenan yelled.

Fallon shot off the bed, dragging on his jeans, hopping into them as he stumbled to

the bedroom door. Cursing as he stepped on the broken glass in his bare feet. He jerked

open the door and came face-to-face with something he’d only glimpsed in his worst

nightmares.

An oversized hand with sharp talons shot forth and poked Fallon’s naked chest.

“You’re it!” a gruff, rasping hiss of a voice said.

Shock lanced through Fallon’s brain and he yelped, staggering back, clutching his

chest and falling to the floor on his ass in an attempt to get away from the immense

threat looming into the room.

Filling the doorway was a huge figure swathed in clumps of ragged gray fur that

reeked to high heaven. Large pointed ears were crowned with spiky tufts and an

overhanging brow that shadowed its red eyes. So tall it had to bend down to lean into

the room, the creature shot out one long arm and thick digits capped with deadly

looking claws waved childlike at Keenan.

“Greetings, Mate of the hound!” the creature said in its garbled voice, and chuckled.

It snorted wetly, ran the back of its shaggy arm under its broad black snout of a nose

then moved backward through the door, lumbering so heavily the floor shook beneath

its weight. Its last words were slurred. “Olly, olly oxen free!”

56

Dancing on the Wind

For a moment neither Keenan nor Fallon moved or spoke. Both were staring wide-

eyed at the empty doorway. When at last she found her voice, it was high-pitched and

unsure.

“Fallon?” Keenan whispered.

Fallon was still on the floor with his mouth hanging open. His knees were bent,

hands braced behind him to keep him from falling flat on his back. His face was pale,

his legs shaking.

“Are you all right?” she asked, and realized she was sitting up on the bed as naked

as the day she’d been born. She grabbed the sheet and tucked it around her.

“I don’t believe I just saw what I saw,” he said with awe.

“You know what it is?” She scrambled off the bed, wrapping the sheet.

“Stay where you are!” Fallon snapped. “The floor’s covered in glass.”

Keenan looked down to see a large shard right in front of her. She bent to pick it up.

“What was that thing, Fallon?”

“
An Fear Liath Mor
—The Big Gray Man. It is the Guardian of the Gateway into the

Other World,” he said, slowly turning his head from the doorway. “I’ve never heard of

it being anywhere outside Ben Macdhui.”

“The mountain in Scotland?”

“Yeah,” he answered. “Mama used to tell me about it when I was a child along with

the Yeti and Sasquatch and Bigfoot. She was always fascinated by cryptozoology, the

search for animals thought to be extinct or hypothesized to exist. I thought
An Fear Liath

Mor
was just an old folk’s tale.”

“Just as I though
drochtáirs
were,” she countered as he got to his feet, wincing. “Did

you get cut?”

“Yeah I got cut,” he said, and lifted one foot to brace its ankle on his knee. There

were slivers of glass along his instep. He began to pull them out. “Son of a bitch.”

“Come sit down and let me do that,” she told him.

He hopped over to the bed and sat down on the edge. “Put your boots on, woman,

before you slash your feet to ribbons,” he grumbled.

“My boots are in the other room, Fallon,” she reminded him. “You carried me in

here, remember?”

Cursing, he got up and limped from the bedroom, coming back with her overnight

bag as well as her boots. Where he walked, he left bloody footprints on the polished

hardwood floor.

After she put on her boots, she went into the bathroom to rummage through the

medicine chest, coming back with the things needed to see to his cuts. Kicking aside a

few shards of glass, she knelt down in front of him and picked up his foot to support it

on her thigh.

“What do you think it meant when it said you’re it?”

57

Charlotte Boyett-Compo

“The fucking retard wants to play tag,” he groused. “How the fuck would I know

what he meant?”

Plucking the slivers from the sole of his foot with a pair of tweezers, she couldn’t

help but smile. “If it had meant us any harm, it could have pulverized us with one

swipe of those claws.”

“You don’t think bursting our eardrums with that laugh wasn’t harmful?” he

questioned. He put a hand to his temple and rubbed. “I’ve got a bitching headache.”

She glanced up at him before using the washcloth she’d brought to wipe the bottom

of his foot. “Do you always get migraines when you encounter other psychics using

their powers? You got one yesterday after we bonded, remember?”

He shrugged. “Yeah, I guess.” He sucked in a harsh breath when she applied an

astringent to his wounds.

“Do you think he’ll come back?”

Fallon groaned. “I hope not.”

“But we don’t know what he wants. If he was inviting you to play with him—”

“I don’t play with other men,
myneeast caillagh
,” he growled.

“He looked like an overgrown teddy bear,” she said as she applied a Band-Aid to

the deepest of his cuts. “A shaggy, stinky teddy bear with a butt-ugly face, but still a

teddy bear.” She tilted her head to one side. “You have pretty feet for a guy.”

Fallon drew himself up indignantly. “I have a man’s feet, McCullough. Manly feet.”

“They’re still pretty,” she said, stroking the arch. “Most men have ugly feet with

misshapen toes and nasty nails. Your toes are straight and your nails are clean and

shaped.” She smiled. “Pretty feet.”

“Manly feet,” he protested.

“They are pretty manly feet,” she compromised.

He reached out for her, took her by the arms and dragged her toward him, falling to

his back on the bed as he stretched her atop him, wrapping his arms around her waist.

“Thank you for doctoring me,” he said.

She lowered her head and kissed his chin. “You are welcome.”

He yawned, weariness showing in his pale amber gaze.

“If you don’t think Sasquatch will return, perhaps we should try to get some sleep,”

she told him.

“Works for me,” he said, “but first…” He arched his hips for her to feel the growing

erection between his legs.

“Fallon…”

“Hey. You gotta get it while it’s hot,” he growled, dragging the sheet from her body

to bare her to his gaze.

58

Dancing on the Wind

“Hound, stop!”

Fallon halted dead in his tracks, shuddered at the imperious, gruff command.

His boots squelching wetly, his self-castigation goading him that he hadn’t brought

along another pair, feeling foolish that he’d gotten them soaked in the first place, he

grimaced with every step. It was just after sunrise and Keenan had been sleeping when

he had quietly left the cottage to search for the creature who had appeared the evening

before. Now that Fallon had found it—or rather the beast had found him—he felt a keen

rush of unease.

Slowly he turned to face the twenty-foot-tall creature who came lumbering out of

the forest toward him, craning his neck back to look up at
An Fear Liath Mor
. “Yes,

Vainshtyr
,” he said, giving the respectful title of Master to the being.

“I will have a word with you, pup,” the Guardian stated then waved a massive paw

at a rock. “Sit your scrawny ass down!”

Since the day he had first Transitioned, Fallon had thought himself in control of his

life, immune to being intimidated by anyone or anything, yet the being hulking before

him brought out intense disquiet bordering on actual fear. It wasn’t the same disquiet

he felt around the Supervisor—who controlled Fallon’s professional life—but was

rather out-and-out dread. He did as he was told as though he were a boy still in short

pants, ashamed of his own reaction to the creature.

“June berries,” the Guardian said as it backed against a thick tree and began

scratching its shaggy back.

“Excuse me?” Fallon inquired, brow furrowing.

“I said June berries, hound! What part of that did you not understand?”

Glancing around him, Fallon saw nothing that even remotely looked like a berry,

but since he had no idea what a June berry was, he could be looking at it without

knowing.

“Ah, if you’ll tell me where to get them for you…”

“
By the grace of the gods you’ll do no such thing
!” the entity roared loud enough to

nearly shatter Fallon’s eardrums—again.

Fallon cringed beneath the onslaught of the command but managed not to bolt from

the rock when the creature leaned toward him—broad face set into lines of fury and

stare glittering dangerously. The breath coming from the beast was so rank it nearly

knocked him from his perch, but he held steady, eyes watering from the stench.

“And you will forget my indiscretion and never repeat said indiscretion to another

living soul,” the Guardian snapped. “Is that clear?”

59

Charlotte Boyett-Compo

Completely lost, Fallon just stared at
An Fear Liath Mor
. “
Vainshtyr
, what is it I’m

not to repeat?”

The creature waved a dismissive hand and straightened up to full height. “They are

tasty, those gods-be-damned June berries,” it said. “All ripe and plump and juicy.” It

lowered its beetle-brow and gave Fallon a steady look. “Much like I imagine are the

teats of your mate. I would not mind comparing them.”

Fallon bristled at that but knew better than to say anything to the provocative

words. He dug his fingernails into the palms of his hands.

An Fear Liath Mor
grinned mercilessly. “Wise choice, hound,” it complimented.

“Very wise.” Once again it waved its giant paw. “But I digress.”

The ground shook when the creature plopped down to sit cross-legged in front of

Fallon. It placed its shaggy paws on its knees and curled the lethal talons downward.

“I could not resist a taste of those June berries though I know I should have left

them be. I reasoned a handful would not hurt and a handful most likely would not

have.” It pursed its thick lips then gave a mighty sigh. “But one handful led to two then

three then four until I had cleared an entire bush of its fruit.” It sighed again. “And that

is where my troubles began.”

Staring down at a huge foot that was bobbing with irritation, Fallon vaguely

remembered his mother telling him he should never look The Big Gray Man in the face

for it was considered not only rude but challenging.

“I like canines so I will allow it.”

Fallon looked up, realizing his thoughts had been plucked from the air. A dull pain

drove through his skull at the invasion but he pushed it aside.

“Canines are good, loyal creatures.” The beast shrugged. “Lupines? I can tolerate