HerMatesEmbrace (21 page)

“And it will become more intense once we finally manage to
talk you out of the tools you’re using to hide your scent. We always want you
and know you feel the same. The magic lesson is necessary. You’re focusing your
power now without meaning to do it. We don’t want an accident to cause any
setbacks to the confidence you’ve gained.” Linc rose easily from the chair, but
stayed where he was.

“You mean that I might hurt someone if I get angry.” She
took a deep breath and closed her eyes.

“That’s a possibility, but it’s not going to happen. We’re
going to work with you and you’ll control it just as you do the rising power
now.” Linc’s tone was firm and assured.

She looked between them for a moment and didn’t seem certain
of what they’d said, but nodded. “What do I do?”

“It’s not too different from what you’ve been doing up to
this point.” Colm stepped back, giving her room. As much as he’d like to be
close to her, she’d need the space when she worked on this. He didn’t want
anything to go wrong simply because he was too concentrated on her. She needed
to learn this, not only to control her magic, but it would increase her ability
to protect herself from Laed and Kynar.

“Focus is the first element. What were you thinking of when
your hands became hot out there on the stairs?” Linc joined Colm, but his eyes
never left Cami.

She tilted her head and Colm saw her straighten as a little
of her earlier anger returned. He hadn’t wanted to remind her of that. It had
been necessary to make her realize how she had done it. Aside from that, he
knew that making her come wasn’t going to take away her anger.

“I wanted to blast you down the staircase.” She bit her lip
as she made the admission.

“Doesn’t surprise me. We were being demanding and you didn’t
want to follow orders. We knew you’d be furious.” Linc shrugged.

“So I’m supposed to become angry again?” She frowned and her
hands flexed at her side. “I still am, but I don’t think I can get it up to
that level again.”

“No, you don’t need to be angry. You won’t need any emotion
fueling this and we’ll go with something that doesn’t involve bodily harm to
either of us. We have plans for you. Injuries would interfere.” Colm raised an
eyebrow wanting to see if she’d respond to his words.

“Can’t have anything interfere with your plans.” She rolled
her eyes and shook her head. “Now, how do I do this and what’s my target?”

Colm looked around and his eyes locked on the pillows on the
floor. He went and picked a few. Taking them over to the wall near the doors,
he lined them up. Looking back, he saw her smiling. It didn’t take much thought
to know why she liked the idea of destroying those cushions.

“There are more pillows in the castle, you know.” He didn’t
fight the grin curving his lips. “If we want you here again, you will sit in
front of us.”

“We’ll see. Tell me what to do. I focus. I know there’s more
than that. I want to be able to do this and more. I want to do everything.” She
tilted her head and stared at him.

“Well, we need to teach you some basics before you can do
everything, because what we’re going to do is relatively simple. Now focus on
the pillows. I want you to visualize a circle of power in your palm.
Concentrate, because the magic isn’t going to naturally form a ball,” Linc
instructed quietly. “Focus, visualize and mold it to your will.”

It took her a little while. Colm watched as the energy
formed in her palm, golden and glowing. It pooled and wavered in her hand. The
details were important in building shields and more complex constructs.

“Cami, you’re not concentrating. Push it into a ball. It’s
your magic. Make it do what you want it to do.” Linc’s voice was firm but
encouraging.

She shot a glare at Linc before looking down at her palm.
Colm pressed his lips tightly together to keep from chuckling at her
expression. She was so damn cute with that determined frown and the narrowed
eyes. The magic pulsed in her hand and tightened into a pulsating oval. She
growled as it collapsed into a blob again in her palm.

“You’re trying too hard. It’s not what you see with your
eyes. Picture a ball in your mind and then fill the ball with the magic,” Colm
suggested.

She took a deep breath, closed her eyes for a moment then
straightened her shoulders. When her eyes flickered open again, she looked down
at her palm. This time the power pulsed and jumped only once before flowing
upward into a tight ball. A smile curved her lips. He thought she was going to
lose her focus with the success, but she managed to keep control. The glowing
ball of magic remained in her palm.

“Now what do I do with this? Throw it?” She looked over at
him and then Linc.

“Throwing it isn’t necessary. Visualize and then will it to
do what you want. It’s much easier and more accurate than physically hurling
the ball. Concentrate.” Linc nodded toward the pillows. “Now, show us what you
can do.”

“The reason I’m here is because I don’t know what to do,”
she muttered. “Will it to do what I want, I know…”

She continued muttering beneath her breath. Colm didn’t
catch the rest of what she said, but knew it was probably something a little
violent. Her temper was definitely showing lately. He didn’t mind it. That
emotion heralded healing and deeper feelings. Both very good things.

The ball hovered over her hand for a moment and then slammed
into the pillow. Colm nodded. She’d picked it up fairly fast. It didn’t
surprise him. She was serious and determined to master something once they
introduced it to her. With practice, he knew she’d be able to strengthen it and
make it into a formidable weapon. Without waiting for them to tell her, she
formed another orb and slung it at another pillow.

“I think you have the idea now. We’ll practice and teach you
more, later.” Colm walked over and brushed his fingers across her cheek. “Ready
to go out and get back to hiding from us?”

“I wasn’t hiding from you.” She frowned and put a hand on
his chest. “Just trying to get a little time away from something I felt was
going to cause a change that I might not want.”

“Same thing.” Colm smiled, simply to see the flush of temper
rise on her cheeks.

“It’s not. If I wanted to hide from you, I could have.” Her
finger poked right above his nipple as if emphasizing her words. “Now open the
door and remove whatever you did to keep me in here. I think I’ve had enough
alone time with you two.”

“You know, I think I might have to make you eat those words
one day.” Linc brushed his hand over her hair. “The shielding spell is gone.
You’ll be able to get out the door now.”

“We’ll talk and more again after we eat tonight.” Colm
reluctantly stepped away from her.

“Maybe.” She grinned and began to walk toward the doors.

Colm watched the sway of her hips. They’d definitely spend
some time with her, maybe even convince her to spend the night with them.

Chapter Nineteen

Cami still felt a little stunned even after a night to sleep
and think about things. She headed for the stairs. Gods, she needed to get
outside. It had been a long day already and she’d just finished the midday
meal. She hadn’t expected Colm and Linc to push her into that kind of position
when they’d seemed prepared to wait for her to take the next step for so long.
Things had changed. Colm and Linc had taken their pursuit public and were in
full hunt.

Shaking her head, she focused on what she needed. Sturdy
shoes, because the slippers on her feet wouldn’t do even for a sojourn within
the walls of the
Thent
. The tan skirt could stay. She didn’t expect to
get to go outside of the defense walls, but even the thought of feeling the sun
on her face was enough to lighten her mood from the heavy thoughts and anxiety
that had plagued her since she’d woken.

It didn’t help that she couldn’t stop thinking of last
night. Colm and Linc hadn’t pressed beyond asking if she’d sleep with them, but
she knew they were impatient to tug her fully into their lives. The little
touches on the way up the stairs last night definitely had her thinking of them
and sex. Small brushes of fingers over her arm or down her back sent sparks
sizzling over her skin. It hadn’t been easy to say no when she wanted those
touches all over her body without clothes getting in the way.

Today, she hadn’t done more than walk through the main
building yet, but she could already tell there was a distinct change in the way
people viewed her. She felt a growl building low in her throat. There was a
respect in the gazes of most of the men now.

Not that there had ever been any disrespect. It was simply
that they saw her as Linc and Colm’s Lady now. It was a higher position than
guest or even member of the
Thent
. She shook her head. It wasn’t so much
the men that irritated her though. They wouldn’t cause her trouble.

It was the females. So far she’d only seen a few women. They
had looked at her with a little confusion as if they didn’t understand the
sudden change. She expected to be confronted with more than that.

She’d received some icy stares from a few women before Linc
and Colm had decided to take this step. Those women wouldn’t be merely stunned.
She knew that their reactions could be much worse than the confrontations she’d
had before. The women who’d confronted her before had been a little angry at
her sudden appearance in Linc and Colm’s life, but after the initial
confrontation, had seemed to move on to other things. Cami expected anger had
been simmering in one or two women. It was going to explode now.

Today, one woman in particular glared at her. As long as she
kept it to mere stares, Cami didn’t care about that. Judging by the intense
anger in that gaze, Cami suspected that the woman wouldn’t be content to hate
her from afar. She didn’t think she’d have long to wait either.

In one of life’s unfair twists, she was going to have deal
with it. The men who caused this entire mess wouldn’t have to deal with
anything except the aftermath. Well, and her anger, because if there was more
drama with the women, she was going to be pissed.

She shook her head. Just as she turned to start up the
stairs, someone barreled into her, shoving her against the wall. The force was
too great and the impact too direct to be anything other than intentional. The
impact into the wall stunned Cami, but it also knocked the woman back a step.

Claws sprang from the tips of her fingers and her teeth
lengthened at the unexpected attack. Even though she’d expected something to
happen, she hadn’t thought anyone would attack her this way. Cami spun in the
small space available. When hands tried to grab for her, she dug the sharp tips
of her nails into the slender forearms.

The black-haired woman yowled as Cami’s claws sunk deep. The
woman jumped back. Cami slipped out of the corner and put a little distance
between them. Cami eyed the petite female with distaste. She recognized her as
the one who’d glared at her from across the room earlier.

Cowardly bitch. Cami didn’t linger too long in thoughts of
the attack from the back. Her eyes narrowed. The woman wanted to make things
physical, Cami would definitely oblige her.

“Well, you’ve got my attention now and you’re going to pay
for it.” Cami’s lips pulled back in a snarl. She wasn’t going to back away and
try to talk this woman out of any further violence. This type of woman would
only see it as weakness.

The woman growled and if she’d been in
tiron
form,
her hackles would have raised. “You don’t belong here.”

Cami shook her head at the woman’s words. She could
practically hear the burning jealousy there. “Funny. I didn’t know you had any
say in that.”

Shock and fury flashed over the woman’s face. She jumped
forward with a scream of rage. Her fingers flexed as if to slash and claw at
Cami. Cami moved out of the way. Her hand caught the woman’s shoulder,
propelling her into the opposite wall. Since she didn’t have a good grip on the
woman’s arm, she backed away and waited. She didn’t hold out much hope that her
opponent would see that this was stupid.

Cami was a little surprised at the woman’s quick reaction.
She hadn’t expected one comment to make her lose control, but was astounded
that she didn’t feel more fear. Even though she’d known she was slowly
recovering from the attack, she’d thought that a situation such as this might
give her trouble. Maybe it was the fact that she was facing a woman. All she
felt was determination and a slow, building anger over the woman’s initial
attack. What did astound her was that men weren’t here already in response to
the scream.

“What’s the matter? Can’t decide what to do now that your
craven sneak attack failed?” Cami didn’t try to hold back the disdain in her
voice or expression.

The woman swung her claws at Cami’s face. Cami jumped back
from the swipe, but immediately glided forward and sliced a punch up toward the
woman’s jaw. The blow glanced off the woman’s jaw as the black-haired woman
instinctively flinched back. She saw a little surprise in the other female’s
eyes.

“I’m not so easily intimidated.” Cami shook her head, but
never took her eyes off the woman. She knew she couldn’t afford to let her
guard down a moment.

“I’m going to make you afraid. I’ll hurt you and keep doing
it until you leave this
Thent
. They’re mine,” the woman snarled.

“Yours?” Cami shook her head and bit off a laugh. “I doubt
you were even under consideration. I dreamed of them with more than a few of
the women in this
Thent
, some more than one time. I never saw you. I
didn’t even know they touched you.”

“They want me now!” The woman rushed at Cami.

Cami twisted out of the way of the furious woman. She
grabbed the petite woman’s shoulder and then slammed her head into the wall
before she could spin around to come at her again. She was getting tired of
dealing with Colm and Linc’s angry past lovers.

“More and more I begin to doubt their level of intelligence
and taste when it comes to women.” She shook her head and then stripped off the
woman’s belt to tie her hands. She didn’t know what she was going to do with
the woman, but leaving the other female’s hands free for another attack seemed
careless.

“I’ll take her,” a male voice announced.

Cami jumped. Where did he come from? He certainly hadn’t
been there more than a moment or two.

“I just got past the women in the hall set to distract us.”
He smiled and stepped forward when she backed away from the woman sprawled on
the floor near the base of the stairs. “The Ardin will probably be inside
shortly.”

The question must have been plain to see on her face,
because she knew she hadn’t said that out loud. As for the Ardin, she was angry
enough right now to try to disappear on them. However, if she did that, she
wouldn’t get to yell at them. Right now she really wanted to yell at them.

“No questions about what happened?” She raised a brow. It
didn’t seem right that he just walked into the middle of this and calmly took
the other woman without hearing either side of the story.

“I heard enough even before getting past the other women to
know she wanted to hurt you. The sound carries rather well along these
hallways. On top of that, you couldn’t have gotten those women to run
interference.” He nodded and hauled the woman to her feet.

“I’m going to my room. If they get here before I get back,
that’s where I’ll be.” She started up the stairs. She was going to need a few
minutes to calm down. Not only because of the power flowing through her, but
because she didn’t want to lose control and go at those two men. She had to
admit he was right about the other women. She hadn’t made many friends here
yet. Most of the females here only tolerated her.

When she closed the door to her room behind her, she began
pacing. Shivers raced over her body. Anger boiled through her. She whipped
around and stalked back to the other end of the room. Colm and Linc were
responsible for part of this and she heaped a lot of the blame their way, but
she knew it wasn’t only them.

The women in this damn
Thent
played a part and so did
she. The women were trying to grab onto something safe and known as well as the
power of being their Lady. Cami stopped and clenched her fists. In a way, she
was taking the easy way the same as them.

She was so afraid to take the chance that Linc and Colm
would turn away from her at some point that she’d been trying to hide from the
truth. In doing so, she almost encouraged this. She hadn’t acknowledged their
claim on her or hers on them, even verbally. She growled and scowled over at
her bag. She had the almost insane desire to dig the bottles out and throw them
at the wall.

She wasn’t sure about the future. Even with her growing
abilities and those dreams, she wasn’t sure if she’d be able to stay here. It
was time to stop cowering in a corner. If nothing else, the last few days had
shown her that. She was strong and she was a survivor. If she had to leave,
she’d do it if they’d claimed her or not. She knew they’d chase her regardless.
She’d keep the bottles, just in case she couldn’t stay. It might help her gain
a little distance on them.

The decision was almost a relief. While she brushed her hair
and straightened her clothes, she thought about what she was going to do.
Is
it really such a great idea?
Was her anger leading her to take a step that
she’d regret later? She exhaled slowly as she thought about it. It might not be
the smartest idea she’d ever had, but the time to hide from the truth had
passed.

Colm and Linc knew that she was their mate. She’d never be able
to convince them otherwise. And the women of this
Thent
weren’t taking
the hint from Colm and Linc’s behavior. She was really tired of dealing with
drama from their past relationships. In that sense, doing this could only be
helpful and not hurt much at all.

The most stubborn of the women might still be a problem. At
least they’d know for certain that Linc and Colm weren’t free. She might regret
it in some ways. Colm and Linc were sure to think of this as some sort of
surrender. That gave her a few qualms, even though it wasn’t how she saw the
decision.

She nodded and turned to leave the room. Time to do this
before she managed to talk herself out of it. No more hiding behind her fear or
waiting to see what was going to happen.

She headed down the hallway, but stopped at the top of the
stairs as she saw Linc and Colm mounting the steps. Each man wore a fierce,
determined look. Both men looked even more intimidating than normal, since both
of them wore stark black from shoulder to toes. She didn’t know why they were
in a bad mood. They hadn’t been attacked.

“Are you all right?” Linc walked up the last of the steps
and curved his arm around her waist.

She leaned into him briefly. “I was attacked from behind,
Linc. What I am is tired of this. I want to talk to the other women now.”

“We’ll take care of it.” Colm hadn’t moved from where he
stood on the steps.

“No, we tried your way, if you’ll remember. The blatant
demonstration didn’t work with these women. They won’t believe anything you say
and they’ll come at me again.” She took a deep breath and struggled to keep her
voice as even as possible.

“And you think they’ll believe you.” Colm raised a brow.

“I don’t care if they believe me, but they’re going to know
what’s going to happen if they attack me again.” She met Colm’s eyes and then
turned her head to Linc.

She hoped they saw her determination and recognized that
she’d made her decision. They always seemed so certain. She hadn’t seen any
type of doubt on anything other than Colm’s doubt about wanting to search for
his true mate. She still didn’t know what had held him back from it.

She knew they wanted to protect her. That hadn’t changed.
She wasn’t going to let the women think she was hiding behind the Ardin’s
protection. She didn’t need their strength in this instance. She did wonder how
they’d react to her claim of them, but it wasn’t at the top of her worries.

Linc met her eyes. He was silent so long that she couldn’t
help but wonder what he was thinking. Was he going to say no and do it on his
own? She knew there wouldn’t be an end to trouble that way, even if they made a
blatant claim. She was almost holding her breath when he slowly nodded.

“Do you want all of the women or only the single women?”
Colm leaned a shoulder against the wall. He seemed a little more relaxed than
he was before.

“Only the unmated women. They’re the ones who can’t seem to
see the obvious. The men haven’t had that problem. After you two decided you
wanted me, the other men never even approached me.” She hadn’t thought about
that at the time. She’d been too busy trying to think of a way to keep them at
a distance. Now that she had, she wondered why none of them had seemed to see
her as an available woman.