Lynn Viehl - [Darkyn 08 - Lords of the Darkyn 01] (16 page)

She stared up at Korvel. “What happened?” She glanced around the lovely but unfamiliar room. “What is this place? Are we in Marseilles?”

“I brought you to a hotel in Avignon.” He studied her face. “Who attacked you at the rest stop?”

She touched the place where the assassin had clubbed her. The excruciating pain had vanished, along with the swelling. “I can’t say.” She sat up and assessed her surroundings. “How did you get a suite like this?”

“The way I usually obtain what I want from mortals.” The side of his mouth curled. “I compelled them to provide it, along with a doctor. I told him that you fell and struck your head. The owner and the hotel staff believe we are married.”

“We might as well be. Every time I wake up, I’m in bed with you.” Mortified by her own words, she put a hand over her eyes. “I apologize, my lord.”

A phone nearby rang, and the bed rose slightly as Korvel went to answer it. She listened, but he spoke only a few low words before hanging up.

The sound of something rolling across the floor made Simone lift her hand. Korvel brought a white cloth-draped cart to her side of the bed; the top of the cart lay covered with porcelain plates topped by ornate silver domes. Two crystal goblets sparkled on either side of a bottle of dark wine and a small pitcher of clear water.

“I have been attempting to contact the high lord, but a storm has cut off communications to the island.” He uncovered two of the plates, which were filled with fruit, cheese, and bread, and reached beneath the linen to take out a tray for the bed.

She sat up and watched as he set the tray over her lap and transferred one of the plates. “What are you doing?”

“The doctor said you should eat and drink something after you awoke,” he said as he filled one of the goblets with water and set it beside the plate. “If this is not to your liking I will bring you the menu.”

“I appreciate your consideration,” she said, “but I’m not hungry, and we need to get back on the motorway.”

“It will be dawn soon. You will have the day to rest and regain your strength. No,” he said as she started to get out of bed. “Traveling in the daylight will also weaken me.”

“You need blood.”

“That can wait as well.” He took a raspberry from the plate and held it in front of her lips. “If I must, I will pinch your nose.”

She reached up to take it from him, but he caught her wrist. “I can feed myself,” she told him.

Glints of violet shimmered in the blue of his eyes. “Open your mouth, angel.”

Simone parted her lips, and he pressed the raspberry between them. As she bit down, the berry’s fragrant juices filled her mouth, so sweet and luscious she felt almost decadent.

“I remember these.” Korvel watched her mouth. “Do they still taste like wine and dark roses?”

“I can’t say. I’ve never eaten a flower.” Her throat felt tight, and she picked up the goblet of water and sipped from it. As she did, she smelled something faint and acrid, and realized the assassin’s sweat was still on her skin. “I would like to bathe.”

Korvel helped her up from the bed. “Do you require my assistance?”

The thought of his big hands on her naked body made her knees turn to jelly. “Thank you, Captain, but I can manage.”

She walked calmly across the room, and only when she closed the bathroom door between them did she give in to the weakness of her limbs and slide to the floor.

Pain she could overcome. Her training had taught her how to withstand the debilitating effects of injury as well as hunger, thirst, and exhaustion. But this was something else, something she had never felt. She wanted to be naked in the captain’s arms again, so that he could touch her the way he had back at the convent. She wanted it so much she was shaking with it.

If she did not regain control of her body it would betray her and render her useless.

Simone got up and went to the sink. The hotel had provided an enormous beribboned basket filled with pretty soaps, lotions, and other toiletries, and from it she took a soft cloth and soaked it under the tap.

The wet cloth cooled her hot face and cleared some of the frantic emotion from her mind. She would offer him sex again, and this time he would use her, and that would extinguish this unbearable longing.

But that had been Pájaro’s sin: using the excuse of duty to indulge his own vices. She had seen the excitement in his eyes whenever he had stepped into the circle with her or one of her brothers. Hurting others gave him pleasure; he had taught her that the night he had come to her room.

Simone had no illusions about herself. She might live as a nun, but she was the daughter of a ruthless killer and a drug-addicted prostitute. She had so feared becoming like her father that she had forgotten her mother’s blood also ran in her veins. Korvel had simply opened her eyes to the other half of her nature.

A close examination of her scalp in the mirror revealed no evidence of injury, although Simone found some flecks of dried blood in her hair. She had a blurred memory of Korvel wounding himself as he took away her copper dagger; the blood was likely his. That would explain her missing injury, if he had offered some of his blood to heal her. She brought a few strands to her nose and breathed in his scent.

She stepped into the shower to scrub the assassin’s sweat from her body and the smell of Korvel from her hair. Once she dried off, she combed out and wove her hair into a long braid, tying off the end with a piece of ribbon from the basket.

Calmer now, Simone put on one of the clean, fluffy white robes hanging by the shower and readied herself to face Korvel again. Now that she had defined what was happening to her, she could pass through it and move beyond it. Desire was hardly different from a knife wound; both simply caused weakness and pain. Given time and care, both faded and were forgotten.

She stepped out into the bedroom to see that he had drawn all the drapes and switched off the lamps. It took her a moment to locate him where he lay on the bed. She moved silently until she could see his face, his brilliant eyes closed now, his chest barely moving.

He had fallen asleep.

Deciding she was relieved, not disappointed, Simone retreated to the broad, curved lounge by the windows. She sat on one end, where she could see Korvel and the door. The padded armrest made a somewhat comfortable pillow for her head, and when she curled up the robe covered her bare legs and feet.

Simone closed her eyes, clearing her thoughts of everything but the need to wake in a few hours, and then drifted off.

Chapter 9

K

orvel watched the nun fall asleep. His own need to rest remained, a sullen weight inside his head, but it could not overcome the stronger, more immediate demands of his body.

While she had bathed he had struck a bargain with his conscience: When she returned to the bed, he would determine whether she was aroused or frightened by him. If she feared his attentions, he would take his rest in the other room. If she wanted him, he would show her every pleasure that convent life had denied her.

Now she slept ten feet away, and his curiosity remained unsatisfied.

Because Simone was mortal, Korvel could not enter her dreams, or lure her into his. Nor could he bind her to him as his
sygkenis
. Although it would have been easier, he was glad Simone remained immune to his abilities and influence. If she ever chose to come to him, to give herself to him, it would be of her own accord.

He reached down to palm the bulge beneath the front of his trousers. His penis felt like an iron club, his pulse hammering beneath the head, and it showed no signs of subsiding. Korvel almost released it to deal with it himself, until he imagined the depths of the hell he would burn in if the nun woke to find him watching her as he stroked himself.

His cock thought it a fair trade and swelled another inch.

He got up to move into the next room, and Simone shifted, turning slightly. The white robe she wore fell open just enough to show the bend of her knee and the curve of one thigh. The fragrance of her body altered as well, growing deeper and sweeter, like herbs covered in dew at the first touch of dawn’s light.

That is not the scent of fear.

Korvel moved to the lounge, easing down beside her, not certain of what he meant to do but unable to stop himself just the same. He reached for a fold of her robe so he could cover her legs, and watched his hand draw it back, exposing more of her thigh. She had strong legs, smoothly muscled, the pale flesh sheened by tiny, almost invisible blond hairs. Like the women in the time of his mortal life, she must have never put a razor to her legs.

Korvel wanted to feel that sweet velvet against his cheek, his lips, his belly. His
dents acérées
slid slowly into his mouth, full and aching, demanding another taste of her, and he had to look away until he could master the beast inside him.

Simone made a soft sound, drawing his attention back to her, and he saw that her eyes were open but unfocused. “Captain?” she murmured.

“Yes, sister.” He bent over her, releasing his scent so he could see her eyes go dark. “It’s me.”

She reached for him, finding his wrist, bringing his hand to her cheek. “Thought you were sleeping.”

If she only knew what had kept him awake, she would run from the room shrieking. “I must go. I will return soon.”

“Don’t.” She held on to him. “Don’t leave me again.”

He could release himself from her grip with barely a flick of a muscle; yet he felt as bound to her as if they were chained in copper. “The drugs are still affecting you.”

“No.” Her eyes, clear and bright now, held his. “Not anymore. It’s you.
You
make me feel this longing.”

Her scent did not change; she was speaking the truth. He wouldn’t allow himself to take her, but he could attend to her needs. “I want to touch you and give you pleasure. This will please me as well. If you do not want this, I will leave and see to my own needs. You have but to tell me what you want, my angel.”

Her hand left his wrist, and Korvel started to rise. He stopped as he watched her hands move down to the belt of her robe and untie it.

He felt a moment of shocked uncertainty, as if she had stripped the centuries away and made him mortal again. Perhaps it was fitting that a nun who had never known a man could reduce him to the state of an awkward adolescent with his first woman.

She pulled apart the robe, baring her breasts and belly and thighs to his gaze. He wanted to open the drapes and allow the dawn to illuminate every inch of her so he could see her skin in sunlight. He didn’t care that it would further weaken him, but such a thing would doubtless embarrass her. He wanted her to remember this interlude with nothing but delight.

Afraid he would lose his head and pounce on her, Korvel moved from the lounge to kneel on the floor. She turned toward him, shifting down to pillow her head on one arm and stretch out full-length.

“You do not belong in this world.” Using one fingertip, he traced the ridge of her collarbone, following it up to her shoulder and down the side of her arm. “In my time men would have taken up the sword and the lance to win your favor.”

“No need,” she murmured. “You have mine.”

Korvel found the end of her braid and removed the ribbon, unwinding the long, thick cable until he could drape her with the vibrant strands. He felt her palm graze his cheek as she curled a strand of his short hair around her fingertip.

She had such an absorbed look on her face that he had to ask, “What are you thinking?”

“The red in your hair is fading,” she murmured. “Soon it will be blond again. If you were human, our babies would all be fair.”

The thought of his child swelling inside her made him feel a surge of regret. “As I am, I cannot give you children.”

She glanced down and touched two of the slanted ridges on her belly. “Even if you could, I can never conceive.”

He covered one scar with his hand. Given the circumstances of his own birth, he had never regretted being rendered infertile by the change, but he knew most mortal females desired children. “I am sorry to know that.”

“Don’t be.” Her eyes shifted to his. “What do you want me to do?”

“Close your eyes.” When she did, he brushed the ends of her hair across her lower lip. “Do you feel that?”

“Yes.”

“That is what I want.” He let her hair sift through his fingers before he put them to her face, following the sweep of her brows around to the arch of her cheekbones, the slant of her nose to the cusp above her upper lip. Her mouth parted for his fingers as he traced its contours before he feathered a caress along the line of her jaw and down the hollows of her throat.

Korvel saw her lashes flutter as she felt his breath on her body. “Tell me what you feel.”

“I ache inside. It feels like fever, but I’m not sick.” She dampened her lips. “I want to open my eyes.”

“Not yet.” He bent his head, stroking his tongue over the swollen peak of her breast before he blew a breath across it to watch the damp tip bead. “You ache here, don’t you?” When she nodded, he curved his hand around the flushed mound. “This is what you need.”

He put his lips to her hard nipple, working his tongue over it. As he suckled, he moved his hand down to her waist, and then to her thigh. He stroked the tight muscle in time with the tug of his mouth, until her legs relaxed and her hips shifted. The scent of her arousal rushed over him as he brought his hand to rest over the curls of her mound. When he parted her with his finger, she jolted, her breast escaping his lips and her hand curling into his hair.

Korvel kept his hand where it was and turned his face to kiss her palm. “You feel the ache there, beneath my hand, don’t you?”

“If I say yes,” she asked, her voice low and tight, “are you going to put your mouth there?”

“You have to say yes to find out.” He stroked his fingers between her folds so that she heard the sound of her own slickness. “I want to feel you on my tongue.” He bent his head, and she felt his words against the skin of her belly. “Say yes, Simone, and I’ll make the aching go away.”