Warrior Untamed (10 page)

With a hand to the back of her head, he slowly pulled her toward him, waiting for some sign of resistance in her expression.

None came.

Her mouth opened as if she might speak, but she made no sound. He leaned into her, pressing his lips to hers.

No hard, fast, spur-of-the-moment kiss like their last one. No, this time he meant it to be slow and gentle. This time he meant them both to enjoy it.

His tongue explored the soft contours of her mouth, and her body molded against his. His spirit soared with her eager response. He wrapped his arms around her and, without breaking their kiss, rolled her onto her back, careful to support himself on his good arm to keep from crushing her under his full weight.

She moaned and twined her arms around his neck, tangling her fingers in his hair and rubbing them against his scalp.

By the Norns, but her touch drove him wild!

He broke the kiss to trail his lips down the length of her neck as his fingers fumbled to part the cloth at her bodice. Caressed by the cold air, her soft skin erupted in small bumps, and she shivered.

Need consumed him. He wanted this woman in his arms more than he could ever remember wanting anyone before.

When he settled his mouth over one perfectly budded breast, she sucked in her breath and he looked up to find her staring at him, her eyes reflecting the desire he felt coursing through his body.

Outside, thunder rumbled and lightning crackled in a nonstop performance, casting a brilliant glow across the velvety night sky.

After a lifetime spent in service to others, this one thing, this one time, he would do just for himself.

With his knee, he nudged her heavy skirt upward until he could run his hand along the bare, smooth skin of her thigh. Up, higher, to the silky softness of her stomach, where the muscles clenched reflexively under his touch.

Grasping her hips, he settled himself between her knees, where she welcomed him by locking her leg over his.

So close. He was so close to where he wanted to be, buried deep inside her warmth. His body ached to take her fast and hard, but he fought the temptation. This was a moment to be savored, not to be rushed.

He pressed against her, his erection so hard he felt as if his skin might burst. When she lifted her hips against him, he had to force himself to wait. Enter her now and he would be lost. It had been too long, and he wanted her too badly.

A moment to regain his control.

A moment to ensure her passion spiked as high as his own.

He shifted his weight to one side and trailed his hand down to her waist and around to the juncture between her legs.

So hot, so welcoming, her hips lifted and she moaned with pleasure as he slipped one finger inside her.

With one finger inside and his thumb covering the hard little nub, he had but to flex his hand and her moan turned to a breathless whimper, her hips lifting rhythmically to meet the movement of his hand.

Two fingers. Two fingers pressing deep inside, readying her body to accept him. Massaging, slow at first, building in tempo until her body convulsed, her throbbing muscles pulsating around his fingers.

He held her through her climax, his lips covering hers until she gasped for breath.

She was ready for the next step.

With his hands at the small of her back, he lifted her hips and positioned himself against her.

She tangled her fingers in his hair and pulled his mouth to hers, opening for him, her tongue fencing with his in a magnificent dance.

It was now. She would be his.

He’d just begun the exquisitely slow slide into her welcoming sheath when an unearthly scream shattered his moment of bliss.

Not quite human, not quite beast, the sound pierced the night, echoing louder than the rumble of the crashing storm outside.

Hall leapt to his feet, grabbed his sword in one hand and his fur in the other. The sword he raised in front of him. The fur he tossed over the fire, smothering the flames and dousing every last bit of light.

“What was that?” Bridget asked in a whisper, lifting herself up on her elbows.

He didn’t answer, tilting his head to one side in an effort to catch the smallest ripple of vibration for miles. In the silence of the suddenly stilled storm, only one sound reached his ears—the steady beat of massive wings passing through the air, racing away from them.

P
AIN FROM THE
depths of Niflheim wracked his body, radiating along the length of his arm.

Fenrir slid from the window ledge into his tower to land on his bare feet. Earlier in the evening, he’d taken the form of the great owl to investigate the odd vibrations he’d sensed from the far corner of his lands.

Half an hour into his flight, he’d spotted it, a strange red glow pulsating up from the ground, flowing out into the night. He’d known that whatever emitted that light was a danger to him, because the five oozing sores around his heart had pulsated in conjunction with the glow. Whatever had caused the wound to Torquil’s body was somewhere down there in the night.

He’d been closing in on the source when a sudden, savage storm exploded the sky around him.

He could find no respite, no safe escape. The lightning caught him, charring his feathers and searing his skin. In his agony, his concentration wavered, and with it, his form. He plummeted helplessly
toward the land below, struggling desperately to recover his hold on the transformation Magic.

In his original form, the form in which he had been created, such a near crisis would never have occurred. But his own form was long gone, destroyed by the Elves of Niflheim when they imprisoned his spirit in those accursed scrolls of theirs.

His merging with the laird of the MacDowylt was nearing completion, and his senses accepted the body he had borrowed as if it were his own. And this body, this weak, helpless body, had plummeted from the skies like a boulder when he was attacked.

And it was an attack. No mere storm, no mere coincidence, could have formed so quickly or so viciously to drive him away.

“I must have my scrolls,” he roared to the heavens, clutching his injured arm.

Without them, he was trapped as a lesser being, unable to enhance this body to prevent such a thing as had happened tonight.

Without them, he was separated from the vast power of his Magic.

Without them, he risked another imprisonment within the Magic of the symbols scrawled on their faces.

The pain in his arm pulsed with every beat of the pitifully small heart in his chest. He turned his attention to study the wound. A burn, jagged and scarring, raced the length of his arm from shoulder to elbow. The sickly sweet stench of charred flesh
rose up from the gaping rip in his skin, churning his stomach.

Silently, he sent an order to the captain of his guard to bring a healer to him. He hurt as only a feeble Mortal body could hurt. Great heaving waves of pain assaulted his physical being. Never before, never in his true form, had he experienced torment like this. The need to relieve the agony was so great that he reached for the jug of spirits on the shelf above the fireplace. Whisky might dull his senses, if only for a short time.

He tipped back the container, allowing the liquid to flow down his throat, burning the tender flesh as it gurgled toward his stomach.

Even before this calamity struck, his evening had been one frustration after another.

None of the remaining men he’d sent in pursuit of his treasure had managed to locate the thief yet. His attempts to control the boy through his dreams were thwarted by the power of the sword. And when he’d attempted to view the culprit’s location through the jewels, his view had been blocked as if the stones were swathed in layers of protective covering, the five of them united in their effort to reject him.

He prayed that the jewels hadn’t been separated from the scrolls. That sort of a foolish move would leave the powers of the scrolls,
his
powers, available for anyone to claim, a completely unacceptable outcome.

It was his concern over the jewels that had sent him winging into the night.

Whisky in hand now, he stared out into the star-sparkled heavens. After spending an eternity imprisoned by the jewels’ power, he recognized the feel of them, and tonight he was sure he’d felt them somewhere in the vast dark of the night, heading in his direction.

Perhaps it was only the dilution of his powers he suffered as he melded with this form, but uncertainty clouded his thoughts. The sudden storm, so strange and unusual for this time of year, had assailed him as if engaging in battle.

Mere chance?

He downed another long draught of the heady drink before turning his back on the window.

He didn’t believe in chance.

Something was out there. A threat greater than he had faced in many years.

Though he wouldn’t be flying again anytime soon, he would be vigilant. He would find a way to search for whatever had given off those peculiar vibrations. To search for whatever life force had lit the night with its eerie red glow.

And when he found it, his justice would be swift and merciless to whoever dared approach him with such a burdensome gift.

E
VERYTHING
B
RIE HAD
ever imagined about what the future held in store for her had changed completely over the course of this strange and wonderful evening. For the first time in her life, she could envision herself with a man at her side as she rode into the hereafter.

One very specific man, upon whose broad chest she rested her head. Halldor O’Donar.

Hall.
Her
Hall.

The warmth of happiness cocooned her and she ran a hand across the hard expanse of chest that served as her pillow. His hand covered hers, offering the reassurance of a light squeeze.

What might have happened between them had they not been interrupted by that horrible scream would remain fodder for her fantasies for the moment. The need to remain vigilant for whatever had lurked outside in the dark outweighed their desire to lose themselves in the fog of sensual pleasure.

What she couldn’t even begin to conceive of,
even in her own admittedly overactive imagination, was what kind of beast could possibly have issued that hideous shriek. Never in her life had she heard such an unearthly sound.

After checking their campsite, Hall had returned with a growled “No fire.”

Under the circumstances, she agreed.

Beneath her ear, his heart pounded strong and sure. Thankfully, adjusting the bandage over his wound had made a remarkable difference in his strength. She prayed, to whatever gods would listen, that he would remain his strong warrior self until they reached Orabilis.

Her
strong warrior.

She’d never dared to think of any man as hers before. But she’d never met anyone like Hall. He, unlike every other man she’d ever known, accepted her as his equal. It seemed only natural they should be together. He was so much like her—a warrior with nothing but his honor, and no place to call his own.

“Will you remain here?” Her question echoed off the rocks above them, jarringly loud in the silence. She lowered her voice to barely more than a whisper to continue. “When all this is over, I mean.”

It seemed a logical question. His brother, Chase, had married Christiana MacDowylt, so without question he would remain at Castle MacGahan.

But would Hall do the same?

“At Castle MacGahan, you mean? Such a prospect
paints a most pleasant picture to a man such as I.” He stroked his fingers softly through her hair for several minutes before he spoke again. “But such is not woven as my fate.”

Surely he didn’t still believe she’d allow him to die out here.

“Your fate is not what you fear. I intend to see you safely to Rowan Cottage, where the witch
will
heal you. I so swear it. You have no call to doubt that outcome or to expect the worst will happen.”

A chuckle rumbled under her ear. “I have not one doubt about your good intentions, Shield Maiden. But even should you be successful, once our task is finished and our enemy defeated, I have no choice but to return to my home.”

She wished for light so that she might see his face as he spoke. So much meaning was lost in the words floating in the dark void where they lay.

“Where is home for you?”

“I live along the northern coast of the Isle of Mists,” he answered, his voice little more than a whisper as well. “Ireland, you’d call it. Home of my grandmother’s people.”

He meant to return to Ireland? And leave a whole entire ocean separating them? That would never do. Whatever laird he served would simply have to make do without her big warrior.

“You ken there’s a place for you here, aye? You dinna have to go back. Forget about those you served there. We need you here.”

She
needed him here.

“My days are not my own. My life’s path is not my own to choose. I am committed to go when and where I’m needed, when and where I’m sent, no matter where I might want to be. I don’t have the luxury of forgetting those for whom I am responsible. Though I’d venture a guess, as often as I’m gone, they might feel forgotten. Nonetheless, they are my people and I have an obligation to see to their welfare.”

“Yer people?” She lifted her head and turned toward him, straining to see his face. In the dark, she could barely make out his shape, let alone his features or expression.

“Yes. With my grandmother gone, Haven Castle and all her people have become my responsibility. I must oversee their welfare and safety, as well as the welfare and safety of those I’m sent to help. It is the destiny I was born to. My path in life. And I cannot change it, no matter that I might want to.”

Brie struggled for her next breath, feeling as though her heart had stopped beating.

He was a laird. With a castle and responsibilities. A man born to substance and wealth.

And she? She was no one. She owned nothing but a few paltry household goods she could carry upon the back of a horse. She was certainly not the dowried lady a man such as Hall would one day wed.