Werelord Thal: A Renaissance Werewolf Tale (50 page)

The safety and delights of the party were
over. Heavy silence between her and Martin weighed on them as the
carriage took them back to Old Town. The ugly sensation of his hand
upon her spoiled the robust thrill of when Thal had kissed her. She
was torn between anxiety and craving. Altea understood that she was
a grown woman and overdue for bedding a man. A husband was a
natural need. She had been taught that her body was meant to
produce children, and she was making poor progress toward
fulfilling that purpose. The advances of Martin were deviant and
her undeniable attraction to Thal was dangerous.

She tucked her feet under her and leaned
against her drunken brother. At least Thal had said he would come
tonight. She knew she could not possibly face the rest of her life
if she did not indulge in the rendezvous. To embrace him again she
would defy everything she had been taught was right.

Once they got home, Martin helped his son
upstairs. Altea was thankful for the unwitting assistance of Elias
who kept Martin’s hands occupied. Grabbing a candle she rushed into
the room of her younger brothers.

She pulled up their covers and brushed hair
from their faces. Yiri mumbled but did not wake up. They were all
adorable as cherubs and sleeping peacefully. She blew out the
candle and crammed herself into bed with Yiri and Erik. The boys
snuggled into new positions, but Altea remained wide awake. She
imagined Thal creeping across the city toward her home. The mad
desire to be near him again scoured her with impatience.

She heard Martin in the hall. Her stomach
twisted when she judged that his footsteps were at her bedroom the
door.

Next he thumped across the hall and opened
the door of the younger boys’ room. Altea shut her eyes. Martin
grunted and she imagined him squinting at her suspiciously. She was
obviously using his own children as a shield.

Finally Martin left. Not until his own bed
groaned under his weight did Altea take a deep breath. She welcomed
the temporary reprieve from attack when his grinding snores rattled
from his room.

Very slowly she got out of the bed. She
gathered her skirt close so it would not catch on anything. She
lifted the door latch with snail-like lethargy so it would not make
a sound.

Once out in the hall, she tiptoed to the
stairs with delicate perfection, keeping her feet close to the wall
to lessen the chance of the floorboards creaking. On the stairs,
she skipped the step that would squeak for sure. She felt a little
safer when she reached the main floor. The servants would sleep
through anything.

In the front room she slid behind the drapes
and gently undid the window latch. The dark street was quiet. A
long time she waited at the window, losing hope. She even began to
wonder if some magic had made her dream the whole interlude with
Thal. That made more sense than actually associating with the
strange criminal.

Then she heard steps on the cobbles. Peeking
out with one eye she saw a cloaked man with a little dog. Happiness
caressed her spirit. His promise had been kept and she would feel
his touch again.

He did not look up when he walked by the
window. “Meet me at your back gate,” he whispered and kept going
down the street.

Altea’s sweaty hands slipped off the window
hardware the first time she tried to pull it shut. The most
splendid excitement burned in the core of her body. Nervous
laughter quivered in her throat but she kept herself silent. A
whole lifetime seemed to pass as she forced herself to creep across
the house. Her legs felt weak. Her nipples stiffened against her
clothes and she ached with warm, awakening lust.

In an agony of enforced stealth, she made her
way quietly out the back door. The dark outline of a man stood at
the back gate and she rushed to him. During those few steps she
knew perfect freedom. There were no rules or light of day. Nothing
but her desire and the cool night air existed. She yanked the gate
open and was in his arms. They sighed each other’s names and
kissed. His steely arms made her feel safe. She ran her hands up
his chest and down his sides until she bumped his pistols.

Then he took his mouth off hers. “I’m sorry,”
he said.

“For what?” she asked, thinking that he was
the only person in the world who had no cause to apologize to
her.

“I shouldn’t be seducing you. You deserve a
real man,” he said.

“You’re more real than any man in Prague,”
she said and kissed him again. Her needy lips and quickly learning
tongue goaded his instincts. He knew well the demanding pull of
animal appetites and the thrill of yielding to them, but he loved
this fair maid too much to sully her.

“I should not have come,” he said.

“But you did,” she said and smiled with a
delighted lack of regret.

“I did,” he agreed.

“It would’ve killed me if you didn’t come,”
she said and hugged him tight and pressed a cheek against his
collar bone. So this is what it feels like to be held, she thought,
appalled by the emptiness of her existence before this day. Nothing
compared to this intimate acceptance.

“Altea, do you understand what I am?” he said
with heavy seriousness.

Her passion ebbed a little. She touched his
goatee and imagined the hairs on the snout of a werewolf. “Do you
really change into a beast?” she said. Her tone was curious, not
disapproving.

“I do.”

“What is it like?” she asked.

Encouraged by her calm curiosity, Thal
smiled. “Magnificent,” he admitted.

“Take me away from here,” she said.

“I have no shelter to offer. Only my love,”
he said against his better judgment. This impulsive woman would
only be encouraged to more madness by this proclamation, but he had
not been able to stop himself. He wanted her for his own.

They resumed kissing. Their urgency built
rapidly. They pressed their bodies together and touched each other
through their clothes. The contours of their flesh rubbed
insistently, determined to overcome the barriers of fabric. Altea
stumbled back against the fence and Thal loomed over her. His hands
hauled up her skirt and she rubbed the inside of her thigh against
his leg.

“No,” he gasped and eased the swelling mass
in his pants away from her body. He did not want to take her in
some smelly alley. This spirited woman who deserved glory but lived
in a cage would get no coarse treatment from him.

Still moaning, Altea gasped for her breath.
She had not known that passion could progress so quickly and she
had been going too fast. The pulsing pleasure between her legs
slowly eased. She felt like she had a whole new body that required
new things.

Thal took her hand and led her away. Pistol
followed, perky with happiness for his master. They emerged onto an
empty street. He slipped his cloak around her and kept her close,
almost concealing her.

“Do you always walk the streets at night?”
she asked.

“Not always,” he answered.

“Did you kill those men and horses?” she
asked.

He chuckled. “Would you really be here if you
thought I had?” he said.

“No. There’s another beast. I can hear the
difference in the howls,” she said.

Her astute judgment impressed Thal. He gave
her an appreciative squeeze and wondered what his mother had
thought of this young woman.

“I’m trying to gain the trust of the other
werewolf. If he’d accept my guidance I could keep him from hurting
people, but I worry he can’t get past his madness,” Thal
explained.

“How did you?” she wondered.

“I am different. My power is not madness. I’m
in control,” he said. He meant to explain more but footsteps made
him go quiet.

A trio of men confronted them. Clubs were in
their hands. Pistol growled, confirming their nefarious
intentions.

“Stay behind me,” Thal said. The dog stood by
Altea’s feet and yapped courageously.

Thal drew his pistols. “I’m armed,” he
warned.

A man charged at him swinging a club. Thal
fired. The flash of igniting powder revealed a bearded dirty face.
The return of darkness hid the explosion of blood but Altea heard
the crunching splat when he hit the street. Thal charged the next
man and hit him over the head with his pistol. He yelled in pain
and staggered against a building. The third desperado fled.

Thal grabbed Altea’s hand and rushed her away
from the scene. They reached a wharf where docked boats bobbed in
the water.

Reloading his pistol, he said, “They didn’t
figure on me having a gun.” He shook his head at their misjudgment.
A solitary figure was not always vulnerable, and he knew how to
tell the difference.

Altea had her hand on her chest. Her heart
was thumping after the terrible fright and the run. His swift
strength had protected them, and she wished that he could save her
from everything.

“This is why I’m supposed to stay in at
night,” she said, trying to be as casual about the incident as Thal
seemed.

He grinned. “It’s barely safe during the
day,” he said.

“That body in the street will be found,”
Altea worried, perplexed by his lack of concern.

“It matters not. No one will lament a thief
with his face blown off,” Thal said.

The onrush of experiences overwhelmed Altea.
She had lived more since the sun set than she had in all her
years.

“What would they have done to us?” she
whispered.

“Kill me, rob me, rape you, maybe kill you
too,” Thal said dispassionately.

His unflustered acceptance of brutal
realities bothered Altea. Was all the supposed orderliness of
society just peeling paint upon a foundation of unrepentant
rapacious violence?

“Is all the world like this?” she asked
him.

“There is much beauty and kindness too,” he
said. Sliding his gun back into his belt, he drew her close again.
“When I look at you I imagine a life of good things.”

“I want to be with you,” she said.

“How can you know that?” he wondered.

“I just know,” she said. She remembered his
howling and how the song had connected with all the feelings of her
heart, but she could not explain it to him.

Thal believed her anyway. Her presence proved
her passion for him.

“What must a man have to be worthy of you?”
he asked.

“You are worthy.”

“No, not in a man’s world. In the forest I
knew how to provide for my family, but here everything is
complicated and out of reach,” he lamented.

“In the forest?” she said, puzzled by his
words.

Thal tensed, worried that he had spoken too
candidly. Perhaps Altea accepted the concept that he was a werewolf
but did not truly understand.

Determined to be honest, he explained, “I
forsook the life of a man many years ago, before you were born.
Magic changed me to a wolf. I chose that life, but unlike the other
wolves I never aged and died. Then in her time of terrible need, my
mother somehow called me back. But I am not just a man. The wolf is
part of me and I can summon that power when I need it.”

Altea contemplated his incredible
explanation. She could not deny his story. Prague had been up in
arms about werewolves ever since she had first seen him.

Thal continued, “So maybe you can see how
this is difficult for me. I want to have a life with you, but I
know that would be wrong for you. I’m sure you want to live a
normal life like a normal woman.”

Altea hugged him. Her arms slipped around his
back beneath the fur under his cloak. The heat of his body was
trapped there and he was very warm.

“And what of you, Thal? What will you do with
your life?” she said.

“Some want me to use my power in their wars,”
he said. “I wanted no part of that, but now I think that it might
be a way to earn enough to give you a home if you would have
me.”

She looked up into his face. “Are you
proposing marriage?” she said.

Thal sighed. “I suppose I’m being more
ridiculous than you are. I’ll take you home. I should not have
lured you out. I was wrong…”

Her kiss cut him off and urged him to stop
thinking about their situation. They indulged again in a heavy
petting embrace until they pulled apart.

“I want to see you again,” Altea said, and
Thal smiled at her forthrightness.

“Look for me at the Knights of the Cross
square tomorrow afternoon,” she instructed.

“I will,” he said, unable to resist
continuing the game he had started. He kissed her and tugged at the
top of her gown until he exposed a breast. His lips tickled lower
down her neck until he was nuzzling the firm swell of flesh. His
tongue swirled around her nipple and she gasped and pulled away. He
righted her clothing while she recovered. They still had so much
territory to cover in the exploration of their bodies. Their mutual
need to mate was readily apparent, but Thal wondered how he was
ever going to get her alone in a proper setting or if he even
should.

Pistol growled and trotted down the wharf. On
alert now, Thal sniffed the stinking cocktail of fish and sewage
and the mashy grain of brewing beer. Within the odors he detected
what had worried Pistol. One of Vito’s sellswords was near.

“We must go,” he whispered.

“What is it?” she asked.

“We must be silent,” he insisted and took her
hand.

Altea had a little trouble hustling alongside
him at his fast tireless pace. He often looked back, and she feared
what was be spooking him.

When they reached her alley, he stopped and
kissed her with fierce hunger. Their connection still blazed with
lust.

“I don’t want to go home,” Altea whispered
into his mouth.

He did not seem to hear her and looked away.
“Go home through the alley. I can’t linger here. I’ll see you in
the square,” he said.

“Thal?” she said.