Temptress Unbound (2 page)

I tugged my hand free of his, angry enough to shove back the seductive lust. “I was
trying
to share my feelings with you, Maer­lin. I was hoping you, of all people, would understand. I didn't say I wasn't going to call the storm; I only wanted you to know what I was feeling, why I've been hesitating.”

“I already know what you're feeling. It hasn't changed for weeks. What's the point in talking about it again?”

“You make me want to strangle you.”

“I do seem to have that effect on Phanne women,” he mused.

“And yet you neither wonder why, nor learn from it.”

“I've learned well enough to keep my distance.”

“Maerlin! What I
want
from you is some sympathy. Some consoling. Reassurance.”

He stopped and stared at me, two male statues behind him staring with equally blank gazes. “I gave you that. I told you I'd be right beside you. If there truly is some great beast of power to be unleashed, we stand a better chance of taming it together than you do on your own. And if we can't tame it . . . Well, we'll go down fighting together, won't we? I won't abandon you.”

I chewed my upper lip. I supposed that was marginally reassuring, and the best I was going to get from him. “Are you afraid?”

“No.”

“Because you're so confident?”

“Because the purpose of fear is to keep us from doing dangerous things. We're going to do this anyway, so there's no point in wasting energy on an emotion that can only hinder our chances for success.”

“You can shut it off that easily?” I asked.

“You can't?”

I sighed, the fight going out of me. My fear said this was dangerous, but he was right: I was going to do it anyway. “I don't want anyone to know exactly
how
we call the storm. I mean, that we'll be joined together when we do it.”

“You don't want Arthur to know.”

I had told Maerlin before that I was half in love with his brother. “He wouldn't understand.”

“He'll most likely marry Wynnetha, you know.”

“Until the day of their betrothal comes, I can still hope for a different future.”

“Does he?”

“I don't know that what he wants has much bearing on what he'll do,” I said.

“Duty has always been Arthur's foremost concern. He could never be happy with you, if it meant failing in his duty to the tribe.”

“Which is why I'm walking circuits around a frozen garden with you, instead of burrowing under the bed furs with him. Please don't let people know how we'll call the storm.”

“No one ever wants to know what I'm up to. You have nothing to worry about.”

“When, then?”

“At the end of Saturnalia. Let everyone enjoy the festivities in fair weather. Does that work with your monthly cycle?”

I nodded, my cheeks heating, although discussing the timing of my flow was hardly the most intimate thing Maerlin and I had shared or would share. He told me some of what he planned for where and how, and by then I was shivering and begged to finish our conversation later. He would have gladly talked all night, but each word was a thorn prick to my skin. I didn't want to think about lying with him, didn't want to talk about it, certainly didn't want to imagine it. It felt like a betrayal of Arthur, even though I knew that in all the most important ways, it wasn't. It would be a different type of betrayal were I to shy from this task and leave Skalibur unforged, and the destiny of Arthur and the blade unfulfilled.

We returned indoors and I shed Maerlin in the chaos. Wine, mead, cider, and beer all flowed freely, and a stable boy had been chosen as Master of the Revels. Servants were waited upon by their betters with much laughter and reprimands for shoddy work as the world turned upside down for this night between seasons. I saw Terix in a corner with the Summer Maiden, who had already abandoned her new king in favor of the fondling hands of the old.

It was a happy night, but my talk with Maerlin had spoiled my mood and my feet were nigh frozen. I retreated through the villa toward my small room, craving only quiet and a warm blanket.

I had just stepped into a dim corridor when hands came down on my shoulders, spun me around, and then pressed me hard up against the wall. A man's mouth came down on mine, swift and furious, with the sweet flavor of cider still on his tongue.

It ended as quickly, and as he drew back I breathed his name. “Arthur.”

“One kiss, on a night when rules are upended,” he said, his voice rough and deep, and not wholly sober.

“Only one?”

“I swore it was all I would allow myself, until you are mine.” He bent his head to the side of my neck, his warm breath sending delicious shivers up over my scalp. He sucked the lobe of my ear into his mouth, released it slowly, and whispered, “I have word that Mordred spends the solstice at Calleva, the invited guest of Horsa.”

I drew in a breath. “So Horsa may have chosen him for Wynnetha's hand.”

“May have. Or may do so shortly.”

I slid my arms around his neck and felt a bubble of joy rising in my chest. It frightened me; it was so fragile, so tremulous, and yet so beautifully bright. “Then you are free.”

He gently drew my hands from him, kissed their backs, and then held them pressed against his chest. “Not yet. But gods willing, I soon will be.” He cupped my cheek in one hand, his thumb brushing over my brow. “And when that happens, Nimia—when that happens, you shall be mine.”

2

“I
still think he's using it as an excuse to get between your thighs,” Terix said, riding beside me.

“Maerlin doesn't think about sex that way. It's a means to an end, nothing more.”

Terix snorted. “He's more clever than I thought, if he's got you convinced of that.”

We were riding together—along with the ever-present Bone—to the forge, where my father, Brenn, waited along with apprentice blacksmiths and several men to handle the sails, and where Maerlin had set up a private shelter for us to call the storm. Or, more accurately, to
increase
the storm. We'd waited for the signs of approaching bad weather, knowing that it would be far easier to whip the winds of an existing storm up to the power of a hurricane than to start from nothing on a calm day. And right now, a brisk breeze was setting the tree branches swaying, and dark, swiftly moving clouds spoke of our approaching weather.

“You think Maerlin cold-hearted, so why wouldn't it make sense to you that he approaches sex the same way?” I asked.

“He's male. When he thinks of having you naked under him, neither heart nor head has anything to do with how he's making his choices. And he knows Arthur cares for you. How could he do this to his own brother?”

“He's doing this
for
his brother,” I said.

“Don't you hear how crazy that sounds? I almost think you're doing this because you'd secretly rather be with Maerlin than Arthur.”

“
Now
who sounds crazy?”

“Maybe you don't want either of them.”

“You think I still want Clovis,” I said.

“He's who you've tried hardest to reach out to with your mental powers, isn't he?”

“I thought he'd be easier, since he was my first, and we were together so long.” Since my aborted training on Mona, I'd been trying to learn on my own how to reach out with my mind, across distance, to men I'd slept with. Their seed had become part of me, as happened with all Phanne women, and it formed a psychic tie I should be able to follow back to each man. I'd managed it once, with the young man I'd deflowered on Mona, but had yet to achieve more than a flickering of contact with anyone else. And the flickers might have been more my imagination than true contact.

“Wouldn't it be easier with
me
?” Terix glared at me with hurt in the line of his mouth.

I drew in a breath of surprise, my lips parting. I hadn't imagined that he would think my lack of trying on him a slight. Once, long ago, we had lain together; once, I had even drunk his blood. There was no one I knew better, or who knew me so well in return, and so it should have been easiest of all to recognize his essence inside me. I leaned over and laid my hand on his arm. “Terix, I wouldn't do that to you. I wouldn't invade your innermost privacy like that.”

He moved his arm until he could grasp my hand in his own, his expression softening to sheepishness. “I didn't want you to, when first you told me about it. Who would? I have thoughts so darkly twisted, I can barely stand to see them myself.” He squeezed my hand and let go.

“What changed your mind?”

“I realized that I'm not such a very special person, so different from anyone else. If
I
—cheerful, horny Terix—have such a wild herd of runaway wants and hates and pettiness inside me, then so does everyone else. Probably more so. I am, after all, a more likable fellow than your average man.”

I laughed. “The Summer Maiden certainly thought so.”

“But alas, she was happier to stay a maiden than to become a fruitful earth mother.”

“Lucky for you, in the long run.”

“But not the short.”

We rode in silence for a short while, Bone galumphing through remnants of snow, seeming to take a child's joy in the crisp strangeness of it under his paws.

“So will you try to see inside my mind?” Terix said.

“What, now? Why?”

“I want to know what it feels like, to have someone else in here with me. No one ever gets to feel that; we're all stuck alone in our own heads. If there's anyone I'd want in here with me, it'd be you.”

“You wouldn't know I was there, unless I made a point of letting you know.”

“Then let me know. Come, Nimia, why not? If you can make this tie between us, then you'll be able to reach me if you need me. That's worth something, isn't it?”

I felt myself wavering. “I don't want you to ever feel like I might be digging through your mind when you don't know it.”

“I trust you not to. Besides, there's enough filth in here that you won't want to come back without a good reason.”

It wasn't filth I was afraid of seeing. Arthur had once said that Terix was in love with me, and I didn't want to see such a raw and vulnerable emotion in him, laid bare to my eyes. Pretending that such a possibility didn't exist was the only way I knew how to continue our closeness.

If Terix wasn't afraid of revealing too much, however . . . maybe Arthur was wrong.

I reined to a halt, and Terix did the same. “All right, I'll try it. You're going to have to stir up some lust, though, to help me get into you. Can you do that?”

“Do you not know me
at all
?”

“Yeah, yeah, I know. Tell me when you're ready.”

“You're not going to help? Augustus wouldn't mind a little hand-holding.”

“I thought you changed his name to Zeus.”

“Zeus sounds too much like a sneeze, and no lady wants to think of snot when a man comes.”

“I'm sorry to tell you this, Terix, but they already do.”

“Crude, coarse wenches.” He grinned. “The cruder the better.”

“Yes, well. Close your eyes and think of what you'd have liked to have given the Summer Maiden.”

“No need.”

I glanced at his crotch, and even through the layers of warm clothing, I could see a ridge that said Augustus was alert and ready to serve.

“Give me a moment,” I said. “I have to stir myself up, if I can.”

“Want help? Penelope hasn't been getting much attention lately, I've noticed.”

“Penelope?”

“I considered ‘Pandora,' but there's too much ill luck that comes with that name.”

“This isn't helping my mood, Terix.”

“If you'd hike up your leg, I could reach under your skirts and—”

“Terix.”

“You know it always feels better when someone else does it.”

“If it's the only way to shut you up.” I grabbed the front of his cloak and pulled him toward me, our bodies leaning awkwardly over the space between our mounts, then I pressed my mouth to his.

He was too surprised at first to do more than keep his balance, our lips mashing together too hard, one of the horses shifting her weight and almost breaking us apart. Then he recovered, and with a strength I hadn't expected he pulled me off my mount and across his lap, one arm around my waist, the other behind my head. His lips parted mine and his tongue delved inside.

I closed my eyes and let him take control, and coaxed myself to forget whose mouth was on mine and just
feel
. He knew his way around a kiss, with no timid hesitation, no messiness—only the sure strokes of a tongue displaying that most crucial of all elements for arousing another: hunger.

Desire stirred inside me, and with its first sparks I opened myself and allowed his desire to flow in. It came like a stream of honey, thick with passion, fragrant and fermented, a heady mead I could drink forever.

The first shimmer of the golden walls appeared in the corners of my vision, startling me, scaring me enough that I remembered my purpose and closed down the flow to a trickle. I pushed myself upstream against it, through the warm, wet contact of our mouths, and into his mind.

It was an inferno of lust, blotting out all else.

Terix,
I silently said into the fire.

I felt his body jerk, his tongue stilling in my mouth, and then the fire of lust lowered. I could feel his confusion now, his surprise.
Nimia?! Where are you?

Right here.

This is so strange.
I felt his wonder, and a sudden rush of panic as he scanned through the more private thoughts he didn't want to bring up into my view.

Don't try to not think about things. It just makes you think about them.

Confusion, then silent laughter.
Is that supposed to make sense?

I'll go,
I said.

No! Wait. What's it like for you?

Like . . . I'm divided. It's like when you look through both eyes, but know you're looking through one more than the other.

No, I mean . . . You're in my mind. Can you show me yours? Can you show me what it's like for you when—
His hand went to my breast, then stroked down to my sex and pressed against it through the layers of wool.

The stream of honeyed desire surged. Unprepared, I drank it in and instinctively sent out an answering trickle, enough that Terix's thoughts lost coherence, swamped by a lustful appetite that would only grow stronger. The more I took from him, the hungrier he would become. His grip on me tightened, I pulled up my skirts myself, and then his cold fingers were on my folds, and I had knocked his hat off to dig my hands into his hair and hold his mouth against mine.

Stroke me,
I commanded.
There, yes, like that . . .

Only it wasn't enough. The gold wall flared to life as if hit by sudden sunshine, and in its bricks I felt the caged thrum of my swarm, yearning once again for the completion of the hive.

I dropped a hand to Terix's waist, pulling at his clothes, trying to find the fastenings and uncover what I needed, even though I already knew that there wasn't enough in him. He had only so much to give, and I would drain it all.

I couldn't find the fastenings and jammed my hand down the tight front of his breeches, needing to touch him. A shudder of pleasure went through me as I felt the silken thickness of him against the side of my hand.

Nimia?
Uncertainty, disbelief. Joy.

The joy jolted me. Joy from a wish long desired, finally to be fulfilled. This wasn't just lust for him. For a precious, crucial moment I broke from the trance and tried to jerk my hand out of his breeches.

I found myself gripping him instead, my fist moving up and down.
Terix, help me stop. We have to stop.

No, there's no reason, yes, like that, hold me like that . . .

Terix, I can't stop myself.

No need to . . .

Yes, need! See how it was for me on Mona, see what will happen to you!
I dredged up the ghastly scene and tried to thrust it into his mind, trying to show him the ravening hunger that had consumed me and the helplessness of the pile of men and women below and around me, their pleasures turning to the pain of unfulfillment as they tried and failed to reach their release. And through it all, me, devouring their energy, draining them to the edge of consciousness.

I wish I'd been there . . .
One of his fingers slipped inside me.

I arched my back, accepting it, wanting more. Wanting everything he could give me, everything inside him.

With my one shred of thought left, I summoned and pushed at Terix the sensations of having both Druce and his man inside me, cock pressed to cock, thrusting inside my passage.

His whole body went rigid. His head lifted, his eyes open wide in shock. “Jupiter's balls,” he said aloud. “What was
that
?”

You wanted to know
. I took my hand out of his breeches.

“I wish I hadn't!”

Could you take your finger out of me?

His face flooded red. “Er, sorry about that.”

“Thank you.”

Looking flustered and ashamed, he gripped me under my arms and hoisted me back onto my own mount with only a slight grunt of effort. Although we no longer touched, I could sense his shame at having gone too far with me, taking a liberty for which I hadn't given permission. He was afraid he'd upset me.

I touched his knee. “It's all right, Terix. It wasn't you making choices. It wasn't even
me
. It was this power I don't yet know how to control.”

He blinked at me.
Are you still inside my mind?

“Yes. Sort of. I can't talk to you if we're not touching, though. If there's a life-or-death crisis, maybe I can.”

Can you get out now?

“I warned you it feels like an invasion,” I said, and withdrew.

Terix shook his head, as if trying to be sure I was truly gone. “Yes. Well.” He looked unsettled, his gaze skittering past mine.

“I knocked your hat off.”