Untouched Concubine (5 page)

           
“I said, ‘I’m happy yours is the last face I’ll see before I die.’ Then I didn’t look at another person until your father came to me and told me I would live.”

           
He reached out and took her hand. It was warm now, while hers was still icy. His penetrating gaze, it hypnotized her. What he had just told her was so very personal, but she needed to know more.

           
“What did you do last night?”

           
“I sneaked into their camps and slit King
Herean’s
throat while he slept, passed out from drink.” She saw no regret in his expression, but there was something. What was it?

           
It surprised her as a feeling of pride came over her at his act. This crazed king had taken her own home, now
Jass’s
, and who knows how many lives he was responsible for destroying? “And your king didn’t tell you to do it, did he?”

           
“No. I acted alone. Nobody knows for sure it was me, but I have a reputation. In fact, no one in
Farna
knows he’s dead.
Lenn
just attacked without telling why, without revealing their leader was dead. They are mindless drones. But their assassins are not. They knew my handiwork. Nobody else could have gotten close to him.

           
“I believed if I killed him, they would end their wars. King Herean was a powerful leader, inspirational in the most deadly ways, encouraging those under him with fear and bringing out their dark tendencies. But even in death, they followed him and attacked. How he could have so many people under his spell, I’ll never know.”

           
Mandia
unconsciously squeezed his warm hand. He laced his fingers through hers.

           
He said in a quiet voice, “I knew we had to leave right away when I saw them coming from the watchtower this morning. I knew we had a little time, not much. And when you begged me to save your mother, I decided maybe one more hour could be risked. When I left you, I looked for her.”

           
Mandia’s
eyes widened. She gasped. “Did you—
Did
you find her?” She held her breath again.

           
A soft smile curved his lips. “She was a butcher’s slave, cleaning the shop.”

           
“You saw her? Talked to her? How is she? Did you tell her I was okay?”

           
He actually chuckled. “Yes, all is well. She was being treated kindly. I paid the butcher a high price to smuggle her out of the city with him, told him a way to get her and his family safely away from the
Lenn
attackers.”

           
“What? And you’re just now telling me this?” She jerked her hand away from him, paused,
then
punched him right in the face.

           
But
Mandia
wasn’t very strong and he barely flinched

           
“Why couldn’t she come with us?” she asked as relief her mother was safe washed over her. She didn’t regret the punch.

           
“I didn’t tell you because I knew you’d want to go with her and the butcher’s family.”

           
“And why didn’t you want me to? That’s where I should be now. Why couldn’t she have just come with us? I don’t understand any of this.”

           
“She was very weak. She never could have made this climb. Where the butcher took her is a safe place, not too far out of the city, in the jungle, a place many were escaping to.
Lenn
doesn’t know the jungle as
Farnans
do and there’s little chance they’ll be found.”

           
“So you’re saying she was too weak for making it here, but why wouldn’t you let me go with her? Why didn’t you tell me?”

           
He was quiet for a long moment, staring at the candle’s flame. He then turned his body to face her, took both her hands. “I had to make sure you were safe, and I knew nobody could protect you like I can.” His eyes gleamed with desire for the first time, black in the darkness.

           
Mandia’s
mouth opened slightly and
a warmth
spread through her body at his words, his touch, his eyes. He leaned to her and she felt his warm breath on her cheek. He gently kissed her face all over,
then
moved to her lips.

           
Their kiss was soft, sweet, and all thoughts of how he was a deadly killer were lost in her. Everything floated away as he ran his hands up her arms and cupped her neck, rubbing his thumbs across her throat.

           
The kiss had started soft, but was becoming more intense. Without even thinking, she reached for him, moved her hands over his chest and shoulders. She was suddenly filled with a sensation she’d never felt, a deep need to have him as hers, to feel his body on her, all over her, inside her.

           
She tore at his clothing, and he whispered into her ear, “Slowly, we have all night.”

           
She moaned,
then
sighed as he nibbled her ear. He undressed her carefully and took entirely too long. But soon enough, he was wrapping her naked body in their furs and stripping off his clothes. He joined her in the furs. The sensation of feeling his flesh all over hers was almost too much to take. She begged him, pleaded with him to take her, but he simply lifted his head from her, curls dangling down and tickling her cheeks, and shushed her.

           
He pleasured her body with his hands and mouth for what felt like eternity, and when she thought she would die from desire, he entered her. There was a moment of pain, and he stopped as she gasped. Then he began moving inside her and she felt her own natural movements matching his.
Mandia
never knew anything like this, and she was mindless; he had taken control of her body and made it react in the most pleasurable of ways. Time stopped, their breathing labored together, and she felt something even more intense than anything else.

           
They cried out together at the same time.

           
He stroked her blonde hair as he caught his breath, staring down at her with an expression of pure love and adoration. He whispered, “I’ve loved you forever and always will.” A look of vulnerability spread across his features.

           
She reached up and tucked a lock of his curls behind an ear. “I love you.” Then she grinned and laughed.

           
He smiled down at her. “What is it?”

           
“When can we do that again?”

~~~

           
Mandia
awoke with a start in the dead of night.
Silence.
What had woken her? She reached beside her, but
Jass
wasn’t there. The candle had long died out.

           
Slowly, she got to her feet and wrapped a fur around her freezing, naked body. She instinctively felt something was wrong, very wrong. She couldn’t see a thing, but after looking around wildly, caught a glimmer of faint moonlight coming from the open flap of the hut.

           
She peeked out.
Nothing.
Not even a breeze. She shivered, stepping outside. Suddenly, she felt vulnerable, in open sight to whatever was out there with her, and she was now certain there was…something…someone.

           
A hand grabbed her throat and slammed her on her back to the ground. She couldn’t breathe as she struggled against her attacker. All she could make out was he wore a mask, his eyes sunken within and showing no emotion.

           
Then another man held her down by the hips. “Tie her feet and hands,” a man’s voice said.

           
Once she was bound, the man released his hold on her throat. She gasped desperately for air. There were four of them, all dressed head to toe in dark, tight clothing.

           
“What do you want with me?” she barely got out. She’d never been so afraid. Where was
Jass
?

           
As though summoned by her thought, he sprung from behind a boulder, taking one assassin down with him.
Mandia
heard the man’s neck snap.

           
The other three immediately went into action. One threw a dagger at
Jass
, but he slapped it aside in mid-air. He yanked out one of his own daggers so fast
Mandia
barely caught it. He hopped higher in the air than humanly possible, landing on the man’s head, slashing his throat.

           
The second assassin tossed something that looked like heavy wire around
Jass’s
neck. He fell back, slit the wire off him quickly, then spun backward and stuck his dagger in the man’s neck. He fell, gurgling.

           
The assassin who had held
Mandia
down by her throat was more careful as
Jass
cleaned his bloody blade on his shirt.
Jass
pulled out his other dagger as the assassin withdrew a long, samurai blade from his sheath.

           
They circled each other slowly, looking for weaknesses. The assassin said, “I held her throat, and it was soft, tender. What will I do with her after I kill you?”

           
“Don’t listen to him,”
Mandia
cried out.

           
Jass’s
posture didn’t change. The cat in him was in full prowl, eyes wide and body oddly loose and tense at the same time. Why didn’t he just
do
something, anything?

           
The assassin continued to taunt
Jass
. “You know you can’t throw your daggers fast enough; I’ll block them and you’ll be defenseless. You know you can’t approach me. My weapon has farther reach. What will you do?” He stepped dangerously close to the bound
Mandia
, and she scooted away, but not in time.

           
He grabbed a handful of her hair, yanking her head to the side. She wanted to stay strong, but she yelped in pain.

           
Jass
flinched.

           
“So this is your weakness,” said the assassin. He reached down and roughly caressed
Mandia’s
neck. “I can see why. Such a weakness I wouldn’t expect in you.
Women.”

           
Jass
stepped closer, never taking his eyes off the man.

           
The assassin raised his blade between them, blocking
Jass’s
approach. But it was a fatal flaw. As the sword rose,
Jass
slashed downward on it with both daggers, spun to the side, then dragged both daggers through the assassin’s side, gutting him.

           
He fell, screaming, and
Jass
ended him with a slash of the throat.

           
The night was the silence of new death.

           
Mandia’s
heart pounded and she breathed shallowly.
Jass
had taken on four expert assassins. He had defeated them, in the dark, with only those two daggers. They’d seemed so threatening to her the first time she’d seen them in the concubine sales house, but now, as he wiped the blood off them onto his last victim’s pants, she knew they could be an extension of his hands, a part of him.

           
“Thank you, oh…” She noticed the red mark on his neck and it was slightly bleeding. “Let me clean that, please.”

           
“We need to go.” He looked deep in her eyes, sadness there.

           
“Why do you look at me that way?”

           
“I don’t want you to see me as a killer.”

           
She let out a long breath. “You kill, but you saved me. And I imagine you’ve saved others. And what I have seen is there’s so much more to you than killing.”

           
He watched her intently as she spoke. After a moment, he said, “We need to leave, now. They know where we are.”