So he thought she could find a suitable bard from amongst those gathered in Arwystli for the contest. While he competed for the position of
pencerdd
to the prince, he expected her to find herself a husband. Sweet mercy, the only bard she wished to marry sat on her bed, less than an arm’s length away.
“We do not know if another bard’s harp can perform the same magic on spirits as yours does.”
“That we do not.” He paused a moment before continuing. “Nicole, we know that together we can aid spirits. Would you consider marrying me?”
They were the precise words she wished to hear. Her heart thudding with joy, Nicole wanted nothing more than to drag him further into the bed and show him how wholeheartedly she would accept him as her husband.
But to agree would put Rhodri in danger and destroy his chance to attain his life’s ambition.
She was truly flattered he sought to help her and loved him all the more for his noble sentiment, but she couldn’t allow him to give up so much out of a misplaced sense of duty.
She wanted to cry out her misery, and dared not. With as much princess-like dignity as she could muster, Nicole shattered her own heart.
“I thank you for your offer, but if we step beyond Mathrafal’s gates, Connor is sure to send men after us. We would again be hunted, this time by Welshmen. If caught, you could spend the rest of your days in a tower cell.”
He opened his mouth to utter what she was sure was a protest; she put a finger to his lips to silence his argument.
“You have a dream you have pursued your life long. The lessons, the practice, the poetry, the music—they have shaped you and prepared you for the day when you would play for a prince and earn your chair. If you are hunted, and so cannot perform without fear of being captured, then all you have worked for is lost. You must go without me and earn your chair.”
“So you do not wish to go with me?”
She wished to go with all her heart. Bards from all over Wales would gather for the contest. There would be music, feasting, dancing, and such gaiety as she hadn’t experienced since entering Bledloe Abbey.
And she would be with Rhodri. But as much as she yearned to agree, she refused to put her selfish wishes above his well-being.
“I cannot.”
Rhodri waved a dismissive hand. “You will be content to select a husband from among the dullards Connor presents to you?”
She inwardly winced. “Not all can be dullards.”
He scoffed. “You have yet to meet them. And what of your own life’s purpose? Will this husband allow you the freedom to aid spirits—if, indeed, you can convince him you hear the dead speak—or will he forbid you concourse with any but the living?”
“He can hardly prevent the dead from speaking to me. I may have a difficult time silencing their voices when they persist, but I learned how to hide my ability while in the abbey and can do so again.”
“If you marry me, you need not hide the rare and exceptional power that is so much a part of you. You could pursue your quest to aid as many spirits as you are able, and I shall help you.”
Why must Rhodri’s words give both joy and pain? Why did he tempt her so?
“Tell me, what would a prince think of his
pencerdd
spending his days playing his harp in graveyards? You would not keep your position long, I warrant.”
“Decidedly not, which is part of the reason we are not bound for Arwystli.”
That surprised her. “Then where?”
“Camelen.”
“Why ever for?”
He put her circlet and dagger on the floor, then turned to fully face her. “I once believed that becoming a
pencerdd
in a great house was what I most desired. Then we accomplished the incredible at Glenvair. I now believe I have found a grander purpose for my music. Nicole, if you marry a Welsh noble, you may never be permitted to return home to put William to rest and he may plague you for the rest of your days. Both you and your brother deserve to have the matter settled.”
William. Sweet mercy, she’d yearned for so long to help her brother seek his peace.
“I have tried so many times to convince William to go to his peace, but he refuses to listen.”
“You have never tried to speak to him at the place of his burial, and not when I am playing the harp. Yester noon, you said you heard magic in my music. Certes, is it not time to test how strong the magic might be?”
Nicole tamped down her growing excitement over the prospect. “If I leave with you, we will have the prince’s patrols searching for us in Wales and may yet encounter the earl of Oxford’s patrols in England.”
“Camelen is a mere three days’ hard ride. No one will be certain of where we are. I am confident we can reach Camelen without incident.”
Could Rhodri be right? Could the two of them, at long last, deal successfully with William?
Magic. She’d been gifted—or cursed—with the ability to hear the troubled dead. Her sister Emma possessed the power to see visions in pools of water. Gwen was the guardian of a potent ancient spell.
Emma required no partner to make use of her ability. Gwendolyn did, and Alberic took his responsibility most seriously. Nicole had never thought she, too, might require a partner to make full use of her gift, but perhaps she did.
Before her sat the one man who she knew not only believed in her gift but was willing to partner her if she would allow. That was why he’d asked her to marry him, so they could uninhibitedly explore the breadth and depth of the magic.
Nicole rose to her knees and wrapped her arms around Rhodri’s neck, wishing he loved her as much as she loved him, but finding a morsel of contentment in what they could share together. As his arms came around her in a comforting and stimulating embrace, she felt more sure of her decision.
“You are certain you will not regret missing the contest?”
“Not for a moment. Will you regret not becoming the most favored princess in all of Wales?”
“Never.”
Then Rhodri kissed her, and Nicole wondered how the devil they could have spent so much time
talking
while in the same bed.
Her thoughts floated away from William, and from all of the problems they could face both at Camelen and in the future. She dismissed her earlier concerns over his inappropriate presence in her bedchamber, and didn’t even wonder over how she had become so blatantly brazen in so short a time.
All she could do was revel in the glorious sensation of Rhodri’s mouth on hers once more. Oh, how she’d yearned for his kiss, and more, all through the night.
A night now nearly over.
“How soon must we leave?” she asked in breathless earnestness.
“We have time,” he answered, falling back to lie on the bed, taking her with him. “Does my princess wish to explore the differences in making love in a soft bed in a warm bedchamber, rather than on the hard ground in a fern-covered shelter?”
She almost called him to task for calling her a princess, but this time he’d used the title as an endearment, without scorn. And truly, she didn’t mind at all being
his
princess.
“Most certes she does!”
The chemise she’d donned was quickly dispensed with, as were Rhodri’s garments. Within moments they cuddled under the coverlet, face to face, skin to skin, without any impediment of space in which to enjoy each other.
“An improvement already,” she commented. “I do not suppose we can take a pallet with us.”
Rhodri chuckled. “Nay, no pallet, but this time we have coin to pay for more comfortable accommodations on our adventure, even if that means a bed of hay in a farmer’s barn.”
Nicole didn’t care where they slept as long as Rhodri slept beside her and, as now, his long fingers skimmed along her curves as skillfully as he strummed his harp.
As he had in a fondly remembered fern-covered shelter, he petted her breasts until they swelled to aching. Her nipples puckered, the nubs going hard and begging for his touch. Understanding her need, Rhodri suckled gently, firmly, tending to her in most satisfactory fashion.
She understood his need, too. The long length of his hard cock pressed against her thigh, eagerly awaiting the coupling to come.
“What can we do in a bed that we could not in the shelter?”
“I can pleasure you properly.”
“What we did in the shelter was not proper?”
The corner of his mouth quirked upward in a wry smile. “What we did in the shelter was not at all proper. Granted, we managed a successful encounter, but our positions were all wrong.”
“So we will couple differently this time?”
“Differently, but with the same rewarding ending.”
Before she could ask what matter the positions if the ending were the same, Rhodri halted her question with another kiss. She drank deeply, her thirst for him unquenchable.
She didn’t stop him when once more he insisted upon petting her breasts, her nipples again hardening under the brush of his thumb. Nor did she raise an objection when his hand slipped between her thighs, his fingers sliding into her hot, wet folds, seeking the small nub that responded wildly to his ministrations.
Tongues mated. Hands roamed. Her heart soared with joy, and her body quivered with anticipation.
Nicole took care to intimately appreciate Rhodri’s finely sculpted body, from the curve of his rugged jaw, down over the rippled muscles of his chest, and down farther yet to the glorious male member jutting proudly upward from a thick thatch of dark hair.
She took him in hand and was rewarded with a low moan akin to agony.
Sweet mercy, he was hard, his cock a marvel of tempered steel encased in silken skin. Her fascination led to exploration and, to her delight, heightened her own desire.
“If I recall rightly, in the shelter you hinted of further lessons.”
“I did.” He pulled her up to lie atop him, and she would gladly slide downward to take him inside her did he not roll her onto her back to cover her. “Lie still, and I will show you one of the joys at which I hinted.”
He kissed her lips, then jaw, then the sensitive hollow of her throat. Ever downward he slid, pausing briefly to honor each breast before sliding again to sprinkle kisses over her stomach.
She thought he would halt there and retrace his path back to her mouth. She was wrong. He knelt between her wide-spread legs, placed his hands on her inner thighs, and lowered his head to kiss her
there
.
Lie still? Impossible!
Nicole arched into the intimate, intense flick of his tongue. She clenched the sheets, frantic to ease the torment, unwilling to cut it short. Exquisite heat flooded her. Her nether regions begged release.
Her fingers burrowed into his hair, intending to pull him upward, but she perversely held him in place, the sensations too divine to tell him to cease.
But if he didn’t halt soon, she would reach her ecstasy without him inside her, and that wasn’t her preference.
“Rhodri!”
He didn’t misunderstand her command. Within a trice he again covered her, and then, to her utter delight and relief, he filled her. One steady, powerful stroke followed another, flinging her steadily further into an adventure she wished to embark on only with Rhodri.
She matched his rhythm, urging him onward. Breath ragged and heart pounding, Nicole followed where Rhodri led.
Ecstasy came in a bright flash of heat, warming her through, convulsing the sheath in which Rhodri thrust. Never had she known such bliss could be reached until he’d shown her how thoroughly a man and woman could come together.
She lifted her hips, inviting him to seek deeper purchase.
On the next thrust he burrowed to profound depths and stayed there. His head thrown back, the cords of his neck stretched taut with strain, the sweat on his upper lip glistening from exertion, Rhodri surrendered.
The pulse of his release harmonized with hers, and Nicole thought it the most wondrous music to be heard in this earthly realm.
He lowered his head to nuzzle her neck. She wrapped her arms around him, now content to lie still until the last strains of the music faded. There was no place she would rather be. Nowhere she wanted to go. Would that they could lock the door’s latch and remain here for hours.
“Ah, Nicole,” he whispered, his breath warm against her neck, creating delicious tingles. “You please me beyond reason, woman. Shelter or bed, the result is the same. Your passion is a gift I shall cherish always.”
Not a declaration of love. Disheartening, but not defeating. Whether Rhodri came to love her or not, they shared a grand passion for each other and enhanced each other’s talents. ’Twas more than many other couples could claim.
“If I had but one wish, ’twould be you had come to my bedchamber earlier.”
He rose up on his elbows and grinned, mischief sparkling in his eyes. “I shall keep in mind that my lady is an insatiable minx and strive to ever satisfy her in new ways.”
“Say you there are more lessons to be learned?”
“A few.”
The night candle sputtered. Rhodri glanced over his shoulder at the now unsteady flame. When he turned back, the mischief had fled. He didn’t need to tell her why.
After a last kiss, he abandoned her and the bed. Nicole rolled off the mattress.
They dressed hurriedly in silence. She slipped the dagger into her boot, then looked around for the harp’s sack in which to place her circlet and the pouch of coins.
“Did you not bring your harp with you?”
“Nay, ’tis already down in the horse’s stall.” He draped her cloak over her shoulders and fastened the clasp. “I also pilfered food and a wineskin from the prince’s larder. This time we will be neither cold nor hungry.”
He made this latest escape sound easily accomplished. Nicole had doubts. Ever since they’d left Oxford, every escape had been harrowing.
“Need I distract a guard or two?”
He shook his head. “We will ride through the gate as soon as it opens for the day. Since the two of us arrived together yester eve, the guards will have no reason to question why we leave together this morn. ’Twill be hours before we are fully missed.”
They left the chamber as the night candle gutted out and made their way through the castle’s passageways by the sparse light of torches burning low in their iron sconces. Nicole followed in Rhodri’s wake down the servants’ stairs and out a small door opening into the bailey.