Tears of sleet sparkled in her mist as she soared to the clouds. The restless hunger Bryton had created now wept with abandoned emptiness. She’d erred. She only responded to him, could not replace him in her arms. She devalued what occurred between them, reduced it to biological function when it was more, something she hadn’t understood and still did not comprehend.
Bryton was no animal to obey primal urges but a thinking, feeling man. He understood the sensations he’d stirred but would not act on them. Why? Why had his rejection hurt as much as his blade? Roric had wanted her, why hadn’t Bryton?
Was there some flaw in her design? Why did she crave his comfort, his touch and more when she was supposed to aid him in finding peace? How could her calm be rippled so tumultuously with a kiss, a caress?
The rhythm of nature sang in a mystical song and she opened her mind, the tune pouring through her, soothing her in a timeless embrace. Trees swayed in time and she let the pure, sweet melody of life flow. Mountain ridges jutted into the darkness, steep ominous crags that challenged the sky. She skimmed the snow-capped tops. Faster and tighter she drove through the heavens, twisting and spinning, channeling the rumbling chaos in her essence.
Salt infused the air and she dove toward a white-frothed sea. Waters black as the night churned with her passing, reaching up to touch her flight. Ships rocked against the docks and tiny sailors far below scurried to secure lines and sails. Salome went farther. The sea and heavens met without end, stretching to a blind horizon. A sudden pain shuttled through her.
Bryton.
Her frantic escape and disastrous ploy had not lessened their bond. His anguish cleaved her spirit. Anger and resentment crumbled away as fear burst into her consciousness. He ached. Scorching agony cried out to her. The torment he carried threatened to tear his mind. A tsunami’s wail spilled from nonexistent lips and she spun, flying back to his side.
Landscape blurred beneath her. Stars smeared to streaks of light. The sea salt never left her vapor, or maybe her mystic tears had permeated her soul. She did not take time to think nor care which. Nothing mattered. Nothing but reaching her charge.
Bryton
.
A small orange fleck appeared, his jagged pain enveloping her like a blanket. He’d built a fire and sat near the blaze on a damp log. The amber light kissed his hair to glossed brass and gilded the black with gold. Fisted hands covered his face, thumbs pressed tight to his eyelids, elbows on his knees. His chest heaved, struggling to draw air. Salome slowed. He was unhurt. Bewildered, she swirled to form in the tree line, watching him.
He rocked. Waves of shame and regret undulated and a piercing soundless cry screamed from his soul. Though she could not read his thoughts, one word echoed in startling clarity—her name. Her essence cringed in distress. What had she done to him? Guilt and doubts assailed her and she stepped into the fire’s glow.
His rocking ceased. His head slowly rose. His cheeks were dry but the lines around his mouth grooved deeper, more pronounced. Shadows layered under blue eyes that raked her chiton then scoured her face. Scarred knuckles fisted to white and a swallow moved his throat. His gaze fell to the fire.
“I didn’t think you were coming back.”
A hollow fracture, a vulnerability never heard from him before, weighted her misery. She dropped her gaze to his knees. “My duty exists still. You shall not die alone.”
Minute embers leaped from the campfire, striving to join the heaven’s lights. They died scant feet from the blaze, too weak, too small, to embrace the lasting glory of the stars. Though they glowed with scalding power and sizzled with heat, they were merely castoffs of a larger fire. Bittersweet knowledge filled her mouth. Just as the flame could not become a star, she could not become what Bryton wanted.
His face went blank, a slab of expressionless granite. Tiny rocks kicked out from under his boots as he stood and stomped toward her. Anger wafted across the fire-lit circle in waves of heated ire. His jaw shifted and he fixed his stony gaze on her face. The black lacing on his shirt collar hung undone. Above it, in the valley of his throat, a rhythmic pulse fluttered. His heartbeat. Salome searched his eyes. They were cold.
“You’re wearing your silk. Did you go to…Did you find a man?”
Wetting her lips with a too-dry tongue, she intertwined her fingers and forced her chin to rise. “His name was Roric.”
A knife of agony jammed into his gut. Shame bled through with a bitter sting.
Oh, fuck, what did I do?
He clamped down, gritting his teeth to avoid the howl that burned in his belly. “Where?”
“The tavern belonging to Penna.”
The knife twisted until it hit bone.
She went into a tavern dressed like a whore and fucked some guy named Roric?
Bitterness welled in his throat, burning with a hundred needles. He couldn’t force the swallow down. Resentment rushed him and he pushed past the pain, past the disgrace, and sucked in huge gulps of air. Each one was flavored with honey he refused to acknowledge.
This was his fault. He’d shoved her away when she was confused and still flushed with desire. He’d yelled and…A growl rumbled from his mouth before he could catch it and he spun on one heel, headed for Jester. He’d ride bareback and be there in two hours.
“Where are you going?”
“I’m going to kill him.”
A swift breath rang out on a sharp-pitched note and Salome darted in front of him, blocking his path. One long finger poked into his chest with such ferociousness that he took a step back. Brows arched like a raven’s wing cut sharply downward. Her nostrils flared and her eyes glittered in menace. The display of feminine ire clogged his throat with admiration, a respect he rarely gave without merit.
“You will not! You have no say over who I choose to fuck.”
Spots of heat formed on his cheeks. “Don’t use that word! It’s crude. I shouldn’t have said it. I was angry and…Just don’t. Nice women don’t use words like that.”
“What does a woman call it then?”
Bryton dipped his head and rubbed his temples. “
Loving
is the polite term.
Bedding
occasionally and…Oh, hell, Salome, I don’t know. It doesn’t matter. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean for you to…It shouldn’t have been like that. Are you all right?”
“Of course.” She would not look him in the eye. “Why would you think otherwise?”
“Some women…hurt the first time. Please tell me he didn’t hurt you.”
“He did not hurt me, you did.”
His head snapped back. She might not know how to throw a dagger but she threw one hell of a sucker punch. Sorrow shaded his whisper to a low gruff scrape. “If I could take it back, change things, I would. It wasn’t you, okay? It’s me. I just…You deserve something more. You need someone who can love you.”
“Love?” Salome squinted. “What is love?”
Bryton twisted his neck, staring at her with shock parting his lips. A groan closed his eyes. “You don’t know what love is? Oh, shit, you are naive.”
“Perhaps you could instruct me and not berate me,” she huffed, crossing her arms.
“Love is…I don’t know, it just is.”
He reached for her hand and she didn’t shy away. Her palm slid along his, velvet on iron. The delicate bones of her hand entranced him. She seemed so frail and yet her fire, her passion, burned like a candle flame in a darkened room. Would she have the same spirited nature in bed? His hunger had not been satisfied and now roared. He guided her to the fire’s edge and sat her on the log. He had to stop touching her.
Deep shadows bisected by watery streams of moonlight played across her face and he drank in her quiet beauty. Her lips were still tight and her brows drawn, jabbing his heart like tiny pins. He had hurt her without meaning to and she’d lashed out. She should have slapped him but, instead, she’d gone looking for what she thought he wanted—an end to her virginity.
When she’d fled into the night, for fifteen minutes he’d been so angry he couldn’t see straight, cursing her down to the last feather. Let her go, he didn’t care. The last thing he needed was a woman slowing him down and interfering. Then he’d started worrying. She wouldn’t really find some man and have sex with him, would she? An hour passed and sick dread churned his bowels. More time and guilt became a tightened noose, choking him. Truth came somewhere in between.
Horror and absolute dishonor had sickened him. He’d sworn a solemn oath to never harm a woman. He’d broken that vow when duty opposed it, questioned a female prisoner and killed a female assassin. Both had made him uneasy. But with Salome, he’d done worse. He’d made her a whore. He’d pushed her into an intimate act with a stranger. It was no better than rape to him. Self-disgust left a thick film on his soul.
She’d lost her innocence because he was a coward. The dream had left him shaken and exposed, and her touch, her caring, lured him. He’d been with women since Katina died, each time closing his eyes and imagining her. One taste of Salome’s mouth and all his reasoning fled. It was no longer Katina beneath him, it was Salome. Every kiss, every caress, had been solely for her. He had trouble conjuring Katina’s smile. All he could see was Salome. It frightened him. He didn’t want to forget.
The thought of Salome with another man, any man, soured his tongue. He couldn’t deny it, he wanted her. But it wouldn’t be right and she didn’t even understand why. How do you explain love to a magic spell? How do you explain the difference between raw, hard-core sex and making real love? How could he make her understand that he was afraid he’d lose Katina all over again, this time in Salome’s arms?
Flustered energy pulsed as he paced around the fire, scratching his head and mumbling to himself about birds and bees. Hell, she knew all that, knew more now than she had when they made camp. But all that was physical. He didn’t know what to say. He could teach her swordplay or battle maneuvers, wrestling or the best poisons to silence an enemy, but love? No, he had no clue what to say.
“Where the hell’s Taric and his love poems when you need his royal ass?”
“I believe the king resides in Thistlemount.”
Bryton stopped and shook his head. A smile tickled his lips, nearly curling his mouth. A softness wedged into his chest.
Still so innocent
. “Yeah, he does.”
Kneeling in the sodden dirt, he reached for her hand. “Salome, listen. I’m not very good at this. I’m a soldier, not a poet. Love is…When you love someone, you want nothing more than to make that person happy. If it takes a jewel or a gift or an embrace, you’ll do what you have to just to see them smile. Something here—” he touched her breastbone with a gentle fingertip, “—gets warm when you think about them and you can’t get them out of your mind. You don’t want them out of your mind. If they’re near, your heart races and everything is better, brighter. When you’re apart from them, you feel empty. Nothing is as important to you as being with them.”
“What you describe, this is love?”
“The best I can describe it, yes.”
“Then I love you, Bryton.”
A flutter nestled under his ribs. She didn’t understand but those words, so sweetly whispered, touched deep inside him. He almost wished she meant them. A squeeze to her fingers accompanied his sad smile. “No, you don’t. You’re duty bound to me, that’s different. Love is magical, Salome. It’s a force that doesn’t have a match. It’s stronger than any man and softer than any woman. You’ll know it when it comes.”
“My time in this world is tied to you, Bryton. You are my purpose.”
A bewildered slant lowered his brows. “I guess it is. I didn’t think about that.”
“Have you loved many women?”
“Only one.”
“But you have loved with others?”
“Yeah, I don’t know how to explain it any more but they were just…sex. Sex is only a sliver of what real loving is. It feels good but it doesn’t touch the soul of who you are.”
“When you touched me, kissed me, I felt…alive, hungry, empty. I wanted more.”
“That’s lust. Too many stupid things happen in life because people get lust and love mixed up. My point to this whole thing is innocence is a gift. You can’t get that back. It’s not something you should have given away to just anyone. I’m sorry if I made you feel like you weren’t enough. You are, Salome. It’s me who isn’t worthy of you.”
Salome nibbled her lip. “I found a man who seemed kind. He kissed me and touched me. I expected the same from his touch as I feel from yours. I felt nothing.”
Could she twist that damn knife any deeper into his belly? It should have struck bone by now. Bryton fought the grimace thinning his mouth. He didn’t want to hear about her lover. But if the man hurt her, he was dead. Bryton would carve him like a roast goose and enjoy every screaming slice.
“But you’re okay, right? Even if you didn’t fly with him, he didn’t hurt you?”
Her head angled sharply and her brow dipped. “Fly with him?”
His headache returned with throbbing force. The heat from the fire warmed his back but his face flamed. Cursing his complexion, he dug for the words, the explanations, that were too personal and not something soldiers needed to have explained to them. Salome wasn’t a soldier. She was his peacemaker, an innocent he’d shoved into a strange man’s arms when she barely understood the rudimentary actions of loving. Rubbing between his eyes, he fumbled. “Fly…um, you know, find…release…orgasm.”
“Orgasm? What is that?”
His swallowed groan jammed beneath his jaw and he forced it down. This had to be a punishment for every barmaid, farmers’ daughter and the occasional minstrel he’d ever taken. Sweat formed along his temples and he wiped it away with an unsteady hand. He’d faced hundreds of armed men, lived through a war and more horror than one man should see in a lifetime. One little magic spell should not twist his stomach into knots like this, not even if she did look to him with huge, evening-sky-lit eyes. Command and authority boomed from his voice, the captain in him giving instruction while the man winced in embarrassment.
“When the loving is right, when it’s good…the feelings, the sensations, grow, compound…until there is a peak. The peak is an orgasm. It’s like your soul is flying.”
Understanding brightened her eyes and her chin bobbed. “Like a storm reaching the crescendo of power, I see. No, I did not fly with Roric. I flew from him.”
“Flew from him?”
“I flew away…with wings. There was no loving. I want no other man.”
His heart skipped a beat. “You didn’t…You’re still a virgin?”
Moonlight infused her hair with silvered threads that shimmered with her slow nod.
His whoosh of relief feathered a tendril away from her forehead and he couldn’t stop his arms from encircling her. How could something not real feel so right in his arms? “Thank God.”
She burrowed closer, nuzzling his neck and clinging to him. “Even now, it’s your touch I crave. I am free to choose and I choose you.”
“Salome.” Bryton pulled from her arms and smoothed that one stubborn curl away from her cheek. He was really beginning to like that lock of hair. “You’re right. You are free. I’m not.”
“You felt lust for me?”
“Like I said, you’re irritating as hell but beautiful. I’m only human. Yeah, I wanted you.”
“Do you still?”
Bryton considered lying. He thought about denying it, making it firm that he was in no way attracted to her. A hidden cruel streak toyed with the idea of laughing at her. But in the end, he took a deep breath and forced his gaze to connect with hers. He gave her the truth. “Yes, I do.” Pale pink lips parted with a soft inhale but he’d taken that first step and could not retreat. “My body wants you but my heart doesn’t have room for another woman. I can’t do that to you.”
Her hand caressed his jaw, thumb slipping over his cheekbone. A soft, teasing smile played with her lips before curving them into a wide smile. Starlight melded with twilight in the depths of her gaze, reaching into his chest and that dead lump of aching flesh he called a heart.
“Your heart has no limits. It is not a tomb, Bryton, but a gateway. Couldn’t you let me in, just a little bit?” Her nose crinkled before she bent to rub it against his, like a rabbit nosing its mate. “I’m not very big.”
A sigh hid his laugh. “Somehow, Salome, I think you are a very small package containing a butt load of trouble.”
The hill country took them through towns of varying sizes and trails of empty woodlands. Each step, each mile, each passing town took him closer to his goal and his death. His jaw gritted tighter and the indigo of his hate flashed with binding intensity. Salome dreaded the destination but reveled in the journey, in his company. An easy friendship formed. Salome soared above or flew beside him. For a while, they walked. He talked, she listened. He told her long epic tales of valor and battle, of good triumphing over evil. Salome waited for each word with a breathless anticipation, hanging on each tale as if reliving them.
The king and queen entranced her, their love surpassing death and magic. Bryton grumbled that the king was simply too stubborn to realize that dead meant dead. Though Bryton complained of the queen’s interference, his admiration rang through. The affection he held for them was as clear as morning. He did not mention his wife and Salome did not ask. Time would make those words easier to speak.
The mountains crept closer, dark and tall, cutting boldly into the blue sky. Nature’s abundance flourished in the warmer southland. Greens were darker, plants more lush. Trees stretched leafy arms high to embrace the breezes. Animals scampered, robust with the driving urges for new life. Sunlight rained down in beams of golden splendor. Only the human population carried the shroud of imprisonment.
Few children played outside cottages, villages held silent roadways, in storefronts people bent their heads, hurrying to complete tasks and seek shelter. Women, if seen, were in groups or with men carrying swords, hunting knives and, in one case, a farmer’s sickle sharpened to a deadly edge. Oppression loomed darker than night in the middle of a glorious spring day.
Bryton did not stop though his supplies grew low. He pushed deeper into the woods, higher up the mountainside. Cool, earthy scents kicked up as Jester struggled for footing on a narrow pathway. Salome watched from above as Bryton’s bright head peeked from between the dense forest canopy. Somehow, that conversation before the fire had eased things between them. They still squabbled but it held less heat, less irritation. A truce had been wordlessly agreed upon.
Attraction arced between them, their competing now limited to flirts and teases. Bryton delighted in making her blush. Feminine pride fluttered her heart each time he tugged at his breeches, demanding she behave. Light kisses and touches thrilled her spirit, not reaching the fervent heights of his rain-secluded tent but with a tenderness that forged him deeper into her heart.