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No one,she was told, was allowed in Mrs. Beale s kitchen. It was probably for the best that she hadn't mentioned trading recipes with the woman who ruled the Hall's kitchen.
Then there was Lucivar. Seeing him with his family, the coven, and the boyos had been a revelation. Demanding and yielding, stubborn and considerate, arguing with one of them and defending that person in the next breath. He'd insisted on morning workouts, which hadn't pleased her until she discovered the whole coven showed up without grumbling. Watching them move through the warmups, watching them spar with him and each other, she realized how serious he was about witches being comfortable using weapons in order to defend themselves. And watching him spar with Jaenelle… Her heart had been in her throat the whole time she watched that violent dance.
But the biggest difference was the way he'd responded to her. Ever since the day when he'd promised to help her learn to fly again, he'd been touching her, giving her easy, friendly kisses. The kisses he'd given her at the Hall made her wonder, made her hungry. They were the kisses of a man who wanted. Except he hadn't asked if he could come to her bed, hadn't invited her to come to his. So she wasn't sure what those kisses meant, but she wondered what it would be like to be with him.
And sheshouldn't wonder. She was hishousekeeper. It would be too easy to forget that if she responded to him as a woman.
Had he wanted her to invite him? Was that why he was so testy now?
Marian looked out the kitchen window. The snow was falling so fast now, she couldn't see anything. Where was he?
Lucivar stood on a mountain ledge on the other side of Ebon Rih, watching the storm come over the mountains. It matched his mood, matched a temper already primed to explode.
Hell's fire! Why had Luthvian wanted to ride out the storm inhis home? She had plenty of food, and with warming spells on the pipes that ran from the house to the well, she'd wouldn't be without water. And hadn't he filled every damn woodbox in her house? Using Craft, she could call in more wood from the woodpile without going outside. So why did she suddenly want to spend time with him?
Not that he would have her. Not today. Just the smell of her, and the lingering scent of her female students, had been enough to make him want to smash furniture, shatter bone. And the males in the villages…
The sight of them had been enough to bring him a heartbeat away from the killing edge. They hadn't done anything wrong, had, in fact, done everything they could to prepare the villages in Ebon Rih to ride out the storm. But he'd wanted to hurt them, had felt something close to blind hatred for all of them.
His father was at the Keep. He could sense that dark power. So tempting to go to Ebon Askavi and test his precarious control against that darker strength.
What in the name of Hell was wrong with him? He wanted to get home before the storm really broke.Wanted to get back to his eyrie, back to…
Marian.
Fury avalanched through him. Changed into something violent, hot, and impossible to resist.
Marian.
He knew what this was now. It had never hit him quite this way before, but he recognized it now.
Rut. That time when a Warlord Prince's sex drive overwhelmed everything else. Every male was a rival to be eliminated. Every female
but the one he'd chosen scraped a temper turned wild and unpredictable.
Sex or violence.The rut worked itself out one way or the other. Sometimes both. He'd gone into rut several times since coming to Kaeleer and had had no desire to slake that drive in a woman's body. He'd depended on Jaenelle's presence to keep him chained. She had soothed his need to be close to a female and had channeled the violence into grueling physical activity that he'd thrown himself into with vicious willingness.
But Jaenelle was at her house in Seek for a few weeks, and the woman he wanted, the woman who made his blood burn and sing…
He had to get Marian out of the eyrie, had to get her away from him before the storm closed in and made it too dangerous to travel, even on the Winds. Because if she was still in the eyrie when the storm inside him broke, if they were trapped together for several days… If that happened, may the Darkness be merciful… because there would be no mercy in him.
Giving an Eyrien war cry that was filled with fury and desperation, Lucivar launched himself into the face of the storm.
As Marian pulled the roast out of the oven and set the pan on top of the stove, the front door slammed.
"You made it," she said as she hurried into the eyrie's front room. When she saw him, she took a step back. His teeth were bared, and he stared at her with glazed, wild eyes.
"Get out," he growled.
"Lucivar…"
"Get out!" He ripped off his short wool cape and threw it aside.
She couldn't take her eyes off his bare, slick skin. It was freezing out there. Why was he so hot? And why wasn't he wearing a shirt or vest under the cape?
The vicious snarl that erupted from him made her press her back against the wall.
"I want you out of here. Go to Riada and stay with Merry. Go to the Keep. Go anywhere, but go.Now. "
Fear shivered through her. She knew what this was. Survival de-
manded that every witch learn to recognize the rut. Warlord Princes were always violently passionate and passionately violent, but the rut drove them to a savagery that bordered insanity. Other males were nothing more than rivals to destroy. And women…
Her mother had once said that a Warlord Prince in rut had enough sexual hunger that he could service an entire coven twice over and still want more. The problem was, he focused on one female and wouldn't tolerate the presence of any other. His choice became the vessel for all that drive, all that need.
She'd heard stories about Warlord Princes. She knew what could happen to the woman under him when he was in rut. Tongues partially bitten off. Nipples bitten off. Bones broken or shattered. Any male who tried to stop him would be killed, and he would turn away from the slaughter to mount the female again, oblivious to the carnage around him until the rut finally wore off.
"Marian."
Lucivar wore Ebon-gray Jewels. If she stayed, she could be maimed, even killed. But if she didn't stay, what would he do? Trapped here by the blizzard, driven by the violence inside him, he could hurt himself.
"Marian."
She was young, healthy, stronger than she'd ever been. And she was in love with him. She'd fallen in love with a man who challenged the world to take him on, sometimes with laughing, boyish enthusiasm and other times as a warrior born and trained to kill.
She could do this for him.Would do this for him.
"No." Her voice quivered with fear, but her heart didn't waver. "I'm not leaving."
