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She needed to stop him. He couldn’t stop himself. Instead, as had happened in her bedchamber back at Dun Eyre, her timidity lasted barely the space between two beats of his heart before the sensual hoyden took over. Keen to follow his lead wherever it might wander. A dangerous trust that would end in trouble.
He took a nipple in his mouth, tonguing it until she threw her head back, her fingers threaded in his hair, quick inhalations rising and falling beneath him.
Rucking the sheer fabric of her gown up against her legs, he followed the swell of her thighs to the ribbons of her garters, the wet heat of her center.
She gasped, her eyes flying open.
He withdrew, just enough to leave her wanting. Her eyes grew black with desire, her face passing through a thousand expressions and emotions in a half second. The tightening spiral of arousal feeding his own desire.
She pulled free his shirt, skimming her hands up the line of his ribs over his chest.
Blood seemed to leave his brain for his groin, making him dizzy. Not the head-spinning effect of too much drink, but a wild exhilaration akin to mastering a half-broke horse or finally grasping an impossible piece of sorcery. It was the joy of discovery. A sweet marveling in the infinite.
His cock throbbed like a second painful heartbeat. Gods, he’d explode in another second.
She fumbled at the waist of his breeches, her fingers unskilled, her mind too absorbed to focus on the simple mechanics of buttons.
“Please,” she whimpered as his thumb rubbed at her most sensitive flesh.
It would be so easy to have her now. To have her writhing beneath him as he took his pleasure. She would regret her easy compliance in the morning. She would hate him as she should. That would be the best thing he could do for her.
Instead, he tore himself free with a groan, his whole body crackling with unfulfilled desire. “Not like this, Lissa,” he whispered.
She gazed upon him, dazed and glassy-eyed, her hair falling free of its pins to curl wild about her face. Her lips bruised and full from his kisses.
He bent to retrieve her shawl, wrapping her in its folds as he might a child. Kissing her brow. Smoothing her hair. His movements shaky and awkward as he fought back his desire.
“Brendan?” she asked softly, already a furious scarlet washing over her pale cheeks. “You left me once before at the altar. You won’t do it again, will you?”
“No, sweet Lissa. On my honor, I won’t.”
It was only long after she’d left him and the fire had burned to cold ash that he realized the voices remained silent. The ghosts had receded. Only one face burned in his mind’s eye—a tempestuous beauty with eyes dark and warm as oak. Only one voice called to him with touching uncertainty.
He closed his hand into a painful fist. Whispered, “On my honor,” to the empty room.
For whatever that was worth anymore.
thirteen
Brendan browsed the Roseingrave library shelves. Not exactly a cornucopia of research material, but it would have to do.
He’d stumbled to bed close to dawn. Immediately fallen into a confusion of bizarre dreams. Not unusual. To sleep without the constant nightmares was a rare occurrence. But these dreams had been different. They’d not been the usual ghostly visitations leaving him drenched in a cold sweat. Instead, he’d wandered a field of corpses, a red sun sinking through a smoke-shrouded sky. Scattered bonfires raged, fed with the bodies of Other, while thieves and camp followers picked among the dead and dying. Smoke and gunpowder and the stench of burning flesh lay upon his tongue and burned his nose. His body ached, blood dripping from a gash in his head, but he held to his feet with a will born of fear. Aidan was out here somewhere. His brother lay among the fallen. He wasn’t supposed to be here. This wasn’t his fight.
Looked for or not, this will become his fight. He is Other. And you are his brother. He will come for you.
The king stood behind him, his usual flame of red hair plastered to his skull with sweat and blood. He pointed with the broken edge of his blade.
There. Among a pile of dead, their staring eyes and twisted limbs holding no hope. Brendan dropped to his knees, gathering his brother against his chest.
Did you think we could win? You should have known. The story of Arthur has only one end. It is my curse and my fate. The Fey have spoken. What can mere mortals do against that? What can you do?
Brendan woke shuddering and sick, the king’s sorrow like a stone in his own chest. Had this been a premonition? Foreknowledge? Bad dreams brought on by food poisoning?
The sun had risen on a mind heavy with questions and sluggish with exhaustion. If he’d had to dream, why couldn’t it have been about Elisabeth? The slide of her body against his. The glow in her eyes. The heat of her sex.
He scrubbed his face as if he could expunge the memory of her from his brain. He’d agreed to this marriage out of guilt. His name for her honor. But he refused to entertain notions of anything more. Not when his future remained uncertain. When just being in his company could destroy her.
He’d spelled disaster and death for everyone he’d ever loved. He’d not add Elisabeth to the list of those who’d gotten too close and been burned for their trouble. Alone worked for him. Alone meant no one got hurt. Alone meant safe.
