by Kay Hooper
“You’re my edge, Hunter,” she told him firmly. “They aren’t sure you’re here in the valley and alive. We have to use that surprise eventually, so why not now? If we’re quick, we can get them both.”
He growled a reluctant agreement, his respect for her strategy growing as they reached the clearing holding the Crystal Pool and he realized what she had in mind.
“They’re coming this way,” she noted quickly. “I’ll get down behind that rocky rise on the other side of the pool while you move around behind the Huntmen. We’ll wait until they’re well into the clearing. When you see me stand, get the one nearest you. I’ll take the other.” Then she was moving swiftly and silently around the pool toward her hiding place.
Hunter faded back into the woods, rapidly finding a vantage point where he halted and strained every sense in listening, in pinpointing. It was a sense other than hearing which found the enemy, a sense honed by survival battles on distant worlds over many years. He instantly shifted position on soundless feet, pleased to note a moment later that his instinct had not been at fault; a Huntman passed, unsuspecting, where he’d stood heartbeats ago.
Knowing in his mind and his body how to measure another man, Hunter followed and studied them, creeping more silent than a whisper in their very bootmarks. He let his instincts probe, his senses reach out fully and carefully. And what he found in them was only greed, bestial anger, and a fear born out of their ignorance.
And the strength of determination.
He watched as they drew nearer to one another, their tactical sweep of the forest narrowing as they moved toward the Crystal Pool.
He might have killed at least one while following, but dared not take the chance of losing one of his two spears in striking at an unsure target. Any miscalculation on his part could mean a greater risk to Siri—and that was something he would not even consider.
It was obvious that these Huntmen mistrusted the path through the woods, equally obvious that they were men determined to find what they sought.
Even if it meant bearding a sorceress in her den.
They reached the clearing at last, moving with the innate caution of frightened men. Carefully, they stepped from the cover of trees, stiff and wary, their own bravado now mocking them as the peaceful pool and apparently quiet and unthreatening clearing met their eyes. Another step. Another.
Hunter readied his spear, marking his target before allowing his eyes to search out the rocks where Siri hid. As quickly as he was ready, she rose into view, arrow nocked, bow arm drawing back expertly.
His own arm snapped forward, the spear released to fly straight and true to its target. He knew the surprise was complete, even as he saw them lurching for cover and weapons with panicked eyes and frantic bodies, confusion leaving them with nowhere to turn. He faded instantly back, his eyes coolly noting his target sprawled face down, with half the length of the spear jutting from the rough leather tunic.
Both his eyes and his ears followed Siri’s arrow singing through the air, a brief song for the short journey it made before finding its destination in the chest of the lunging target.
Neither of the enemy had managed to use his own weapon.
Hunter thought of Siri rising from those rocks, silver hair flowing about her shoulders as if it possessed the living intent to enchant.
Even in the brief instant granted him to see her, the impressions the Huntmen must have felt had crashed through him. How extraordinarily magnificent she was! Black-clad strength and grace, black-eyed savagery and power, and the beautiful face and perfect womanly body of a goddess. Rising out of nowhere in silence and purpose.
Death wedded to Beauty by sorcery.
Hunter took a deep, full breath, his first in what felt like a very long time. God, she was glorious! Like no woman he had ever known, she embodied all the very best of womankind. Strong and wise, knowing and innocent, beautiful and gentle, passionate in her temper and vulnerable in ways he didn’t understand. He felt humbled suddenly that this woman had trusted him with the secret knowledge of the herd’s hiding place, had allowed him to help her defend her beloved Unicorns.
Siri was waiting by the pool, smiling when she saw him, her eyes the bottomless, serene black that was not battle. “You’re good with spears,” she noted admiringly, nodding toward his fallen victim.
“You’re better with the bow,” he returned, his voice husky from emotions still swirling within him. Then, conscious of her searching look and unwilling to bring about the return of her inexplicable pain by reminding her of his love, he changed the subject carefully. Nodding toward the bodies, he said, “We leave them?”
Siri nodded. “The animals will take them to the gorge and leave them there.”
Remembering the almost bottomless canyon at the far end of the valley, Hunter decided it would make a fitting resting place for the Huntmen. In battle, there was no feeling for the shells left by the enemy.
Chapter 9
As they went about releasing the Unicorns and trying to restore the valley to normality, Siri wondered. She was troubled by her continued unsettled feeling of blankness in the valley. She wondered why the black agony had not materialized. And lastly, she wondered why they were unable to discover any of the Huntmen’s weapons.
They’d gone first to free the Unicorns; by the time they’d passed the Crystal Pool, the two bodies had been taken away by the animals. The speed of that was unusual, but Siri decided that the animals had just acted more quickly today. At the Huntmen’s abandoned camp, there was nothing but a circle of charred ground and four worthless, empty packs. There had been no opportunity for her to take the weapons of the two she’d slain in the forest during the night, and now those bodies had also been taken away by the animals.
Hunter didn’t seem concerned by the lack of weapons; he was clearly too relieved that nothing in the valley had been destroyed to worry about anything else. And even though he could hardly know what was normal under these circumstances, Siri shared his relief and finally pushed aside her troubling thoughts.
And it wasn’t until after their noon meal that she realized the blankness was gone. She reached out with her mind, probing, and found nothing but peace and quiet in the valley. And even though she was relieved by that, she was still troubled. She was also uneasy to find that with the valley restored to normality, she had nothing to keep her mind occupied with things other than Hunter and her own feelings.
Every instinct she could claim told her there would be an ultimate confrontation between them, and her tension grew as she realized he was watching her more intently than ever, and that he, too, was obviously conscious of passing time. They both knew he would return to his world; neither mentioned that subject. But Summer was waning, and although there would be a brief, cool Fall, Winter would make travel to his ship impossible.
He would have to leave before Winter.
—
“Siri?”
She halted at the door, then half-turned to look at him. “I’m going for a swim,” she said, her inner restlessness apparent in her voice.
“May I come?”
With a shrug, she left the cabin. A vague instinct warned her that it was not wise to accept his company, but Siri didn’t understand why. In the cabin or at the pool, what difference did it make?
She began to understand when, reaching the pool, she pulled off her boots and stood to unlace her bodice. Her movements were casual and automatic—until she glanced up to find Hunter standing nearby watching her. Nimble fingers became awkward suddenly, and she felt heat flush through her body. Frowning, she worked the stubborn laces until she could shrug out of the top half of her garment, then bent over to pull the clinging material down over her hips and legs and step free of it.
Without looking at him again, she moved slowly out into the cool, clear water of the Crystal Pool.
Hunter was barely aware that he was removing his own clothing slowly, unable to take his eyes off her. He had seen her in this pool once before, b
ut at night and from a distance. Now she was so close, and the filtered sunlight dappled her golden body with light and shadow. His physical response to her was instant, and he swallowed hard as he followed her into the water.
The wellspring water should have been icy, but was instead cool and refreshing. It should have chilled his ardor, but he realized that little, if anything, was capable of that now. In the middle of a blizzard, he would be hot with wanting her.
Gritting his teeth, Hunter struck out through the water, trying to release tension in physical activity. But he was starkly aware of the caress of the water over his skin, and of his body’s pounding, throbbing need. He couldn’t take much more of this, couldn’t go on fighting himself. For the first time he was very much afraid that he would completely lose control and force Siri against her will.
He swam with powerful strokes, forcing his body to its limits, desperate to attain some measure of control. Hardly aware that she had slipped into the shallower area to give him room, he swam blindly, fighting to block out the intensity of his need, trying to exhaust himself.
Siri, trembling, watched him. Though she was not tired herself, her breathing was as ragged as his, and her heart pounded. She felt shaky and weak, and her body was hot. She located a flat stone under the water and waited there, feeling the waves of Hunter’s passing lap over her breasts, feeling his thoughts battering her. She drew her knees up and put her arms around them, half-consciously rocking a little and almost moaning aloud with the aching fullness of her breasts.
The images in his mind tormented her; his struggle to control himself pulled at her like a lodestar. He fought himself and she fought them both, and her battle was no more successful than his. The taboo in her mind grew wispy, insubstantial; her will seemed to flow from her grasp as though a barrier inside her had ruptured. She felt the scalding trickle of tears and wasn’t even sure why she was crying, except that she hurt.
Hunter rose from the water before her, and she looked at him dazedly. For the first time she saw his body not as something that needed mending but as a male body in the prime of beauty and strength. The rippling muscles beneath his smooth bronze skin fascinated her; the mat of black hair on his powerful chest filled her with a need to press her breasts against him, and the swollen fullness of his loins made her own ache emptily.
When she looked at last at his face, she felt something inside her quiver tensely and then, suddenly, yield. A shuddering sigh escaped her lips, and when he reached down, her hands grasped his and she allowed him to pull her up.
“I can’t stand anymore,” he said in a thick, rasping voice. His chest rose and fell strongly with his harsh breaths, and his vivid green eyes were alive with desire. “Siri…I’m not made of stone. I’m half mad with wanting you…Don’t stop me this time, beloved.”
“I can’t stop…” She heard the voice that was hers and not hers, and knew it came from someplace deeper than her mind. “I have to…stop.” Her body, yielding, swayed toward him; her mind, trapped in the chaos of its terrible conflict, fought the need to surrender in love and desire.
It was the confrontation she had hoped to avoid, and the pain of it tore at her. The full force of his need was focused on her, battering her mind and body, and her female flesh had surrendered at last. But her mind struggled to remember the price she would pay for her body’s capitulation. If she could have, she would have told him then why this was forbidden to her; but she was physically incapable of speaking of it except as a last, desperate resort. Should he try to force her, she could speak; otherwise, she could say nothing.
It was her choice…her choice…Hunter or the Unicorns…to live fully as a woman, loved and loving, for a few brief weeks…to live the remainder of a natural life alone but for a Summer that came once in ten years…to love or not to love…to be woman or Keeper…to live or to die….
“Siri, I love you!”
…woman or Keeper…
“I need you so much—”
…Hunter or the Unicorns…
“—and I know you need me!”
…to live or to die…
“Goddammit, Siri, talk to me!” He was almost out of control, fighting himself and wildly intent on obtaining a response from her even if he had to force her brutally to confront her own feelings against her will. The heat of her naked body inflamed him, and he reached out with a groan to persuade in another manner.
But the cry that came from her then chilled him; it was soft and agonized, eerily inhuman: And he caught her body as it crumpled bonelessly against him.
“Siri!” He lifted her into his arms and carried her swiftly to the bank, suddenly afraid that he had finally pushed her too far. Her wet body was light and completely limp, and only the faint pulse he detected in her throat reassured him that she lived. Without pausing to gather their clothing, he carried her through the forest to the cabin.
—
She awoke slowly, surfacing from a nightmarish world that was cold and white with snow, and utterly empty. It took several moments for her to realize that she was in the bed that had been Hunter’s since his arrival. She was covered with the quilts and naked beneath them; her clothing lay across the foot of the bed. She sat up slowly, holding the covers to her breasts in a new and unconscious modesty, looking around until she saw Hunter.
He was standing at the door, leaning against the jamb as he stared outside, his body stiff. He was fully dressed, and Siri hesitated only a moment before swinging her legs from the bed and reaching for her clothes. She kept her back turned to him, and realizing that she did so was a tiny shock.
He didn’t speak until she drew on her boots and stood, and it was obvious that he had been aware of her movements even though he had not turned to face her.
“Neat trick, that.” His voice was flat. “I suppose some men might enjoy making love to an unconscious woman, but I’m not one of them. A wonderful defense, Siri.”
I couldn’t choose! She even opened her mouth to speak the words, but they simply would not emerge. “I can’t change what I am,” she managed finally, huskily.
He swung around then to face her, his face stone and green eyes violent. “I don’t want to hear that again! What you’re doing to me isn’t pretty, but then, you know that, don’t you? You know exactly what you’re doing to me. Did I say I was half mad with wanting you? I was wrong. I am mad. There’s no other explanation. I should have listened in the city when they told me you drove men mad, because now I know it’s true! If I had a scrap of sanity to call my own, I’d climb out of this valley and put a galaxy between us. But I can’t leave, Siri.” His laugh was harsh. “God help me, I love you. And there’s not a damn thing I can do to change that.”
The hardness of his face and the ferocity in his eyes hurt her, but there was nothing she could say or do to change him. She was so weary and frightened. Although her loss of consciousness had stopped the confrontation, it had solved nothing. He still wanted her, she still wanted him, and there was still the choice that would destroy her no matter what.
She acknowledged that to herself then. If she chose Hunter, she would die. If she chose the Unicorns and that choice drove him away from her—as she had no doubt it would—there would be nothing left of her but an empty shell. Rejected by her one time too many, he would return to his world for good, she knew; no human man would remain contentedly in love with a woman he could not possess physically without a very good reason. And she could give no reason. Love would become hate, and he would be gone, never understanding why she had driven him away.
Never even knowing she loved him.
—
Boran summoned the sorceress several hours before dawn. He had returned with his second group of Huntmen, discovering they were laughably easy to control; it only required a fraction of his concentration to keep them as docile as sheep. Leaving them asleep in exhaustion after their rough entrance into the valley, he made his way swiftly but silently to the deepest part of the forest and summoned the sorceress.
And, as she neared, he realized in shock that his control over her was a newly tenuous thing. He frowned, concentrating, and felt the chaos of her mind. A grunt escaped him when he also felt the pain in her. Surprised and unsettled, he carefully probed her thoughts, discovering the source of her confusion and pain.
So! The other was demanding a consummation of his love, unaware of the cost to her. And her body had surrendered, but her mind had prevented that consummation. The resulting battle within her was throwing up a kind of shield against himself, Boran realized.
He waited until she stepped into the clearing and then focused all his mental energies on retaining his control over her. But when he went to meet her, he saw that a curious transformation had occurred. The woman who faced him was his creation—and was not. Moment by moment, she wavered between Keeper and awakening girl. She smiled at him, yet her black eyes were wary, disturbed. Physically she was a little stiff.
Without saying a word, Boran poured into her mind all the sexual power he could summon. He used their past meetings, used his mental imagery of the fantasies he had indulged in, mentally caressed her awakened senses. He allowed his constant desire to flood her mind, forcing her to mentally “feel” his arousal, the potent male need for release in a female body. He shifted his intense gaze to her breasts, and the power of his mind made the look a physical caress that brought her nipples instantly erect and visible beneath the black cloth. He heard her gasp, and his gaze moved lower to fix at the base of her belly, and he thought of a silver-furred triangle and damp heat.
He stepped closer even as she closed her thighs tightly, and when he looked at her face he found that something in her was still resisting him. Suspended somewhere between Keeper and woman, she was fighting arousal, fighting him. And there was something else in her face, something new. A serenity he had never seen in her, an utter calm.
“I want you, princess,” he said softly.
