by P. C. Cast
“Please do not try. I am much enamored by who you are and how you speak. And the workings of your mind. And your beauty. And—”
“Stop! I appreciate the flattery, Arthur, but it embarrasses me.”
“And your caring heart,” Arthur said, with a grin. “And I could go on, but now I will stop.” He refilled both of their goblets, although she’d barely put a dent in her own to begin with. But she didn’t protest. She was too freakin’ happy just to be with him.
Merlin is happy, Arthur and Isabel. He is still in a deep sleep, but he smiles as well.
Arthur frowned. “Did you hear that?”
Isabel didn’t know whether to say yes or no.
“Hear what?” she asked, deciding noncommittal was the way to go.
“About Merlin?”
“Merlin?”
Arthur shook his head. “It must be my mind playing tricks.”
She tried to word her answer as best she could. She did not want Arthur thinking he was losing his marbles. “I think that when thoughts enter your mind, they are there for a reason. To ponder upon. At least, that’s how I find those types of voices in my head.”
Viviane, cut it out!
Sorry!
He sat back and said, “So tell me, Izzy, what would you like to know most about me? My first love?”
What she’d love to know most is how he looked totally naked. And whether he was as good a lover as his eyes and smile promised. But brazen hussy that she normally was, she wasn’t quite ready to blurt out those questions. Yet.
“I would love to know that story, but it’s not what I’d like to hear first. But I fear going too far.”
“Try me,” he said.
She hesitated. “I would like to know what your greatest passion is. What matters the most to you, Arthur?”
He took a few long minutes to answer, rubbing his beard. In the meantime Isabel took several sips of her wine, waiting for him to tell her all kinds of things. Like it was none of her freaking business, for one. Re-winning Gwen’s affection for another. Running out of the room before answering her for another.
Finally he said, “I have many of those. May I choose more than one?”
“Of course,” she said, swallowing a hiccup and fear. Fear of what, she wasn’t certain, but there was definitely fear hanging around her. A more benign question would have worked better.
“I want to secure the safety and happiness for all of Camelot. But I am much concerned that this is not going to be possible.”
“Why?”
“There be too many who want to bring us down. ’Tis why we are having this meeting of the knights from other realms. To unite against those dark forces.”
“Dumont is not one, Arthur. I promise you.”
His smile was grim. “I know that, Isabel. And I much appreciate the support you are offering.”
“I have men on their way, ready to defend you.”
That was a bunch of bullshit. She didn’t even know if she had men. But she was depending on the Lady to help her with that one.
“Your men have come already, Isabel. They are even now settling in.”
“They have?”
“You did not know?”
Get with the program, Isabel. Do you think I did not bring backup?
A little forewarning might have been nice.
You should recognize them easily, as they will look familiar to you. They are the entire football team of UO, but to make this rhyme Oklahoma U.
Holy shit, you did not take them away from—
Oh, can it, Isabel, they are mirror images as are Tom, Dick and Harry.
Isabel didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. She wondered if the Sooner Schooner had carried some of them.
Yes, indeed. Now please get back to Arthur.
She swallowed. “They did, indeed, arrive ahead of schedule. My apologies if this is a burden for you.”
He laughed. “No burden at all. They have been nothing but a pleasure, according to James. They even brought something called a mas-cot.”
“Oh boy. They’ll have your men tailgating in no time.”
She saw his confusion and quickly shook her head. “I will have to go welcome them and thank them for coming shortly. But not before I hear what more you have to say.”
“To say?”
“Or maybe you don’t. I thought you had more than one passion.”
“Oh, yes. My passions.”
Once more he grinned in a way that truly made her melt and fire up at one and the same time. Something she had never felt before. Try to figure that one out, Dr. Phil.
“Yes, passions. We definitely need to get back on track here. I passionately want to keep peace between Gwen and me.”
Talk about your heart sinking straight to your toes. “I understand that, Arthur. And I believe you should. Salvaging your marriage should definitely be your first priority.”
Her necklace thumped.
“You misunderstand. I passionately want Gwen to be happy. That is not with me. She is much in love with Lance. I cannot stop them nor do I want to hurt them in this. Truly, I am most concerned that I cannot protect them as well as I need to do. I care about the two very much.”
“Even though they have—”
He leaned forward and put a hand to her lips. “They have followed their desires. Would I ask for a different outcome? Perhaps. But ’tis done, and cannot not be undone. Now I must secure their safety. And truth to tell, all will be well.”
Isabel ran her hand through her hair. “I honestly don’t understand.”
“’Twould be a horrid price both would pay if they are caught. I will try to guard against this to the best of my ability.”
“You are a good man, Arthur. With a big heart. We have a saying in my land. ‘What happens in Dumont, stays in Dumont.’ Unless you’re dumb enough to talk about it to every person you meet outside of Dumont.”
“I very much enjoy the thoughts of the people of Dumont.”
“As do I,” she said, which was a bit of a whopper of a lie, considering, hey, she didn’t know a single citizen of Dumont.
She took a last glug of her wine and stood. “Now perhaps I should go and greet my men.”
He took her hand. “You have not yet heard my third passion.”
“Maybe later, Arthur.”
“Please, it is short.”
She nodded and sat back down. In fact, she was ready to lie down. This drinking so early in the day was not good for her equilibrium. “Your third passion?”
He kept hold of her hand, running his thumb over her palm. For a moment he seemed to waver, but then he looked her straight in the eye. “To lie naked with you. To make love with you. To kiss you so passionately that ’twill make you dizzy. That is my third passion. And of the passions I have mentioned, ’twas not necessarily ordered properly. It just took me some time to build up the courage to voice this one.”
Thank the gods she was sitting, because sure as hell her knees would have caved on her. And for maybe the first time in her life, she was totally speechless.
They stared at one another for so long that the sun could have set and she wouldn’t have noticed.
Finally he broke the gaze and stood. “I should have not said such a thing. It was untoward.” He bowed. “My deepest apologies.”
Isabel grabbed his arm and pulled him closer as she stood, so they were face-to-face, body-to-body. “I bet you one of our horses that you cannot get me out of this contraption called a gown faster than Mary can.”
He grinned, then cupped her face. “Oh, Countess, how you underestimate me.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
OH, how Isabel had underestimated him. In every single way. Arthur had her gown off in record time, kissing her senseless the entire way.
“You’re good,” she said, as her gown dropped to the floor.
“I very much hope, lady, that you feel the same way in a while.”
Other than the gown billowed around her ankles, she w
as naked, and suddenly felt shy. She covered her breasts with her arms.
“Oh, Isabel, please, no. You are so beautiful.”
Isabel had no idea how the workings of men’s tunics, breeches or other stuff worked. She was only able to shed him of his outer vest before being at a total loss. “I’m afraid I don’t know what to do.”
Arthur, who’d been fixated on her body, went still and drilled her with his gaze. “Are you telling me you are still untouched?”
She had no freaking idea how to respond. She was at a total loss for words.
Viviane?
No answer. And it suddenly occurred to her that Viviane had promised her privacy at times like this. Great. Really fucking great.
“Does it matter?” she asked. “I just have no idea how to deal with men’s clothing.”
“It matters very much to me,” he said, looking and sounding angry.
He pulled her gown back up over her body. His heaving breaths no longer sounding full of lust and longing. They sounded full of an attempt to resume control of his body.
“Please tell me what’s so wrong, Arthur?” she asked, holding the unlaced gown around her. “What did I do?”
He picked up his vest, the only garment she’d managed to strip from his body. “I will not take away something that is the province of your future life mate.”
He headed to the door, shoving his vest back on with every stomping step.
“You wait just one minute, buster! Get your ass back here and talk to me.”
He turned back, just as he was about to switch the latch on the door. “What more can I say? I am not upset with you, madam, I am upset with myself. I deeply, deeply apologize for what I was about to do.”
“If you hadn’t noticed, I was a very willing participant.”
“Which was heady indeed. Truth be told, it overruled all else.”
“Then why are you taking it out on me? And why am I suddenly madam instead of Isabel, or even Izzy? You might believe you’re punishing yourself, but you are punishing me more. Why?”
He deflated just a bit, which hurt Isabel’s heart. Abandoning the door, he approached her. “Let me help you with the laces.”
“Fine, while you do, why not help me to understand what just happened here.”
“’Tis not a nice story,” he said, as he began lacing her like a pro.
“As if we all don’t have many of those. Spill, Arthur, please.”
“’Twas a time I was a bit too full of bluster. Too filled with my newfound power and fame. I was but a lad but wanted quite desperately to be a man.”
“I get that. But what does this have to do with us? With this?” she asked. “I believe the truth is in order.”
He sighed. “Yes, you deserve the truth.”
And a freaking good orgasm. But for now she’d settle for the truth. “Yes,” she said, trying desperately not to start crying.
He nodded. “Then the truth you shall have.” He gently pulled her hands from her dress, seeming to need something to do.
“Tell me, Arthur.”
“Where to begin?”
“Right after successfully freeing Excalibur.”
He nodded yet again. “Soon after I met a young lady enamored with me named Elizabeth. She was lovely and sweet. I was feeling bold and powerful, and felt the world was mine.”
“As you should. You had done something no one else could.”
He finished lacing her up, then turned and sat back in one chair. Isabel again sat in the other. “Go on,” she said.
“This sweet young girl allowed me to . . . make love with her. ’Twas a hurtful experience for her, as I was very much not as worldly in some things. ’Twas my first time as well.”
“You knew how to take swords out, but not quite how to put them in?” She saw his expression and chuckled. “I apologize. That joke was in very bad taste.”
He cocked his head. “Unfortunately, all too true. I had terrible nightmares about what I had done. For I left without an apology. I, after all, had more important missions to accomplish. A few years passed, yet the nightmare of that day still weighed on my mind. I attempted to contact her, to ask of her well-being. But I was told she passed in childbirth.”
“Holy shit! Here comes Mordred.”
“I had nary a clue that the child was mine. I swear this to be true. Her sister took over care of the child and led Mordred to believe she was his true mother. She had hatred of me, though I attempted to make peace with her. But she would have none of it. I counted and knew he had to be mine. ’Twas twisted, ’twas a horrid time for all. I tried to make all right, Isabel. I truly did.”
“I believe you, Arthur.”
“The reasoning for this story is to tell you how much I fear ever hurting another woman in such a way again. And you, Isabel, I fear hurting most.”
“I have to believe Gwen was also a virgin when you married her.”
“That is true, but I was very careful, knowing this. I was very careful to make certain no harm would come to her.”
“Then why did you freak out with me?”
“Freak out?”
“Why did you stop?”
He shook his head. “Do you not understand? My body was out of control. I wanted to take you. I wanted to ravish you.”
“So? I wanted to be ravished.”
Arthur stared at her. “I might have hurt you. I had already done that to another. I could not live with that.”
“Did I appear frightened?”
“No, Isabel, but ’tis because you have no knowledge of the pain a woman endures the first time.”
Like hell she didn’t. Brian Gordon had been just as clumsy and clueless as Arthur. And, hell yes, it had hurt like hell. But she got over it. Rather quickly, actually.
“You could have been just as gentle with me as with Gwen.”
“I could not.”
“Why not?”
“Because with Gwen I was in full control of my faculties. I had learned from that first experience with Elizabeth. And Gwen was more of a piece of fragile artistry. ’Twas easy to treat her as such.”
“I know I’m not a piece of fragile artistry, although the jury’s still out on how offended I am. But just what is so very different here?”
“I have told you, Isabel, with you I was not in control. ’Tis a fact that I have ne’er wanted a woman as I do you. Even as a lad, and full of lustful thoughts, ’twas not as this.”
Isabel wanted to scream. He was making no sense and at the same time too much. He was a gentleman and a gentle man. But her thrumming body was simply pissed off.
Then again it felt really good to hear that he had wanted her that badly. Why hadn’t she just said that of course she wasn’t a virgin? That she had had several lovers over the years? Good lord, at her age you’d think her vagina had closed over permanently if it had never been penetrated.
The moment had come and gone, however, and her hesitation had cost her. Big time. To blurt out now that in truth she was very familiar with what he would call bed sport would seem disingenuous. And would probably anger him because she hadn’t spoken the truth to begin with.
She stood up, feeling a kind of defeat like no other. “I thank you for your honesty, Arthur. I wish only that I had done the same when you asked.”
He, too, stood. “Your meaning?”
She couldn’t seem to meet his eyes. “It doesn’t matter now.”
He reached out and took her chin, forcing her to meet his all too probing gaze. “To me it matters a great deal. In the end, Isabel, truth is all we have.”
Oh, jeez, could she feel any worse? Her entire life in this land was a lie.
“May we discuss this at another time? Right now I am spent, and may I say, not in the way I had hoped. But I have much to do before the evening meal and need to get to it.”
He stared at her for what seemed an eternity, then gave a short, curt nod. “Another time, then. I, too, have obligations. I have not gone through my swording and
bow skills as yet today, and must needs do this, lest I become fat and lazy. This evening, perhaps?”
Her laughter shook. It would take at least a year or more of total sloth for Arthur to gain a pound or lose an ounce of muscle. His body was finely toned from shoulders to toenails. At least it felt that way. How she wished she could have explored for herself. “Perhaps. We’ll see.”
“I will see you at the evening repast, then?”
“You will. I never miss a meal if I can help it.”
He chuckled. And then before she knew it, he cupped her head and ravished her mouth. Her hormones, which had finally started to go back into dormant mode, sprang back to life as if zapped with electricity.
Arthur kissed like no other man she knew. His lips were firm and sure, intent on molding hers to their bidding. His tongue made only an occasional appearance, to taste her mouth and touch her own tongue. He didn’t try to shove it down her throat as too many men had done, didn’t use it as an oral fuck, just playing and teasing and basically driving her crazy.
Long moments later he broke the kiss, but then laid his forehead against hers. “Oh, Isabel. Your taste and your scent and your feel are almost too much to bear,” he whispered.
“Oh, right back atcha,” she said.
“Until this evening?”
“Yes.”
He stood back, albeit appearing totally reluctant to do so. His eyes swept over her, from face to feet. “Trust me, Isabel, you have no need of shyness. You are so beautiful.”
He went to move past her, but she touched his arm and he turned back. “Yes?”
“So are you.”
He grinned. “You are presuming. You may take back those words some day. I have many a battle scar on this body, Isabel.”
Although the thought of him being hurt nearly made her shudder, she understood this was the way of this world. And then she thought of Curtis and Afghanistan, and realized brutality hadn’t changed, only the nature of it. Still, she couldn’t wait to explore every single one of those scars. If she ever got the chance.
She walked with him to the door, but before he opened it she stopped him again. “Arthur? The next time we have the chance to speak, I promise the truth. Because you’re right. In the end it is all we have.”
