by Megan Derr
Fear shot through her. That wasn’t good. Only Penli knew where she would go. Had Mercen finally gotten it out of him or intercepted a letter? She’d already been worried she hadn’t received a single one—between traveling to the monastery and since arriving, she’d been gone from the castle for nearly four months. At least one letter should have found its way to her. But surely if it was Mercen’s men, Rori would be more alarmed?
Could it be Kallaar and Ahmla? No, that was stupid. There was no reason they would travel all the way out here, and Penli wouldn’t tell them where she was, anyway. Was it Penli? But no, that didn’t make sense; Penli wouldn’t be able to make such a journey—not with a broken arm, not with his marriage only a few months away, and certainly not with her stepfather undoubtedly watching his every move. “Did they give a name?”
Rori extended a calling card. Shanna stared a moment before taking it. Definitely Penli, despite its simplicity. The card featured only a flower for decoration—a moon rose, specifically, because they were the silvery white of the moon and bloomed only at night. This card was black, with a moon rose on one side, and a line from a book Penli adored: Where there is beauty, there is strength.
How in the world had Penli managed it? She really should have known that if anyone could, broken arm and all, it was Penli. Shanna smiled. “I’ll come see him at once. Did he seem well? Troubled?”
“Tired, and his arm looked to be healing from a break. He’s waiting for you in the blue prayer room. His servants appear more displeased with life than he does.”
Shanna laughed. “I imagine they would, if he dragged them all the way out here.” She tucked the card in a pocket of her shapeless—and frankly, uncomfortable—robe and headed off.
When she reached the blue prayer room, Penli was fidgeting with candles set on the shelf built into the wall behind the enormous altar. He turned as he heard her and broke into a beautiful smile that almost banished the exhaustion and pain lining his face.
After closing the door and shoving back her hood, Shanna strode across the room and only just barely remembered not to sweep him into a crushing hug. She settled for a gentle embrace and kisses to his cheeks and lips. “Penli, sweet, what in the world are you doing here?”
“Forget that,” he said, staring in horror. “What in the names of all the gods in existence are you wearing? Your mother would weep. I’m about to weep. Just because you live with monks doesn’t mean you have to practice their atrocious dressing habits!”
Shanna laughed, though laughing nearly turned to crying, she was so happy to see his familiar, dearly loved face. “Honestly, I cannot hide in a monastery wearing gowns or hose. Never mind that for now. Tell me why you’ve come, because for all that I am happy to see you, I doubt this is purely a social visit.”
“You could wear better than that, Honeydrop,” he replied, but at her warning look, said, “I’ve come because I’ve nowhere else to go. After His Majesty discovered you were missing, he went on a bit of a rampage and arrested every last one of us who might have had the slightest possible chance of helping you escape. He is trying to convince everyone you are guilty of treason and have been conspiring against the throne with your betrothed. But he’s been rather elusive with the details. For all the man has skill enough to shame war strategists, I do believe you have managed to surprise him with your vanishing act, and he is not recovering well in the aftermath.”
“You were arrested?” Shanna pressed the heels of her hands to her forehead and then looked up at him. “Oh, Penli, I’m so sorry. You’ve been my best friend all these years, and I repay that by ruining your life.”
Penli flapped one hand, and she felt even more awful that he was dressed in plain, rough travel clothes instead of all the beautiful colors and lace and jewels he loved to wear. “Sweetmelon, I’ve been ruined since the day my mother decided every moment of my life for me. I’m a little irate with the broken arm, and I was severely displeased over the broken nose that crummy guard gave me for ‘resisting arrest,’ as though I would ever be so uncouth as to make that kind of scene, especially since I was wearing my brand-new lavender morning jacket!” He looked momentarily crestfallen. “I miss that jacket. I didn’t even get to wear it a whole morning.”
“I’ll buy you all the new clothes you want once we’re home again.”
“Yes, as to that,” Penli said, turning somber. “You most certainly cannot go home anytime soon, though I’m certain you knew that. If I were you, I’d find a country that likes you and convince them to like you even more—enough to give you an army or two. Also, take me with you because I most definitely cannot go home either.”
Shanna bit back a bitter laugh, but only barely. “That sounds like the perfect plan, but you forget my stepfather has kept me more or less chained to the castle but locked out of all the rooms I needed to be in to forge such alliances. I’m so sorry you’ve been dragged into this nightmare with me.”
“Creampuff, I dragged myself into this nightmare, and I owe His Majesty one for breaking my arm.” His mouth tipped up at the corners. “As to allies, I think I know of at least one prince who would be willing to help. Certainly, he has proven to be an army all on his own, and enough to topple armies with that bodyguard of his.”
“What?” Shanna’s breath caught. “Prince Kallaar and Master Ahmla are safe, then?”
Penli’s somber look turned into an expression of pure mischief. His gray eyes flicked to something over her shoulder. “Of course, they’re safe. Who do you think helped me get here? See for yourself.”
“What?” Shanna repeated, at much higher levels, as she whipped around—and her heart dropped into her stomach as she saw Kallaar and Ahmla standing in front of the door.
When she’d met them in her stable all those years ago, and every time she’d seen them since, they’d been dressed in Morentian travel clothes, or sometimes Rilien clothes. Save for when they’d revealed themselves, and worn clothes that matched their stations. Now they wore leather armor, black robes that bore no resemblance to the stiff, shapeless one she wore, but instead folded across the front and fit their frames entirely too well. Kallaar’s was trimmed in scarlet and gold, and the sash to keep it closed was the same. Ahmla’s was trimmed in gray and silver, with a blue, gray, and silver sash. Both men had fabric wrapped around their heads. Kallaar’s decorated with jewels and gold, Ahmla’s in blue with a single jewel off to the right. They looked like fierce warriors from a story, set on a quest from which only death would keep them from completing. They were beautiful—and furious.
“I believe that is my cue to depart, but I shall see you for breakfast, my apple dumpling.” Penli kissed her cheek and left.
As the door closed behind him, Kallaar and Ahmla turned as one to face her. “Your Highness,” Kallaar said after the silence had stretched on. Those words from his lips had never sounded so stiff and cold.
Shanna swallowed, barely managing to keep her hands at her sides instead of clinging to the fabric at her throat. “What are you doing here? I thought you would be well on your way home by now.”
Kallaar’s brow furrowed. “Why would we go home? We have sworn ourselves to you. I know you do not know us well, but I would have thought you’d at least have the courtesy not to discard our vow so callously. If you did not need us, or trust us, or want us, you could have had the decency to say, Your Highness, instead of simply fleeing in the night without so much as a word, like we were of no worth to you. If you needed help, you should have come to us.”
He looked genuinely hurt, and all of Shanna’s confusion vanished under a tidal wave of anger. “You’re the ones who didn’t want to be here!” At their confused expressions, her anger spiraled. “I heard what you said! ‘Tired of lying and hiding.;’ that’s what you said. That I was nonsense. That’s what I was, what I am, to you. ‘Subterfuge and nonsense’ you couldn’t wait to be done with.”
She wouldn’t cry again, she wouldn’t. Gods, she wanted to smack those baffled, stupefied looks off their infuriatin
gly handsome faces.
Reining in her anger and disappointment, she said, “That aside, I wasn’t about to risk your lives further, or Penli’s. If I had stayed, I would have either been forced to do what Mercen said, or he would have killed Penli and sent the two of you home just short of dead. The only solution was for me to run away. Why in the world would I so selfishly expect you to come with me?”
“You’re not…you’ve never been nonsense,” Kallaar said, looking even more wounded than he had during his tirade. “Where would you get such a notion? We’ve never thought of you as nonsense. You’re precious.”
“I heard you!” Shanna raged. “I don’t know why you bothered with all your lying and deceiving when you could have just been honest, but don’t lie to me now! I heard you—”
“In the hallway,” Ahmla cut in, his voice level but thunderous. “That guard wasn’t watching us that night; he was watching you. Why did you hide?”
Shanna looked away, unable to take the weight of his gaze. “Because if I hadn’t, he would have known we were colluding.”
Ahmla sighed.
Kallaar looked horrified. “The ‘nonsense and subterfuge’ wasn’t you. I mean, not the way you obviously think. Why didn’t you simply ask?”
“Kali,” Ahmla said, and Shanna swallowed as all indications of subservient bodyguard and commanding prince fell away. The dynamic flipped between one breath and the next, and somewhere in the middle she’d lost her own ability to breathe. “Of course, she didn’t ask. We deceived her for years, and she’d only known us as we really are for a couple of days. That we’d consider her a burden rather than an honor made the most sense.”
“No one should ever consider her a burden!” Kallaar bellowed, then looked contrite. “You’re not a burden. Damn it all, that is not what we were talking about. Why didn’t you reveal yourself after we’d taken care of the guard?”
Tears slipped down Shanna’s cheeks and she angrily brushed them away. “What else could you have meant? You’re lovers; that was apparent. And you—you—” Pretended to want me. “You didn’t want me to know.”
Kallaar made a soft, indecipherable noise. “Ahmi.”
The two men shared that damned look she didn’t understand, then strode forward, so swift and sudden and sure that she backpedaled—and stopped with a soft cry as she collided with the altar. “What are you doing?”
Ahmla swooped in, pinned her against the altar, and kissed her.
Shanna whimpered. He tasted like winter—snow and evergreen and a crackling fire. He kissed like someone who knew what he wanted and would do whatever it took to earn it. Unlike Kallaar, there was nothing pliant or submissive or eager to please in his mien. Ahmla took and expected to be taken.
So that was precisely what Shanna did. Tangling her fingers in the edges of his leather armor, she kissed him harder, deeper, their tongues tangling, fighting for dominance and finding instead a happy balance.
When Ahmla finally tore away, Shanna was panting. She stared wide-eyed, reality returning sharply. “You kissed me.”
Kallaar’s soft, bright chuckles washed over her. “Of course, he did. That is the ‘nonsense and subterfuge’ we were referring to. Ahmla is my lover, and my love. I’m equally precious to him. And since I was a child, I have been informally betrothed to a beautiful princess we have been hoping to court and woo into becoming our lover, not only mine. A princess we have been watching over, protecting, and slowly coming to truly love over the past few years. But we did not want to selfishly suggest such a thing until you were safe and capable of making such a decision free and clear.” He made a face. “I know I can be flirtatious and such, but I tried never to go too far…until, well, I did in the garden, and after that I just got worse.”
“Because you’re a spoiled brat with no sense of patience or restraint,” Ahmla said, voice stern and affectionate.
“I am sorry,” Kallaar said, looking like a wilted flower.
Shanna didn’t know whether to cry or laugh. Somehow, she wound up doing a little bit of both.
It was Kallaar who kissed her that time, twining around her and submitting so sweetly as she kissed him thoroughly, biting and sucking at his soft lips. He keened as she sank her fingers into his hair, bit again at his bottom lip before diving into another kiss when he moaned her name in a low, ragged voice.
She jumped, jerked away, when hands landed heavily on her hips and a hot, wet mouth sucked at the pulse point on her throat. “What—” She moaned. “What are you doing?”
Kallaar’s expression was all mischief and hunger. “Now that I know you don’t hate us and aren’t averse to an us, why, I believe we are going to misuse an altar.”
“You are—” Shanna broke off with a string of curses as they grabbed her ugly robe and yanked it up and over her head.
Ahmla spread it on the altar; then, both men stared at her lace underwear and the binding corset she used to flatten her chest.
Shanna resisted an urge to cover herself, mostly because there was nothing she could use for cover. “Give me back that robe. You are not misusing an altar! This is a holy place! You—”
Words stuttered and thoughts fled completely, as Ahmla’s heavy arms wrapped around her from behind, smoothing over skin and fabric, his touch so hot she shivered. She was torn between pushing into him and pulling away—and forgot that battle as Kallaar pressed against her front and treated her to another one of his sweet, eager kisses.
Her mind warred with her body, common sense fighting want, but every time reason started to win out, she was treated to another kiss, one mouth exchanged for another, a large hand replaced by a smaller, lighter touch, both men eager and knowing very much what they were doing.
Finally, she managed to tear away, but after licking the taste of them from her lips, the only words she managed to get out were, “I want to see the two of you. Naked. Together.”
Kallaar laughed in delight, and Ahmla looked pleased, and then they were stripping each other with the ease of lovers who had done so a thousand times or more. The process was slowed by stray kisses and teasing touches, but oh, Shanna was more than happy to endure such torture for as long as it lasted.
When they were finally naked, Ahmla dragged Kallaar close and kissed him hard, wrapping arms around his waist and practically lifting him off the ground. Kallaar wound his arms around Ahmla’s neck, both men moaning at the press and slide of their cocks against the other’s skin. Ahmla gripped Kallaar’s ass, grinding them together.
Panting as he broke away, Kallaar turned his head, mischief back in his expression. “Are we meeting your approval, my queen?”
Oh, she did like the way he said “my queen” a bit too much. She had missed it, tried so hard not to think about, and failed miserably. Swallowing, Shanna nodded. “Yes.”
Kallaar moved aside with a snicker, and Ahmla prowled toward her. Shanna stepped back instinctively, but that just made him move faster. Before she could even draw breath to cry out in delighted terror, he scooped her up, swung around, and deposited her on the altar.
“This is not what an altar is for,” Shanna hissed and lost the rest of what she’d been going to say as Ahmla cupped her, rubbing hard through her damp underwear.
He leaned down to kiss her hungrily, fingers pushing and teasing. Shanna clung to him, moaning and whimpering, barely aware as he dragged her to a sitting position until cool air washed over her bared breasts. Pulling away from the kiss, she turned in time to see Kallaar throw her corset on top of the pile of discarded clothes. He joined them at the altar, reeled her in to take a kiss of his own, leaving her awkwardly sprawled on hands and knees.
Rough fingers pulled the ribbon and pins from her tightly bound hair, carding through it until it spilled about her shoulders and down her back in a tangled mass. Shanna leaned back on her legs, skin flushed with lust and mortification. “We’re in a temple! In a prayer room! Have you no respect for holy places?”
Kallaar pressed close on one side, kissing hi
s way along her stomach up to her breasts, while Ahmla teased fingers up and down her spine while sucking up marks on her throat, the scrape of his facial hair making her shiver.
Voice deeper than usual, rough-edged and hungry, Ahmla said, “I do not think the gods will mind a bit of a show, and we intend to be quite worshipful.”
Shanna moaned, partly from the words, partly from the long, slender fingers that had slipped inside her underwear to stroke and press.
Chuckling low and smug in her ear, Ahmla licked and bit it before drawing away, lying her on the altar, and finally stripping her completely. “Kali.”
Kallaar climbed eagerly onto the altar and over her, pressing a surprisingly sweet kiss to her lips before putting his mouth to work far less sweetly down the rest of her body, lingering at her breasts to lick and suck and playfully nibble, his laughter husky and pleased as she tangled her fingers in his hair and urged him on.
Moving farther down her body, he spread her legs wide and set to proving just how talented that mouth of his was, sucking and licking with the enthusiasm of man who loved what he was doing. Shanna moaned and gasped, hands flailing for purchase she couldn’t find on the cool, smooth altar.
Ahmla kissed her roughly, left her mouth sore and throbbing. She clung to him, dragging her nails along his back, moaning at the muscles that flexed and rippled, nearly screaming as he took one nipple in his mouth right as Kallaar pushed his tongue deeper inside her.
“I want—” she gasped, before breaking off to moan.
Chuckling, Ahmla kissed her again and then withdrew, fetching something from the pile of fabric on the floor before moving around to stand behind Kallaar, who stood at the far end of the altar, bent over to better feast on her. “Is this what you want, my queen?”
“Yes,” she managed, though she wasn’t picky about what they did together; she just wanted to see.
Ahmla cast her a wolfish expression before kissing Kallaar’s shoulder, and the sweet affection of that moment got to her more than even the tongue driving her to madness, the hands stroking and teasing and pinching the insides of her thighs. Shanna trembled, barely covered her mouth in time as she screamed, pleasure washing over her like a stormy tide.
