Leila’s Legacy

by Madeline Martin

  She drew in a pained breath. “I stopped sharing most of what I saw, because doing so raised more questions than I could answer. These visions are fickle things, sometimes easily misread. Sometimes, I never had visions of dangerous events that came to pass. But even though I ceased sharing what I saw, they were always there. Not just the future, but the past and the terrible things that happened.” She hugged herself again, though this time against the hurt within her rather than the chill of the room. “My mother. I dream of her often, of what happened to her.”

  “Leila.” He said her name gently. When she looked up, she found his forehead creased with concern.

  “I’ve tried to keep from loving you, Niall.” A tear slid down her cheek. “I’ve fought it since you loosened the bindings on my wrist, and tried to keep my heart dammed from every kindness and good thing you’ve done. Loving you is…”

  He reached for her and took her into his arms. His body was solid with strength and the wonderfully familiar scent of him, of leather and cedar, caressed her soul. He tenderly touched the underside of her chin and lifted her face.

  “Loving me is what?” he asked.

  She licked her lips. “Dangerous.”

  He released her abruptly, as though she had burned him. “How so?” His demand was harsh, though she knew he did not speak thus out of anger. Not when his eyes were wide with fear.

  She considered the situation from his perspective then; considered how she would feel if he told her she would kill him. Something deep within her splintered. She should not have said anything at all. She ought to only have shared that they were meant to be lovers and nothing more.

  “Leila, tell me.” Niall swallowed. “Please.”

  She closed her eyes and the heat of another tear slid down her face. “I will not survive my time at Liddesdale, and you will be the one to kill me.”

  “Nay!” The protest erupted from Niall’s mouth before he could stop it. He closed the distance between himself and Leila and drew her into his arms one more time, reveling in the sureness of her sweet body against him, where he could keep her safe and protected. “I willna ever hurt ye,” he vowed against the cool sleekness of her dark hair. “I love ye.”

  “And I love you, Niall.” She drew in a shaky breath and pulled away to regard him. “But, aye, you will kill me.”

  He shook his head. “How can ye be so certain?”

  “The more often I have a vision, the more likely it is to come to pass.” She looked down at her hands. Her fingernails had healed in the time she’d assisted Lady Davina. “Like a siege we had at the castle once, like the pestilence sweeping over the land…and like you.”

  He wanted to take her hands in his, to caress the smoothness of her skin as they talked, to reassure her. Her claim, however, stayed his affections. How could any woman trust a man she anticipated would cause her harm?

  “How often have ye had visions of me?” he asked.

  “Since I was a child.” She played with a loose thread on the edge of her sleeve, focusing on that instead of turning her gaze to him. “I have always had visions and dreams of you killing me. It was not until I was older that I realized I would also be your lover.”

  Lover.

  That word conjured carnal images of their bodies splayed on his bed, glistening with sweat and panting with exhaustion. He ground his teeth. “How do ye know ’tis a vision when ye have it?” His demand came out with a steadfast denial even he was able to detect.

  “I feel it.” She closed her eyes and her face went serene with apparent concentration. “It tingles warmth through the back of my neck and spreads everywhere with a sense of calm. I see it all around me as though I were existing in another place and time, rather than where I presently stand. I can feel the ground beneath me, the wind blow and I can smell whatever scent the air carries. I am there, even though I am not.”

  “How?” he asked.

  She opened her eyes. “I know not. It has always been a part of me, and I’ve always loathed it. I am helpless to control what I see, what I experience.” She shuddered.

  This time, he did lift her hand. The connection between them was instant, alive with a pleasant tingle.

  “How?” he said again. “How do ye anticipate I will kill ye?”

  She stared into his face with more tenderness than he would ever use to gaze upon his own killer. “Are you certain you wish to know?”

  “Aye.” If he knew, he could prevent himself from doing it. No matter the cost. He would die rather than take her life.

  “Drowning.”

  Drowning? The death of a witch.

  Niall shook his head vehemently. “Nay. Ye canna be correct.” He pulled on her hand to bring her closer to him again and folded his arms around her, as though he could protect her from everything. Including himself.

  He reveled in her petite body that he knew possessed the strength of a warrior, in the cool smoothness of her hair that somehow always smelled clean and wonderful, in the determination of her spirit that he found even more beautiful than her external loveliness. “I love ye,” he whispered vehemently. “I would give my life rather than take yers.”

  She lifted her face up and placed her hand on his jaw. Her gaze slid to his mouth and the familiar stirring of lust rose within him. She eased upward on her toes even as he lowered his head. They met somewhere in the middle, their lips connecting in a gentle kiss.

  “I love you, Niall,” she said against his mouth.

  “I’ll never hurt ye,” he vowed again.

  She swept the tip of her tongue against his and any idea of speaking burned away with the flame of desire. Their declarations of love came in the slant of their mouths against one another’s, in the panting of their shared breath, in the arch of their bodies as they moved together with desperation.

  Leila’s hands molded over his body, over his arms, his chest, down the rigid lines of his stomach. He groaned at her exploration, proud of the body she found so appealing.

  He cupped her bottom with one hand, drawing her pelvis to his. She moaned into his mouth and rubbed herself against him in the most maddening, wonderful, enticing way. He kissed the sensitive skin behind her ear and along the length of her graceful neck as his fingers worked at the neckline of the kirtle. The gown was too big and gave easily under his touch, springing free her pink-tipped breasts.

  Leila gasped and pushed her chest toward him, as though in offering. One he would gladly accept. He cradled the silky warmth of one in his palm and teased at the bud with his thumb. With the other, he closed his mouth over the pert nipple and flicked his tongue against the nub until it went hard.

  Her hands clutched his head to her. He loved her pleasure, her breathless whimpers, the way her eyes grew heavy-lidded and sensual, the brilliance of her own passion for him. His fingers shifted from her bottom to the hem of her kirtle and then up to the shapely calf beneath it. The cries of her climax had echoed in his mind since the first time he pleasured her. He wanted to hear them again, to think of them later as he stroked himself.

  Higher and higher, his hand crept up her long, lean legs. Quicker and quicker her breath came, in obvious anticipation. He ran his thumb against the side of her inner thigh, a breath away from her sex. Her leg quivered beneath his touch. He did the same on her other leg, teasing.

  She gave a whimper of frustration and parted her legs wider for him. This time, he ran his fingers along her damp slit. She sucked in a sharp breath and her hips bucked.

  “Is this what ye want?” He slid his touch over her, pausing at the top to gently swirl a circle over the little bud.

  She gave a long, eager moan even as she shook her head.

  Niall removed his hand from beneath her kirtle and cast her a questioning look. “Did I hurt y—”

  Her finger came to his lips, silencing him. Wordless still, she reached toward him and slipped free the first button of his doublet. His heart slammed hard in his chest and thundered in his ears.

  “Leila, I—”<
br />
  She paused from her task of slowly, painstakingly working down the line of buttons of his doublet. “I don’t simply want release this time, Niall.” She undid the last button and pushed his doublet from his shoulders. Her smile curved up, edged with a wickedness that went straight to his cock. “I want you.”

  16

  Leila’s heart raced at her own brazenness as she nudged Niall’s doublet to the floor. The white leine he wore beneath was of average quality linen, thick and opaque. The open neckline revealed the muscles of his neck and the hidden strength along his chest.

  Her hands trembled as they skimmed down his firm torso to the hemline of the leine.

  “Leila.” Her name came out in a deep baritone.

  She stilled and lifted her gaze to his burning stare.

  “Ye’re a lady.” He tensed. “I canna—”

  She shook her head. “Don’t say anything more.”

  “Yer maidenhead—”

  She put up a hand to stop him. “I know my future,” she said carefully. “I will not throw away this one chance at happiness because it isn’t proper.”

  His brows furrowed with a pained expression. “I willna hurt ye, Leila. I’d never hurt ye.”

  She traced her fingertip over the sharp line of his jaw. The whiskers prickled over her skin and caught at her short nail. “Love me, Niall.”

  He gave a wounded groan and lowered his mouth to hers, capturing her lips in a searing kiss, one filled with passion and promise. Her hands found their way to the hem of his leine once more and drew it upward. He grasped it with her, tugging it over his head and tossing it aside, before reaching for her once more.

  His body was beautiful in movement, muscles bunching, shadowed valleys shifting. A golden line of hair trickled down his rippled abdomen from the base of his navel where it dipped into the waistline of his trews. He pulled her to his hard body, pressing her to his hot skin as he kissed her.

  Her hands moved over his exquisite back, seeing with her hands every carved line of his strength.

  “If ye keep touching me like that, I willna last long,” he said in a low voice.

  She ran her fingers along his sides and down the bands of his stomach to the sprinkling of hair that descended into his trews. “Like this?” she asked innocently.

  He growled and caught her hands. “No’ yet. No’ when ye’re still fully clothed.”

  Leila lifted an eyebrow and slowly turned around to put her back to him where her kirtle was tied closed. Niall swept her hair aside and grazed his lips against the sensitive dip where her neck and shoulders met. She gasped in happy surprise as prickles of pleasure played over her skin.

  He curled his strong arms around her and held her body snug to his own, so her bottom pushed against the length of his arousal. “I want ye so verra much,” he whispered beside her ear, his breath warm and tantalizing where it swept over her. He stroked her skin from her neck to her shoulder and back again before tracing the same path with his mouth, his tongue.

  Leila pushed back into him, arching against his erection with a moan. Desire pulsed at her core.

  “I want ye,” he repeated in a low groan. “But I want to take my time with ye. To savor ye.” There was a gentle tug at the back of her kirtle as he pulled free the bow tied there. “To savor us.”

  With one hand, he ran his fingers up the column of her throat, leaning her head back against his powerful shoulder. He nuzzled his nose to her neck, followed by the heat of his lips and then the rasp of his whiskered chin. As he made her nearly melt with kisses, the fingers of his free hand worked at the back of her kirtle.

  He pressed his lips just below her ear.

  He slipped a lacing free.

  He nipped her earlobe gently.

  Another lacing slipped free.

  “Mo chridhe,” he murmured into her ear, “I canna wait to unveil ye.”

  Another lacing slipped free.

  Mo chridhe. My heart.

  Leila closed her eyes at the caress of his endearment, at what it meant. The kirtle now gaped at her back and let in tendrils of icy air in contrast to the burn of her longing. Niall held her shoulders with both hands now and swept his fingers down over her chest, brushing the tops of her breasts.

  She leaned back on his strength, wanting to feel every part of him touching every part of her. Slowly, he pulled her around to face him once more, his eyes alight with desire, his naked chest rising and falling with his ragged breathing. Leila pulled at her kirtle, peeling it from her body so she stood before him in only her chemise. Unlike the linen he’d worn, hers was fine. Thin. Her body was no doubt visible beneath it.

  Leila grasped the hem and drew it upward. Niall gave a long, low exhale as she pulled it over her head and let it fall away. She hesitated, wondering what he might think of the puckered scars left from the arrows that had struck her as a girl: one on the upper portion of her left arm, one beneath her right breast. Those, as well as the white marks upon her skin that Death had left behind that always remained cold to the touch.

  “Leila.” He uttered a curse under his breath. “Ye’re even more perfect than I imagined ye.”

  Heat effused her at his compliment. His gaze did not linger on her scars, but on the whole of her, raking over her with searing desire.

  “You imagined me naked?” She smiled coyly to cover her shyness.

  He skimmed his hand over her waist. “That isna all I imagined.” His gaze seared into hers.

  Leila’s throat went dry. “Pray tell what other things you imagined.”

  His lips lifted at one corner in a boyish grin. “I think I’d rather show ye.” With that, he swept her legs from beneath her, so she fell back into his strong arms.

  She laughed at the surprise of it and he carried her to the bed where he lay her on the mattress. Sitting beside her, he cradled her jaw and leaned toward her to kiss her slowly, thoroughly with the stroke of his tongue and the nip of his teeth.

  He eased over the top of her on all fours. Leila’s breath caught at the image of his beautiful body poised over her. While she was a maiden, she knew enough about intercourse. One did not deliver babes without knowing of their origin, and everything in her hummed with anticipation.

  Except that he still wore his trews.

  He cupped her breast and leaned over her. His tongue flicked against her nipple and set her alight with a new wave of desperate desire. If he noticed her scars, he did not mention them, and for that, Leila was grateful. Instead, he loved her breasts with his hands and mouth and little scrapes of his teeth, alternating between the two until Leila was squirming beneath him.

  She rubbed her thighs against one another for the scant pressure it provided to the lustful pounding at her core.

  He glanced down at where she writhed in carnal frustration. His finger tickled down the side of her stomach. She twitched beneath him; her skin overly sensitive.

  “Do ye need relief, mo chridhe?” he said with silky seduction.

  She whimpered, a small, pathetic sound that gave voice to what words could not. His touch swept lower, lower—dear merciful heaven—lower… His fingertip brushed the apex of her legs and Leila cried out.

  Niall kept his gaze on her as he crawled backward. With purpose, he nudged her legs apart, spreading her thighs. Leila flushed at the idea of her sex being blatantly splayed before him.

  He met her gaze, then leaned over her and let his tongue drag against her center.

  Leila’s hands fisted the bed sheets as he repeated the motion, more firmly this time. He lowered himself to the bed with his face firmly settled between her thighs as he licked at her center with the most delightfully wicked tongue.

  His finger gently probed her as he tasted her, carefully stretching her as he eased the digit inward. There was a little discomfort with the action, but nothing that could draw her from the haze of pleasure building around her. He continued to nudge his finger into her until the slight pain melted into something euphoric and her hips bucked up to
meet the glide of his hand.

  Her core drew tight with anticipation. Niall’s finger and tongue were hot and wet against her, encouraging her over the edge. She soared into her crises on the wings of love and bliss. When she gently floated back, she found him climbing off the bed with his hands settling on the ties of his trews.

  She rubbed her thighs together as currents of pleasure tingled throughout her body.

  “Ye’re certain?” Niall lowered his gaze at her. His stomach flexed hard with each breath, as though he labored to maintain control of himself. “It canna be undone once we’ve…”

  “Aye,” Leila replied with more certainty than she’d ever felt before. “I want you.” For if she did not survive her capture at Liddesdale, she would at least feel the full force of his love before she succumbed to death.

  Niall watched Leila as he pulled free the first tie of his trews. She was lovely where she lay, her lithe, lean body bathed in a wash of sunlight, gleaming across lines of delicate muscle. She returned his regard with curiosity in her bright eyes and a flush to her cheeks, brought on by her crises.

  He still had the intoxicating taste of her on his tongue, even as his ears echoed with her hoarse cry as she fell under her release. His cock raged with these sensations and the driving need to possess this extraordinary woman.

  He drew free another tie and her teeth sank into her lower lip. He wanted to pull that lip free and glide his thumb into her mouth or kiss her until she was writhing again. Her gaze dipped over his torso, down his legs and back up again, flitting occasionally to where his arousal strained at his trews.

  He tugged at a third and fourth tie and shoved the garment to the floor, so he stood before her completely naked. Leila’s blazing stare roamed over him, taking in every inch of him.