by Mara Kelly
An anthology of romantic erotica by
Cincinnati, Ohio
6470A Glenway Avenue, #109
Cincinnati, OH 45211-5222
This is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, organizations, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
eBook ISBN 1-59426-545-3
Under Distant Moons © 2005 by Mara Kelly
All rights reserved under the International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
Cover art © 2005 by Stacey L. King
Edited by Catherine Snodgrass
Phaze is an imprint of Mundania Press, LLC.
www.Phaze.com
Table of Contents
Fallen Stars
The Exploits of Her Thief
The Physician of the Hands
Single-minded
Only Fools are Sure of Their Way
The Prince's Bride
Seeding
Someday My Prince
Initiation
Choice
The Way of Our Kind
Fallen Stars
Arnis leaned back on his palms and looked up at the pitch black sky. Few stars were visible tonight. Not that the fact surprised him; the world had all but forgotten the Starborn. It seemed somehow appropriate that the haze created by men and dwarves and the other races who loved their fires and their factories should cloud even the stars from view.
Few others had come up onto the hill tonight to watch for newly fallen stars. The number grew smaller every night, but Arnis knew in his heart that he would come here as long as he remained in the world, until his body felt the call of the sky and he sought the ancient staircase. It was foolish of him, he knew—very few of the Starborn who ascended the staircase ever chose to fall again, and fewer still in these days when the world had lost its memory of the fairest of her children, when the other races told children's tales of the Starborn, as though they did not still walk the nighttime forests.
But still, he came here each night, as he had since the day that Mairead had departed.
He'd been on his way up to his father's hall when he first heard her voice. He paused outside the doorway, listening to the musical cadences, and only after a few moments did he begin actually to listen to what the voice was saying. She and her party had come from the Southern Forest, she was explaining, on their way north to seek the staircase home. They brought greetings from Queen Linsith.
Arnis grimaced as he heard his father's harsh, suspicious reply to her. He understood the need for caution, especially with the rumors of goblins in the depths of the forest, but he did wish that King Palis would show as much concern for diplomacy as he did for his golden bowls and jeweled crowns. Surely it would be many years still until the king felt the pull of the sky; he was far too concerned with the things of the world.
Arnis stepped softly into the room amidst the pause that rang out after his father's words. His father was seated lazily on his throne, a silver goblet unsurprisingly in his hand, and she stood before him, a slight smile on her face, as if amused by his insolence. Three others stood behind her, two men and a woman, and their clothes bespoke of the sunlit Southern Forest in the red torchlight of the king's hall. Arnis eased his way silently along the side of the chamber until he had a clear view of the woman.
She was beautiful, not in the audacious way of a rose in springtime, but in the modest manner of a bluebonnet, hiding its charm from all but those who sought it. Her golden hair hung in a braid down her back, and Arnis caught the glint of laughter in her eyes as she opened her mouth to reply to his father.
"Well do we understand the need of your caution," she said, and the tone, though gentle, carried throughout the wide hall. "And that is why Queen Linsith sends you this gift, to assure you of our sincerity." She stepped forward and drew from beneath the folds of her gown a gem of sparkling blue, nearly the size of her hand.
Palis, to Arnis's eternal embarrassment, practically leapt from his throne to accept the gift. She only smiled and handed it to him with grace, and nodded politely as the king offered her and her companions the hospitality of his kingdom. Almost as an afterthought, he beckoned his son forth and introduced him, and Arnis stood speechless as he watched her and her companions depart from the hall to prepare for the evening's feasting.
Mairead was her name, Arnis learned from one of the servants—he stopped paying attention as the man went on about the identities of her companions. The name ran through his mind like a song as he left the palace to join the evening's feast in the forest, and he seized the chance, when it opened, to sit by her at the meal.
"I hope you are finding your accommodations comfortable," he said formally.
She turned to him with a laugh. "Your palace is admirable, yes, but I must admit I prefer the outdoors. Perhaps I am too accustomed to the ways of the Southern Forest."
"The Northern Forest is not nearly so safe as that wholesome wood, I fear. It is not wise to stray from the lamplight or to roam alone during the day, even for the most powerful of us."
Her face grew somber. "I have heard the tales. It is a sad thing. This forest was once great, before the goblins came. It was one of my favorite places in this world." She smiled sadly. "I am pleased that our path to seek the stairs took us here."
Arnis did not answer; he himself did not remember the time when the forest had been other than what it was now, as the goblins had already found their way into it when he had fallen to earth and been taken by the king to be his son. He suddenly felt very young, young as he had not felt in five hundred years or more. But Mairead had walked these lands long before he had, had left the sky long before him. He wondered if he had known her in her star form, if that could explain this urge he felt to be near her. He could remember nothing from that time, though. None of the Starborn could.
Yet she would be leaving the paths of the world soon, and she would regain that lost knowledge of the sky. He knew that what was growing in his heart, even now, was dangerous. But it was not something he could stop.
"Will your journey take you to other favorite places?" he asked.
"I do hope so. We will visit the nymphs in the river Winding, and bid farewell to many a tree and stone that have seen their time here with us. I suspect that none of these partings will be more difficult than the leaving of Queen Linsith's court, but"—she glanced up at him with a faint smile—"I may be wrong."
Arnis did not know how to respond to that, but he did not have to, for that was the moment that the pipers began, and the dancing started up around them. Mairead leapt to her feet and pulled him into the line without warning—not that he would have protested in any case. Dancing, she explained breathlessly after a few rounds, was not something one did much of in the Southern Forest.
He saw her back to the palace after the feasting, and roamed the halls in a sleepless dream that night, unable to rid his mind of her face.
The next week was a torturous procession of long days, out on hunting parties with his father's men or consulting with the guards about the security of the palace borders, while his mind focused on one thing only: the woods at night, with the lantern light gleaming off of Mairead's golden braids and laughter in her clear green eyes. He had never truly enjoyed the dances before, but watching her joy inspired it in him, and besides, the dancing gave him an excuse to be close to her. It was one he needed, for though she sat beside him and talked and laughed ea
ch night, she seemed singularly reluctant to allow anything else to develop.
He knew why, knew why he should not let himself feel what he was feeling. But it was not a choice, this focus of his heart. He could no more stop it than he could change the movement of the stars.
The night before she was to leave, his heart was heavy with the knowledge of the parting. There was sadness in her face too, he thought—or imagined. When the dancing started, she did not rush to join it, but excused herself and walked away from him through the crowd.
It was only a few seconds before Arnis rose to follow her. He suspected she was going back to the palace, to sit alone in her torchlit room, and he would not allow her to be sad or alone on this night, not while he could make it otherwise. But the path back toward the bridge was empty save for the guards.
He frowned and turned back toward the large clearing that held the feast. Movement to his left caught his eye, and he turned to see Mairead standing just outside the clearing, where the rays of lamplight kept the shadows of the forest at bay, but the low hanging branches of a willow screened her from sight of those in the clearing. He could not see her face—it was in shadow—but she was turned toward him, and he knew that those green eyes were watching him.
He was beside her in a moment. Her hair was down around her shoulders, falling in golden waves and ripples. It was the first time he had seen it thus, and the sight affected him strangely; his throat went tight, and his heart beat faster.
She lifted her face, and her eyes met his unflinchingly. "I hope you will not think it too presumptuous of me that I wanted to be alone with you tonight."
He glanced toward the clearing. This was hardly what one could call alone, not in the sense that he suddenly found he would prefer.
She laughed softly and waved a hand toward the clearing. "Don't worry about them."
Arnis frowned, filled with the sense that she knew many things he did not. He glanced at the clearing again; indeed, it was as if the willow behind which they stood hid them from view entirely, as if the high poles at the edge of the clearing on which the lamps hung formed the boundaries of vision for those within. He wondered if it was always thus, and he hadn't known it, or whether she had worked some magic of her own to create this.
But this was not the pressing question in his mind. "You still mean to leave tomorrow then?" he asked, almost against his will and certainly against his better judgment. He already knew the answer, but he watched her face anyway, as though he would see something of comfort there.
Her face was not sad now, but there was something wistful in it. "I must," she said, and she turned to look away from him—toward the north, and the stairs, he realized. "It is my time to go. I cannot deny it." She laughed softly. "It is a strange thing. This journey is one for which I have long prepared, and yet, as I come to it, I find myself reluctant to leave. The willows of the Southern Forest, the oak and birch of the wayside paths, even the shadowed trees of this land each hold a place in my heart. It is an odd thing, to know that I will not see the sun rise over the river again, once I ascend the stairs to the sky."
He watched her face, trying to comprehend the ages of sadness and joy encompassed there, even as her eyes and smooth skin shone with the delight and discovery of one more recently come to this world, like himself. "It will be better, where you are going," he said, as evenly as he could.
She looked at him again, as if suddenly remembering his presence, and her lips turned upward in a smile. She looked long into his eyes, and reached up to touch his face. She caressed his cheek slowly, as if memorizing it, and Arnis closed his eyes to seal the scent and sensation of her into his brain. It seemed impossible that his heart could be pulled so strongly toward her—he had only seen her for the first time a week before, and that was nothing but a blink of an eye to his kind. But she affected him like no other woman ever had, and he began to understand that he also had an effect on her.
He was not aware of their lips meeting, only that they were joined together in a kiss, a soft, languorous embrace. His arms went around her waist—he could feel the warmth of her skin through the silken fabric of her gown—and she laid her hands flat on his chest in a feeble imitation of a gesture to push him away. She did not push him away, however, and it was only after several long minutes that she pulled back enough to speak.
"There are," she said softly, her breathing as heavy as his, "certain memories that I would gladly take with me to the sky." She opened her eyes and looked at his face, then gently removed his hands from her waist, and, as he watched in awe, untied the front of her gown and let it fall from her shoulders.
There were no words in the tongues of the world that could express the emotion in Arnis's heart as he swept his eyes over the firm white skin of her breasts, the smooth curve of her stomach. She was giving him a gift, he knew, one that would be taken away come the dawn—a gift that was as bitter in its giving and receiving as it was both desired and blissful.
Mairead laughed again, a soft, breathy sound. "Don't just stand there," she said. Arnis realized he hadn't moved, that he had been frozen in place by the sight of her fair skin gleaming in the lamplight, and he stepped closer to her. His hands strayed over her smooth hips, her back, along her arms; she stood watching his face, her eyes clear and untroubled now.
He had overheard a visitor once, an old wizard who had frequented his father's hall when he'd been younger, say that the Starborn of the Northern Forest were like to other Starborn on the surface, cool and slow to kindle in either hatred or love, but once a fire was lit within them, it burned long and fierce, and more dangerously than many in this world could imagine. The wizard had been referring to his father's love of treasure then, and had been rebuking Palis for his dealings with some of the eastern dwarves.
But Arnis recalled the remark keenly now, and he finally understood the truth of it. There had been other women, of course—other dalliances under tree and stone roof, but never had he felt desire rise within him like sap in the spring, never had he known such a fierce need to hold and to be held, and to feel the hot flesh of another against his own. It was all he could do to slow the wandering of his fingers, to keep his touch gentle. This was a gift freely given, and he would not ruin it for either of them with unnecessary haste.
He lowered his mouth to her neck, and she gasped softly. She gripped at his shoulders and pulled him closer, and he knew that he was not the only one in whom the slow-kindled passion of the Starborn had been awakened. The knowledge excited him; he trailed his lips lower, over the soft skin of her shoulders, and groaned as her fingers moved through his hair. He took one round breast in his hand, outlining the nipple with his thumb, raising his head to watch the effect on her face. Her head tipped back, and her eyes closed. Her lips parted slightly, her breath coming in gasps, and he could not resist the sight. He sealed his lips over hers; she met him with equally passionate force, and he felt her skin grow hot under his hands.
She was pressed against the tree trunk now; he could not recall how they had gotten there, but the long branches of the willow hung around them like a curtain, and she was bound between his body and the trunk. Her hands fumbled on his tunic, and he reached down to help remove the offending garment as quickly as possible. There was nothing graceful, nothing of the starlit sky in the haste with which they both pulled at his boots and clothing, but she seemed to care about that as little as he did. It was only a moment before he stood naked with her, suddenly shy though he had been kissing her only a moment before.
She paused, raising her hand to his cheek again, and the look in her eyes held things he could not comprehend. She seemed very old to him, in that moment, and yet also very young, full of the promise of green springtime and thawed streams running free. She is not ready to leave these paths. The thought flashed through his mind unbidden, and he pushed it away, pushed it away as he would have any unpleasant thought that interfered with the fierce urgency of the moment.
Her height matched his, and she did
not have to reach up to kiss him; her lips met his again, and her hands moved with a purposeful force over his sides and stomach. He groaned into her mouth, savoring the gentle touch of her fingers as they found the core of his yearning. There had been others, yes, but there had never been this desire, this fierce need.
Mairead broke the kiss and lifted her chin with a sly smile, then took his hands and drew him down onto the soft grass with her. Their bodies twisted together on the damp ground, the willow branches falling all around them, the music and chatter of the forgotten feast receding into the distance as the world was winnowed down to this one embrace, this one confluence of flesh and need and souls.
Arnis propped himself up beside her, to let his fingers trace the curve of her breast, the satin of her stomach, and his lips followed suit, drawing a sharp sigh from her. He moved his mouth across her breasts, stopping to tease the nipples with his tongue. Her chest rose and fell in sharp gasps, and her fingers moved in helpless circles over his back. He let his hand drift lower, until he touched her center, and she convulsed and drew his mouth hungrily to hers. There was nothing high or remote, nothing of either sky or Southern Forest, about her now. No matter that she would leave tomorrow; she was his entirely at this moment.
The thought faded into blissful oblivion as her fingers wrapped around him once more. It was like falling into a deep mountain stream, like drowning...but he had no need to rise to the surface.
He moved his fingers more quickly, and she broke away from his mouth, her head tipping back. Incoherent syllables of a language he did not recognize escaped her throat, and through the haze her still-dancing fingers had put over his brain, he took in the sight of her, spread on the forest floor beneath him, her golden hair pooling around her, her face shining in ecstasy.
