Lords Of The Dark Fall - Fabian

by C A Nicks

  His kind of world, he realised with a jolt. Here, the odds were more stacked in his favour than his own world. If the mages were as ineffectual as Tig made out and power depended on strength, how could he lose?

  Strength he had in abundance.

  After dumping the sack in the barn, he made his way to the bath house, pushing open the door with no concession to Tig’s modesty. She was naked to the waist, scrubbing at her flesh as if trying to remove a memory. She paid him no heed as she washed away the ride and whatever else had happened to her.

  “Pass me the towel, will you?”

  He snatched it up and stalked across the small room, already half-aroused by the sight of her. With deliberate care, he touched the cloth to her shoulder and gently wiped away the droplets of water. She brought up a hand, stopping him as he moved towards her breasts.

  “Not now.” She spoke quietly, eyes downcast. “I’m tired,” she added, as if that could explain.

  He let her take the cloth, stepping back to better gauge her expression.

  “Did he touch you?”

  “What does it matter if he did?”

  “Tig.” He paused, getting a grip on anger that shouldn’t be directed towards her. “I promised to tell you the truth. Allow me the same courtesy.”

  The baggy shirt hid her from his view. Covered, she seemed to regain her strength.

  “A quick grope for a sack of potatoes sounds like a pretty good bargain to me.”

  “I do not like you whoring yourself out for food.”

  “You have any better ideas? Because, strange as it might sound, I don’t exactly enjoy having creepy Hal’s hands on me.” She stood, bowl in hand, meeting his challenge like the most courageous of warriors. “With an appetite the size of yours, what would you have me do?”

  Water from the upturned basin sloshed over his boots and spiralled away down the metal drain. He stood his ground. “So you do wish me to leave?”

  Confusion clouded her features. “I didn’t mean it that way. Don’t twist my words.”

  “Answer my question. Do you wish me to leave?”

  “You already know I don’t.”

  “I would hear it from you.”

  Her shoulders slumped. “Fabian, please.”

  “Flatter my ego. Say it. For me.”

  “I don’t want you to go, okay? But if you stay, I have to find food for you without drawing attention to the fact that I’m feeding an extra mouth. And Hal wasn’t fooled by the injury. He knows something is off and means to find out what. Add to that, Sunas asking if she could come to stay for a few days and having to say no to one of my oldest friends. Well it’s been a hell of a day.”

  “Come here.” He crooked a finger, knowing it would take more than that to convince her.

  “Why?”

  “Because I wish to hold you. To offer comfort. Would that help you?”

  Confusion turned to surprise. She let out a small laugh. “This is scary Fabian.”

  It was his turn to be confused. “How so?”

  “You’re adapting faster than I imagined. Have you ever spoken those words before? When was the last time you held someone, just for comfort?”

  In all his years, had he ever? He shrugged. “I cannot recall.”

  She shook her head. “You’ve missed out on so much, your majesty. Your highness. What did people call you?”

  “To my face or behind my back?”

  Her lips quirked at that. “To your face, while they quaked in their boots, no doubt.”

  “Yes,” he replied dryly. “I do recall a certain amount of quaking. Along with the bowing and the scraping, the insincere smiles. The abject fear and the desperate pleas for mercy. The most exalted one certainly knew how to command respect.”

  “But he never knew the comfort of a hug?”

  “No, he never knew the comfort of a hug. But he would know it now. Would you indulge him?”

  In answer, she stepped into his open arms, her cheek coming to rest against the place where his heart beat out a steady rhythm. Instinctively, he pulled her in, one arm circling her back, the other around her shoulders, fingers burrowing into the silky strands of her hair. For one with so slight a frame, she felt surprisingly strong and grounded, returning the hug with equal measure until he didn’t know which of them was giving and which taking the comfort.

  In the right relationship, perhaps it was possible to do both at the same time.

  He held her tighter, knowing he could never convey to her the magnitude of his simple gift. What she offered so freely had cost him everything.

  Outside, the shadows lengthened, the room grew dim. Tig tipped back her head to look at him. He held onto her when she tried to step away, taking her gently by the shoulders, more a request, than a demand that she stay in his arms for a few moments longer.

  Nodding her ascent, she remained in place, studying him intently in the darkening gloom. A little wistful, or was that sadness he saw? In the back of his mind, a small voice whispered impossible things. A life here, with her. As farmer or warlord, what did it matter as long as she was here?

  For a few, brief moments as he held her, the impossible became the possible.

  “I saw your story-plates. You have talent.”

  “I have a beginning. But as yet, no ending.”

  He knew what she was asking and couldn’t give her the answer she wanted. If his brother made it home, Marcellus would need him there to lead, to lend weight to the reclamation of their birthright.

  “The ending will be the same. I cannot allow my family name to fester in such infamy.”

  “So, we’re still going with the blood-bath?”

  “The Imarna will be punished for their treachery, yes. I will personally--”

  She stopped him, hands raised. “No, don’t go there. I’d rather remember you like this. You should hug women more often, Fabian. You’re a natural.”

  “In my world, that would be showing weakness.”

  Tightening his fists, he stopped himself from taking the comb she’d grabbed and helping her with her hair. Turned away so he wouldn’t have to watch the damp, tangled strands transform into spun silk as she hacked at the snags. He sensed this was a vulnerable interlude, when they might well tie themselves up in knots that would be difficult to untie when the time came.

  “But I will consider your words,” he said by way of concession.

  “You’ll be a different man if or when you get back.” Tig peeked around the bath house door into the yard, waking the dogs who were supposed to have been on guard. They both rose as one, stretched and then trotted not to her, but to him, one on either side as if waiting for orders. It seemed to amuse her.

  “They know a leader when they see one. Send them for rabbits and let’s get inside and lock up. I have no idea how I stand with the new warlord or whether he’ll deem a small farm like this worth protecting.”

  “I would camp an army on your doorstep. Kill anyone who came near you.”

  “My own personal army? What wouldn’t I give to see Warrington’s face?”

  The rustic kitchen embraced them with its cosy charm, the feeling that people had loved and been loved here. Perhaps he was changing more than he’d realised. He who had lived in the greatest of palaces, surrounded by opulence found only in most people’s dreams had never lived in a dwelling with so much heart.

  “Hunt,” he said to the dogs who were attempting to slither past him into the house. When they’d turned and spun away across the yard and out of the gate, he closed the door and threw the bolts. Turned the keys in the locks. How ridiculous that he’d always kept a man to carry his keys and open his doors. A man should lock his own doors at night. Should feel the satisfaction of knowing he’d done what was required to keep his loved ones safe.

  Is that how he thought of her now? He listened to Tig’s light foot-fall on the wooden boards upstairs. The creak of the wardrobe door. When she reappeared, she’d donned the green dress that hung even more loosely around h
er thin frame now he was eating all her food. She stopped to soak up the appreciation in his eyes, to give him a bit of a wiggle as she padded barefoot down the wooden steps. A characteristic gesture and always accompanied by a hint of wicked mischief in her smile.

  A smile that offered what he had no right to take.

  Before he had time to follow up that thought, she skipped across the kitchen to scrutinise the neat row of jars and metal boxes lining what she laughingly called her pantry.

  “So, what’s your pleasure tonight, most exalted one? If the dogs get lucky, I can offer rabbit and rice. If not, it will just have to be rice. I bet you’ll be glad to get home so you can eat some decent food. Do me a favour and reach the canister down for me?”

  She’d meant to move out of his way but he was too fast, striding across the kitchen, trapping her in place while he reached up behind her and took down the canister. He placed the metal can on the counter-top and then both of his hands, one on either side of her, stopping her escape.

  She stilled, quivering a little like some animal preparing for flight. Or was there anticipation in the glance she flicked him, so briefly he nearly missed it? This was no offer of a hug, and she knew it.

  “Mortality is a call to arms like no other,” he whispered. “Do you understand what I’m saying? What we need to do?”

  “You’re talking about seizing the moment? That’s something both of us will regret.” She turned in his arms, facing him with a look of such painful honesty something twisted inside of him. “It’s no longer just sex, Fabian. Not for me, anyway. This time it won’t be so easy to walk away from.”

  “We may regret this, but I believe that if we do not, then we will regret it more.”

  “I bet you say that to all the women.”

  He bent his head, pushed back her hair and pressed a light kiss to the shell of her ear. “It is a line I have used more than once, the difference is that this time, I mean it.”

  He understood the struggle written plainly on her face. No denying that she wanted him as much as he wanted her. The air between them was almost too thick to breathe. When he touched his lips to her throat, he felt the frantic beat of her pulse, the slight tilt of her head to give him better access, to encourage him to continue.

  Even though her body practically screamed out its needs to him, he understood why it would be more prudent to walk away from this heat they made between them.

  When had prudence any place in affairs of the heart?

  “If we don’t do this we will spend the rest of our lives wondering. Say yes, Tig, and I will give you a night you will never forget.”

  “Promise?”

  “You have my word on it.”

  “What about the dogs?”

  “They will eat the rabbits. Let them. I’m hungry only for this.”

  “You have the cheesiest lines.”

  “You doubt my sincerity?”

  She shook her head. The faint smile, the light fingers creeping across the soft fabric of his shirt, signalled her capitulation. He’d seduced enough women to know the signs. If he swept her up now, she would not resist. And if he had any sense, he would.

  Since being in this world, meeting Tig, his good sense seemed to have deserted him.

  “Would that I could offer you more of myself,” he said with genuine regret. “This is all I have, but it is a gift I give freely. You would do me great honour by accepting.”

  She made him wait a few more heartbeats before twisting her fingers in his collar to pull him down to her.

  No need of words. Her warm mouth, the way she kissed him said she knew this was the start of the long goodbye, and that she cared. Hard to admit he did, too. Somehow, in the past few weeks, she’d crept into his heart and left memories that would be hard to forget.

  He may have instigated this, but following her upstairs, knowing that soon he must walk away took more courage than leading an army into war.

  “This is what it is to be human,” she said when he hesitated at the door to her bedroom. “We know it will break our hearts, but we do it anyway, foolish mortals that we are.”

  He stepped over the threshold, unable to walk away now she was here and willing. They would worry about broken hearts in the morning. For now, there was only this.

  Chapter 7

  She shouldn’t have said it. No illusions that these developing feelings were one sided. Men like Fabian didn’t do broken hearts and to give him his due, he’d made her no false promises. He'd let her know exactly what he needed to do and where she stood in his grand plans.

  Take what he offered and be grateful a man like him would even look at someone like her. And when she was inevitably pushed into sharing Hal’s bed, she’d at least have this memory to distract her.

  “Let me,” she said and stepped forward to twist open his shirt buttons, one by one. Smoothing the material apart, she revealed his broad chest, took in the dips and curves, the bunched muscles flexing under her questing fingers. She wanted to remember every inch of him so when she looked back and wondered if this was a dream, she’d be able to recall the feel of iron and steel encased in warm flesh. The hard ridges of his abs, the dark hair circling his nipples.

  Perhaps she only imagined the sadness in the slow smile that told her he was enjoying her attentions as much as she was her scrutiny of his hard, warrior body. She measured her hand to his. Hands that were twice the size of hers, calloused from wielding the broad-sword. Killers hands, no doubt, yet capable of infinite tenderness.

  He opened the shirt-cuffs himself. Threw the shirt down. Her breath caught.

  She’d seen him naked more than once, but it was still a revelation. Or was her sudden inability to breathe because of what they were about to do?

  Mirroring her actions, he stripped her of her dress, pulled the camisole over her head to leave her clad only in her underpants, his actions decisive and sure. If she asked him to, would he stop? She trusted him to do that but had no will to call a halt to this, despite the small voice in the back of her mind warning her of the pain that would accompany these few hours of pleasure.

  “I find you beautiful,” he said before bending to touch his mouth to a nipple. The long, slow sweep of his tongue robbed her of any further thoughts of stopping him.

  “You do?” she gasped and threaded her fingers in his hair to hold him in place. “I’m not, but thank you for saying it.”

  He lifted his head, brows creased into a frown. “It saddens me that you do not see your own beauty. But know that I do. Believe that I do.”

  She wanted nothing more than to do that. He had a clever tongue and sounded sincere. Perhaps it was true.

  A burning kiss stopped that thought. She gave in to the assault of his mouth on hers, to the thrust of his tongue only now realising how much she needed this time out from the world and all its problems. He’d asked for this so she gave herself over to him and let him take her. Let him strip her naked and spread her out on the bed for his pleasure.

  Through half-closed eyes, she watched him shed the rest of his clothing, boots and socks, pants and underclothes. Never had she met a man so comfortable in his skin. He allowed her scrutiny, not through vanity, but because, unlike her, he knew what she was seeing.

  “Use the protection,” she said, pointing to the dresser drawer. Much as she wanted to feel him skin to skin, it would never be an option.

  Fishing the small packet from the drawer, he regarded it with a disdain that made her laugh out loud.

  “Another downside of being human, but you must understand why. Come here and I’ll put it on you.”

  Instead of handing it to her, he tossed it onto the nightstand. With one knee on the bed, he leaned over to place a light kiss on her quivering stomach, then another a little lower down, then another.

  “Later,” he breathed against her mound. “We have the whole night ahead of us and I wish to pace myself. To take you slowly. Very, very slowly.”

  Oh, by the malformed saints, his words alo
ne could reduce her to mush in his arms. When had she become such a pushover?

  He might wish to go slow, but she was already feeling the delicious tightening, the ripples of sensation radiating from the place now receiving the insistent attention of his clever tongue. Here was a man who definitely knew where a clitoris was.

  He chuckled when she moaned lightly and rode the first wave.

  “I intend to make you come again and again and again, until you plead for mercy. Would you like me to do that?”

  Her yes was a little too fervent, desperate even, but who in their right mind would refuse an offer like that?

  “If you’re going to break my heart, then do it right. I want to remember this night.”

  “Oh, you will.” In one swift move he was astride her, pinning her arms above her head, the weight of him trapping her in place. Slowly, he slid his hands along the length of her arms, releasing them, continuing the slow slide down her body, while she took in a shuddering breath and gave herself over to him.

  The sheer bulk of him blocked out the last pale rays of the sun as it sunk below the horizon. Tonight he could be the haven she so craved. With him wrapped around her, covering her, she had nothing to fear. Constantly being strong, pretending she didn’t care, was a drain on body and soul. Even before Fabian arrived, she’d been hovering at her limit. Hanging on by sheer bloody-minded force of will.

  She moaned again when he parted her knees and dipped his dark head between them, unable to help her response to the sinuous lap of his tongue, the rasp of his stubbled cheek against the tender skin of her thigh. The pad of his thumb rubbing and circling and seeking out her most secret places.

  Stop him now, her rational mind screamed. You’ll spend the rest of your life searching for more of this, comparing other men to him. And always coming up short.

  The second wave brought ecstasy and tears which made her look way too needy. Blinking them away, she focussed on the feel of him, the smell of his sweat-slicked skin. The physical, because that was easier than dealing with the emotional turmoil he’d unleashed. What she wanted most were the things he couldn’t give. Security, companionship, a man who made her smile fondly and her heart miss a beat when he looked at her a certain way.