VirtualHeaven

by Ann Lawrence

“Be careful where you say that word. He is sensitive to his ancestry—on the wrong side of Ruhtra’s blankets!”

  “He is a worm, no matter the side of the blanket on which he was birthed. Damn.”

  “Damn? You have picked up too many of Maggie’s sayings. Next you will be slurring your words.” But Vad spoke to Kered’s back as a black cloud blotted out what little light remained.

  “Maggie!” Kered ran as fast as he could. His heart thundered like a warhorse out of control and running downhill. “Stand still,” he cried. “Do not move.”

  “I’m not moving.” Indeed, she stood like a marble statue, her gun drawn and ready, fear and wonder warring for a place on her face.

  Kered came to a halt about twenty feet from her. “The puffin is a sacred bird, as is the raven. Do not use the weapon.”

  Maggie tried not to be alarmed at the crowd of puffins surrounding her. One moment she had been alone; the next, a flock of birds had landed. Their great thick triangular beaks opened and closed as they turned their heads to stare at her. The red markings reminded her of blood.

  “Tell them to leave me alone.”

  “I do not talk to birds,” Kered said. “This is an ill omen, this gathering of puffins.”

  “Please,” she said softly, “if I can’t move, how will I get past them?” Maggie looked up at him, expecting that he could solve this problem. Her trust sharpened his feeling of shame.

  “Hm. Slide your foot forward and see if they peck at you or just move aside.”

  The ground undulated with a mass of black glossy wings. “Why sacred?” she asked, sliding a bare toe ahead an inch, then moving it hastily back as a puffin made a quick move in her direction. Their bright orange feet made her think of clowns. She’d always hated clowns. Nervous laughter bubbled up in her throat and the sound agitated the surrounding birds, who ruffled their feathers and bobbed their great beaks.

  “‘Tis said the soul of Ruhtra abides in a puffin. Others claim a raven. As a result, Tolemac is overrun with both.”

  “Stop talking and get me out of here.” Maggie had seen Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds many times. Puffins or seagulls, the gathering flock made the hair on her nape creep. More birds darkened the sky as they joined the gathering. Ravens, this time, adding their own midnight threat. “Do something.” Her voice rose in panic.

  “Okay,” Kered said, inching his way to her. The birds pecked vigorously at his boots. When he reached her, he gently lifted her into his arms.

  “Thank you,” she murmured in his ear as he slowly slid his feet through the flock. The birds grew more agitated the longer he stayed in their midst. “Hurry,” she urged him. She could see Vad hopping from foot to foot in his own turmoil, watching Kered rescue her.

  “Think of a way to send them thither,” he said. His hand was caressing her breast in an unconscious rhythm.

  “Stop that,” she ordered, slapping his fingers. He grinned. So much for unconscious. Then an idea struck her. “I have it. When we get clear, set me down.”

  For many slow minutes, Kered waded carefully through the mass of birds, ignoring their constant attack on his ankles and calves, grunting once as a beak penetrated the leather.

  More birds were winging their way to join their friends.

  “Kered. Maggie.” Vad had climbed onto his saddle, which was fast becoming an island in a sea of birds as the puffins spread out to encircle him. “I think you should just stand still. There are too many and they seem to be shifting my way, following you.”

  Kered nodded and went still as a statue. Maggie smiled with an assurance she wasn’t sure she had. “Hold your ears.”

  “How can I hold my ears, when I am holding you—” He didn’t finish, for Maggie split the air with a shrill whistle. The puffins burst into flight in a roar of wings, splattering the three of them with excrement as they soared away in fright. A few lone, and Maggie supposed deaf, puffins remained bobbing and weaving about. She let loose again, fingers to her lips, and they, too, escaped into the air.

  Kered clapped his hands to his ears, dropping her unceremoniously on the ground. Well prepared, Maggie landed on her feet.

  “Well, that worked great,” she said.

  Vad jumped off his saddle and grabbed her about the waist, swinging her about. “Teach me to make that sound.”

  “Oh, it’s easy.”

  For the next few minutes as Kered scowled at them, Maggie taught Vad how to whistle. Like a child with a new toy, Vad experimented until Kered thundered at him to be silent.

  “Okay,” Vad said. “See, I, too, can use Maggie’s words.”

  “Hmpf. You stood on your saddle like a female,” Kered snarled, wiping bird splatters from Vad’s shoulders.

  Maggie patted Kered’s arm. “Would you like me to teach you, too?”

  “I have no need to learn this skill. I have you, my slave, to perform it for me.”

  “That was really low, Ker. Unworthy of such a noble warrior. Apologize.”

  “Forgive me,” he muttered, then stomped away, leaving Vad hooting with laughter and Maggie smiling, her spirits greatly lifted.

  Vad sat cross-legged by her side at their fire, tending to his stained tunic. “What else may I learn from you?”

  “Can you guys read?”

  “Guys? Is this a name for a warrior?”

  “Actually, it just means men. Can you? Read?”

  “Aye. We ‘guys’ can read. Kered avoids it like the plague these days. He will not admit to having difficulty seeing the words.”

  Maggie looked up the hill where Kered stood outlined against the darkening sky. “Really?”

  “Aye. He hid it from me until the treaties with Einalem. ‘Twas then I noticed him holding the documents at arm’s length. An affliction of great pain, this failing of his sight, to one of Kered’s stature.”

  “Tell me more about Einalem.” Maggie kept her head down so Vad could not see the jealousy that painted a blush on her cheeks. Kered no longer remarked on it, but Vad still went into childish raptures over the phenomenon.

  “Conniving bitch.”

  “Really?” she said. Vad was a natural-born gossip.

  He frowned and picked a blade of grass, which he split with a fingernail. His long blond hair glistened in the firelight. “Samoht will do anything to gain his ends. Einalem does as he tells her. A brainless woman who cannot make her own decisions, and she with two arm rings!”

  “My, two you say.” Maggie did little to keep the sneer from her voice.

  “Aye. Two.” Vad leaned closer, one eye on the vigilant man standing guard upon the hill. “I think there is an unnatural love between Samoht and his sister. When she lifemates, ‘tis wagered by some her man will not find a virgin in his bed, but rather Samoht’s practiced lover.”

  Maggie was shocked. “Are you saying that she sleeps with her brother?”

  “Sleeps? No. I am quite sure she sleeps in the women’s quarters.” He tipped his head, puzzled.

  “That’s not what I meant. Where I come from, to say a woman ‘sleeps’ with a man, means she is making love—copulating with him.”

  “Then aye. Some say she ‘sleeps’ with Samoht.”

  “What about a baby?”

  He flicked out a negligent hand. “Any good herbalist has ways to prevent that. Do you not have such potions in your place?”

  Maggie sighed. “Some things are the same everywhere. So, how did Ker feel about lifemating with a woman who might be making love to her brother?’’

  “Kered’s pride will not let him speak his inner thoughts on the matter. But he is my brother for all intents and purposes, and I am not blind to his faults. He often does not see the scheming behind a woman’s bright smile. And then—” Vad lowered his voice.

  “Yes?” Maggie edged closer to hear.

  In the distance, thunder rumbled. She rose on her knees, her curiosity forgotten. Memory of the night she’d met Nilrem and Kered came to her with vivid, stark pain. She stood and cried out as lightn
ing pierced the heavens, throwing Kered’s silhouette against the indigo sky.

  She tried to run forward, but Vad restrained her, one arm about her waist. “Come, you will be drenched,” he cried.

  “No.” She wrenched away and ran, oblivious to the rough turf tearing at her soles. All she could do was run, run to Kered. Each time Tolemac’s thunder and lightning came, some frightening magic occurred.

  She leapt into Kered’s arms and he held her tightly to his chest. The rain poured down, soaking them to the skin. As she shivered in his arms, she realized that nothing had changed. She was in Tolemac despite the jagged display of nature going on over the distant hills. Reluctantly, she drew back from him. The only magic was the scent of his skin and the raw power of his strength beneath her hands.

  “Come. We will need to find shelter.” He lifted her into his arms and, as if she weighed nothing, loped down the hill to where Vad had gathered their belongings. Vad looked like a drowned angel at that moment, blond hair straggling on his cheeks, his tunic clinging to his muscular form.

  “By the sword,” Vad said, rubbing his thumb up and down Maggie’s forearm.

  “Just bumps of the goose,” Kered answered casually as he removed Vad’s hand. “‘Tis a change in Maggie’s skin when she is cold. Do not touch her.”

  “Must you wear a knife? Even to sleep?” Maggie complained as she wriggled against Kered’s warm body. The two men had made a sandwich of her in the shepherd’s hut.

  “‘Tis not my knife,” he muttered, shifting her position.

  “What did you say?” she whispered, conscious of Vad snoring at her back.

  “Nothing. I said nothing. Can you not stop squirming?”

  “You don’t have to get crabby.” Maggie curled her chilled fingers into her armpits and tried to fall asleep. In a few minutes she gave it up. If Nilrem’s hut had been primitive, this was prehistoric. Across a short distance of muddy floor lay the shepherd, adding grunts and snufflings to Vad’s snores. The stink of the hut was enormous, for several of the shepherd’s sheep had bedded down with them. Every now and then a drop of icy water crept through the thatching to plop on her shoulder. “I can’t sleep.”

  Kered sighed. He drew her closer and began to kiss her hair. “Perhaps I may distract you.”

  “That’s not what I had in mind.” But she edged nearer and raised her lips.

  He whispered against their softness, “Touch my tongue with yours, Maggie.”

  The air between them sparked. Her breasts swelled with a sudden heat. She fought a maddening desire to rub like a cat against his hard chest. “I want more than touching tongues,” she said into the charged atmosphere, spreading her hand on his hip.

  He growled.

  Their mouths met in a slow, sensuous mating of tongues. She led him and taught him, taking cues from the catch of his breath or the clench of his muscles beneath her fingertips. With deliberate finesse, she stirred his senses. That she was the one ensnared, captivated by the tastes and textures of him, eluded her. She was lost in a slow-burning fire that crept from every point their bodies touched to settle like a lance of pleasurable pain when he brushed his hips against hers. She lost track of conscious thought in the throb of her blood in her veins.

  Her desire for him drove all sense away. It didn’t matter that two men lay close by. At that moment no one existed except him. She breathed in the heady scent of him and savored the salty delight of his throat. He pinned her against the dirt floor, settling himself between her thighs. She lifted her hips, seeking his warmth and whatever gifts he could offer, maddened by the separating layers of leather and wool.

  “Do you think you could wait until we reach the capital?” Vad complained. “I am neither blind, nor deaf.”

  Kered rested on his elbows and stroked Maggie’s cheek with the tips of his fingers.

  She wanted to scream with frustration, but instead pulled Kered’s head down and gave him a wet, smacking kiss on the lips as if it were all a meaningless game. Vad snorted, then edged away, wrapping himself in his cloak.

  “We can wait, can’t we?” she lied.

  In truth, her heart was racing, and she wanted to whack Vad over the head with Kered’s sword. He had interrupted something she’d craved for so long that she felt as one must when starving and food is offered and then withdrawn.

  “Aye. I can wait.” Kered’s tone made it a promise.

  Maggie held her breath. The dim light of a few remaining coals in the shepherd’s fire lit Kered’s turquoise eyes with an inner glow that hypnotized her.

  She had been wrong. The thunder and lightning had brought magic, Kered’s magic.

  His body moved with subtle undulations against hers, denying his words. They danced a silent and almost imperceptible ballet, first one sliding against the other, then the other answering. It was subtle, but potent, in its arousal.

  He played the game lazily, propped over her on his elbows, his fingers drifting back and forth across her cheeks, tracing her ears and teasing her neck. She played it more boldly than he, soothing the ache of her breasts against his rough shirt, caressing herself and him with deep intakes of breath. Her hands repeatedly played through the silky-rough tangles of his hair.

  This was real. He was real.

  Tears welled in her eyes and slipped over her cheeks. He caught them on the tip of his tongue and smoothed away their tracks with the tips of his fingers. Words of love clogged in her throat, unexpressed.

  Where they touched, heat sprang up, flames licked along nerve endings, sending sensual messages racing along thighs and breasts. A warmth had built within her, needing release. An urgent beating and throbbing of blood snatched her breath. She caught his fingers as they moved across her lips and bit down hard to keep from screaming as wave after wave of lightning streaked through her body.

  Kered dropped his head beside hers, gasping in air as if he, too, had run a race. Maggie knew they’d played the game too long and untangled her fingers from his hair. She slid her hand between them to press against his heat. He pinned her palm with his as long shudders ran the length of his body. Every muscle in his back and arms went rigid; his chest heaved. When at last he relaxed, falling to his side, Maggie rolled over him to see his face, to judge his mood, and to assess his reactions to what had passed between them.

  They stared at each other.

  “You have bewitched me,” he whispered.

  “You’ve enslaved me,” she answered.

  Chapter Sixteen

  They buried the sword and cup, along with the gun, in a narrow crevice by a beautifully blooming rosebush. Maggie thought of her mother’s summer roses, full-blown, fragrant, and heady with scent. She looked about and treasured the moment, for she felt a sudden apprehension in her stomach, knew fear.

  They would no longer be alone. Even the band of little beggars seemed unreal, something a dream conjured up. Other people would see her, remark as Kered and Vad did on her lack of arm rings, her unusual coloring. Vad did not delve too deeply; he respected her silences. Would others? Would she be put to a close scrutiny? Would some stranger know the land beyond the ice fields? Would she ever see home again!

  “You are afraid?” Kered asked as he mounted Windsong behind her. “Do not fear. I will say you are my slave and naught will happen to you.”

  They did not ride the coast for long before the city loomed before them. She gasped aloud.

  He followed her pointing hand and grunted. “Some say ‘tis lovely.”

  “Lovely? It’s frightening,” she said, pressing back against his chest as if to distance herself from the approaching capital. Gray stone buildings blended with forbidding rocky hills. The only relief from stark and windswept were the flowering gardens edging the street.

  People hurried along, intent on their tasks. A man drove a pig with a stick, another carried two chickens squawking under his arms. Children dodged across their path.

  Women stared openly at her, and Maggie found herself watching the saddle’s
pommel to avoid eye contact. As they neared the center of the city, gray stone gave way to stuccoed manors, trailed with flowering vines. The roofs here were thatched with elaborate designs of scallops and weavings.

  She admired the artistry of each roof. Shutters were flung open to the red Tolemac sun, and it painted a copper glow on the thatched roofs. “They’re beautiful,” she admitted, relieved.

  ‘“Tis just buildings. Too many buildings, too many people.”

  They trotted through a massive town gate with a great, toothed portcullis, and clopped across a short stone bridge over a river that flowed a deep purple, nearly black, as it wended its way along the city’s edges. Ravens vied with puffins for space upon the banks. Maggie thought they watched her with cunning, craning their necks and ruffling their feathers as she rode by.

  The people were very homogeneous, fair-skinned, and in most cases their hair ranged from nearly white blond like Vad’s to brown. No redheads, no black. The elderly were sometimes bald, but often had full heads of white hair. Kered no longer seemed gigantic to her, rather one of many.

  Kered drew Windsong to a halt. He helped Maggie dismount, but she noticed a distance in his behavior as a man took the reins. When Kered bent toward her, she understood.

  “Slaves walk behind their master. I do not want trouble before I present the cup and sword. Please, I ask your forbearance to tolerate the position.”

  She nodded and kept her head down as they climbed a steep hill next to a high stone wall. This was not the place to exert her independence.

  “No,” she gasped when they reached the top. There, across a narrow strait, loomed a great mountain. Atop it stood more buildings clinging to the steep slopes, resplendent with high towers and pennants snapping on the wind. The only way to the mountain was down a long, wooden stair, across a short bridge, and then up another steep staircase.

  “Behold the seat of Tolemac’s council.” Kered plunged down the steps. Maggie gulped before stepping gingerly off into what felt like open space. The steps were sturdy, but clung to the sheer wall of the cliff down which they climbed. She imagined that the defense of the council was simple. Once the stairs were burned, it would be impregnable. Her imagination placed men with clashing swords on the bridge that spanned the roiling purple sea. It didn’t take much more to see them crushed against the great black boulders that rose like jagged teeth below. The beauty of it awed and frightened her.