The Heart of War

by Lisa Beth Darling

  Alena didn’t look at him. “Jealous much?” Out of the corner of her eye she watched his jaw drop and then it was her turn to laugh.

  At first Ares was insulted, he was angry, but then her laughter washed over him. It was the first time he’d heard her honestly laugh or saw a smile that lit up her face—bruised and battered as it was. He couldn’t help but laugh with her, laugh at himself. Alena put an arm around his shoulders and drew him in a little closer, she was still laughing. Ares didn’t think she even knew she’d put her arm around him at all. He didn’t hesitate to move in closer to her and take in the sweet scent of honeysuckle.

  “His name is Earl; he was the Headmaster at the school where I taught,” she explained as she stopped laughing. “He has a wife, six children and eight grandchildren. This was a dinner given by the Secretary of Education for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. A bunch of stuffy academics get together, get drunk and let loose for a night.”

  “Stuffy academics, hmm? Is that what you are?”

  “It’s what I was, once upon a time.” She looked down at him in her arms and wondered how he got there. She liked having him there, feeling the warmth of his flesh against her and taking in the deep masculine scent of him. Alena began running her hand across his shoulder to feel the smooth ripples glide under her fingers. “I’ve been many things. Haven’t you? Or have you always been Ares God of War?”

  “We are always who we are no matter what name we go by or what we do,” Ares said thoughtfully. “If you’re asking if I ever tried being a businessman or a teacher or something, the answer is no. Once in a while I go out there and play with the Mortals but…”

  “And you always tell them you’re Ares God of War?” Alena led. “That you live in solitude on your own private island?”

  “Fine, I have a few disguises for the Mortal World. A few homes, a few cars, a few motorcycles…”

  “Why? What do you need with a car or a motorcycle? You’re a God; you just zap yourself wherever you want to go.”

  “They’re fun,” Ares returned simply. He loved speeding down a winding road on a motorcycle or taking the highway in a brand new sports car. “Have you ever been bungee jumping? Skydiving? Sometimes, Alena, you just have to have a little fun.” He looked down at the photograph. “Or have you forgotten that in your time in that wretched camp? Did it take all the joy out of you?”

  “Me? It seems to me that out of the two of us you’re the joyless one.” Now her fingers were in his hair. “Bungee jumping? Skydiving? Those are easy for you anyway, even if you hit the ground at full force you won’t die, will you?”

  “I might.” Ares looked at her with thoughtful eyes as she gazed back at him with curiosity. “There is no such thing as true immortality, nothing lives forever unending.”

  “But you’re…”

  “Everything that’s born has several things in common—everything. In some manner it breathes, it feeds, it gets rid of its waste, it reproduces, it bleeds and it dies. In between the birth and the dying it’s merely a matter of degree.” Ares reached into the box again and pulled out the vial that had given many things to ponder about her and why she had concocted it. “What is this?” He held it up for her to see.

  Alena stared at the little vial with the fatal contents and swallowed hard. “The seal is broken,” she mumbled, “you already know what it is.”

  Ares nodded. “Let me be clearer; what is it for?”

  “Hunting.” That was what she had told the children and they believed her, but they were children and Ares was not.

  “No hunter uses poison this toxic unless they’re going after very big game. What were you trying to kill? Jaakim?”

  Yes, she’d thought about that many times. Tried to come up with ways to put it in his food or just cram it down his ugly throat, but in the end that wasn’t why she’d brewed up the poison. “Yes.”

  Ares sighed deeply. “I don’t appreciate it when those around me lie. Want to try again?”

  “No,” she stammered and pushed his hand away, hoping he’d put the vial back in the box. “I’d rather not answer your question. It’s…personal.” Alena’s bottom lip began to quiver and her eyes began to mist.

  She didn’t have to go any further than that.

  With a wave of his hand, the box and all its contents—including the vial—disappeared from the bed. He reached up to put his hand on the nape of her neck and brought her down to him. “You were going to drink it, weren’t you?”

  She turned away from him with a deep frown. It wasn’t the first time she’d tried to take her own life and she doubted it would be the last. Like her attempts to commit suicide over the centuries, Jaakim hadn’t been the first to abuse her in such a way, but he had been the worst. The day she returned from being Jaakim’s little sex toy, still full of Mamba venom, she’d gone to the girls’ dorm, opened the footlocker and broken the seal on the vial. She drank it. Battered and broken, she’d crawled into her bed and waited to die. Alena was very sick for about a week but she was still breathing. Although they did have very long life spans, Feys were not Immortal. Alena was only half Fey. She never understood why no matter what she did, how hard she tried it just didn’t work. She always woke up the next day.

  “Tell me,” Ares said in a firm tone.

  Without looking him, her gray eyes fixed on the fire burning in hearth instead, Alena spoke. “I just wanted it to be over. I was tired of being afraid all the time. What does any of this matter to you?”

  Ares turned her face back to him to gaze into her watery eyes. Although he couldn’t yet say why, it did matter very much to him. “The taking of one’s own life is never the answer.” For a moment Ares sat there in her arms, taking in that sweet scent and feeling her warmth while wishing he’d killed Jaakim just a little slower.

  “Why not?”

  “Because if you’re dead you can’t experience this.” Ares kissed her.

  As their lips touched her fingers that had been dancing so delicately across his shoulders and upper back froze in place, flexed, and grabbed at the flesh below. Lowering the hand at her neck to her waist, he pulled her body down onto the bed. Alena let out a very sweet sigh as she slid right into the crook of his arm with her lips pressed to his. Her hands were finally allowed to run wild in the space between his neck and his chest. Even though she was afraid that once this started it might never stop, she couldn’t get enough of touching him. The heart in her chest raced like the wind, her lungs couldn’t get enough of the air around them, which had suddenly become hot, steamy. The scent of him, so deep and rich, every breath was intoxicating making her head light and dizzy, her body weak, and her soul cry out for more.

  When his lips pulled away from hers only to land on her neck and suckle, the palm of his large hand covered her heaving breast over the thin material of the shirt. Alena pushed the shirt open under his hand so that there was nothing between them. His touch warm and although it was manly, it was also soft, especially for one who called himself a warrior and was always splitting so much wood. The feel of it over her hard nipple made her nails scrape along his back. Ares couldn’t wait to get his mouth around it; she cupped her hands to his face and brought him closer and then his tingling lips left her once more and made their way to their first destination of the evening. His mouth gently closed down over her ample breast and her back arched up off the hard stone to greet him. She tasted like heaven, sweeter than Nectar and more palatable than Ambrosia; he began to wonder what that bald space between her legs would taste like dancing on his tongue. However, there was no rush. They had the entire night. Apollo wouldn’t return until morning and by then it would be too late. Reaching down past that patiently waiting place between those too slender hips, he grasped the hem of the shirt and slowly pulled it upward, letting those thick fingers linger over that same waiting spot, finding it moist already before he brought the shirt up and over her head, laying her bare beside him.

  She was a rare prize, Ares understood all of the r
easons Cernunnos wanted her. She was beautiful. She was brazen. She was brave. She was passionate. Just what the Olympians wanted with her or what Eros had already done with her he didn’t know but he intended to find out. Not before he took all that she was offering to him—her body along with her heart. Not before she said that she was his.

  The world around her began to spin and Alena could no longer tell up from down. It was getting hard to breath and even more difficult to tell where she ended and he began. Men had touched her before but none like this, none that made her want to explore, to surrender, to lose control. The space between her legs became misty, then steamy, then it sweltered as it swelled and prickled with life. “What are you doing to me?”

  Ares didn’t know what he felt, why she filled his head with helium, making it so light he felt it would float off his shoulders and he would be glad for it. He didn’t know why what had turned in his favor as a simple barter between friends became so electric and heated. Then again he hadn’t destroyed that camp because someone defiled one of his whores long before he came along. Ares did it because he was so angry that Jaakim would dare to touch one like Alena that he couldn’t see straight long before Sha’Quanda finished the story.

  “If we do this, you will protect me from them? From your Family?”

  “Are we still bartering?”

  All rationale and reason fleeing swiftly, Alena grasped for the last bits of both. In the end, he was Ares and Ares had a reputation that didn’t bode well for him. “If we do this, Cernunnos will know. He will send them after me.”

  A barter it was. Fine. Ares always did like to get his payment up front. “Let him know. Let him come. I am not afraid.”

  Staring into those deep smoldering eyes it was clear to see that no, he wasn’t. Why should he be? He was strong. He was powerful. He had the command of fire. He was a God, which put Ares on even footing with Cernunnos. “I thought you didn’t like virgins. Too much crying.”

  Ares cradled his head between her breasts so he could listen to her heartbeat. It was strong and fast. He reveled in the feel of her hands running through his hair and down his back. No woman made him feel this way. He didn’t just want to penetrate her, he wanted to take his time and savor every inch of her. “I lied.”

  Why didn’t that surprise her? After all he was Ares, what else should she have expected? “Kiss me again.” Alena couldn’t help herself. Ares wasn’t the best custodian she could think of to hold and protect her heart, but she couldn’t fight what she was feeling any longer. All she could do was surrender to him and the desire swelling within her.

  “With pleasure,” Ares whispered, his full lips barely touching hers. When they pressed to hers Alena’s head lit up with electricity and the whole world vanished. When those hot full lips pulled away and his teeth sank into her neck just below her ear, Alena was hopelessly and helplessly lost in the God of War.

  The little Fey surrendered just as pretty as you please. Tonight, and every night hereafter, she was his. Her hands were running through his hair, Ares grabbed them as they came together and pinned them up above her head with one hand. Propping himself up on his elbow, he gazed down at the prize he’d won and found it pleasing. The hungry beast between his legs stirred as it realized it was not going to be denied the pleasure it sought

  Ares ran the flat of his free hand down Alena’s body from breast to hips and back as his tongue came out to wet his lip and she began to quiver. Alena didn’t know anyone’s touch could feel this good, so much better than her own. There was still fear. Apollo said many things about Ares and if they were true, she could leave this room only to be headed for a pyre of her own.

  When his hand reached the place between her legs, the wonder and desire in her eyes flashed fear, unmistakable fear. Letting his fingers linger just a little, allowing them to soak in the musky, silky wetness that clung to her skin, the fear reflected in her eyes was defeated by curious desire. That sweet scent of honeysuckle mixed with the heady scent between her legs filled Ares’ head with passion. He couldn’t wait any longer to take a taste. Ares was long and strong enough to keep Alena’s hands pinned over her head very securely while he bent between into those wet waiting folds. Just to make sure Alena was aware who was in control here, he kept her that way, pinned securely to the bed between the pressure at her wrists and his leg wrapped around hers. Slowly bending his head forward to allow the lustful scent to fill him, his tongue lapped out and he got his first taste of those wet juices. The flat of Alena’s stomach quivered and she let out a heavy rush of air; it sounded like ‘oh God’.

  Up until that moment, Alena hadn’t known anything in the world could feel that good. It had to be sinful. Illegal at least. Between the slickness of his tongue and the softness of his beard, she didn’t know which brought a greater sensation of pleasure. She didn’t even think about straining against his hands holding her down, seemed the strength in her body had fled to parts unknown. She lay there filled with lead and helium, a very strange mixture indeed.

  God or not, Ares was a red-blooded male and he loved the taste of a woman. Other than the heat of battle, not much got him quite as excited as having a woman below him—or on the side of him or over him, or anywhere really. Moving over her and then between her splayed legs, he let go of her hands. Alena left them in place, which pleased him. Ares got his first look at that pretty flower between her legs, so delicate and full, as it waited to be plucked from the vine.

  Another flick of his tongue and another harsh rush of air met his ears. The soft scent of honeysuckle was no longer faint but thick, as though he were standing in an entire field of it on a hot summer day. The taste, oh the taste of her, it was so delicate but empowering as it rushed through him in a river of sweetness. Ares once heard a song, some man crooning about Tupelo Honey, he sang of how his woman was just as sweet, in fact she was an angel of the first degree. Now he knew what the man had been singing about with such reverence and feeling.

  When the tip of his tongue pushed apart those inner lips and found its way inside she quivered harshly; it went right through her from the top of her head to the toes that curled at her feet. It ran through him as well, made him feel alive and brought the strangest feeling of being connected to someone other than himself. The hands that had surrendered above her head searched out the hides and began to grasp at them greedily. Wanting to get a better look at the softest part of his new prize, Ares pushed the lips apart with his fingertips and found them devoid of the marks of the snake. It bit her on the inside, where it was even softer and warmer than it was here. Alena cooed and sighed as she bit down on her bottom lip, her eyes closed, her slightly misshapen hips searching out his fingers as they arched and rocked toward them, calling them inside. Ares didn’t want to disappoint her. She stopped breathing altogether as he slid his index finger into her with much slow purpose. That didn’t stop her hands from reaching down and grabbing the sides of his head where they ran through his hair. Ares pushed his nimble fingers a little further into her.

  Two hundred and forty-five years was a long time to deny the body such basic pleasures. Alena wasn’t going to be denied any longer. With the heat coming off him, Alena nearly felt as though she were burning. As the old song went, it was a lovely way to burn. She felt like a helium filled balloon carried away by a warm current, rising higher and higher into the air up through the layers of the atmosphere, catapulted towards the stars on a journey that might never end. The fingers in his hair turned into talons, hungrily grabbing at him wanting more. Demanding it.

  She wasn’t ready and Ares wasn’t sure he was either. That crank of his was growing to full between his legs and he couldn’t control it. As hard as he fought to make it smaller, it wouldn’t yield. The last thing he wanted was to hurt her, not when she was coming to him so sweetly, so willingly. The more of her that rained down on his tongue and the deeper his fingers went, the harder and longer he became. The more he wanted to sink every single inch of it into her.

  O
nly wanting one thing and being able to focus on nothing else, her fingers entwined in his hair and gave a hard yank upward. She pulled him with her hands and nudged him up with her knees. He didn’t stop doing what he was doing between her legs. “Please?” she moaned. “Please?”

  It was so hard to hold back but Ares wanted this first. She was close to it; all he had to do was… Two fingers deep inside, he grabbed the hands in his hair with the other hand and held them down on her breasts. “Give it to me,” he demanded. “Now. Give it to me and I’ll give you what you want.” The swelling walls around him grew even wetter as he thought he was only scratching the surface of how much the little Fey wanted to be dominated. If that were the case then she’d come to the right God and the right place.

  Other than to say she was burning in paradise, Alena didn’t know what she was feeling. All she did know was that a heated tingle started between her legs and spread quickly outward to her thighs, her hips, her abdomen and then throughout her. Instinct arched her high off the stone bed and some unseen part of her just kept going upward. It ascended, not to the ceiling but out of the cave and rocketed straight up through the atmosphere. Then time simply stopped for one long glorious moment as she hovered high in the sky. The moment was perfect; she wanted to capture it and live in it forever.

  Then it burst. Exploded in a great fiery ball.

  A quiver, nearly violent in its strength, bolted through her and liquid rushed out of her in a long steady stream as her hips hovered in the air and Ares’ tongue lapped heatedly between her legs. He pushed his face and his fingers further into her and pushed her over the edge of sanity to a place she hoped never to return from. It seemed eternity before it was over and her hips lay on the stone, weak and unable to move.

  Wiping the juice off his beard Ares rose between her legs. “Now.” Putting one hand on each knee, he pushed her legs up and forward as he settled between them, still reminding himself to be somewhere near careful. This was her first time.