by Jan Delima
“Yes,” she confirmed in a quiet voice, rubbing her hands up and down her arms as if warding off a chill. “After you left, after our father died . . . our mother lived with Madron for a while.”
“I didn’t know.” Bile rose in his throat as rage clouded his vision. “You should have told me. Why have you kept this secret?”
“It was my secret to keep.”
“Even from me?”
“Yes, brother . . . even from you.”
A question he shouldn’t ask fell from his mouth. “Did Madron ever touch you?”
“No.” Her denial eased his tension somewhat, but not enough, not when her eyes remained distant and her voice haunted. “Even at fourteen years of age I was too old for his peculiar tastes. I shared a chamber with one of his favorites.”
A shattered breath fell from her lips and Dylan remained quiet, in part because he was afraid of his own voice, afraid his anger would, in some way, debase her confession.
“Her name was Leri,” Elen continued. “She was ten, not yet showing signs of womanhood. Madron would send his sister to our chamber at night to bathe Leri. And dress her in fine silks. She never told me what happened when they took her each night, but I knew . . . She made me promise not to tell anyone. She made me promise not to speak of it. And I never have . . . until now.”
When he spoke, it was only to say, “I am sorry.”
“It had naught to do with you.” She waved away his apology as if it were an annoying insect about to feed on one of her precious plants. “I’m not sharing this story to put more weight on your conscience. You do that well enough yourself. I’m sharing this because I want you to understand the importance of Sin’s weapon.”
Dylan understood full well the importance of Taliesin’s weapon. “Go on.”
“One night, when Madron sent his sister, Leri refused to go. He returned to our chamber in person . . . but this time Sin was with us, telling Leri and me a tale of evil men and courageous knights, and why some men needed to die. Sin was waiting for Madron. I realize that now.” She took a deep breath and let it out. “He told us to turn our backs, to cover our eyes. Leri obeyed . . . but I didn’t. I wanted to see. The beheading was instant. You would not believe how fast unless you saw it with your own eyes.”
A human’s spine was strong, a Guardians’ even stronger. A beheading didn’t happen in an instant, not without momentum, weight, muscle, gravity, or a device that embodied all those qualities. “He used the Serpent to do this?”
Understanding the direction of his thoughts, she added, “I don’t believe the Serpent of Cernunnos is entirely of this world.”
“I would have to agree.” Dylan had felt its power, its anger, when he had tried to take it from Sophie.
Elen started to pace. “If the Guardians knew that Sophie has possession of it . . .”
A reminder he didn’t need. “Then Taliesin will have condemned my wife.”
She stopped in front of his chair and gave him a pointed look. “Sin may be trying to protect Sophie. He obviously cared enough to get involved.”
Condemn or protect?
“Are they not one and the same?” Dylan felt as if a vise had tightened around his heart. Anyone who knew Taliesin’s history understood the frightening significance of that statement, because every person that man cared about always ended up dead.
Elen didn’t deride him with false words of solace. “Then it has finally come.” Her voice deadened with acceptance. “The time has finally come for us to face the Guardians.”
“Yes.” It was a soft answer, one he’d given before, one he didn’t enjoy giving again. She’d held on to hope, he knew, to the possibility of another explanation for the banner, but Sophie’s possession of the Serpent was a new warning too significant to deny the impending arrival of the Guardians.
He reminded her, “We are proceeding with a course of action in two days hence. I expect arrivals to begin Friday after sunset. If you’re not going to use your apartments, I’ll have them prepared for Isabeau.”
“Of course.” Elen waved her hand absently. “Sophie should be told of the gathering.”
A sound came from his pocket and for once he wasn’t annoyed by the interruption. He retrieved his cell phone and flipped it open. “What?”
Gabriel’s voice filtered through the line; he was one of the guards assigned to the woods surrounding the lake house. “Your wife is running.”
His vision blurred as he gripped the phone. Utter, immobilizing fear clawed at his spine. “How far did she get?”
He listened to the directions as Elen hovered close with a worried frown.
“What’s wrong?” she whispered.
“Sophie’s running away.”
The phone fell from his grip as he slammed out of Elen’s house, her voice a distant warning by the time he hit the forest at a full sprint.
Fifteen
SOPHIE FOCUSED ON THE EVEN POUNDING OF HER STRIDES until she sensed a second echo, a second rhythm interrupting hers. It was her only warning before her feet left the ground.
It happened so fast, inhumanly fast, she had no time to react other than to hold out her hands to accept most of the fall. One moment she was running and the next she was on the ground, face first, gravel cutting into her palms with a large mass on top of her.
The form of a man—not a wolf—held her down with forearms and large hands.
“Don’t move,” an all-too-familiar voice growled next to her ear; the weight of his body forced air from her lungs.
“Good God . . . Dylan?” She practically melted with relief that she hadn’t retaliated, and yet the hard earth beneath her cheek was a cold reminder that she should have. If it had been anyone other than Dylan, that split-second hesitation could have cost her life. She twisted out from under him, using a root from a nearby tree for leverage to crawl forward. “What is wrong with you?”
“Did I tell you too much yesterday?” He grabbed her leg and pulled; her sweatpants caught on a rock or fallen branch, she wasn’t sure which, just something sharp that exposed her calf as he continued to yank and her clothing refused to follow, bunching up around her knee. “Is that why you’re running away?”
“What?” she seethed through clenched teeth. “Running away? Are you crazy? I’m not running away. I’m jogging.”
“Jogging?” He sounded confused.
“Yes, jogging. You know . . . like . . . exercise.” She lunged forward, grabbing at the ground for more leverage, kicking backward and hoping to land a solid blow on his chest if her calculations were correct. “I would never leave my son.”
He grunted as her foot landed on something solid. Unfortunately it didn’t dislodge his hand, which continued to remain a vise around her ankle.
But then his motions stilled and his voice took on a strange tone, low and barely audible. “What is that on your leg?”
“It’s called a knife,” she snapped, twisting onto her back to face him, forcing him to let go of her ankle or be tangled in her legs. He loosened his grip enough for her to turn. Her new position freed her right leg. She braced her foot against his groin, eyebrows raised in challenge and ready to kick.
His eyes were not on her knife.
But on her exposed skin instead.
With proficient motions, he yanked off her calf holster and threw it onto the path, uncaring that it fell within reach. He left the other leg alone, obviously not threatened by either weapon. Instead, he tried to push her pants farther up her exposed leg. After a few seconds of fighting with the elastic material, he decided to yank them down, and off, instead.
Aware now of what he’d seen, of what he wanted to see more of, Sophie kicked out, only to have her free leg caught and disarmed, his movements a blur to her human eye. Her sneakers followed. She fell back with a groan, knowing a struggle would only prolong the inevitable. Genetically, he was stronger than her. She was human. And he was . . . more.
Besides, she was beginning to accept the fact that she rea
lly didn’t have the heart to fight this man; her heart had an entirely different desire.
He peeled the pants completely off and threw them to the side. She had removed her sweatshirt during her run and tied it around her waist. It had untangled sometime during their scuffle, offering no protection from his heated glare.
Irritated, more with herself than him, she rose to a semi-sitting position and leaned back on her elbows, looking down the length of her bared body. All that remained were her sleeveless concealed holster shirt over a sports bra, purple underwear and white ankle socks. Her gun bulged outward from her side. Pine needles and dirt clung to her sweat-coated skin, but not enough to hide the purple scars that puckered her left leg from hip to mid-calf, more prominent because of the chilled air and her matching hip-hugger briefs.
“Who did this to you?” His voice was raw, almost broken as he knelt before her.
Her answer lodged in her throat as Luc chose that moment to barge into the clearing. Wild silver eyes scanned the area until he looked down and found his quarry. Six others followed: three men, two women and a brown wolf. One of the women was Taran. Without being asked, the guards formed a circle around Dylan and Sophie.
There was a gasp and several murmurs as they assessed the situation—and Sophie’s exposed leg.
“Who did this to you?” Dylan asked again, uncaring that they now had an audience.
“It happened the night I left you . . . but it looks worse than it was,” she told him, only because she wanted out of there as quickly as possible. “I think if I had gone to a hospital it would have healed better.”
His voice lowered to a deadly whisper. “Are you telling me that Siân did this to you?”
“Yes,” she answered with more calm than she felt, feeling the weight of eight sets of eyes. “I told you that Siân threatened to kill us if we ever returned. And that I had reason to believe she’d try. I don’t make false accusations.”
A strangled sound came from Taran, a moan of feminine denial laced with fear.
“You didn’t tell me she had harmed you,” Dylan ground out, tracing his hand over the puckered scars.
Gritting her teeth, she placed her hand over his to stop the movement. “The scars are sensitive to touch,” she explained.
“Your nerves were damaged.” A tremor entered his voice, an odd sound coming from a man who never showed emotion. “You were not treated well here . . . were you, my wife?” It was a question he obviously didn’t expect an answer to and so she remained silent. “I brought you into the woods that night to help you understand why I kept you away from your family. And in return you were attacked by one of my people. It’s no wonder you never returned.”
At a loss for an appropriate response, she clung to the obvious. “I’m here now.”
“Yes,” he challenged. “But for how long?”
“I will always choose the path I believe best for our son. That path has led me back to you. Joshua needs you. And I will stay as long as my son wants me to.”
Looking somewhat consoled, Dylan shifted onto his side and stood, helping Sophie up. With calm proficiency, he found her sweatpants and handed them to her. Ignoring the pine needles and dirt stuck to her skin and bottom, and probably other areas she didn’t want to think about, she yanked them back on. She walked over to her discarded sneakers, paused to unroll her wet socks, and shoved her bare feet into the shoes. Next, she retrieved her knives, letting the holsters dangle from her hands rather than bending over to strap them back on.
Feeling more secure dressed, she looked up only to find Luc watching her with one black eyebrow raised to her weapons and a slight grin on his face. He dipped his head in acknowledgment.
Dylan took a step toward the circle of guards. “Taran, did you know of this?”
“I didn’t.” Taran fell to her knees, her head bowed. “I swear, Penteulu, I didn’t know.”
“You sensed nothing,” Dylan spat.
Her breath fell from her lips. “I . . . I knew something had happened. My sister changed after that night, her mind became whole again for a while.” Absolute fear laced through the woman’s voice, a plea more than an explanation. “Siân thought . . . She thought you were free again. She refused to believe that woman’s child was yours. She refused to believe you were mated.”
Sophie frowned at the woman’s choice of words. Mate was a very specific term, especially when referring to the habits of wolves.
Luc stepped forward and the others moved out of his path. His hair was loose and black around his shoulders, his chest bare. Several tattoos of black symbols and scrolls covered his back and upper arms, more noticeable as he hovered over the bent woman.
“There would have been blood,” Luc sneered as he grabbed a fistful of red hair and pulled her head back with enough force to lift her knees off the ground. “A good wolf would have sensed it on her sister.”
Sophie took a step forward but then stopped. She was becoming more aware, and sadly, more comfortable with their dominant behavior now that she knew its source.
“I didn’t,” Taran pleaded, her eyes rolling back and then away. “Siân reeked of skunk for days.”
“I was sprayed by skunks that night,” Sophie admitted. Upon hearing her voice, Luc’s grip on Taran’s hair eased enough so that her knees touched the ground. “I hid in a hollowed trunk occupied by skunks. It may have hidden my scent. It took days for the smell to leave my skin.”
Frowning, Luc looked to his brother. “How should I proceed?”
Sophie took another step forward and placed a hand on Dylan’s cheek, guiding him to look down at her. Gold and green streaks had bled through the blackness of his gaze.
She swallowed, keeping her voice calm. “Taran wasn’t there that night. Punish her if you think she’s a threat to our son, but don’t punish her for what her sister did to me. She wasn’t responsible for her sister’s actions.”
He rubbed his cheek against her palm, unshaven and rough against her skin, before turning his head toward his brother. “Luc, take Taran home and question her at your discretion . . . for I cannot without prejudice. If you feel she’s innocent, I will default to your judgment. But”—he looked to Taran as he made his last order—“I want her removed from guard responsibilities.”
Luc gave a sharp nod. “Understood.”
Dylan looked to the others. “John and Malsum, return to your posts. The rest, follow Luc.”
There were murmured farewells and a few nods in Sophie’s direction. As their footsteps retreated, she tried to ignore the pounding of her heart, although Dylan surely must have heard it. “Will Luc harm her?”
Dylan shook his head, holding her hand to place a kiss inside her palm before answering. “Not unless she gives him due cause. He will remove her from her duties and keep her contained and watched until we know she can be trusted.”
“Good,” she said, tugging her hand from his grasp and turning away, not because she didn’t like it, but because she did.
Not dissuaded, Dylan walked up behind her and wrapped his arms around her waist. “No,” he said as she tensed, “don’t resist me. Just let me hold you.”
His heat seeped into her muscles, so warm, so enticing, as if she could melt into his arms and all their troubles would go away. How long had it been since she’d allowed someone to hold her? To comfort her?
Forever, it seemed. Not since the birth of her son. Not since Dylan had brought her into these very woods sixteen years ago.
With her back to his chest, she slowly relaxed into the sensation of being protected. Unfortunately, something Taran had said continued to ride her thoughts and refused to be ignored. “How much are you compelled by the instincts of the wolf?”
His arms tightened around her. “More than I would like.”
“Taran said her sister didn’t believe you were mated. Mate is a very specific term, especially for wolves.”
One hand loosened from her waist and found the elastic in her ponytail, tugging until her ha
ir fell around her shoulders. “I like your hair down.”
“You’re changing the subject.”
“Then stop hedging and just ask me what you want to know.”
“Fine.” She took a deep breath and let it out. “This is going to sound silly, because I know wolves don’t always mate for life.” She was rambling, she knew, but couldn’t seem to stop. “If one mate dies, the survivor will find another.”
He nuzzled her hair; his breath whispering against the exposed flesh of her neck. “You don’t feel dead to me.”
Her stomach twisted. “Oh, God.”
“That’s right.” His lips dropped to her neck, a whisper of movement against her sensitive skin. “Our son isn’t the only thing I lost when you left me.”
“But you’re also a man,” Sophie emphasized, trying to ignore the sigh of his breath across her nape. “Humans are not bound by those convictions. Surely . . .”
“I’m compelled by both human and wolf instincts. For our kind, the melding of the two strengthens the mating bond, as if human emotion reinforces the wolf’s choice. Most of us mate for life.” His cutting tone left little doubt that he considered himself among the ones who did.
“So there are others of your kind who don’t? How do you know for sure that you’re not one of them?” Inwardly she cringed, aware that she had opened a precarious door to a difficult subject.
“Like all humans,” he stated bluntly, “I could bed anything I wanted. I could carry out the act. But because my wolf has chosen its mate, because you conceived my child, mating with anyone other than you would feel unnatural, a violation.”
She closed her eyes. “Like a rape?”
“I wouldn’t know.” He dropped his hands from her hair and returned them to her waist. “I’ve never had a taste for that act, but there a few of my kind who have no distinction between the two.”
“The Guardians, I assume.”
“You’re learning.” He plucked at the waistband of her concealed weapon shirt, changing the subject once again. “Where did you get this garment?” Annoyance darkened his voice.
