Faerie

by Jacobs Delle

  Except that he was not asleep. He lay on the bed, propped on one elbow, watching. His eyes grew hazy, seeming like smoke in the darkness. She knew that look. She was one of the Faeriekind in that way, that the gaze of a man whose thoughts were fixed on sexual desire was never a secret. Could it be that he wanted her, though he denied it so completely? But all men were that way, she knew for a fact. They were not discriminate creatures when it came to their desires. What was close was good enough.

  She would have turned away, except she could not. The very look of his eyes compelled her. Her heart began to speed, pounding, and something hungry inside her clawed at her insides, wanting to be released. She gathered her hair at her neck, slowly shifting it over her shoulder to cascade in thick waves to her knees. His steamy eyes followed every movement, as if they touched her skin and were like fingers playing through her hair. Her lips went dry, and she wet them with her tongue, aware that the bright moonlight played over her face, betraying her every move.

  His back straightened abruptly as he sat up in bed. She held her breath, her skin tingling as she watched him rise in the dark, fully nude, with his shaft hard and huge, as it had been in her dreams, and she could imagine its heat throbbing in her hands. She bit her lip.

  He was all bulging thighs and arms, with the magnificent curves only a huge, muscular man could have, broad shoulders and expansive chest tapering to tight muscles that rippled over his abdomen. And he was slowly, very slowly, moving forward, his eyes fixed on her, a rumpled frown on his brow.

  She froze where she stood, sudden terror lacing through her like lightning. Was it anger? The erect state of his shaft, the focused, yet perversely hazy predatory gaze as he approached, said something else. Had she been wrong when she had begun to doubt his guilt of the crime against her in the woods? Did he mean now to put an end to this farcical marriage?

  Nay. She let the shiver pass down her spine and fade away. She had made her decision, and she would not back down. Her resolution once more hardened as she awaited whatever was to be her fate.

  He moved to the narrow window, standing before her. The bright light of the full moon silvered his hard flesh, outlining the heavy veins beneath his bare skin where they meandered over his muscular arms. The deep furrow in his brow shifted oddly as his hand touched the thick hank of her hair that fell over her shoulder, and he lifted it into the light.

  Her own brow wrinkled in confusion, and then she saw it was not a frown of anger, but the strain of some deep sadness, a hungry yearning left suddenly bare and visible. She caught her breath at the starkness of his pain. Nay, not anger at all.

  What is it that gnaws at your soul, Peregrine? It’s more than the wife you lost. What is it?

  But she dared not ask aloud. She knew in her heart he could not share it with her.

  He released a deep sigh. Still fondling her long curl, he said, “Turn around. I will braid it for you.”

  She opened her mouth to protest, then closed it and did as he requested. Perhaps he could not look in her eyes any longer. He had shared, but just for a moment, and all she saw was his pain. But she knew as well he could not go further with it.

  Behind her back, he gathered her hair into a bunch at the back of her neck. With each grazing of his fingers as they plaited her hair, touch and touch, stopping to comb through the strand, then braid again, tiny caresses set her afire again and again. As he reached her waist, she swooped her hand behind her neck to lift the braid higher, the way she’d always done for Ealga. ’Twas a practical thing to do, but she knew she did it so his hands would not stop touching her.

  It could not last forever, though, and at last he came to the end of the braid, and reached for the ribbon to tie it. She mumbled her gratitude, knowing for these few moments they had both been liars, pretending they did not want, nay, hunger for each other.

  “Get some sleep,” he said, and turned his back to her. He removed his tunic from the carefully folded garments and pulled it over his head.

  “Where are you going?”

  “Go to bed. I must check the wall.”

  She knew better. His men were competent. He needed to leave, and that she understood. Perhaps it was best. She watched him buckle on his sword over his tunic, but he left the solar with bare legs and feet. Leonie lay on the featherbed and pulled the blanket over her against the cooling of the night, and turned her back to the door. She would pretend she didn’t care, and mayhap some day it would be true.

  She saw the Peregrine standing atop the mountain, wild wind tossing his golden hair in a frenzy with his deep blue mantle, his massive legs widely placed, arms spread out, sword in his hand, glowering down at the world.

  “What is it you would have, Peregrine? You only need ask.”

  She was Faerie. She knew in her heart what he wanted. He longed for her. That was what a man always wanted of a woman. She faced him, unafraid, unwilling to be afraid. She had decided. She would never give in to fear again.

  “You know.”

  “Aye.”

  But he did not ask. He only raked his honey-colored eyes over the length of her body. Why would he not take what was his right to take?

  “’Tis yours, Peregrine.”

  “You do not know.”

  “’Tis a fact. I do not.” The Faerie slid her willing hand down his chest and moved the cloak from his shoulders, so that he stood before her unclothed. She had known forever the feel, the look of his body, the smoothness of taut skin over hard muscle, the crispness of hair that clustered on his chest and around his shaft. She slid her hand over the heated flesh, feeling her own heat grow within, a mountain of wanting. She was Faerie. She knew wanting in the way no poor human maid could know.

  “Is this what you want?”

  “Nay.”

  “Say it.”

  “Nay. I must not.”

  “Are you a monk, Peregrine, that you have such monkish ways?”

  “Nay.”

  The Peregrine pulled her into his embrace. He kissed her lips roughly.

  They lay together on a verdant carpet of grass, their bodies touching, their hands exploring, fondling where they might. He found the crevice between her legs and explored. ’Twas a touch she had not known.

  “What is it you would have, Peregrine?”

  “Nothing. I want naught from you. Leave me, Faerie.”

  Leonie woke from the dream, feeling a tear sliding down her cheek. She brushed it away and lay back down.

  Silent as a slinking wolf the Peregrine came into the chamber and slipped into the bed, naked. Lying down, he nestled himself against the lady’s back. His arm lay over her waist, barely touching. The hardness of an erection came upon him quickly, but he had come to accept its ever-present state and shoved its demands to the back of his mind.

  He slept.

  Beneath his hand, the warmth of her flesh goaded his desire. He skimmed the silken flesh with light caresses. Desire would never go away, and somehow it felt better to torment himself with its exquisite pain as his balls grew hard, furiously, achingly hard.

  Still he slept, he dreamed. The aching of his flesh propelled him into flights of color and cloud. He flew through the lovely torture.

  Confusion stirred in her. Leonie shifted, feeling sleep part like a veil. It was a dream again, that deliciously frightening, enticingly sad dream. But her dream had become his.

  Nay, she was wrong. He really was touching her, with strokes that sent heat flowing through her veins. Reaching up, she felt his hand where it rested on her belly in its lightly caressing strokes. Did he sleep? She thought he did. Else, would he so willingly touch her?

  Aye, his dream, not hers. She had heard it, seen it in her mind, but it came from him. She could feel his torment, wanting, yet refusing himself, and she did not have to know why, only that his pain was deep. But in the dream, he could do as he wanted. If she closed her eyes again, would the dream come back to her?

  She closed her eyes, relaxed against him, soaking in the sensuousne
ss of his touch, to let the dream overtake her. ’Twas the curse of Faeriekind, Ealga had said, that they were forever bound to one love. But she was only half Faerie, or perhaps not even that much now. Would she be so bound? And her love was merely human, so he was not bound. If she were so cursed, she did not care. Shifting, she rolled partly to her back and moved her upper leg over his. His hand slid into the curls of her opened crotch. She hummed at the pleasant tingling. One broad finger slid into the cleft to rub against the excited nub inside. A jolt of passion shot through her like lightning, and involuntarily her back arched with a fierce shudder.

  Jerking awake again, she glanced over her shoulder. He still slept, yet his careful, insistent strokes continued. Well, who was she to wake him when he seemed to be having such pleasure? Furtively, she wiggled her hips to open herself wider to his strokes. Reaching between her legs past his hand, she ran her fingers down the length of his hot, hard, moist shaft, wildness turned loose inside her as if it spun through her body like a whirlwind.

  His moan was sharp. He lunged his body up off the coarse sheets, his eyes dark and wide, vacant of all except sudden, shocked lust. In one quick, fierce movement, he was atop her, his hands splaying fingers over her hair, his mouth pressed against hers, forcing against her, demanding. Eagerly, she opened to his kiss and the deep thrusting of his tongue that set her ablaze.

  “Damn you,” he said, breaking the kiss, then just as quickly pressing into another as she ran her fingers into his hair.

  She rocked against his body, he against hers. Her legs wrapped around to his back, locking him tightly to her, feeding her craving to have him inside her. She was Faerie. Aye, she had never known that as much as now, in her yearning for completion. This she would beg from him, if she must.

  His shaft fit against her as if made for her, and then began to push, sliding into the slick heat that had become everything. The murky haze of passion encompassed her like a thick fog, and her hips rocked, urging his invasion in every way she could, deeper and deeper, the most exquisite thing she had ever felt. No dream had ever been like this.

  For a moment he stopped, his forehead resting on her head. She felt the exhale of his breath and a tense trembling of his limbs. His heart pounded in his chest, palpable against her skin. “Damn you,” he whispered again, the words grating out.

  Then, pinning her arms, he lifted himself and began thrusting into her with fearful ferocity. She should be afraid, for he was angry enough. But she didn’t care. The harder he stroked the better it was. She bucked against him, forcing him into the places she most needed him, the ones that begged for more, for something that she knew could only come through her own release.

  She met him with the same ferocity. Feeling him move slightly to one side, she moved quickly, dumping him over, then rolling atop him. Just as suddenly, she moved her knees, straddling him, answering his shocked look with a wicked smile.

  She came down on him, burying him deeply inside her, and let her instinct, that Faerie part of her, have full rein. She could see the passion taking over his face as shock faded away and that ecstatic pain flooded his thinking mind and drowned it in the red haze. She wanted that.

  Aye. Let it be.

  Leonie threw back her head, eyes closed. Deep inside where his swollen shaft fought its battle, she let loose the muscles that tightened around it, relaxed, then tightened, harder, pulsed and pulsed, again, again. She moaned, shifting her hips to take in everything, repeating because she must. Her parts swollen against his, meant to fit, driving her need with such force, she thought she would die from it. Yet, nay, she must have it.

  “Ride me!” he said angrily. “Ride me, woman!”

  Aye—nay, she was not done yet. Instead, she contracted her muscles so tightly she thought she would scream.

  He roared. Loud and rough, like a berserker.

  Aye, my berserker, roar for me! Her breath like ragged northern winds, she leaned back and forth, feeling everything as deeply as she could, and then the violence of her completion convulsed through her, and she vanished into the hazy fog as her body found its rhythm.

  Gasping for breath, she fell against him. ’Twas done.

  But it was not. Even more fiercely than she, he rolled with her, landing her on her back, and in wild strokes drove deeply, deeply, over and over. With the rage of a bull, he thrust, bellowing, his body in the hard spasms of his release.

  He fell against her, breathing hard. She felt his racing heart finally slowing, quieting as at last he came to stillness.

  “Damn you,” he said once more, still not moving from his rest.

  Aye, she would be damned now. And she didn’t care. Perhaps Ealga had told the truth about the curse. And if that love be human male, they were doubly cursed. She smiled, a tiny smile known only to her. If so, then she welcomed it.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  LYING ON HIS back, Philippe fought away the fog and lethargy that engulfed him. Nearly seven years he had remained celibate, had successfully fought off his most violently hungry urges, at all costs resisting needs to which any normal man would have yielded.

  What had he done? How had she tricked him? Had she drugged him? He couldn’t remember, only that there had been the dream, and his eyes had popped open to find her leaning over him, caressing him intimately, and he was beyond the point of turning back. Had he been awake, he knew he could have resisted. He had withstood so much for so long.

  Forcing strength back into muscles and bones as limp as rags, he moved, and the more he moved, the more he regained his wobbly mind. He sat on the bed for a mere fragment of a moment, then leaped to his feet. Anger forced its way through the lethargy that fogged his brain. Briefly he wondered if he might have dreamed the entire thing. He often had such lurid dreams about her that they seemed real when he awoke. But then he looked down and saw that one limp part of his body sagging like a dead snake, and he knew exactly why.

  How dare she? They’d had an agreement. Rage at the betrayal surged like red heat through him, bringing potency to his limbs.

  “Witch,” he ground out like a curse, and he snatched up his tunic to pull over his head and cover himself from her leering stare. From the corner of his eye, he caught her movement and quickly turned his back to her.

  “I am no witch.” A tinge of fear lurked in her voice.

  “Then what are you, to turn me against my vows? You are no loyal wife.”

  “I? I only obeyed. I did no more than you asked—nay, commanded, of me.”

  “I commanded nothing of you.” Not even taking the time to put on his braies and hose, he snagged his sword belt and strapped it about his hips.

  “Are you so sure?” The temptress’s voice turned sultry as she padded almost silently across the rammed earth floor and stood behind him. Instantly his nether parts twitched. He froze where he stood.

  Damn her, didn’t she realize the damage she had wrought? But then, why would she, since he had never shared his hideous secret with her?

  He couldn’t. Never could he tell her. Yet her very life was endangered by what she had done. Only anger could defend him from worsening his mistake.

  She slid around to face him, her body starkly nude, and in spite of every oath he made to himself, his entire body sprang to life, readying for another go at it. Worse, he relived that exquisite torture in his mind in one wild, instant flash. He was doomed. And she, more so. God and Jesu help them both!

  She raised one finger to his chest and let it fall between the unlaced split in his tunic, right above the breastbone. “Did you dream this night, Peregrine?” she said.

  His breath froze in his lungs. Aye, he had dreamed.

  “So did I,” said the voice, twining about him and curling into his ears like a liquid smoke. Now she also knew they shared those lurid dreams. It could not be. Yet it was.

  Her pure green eyes with their sharply haughty gaze ripped through him like a falcon’s talons, then softened as if turning to smoke, and raked down his chest to that bedamned be
traying instrument of his destruction poking upward through his garment. Her lips slowly widened into a smile as lethal as a sword stroke.

  “Go if you wish, Peregrine. Be gone forever if that is your desire. Beat me, strangle me, truss me, and burn me at the stake. But never again will you convince me you do not want me.”

  He found the fury he desperately sought, swirling in streaks of darkly furious colors around him and girding him like the hard leather of his sword belt. He swung on his cloak to go back out into the night. The cock, the feathered kind, would soon crow. Night might belong to woman, but day belonged to man.

  Turning toward the door, his ears pricked to a faint sound. An odd one, not belonging to this castle. Beyond the walls. He focused on it, straining his ears toward it.

  “God’s face,” he hissed. “They’re here.”

  “What?”

  “Stay here, woman. This is man’s work.”

  As silently as he could, he hurried through the hall, waking Hugh and gesturing to him to be quiet. With hand motions, he signaled his guess that a battle was about to begin.

  Ignoring his command, Leonie rushed down the aisle, waking men as she went. At least she’d had the decency to pull on her chemise and kirtle.

  Leaving the soldiers and knights to Hugh’s supervision, he ran across the bailey toward the wall where he had heard the noise and dashed up the steps to the wall walk. He shushed the sentry before he could speak and leaned through the crenel toward the deep gloom beyond.

  “Are they out there?” Devil’s gore, it was her.

  He hissed at her to be quiet. “If you’re so determined to be a woman, go back to the solar and cringe behind the tapestries. The men will defend the castle.”

  “I cringe for no man. What do you hear?”

  “Aye, lord, what shall we do?” the sentry asked.

  “Wait. I can’t see where they are. But I hear them.”