by Brenda Joyce
Sibylla was taking her life.
Claire’s knees felt weak. She stumbled, aghast with what was happening. And she felt lust blaze in the other woman. Claire looked up to beg for her life.
Sibylla’s eyes were hot and bright as she leaped from the horse to kneel over Claire. And the moment their gazes connected, Claire knew she’d made a fatal mistake. For Sibylla began to mesmerize her and Claire felt her body relax, even though her mind screamed at her to resist. The mushy feeling inside her increased—and to her horror, a wave of pleasure swept her body, and her loins swelled, aching for a caress.
Sibylla laughed softly. “You have so much power! But I have known that for some time. Unfortunately, I’m not allowed to kill you, darling. And by the way, you won’t need that.”
And before Claire could understand, Sibylla leaned down and reached for her throat.
And Claire saw the other woman holding her mother’s necklace. Disbelief and impotence vanished. Instead, there was rage. She howled, attacking the woman, intent on dragging her down—she’d get the stone back! But Sibylla caught her wrist, her strength shocking once more. In that moment, Claire knew she was toast.
Time stopped. Silence fell. Her eyes gleaming and crazed like a drug addict’s, Sibylla thrust her shortsword deep into Claire’s shoulder.
Claire had never known so much pain. She stiffened, blinded by the red-hot agony, incapable of any thoughts except a terrible awareness of the stunning torment.
“I’m not allowed to kill you,” Sibylla whispered. “But maybe you’ll die anyway.” She released Claire.
Claire heard her but couldn’t reply. She sank to the ground, her legs giving way instantly. The sky was turning black. She wanted it to turn black. She spun in a cyclone of pain. Vaguely she heard Malcolm’s roar of rage. The pain made her want to die. Then there was nothing but silence.
MALCOLM PANICKED.
As Claire fell, blood pouring down her chest and arm, he froze. Then panic exploded. Sibylla leaped onto her horse, sword raised, and charged at him.
He came to his senses. He parried her blow effortlessly and ran past her steed to Claire. He knelt as the sounds of battle died behind him. “Claire!”
She was unconscious and bleeding profusely, dangerously. He saw that the sword had gone through most of her shoulder. There would be no way to save her arm if she lived, but the rate at which she was losing blood made her survival questionable. She needed someone who had the power to heal her with ancient gifts. He roared for his brother. “Aidan!”
Royce jumped from his charger, running to him. “They’re gone. Do ye have the page?”
“Aye. Get Aidan. Get Aidan here now!” Malcolm shouted at him, cutting off a long piece of his leine. She was turning white from the blood loss. He bound up the wound, aware of his hands shaking. She could not die!
Aidan leaped off of his black steed. Malcolm looked up and saw the fear in his half brother’s eyes. “Ye heal her,” he warned thickly. “Ye find the power an’ ye find it now!”
Aidan knelt. “Get away from me,” he said tersely, putting his hands on her wound. “Ye be a distraction I dinna need!”
Malcolm did not want to leave Claire. He stood, staring at her, unable to believe that this was happening. Fear made it almost impossible to think. He only knew he could not lose her. Not now, not like this. Not ever.
Aidan was sweating now.
Malcolm looked up at the heavens above and prayed. He prayed to all the old gods and, afraid they would not listen, offered them his own life in return for hers. Surely they would accept such a bargain! Then he looked down at his half brother. “What happens?” he cried. He could not find calm, no matter how he might try.
“I can feel her life,” Aidan said tersely. He finally glanced up. “She be weak, Malcolm.”
“Ye feel it returnin’ or leavin?” Malcolm demanded furiously. He knew how weak Claire was!
Royce seized his arm and pulled him away. “Yer fear doesna help him.”
“It be returnin’ to her,” Aidan said harshly. “She doesna need me. She be healin’ herself. I can feel her force. Malcolm, she has power.”
He felt no surprise. He had been suspicious of who she was from the start. Malcolm knelt and took Claire’s hand. As he did so, he felt her life, weak but steady, flowing in her hand, around his. He tried to sense her power and slowly, he began to feel it, soft but strong, a clean and good white life force, so oddly familiar.
Aidan pulled the soaking red linen off her arm. He laid his hand on the wound. “She’s nay bleedin’ now.”
As Aidan sat with her, his hands on her, Malcolm held her hand. He felt her pulse becoming stronger. Relief finally began.
Royce squatted and clasped his shoulder.
Malcolm looked at him.
“She’ll need to stay at Awe fer a few days,” Royce said. “I’ll take the page to Iona.” He hesitated. “I willna ask if ye’ll stay with her.”
“Good.” Malcolm wasn’t leaving Claire until she was well on her way to recovery. He reached into his brat and handed Royce the rolled-up page. Royce stood, his expression turning hard, and a moment later he had vanished into thin air.
Claire murmured his name.
Malcolm leaned over her. “Lass!”
Her lashes fluttered but her eyes did not open.
Aidan sagged to his hands and knees, his hands and forearms covered with Claire’s blood. He was deathly white. “Get her inside. Ye can move her now,” he gasped.
Malcolm realized Aidan had used his own power to heal Claire, so much so that he had made himself weak. He was dumbfounded. He signaled to the men surrounding them. “Help yer lord into the keep,” he said sharply.
“I be fine,” Aidan snapped, but he remained on the ground and did not appear to be capable of getting up.
He was a pigheaded man, Malcolm thought grimly. He knelt and lifted Claire gently into his arms. More relief made it hard to breathe. Two men had helped Aidan to his feet and he stared.
Malcolm gave in. “Thank ye.”
Aidan nodded. “Ye be welcome.”
CLAIRE REALIZED she was in a fluffy feather bed. Floating on down, she smiled dreamily, wondering whose bed she was in. Maybe she was dreaming, she somehow thought, as her own Doctor’s Choice mattress was far firmer than this. Sunlight poured into the room. But such bright sunlight was nonexistent in Manhattan. Claire blinked, confused, and saw unfamiliar, crude stone walls that bobbed around her. Her shoulder hurt, the throbbing ache deep and intense. Then she realized that she was in someone’s arms.
Claire pushed through the layers of fog. She was dazed, groggy. She saw a man’s powerful forearm across her waist and felt his broad chest against her back, and realized Malcolm lay on his side behind her, and she was spooned against him. He felt incredibly right—strong, warm, safe. The room continued to slowly spin. She wasn’t in the city or the present. She began to recall the terrible battle outside of Awe and Sibylla’s vicious attack. Sibylla had thrust her sword into Claire’s shoulder and she had enjoyed doing it. She had enjoyed taking some of Claire’s life force even more.
Claire realized she was on some kind of medieval drug and it was hellishly strong. The bed seemed to be on a merry-go-round and it was hard to think clearly. She should be out of her mind with pain. But maybe there was another reason she wasn’t in agony.
Afraid, Claire tensed and looked at her left arm, but it was attached to her shoulder. She sank against Malcolm in sheer relief. How long had she been unconscious? Days? Weeks? Thank God someone had saved her arm!
She somehow shifted, so she was on her back and could look up at him. She had assumed him to be asleep, but he was wide-awake and watching her closely. When she met his gaze, he smiled.
It was a beautiful, unreserved, heartbreaking, heartwarming smile. “Good afternoon, lass,” he said softly.
Claire shifted to face him, pain stabbing through her, but not badly. Malcolm seemed to bob, too, but not in tandem with the walls and
window. She laid her left hand on his hard chest and shivered with pleasure. “These are wild drugs,” she whispered. “Why are you in my bed?” She smiled up at him.
His hand clasped her waist. “I was tired. I thought to sleep.”
Claire looked up into his stunningly gentle and uncomplicated gray eyes. Affection shimmered there. “You have your own bed,” she murmured. Was she seeing what she wanted to see, as she was so heavily under the influence of whatever potion she had been given?
He hesitated. “Do ye remember what happened, lass?”
Claire nodded. “How did they save my arm?”
Malcolm met her searching gaze. “Aidan worked to heal ye. But ye have yer own powers, Claire. There’s no more denyin’ it.”
She knew that was absurd. “The stone has power,” she whispered, reaching for it with her left hand. She froze—it was gone. Sibylla had taken it.
“I’ll get it back fer you,” Malcolm said, sliding his other hand into her hair, the gesture entirely comforting.
But Claire wasn’t comforted. In that instant, in spite of the weaving room, Claire knew that stone had belonged to her father. She recalled the way Ironheart had inspected it. But it would be an impossible coincidence if her father had been his brother. “It was my father’s. I am certain of it now.” Panic began. She would be lost without the stone! It was her only connection to her parents.
“Dinna worry about the stone.”
But Claire was ill over the theft. “Why would she take it?”
“The stone may be givin’ ye yer powers. Ye said ye wore it since yer mother died. That’s a long time to wear magic, lass. I think that is why Sibylla took it from ye.”
Claire thought that made a lot more sense than having powers of her own, which she knew she did not. But she was recalling something else, something she really didn’t want to think too closely about. “Malcolm, I think Sibylla said she was not allowed to kill me.”
He looked away from her now. “Ye be confused. Father Paul has given ye strong herbs an’ flowers.”
Maybe he was right, especially as the bed continued to slowly move around and round like a carousel. She used her left hand to touch his chest, beneath the veed neckline of the leine. His skin was warm, the hair there crisp. His eyes flickered and she knew he wanted her to continue touching him. Claire felt a stirring between her legs, a dryness in her mouth, and was surprised that she felt desire now. “You feel so good,” Claire whispered. “Whatever he gave me, I like it. How long have I been unconscious?”
“Two days.” His tone had changed.
Claire would have never believed it possible to feel this way after two short days. But she didn’t care to analyze that, because Malcolm was having a very definite reaction to their proximity and her caress, and so was she. She met his gaze, watched it smolder, watched it go to her lips. She slid her hand up to his neck, shifting so she could arch sensually toward him. A very firm erection leaped against her hip.
“I’ll go,” he said, but he did not move, watching her closely.
“I miss you,” she breathed in return. Damn, she might as well have been drunk. “I miss you so much.”
Malcolm’s breathing had deepened. He hesitated. “Ye scared me, lass.”
“Why?” Claire asked, drifting her hand lower to his ribs, over the linen. He was such a beautiful man. “How could I possibly scare you?” She couldn’t help it. The moment almost felt like a dream. She leaned toward him and pressed her mouth against his chest, in the gaping vee of the leine, near the heavy cross he wore.
He closed his eyes, not making a sound.
“This is so perfect.” She vaguely recalled the terrible events of the night he had been locked in the tower, but it felt like a lifetime ago and she knew it could not affect them now. She moved her mouth to his neck. She opened her mouth there, long and slow.
His body tensed. “Ye scared me ’cause ye almost died,” he whispered roughly.
She stared into his eyes. He stared back and she smiled, because she was very much alive and there was moisture gathering to prove it. She stroked lower, to his navel, and met a thrusting head through the leine. She slowly looked up.
His gaze was bright silver. Claire slowly lifted the leine out of the way. She was expecting him to seize her hand to forestall her and jump from the bed. Instead, his hand tightened on her waist.
Claire gave in to swelling desire. She sighed and lay back against the pillows, leaving her hand on his bare hip, careful not to touch him now. Malcolm moaned.
“Do you like being teased?” she murmured, scrapping her nails gently over his belly.
“Nay very much,” he warned.
She smiled and ran a nail around his burning hot head.
Malcolm turned toward her, his face as crimson as his member. Claire leaned low and used her tongue.
He fell onto his back. “Thank ye, lass.”
Claire wanted to enjoy every possible inch of him, unhurried and unrushed. And when she came up for air, he was breathing hard, and their gazes met.
She inhaled when she saw the look in his eyes. “Come here,” he said softly.
She slid her thigh over his in an unmistakable invitation, the chemise she wore riding high. She thought, this is so perfect, slow and hot and soft.
“I dinna mind slow, lass, but soft?” His smile came and went as he slid against her, probing there.
Claire gasped with pleasure as he slowly slid deep. “I meant gentle,” she managed to say as he filled her. Tears came. Pleasure rose, a growing wave.
“Ye meant this,” he said roughly, pulling her closer and moving with excruciating care and deliberation, so slowly. “Ye did mean this?” A teasing note had entered his thick tone.
“Yes,” she tried, and gave up. She closed her eyes and allowed a sweet, soft sensual release to begin. She cried out and pleasure rained down on them.
He gasped and she felt him smile. He began to move more swiftly, accelerating the pace. And suddenly an entirely new urgency began.
Claire tensed, holding on to one shoulder, instantly sensing the change in him. Every single muscle in his hard body had turned to steel, his heart rate exploding against her breast. A new, terrible ambition had arisen, and she felt his mind going to a dark, dangerous place. Malcolm went still.
“Come back,” Claire whispered, holding on tightly, afraid in spite of her daze. “Don’t go there. Come back to me.”
Malcolm struggled with himself, the muscles in his arms bulging, his penis throbbing. “I want all o’ ye,” he ground out. He lifted his head and she met blazing eyes, eyes she instantly recognized, mirroring unholy, uncontrollable lust.
He knelt over her, pushing her onto her back. And as he loomed there, she saw his body thicken with more power, more muscle, while black shadows formed behind him and red fire burned there. Still buried inside, he threw his head back and panted and Claire felt him touch her life.
She gasped as the room whirled, a sudden vortex of pleasure sucking her in.
Malcolm cried out savagely, and then he jumped from the bed.
No shattering ecstasy came. The spinning eased. Claire somehow sat up. The room tilted wildly. She met fierce, glittering silver eyes. She blinked and saw Malcolm leaving the chamber.
Claire collapsed against the pillows, fighting for air. The spinning room slowed but did not stop. Malcolm, don’t go, she begged.
If he heard her silent cries, he did not answer.
She somehow sat up again. She cursed the herbs and flowers, but that did not clear her mind. They had been making love and he had turned into that raging beast. She had felt him touch her deeply, she had felt him touch her soul. She stumbled from the bed.
Claire reeled but made it to the door. She pushed it open. “Malcolm.”
There was no response.
She felt him leaving, not just her but Awe. Alarmed, Claire rushed to the stairs. She tripped, falling against the wall. Strong hands seized her.
“Let him go,” Ai
dan said firmly, a command. “Ye need to rest an’ he needs to go. He’s huntin’ Sibylla now.”
Claire shook her head. “I am…going with him!”
“Dinna make me cuff ye in the head a second time,” Aidan warned.
Claire couldn’t answer. The stairs were lurching toward her. For one moment, she really believed it was an earthquake. Then Aidan caught her and the stairs leveled and settled where they belonged.
Exhausted, despairing, Claire started to weep.
THREE DAYS LATER, Claire stared at her shoulder in the looking glass in her chamber. The potion had finally worn off and she felt as healthy as ever. Her shoulder had a vivid and unattractive pink scar, but miraculously, otherwise, there was no sign of the recent wound. Yesterday when it had rained, her shoulder had ached. Today it felt fine, but when she reached overhead she was aware of a slight strain.
Ye have yer own powers, Claire. There’s no denyin’ it.
The stone, which Sibylla had stolen, had somehow imprinted her with its power to heal. Claire pulled her sleeve down and glanced at the vase of wildflowers that Isabel had brought to her room. Several days old, they were dying.
She stared at the flowers, thinking about seeing them rehydrate, grow, even blossom. She should have felt foolish. She did not. Nothing happened.
Claire picked a small pink blossom up and held it in her hand. She tried to focus. Instead of returning to its brilliant state of days before, a petal fell to the floor.
She sighed, putting the flower down. Whatever power she might have had, it was gone. Besides, Aidan had helped to heal her, and there was no question that he had some abilities, even if he wasn’t adept at using them all of the time.
Claire became grim. Malcolm was hunting Sibylla. Maybe she was paranoid, but she was afraid it was another trap.
She’d had three days to think about him—about them. It was dangerous feeling about him as she did. It was probably hopeless for her to want him to return her love. Claire knew she couldn’t control her own feelings or her yearning. They were in a relationship, as difficult and strained as it was. It wasn’t going to last forever. At some point, she was going home. But while she stayed in medieval times, she wanted it to work.
