It seemed a waste to leave such glorious weapons hanging unused on a wall.
“They’re quite magnificent,” he said.
“Do you think so?” Miriel asked.
“Oh, aye, most magnificent.”
His response pleased Miriel.
When she’d first entered the chamber, she’d naturally been shocked to find Rand within, horrified to find him wielding her chut gieh. But to think he might be genuinely interested in her weapons…
She’d begun collecting Chinese arms from the time she’d brought Sung Li home. As far as anyone knew, they were simply pieces of art Miriel liked to hang upon her wall, chosen in part to appease Lord Gellir, who had never understood her dislike for combat. That was the tale she’d told everyone. Not even her sisters suspected Miriel actually knew how to use them.
The fact that Rand seemed interested in them relieved and delighted her. Did she dare to hope he shared the same fascination with such things? Perhaps she could teach him how they were used.
Then Sung Li had interrupted, claiming the weapons were his, and Miriel suddenly realized the truth of her situation. She could hardly admit to owning a grisly collection of Chinese weapons herself. How could she possibly explain that the docile lady Rand had fallen in love with was an imposter? That the real Miriel was neither meek nor mild? That she could pick up that kwan do and kill a man in a single blow?
Not that she had, of course. One of the important philosophies of Chinese warfare was that violence was always a last resort. Deadly force and lethal skill were paramount, but the preferable choice was having to use neither.
“What are you doing here?” Sung Li demanded, facing Rand with his arms crossed imperiously over his chest.
Miriel wondered that, too. But her curiosity was tempered by pity. Rand was trying desperately to fit in, and he was obviously discomfited by what he’d done. There was no need to make him more uncomfortable.
“I asked him to meet me here,” she lied.
There was a flicker of surprise in Rand’s eyes, but he was quick to pick up on her ploy. “Aye.”
Sung Li narrowed his eyes. “Indeed? In your bedchamber?”
Miriel shrugged. “I didn’t want to go down to the lists.” She wrinkled her nose. “’Tis far too dusty.”
“Oh, aye,” Rand agreed. “Couldn’t have her soiling her pretty skirts.”
“Hmph.” Sung Li could see Miriel was hardly wearing pretty skirts. Indeed, it was only her drab brown work kirtle. And if he’d known that Miriel had been rolling in the hay in it earlier, he would have been even more disgusted. “And what were you meeting for?”
“Er…” Rand glanced at Miriel, at a loss.
“Rand and I,” she said, crossing the room to take him by the hand, “are going riding.”
From the corner of her eye, she saw Rand’s mouth twitch. She prayed he wouldn’t laugh, for if he did, so would she, then their perfidy would be discovered.
Sung Li looked from one to the other, clearly displeased, but there was nothing he could do. Though he was Miriel’s xiansheng when they sparred, he was not her master. Indeed, in front of Rand, he was little more than a servant. He could not dictate where Miriel might and might not go.
Sung Li raised his chin smugly and said, “But what about the physician, my lady? Did you not promise to accompany him to the monastery today?”
God’s eyes! She’d forgotten. She’d offered to help treat an ailing monk. That was the reason she’d canceled her riding trip in the first place. That was also why she’d come to her chamber, to fetch a cloak and a few of her own medicines.
But instead of conceding defeat, thinking quickly, she flashed Sung Li her sweetest smile. “Oh, Sung Li, you’d do that for me? Go in my place? How kind. I’d be so grateful.” She turned to ask Rand, “Is Sung Li not the most wonderful maidservant?”
“Wonderful,” Rand agreed.
The frown between Sung Li’s brows deepened, and his eyes darkened with fury. He might not be able to issue orders to Miriel at the moment or even refuse her requests, but he could make her life miserable when they sparred on the morrow. She could almost see him dreaming up harrowing exercises for her.
Still, it was worth saving Rand’s pride. Besides, with one of the day’s most time-consuming duties delegated to Sung Li, Miriel would have time to spend with her suitor.
“You’d better hurry then,” she urged the maid, snapping up two vials from her table and handing them to Sung Li. “Here are the medicines. The monastery may keep them. I’ll purchase more tomorrow at the fair.”
When she placed the bottles near Sung Li’s hand, he grasped her wrist in a subtle but sharp pinch, pinning her with a gaze as pointed as the shuriken on the wall.
She refused to cry out or flinch. She understood Sung Li was communicating his intense disapproval. But two could play at that game.
Miriel reached out her other hand, ostensibly to press the vials into his palm, but instead grasped the meaty flesh between his thumb and finger between her short nails and squeezed.
For a long moment, the two of them stared stoically at each other, neither one willing to admit pain or defeat.
“Give the father my best wishes,” Miriel said with a taut smile.
“Enjoy your ride,” Sung Li replied, returning her smile.
“Tell Brother Thomas I shall pray for his recovery.”
“Watch out for slippery ground.”
“Don’t forget your cloak.”
“Don’t be late for supper.”
It was Rand who ended the stand-off. “I’ll go find a carpenter to repair your bed.”
Miriel released Sung Li and whirled about. “That won’t be necessary.” Then, with her warmest smile, she crossed the room to open the door for Sung Li, bidding him a deceptively fond farewell. “Have a safe journey, Sung Li.”
As Sung Li passed by her, Miriel felt the anger shimmering off him, almost like the heat off a forge. As he walked through the doorway, he turned to have the last word, probably a reprimand for entertaining men alone in one’s bedchamber. But before he could speak, she shut the door in his face. Whirling about, she leaned back against the closed door and offered Rand a lazy grin.
Rand clucked his tongue. “What a pair of liars we are.”
“Liars? I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Feeling rather self-assured, having challenged Sung Li and won, she ambled up to Rand and coyly walked her fingers up his tabard. “It seems I do have time for a ride after all.”
Her own daring excited her, and it was only magnified by the gleam of pleasure that flared in Rand’s gaze.
“Indeed?” His voice was rough with desire, and there was no doubt when their gazes met just what kind of ride they intended.
She smiled at the way his eyes shone, dark and inviting and full of affection, and suddenly she knew she’d made the right decision.
She had to lose her maidenhood sometime, after all. And there was no one she’d rather give it to than Rand.
He caught her straying fingers, raised them to his lips, and gave her knuckles a slow, suggestive lick that sent a shiver through every nerve in her body. “Your steed is ready and waiting, my lady.”
Chapter 17
Rand decided he must be the luckiest man alive. Miriel was a gift from God, a woman who would lie for him and with him.
At the moment, he wanted nothing more. It didn’t matter that they’d trysted in the stables an hour ago. Nor did he care that she was distracting him from his duties. He’d even lost his interest in Sung Li’s exotic weapons.
The temptation of stretching out on a real pallet with his ladylove by the light of day, joining with her in complete union—body, heart, and soul—was impossible to resist.
Somehow they managed to make it to the bed, despite the little wanton’s impatient caresses and gasping kisses and frantic clawing at his tabard. He was determined to be gentle with her, no matter how insistent her need. He might be a savage warrior when it served hi
m, but he was also capable of great tenderness, especially when he was making love to the woman he adored.
It was a most challenging task, for everywhere she touched him, she left desire burning like a brand upon his skin, and in every fiber of his body, he longed to douse that flame.
But he used the utmost restraint, refusing to let her rush him, no matter how her fingers pulled at his clothes, no matter how many kisses she showered upon him. Of course, his withdrawal only incited her further. Soon she had slung her leg possessively over him and was trying to climb atop him on the pallet.
“Ah, lady,” he groaned, chuckling ruefully, “if you start at a gallop, the ride will be over before it’s begun.”
Her eyes looked as hazy and blue as distant pines as she said, “Perhaps we shall go on more than one ride.”
He grinned. “Indeed? You are a woman of ambition.”
Another time he’d let her ride him like a destrier, steering him to her will. Another time he’d let her spur him on and rein him back, give her complete control. But for her first time, he needed to take charge.
He rolled her over forcefully, trapping her legs between his own and seizing her straying hands to still their seduction. She gave a whimper of irritation. The headstrong vixen clearly didn’t like yielding to his whims.
“Let me ride you, my wild little mare,” he coaxed her. “I promise your day will come.”
She frowned, displeased at her unseating, but she wasn’t displeased for long. When he loosened her kirtle, dragging it down with his teeth to suckle at her succulent breasts, she sighed in gratification. When he plucked off her shoes, then pushed her skirts up to roll down her stockings slowly, she shivered with delight.
“I want to see all of you,” he whispered, “by the full light of day.”
Miriel was not a shy creature where her body was concerned, and while the trait seemed at odds with her meek nature, he was grateful for her brazenness. She was like a butterfly, squirming eagerly out of her cocoon, emerging naked and new and beautiful. The sight of her sprawled shamelessly atop the coverlet, her skin the color of honeyed cream in the sunlight, her hair tumbling across the pallet in dark disarray, her breasts small and perfect and inviting, left him breathless.
For a moment he only stared down at her, drinking in every aspect of her lovely form—the delicate bones below her throat, the smooth hollow of her belly, the gentle curve of her hips, the soft triangle of chestnut-colored curls at the juncture of her thighs.
Then his eye caught on a recently healed gash with a dark purple bruise marring one of her knees. Shock froze the breath in his lungs. For a moment, he could only stare at the damning mark while astonishing thoughts swirled through his mind.
Nay. It couldn’t be. Miriel couldn’t be The Shadow. The injury was coincidence, no more.
He ran a fingertip lightly over the healing wound. “How came you by this, my love?”
She jerked her knee back reflexively. “That? ’Tis nothing. Just an old bruise.”
He told hold of her ankle, straightening her leg with gentle but insistent force, to study her knee. “’Tis considerably more than a bruise, I’d say.”
“I slipped. On the stairs.”
He peered into her eyes. Her gaze was wide and innocent. Surely she was telling the truth.
Then her brow furrowed, and she bit her lower lip. “You find me ugly,” she murmured.
Rand blinked, startled. “Ugly?” Was that what she thought? Nothing could be further from the truth. “Oh, my lady, I find you beautiful beyond compare. Every scratch, every nick, every freckle.” To prove it, he placed a featherlight kiss atop her knee. “They’re all a part of you.”
Lord, how could he have ever imagined the sensitive lass offering herself to him so sweetly was a hardened outlaw?
Miriel blushed prettily even as she was screaming a silent curse. Bloody hell! How could she have been so careless?
The injury on her knee was only one of the myriad minor wounds she inevitably earned from combat on a weekly basis. But she could hardly explain that to Rand.
One day she would. One day she’d admit that the weapons belonged to her. One day she’d confess that she was a master of Chinese warfare. But not now. Not while he was gazing down at her as if she were the most precious fragile flower.
Fortunately, he seemed to believe her lie about the stairs. It was a lame excuse at best. But considering she was lying naked before a man she’d met less than a fortnight ago, her blood simmering with desire, prepared to give him the most precious thing she had to offer, it was a wonder she could think up an excuse at all.
Unfortunately, he wasn’t finished examining her scars.
He spotted the one on her thigh, the slash she’d earned from the swipe of Sung Li’s do two years ago.
“What about this one?” he asked.
She sighed. Why couldn’t he return to seducing her? It was a far more intriguing pastime than cataloging her injuries. “A kitchen knife,” she lied.
He kissed her there, too, and she shivered as his lush locks softly brushed her thighs.
“And here?” He touched the scar high on her other thigh where she’d missed a block and been gouged by the fu pa.
Still quivering deliciously from the sensuous tickle of his hair, she found it mentally challenging to come up with new lies. “A…a cow.”
“A cow?”
“A cow’s horn. She…she didn’t like the way I was milking her.”
It was a ridiculous explanation, she knew, but rational thought had become too demanding. And the fact that he was moving farther and farther upward with his kisses, toward the spot where she most longed to feel his warm tongue and hungry mouth, made her care little if what she said made sense at all.
He brushed a thumb across the fading bruise that ran along the inner ridge of her hipbone. “And what happened here?”
“I…I…” She’d suffered a hard kick there that she hadn’t dodged in time. “I can’t remember.”
He ran the tip of his tongue lightly over the spot. “Can’t remember?”
“Sung Li says I’m…clumsy. I probably…ran into a table.”
He sucked gently at the bruise. Then his mouth followed the curve of her pelvis until it teased the edge of curls guarding her womanhood.
“You know, don’t you,” he murmured, “that in coupling, I must inflict injury upon you as well?”
Miriel was hardly afraid. The blade in his trews wasn’t sharp. Nothing he could do to her could hurt as much as the sting of a shuriken or a foa huen’s slash. Indeed, she looked forward to being impaled by his firm, sleek, velvety weapon. Why was he tormenting her with speech?
Once, twice, he moved his head down, parted her downy nether lips, and let his tongue slip between them, touching upon the burning hot bud of her need, making her feel as if she burst into bloom at the contact.
Then, when impatience nearly compelled her to seize his head and force him to devour her wholly, he moved away from her, further frustrating her wants.
While she lay panting in thwarted need, he sat back on the pallet to pull the tabard over his head. Stifling a groan of dismay, she perused the layers of armor he wore. Bloody hell, it would take an eternity to undress him. Surely he didn’t mean to make her wait so long.
“Come to me now,” she bade him, her voice more rough and demanding than she intended.
He gave her a lopsided smile, making one of his adorable dimples appear. “Patience, my sweet.”
Why was the varlet making her wait? It was clear by the smoldering in his eyes that he wanted this as much as she did. She intended to remedy his delay at once. When he began to haul the coat of chain mail off his shoulders, she reached beneath it to press her palm possessively against the bulge in his trews.
He groaned, and the sound sent a surge of power through her soul. Now she would make him bow to her will.
To her surprise, he resisted even that, gently but firmly pushing her hand away, though his voice w
as shaky with restraint. “God’s bones,” he groaned. “Allow me to at least disarm, my lady.”
She scowled in dismay. She cared not. She would make love to him in full armor on the back of a horse if it would hurry her fulfillment.
While she waited with ill-concealed impatience, he threw off his coat of mail, then removed the padded gambeson beneath. He painstakingly unfastened his sabotons and poleyns, then unbuckled the belt that held up his chausses, letting them shiver to the ground in a silvery pool. Finally, he removed his linen undershirt and trews, until he stood before her, naked as a newborn babe.
But he looked nothing like a babe. Nay, he was all man.
If she thought she’d desired him before, it was nothing compared to the way she felt when she beheld his glorious body bathed in golden sunlight.
Damn, he was magnificent. His shoulders were wide and capable, his arms well muscled, his hands broad. His chest should have seemed menacing in its breadth and strength. Yet she found herself longing to burrow into the firm-yet-yielding refuge of his embrace. His flat stomach was lightly furred, and the faint hair glistened in the afternoon sun. His hips were lean, and the curve of his buttock made her want to run her hand along its slope. She let her gaze rove down the strong pillars of his legs, the powerful thighs, the contoured calves. Sweet Mary, even his feet were beautiful.
But nothing compared to the dark mystery of the staff that jutted proudly from its nest of deceptively soft curls, and it was there her gaze was riveted.
“My lady,” he breathed, a smile hovering about his lips, “I believe you’re ravishing me with your eyes.”
She ruefully quirked up one corner of her mouth. “’Tis all you’ll allow, it seems.”
“Are you ready for me?”
It was an absurd question. Her mouth had gone dry with thirst for him, and her heart fluttered madly against her ribs. “You know I am,” she whispered.
“I don’t want to hurt you, my love,” he said, coming near, reaching out for her ankle and sliding his hand slowly upward, making heavenly friction against her leg. “Make me a vow. Promise me you’ll let me take the reins this once.”
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