by Unknown
Cameron came out of the interrogation room. He had been in there, in the dark.
He didn't look down the stairs toward the central hall. She presumed he didn't know she was there, although he might simply be ignoring her. Fine. The more he ignored her, the happier she would be.
She sat still in a huge armchair in front of the window, shielded by its broad back as Cam descended the staircase. Was he coming down to talk to her again? Not now. Not while she was enjoying her time with his brother.
But he walked right past the archway leading into the living room. As he started down the second staircase, the one that led to the outer door, she saw something move on his shoulders. Something dark. She stared, feeling that chill wash through her again. Was there a creature of some sort on his back? A cat? A bird? What in Karth's name was that?
He reached the door and opened it silently. The very air around him seemed to have stilled. As he passed through the door into the night, she heard what she now recognized as the strange bony crack of a shape shifter shifting.
Ariane rose and moved to the window that looked out into the courtyard. She watched Cam as he glided away into the darkness. Near the gateway that led to the island, something dropped away from him. His clothing? His form elongated, became strange, almost hooded. And the thing moving on his back turned into a set of enormous wings.
Ariane stood frozen at the window, her heart pattering like rain on the roof in a thunderstorm.
Cameron had not shifted into a wolf, as Colin said he did.
He had shifted into a darkling.
Chapter 18
"Why are you blocking me, Ariane?"
It was much later, near dawn, and they were back upstairs in Colin's bedroom. But Ariane hadn't been able to relax.
It wasn't the lovemaking. That continued to be wonderful. The same easy meeting of minds persisted as they explored each other's bodies more thoroughly. Ariane loved the way Colin combined great delicacy of touch with his confident sensual demands. He was a gentle taskmaster. He knew what he wanted and didn't hesitate to ask for it, yet at the same time he used the bond to learn what her yearnings were and how best to nurture them.
She liked the balance he established between his needs and her own—he honored both. She knew there were men who cared little for their partners and sought only their own satisfaction, although she had never had such a lover herself. But she had once had the opposite – a young man who was so devoted to pleasing her that he neglected his own pleasure, claiming, not very convincingly, that her satisfaction was all he desired. That relationship hadn’t lasted long – she had quickly grown bored.
She did not think she would ever be bored with Colin.
But she was at a total loss about what, if anything, she should tell Colin about what she had seen as Cam had left the keep.
"Colin, I can’t—"
"I'm not going to press you. You're getting enough pressure from Cam. I'm just wondering why you're so tense."
"It's naught to do with us," she assured him. "I think I'm still trying to adjust to this strange world of yours."
She knew she hadn't convinced him, but he kept his word not to press her.
It had been hard to hide the reason for her stress from him. Blocking took energy, and by the time he fell asleep, blissed out and happy, she was exhausted. On one level, she too was blissed out and happy. On another, she was scared.
She had tortured herself for a while trying to figure whether Colin and everyone in his family were darklings or whether it was just Cam. Was she imprisoned in some demon castle? Were any of them what they seemed to be?
But this extreme paranoia had faded as she'd remembered Kate's warmth and Ross's kindness. As for Colin, she had been inside his head, and unlike her, he did not know how to block or guard his thoughts. Colin was not a demon, and he was telling her the truth when he declared he could only change to two other forms—a wolf and a sea dragon.
The next thing she concluded was that Colin did not know about his older brother's strange ability. Darklings, called vampires here, were hated creatures among the shape shifters of Scotland.
Did Cameron shift to that form because he wanted to? Because he chose it? Or because he could not help himself?
Given that darklings were so reviled, maybe he kept it a secret from his family?
Yet how much of a secret could it be if he left the castle in the middle of the night and shifted right in the courtyard? Over the years, she couldn't have been the only person who had seen this happen.
The scariest thought of all was this one: had it been Cam, in his vampire or darkling form, who had attacked her and Rin on the far side of the Barrier and driven them through? She had never seen a darkling close up before. And she had only caught a quick glimpse of Cam. No doubt if you dealt with darklings on a daily basis you could tell them apart, but what if Cam had been in her world, which he must have been at some time, since he spoke the Common Tongue? What if he had targeted her for some unknown reason and driven her across the barrier to Mallochbirn on purpose?
What did this creature look like? Would you recognize it if you saw it again? That had been one of Cameron's first questions to her. Had he been afraid of being recognized by her?
It didn't really make sense, though. She was a Traveler, yes, but a junior one. She wasn't important. What could he possibly want from her, this intimidating man with all his relentless questions? Had she been brought here specifically to be interrogated? If so, why? She really didn't know very much that was significant.
If he wanted her here, then he must have a plan. By answering his questions, she was playing into that plan. Maybe all the nonsense about how she might be a threat to this world by stealing their technology was really a spin on his own plan to steal something from her world? Or to attack it? To sow chaos? To steal resources?
If she was part of his plan, then wasn't it incumbent upon her to thwart that plan? To prevent him from getting whatever it was he wanted? To escape?
Rin was well now. He still had to regain some strength, but he could swim. If Cam's plan had been to kill Rin and capture her, leaving her with no way back to her own world, then he had failed. She was no longer helpless—a Traveler without a means of Traveling. She could go down to the cavern, hook onto Rin's breathing bud, and have him swim her away from here. She knew where the Barrier was on this side. The mission to rescue Rin had shown her the way.
She could leave.
But...but Colin. Their lovely sex. Their mental bond—two intelligent minds linked together in joyous conversation and laughter.
He didn't seem overly fond of his brother Cam. Maybe she could tell him what she had seen and explain all her fears. Maybe he would come with her. They were mates, after all.
Maybe he would refuse.
He was bound to uphold his Council—he had already made that clear. Neither he nor Ross had liked what Cam was doing to her, but they hadn't stopped it, had they?
She could take Rin and flee. Better still, she could steal some of the medication Ross had given to Rin, that antibiotic stuff that had healed him. There was no medicine so effective in her world. Without that treatment, Rin surely would have died. And if she understood correctly, he still needed to receive the medication for several more days.
She was a spy, here to steal technology. That's what they believed, wasn't it? She had never dreamt of such a thing, but now the idea was in her head.
Could she betray her promise to such an extent? Could she betray Colin, whom she adored? Colin, who was her destined mate?
Oh Mother. Her head was pounding.
Chapter 19
Ariane told herself she was just going down to the cavern to visit Rin. To make certain he was still well. Still gaining strength. Not having some sort of relapse.
And it was so easy to sneak down there. The door to Colin's room was not locked or barred. No one stopped her. The path down to the cavern was complex, but she was a Traveler. If she had taken a road once, s
he had no trouble retracing it afterwards.
Rin was sleeping when she reached his side. She did not wake him. She sat instead on the white sands of the small beach. The tide was out, so the sands were entirely exposed, if a little damp. Over her head, the crystals shone in a panoply of colored light. The water of the pool moved lazily with the currents from the outside. It must be windy out there. The tide was rising.
There was an orange cat sleeping on the beach, not far from Rin. When she settled down, it strolled over and head-butted her hand. Smiling, she petted the cat, who started purring loudly. Kate had told her about this cat, but it was the first time she'd seen him. The cat named Prince, who liked sea dragons. Had he been making friends with Rin?
She rested her chin on her upraised knees and sorted through her options.
She thought and thought.
"Here you are," said a familiar voice from behind her.
She started violently, surprised at not having heard him approach. Shifters were quiet creatures, too.
She turned and smiled at Colin. He came to her side, treading gingerly over the sharp stones with the shiny crystal edges, clad only in his beloved kilt and a pair of battered half boots that rose up to his ankle. "I woke up and you were gone."
"I was checking on Rin."
"How is he?
"He's good. He's sleeping. Getting his strength back, I guess."
Colin sat down beside her, looking, she thought, a little relieved. Had he been afraid she had abandoned him when he'd woken up alone? She couldn't blame him if he'd thought it. She'd considered it, after all.
She turned to him and planted a passionate kiss on his lips. "Colin. Make love to me?"
His arms closed tight around her. "I'd be glad to."
She prompted pushed him back on the sand and began tearing at his kilt. His eyes flicked sideways. "You mean here?"
"Yes. It's lovely here, don't you think? And the tide won't be in for quite a while, I think."
He flipped them over so he was on top. She could feel his cock, hard and ready to go. She loved that about him—he was so quick to be aroused but so deliciously slow in his love play. "What about him?" he asked, glancing over at the sleeping sea dragon.
She didn't see the problem. "Rin? He's sleeping soundly and I doubt we'll wake him up. If we do, he'll just remember how odd these two legged creatures are and go back to sleep."
"Oh aye." Colin kissed her for a good long while before asking, "So he won't be jealous?"
"Jealous that I'm spending time paying attention to you instead of to him? Or—" She realized from his embarrassed color that he meant sexually jealous. She burst out laughing. "What sort of bond do you imagine a Traveler has with her bonded companion?"
"Still trying to figure it out," he admitted.
"You don't think that we...goodness...I mean, how would that even be possible?"
He was laughing now, too. "Well you'll have to ask Kate about that. Did you ever hear how she met my brother? There's an annual festival here, been going on for centuries. A woman from the village gets sacrificed to the Zrakon. That would be Ross."
"Sacrificed? You mean he kills someone every year?" she was appalled.
"Er, no. Fucks her rather. Nobody dies. Kate came to the village last year and was here on Midsummer's Eve. She attended the festival, but when she understood what was happening, she rescued the supposed victim from the sacrificial rock and ended up stuck there herself. Then Ross, in his sea dragon form that is, took one look at her and was eternally smitten. He seized her, popped her onto his breathing bud, and carried her off. They've been together ever since."
"He abducted her?"
"Aye, he did, the nasty lad. But she was willing enough, in the end."
"But he didn't actually have sex with her? As a sea dragon I mean?"
"Well, no one knows. Except the two of them. I wasn't here at the time, so I just heard about it all later. And then Ross told me that this year I'll have to play the sea dragon role since he's out of the action now and—"
"What! Please tell me you aren't going to do any such thing."
"If I don't, the village women will be mightily disappointed." She could tell he was teasing her now. "Apparently there's something about those tentacles that drives them all wild."
She thought about it. Okay, it wasn't as if she'd never thought about it before, but never seriously. Not with Rin. That would be...eww. She adored Rin, but she loved him the way she would love a cherished pet.
It might be a different story with Colin in his shifted sea dragon form. He would be Colin. They would be linked mind to mind, talking internally and laughing. The tentacles might grow on her in that situation.
He was watching her, looking mischievous, and she realized that she was thoroughly embarrassed just from thinking about it. And she had thought that nothing about sex could embarrass her.
"You're really wicked to get me thinking about stuff like that," she said.
"Oh, I'm wicked, I know. Want me to shift? We could see what all the fuss is about."
"No. I mean, stop it, Colin. You're so evil." He was tickling her and she couldn't stop laughing.
"Not a sea dragon? Well, how about a bit of the wolf? Maybe a little more chest hair, a smidgen of fangy goodness, and then, you know, there's that knotting thing that happens when the male wolf's dick gets stuck inside the female—"
She plastered her mouth on his. "Shut up. You're going to make me start having all sorts of strange fantasies! Shape shifters...may the Mother help us. What kind of world have I fallen into?"
"It's a wicked, wicked world, lassie," he said.
* * *
They returned to Colin's room after their erotic tryst in the cavern. Ariane was feeling a great deal better. Whatever happened, there was no way she was leaving Colin. She adored him.
"That device—the metallic collar that your brother made me put on. What exactly is that?" She hesitated, trying to remember all the new words she had been learning that didn't have precise equivalents in the Common Tongue. "Is it some sort of nuclear device? Or robotic? Or digital?"
Colin burst out laughing. She loved his deep hearty laugh. It made her sex clench no matter how many times he had already pleasured her.
"None of those things. And don't let Cam hear you using those words."
"I have been reading Wikipedia. I guess you don't need libraries in your world, do you? Except for old texts. There is something almost sad about that. What will happen to ancient traditions and wisdom?"
"You'll find it all on your ebook reader, I guess."
"I haven't learned what that is yet."
Colin was chortling hard now. When he finally managed to speak he said, "There are still ancient traditions, especially among us shifters. As for the collar, it's not high tech at all. It's some sort of magic. I think magic is harder to fathom than technology, actually. At least tech makes sense."
"What does it do exactly? I was told it was to prevent a shifter from changing his form, so it shouldn't have had any effect on me. But when I was wearing it, it felt warm. It seemed to be burning me although it left no damage on my skin. I also felt—" she paused not sure how to articulate it. "I felt as if it sapped my will. Not completely. It just made me feel vulnerable."
"Cam'll make anybody feel vulnerable." He paused. "It's a type of slave collar. It is still used in some shifter communities. Some shifters are a lot stronger than others, some have been known to enslave the weak. That's not too common nowadays, but there are criminal groups where such things still happen." He paused and lifted an eyebrow at her. "Then there are the erotic uses of the thing." He slid one hand around her throat, not pressing just holding her there. She felt a flutter in her supposedly-weary sex. "Sometimes, just as a game, I like my partner to feel vulnerable. I like her will to be subject to my control. Does that frighten you?"
She laughed. "We play sex games in my world, too. There is an infamous shop in the city of Binariye where they make some of the mos
t inventive devices. Some of those would make your slave collar seem paltry in comparison."
He flipped her over so she lay under him. He knelt between her thighs and pressed her legs as far apart as their bed would allow. "Tell me more," he ordered as he began tonguing her belly and thighs.
"Well, have you visited any of the pleasure houses in Binariye? They are famous all over my world."
"I've mostly been sea dragony in your world. Exploring the oceans and trying to understand other sea dragons. I've shifted to human in port cities to practice my language skills, hear the gossip and such, and yes, I have visited Binariye. It reminds me of what Istanbul must have been like during the reign of Suleyman the Magnificent. But the pleasure houses? Sadly, no."
"They are called Butterfly houses. Depending on their color—gold, azure, crimson, black—they specialize in different practices. They are artists of sensuality. Wealthy clients, both men and women, contract for their services, depending on which pleasures are dearest to them. It is considered quite acceptable in Sariye, although it's frowned upon in some other countries."
"Have you ever contracted for such services?"
"Alas, I can't afford their prices."
"But if you could, which color Butterfly house would you visit?"
When she told him, he grinned. "I can do that. In fact, I'd love to do that to you. I think there is a good reason why the sevmelle struck us, Ari. Sounds like we're perfect for each other."
Chapter 20
Ariane was nervous the next morning, but she was also determined. So, after breakfast, when Cam imperiously summoned her to his office and Ross was about to leave for his surgery hours, she took Colin's hand in hers and said, "I will come for questioning, as I promised. But today I want the rest of you present, at least at the start."
Cam's eyes narrowed. "There's no need for Ross, who has better things to do. And we've already agreed that your boyfriend isn't allowed to help you in this."
