Forbidden

by Christina Phillips

  But Carys would never be merely a convenience. She would never accept his word as her law, unless it suited her.

  Once again, he was back at the waterfall and the choice was his. Force her to his will, or allow her to go.

  He circled her wrist with thumb and forefinger and removed her hand from his arm. “I shall provide you with a horse and weapon. If you allow any harm to befall you, I’ll kill you myself.”

  She flashed him an inappropriate smile, rose onto her toes and brushed a teasing kiss across his lips.

  “You’ll never have any need to kill me.”

  Her words echoed in his mind, an ominous refrain.

  A shudder inched along his spine. Madness. He would never harm Carys, whatever trouble her foolhardy behavior caused.

  She was his woman, his responsibility. And whether she liked it or not, in the eyes of Rome her actions were his.

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  As soon as Carys reached the Cauldron, she saw her medicine bag where she’d left it. She dismounted the mare Maximus had acquired for her and hastily gathered her scattered belongings together, whispering prayers of gratitude and love to Cerridwen for protecting her possessions from scavengers.

  She dug into the bag and retrieved her dagger, and secured it at her waist, next to the one Maximus had given her. Never again would she allow herself to be so vulnerable.

  Aeron sucked the noxious fumes deep into his lungs, holding the smoke within his physical body, freeing his spirit to commune in the astral plane.

  Gwydion, the warrior magician, the greatest of the enchanters, whispered caution through his mind. They hadn’t come this far to shatter their illusion of allegiance to the old gods yet.

  Soon. But not today.

  Aeron bared his teeth but dampened down his rage and derision toward the swarming multitude of gods and goddesses he’d pretended to worship most of his life.

  Only Gwydion, master illusionist of the immortals, knew his true heart. Only Gwydion had seen his pure spirit at the age of eight while he writhed in the torturous grip of his revelatory vision.

  Gwydion, who had taken the terrified boy and protected him, nurtured him, taught him how to hide his fear, feed upon his disgust and gain strength from his deceptions. Gwydion, who had loved him before any of the other gods deigned to acknowledge his existence.

  The god of illusion had instructed him well. For even Gwydion did not know the entire scope of Aeron’s plans.

  It was not yet dawn, and the cromlech was blissfully deserted, allowing him uninterrupted meditation. The Roman scum’s blood was even now fermenting in the sacred bowl, mingling with his magical concoctions, the acrid odor weaving through the air, sending out its malevolent tentacles.

  The Roman would be drawn into its mystical web. Without his knowledge he would be led to the sacrificial altar. And there, at the appointed time, Aeron would rip open the enemy’s ribs and slice his filthy heart from its moorings.

  A dramatic and auspicious start to the battle that would eradicate Rome from the soil of Cymru.

  He felt Morwyn’s approach, like the scuttle of spiders across the nape of his neck, before she came into sight. He focused his concentration on the bubbling sludge in the bowl, but the edge of his awareness prickled.

  Morwyn had not retreated when she saw him engrossed. She was standing beyond the outer ring of the bluestones, waiting for him to acknowledge her presence.

  Strands of consciousness intertwined with the nebulous odor, feeding, assessing.

  The target had been located.

  With a long, outdrawn breath Aeron’s tightly coiled muscles relaxed and his fingers flattened against the cool stone of the altar.

  Justice would be his.

  Only then did he open his eyes and turn to Morwyn. She came toward him without her usual exaggerated swagger and, unaccountably, the lack needled him.

  Perhaps he should fuck her here, on the ground by the sacred altar, show her what she had long coveted. Except Morwyn wasn’t Carys, could never be Carys.

  Carys was now as soiled as the land of Cymru, raped and violated, unworthy of nurturing his precious son.

  The rage erupted through every pore, every orifice. He wanted to smash Morwyn’s face for being here when Carys wasn’t. Wanted to fill her wretched womb with putrid maggots, because Carys’s womb was polluted and Carys’s womb was the one he wanted. Needed.

  Craved.

  “Aeron?” Morwyn sounded unsure, and if there was one thing Morwyn was, it was sure of herself. He reined in the fury, and it steamed through his blood, scalding, blistering.

  “What is it?” Years of practice ensured his voice remained neutral, despite the havoc wrecking every burning point of his body.

  “Have you seen Carys?”

  Instantly his senses sharpened, searching for hidden meaning in her words. “Since when?” He glanced back at the bowl, feigning disinterest.

  “Since yesterday. I couldn’t find her in the mound last night.”

  Morwyn hadn’t witnessed the scene at the Cauldron. He sucked in a measured breath, waited for his heart to resume its normal beat.

  While he had every right to take Carys, with hindsight he had, perhaps, been a little hasty the previous day. Had the Roman not interrupted, Carys would have conceived his son. But would she also have had the audacity to cry rape?

  A chill shivered through his groin. Knowing Carys, such blasphemy was very possible. And despite his power, despite his position, he was not yet omnipotent, and had Carys accused him, his balls would be ripped from his body and burned before his eyes for daring to touch their precious princess.

  Even though she was his. Even though she would always be his, even after he slit her throat and watched her tarnished blood gush over the smooth stone altar.

  “Aeron?” Morwyn’s sharp tone dragged him back to the present, dragged him back to the harsh reality that he had lost Carys to the Roman. That even now the Roman was fucking her, using her body, pumping his rancid seed deep into her womb.

  “No doubt she slept out in the forest.” He began to gather his various implements together, unable to trust himself to look at Morwyn in case she saw the malice burning in his eyes.

  “I’ve checked her favorite places.” There was no mistaking the worry in Morwyn’s voice, and finally he wondered why. If she hadn’t seen the incident yesterday, if she had no idea that Carys was currently the sex slave of a perverted Roman weasel, then why was she so concerned for Carys’s safety?

  He veiled his eyes and looked up at her. “Then perhaps she spends time with a lover.”

  Morwyn’s eyes widened, as if in shock. Her lips moved, as if she tried to speak, but no sound emerged. He waited with false patience, to see if she swallowed such an outlandish explanation for Carys’s whereabouts.

  “A lover?” Morwyn’s voice was unnaturally high. “Oh. I—That hadn’t occurred to me.”

  Of course it hadn’t occurred to her, because Carys had never taken another lover since leaving him. But now it served his purpose if Morwyn believed such a lie.

  He was not yet ready to disclose she had been abducted by the enemy. And he would never divulge the true circumstances of her abduction to anyone, least of all a female acolyte of the cursed Morrigan.

  Carys led the mare through the gap in the spiral, and whispered words of comfort to soothe the creature’s agitation. The vertigo caused by the sacred protections still affected her even after all these moons, but for one who had never passed through before, the shift in perception shocked.

  She kept to the outer rim of the spiral. The last thing she wanted was to approach the cromlech and risk being seen by Aeron. She’d tether the mare in the glade where they kept their own horses, entwine one of her jade ribbons around the reins to claim her for her own, and seek out Druantia.

  Her plan worked until she turned to leave the glade and saw a figure moving toward her through the trees from the direction of Druantia’s sacred grove. He saw her the moment she sa
w him, and froze as if she were a spirit returned from the Otherworld.

  Carys drew in a deep breath and forced herself to keep walking. She was deep within the spiral. There was no reason Aeron would even think she had only just returned into its protective sphere.

  But she truly did not feel up to more of his insistence that they belonged together. She offered him a brief smile and hoped that would be enough greeting.

  His continued silence scraped along her nerves and she paused and shot him a cautious glance. He was still staring at her, but not with the undercurrent of lust she had grown accustomed to over the years.

  Instead, a primal claw of horror ripped into her mind and she staggered, momentarily unbalanced by the force of the emotion, by the incredulity that such emotion could emanate from Aeron.

  And then the sensation vanished, as if it had never been, and she flattened her palms against her thighs in an effort to regain her equilibrium. Had she just imagined it?

  Yet still Aeron made no move toward her. No word of greeting, or condemnation.

  She flicked her tongue over her lips. Half in shadow, his face was concealed but his strange silver eyes glinted at her, as if daring her to—to do what?

  Her heart thudded with breath-crushing force against her ribs, sending tremors of doubt vibrating through her gut. In all the years she’d known him, from a child when he was a youth rising through the ranks, when he first noticed her and claimed her for his own, even when she had severed their relationship—she had never feared him, because she knew, at a fundamental level, he would never harm her.

  But now, suddenly, and for no reason she could envisage, an unformed fear fluttered through her soul, and for the first time she truly understood why so many of her people trembled at the mere mention of his name.

  But this was madness. He would never hurt her. There was no reason why he would, no reason why he should want to. She was still in a dream thinking of her love, still wrapped in gratitude that Cerridwen had returned, and her senses were dulled.

  She took a deep breath, attempted to ignore the nervous churn of her stomach. “Good morn, Aeron.”

  He visibly stiffened, as if her voice jolted him from his strange contemplation. Perhaps that was it? He had fallen into a vision, and hadn’t seen her at all?

  “Carys.” His tone was low, emotionless. Unlike any he normally used when addressing her. An odd shiver chased over her arms and her fingers tensed against her thighs.

  “I’m going to see Druantia.” There had been no need to tell him that. And yet the unbearable silence after his greeting had screamed to be shattered.

  He stepped from the shadows and she had to forcibly stop herself from backing away. This was Aeron. She had known him almost all her life. And even if, for some unimaginable reason, he did wish to harm her, she was still his princess, still his social superior, still elevated from all other Druids by virtue of her powerful matrilineal heritage.

  Unless he could prove her a traitor.

  But she had not betrayed her people. And besides, how could he have found out about Maximus? It was impossible. She wouldn’t believe it.

  Cerridwen, hear my prayer.

  His gaze drilled into her, as if reaching for the secret corners of her mind. “Morwyn has been searching for you.”

  She swallowed her apprehension. It was all in her mind. She loved Maximus, but her guilt over loving her enemy would always cloud her judgment when it came to her people. She would have to learn to live with it.

  “I’ll find her after I’ve greeted Druantia.” She hoped Morwyn hadn’t told Aeron of the incident involving those three Roman louts. Goddess, surely Morwyn wouldn’t have confided that she’d taken Carys with her to the fortification? Aeron would be enraged.

  But he wasn’t enraged. He was strangely calm, but it was a calmness that ate through her nerves like starving rats shredding a rotting corpse.

  “Morwyn was concerned,” Aeron said, as if she hadn’t responded, “because she feared you had spent the night outside the spiral.”

  Carys almost refuted the claim. But something stilled her tongue. Sweet Cerridwen, guide me. “I did.”

  His eyes glittered; his nostrils flared. Heat washed through her. Had she made a terrible mistake?

  “Where did you go after leaving the Cauldron?”

  The Cauldron? Carys stared at him as knots of alarm tightened her muscles and constricted her chest. “How do you know I was at the Cauldron?”

  His unblinking gaze never left hers. “Morwyn told me.”

  Her heart stuttered in relief. Of course Morwyn had told him. Had Aeron witnessed the incident with the Roman lout or, even worse, seen Maximus rescue her, he certainly wouldn’t be standing here questioning her as to her movements.

  He would have attacked the would-be rapist himself. And then Maximus wouldn’t have seen her at the Cauldron, and she wouldn’t have spent the most magical hours of her life in his arms last night.

  And she didn’t even want to contemplate the outcome had Aeron seen Maximus at the Cauldron instead.

  She realized Aeron was still waiting for her answer. “I attended a woman who is recently with child.” She hoped Aeron wouldn’t insist on knowing where she had spent the night, because there was a difference between omitting the truth and telling a blatant lie.

  He took a step toward her, as if he couldn’t help himself. “And nothing untoward happened while you were at the Cauldron?”

  Had he sensed something was amiss yesterday? Or could he feel her hiding her innermost thoughts from him?

  “Not that I recall.” It was the truth. She couldn’t recall the attack, no matter how hard she tried. She realized, belatedly, her response was lacking. “Why?” She infused as much confusion into the word as possible, but, sweet Cerridwen, how much longer would Aeron bombard her with cryptic questions?

  For a heartbeat, disbelief flashed across his features, followed instantly by relief. So fleeting the emotions, so swiftly erased, she wondered if she’d imagined them.

  But she hadn’t. And for the life of her she couldn’t understand what had just transpired between them.

  “The countryside is infested with Romans.” His lip curled in disdain. “Even Cerridwen’s Cauldron is not immune to their poisonous touch.”

  “I saw no enemy. And now I must go to Druantia.” She turned away and let out a shaky breath.

  “Wait. I haven’t yet finished with you.”

  She forgot about her relief at escaping his probing questions and flicked an incredulous glance over her shoulder.

  “You haven’t what?” Had she misunderstood his tone? It was the way one spoke to a slave. Or the way a barbarous Roman might speak to his mindless Roman wife.

  Not her Maximus, though. And no Druid either.

  Aeron appeared not to notice her chilled response. “You haven’t told me where you spent the night, Carys.”

  She drew herself up and gave him her most regal look. “No. I haven’t.” And with that she turned and stalked off, head held high, toward Druantia’s grove.

  Aeron gripped his hazel rod with such force his fingers grew numb. How dare she turn her back on him? How dare she treat him as if he were a lowly acolyte, unworthy of her time?

  The fucking whore.

  Breath hissed between his clenched teeth as he watched her disappear between the trees. He attempted to calm his mind, regulate his pulses, reach for serenity.

  But the image of Carys in the arms of the enemy pounded through his brain.

  She didn’t remember anything that happened at the Cauldron. He accepted that. But when had her consciousness returned? What had the Roman done with her?

  He couldn’t believe the Roman had taken her to a Celtic dwelling to recover. A Celtic dwelling where, by chance, a pregnant woman required assistance.

  Not unless the barbarian preferred fucking other men, and the look on the Roman’s face as he’d glanced at Carys left Aeron in no doubt as to where his sexual preference lay.
r />   So how had she escaped her captor? It was inconceivable he had allowed his delectable slave to leave.

  Unless she wasn’t his slave. Wasn’t with him unwillingly.

  The answer flared through his cortex, splintering his reason.

  Had Carys stayed with the Roman last night voluntarily?

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  Carys kissed Druantia and settled in her usual place at the elderly queen’s feet.

  “You’ve found someone at last.”

  Carys’s breath hitched in her breast. She should have known the great Druid would see the truth. Druantia was smiling down at her, but it was a smile shadowed with doubt.

  She swallowed the flicker of apprehension. “Yes.” Sweet Cerridwen, don’t let Druantia ask her who the man was. It would crucify her to lie to her beloved matriarch.

  Druantia stroked the top of Carys’s head. “And yet he is not Aeron.” There was a questioning note in her tone, as if she pondered the fact.

  “No.”

  “I always believed the Morrigan meant you for Aeron.”

  Carys barely suppressed a shudder. She still hadn’t recovered from the odd sensation of primal terror that had whipped through her as Aeron had scrutinized her earlier.

  “Aeron isn’t the man for me.”

  Druantia’s hand stilled on her hair. “The Morrigan was grieved when you turned from him, my Carys. And her affront was great when you spurned all other men afterward.”

  Carys clasped Druantia’s other hand. When Aeron had become her lover at the age of fourteen, she had secretly hoped the goddess would honor her by acknowledging her presence. It wouldn’t have mattered how fleeting that acknowledgment was. Just a small sign to reassure her that the Morrigan wasn’t truly ignoring her. That the feeling of being slighted was all in her mind.

  It had made no difference. During the three years she’d been with Aeron, the goddess had remained as distant as ever. If even having the High Druid as her lover hadn’t caused the Morrigan to look upon her with favor, how could taking another man change that? And how was she supposed to have known severing her relationship with Aeron would have grieved the goddess? “But I still worshipped the Great Goddess. I tried to show her how much I loved her.”