Legendary Shifter

by Barbara J. Hancock

  Chapter 16

  They didn’t stop on any of the main floors. Staircase after staircase wound down through the center of the castle. Romanov had said they would follow the sword, but it was actually his steps that led them, illuminated softly by the gem’s light. He paused to enter the door of a large chamber beneath the kitchens. Elena waited outside. It was a room she hadn’t explored, and through the narrow opening he’d left, she could see walls lined with books and the foot of a massive bed. She assumed it was his room. The air held the scent of paper, old ink, leather and the slight hint of ash from a fireplace she couldn’t see.

  When he carried some bedding out of the room, he brought the scent with him. It was pleasant and sensual in a homey way. She hadn’t imagined him sleeping or reading or warming himself by a fire. Apparently, legends needed the comforts of hearth and home even when they tried to deny it.

  The stone had faded greatly by the time he returned to her side, but once he’d shifted the bedding to one side and clasped her hand, the stone brightened again. It was like a mood ring for their relationship. He refused to acknowledge their connection, but his silence didn’t fool the stone.

  Several more flights of stairs took them lower and lower until they were below the keep. The polished flagstone roughened into coarser stone until the last stairway was nothing but steps that had been roughly carved out of the mountain itself. They had descended beneath man-made levels into a natural cavern that opened up into a cathedral-like space beneath the castle.

  The sapphire gem in the hilt of her sword suddenly flared and Elena paused on the stair. Romanov allowed himself to be pulled to a halt by her stop.

  “It’s beautiful,” she said. The light from the stone filled the cavern with its soft blue glow. Natural mica in the cavern’s limestone twinkled like stardust above and around them.

  “And cold when you don’t have a wolf’s coat. That’s why I brought the blankets,” Romanov said. His breath fogged in the air. “Welcome to the black wolf’s lair. It’s the one place I could think of where even a witchblood prince would be afraid to follow. I haven’t been here myself in some time.”

  Elena shivered, but not because of the cold. She could imagine the alpha wolf in this place. It was a fitting lair for an enchanted wolf.

  “Even Lev and Soren don’t come here,” Romanov said. He tugged on her hand and she followed him the rest of the way down the stairs. The walls narrowed and curved so that the cavern became a tunnel. The air was slightly warmer. Their breath no longer showed. The tunnel was large enough to accommodate the black wolf, but small enough to be cozier than the cavern. And, when the tunnel curved to end in an irregularly shaped oval room with a depression on its floor, she knew they’d reached their destination.

  Romanov spread the bedding out on the smooth stone floor.

  Once again, the stone’s glow began to fade. The room darkened around them. The stardust on the walls twinkled when she moved closer to Romanov. He’d brought several blankets, furs and a heavy quilt. The nest looked appealing, not the least because the man himself had settled to his knees on the bedding once it was laid.

  “Vasilisa isn’t here,” Elena said as she sank to her knees beside him. She placed the sword within reach on the edge of the depression. When she released the hilt, the gem faded more still. They were in darkness but it was a slightly bluish dark that sparkled around the edges of her vision.

  “No, she isn’t. We’re alone,” Romanov said. “Except for the blade.”

  “The blade already knows,” Elena said. She flaunted his denials. She dared him to continue to reject her.

  But her bold words turned to a gasp when he reached for her face in the dark. She could barely see him. His expression was shadowed. But she recognized the intensity there. She saw his intention. His strong calloused fingers cupped her face on either side. He tilted her chin and he held her firmly in place. Her breath caught as he slowly lowered his lips to her upturned mouth.

  When their lips touched, the sapphire pulsed in time with the throbbing beat of her heart. The strobe effect combined with the mica on the walls caused her head to swirl. She closed her eyes and realized it wasn’t the light or sparkle that made her dizzy. It was Romanov’s tongue teasing in and out of her lips in time with the beat of her heart. She reached for him and found the heat of his skin through his linen shirt where his leather jerkin had ridden up at the waist. He moaned against her tongue as she tasted his lips and caressed the heated skin she could feel through his shirt.

  “Elena,” Romanov breathed against her mouth when they paused for air. “I won’t let Grigori or the Ether have you. When this is done, you’ll be free.”

  “I thought I wanted freedom, but now I crave something more. I want to fight by your side. Forever or as long as the fight goes on. I won’t accept anything less from you, Ivan Romanov,” Elena vowed. “You’ve brought me to your lair. Now let me into your heart.”

  “She would destroy you to punish me. I’m the last Romanov and she won’t rest until I’ve been completely subdued,” he said.

  He raised his head away from her lips and his warm hands slid from her face. She held him, but he seemed prepared to pull away. His body had gone stiff beneath her hands. His spine was ramrod straight as they faced each other, knees to knees.

  Elena twined her arms around his neck. She didn’t grasp him. She only held him. She only pressed the length of her torso against his. She was rewarded by an intake of air and the tilt of his chin as he closed his eyes at the sensation of her full breasts against him.

  “Then she’ll never rest,” Elena said. “The Ether will never take us. Not when we have this to look forward to with every materialization.”

  She pressed into him harder and he didn’t resist when her weight urged him back on the quilts. She straddled him once he was stretched out beneath her. She reminded him of what they’d shared before with a gentle rocking of her hips. And she was rewarded with a sudden hardening beneath her bottom. It seemed as if all they’d ever have was stolen time, but she’d decided she could live as a swashbuckler after all if Romanov was her reward.

  “It isn’t only the Ether I’m afraid of for you, Elena.” Romanov reached up to cup her face again. His move stilled her hips. She held herself still with her hands on his broad chest. He pulled her down so he could look into her eyes in the soft blue light. “My mother died at the hands of the Dark Volkhvy king. She was holding the sword when she fell. It didn’t save her. My father didn’t save her. Warriors fall even when they have the full protection of the Light. I can’t lose you to the Ether or to the fight.”

  Elena couldn’t breathe. She could see the darkness in his emerald eyes. The shadows she’d thought were only Ether taint. He’d been hurt long before the curse by his mother’s death. He’d been trying to save Bronwal far longer than she’d imagined. His mother had been killed battling the Dark Volkhvy, and he’d had to continue to fight for the deadly queen who had demanded his mother’s sacrifice. Suddenly, Elena knew... Vasilisa had cursed the Romanovs by choosing them as champions and enchanting their blood. Ivan saw the sword and the shift as a curse.

  Even before the Ether began to devour the castle ten years at a time.

  The legend that had enchanted her since she was a child wasn’t a legend to Ivan. It was a nightmare from which he could never awake. He cared for her. She was certain. But she was more certain than ever that he wouldn’t allow the sword to claim her.

  * * *

  He’d always loved the galaxies that shimmered here beneath the earth. He’d claimed this place a century ago because of the mica in the walls. Now as he saw them sparkle above Elena’s head he was glad that he’d found the cavern one wild hunt long ago. He’d been in his wolf form back before there was any danger in it. He and his brothers had been chasing a large hare more for sport than for food. It had darted down a hole close to a crevice that led into
the cavern. He’d sought refuge here after that. He would shift and lie beneath his own private stars while his parents fought and his mother cried.

  After she died, he would come here to retreat from Vasilisa when she came to see his father. Everyone suspected they had become lovers. The queen’s prince consort had died in the same Dark Volkhvy attack as his mother. Ivan hadn’t cared about his father’s assignations with the queen. But he couldn’t forgive the “Light” queen for being the cause of his mother’s death. She’d been strong and brave and honorable.

  And then she’d been gone.

  He’d been left with nothing but the demands of his brothers and the harshness of his father. Then he’d been left with nothing but the entire Romanov enclave and everyone in it. Vasilisa hadn’t even blinked when she’d condemned her young wolf shifters to hell. He’d endured it alone.

  Until Elena Pavlova came.

  She couldn’t have any idea how tempted he was by what she offered. A mate. A partner. Stalwart support in the face of the endless vacuum that sought to annihilate him. He’d felt its pull long before the curse. After his mother’s death, he would stay too long in his wolf form and have to force his way out.

  But this time was different.

  “I had no say in my mother’s sacrifice, but I can prevent yours,” he said.

  “She died for a cause she believed in. The sword wouldn’t have chosen her if she didn’t willingly pick it up,” Elena said. “Vasilisa is wrong in many ways, but she’s right to fight the Dark Volkhvy. I’ve seen the witchblood prince’s dreams and desires. He has to be stopped. Not only from tormenting me. Stopped altogether.”

  “You’re a dancer. Not a warrior,” Ivan said. He lifted one of her arms from his chest and trailed his fingers along its graceful curve. Her muscles were harder though. He could feel the bulge of her bicep beneath his thumb. They silently proclaimed his words a falsehood.

  “I am both. I’ve always been both,” Elena said.

  He pulled her closer and silenced her with his lips. She resisted for only a moment before she allowed her body to melt against his. He plumbed her mouth with his tongue, exploring the different textures of silk and velvet while his fingers threaded into the blond waves of her hair. The glow from the sapphire had given the flaxen strands a blue halo. He closed his eyes against a truth he tried to deny. She couldn’t be the sapphire’s warrior.

  He wouldn’t allow it.

  A faint scent of roses came from her skin, but it combined with her unique energy to create a lighter, fresher scent than the heavier scent of Vasilisa. The Volkhvy queen’s perfume brought to mind lush, blood-red roses in such profuse bloom that they approached decay. Elena’s skin reminded him of spring and potent pink buds just beginning to open.

  He’d grown up with the queen’s motif, a claim and a poignant reminder, throughout the castle. But Elena had somehow taken it and changed it. There was beauty and hope in the buds and strength with resilience in the thorns when she touched them.

  “You’re trying to distract me,” Elena protested. They’d parted only enough for air. Her words were a soft whisper of breath against his lips. He was already rampantly erect. He throbbed against the heat she’d settled firmly against him. He ran his hands from her hair, down the delicate curve of her back to cup the firm mounds of her bottom. He pressed and she hmmmmed an approval. The sound vibrated against him.

  “You need to forget what happened earlier tonight. We both do. What better way than this?” he asked. He lifted his hips to rub his shaft against the hot V between her legs, and she moaned in response. Her eyes rolled back and she slid her hands up from his shoulders to his face. She cupped his jaw and met his eyes. It was dark. There were shadows that hid thoughts of what might come between them. It was a stolen respite. A chance to focus on the intense physical connection they’d found without the battle of where it might lead them.

  He would protect her. He would pleasure her. Until the Ether claimed him.

  And he would gladly be swallowed by Ether for eternity to keep her safe.

  * * *

  When he gently flipped her off his hips and onto the quilts that padded the rock beneath them, Elena didn’t have time to protest. When he stood to shrug out of his shirt and leather jerkin, she didn’t want to protest. The view was too spectacular. Not only the broad expanse of his masculine chest, but the backdrop of a thousand stars behind him. The sapphire’s glow caused the mica to sparkle. It also highlighted the dark waves of his wild hair and bathed every inch of him in pale blue light.

  He was tall and broad and his erection swelled out his pants between his muscled thighs. He stood above her as if he appreciated the look of her spread beneath him. His attention tracked over her body from her head to her feet and back again. Her nipples hardened beneath his gaze. The heat of her flush was obvious against the cool air.

  “I’ve never shared this cavern with anyone else before,” he said quietly. He stepped closer and dropped to his knees between her slightly parted legs. She smiled and opened to make room for him. He accepted the unspoken invitation to settle warmly against her, and the heat of her flush was nothing compared to the heat they generated when his naked chest was so close to her.

  Elena was suddenly very happy that he’d shared his refuge with her.

  Ivan touched the soft corner of her smile as if he wanted to catch the elusive expression before it faded from her face. She wanted to tell him her smile wasn’t going anywhere while they were together. Instead, she reached to twine one long silky lock of his hair around her finger, and then she caught hold and used it to pull his mouth to her lips. He pressed closer and more intimately between her legs as they kissed and his weight was glorious. He’d worried about her knee before and she’d enjoyed riding him, but the length and breadth of his large body on top of her was a different sort of thrill all together.

  “It’s cold here. You might want to stay dressed,” Romanov said. His hand held behind her good knee as she’d lifted that leg to allow his hips better access to her heat.

  “I’m not cold. I’m never cold with you. In the middle of a snowy courtyard, you make me steam,” Elena said. It was true. He had. And not only from exertion. While they had trained, she’d been on fire in much more intimate ways. He chuckled low and deep. Then he grew suddenly still and serious. His hand on her leg tightened.

  “You know I noticed. Every tremble. Every sigh,” he said.

  She claimed his confession by licking the edge of his slightly parted lips with a teasing tongue.

  “As I noticed your response to our closeness. Your tension. Your heat,” Elena replied. “There’s no chance I’ll be cold when we’re lying together, skin on skin.”

  She helped him, then, to pull off her tunic and slide her leggings down her hips. Her underthings came away easily, as well. The air was cool. Her nipples pebbled and gooseflesh rose on her skin. He stood to pull off his boots and pants and he paused only a moment to throw all their clothes to the side, but that pause made her mindless of the chill.

  Because he was beautiful in the soft blue light. He was as perfectly formed as a statue, except he was warm and real and hers...if only for a little while. His erection jutted from a nest of black curls and the sight of his eagerness caused her to flood with need.

  He might be a tormented legend, but he was naked and hers to soothe for the rest of the night.

  He came to her then and gifted her with the skin-to-skin she’d craved almost since they’d first met, and definitely since they’d practiced side by side in the courtyard. They had ostensibly been training and not engaged in foreplay with swords, but her body and his had known that every glance and every brush of their fingers was leading to this.

  “I’m not cold at all,” Elena said. She wrapped her arms around his back and placed her hands on the sensual curve above his bottom. She spread her fingers, but she thought it was the embrac
e of her open legs that made him moan. She pulled him close, and he rewarded her with the hot and heavy press of his erection against her moist, throbbing folds.

  He undulated his hips to stroke his shaft teasingly against her, and she lifted her hips to meet his strokes in a rhythmic welcome. The slide and friction was almost more than she could bear. Her body was hungry for a complete connection. She murmured pleading suggestions of where she needed him, and he complied.

  The sapphire’s glow seemed to bless their union when he found her opening with the head of his shaft. He reached to position himself and she held on to his back as he worked his hips to fit fully inside of her. She was wet and ready. He’d melted her from the start, but his naked body on top of her caused an even slicker reaction. He was well-endowed, long and thick with excitement, but her body eagerly stretched to accept every inch. In fact, she was the one who increased the speed of their thrusting and only then did he throw caution aside to match her frenzied writhing.

  “We’ve reclaimed this night,” Elena promised into his hair as he buried his face into her neck. “All else is forgotten.” His hands had come up to cup the heavy globes of her breasts and he held one to suckle as he thrust and thrust, completely lost to claiming what she offered. She cried out from the heat of his mouth and her body tightened around his shaft as she came. He might refuse to claim her with his words, and her heart may have been wounded, but her body knew his rejection was a lie. Her body knew the truth. They were a team.

  He was her mate.

  His body knew the truth, as well. He rose up, bracing himself with his hands on the floor on either side of her shoulders. His hair spilled down all around her, creating a wild tent that tickled as he moved. In the blue light, she could see the intensity tightening his face even before he opened his eyes. But when their gazes met and held, she saw the truth shining even in the shadows.

  She looked into his eyes as his body jerked and tensed. He didn’t close them against her as he buried himself all the way to her womb. He came with quaking spasms and a harsh cry that was nearly a howl. Only then did he close his eyes and throw back his head. The heat of his seed sent her over the edge again and her body quivered around him as her soft cries of pleasure joined his.