He rolled with her, flipping himself onto his back and having her straddle him. She raised herself up, her hands braced against his chest as his hand gripped her hips and moved her against him. He picked a rhythm to suit her and before long she was moaning in earnest. Every upward thrust set her breasts to shimmying and he longed to taste them. But he stayed focused on her impending orgasm. She began to ride him with energy, taking her pleasure instead of just allowing him to give it to her. It was a wondrous sight to behold, to see her grow so bold as her pleasure unfurled before him. She threw her head back and came hard.
It was impossible for him not to join her. She looked so glorious, felt so incredible. He gripped her hips so tightly he may have bruised her as he emptied himself inside her in long, hot pulses.
She collapsed onto his chest, panting hard for breath, her silvery gray hair tumbled all about his chest and shoulders. After a moment she sighed.
“I think that was better than the last time!”
“Imagine how the next time will feel,” he said.
She sat up a little and looked down at him, bracing a hand against his shoulder. “Surely you don’t mean tonight.”
“Not if you don’t want to,” he amended.
“But you can’t possibly…aren’t you tired? It’s been such a long night and you’ve used a great deal of magic. Don’t you ever get tired?”
“I do,” he admitted. “And I am. But something about you rejuvenates me.”
“Really?” she asked shyly.
“Really. I can’t remember the last time I wanted a woman with such appetite.”
“You don’t have to say that,” she said, biting on her lip.
“I do not lie,” he said sharply to her, making her startle.
“I did not say that you do!”
“You implied it. That I would speak words I do not mean would be the same as lying. I mean what I say, Viève. It has been almost a century and a half since I have taken a woman to my bed. True, one hundred years of that was spent in the Ether, but to go from one lifetime to the next without craving another and then suddenly there was you…I am still blown away by my reactions to you. I had not intended to take a lover today. It was the furthest thing from my mind. But I could not resist you.”
“I wasn’t trying to seduce you or anything,” she said softly.
“You did not need to try. This came naturally to both of us, and that is something to be treasured. I will not take it lightly or for granted.”
“I won’t either,” she vowed. “I never thought I would be so lucky. I never thought I deserved a lover.”
“I hope now you see the error in your thinking,” he said.
“I think I do,” she said with a little lift to her chin. “Everyone deserves a lover. Even me.”
“Especially you,” he said firmly.
“If you say so then I must take you at your word because, as you said, you do not lie.”
“No, I do lie. We all do. But I will not lie to you. Can we be agreed on that much?”
“I think I’d like an agreement like that. I will not lie to you either.”
“Not even a little?” he teased her.
“Not even a little. Now come on, let’s get some sleep. It’s been a long night. Many things have happened and I need time in which to process it all.”
“So sleep,” he said, easing her down onto his chest. He pressed a kiss to her hair. “Know I will watch over you now.”
“Mmm. What a nice thought,” she said with a sleepy yawn. “But you need to sleep too. I will watch over you.”
He chuckled. She wasn’t making much sense and was probably half asleep already. He should not have made demands on her. She had clearly been weary. As had he. But they had each found energy in each other.
“Shh shh shh,” he hushed softly.
His lids grew heavy, and within minutes he too was asleep.
Chapter 12
Sagan awoke the next evening with a huge yawn. He rolled over and found his wife’s warm body not too far away. He drew her in close, thoughtlessly waking her up.
“Mmm,” she murmured.
The room was pitch black as always. It needed to be. The slightest bit of light could kill Sagan. When they were awake, Valera could cast a spell that blanketed him in darkness allowing him to go out amongst the others, but he did that very rarely. All it took was one little accident to disrupt her concentration and the spell would dissipate, leaving him vulnerable to whatever light there was. Luckily the Nightwalkers had excellent night vision, so it was easy for them to shut off all the lights and allow him to walk about without risk.
Still, there was always the danger of someone accidentally flicking on a light switch. In all of their training drills, the first thing they did was hit the main breaker and kill all the lights. This would allow for Sagan to come out into the darkness and use his deadly kurkuri blade in battle. The curved blade was his favored weapon, a katana coming a close second.
Valera ran her hand up along his arm as he kissed her ear.
“Sweet dreams?” he asked.
She sighed. “Not really. I don’t think I’ll have sweet dreams until this is all over and we’re back in Alaska with nothing but darkness around us. I have this continual nightmare that someone somewhere is going to flip on a light switch and that will be the very last of you, my love.”
“That isn’t going to happen. We spend most of our time in this room. And when we leave it they shut off the main breaker to the house. Plus we cast your spell to protect me at the same time. There’s no way any light is going to touch me.”
“That doesn’t help you in the thick of battle. According to Marissa and Jackson, Apep throws beams of light.”
“I’m not going to engage Apep, and neither are you. You and I are limiting ourselves strictly to ground forces.”
“The Curse of Ra that Templars use is a red light beam of energy. It’s just as bad.”
“Your spell will protect me. That’s why it’s important you stay back and focus on protecting me while I do the fighting.”
“I still don’t like it.”
“We’ll keep practicing until you are confident.”
“We may not have any more time to practice.”
“Valera, would you prefer if we returned to Alaska? They sent us because you’re the only one that can protect a Shadowdweller in the world of light. If it’s too much—”
“No. No, we have to stay. Remember what they said earlier? They need all twelve races in order to have any hope of breaking this curse.”
“That’s if they can break the curse. There are no guarantees, love.”
“There never are. No,” she said with another sigh. “We have to stay.”
He bent his head and kissed her again. “I’ll make it worth your while,” he said on a teasing growl.
“Last night wasn’t enough?” she teased.
“It will never be enough,” he vowed to her. “It’s been years now, yet I still feel as if we are at the start of it all.”
“Oh, not the very start. The very start was hard.” She thought about how they had once thought they couldn’t bridge their two worlds. He had been a penance priest at the time, sworn to uphold a duty bound by the laws of his god and goddess. But they had left all that behind when he had resigned and they had gone to live together in the underground Shadowdweller city in Alaska. Away from light, away from the outside world. Just them and their three cats. She’d had to leave the cats behind when they moved out there, but Daenaira, a close Shadowdweller friend, was watching over them.
“True,” he said. “I was talking to Chancellor Tristan yesterday.”
“How is he?”
“He’s fine, as is Malaya.” Malaya was Tristan’s twin and also Chancellor of their people. They shared the title in much the same way they shared everything else. “He mentioned coming down here to be with us.”
“Oh no! He shouldn’t do that! I can’t protect you both!”
�
�I know,” he said, calming her. “I told him as much. He just feels that he should be doing something to help us.”
“Staying home would help us. Tell him to watch the cats. That’ll be a big help to us.”
“Val! I can’t tell the Chancellor of my people to watch our cats! Besides, Dae is already doing it.”
“Well, tell him anything, just keep him home safe.”
“I already said as much. Give me some credit. But he does want to be apprised of the situation at all times.”
“Well, we’ll do that then.”
“I said that too.”
“Okay good.” She reached up and kissed his lips. “Now move. I gotta pee.”
He laughed. “All of the romance has gone out of our relationship.”
“Ha! Tell that to my sore thighs,” she said as she scrambled over him.
“Your thighs are sore?” he asked with concern. “I was too rough on you?”
“No!” she called out from the bathroom. “You were just rough enough!”
That made him grin a wolfish grin. His fiery little redhead had always been hot to the touch. And there was nothing he liked more than seeing his dark hands on her pale white flesh.
“Ah! That’s better!” she said, coming out of the bathroom and sitting on the edge of the bed. He reached for her hand and began kissing her fingers. She didn’t seem to notice as she said, “You know, I think we should have another one of those training sessions this evening.”
“We’re having one later on tonight.”
“Well, I think we should have two. One in the evening and one later in the night. I feel like we need to be doing more.”
He frowned. He understood the feeling. It was one he shared. He was a warrior. He was meant to be in the thick of battle. He exercised his skills every day, that wasn’t the problem. The problem would come when people started hurling bolts of light at him. He felt restricted by his vulnerability to light. The only solution was to not be a target. To sneak attack. Move in and out before anyone saw him. Using shuriken, saw stars, and glave to hit from a distance. At home, in the dark.
“Then we’ll go to Jacob and tell him how you feel. I’m sure everyone can agree there is no such thing as too much battle-readiness.”
“All right.” She nibbled on her nail a minute. “My protection spell has gotten stronger, and I think the spell that blocks light from touching you could work in tandem with it to protect you against the Curse of Ra. But the only way to know for sure is to have someone throw the Curse of Ra at you and see if it works and I’m not willing to take that risk.”
“I think we might have to. It’s the only way we’ll know. If we don’t know for sure then I shouldn’t go out in the thick of it.”
“Well, we can’t test it on you! What if it doesn’t work?”
“That’s it!” he said, brightening suddenly. “We won’t test it on me. We’ll test it on someone else.”
“But light doesn’t hurt anyone else.”
“Wrong. Sunlight burns Vampires. The Curse of Ra is a concentrated beam of sunlight. That’s why it hurts Nightwalkers so much. Now all we have to do is figure out how to get the Curse of Ra on this side of the fence.”
“I could cast it and—”
“No! It’s an aggressive, antagonistic spell. It’s just the kind of magic that can turn a human magic-user into a necromancer, poisoning you from the inside out. I won’t have you doing it. We need a Templar—Kamenwati or Tameri.”
“But the same problem as always applies. We can’t see them and they can’t see us.”
“On the plus side, with the curse in place we aren’t threatened by the Templars and the Curse of Ra. Again, they can’t see us and we can’t see them. On the negative side, if they have necromancers that can cast it or something like it, we’re screwed.”
“So what do we do?”
He reached up and stroked a thumb across the sensitive, delicate skin beneath her eye. “I have no idea, baby.” He sighed. “I have no idea at all.”
—
Kamen awoke with a start, feeling something was out of place. He went to move, but something on his chest weighed him down. That was when he looked down and remembered what had become out of place. He wasn’t used to sleeping with a woman. Even when he had indulged in sex it had been a rather cool exchange, certainly nothing worthy of having a woman sleep by his side. There had also been trust issues. The Templars were a sect known for its power-hungry ways; there were many who were willing to do anything to get it, and it would’ve been unwise to place trust in any of them for any reason—especially as a high ranking officer. It was also rather akin to a boss sleeping with one of his underlings. Never a wise choice. Not if he wanted others to take him seriously.
But anyone who was in the Templar sect had known to take him very seriously. He had proven himself time and again, in ways he was now not proud of. He had let himself be swept up in the coldness and callousness of Odjit’s way of handling things, had kept his mind free of guilt by justifying it as a necessary evil.
He had many sins on his head, and he did not deserve forgiveness for them. Not yet and maybe not ever.
And he certainly didn’t deserve her.
He reached up a hand and brushed back one frosted gray strand of hair from beneath her nose where her breath was stirring it. He traced the apple of her cheek with the lightest touch he could manage. He didn’t want to wake her. He didn’t know what kind of sleeper she was. Was she one that slept so heavy a freight train could come through and she wouldn’t even stir? Or was she one of those who slept fairy light and stirred at the slightest disturbance?
He wasn’t of a mind to find out just yet, so he spoke a Word and she slowly levitated into the air. As soon as he was able he slipped out from beneath her and then lowered her back down onto the bed in ginger increments. She settled and with a little snort she grabbed the pillow her head was on and hugged it closer to her cheek.
“Kamen,” she said on an exhale of breath, then slept on.
He smiled. He liked the sound of his name on her soft lips. Hell, he liked everything about her. Except for her low esteem of herself. The thought wiped away his smile, replacing it with a dour frown. One of these days he was going back to that cell in Iowa and he was going to have a long talk with some Wraiths about the way they had treated her.
But he was treating her almost as badly. By continuing to be her lover without coming clean about who he was…it was a low thing to do. But he was a low creature and clearly that had not changed. He was just as selfish as he had been before. He could only hope that this time his selfishness would not have such a horrific impact as the last time. The last time he had wanted things his way, he had created the means for Apep to possess Odjit’s body.
No. This time his selfishness was bound to hurt only one person. He touched her cheek again and tried to will himself to do the right thing. As soon as she awakened he would tell her everything. It was the right thing to do.
But it would mean the end of what he had found with her and he could not bear for that to happen just yet. Not just yet.
But he had to be the one to do it. The longer she spent in this house the more likely it was that someone would tell her what he had done.
Yes. When she awakened, he would tell her. And he would watch the light go out of her regard for him and she would look at him the way everyone else in this house looked at him.
Like the criminal he was.
Kamen stood up, walked into the bathroom, and stepped into the shower. His thoughts churned around and around as he tried to come to grips with what his next step would be.
Unable to agree with himself about things as far as Viève was concerned, he decided to plot his next course of action for the task of getting all of the Nightwalkers to come to the table. The only holdouts now were the Wraiths and the Mysticals. If he could get the Mysticals on board, the Wraiths would follow. But that was a pretty big if in the grand scheme of things. He had no idea what his recep
tion with the Mysticals would be. He wasn’t even sure that the Empress was of sound mind.
The Empress of the Mysticals was, in her Mystical form, a winged horse. Apparently she had been held captive for a length of time by the Wraiths. He didn’t know why the Wraiths would want to hold the Empress prisoner, but it did not bode well for them getting along in the future. The Empress may not want anything to do with any agreement that involved the Wraiths.
But perhaps here he could use Viève. She was a kinder and gentler face for the Wraiths. Maybe if the Empress got to know Viève it would make her look more kindly on the idea of peace with the Wraiths.
But it wasn’t only the Wraiths involved here, and the Empress must be made to see that as well. The idea of facing an enemy of the caliber of Apep was no easy thing. He was amazed he had gotten ten races to the table already. They had been fortunate in the fact that the First Faction of Nightwalkers had already shared a certain unity between the races. It was a unity the Second Faction lacked. But hopefully the future held better things for them. All they had to do was—
His thoughts were interrupted with a start when he felt a hand touch his back. The shower stall was a walk-in without doors, a small room of marble. She had walked in without him even hearing her. He turned under the spray to face her and she pushed at his chest so he took a step back. That allowed her to get completely beneath the spray of the shower and the water darkened her hair as it got wet. She washed her hands up over her face, basking in the shower as a lizard might bask in the sun. She was beautiful and he couldn’t resist her. He ringed a hand around the back of her neck and pulled her up into a wet, heated kiss.
Her hands came around his back, clutching him to her. Their tongues danced against each other. After a long pair of minutes, he let her up for air, blocking the spray with his body so she could look up at him without getting water in her face.
“Hi,” she said, beaming at him.
“Hello,” he returned. “I thought to leave you sleeping.”
“I woke up when you were no longer there.”
Nightwalker Page 14
