A Midwinter Fantasy (16 page)

Everyone was still staring at him, murmuring now. Mace was used to that but still irritated, and to add to the matter, everyone he saw was male, showing none of the fearful respect
he was used to getting. He was tempted to just walk out, but this was still the best place to start. The mail convoy he sought would have gone through this town. If the convoy hadn’t stopped at this inn, the innkeeper still should know where it went. It was even possible that Jayden was still here, though Mace couldn’t sense him. He’d never paid much attention to Lily’s male orphans, but he knew them well enough that he could identify their patterns. That was true of Jayden especially, since the boy was always around. Mace only had to get within a few hundred feet of the youngster to spot him.

He went across the room to the innkeeper, who’d just had one of the patrons at his bar whisper to him and was now regarding Mace with rather more concern than before. There was a bit of fear under the bluster, but it still had nothing to do with any realization of what Mace actually was. Mace couldn’t read minds, only emotions, and right now that didn’t help him much.

He stopped on the other side of the bar, looking down at the man.

“You lost your cloak,” the innkeeper noted. “You get attacked by those bandits?”

“What?” Mace said, surprised. He hadn’t heard anything about bandits, though of course he wouldn’t have cared, so long as they stayed off sylph land. “I’m looking for a boy. His name’s Jayden, about fourteen. He would have come through here a week ago with a mail convoy out of Sylph Valley.”

To his surprise, the man’s expression turned to dismay, and the talking started up in the inn again. Mace looked around in bemusement, listening to the conversations for information, but it was the innkeeper who said something that made sense. Sort of.

“Oh, hell. Look, we didn’t know where he came from.
The postmen didn’t stay long enough to say much. I mean, we knew about it, but we didn’t know who to tell.”

Mace eyed him. “What are you talking about?”

The innkeeper took a deep breath, obviously not happy with what he had to say next. “A mail convoy got attacked by bandits on the road a few days ago. They came through here afterward and didn’t stay long; they’d lost everything, and no one wants to stay here anymore, thanks to those damn murderers.” He paused. “They said that the bandits told them that if they didn’t get a recruit, they’d kill everyone. They said a boy volunteered to go with them. No one’s seen him since.”

“Damn bastards,” a patron growled. “Just wanted to toy with him, I bet. They don’t need recruits. They got enough already.”

“Won’t be long before they attack us, I tell you. That wall won’t be enough to keep them out.”

“Someone’s got to petition the king for help!”

“We’ve already sent to him. Won’t see nothing until spring, if we see anything at all.”

Mace looked around at the different speakers until an older man with sparse hair and a facial similarity to the innkeeper leaned over and patted his arm. He smelled of ale. “He was a brave, brave lad. He your son?”

“No.” Mace pulled his arm free. This was going to take longer than he’d hoped. “Where are these bandits?” He didn’t ask why the townsfolk hadn’t risen up themselves against them. They weren’t battle sylphs.

The innkeeper’s brow lifted. “Are you planning to go after them? By yourself?”

“Of course.”

They laughed. Mace would have been annoyed if he’d cared. They seemed to think he was crazy, though, and he hoped he
wouldn’t have to reveal his identity just to get them to take him seriously. This whole “discretion” approach really wasn’t working as well as he’d hoped.

The innkeeper howled, wiping his eyes. “You’re going to go after them. Bandits. In winter. Alone. Just who the hell do you think you are?”

Mace frowned. “My name is Mace, and I need to know—”

“Mace?” The man gaped, his emotions flipping instantly to surprise. A complex twist of emotions overlaid with disgust replaced this as his entire personality changed, faster than Mace would have thought possible. His eyes narrowed. “Have you been here before? About nineteen years ago, in the winter?”

“Yes,” Mace said, having no idea why the man was asking. He’d been a giant, silent suit of armour then, and he’d never stepped into the inn. He’d been left out in the stable for the night, with only a single visitor.

“Bastard!” the man thundered, his face flushing red as he reached under the bar. Surprised, Mace just stared at him until the innkeeper brought out a cudgel and swung it hard against the side of his head.

It was a blow meant to kill, fueled by a sudden, passionate rage. With a normal man the attack would have been fatal, but Mace’s head only rocked to one side and back. The innkeeper gaped, and Mace reached across the bar, grabbed him by the front of his shirt, and threw him across the room. The man howled and crashed into a table, knocking it over and scattering the people sitting around it. A moment later, everyone seemed to be piling atop Mace, joined in some form of semidrunken solidarity that was familiar to a battle sylph, if annoying beyond belief.

A chair smashed across Mace’s back and an ale mug struck him. Truly annoyed that Lily banned him from killing anyone,
the battler grabbed one fist that was speeding toward his face and flung its owner off to his right. He then backhanded another. He didn’t try to kill either man, but his blows were more powerful than a human’s. This didn’t deter his attackers, however. The men in the inn were obviously family, and the more of them he knocked down, the more the rest seemed determined to get vengeance.

Mace wasn’t prepared to be their victim, no matter how much of this was a fear reaction because of bandits. Stepping forward, he bent down as a man came at him, catching him around the waist and straightening. The man’s roar of anger became an unmanly shriek as he found himself abruptly flipped upside down, held behind Mace’s head. Mace let him go and stepped forward, letting the man crash heavily onto the wood floor.

By this point, the innkeeper had struggled to his feet, standing unsteadily and waving at the rest. “Bash that guy’s head in!” he shouted. “That’s the bastard who ruined our family’s reputation! Just don’t wreck my inn!”

Right. There was a table beside him, a heavy thing made of scratched wood. Mace grabbed the end of it with one hand and threw it at a group, careful to aim just high enough that they could duck, much as he wanted to take their heads off. That gave more than a few of them pause, some of them realizing at last that this wasn’t a normal fight. Not that Mace cared. He just knew that he hadn’t come here for this, and he didn’t have the patience for it.

Throwing the table wasn’t enough. The men kept coming. Seeing no other option, Mace released his hate. Every man in the bar, whether drunk or sober, angry or afraid, froze. The hate of a battle sylph was a palpable thing, an aura that covered and overwhelmed, causing terror in the hearts of humans and the urge to fight in other battlers. For the years
when he was bound, Mace had used it to hide his emotions from his master, who was empathic with him. He hadn’t used the aura in years, but even now it marked what he was and made those near him afraid. It was a warning. They wouldn’t accept him as one of them? He wouldn’t pretend anymore.

“Oh, gods,” the innkeeper gasped, his face utterly white. “She wasn’t lying.”

Half the occupants of his bar were already running for the door, and the only regret Mace felt was the fear he sensed in Ruffles outside, who couldn’t understand battler hate and was bolting in terror. He was just turning to go find her when the door to the kitchen banged open, hitting the wall so hard that even Mace turned to look.

A woman stood there, thin and tired, her hair done up in a messy bun and her clothes faded and worn by toil. Her face was lined with old worries, but even as Mace looked at her, the lines were dropping away, amazement returning her youth as she stared at him, her arms covered in soapy water to the elbows and her apron stained and worn.

“Mace?” she whispered.

“Yes,” he replied uncertainly, staring at the strangest reaction to his hate he’d ever seen in his life. He let the aura drop.

“Mace!”

She screamed and ran forward to throw her arms around him, burying her face against his chest. This close, he could smell her soap and her scent—one he’d smelled many years ago, during a night spent banished to a stable with only a single visitor. Smiling, he put his arms around her.

“Sally,” he said, and she started to cry.

Sally was seventeen when she came to him that night nineteen years ago. Mace had been standing in an empty stall, though of course the entire stable was emptied of animals to try and accommodate him. Jasar had been especially petty since the journey began, not having wanted to travel in the first place and being angry with Mace for other reasons. He’d tormented his battler to distraction, making him angrier and angrier until, by the time they reached the village, Mace was steaming with hatred and not caring how far he broadcast it. He’d been wallowing, Mace knew, especially since Jasar was too small-minded to be bothered by his hate, but he hadn’t been able to stop himself. He’d just wanted to hate, to make sure everyone shared his misery.

That changed when Sally came in. He was so busy imagining tortures for his master that he didn’t even realize she was there until she spoke. Mr. Mace, she called him. The second he heard, he shut down the hate. His master he’d see die a thousand different deaths, but he’d never deliberately hurt a female of his own volition. She’d called his name again, so afraid of what he could do to her but so brave, and he’d stepped out of his stall to see her.

Her beauty had almost undone him. He’d seen many women in the castle where Jasar lived, and he’d had many of them as well, slaking his needs on them and preventing his own madness, but Sally was different. She wasn’t dressed in
a noble’s finery or a servant’s uniform. She wore a simple homespun dress, her hair curling around her face where it came loose from the bun, and her hands curled in her apron, twisting the fabric in a way that made his heart surge. She was innocent and sweet, and deep inside her he felt the needs that she was afraid of facing in herself, needs she certainly hadn’t come into this stable expecting to experience.

She asked him to stop scaring everyone in the inn. He nodded in agreement: he only wanted to hurt Jasar, and to Jasar the hate meant nothing anyway. Instead Mace felt the deep longing she had, the loneliness and surety that no one could ever want her, and he drew it into himself, blending it with his own never-ending desire before sending it back to her. He heard her breath catch and wanted to take her into his arms. Instead she fled back to the inn. He let her go, despite longing as always for a woman’s touch. This was what he was made for, even more than the hate and the violence. He was meant to be a lover.

He thought this woman wouldn’t have him. He had offered—in the only way he could, given that he was forbidden to speak—and she’d fled. She came back, though. Deep in the night, after the rest of the town was asleep, he saw the brief flicker of a hooded lantern at the window to the stable, followed a moment later by a slim, shadowy figure darting inside. She hesitated, but she had courage and Mace could feel her desire, could feel the burning knot deep within her, and his own lust surged, projecting straight to her. She gasped at the feel of it, trembling, and he stepped forward to take the lantern from her before she dropped it into the straw.

She stared up at him as he set the lantern aside and turned the wick up a little so that she could see. He didn’t need it; he could see in the dimmest light or use his senses to find his way. He was aware of far more of her without his eyes
anyway. Most importantly, he knew exactly what she needed and what she’d come for.

She wasn’t so sure, despite the bravery he felt deep inside. “I don’t know why I’m here,” she whispered.

He was tall and bulky in his armored shape, his interior seemingly empty though Jasar hadn’t specified what was supposed to go
inside
the armour when he commanded Mace’s form. Many women had learned in fact that he wasn’t empty at all. This female barely came to the bottom of his breast-plate though, so Mace knelt down before her, reaching up to cup the sides of her breasts with his hands. She gasped at that, and he brought his thumbs around to brush her nipples. She whimpered, and he pressed a little harder, just enough to feel her pleasure increase, stimulated by his aura of desire as much as his touch.

She wanted more, and he lifted his hands away to unlace her bodice. She let him, her breath quickening, and he opened the heavy fabric to free her breasts in the chemise. The front was cut low, normally kept decent, if tantalizing, by the bodice. Mace just pushed the cloth wide, and she cried out as he took her bared breasts in his hands, squeezing them rhythmically as his thumbs made circles around her nipples.

“Oh, this is why I’m here,” she gasped, her head falling back. Her entire body was taut, pleasure quivering through her, but he contented himself with her breasts, rubbing the visor of his face against her. All his moments had been stolen before this, quick flashes of sex taken in hurried minutes in which he always feared someone would come and see, women with skirts tossed up to permit him, often biting their own hands to keep from screaming while he filled them. He’d never had leave to take his time before, and he meant to take advantage of it. This woman came to him willingly. He had the leisure to make her never regret it.

Mace stroked every inch of her body, baring her slowly as he set aside bodice and chemise, then went to work on the ribbon that held her hair, loosening it and running his hands through her locks before dropping his hands to loosen the ties around her waist and lower her skirts and undergarments. She leaned forward while he did, planting little kisses all over his visor and helm.

She was beautiful naked, her body soft and curvy. Mace pulled her toward him and she came willingly as he sat back on his heels, twining her arms around his neck as she continued her kisses.