Abducting the Princess (5 page)

Mother you were right. You were so utterly right.

She could only be glad her sexual needs weren’t dead as she’d once suspected.

“Are you okay?” he asked gruffly, proffering her a hand and pulling her effortlessly to her feet.

No. I’m far from okay. I’m falling for you, the one man I shouldn’t be when I’m pledged to another.

She nodded. “I think so.”

He took hold of the shirt’s hood and pushed it back from her face. More sand spilled free. He unknotted his
darfe
from her face and shook it. Her eyes were gritty and dry. Little wonder. Fine powder still floated in the air, giving off an eerie, unnatural glowing haze to the coming dusk.

Mahaya seemed to barely notice. Instead his stare moved slowly over her body. She pushed aside a sudden thrill of delight. He was merely assessing she was unhurt.

Nothing more.

The same couldn’t be said about him. Red welts and burns covered his belly and chest. When he turned to his horse and uncapped one of the water skins, she realized his back was even worse. The sand had ripped and gouged into his skin, leaving a mess of open wounds. She could only be thankful his being a shifter would heal him fast.

He faced her once again, holding out the skin. “Here. Drink. You’ll be needing it.”

She shook her head. “Not until you’ve had some first.”

He raised a brow. “I’m flattered you care.”

Tipping the skin to his mouth, he took one long sip. No more. Before he handed it to her. Too overcome with thirst to deny herself any longer, she gulped it down. The water was sweet and wonderfully cool. Every drop rejuvenated her body, wet her dry throat and belly. “That’s enough.” He pulled the skin from her lips and recapped it before he murmured, “Too much and you’ll be sick. Better to be sparing and drink when it’s most needed.”

She nodded. “Of course. I…I didn’t think.”

“No need to apologize, Mira. You’re hardly a seasoned warrior.”

And whose fault was that? Her princess attributes might be more than adequate inside the palace walls, but out in the desert she was about as useful to him as a noose around his neck.

After placing the water skin behind the saddle, he lifted the
darfe
over her face and gently pulled the hood back into position. “There will be many searching for you now—and not just your father’s soldiers. Best to keep you covered.”

At her silence, he turned to his horse and checked him over, running his hands over the stallion’s long, muscled legs before undoing the girth and using a gentle touch along his withers, shoulder and flank.

She abstractedly brushed off more sand, aware Mahaya’s care and attention to his mount—and toward her—were not the expected behavior of any
nightmix
she knew.

Aside from her father.

He crooned gentle words to the stallion while working the stitched skin up and over Jax’s neck, ears and head, freeing him from the protective skin. The stallion stood quivering a little, but otherwise trusting and quiet. Mahaya then got busy unrolling another skin before he shaped it into a bowl and tipped in some of the water. Jax drank thirstily, while Mahaya proceeded to saddle up the roan.

She turned away, an unsteady hand pressed to her mouth. Had she judged Mahaya unfairly all along? Had he not kidnapped her, would she have given him more credit as a
nightmix
? Probably not. But surely her father wasn’t alone in being able to fight off the inner darkness?

“Are you okay?”

She twisted to face him. “Yes. Of…of course.”

The back of his knuckles brushed along her cheek in tender concern. “I really didn’t intend for you to suffer in any way. Please know that.”

She nodded. For once words were lost to her. What could she say?
Yeah, against all my better judgment I believe you?
She’d sound delusional, foolish. Hell, perhaps even both.

Placing his hands on her waist, he lifted her up onto the front of the saddle before swinging into place behind her. “We’d better get moving.”

Cradled in Mahaya’s arms, somehow she couldn’t fight the sense of rightness, of belonging. She cast him long, lingering glances as she leaned against the strong bulk of his chest, her every dip and curve fitting perfectly against his. She should loathe this
nightmix
, instead his every look and touch detonated a fiery passion within.

Were her feelings so strong because she too had always been a misfit? A
larakyte
royal with mostly human subjects who no doubt resented the fact their monarchs weren’t mortal.

Worse, she was an unknown entity.

An outcast.

She bit into her bottom lip. Right then she wished more than anything to have Mahaya’s freedom. She frowned. She’d never wished for a different life before. Why now the sudden yearning?

Because you’ve never really been outside the Zaneean and
larakyte
palace walls. You’ve never spent time with a man who made you feel like a real woman. You’ve never known any different.

It was an odd, disorientating feeling, as though the foundation of her existence was being pulled out from under her.

Just like my belief that all nightmixes are dangerous?

In that moment it was as if her whole life had been built from lies of her own making.

“Something wrong?” Mahaya asked, his husky voice that was close to her ear, startling her.

“No, I’m fine.”

“So why are you stiffer than my cock?”

His crude words had the desired effect. Immediately heat flashed through her, every cell aware of him, of his anatomy pressed against her. She tilted her chin. “If I was as stiff as your…
cock
, I’d snap in half.”

His laugh pierced the air, making her forget for one moment all her self-doubts, all her anxieties.

“You might be right—”

Her senses went into high alert at his obviously cut off sentence. Her gaze sharpened, caught by the red-turbaned riders appearing through the distant haze. Even without really knowing, she perceived right away who they were.

Dissenters.
“Stay silent,” he urged in an undertone.

It was a surreal moment, dreamlike in its intensity as the twenty or so riders approached with suspicious, hard stares. Bits jingled and one of the horses nickered as the riders passed them by without comment.

It was a moment that seemed stretched out for long minutes, but would have been no more than ten or twenty seconds at best. She expelled an unsteady breath at the dissenters leaving, feeling as if a malignant force had just released its hold.

“Don’t look back,” Mahaya murmured.

But she didn’t need to look over her shoulder to know the turbaned riders had wheeled their mounts around. The men soon surrounded them, hemming them in. The one who appeared to be the leader, a big, heavyset man who sat astride a horse too small for his size, asked harshly, “Traveling alone?”

Mahaya shrugged. “My wife and I had to leave in a hurry.”

“In too much of a rush to organize a guard to take with you?” the other man sneered.

“Obviously,” Mahaya replied steadily, not backing down an inch. Against her spine his whole body stiffened, his tension palpable.

Oh, shit.
She could sense Mahaya’s inner panther readying to fight, attack. But surely even a
nightmix
couldn’t hold off a group this size, particularly ones who were trained to fight and kill without mercy?

The leader pulled free his sword, brandishing it with a dark chuckle. “Looks to me as though you’re no longer in a hurry. Remove your wife’s
darfe
and hood, or I’ll take off her head.” His grin became even more malicious. “Even if she is the…princess.”

She swallowed back immediate fear, cold beads of sweat forming on her brow.

They knew.

Jax tossed his head, aware of his master’s tension. Mahaya’s panther was mere seconds away from shifting.

Mira raised a steady hand. All eyes turned to her. Exactly what she wanted. She’d spent most of her life reasoning, persuading and keeping a cool head. She could only hope her skills and self-discipline would come to her aid when she needed them most. “I give you fair warning.” She ensured her voice remained coarse and un-princess like. “My
darfe
and hood aren’t just protection from the sandstorm.”

Irritation flashed in the leader’s eyes. “Don’t play games with me,
Princess
. Show us your face. Or die.”

She snorted, deliberately inelegant. “
Princess?
You deluded fool.” She pretended to untie her
darfe.
“I have desert fever. We’re on our way to see relatives so I can say my goodbyes before it’s too late.” She untied the knot. “If I had royal blood flowing through my veins would I look like this—”

“Stop!” the leader snarled, real fear in his hard stare. “Stay covered.”

Desert fever was an airborne disease that had hit mostly the poorer out-dwellings, the people whose malnourished bodies didn’t have the capacity to fight off the sickness. Whole families had been known to catch the malady while tending the carrier.

She retied her knot and stifled a cough as the leader backed his horse away and nodded, a hint of sympathy shadowing his hard features. “Goddess be with you.”

Mahaya nodded before he pushed his horse forward. The
larakyte
haters parted way before them as though camels ceding way to a malicious herder. In reality none of the humans wanted to be near a carrier of the dreaded fever. Perverse, really, that the same men who’d risk their lives to be rid of the shape shifter race, were scared shitless by an airborne disease.

Restrained laughter spilled from Mahaya’s mouth. She could only be glad the hazy, thick-as-soup air blocked his merriment.

“Too clever, Mira.”

A grin pulled at her lips, relief pouring through her body at their close escape. “I might not be a warrior, but I’m experienced in the art of words.”

He held the reins one-handed, his free hand caressing her hip in what seemed an absent yet meaningful gesture. “I believe you could coax most men off a cliff without even trying. But you’re a warrior too. Smart in every way, courageous and tough.”

She positively beamed at his praise. He saw and valued the real her and it meant more this once than she could put into words. She sobered only a little when she pointed out, “Without you we would have already been dead out here.”

“Physical strength doesn’t make a soldier. Cunning, wits and staying cool under pressure serves one far better.”

“Thank you.”

“No. Thank
you
my princess warrior,” he said gently.

With the danger passed, at least for the moment, his hand lifted to untie her
darfe.
He knotted it once more around the waistband of his pants before he pushed Jax into a canter.

The rim of the sun was sinking over the distant horizon, long shadows chasing away the light. But she wasn’t afraid. Wrapped in Mahaya’s arms, the desert night air deliciously cool on her skin, she was carefree. Flying. And as close to being free as she’d ever been.

She’d never felt lighter. Until that moment, she’d never really lived before. It was a poignant, sad, yet amazing self-admission. One that kept her silent and thoughtful while Jax effortlessly carried them.

A quarter moon and blanket of stars threw out enough light to reveal a gradually changing landscape. Straggly shrubs dotted the sand, followed by scrawny trees that were bent by the elements, the wind and heat. And then, in what seemed a blink of the eye, huge pine trees reared into the sky all around them, their needles covering the ground and their pungent scent filling the air.

No longer the white, glaring sand and relentless heat.

The
scantia
forest. It had to be.

Excitement coursed through her. This had once been her mother’s home. The
larakytes
home. Until the dissenters had driven them out.

Mahaya brought Jax to a walk as the path he followed became little wider than the cave tunnels, with trees hemming them in and the sky hidden way above the canopy.

Little wonder most humans were still superstitious of the forest and preferred the harsher environment of the desert kingdom.

The forest was dark. Murky. Shadowy.

She shivered, but it was little more than a passing fear. Her ideas. Her perceptions. Everything had been challenged…and altered.

Perhaps an hour later, Mahaya reined Jax to stop in a clearing near a deep waterhole. The stallion dropped his head and drank deep when Mahaya dismounted before holding out his arms to her.

She went to him without hesitation. “We’re here?”

He looked down at her, his hands at her waist and his teeth glinting stark white under the faint wash of moonlight seeping through the foliage. “Not far now. But I thought you might like to rinse off some of the sand first.”

As Jax wandered a few paces away, tearing up the green grass that flourished close to the waterhole, Mira nodded and said huskily, “Please.”

His fingers curled under the hem of the hooded shirt. But before he drew it over her head, he asked, “May I?”

Her mouth dried. Awareness leapt from within her as though a spark becoming a raging fire. She nodded, mute, though her panther roused and her body sang.

The shirt discarded, she stood still and trembling before him. She’d been naked plenty of times before her
cotesh
servants, but even clothed in her usual garb she’d never been more conscious of her own body. Her every atom drank in his desire; relished the attraction that was all too mutual.

In that moment she was his perfect mate. In that moment nothing else mattered but answering the call within.

It took just seconds more for Mahaya to divest her of her bra top and pants. It took him even less time to unbuckle his cinched belt and place his blade within reach on the ground, then strip bare of his own clothes.

Gods, he was beautiful. Every dip and curve, every hard muscle and long sinew was masculine perfection. Her breath caught when she dropped her gaze, taking in his engorged cock rounded off by its silky helmet head.