Aurora's Promise (16 page)

“Certainly. It varies some from House to House and it is up
to each mate as to the extent of involvement. Generally, outside of being
present during formal celebrations, we are fairly free to choose our own path
as long as we can be kept safe.”

“So no fighting on the front lines?” Aurora asked in a mock
seriousness.

Kaia shook her head. “No doing
anything
that involves
even the possibility of coming into contact with the Sleht, but just about any
other option is open in one manner or another. Do you have any interests you
are particularly hoping to pursue?”

An unexpected image of Connyn in all his glorious naked
yumminess rose in her mind and she nearly choked herself on a piece of bread. “Umm…”
she finally managed, “I’m not sure. Though I’m sure some things will appeal to
me more than others.”
Like fucking your son.
Jesus. She
was
tired
if her mind was wandering there after the fight they’d had this afternoon. Time
to simply be quiet and listen. She’d learn something, but most importantly, she
wouldn’t let something slip that shouldn’t. She had a feeling that Kaia didn’t
miss a single thing.

With an encouraging smile for Kaia to begin elaborating on
the Royal duties required of members of the Third House, Aurora settled back
against the cushion and kept her mouth shut.

* * * * *

“What are you doing in here?” Connyn’s voice sounded loud in
the quiet room and Aurora jerked awake under the covers.

She sat up groggily, brushing her hair out of her eyes. “Sleeping.”
She flopped back down. “Go away.”

Stifling the growl rising in his throat, he scooped her up. “I
meant, why are you in this room rather than in ours?”

One eye cracked open. “This is the only room with a bed in
it.”

He carried her out into the main courtyard and tilted her up
to see the door he was approaching. “This is our room.”

She dropped her head back against his shoulder, closing the
one eye she had opened. “I tried that door. It wouldn’t open. I thought it was
the room you kept all your treasures in or something.”

His mate was more right than she’d believe. Readjusting her
so she could see what he was doing he said, “You have to touch the stone with
your ring. Any doors in this section of the palace with this stone in the
middle open only when you touch it with your palm and the ring.”

“Cait doesn’t have a ring and she comes and goes,” Aurora
mumbled.

“Under normal conditions, certain servants can enter the
main room with permission during the day.”

Aurora grunted. With a sigh, he let the door slide open and
then turned to close it again once he was inside the room.

He placed her in the middle of their bed and then stripped
out of his clothes. Without opening her eyes, Aurora scooted around the bed
until she was under the covers.

“I heard you were interested in your new duties as my mate.”
The news had pleased him extraordinarily, especially after her ridiculous
proclamation this afternoon. His mother had embedded the information in a short
but stern lecture about not pushing his mate too far too fast, but she’d be
surprised at how much stronger Aurora was than she looked. It still surprised
him.
She
still surprised him. Regularly. His mother hadn’t been on the
receiving end of one of her tirades or seen her attack a Predator. He had and
he still didn’t believe it.

Aurora squinted up at him and found him looking down at her.
She pulled the cover completely over her head.

Smiling, he crawled into bed beside her, tugging the blanket
from between them. She turned her back to him, so he wrapped his arm around her
waist and hauled her body up next to his. When he started to tug up her
nightshirt, she smacked his hands.

“Forget it. I’m tired and still angry with you.”

Smoothing the hem of her short gown down over her thigh, he
kissed the side of her neck. “You’ll feel better in the morning.”

“I’ll be rested, but still angry.”

He chuckled. “We’ll see.” Pulling the blanket up over them
both, he pressed close to his mate. “I’ve spoken to Wyc and Rordyc. I should
have sent Bethany and Brooke over today. It might have made your first day in
Ilyria more agreeable if your sisters had been here to welcome you.”

“They didn’t know we’d arrived?”

“Very few outside our sector were made aware until I had had
the opportunity to check that all safety measures were in place.”

She went back to her grunt-only response.

He slid his hand over her breast and got an elbow in the
ribs for his effort. He didn’t move his hand.

“I’m going to sleep,” she muttered.

Gently squeezing the soft weight of her breast in his hand,
he kissed her hair. “Sweet dreams, my
vystra.
”

True to form, Aurora grunted and jabbed him in the ribs again
for good measure. He had a feeling the sweet dreams would be his.

* * * * *

They’d been anchored off land for nearly a day and she
was furious that he had broken his promise. Instead of setting her free, he’d
kept her locked in his cabin under the close watch of two of his most trusted
men. It was several hours past full dark when she heard the crew returning to
the ship across the inlet, a loud and very boisterous crew that announced their
arrival with spontaneous bursts of off-key singing. The scattered lines from
songs with such graphic lyrics would have shocked her into silence if anger had
not rendered her mute long ago. They did, however, serve to spark to flame the
anger that had cooled in the previous hours she’d been given over to her own
company.

Not long after their return, low murmuring came from the
other side of the thick wooden door. No doubt her guards were making a full
report on her behavior throughout the day which ranged from a screaming shrew
to the icy silence of a fury that delved too deeply for mere words, be they
threats, logic or desperate pleas.

It was this absolute quiet that had seemed to unnerve her
guards the most. Indeed, it was the only time either had tried to talk to her
through the door. When she had held her tongue, an argument had ensued between
the two over whether their captain’s wrath was worth opening the door to check
on her. Ultimately, any possible decline of her health was found wanting when
weighed against the sure decline of theirs should they go against the captain’s
orders.

When the door did finally open, Captain Kilth entered
with the confident arrogance that was his natural demeanor regardless of the
task at hand, though she did notice that his hand rested however casually on
the hilt of the sword he wore at his side. Since she had lit no candle or
lantern, he regarded her in the dim shafts of moonlight silvering through the
portholes.

Had he entered earlier in the day, he would have found
himself the target of any and all heavy items left in his cabin not nailed
down. At present, her rage was coldly calm, calculating and waiting. She was
not surprised to hear the anchor being raised and the ship being readied for
immediate sail.

“You are well, I see.” The captain’s voice came close to
startling her, rumbling as deep and dark as the shadows lurking in the room. “My
men were quite concerned that you might have expired while they were on watch.”
He moved farther into the room, removed his weapons and laid them on the table.
It might have appeared as a clear taunt, but both of them knew that even if she
managed to make it to the table and succeed in using one of his own weapons to
disable or kill him, there was nowhere for her to go.

Into the arms of a crew whose captain she’d just
attacked? And past them, into the arms of a sea that had swallowed hundreds of
men stronger and better swimmers than she, and without the encumbrance of yards
of muslin and silk that would carry her to the bottom of the ocean as surely as
iron weights shackled to her limbs?

Kilth moved to stand next to her, placing himself so that
the moonlight shafted over his shoulder, leaving his face obscured and hers
illuminated. “You have something to say to me?” His voice was soft, but not
threatening.

She did not move, did not respond. She simply continued
to stare straight ahead into nothing.

“No question you’d like to ask?” A dark sensuality
whispered through his words, teasing her to awareness in spite of her anger.

Damn the man. He knew she had questions, accusations. But
she would not be toyed with, batted about like a ball of string given to a cat
for a pleasing distraction. Again, she did not answer or make the smallest
movement that might indicate the depth of her anger and disappointment.

After a long moment in which she neither moved nor spoke,
he inclined his head. “That is as it should be.” Taking a seat at the table, he
began removing his boots. “Come then. Ready yourself for bed.”

She had thought her anger had plumbed the limits of its
depths. She’d been dreadfully wrong. So gripped by shock, she’d not believed
she’d heard him correctly until he’d discarded his shirt as well as his boots
and began unfastening his breeches.

“You cannot possibly imagine I would share your bed again
after your blatant disregard of the promise you made me.”

“I have not disregarded my promise to you, blatant or
otherwise. Remove your dress.” His command was so casual, his comments stated
so bluntly, she could not—could
not—
stop the explosive rage that blanked
all thought from her mind in one white-hot moment.

He had moved away from the table in the process of
disrobing, leaving her a clear path to his weapons. She leapt forward and
grabbed the small dagger he customarily wore at his waist. The same lunge
carried her close enough to strike out at him, slicing the air where just a
breath before his chest had been. As it was, the tip of the dagger caught him
just under the right side of his rib cage and cut a clean if shallow rising arc
to his left side that stopped just over his heart.

Instantly Phoebe found both her wrists manacled in his
hands, the dagger clattering harmlessly to the floor.

“There you are, Lady Ballantine. I was wondering where
you were hiding.” The man actually had the gall to smile at her before glancing
down at his chest where tiny drops of blood were starting to ooze from the
deeper parts of the cut. “Congratulations. You’ve executed the most successful
attack on my person in years.”

His smile faded as his eyes focused on the rapid rise and
fall of her breasts. Slowly, heatedly, his gaze rose to meet hers. His eyes
smoldered with passion and something more. “I promised to release you once we
reached
a
port. The port is of my choosing.”

“That is preposterous. Send me ashore at once.”

“This port? Where every man and woman would have been
only too happy to take you off my hands?”

He transferred both her hands to one of his behind her
back. Sliding the fingers of his free hand through her hair, he started at the
nape of her neck and threaded through her curls until they fell free of the
twist she had been wearing it in.

His touch had a drugging effect on her, but she fought to
hold on to her anger and her senses. “Then it should not have been a problem to
live up to your end of the bargain.”

Angry impatience flashed in his eyes and his sudden
stillness seemed to have the authority to freeze the very air around her. Until
he released his breath on a half growl, she hadn’t realized she was holding her
own breath. “I will uphold my promise when it best suits me, woman. But
understand this. I will not release you until you are assured both your freedom
and
safety. The best you could have hoped for in that place was to die
quickly. Not the rescue you envisioned, I’m sure.”

She’d heard of such places of course, but it was
difficult for her to believe that there wouldn’t have been one decent soul to
help her return to her uncle among the degenerate masses described, though
finding that particular needle in the haystack might have been difficult.
Regardless, she wasn’t willing to release her anger yet. She turned her face
away from him, refusing to acknowledge the heat in his eyes and the desire it
lit within her own body.

“I can take care of myself.” Even to her own ears, her
words seemed full of false bravado.

Leaning in, he placed his lips against her throat and
murmured, “I have no doubt you believe that to be true.” Her heart skipped and
then thumped loudly in her chest, speeding up as he started to kiss her neck.
His lips, tongue and teeth quickly worked their mysterious magic on her body.
He pressed her to him with her hands still caught at the base of her spine. The
way he held her, bending her slightly backward while kissing her, pressed her
breasts against his naked chest. Even through her bodice and chemise she could
feel the scalding heat of his skin and immediately she felt herself start to
melt into him.

“I’m sure I would have figured out something,” she said,
grasping for the sanity that was quickly slithering out of her reach.

His low chuckle reverberated through his chest, teasing
her tightened nipples as they chafed against her clothes. “I’m sure we can
figure out something right now.” With movements no doubt perfected by practice,
he had her stripped to the waist in a matter of seconds. When his kisses began
on her breasts, the lust she had become so familiar with over the past days
rose in force and she knew the time for arguing had passed. For the moment.

Desire washed over her in waves as the ship rocked, both
she and the ship moving toward deeper waters. Scant minutes passed before she
lay beneath him on his berth, flesh to flesh and gasping as his expert touch
once again reduced her inhibitions to ashes.