Boyett-Compo, Charlotte - WesternWind 01 - Wynd River (20 page)

Council. She sat on the horse as her husband rudely slammed his fist against the depot master’s door,

waking the poor fellow and causing him to commence to stammering and trembling at the sight of a

Reaper shoving past him and into the depot office. When Cynyr came stomping back, he was carrying a

small box, which he handed to her.

“That’s twice what they normally allot me,” he said, swinging up on the steed. “At least they’ll provide

for you despite my crime.”

“What crime was that,
mo tiarna
?” she asked, knowing full well to what he was referring.

Cynyr didn’t answer her. He knew she was more than aware of what crime he had committed. Reapers

were prohibited from making others like themselves and he understood there would be punishment of

some kind from the High Council.

“And there will be.”The four words sent a shiver down the Reaper’s back.

Aingeal had not heard those words. She settled back against her husband, reveling in the feel of his arms

to either side of her as he controlled Storm’s reins. “Are we going to ride to the Citadel?” she asked.

“That is my plan.”

“Think again, Cree,”Lord Kheelan snapped in his mind.
“You will go back to Haines City, stable your

mounts and then take the train here.”

That statement made Cynyr frown sharply. It seemed the HC was in a hurry for him to make the journey

to the Citadel. Such haste didn’t bode well for him, and the situation put him in a fouler mood than he

was already in.

The niggling pain in his back was growing worse and he could tell Aingeal was uncomfortable, for she

kept shifting against him so he reined in their horse, walked him over to a stand of trees and dismounted.

“Give me that,” he said, reaching for the box in her hands.

Aingeal handed him the box, which he set down on the ground then held his arms up to her. She threw

her leg over Storm’s head and went into her lover’s arms, a bit disappointed when he deliberately kept

her from sliding down him. As soon as her feet touched the ground, he let go of her, picked up the box

and tore it open.

Cynyr snorted when he saw the two vac-syringes lying in the box. Each was filled with a week’s supply

of tenerse. He knew the vac-syringes would be regulated so only one dose of tenerse could be

administered daily. He hated that type of contraption but knew it would be easier on Aingeal than the one

he normally used.

“Want me to give you your injection?” she asked.

He nodded and instructed her on how to use the vac-syringe. He hunkered down so she could reach his

neck.

Despite the sophistication of the vac-syringe, the payload housed within its unbreakable glass barrel was

just as potent as it always was and he couldn’t stop from cringing as the med entered the vein in his neck.

If anything, it hurt worse than usual. The thought of Aingeal enduring such pain drove it home again to

what a selfish thing he had done in turning her.

“Now me,” she said, handing him her own vac-syringe and then dropped gracefully to the ground in

front of him.

Guilt was slamming into him with such force he felt tears gathering in his eyes. She was so trusting of him,

so willing to suffer whatever was necessary, that he wanted to howl with remorse.

“Cynyr?” she questioned as he just stood there. She was looking up at him.

“I’m sorry,” he said, then administered the drug before he lost his nerve.

Aingeal winced only a little as the drug went into her flesh but then, as quickly as the needle was

withdrawn, she smiled. “That wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. It barely stung at all.”

“Don’t pretend, wench,” he said. “I know—”

“She neither deserved what you did to her nor asked for it. Do you think we would make her suffer

needlessly for your brazen selfishness?”

And Cynyr understood that part of his punishment had been mixed with the med in his vac-syringe. In his

misery he took no notice that his wife was still on her knees and her hands were on his thighs. When he

realized she was unbuttoning his britches he stared at her. “Aingeal, what are you doing?”

She grinned at him and reached her hand inside his britches to pull his shaft free.

“Wench, we shouldn’t…” He glanced around them. Truth be told, he was a bit embarrassed by her

actions, yet at the same time his blood was pumping heatedly through his veins, making him as hard as

stone.

Aingeal didn’t give him time to finish his denial before she drew him into her mouth. She wanted to take

away the anger on his face, the guilt from his amber eyes. She wanted to show him how much she loved

and needed him.

Her mouth was a hot chamber that undulated sweetly around his rigid flesh. She was suckling him, her

eyes locked with his, and in those beautiful gray orbs he could see both amusement and passion. When

he delved lightly into her mind, he realized she felt no shame or disgust at what she was doing. She was

enjoying pleasuring him.

“Ah, wench,” he sighed, threading his fingers through her hair. Unconsciously he began pumping his hips

slowly with the rhythm of her lips.

His climax, when it came, was so strong, so potent, he had to clamp his lips together to keep from

shouting his release. His hands tensed against her scalp and he let his head fall back, squeezing his eyes

shut to the powerful sensation that rocked him. It felt to him as though his cock had been

primed—waiting for her sweet, warm mouth to draw upon it. With the discharge of his cum, he felt his

tension dissolve and, with it, his anger.

“You don’t deserve a woman like her,”Lord Kheelan stated.

The inner voice snapped Cynyr’s eyes open and he reached down for Aingeal, drawing her up against

him and pulling her to him as though she was about to be wrenched away from him.

“At least let me put you back in your britches,
mo tiarna
,” she joked, trying to push away from him to

do just that.

“No,” he said, and felt himself trembling. He was terrified that someone, some
thing
would spring out at

them and jerk her out of his grip. He was glaring around them, attentive to every tree, every bush and

every place from which an enemy might leap.

“Cynyr,” she said. “You’re squishing me.”

Fear was a cruel master raking sharp spurs down the Reaper’s back. He could feel the metal cutting into

his flesh as the whip had so long ago. So lost in his own alarm, he was unaware that Aingeal had slipped

beneath his guard and was reading his thoughts.

“No one is going to take me away from you,” she said, shoving against him until there space between

them. His hands were fierce on her upper arms. “No one, Cyn. Do you hear me?”

He wasn’t so sure. He feared that was the reason the HC had demanded he bring her with him to the

Citadel. His belly roiled at the thought of them taking her away from him.

“It isn’t going to happen,” she said firmly. “Not now—not ever.” She reached up to take his face

between her palms. “Don’t you know by now I’d fight for you, Reaper?”

He knew she would try, but she had no idea how powerful the HC was. The Shadowlords were a force

with which to reckon and not even the Reapers dared go against them. The trio held a power so

formidable, so exacting no one had ever stood up against them and won.

“This is one time someone will,” Aingeal stated. “I’m not about to let them part us.”

Looking down into her stormy eyes, he realized she meant it. She would, indeed, fight for them to be

together. That knowledge filled him with the first hope he’d had in the last two days. He barely noticed

she was stuffing him back into his britches and buttoning them.

“We can’t have your wagtally flopping around, now can we?” she asked, winking at him.

“Wagtally?” he questioned, his lips twitching.

“Well, I could call it something else,” she said, “but I always thought the Southern term for it was truly

vulgar.”

“Which is?” he prompted.

She lowered her voice. “Tallywhacker,” she whispered.

Cynyr couldn’t help laughing. The word did seem more vulgar than anything he’d ever heard a penis

called. He pulled her close to him again, his mood lightened considerably.

“Wench, you are good for my soul,” he said, then put a finger under her chin to lift her face to his so he

could kiss her tenderly. He was very careful not to make that kiss even a single degree hot. “Let’s get

going,” he told her.

Swinging her up in his arms, he sat her on Storm then mounted behind her.

The closer they got to the camp where they’d left Brownie, the lighter Cynyr’s heart felt.

Moira had made them some sandwiches for the train. She sent along a jug of lemonade and half a dozen

apples. Mick Brady had insisted they take along a jar of jawbreakers he kept for his younger customers.

Brett Samuels assured them he and his brother-in-law Verlin Walker would take good care of the two

horses. Matthew Schumann offered to re-shoe the mounts at no charge.

It seemed the entire town turned out to see them off on their journey east.

“Did it seem to you as though the good folks of Haines City wished us well?” Aingeal asked her

husband.

Cynyr grunted. He wasn’t ready yet to admit the townsfolk had accepted them. Everyone had been

friendly when they’d returned. A few—like Moira and Mick—had actually seemed relieved he was all

right. Mick had even made the comment that he hadn’t feared for Aingeal’s safety, for he knew she’d be

taken care of.

Aingeal looked at her husband. He was sitting on the aisle seat, his long legs stretched out in front of him,

his ankles and arms crossed, his hat tipped down over his eyes as he rested. She dug him in the ribs with

her elbow.

“Well, didn’t they?”

“If you say so,” he mumbled.

The Reaper’s wife sniffed and turned her attention back to the passing countryside. She and her first

husband had traveled to the plains in a covered wagon, their meager belongings packed like sardines

beneath the canvas topper. The scenery from Flagala Territory to the Moilia Territory had been entirely

different. As the train entered the Armistenky Territory and the sign welcoming them to the territory

slipped past, she laughed.

“What?” her husband asked.

“Arm is stinky,” she answered.

Cynyr lifted his arm and sniffed. “No, it isn’t.”

She punched him on his shoulder. “No, silly. The territory sign. It read like it was ‘arm is stinky’.”

“Stin,” he corrected her, sitting up and pushing his hat back. “Arm is stin key, wench. Not arm is stinky.”

“Whoever named the territories after the floods and the War had a good time doing it,’ she said.

“Wonder what the true names of the states were? Especially those that sheared off into the ocean out

west.”

He shrugged. “Only the HC knows,” he told her. “You’ll have to ask them.”

Her eyes flared. “Do you think they’ll want to speak with me?”

“I don’t know if they will or not,” he said, and reached down to thread his fingers through hers.

Aingeal tucked her bottom lip between her teeth. She was more than willing to take on the High Council

if it meant staying with her husband, but the thought of standing before the Shadowlords was daunting.

“Don’t concern yourself over it.”

Easy for him to say, she thought.

“We’ll have to be discreet about it, wench, but I’ll need to call one of the porters or a few passengers in

to provide us with Sustenance,” Cynyr told her.

Aingeal swallowed hard. “I hadn’t thought about that.”

“If you’d prefer, I can take the blood and you can feed from me.”

She nodded enthusiastically. “I’d prefer that.” She glanced at his neck then away.

“From here, wench,” he said, holding out his arm to her.

“Oh,” she said, and sighed.

They were quiet for a few moments then both stared out the window at what remained of a large city,

the buildings lying like a child’s abandoned blocks along the rails.

“You have to wonder how many people died when that city was hit,” she said softly. “And why haven’t

they rebuilt around it.”

“Most likely the ground is still contaminated,” he said.

“There was a big city down south they haven’t touched yet, either.”

“Do you ever wish you had been around back then?” he asked in an attempt to take her mind from the

thoughts of death.

“Before the War or the floods?”

“The War,” he said, since that had come first.

“Sometimes, but then I think of how awful the war must have been and I’m glad I didn’t have to live

through it.”

“Aye,” Cynyr said. “I wouldn’t have wanted to either.”

“When did you come to Terra?” she asked, laying her head on his shoulder.

He leaned his head to hers. “About two decades ago,” he said. “Not long after the Shadowlords

arrived.”

“Do you like it here?”

“It’s a helluva better place than I spent in the damned quarry,” he answered.

“How long were you in the quarry?”

“About twenty years.”

“And you’ve been on Terra about twenty?”

“Aye, why?”

“I remember you saying you were fourteen when you were sent to the quarry so that would make

you…” She counted on her fingers. “Fifty-four years old!” She lifted her head and stared at him. “You’re

fifty-four years old!”

“So?”

She shook her head. “You don’t look a day over…”

“Thirty-six,” he informed her. “I was three days past my thirty-fourth birthday when Morrigunia did the