PRINCE OF THE WIND (4 page)

If Aidan did not arrive at Vent du Nord in time, Christina meant to see the woman there dead and in her grave before her precious son could be made to spend the rest of his life with the bitch.

"You’ll not have him," Christina swore as the door to the Crossing Path opened. "Not now or ever."

Suzanna held the cup out to Riain and bid him drink.

"What is it? It has an odd smell," he said.

"It is the only cure for the Fever, Milord. Healer Henri prepared it for you. Now drink."

Riain looked into the pale pink concoction and felt the gorge rise in his throat. The cherry smell was overpowering, and the liquid actually bubbled in the cup. "What is it called?"

Suzanna hissed like a cornered rattlesnake. "How am I to know? Am I a Healer?" She put her free hand on his shoulder and shook him. "Do as you are told, Milord. Drink the brew!"

He glanced at the woman’s ugly face. She was glowering; her expression brooked no resistance. He hated to be touched by her, but he hated her caustic, venomous temper even more, and had learned she could be vindictive when riled.

"Drink it, boy!" She thrust the cup to his lips.

And he hated her calling him "boy" even more than he hated her despicable temper and warthog-ugly face. He’d do anything to get her out of his room, so opened his mouth and let the potion flood over his tongue.

The cherry-flavored galenical burned his tongue. The taste wasn’t all that bad, but the chalky aftertaste when he swallowed seemed to grow mold on his teeth; it was all he could do to drain the cup and keep the godawful mess down his gullet. He swiped at his lips to rid them of the tingling.

"Good boy." She set the cup aside and folded her arms.

"For the thousanth time, I am
not
a boy."

"Well," she stated, her crooked smile almost predatory, "you shall not be one for long, at any rate."

Riain frowned. "What is that supposed to mean, Lady?"

"You will see," she said mysteriously and stared at him.

At first, it was only a mild, uneasy feeling in the pit of his belly—like a nest of butterflies fluttering about—and he dismissed it. Some of the other medicinals Healer Henri had insisted he take to curb the fierceness and prolonged duration of the Fever had made Riain queasy; a little jumpy feeling in his gut could be tolerated well enough. But when the strange tightness and pulsing began elsewhere in his body, Riain grew uneasy.

"How do you feel, Milord?" Suzanna asked, her face filled with an odd, unholy light that looked evil in the faint candlelight from his bedside table.

Riain put a hand to the side of his head. A faint throbbing had begun and he feared his fierce headache was about to return.

"What was that stuff you gave me?" he again questioned.

"Just a minor brew, Sweeting." She met his inquisitive look with one of her own, a look that chilled him to the marrow of his bones. "A little something called a philter."

"Philter?" he repeated, knowing he’d heard the word before.

"Aye."

"Lady," Riain began, feeling acutely uncomfortable, "go now."

"I think not."

It was almost as though it were a torment unto itself to remain still. He felt as though his heart was beating far too fast. He wanted to get up, pace the room—run around—yet he knew he was too weak to do any of that.

"Lie down," she told him.

Riain slid beneath the covers, but almost immediately pushed himself up again. He could no more lay there than he could sit there and, he suspected, wouldn’t feel any better if he got out of the bed and tried to walk off this agitated feeling.

"What did you give me?" he demanded, alarmed at the rapid tattoo of his heart. "I feel as though I am about to explode!"

Suzanna’s grin stretched as wide as it could on her homely face. Her almost-nonexistent lips parted to reveal crooked yellow teeth that had a wide gap between the central incisors. There was a mean, determined look in her stare, now, and she unfolded her arms to lift up her hands to the prim bun at the back of her head.

"Please leave," he begged, scooting beneath the sheets.

Her thin mousy brown hair fell from the confines of the bun to swing limply at her thick waist. She shook her head, but the fine wisps of hair lay straight and oily along her cotton robe.

"Lady, please, I am asking you to go."

The Northwinds princess loosened the tie of her robe, then shucked it from her shoulders, letting the faded covering fall to the floor. "You do not want me to go at all, Sweeting," she said in a throaty voice.

She stood at his bedside as naked as the day she had come from her mother’s womb. So unexpected was her behavior, so fully incomprehensible to Riain, he merely gaped, unable to believe what he was seeing. In amazement, his gaze shifted down her nude body.

"Lady, you must go!" He swallowed, trying to force his eyes away from the sight of her thick waist, sagging breasts, and potbelly.

"You’ve not been with a woman before, have you, Milord?" She ran her hands over her flabby breasts.

All Riain could do was shake his head in denial. He felt the bile leaping up his throat and he wasn’t sure if it was from the godsawful brew bubbling in his gut or the sight of this hag putting her hand between her legs and rubbing herself in an obscene fashion.

"I have never lain with a man, either," she said and reached for the sheet covering him. "You shall be my first. My one and only."

Riain only meant to knock her hand away, to deny her what she so obviously intended, but the moment his flesh touched hers, something totally unexpected happened. He felt a surge of arousal so intense, so powerful, his entire body convulsed with the sensation. Instead of pushing away her hand, he grabbed her wrist in a punishing, brutal grip that belied both his years and his strength, and yanked her into his bed.

* * *

Suzanna had not taken into calculation the effect her potent brew of tenerse and milk would have on a boy just past puberty. The outlawed potion was a strong aphrodisiac when mixed with the secretions of the mammary glands of animals. When combined with those of a human female just delivered of child—as was this brew Suzanna had obtained from a magik-sayer from the foothills—it was an extremely potent intoxicant that could cause grown men to become rutting, savage beasts. Mixed with the budding hormones of an untried, eager, and ready pubescent male, it was nearly lethal.

* * *

When morning came and the last of the drug had drained from his body, Riain found Suzanna’s head on his shoulder, the tumbled sheets around them bearing the unmistakable odor of spent passion.

"Oh, god!" he whispered, his eyes going wide with stunned disbelief. "What have I done?"

Suzanna stirred, lifted her head, and looked at him with deep adoration. "You have made me your woman, Milord."

"No!" He shoved her away and leapt from the bed, ignoring his lightheadedness.

"Aye," she said with smug satisfaction. "You have made me well and truly a woman." Her predatory smile returned. "As I have made you well and truly a man!"

Riain stared in horror at the telltale signs that could not be denied. A wave of shock passed over him. He grabbed the bedpost to keep from collapsing.

"Of course we will be married," she said.

He raised his head to gape at her. "What?"

"At the Harvest Feast, I think." She stretched out, her ungainly body yellow against the rumbled white sheets. "I have always wanted a Harvest Feast Joining." She patted the place beside her. "Come and love me again, Sweeting. I like well the feel of your young body close to my own."

Riain turned, sickened by the thought.

"I will take care of you, husband. I swear, I will always take care of you."

"I am honor-bound to another," he said, hoping his half-lie would make her see reason. "She waits for me in Chale. I—"

"You are mine, Riain Cree," she told him fiercely. "And mine you will always be!" She reached for him.

"Get you hands off me!" He stumbled backward, slammed into the wall, and slid along it, feeling like a trapped animal.

"You
will
marry me," she said, her mouth tight and her face aglow with triumph. "You deflowered me. My father will demand you put it to rights."

"You are insane!" He did not see his clothing anywhere and suspected she had taken it away.

"He will announce the Banns this evening at the night meal."

"I wouldn’t marry you if you were the last female on this world.
Never
would I do such a thing!"

"You will not be given a choice, my fine young sir! You are on Northzoner soil and have seduced a Zonelander maiden who—"

"Seduced!" he bellowed. "I did no such thing!"

"Did you not grab my hand and yank me into your bed?"

"I—" Riain knew he had. He also knew he had been drugged with some evil concoction that had made him do something out of character. He was not to blame. Such perfidy could be laid at her doorstep, not his.

He only hoped her father would listen to his side of it before he was forced to Join with the gloating hell-hag.

"You tricked me into doing what I did," he said from between clenched teeth. "Think you your father will condone such treachery?"

"Think you he will care how I got a Cree heir to deflower me? He will never allow you to do what you have done and not pay the price!"

"No man in his right mind would believe I took you to me willingly! All they have to do is look at you to know I would never consider it!" He shook his head wildly and his eyes narrowed with brutal intent. "I would rather die than live with you!"

"You just might, Milord. You just might."

* * *

"I cannot," Gunter said, shaking his head.

"You
dare
not," du Mer corrected.

Suzanna lifted her chin and stared at the men. "Would you reveal to the world I am no longer pure, Father?"

De Viennes winced. He should have guessed at Suzanna’s plans and put a stop to them before the damage was done. Now, it was too late.

"Is it because you do not think me worthy of a Chalean princeling?" Suzanna challenged, her eyes flashing dangerously.

"Of course, not," Gunter replied on a long, tired breath. "It has nothing to do with whether or not the two of you suit." He slumped down in his throne. "What am I going to do?"

"I do not see a problem," Suzanna grumbled. "He deflowered me—he must marry me."

"The problem," du Mer put in, glaring at Suzanna, "is how the Cree clan is going to view the situation. How they will feel about a twenty-nine-year-old woman having relations with a sixteen-year-old boy. A boy nearly half her age and a virgin, himself, no doubt being saved for some powerful alliance among his clan’s allies."

"Why, Suzanna?" Gunter asked, bewilderment and hurt—as well as a goodly dose of fear—filling him. "Had you no conception of what a foolish thing this was? How dangerous?"

"When does she ever think about the consequences of her actions?" du Mer said and snorted derisively.

"Love is never foolish, Father," Suzanna answered through clenched teeth. "Haven’t you always said as much?"

"The boy is devastated," Sir Gerard commented. He, too, was glaring at Suzanna. "He was given a full measure of tenerse in mother’s milk."

"By the gods," de Viennes groaned, horrified. He stared wide-eyed at his child. "Is that true?"

"No," Suzanna replied, her back stiffening.

"She left the cup on his bed table," Gerard said. "I took it to Henri and he verified what had been in the cup." The Master-at-Arms shook his head. "Not only is the brew illegal, it can be highly lethal when administered in such a large dosage as was found in that cup. She could have killed the boy."

"You set out to corrupt that boy a’purpose!" du Mer accused.

Fire leapt from Suzanna’s sage brown orbs. "You are so sure it was me who seduced him and not the other way around?"

"I know you, Suzanna," du Mer snapped. "You will do anything to get your way."

"Aye, you know me, but not as well as you’d like to."

"Enough!" Gunter shouted.

Du Mer and Suzanna glared at one another, but they hushed. It was rare that Gunter lost his temper; rarer still when he raised his voice to the timbers as he had just done.

"Get to your chambers, daughter," Gunter commanded. "Do not let me see your face again until I have called for you." A muscle worked furiously in his jaw as he turned from the imploring look on her face. "You will take your meals there, as well."

"But—" Suzanna began, but the warning look from both du Mer and Sir Gerard made her snap her mouth shut. She dipped her father a careless curtsy, then spun on her heel and marched off, her back ramrod stiff, her chin thrust out.

"There will be trouble from this, Gunter," Guy du Mer prophesied. "The lad will surely demand some form of satisfaction from us."

The Master-at-Arms shrugged. "I think not. The boy is understandably upset, but he puts the blame where it lies."

"On my conniving daughter," Gunter lamented.

Gerard folded his arms over his chest. "If it were left up to him, he would not mention this to his father."

"By the gods," Gunter breathed and leaned back in his throne. "The father. He will murder us all if he finds out!"

"If the boy doesn’t want it mentioned, then can you not oblige him?" du Mer asked. "Can you not keep Aidan Cree from finding out?"

Gunter shook his head, then ran a hand over his tired face. "Not and uphold what little honor we have left." His troubled gaze latched on du Mer. "What if she has conceived?"

Du Mer blanched. He had obviously not thought of that. He looked to Gerard and it was also obvious that stalwart warrior had not considered the possibility, either. Both men let the situation sink in, and neither could voice an answer.

"The Cree’s emissary will have to be told and the matter of what to do about this left up to him." Gunter groaned and his chin sunk to his chest. "We may have to go to war with the Chales once the news reaches Cree."

"I’d rather not," Gerard said. "There is no way—even given the strength of men in the Outcountries surrounding Vent du Nord—we can defeat the berserkers of Chale."