Spectre of the Sword (20 page)

“I thought I’d lost
you,” she sobbed. “I thought that you hated me. I wanted to hate you, too. But
I could not. I… I just wanted to leave. I had to leave.”

He stopped kissing her
long enough to take her face in his massive hands, swallowing up her skull. 
The brilliant blue eyes blazed at her.

“You and I will never be
apart,” he whispered. “I’ve tried to tell myself that it must be so, that we
must part ways now or forever condemn ourselves. But I know now that I will be at
your side for the rest of your life, serving you with unwavering devotion.  You
may marry another, but I will always be sworn to you, my lady. You will never
be rid of me, with God as my witness.”

She gazed up at him, his
bloodied nose and stubbled face.  It occurred to her that he looked exhausted.
Perhaps he had been just as miserable as she had been; only he had been too
stoic to show it.  Her crying lessened as she stared at him, digesting his
words and the turn of events.  It was as if she had come out of a nightmare and
suddenly, the world was starting to right itself again.   But his words,
comforting though they might be, brought up an entirely new set of issues.  Her
weary mind began to reach far into the future when she would be married to another,
yet Rhys would always be with her, sworn to her… untouchable to her. 

“I wonder,” she said
softly, her voice dull from weeping, “what will be worse? Married to another
and never seeing you again, or married to another and seeing you every day,
knowing we can never be together.”

He lifted a dark
eyebrow. “Never seeing you again.”

She sighed, raking her
fingers through his hair gently, memorizing the feel of him. “I have been only
thinking of me, Rhys. What of you? I will be married and bearing children for
another man. But you… if you stay to serve me, what will you do? Will you never
marry again?”

He shrugged. “I have not
thought on it. I already have a son; I do not need to marry to produce an
heir.”

“So you would waste your
life serving a woman you can never have?”

He pursed his lips. “You
cannot have it both ways. You cannot have me serve you and also never see me
again.  Make your choice, lady, and I shall abide by it.”

She could see that he
wasn’t truly frustrated; he was, in a mild way, attempting to force her to
think of the coming years. Now that they were both calming, she was able to
think far more rationally.  Emotions always wreaked havoc with her thought
processes.

“I would want you with
me, of course,” she said softly.

“Then it shall be so,”
he replied. “But I will make one thing perfectly clear if that is indeed your
choice.”

“And that is?”

“There will be no
physicality involved. I will not conduct a physical relationship with you while
you are married to another man. I do not share, and I do not take another’s
leavings.  I either have all of you or none of you.  This I must do for my own
sake as well as my own moral convictions.  Is that clear?”

Surprisingly, she did
not flare.  She continued to gaze up at him, the deep green eyes red from so
much weeping.   Then she sighed softly.

“It is,” she whispered.
“As painful as it is for me to say, it is abundantly clear.  My position will
be precarious enough without the added complication of a lover. It would be
used against me and you would be pulled into something as dark and deep as you
can imagine. But it does not mean that I will not love you with all of my heart
until the day I die, Rhys. Nothing will ever change that.”

“You may very well grow
to like your husband, you know. You may even grow to love him.”

“And you may fall in
love with another woman and leave me altogether.”

He conceded the fact.
“Anything is possible. But at the moment, I am only thinking of you.  If I
cannot have you, then at least I can serve you.”

“Are you sure?”

“Never more strongly
about anything.”

She felt strangely happy
and strangely crushed all at the same time.  Her hands began to move over his
head, his scratchy cheeks. Without another word, she lifted herself up and
kissed him fully on the lips.  It was a sensual kiss, one that sent bolts of
excitement through his big body. He pulled her into a crushing embrace and
slanted his mouth over hers, suckling her sweet lips for a moment until his
tongue demanded entry. Elizabeau’s mouth instinctively opened for him, the new
sensations of his wicked kiss filling her brain with a new kind of madness.

It was the second time
that their passion came in the grass.   Rhys rolled over on his back, taking
her off of the damp earth so that she would be spared.  His hands were in her
hair, moving down the small of her back and feeling her sweet body against
him.  His hands, as large as trenchers, were moving by pure instinct; as his
mouth ravaged her neck, his fingers found their way onto her buttocks and he
gripped her tightly, holding her pelvis against his. 

Rhys’ thighs were apart
and Elizabeau’s legs between them.   Though she was a maiden, she knew enough
about the ways of men and women to know that Rhys had a very hard arousal that
was pressed against her Venus mound.  His enormous hands were covering her
buttocks, holding her against him as his lips and tongue sucked every last
thought from her head.   She should have been shocked, embarrassed at his
blatant physical reaction to her, but she found that she was not in the least. 
His excitement fed her, causing her head to swim and her breathing to come in
strange gasps.  All she knew was that she very much wanted to explore whatever
they were feeling between them.  She was positive she would never experience
such passion, or joy, again.

“Rhys,” she murmured as
his lips suckled hers. “Show me how a man and woman respond to each other. 
Show me everything.”

He growled deep in his
throat, his furious kisses easing. “I cannot and you know it,” he said
hoarsely. “You cannot go to your prince compromised.”

“But you love me.”

“Aye, I do. I love you
enough not to compromise you in that way.”

She suddenly sat up,
pushing herself awkwardly off of us chest.  Rhys watched her curiously as she
settled back on her knees, still between his legs, and looked at him.

“Then show me everything
to that point,” she begged softly. “Show me all you know until the point where
men and women couple.  Please, Rhys.  If nothing else, give me that to remember
of you.  Give me warm memories of a most miraculous moment to keep against my
heart in times when I need such comfort.”

Rhys was a strong man,
but he wasn’t made of stone.  His emotions and lust had the better of him and
he knew it.  He propped himself up on his elbows.

“Angel, I cannot,” he
said sincerely. “God help me, nothing would please me more.  You cannot know
how much I want to grant your request, truly. In fact, you do not even have to
beg; if there were no consequences, I would have already done it.   But I do
not believe I am strong enough to stop once we got started.  You overwhelm me,
lady.  I am a weak man in your arms.”

Elizabeau stared at him,
her heart pounding loudly against her ribs.  Without another word, she stood up
and yanked her surcoat off.  It went flying, followed almost instantaneously by
her shift.  Before Rhys could get to his feet, she was standing naked in front
of him from the waist up.  Startled, and struggling not to let himself be
devoured by her alluring nakedness, he went to pick up her shift. The moment he
retrieved it, however, she was on him.

“Please,” her hot mouth
was against his ear, her luscious body against him. “Please touch me, Rhys. Let
me feel your touch once and I shall never ask again. Please.”

He was off-balance and
fading fast. “’Tis too cold out here,” he admonished, trying to get the shift
up to cover her nude upper body. “Get dressed, angel. It is not the time or
place out here in the wild.”

Her arms remained around
his neck and she gazed up at him with a wide-eyed look that was both
disappointed and suddenly embarrassed.  He waited for her to beg him, as it was
not in her nature to immediately concede, but she made no such move to plea. 
In fact, she folded rather easily.  He watched her as she lowered her gaze and
put an arm across her full breasts, taking the shift from him all in the same
movement.

As she fumbled with the
shift, he allowed himself a view of her body.  An involuntary shudder rolled
through him as his eyes devoured her slender torso and full breasts.   Her skin
was incredibly flawless and he literally had to clasp his hands behind his back
to keep from reaching out to grab her.  

When her arms when up to
pull the shift over her head, he was confronted by a full frontal view of her
sensuous figure.   He gradually began to lose all sense of control, especially
when the shift got stuck on her head and she was forced to wrangle with it.
Suddenly, he couldn’t think any longer.  All he could see was her rounded
breasts and puckered nipples.  They were calling to him, taunting him into
madness.  His hands were moving towards her before he could stop himself.

Enormous hands encircled
her rib cage and suddenly, something hot and wet had clamped down on a
distended nipple. The shift was still up around her head and Elizabeau yelped
in surprise as Rhys virtually swallowed her up in his massive embrace. But her
moment of surprise was quickly replaced by a feeling so powerful, so hot, that
it fired through her slender body and caused her knees to give way. By then,
Rhys had her pulled up against his torso as his lips suckled her nipple
furiously. The shift came away from her head and she gasped with the newness of
her passion, her arms going about his head to hold him close against her
breast.

She couldn’t even speak;
she just held him fast against her breast, feeling his lips upon her and
weeping softly with joy.    His tongue lapped her sweetness, moving from one
breast to the other, clutching her so tightly that he was in danger of crushing
her. Elizabeau did nothing more than hold him tightly as he ravaged her. It was
all she had ever wanted from him and more than she could have possibly
imagined. It was magic.

When his head finally
did come up, his expression was glazed with passion.  They simply stared at one
another, afraid to speak, afraid to break the spell.

“Was that what you had
in mind?” he breathed.

She blinked.   “I… I do
not know what I had in mind. I have never… that is, no one has even come close
to….”

She trailed off, unable
to finish. She was still panting, her deep green eyes watching his mouth rather
than staring into his eyes.  He bent over and kissed her, so sweetly that she
very nearly swooned.  When he pulled back, it was to brush a stray lock of hair
from her face and study her intently.

“Now get dressed,” he
said quietly.  “We must return before someone comes looking for us.”

She nodded unsteadily,
pulling her shift back over her head without his assistance. In fact, Rhys
simply stood there, watching her hands shake as she tried to dress herself,
knowing that if he were to assist her, she more than likely would end up with
less clothing on than before. It was safer for him to keep his hands to
himself.  But she had trouble cinching up the surcoat and he took pity on her,
gently spinning her about to tie the fastens on each side of the garment that
secured it to her figure.  

When she was dressed,
they just looked at each other.  Her breathing had resumed its normal rhythm
but her eyes held tremendous softness upon him. Rhys didn’t know what to say;
he wasn’t thinking straight and he didn’t trust his tongue. After a moment, he
smiled weakly for lack of a better response and extended his hand to her.  She
placed her small, cold hand in the palm and he squeezed it tightly. 

They walked in silence
the entire way back to Whitebrook.

CHAPTER NINE

Rod de Titouan was the
type of man that women went mad for.  He had black hair like his older brother
and eyes that were the color of the sky. His eyes did not have the intensity of
Rhys’ brilliant blue, but they were nonetheless captivating and intelligent. He
was tall with a muscular build that was both lean and powerful, and he had a
smile that positively lit up the heavens; it was the first thing Elizabeau
noticed when she saw a strange, handsome knight standing in the courtyard of
Whitebrook.  He smiled and all she could see was teeth.

Rod was smiling broadly
at his older brother, who walked up to him, grabbed him in a bear hug, and
promptly threw him to the ground.  Elizabeau gasped as the two of them began to
wrestle in the dirt but it was clear that their antics were not the result of
animosity.  It was widely apparent that the brothers adored each other as they
rolled around, mock-punching and trying to rub each other’s face into the dust.

“You little whelp,” Rhys
had his brother by the shoulder, good-naturedly pounding him in the chest. “I
should have smothered you while I had the chance.”

Rod was not as strong as
his brother but he held his own quite well.  In a slick move, he swept his legs
sideways and took Rhys’ feet out from underneath him. Rhys landed heavily, with
a grunt of pain, and Rod rolled on top of him.