The Saint (37 page)

Kris made a noise at the back of his throat and scooped her up in his arms. His hair made a silver curtain around them.

They moved quickly through the slowly brightening tunnels and, gradually, his eyes began to dim. The worst of the murderous tension drained away, leaving behind what Adora recognized as a kind of lust, though she had never encountered anything like it before. Kris wanted so much more than her body.

They stopped suddenly. When she looked up, she found that they were in Kris's bedchamber, alone with just his portrait and the many piles of books that stood as testimony to his avid desire to learn about her age.

“You're here,” he said softly. His voice was a caress.

She realized that a part of her had been close to Kris for a while—perhaps from the beginning. It had been love at first hearing, she thought, though she also found pleasure in the way Kris moved: confident, graceful, as if he had dominion over everything. Really, he was all that she was not and yet longed to be.

He kissed her roughly, interrupting her thoughts. She kissed him back—harder—and knew when he again tasted the blood from her bitten lips. Her hands tightened on his face in case he thought of pulling back.

No
, he said inside her head, his words a balm.
Not now. It's far too late for retreat
.

And she believed him, because she could feel his sex growing between their tightly pressed bodies, growing ridiculously. And then he deepened their kiss, maybe excited by the blood from a wound she could no longer feel, and she forgot to think about anything else except that her flesh began to cry out for more of his touch.

She broke away to pull his shirt over his head, wanting to feel him closer, to lay his skin against her own, perhaps to use some arcane magic to make them one. As she looked again into his eyes, a new primal urge flickered and then flamed into life. For an instant, her resolution wavered. But this was Kris and she was certain—fairly certain—that he would never hurt her.

Still, danger floated in the air around them—and heat.Too much heat. They should be cautious, but neither of them pulled back, though their breaths and touch almost seared the skin everywhere their flesh met.

Faith. She had faith. Didn't she?

Kris grunted once and then tossed her on the bed. He jumped up himself, straddling her like a mother bear protecting her cub. Except it wasn't maternal protection she saw in his eyes or read in his body. His torso was a long column of icy white, every muscle tensed as he looked down at her with unblinking eyes.

“Adora, I need the words. Now.”

Adora stared up at him. She knew the words he wanted her to say—
Eat my heart. Drink my soul. Love me to death
. But she couldn't say them. Not yet. It would be an act of final surrender, and her faith wasn't that strong. Instead, the words that came from her in a whisper were, “Kiss me. Help me. Love me.” And when Kris hesitated, she added passionately, “Kiss me—because my heart has hurt forever and only that will heal me. Help me—my soul is chained and I can't get free to know this love you speak of. Love me, or it's death in every way that matters. . . .”

Something moved through his eyes. The urge for bloodshed had been restricted, confined, but the heat of those emotions was still there. And the hunger.

Adora spoke gently, as she would to a wild animal. “Kris, I don't know how else to be with you when I'm still afraid. Please—kiss me so that I can remember what love should be. And kiss me so I can forget what has been.”

Kris made a low noise in his throat and dropped down on her. He moved so quickly that he was little more than a silver blur. He pulled her close for a third time, looking deep into her eyes as his groin pressed into hers.

“So shall it be,” he said in a low voice that was almost a growl. It sent vibrations deep into her body and made her shudder. And then they kissed. This time it was different. Pouring into her mouth and down her throat came a stream of emotions Adora could not identify. They filled her up and left her pliant and stunned.

Kris removed her clothes with ungentle hands, and her skin as well, or so it seemed, leaving her nerves and emotions naked. His touch was delicate but still devastating, and he explored, proving desire of a degree she had never even imagined existed. Even now, a part of her wanted to hide from him, but she didn't flinch or shut her eyes.

Was this love?

Who could say? Certainly not she. But whatever strange emotion she was feeling, it was accompanied by a longing that reached to her very bones. More than breath, more than life, she wanted Kris inside her.

Not sure how she got there, Adora found herself pressed against his belly, her cheek pillowed against his groin, the thick ridge of his sex on her cheek. The slight gap in memory gave her a moment's pause. She lifted up slowly and studied Kris with interest, wondering if he varied from other men in ways other than size.

He was beautiful, alabaster and pure spun silver. But not cold, she thought, kissing him lightly. Nothing about him was cold.

Her gaze traveled upward over his muscled torso, still lightly scarred but its beauty in no way compromised. His shoulders were wider than she remembered, his arms more muscled, and his silver hair glowed as if bathed in moonlight. She knew every strand was waiting for her touch.

“It's been a day of revelations,” she said at last, turning her head the rest of the way and facing him. His gaze was direct, heated, but now controlled. She knew hers was too. She let him see the hunger in her, the need to be touched—touched in a way that she had been deprived of all her life.

“It has indeed.” Kris rolled over suddenly, contracting his long muscles as he sat up and reversed their positions. He let his head slide down her body, his hair leaving a fiery trail as he kissed his way back to her mouth. “And I'm pleased with you too.”

“I can still feel it in you—the wildness. But I'm not afraid now,” she whispered. And she did feel his lack of complete control. It was roaming her as well, flames licking at her body from the inside where no hands could reach. Yes, that beast was banished but not defeated.

“Yes.” His gaze met hers and scorched. “Does it bother you that I've transformed bloodlust into desire?”

“No,” she whispered. “Not at all.” But she did mind what was going on inside her. It was hot, so hot—she was burning up.

He reached for her, his fingertips sliding over her thigh, moving along the sweat-moistened skin. She was very wet, but still she could feel herself catch fire every place he touched. His hand cupped, and he slid a finger inside her. His other hand wrote a fiery blessing on her skin, and he gave her the gift of knowing she was beautiful in his eyes.

Emotion swelled in her heart, pressed hard against her breastbone. Her lips parted but no sound came out. Her feelings for Kris were so large that they could never be poured out through her small throat. There just weren't enough words to carry her inner love to the outside world.

Yes, there are
.
You know them
, she realized.

“Eat my heart. Drink my soul. Love me to death,” she finally murmured—because now it was safe to say it.

Darkness again moved through Kris's eyes, and Adora felt something powerful roll over her. Kris shifted above, lying between her legs, his weight supported on his arms that were lean and wiry but that could probably bench-press a truck. He pressed his mouth to hers, and this time she felt him drink her in, stopping her heart, drinking her soul, loving her almost to death.

Around them the air roiled and grew smoky. She had little warning except the movement of his hips before he was inside her, the power of his thrust driving the breath from her body and thought from her mind. In the black-glass ceiling she could watch him as he drove into her and slammed her into the bed. She saw her own back arch as she writhed against him, just as violent, just as lustful as he. It was a pleasure that was almost brutal. Almost pain. Yet it was neither.

And then, overwhelmed by both sensation and imagery, her eyes closed so that she would see no more of the wanton, animalistic creatures that coupled on the bed, so she would not see the expression of hunger on her own face. It was difficult enough, knowing that she hungered so desperately to actually place her life in someone else's hands.

Brightness poured through her eyelids, and she knew it came from Kris, that somehow he had transformed his shadow into pure light. Inside her body, something opened and flew outward like the universe after the Big Bang, and something else rushed back inside. It was the approach of fiery creation. It was soul called home from the cold wilderness of Hell, though whether hers or his, she could not say. And for an instant, Adora understood what Kris had meant about the laws of eternity not being the laws of time. Whatever this thing—this feeling— was, it could not be confined to, or explained by, any experience she had ever had.

He put his lips firmly against hers, muffling her voice, and she screamed into his mouth. All the power was trapped between them. She was barely aware when he pulled out of her body and emptied himself on her belly.

Not yet
, Kris said, even as the last echoes of pleasure shook him, and she knew that he was speaking to the Goddess, denying her the new life she had hoped would be created when they made love. And in that moment, Adora knew that it was possible that she could love Kris and do so without fear. Even if he didn't understand why, he knew her dread of parenthood, and he was protecting her even against the Goddess he served.

She might have said something then, foreign emotional words, but Kris reared back suddenly and jerked her from the bed. He held her only until he was sure she would not fall, and then he turned and ripped off the fur coverlet and dropped it on the floor.

Adora stared, openmouthed, as the hide slowly blackened and smoke circled the room. She leaned against a stack of books, feeling them shift behind her. She clapped a hand over her stomach as Kris's seed began to slide down her body. It burned slightly in the palm of her hand, and her stomach was marked with a long red blaze.

“Holy cow!” she said inadequately. “We actually set the bed on fire.”

“I guess we both have some control issues,” he said—and then Kris started to laugh.

 

 

And Niklas worshipped thusly: “Love and light Thou offer. Life and hope Thou offer. And I shall offer too.” And then Niklas lay himself on the barren earth and spilled his power into the ground and all around him wheat did grow.

—Niklas 19:36

Nicholas's face twisted. He knelt before the cowering woman and gently freed her face from the cruel cage, carefully removing the sharpened bit from her bloodied mouth. He stared at the object in his hands with an emotion somewhere between distaste and horror. A scold's bridle—he hadn't seen such a device used in years.

He kissed the woman, Sarah, on the forehead, and then on the mouth, stopping the bleeding. When her tears had ceased, Nicholas rose and turned toward the man who had so harshly used his wife. He felt old anger stir in him, a black ice that rose from the guts and reached for the heart. That one touch of cold was warning enough to deter his anger. Just as he had feared, the monster, the bringer of death, was still inside him.

“Black Peter,” Nicholas said to his goblin friend, his voice harsh enough to strike fear in the human husband's heart. He knew his eyes had turned. “Take this woman to her family. See that she is given enough gold that she need never return to this house. Then return here. This sinner and I shall have words while you're gone.”

“Nicholasss . . .” Black Peter said nervously, for he too could feel the creature inside of Nicholas and knew to fear it as he would Armageddon.

“Go,” Nicholas added in another tongue. “Don't be afraid. The only thing that will kill this man is kindness, and that I shan't be sharing. I am sure such a pleasant, selfless emotion would be poison to him.”

Black Peter backed out of the room as Nicholas weighed the cage in his hand, his eyes fixed on the cruel human who now cowered on the floor and called out for Saint Nicholas to save him. The irony of the man's choice of saviors had the goblin smiling.

“Asssk and ye ssshall reccceive,” he muttered as he wrapped the stunned woman in a cloak and led her from the small cottage. “And reccceive more than you wish.”

Kris was higher than a kite in a hurricane, and mostly due to Adora. She has a lovely laugh, he thought. Soft and contagious, and precious for being so rare. And her voice—
Kiss me so I can remember. Kiss me so I can forget.
Her words still reverberated within him, leaving him shaken.

He had also loved the shock in her eyes when pleasure overcame her. He loved that this woman of words, who could describe in detail every nuance of human emotion, was rendered speechless by their lovemaking. Above all else, he relished the feeling that flowed through him from her heart, a stream of emotion that rolled through his body and restored hope and faith and even memory. For he too had needed to remember, while also needing to forget.