Touch of Passion (48 page)

The answers didn't matter, because they were together, as they would have been if not for the curse. They were
unoliaeth
and were floating, as one soul, out of all time and physical restraint. He gave his life to her, and she gave it back in turn.

And then it began to change, as Kian knew it must, and he felt them separating, becoming two again, except that he held on to Loris even more tightly, keeping her with him as they went back.

Physical sensation returned, along with sound and smell. It was like waking from a deep and powerful slumber, such as the one that the
athanc
had so recently been called from. Kian was kneeling on the hard, cold ground, and a tumult went on all about him. Dyfed and Desdemona and Professor Seabolt were all trying to get Kian's attention, and the men were standing about, murmuring. The many horses they'd brought were pawing the ground and whinnying. Kian could even hear the sounds of the water in the lake as it waved to and fro in time with the earth's rotation.

All these things he could hear and envision, but he cared for none of it. Loris was in his arms. She had opened her eyes and was smiling at him, and her wounds had all been healed, leaving behind only the bloodied, tattered gown as proof that she'd ever been harmed.

“Kian,” she murmured, reaching up a hand to touch his face. “It's gone.”

“Yes, love.”

With her other hand she touched her breast, over her heart, and gazed at him with wonder.

“I can feel it here, as if a heavy shadow has been lifted away. It's gone, Kian.”

It was odd, Kian thought, that fresh tears should begin to fill his eyes. He had never been happier in his life, but he was weeping like a child.

But she was weeping, too, because she knew, as he did, that the blood curse had at last been lifted.

Perhaps it wasn't precisely noble of Kian, but after ten years of impatient celibacy and waiting for the woman he loved to love him in return—and having almost lost that same woman to a fatal blow—the last thing he wanted to do was spend another minute at the lake dealing with the
athanc
.

But it had to be dealt with, and so, ignoring the great interest in the now slumbering beast, especially by Professor Seabolt, who was actually jotting down notes and sketches in a journal with the small help of the nearly fog-shrouded moonlight, Kian floated the creature up into the air until it was directly over the deepest part of the lake and then lowered it into the water.

“Write the enchantment down in as many journals as you possibly can, Professor,” Kian advised. “I don't want a future Baron of Tylluan being obliged to wait so long in order to deal with the brute, should it ever be raised to life again, may God forbid it.”

As to the other magic that had occurred, bringing Loris back to life and breaking the curse, Kian had no explanations. The new magic that the Guardians had gifted him with was something he would have to ponder for a long while and discuss with Malachi at length in order to understand it. As
to the curse, Kian was truly baffled. He'd done nothing that deserved such a boon; indeed, he'd nearly lost Loris forever.

“It wasn't you having to do some great deed,” Desdemona Caslin said, casting a patient glance at him. “It was you putting your foolish man's pride away and letting her make a sacrifice for you. Because of love,” she clarified when those around her merely looked mystified.

“I believe she must be right, Kian,” Professor Seabolt said. “All these years, we assumed you would have to perform some great task, but perhaps the Guardians were simply waiting for you to prove that you learned a lesson about needing someone—your own
unoliaeth
, for instance.”

“Of course Desdemona's right,” Dyfed said, beaming at his beloved with adoration. “She knows a great deal about how much those who love need each other.”

It was nearly dawn by the time they arrived at the castle, though the fog made the sky as dark as before. Kian had sent the men away to their homes, promising that another celebration—much larger this time—would be held that evening. Everyone who lived within Tylluan's borders was to come to give thanks for the victory over the
athanc
and to give the new Lady Tylluan a proper welcome home.

Kian held the reins to Loris's horse as the others made to dismount. When Dyfed looked at him inquiringly, Kian said, “Malachi and Niclas will be waiting for explanations. Do me the favor of making them for me.”

Dyfed smiled and nodded.

Kian guided his and Loris's horses through the bailey and to the back of the castle. Outside the gate that led to the gardens, he dismounted and moved to lift her from her saddle. Standing with his hands on her waist, he gazed into Loris's upturned face. For the very first time since they'd met at the Red Fox, so many years before, he saw love, for him, in her eyes. Unvarnished and unhidden.

“Are we going to spend the night in the gardens?” she asked.

“No,” he said. “We're going to have one last visit from the spirit of Liw Nos, and then we're going to fondly bid him good-bye.”

He sent the horses back to the stable and then picked Loris up in his arms and carried her into the garden, coming to a stop just below her balcony.

They looked up, and Loris said, “I always thought Liw could fly, because he was one of the faerie folk. But I didn't know you could do the same.”

“I can't,” Kian told her. “And neither could he. Hold tightly, love. I pray this is the last time I shall ever have to come to you in such a manner.”

The climb took some doing; Loris was no frail and delicate female, and her long limbs and skirts made it difficult for Kian to both hold her and keep a grip on the brick wall. They laughed, despite the danger, and Loris remarked that if he had not been a baron, he could have made a wonderful living as a thief.

The sound of her voice spurred him upward; there was so much pleasure and joy in her tone and the same relief that he could hear in his voice as well. Tonight their lives would begin anew. Everything in their upended world had been set right, at last, and all the shadows that had once haunted them had been banished.

He set her on the balcony before climbing over the half wall, then pointed at the locked balcony doors and said, “Aperio.” The bolt slid silently open.

“Now I know,” Loris murmured.

Kian took her hand and led her inside. He bolted the doors again and started the fire, and then, impatient, drew her into his arms.

She came willingly, rising up to meet his kiss. They drew apart after a moment, arms holding each other tight, and waited. A full minute passed in silence, and then another.

“Anything?” Kian asked, sliding his hands purposefully over her back and waist.

Her slow smile told him that it was all right. “There's no pain,” she whispered. “Your touch only feels . . . wonderful.”

That was all he needed to hear. He picked her up and set her on the bed, kneeling before her to perform the same duties he had done shortly after she'd arrived. Her boots came off, then her stockings, though his hands shook so badly that he almost couldn't undo the fastenings. Her dress, in tatters from the
athanc
, fell off almost without assistance, and when her undergarments refused to cooperate he uttered a low curse and tore the fastenings with impatient fingers.

Loris laughed and reached up to take his face in her hands. She brought her lips to his, murmuring, “There's no hurry now. We have the rest of our lives.”

Kian tossed her petticoats to the other side of the room. “I've been waiting for ten years,” he said. “And dying for want of you. I apologize.” He kissed her, hard, then set her away to start ripping off the remnants of her chemise. “I intend to be the most romantic of husbands in all the years to come, but for the moment, I'm not going to survive another ten minutes unless I'm inside of you.”

She laughed again, then gasped as his warm fingers found her bare breasts. “Oh,” she said, and arched against him. His lips followed his hands, caressing her face, her throat, and lower to her shoulders as the rest of her garments slid to the floor.

“Oh, my God,” Kian murmured, his hands stroking over the soft skin of her back and hips. His fingers tested the swell of her buttocks, the curves of her waist, at last grasping her hips and pulling her tightly against his arousal.

Loris's hands moved over him, as well, and her mouth met his with equal passion. When he teased her lips with his tongue she eagerly opened to him. Her fingers slid over his shoulders, pulling his coat down. Not breaking their kiss, Kian struggled out of it, and Loris set her fingers to his waistcoat and shirt, murmuring with delight as the garments gave way and she could splay her hands over his warm, silky skin. The bold caress made Kian groan with pleasure, but
when her hands slid lower, stroking his buttocks, then sliding forward to touch his manhood over the cloth of his trousers, his sanity gave way.

Somewhere in the dim recess of his mind he had a fleeting thought about taking his boots off, but the notion disappeared before he could make any sense of it. He undid the front of his trousers with shaking fingers, tearing the buttons, and then pushed Loris onto the bed.

She opened to him completely, putting her arms about him as he came over her and pulling him down. She said his name, and he heard his own rough voice giving reply, and then he was pushing inside of her, hard and urgent, unable to school himself to gentleness.

It hurt her. He knew it, for he could both feel her untried tightness and hear her gasp of surprise. Regret forced him to stillness, but the pleasure of her, of being inside her, made his voice unnaturally strained.

“I'm sorry.” He rested his forehead against hers and opened his eyes. “I didn't mean to . . . I've lost my senses.”

“It's all right,” she whispered. “It feels . . . it feels good.” She drew in a shaking breath and said, wonderingly, “You're inside of me, Kian. We're one now.”

Aye
, he thought as he began to move in her more slowly, more deeply. They were one, and the pleasure of it was going to kill them both.

“I love you,” he murmured, and felt her relaxing beneath him. Pleasure took the place of pain in her eyes, and she began to move in union with him. She said his name and then, as the pleasure grew more intense, murmured, “Oh!”

It was the most erotic thing he'd ever heard and sent Kian over the edge. Pleasure exploded through him just as it washed over Loris, and his last coherent thought as they fell into sensation was that waiting ten years for this moment had been more than worthwhile.

They slept for an hour, cocooned together beneath the blankets. Kian had been too exhausted to even take off his boots
or pants. When they woke, he finished undressing, took a few moments to help Loris wash the blood from her thighs, and then made love to her again, far more slowly and gently and sanely. They slept again, through the morning and into the afternoon, and when he woke it was to find Loris gently stroking his fully aroused member. He pulled her to sit astride him and showed her how to take him into herself, how to ride him to her own pleasure and then to his. Life, as far as Kian was concerned, could go on exactly in this manner for the remainder of their days.

But the world had other ideas.

Elen meekly scratched at the door just as they were about to sleep again, and when bade to enter, refused to come any farther into the room.

Loris slid from the bed and took up her wrapper, covering herself and padding barefoot across the carpeted floor to speak to the girl.

A few minutes later Loris returned to the bed to find Kian propped up on the pillows, his hands beneath his blond head and his magnificent body exposed from the waist up. The smile on his face told her exactly what he wanted to do and she would have liked nothing better than to throw the wrapper aside and acquiesce, but it would have to wait.

“I never realized how very handsome you are before now,” she told him, climbing up to kneel beside him on the mattress. With one finger she traced the line of one of his recent scars. “I could do without these, however, though I daresay if you kept them, women would swoon at the sight of your battle wounds.”

“And then I'd have to make up a tale of having served in a very different sort of war,” he said, drawing one of his hands out from beneath his head to toy with the edge of her wrapper. “I hope you asked Elen to have a nice, hot bath brought up for us. And food.”

“A bath?” Loris asked, her eyebrows rising. “For both of us? Is that possible?”

He pushed up to his elbow, coming near enough to kiss her. His hand stole inside her wrapper to caress her naked breast.

“Entirely,” he murmured against her lips, and his clever fingers stroked lightly over her sensitive nipple. “Especially with lots of soap and warm, scented water. I shall enjoy bathing every single part of you.”

His lips tasted hers and his tongue teased the corner of her mouth, and Loris very nearly forgot what Elen had just told her.

It took an effort to pull away, especially with visions of bathing with Kian dancing through her brain, but she did, saying, “Cadmaran's coming.”

Kian fell still. His hand came out of her wrapper. “What?”

“Malachi sent Elen to wake us,” Loris said. “Lord Llew will be here within the hour. He sent word. He wants to meet with you, and with Dyfed.”

Kian sat up, staring at her. “He's going to issue a challenge,” he said. “To Dyfed.”

“To Dyfed?” she said as he tossed the covers aside and stood. “Because of Desdemona Caslin? But I thought they were fated. Lord Llew surely can't challenge Dyfed for something that the Guardians decided.”

Kian was searching the room for his clothes. “He shouldn't be allowed to,” he said distractedly. “But that's never stopped the man before. I've got to find a way to avoid it. He'll kill Dyfed in a contest.”