“Weel, we don’t know that, do we, laddie?” Egan said, his brogue going broad. “We don’t know whether ye be dead by an assassin’s blade or merely bein’ intimate with the streets.”
Damien only gave him a withering look and rang for a servant to bring dinner.
That night, since they had a bed alone, Damien made love to Penelope perfunctorily but swiftly, and then gathered her close, saying nothing, simply holding her.
From Budapest, the river ran straight south until Belgrade, where it turned abruptly east again, pulled toward the Black Sea. They plunged between the Carpathian mountains and lands to the south, the cliffs rising abruptly from the water. They drifted close to a cliff that had a small Roman tablet carved in it, to mark the spot where a Roman of old had crossed the river to conquer the barbaric peoples to the north.
Penelope let her fingers scrape the stone in wonder. She’d seen Roman ruins in Bath, but here in the middle of the wilderness, the lone marker that had stood for millennia struck her as lonely and powerful, silent and sad.
Not long after that, where narrow paths took them through cool mountain passes and soaring trees, Felsan struck.
Damien had sensed it coming, but he’d wished the man had waited until they were high in the mountains, Damien’s own territory. He wanted to capture Felsan, truss him up, and deliver the Prussian facedown to Alexander in the throne room of the Imperial Castle.
How the devil the man had decided what route Damien would take, he did not know. One moment, they walked through cool woods; the next, Wulf gave a sudden whimper, and they were surrounded by men with drawn pistols.
“Hell and damnation,” Egan said. He drew a long knife from his belt, and he and Petri and Titus formed a tight circle around Penelope and Sasha.
The leader of the mercenaries, a huge man with closecropped blond hair and sunburned flesh, held his pistol on Damien. “Do not kill the woman,” he told his men. He spoke in blunt, hard English. “Only the prince. If the others make it necessary, kill them as well. But not the woman.”
Damien wondered why the declaration in English, when his men should already know their orders. He realized that Alexander wanted both Damien and Penelope to know that he would not order Penelope’s death.
He must believe I will think better of him when I see him in hell.
“I commend you on your ability to track me,” he said in German.
Felsan grinned and ran his tongue across the ball of his thumb. “The Austrian woman, she screams very hard.”
Damien felt something evil tighten inside him. He went rigidly silent, but Egan growled like a bear. “You’re dying for that, you mother-loving bastard.”
“I left her alive. He said I was not to kill any of the women.”
Damien heard Wulf whimper again, then the boy suddenly pushed his way between Titus and Petri and ran off into the woods. A mercenary raised his pistol, but Felsan signaled him to stop. “No women. No children. Only princes.”
He smiled, showing crooked white teeth. “Step out and take it like a man, Your Highness,” he said in Nvengarian. “Do not let one of these good servants leap in front of the bullet and sacrifice himself for you.”
Titus snarled, his young face red with fury. “I would die a thousand deaths for him before I let you take him.”
Felsan chuckled. “Only one death would be necessary.”
“Titus,” Damien said clearly, “shut up. I need you to take care of the princess. Do you understand? You guard her with everything you’ve got.”
Titus went quiet, then gave a nod.
Damien looked at Felsan. “If you want me, I will step away. That way if you miss you will not hurt them.”
Felsan’s grin widened. “Was ist das? You will not try to pay me more money to be on your side?”
“You would take my money and shoot me anyway. A mercenary who gains the reputation of not staying bought is never again employed.”
“A perceptive man you are. Also, gut, stand there.” He pointed a thick finger at a tree to Damien’s left.
“May I say my good-byes to my wife?”
“Yes. If she moves from the others.”
Damien glanced at Penelope. “Love,” he said softly. “Come here.”
Penelope was white to the lips, and her beautiful eyes held great anger. He beckoned to her, and she stepped around Petri and walked slowly to him.
God damn Felsan. Damien had finally found what filled the empty places inside him, what ended the loneliness, what let him rest in darkness without fear. He’d found Penelope after a lifetime of searching, not even knowing he was searching. And he’d had no time, so very little time, to spend with her. Felsan deserved a special place in hell.
Damien reached for her, sliding his fingers through hers, and drew her close. She searched his face as he brushed his thumb across her cheek and leaned to kiss her.
He savored her mouth and the flash of her tongue against his. He knew she thought he had a brilliant plan that would save them all and destroy Felsan. He did have a plan, but it was far from brilliant and depended on much luck. Felsan was slowing him down and had very nearly wrecked what he had set up, the stupid man. Midsummer’s Day was too close, only days away; he did not have time for this.
He eased the kiss to its end, their lips clinging a final moment, and touched her sweet face again. “You do what Egan and Petri tell you to, all right? Promise me.”
Her gaze roved his face again. “Damien…”
“Promise me.”
She watched him a moment longer, then wet her lips and nodded.
“Good.” He brushed his lips to hers again, then peeled her hand from his. “Go stand with them.”
She swallowed, nodded again, and turned to obey. She still thought he had a brilliant plan. He hoped she would not be too disappointed.
“No,” Sasha screamed.
Felsan started. Petri swung around. “Shut up,” he said frantically.
“No.” Sasha fell to his knees in the dirt. He was weeping, tears running down his face. “You cannot kill him. Do you know what this man has done for me? He took me with his own hands and raised me up. He remembered me, he came for me. Any other man would have let me die, forgotten, but not Damien. He let me live. He is the true prince.”
Felsan’s men trained weapons on him, fingers nervous on triggers. “Shut him up,” Felsan snapped.
“Sasha,” Damien said warningly.
“Kill me, instead. I will die in his place. I am alive only because of him.”
“Fine,” Felsan said in a hard voice and aimed his pistol.
An unholy shriek echoed through the woods, a cry a man might hear in a nightmare. Before any of Felsan’s mercenaries had time to react, a black streak shot through the air and struck the startled Felsan.
Snarling and hissing, clawing and biting, Wulf, once more a demon, began to tear Felsan to pieces.
Felsan’s pistol discharged. Damien dove for the ground, bearing Penelope beneath him. The mercenaries shot wildly, missing Wulf entirely. Egan tackled one of them, snatching the pistol from his grip and using it to shoot a mercenary who was aiming to kill Damien.
A few more pistols discharged. Blood blossomed on Egan’s arm, but this only enraged him all the more. The Mad Highlander sprang, grabbed another mercenary in his brawny grip, and squeezed hard. With a crunch of bones, the man fell to the damp earth.
Wulf looked up and around, his face and sharp teeth red with blood, his lips drawn back in a snarl. Felsan was a silent and bloody mess beneath him.
The mercenaries who were still unhurt glanced at Wulf, glanced at each other, then turned as one and fled. One was kind enough to scoop up the man whose ribs Egan had broken, carrying him, groaning, over his shoulder.
Egan straightened up, his hand pressed to the bloody arm of his shirt. “God,” he said, looking at the body of Felsan. “Now I truly will be sick.”
They carried Felsan’s body to the river and threw him in. He’d fetch up in a town do
wnstream, where the priest could order him to be given a proper burial.
Penelope was silent as they walked on. She said not one word, not to ask if Damien were all right, or to lend sympathy to the frightened Sasha, or to Egan whose arm had been grazed, although she did help bind it.
“You can go back,” Damien told Egan. “Catch a passing boat that will take you upriver, where you can have that properly seen to.”
Egan gave him a look of disgust. “Abandon you because of a wound that couldn’t slow down a rabbit? Don’t bleat like an old woman.”
Damien smiled to himself. Egan was fine.
Wulf, on the other hand, had disappeared. He had glared at their startled faces when they tried to move to Felsan’s body, then with another shriek, he ran off into the woods. They had not seen him since.
“Do not worry about him.” Damien tried to comfort Penelope. “These mountains are his home. He comes from here.”
Petri added, “He probably went to see his mum.”
Egan glanced about darkly. “So long as he doesn’t bring her back for a visit.”
They walked the rest of that day and on into evening. Penelope tired before long, and when Damien put a supporting arm around her, she looked up at him with dark eyes full of shock. She needed to rest, but he did not want to spend the night in the open. Some of the mercenaries might be courageous enough to try to murder them in the night, and they might not share Felsan’s scruples about not killing them all.
Near sunset, a carter driving into the next village agreed to let Penelope ride on his load of turnips. Damien lifted her, unresisting, and laid her on the rough sacks. He made Sasha ride as well, even if the man insisted he was fine. As soon as Sasha climbed onto the wagon, he fell back onto the lumpy sacks, sound asleep.
Damien carried Penelope to the town’s only inn, and bade the landlord get her a bath and a soft bed. The landlord and his wife looked closely at Damien, no doubt working out in their shrewd country minds exactly who he was. The pass to Nvengaria was not far from here, and the prince was expected with his princess any day.
Fortunately, they said nothing. The landlord’s wife helped Penelope bathe, and tucked her into bed.
When Damien joined her much later in the night, he thought her asleep, but as soon as he stripped and climbed beneath the coarse blankets with her, she threw her arms around his neck, sobbing.
“Shh.” With expert hands, he unwove the braid of her hair and smoothed it with his fingers. “It is over, love.”
He eased his hand to the small of her back, kneading and massaging, while he drew her on top of him. He roved one hand to the nape of her neck and fit her mouth over his. He explored with his tongue, not forcing her to kiss him back, probing her mouth and the moisture behind her lower lip. He slid her legs apart as he kissed her, his erection swelling and stiff, and eased her down onto him.
His mind clouded as her hips began rocking against his, making love to him even as she wept. He scratched lightly across her back, raking his hand to her hips and thighs, tracing circles as he pushed up into her. The high bed creaked, a loose leg thumping against the boards of the floor, as he drove as hard and high into her as he could.
Her hair fell over him like a curtain. He caught strands in his teeth and tugged them. Her tears dropped to his face, hot like the rain that had begun outside the window, tears on the panes to match hers.
He rocked swiftly against the bed, scrape-thump, scrape-thump, scrape-thump. Black spots swirled before his eyes, tiny rivulets of sweat furrowing his skin.
Still crying softly, she lay down on him. Her back was slick with sweat, and their legs and bellies sealed together from the dampness. He moved his hands to her buttocks, but before he could go any further, she came, her climax uttered in gasps and moans.
“Penelope,” he heard himself cry out. He squeezed his eyes shut as his climax took him, purple flickering on the edges of his vision. His seed poured out of him in violent shots, wanting her heat, her juices flowing back hot around him.
“Love you, love you.” He thrust his tongue into her mouth, wanting to be inside her any way he could. “Love you,” he said, his voice hoarse.
Her tears wet his chest. His climax wound down, though he was still stiff inside her.
“It’s all right,” he murmured. He heard himself speaking Nvengarian, but he was too exhausted to think in another language. “It is over, sweetheart. We are still here, still together. If he had not killed Felsan, I would be dead, and I would much rather be here in this bed with you.”
She raised her head, her face twisted with weeping. “I was glad Wulf killed him,” she said, her voice broken. “I was happy to see the blood, because he wanted to hurt you. I wanted to do what Wulf did. I felt it inside me, that insane rage. I wanted to tear him apart for trying to hurt you. I wanted to.”
She squeezed her eyes shut, her sobs uncontrollable.
“Sweetheart.” He gently pulled her down on him and held her close. “It does not matter, love. You were scared—and I did not particularly want to die.”
She let out more hoarse sobs. “What is wrong with me?”
“Nothing, love.” He smiled into her hair. “You are a Nvengarian, that is all.”
Whether what he said comforted her or she had simply worn herself out with weeping, emotion, and lovemaking, her crying eventually wound down into little hiccups, and then she drew in long breaths, as though trying to still herself.
After a long time, he eased her from his body. Limp, she collapsed onto the pillows, and he curled around her and fell into a numb, oblivious sleep.
In the morning, Penelope felt a little better. She’d washed her tearstained face and dressed again in the frock she’d worn since London. The landlord’s wife brought her breakfast of bread and creamy butter, ham, and eggs, and she ate them heartily.
She saw Damien through the tiny window, leading two horses back toward the inn. Egan and Petri waited for him in the inn yard. Of Wulf, there was still no sign.
She went downstairs to meet them, ready to press onward toward Nvengaria. She knew that the landlord’s wife suspected who they were, and that everyone in the inn must have heard her and Damien’s not very silent lovemaking the night before. Indeed, the landlord’s wife had sent her a knowing smile, and when Penelope blushed, the woman’s eyes danced in mirth.
The horses, Damien explained when Penelope reached the yard, were for her and Sasha. The others would walk, but they still had a long way to go.
Petri hoisted Sasha into the saddle. Sasha looked ill, white-faced and red-eyed, and he clung to the horse like a drowning man to an upturned boat. Damien seemed not to notice. He lifted Penelope into her saddle, laying a warm hand on Penelope’s thigh.
The landlord’s wife shuffled out with a packet of cakes that she passed up to Penelope, then squeezed Penelope’s hand between both of hers and kissed it. She patted Penelope’s foot and said something in a language Penelope did not understand.
“She wishes you to go with God,” Sasha said, his voice strained. “And hopes God will bless your union with your husband and your kingdom. She knows who we are.”
“She is a good woman; she will say nothing,” Penelope said with conviction. She smiled her thanks at the woman, who took a step back and curtsied deeply.
“We need to move on,” Damien said, paying no attention. He scanned the little group gathered in the yard. “Where the devil is Titus?”
Egan looked about, as though just noticing the youth missing. “Ah, well, he found a lass last night who responded to his winks. I am thinking he’s still at it.”
Petri chuckled, but Damien gave him a cold stare. “Find him.”
He picked up the reins of Penelope’s horse and led the beast out of the yard. Sasha directed his horse to follow. Behind them, she heard Petri shouting, “Titus, lad. Hurry yourself.”
Damien and Penelope had made it all the way to the end of the quiet street before Titus burst out of the inn, trying to run and fasten
his breeches at the same time.
Damien bent a glare on him when he reached them, and the young man flushed as he laced his shirt. “Sorry, Your Highness.”
“What did you get up to last night, Petri?” Damien asked. “You are not so well yourself.”
Petri looked slightly guilty, but Egan laughed. “Getting Sasha drunk, that’s what we were up to. He needed it.”
Sasha moaned just then and pressed his hand to his stomach. Damien turned abruptly and led Penelope’s horse onward. They left the high street and passed out of the village, following the road as it climbed into the hills. About a mile from the village, Damien stopped.
“Egan,” he said. “God damn you. This is far from over—do you think Alexander will stop because Felsan is dead? Was Penelope safe when you crawled into the whiskey bottle last night?”
“Hold steady, lad. We needed it after—that. And the whiskey was piss, so I paid for it.”
“You celebrated by getting Sasha drunk, and finding Titus a skirt to lift.”
Egan’s eyes narrowed. “Ease off, Damien. He was only getting a bit of what you were having.”
Damien slammed Egan into the nearest tree, holding a firm hand against his throat. “You speak of my wife like that again, and your claymore will be sheathed in your brain.”
Egan looked slightly dazed and not a little sick from the bad whiskey, but he glared fire at Damien. “Let go of me.”
Damien did not move. “We are not finished. We are not home. Alexander can strike at any moment. Penelope is not to be unprotected for one second, do you understand me?”
“I understand you fine,” Egan said. One lock of brown hair fell across his face. “You take your hand off me throat, and I’ll let you keep your fingers.”
Damien released him, but not because of the threat. His face was granite hard, the look in his eye deadly. “You take care of her, or you go.”
He turned around, lifted the reins of Penelope’s horse, and led it onward. Egan and Petri exchanged a look. Titus looked sheepish and guilt-stricken.