“You’ll have them,” he said as his eyes met Elspeth’s in the dimly lit room. There was an unspoken threat in them, and Elspeth wondered where her panic had disappeared to. Perhaps she’d run so far and so fast that she could no longer fight him. If he wanted children she’d at least be expected to survive another nine months in reasonably sound health. She should take that as a good sign.
She could see the cut on the side of his face. It hadn’t been stitched, and it would leave a scar. One more thing he could blame on her, she thought, wanting to burrow down beneath the heavy fur throws that covered the soft bed.
He moved further into the tiny cottage with disdainful, elegant grace, entering the tiny bedroom, dwarfing it with his presence. “She’s the one, isn’t she?” he asked almost absently. “White and black…”
“Aye,” his mother said.
“She’ll destroy me.”
“Perhaps.”
He moved closer to the bed. He was wearing a loose black shirt, black hose, and tall black boots. He looked impossibly evil, and his black-gloved hand reached out and took a strand of her pale hair. “She hardly looks lethal,” he said in a deliberately bored voice, which was belied by the gleam in his golden eyes.
“If you can’t bring yourself to touch her,” his mother said, “I could brew some tea for you as well. That is, if you don’t want her…”
“Oh, I want her,” he said softly, dangerously.
“Well,” said Morgana briskly, taking a step back. “Then that’s that. The marriage bed awaits you. I’ve strewn it with lavender and tansy, wolf’s bane and thyme. There’ll be a son from this night’s work, you’ll see.”
He didn’t even glance her way. Slowly, he began to strip off his heavy black gloves, watching Elspeth’s expressionless face. “Make yourself scarce,” he said. “I’ve no desire for an audience.”
“I expect you know what you’re about, “ the old witch cackled. “I’ve got some herbs to gather, and they’re best picked by the dark of the moon. Mayhaps I’ll head over toward the north ridge. Won’t be back till midday, or later.”
He nodded, untying the laces of his black shirt, not moving as the door closed loudly behind the old woman. In the still night air they could hear her voice mixing with the sounds of the other night creatures, the cry of the owl, the song of the nightingale. She was muttering something in a singsong voice, familiar words that made no sense, and slowly they faded away in the distance. And Elspeth was alone with her husband in the heart of the haunted forest.
He sat down heavily on the end of the bed, not touching her, and began to strip off his tall riding boots. She watched him, wondering if there was any way to distract him from his goal. When he’d pulled off his boots he rose and looked at her, and the moonlight speared down through the hole in the roof, hitting his midnight hair, giving the odd and totally inappropriate effect of a halo.
“Why should I destroy you?” she asked suddenly, the first words she had dared speak.
They halted him in his steady advance. “You couldn’t,” he said flatly.
“Then why are you afraid of me?” Not the wisest choice of words, but Elspeth had recently discovered she was very far from wise. After twenty-two years of practical, celibate living, during which she’d viewed men as overbearing tyrants who were at least tolerated, and at most shunned entirely, she was suddenly irrationally vulnerable to a man who seemed to combine all the worst traits of the species. She hadn’t needed Morgana’s love philtre. She’d somehow managed to imbibe one of her own.
“I’m not afraid of anyone,” he said. “Of anything of this earth or of other dimensions. My mother has seen to that. It’s part of my power.”
“What about your father?”
He laughed softly. “Ah, yes, my father. The devil himself.”
“Was he?”
His smile was small, bitter, but not without amusement. “I doubt it. If he were, I wouldn’t have had to work so hard to get where I am. Indeed, I think Morgana would remember if she’d managed to couple with the prince of darkness himself. As it is, I imagine he was a handsome tinker. Or even a landholder. Someone who has no memory of what a tumble with a witch brought forth.”
He was standing very close to the bed. She could smell the herbs, mixed with the warm summer breeze and the wondrous scent of the forest. She could lie back and stare at the moon and try not to pay attention to what he was doing.
She glanced at him with a doubtful expression. “You are going to do it, aren’t you?” she asked, wishing she could think of a better euphemism but failing entirely.
“To be sure.”
“And it’s going to be painful. I know that full well. Even with the tenderest of husbands, the act is uncomfortable and degrading for women. It was ordained that it be so, so that we should pay for the sins of Eve. And you aren’t,” she added boldly, “the most tender of husbands. I imagine you’re planning to pay me back for coshing you on the head with the water jug.”
He finished untying the shirt and stripping it from his strong, lean body. “Oh, I don’t know if I need to go that far. Mind you, I’m not about to turn my back on you again. But there are other ways of ensuring your future obedience.”
She looked at him uneasily. She could endure pain. Her father had been quick to punish a recalcitrant child and the Sisters of the Everlasting Martyr had lived up to their name. She could kneel for endless hours on a cold stone floor, eat nothing but thin gruel and drink foul water. She could survive ritual whippings and beatings and solitude. But she wasn’t sure she could survive that intent expression in Alistair Darcourt’s golden eyes.
“Please,” she said, sudden degrading fear filling her voice.
His smile was unnerving. He knelt down on the bed, leaning over her, and he seemed huge and dark and smothering as he blocked out the moonlight. “Indeed, I do just as I please,” he said. “You’re my destiny, Elspeth of Gaveland. Or my curse. It remains to be seen.”
“I don’t understand.”
He picked up a strand of her hair, running it through his long fingers, and once more she was mesmerized by the beauty of his hands. “White and black, they shall combine,” he murmured, bringing the long, silky strand to his lips. “Pure as snow, as blood-red wine.” He moved down, settling his body over hers, the heavy animal furs between them, and yet she could feel him, every bone, every muscle, hot against her tender flesh. She could feel the pulse racing through her body and his, feel the thudding of her heartbeat matching his. “You’re white,” he whispered, his voice only a breath of sound. “Pure as snow.” His mouth drifted over her brow, her cheekbones, and she shut her eyes, feeling his lips feather against her trembling lids. “And I’m black and evil, darkness personified.” He kissed the tender spot behind her ear, his tongue hot and damp.
She was having trouble breathing. She was burning up beneath the mountain of covers; she was freezing cold, shivering. “Is that all there is to the prophecy?” she choked out.
He levered himself off her, his mouth traveling down the side of her neck as he tugged the heavy covers away from her. “Flame and fire destroy them both,” he whispered against her skin. “Death and rebirth, blood their troth.”
“It sounds a little extreme to me,” she said in a strangled voice as his hand drifted back up the front of her thin linen chemise. His skin was hot, burning through the material; the fingers deft, sliding, reaching, and covering her breast. She jerked, arching off the bed in silent protest, but he simply pushed her back down, holding her shoulders pinned against the rough mattress as he put his mouth where his hand had been all too briefly.
She’d never paid much attention to her body before. Her breasts had simply been there, small, in the way, with no earthly use since she’d never intended to marry or bear children. Alistair’s mouth on her breast was an astonishing revelation of feeling so overwhelming that she wasn’t sure she could bear it. His mouth pulled at her, hotly, wetly, his tongue circling her nipple, and she felt it grow hard i
n his mouth, felt her other breast tighten in sympathetic response, and she made a low, helpless sound of protest.
He lifted his head to look down at her, and there was no denying the cool triumph in his eyes. “I thought it a little extreme myself,” he said, his slightly labored breathing the only sign that he was moved by her reaction. “But there’s hope. The prophecy goes on.” And he touched the tip of his tongue to her other breast through the thin cloth, dampening it, teasing it, and Elspeth found she was clutching the heavy velvet beneath her, fisting it in her hands to keep from touching him.
“Does it?” She couldn’t even manage a pretense of calm. Her voice came out in a quiet gasp.
He sat back, staring down at her, and his sleekly muscled chest was rising and falling more rapidly now. “Yes,” he said, reaching to the high neckline of the thin chemise. With one deft yank he tore it open, ripping it down the middle from neckline to hem, pulling it away from her pale white body, exposing it to the moonlight and his cool, deceptively dispassionate gaze. “In thunder, rain, brought right again,” he said, and it took a moment before she realized he was still quoting the prophecy. “And all shall be as God’s design.”
“God’s design?” She watched him, wary, waiting. “You think God has blessed our union?”
“Or the devil. It makes little difference to me.” He reached out and took her heavy silver cross in his hand. “Is this supposed to protect you from the likes of me?”
“It’s failed.”
“Indeed.” He yanked on it, and it broke free, to disappear in the tumbled bedclothes. He leaned forward and put his mouth hard against hers, his body pressing against her undressed one, pressing her into the warmth of the bed, settling between her long legs. She searched for one last defense, one trace of pride, of self-discipline or protection. None remained as she released her grip on the bed beneath her and put her arms around his neck, slanting her mouth beneath his, kissing him back.
His chest was hot, sleek, and strong against hers, his arms muscled and tight with self-control. He slid his hand between their bodies, between her thighs, and her shock this time was even more intense. As was his determination, his fingers threaded through the thick tangle of hair, touching her, pressing against her, sliding deep into the damp, throbbing heat of her. She tried to tighten her legs, but he would have none of it. He was strong, more than she realized, and very determined, and he broke the kiss, panting slightly. “Don’t fight me,” he said. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
She stared up at him, baffled, her mouth tingling, her body trembling with fear and longing. “Why not? I thought you enjoyed hurting.”
He cursed then, a low, foul curse that made her flinch. His eyes were mesmerizing, watching her. “Do I terrify you, then?”
She wanted to say yes. And yet if he left her now, sent her back to the convent, she would be very willing to die.
She just managed a smile. “Do I terrify you?” she countered in a rough whisper.
He shook his head, more in wonder than denial. “You astonish me,” he said. And sliding down the length of her body, he shocked her still further by putting his mouth between her legs.
She tried to hit him then, but he ignored her, his hands clasping her thighs, holding her in place. She squirmed against him, but it only brought his mouth tighter, hotter against her most secret places. This was his revenge, his torment, his degradation, and she hated him, she hated him, she…
Began to like it. Her breath caught in her lungs as a tight, spiraling sensation curled in the pit of her stomach and fanned outward. She wanted to cry, she wanted to scream, she wanted to die; she wasn’t sure what she wanted except for him to stop, to keep on. Her heels dug into the pile of velvet beneath her, the soft breeze danced across her skin, and she knew he had to be the son of the devil himself And then her body exploded, splintered into a thousand stars, and she heard a low, animal-like shriek, and knew, to her shame, that it came from her own throat.
He slid up, covering her, his hips resting between her legs as he threaded his hands through her thick hair. “Did you like that, my pretty little nun?” he murmured.
She couldn’t catch her breath. Her face was wet with tears, and she was lost, confused. “You’re a monster,” she gasped. “A devil, a cruel, rapacious beast…” His mouth stopped hers, and without hesitation she kissed him back, fiercely, her arms sliding tightly around his neck, holding him hard against her body.
He lifted his head. “We’re not finished yet,” he said.
“No,” she answered.
He levered his body away from hers a few scant inches, and she felt chilled to the bone. “No?” he echoed in a mocking, reasonable voice.
She was a good, holy woman, a keeper of the faith, one who had never blasphemed in her life. “God damn you,” she said. “Yes.” And she pulled him back against her.
5
Alistair Darcourt had bedded many women in his life, so many that he’d long ago lost count. But all those faceless, nameless women hadn’t had the power to move him like the small, slender woman lying beneath him, staring up at him with a mixture of anger and desire.
He threaded his long fingers through her silken hair, molding her skull beneath his hands. So fragile, so deceptively meek. He’d been a fool to marry—he simply should have taken Dunstan Woods for taxes. Sir Hugh of Gaveland wouldn’t have dared to defy him, and the woman who’d already begun to twist and turn into the fabric of his life would still be safely in her convent.
He could send her back. Keep her immured there, away from the sight and touch of men. It was almost an acceptable alternative. As long as no other man touched her, he could forget about her.
But priests were men, despite their vows of celibacy. And he’d seen his own cousin’s reaction to her.
He had two choices. He could bed her, take her body until he tired of it. He could get sons from her, wear her out, and then send her back to her convent, or stash her in one of his own smaller houses, away from temptation. Or he could save himself a great of trouble and simply kill her now.
People said he had witch’s eyes: his mother’s eyes, an eerie golden color that could look into people’s souls and ferret out their secrets. They were nothing compared to the limpid blue of his pale bride. She lay beneath him, her white-blonde hair fanned out around her. The cool intelligence in her eyes disconcerted him, particularly when she made no effort to disguise her confused desire for him.
“Are you going to do it?” Her voice was little more than a whisper, but unnervingly calm.
He pressed against her, wondering if she even recognized his arousal. From the faintly shocked expression in her eyes, he decided she had a fairly good notion. “I thought we already made that clear.”
“I mean are you going to kill me?”
It was almost enough to unman him. “What makes you say that?” he countered cautiously. He wanted to kiss her. He wanted to cover her soft mouth with his and drink deeply. He wanted her body, her heart, and her soul.
“Do you deny you were considering it?”
“I don’t have to deny anything.” Damn his mother! She must have dosed him when he didn’t realize it. There had to be something to explain his mindless reaction to the pale wench. “You’re my bride, and my property. I can do anything I please with you.”
She didn’t even flinch. Lying naked beneath him, her body still racked with faint tremors of reaction from what he’d just done to her, she accepted that information without pause. “If you’re going to kill me, you might consider doing it now.”
She sounded so reasonable as she discussed her death. He didn’t want her reasonable. He wanted her panicked, silly, dismissible. Not fascinating.
“Why?”
“Because if I die a virgin there’s a good chance I’ll be considered a martyr. Perhaps even a saint, eventually.”
“Ambitious, aren’t you?”
Her lashes were surprisingly dark, fanning over those clear blue eyes. “‘I always have
been. At the very least, if I die a virgin I’ll be guaranteed a swift entrance to heaven.”
“Sorry,” he said.
“It would be very simple,” she said, her voice low and persuasive. “You’re strong—you could just squeeze your hands together and crush my skull. Or you could strangle me—it wouldn’t take long.”
“Bloodthirsty little creature, aren’t you? Haven’t you heard—I prefer to use a knife,” he mocked her, thinking of the young woman he’d turned from his bed, who’d turned up dead two days later.
His meek little bride winced. “I’m not over-fond of blood,” she confessed. “Perhaps your mother could poison me?” She sounded hopeful.
He laughed then, unable to help himself. “By the time she got around to it you’d no longer be a virgin.” He rocked against her again, lightly, reveling in her little shiver of response.
“Wouldn’t you rather kill me?” she asked in a sweet, plaintive voice.
“I’m afraid not.” And he gave in to temptation, setting his mouth against hers, thrusting his tongue inside her mouth roughly, trying to still that ember of desire that burned brightly, paradoxically within her.
He didn’t want her to want him. She was dangerous, all purity and gentleness and seductive goodness wrapped up a serene, beautiful body and a betraying sense of humor. He’d never met a woman who dared to mock him. He doubted there was anything Elspeth of Gaveland wouldn’t dare.
Not even taking the black, dangerous high sheriff of Huntingdon into her bed, her body, her heart. She had a heart, there was no doubt of that. It was beating madly against his. She would take him and love him and weaken him. The thought was unbearable.
He put his hands on her throat, feeling the pulse throbbing. It would be so easy. He lifted his head to stare down at her, trying to will himself to take the blackest, darkest step of all.
He couldn’t do it. It was already too late. Instead, he put his mouth against her neck, biting it lightly as his hands slid down and covered her small, perfect breasts.