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  “Even if that’s true, how will it help us if this one focuses on you?” Iril shook her head.

  Calanthe couldn’t explain the source of her knowledge, so she stalked off in search of bandages, food and water. Tamel couldn’t complain how long she spent at the well if he inflicted wounds she needed to wash. The deaths must feel like a personal affront to him, after he had established the city as a sanctuary for sorcerers. But to whip a man as though he were an animal— That was what he thought, she realized. The wolf-born were not people to him. A cloak too, then, if this one had been locked up naked.

  She made her way into the cellar and was relieved to find that it was lit, at least. The wolf-born sat facing the corner, so that she could clearly see the long welt on his back. She wanted to tend it right then, but she knew better than to startle him. She deliberately scuffed her foot on the floor as she walked toward him to alert him to her presence.

  His head swiveled toward her. His features were drawn into a feral mask, and there was something so terrible in the way he looked at her, utterly rapt, as though she were not a person but some strange thing to investigate by peeling away the layers of her skin and muscle, that she almost fled what must be the wrong cell. But she recognized him.

  “Ryu!” The name was startled out of her, a single, sharp word, and it cut into him. He blinked, and for a moment she saw something vulnerable pass over his face. Then his expression hardened. It was human this time, but even more frightening for it.

  “Calanthe,” he said, and there was a gleam in his eyes, that of a long patience rewarded. He nodded toward the key she held.

  She hadn’t dared believed it would be him. Words flooded her throat and drowned her voice. She knelt beside him and unlocked his chains, and immediately knew it was a mistake.

  Chapter Eight

  Ryuan snapped his arms up, shedding the chains, and stood. Calanthe stepped back, but he took that same step toward her, holding her gaze. If she ran, he would follow, and bring her down, and take her again and again until he was indelibly marked on her flesh, so that she could never leave him.

  He was almost disappointed when she did not turn to flee. Her eyes were still wide with surprise, and she seemed too shocked to even try to run.

  “You didn’t expect to find me here,” he said, working out her reaction.

  “No.”

  “So you didn’t come to free me.”

  “I came to tend your wound, and bring you food and water.”

  “Water. A familiar offer. And if I hunger for something else? Are you supposed to offer me that too?”

  She did not deny that her seduction had been planned. Something in him wanted the semblance of innocence to cling to, but even that was gone now. Instead she said carefully, “I was waiting there so I could distract you—”

  “So that I would fuck you.”

  She flinched. “Not for the whole summer. I stayed that long because I wanted to.”

  “Ah, so I was worth a summer’s dalliance. And then you wanted to rejoin Tamel.”

  Her mouth firmed. “I regret what I did, but I had my reasons.”

  She regrets it. Anger simmered in him. “You had reason to defend a murderer?”

  “He killed an outlaw who attacked him first!”

  “Since then he has raised a city where sorcerers can run amok and return us to the chaos there was before the Law of Century. Exile was too good for him.”

  She faltered. “You were going to exile him?” Her hand came up and found the wall for support.

  Her reaction checked Ryuan’s rage. “I was,” he said. “Since he had used sorcery in defense of his life. Prince Kaen is a fair man. But now, since he has used it for other purposes, I am commanded to execute him.”

  He saw something in her face that went deeper than dismay. “I thought you were going to kill him,” she whispered. “And I couldn’t bear the thought of his execution.”

  His guts twisted. “So Tamel is your lover.”

  “He was. Before you. Never after.”

  “Never?” Could any man truly have resisted that body, that laugh?

  “With anyone.”

  He could not stop himself. He did not want to. “So it’s been three long seasons since anyone has touched you like this?” He brought his hands to her face, then kissed her.

  Incredibly, her mouth was as sweet as he remembered. He had thought such a taste must have been dreamed. She did not respond at first, but it was the motionlessness of a bow pulled too taut to bend further—he could feel her trembling. Then she leaned into him.

  He remembered, he remembered. He remembered her lean body and the rich tones of her skin, darker now from hours in sun. He remembered molding those slender curves with his palms, and the memory of her long legs spread for him was emblazoned in his mind. He remembered the way his name sounded in her husky voice when he touched her here, or when he set his mouth on her there. And it was all too easy to fall back into the patterns he had dreamed of for the last three seasons and make love to her lingeringly.

  He tried to set his hands at her waist, but the manacles stopped him. He growled and pulled away, remembering himself.

  Her face was still upturned from the kiss. Slowly her eyes opened, but they were unfocused. Her hands, on his shoulders now, tried to pull him back to her. “It’s been too long…”

  He would not be drawn into this again, not this tender exchange of caresses and teasing kisses. Ryuan kissed her again, but this time raked his teeth over her lower lip. She gasped, and he used his body to herd her against the wall. His hands were trapped low between them, and he twisted them to seek that one place. She made a sound low in her throat when he found it, and he dug his knuckle in against her, trying to ignore how it made his wrist rub against his own shaft.

  “Touch me,” he said.

  Her fingers scratched down his arms, then reached the manacles. She stilled.

  The she set her palms on his chest instead. The eyes she lifted to his were liquid, full of unshed tears. “I don’t want you to think I was sent here to do this.”

  He whipped away from her and went to the opposite wall, pressing his forehead against it as his breath rasped in his throat. Despite what he had told himself, that he would take her no matter what, he could not face her like this, with honest loss on her face.

  She thought that, with her betrayal, she had lost him.

  And he knew she never had.

  When she spoke, her voice held a defeated note he had never heard before. “I was going to tend your back—” She found the cloth she’d brought with her and came to him to wash the lash-mark. Her hands were gentle. He could not help but think of them drifting elsewhere.

  “Calanthe…” He turned around. She immediately looked down. “Did you love me?”

  Her hands tightened. “Would you believe me?”

  He wanted to. That wasn’t enough. “Why did you leave?”

  She laced her fingers together and studied them. “I thought I was with child.”

  His breath stopped. “We have a child?”

  At last, she met his eyes. “I lost it. In my haste I traveled too hard. But if it had lived… I did not want it to live under a lie. And I couldn’t bear to tell you the truth. You would look at me the way you’re looking at me now…”

  “You were going to raise it with Tamel?”

  “I just left, Ryu. I didn’t know where I was going. Then I miscarried, and I went where I thought I would be safe without having to deceive anyone. I didn’t realize that my feelings for Tamel were gone until I saw him again. I hoped, sometimes, that you would come after me.”

  He hadn’t even tried to follow. “I thought you didn’t want me.”

  “I thought you wouldn’t, once you knew what I’d done.”

  “If you had known I wasn’t planning to execute Tamel—”

  “I wouldn’t have been waiting at that well,” she said. “I would not change that.”

  His anger was slow to fade, but then
he reached out, unable to help himself, and traced a line down her stomach. He couldn’t imagine the curves of her body being different from how they were now. “You were pregnant with our child.”

  “We lay together often enough,” she said dryly.

  For the first time, she sounded like herself. He shook off his contemplation of fatherhood and smiled.

  She raised a hand and traced his lips. “The first time I saw you, I wanted to make you smile. You were too serious.”

  He thought of her standing by the well, drawing him out of wolf-shape. “You were a sight to make anyone smile.”

  “It took some teasing first, I recall.”

  “And more…” He let his hands caress her neck, then move downward.

  Her face turned anxious at the sight of his shackled wrists. “It’ll take a smith or someone with a metalworking gift to get those off.”

  He kissed her furrowed brow. “If I hadn’t been captured,” he said, “I might not have met you now. And I would not change that. We’ll not let these get in the way.” When her expression remained worried, he said impatiently, “I need you now.”

  She began to smile herself. “I remember someone taking his time once.” She shrugged one shoulder out of her dress. The skew of her neckline only just covered one nipple. He could see it peaking the fabric.

  Ryuan lifted her breast free, then bent to lick a spiral around the nipple. Because his hands could not wander elsewhere, he lavished attention on each breast in turn. He yanked out her laces with his teeth and her dress slithered to the ground in a soft pile of forgotten fabric.

  He had to step back to control his excitement at the sight of her nakedness. Something about the light lit her curves and shadowed others in a way that almost made her body unfamiliar, but at the same time he could have closed his eyes and molded her exact shape in clay.

  He nodded toward the ground. “Lie down.”

  Calanthe looked at him speculatively, and he knew she was coming up with ideas about how helpless he might be while shackled.

  He circled her, brushed her hair aside, and kissed the nape of her neck. Then he folded his knee into the back of hers, sending her weight back onto him with a startled cry. He laughed as he lowered her gently, careful not to scrape the silver against her skin. “Thought you had the upper hand?”

  “Since yours were bound…” She smiled up at him.

  He eased her legs apart and knelt between them. “I can still use my hands.” He rubbed his thumb directly over her clit and saw the muscles shift in her legs as she tensed. “And my mouth…” He kissed her hip.

  His hand was growing increasingly slick, and he slid one finger into the passage her wetness came from. Then he added another finger.

  Her body jerked in time to his pace. The smell of her cream grew into an overwhelming temptation. He wanted it on his tongue as well, so he sank down and brought his mouth to it.

  His tongue flickered over her clit, then moved into her. Her taste was rich and heady. He lapped it into his mouth, savoring the helpless sounds she made, like birds’ cries. And when she reached a crescendo, he did not stop until she pushed his head away, flushed and heavy-lidded.

  He rolled onto his back and she crawled up his body until her mouth reached his and they could share a hungry kiss that tasted of her. Then she sank onto his cock.

  He arched his hips upward, trying to fill her to the hilt. Despite her earlier release she was tight around him, and it took an agonizing eternity. He thought he would go mad from the pleasure. But once she had finally taken all of him, she began to move, and it was then that his restraint was truly challenged.

  He wanted to pull her hips down over him, but the cursed manacles kept him from it. He half-raised himself, trying to better position himself, but she caught his arms and coaxed them over his head. “Let me…”

  “Faster, then,” he groaned.

  She leaned down and braced her hands, then ground herself against him furiously. He felt himself going and brought his arms down with his hands behind her neck, drawing her in for a desperate melding of their mouths. When he came he wanted to throw his head back, but he forced his eyes to stay open and locked on hers. This moment was full of her, full to bursting.

  Her gaze was smoky as she watched his face throughout his release. Her hips finally slowed, but she kept him inside her as she lay her body fully down over his and pressed her face into his neck.

  “I missed you,” she said.

  With those words, and her warmth enfolding him, he could easily have remained there forever. He settled his hands at the small of her back. But as soon as his eyelids drifted shut, she sat up, ducking her head so that his manacles could pass over and land with a thump on his chest.

  “Calanthe?”

  “We have to get you out of here,” she said, donning her dress again and gathering the things she had brought.

  He came to his feet immediately, recalled to his purpose. “I can’t leave the city.”

  “Can you bring yourself to at least leave this cellar?” She unfolded a cloak and settled it over his shoulders.

  He wanted to catch her shoulder with one hand and turn her face toward him with the other. Because he couldn’t, he used his eyes instead, holding her gaze and willing her to come to him.

  She sighed. “When you look at me like that…” She linked her arms behind his neck and kissed him.

  “Calanthe,” he said, only a finger’s width apart from her, “I still have to find Tamel. I can’t ask you to help me when you don’t want him to die.”

  “I can’t leave you here,” she said. “And there have been a series of killings. For all I know, you’re vulnerable too.”

  He thought of Nerav grimly. “I will bring justice to the killer too.”

  “Justice doesn’t always mean death,” she said quietly.

  He took a breath. “If I kill Tamel…”

  She pressed his hands to her heart. “Whatever happens, I won’t leave you again.”

  With that reassurance he followed her out of his prison, and emerged before Tamel’s astonished stare.

  Chapter Nine

  “Calanthe—”

  Ryuan and Tamel spoke at once, stopped at the same time. Ryuan twisted his wrists in the impossible hope that this time the manacles would break. He longed to take his wolf-shape.

  Calanthe said to Tamel, “This is the prince’s hunter. Yes, I freed him.”

  He must have seen something in her face, or even the muss of her hair. “The two of you…”

  “Yes.”

  “No wonder you wouldn’t have me afterward.” He laughed bitterly. “I’m glad you didn’t. In love with one of the wolf-born!”

  “Your quarrel is with me, sorcerer,” Ryuan said.

  “You did as you were commanded,” Tamel said dismissively. “You can do no more, no less. But you—” He reached out and touched Calanthe’s cheek. “You betrayed me.”

  She turned her head away, causing his fingers to fall away. “My heart is mine to give.” But her face was pale.

  He curled his rejected hand into a fist. Ryuan started forward, but instead of trying to hit Calanthe, the sorcerer flung his hand at Ryuan.

  The world exploded, but Ryuan braced against it. The manacles burned his skin as they picked up the heat, but when his vision cleared from the burst of scarlet, he found himself standing otherwise unharmed on scorched ground.

  Ryuan began closing the distance between them. “Even in the shape of a man I can kill you,” he said.

  Tamel tried again, this time sweeping up both arms. A gale struck with hammer-force, cracking the walls and tearing the roof away.

  Ryuan threw his body over Calanthe’s, trying to shield her from the wind-tossed debris. The wind filled his ears with an unrelenting howl. He gritted his teeth and bore it out, knowing that Tamel was in the eye of this wind-storm.

  When the air finally stilled, it took Ryuan a long moment to move. He had clenched his muscles so tightly they protested
even as he turned his head to look about him.

  The sky was open above them. The building had been ripped from the earth, but they still remained.

  “Whoever created you was powerful indeed,” Tamel said between long breaths. He looked older, face creased with strain.

  There were scattered cries around them, and Ryuan saw people scrambling to their feet and fleeing. One woman ran toward them instead, the one called Iril. She caught sight of him and wheeled on Calanthe as she struggled to her feet. “Why did you let him go?”

  “He is the prince’s hunter,” Calanthe said. “And I couldn’t bear the sight of him in chains.”

  Iril’s eyes widened and she grabbed Tamel’s elbow. “You whipped the prince’s hunter?”

  “You caught him,” he reminded her, jerking his arm back.

  “You’re raising a wind-storm on him fit to blow away all the sands of the desert!”

  Ryuan felt as though his back had been scoured by those sands. The lash-mark throbbed. He did not let these things stop him from standing and hurtling toward Tamel.

  “No!” Iril stood in the way, and it was not her throat that Ryuan wanted to crush. He tried to fling her out of the way but she clung to him stubbornly. He finally tossed her aside, harder than he had wished to, but then he saw how Tamel had circled around and seized Calanthe.

  “My sorcery may not work on you,” Tamel said, “but it will on her.”

  Ryuan stilled, the wild-mind snapping away. He could not endanger Calanthe.

  She smelled afraid, but when she looked at him he saw no surrender in her face.

  “You would not kill a woman you once loved,” Ryuan said.

  “When she loves me no longer?” He pressed his face into her hair, inhaling. “Go on, pretend you are my master. Tell me what I won’t do, wolf-born.”

  Ryuan’s senses alerted him. “You won’t survive this,” he said.

  A shadow moved. Silently, Nerav sprung upon Tamel. He had time for a single scream, echoed by Iril, before that scream was ripped out of his throat. His body folded to the ground.