Winter Rose - Once Upon A Rose Part 6

At his words, he saw color return to her face, watched the dullness clear from her eyes. He came to the foot of the bed, which was draped in deep red velvet. "You recover quickly, madam."

"The tonic is potent." Indeed she now felt clear of mind, and even the echoes of pain were fading from her body. "Thank you for your help.

His mother and father would have been too distraught to a.s.sist. Their worry could have distracted me. More, fear feeds death."

She glanced around the room, a little warily. Orna hadn't laid out her nightrobe. "If you'd excuse me now, I'll go see for myself."

"Not tonight."

To her shock he sat on the side of the bed near her. Only pride kept her from s.h.i.+fting over, or tugging up the blankets.

"I have questions."

"I've answered several of your questions already."

He lifted his brows. "Now I have more. The boy was dying. His skull crushed, his neck damaged if not broken. His left arm was shattered." "Yes," she said calmly. "And inside his body, more was harmed. He bled inside himself. So much blood for such a little boy. But he has a strong heart, our Phelan. He is particularly precious to me."

"He would have been dead in minutes."

"He is not dead."

"Why?"

"I can't answer." Restlessly, she pushed at her hair. "I can't explain it to you."

"Won't."

"Can't."

When she would have turned her face away, he caught her chin, held it firmly. "Try."

"You overstep," she said stiffly. "Continually."

"Then you should be growing accustomed to it. I held the boy," he reminded her. "I watched, and I felt life come back into him. Tell me what you did."

She wanted to dismiss him, but he had helped her when she'd needed his help. So she would try. "It's a kind of search, and a merging. An opening of both." She lifted a hand, let it fall. "It is a kind of faith, if you will."

"It caused you pain."

"Do you think fighting death is painless? You know better. To heal, I must feel what he feels, and bring him up..." She shook her head, frustrated with words. "Take him back to the pain. Then we ride it together, so that I see, feel, know."

"You rode more than pain. You rode death. I saw you."

"We were stronger."

"And if you hadn't been?"

"Then death would have won," she said simply. "And a mother would be grieving her firstborn tonight."

"And you? Deirdre of the Ice, would your people be grieving you?"

"There is a risk. Do you turn from battle, Kylar? Or do you face it knowing your life might be the price paid at end of day? Would you not stand for any one of your people if they had need? Would you expect me to do less for one of mine?"

"I was not one of yours." He took her hand before she could look away. "You rode death with me, Deirdre. I remember. I thought it a dream, but I remember. The pain, as if the sword cut into me fresh. That same pain mirrored in your eyes as you looked down at me. The heat of your body, the heat of your life pouring into me. I was nothing to you."

"You were a man. You were hurt." She reached out now, laying her hand on his cheek. "Why are you angry? Should I have let you die because my medicines weren't enough to save you? Should I have stepped back from you and my own gift because it would cause me a moment's pain to save you? Does your pride bleed now because a woman fought for your life?"

"Perhaps it does." He closed his hand over her wrist. "When I carried you in here I thought you would die, and I was helpless."

"You stayed with me. That was kind."

He made some sound, then pushed himself off the bed to pace. "When a man goes into battle, Deirdre, it's sword to sword, lance to lance, fist to fist. These are tangible things. What you've done, magic or miracle, is so much more. And you were right. I can't understand it."

"It changes how you think of me."

"Yes."

She lowered her lashes, hid the fresh pain. "There is no shame in it.

Most men would not have stayed to help, certainly not have stayed to speak with me. I'm grateful. Now if you'd excuse me, I'd like to be alone."

Slowly, he turned back to her. "You misunderstand me. Before I thought of you as a woman-beautiful, strong, intelligent. Sad. Now I think of you as all of that, and so much more. You humble me. You expect me to step away from you, because of all you are. I can't. I want to be with you, and I have no right."

With her heart unsteady, she looked at him again. "Is it grat.i.tude that draws you to me?"

"I am grateful. I owe you for every breath I take. But it isn't grat.i.tude I feel when I look at you."

She slid out of bed to stand on her own feet. "Is it desire?"

"I desire you."

"I've never had a man's arms around me in love. I want them to be yours."

"What right do I have when I can't stay with you? I should already be gone. Both my family and my people wait."

"You give me truth, and truth means more than pretty words and empty promises. I wondered about this, and now I know. When I healed you I felt something I've never felt before. Mixed with the pain and the cold that comes into me so bitter there was... light."

Watching him, she spread her hands. "I said I did nothing to bind you to me, and that is truth. But something happened in me when I was part of you. It angered me, and it frightened me. But now, just now..." She drew a breath and spoke without a blush. "It excites me. I've been so cold. Give me one night of warmth. You said you wanted me willing."

She reached up, tugged the ribbons loose from the bodice of the nightdress. "And I am," she said as the white gown slid down to pool at her feet.

Chapter 7

She was a vision. Mote than he could have dreamed. Slim and small, she stood in the glow of candle and firelight.

"Will you give me a night?" she asked him.

"Deirdre. My love. I would give you a lifetime."

"I want no pledges that can't be kept, no words but truth. Only give me what can be, and it will be enough," she replied somberly.

"My lady." He felt, somehow, that the step toward her was the most momentous of his life. And when he took her hands, that he was taking the world. "It is the truth. Why or how I don't know. But never have I spoken cleaner truth."

She believed he meant it, in this time. In this place. "Kylar, lifetimes are for those who are free."

So she would be, he promised himself. Whatever had to be done. But now wasn't for plans and battles. "If you won't accept that pledge, let me pledge this. That I have loved no other as I love you tonight."

"I can give that vow back to you. I thought it would be for duty." She lifted her hands to his face, traced the shape of it with her fingers. "And I thought the first time, it would be with fear." She laughed a little. "My heart jumps. Can you feel it?"

He laid a hand on her breast, felt the s.h.i.+ver. Felt the leap. "I won't hurt you."

"Oh, no." She laid a hand on his heart in turn. They had brushed once before, she thought. Heart to heart. Nothing had been the same for her since. Nothing would be the same for her ever again. "You won't hurt me. Warm me, Kylar, as a man warms his woman."

He drew her into his arms. Gently, gently. Laid his lips on hers.

Tenderly. There once more, she thought. There. That miracle of mouth against mouth. Sighing out his name, she let herself melt into the kiss.

"The first time you kissed me, I thought you were foolish."

His lips curved on hers. "Did you?"

"Half frozen and bleeding, and you would waste your last breath flirting with a woman. Such is a man."

"Not a waste," he corrected. "But I can do better now." With a flourish that pleased them both, he swept her into his arms. "Come to bed, my lady."

As she had once longed to do, she toyed with his silky black hair. "You must teach me what to do."

His muscles tightened, nerves and thrills, at the thought of her innocence. Tonight she would give him what she had given no other. In the candle glow he saw her face, saw that she gave him this treasure without fear, without shame.

No, he would not hurt her, but would do all in his power to bring her joy.

He laid her on the bed, rubbed his cheek against hers. "It will be my pleasure to instruct you."

"I've seen the goats mate."

His burst of laughter was m.u.f.fled in her hair. "This, I can promise, will be somewhat different than the mating of goats. So pay attention," he said, grinning now as he lifted his head, "while I give you your first lesson."

He was a patient teacher, and surely, she thought as her skin began to s.h.i.+ver and sing under his hands, a skilled one. His mouth drank from hers, deep, then deeper until it was how she imagined it might be to slide bonelessly into a warm river.

Surrounded, floating, then submerged.

His hands roamed over her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, then cupped them as if he could hold her heartbeat in his palms. The sensation of those strong, hard hands on her flesh s.h.i.+mmered straight down to her belly. His mouth skimmed the side of her throat, nibbling.

"How lovely." She murmured it, arching a little to invite more. "How clever for b.r.e.a.s.t.s to give pleasure as well as milk."

"Indeed." His thumbs brushed over her nipples, and made her gasp. "I've often thought the same."

"Oh... but what do I..." Her words, her thoughts trailed off into a rainbow when that nibbling mouth found her breast She made a sound in her throat, half cry, half moan. It thrilled him, that sound of shocked pleasure, the sudden shudder of her body, the quick jolt of her heart under his lips. As she arched again, her fingers combed through his hair, gripped there and pressed him closer. The sweet taste of her filled him like warmed wine.

He rose over her to tug his doublet aside, but before he could satisfy himself with that glorious slide of his flesh to her flesh, she lifted her hands, ran them experimentally over his chest.

"Wait." She needed to catch her breath. It was all running through her so quickly that it nearly blurred. She wanted everything, but clearly, so that she might remember each stroke, each taste, each moment.

"I touched you when you were hurt. But this is different. I looked at your body, but didn't see it as I do now." Carefully she traced her finger along the scar running up his side. "Does this trouble you?"

He felt the line of heat, took her hand quickly. "No." Even now, he thought, she would try to heal. "There will be no pain tonight, for either of us."

He lowered to her, took her mouth again. There was a hint of urgency now, a taste of need. So much to feel, she mused dreamily. So much to know. And with the warmth of him coursing through her, she enfolded him. There was a freedom here, she discovered, in being about to touch him, stroke, explore, with no purpose other than pleasure. The hard muscles, the pucker in his smooth skin that was a scar of battle.

The strength of him excited her, challenged her own so that her hands, her mouth, her movements under him became more demanding.

This was fire, she realized. The first true licks of flame that brought nothing but delight and a bright, blinding need for more.

"I'm not fragile." Indeed she felt alive with power, nearly frantic with a kind of raging hunger. "Show me more. Show me all."

No matter how his blood swam, he would be careful with her. But he could show her more. His hands roamed down her body, over her thighs.

As if she knew what they both needed, she opened to him. Her breath came short, s.h.i.+vering out with quick little moans. Her nails bit into his back as she began to writhe under him.

He lifted his head and watched her fly over that first peak of pleasure.

Heat, such heat. She had never known such fire outside of healing magic. And this, somehow, this went deeper, spread wider. Her body was like a single wild flame. She cried out, the wanton sound of her own voice another shock to her system. Beyond control, beyond reason, she gripped his hips and called out his name.

When he plunged into her, the glory of it was like a shaft of lightning, bright and brilliant. There was a storm of those glorious and violent shocks as he thrust inside her. She locked herself around him, her face pressed against his neck and repeated his name as that miraculous heat consumed her.

"Sweetheart." When he could speak again, he did so lazily, with his head nuzzled between her b.r.e.a.s.t.s. "You are the most clever of students."

She felt golden, beautiful, and for the first time in her memory, more woman than queen. For one night, she told herself, one miraculous night, she would be a woman.

"I'm sure I could do better, my lord, with a few more lessons."

She was flushed, all but glowing, and her hair was a tangle of honeyed ropes over the white linen. "I believe you're right." He grinned and nibbled his way up her throat, lingered over her lips, then s.h.i.+fted so that she lay curled beside him.

"I'm so warm," she told him. "I never knew what it was like to be so warm. Tell me, Kylar, what's it like to have the sun on your face, full and bright?"

"It can burn."

"Truly?"