Shadow's End

EIGHT

Left alone by the fire, Bel curled on her side and drew her knees to her chest. She stared sightlessly at the dying flames.

Making love with Graydon had been more raw and elemental than she could have imagined. It had also been over much too quickly. Sharing that sense of closeness and pleasure, the urgent need for each other. His body was so powerful, and he used it so gently. She fingered one of her nipples, still sensitized and swollen from his mouth.

She loved sensuality, and she enjoyed making love. She’d had other lovers besides Calondir, both before marrying him and after they had decided to reunite for the sake of the baby.

But the community they had established in South Carolina was a close-knit one, and she hadn’t taken a lover since they had created the Elven demesne, so long ago. She had set that part of herself aside and focused on the many other aspects of her life.

She felt as if she had drifted into a state where she had been only half-alive, partially awake, but now her sexuality had flared to life again, opening all her senses.

The ground felt harder, the air cooler, the fire warmer. Her skin was hypersensitive to the weight of her cloak and the uneven folds of his coats underneath. Unaccustomed to being with a man, the private place between her legs throbbed.

The look on his face as he left her. Her emotions felt heightened too, and the pleasure she had felt turned to ashes. Her eyes filled.

Blinking back the wetness, she searched for the handkerchief from the parcel of food. When she found it, she used it to clean the inside of her thighs. Then, as the clearing lightened with dawn, she dressed.

Funny. She had been so warm before, she had felt like she was burning up. Now she felt so cold, her bones ached.

She kicked apart the dying fire and began to toss dirt onto the most stubborn of the embers. As she worked, Graydon returned in silence.

He was naked, of course, and dripping wet, and completely unself-conscious about his nudity. He moved fluidly, without affectation or hesitation, like an animal.

Staring at him, she forgot what she was doing. They had coupled together in such an uncontrolled, heated rush, this was the first time she had truly seen all of him.

Unclothed, his masculine body was lethal in its perfection. He was the same golden tan all over, his tall broad bone structure wrapped with heavy, powerful muscles. The sprinkle of dark brown hair on his chest arrowed down his long, rippling abdomen to his groin.

No longer erect, his penis was still large and heavy. It lay in a thick arc over round, tight testicles. She swallowed as she looked at him. No wonder she was so sore.

She dragged her eyes up to his closed expression. His jaw was tight, and he held the firm lines of his mouth in an uncharacteristically stern line.

“I’m sorry,” she told him. “If I had been thinking more clearly, I wouldn’t have started dousing the fire before you’d had a chance to dry off and dress.”

With the back of one hand, he swiped at a droplet of water on the end of his nose. “It’s all right. I needed the cold.”

He wasn’t deliberately being mean or cruel. She didn’t believe he could ever be that with her. He had simply closed himself off emotionally, in a way that he hadn’t been since he had stepped into her path at the masque.

Ducking her head, she went back to her task, not stopping until she was certain the fire had been extinguished. Out of the corner of her eye, she watched as he dragged on his clothes. It couldn’t be pleasant to dress while still wet, but he didn’t complain.

She couldn’t blame him for erecting an emotional wall. In fact, the wisest thing she could do was follow suit, but she missed that magical sense of connection they had shared. She missed it desperately.

As she looked at the strong lines of his throat where his shirt lay open, she had to swallow again. And oh gods, the desire she felt for him was stronger than ever.

I want this too much.

The quiet force behind his words ripped through her memory. She should respect the closed wall she saw in his face and leave him alone. She had to let go of him. Their brief time was over. The sun would be up in a matter of minutes, and she needed to find her son.

Her feet didn’t understand any of that reasoning. Acquiring a will of their own, they carried her over to him. He watched her approach with a dark, brooding gaze. She thought of half a dozen things she might say, but everything seemed to run the gamut between needy and banal.

In the end, she simply shook her head at him. Her mouth twisting, she walked forward and put her arms around his waist, hugging him tightly. He stood rigid, neither denying her embrace nor responding to it.

The sweetness had left her heart, until all that remained was pain. She buried her face in his chest, muffling a sob.

Finally he moved. His arms closing around her, he bowed his head over hers.

Her voice thick, she managed to say, “I am experiencing a great deal of difficulty at the thought of letting you go. I probably shouldn’t tell you that, but I can’t seem to help myself, because among other things, over the course of this night you’ve become my dear friend, and I’ve cherished confiding in you. And I want this too much, too.”

He held her tightly with his whole body.

“I shouldn’t have left you so abruptly like that,” he said into her hair. “Bel, I don’t want to let you go. Because I can’t control my emotions, I’ve spoiled the last few minutes we had together. I’m sorry.”

She ran her hands along the broad expanse of his back. “You have nothing to be sorry for. I understood.”

She hadn’t yet rebraided her hair, and he ran his fingers through the length compulsively.

He muttered, “Maybe this doesn’t have to be over. You said that you and Calondir often spend weeks apart, and you don’t always reside in the Wood, right?”

The world stilled. She nodded.

“When I take leave from my position, I could fly down to South Carolina,” he whispered. “I could meet you anywhere you like.”

As she listened, her heart began to pound. His words sent her across another boundary, to a place where the pain might become manageable, and the sweetness might return.

She shouldn’t agree. She should make a clean, complete break, but the thought of trying to deny the part of her that had come back to life was unendurable. She would do almost anything to hold onto it.

To hold onto him.

“Do you really think it’s possible?” she whispered.

“We’ll make it possible.” His warm breath stirred the tiny hairs at her temple. “We may have run out of time right now, but I’m not ready for this to end. It’s no use telling myself I should walk away from you—I can’t. I won’t.”

His words banished the chill that had crept into her. Hardly daring to hope they could work something out, she said slowly, “Perhaps I could rent a place in Charleston.”

Sinking his hand deep into the hair at the back of her head, he tilted her face up and kissed her, quick and hard.

“Don’t misunderstand, I’m not ashamed to be with you,” he said against her lips. “If our lives were even marginally different, I would shout about this from the rooftops. But as things stand, I’m not sure Charleston would be the best idea. If word got out, frankly, I believe the world would put a great deal of pressure on us to stop seeing each other, and I don’t ever want to give you the slightest reason to turn me away.”

“No, I could never be ashamed of being with you either.” She stroked his rough face as her mind raced over options. “And you’re right. While Calondir might have no interest in the fact that I may be sleeping with someone else, he would hate to know that I had developed a liaison with one of Dragos’s sentinels, let alone . . . oh lord and lady, let alone how everybody else would react. Perhaps I could buy property a short distance outside the city, a small house with enough of a garden so that you could land or launch in privacy.”

His gaze seemed to turn inward. “I might be able to live with that,” he murmured. “This might give us a solution that we can both live with.”

The way he had phrased that first sentence seemed odd. Her brows drew together, but before she could puzzle at it too deeply, he kissed her again, slanting his mouth over hers and driving deep into her mouth with a rapidly escalating hunger.

His kiss was so scorching, it burned away coherent thought. Clinging to his shoulders, she kissed him back wildly, causing him to growl low in his throat. Instead of cradling her head, he gripped her neck, a gesture so possessive, it thrilled through her.

He pulled away just far enough so that he could talk, nose to nose with her and staring deep into her eyes with a fierceness that set her heart to pounding. “I don’t want to wait to see you again. You’ll be in London at least for the next couple of days, correct?”

She nodded, as much as his hold would let her. “I have engagements for at least the next week,” she told him unsteadily. “When we return to London, I’ll look at my commitments and cancel everything I possibly can.”

“I will, too. And as soon as you return to South Carolina, you’ll begin looking for that house.”

“Absolutely.”

“I’ll pay for the house.”

“Thank you, but there’s no need.”

He frowned. “I don’t like for you to assume all the financial burden.”

“It won’t be a hardship,” she assured him. As he continued to frown, she stroked his hair with a smile. Gentle though he might be with her, he did have his share of masculine pride. She promised, “I’ll start searching the day I return. With any luck, I’ll find something suitable very soon.”

Dismissing the subject of finances, his face creased with an answering smile, and he kissed her forehead. “I can arrange things so that I get at least a couple of days together, every month. We can plan for that. It will be difficult to wait, but as long as I know that I will be able to see you, I can manage.”

The sweetness returned, spreading through her limbs. It felt remarkably like joy. She breathed, “Think of it—we’ll see each other every month. That sounds almost too good to be true.”

“Well, it’s far from perfect, and realistically, my life as a sentinel can get unpredictable. There will probably be times when I can’t make it, and I won’t be able to notify you. If I sent you a letter or a note, it would take weeks to reach you.” His mouth twisted wryly.

“I don’t care.” She laughed under her breath. “That’s not true. I do care, but I understand, I promise. No doubt sometimes I’m going to feel horribly disappointed when you don’t show up as planned. But right now, I’m just so happy I don’t know what to do with myself.”

“I know how you feel. I feel the same way, and believe me, I’ll do everything in my power to make it happen—” He broke off abruptly. As he looked around, his expression changed.

Suddenly he appeared so different, his features hard and edged, and completely unlike the tender man who had smiled down at her a moment ago. This time, when her heart started to pound, it wasn’t in delight but in alarm.

“What is it?” She looked around the clearing as well.

As they had talked, the light had grown much brighter, and dawn had arrived in earnest. The rose-gold color caught on the dark bare branches of the trees surrounding them.

“I don’t know. I could have sworn something brushed past us, but I don’t scent any other creature. I don’t hear anything either.” Releasing her, he prowled around the edge of the clearing, sharp-eyed and cat-footed. “Do you sense anything?”

Frowning, she pivoted in a circle, searching the scene as he had.

Everything appeared as it should. Their things lay scattered where they had left them—her cloak, his coat that they had used for a bed, and both their swords lay beside the log they had used as a seat. She cast her awareness into the woods, but the only creatures she sensed were small, furry animals, tucked deep into winter nests.

Just when she had convinced herself they were alone, something invisible brushed past her cheek, carrying with it a sense of ill will.

A figure solidified in front of her. It took on the appearance of a handsome man, with a face like an angel, with golden hair and eyes that shone like sparkling diamonds, but the appearance was a lie. He was no physical man, but a Djinn.

Fear crawled through her body. Normally, when the Djinn appeared, they did so in a whirl of Power like a tornado. This Djinn had masked his Power to creep up on them like a predator stalking its prey.

Movement blurred at the corner of her vision as, with a gigantic spring, Graydon leaped to her side.

“What an interesting scenario I have stumbled upon,” said the Djinn. “One of the Wyr sentinels having a tender moment with an Elven lady who is not his.” He gave them both a glittering, hard smile that vanished in the next moment. “If I am not mistaken, it is the very same sentinel and lady who visited my establishment late last night. An establishment, I might add, that I had grown quite fond of, and that, as of this morning, is no longer in existence. Coincidence? I do wonder.”

“You’re Malphas,” Graydon growled. He stood so close to her, their shoulders touched, and his energy bristled with protectiveness and aggression.

“Indeed, I am,” said Malphas. “I believe I’m in possession of something you want.”

She bit out, “Where is my son?”

The look he gave them was so hostile and full of rage, Bel controlled an entirely useless impulse to lunge for her sword. Swords were useless in a battle against the Djinn. “He is up at the manor, but then you already knew that, or you wouldn’t be here. He’s had a rough night, and he’s sleeping it off.”

Rage washed over her, obliterating the fear. As she lunged forward, Graydon’s arm snaked around her waist, and he held her back. She cried, “What did you do to him?”

“You’ll have to come see for yourself,” said Malphas. “No doubt you can find your own way up the hill to the manor. Don’t expect breakfast, and be prepared to beg when you arrive.”

The Djinn vanished.

She whirled to face Graydon. “What was he talking about? Malfeasance no longer exists?”

He had paled until he looked bone white. “Get your things. Hurry.”

She didn’t need any further urging and leaped for her sword and cloak, while beside her, Graydon did the same. Shrugging into his coat and sword harness, he shapeshifted. She leaped onto his back.

Only when he had lunged into the air did he speak. They were selling children.

What? She felt so crazed with worry, what he said didn’t make any sense.

At Malfeasance, he said. They were selling children.

It took a moment longer for his words to sink in. When they did, she rocked as if he had physically struck her. Oh GODS.

I didn’t want you to know. His telepathic voice sounded more bestial than human. I’m from the New York demesne. If I had destroyed any establishment here, it could have been interpreted as an act of war, yet I couldn’t stand aside and do nothing. I paid for the children before we left. When I went back to the Gardens, I approached Weston and told him—not about you. Weston said he would rescue the children and shut down the business. That was when I left.

The more she heard, the more ill she felt. I don’t have any words.

While he’d been talking, he had climbed so steeply into the air, within a matter of a few moments she could see for miles. Any other time, she would have been enchanted by the view of the picturesque English countryside crowned with the new light of day. Winter colors wreathed the land in browns, golds and oranges, and trees rose out of a low hanging mist.

Almost immediately, a manor came into view. Just as the stable boy had described, it sat on top of the hill overlooking the town’s mill. She noted bitterly that it was a sprawling, palatial-looking residence. Owning a gambling hell appeared to have paid high dividends for the Djinn.

We’re almost out of time, Graydon said as he descended. Listen—Malphas can’t be certain that we were behind whatever happened to Malfeasance.

You paid for the children, she said numbly. Then Weston came to take them away.

Yes, but he can’t know anything for sure. Weston and I spoke telepathically. I didn’t say a word to anyone else. Remember that. Let’s not give him more fuel for his anger. We’ll get Ferion, and then we’ll get out.

I understand. Just get me down there!

She leaped from his back before all the gryphon’s paws fully touched the earth. As she ran to the front doors, Graydon shapeshifted and raced after her. His Power roiled as it had back at the gaming hell, with a towering fury.

The large, double oak doors stood open. Neither she nor Graydon hesitated. They plunged inside and paused in the great hall.

To her right, through an open doorway, a fire blazed in the fireplace of the front receiving room. Turning by instinct toward the heat and light, she started to sprint forward, only to be brought to an abrupt halt when Graydon gripped her arm. He gave her a grim look of warning.

Her spirit raged at the restraint, even as she recognized the wisdom in his caution. She gave him a curt nod. Together they stepped forward, looking around warily.

The room was decorated with colors that had been in fashion a decade ago. A blue velvet armchair had been positioned strategically by the fireplace, facing the front hall.

Malphas sat in the armchair, legs crossed. His demeanor was as regal as if he sat on a throne. He rested his elbows on the arms of the chair, fingers steepled in front of his mouth, eyelids lowered over piercing, starlike eyes.

Ferion sat cross-legged on the floor in front of him. He was beautiful in the way that Elves could be, his lean and graceful frame holding a tensile strength. Long blond hair fell past his shoulders, pulled back from his temples and tied with a strip of leather.

His lean, handsome face was blank, while dark purple shadows like bruises ringed his eyes.

As soon as Bel’s gaze fell on her son, renewed rage and worry swept common sense aside. She tried to rush forward, but Graydon still gripped her arm. His fingers tightened, halting her in midstep.

“Look who has come to visit this morning,” said Malphas. “The adulterers have arrived. Ferion, did you realize your mother has been unfaithful to your father? Faithful . . . unfaithful . . . Those words don’t mean anything to me, but I know they matter a great deal to some people.”

“You have no idea what you’re talking about,” Ferion whispered. His dull gaze met hers. “Mother, I am so sorry—”

“Shut up,” Malphas ordered.

Ferion’s words cut off, as abruptly as if Malphas had stuffed a gag in his mouth.

“You lied,” Graydon growled. “There was no exclusive game here. Nobody’s here except for you and Ferion.”

What did he mean? She glanced around the room again. This time, she noticed other details.

Cobwebs draped in corners of the ceiling. The armchair in which the Djinn sat looked bright and fresh, but the other furniture was dull with dust. On the floor, footsteps clearly showed on the worn, faded carpet.

“Don’t mistake me,” Malphas said. “I can and do lie when it suits me, but I didn’t lie about this. There was an exclusive game. It was with me. Yes, we could have played it in London, or anywhere else, for that matter. I just like to see how hard people will work for it.” He shrugged. “Of course the only people I invite here are the ones who can’t resist the game.”

She gave the Djinn a look filled with loathing, and then dismissed him to concentrate on her son.

“Ferion, never mind what has happened,” she said, struggling to keep the anger from her voice. “We need to leave. We also need to talk, but we can do that away from here.”

“I don’t believe you understand yet why you need to beg,” Malphas said. “So, I’ll show you. Ferion, go to your mother.”

Graydon said telepathically, Bel, be careful. I don’t know what he’s doing.

His words didn’t hold any real meaning for her. They fell far outside the urgency in her mind. As Ferion pushed to his feet and approached, she pulled her arm from Graydon’s grasp and rushed forward.

Malphas said, “Put your hands around her neck and squeeze.”

She had already moved to throw her arms around Ferion when she heard those words. Before she could recoil, Ferion’s hands snaked around her neck. He began to choke her.

Suddenly, she couldn’t breathe. Pressure pounded in her eyes.

Instinct took over. She tried to yank back, but Ferion was extremely strong, and she couldn’t dislodge his hard fingers.

Even as she arched away and attempted to twist out of his hold, snarling filled her ears. A powerful blow slammed into her chest. Graydon drove his big body between them like a battering ram, and through sheer force, he shoved them apart.

Gasping for air, she stumbled back, fell over one end of the sofa and sprawled on the floor. Ferion slammed into the nearby wall.

Two booted feet planted themselves on either side of her head, as Graydon straddled her prone body.

Coughing, she rubbed her throat as she stared up at his towering figure. The angles of his face and hands seemed strange and wrong, his fingers tipped with talons and his mouth distorted with fangs.

She had heard of such a thing, but she had only witnessed it from a distance. When they were under extreme duress, sometimes Wyr shapeshifted partially.

Even as she stared, he bared his fangs at Malphas and roared. The sound blasted through the house and shook the floorboards. She felt it vibrate in her chest.

It sounded like a lion’s roar, but it was more than mere physical sound. As he roared, his Power boiled out from him in a raw blast toward the Djinn sitting in the armchair. Malphas’s figure dissipated under the force of it.

This confrontation had dissolved into catastrophe so fast, it sent her reeling. Flipping over to her hands and knees, she pulled into a crouch at Graydon’s feet. Across the room, she saw Ferion do the same.

His expression was filled with the same look of horror she felt twist across her own face. He said telepathically, I would never—I could never—

I know, she told him.

The Djinn’s energy coalesced in the doorway leading to the front hall.

“Now you begin to understand,” Malphas said. “But not, I think, fully enough. Ferion, stop breathing.”

Slumping back against the wall, Ferion’s gaze met hers. His shoulders hunched and his face darkened, as his body struggled.

In a complete panic, she sprang across the room. He clawed at his own neck. She flung her arms around him as she frantically searched for some way to help him. She could find nothing, nothing.

Nothing except an odd frisson buried deep in his body. To her mind’s eye, it felt like a darkened smear across the brightness of his soul.

Graydon roared at Malphas, “Release your hold on him!”

I love you, Ferion said in her head. His eyes reddened as blood vessels burst in the whites.

If she could strike a blow at the Djinn, she would, with all the terrified fury raging in her heart. But while she could fight very well in a physical battle, at his essence, Malphas was not a physical creature. She was considered one of the most Powerful of her kind, but most often, Elven Power was connected to the elements of the earth.

Her Power connected her to wild, living things. It was the kind that ran slow and deep, and took years to build. By working with natural forces like vines, trees and other foliage, given enough time, she could destroy a city. She had an array of other specific spells, like misdirection and cloaking, but she had no real Power to use against a creature of spirit.

The only weapons she had of worth in any conflict against the Djinn were things like connections and political influence. Those, too, were weapons that could be wielded very effectively, but only over time.

In that moment, though, there was only one thing she could think to do that might work quickly enough to save Ferion’s life.

“You want begging.” She didn’t even recognize her own voice. “Fine, I’m begging you. Please stop this. Do you need to see me on my hands and knees? Look, I’m already here.”

Cold satisfaction settled into Malphas’s face. He said to Ferion, “Breathe.”

Instantly, Ferion’s body arched as he sucked in a huge breath of air. Wheezing, he closed his arms around her.

Graydon strode across the room to stand protectively over them. Staring at the Djinn with open hatred, he snarled, “You’ve made a massive mistake.”

“Have I?” said Malphas. He strolled into the room. “Pray tell, how did I do that? Did I force Ferion to come into my establishment to gamble? Did I make him accrue the kind of debt that he cannot repay?” He looked down at her son. “Ferion, did I compel you to ride out here to take part in a game? Answer.”

As she stared down into her son’s face, shame darkened his features. He kept his gaze downcast as he whispered, “No.”

“There you have it.” The Djinn shrugged. “By making a series of choices—not just one—he created a situation where he cannot keep his side of a bargain. I might be a pariah, but that single fact adheres to the very heart of Djinn culture. By Djinn law, I am well within my rights to force a satisfactory conclusion to the bargain by taking some kind of recompense.”

“You preyed on him,” she said hoarsely. “He’s a good man with a bad weakness, but instead of recognizing that, you gave him credit to continue to gamble, when you knew he couldn’t pay.”

“Irrelevant,” Malphas told her. “At any point, he could have said no and walked away, paid his debt and been done with the exchange. Now I’ve called in my markers, his debt has come due, and he cannot pay it.”

The situation had gone so far beyond disastrous, implications reverberated in her mind. Malphas knew about her and Graydon. Of all the creatures to discover them, he was the one who actively wished them harm. And Ferion had accrued a debt so significant, Calondir was sure to hear of it. Life as she knew it began to crumble around her ears.

Maybe I can still fix this, she thought. If it’s more than I can pay, I might be able to borrow money in secret. I have friends who might help.

“How much does he owe?” She looked down at Ferion. “How much debt are you in?”

Pushing out of her arms, he sat, moving quite unlike himself, as if he were an aged, frail human. While he was breathing easily again, his face remained gray, his eyes despairing.

He said, “Too much.”

“I believe you still misunderstand,” Malphas said. “You can’t pay his debt for him. Only Ferion can keep his side of the bargain—and he’s done so the only way he can, with the one thing he owns that is of any worth to me. I’ve placed a lien on his soul.”