The Stone Prince

TWENTY

KATIE BURROWED deeper into Jorlan’s arms, her mind too active to sleep and her body too sated to move. Twilight filtered through the window and cast a luminous spell around her bed, a canopy that kept the real world at bay. She’d enjoyed watching Jorlan with her family today. She’d enjoyed even more how he’d swooped in to her defense.

A girl could get used to that.

She wondered what was going through Jorlan’s mind right now. He’d been silent with his thoughts the past hour, and she’d been loathe to disturb him.

Sighing, she lightly traced her fingers over his chest. Right now both she and Jorlan were sticky with a light sheen of perspiration, and she thought longingly of a warm bath and all the things they could do inside that warm bath. Perhaps in the morning they could—

“I want you as my life-mate, Katie. Not for a time, but forever.”

Jorlan’s voice sliced through the silence, startling her. Surely he hadn’t said…Surely he didn’t mean…“I don’t understand.” Shocked, afraid to hope she’d heard him correctly, she didn’t know what else to say.

“I want you in my life, now and always.” His arms tightened around her bare waist, locking her in place. “Do you understand now?”

“Yes.” Joy burst within her chest then raced along her nerve endings with the force of an earthquake. “Are you sure? I mean, this is a big step.”

“Aye. I am sure.” Absolute conviction filled his eyes, making the blue appear deeper, darker than any ocean.

“I can’t believe this is happening. Sure, you asked me before, but that was temporary and this is…God, I don’t know what to say.”

“Start by telling me your answer, woman.”

This gorgeous man wanted her as his wife. Now and always, he’d said. What shocked and thrilled her the most, however, was that he was going to stay with her. She hadn’t asked him, yet he was going to stay of his own free will. A smile brimming with happiness curved her lips. She should have had to think about it, but she already knew her answer. “Yes! Yes, yes, yes!” A laugh bubbled past her throat, and she wrapped her arms around his neck, holding him close.

His entire body relaxed, though she hadn’t noticed that he’d tensed. He breathed a long sigh of relief, smiled and adjusted their bodies so that he could gaze down at her. His glorious weight pinned her in place. “I feared you would say nay again.”

“Are you kidding me? I’ve never been happier than I am at this moment.” She smiled. “Do you want to have a church wedding? That’s what the couples of my planet do. Oh my God. I’m still in shock.”

“Say it again.” His hands tangled in her hair, forcing her to continue looking up at him. “Tell me your answer again.”

“Yes. I said yes.”

The awed expression he gave her washed over her body with the smooth richness of a caress. He gently laced his fingers through hers, bringing her hands up to rest on each side of her head until they were palm to palm. His expression was warm and tender. “You will not regret this decision, katya. You will love my world as you love your own, and I will devote my life to making you happy.”

Katie froze.

Jorlan continued, lost in his own thoughts. “Tell me you love me. I need to hear those words, not simply because of the curse, but because they come from you.”

The delight dancing through her withered. Comprehension dawned, and she was suddenly left bereft and cold. “When you asked me to marry you, you assumed I would be coming with you?”

He blinked. “Of course.”

Of course. She laughed, but the sound held no trace of humor. No, the sound emerged as a painful whimper, like an animal trapped by a snare. “Jorlan, I assumed you would be staying here.”

“Katie—”

“You have to understand. My family is here.” Tears burned her eyes. She held them back. She loved her family too much to leave them, but for Jorlan’s love she just might do it. She might pack her bags and go with him to the ends of the galaxy. Lord, she just didn’t know. “Do—do you love me?” It was the hardest question she’d ever asked, because she both feared and craved an affirmative answer.

For a long while, he hesitated, some sort of war brewing in his expression. Then, “Aye. I love you.”

What did that hesitation mean? Was he lying now? Finally compromising his honor so that she’d admit she loved him in return? Could she risk her heart, her life, her existence on words he might not mean?

“You have to stay here with me. Please. Stay. Just stay.”

“My family is there, and I have been gone so long. Too long. I have to know what happened to them. I have to know who lives…and who has died.” Pain etched every curve and hollow of his face. “I cannot stay.”

She squeezed her eyes together so tightly her tears were forced to fall. Her chin trembled. “Then I’m sorry. My answer is no.”

JORLAN SAT before a small, picturesque window, nestled in a private alcove within Katie’s bedchamber, gazing out at the moonlight. Stars twinkled across the heavens like the jewels of a king’s crown. If only he possessed such riches right now that he might present them at Katie’s feet. Yet he did not for a moment think that such an offering would change her mind—but he hoped. And hope was what drove him.

She’d asked if he loved her, and he’d thought love her? Did he truly, could he possibly love her? Care, aye. Admire, aye. But love? And then the truth of it had danced through him, a culmination of victory and defeat, yet so undeniably true it pounded through his heart with the force of a magic spell. He loved her. He loved Katie with all of his being. Nothing else explained why he wanted her so desperately, why he needed her for eternity.

This feeling of love did not resemble the type of love he’d felt for Maylyn on any level, and mayhap that was why he’d taken so long to discover the truth. This feeling was deeper, more intense. Real. What he’d felt for Maylyn hadn’t been love, he realized now, merely a healthy dose of lust.

He wouldn’t have cared if Maylyn had said no to his proposal. Yet hearing Katie say nay cut deeper than the sharpest talon. Her refusal might have been easier to accept if her reasons had been different. He could have easily soothed her had she worried that the sting of age would overcome her, while he remained as he was. He did not know how he would age, so why worry until they knew? He could have easily soothed her had she worried that he might one day wish to possess another woman, for he knew that to be untrue. Katie held his heart, his desire.

But he could not discount her love for her family.

At the moment, Katie was lying on the bed, sleeping soundly. He thought again how in slumber her features relaxed, softened, giving her a delicate quality, almost angelic. Strands of her hair surrounded her face like a pale halo. Yet he knew that awake and aroused, she was anything but celestial. Nay, she was carnal, like the very devil, taunting him, teasing him.

Tempting him.

In the last hours he’d taken her over and over again hoping to prove to her just how much she needed him. Instead, she had held fast to her convictions. Winning Katie was proving the greatest challenge of his life, and he knew not what to do next.

THE SORCERER KNOWN ONLY as Mon Graig was coming for Jorlan, coming to take him home. Percen sensed the old sorcerer’s magic drawing nearer, and knew the man would soon appear to Jorlan, would wait until Jorlan’s curse was completely broken and then take the warrior to Imperia. Percen could not allow that. He needed more time, just a little more time. So he waited at the man’s tiny dwelling, shadows surrounding him, scepter drawn.

By the new dawning, Mon Graig was trapped inside his own stone casing.

“HEATHER STILL ISN’T feeling well.”

Katie lowered her paint roller from the wall and gazed over at Frances, who stood at the Victorian’s threshold. Midday sunlight streamed around her, mingling with the overhead light. Katie was careful to keep the thick mauve liquid from dripping onto the plastic floor covering. She didn’t want to track the stuff on her shoes. “Is she okay? She’s been sick all week.”

“I hope so.” Concern darkened Frances’s hazel eyes. “I can’t help but worry about her, though. She lies in bed all day and all night. She doesn’t want to eat or sleep; she just stares up at the ceiling. Sometimes she even talks to herself.”

“If there’s anything I can do, just let me know, okay?”

“I will. Thanks for understanding.” With a shaky smile, Frances left to continue her work outside. The little slice of light cut away as the screen door banged to a close.

Half of the day was gone already, Katie realized. It had melted away as quickly as the week had. Frowning, she dropped her roller into the tin. Her arm muscles ached from pushing it up and down the downstairs walls. She wondered how Jorlan was doing upstairs. Had he finished painting the bedroom yet?

With each passing day, he’d grown more and more restless, more and more reserved. He no longer smiled, no longer teased her. He almost seemed…sad. Every day he told her he loved her, and every day he asked her if she loved him. Her answer remained the same. No. She was unwilling to love a man she could not trust completely. While part of her believed him every time he spoke those wonderful words, a part of her still felt disbelief and suspicious of his intentions.

Time was running out, though, and she couldn’t allow him to return to stone.

What was she going to do?

Katie didn’t know. She did know that she needed to see him and assure herself that he was still here, that he was still the flesh-and-blood warrior who held her each night. She marched up the stairs. Her tennis shoes squeaked with every step, and she made a mental note to wedge a few nails between the plank seams and at last end the squeaking. When she entered the bedroom, she stopped and silently observed. Jorlan had his back to her. He was shirtless. Natural light flooded through the unadorned window, caressing his muscles, making his skin glow a golden brown.

Her nerve endings hummed to life as she watched him stroke the roller up and down just as she’d shown him. His shoulder muscles were tense, but not from painting. He knew she stood behind him, and he was determined to ignore her.

I will not be ignored. Her steps clipped, she closed the remaining distance between them, jerked the roller from his grasp, and rolled it down his face. Ha! Ignore that.

At first, he remained completely still.

“You will pay for that,” he said softly. But instead of punishing her, he wiped his eyes clean and grabbed the paintbrush at his feet. He dipped the bristles into the paint tin. Then he smeared the pale-yellow liquid onto the walls. His face took on an I-must-concentrate-because-the-fate-of-the-world-rests-in-my-hands expression. Up. Down. Up. He put his entire body into the experience, making his muscles strain and flex.

Even while ignoring her, the man was passion incarnate. His physique came from many years on the battlefield, she surmised, but looking at him did not evoke images of blood and gore. No, looking at him made her think of silk sheets and sweaty bodies.

“I need more paint,” he finally said, though he didn’t glance her way.

“To paint me?”

His jaw tensed. “To finish painting the wall.”

It took a moment to register what he’d said, and when she did, she snapped out of her lustful haze. “I gave you enough to cover the Great Wall of China.”

“And yet my tin is empty.”

Not sure what to expect, Katie leveled her gaze onto the wall. It looked perfectly fine. She rotated and surveyed the wall behind her. Her gasp echoed in the sudden quiet. “Oh my God. What did you do?”

“I painted.” Three empty paint cans occupied one corner of the room. “With a bit of magic,” he reluctantly admitted.

“You opened and used other colors.” Her voice whisked out in a horrified whisper, but soon picked up in volume. “I only gave you one color. One. One!”

“Those were available, thus I made use of them.” He motioned to the row of paint tins she had organized according to color. He’d taken one from each row. “If they were not to be used, this should have been mentioned.”

“Not mixing colors is common sense.”

“Do not paint the floor, you said. Do not paint the side trim, you said. Do not use circular motions, you said. Well, I did none of those things.”

“You’re right.” Hell, he was right, and she couldn’t chastise him for her own mistake.

The wall looked horrible, though. Absolutely hideous. Like a smeared, discolored rainbow. Several places were bubbled with…good God, was that mud? She stifled a groan. How was she going to fix that wall? With four years of experience, she’d never encountered this sort of problem before.

“Have I not done as you wished?” he asked, his expression mutinous—and comical because of the streaks of yellow paint running down his cheeks.

Now, on top of everything else, she’d hurt his feelings. Wonderful. Just freaking wonderful. “You’ve done fine.”

“I will hear your thanks, then.”

He would hear her thanks? He would hear her thanks? A red cloud descended over Katie’s eyes, eradicating her previous benevolence. He had ignored her all day, had ruined her wall, and now he would hear her thanks? “Why should I thank you when you missed a spot?” With that, she reached out with her roller and drew it down his nose.

He paused only a brief moment, but then returned the favor.

She gasped as the cold liquid coated her skin. “Do not do that again,” she growled. But even as she said the words, she was reaching out and smearing him with another coat.

He grabbed her in the next instant, looking like the playful, teasing lover she’d come to know. “Think you can paint me?”

She chuckled. “Yes, actually, I do.”

“Then let us see who wields the mightier brush.” In a heartbeat of time, he had her pinned to the ground. Slowly, very slowly, he painted her hair, her collarbone, her legs.

Toward the end, she was laughing so hard she couldn’t rebuke him. Finally, he tossed his brush aside. He stared down at her with a serious glint in his pale-blue eyes, watching her for a long, silent moment. Then, he kissed her, a languid kiss that went on and on and made her wet with arousal. Instead of making love to her, however, he pulled away and, without a word, swiped up his brush and went back to painting the wall.

Turn away from her, would he? She dumped the remaining paint over his head.

He stood stunned for a long while, yellow rivulets dripping from his head and face. His eyes narrowed. “You will pay for that, katya.”

“You have to catch me first,” she taunted, darting away.

“Oh, I will catch you. Doubt it not.”

Smothering her laughter with her hand—it wouldn’t do to give away her location so easily—she slipped into the next room. But she had only taken three steps when the wood cracked beneath her feet. Without warning, she tumbled down, down, down. Something sharp sliced at her body. Katie screamed, anticipating impact.

When she hit, she hit hard, like brick against brick. She tasted the metallic tang of blood in her mouth, grasped for a breath, but couldn’t drag in the smallest bit of air.

Jorlan shouted her name, the sound anguished and desperate.

Darkness claimed her.