Six Unholy Confessions
SIX
Unholy Confessions
I
Suddenly Nora felt Dav’s fingers clamp around the back of her neck. With his other hand, he shoved the gown away and flattened her bloody palm over his heart.
The wound had closed. She didn’t understand why or how. She only knew that her blood was healing him.
“Yes,” she cried, “take everything you need.”
In a burst of speed, he flipped her onto her back, and his weight came down upon her. She clutched him between her thighs and ran her hand over his body, feeling the new life in him. Her own body pounded with awareness of everywhere they touched, as if she too were coming back to life.
He slid her hand down the damp planes of his stomach to the front of his trousers. She felt the silk fabric and the forbidden steel beneath. Together, they rid him of the last barrier of clothing between them. Admonitions from the Order’s matrons fled from her mind. Her thoughts filled with words she was not supposed to know and acts she was not supposed to imagine.
She gave in to her desire to explore his cock. He wrapped her hand around his shaft and guided her strokes up and down. Fascinated, she learned his shape and texture. His jaw clenched, deepening his bite, and they moaned together.
But his canines eased out of her neck, her hips twitching with the sensation. He gave the wounds on her throat worshipful licks until they healed into raw new skin. She arched under him, feeling empty, but he held her down and lifted his head.
“Nora. Are you really offering me everything?”
“If you’ll have me.”
“I’ll have you in every way you can imagine, on one condition.”
“Name your price.”
“You will not feel an ounce of shame about what we do to each other in this bed tonight.”
The guilt had bled out of her a little more with his every bite, leaving behind this wild rush in her veins. “You can touch me anywhere you wish. On one condition.”
His tongue swept across his stained lips for another taste of her blood. “Anywhere?”
“Nowhere is forbidden.”
“I’ll promise you anything.”
“I don’t want some tasteful consummation,” she demanded. “Don’t bed me like a proper husband. Ravish me like a heretic.”
He ran his hand up her thigh, over the impressions the scabbard had left on her flesh, and squeezed.
She held his glowing gaze and let the heat in his eyes burn her. His magic swept deeper into her mind, a dark thrill.
He was upon her with Hesperine swiftness and grace. In one heartbeat, his hard length was buried inside her. She dragged in a hoarse gasp, pinned to the bed on his shaft, her core stretched around him.
“Did it hurt?” he whispered.
“No,” she moaned. “It’s too good.”
He pulled out with blinding speed, leaving her wet and reeling. And then he filled her again, driving inside her with the power of an immortal.
In the ancestral bed of generations of holy knights, Nora lay impaled beneath a Hesperine and spread her legs wider.
Dav kissed her, shocking in his tenderness. “I love how wide your mouth is.” He smoothed her hair back from her face. “I love how wild your curls are.” He arched his back, and the different angle of his body pressed new pleasure into her. His warm breath washed over her chest. “And Goddess , I love the size of your breasts.”
He closed his mouth over her nipple and sucked. Clutching his shoulders, she squirmed under his implacable hips. He worked her breasts over with his mouth, first one, then the other, until she was on the verge of climax and begging him.
But then he lifted his mouth away. He turned his head. When he kissed the scar Sancti had left on her shoulder, she froze under him.
He waited a moment, then licked the cut on her arm. “Does it hurt?”
She swallowed hard. “Not now.”
He lapped at the sluggishly bleeding wound. She could feel the sweet darkness of Hesperine magic flowing into her, putting out the burning light. Tears slipped down her cheeks.
When only unbroken skin remained under his tongue, he lifted his head and recaptured her gaze. He began to move inside her, his forceful rhythm grinding her thoughts down into a haze. She braced her feet on the bed, needing leverage. Needing to move. She rocked her hips up for his thrusts.
“I love how greedy you are,” he said.
Faster, harder, he pounded into her. She urged him on in wordless groans.
“I love the sounds you make,” he snarled.
She cried out, half growling, as her core convulsed around his shaft. His fangs drove into her throat once more, releasing her blood. She writhed under his bite, wringing out her long years of hunger on his cock. She felt him shudder with her and pulse against her inner walls.
At last she lay back, his fangs still embedded in her throat, knowing he had spilled a Hesperine’s fruitless seed inside her. She was thoroughly corrupted, and it felt better than anything she had imagined. She let out a wild laugh.
He put his mouth to her ear. “You want more, don’t you?”
“I’m so hungry, Dav.”
By the predawn hours, she lay spooned against him, finally too spent to move. The deepest ease she had ever known settled into her languid limbs. But her body’s reprieve was not enough to keep her thoughts at bay.
She said the words she needed to say. “I’m so sorry about Rahim.”
“I’m so sorry about your parents,” Dav said. “In Orthros, when someone loses a loved one, we say, ‘Your grief runs in my veins.’”
She turned her head, looking at his shadowed face in the dying firelight. “Your grief runs in my veins, Dav.”
He stroked her scars. “I know it does.”
“Why did he come here? Why would he do all of that for me?”
“It is an honored practice among our people. He became a Hesperine errant—an immortal who leaves Orthros to travel human lands, offering aid to your people. He was moved to use our great power to alleviate suffering in the mortal world.”
“And when he couldn’t come back for me…you did.”
“It was his last wish. He begged me to rescue you. I hope you can forgive me for taking half a year to accept that calling, and not so gracefully.”
She pressed her eyes shut. “If you can forgive me for greeting you as an enemy.”
His hand stilled on her arm. “That was not your doing. Nora, I will not let Sir Virtus hurt you again.”
The dream Rahim had given her that night came back to life. It was possible. A new life.
“Forget this place.” Dav whispered the greatest seduction of all in her ear. “Leave Tenebra behind. Come home to Orthros with me and let every night be like this one.”
She wrapped his arm around her, pressing back into him. Allowing herself one more moment of astonishing comfort from this being she had not known three days ago.
“Can you forgive me if I stay?” she asked.
His arm tightened around her. “Why in Hespera’s name would you stay?”
“You are trying to honor Rahim’s memory,” she said, “but I must honor my parents. I can only think of one way to do both. I must become a dame in the Order so I can hold Castra Gloria—and work from within to protect Hesperines from the knights.”
“The Order doesn’t matter,” he ground out. “I need you to come back to Orthros with me.”
“It matters to me. It mattered to my parents.”
“Nora.” So much pain in one word.
“I’m so sorry.” Her voice thickened. “I cannot fulfill Rahim’s wish. But we can get justice for him and my parents. I have a plan. Will you come back tomorrow night so we can end Sir Virtus—together?”
Dav pushed her onto her back. His golden eyes glowed at her through the darkness. “Here are my terms. I will go along with your plan. But when we have defeated him, you will give me one more chance to change your mind.”
She should refuse. If he tried to convince her again, she might lose the will to refuse him.
But she wanted one more night of a Hesperine’s persuasion, before she must remember how to be dutiful.
“I accept your terms.”
q
Dav followed Nora down the corridor, the most dangerous shadow in the dark hallway. Her blood flowed in his cleansed veins. Last night had changed him, as profoundly as the night he had transformed from human to Hesperine.
There was only one possible explanation for why she had been able to save him. She was the mate whose blood could free him from hunger for any other. The partner destined to share his long eternity.
Nora was his Grace.
Dav had already drunk more than enough from her to awaken their bond—and the Craving, the addiction every Graced Hesperine suffered. If she wouldn’t accept Sanctuary, he would face a short future of withdrawal and starvation.
He had found her at last, after all these centuries alone. His brother had died bringing them together.
Dav would not let anyone take her from him.
As she approached the door of the shrine where Sir Virtus awaited her, her terror washed over the Blood Union. But she put one foot in front of the other, walking with determination toward her greatest fear.
Hidden in veil spells, Dav looked Sir Virtus in the eye. Here was the fanatic who had tormented her. His were the hands that had killed Rahim.
Dav’s hand tightened on Arceo’s hilt. He could no longer call himself a healer after what he was about to do. He didn’t know what that made him. He only knew Sir Virtus was the greater monster.
“Honora,” came the man’s warning tone, “Arceo has not been returned, and now three more relics are missing.”
“I know, Uncle. I noticed when I was saying my afternoon prayers. I have spent all evening questioning the servants.” She held out the scabbard. “I found this.”
Sir Virtus snatched the empty dagger sheath from her. “Where was it?”
“Someone left it on my father’s tomb.”
Dav enjoyed watching the color drain from Sir Virtus’s face.
“Who?” the knight demanded.
“I do not know, Uncle. But it was very painful for me to visit the crypt today. Will you help me find comfort in prayer?”
“Of course, child. Of course.”
Sir Virtus took Nora’s arm, and her emotions flinched. Dav bared his fangs. He stalked behind them as they walked down the central aisle of the shrine.
The auras of the relics stung his arcane senses. The whole chamber was aglow with bright halos of anti-Hesperine magic. Nora had rid the room of the three artifacts that could reveal his presence, but he was still surrounded by things that could destroy him if he made one wrong move.
Dav hated watching Nora kneel with that man before the emblem of her judgmental god. This heretic would enjoy desecrating Andragathos’s shrine.
Nora’s voice disrupted the quiet of the room. “On my last night as Lady of Gloria, I have meditated on my duty to my parents. Will you pray for their souls with me, Uncle Virtus?”
A drop of sweat trickled down his brow. “Certainly, daughter.”
Sir Virtus bowed his head, closing his eyes, and began to drone a prayer. Nora slid her hand into the folds of her skirts.
This was their chance. Dav moved swiftly to the box Nora had described to him. The lock was a mundane one that whispered open at a touch of his magic. He eased the lid back.
Arceo heated in his hand, and a cold fire answered from the opal in Sancti’s white-gold hilt. Pain flared behind Dav’s eyes, and his stomach turned over. He wouldn’t be able to hold both daggers long.
Gritting his teeth, he closed his hand around Sancti’s hilt. The current of magic between the daggers flared along his arms, white hot. He slipped over to Nora, kneeling to press the Blade of Purification into her grasp.
He rested his scorched hand on her shoulder and tapped once. Twice. Three times.
They moved in unison. He heard the blades glide through the air, too quiet for mortal ears. They swung together at the praying man’s heart.
Dav’s dagger never landed. Glass shattered. Fragrant smoke struck Dav in the face, obscuring his vision and clawing into his lungs.
“Step away!” Nora cried.
Dav transported himself to the other side of the room, his eyes watering and coughs wracking him. Through clouds of smoke, he made out the silhouette of the knight, swinging a sword where his neck had just been.
“Nora?” Dav called. “Are you all right?”
He sensed her aura darting toward him.
The figure of Sir Virtus loomed between them. “Did you think you could bring a Hesperine into the shrine without my knowing? Did you think removing those relics would fool me? My amulet warned me the moment that creature approached.”
Nora let out an angry cry. “This is Andragathian Incense! The smoke will reveal y—”
“Silence!” Sir Virtus barked, and Nora gasped. Her pain flared in Dav’s senses.
Dav Willed open the door of the shrine. Air swept in from the corridor, and the incense thinned. He saw Nora in Sir Virtus’s grip, his sword at her throat.
“How could you betray me like this?” Sir Virtus lamented. “After everything I did to teach you goodness.”
Dav calculated options in his mind. If he stepped to Sir Virtus, would the man have time to slit Nora’s throat before Dav could stop him?
Sir Virtus dragged Nora toward a pedestal, where an orb of magefire burned in a golden chalice. “You will pay for this, Hesperine. I will drive you from this sacred place with holy fire.”
When Nora’s hand moved in the folds of her skirts, Dav realized. Sir Virtus had been so preoccupied with the Hesperine threat that he had made his greatest mistake of all.
He had underestimated Nora.
She raised Sancti and slashed the Blade of Purification across Sir Virtus’s arm. The man drew a hollow gasp.
It was all the diversion Dav needed. He stepped to Nora’s side, ancient muscle memory returning to him. He dealt Sir Virtus blow after blow that he had learned in the Imperial army. When the man was disarmed and on his knees, Dav seized him by the throat and hurled him against the Shield of Andragathos. He held the gaping mortal there and let the man struggle against his immortal strength.
Dav smiled, putting his fangs on display. “You’re the coward who threw a dagger at a fleeing Hesperine. He was my brother.”
The scent of the man’s fear filled the shrine.
Nora searched his surcoat, depriving him of his belt pouch of incense, his amulet, and a hidden prayer book that emanated magic. She tossed the incense into a bowl of healing water and dropped the other two artifacts into the cup of magefire. Nora watched his face while his relics burned.
Sir Virtus moaned. “I can still save you, child.”
She laughed loudly. Tearing the veil from her hair, she let her red mane free. “You failed, ‘Uncle’ Virtus.”
“Turn away from this creature! We can defeat him together.”
Nora held Sancti’s tip to Sir Virtus’s throat. “It’s too late. He’s bitten me. I gave him my blood over and over again. Then I welcomed him into my bed. And I enjoyed it.”
Sir Virtus spat prayers and curses at them.
“Don’t shout about holiness to me,” Nora shot back. “You killed my parents.”
Specters of guilt haunted Sir Virtus’s aura. “This Hesperine has addled your mind! Lies!”
“I remember everything,” she said.
Bitterness welled out of the man, a bile so potent, it must have been festering in him for years. “I was always a better knight. A better man. I gave the Order my all. I even resisted my lust for your mother. Only for your father to take her to wife instead. And what thanks did I get from the Order for my self denial? They celebrated him. They entrusted all the greatest relics to him.”
“When he was given Arceo,” Nora said, “that was the final blow, wasn’t it? You were planning to take both daggers for yourself.”
“I was their rightful wielder! He couldn’t even discipline his own daughter properly! He was too fastidious to use Sancti on you. Why do you think he asked me to do it every time? I was a better father to you than he ever was. Your mother understood what was necessary. She prayed for your soul whenever she bandaged your wounds.”
Dav’s thoughts reeled. But his own shock was not mirrored in Nora’s aura. This was a memory she had never lost.
Dav searched her face. “Your parents knew ?”
Nora took a step back. “I was always a disappointment.”
“They allowed him to do that to you?”
“It wasn’t their fault. Sir Virtus must have persuaded them it was necessary.”
“They asked it of him!”
“They were trying to help me.”
“The night they died,” Dav said, “they didn’t come here to rescue you.”
Nora clutched her arm, Sancti dangling from her other hand. “They were coming to join him. But then Father saw that Sir Virtus had taken Arceo. He was angry about the theft of the relic.”
Her parents had cared more for this dagger than their daughter. Even as Dav’s hand tightened around Sir Virtus’s throat, he knew Nora’s first enemies were already dead. And they had left her with scars so deep, she could not even bring herself to acknowledge that what they’d done was wrong.
Dav fingered Arceo’s hilt in his free hand. All of Hespera’s sacred tenets faded from his mind under the red haze of his rage and grief. He wanted to drive the blade into Sir Virtus’s heart. Once for Rahim. Again for Nora. Over and over for all the blows he could not deal her parents.
While Dav had been writing research treatises in the placid halls of Orthros, Nora had been here. Every day of her life had brought suffering. When Dav had begged his brother not to waste his power on ungrateful mortals, Rahim had come here. He had risked everything to save this one life.
It took all of Dav’s Will not to tear Sir Virtus apart with the dagger. But the memory of his brother’s gentle aura stayed his hand.
Vengeance was not a word his brother had known, nor a word Queen Soteira had taught Dav.
Revenge was different from justice.
Dav swung the dagger with all his immortal might. He listened to Sir Virtus scream and heard the blade point crack the shield. He left the man pinned to the shrine, Arceo embedded in his shoulder, his heart still beating.
Nora stared at Dav. “Don’t you want your revenge?”
“I didn’t come here for that. I came for you. What do you want?”
She spun toward Sir Virtus, her knuckles white on Sancti’s hilt. “I want him to know how I felt.”
At last, her anger and her dagger were aimed at the same target. The whites of Sir Virtus’s eyes showed as he watched his judgment approach.
Nora plunged the Blade of Purification into Sir Virtus’s other shoulder. The magic of the two daggers collided in a glare of light. Memories flared across the surface of his thoughts, coming to Dav in glimpses. Nora’s parents, falling dead. Nora, weeping, begging him for compassion. He began to sob, muttering confessions.
Nora staggered back. “What’s happening? Sancti never did this to me.”
“It must be the combined magic of both daggers. His own transgressions are flashing before his eyes, over and over.” Dav mustered his power to shut out Sir Virtus’s thoughts.
With his senses clear, he heard the heavy footfalls in the corridors and the voices of men rising through the fortress. He slammed the door shut with his Will.
“Dav, what is it?” Nora asked.
“A large party of warriors is approaching the shrine.”
Nora swore. “The other knights have arrived.”
“What will they do with him if they find him like this?”
Nora’s lip curled. “The Grand Master will hear his confessions and strip away everything he ever worked for in the Order.”
“That sounds like justice to me.”
The voices drew nearer. Nora hesitated.
“They can’t find us here,” Dav said.
Her eyes beseeched him. “You know you must bring me back.”
“You promised me one more chance to change your mind.”
She came into his arms, and he stepped her away to the tower. The quiet of the Hesperine Sanctuary wrapped around them.
But her aura was in chaos. He heard echoes of her parents’ words in her thoughts. Disappointed... Ashamed... Too loud. Too buxom. Wish you’d be en a son.
Nora pulled Dav’s mouth down to hers and kissed him fiercely. He let her silence her own thoughts against his lips. His magic and his blood stirred in instinctive response to her need. But he only held her gently, waiting until she came up for air.
Seduction was not how he would try to change her mind this time. He would offer her something even more tempting. The truth.
“Remember what Rahim said to you. None of this is your fault.”
Her hands closed on the front of his robe.
“What your parents did to you was wrong,” Dav said. “It will take time for you to feel the truth of this. That’s natural, after they played mind games with you for years and wore you down. Which is why you need to surround yourself with voices who will tell you the truth about yourself.”
She hid her tears against his chest.
He lifted her face in both hands, stroking her. “You’re perfect, Nora. Everything about you. Just as you are.”
The new thoughts spinning through her pulled at the scars in her mind. “What was it your queen said? Questioning is not a betrayal of the truth?”
“It is the only way to prove your truth to yourself.”
“I don’t know what my truth is yet. But I…I am questioning. Everything.”
Dav rested his forehead on hers. “I want to be at your side while you question. Will you let me do that?”
“Dames of the Order are not permitted to question anything.”
“But heretics are.”
“If I never return, the castle will fall down.”
“And you can build your own.”
The light of possibilities rose in her aura. The Blood Union ached with her longing. She was so close to changing her mind.
Dav was done choosing the safe path. He took the most dangerous gamble of his existence and put his life in her hands one more time. “And if you need another reason…you should know why your blood healed me.”
Nora’s brow furrowed. “I do want to understand how that was possible.”
“For every Hesperine, there is one person whose blood is more potent than any other. The perfect elixir, which can sustain them for eternity. No other blood could have been restorative enough to pull me back from the brink of death.”
“How? What magic is this?”
“It is a bond fated in our blood. We call it Grace. And now that I have tasted you, my Grace, I will die without your blood.”
She put a hand to her throat, where the unseen mark of his bite lingered. “It simply…is? Naturally, without any effort? My blood can do that?”
“You’re perfect,” he said again.
A sense of power welled up in her, drowning out the doubts in her emotions. “It seems I have you at a disadvantage, Dav. You need me. What does that mean for my future if I return with you to Orthros?”
He pulled her hand away and scraped her vein with his teeth to feel her shiver. “It means you are my mate, and the only person I will ravish like a heretic for the rest of eternity.”
Her throat moved as she swallowed. “Eternity is a long time.”
“It will take you time to feel the truth of this too, I know. But I’ve been hoping to find my Grace for five hundred years. I can wait as long as you need to embrace the idea. I will be patient while you design your own palaces, until you decide you’d like to build something with me.”
Nora wrapped her arms around him.
“Can you deny you want what I’ve shown you?” Dav asked.
“Leave,” she demanded. “Never set foot within sight of Castra Gloria again. And take me with you.”