Chapter Eighteen
There was a time so long ago
When warriors side by side,
We fought the Dark with sword and bow
With strength and burning pride.
Now ghosts remain in Shadow’s scorn
Imprisoned not by will
Soon in time the child is born
And stolen to the hills
From the poem “Shei’tanitsa Reign”
by Lady Flarien diChanis
In the dimming twilight after the Great Sun had disappeared below the horizon, Rain and Ellysetta swam back to the shore where
their boat was moored. He dug two long lengths of absorbent cloth from a basket in the boat and handed one to her.
She wrapped the cloth around herself. The air was much warmer than the bay had been, and her shivering quickly faded. “What
now?”
“Now we make our bower so we may sleep beneath the light of the fairy-flies and dream of our soul’s true purpose. Look.” He
pointed to the forests nearby. “They are waking.” Sure enough, in the dark forests at the volcano’s base, tiny lights were
flickering.
He led the way into the forest. His bare Fey skin glowed faintly silver in the darkness and made him easy to follow as he picked his way down a narrow pronghorn trail through the dense brush and soaring trees.
“Here.” The trail opened to a small glen at the base of the nearest volcano. “This will do.” The glen was little more than
a bare space in the forest where the rock lay too close beneath the fern-covered ground for trees to grow. A waterfall streaming
down the side of the volcano had formed a small pool at one side of the glen. “Come, shei’tani.” Rain unwrapped the cloth from about his waist and snapped it out to its full length, lowering it over a dense bed of ferns.
“Time for sleeping.” One black brow arched, and his lavender eyes began to glow. “Or other things.”
Smiling, she went to him and offered no protest as he tugged free the end of her wrap and let the cloth slip from her naked,
gleaming body. Her hair spilled down her back and over her shoulders, framing her small, round breasts with vivid licks of
flame and curling down her back to brush the swell of slender hips.
Sunset on the Bay of Flame was indeed great and powerful magic. Without a doubt, something had changed in her tonight as she’d
swum in the flame-kissed waters set afire by the setting sun. For the first time she stood naked before him and was not the
least bit ashamed. Instead, her veins hummed with nascent womanly power.
She reached up to cup his face in her hands. “Do you love me, Rain?”
“More than I knew it was possible to love. All the stars will fall from the heavens before I ever stop.”
His truth was pure and absolute. So unswerving there was no hint of doubt in him. She took a deep breath, dazzled by his utter
devotion to her.
He had told her he must go to war to become a king worthy of his crown and a Fey worthy of his truemate’s bond, but the truth
was, he was already so much more than she deserved.
She ran her hands over the sleek, rounded muscles of his arms, adoring his faint trembling when she touched him, the crackles of magic that leapt to her touch as if every part of him yearned to become a part of her.
Such a fine, beautiful Fey. Her Fey. Her love, her heart, her soul’s truemate.
So strong, so brave. Everything she never had been.
Everything she must become to be worthy of him.
Not a frightened girl, clinging to him for reassurance and protection, but a brave woman, strong and self-assured in her own
right. A Tairen Soul. His equal.
All around them, the dark of the forest began to glow with shimmering lights as fairy-flies by the dozens awoke and took wing
from whatever small nest had sheltered them through the day. The small, glowing creatures danced like stars in the shadowed
forest. The waterfall splashed softly into its pool, and in the distance the muffled roar of the surf filled the air with
the tang of the sea. Ellysetta stepped back, her bare foot finding the soft expanse of the cloth he’d laid down for them.
Her knee bent and she sank lightly to the bower he’d prepared, pulling him with her, but when he would have covered her body
with his own, her hands pushed against his shoulders, urging him to his back.
“Nei, shei’tan. Let me.” She’d taken the lead in their love-making before, but only when her tairen had roused and its passions overrode
the shy Celierian that remained so much a part of her. This time, she was neither wild nor shy, neither tairen nor mortal.
This time, she was simply Ellysetta, mate of Rain, a woman taking the final step from girlhood.
“Do you know how much I love you?” It stunned her how much that love had grown in so short a while. And she had grown, too,
from the breathlessly infatuated girl who’d loved Fey tales, to the grief-stricken realist who’d seen her mate leave and her
mother die, to the raging tairen in the Mists who’d reached out in desperate fear and trust for her mate, to the young Feyreisa
determined to master both shei’dalin and warrior magic and find the answers to save her new kingdom. Each step of the journey, she’d taken because of him. For him. Nourishing her increasing strength with the deepening love she bore him.
Her hands slid down his body, marveling at the smooth warmth of his skin. Pale as silver mist, sleek as satin. She loved the
feel of him beneath her hands, the strength and power coiled within such devastating beauty. She laughed softly as she discovered
his ticklish feet and the way his thighs quivered when she smoothed her hands over the long ropes of muscle and bent her head
to take tiny bites across his flesh.
“Fellana . . .” he growled, hands reaching for her.
“Nei, Rain,” she admonished, evading his grasp. “This time is mine.” His sex was already full and thick, pulsing with the heavy
beat of his heart. She stroked him, filling her palm with the hard heat, brushing her lips across the velvety softness of
his skin, then dancing away to lave kisses on the flat, ribbed muscles of his abdomen.
He groaned and shifted, his hips bucking up against her in instinctive demand. “You tease.”
She purred and touched her tongue to the round indent of his navel. “I but prolong the pleasure.” The sweet fragrance of his
skin—anchored with the darker scents of tairen—made her muscles tighten. Arousal became a heavy ache, a ripple of clenching
inner muscles, a slow burn of flesh.
His nostrils flared at the betraying scent of dark honey, and his eyes, which were already glowing, blazed with sudden fire.
“You want me,” he whispered.
“More than you know.” She bent to his chest, nipped at the taut buds of his nipples, followed with savoring licks, tasting
him, drawing him into her mouth.
A low, vibrating growl purred in his throat and chest, the seductive hum of his tairen’s need. “Then come, kem’fellana, kem’tani, and take what you desire.”
The low purr sent heat flashing through her veins.
Her breasts grew tight, the nipples hardening to aching points.
She sat back, straddling his thighs, and flexed her spine, hissing as his hands rose to cup her breasts and his thumbs flicked over their sensitive tips.
Gods. All it took was one touch of his hand on her, and the harmonic pleasure intensified so rapidly it was all she could do to
hold back her first shuddering orgasm. She didn’t want that yet. This was her time, her seduction, her night to tease and
torment until his control hung in shreds and he begged her to take him. This was her time to claim him, as he had so often
and exquisitely claimed her.
Gasping, she arched away from his dangerous hands. “Do you think weaves spun for loving would keep the fairy-flies from working
their dream magic?” Her fingers trailed along his chest, and she shared her essence with him the way he’d taught her back
in Celieria.
He shuddered and gave a laughing groan. “I’m willing to risk it.”
With a slow smile, she bent her head to his chest and wriggled her way down his body, trailing kisses and teasing sparks of
magic in her wake. She caressed his flat belly, his lean hips. Her fingernails scraped lightly across his skin, and she reveled
in every tiny shiver and catch of his breath and the brightening glow of his half-lidded eyes as he watched her near the length
of straining flesh that throbbed in anticipation of her touch.
Smiling up into his eyes, bold with feminine power, she bent her head and took him into her mouth. His eyes closed on a groan
and his jaw thrust up in the air as his head tilted back and he abandoned himself to her. The heat, the salty-sweet taste
of his skin, the rich, heady scent of male Fey arousal bathed her senses.
His hands came up, lavender Spirit glowing brightly around them, but she waved them away. ?Nei, shei’tan. This weave is mine to spin.?
Always before, he had been the one to weave the magic over her, his Spirit spun with such vivid perfection and devastating
power, she’d not been able to separate reality from illusion.
Now, it was her turn.
She called upon her power, summoning it as Jaren and Venarra had spent the last weeks teaching her. The magic came to her
call, a heady rush of pure power. She pictured the images and sensations she desired, spinning the intricate pattern of the
weaves. Spirit was her strongest branch of magic—it always had been.
When the weaves were as full and rich as she could make them, she let the magic spill forth in great shining flows. It fell
over him like a veil, wrapping him tight in the enchantment of illusion so finely spun, even he could not tell where reality
became magic.
Rain gasped as his blood ignited, becoming liquid flame, searing him from the inside out. Heat filled him, gathering in his
loins and swelling his flesh near to bursting as her sweet mouth devoured him with relentless ardor and her magic overwhelmed
his senses. Every muscle in his body clenched and strained as he fought to hold himself in check.