The Stallion & The Tigress (Destined #2)

Chapter 1

Autumn’s Eve

Aleksi surveyed the field covered with

brightly colored tents and the lines of horses staked to the ground

around them. It had taken him, Serge, and Pyotr four years of

planning, scraping, and saving every piece of silver and gold they

had earned working in the king’s stables, but they were here. They

had made it to the Autumn Festival held in this city on the

southern shore of the Great Inland Sea with a string of fine horses

to trade, and with enough silver the fee for Aleksi to enter the

races. Races he meant to win on his stallion, Zolotoy, the last

gift his father, King Maksimillian, had ever given him.

He shaded his eyes and turned his gaze to the

road leading toward the palace gates as the low hum of men’s voices

rose to a loud buzzing as the crowd parted to either side of the

pathway. Two young, unaccompanied women walked between the lines of

tents and horses. In truth, the smaller, finer-boned woman walked.

The taller woman strode straight for Aleksi’s tent with a sure

feline grace, her ocher skirt swinging with purpose around the

length of her long legs.

Her hair was covered by a headscarf of green,

gold, and red, and she wore her tunic of marigold yellow tucked

into her skirt. A belt of plain leather cinched her slim waist

where a leather sheath held a small blade. The only adornment she

wore was a wrist cuff of etched leather on her left forearm. No

earrings dangled from her lobes, no jewels encircled the smooth,

tawny skin of her neck, and not one of her long tapered fingers

bore a ring.

She stopped no more than a pace from Aleksi,

shoulders back and head high, and he knew why she wore no jewelry.

No manmade adornment could ever match the crystalline brilliance of

her eyes. Cat-like in shape and heavily fringed with long black

lashes, they gleamed like cut emeralds flecked with gold in the

sun’s light.

“Ladies.” Aleksi tore his gaze from the

mesmerizing green brilliance and dipped his head to the dainty,

brown-haired, gray-eyed woman with a courtly smile. He’d learned

enough princely manners in his time at his father’s palace to be

polite and charming when needs be, and he had discovered the

rewards of politeness with women many years ago. “My name is

Aleksandr,” he said to the dimpling young woman who looked to have

some girl in her still, and then he turned his full smile on her

companion, who was still young, but all woman. “How may I be of

service?”

Piercing cat eyes held his beneath dark,

shapely brows, taking his measure. Though no giant, Aleksi was tall

and broadly built, and he stood even taller under her scrutiny. He

liked women in general, and they liked him, but this one didn’t

seem outwardly impressed. Perhaps because she was taller than most

women and stood eye to chin with him. Or perhaps it was her

bearing, lithe and sure, and regal. Yet neither her nor her

companion’s clothing suggested royalty. Though clean and free of

obvious mending, they were made of plain, well-worn linen. There

wasn’t a scrap of worm weave or embroidery on either of their

tunics or skirts, and they were two women—two exceptionally comely

young women—wandering through a field full of strange men without

guards.

They didn’t seem to be pleasure women plying

their trade. There was no look of wanton invitation in either their

mien or their gazes. Aleksi reminded himself that the people of

this city prided themselves on their freedoms of choice and

movement.

“I’ve been told of your golden stallion,” the

jewel-eyed woman said in a low, smoky voice. “Is he for sale?”

Aleksi pushed a stubborn lock of hair back

from his forehead and glanced over his shoulder at Zolotoy who his

father had gifted him as an unbroken two-year-old the spring Aleksi

had turned twenty and one.

“No,” he told her, “he’s not. Him I will ride

to victory in the races and then pick one of the royal broodmares

for him to cover and start my own line of horses that will rival

even King Asad’s.”

Her brows quirked and the corners of her

shapely mouth lifted. “Do you have a particular mare in mind?”

“Lasair, I believe she is named. The last

filly by the king’s stallion Storm Chaser and the queen’s mare,

Cloud Dancer.”

“Impossible,” she said.

Impossible was not a word Aleksi cared for,

even when spoken in such an entrancing voice. “How so?” he

challenged.

“Lasair belongs to Princess Sahar, not her

father. Any stallion privileged to breed with Lasair will be chosen

by the princess and no other, after they win the races.”

Aleksi laughed, quick and short. “You seem to

have a good eye for horses. Do you truly believe any mare could

beat my stallion in a race?”

She smiled like a cat who had spied a fat,

lazy vole. “Lasair is not any mare,” she said.

“You’ve seen her?”

“I have.”

“Is she as sleek and swift as they say?”

“She is.”

“And her mistress, the princess?”

The dove-eyed girl slid a sidelong glance at

her companion whose piercing gaze narrowed on Aleksi.

“What about her?”

“Is she as beautiful and proud as they

say?”

Full, lush lips pressed into a thin line. “Do

you plan on winning her as well?”

“Now why would I want to win the princess?”

Aleksi asked with a derisive snort. “A soft, spoilt, demanding

royal pain who’s so full of herself that she’s turned down every

offer of marriage presented to her.”

She said nothing, and Aleksi closed the short

distance between them, giving her his most charming grin. He had as

good an eye for women as he did for horses, and he intended to

return to his home with a string of broodmares and a wife to prove

to his father and the rest of his royal, full-blooded kin that

Aleksi was not some round house dwelling half-breed, but a

self-made man, as good as any of them.

“I would rather win you, kitten,” he said. He

reached up and pushed the scarf back from her head, spilling a mass

of thick, wavy curls as black as pitch down to her waist. When she

didn’t shy away or even twitch, he lifted a heavy tress between his

fingers, which shone russet in the sunlight. “I would rather marry

a woman of sturdy body and easy temper to bring my sons into this

world.”

Her spine lengthened and her eyes widened.

“Are you proposing marriage to me?”

“I am.”

“Why would you propose marriage to a woman

you know nothing about?”

“I know you are strong of mind and

long-limbed,” he told her as he stepped in even closer. He unwound

the lock of her hair and pushed it back behind her ear. “I know

your hair shines black and russet in the sun’s light, and that your

eyes flash green fire with sparks of gold when your pelt is

ruffled, as it is now, kitten.”

He leaned in and whispered into her ear. His

senses assailed with the sweet, seductive scent of exotic flowers.

“I know you’re as intrigued with me as I am with you, and that you

wonder what it would be like to breed with me.”

Slowly, she turned her head. Her mouth was no

more than a breath from his, teasing, tantalizing. “How are you

going to sire children with me or any other broodmare, you

strutting stallion,” she growled, pulling her blade in one swift

motion and pressing the point of it into his groin, “if I geld you

here and now?”

Aleksi went stock still for a heartbeat, and

then he laughed, low and rumbling. “So,” he said, stepping back and

letting her hair slowly slip through his fingers. “My kitten has

claws.”

“Claws she will not hesitate to use should

you accost her again,” she assured him with eyes blazing.

“I am forewarned,” he said with a courtly bow

and a grin.

“You are foresworn, Aleksandr.” She spun on

her heels and began to stride away, her black mane swinging in time

with her skirts.

“Wait,” Aleksi called out.

She stopped mid-stride, her silent companion

almost bumping into her as she whirled around to face him.

“What is your answer to my proposal?” She

glared at him as if her eyes truly could flash fire and raze him to

ash. “At least tell me your name.”

“Not ‘kitten.’”

Sahar sat at the royal family’s long table in

the center of the palace courtyard, sipping her spiced wine and

picking at the honeyed dates that were the last of the seven

courses served for the Feast of Autumn’s Eve. As soon as the dates

were cleared away the men riding in the festival’s races would be

introduced to the king, and two things would happen. The arrogant

ass Aleksandr who, by his accent and fair looks, hailed from the

Northern Steppes, would find out who she was, and she’d be the

first and only woman to stand and join the line of riders.

Her parents, King Asad and Queen Oona,

wouldn’t argue or humiliate her by trying to dissuade her from

riding in the races in front of an entire courtyard filled with

visiting royalty and the merchants and traders of their city. Once

announced publicly, they would have to stand by her. After all, it

was they who had told her all her life that she rode as well as any

man. Now she would have the chance to prove it.

Halah, her cousin and companion earlier today

when they had gone to look over horses for trade, had been the only

other person to know of Sahar’s intention to enter the races, and

she had kept her cousin’s secret well. Better than Sahar had. She’d

let it slip while challenging the braggart Aleksandr, who had the

gall to think his stallion capable of beating Lasair in a race and

worthy of breeding with her. He’d obviously assumed Sahar was some

simple maid who’d fall at his big feet and weep with joy and

gratitude that he considered her worthy of becoming his wife and

broodmare, not the proud, spoilt princess he had spoken of with

such disdain.

She drank down the last of her wine and felt

its easing warmth spread through her veins. Certainly, she had

faults enough. Her father, while proud of her swiftness of both

mind and body, had often lectured her on her rashness, while her

mother, herself a woman who had gone against the traditions of her

own clan as well as those of the desert tribes, had often stressed

the importance of choices and manners. No, her parents had never

spoiled her or her twin brother, Asim, other than with their love.