The Mark of the Vampire Queen (25 page)

“Your match.” He gave a slight bow, though he didn't take his eyes off Malachi. “My lady sends her high regards for your skill.”

Malachi nodded, wiped his brow with the back of his hand and turned to offer his gasping mate a hand out of the water.

Diplomacy. Jacob managed to create a mask of it as he turned to the Australian, though from the man's look he suspected he wasn't concealing his expression of murderous fury well enough. “So, this drink—”

“Watch out!” The man shouted it a mere second after Jacob sensed it and spun. The movement kept the spear from going through his kidney. Instead, it tore into the meat of his thigh, the blade end as razor sharp as a sword.

He had time to see the red spurt of blood, telling him Malachi had hit a vital artery. But that thought was immediately consumed by a surge of bloodlust so strong, he knew it didn't come all from him. Perhaps most of it didn't.

Malachi and the Viking charged, slammed into his body and took him down into the water. Struggling for control of emotions not his own, plus the male fury that was, he reached out to her.
My lady?

Kill him.

Every man had a reservoir of primal rage. He'd learned that in fighting at Gideon's side. When opened, fear disappeared, and there was only blood. Propelled by the force of his lady's reaction, it consumed everything but instinct now. The solid spike of fury in her response confirmed the source of the nuclear rage boiling through his blood. It made him understand why she commanded so much fear and respect. If she turned even a tenth of what was rushing through him on her enemies, none of them would survive it.

Surging up, he seized the neck of the staff and twisted it decisively. Malachi had no opportunity to let go, crying out as Jacob broke his wrist and followed it up with a jab that shattered his nose.

His vision was graying, his leg going numb.
Oh, no you don't,
Jacob silently snarled to his weakening body.
Not until we do our lady's bidding.

He dispatched the Viking as an afterthought with a second precisely aimed blow to the windpipe that crushed his airway completely, if the sudden look of panic and clutching of the throat were any indication. Jacob flipped the spear as Malachi stumbled back to a fighting stance and raised his own, but Jacob's point was already against his chest, inside his guard.

“Two against one…some code of honor,” Jacob spat, noting that the knee-deep water in which he was standing was swirling with his blood. His leg was slick with it.

“We have no honor other than what our Masters permit us to have.” Malachi dropped his weapon and went to his knees. Jacob had to give him points for bravado. His expression was cool and indifferent, though his chest was laboring, a tremor running through his hands. “My Master concedes the match. On his honor and mine, which serves his will, may his life be forfeit to your lady if he lies.”

It was a mouthful to get out while facing the fatal end of a spear. Jacob forced himself to still his forward motion while keeping enough pressure to create a trickle of blood down the man's stomach. He was getting dizzier and didn't dare grip it harder or he'd betray himself by impaling the man.

My lady?

“Let him go, Jacob.” She spoke just behind him. When he tilted his head, he saw she was in the water with him. The surf made her skirts float in rippling waves around her calves and bare feet.

Jacob managed five steps toward her before the spear fell from his fingertips. He barely felt it. His knees gave way, mortifying him, but she caught him, easing him to his back. The hands of the Australian were on him as well, taking him to the wet sand, his friendly face and concerned hazel green eyes just to the left of his lady as he stepped back and gave Lyssa a respectful distance. His hands were red with blood. So were hers.

Looking down at himself hazily, Jacob saw as fast as the water was washing it away, the blood was still spurting. Then her hand was over it. “Femoral,” he said. “Going to be dead.”

“No. It's already healing as we speak. Your third mark gives you a remarkable ability to knit wounds, though you'll need some of my blood. After you drink, you'll be as good as new in less than half an hour.” Her green eyes still held the glimmer of red fire he'd felt racing through his whole body when Lord Belizar had apparently ordered his servant to spear him through the back. “You won't be able to get out of your duties here that easily, Sir Vagabond.”

Bringing her hand to her throat, she extended one finger, pressed into the artery in a practiced move that immediately welled with blood. Jacob blinked. His fuzzy brain slowly processed the fact she'd fitted an ornamental metal tip over her forefinger, allowing her to make the clean and fast puncture.

“Other women carry lipstick. Breath mints…”

“Sssh.” She bent over him, pulling her hair over to the opposite shoulder so it fell forward and curtained him as she brought her throat within reach of his mouth. “I command you to drink. Your ability to heal
is
phenomenal with the third mark, but you've not matured in it long enough for us to delay.”

As she felt his lips close over the wound, drawing in her life force, Lyssa closed her eyes. The wound under her hand was slowing even now, but his blood loss had been great. At one time, she supposed she'd understood these power games that sated her kind's bloodlust, their need to prove domination. She'd drawn back from that in the past two years, after Rex and Thomas.

As recently as the last Council Gathering, she would have admired Lord Belizar's canny test to determine the suitability of her servant and the test of her own mettle. Power was always shifting, and a vampire was a vampire. Such challenges confirmed that those in leadership positions deserved to be there. She understood all that, had even helped tailor those dual strengths and failings into the present structure they had that kept the more brutal practices to a minimum, but it didn't make her feel any less furious, imagining that spear coming at Jacob's back.

She'd worried so much about him not being prepared for this event, she'd overlooked her own need for a refresher course in vampire politics. She was angry at herself. Just because she was weary of always being on her guard was no excuse for allowing herself not to be. Jacob had handled himself more than capably, winning the respect of the spectators. Servants would report back to their overlords, Region Masters and Council members what they had seen, that Lady Lyssa had chosen her servant wisely.

Instead of being glad, triumphant, it made her head hurt. Earlier he'd defied her as a male was wont to do in the face of another man's challenge, but when it came to the value of his own life, his obedience to her had been more important to him. He'd
waited
for her permission to defend himself.

What have I done to deserve you? What horrible thing did you do to deserve
me? She didn't let him hear such thoughts, of course. She was aware of the others retreating. Malachi. Devlin, with a short bow. His Australian Mistress, Lady Daniela, was known and liked by Lyssa, for all that she ran a small territory and was not considered of much consequence among this Gathering. She was here, however, because she was a full-blood, born vampire. Lyssa would not soon forget her servant's aid to Jacob, which likely had saved him from an even more grievous injury.

She also noticed he was regaining his lucidity, on several levels. His tongue had gone from a functional press against the wound to a swirling pattern, his lips pressing against her skin with remarkable sensual intent. He knew exactly how sensitive her throat was, having been a quick study from the first. Over their short time together he'd taken every opportunity to practice.

It brought to mind one night in her rose garden, when he'd somehow managed to talk her into lying naked under the stars with him. He'd started at her toes, exploring every part of her with his mouth, asking with a combination of husky spoken words and thoughts how each contact felt. If she liked this better…or that. By the time he reached her hip bone, words were no longer articulated. He was simply reading the swirl of her responses as an answer.

Drinking a vampire's blood could arouse a human, for usually the vampire ensured the servant was ingesting the proper chemicals to spur that reaction. With the second mark, Jacob had asked her never to use the pheromones on him again. Except for the night with his brother to override his objections, she had honored that request. It always moved her how aroused he got despite the pain. Or because of it. His choice not to explore that dark part of himself analytically might amuse her, but when he allowed it free rein, its power was overwhelming to her senses.

His
response could be explained in a variety of ways. But since he didn't have any pheromones to release, she found it difficult to explain why the touch of his lips in this very public place caused an immediate flow of heat through her body, into fingers chilled from the lack of movement during her meeting with the other Council members. She had her arm diagonally across his hips, low, where she'd placed her palm on his thigh wound to gauge the rate of healing, the stemming of the blood loss. Now his cock was hardening, pressing up against her forearm, making it an irresistible compulsion to shift her grip and close over him. Because they were still within the tide line, a gentle surge of water lapped over his body, across his belly, over her folded legs and bare feet. The water rushed over her fingers, gave her knuckles a lick of cool foam while the heat of him increased, as well as the thickness which filled her so well.

Since vampires expected sexual interaction between servants and their Masters and Mistresses, particularly here, there was nothing technically inappropriate about her indulging the moment. Except she had been with Thomas for some time, and she'd not made the monk break his vows of chastity except once. Even before that she tended to be more private in her personal, direct indulgences. Straddling Jacob, letting her wet skirts cling to his bare body as she rode him to sate the longing he stoked inside her would be a bit shocking, particularly for what they knew of Lady Wentworth. But God, how she wanted him. It never seemed to stop for either of them, no matter what they faced. Worry, anger, passion, joy, danger…everything they felt together or about one another seemed to lead to this need to join, to reaffirm the inseparable bond the marks gave them. Or something more.

A soft whisper of air escaped her lips when his large hand came up to cradle her face. He increased his fervency at her throat, the soft trim of his beard stroking her collarbone and the top of her sternum.

Jacob. Stop, before you embarrass me before this mob.

Your taste is sweet, my lady. I must have you to regain my full strength. I'm sure of it.

With an effort comparable to the removal of a vital organ, though she knew it only appeared as if she calmly extricated herself, she pulled back. As she rose and stood over him, he propped himself on his elbows and stared up at her face, raw hunger in his expression. She had to stifle a groan. His lean body lay in the shallow surf completely naked, the blood washed away and wound almost completely healed, such that all she saw was an expanse of muscle slick with the water's passage over him in waves and moon-illuminated drops. The brace of his shoulders and elbows bearing his weight made his biceps round, his broad chest taut. Every curve emphasized, as well as his long, proud cock, the weight of his testicles.

All of it hers to do with as she wished, when she wished. On her terms. The reminder as well as her surroundings helped her rein in her response.

“I will have you when I say it's time, Jacob. Rise now.” At his ironic look, she bit the inside of her cheek. “Don't test me, Sir Vagabond.”

A twinkle sparkled through his beautiful blue eyes as he got to his feet. The effort cost him, for she knew it would be a couple of hours before he was restored to full strength, but he made it into a smooth, lithe move, giving her a slight bow as he rose. He was so much taller than she that the moon haloed him, disturbing her. She couldn't help reaching up and threading her hands through the wet hair that brushed the tops of his shoulders, letting her fingers play along the ridge of bone and muscle there. She drew her hand away before he could take it as an invitation. His hungry cock was still erect and too temptingly close.

Damn it, why the hell shouldn't she have him? Why did appearances have to matter so much? She didn't care about any of this. His blue eyes were so bright, their color somehow getting more brilliant by the moment, more blue than she'd ever recalled before. Calling to her. Taking a step forward, the ground didn't seem to be where she thought it was.

Jacob caught her hand when she stumbled, making it appear as a hitch in her stride caused by the weight of her clothes. “Be careful of your skirt, my lady. I apologize for making your clothes wet. Would you like me to carry you from the water, take you back to our rooms so you can change?”

She wasn't sure if she nodded. She hoped she did, so it wouldn't look incongruous, her servant gathering her in his arms and lifting her to stride off the shore. She had to fight not to close her eyes. The colors were getting blinding. Nausea was surging forth at a rate that brought a flood of panic with it.

Hold on, my lady. It's all right.
Jacob's voice, soothing, helping her balance the desperation. She'd fought things in the course of her life that would have given an archangel nightmares. So this emotional panic attack—no other term for it—was a new symptom, something else out of her control. Everything was starting to be out of her control. She had to go…fly…She couldn't…Why was the world so bright? It was like the sun, the threat of burning. The consumption of fire…

“A good match, as I said. Tomorrow evening perhaps I can think of a suitable way for Malachi and Jacob to make up. Something we'll all enjoy.”