Charlotte Boyett-Compo- Wyndsheer

To: My husband, the weatherman. My very own Lycant with gentle hands and a warming smile. I love you, Tompe.

AUTHOR’S NOTE:

The world in which this novel is set is one entirely of my own creations. It does not exist in
any real place or in any real world or in
any
real time. Though the setting may look familiar, seem as though it belongs on Earth, trust me, it doesn’t take place here. It is a parallel place that only vaguely resembles our world. The time period is neither medieval nor futuristic but somewhere in between. There might be similarities to our world’s history but such likenesses are only there as reference points and are
not
to be taken literally.

As you read, you may come across what you take to be references to modern accoutrements, language and idioms. Likewise you may encounter things you are accustomed to seeing in historical novels or even in comic books. In this fanciful world I have created, this is simply the way its inhabitants speak and act and react. The words they speak are their own and not to be confused with the way the people of our world and of our time speak.

This work is a compilation of dreams and fantasies and wishes of my own fabrication. Their world is as I see it and it is peopled with characters who I labored hard to give birth. These characters live in a mystical place crafted entirely from the darker reaches of my very vivid imagination. They don’t know about your time or the time of your ancestors. To them, it is the here and now. To me, it is a world I long to visit.

So sit back and detach yourself from your here and now and journey to theirs. Suspend what you think you know and leave your mind open to the mystery of ... what-if?

Charlotte Boyett-Compo

Prologue

It was not a sound Jamie MacGivern could have expected and it startled him as he laid in wait for the eight-point white tail buck that had been eluding him for the last two days. It was the unmistakable drone of a small aircraft engine and the sputtering, coughing hiccup of the sound told him the craft was in trouble.

Looking up as the noise passed directly overhead to make the old amalgam fillings in his teeth throb, the Highlander narrowed his pale green eyes, a deep crease forming above the bridge of his straight nose. He caught just a flash of silver underbelly through the canopy as the plane sailed past in the sodden gloom of the late morning. A soft rain peppered his face for it had drizzled nearly all night and showed no signs of letting up. He had to blink away the intrusion of the raindrops, resisting the urge to shake the hair plastered to the sides of his face in an effort to remain as still as he could.

His long fingers instinctively flexed around the stock of the crossbow, his middle finger hovering over the trigger. Even as the noise careened away then grew to a deafening volume--that of an engine struggling hard to stay running--he silently returned his gaze to his quarry. The animal stood immobilized though its sensitive ears were twitching, its head held high. A second or two before the noise ceased to be, replaced by a thunderous boom that made him cringe, he watched the buck’s distinctive tail dip and its hindquarters flex, and knew any shot he made would do no more than graze the beast even if he managed to hit it at all.

Reluctantly, he lowered the weapon for his prey made a graceful leap and bounded into the thick concealment of the verdant forest, the rattling of its passing loud in the now silent woods.

“Fuck,” he spat as the ground around him rumbled, the vibrations spreading out from the point of impact. He could feel the faint tremors along his belly, elbows, and thighs as he lay on the wet mat of decaying leaves with the fecund stench teasing his nostrils. Lowering his head to his forearm, he squeezed his eyes tightly closed for a moment, striving not to bellow with aggravation. He lay there hissing angrily then shook his head at the interruption.

Sighing deeply, he got to his feet in the squishy carpet of detritus in which he’d been stretched out. For a moment he hung his head as a muscle ground in his lean jaw, his teeth ground brutally. His grip on the crossbow was so tight the knuckles of his hand had bled of color and his eyes were filled with ferocity. He spat out another expletive then walked to a tall oak and laid his weapon at its base. Furious and frustrated that he’d once again failed to bring down the buck, he turned on his heel and headed for the area where he knew the plane had gone down.

Tramping through the hip-high brush, he batted aside the low branches. The region where he’d been hunting was thickly overgrown and nearly impassable in places. It was high in the rugged Pionós Mountains--an area backpacking tourists avoided since it was well away from the range of high huts. The huts--used to provide shelter and food for hikers and mountaineers--were tended by rotating personnel during the mountain climbing season but the closest hut to where Jamie passed had no croo, as they are called by mountaineers, due to its remoteness. Because of that, he was the closest humanoid to the crash site.

It took nearly an hour for him to reach the scene. The closer he got to the place where the plane had gone down, the smell of burning rubber, spent fuel, and smoldering debris intensified, wafting to him on a quickening breeze. From the volume of the explosion, he did not expect to find survivors so he took his time picking his way. The crash of a small fixed engine plane in this wild section of the mountains was not unheard of, but it was an uncommon occurrence. He had no real desire to see the carnage, the possibility of charred bodies or headless corpses, yet that part of him that still bore some resemblance to humanity urged him on just in case a spark of life remained.

Lightning flared around him as he dug his toes into a steep bank to make his way up the incline. The soft raindrops suddenly became a steady bombardment of icy-cold pellets then a drenching downpour, making it hard to see through the curtain of water. As he crested the incline, the wreckage lay crumpled in front of him like a child’s broken toy, a few slender plumes of smoke rising into the gray light. Swiping a hand over his wet face, he surveyed the damage with no hope of finding life in the ruin of the plane.

But then he saw movement off to one side and his gaze narrowed as he swung his attention in that direction--sweeping the scene carefully until he saw a hand rake at the air, claw at it, heard a low, wet groan that set the hair stirring at the nape of his neck.

Hurrying forward, he saw a man and woman lying together, the male scrambling to push himself up and away from the female beneath him, his hand scraping at a piece of twisted wreckage at their head as he tried to gain leverage.

“Hang on!” Jamie called out as he skirted razor-sharp fragments.

The man twisted his head around to reveal a face streaked with blood. He squinted up at Jamie as though he couldn’t see him. “I can’t get it off,” he said in a deep, guttural plea. “Please, I can’t ....”

Once those words left the man’s mouth, he collapsed atop the woman, his hand sliding down the jagged metal, the base of his palm snagging on one serrated point.

Jamie knew the man was dead even before he hunkered down beside him and put two fingers to the side of the man’s neck. There was no pulse, no movement of his chest as he lay covering the woman with his much larger body. The female was all but hidden beneath his bulk.

As gently as he could, Jamie pushed the dead man over, wincing as the body flopped against the sodden ground. The woman’s face was turned to the side, her features hidden beneath stringy strands of wet dark hair. Reluctantly he reached out to touch her just below the jaw and was surprised to find a faint pulse though her flesh was clammy and cold. He looked down at her chest and saw a steady, slow movement.

A sharp crack of lightning rent the air and the wind howled viciously. He knew if the woman had any chance of survival at all he would need to move her out of the fury of the storm. Stepping over her legs, he slid his hands beneath her shoulder and legs and started to lift her--only to find she was anchored to the dead man at her side.

“What the hell is this?” Jamie grumbled as his gaze fell to where her wrist was shackled to the wrist of the dead man.

Hunkering down beside her, he reached out to tilt her head toward him, carefully dragging the wet hair from her face.

“Holy fucking shite,” he breathed as he took in the beauty of her face.

Though she had a nasty bump on her forehead and a livid bruise forming around it, her features were so delicate, so ethereal he was held spellbound despite the tempest surrounding him. Dark lashes hid the color of her eyes from him but the soft oval structure of her face, the slightly upturned nose, the high cheekbones and smoothness of her complexion drew his hand like a magnet and he traced rough fingers along her jaw, across her full lips, and down her slender neck. He could span her throat easily with his large hand and because he could a strange protectiveness leapt up inside him and he cocked his head to one side, unable to look away from the perfection of her lovely face.

“What did you do, lass?” he asked softly and let his hand wander down the center of her chest. As though they had a mind of their own, his fingers molded around one firm breast and squeezed lightly.

His cock hardened instantly and he jerked his hand back as though he’d been burned at the contact. He trembled, wanting this unknown woman so badly, needing her so desperately he wanted to roar like a beast.

Another brutal shriek of the storm broke the trance into which he’d slipped and spurred him into action. He shot a glance at the dead man’s hand and when he saw no key clutched there, moved over and began going through the pockets of the business suit that was now a soggy mass of material. Still he did not find the key to the handcuffs that linked the two together.

He started pushing aside the leaves and pieces of soaked insulation on the ground around the man until he found the key.

With the cuff dangling from her wrist, Jamie once more moved to the woman’s side and put his arms under her. He hefted her against him and began picking his way carefully back through the wreckage. It was a long way back to his cabin and the light was beginning to fade.

Chapter One

To his way of thinking she weighed next to nothing as he carried her through the forest, her head falling back over his arm so all he could see was the underside of her firm chin, the sweep of her long hair swaying against his leg. He would look down at her from time to time to stare at the steady pulse throbbing in her neck. It was the only way he had to make sure she was still alive, still breathing.

The rain had increased with the wind lashing brutally at him, making each step difficult on the rock-strewn ground. It had plastered her white blouse to her chest and he could clearly see the lacy outline of bra beneath. Each time he glanced down, his body throbbed with need, for it had been a long time since he’d held a woman so close to him.

As he picked his way over the uneven ground, he wondered how long it would take a search party to climb the barren stretch of mountain to locate the wreckage. He knew unless there had been a radio problem the pilot would have sent out a mayday, would have given their location. But given how far up the mountain the plane had crashed, the terrain into which it had plowed it might be days before a rescue team stumbled upon it.

His face filled with grim resolve, he knew once he had the woman safely at his cabin he would have to go back to the crash site and conceal every trace of his passing, make it look as if she had gotten loose and stumbled over a cliff and into the turbulent whitewaters of the Aimrid River far below. He would leave no trail for the rescuers to find her.

“You belong to me, now,” he said, his green eyes hard. “No one will ever find you where I’m taking you.”

Blinding light flashed above him and the strobe effect momentarily disoriented him. He stopped moving to wait for his eyes to readjust to the dim light. When he did, he heard the unmistakable drone of an airplane engine. Despite the violent storm, the searchers had arrived but he doubted the wreckage could be seen from the air in the murky gloom. The vast canopy of the thick forest growth would hide it.

Shifting her weight against him, he continued on, increasing his speed, more determined than ever to make it back as quickly as possible to the crash site to cover up her disappearance.

Half an hour later he was skirting his way around two tall rocky outcroppings and slipped carefully through a fissure that hid a vine-covered entrance into the vast cave system he called home. Sliding between two cascading vines, he entered the cave and bent over to lay the woman gently on the ground. He dug into the pocket of his jeans and pulled out a small tin of matches then reached for the lantern he kept hanging on a piton beside the entrance. He lit the lantern before bending down to pull the woman to a half-sitting position. Putting his shoulder to her belly, he lifted her to sling her over his shoulder for that was the only way he could carry her and the lantern at the same time.

Unhooking the lantern, he started down a narrow opening that led deeper into the cave. He held the lantern high to light his way for there were many pitfalls along the way--narrow cracks into which an unsuspecting traveler’s foot could slip. Peppered the length of the pathway as well were breaks in the rock that plummeted straight down and ended only God knew where. He stepped agilely over those openings and made his way ever further into the hushed stillness of the cave.

Down twisting, serpentine ledges and through fissures and past a maze of tunnels he traveled until he came to what at first appeared to be a dead end. But upon setting the lantern on a rocky overhang, a single push at the center of the seemingly solid wall made the entire section pivot inward with a scraping sound that echoed loudly.

He took up the lantern and carried her through the opening, turning to nudge the stone doorway with his knee. The portal closed quickly and only a knowing eye could have discerned where the opening had been.