Kiss of the Goblin Prince (38 page)

“Yeah, I do,” he said against her mouth.

She tore open the foil. Her fingers found his shaft and rolled on the rubber as he kissed her until she couldn’t breathe for the lust riding in her blood. He eased over her. She’d forgotten what it felt like to have a man’s weight above her, but her body knew what to do. And so did his. They moved together creating the magic only lovers can make, the ancient rhythm merging with the new as a spell of their own wove around them. Love.

Chapter 23

Roan held the plaque in his hand as if weighing it, then he handed it to Dai. “You can make it right.”

Dai nodded. The metal was cold and heavy in his hand. He placed his hand over the four names. The metal warmed as he altered the engraving. Then he lifted his hand. This time there were only three names engraved on the plaque: Fane, Anfri, and Brac.

He’d told Roan about seeing Fane, and how he was still repeating the curse and his death. Unable to break free because he wouldn’t face the consequences. He glanced at Eliza and the new life taking hold. She hadn’t told Roan yet. Would they know the baby when it was born? Would they want to know? He still hadn’t told Roan about Mave, but there wasn’t any point. Everything was as it should be.

Except one person was missing.

Meryn.

All of them hoped he would find his way back. His family was waiting. He’d make daily visits to Meryn, and he was sure Meryn would talk to him eventually. The alternative was too awful to think about. He had to make Meryn see life was worth fighting for no matter how different it was from the life they’d led before.

He turned his head and smiled at Amanda. It had been worth waiting nearly two thousand years for her to come into his life. Her touch banished so many dark memories and replaced them with light and love. Her lips curved as if she knew what he was thinking.

They would be sneaking around for a little bit. She wasn’t ready to tell Brigit, and he wasn’t ready to be Dad. He turned his attention back to the tree. With a little magic, he fixed the amended plaque into position.

No one gasped. They all just stood there looking at the names of those who didn’t survive the curse. The cool night air wrapped around them, summer still too far away to warm the nights.

Amanda pulled the gold wedding band out of her pocket. Brigit handed her a drawing folded into a tiny square. Together they put them in a small hole under the rose bush planted on top of the swords and torques and patted down the soil. No one spoke. There were no words to say in any language that could ease the loss of those who were no longer around.

She dusted off her hands and joined him, her hand slipping into his. Between them, the strands thickened with each look, each touch, each kiss that brought them closer together. He wasn’t afraid of where the future would lead because Amanda walked with him, holding back the shadows.

Chapter 1

Nadine surveyed the emergency ward of the hospital. What was it about the full moon that turned this place into an overflow of hell? Crowded would’ve been great. This was just madness.

She checked the stats of a man who would need stitches on the side of his face, and she let out a sigh. Two more hours to go. Gina owed her for this shift swap.

A nurse tapped her on the arm. “Nadine, you’re wanted at triage.”

Nadine frowned. She didn’t work the front counter.

When she saw the cop, her stomach tightened. Police never brought good news. What had her father done now? He’d barely been out of prison for two weeks.

She gave the officer a tight smile and forced herself to be professional. “How can I help you?”

“I’ve got a guy with a head injury who doesn’t seem to speak English.”

Nadine looked past the cop to the man sitting in the waiting room. Blood ran down the side of his face and stuck in his shaggy hair. His eyes looked red and irritated. But it was the clothes that struck her most. He looked like he’d crawled out of a third-world jail. His loose fitting tunic was worn with age, as were his pants and boots. None of it seemed quite right, as if he was wearing castoffs from another age. His gaze was firmly fixed on the floor and his shoulders slumped in defeat.

“He’s having some kind of episode. Freaked out when we brought him in.”

“What did he do?” She had no intention of being attacked by a psychiatric patient, yet he didn’t seem dangerous…just lost, locked in his own world. She’d seen that look before on a returned soldier who wasn’t coping.

“He was being a nuisance.” The cop paused then leaned a little closer.

“And?” Nadine prompted, still not sure she wanted to be involved.

“Waving a sword,” the officer said quietly.

Right. A sword. Of course. She glanced at the man, but he hadn’t moved. Not a third-world jail, a medieval jail. Had he raided a prop department? “How’d he get hurt?”

“No idea. He speaks gibberish. Look, I don’t want to take him down to the station. He needs help. Can you get him a psych consult?”

If she said no, the scruffy man would spend the night in lockup with real criminals and be back on the street by morning no better off.

“I’ll have a look at the wound, but unless he speaks French, he’ll have to wait until we can get a proper translator in.” A serious head injury could explain his lack of proper speech.

“Thank you.”

Nadine grabbed a pair of gloves, went through the security door and into the waiting room. A second cop pulled the scruffy man up from the hunched over position he’d been in. The man’s gray eyes focused on her. Shadows she didn’t understand gave him a haunted look, as if he’d seen too much. She couldn’t leave him in the care of the police; he was already traumatized.

He spoke, but his words were unintelligible. Fast and fluent. They had the rhythm of language that gibberish lacked. Nadine bent down so she was at eye level, but far back enough to be out of range if he lashed out with his feet. His hands were cuffed behind his back—even though the cops claimed he wasn’t a threat. “
Monsieur, parlez-vous français?
” She smiled encouragingly while she held his gaze and studied his eyes. The pupils were even and they weren’t dilated.

The man’s eyes darted between Nadine and the cops. His forehead furrowed as if he were trying to make sense of her words.

His voice was quiet but strong as he spoke again. This time in a different language.

“Pardon?” Nadine moved closer to listen again.

He inclined his head at a crying baby and repeated the same words more slowly as if she were simple.

She glanced at the baby and then at the man. He was talking about the crying child.
L’enfant.
But what was he saying? Nadine pointed to the shaggy man’s bleeding head. “You’re bleeding.”

That he seemed to understand, but he shook his head, spoke, and looked at the baby, adding extra sentences filled with force. Yet his words were formal and he stumbled over some as though this wasn’t his first language. It was no one’s language.

“I think he’s speaking Latin.” As she said it aloud it didn’t seem possible. Maybe she was wrong and he was speaking an obscure dialect of…of what? Not Italian. Breton? She glanced at the dust-covered man again. What was he covered in?

“Who the hell speaks Latin?”

“No one.” Nadine frowned. “It’s a dead language.” And the man speaking it looked like he should be dead, but had refused to quit.

His gaze lingered on her, gray and endless. There was something about him…a half-hidden nightmare glided through the back of her mind. The child began wailing in a higher pitch. The man shook as if he couldn’t bear the sound, tears pooled in his eyes, and he hung his head as if to hide them, repeating the same line about the baby over and over.

“The baby.” She turned to the cop who had come up to the counter. “Take the woman and baby up to triage and get them seen. They shouldn’t be waiting.”

Nadine touched the man’s shoulder to get his attention. He lifted his head as if expecting reproach. She smiled and softened her voice from the orders she’d given the cop.

“Look. The baby is getting help.” She pointed at the mother and child, now getting fast tracked through emergency. “Can I take a look at your head?” She pointed to his head, not sure how much he understood, but he didn’t seem disorientated or confused. He just didn’t comprehend the language.

He watched the woman with the baby be taken behind the doors. He blinked, but his tears had already tracked a line through the gray dust covering his face. Once they were gone, he nodded.

If he spoke no English, it was no wonder he was having an episode when the cops dragged him in. He had no idea what they were saying or where they were taking him. Yet he’d had enough compassion to ask that the baby be seen first. That said more about the man than anything else.

“Uncuff him and I’ll bring him through to the ward for a proper examination.” The cop gave a visible sigh and freed the man. He looked at her, smiled, and said something that had the tone of gratitude.

He rubbed his wrists and she noted the fresh grazes and cuts, but they didn’t bother her as much as the gray coating on his skin and possible damage to his irritated eyes or his lack of regular language. She noticed a gold broach securing his cloak around broad shoulders. It was a beautiful piece, two wolves chasing each other in an endless circle. If he’d been living on the streets, that would’ve been stolen. And he’d been picked up carrying a sword. Nothing about this man was adding up.

She shook her head. “Who are you?”

***

The woman in front of Meryn smiled. Her teeth were white against the honey color of her skin and around her neck was a gold necklace. A crucifix. A man was forever dying at her throat. He flinched at the symbol of Roman punishment, and her friendly smile faltered. She spoke, a question in the other language. Not that it mattered. He didn’t understand her.

Without the crying of the child he could almost think. He could almost shove the memories that tore at his mind away. Lock them back behind the walls he’d constructed when he’d become goblin.

The woman’s soft hands touched his and flexed his fingers, checking the cuts made when he’d fled the tower in the Shadowlands. The things his hands had done. So much blood. So much battle. So many things he hadn’t recalled while he’d been goblin. As if a goblin’s mind couldn’t hold all the horror. Now he remembered.

And he couldn’t live with the weight of his past.

He’d failed his wife and his children.

He’d failed his tribe.

He’d failed his king. Finding the traitor had been his responsibility. The pain he’d locked away when he’d surrendered to the goblin curse sucked him under, tore at his heart, and the screams of his family echoed in his head. This was the reason he had given up being human to run with the goblins and devote his life to the endless need for gold.

The play of light on the woman’s gold necklace held his gaze for a moment too long. The chain and cross hung just out of reach. It didn’t tempt him the way it had when he’d been goblin, but it offered salvation. In taking gold he could once again be goblin and free of the deaths his failure had caused. Gold didn’t hurt and cry and scream.

He glanced from the gold necklace to the green-brown eyes of the woman trying to help him. He tried to place the words that made no sense, but his mind was crowded with the memories.

He wanted the silence of being goblin. He wanted the pain crushing his chest to ease.

The crucifix swung in his vision as the bronze-skinned woman probed the wound on his head. Her hands were gentle on his tender skin. He wanted a piece of her calm and kindness.

In the Shadowlands there had been stillness. He’d known a measure of mindless peace. He didn’t understand the Fixed Realm anymore. It had changed beyond his understanding. He wanted to be goblin again. He understood the rules of the Shadowlands.

Gods, he was weak for wanting to go back.

What had happened to the man who’d raised an army for his king against the Romans? Not once, but twice? What had happened to the man who’d sworn to the rebellion and promised to free the Decangli from the Roman stranglehold?