Lyon (2 page)

Behind him stretched the bulk of the island called Île de la Cité. Ahead of him, at its western tip lay the Parc Vert Gallant, a triangular spit formed by centuries of sediment deposits. Jutting into the Seine from just below the bridge, it pointed downstream like the prow of a ship.

Stepping into the park, he quickly swept the banks with his eyes, but saw nothing move. Where were they?

The crooning reached him again, louder and more beguiling this time. He walked the perimeters of the park where land met water, searching more keenly.

Here, the fresh natural odors of loam and vegetation filled him, offering a welcome respite from less pleasant smells of brick and smoke above in the bustling city. Cities were entertaining in their own way and on occasion, but why anyone of means would choose to inhabit an urban area in preference to the vast expanses of rural terrain that lay outside its borders was beyond his reasoning. Something in his soul tied him to the land.

Suddenly, he whipped around. The crooning had come again, this time from the park's north bank. An unanticipated thrill engulfed him, prickling his skin, and hardening his cock to ever-greater dimensions.

For this time, the sound had brought with it something new. A precious fragrance. It entwined the call, separating itself from Human smells and marking itself as peculiar. It was an unmistakable scent. That of Faerie. Aroused Faerie.

Was it possible he'd so easily located the very female he'd come to Paris to find? He paced the length of the north shore again, more impatient than ever for a first glimpse of the river nymphs. Convinced now, that King Feydon's third daughter was among them.

Never mind that until this moment he'd been aggrieved at this duty and reluctant to meet her. Never mind that having
her
find
him
the very night of his arrival in Paris seemed an errand too easily accomplished. Never mind that it appeared she was inexplicably of the sea, rather than of the land.

One thought and one only rode him—that within minutes, in this very park, he would make her his. Reason could wait until after his cock had found a haven in her.

His eyes scanned the bank. Where was she, damn it all?

Something stirred the river just beyond a patch of grassy silt beneath a plane tree. A lithe form rose from the depths, water streaming from its dark hair and slicking over shoulders and full, tipped breasts. Silhouetted against the sunset's brilliant orange reflection on the Seine's surface, a nymph reached toward the park embankment. Bracing her arms there, she pulled herself higher and turned to sit onshore with her glistening back toward him.

Lyon devoured the distance between them. Earlier, he hadn't wanted to find her, but now that he had…

He came to stand just behind her, his legs warm on either side of her river-chilled spine. Twin opalescent dorsal fins at her shoulder blades twitched against him, like the gentle flutter of faerie wings.

Her body was sleek and curved, beautiful and mysterious. Her hair was a dark wet scarf, its length wrapped once around her neck and its ends draping forward to cling damply at her hips and lap. The tip of her tail remained hidden, still swallowed by the Seine.

His hands touched the sides of her face and caught her hair, smoothing it from her cheeks and unwinding it until its length hung free down her back, soaking the front of his trousers.

Beyond her he heard two more nymphs making their way to shore, but he ignored them. This one was Feydon's daughter. From the moment he'd drawn near to her, he'd been certain of it.

Slipping his hands under her armpits he gently lifted her dripping figure clear of the river. The sooner he got her on land, the sooner she'd dry enough to transform for him.

Over her shoulder, her head angled his way, but otherwise she didn't acknowledge him.

Other heads had swiveled toward him as well, for the crowds had spilled down the staircases on either side of the bridge and out into the park. Human voyeurs, eager to be shocked and entertained, craned their necks and whispered.

“You see nothing,” he murmured in their direction. Eddies of air caught his words and carried them, spreading a mindspell throughout the atmosphere of the park and beyond.

One by one, the gawkers turned away and forgot what had captured their interest in the first place. No longer would they be able to detect him or the fey in any way. The more perceptive among them could still see had they chosen to do so, but now they would no longer be inclined to look.

Turning the nymph to face him, Lyon anchored her against him with a muscular forearm at her lower back. Of necessity, he supported her entire weight, for she would remain unable to stand on her own until the transformation occurred that would replace her tail with two limbs.

His gritted his teeth at the thought of the wait ahead. As a protection against rape, nymphs' mating cavities were sealed until their bodies had been sufficiently aroused by their partners. It would take at least a half an hour on land before her tail would bisect. Only then would she be available for mounting.

He pulled back to see her, but she kept her face averted. Her arms lay on his chest and gleamed with the phosphorescence of sea creatures that haunted only the deepest parts of the ocean. It would fade with her metamorphosis, disappearing completely if she remained on land. Which, if things worked out as he expected, she would.

The curtain of her hair streamed over shoulders made strong by many days of battling sea currents. It partially cloaked her like ropes of wet satin hanging almost to her knees.

Against him, her ice-blue breasts soaked his shirt in dual fat circles. A dozen or more strands of sumptuous jewels draped her neck. Frigid, pointed nipples peeked from among them, poking his chest as hard as two fingertips.

Having grown to its usual legendary proportions, his long-suffering cock nudged her through his trousers, beyond anxious for a taste. It occurred to him that wedding this half-Faerie might not be as bad as he'd feared.

“Look at me,” he growled.

With the smooth elegance that typified water-dwellers, she lifted her gaze. His head jerked back as he got his first look at her face, for it bore telltale pearlescent V-shaped scales.

“Twelve hells! You're a Nereid?”

She cocked her head. “You expected something tamer?”

Damn! King Feydon had saddled him for life with a Nereid? A nymph who was equal parts sea-faerie and she-devil?

Her hands clutched the hard swells of his biceps as though she feared he'd withdraw from her. “I am the king's child—the one you seek,” she assured him.

“Your name?” Lyon heard himself ask.

“Sibela, my love.” Her voice was pleasing, her every utterance a lilting chant of the kind that had lured legions of males to their doom.

She tugged him closer and her lips found his jaw, nibbling delicately along it. Then she licked his cheek with a firm upward sweep of her abnormally long tongue. He'd forgotten that the Nereid liked to taste their men.

He heard a splash and used the excuse to turn his face from her. A distance behind her, two more of her kind had levered themselves up on the banks. Their covetous eyes ran over him as they began drying themselves with crisp ruby and gold maple leaves as big as his hands, anxious to hurry their own metamorphoses.

Sibela's eyes flashed seashell pink, then green again and her tailfin slapped the earth at his feet, its two sharp points ripping at his boots. Her melodious voice was the yowl of a harpy now as she scolded and warned them off, laying claim to him. The acolytes shrank back, but didn't go.

Lyon winced, envisioning his future with this creature.

“What are Nereids doing in the river?” he asked, silently cursing King Feydon. “Your kind normally frequent the Mediterranean or even the oceans, leaving the rivers to Naiads.”

“I've come for
you
,” she whispered, all smiles and sweetness again.

“How did you know to come searching for me here?” he asked, suspicious.

“News of your coming and the reasons behind it was brought to me by the currents. I know what you want of me tonight. And I am willing.” Claws ripped at his shirt, opening it and pushing it off his shoulders. “Eager.”

Her story was viable. It was no secret that he and his brothers had begun searching out brides of late. And he was well aware that EarthWorld's waterways circulated such gossip more rapidly than its land roads.

Cool hands slid lower around him to knead the cheeks of his buttocks through his trousers. Her sea-green eyes turned sly and knowing as she ground her groin against his and felt how much he wanted her.

Instinctively, he shifted aside, evading her overture. He stared down at her, shocked at himself. His body was well primed for a mating, so why the fuck had he done that?

She was glaring at him now, clearly wondering the same thing. “Lie with me,” she coaxed.

Feeling that everything was wrong about this, Lyon nevertheless summoned a grim smile. “Yes. Of course.”

He swung her into his arms and carried her farther onto shore, leaving a trail of liquid phosphorescence in their wake. She touched his cheek and something akin to panic filled him when he realized he felt no special attachment toward her.

Where was the instantaneous bonding Nicholas and Raine had felt toward King Feydon's first two daughters upon meeting them? Where was the craving to join his body to Sibela's to the exclusion of all others? The kind of impatient desire he'd witnessed in Nick, only when he was in Jane's presence? The intense, selective need even his remote brother Raine had been unable to hide when Jordan was near?

As he lay her upon a soft bed of reed grasses a distance away from shore, the realization that he felt nothing above ordinary lust toward the female in his arms shook him. Yet his body did clamor to claim hers, and he took heart from that.

So he stretched himself on the ground beside her, preparing to mount her here on the very spot where Jacques de Molay, Grand Master of the Knights Templar, had been burnt at the stake in medieval times. She was willing and her body would give his ease. More importantly, their joining would initiate the protection that a lengthier mating during Moonful tomorrow night would greatly extend and reinforce.

But he was certain now that she would not leave her stamp upon his heart. No woman ever had.

Lying with a forearm pillowing her head, he nudged her onto her back and ran his hands over the bones of ribs and hip, then lower. As her body dried, a shallow furrow was forming along the central length of her, from groin to tailfin. The flat of his fingers traced over it, slicking away the droplets of seawater that had pooled in the depression.

“How long?” he growled, as desire rose hotter in him.

Seawater eyes brimming with sexual promise caught his. “Soon, my sweet.”

Sweet?
It was obvious from her tone that she enjoyed the fact that he was suffering for want of her.

His finger found the tip of a luminous breast amid the tangle of rubies, pearls, and other less exotic stones encircling her neck. Hooking an inexpensive strand from amid the more costly necklaces, he lifted it for closer study.

“Where did you come by all this?” he asked, nodding toward the bounty.

She snatched it from him and carefully patted it back into place. “From here and there. My most recent finds were from the hold of a vessel. A sunken one littered with dead Spaniards who were so kind as to leave a trunk full of gems at my disposal. However grateful I was for their gifts, they proved quite a trial.” Her eyes were cunning as she slid her hand lower between them. “For their flaccid organs provided little in the way of entertainment.”

He caught her hand, thwarting it from finding him. “Do you think to make me jealous with your talk of other men?”

“No. Of course not.” She shook off his restraint and he let her. “It's only that your carnal exploits are the stuff of legend and I wish to assure you that as a woman of experience, I'm your match in such matters.”

Her hand found his cock then, and her voice turned intimate. “And I find myself hungry tonight for a more lively joining with a far greater treasure than limp Spaniards.”

Clawed fingertips pricked through his trousers, fondling his tumescent shaft.

Hissing inwardly between his teeth, Lyon gave her a warning squeeze. “If you want my ‘treasure' so badly, I suggest you exercise care not to damage it before it can perform as you like.”

She looked ready to speak, but then something beyond him caught her eye. Abruptly, she rose on an elbow to glower menacingly over his shoulder. Slithering on their bellies across the grass, the others of her kind had trailed them and had drawn too near to suit her.

Reminded of Sibela's wrath, they halted a distance away combing their hair with their fingers and eyeing him.

With mechanical expertise, his fingers continued to caress, deepening the trench along Sibela's tail. But his mind worked apart from his hands. “How is it that King Feydon's third daughter comes from the river instead of land?”