Moon's Flower: Book 6 (Kingdom Series) (7 page)

She traced the lines of his mouth with her finger. Moved up the curve of his jaw, across his firm forehead and then back down again. Repeating the action and he let her and this time she understood the quivers in his flesh, understood the popping of muscle… because she hadn’t been tracing just a flower, she’d been touching the man.

Only his hard moan brought her back to the present, to the reality of what she was doing and she snatched her hand back, hugging it tight to her body as if burned. Every instinct in her screaming to get up and run away.

But as if he sensed it, he shook his head. “Don’t leave me. I don’t have much time left.”

Swallowing her panic, Calanthe took a moment to collect herself. “Why?”

“How much do you know about me?” he asked, touching his chest.

She shrugged. “Nothing.”

“No.” He sliced his hand through the air. “Not me, Jericho. But me, the Man in the Moon?”

Only that he existed. That the Man in the Moon controlled the shifting tides of the sea, brought the cloaking veil of night to the lands. But Calanthe’s life had always been dominated more by the sunlight than the darkness. Sun made her seeds sprout, fed her flowers so that they’d grow and bloom as they ought.

“Very little,” she ruefully admitted.

His smile was soft. “I’m a man, born of an entirely different place.”

She wrinkled her nose. “In Kingdom?”

“No.”

He laughed, and the sound shivered across her flesh, made her stomach curl in on itself.

“I wasn’t born in Kingdom. I was born far, far away. In a place called Earth.”

“Earth?” Of course she’d heard of Earth, a place filled with humans who read their stories and thought of them merely as myth, as tales to tell around a campfire. A place with no magic, and very little belief in it. “How did you get here?”

“Siria,” he said the name like it should mean something to her. But it didn’t. What she did notice though was that when he’d said the name it was cold and inflectionless.

She shrugged.

“She is the sun.”

Calanthe laughed. “I never knew the two of you had names. How odd that I wouldn’t know that. I see the sun and moon every day and never wondered about it. But how did she bring you here from Earth?”

Leaning back on his hands, he stared out at the night with an unseeing gaze. As if he weren’t looking at the forest, but back into the past.

“The moon and sun can travel across all planes of existence. From Kingdom to Earth and a trillion different realms in between.”

“Wow,” she breathed, not just a little amazed by that fact. “What have you seen?”

His smile was broad and so breathtaking that for a moment she really did forget to inhale.

“Galaxies.” He stared up at the sky. “The birth and death of planets and stars, of entire civilizations. Creatures so strange as to give you nightmares. Civilizations comprised of peoples with purple skin and tusks for mouths.”

“Purple skin and tusks for mouths,” she laughed. “You’re lying.”

“No.” His eyes twinkled. “I have seen things you could not even dream of.”

Excited, blood pumping as she tried to imagine it, she sat to her knees. “How old are you, Jericho?”

Blinking, as if coming back to himself, he turned toward her. “I’m not really sure actually. Time moves so differently here than it did on Earth. The days are so much longer. But I’ve been locked away in that castle for over two hundred Kingdom years.”

She frowned. “Then how can you safely move in between realms. I’ve always heard that only those from Kingdom can go to Earth and not age back to what they should be now.”

“True, and were I to actually leave Kingdom, I would surely die.” He said it with such bluntness, she didn’t think he’d actually mind if he did.

But just the thought of it made her heart want to seize with terror. She’d only just found him, and strange as it seemed, she knew deep down with every fiber of her being that Jericho was the excitement she’d been waiting her entire life for.

No, it wasn’t done. A fairy shouldn’t want more than what a fairy had. But being with him now, she was full. No longer empty, or cold, or depressed. He filled the hole, the ache. The night she’d met him as a flower, and now, meeting him in the flesh… he was her adventure.

It was wrong on so many levels, she knew that, and knew that should they get caught now it wouldn’t go well for her… but she simply couldn’t bring herself to care, because this was right.

She grabbed his hand, slipping her fingers through his. Looking down at their joined palms, he smiled and it made her heart sail.

“I live in the castle, up there.” He pointed to the moon and as much as she wanted to, she couldn’t see a castle at all. Nothing but the crags and cliffs of the moon. “The magic of Kingdom permeates my home. In essence a slice of Kingdom goes with me wherever I go.”

Wiggling just an inch closer, she tried to hide the blush. She knew she was acting bold, but she couldn’t seem to help herself. Not where he was concerned.

“But you’re here now.”

Lifting their hands he stared at it for a while and then shrugged. “Yes, for now. But I can only do this once a month.”

It was like a slap of cold water to the face. “Why?” She tried to hide the fact that she wanted to see him again, wanted to do this every night for the next million nights, wanted to talk of other planets and strange and exotic people, but she knew the sad note in her voice was giving her away.

Using his other hand, he traced her knuckles and his touch felt so good. Like a brand it burned straight through her, made her nerves tingle. But then he did something even more amazing. He lifted their hands and kissed each and every single one of her fingers. Lingering long between kisses and she couldn’t help herself from moaning because the pleasure was wild and racing and making her dizzy.

Her body reacted strangely, in a way it never had before. Her limbs felt heavy, why… even her thighs tingled, and her dress was suddenly much to tight on her chest.

She feared that perhaps she was dying. But was it possible to die from too much pleasure?

“I cannot stay long,” he finally whispered, and holding her gaze, she read the sincerity in his gaze.

“But we’ve only just met, Jericho.” She shook her head. Wishing there were someway to keep him with her. “If you knew of me already, knew how to find me, why did you wait so long to come and get me?”

It was an innocent question, she didn’t expect for the light in his eyes to dim, or the sadness that crept across his features. Cocking her head, she cupped his cheek. Now that she could touch him, she wanted to continue to touch him. It was almost an obsession. He’d be leaving soon and she wasn’t sure she’d ever see him again.

She nibbled her lip.

“That is a convoluted and twisted tale and if I had more time…” he sighed, the sound was loud and long and full of regret. It pained her to hear it.

“How much longer do we have?” she asked.

“Ten minutes at most.”

“So soon? Will I see you again?”

“As long as you want to, Calanthe, I’ll never stop coming.”

And this time, he was the one to close the distance between them. Yanking her onto his lap, he rubbed her back, paying particular attention to her highly sensitive wings. It made her body feel as if it’d gone up in flames. She shivered in his arms.

“Do you believe in love at first sight?” she whispered. Godmothers had always spoken of the myth. Fairies of course had laughed, because while a few of them worked to develop love matches between humans and nonhumans, fairies could hardly conceive of the notion as being truly real.

They loved their animals and flowers and fun… but love of one for another, in a sexual way… it simply wasn’t a part of them. But what she was feeling now for this man, this virile, mysterious Jericho was definitely
not
what she felt when she was around June.

His lips were on her forehead and she felt the stretch of them as he said, “I’ve seen it enough to know it is real.”

Pulling back, she gazed at him. “I am not a proper fairy, Jericho,” she whispered her most painful secret to him.

His eyes blazed and she hoped he understood what she implied.

Tipping her chin up with his finger, he pulled gently, tugged her toward his lips and she fell into the kiss with the ardent passion of a virgin in love.

She didn’t know what she was doing, or if she was even doing it right. But she kissed and kissed and kissed him and when he growled and his tongue skated between her pinched lips, forcing her to open them and he slipped inside, sounds she’d never in her life made spilled from her.

Purrs and mewls and her hands were frantic to touch him, all of him. His tongue tasted like heaven and the chords of his muscle flexed beneath her manic hands. After a moment, he laughed and pulled away and his eyes glowed and she knew hers did too. That’s when she noticed that in her frenzy to touch, she’d actually scratched his face so hard there were now welts.

“Oh, my… I’m… I’m so sorry, Jericho.” She covered her mouth in shame.

But he pulled her hand away and kissed her lips once again. No tongue this time, which made her pout. But only a little.

“I’ll wear it like a badge of honor, my beautiful, sweet Calanthe.” And with a long sigh, and one final kiss to her brow, he made to stand.

Jumping off his lap, she scrabbled to her feet. “You’re leaving?”

Even as she said it a glimmering blue veil shimmered beside him. It was a long tunnel that drew up into the very heavens.

“I don’t have a choice, or trust me, I wouldn’t.”

“Then let me come with you.” She grabbed his hand, bold in her declaration of love.

Brushing his knuckles along her cheeks, he sighed. “I wish you could. But the magic would never allow it.”

Where just seconds ago her heart had been ready to burst with joy, it was now squeezing with pain. “You will come back to me, yes?”

Releasing her, he walked toward the veil and her heart was literally breaking. It felt like ripping a part of her soul in two and watching it float away, helpless to stop it.

“Always,” he whispered and then he was gone and there was nothing to show he’d ever been. There wasn’t even a footprint in the grass.

Calanthe stood in the middle of the woods with a dumbfounded expression. Jericho had excited a passion in her, a desire that (while she couldn’t completely understand it) made her want to be reckless and free and now it was all gone.

Just gone.

There’d been so many questions and not nearly enough time.

The rustling of a bush snagged her attention. She didn’t turn because she already knew who it was. “June,” she whispered.

June’s eyes were bold and bright. “Calanthe.”

And she knew by the way her friend said it, that she’d seen it all. There was no excuse to give; there would have been none anyway. June’s countenance was practically dumbfounded as she said, “My friend, what are you doing?”

And though it grieved her that Jericho was no longer here, she could smile, because the mere fact that June had seen him too was proof that he wasn’t a dream, wasn’t a façade of her most secret yearnings, he was a man and he was real and she loved him. Desperately. And in one month he’d be back.

“Falling in love, June,” she whispered and tipped her gaze heavenward. “Completely, madly, wildly in love.”

~*~

The next month was excruciating for Jericho. Watching Calanthe day in and day out, desperate to touch her. To hold her. To kiss her as he had. To feel her tiny shudders, the way she trembled in his arms… it was painful. The forced separation only increased his need, his obsession to be with her.

His moods were foul, every night that he had to share space and time with Siria only increased his agitation. He did not want to be with her. Did not want her company… she’d forced this existence upon him, and granted, had she never brought him to Kingdom he would never have met Calanthe but that was a very small consolation prize. Because being unable to have and hold the treasure you craved most in life was a torture all its own.

Tomorrow he could go back to her. Somehow they’d gone through another month and he was so grateful that Calanthe hadn’t created another moon flower because that would have been so much worse. To have her touch his body, but him be unable to touch hers…

Gripping the railing, he stared hungrily at the scene below him. Every night Calanthe returned to their woods. To their knoll, she sat and she stared up at the moon and sometimes would even wave.

One time, she’d laid on her back and held up a thin sheaf of bark with an etching that read, “I miss you,” and it was like someone had ripped his heart from his chest. He’d watch as she’d create the most amazing blossoms of pinks and blues and violets and silver. In short, he was awed and fell more surely and deeper in love.

He stayed where he was at, until he no longer could. Until the navy blanket of sky began to pierce through with bolts of pink and orange, until his body trembled from the ache of standing too close to the sun. Even in its weak form, the sun was too much.

For a split moment the shaded mirage of Siria appeared before him wearing a shocked expression on her face because he’d never stayed outside this long. Head throbbing, mouth tasting like cotton he knew he couldn’t stay any longer. Weakened, he shot like an arrow back to the safety of the castle and gulped in mouthful’s of air as his body shook with a run off of adrenaline and pain.

He slept fitfully all that day, waking from dreams much to real. Panting because he realized he hadn’t been holding Calanthe, hadn’t been inhaling her sweet perfume, and hadn’t been pushing deep into her pliant and silky, wet body. By the time the veil of night called to him, he jumped from his bed and ran to dress.

It took only seconds. He wanted to take more time, wanted to shave his whiskers and make himself look as presentable as he possibly could, but he’d waited so long and the anxiety of the moment was simply too much.

Pulling out the same outfit he’d worn the first night they’d met, he tossed it on and brushed his teeth and that was the extent of his primping.

Running to the railing he knew, damn the consequences, he would not be jumping in between realms tonight. He was going straight to her.