WINDWEEPER (10 page)

Easing away from Liza, Conar stood and walked to the water, knelt, scooped up a double handful of the milky green fluid, and splashed it over his face. "I feel like hell," he told his wife.

Eyeing the empty bottles strewn about, Liza smiled, but it was a smile filled with concern for him. "I've no doubt you do, Milord."

After shaking his head to fling away the water, he look over his shoulder at her. "You don't mind being a renegade with me, lady?"

"I would rather you stay here and fight for your rightful place, but if leaving is what you think best, I will gladly go with you." Her tone let him know she thought what he was doing was wrong.

Standing, Conar glowered at her. "You think I'm running away?"

"Isn't that what you're doing?"

"No!" he spat. "I'm leaving before any real wedge can be driven between my father—my King—and me! Maybe once he cools off, he'll realize he was wrong."

"Think again!" came a breathless voice from the archway. Hern stood panting, his run from the seagate, down the spiraling steps to the Grotto, having winded him. He held his right side with a tight hand; his face lined with a strong grimace of pain. "Your father called the Tribunal together a little while ago. He asked for an abrogation of your inheritance and is conferring the title of Prince Regent on your treacherous twin!"

"Galen?" Liza whispered. "How could he?"

Conar merely looked at his old mentor. He neither registered the hurt he felt, the betrayal, nor the deep, abiding anger building in his calm face. He put his hands on his hips and took a deep breath. "It should have been Coron, even Dyllon, but if Galen's who he wants—"

"It was who the Tribunal demanded!" Hern snapped.

Conar shrugged. "Let them do whatever they want."

"You don't mean that! You have to stop this, brat!"

"I can't stop it."

"You can fight," Liza parried.

"I already fought." Conar snorted with fatalistic acceptance. "And lost."

"Damn you, Conar!" Hern shouted. "Fight for your rights. Your daughter's rights. If the Tribunal accepts this abrogation, the babe will no longer be considered in line for the throne!"

"It doesn't matter anyway," Conar told them. "We won't be here to worry about it."

Hern took a few steps toward Conar. "I thought I taught you to stand your ground, boy!"

Something stirred in Conar. Something dark and evil, lethal, but he kept a closed lid on the coiling serpent struggling to get free. He felt Liza staring at him and returned the glare. "What the hell are you looking at, woman? What is it you think I can do?"

"I want you to stand up for yourself, Conar! Stand up for our daughter's birthright! Galen McGregor has no business sitting on the throne of this land and you know it. How can you allow that to happen after all he has done to you?"

"Make your father see how wrong he is about you, Coni," Hern encouraged. "He is letting his pride cripple both you and him! Talk to him. You have to try!"

"I can't make the man see what he refuses to see, Arbra! To him, I don't exist anymore."

"I ought to beat some sense into the both of you!" Hern shouted. He jabbed a rigid finger toward Conar. "
You
, more so than your sire!"

"Don't try it, Hern. I have nothing left to lose. This will be one time when you'll have to kill me before I buckle under!" Conar stood his ground, fury racing to his brain with the heady wine.

Hern stared at the man he helped raise, the man he always thought of as his own son. He took in the set of Conar's shoulders and wondered when they had become so wide, so strong-looking. He flinched at the fierce gleam in those pale eyes. He knew it would take more of a beating than the stubborn brat deserved to make him back down this time.

Exasperated, he threw his hands in the air. "Then take the cowardly way out, Conar! I won't try to stop you!" Hern stalked from the stone corridor, shouting over his shoulder: "The gods help you, lady. Your man has gone mad!"

Conar turned a closed face to his wife. "If you're going to come with me into exile, Madame, the least you can do is stand behind my decisions!"

"Even though I know them to be wrong?" she asked.

"Right or wrong, you will either abide by them, or you had better stay here!" His voice was brittle, curt, sharp.

"Perhaps you would rather I stay!" she shouted. "There would be no one to tell you how stupid you are being!"

"Is it stupid to know when you are beaten?"

"It is stupid not to fight for what is by rights yours! Only a coward slinks off into the night!" She turned her back on him, starting away, but he laid his hand on her arm.

Spinning her around to face him, he didn't realize what a strong, punishing grip he had on her until he was staggered by the slap she sent to his left cheek.

"Stop manhandling me, Conar McGregor!"

Conar winced at the stinging fire pulsing though his cheek. He was amazed that such a small woman could have such force behind her hit.

"Never do that again!" His nostrils quivered with rage. She had managed to unleash the coiled serpent within him and the reptile was ready to strike.

Liza watched the fury spreading across her husband's face. She'd seen that look once before. She tried to snatch her arm free of his grip, but he viciously jerked her.

"Did you hear me?" he snarled.

Liza struggled, but he only tightened his grip, her whimper seeming to excite him. His free hand plastered her body tightly to his. Her struggles only made him hold her closer; she could barely breath.

A thin, malicious grin stretched his full lips. "That was surely a mistake. You're well and truly caught, woman."

"Let go," she groaned, kicking, trying to connect her slippered foot with his shin.

"Never," he vowed, backing her toward the cave wall.

She twisted in his arms, but he slammed her against the wall and held her there with his body.

"Let go, Conar! I mean it!"

"Never, lady," he whispered, his breath hot and tingling in her ear. "Never in this lifetime."

So closely pressed together were they, she could feel the sudden straining of his manhood against her lower belly, the pulsating movement of his shaft sending quick jabs of intense desire through her.

"Conar, don't." Her voice wasn't as strong. Her protest minimal. "Not now."

His lips went to the juncture of her neck and shoulder, seeking the tender, sensitive flesh along her collarbone. Her head fell to the side as his teeth nipped at the soft flesh. He smiled. She was his for the taking and he knew it.

"Do I let you go now, Milady?" his soft, quiet voice asked against the column of her neck.

Ripples of goose bumps spread along her arms and thighs. She licked her suddenly dry lips. His hips ground into her lower body with an incessant display as to the extent of his arousal. She sucked in her breath as he lifted his right knee and wedged his thigh between her legs, pressing firmly. Roughly he rubbed the hard-muscled flesh of his thigh between the V of hers, igniting, feeding, fanning the flames already growing within her lower body.

"What about now, Milady? Do I let you go now?"

His hands slid from her shoulders to the crook of her arms, pulling her away from the wall, straining her upper body backward as he braced his foot on a stalagmite, her body still straddling his hard thigh. He nipped at her chin and then trailed his lips down her throat and chest to press hotly against the fabric of her gown over one taut breast.

Beneath the silk of her bodice, through the cotton of her chemise, Liza could feel the heat of his tongue swirling the peak of one coral tip. It suckled, drawing a nipple almost through the material. His teeth grazed over the fabric, biting gently into it, pulling it away from her flesh, sucking on the wet material. She felt as though she was on fire, every nerve-ending singed with the white-hot heat of his desire.

"What about now, Liza?" he cooed, his teeth still tangled in the fabric as he glanced up at her. "Are you still so intent on me letting you go, now?"

She looked down at him, searching the glow in his eyes. There was no anger lurking there, only a desire so rampant and so unwilling to be denied that she knew he would take her whether she protested or not. Not as he once had—with pain and humiliation—but with insistent, undeniable intensity.

"Damn you, Coni," she whispered. "You don't play fair."

"Answer me," he demanded, turning his head to one side. "Shall I take my hands from you,? Shall I deny us both what we want?" When she didn't answer, he shifted her on his thigh and smiled as her eyes flared wide.

"
No!
" she whimpered, unwilling to have him leave her.

His hand came away from her right arm; he wedged it between his thigh and hers. He cupped her center and heard her draw a breath. "Do you yield, then?"

Liza moaned, nodding, and he raised his head to look at her. His eyes darkened to the color of rich sapphires. They bore into hers as though he could penetrate to the very core of her being, could plunder her soul, taking it as he was about to take her body.

"Never, ever deny me, lady. Never try, for I shall never let you go as long as there is strength in my hands and breath in this body."

She felt him drawing her down to the cavern floor. Her knees gave way as his thigh pressed even more insistently between her legs. She lay flat upon the sparkling sand, his body sliding over hers, imprisoning her with the hard, muscled length of his tall frame. He covered her mouth with his own. Conquering it with his tongue as he meant to conquer, to bring her body into submission with his manhood.

Liza could feel herself being drawn into the web of his lust, tangled there, hopelessly lost to him. She ran a nervous tongue over her lips. His eyes dropped to the movement her tongue made before he returned his hot gaze to hers. She watched as the blue pools narrowed in intense desire and swallowed hard against the agony building in her throat to scream at him to take her. She longed for the release only Conar McGregor would ever be able to give her.

Conar wanted her and would not be denied. In the back of his mind a voice warned that this might well be the final time he would have her, but he firmly pushed aside the threatening voice, ignored Tohre's words that this woman would one day betray him. "You belong to me."

He brought up his other leg, pressing her legs far apart so his bulging shaft could be felt between her open thighs. He pulled up her skirt, fumbled with the opening of his breeches, and flipped the buttons from their holes until he was exposed to her naked flesh.

A whimper came from her, her chest heaving with every breath. She felt his manhood, hot and dripping with his arousal, slide across her bare thigh, and his hardness took her breath away. It was like steel stabbing into her sensitive flesh and her womb quickened with a surge of welcome. His lips came once more to the pulse at the base of her throat and she heaved her body upward in an unconscious pleading for his impalement.

As his hand moved to the opening of her thighs, Liza twisted beneath him, seeking to mold her soft body to his hardness. She felt the rough calluses of his sword hand rubbing against her, tangling in the crisp curls that hid her womanhood. When his fingers found the moist heat of her passion, she closed her eyes and drew him closer. She pushed upward as his fingers slid into her, moving slowly, gently, insistently along the throbbing walls, going deeper and deeper as though he was striving to gain access to her very womb.

"I am aching for you," he said so softly his voice was but a movement of air. "I could hurt you."

Liza heard worry in his voice; she heard hesitation, and she knew a moment's sheer panic that he would withdraw and leave her to burst into the flames her body hinted were leaping within.

"Don't worry," she whispered. "I can handle it."

He looked at her. An amused smile lined his mouth. Her eyes were tightly closed. Puckering his lips, he raised his head and blew his sweet breath across her face. "Elizabeth," he breathed her name softly, a lover's sigh, a heart-felt caress.

Liza's eyes locked with his. She felt herself drawn into the glowing vortex of that blue sea, drowning in the love she saw reflected there, dying in his arms on the release of their combined passions. She stared at him until his gentle smile faded, his eyes turned hot and his lips came down to claim hers, his tongue penetrating her mouth. She felt the muscles of her vagina grab his questing fingers, heard the low growl of pleasure and need erupt from the back of his throat. Very gently, he eased his fingers from her.

Liza protested the loss of such pleasure, but she felt the stabbing blade of his sword poised at the entrance to her passion and opened her eyes wide as he slid gently, unerringly, full length into her.

She felt immense pleasure as he settled into her as he had done many, many times before. His cupped her face as he looked down at her. "Shall I stop, now, Milady?" he asked, his lips playing along hers.

She shook her head, trying to move against him, to press her quaking, throbbing muscles further up along him so that she could feel the sharper pain his length always brought her. But with his hips he denied her movement. His mouth came away from hers so he could stare into her heat-flushed face.

"Be still, lady." He felt her squirm and his voice went up a fraction in volume. "Be still, Elizabeth."

A ragged breath escaped her throat. She whimpered, wanting him to begin the rhythm that would put out the burning flames building to a roaring inferno within her, but again his stern voice overshadowed her whimpering and her squirming.

"Lie still, love," he commanded brokenly. "Wait."

It took every ounce of what little control he still possessed to keep his body immobile over hers. Every muscle screamed to move. Every manly instinct told him to thrust wildly, deeply into her, branding her, conquering her, quelling her body into submission. But his heart knew the right pathway to take to her pleasure, so he lay perfectly still, sweat popping out on his forehead and upper lip, his manhood throbbing as though it were locked inside a vise.

He could feel the blinding, searing agony in his loins as he denied himself. He ached to burst free inside her. He began to pant, his muscles quivered, a fine sheen of sweat soon covered his entire body. He heard his blood pounding in his ears, felt his knees trembling as he reclined atop her, keeping his full weight from crushing her. His elbows were bruising from the contact with the sand, the crystalline particles digging into his flesh.

"Conar, please!" she begged against the lips that hovered over hers, barely touching. "Please, Beloved!"

He merely shook his head, denying them both. He could feel his release building, striving to break free, and he clamped down hard on his wayward male instincts.

Liza moaned in mounting frustration; she wanted him, needed him. All along the edges of her consciousness, she felt the beginning of the tingling, itching sensation that signaled the rush of her orgasm. She opened her eyes in wonder, looked into the fiery blue depths of Conar's eyes, saw the certain knowledge of his understanding building there. She felt his manhood leap within her in answer to the careening desire flooding through both their bodies. Her chest heaved against him and the small movement centered the fire in her loins. She felt herself quickening, building, lubricating around him.

Conar watched her closely. He knew the exact moment her desire became full blown. Easing partially out of her, he waited until he felt the first faint throb, the first quiver, the first tiny grab of her muscles around him, the single grasping tremor deep within, and then pulled all the way out of her.

"No!" she screamed, clutching at his shoulders, pulling him to her. "Don't stop!"

Conar had no intention of denying her. Instead, he thrust as gently as he could deep within her, impaling her on the entire length. He felt the rapid succession of her climax moving around him, felt her nails digging furrows into his back through the fabric of his shirt. Just before he released his juices into her waiting body, he heard his name screamed in the abandonment of his wife's release.

Their bodies thrashed against one another, straining, aching. They tumbled headlong into the maelstrom of their combined lust, blending together into one entity. They were complete unto themselves: two bodies, one soul. Inseparable, made whole by their great love for one another. His seed surged deep into her womb, claiming, branding, fulfilling.

It was the sound of his name being called that brought Conar back to total awareness. He listened as heavy running footsteps came crashing down the tunnel into the cavern. Instinctively trying to protect the woman he loved, he withdrew from her, hearing her gasp of slight pain, then, all in one motion sat up and shielded her body with his own. He withdrew the dagger strapped to his thigh.

Sentian Heil came up short when he saw Liza. He turned away, but his flushed face and breathlessness caught Conar's immediate attention.

"What's happened?" Conar asked, coming to his feet, adjusting his breeches.

" 'Tis the babe, Milord! We can't find the babe!"

* * *

All through the rest of that day and into the long night, every man, woman, and child old enough to do so, searched for Conar's daughter. A crescent moon rode high in the night sky while candles and torches lit the deep shadows in every nook and cranny within the keep, every hovel and inn in the village, every ship in the harbor.

Bloodhounds brought in from the gamekeeper's cottage joined with those of Master Tucker's kennel of dogs, and the infant's blanket was given to the canines to sniff. The hounds were set loose on the vast grounds of the keep, its outbuildings, the wharves and the village, but their sensitive noses were unable to pick up a scent.

No ransom note had been found; no demand had been made; no missive was sent claiming responsibility for the child's disappearance. Gezelle was questioned until, red-eyed and on the point of hysteria, Cayn, the court physician, ordered her to bed with a sedative. Sadie MacCorkingdale, the head cook of Boreas Keep and the last servant to see the babe before her disappearance, sat stony-faced and dry-eyed before her interrogators, her jaw clenched.