Page 35 of Fletcher

He fucked her deeper and harder, with so much force she could only clasp her thighs around his hips and give herself up to him. This wasn’t making love, it was mating, as if they’d abandoned all they were for what they could be together. Lark sensed something dark and carnal building inside her, like some terrible storm intent on tearing her apart, but she wasn’t afraid. She put her hands over his, rubbing his palms over her nipples as she lifted her hips up for every stroke he gave her.

A bright shaft of sunlight poured over them, turning Fletcher’s eyes golden and making her hair appear to catch fire. The scent of their skin and their sweat blended to create a deep, musky sweetness. They became so beautiful together in that moment Lark almost sobbed, and then she lost herself as white hot bliss erupted inside her. He stroked her through the climax, grunting as she gripped him from within, and then uttered a low roar as his cock began to jerk deep inside.

Fletcher caught her chin and made her look at him as he came in her core, his features tight and sharp with his own release. “I’m your curse now, my lass. You’ll never rid yourself of me.”

It sounded like a spell more than a curse, as if he’d used his body and his beauty to enchant her. Maybe that would be enough for them both, Lark thought as she reached up and pulled his head down to hers.

“It’s the same for you now,” she whispered against his ear. “I want us to share the same bed every night. I don’t care if it’s mine or yours. I just want to go to sleep beside you, and see you when I wake up in the sunlight. Like this.”

“Aye, so you shall.” He gathered her up in his arms, and buried his face in her hair. “From this day ever on.”

Shaw stood outside his brother’s work room, more to guard against any unneeded interruptions than to eavesdrop on Fletcher and Lark. From the muffled yet familiar sounds coming through the oak door they needed the time to do as they pleased. Once he heard them speaking in soft voices he left his post and walked to the laird’s chamber, where Connal was listening to Duncan report on the injured chamber maid.

“Where’s my seneschal?” the laird demanded as soon as he saw Shaw. “I dinnae give orders so Fletcher may ignore them.”

“Healer, might I have a word alone with the laird?” Once Duncan bowed and left Shaw closed the door, and then regarded Connal. “We’ve a larger concern than our brother flouting your orders. Mistress Ambrose possesses a Fae boon.”

“Dinnae act the simpleton,” the laird said, disgusted now. “If that wee lass wielded any manner of power, we’d ken by now.”

“I watched her use the boon from the cliff top,” Shaw told him. “She snatched Fletcher from the bay and flung him on the shore—and aye, I ken ’twas her doing. The very air around her shimmered blue-green with our sire’s magic. As for our brother, he’s nary a mark on him.”

Connal’s expression darkened. “Mistress Ambrose, she’s no’ Fae.”

“She yet wears Joana’s ring. The same ring gave your wife the boon to ken the thoughts of others with a touch.” He didn’t like cornering his brother, but the ability Lark possessed could easily prove lethal. “She’ll need learn control the power, else she casts Dun Ard and all of us into the heavens.”

“Fack.” The laird’s gaze shifted to his inked arm. “You cannae train her.”

“Nor may you,” Shaw said. “Fletcher can serve as teacher. Bid Nyall assume his duties for a time.”

“Such a boon, ’twasnae meant for mortals.” Connal rose and began to pace. “We may remove Joana’s ring, and see if that renders her powerless.”

“Your wife yet reads the mind of anyone she touches,” he reminded him. “These boons dinnae start nor end with the wearing of the ring.”

The laird stopped and glared at him. “What more ken you that you dinnae say?”

“Naught you need hear.” Shaw’s arm, which had been itching since the moment he’d seen Lark use her boon, now crawled as if thousands of insects covered his skin. “I need go and drill. Keep calm, and do what you must so we may protect the clan and our vassals.”

He left before Connal could pester him with more questions, and used the back passages to make his way to the lists. There the morning drills had concluded, so it stood empty except for a few young pages tidying the grounds. All of them touched their brows when they saw him, and slowly shuffled back a few steps.

“You’ve done well, lads,” Shaw told them, knowing his eyes had darkened so much he was frightening them. “Leave the rest and go on with you.”

The pages bowed and pretended to walk without haste until they reached the shadow of the gallery, when they ran. Inside Shaw, the thing he kept chained strained at its bonds, snarling silently as it fought to free itself and give chase. He closed his eyes as he pulled his tunic over his head, his arm blazing now, and shed all the weapons he carried as he circled the straw targets the lads had just finished replacing. Taking a bucket of water, he doused each one, assuring that he wet down the pells thoroughly so his touch would not set them alight.

No one knew what any show of beyond-mortal power did to him, and Shaw intended to keep it that way.

The Pritani had bound dead gorse instead of straw to their pells, so that every blow left wounds on the fists. If an enslaved warrior hesitated to strike a target, a trainer would lash his back ten times. Anyone who became entangled with the target suffered even more; the trainer would set fire to the spiky plants, which blazed even quicker and hotter than pine needles. Shaw could still smell the stink of charred flesh from his first week of training, when he’d been beaten near to death for trying to free a weaker slave from a target he’d set on fire.

Your touch, ’tis for feeding the dark one, no’ deny him his due.

The ink on his arm began to move restlessly, as if it meant to crawl off his hide. Shaw ignored it and the thing now noiselessly bellowing inside him as he knotted the fist of his unmarked arm and struck the target squarely in the middle. Good, clean pain rammed through the arm that still belonged to him. Straw flew around him as he hit it a second time, and then a third, which tore the pole from the ground and sent it skidding across the hard-packed dirt.

I roasted for you like a fat goose so you might dine well for nigh on twenty year, you bastart. Now you shall starve and freeze.

How much time passed, Shaw did not know or care. Only once he had smashed every practice target did he look around the grounds, which had been littered with damp straw blackened by his touch. The dank, burnt stink of his destruction only goaded him more. He then went to a free-standing wall to one side of the lists that the laird had ordered built for his use. It had been repaired and rebuilt many, many times since Shaw had returned to the clan. He lifted his bloodied fist, studying it to assure none of his bones had popped through his flesh before he drew it back to strike the mortared stones.

“’Tis enough, Brother,” a hard voice said. “I need you.”

He looked over at Nyall, who had wisely shed all of his weapons before entering the lists. “Think again, leave and find another.”