Philippa Ballantine - Wrayth

“Who am I to argue with the Grand Duchess,” he chuckled, slipping the blade between the leather laces and slicing them away.

The sound of them parting was delicious and arousing. Zofiya spun back to him, letting the confection of lace and satin drop to her feet. With only faint starlight and dipping candlelight to illuminate her, the Grand Duchess stood quite naked before Deacon Merrick Chambers.

His indrawn breath was quite satisfactory. His fingers brushed her skin, making her shiver with anticipation, but she stood still and let him examine her. Merrick’s hands traced the line of scars and bruises her training left on her. Some were old and some relatively new.

The long scar that curved from her back around her hip was the one that made her flinch when touched.

She didn’t really think about it anymore, having successfully shoved the darkest of her times in Delmaire firmly to the back of her mind. However, sitting on the bed, holding and touching her, Merrick looked up at Zofiya.

“Your father did this?” She’d been a fool to forget his powers. It was so much easier to do with a Sensitive than with an Active, but she did not move his hand away.

“I was not exactly what he expected in his children—especially his girl children,” she said as lightly as she could manage. “Finally, he had enough. So you can understand why I decided to come with my brother.” She shivered when Merrick laid his lips to the silvered line, licking it gently with his tongue.

“Our scars are part of us,” he said, placing his hands on her hips and pulling her backward onto the bed, “but you are more than the sum of them.”

He really was the most strange, extraordinary young man, and Zofiya felt her mood slide from the need for anger and sexual release, toward wanting to explore him more deeply.

She stripped off his clothes as he lay on her bed, kissing her, and traced the lines of his body. He too was not without his scars, though they were smaller than hers. “Most of mine,” he confessed, “were in the practice yard at the Abbey.”

Straddling him, Zofiya pressed her naked length against his, and tucked her hair behind one of her ears. “Is it a strange thing,” she whispered, “for a Grand Duchess of the Empire and a Sensitive Deacon of the Order to be together like this?”

While his hands ran over her body, Merrick smiled back. “For a few hours, let’s not ask such questions. Let’s just be two ordinary citizens, about the business of pleasure and togetherness.”

Then they needed no words after that.

Maybe Zofiya had been expecting meekness from the man, but that was not what she found. Merrick was gentle when she needed him to be, and passionate when that was required. He matched her movement and desire, something that she realized must come from his training at the Abbey. If any of the women of Arkaym knew of the benefits of bedding a Sensitive Deacon then they had kept it from her.

He had control and passion—something she’d never experienced in such perfect balance in a man before. Merrick Chambers knew where to lay his hands merely by listening to the Grand Duchess’ sighs and soft groans. It was as if he were a master musician and she a willing violin.

Later, when she lay resting in his arms, looking up at the moving silk hangings around the bed, she felt exhausted but stronger. Merrick had drifted off to sleep, his face nestled against her neck, one leg hooked in hers.

The daylight had not yet crept in through her open windows, and it was easy to imagine the fight before them was a long way off. She would allow herself that illusion for a few more minutes.

She glanced to her right and at the sleeping Deacon. He was about her age, but there was still a strange innocence about him that she had never been able to afford in the palace at Delmaire. Sometimes it felt as though she’d been born world-weary and conspiracy alert.

Zofiya sighed, turned her head and pressed her face against Merrick’s curled head. It felt good to have an ally—even one with divided loyalties outside the palace. Despite her doubts, the Deacons had always fought bravely for her brother and now she hoped one of their number would fight just as bravely for her and the Empire. It could get very ugly very quickly for both of them.

Just as she felt sleep tugging at the corners of her own eyes, a tiny sound made her slide cautiously out from under Merrick. It was so soft and gentle that it might have been mistaken for a mouse running by the wall, but Zofiya knew every noise in her private domain. This one was not familiar.

Her eyes darted to the door that led into the privy chamber, and then to the only other entrance to her bedroom, the one that led to her balcony. It was that place at least three assassins had tried their hand at reaching. Two had fallen to their deaths without a handhold on the sheer wall, while another more agile one had met his fate at the end of her sword. If this del Rue was going to try a similar thing then she would be only too happy to oblige him. Once she had a dead assailant to show her brother he might well view her concerns more seriously.

Taking up her weapon, she slid naked from the bed and padded toward the balcony, but when the sound came again it was not from that direction. It appeared to be coming from the large grandfather clock that stood in the opposite corner. It was one of Kal’s rejected pieces, so it didn’t work, but she had always admired the detailed carving on it. Now it made a decidedly odd creak—almost as if one of the gears had come loose.

She knew every inch of the palace, and was certain there were no secret doors or passages behind this section of wall. However as she leaned forward, brow furrowed, to examine the clock, a hand, covered in a fine leather glove that shone with the light of a rune shot out of the solid oak paneling and grabbed hold of her. Then another, with an encircling wreath of green flame closed over her shoulder.

The Grand Duchess abruptly had no strength to lift her sword. It was suddenly heavier than an anvil. As it dropped from her strangely numb fingers, a hooded face appeared out of the woodwork, phasing through it as only a Deacon could manage. It did not surprise her that it was del Rue, or that he was smiling.

Then after that, all was darkness.

The Rossin fell and, snatching control of Raed’s body from the weak mortal, transformed in midair. The human’s clothes were ripped away, and the pack he carried tumbled down the shaft. None of that mattered. An eagle’s scream sounded in the nest of the Phia and he didn’t care. Raed had called on him again, a deep desire to survive might have driven it, but he had still done what was required. With every change he was one step closer.

The Beast was careful to hide his thoughts when the mortal wore the flesh, but when his royal host was subsumed it was liberating in all ways. He had tried to keep them away from the land of Ensomn, but he’d not been able to stop the fool. Apparently sibling bonds ran very deep.

Now, they were in the lair of the Wrayth and there was nothing to be done except get them out. The Shin was a name they had taken to hide their true natures, and it appeared to have worked well for them. A fortress. Ruling over a stupid population of people. It was an old trick, but still a good one.

The Rossin twisted his wings and surged upward toward freedom and the open sky. Only the narrow slice of moon gleaming through the steel grate stopped him crashing into it. He twisted midair like a falcon, and slammed his curved talons into the barrier. Then opening his wings wide, he heaved. The only thing that snapped however was his beak in rage.

Hanging there like an enraged bat was not his happiest moment in this realm. The Wrayth were cunning and so numerous that they were in fact a far more dangerous opponent than even Hatipai. The Rossin’s avian form was meant to fly, meant to dominate the air. It was not meant to be caged like this—but what was the other option?