chapter Eight
I was walking through the forest wearing a medieval-looking gown that felt familiar to me. It was more appropriate for a Renaissance fair than a nature hike. Where had I seen it before? The night was moonless, and there wasn’t a star in the sky. It wasn’t the gentle dark that comes with sweet dreams, but the cold and calculating dark of nightmares. I shivered from the bones out.
“Run,” hissed a deep voice that was neither male nor female. “Run as fast and as far as you dare, you American whore,” said the voice.
Almost involuntarily my legs began to pump, faster and faster still, until I was tearing through the forest blindly, not watching where my feet went. I put my hands up as if to ward off the unseen blows of limbs slapping at my face. My mind echoed with the words, and it gave me pause.
I’m no whore, I thought timidly and then more firmly. “I’m no whore,” I yelled. “Who the hell are you to be throwing down the verbal gauntlet?” I taunted, leaning back and forcing my legs to either slow or allow me to fall. They slowed. Then I stopped, spinning in a circle and I screamed out, “Coward.”
The blow landed on my shoulders and made me face-plant into the dead leaves and moss of the forest floor. I choked on the detritus in my mouth, spitting it out. Warmth spilled down my face, and I realized I’d bit my bottom lip when I hit the ground and I’d split my forehead open at my hairline. It didn’t hurt, which meant it was either nothing much or something serious. I pushed up to my knees and took a well-placed kick to the ribs. Grunting, I went back down. That was going to leave a mark.
The asexual voice seemed to come from all around me when it said, “Do you challenge me?” It sounded amused.
I couldn’t breathe to answer.
“I didn’t think so,” it chuckled. “Now let me spell this out—”
An iron fist gripped my shoulder, and I wheezed in fear.
“Get up.”
I struggled to my hands and knees and pushed myself to kneeling, wavering slightly and holding my side. A light shown in the darkness, and I turned my face to it just as the voice bellowed.
“No. I rule this night. You’ve no leave to be here.”
And I was yanked from the forest floor, airborne with a dragon for the second time in less than a day.
“Maddy?” came Bahlin’s voice.
I was confused. He sounded worried. My eyes fluttered, and I smiled up at him. “Why did you glow?”
“Huh? Sweetheart, I didn’t. I felt you twitching and then you grunted and began bleeding, the wounds and bruises appearing as I watched.” Bahlin gathered me up in his arms and cradled me close to his chest with amazing tenderness for such a large man. He bent to bury his face in my hair. “Meditating to dream walk with you again was the hardest damned thing I’ve done in more than two centuries. I didn’t know if I’d be able to relax while I watched you fight some unseen battle.”
“Ow.” I cringed as I tried to twist to a more comfortable position in his arms. “I think calling it a nightmare walk would be more accurate. I got my ass kicked in record time.”
He held me away from him and looked into my face, wiping the blood from my brow. “No jokes, Madeline.” He kissed my lips gently. “Why did you ask if I glowed?”
“I saw you coming for me, and you were glowing and you told me to get up. I turned to face you right as you snatched me…up. You snatched me up. You came from above.”
He looked concerned. “Of course I did, Maddy. I sent my dragon form into your dream this time because I could tell something violent was happening. I wanted his power available to you. I plucked you from above because I was flying when I hit the dream.”
I pushed myself to sitting in his lap, finding it ironic that I found myself repeating the same events of our first night together. “You came from above—”
“So I think we’ve established, Maddy.”
“Stop it. Someone was coming through the forest…”
“Do you have a concussion?” Bahlin asked, feeling around on my head for any major knots, then gripping my chin and looking at my eyes.
“Stop it. I’m serious. I think it was Tarrek.”
“I’m being serious. It wouldn’t be unreasonable except we don’t know if he’s…” Bahlin looked away, clearly uncomfortable.
“He’s not dead,” I said vehemently. “I’m not too late.”
“Who was this voice?” Bahlin set me down on the bed and walked into the bathroom, calling over his shoulder, “I’m listening, go ahead.”
“Uh, I don’t know exactly.”
“Male or female?” he called back.
“Both?” I said, knowing it sounded impossible. “Didn’t you see anyone when you snatched me up?”
He walked back out of the bathroom, still in his boxers, and carrying a small basket of first aid supplies and a handful of damp washrags. “Forgive me, darling, but you were my priority,” he said wryly.
“Sure, and don’t get me wrong, I’m very glad you showed up when you did. But I need to know who the voice was, and how Tarrek was able to dream walk into my sleep.” I winced as Bahlin sat on the edge of the bed, and my abs tightened involuntarily to keep me sitting upright.
“Sorry,” he said quietly. “This is going to sting a little.” And faster than thought he slapped a rag on my forehead.
“Son of a bitch!” I jerked my head back so hard it bounced off the wall. Whatever was in the rag burned nearly as bad as his dragon fire had. “What is that stuff?”
“Uh, some type of antibacterial stuff Brylanna had in the wash cabinet. I know it burns. She’s used it on me before.”
He didn’t look nearly contrite enough for me, and I reached up to yank his hand away. He relented, and I glared at him. “Next time just do that dragon magic stuff. It hurts about the same,” I groused.
“‘That dragon magic stuff?’” he said, amused. He set down the rag and began digging through the basket, coming up with butterfly bandages and liquid stitches.
“Whatever. But no more of that crap.”
He leaned over me and treated the split in my forehead, holding the edges of the wound together. “It’s only about an inch wide,” he said, answering the unasked question that must have been written on my face. “I don’t think it will scar.” He added a couple of butterfly bandages then kept his hand cupping my head. The simple touch was my undoing.
Suddenly the fear from the dream came crashing back down on me, and I shuddered.
“Maddy?” Bahlin dropped his hand.
I launched myself at him, both of us grunting as I slammed into his upper body. His arms automatically caught me, wrapping me up in a strong embrace. I wrapped my arms around his neck and lifted my chin up. We were suddenly face to face. My legs snaked around his waist, and I clung to him like he was my lifeline. His lips caressed mine in a butterfly’s kiss, and I shuddered for a new reason. This validation of life was as good an excuse as any, but if I was honest with myself, Bahlin chased away the fear and raised in me a sense of passion that I’d never before experienced. I pulled his head down to me and kissed him, expressing that passion with a deep, hard kiss. Our tongues touched tentatively at first, growing bolder with each pass. Suddenly he was exploring my mouth as if he were on a mapping expedition. I moaned into him, breathing harder by the second. He gripped the back of my head and fisted my hair as much as he was able, holding me firmly to his mouth. Bahlin’s erection jutted out from his boxers, tenuously contained by the small button on the fly.
Wrapping his arms tighter, he lifted me up and laid me back on the mattress, fitting his body over mine. Bahlin continued to kiss me, and I felt like I was going up in flames. No man had ever kissed me like this. It was insane the feelings it produced. My core throbbed and ached with wanting him. I ground my hips into his instinctively, and he lifted his mouth off mine with an unsteady gasp.
“By the goddess, Maddy,” he said, breathing hard through his nose. “You’ll kill me before we get to the good part if you don’t quit.” He flashed a grin and dove back for my mouth. The split lip had ceased to ache under the onslaught, and I hadn’t even noticed. I wondered fleetingly if he’d healed me again. Curious but definitely a question for later…much later.
I twisted my head to the side and pushed at Bahlin’s chest and he gave way, falling onto his back though not without protest.
“Don’t tell me you want to stop, Maddy, or you’ll see a grown man cry, I swear it.” His face was serious while his eyes were full of mischief.
“Oh no, dragon boy, I’m not stopping. I only want you in a better position,” I whispered, dropping my lips to his bare chest. I rained kisses over his collarbones and down between his pectorals. I made it to his chocolaty nipple and latched on, forcing a gasp from him as he arched his back. I sucked harder, running a hand down to caress him and he groaned.
“Maddy,” he rasped, one hand reaching for my hair and the other fisting in the sheets.
“So you like that?”
“Too much talking,” he growled and, grabbing my shoulders, flipped me onto my back.
I squeaked with alarm and then he was ripping my clothes from my body with enough force to lift me off the bed. Without the semi-protection of underwear, I was suddenly naked before him. What had been a pup tent was suddenly a circus tent at the front of his boxers, and I worried for the barest moment. Would he be built like other men?
With one smooth move he dropped his shorts and answered my question. While he was physically built like a human man, his proportion was outrageous, even to my limited experience. His erection pushed his navel with every heartbeat, and I worried about us making this work physically.
He must have seen the look of worry on my face because he said, with a combination of pride and sympathy, “It will take some doing, but we’ll go slow.” And then he lowered himself on top of me. I braced for invasion but he only began kissing me again. I squirmed underneath him as I started to reheat, my need rising faster with each stroke of his hand on my bare skin. He worked his way down my front, paying attention to nearly every square inch of my body until he reached my center. I gasped as he breathed hot air on my lower lips, and groaned when he nuzzled my inner thigh.
“Bay, please,” I begged, arching my back as he gently bit the tendon at the inner crease of my hip and thigh.
“Please what?” he teased.
“Less talking,” I repeated on a hissed breath as his mouth brushed across my mons.
With a sigh, he settled in and began laving me, rasping his tongue across that centralized nerve bundle again and again. I felt the orgasm building almost immediately and I strained for it, amazed that he could bring my body to pleasure so quickly.
Pausing he lifted his head and said, “Relax, Maddy.”
I whimpered and pushed at his head, trying to force it down. He chuckled darkly and set to pleasuring me with a zealous fervor, kissing, stroking, sucking. The orgasm built, layer upon layer, as he massaged my hips with his hands. In one minute it was building, and the next it was wracking my body and overwhelming me with its intensity. I screamed out my pleasure, arching my back and digging my heels into the bed. Bahlin didn’t relent but pushed me harder, drawing out my climax until I was physically spent, my body limp.
Before I could completely come down from the high, Bahlin crawled up my body. Without a word he lifted one thigh up, hooking it over his elbow and placing his hand flat on the bed beside me. The other hand he used to guide his erection to my entrance. With gentle but unrelenting pressure he began pushing his way inside me.
“Holy shit, Maddy, you’re tight,” he groaned, pausing to allow me to adjust to his girth.
I gasped at the feeling of him, only partially inside me, stretching me almost too tight. The feeling was borderline painful.
“Don’t stop, Bahlin, please don’t stop.”
“I don’t…think…I can,” he grunted and pushed forward some more, pausing with every inch. I must have winced because he began to ease out.
“No,” I said, wrapping my free leg as far around his hips as I could. I pushed my hips up off the bed and reclaimed the ground, and then some that we’d lost when he retreated. I hissed in discomfort at the reclamation. His head fell back, and he breathed hard through his nose.
“Maddy, I won’t last long, sweet.”
Turning my face toward his arm I breathed, “Finish it, Bay.”
He surged forward, seating himself all the way to my womb and I cried out. He held still for a few moments, giving me precious time to adjust to his girth and length, before he began to move. I whimpered at the feeling of being stretched to the point where pain and pleasure converged and were indiscernible from each other. Hearing and recognizing the sound, Bahlin stopped being gentle and began to pound into me in earnest, forcing me into the mattress with every downward stroke. In no time at all I was meeting his thrusts with my own and grunting as the head of his penis hit my cervix over and over again. Without warning, the orgasm crashed over me and I tightened around Bahlin’s cock, gripping his shoulders hard enough to dig my fingernails into his flesh and draw blood.
I yelled his name to the heavens, pleading for more and he gave it, drawing out my orgasm. With a shout he joined me, and I could feel his ejaculate pulsing into me with hot urgency.
He held there for a moment longer before he collapsed on his side, breathing heavily, a look of sheer awe on his face. He drew me closer, kissing me more gently now, and running his hand up and down my back slowly.
“I had no idea it could be like that,” he said softly, lifting a heavy limb to caress my face.
I turned my head into the caress and whispered, “Me either.”
“You were amazing, love. I’m not sure I’ve ever been quite so swift in reaching the finish line.” His smile was self-deprecating.
“Not a cold fish?” I asked, old insecurities rising to the surface and I resented the hell out of their presence in this bed.
“A cold fish?” he asked incredulously. “Whoever told you that was lying to cover his own inadequacies, mo chrid. You are wildly passionate and incredibly responsive. Why, I thought you’d milk my cock to—”
“Okay.” I laughed, blushing like mad. “Okay. Thank you for that, I think.” We lay there looking at each other, the silence unexplainably comfortable. “What happens since you broke your word after my good faith negotiations earlier?”
He laughed out loud, pulling me tighter into his arms. I went willingly, pressing flesh to flesh and finding comfort in his touch.
“My love, you are a wicked woman. I didn’t seduce you, rather you seduced me, so no promise I made was broken.”
“Well, shit.”
I laid my head on his shoulder and it fit well. He massaged my head with deft fingertips, and I was asleep in moments.
A car door slammed, and I jerked awake. Bahlin’s side of the bed was warm but empty. Why had he left me alone? I looked around the room for clothes but the only thing remaining was in shreds, evidence of our lovemaking. I heard the rumble of his voice and an answer too soft to make out, though I thought it was Brylanna. Foregoing politeness, I dug through Bahlin’s dresser and grabbed a long T-shirt that covered the important parts. I sidetracked to the bathroom and cleaned up, then snuck down the hallway toward the voices. They paused when I got near.
“You might as well come out, Maddy,” said Bahlin. “I can see we’ll need to work on your stealth skills.”
Harrumphing, I walked into the living room and saw that I had been right. Brylanna had returned. I walked over to Bahlin and, before I could protest, he pulled me into his lap. He was wearing the same boxers he’d had on earlier.
“I see I was right,” Brylanna said coolly, looking me up and down.
“Brylanna, you will be courteous at the very least,” Bahlin said, his voice warming with anger. “I’ve warned you about this before.”
“So you have,” she said. She tipped her head toward me in apology. I shrugged.
“Right about what?” I asked.
Bahlin’s chest rumbled with a deep growl.
“I foretold that he would screw—”
“No need to be crass,” I interrupted her, a flush climbing my cheeks. “I’m fully aware of what we’ve done, and don’t need to know you can pull a play by play from the stars, or however you do it, because that’s just seriously wrong. Do me a favor?”
She looked at me intently, then nodded.
“Stay the hell out of my love life,” I commanded in a tone leaving no room for argument. “I don’t care if you see a ménage a trois in my future. It’s none of your business, so don’t go looking for it. And especially when it comes to your brother. That’s just squicky. Who looks in on their brother’s love life anyway?”
She looked astounded that I’d speak to her that way. Little did she realize that I was only pausing for breath.
“And furthermore—”
Bahlin interrupted me by gently covering my mouth with his hand. “Enough, Maddy. Your point is made. And we’ll likely need her in the future so there’s no need to alienate her, right?”
I didn’t answer him.
“Maddy,” he warned.
I nodded, and he removed his hand.
He bent me backward and looked at me, quirking his eyebrow.
“Right,” I groused. “You’re right.”
He sat me back up, hugged me tighter and pressed a kiss to the back of my neck.
Brylanna watched our exchange with interest and then sat across the table from us. “I’ve come with a warning. The weyr has met and is prepared to offer you its protection, Maddy.”
“The weyr?”
Bahlin stroked my back and said, “A group of dragons is called a weyr. Our weyr is very powerful, so to have their support is a good thing.” To Brylanna he said, “They must not believe she killed Gretta without cause.”
Brylanna looked at him for a quiet minute and as I was getting ready to break the tension when she said, “I told them what I had seen regarding the fight. Combined with your account of things, it will be enough for them for now. The King and Queen of Faerie are imploring us for help in find Tarrek before it is too—”
“Can you see him?” I asked, interrupting.
“Tarrek? No. All I can tell is that he’s bound and is in a dark place, but nothing more comes to me.”
“Maddy,” said Bahlin, “we need to get back to London. How soon can you be ready?”
“Um, I need to borrow some clothes.”
“Brylanna? Take her to your room and get her outfitted. I’ll put together a few supplies, and we’ll be off.”
Without a word Brylanna stalked down the hallway. I followed after her keeping a cautious distance.