Page 104 of Luthias

His hand stroked over her damp hair. “Your bed, ’tis too small.”

“Give me a bigger one to sleep in as part of my reward, then.” She lifted her head and saw the worry as well as satisfaction in his half-closed eyes. He knows, Emery thought, how much trouble we’re in now. “Yours is nice and wide. I liked it better than the one in my room, actually. You probably have more feathers in your mattress, too, you being the laird and all.”

Luthias ran his fingertip over her bottom lip. “If you sleep with me, the clan, they’ll ken you’re my woman.”

“Too late to change your mind about that.” It hurt to think about leaving him, so she scooted up to give him a noisy kiss on the chin. “If anyone objects, just remind them that while I’m here you’re my protector. That’s a full-time job, right?”

He lifted her up a little more to kiss her lips. “They’ll say more than that.” He sighed. “I’ve never brought a woman to my bed.”

“What?” Emery pretended to be horrified. “You were a virgin, and you didn’t tell me?” As he laughed she gave him a stern look. “Oh, I definitely have to be your woman now. You need lots and lots of lessons.” As he tried to sit up she pushed him back down. “Stay right there. It’s time for another teaching session.”

“What mean you to teach me?” Luthias asked, and watched her turn her back toward him as she straddled his hips. “Ah, lass, what do you now?”

“You’re always staring at my bottom. Do that while I do this.” She wriggled into position, and clasped his swelling shaft with one hand as she brought the heavy dome between her thighs. “Just think of it as a little reward for you, too.”

In the castle that night, after making love for hours, Luthias held Emery until she fell into an exhausted sleep. He watched her in the darkness for a time before he slipped from his bed and dressed. He wanted to forget the rest of the world and stay in his chamber with her, where he could wallow in her love to his heart’s content. He imagined he would never leave the bed unless dragged from it; as a lover she had been everything he’d wanted and more. Even smelling her soft sweetness on his skin made his cock harden yet again.

But beyond his chamber door waited the clan.

Luthias banked the hearth before he made his way down to the great hall, where he saw Taveon sitting at a table reading scrolls. As the war master looked up and regarded him with an arched brow he felt an unwelcome twinge of conscience.

“You’re wounded.” The war master frowned. “Mistress Parker’s doing?”

“No. A boulder came down and smashed the path near the loch meadow,” he said, and related the details of the incident. “Emery learned I couldnae drown after she pulled me from the water.”

“So you told her all,” Taveon guessed, and when he reluctantly nodded he sighed. “Och, ’twas as I suspected. You’ve finally taken her to your bed and made her your woman. I would speak now as your brother, my lord, no’ as your war master.” Luthias knew what was coming, but nodded anyway. “She’s bright and lovely, and the clan adores her. Darach would kill for her, and I reckon so would I. Even Camdyn’s grown fond of the lass, and since the mess with that conniving wench you ken how he’s hated all females. Any man would happily love her.” He sat back and folded his arms. “Only you’re no’ just a man, you eejit.”

“Aye.” His halfling blood, his immortality, and his duty to the clan all stood between him and Emery, and there was nothing he could do about any of them. “I ken.”

Taveon glanced up at the Fire Sword in its crystal crypt. “If the sain brought her to save your life, according to the old legend, the hilt, ’twould alight and remain so until she made her wish. ’Tis yet dark. ’Twasnae her purpose.”

“She didnae come back for me.” He sat down across from him. “She came to save the clan.” He thought of her terror and fury after pulling him from the loch. “She’ll do well, Tav. Never I’ve ken anyone like her. She’s the heart of a warrior.”

“If she doesnae tear yours to pieces, my lord, I shall be happy.” He picked up one of the scrolls. “You should ken that the Tolmach now grudgingly agrees to end his betrothal without killing all of the MacAnvoys, so long as Ramsay keeps the pledges he’s made to him. Ailsa shallnae go to the nuns, and may remain happily unwed. No doubt she’ll die an old, soured crone cursing the Clan MacRoss to her grave.”

A sudden vision of Emery floundering in dark water with green lights glowing beneath her flashed in Luthias’s head, making him grip the table until the wood creaked.

“What bedevils you now?” Taveon asked.

As the horrifying image faded Luthias braced his head in his hands. “Naught. What of the intruder?”

“We’ve found no more signs of the fiend.” Taveon rubbed the back of his neck. “’Tis likely we shallnae. The bastart left no tracks around that cave. Mayhap he’s gone, never to return.”

“He’s been at such for some time.” Luthias related what Emery had told him about the intruder’s skill and knowledge, and saw a weariness fill the war master’s expression. “What do you reckon now that you dinnae wish say?”

“I agree with your lady,” Taveon said slowly. “’Tis something new I learned from one of the villagers. The Carack, they’re searching for a runaway vassal. They’ve asked of her at every inn and stable for miles around their lands. She’s no’ the first to vanish, either. I’ve heard tales of others disappearing over time, never to be found again.”

He thought of the gibbeting cage made of antlers. “You reckon the bastart’s taken them all?”

“None of the bones we found in that cave belonged to a person,” the war master reminded him. “’Twould be difficult to move a mortal body on our land and no’ leave any sign.”

“Difficult, but no’ impossible.” Luthias pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes for a moment. “He couldnae burn them as we did the Roman dead. The smoke and smell, ’twould alert the patrols. ’Tisnae a place to bury them easily out of sight. Most of the old caves, they’ve collapsed.” He met Taveon’s gaze. “The lochs, then.”

The war master nodded. “Bound with stones and well-pierced through, the bodies would sink. In a few weeks the fish would leave naught but bones. He’d wait to retrieve the bones at night, and do his filthy cobbling elsewhere.”

Was that why he had seen Emery drowning in dark water?

“Set watches around all three lochs from sunset until dawn,” Luthias said. “Assure no vassal or Emery goes near the water until we have him.”