“He is a good man, your father,” Rain murmured.
“Yes. The best I’ve ever known.” But she knew…she’d always known…that as much as Papa loved her, he also feared the thing that lived inside her.
And she knew he was right to fear it.
“Rain, if he hadn’t stopped the exorcists, I don’t know what would have happened, but it would have been bad. Very bad.”
“What do you mean?”
“I wanted to kill them, the men who drove those needles into me. I was only a child, but I’d already seen death through my nightmares. I saw it again then, in my mind, but this was different. It wasn’t a nightmare. It was what I wanted to happen, what I wanted to do to them. I saw those men torn apart, screaming as their limbs were ripped from their bodies. I saw myself laughing, dancing in a shower of their blood, drinking it like a child drinks rain as it falls from the sky.” She pressed her hands to her cheeks. “Oh, Rain, what kind of monster am I?”
She waited for his horror or revulsion, but it never came. Instead his arms enfolded her and pulled her close against his chest. “Ellysetta…Shei’tani…You are not evil to have wished those exorcists dead for torturing you as they did. And do not believe you could have killed them, even though you dreamed of it. Fey women cannot kill, not even to defend their own lives. Their natural empathy prevents it.”
“But Rain—”
“Shh. Hear me out. Even though your physical appearance seems mortal, there is little doubt in my mind that your blood is Fey. Who your parents are and why they did not return to the Fading Lands before your birth, I cannot say, but your soul shines too brightly and your magic is too strong for me to believe you are anything else.
“When those men hurt you, adding more pain on top of that you were already suffering, your Fey heritage must have stirred in anger against the crimes done against you. The tairen lives in us all, and it is not a tame creature.” He smoothed her hair back from her face and stared earnestly into her eyes. “Do you think Marissya has never wished death upon another? Nei, Fey women are not so timid as that. They are gentle, aiyah, and compassionate, but even they feel the tairen rouse when pushed hard enough.”
Hope flickered in Ellysetta’s heart. “Do you really think that’s what it was?”
“I have no doubt.” The unwavering certainty in his eyes made her consider, for the first time in her life, that perhaps the dark, dangerous thing inside her wasn’t evil after all.
“But…even if that’s true, it doesn’t explain why all my life I’ve suffered those horrible seizures and nightmares.”
“That is a separate matter.” Cold anger flickered in his eyes, making them glow. “If I am right, this Shadow Man of yours is a Mage, and he’s been hunting you all your life. Definitely in your dreams. Night is the time when Azrahn grows strongest, and dreams are one realm where Azrahn lives in us all. I suspect your nightmares, your seizures, and probably those wandering souls, those ghosts you feel walking across your grave, are all connected, and all in some way spawned by the Mages.” He stroked her hair.
“But why would they do that to me?”
“You are a Tairen Soul’s mate. Your magic, though you keep it locked away, is powerful beyond measure. Even as a child, they must have known something about you—or known enough to hunt for you. Soon we will be wed, and I will take you back to the Fading Lands. We will search for answers there. When I discover who has been tormenting you, I will make certain they can never do so again.”
This time, the cold, implacable promise of death and retribution did not frighten her. It made her feel safe instead. She’d told him the worst nightmare of her soul, and he had not reviled her. She turned to him, burrowing into his arms, pressing her face to the warmth of his throat. “Hold me, Rain. Keep me safe.”
“I will give my life before allowing harm to come to you, shei’tani.” He rested his cheek against the soft spirals of her hair and closed his eyes, breathing in the delicate scent that was already imprinted on his soul. The tairen in him stirred to life, but this time with fierce protectiveness rather than hunger, solicitous of its mate and her fragile state.
With more instinct than thought, Rain began to croon a soft, wordless, purring song, a song of thought and magic and emotion all woven together in silken, resonant waves.
In his arms, Ellysetta went still. He felt her breath catch in her lungs, then release in shallow, delicate gasps filled with wonder. Within her soul, a tiny, unseen door cracked open. Communion, like a shimmering beam, fell upon him and in that shining sliver of warmth the first, fragile bond between them was formed. A tender, tremulous thing. A warm light where moments ago there had been only cold, dark solitude.
His ancient soul trembled, its fierce arrogance humbled. Tears—his first in a thousand years—glimmered in his eyes. He blinked. The tears spilled down his cheeks, and he marveled at the feel of them, warm and wet, cooling rapidly. One tear tracked to the corner of his mouth, and the long-forgotten flavor of salty wetness touched the tip of his tongue.
“What was that?” Ellysetta whispered when his song died away into silence.
He tightened his arms around her and buried his face in her hair, breathing her in, rubbing his skin against her, like a tairen exchanging scents with its mate. “Tairen song.”
She tilted her head back to stare up at him, her eyes filled with as much wonder as his own. “I could feel it. Inside me, in my heart and in my head.” She raised a hand and touched the cooling tracks of his tears.
“My song sang to you, as a tairen’s song sings to its mate.” His voice sounded low and husky to his own ears, rough with longing and long-buried emotion. Hope was a fragile flicker that he wanted to cup with both hands to protect against the harsh winds of reality.
Ah, gods, I know I am not worthy, but I will devote my life to becoming so.
He bent his head to kiss her, mating his lips to hers, his breath to hers, mating even the beat of his heart to hers. His lips tracked fevered lines across her face, her throat, her hands, then found her mouth again to give her back the passion and essence of his own self. He kissed her as if life itself lived in the wonder of her mouth, to be drunk from her lips lest he die.
Her hands fluttered against him, then clutched at him. Her fingers threaded through his hair, holding him tight. Her arms wound around his neck, slender, silken chains he knew he would never want to be free of. She kissed him back with an intensity to match his own, fearless and fierce, and the beast in his soul roared with triumph and desire.
“Shei’tani. Ellysetta.” He gasped her name and tore his lips from hers while he still could. It was no easy task, when his instinct, driving and powerful, was to lay his body over hers and claim her. His body shuddered in protest, muscles trembling with enforced restraint.
“Rain?” Ellysetta laid her hand upon his face. Her concern lapped at the ragged edges of his control, as did the innate, calming power that soothed him from her first touch. She was so gentle, so endlessly giving, and yet so strong in ways he was only coming to recognize. For all her outward timidity, she possessed an underlying will of purest steel, tensile and enduring. Her courage was so quiet, most would never see it. Even she did not see it. She would bend, but never break. She would not fight unless she had no choice, but when she did, there would be no defeating her.
He kissed her once, fiercely, then regretfully started to pull back. «I should go. You have already been through too much tonight, and my control is not what it should be.»
She clutched his hand. “Please. Don’t go. Stay with me tonight.”
He shook his head. “Sieks’ta, shei’tani, but I cannot.” He bent his head to hers and admitted softly, “This Fey aches to mate with his beloved, even if only in Spirit, and the need is more than I could bear if I stayed.”
Ellysetta tilted her head back and stared up into his eyes. “I don’t want to be afraid anymore, Rain,” she said. “I don’t want to give him that much control over me. Teska.” She guided his
hand to her breast. “Take away the nightmare. Give me something else in its stead. Show me the wonders between a shei’tan and his mate. Ku’shalah aiyah to nei.”
“Ellysetta.” Pride and devotion set his eyes aglow. “Your warrior’s heart humbles me, shei’tani.” Because he couldn’t bear not to, he ducked his head and took her lips in a passionate kiss. “Aiyah, shei’tani. A thousand times, aiyah.” Green Earth swirled around him, depositing his swords and weapons belts on the table nearby.
More magic gathered inside him, and she felt the throbbing heartbeat of living energy and harnessed power. Spirit exploded from his hands in a complex weave of stunning mastery. The shinning mass surrounded them both, alive with form, texture, tastes, and scents, so real that even knowing it was a weave, she could not tell the difference. No longer were they lying on the narrow bed in her room. Instead, they were stretched out on cushioned divans, in a silken tent where perfumed breezes flapped long swaths of fabric in a sensual, hypnotic dance. The air was warm and dry, smelling of cinnabar oil and magic. Outside the tent, the low, feline roar of tairen sounded in the distance.
“Where are we?” she whispered.
“This is my shellaba, a private retreat on my family estates, near the Feyls in the Fading Lands. When you accept my soul into yours and our matebond ceremony is complete, I will bring you here for the first night of our oneness, to mate with you on the lands of my ancestors, in the shadow of Fey’Bahren, and ask the souls of those who came before me to bless our union.” Rain leaned over her, robes of purple satin sliding across her skin as he moved.
He trailed kisses down her throat, parting the satin of her own robes and laving devoted attention to each breast until her nipples were tight, aching buds and her legs fell open in restless invitation. Obligingly, the warm press of his palm cupped her. The dance of his fingers, so much broader and stronger than her own, caressed her most sensitive flesh. She kept her eyes open, fixed on his face, watching the play of emotion as he felt her body begin to respond. He took his time, patient and thorough despite his own needs, smiling into her eyes as he drove her body wild.
Her hips arched, bucking up against his hand. Weave or no weave, her response was utterly real. Heat raced through her veins, and her breath grew shallow. She reached behind her head to grasp the sides of the divan. Her fingers gripped the softness of cushioned velvet, and the smooth, polished hardness of wood. She squeezed, hanging on tight as waves of sensation washed over her.
“I will touch you like this,” he whispered. He kissed his way down her body, following the earlier path of his hands. The long, silken swaths of his hair trailed across her skin, adding yet another subtle friction to tease nerves left throbbing with heightened sensitivity in the burning wake of his mouth. “I will set your body afire, until you think you can take no more. Until you beg me to come inside you and unite our flesh as the matebond unites our souls.”
“I’m begging already.”
He purred deep in his throat, the sound low and stirring. “Not enough. Not yet.”
He lowered his head, replacing the tormenting dance of his hand with the seductive heat of his mouth. His tongue stroked, hot and wet, deep, long laving strokes that made her groan, tiny, flickering strokes that made her shudder and gasp.
“Rain…oh, gods save me…Rain! Please!”
«Not yet… » It was a thrill like no other to make her fly apart in his arms, even if only through Spirit. She was so open, so responsive, an alluring mix of innocence and sensuality. Again and again he brought her to shattering release, wiping out every remnant of fear from her nightmares, replacing each doubt and dread with passion and glorious sensation until there was no room in her mind for anything but him and the feelings he wove upon her.
Only then, only when no hint of fear remained in her eyes, did he draw upon every erotic thought and dream he’d had since her soul first called to him, spin them into each thread of the weave and slide his Spirit body deep into her waiting warmth. He poured his thoughts, his strength, his emotion, his very soul into the weave, fashioning touch, taste, smell, until she could feel his body moving on hers, in hers, until he could feel the tight, wet clasp of her muscles closing around him, pulling him deep. The tendons in his neck drew tight, the muscles in his arms clenched and shook. Part of him was aware of her wide, stunned eyes, her shallow, gasping breaths, the other part was only aware of the naked, sweat-glistening bodies of Spirit that mated in his mind and hers.
“I want to be inside you like this. I would crawl inside your soul and live there if I could. Ver reisa ku’chae. Kem surah, shei’tani.”
“Rain,” she gasped. “Shei’tan!”
He pulled her to his chest and plundered her mouth, as the bodies in his weave arched against each other in screaming, shuddering release. He felt her quake in his arms, felt his own body give itself over to a powerful orgasm that ripped through him with stunning force.
The weave dissolved. The images of his shellaba faded into mist, leaving only Rain and his mate, still fully clothed and lying boneless as sated cats on the bed in her tiny room in the woodcarver’s house.
Much later, when he rose to leave, Ellysetta’s hand curled around his wrist. “Don’t go,” she whispered. “Stay with me. At least until I go back to sleep.”
The glow in his eyes warmed to tenderness. Green Earth swirled in a fresh mist, smelling of springtime and blossoming life. His leather tunic dropped neatly beside the blades and weapons belts on her nightstand. Warm, pale flesh lay beneath her palms, strong arms wrapped tight around her, and the aching beauty of tairen song purred across the newly-forged first thread of their bond, singing a stirring vow.
Rain kissed her with exquisite care and smiled into her eyes. “I will stay with you for eternity, if you allow it, shei’tani.”
Key Celierian Terms
Bell: hour
Chime: minute
Dorn: Furry, round, somnolent rodent. Eaten in stews. “Soggy dorn” is an idiom for someone who is spoiling someone else’s fun. A party pooper.
Keflee: A warm beverage that can act as a stimulant or aphrodisiac.
Lord Adelis: God of light. While Celierians worship a pantheon of gods and goddesses (thirteen in all), the Church of Light worships Adelis, Lord of Light, above all others. He is considered the supreme god, with dominion over the other twelve.
Rultshart: A vile, smelly, boar like animal.
Key Elden Terms
Azrahn: The soul magic forbidden by the Fey for its corrupting influence but used and mastered by the mages.
Primage: master mage
Sulimage: journeyman mage
Umagi: a mage-claimed individual, subordinate to the will of his/her master
Key Fey Terms
Beylah vo: thank you (literally, thanks to you)
Cha Baruk: Dance of Knives
Cha’kor: Literal translation is “five knives.” Fey word for “quintet.”
Chatokkai: First General. Leader of all Fey armies, second in command to the Tairen Soul. Belliard vel Jelani is the chatokkai of the Fading Lands.
Chervil: Fey expletive similar to bastard, as in “you smug chervil.”
Dahl’reisen: Literally, “lost soul”. Dahl’reisen are unmated Fey warriors who have been banished from the Fading Lands either for breaking Fey taboos or for choosing to walk the Shadowed Path rather than committing sheisan’dahlein, the honor death, when the weight of all the lives they have taken in defense of the Fey becomes too great for thier own souls to bear. Dahl’reisen recieve a physical scar when they make the kill that tips thier souls into darkness.
E’tan: beloved/husband/mate (of the heart, not the truemate of the soul)
E’tani: beloved/wife/mate (of the heart, not the truemate of the soul)
E’tanitsa: a chosen bond of the heart, not a truemate bond
Felah Baruk: Dance of Joy
Fey’cha: Fey throwing dagger. Fey’cha have either black handles or red handles. Red Fey’cha are deadly poison. F
ey warriors carry dozens of each kind of Fey'cha in leather straps crisscrossed across their chest.
Feyreisa: Tairen Soul’s mate; Queen
Feyreisen: Tairen Soul; King
Ke vo’san: I love you.
Kem’falla: my lady
Kem’san: My love/My heart
Krekk: Fey expletive
Ku’shalah aiyah to nei: Bid me yes or no.
Las: peace, hush, calm
Maresk, mareska, mareskia: friend (masculine, feminine, plural)
Mei felani. Bei santi. Nehtah, bas desrali: Live well, love deep. Tomorrow, we (will) die.
Meicha: A curving, scimitar-like blade. Each fey warrior carries two meicha, one at each hip.
Miora felah ti’Feyreisa: Joy to the Feyreisa
Pacheeta: A silly bird; not very smart.
Sel’dor: Literally “black pain.” A rare black metal found only in Eld that disrupts Fey magic.
Selkahr: Black crystals used by Mages. Made from Azrahn-corrupted Tairen’s Eye crystal.
Sheisan’dahlein: Fey honor death. Ceremonial suicide for the good of the Fey. All Fey warriors who do not truemate will either commit sheisan’dahlein or become dahl’reisen.
Shei’tan: beloved/husband/truemate
Shei’tani: beloved/wife/truemate
Shei’tanitsa: the truemate bond, a mating of souls
Sieks’ta: I have shame. (I’m sorry; I beg your pardon)
Tairen: Flying catlike creatures that live in the Fading Lands. The Fey are the Tairenfolk, magical because of their close kinship with the Tairen.
Tairen Soul: Rare Fey who can transform into tairen. Masters of all five Fey magics, they are feared and revered for their power. The oldest Tairen Soul becomes the Feyreisen, the Fey King.
Teska: Please
Ver reisa ku’chae. Kem surah, shei’tani: Your soul calls out. Mine answers, beloved.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I am blessed to have the most wonderful friends, family and supporters. A special thanks to Michelle Grajkowski, my agent, for taking a chance on a 1, 000 page fantasy romance from an unpublished author, and to my editor, Alicia Condon, for the same reason. You both made my dream come true. Thanks to all the critique partners who’ve helped me in so many priceless ways: Christine Feehan, Diana Peterfreund, Mom, Betina Krahn, Sharon Stone, Kathie Firzlaff, Carla Hughes, my sister Lisette, Tanya Michaels, Sheila Clover English and Alesia Holliday. Thanks to my dear friends Kim Klein, Keith Stringer, and April Rice who have cheered me on, and to my husband Kevin and our children Ileah, Rhiannon, and Aidan for being so understanding of all the long hours I’ve spent sequestered in my office.