Marian shook her head. Then she paled as his words sank in. "No, Lucivar. No. You weren't trying to hurt me. You thought something had gotten into the room, into the bed. You were trying to protect me."
"Nothing could have gotten into that room, not with all the shields I had around it."
"Nothing did," she agreed. "But you didn't know that. You were startled and…"
"By what?" he snapped, feeling raw…and not sure he really believed her.
She mumbled something and wouldn't meet his eyes anymore.
"What?"
"I didn't know my feet were that cold, but then you screamed and leaped out of bed and—"
He looked at her feet.
"I'm wearing socks."
She sounded grumpy. Grumpy was good. Grumpy was wonderful.
"You didn't hurt me, Lucivar. Not in any way."
Relief surged through him, but his heart still ached because he'd sensed a lie beneath her words. He tried to smile, "But you don't want me for a lover." He saw hope in her eyes—and maybe something more? "Do you want me, Marian?"
"I—" She swallowed hard. "Yes, I want you."
He held out a hand. "Then take me."
She turned shy and uncertain. Couldn't quite look at him. Another kind of woman wouldn't have hesitated to take what he offered. Marian might, given time and encouragement, initiate sex by giving a quiet invitation, but she would never demand.
He approached her slowly, his fingers linking with hers when he got close enough to touch her. "Take me, Marian." He stepped back, bringing her with him, until he could sit in one of the chairs. A quick tug and a deft move had her straddling him. He brushed her hair away from her face, enjoying the feel of that black silk flowing around his fingers. His lips touched hers, a soft kiss. "Take me."
He remembered her, but now he could savor the sensations of being with her. The way her mouth opened for him. The timid way her tongue stroked his, encouraging him to take what he wanted. Soft. Sweet. The kind of sex he'd never had before.
Her fingers flexed on his shoulders, her only signal that she wanted more.
His mouth drifting along her jaw and down her neck, he undid her tunic lacings and slipped it down her shoulders as he vanished her undershirt. He doubted she was aware of arching her back in an unspoken invitation to suckle, but he took the invitation while his hands slipped under the tunic to caress her back.
He played with her until she squirmed in his lap, looking for what was still caged behind leather. She gasped, startled, when he vanished all of his clothes and all of hers below the waist. His hands kneaded her buttocks, rubbing her against him.
"Take me." He lifted her, sheathed himself inside her. "Take me." She was too focused on the feel of his cock to understand he was offering more than sex, but he knew he was offering his heart as well as his body. She was ready to ride. He wanted to be ridden. But she didn't have the leverage, so he slid his hands down her legs and cupped her knees, giving her stirrups.
He couldn't touch her, had effectively tethered himself so that he could only submit. Watching a woman ride him to her pleasure had never thrilled him before, but watching Marian lose herself in a sexual haze made him wild to touch her, taste her. But he stayed tethered, helping her ride him, gritting his teeth against the need to explode until she cried out and crested—and took him with her.
She melted against him, limp and trembling, her head pillowed on his shoulder. Feeling his own muscles quiver, he released her knees and wrapped his arms around her, content to hold her. But as the sweat began to dry on his skin, he shivered.
"Come on, sweetheart," he said, giving her a little squeeze. "We can't sleep here."
"Can," she mumbled, rubbing her cheek against his shoulder.
He considered picking her up and taking her to bed, then dismissed the thought. With the way his legs were quivering right now, he'd just dump them both on the floor.
"We can't sleep here. It's too cold." He pushed and prodded until she finally raised her head to look at him. Her eyes were dull with fatigue, and he realized she must have tried to work herself into the ground to run from her own thoughts. "We'll have something to eat and then cuddle up in bed."
"Cuddle?"
Before she could fold around him again, he got her off him enough to dump her in another chair and call in a blanket to wrap around her. After calling in the robe she'd made him for Winsol and putting a light warming spell on it and the blanket, he brought the bread and cheese to the table, then ladled out two bowls of soup. She just watched him, which told him well enough how tired she was.
Even hunger couldn't compete with exhaustion, and neither of them managed to finish the soup. But Marian roused enough to insist on putting the food away properly, then stumbled with him to his bedroom.
It smelled clean. Fresh. He wasn't sure how she'd managed to air the room "when it was still so wickedly cold outside, but he was grateful the thick musk of sex was gone.
A few minutes to add fresh wood to the fire, add more power to the warming spells, and get Marian focused enough to call in a nightgown.
Then he bundled them into bed, set his teeth, and shifted his legs until she could warm her feet on him. Damn, they were cold!
She curled up against him and sighed in contentment.
Lucivar brushed his lips against her forehead and smiled. If sex wasn't enough incentive for his little hearth witch to share his bed, having a man who would keep her feet warm this winter would be.
NINETEEN
After a hard winter, nothing lifted the spirits in quite the same way as the warmth of spring thaw, Marian thought as she went from shop to shop to do the marketing. Even Riada's muddy streets couldn't dull her pleasure…especially since Lucivar had taught her how to air walk and she could keep her boots above the mud.
He'd taught her a lot of things over the winter months.
As she considered stopping at The Tavern to chat with Merry and have a quick bowl of soup or stew before going home, she almost ran into the woman who stepped out of a shop directly in her path.
She hadn't seen Roxie all winter. Didn't want to see her now.
"Lady Roxie," Marian said, stepping to one side to go around the other witch.
Roxie stepped into her path again. "You'd better start looking for a new position. When I move into the eyrie, I'm not sharing Lucivar with the likes of you." She gave Marian one scathing look from head to toe. "I suppose using you for relief was better than using his own hand, but not by much. Once I'm there, Lucivar won't have any interest in you, and I'm not going to have a servant working for me who doesn't know her place."
A chill went through Marian. "What are you talking about?"
"Lucivar's going to be my lover. I'll be moving into the eyrie with him any day now."
Marian shook her head. "He doesn't want you. He'd never invite you to live with him."
Something ugly glinted in Roxie's eyes before she smiled. "He's not going to have a choice. He's going to have to do everything I want."
"He's the Warlord Prince of Ebon Rih," Marian protested. "You can't force him to do anything he doesn't want to do. He doesn't serve you."
"He's going to," Roxie said smugly. Then she leaned close to Marian. "I'm going to tell everyone he tried to force himself on me but came to his senses before it became an actual rape. The Queens in Ebon Rih won't demand an execution…they wouldn't dare, considering who he's related to. But I'll insist that he be made to serve me for a year as the price for the trauma inflicted by his unbridled lust. And they'll give him to me."
Marian stared at Roxie, stunned. Accuse Lucivar of rape? The accusation alone would require going before a tribunal of Queens to determine the man's innocence or guilt, and even if he was declared innocent, the taint of being accused could shadow him the rest of his life. It had happened to a friend of her father's. Despite being falsely accused, the Warlord had been dismissed from the court…and had ended up leaving Askavi because even his closest friends had turned away from him, afraid their own reputations would be smeared if they were seen with him.