Lennox, Mary - Heart of Fire.txt Read online

  very politely, that he desist? Do you think he’ll learn a thing

  from this? I wanted to kill him. Seeing him… seeing you….”

  Sera shook her head. Denying, refusing to believe it was

  true, she backed away from him. She felt crushed by the ugliness,

  the brutality, the lack of choice. This was a world of horror.

  Nicholas took Sera’s arm and pulled her toward the stable,

  holding her with that same gentle touch. “Someone must see to

  your injuries, my lady,” he said. His manner, his voice, had

  undergone a lightning swift transition. He was grave, and his

  eyes were so soft.

  “I’ll not insist that you move to the palace tonight. You’re

  weary. You’re sickened by what you have endured. The doctor

  will come within the hour. And tomorrow, you’ll come to live

  where I can be certain of your safety and well-being.”

  “No. Please, Nicholas Rostov. I am well. I am happy here.

  Don’t make me live in that prison.”

  He shook his head, stroking her hair back from her forehead

  with a hand that trembled a little. “I can’t protect you here. And

  I can’t let you go. Tomorrow morning, my…Sera. You must

  come to live with us. Where you belong.”

  The doctor came and went. The moon rose higher. Sera

  stared at it from her window. She couldn’t bear it, not another

  day. Nicholas, so gentle one moment, so dangerous the next.

  The violence of his world reflected in his swift, terrible

  vengeance.

  Outside her room were the contented sounds of sleeping

  horses. Occasionally, one snuffled and blew softly. She slipped

  from her room and crept down the stairway, making her way to

  Wind Rider’s stall.

  “I am here, Tzirah,” she whispered to him in the Hill tongue,

  her language, reminding her of her life. She bridled Wind Rider

  as quickly as she could and led him into the park. Throwing

  herself on his back, she galloped him out, trying to break the

  pull of the lodestone holding her here.

  Sera raced for miles to the very end and saw what she’d

  been looking for since she had come to this place—a break in

  the tall, thorny hedge that walled the grounds in. The broken

  hedge still stood at ten feet. Two thirds of the way up, wicked

  thorns spiked out at all angles. A horse and rider crashing through

  them would be torn to shreds. Sera halted Wind Rider and stared

  at it, her breath catching in her throat. Half Outlander that she

  was, she lacked the full power of the Hills, didn’t she? Did she

  dare to risk them both?

  There was no doubt that she must go now. There was a way

  out and a destination. It did not matter how compelling a straight,

  tall, utterly unpredictable man with broad shoulders and

  beautiful gray eyes could be. It did not matter at all.

  She took a deep breath, shut her eyes, and willed Wind

  Rider up. The stallion’s powerful haunches gathered and sprang.

  In a burst of strength, they soared, arced and came down again

  on the other side. With barely more concussion than a four-foot

  jump would have taken, Wind Rider landed, and without

  breaking stride, galloped away to freedom.

  Five

  “They’ve sacked Selonia!” The first messenger arrived,

  shouting the news in the courtyard. Pandemonium hit the palace.

  Nicholas reestablished order as quickly as he could.

  “Oblomov,” he said to the grizzled general, whom he trusted

  to keep his head in the midst of a whirlwind. “Remain in

  Montanyard with most of the army. I’ll lead four regiments to

  Selonia. Above all, we must keep the news of the raid quiet for

  as long as possible.” He didn’t need a nation in panic right now,

  and even less did he need his enemies to realize the Brotherhood

  had somehow slipped through his eastern border.

  General Obomov bowed his gray head. “It’ll take a few

  hours to put together the heavy weaponry and the supplies.”

  The general left in quick step, followed by his aides.

  As he called for his ministers, Nicholas could hear

  Oblomov’s voice barking orders all the way down the hall.

  A short time later, when Katherine burst into his chamber,

  her eyes full of fear, Nicholas was dressing for the journey and

  was suffering Simmons’ ministrations on the knot in his brown

  stock tie.

  “Sera’s gone,” she said. “Nobody has seen her since last

  night.”

  Nicholas froze, then pushed away from Simmons’ hand.

  “Her room is empty?”

  Katherine nodded. “Wind Rider is gone, as well.”

  “Damnation!” As anger pushed back the panic, Nicholas

  shoved his left foot into his riding boot and muttered. “Little

  fool. To think after what Dawson had done to her that she could

  survive out there alone on the road.” Katherine handed him the

  right boot, and he pulled it on with more force than necessary.

  “Of all the times to pull this stunt! How the hell did she get

  out? Does anyone know that, at least?” He flung himself out

  the door, striding down the hallway with long, quick steps.

  “The guards say she never passed the palace or the city

  gates.” Katherine ran to keep up with him. “Andre’s waiting

  for you on the grounds before the palace.”

  Nicholas thought of the way Sera had looked at him after

  he’d beaten Dawson. She had thought he was some mad,

  ravening beast. He, too, had been shocked by his lack of control.

  But the world was full of more dangerous beasts. His stomach

  twisted in fear.

  “I should let her persist in this mad scheme. With the

  Brotherhood loose on the land, not to mention your usual

  assortment of killers and rapists hiding behind every crossroads,

  she’ll be dead or worse in a day.” Nicholas had reached the

  grand staircase and was running down it two steps at a time.

  “Nikki!” Katherine cried out to him in a voice that echoed

  all the way to the painted dome three stories above them.

  Impatient to be off, he turned and looked back at her standing

  on the landing. Her face was pale and her eyes haunted.

  “Bring her home, Nikki. Please.”

  He nodded sharply and, not waiting for the footman’s

  services, shoved his way out the high double doors.

  In the courtyard, Andre was already mounted. “She didn’t

  get out the gates. They’re certain of it,” he said holding out the

  reins of Nicholas’s chestnut. Nicholas swung up into the saddle.

  “That means she’s loose in the park. She was horrified last

  night by the violence, the blood—she can’t understand what

  kind of evil exists in this world. And I thought she might be a

  spy! She said once that when she was troubled, she rode. Andre,

  if she went out in the darkness, not knowing where the cliffs

  end out there beyond the paths…” His voice broke. “I shall

  never forgive myself.”

  Andre stared at him. Then his face softened with something

  akin to pity. “Katherine says she rides like a Valkyrie. That horse

  has sense, even if she doesn’t. Come. It
will take the army a

  while yet to assemble with the supplies. We have time to check

  the park.”

  “Take the outer perimeter. Just in case there’s a way through

  that hedge that even the gardeners don’t know about.”

  Andre nodded. “You’ll take the park, itself?”

  “Yes.” If he found her, if she was…dead, he wanted to be

  alone if he had to face that possibility.

  Nicholas took a deep breath. Fear would only get in the

  way. He followed the hoof prints made the night before by a

  large, well-shod horse cantering along the park road.

  At one point, he heard Andre on the other side of the hedge

  and shouted to him. “I’ve found her trail. Keep up with me

  along the perimeter unless you hear a shot.”

  He got to the very end of the park before he saw it, and then

  he simply jumped off his horse and stared at the ground. Here,

  the hedge rose to ten feet, not its usual twelve. Still, not even a

  puissance rider and horse could take a jump that height. Yet six

  feet from the hedge, a good sized horse had gathered his

  haunches and taken off in a jump that wasn’t possible. Thorny

  twigs scattered about meant that he had grazed the top of the

  hedge with his hooves.

  “Andre!”

  “Almost there.” Andre’s voice shouted back to him.

  He heard the beat of hooves and the long slide to a stop

  outside the hedge. “Check the ground about six feet from the

  hedge,” he called out.

  There was silence for a moment. Then Andre’s voice, slow

  and stunned. “I don’t believe it.”

  “She landed there?”

  “And kept galloping, it appears. How is it possible?”

  Nicholas barked out a wild laugh. “Hill magic. What else?”

  “Are you saying that Sera’s a—a witch of some sort?”

  Andre’s voice held just the hint of a hoot.

  A witch…where had he heard rumors of witchcraft before?

  Who had been so branded? Somewhere, in the back of his

  memory, a shadowy picture of a woman rose, dark-haired and

  beautiful. Then that small flash of recognition was gone.

  “Not a witch, exactly, but something—different.

  Something…powerful.”

  In spite of his fear for Sera, a soaring exultation welled up

  from that place he could never control where she was concerned.

  He would find her, by God, and he had his justification for

  keeping her. The woman could make a horse fly like Pegasus.

  What other wonders could she perform for Laurentia?

  “Get back to the palace. I’m going after her.”

  Shortly thereafter, Nicholas sat a fresh mount in the

  courtyard, assigning a troop of men to accompany him and then

  turning to Andre, now remounted beside him.

  “Lead the army along the road to Selonia. I’ll ride ahead

  and meet you with our truant in tow when you arrive there

  tomorrow morning.” Please God, he added silently.

  Nicholas and his men followed Sera’s tracks into the forest.

  Her trail was so clear an old man with cataracts could have

  followed it. He grew both more anxious and more certain of

  finding her.

  As the hours passed, Nicholas galloped through the forest

  in a state of gnawing anxiety. Nightmare visions invaded his

  mind—all of them featuring Sera in tears. It was well after

  moonrise when they came upon a little camp in a mossy clearing

  beside a stream. Nicholas looked through the trees and saw Wind

  Rider grazing placidly.

  He raised his hand to them. “Stay here. I don’t want her

  frightened or disturbed.”

  The men nodded and dismounted, gathering brush to make

  a fire and settling in for the night. Nicholas walked silently into

  the clearing.

  Wind Rider raised his head and widened his nostrils at

  Nicholas’s approach, but he soon lowered it again, cocked his

  hind leg, and half closed his eyes. Nicholas spied a small,

  bundled figure lying still beneath a blanket. There was no fire

  to warm her, he noticed as he knelt beside the blanket. At least

  she had known enough not to light one, lest she attract the

  attention of any brigand in the area.

  Sera slept, trusting as a child, in the midst of a forest filled

  with wild beasts and outlaws. She was breathing, Nicholas

  reminded himself as he bent over her. She was alive and safe.

  Nicholas was afraid to touch her because he wanted to shake

  her until her teeth rattled, or kiss her until the crazy fear that

  had haunted him all day burst into fire, burning away all the

  turmoil. He drew the blanket down to get a good look at her

  before he wakened her. The overhanging branches swayed in

  the wind and the moon shone through, giving him light to see

  her face. She looked tired and worn, and he shook his head,

  feeling half his anger drain out of him like sand from a sieve.

  He shook her shoulder far more gently than he had planned

  to. “Get up, Sera,” he said low.

  Her eyes remained shut. She raised her hand to his as it

  cupped her shoulder, lifted it and brought his palm to her lips.

  Rubbing against it, she breathed deeply, taking in his scent.

  “Nicholas,” she whispered. “I miss you already.” Her voice

  had the soft slur of a dreamer half-waking.

  Something cold and frozen melted inside him, filling him

  with a confusion of emotion he had no means to understand.

  His voice came out in a strangled, low moan. They had hours

  yet to meet the troops on the Selonia road, he reasoned. She

  was so tired. As he slid beneath the blanket, it occurred to

  Nicholas that he had never before actually slept with a woman.

  He had simply satisfied his lust and returned to his duties.

  He settled Sera into the hollow of his hips, her back to him,

  the lush curve of her buttocks warm and soft against him. It

  was a good feeling, to have his arms wrapped about her, and

  the sweet touch of her body all along his. She fit him as though

  she had been made for him. He drew her closer against him,

  burying his face in the tender curve of her neck.

  He smoothed back her hair breathing in the elusive flower

  scent. “Go back to sleep, Sera,” he said. And lay beside her,

  keeping watch through the night.

  ***

  Sera dreamed that Nicholas was kissing her—all over.

  Somehow, his hands were beneath her gown, caressing her

  breasts, teasing them into a fullness of inchoate need. Then his

  mouth was traveling in a slow, tantalizing line from the curve

  of her shoulder down. She could feel the light flicker of his

  tongue and the nibbling kisses along the path he was taking,

  heating her skin wherever he touched it, making her tense with

  anticipation. She liked it, lying with him, feeling the warmth of

  his breath hovering over her nipple. She made a sound in her

  throat, a helpless murmur, and arched upward, moving her hips

  as he gently kneaded her with his hands. She didn’t want to

  wake up.

  Slowly, in her dream, his taut warmth left her. Confused,

  she opened her eyes to find he wa
s indeed there, but standing

  with his back to her, his body rigid in the gray light of dawn.

  She scrambled to her feet, still dream-befuddled and wary.

  What had he done to her? Had it been real, or just a figment

  of imagination, a weakness in her character? Did she desire this

  man so much that his mere presence caused her to dream such

  wicked things? Should she be outraged with him or with herself?

  “Don’t run away from me again.” He didn’t turn. He didn’t

  move. He was a statue in the growing light, perfect, immobile,

  his very essence marble-hard.

  “Let me go,” she said. “And I shan’t have to run away.”

  “Tell me your secrets. How did you jump that hedge? What

  more can you do? Tell me, and help me keep my country safe.

  Then I’ll let you go.”

  “I cannot.” She wanted to scream with frustration, to sit in

  a heap on the forest floor and just cry for loneliness and grief. If

  she allowed it, one world would brand her a witch, just as it had

  branded her mother. And the other world, the one she protected

  with her silence, would see her betrayal as the weakness of an

  emotion-laden child, incapable of higher understanding.

  He finally turned around, his dark eyes boring into her as

  though he wanted to read her very soul. “Little fool. Do you

  have any idea what could have happened to you? Even a first

  time hunter could have followed the tracks you made. It’s time

  to face the sad and sorry truth, Sera. You can’t survive without

  protection.”

  He began to stride for the trees, leading Wind Rider along

  with him. “My men await us just outside this copse. Ten minutes,

  Sera. That’s all the time you have for a toilette.”

  She washed hurriedly at the stream, hearing the snorts and

  rustles of horses, the unmistakable sounds of men breaking

  camp. She realized with horror that she had slept through the

  arrival of what sounded like an entire regiment of soldiers.

  Sera hurried toward the cavalry troop massed at the edge

  of the copse. Nicholas was already mounted on his own horse,

  holding Wind Rider firmly by the reins. She took the reins from

  him and mounted, following Nicholas out of the forest and onto

  the road.

  They rode silently through the morning, the men clustered