Earthly Desires Read online

  Keira Andrews&Leta Blake

  Part of the Tempting Tales series.

  Cursed as an infant with a lack of physical and emotional gravity, Prince Efrosin can’t keep his feet on the ground or his head out of the clouds. Laughing his way through life, he’s never been weighed down by love and lust.

  Then one fateful day, his tenuous tie to the earth is severed and he blows away on the wind. He’s rescued by Dmitri, a handsome young woodsman who suffers from a mysterious curse of his own, and the two strangers are irresistibly drawn together. Experiencing sex and love for the first time, they dive into a delightfully sensual and passionate affair.

  But the evil witch who cursed them is planning her ultimate revenge. Efrosin and Dmitri must fight to find their fairy tale ending and live happily ever after.

  Keira Andrews & Leta Blake

  Dedication For all our friends who have supported our stories over the years, and for everyone who likes a sexy tale.

  Prologue

  Once upon a time, there was a kingdom at the edge of what was and what could never be. At the center of this kingdom was a castle, and within this castle was a king. Inside this king was a terribly selfish heart.

  One summer day, as the river ran, the birds flew and the flowers bloomed, King Leo paced by his queen’s chamber door, listening as she labored. After three bastard daughters and one bastard son, King Leo was impatient for his queen to present him with an heir to the crown.

  He banged a fist against the door, raging at her to hurry, so that he might hold the babe aloft for the gathered crowds to see. “And God help you if it isn’t the son I deserve.”

  But the birth was hard going. Finally, he heard the midwife shout, “I see the head, my queen.”

  The king flung open the door, strode into the room and pushed aside the old crone attending to his wife. To his eyes, his wife lay resting when she should have been striving to grant him his heir.

  Her pale face shone with sweat, but he cursed her laziness. “Push, or find out what it is to defy me!”

  She struggled up to her elbows to obey. As the queen gave another great cry, the child burst forth into the king’s waiting palms.

  He gripped the small body under its armpits and raised it up. There, before his eager eyes, dangled the child’s penis. The king turned away from his sobbing wife, ignoring her outstretched hands and whimpers for her son.

  He strode across the room and flung open the shutters to lean out of the queen’s high tower chambers. His hands gripped the baby’s body firmly as he thrust it into the light of the day. He yelled, “Kneel before your prince! Kneel before my son!”

  The sun illuminated the wailing infant until he appeared to fairly glow, and the gathered crowd let out a wild cheer, collapsing to their knees.

  As the news of the child spread, joy cascaded through the kingdom. Perhaps this prince would be good and handsome and wise. Perhaps he would be different from his father. And, as with every birth across endless time, hope was reborn.

  Chapter One

  “It’s my birthday,” Efrosin sang, bobbing in the air near the ceiling of his bedroom, as was his wont. He was wearing his usual silk pajamas, and Geoffry felt a prick of concern regarding his chances of convincing his charge to change into more appropriate finery.

  “Indeed it is, Your Highness. Many happy returns to you,” Geoffry said.

  Efrosin pushed off the stone wall with his bare feet and skimmed through the air. “As my manservant, Geoffry, it is your duty to help me get what I want.”

  His short golden hair was still wet and disheveled from his usual morning routine —several hours spent swimming in the embrace of the river. Geoffry imagined that if it were not for the traditional wreathlaying ceremony upon the late queen’s grave, Efrosin would soon be ready to leave for his afternoon routine—even more hours frolicking in the depths and shallows of the river.

  Not that Geoffry could blame his charge for his obsessive love of the water; due to the misfortune of having been cursed soundly by a vengeful witch when he was but an infant, it was the only place where Efrosin had any weight at all.

  Obviously feeling anything but unfortunate, Efrosin spun about mid-air without a care in the world. Geoffry turned from him and began to set out the proper outfit—including a specially designed coat with many long, colorful ribbons sewn firmly to the hem. Each ribbon would be held by a knight to prevent Efrosin from floating into the great, blue sky. Geoffry straightened the collar on the coat and pondered how best to persuade Efrosin to put it on.

  “I hope that what you want, sire, is an afternoon ceremony beside your mother’s grave,” Geoffry said. “For that is what you shall have. Come now, we should hurry. There isn’t much time.”

  Efrosin pushed off the ceiling and took the white, silver and gold embroidered shirt from Geoffry’s hand. “If I must do something quite so dull, then you must entertain me with one of your fine tales first, Geoffry.”

  “Put on these clothes, sire, and I’ll consent. What tale would you like to hear?”

  “The one of my birth would be rather apropos, don’t you agree?”

  “You know that one by heart, sire. I’ve no doubt you could tell it quite well enough to entertain yourself.”

  But Geoffry knew it wasn’t true. Due to his cursed condition, Efrosin lacked emotional gravity and could never pitch his voice to the right note of grief having never felt anything close to it himself. Geoffry had often noted that Efrosin, in his unwitting callousness, best liked tales that evoked great sadness in others. He clearly found the emotion fascinating and even amusing.

  Pulling the shirt over his head, and taking the pants Geoffry offered, Efrosin took Geoffry up on his suggestion. “Once upon a time, a beautiful queen—my mother —gave birth to a handsome and blessed son.” Efrosin frowned. “Hmm, maybe if I skip to the good part?” He cleared his throat and tried again, “Sadly, she was overcome with fever and never recovered from childbed. The country went into great mourning over the loss of grace and kindness the kingdom suffered when she died.”

  Efrosin dove down through the air to grab hold of Geoffry, and, with his help, put on the heavy, beribboned coat. “It’s much better when you tell it,” Efrosin said, a haze of dissatisfaction almost clouding his face before evaporating. “It’s my birthday,” he repeated, and this time there was a note of determination that set off a warning bell in Geoffry. “And, as I was saying, a prince should have what he desires on his birthday.”

  “Yes, your eighteenth,” Geoffry said warily. “You’re a man now, sire.” Geoffry hoped, even though he knew it was useless, that by saying it aloud Efrosin might feel even a small portion of the burden associated with his upcoming responsibilities as Crown Prince. “And as for what you desire, well, you should take that up with your father.”

  The king had decided the time had come to make a strong alliance with a neighboring kingdom, in order to strengthen his position for another war. To that end, Geoffry knew the king intended as his birthday gift to present his son with a selection of princesses and princes—one of whom would become Efrosin’s spouse.

  Being fair of face and having grown into the lean, strong body of a man, Efrosin should have been an ideal husband. Yet because of his cursed condition, his temperament and urges were still very much those of a boy. And, understanding Efrosin better than anyone, Geoffry knew the marriage would be doomed to misery and unhappiness for whomever was chosen.

  “Truly, I would rather not go. It’s so terribly boring.”

  Geoffry said, “It is important that your people see how much you honor the woman who died giving life to you.”

  Efrosin seemed to ponder this. “Well, I am very happy to be alive. It would be awfully dreary to be dead.”

  “Yes, quite. Now come, let me call Sir Carlisle and the others.”

  Geoffry was greatly relieved when Efrosin consented. He watched Efrosin closely during the ceremony, though, and noted that beneath Efrosin’s expression of cheerful boredom, there was an unmistakable glimmer of excitement. A hard knot grew in Geoffry’s stomach. The king, who could barely be bothered to look anything but bored himself, didn’t seem to notice. But then, that was nothing new.

  Back in Efrosin’s room, the sun glowed bright in the early afternoon sky, and Geoffry’s fingers shook as he undid the buttons of Efrosin’s coat while Efrosin bobbed low to the ground where the knights held him fast with the ribbons.

  As soon as the coat was off and the knights dismissed, Efrosin’s smile grew so big that Geoffry felt his middle-aged heart might fail him. It was never a good sign when Efrosin looked quite that delighted.

  “I am no longer a child, you realize,” Efrosin began. “And you must follow my orders. You will tie a rope to my ankle—this one here, the right one, because the left is much too pretty for rope burn, you see—and fly me like a kite, high, high above the tallest tree. So, it must be quite a long rope.”

  Geoffry’s mouth went dry. His eyes went to his time piece and he noted the king would be having his afternoon nap now. The punishment for waking him was death or dismemberment, or sometimes both. He cleared his throat.

  “Indeed, sire, and while I’m sure it would be a great adventure for you, it would be terrifying for me. What if I were to stumble, drop the rope, and you were to blow away? It isn’t as though you’re a balloon. We couldn’t simply have a good marksman on hand to shoot you down again.” He set about needlessly polishing the prince’s shoes. How could they be scuffed when they never touc
hed the ground? “And I’m equally sure that we do not have a rope of such a length.” This, surely, would be enough to dissuade the young daredevil.

  The prince may not have understood the gravity of the proposal, but Geoffry certainly did. He would never forget the violent lashing he’d received when Efrosin was but twelve and had managed to float himself out the window with a rope made of lengths of sheets while Geoffry slept. Though the boy claimed it was an unplanned, impulsive adventure, Geoffry had seen the glint of mischief and glee in the child’s face as he’d read the bedtime story that night, and he’d suspected that Efrosin might take his closed eyes as an invitation to adventure.

  But could Geoffry be blamed for falling asleep despite his best efforts? He was no longer such a young man, with his dark hair graying at the temples and aches in his bones when he did not rest. Besides, who impulsively tied together ten lengths of bed sheets? At some point, one must begin to recognize what they are doing and it then becomes a plan.

  “As it happens,” Efrosin said, pushing his foot against the ceiling to propel himself downward and drifting weightlessly toward the tall post at the foot end of the bed, “I have requisitioned such a one from the ropemaker. I summoned him last week while you were at market. Surprise! Now you have no excuse.”

  Geoffry wished to call his prince a scamp and beat his tail with a birch rod, as he would his own child for such foolishness, but he knew it would do no good. He remembered well the day during Efrosin’s tenth year when the king decided to forcefully instill some gravity in his freefloating son, declaring that boy would be sobered by the time he was done.

  The screams of pained laughter Efrosin had let out as his father had beat him still haunted Geoffry’s worst nightmares. At times, sweating from dreams of it, he wished he had interceded—his own beating be damned—for he had known it would change nothing.

  And it had not. The king had left Efrosin’s chambers with a rare look of humiliated defeat, abandoning Efrosin naked on his stomach, with his back, buttocks and thighs striped from the switch, and delirious, broken laughter drifting from his smiling mouth.

  Geoffry’s own eyes had filled with tears when Efrosin had giggled, “That rather hurt a lot, Geoffry. I do so wish that I could cry. Tell me, would that make it feel better?”

  “No,” Geoffry had said. “It would not.” Though, he’d thought, perhaps it would. “Oh, well then, if only I could cry then at

  least Father would not be so cross.” Then

  he’d laughed some more. “Usually, he is so

  funny when he is cross.”

  But something told Geoffry that, despite

  Efrosin’s laughter, he did not find his father

  so very funny at that moment. It had been a

  difficult night for Geoffry, applying salve to

  his princeling’s wounds and crying tears in

  Efrosin’s stead. The king had never tried

  such a thing again, and now seemed

  resigned to his son’s flighty ways.

  “You requisitioned a rope so that I may

  fly you as a kite,” Geoffry repeated slowly. “Indeed. And it shall be jolly and grand.

  Just think, Geoffry, I’ll see the top of the

  castle. I’ll see where the river flows. Perhaps

  I’ll even see—”

  “You saw the top of the castle the time

  you broke free of your handler and floated

  up to the top of the highest turret. And poor

  Michaelson nearly fell and died trying to

  fetch you down.”

  Efrosin’s lips curved up into a wide

  smile. “Oh yes, that was a brilliant day. But

  that was not quite the same. That was a

  mistake, you see, and I was a bit frightened,

  which made it an ever so sharp joy to float

  that high. This will be more sedate, and you

  are always imploring me to be sedate.” “Sire…”

  “Come,” Efrosin called, gripping the poster of the bed firmly and shoving himself toward the door with the effortless grace of a balloon drifting through the air. “Let us

  begin.”

  Geoffry’s heart sank. There was nothing

  to be done for it. He hoped it didn’t hurt too

  badly when he was hanged. And that would

  be a just punishment if he got caught

  holding onto the end of Efrosin’s rope while

  the boy floated in the heavens. If Efrosin

  should float away…well, there was no

  telling what would happen to Geoffry, or his

  wife and five children.

  Geoffry crossed himself and followed

  Efrosin as he slowly bounced through the

  hallway, his feet always at least three feet

  above the ground.

  * * * * *

  Efrosin had never been so high before. Well, not on purpose. Well, not lately. And then he was even higher. He gazed down at dear Geoffry, who looked so tiny on the ground, both hands clenched around the end of the rope as though it took effort to keep Efrosin from floating away, when he was as light as air itself.

  He could see the preparations for his birthday feast being made on the other side of the line of trees separating the field from the castle garden. He laughed as he imagined the great fright the servants would have if they would but look up and see him there in the sky like an angel of the ether.

  “I should have Geoffry construct wings,” he declared, his eyes shining at the thought.

  He felt a stab of high-spirited annoyance that he had not thought of it before. “It would have been the most divine entrance to my party.”

  If he’d had it in him to mourn that this idea had come to him much too late, he’d have mourned. As it was, he turned to count the clouds, and called down to Geoffry the many wonders of their beauty. Then he spent a few minutes casting about for a sound other than the whistling of wind in his ears, which was so much sharper than the burble and rush of water.

  “Lo, but it is lonely up here,” he said at last, his eyes following the green of the fields cutting a swath down to the path taken by the blue river.

  Geoffry had argued admirably that Efrosin celebrate his birthday with another swim instead of a flight, and Efrosin had been tempted. The river, much more than the air, was his best friend. It alone held him in a snug and secure embrace, with just the right amount of gravity to prevent him from floating away.

  He’d spent much of his life in the water, bobbing in his own world, splashing and laughing, and sunning for endless summer days. The river calmed him, and was the only place he could be persuaded to listen long enough to have learned his letters and numbers. Efrosin remembered his tutor in a boat, umbrella held over his bald head, teaching Efrosin to conjugate verbs as he swam in circles or floated dreamily on his back, his ears below the water, and the professor’s rumbling words lost in the tumble of the current.

  In comparison, the air was an ocean of risk, at once compelling and terrifying. It was godless, empty, full of distance and height, and Efrosin could vanish into it entirely, never to be seen again.

  He sometimes dreamed he’d floated as high as the constellations and the endless, cold horror of it would startle him, laughing, from his sleep. “Oh what a wondrous thing,” he’d exclaim, his blood coursing in his veins. “What a terrible thrill.”

  And yet he was drawn to it like a moth to a flame.

  He’d never told anyone—not even Geoffry—that it frightened him so, and that perhaps it wouldn’t be quite so very bad to have his gravity returned to him. He’d been told he was born with it, but couldn’t remember ever possessing an ounce of substance.

  As fate would have it, Efrosin had no sooner decided that he’d had enough of the thin air for the day and that a swim would, indeed, be a better way to pass the time until his birthday celebration, than a blackwinged bird flew past his face. It reared around and beat its wings like cupped hands scooping the air to pause mid-flight before him, and screeched.

  The bird seemed to smile, something eerie and white, as red flashed in its eyes. Then it dove for the rope tied securely around Efrosin’s ankle, landed on it like a sideways clothes line, and tore into the rugged material with a razor-sharp beak.