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She hugged herself tighter as she waited long heartbeats for him to turn and face her. He expected her to leave today. She hadn’t found the alpha wolf. Grigori would find her, alone and defenseless. There was nowhere she could hide from him. Ivan Romanov couldn’t be her only hope because he was a man who didn’t believe in hope. Not anymore.
“Did you send the wolves to find me?” Elena asked.
Though she’d braced herself, she wasn’t prepared for Ivan to suddenly turn around and pace toward her. She backed away several steps from the ferocity that tightened his face before she stopped herself and stood her ground.
“You weren’t in the tower,” Ivan said.
He came close enough to touch her, but instead he reached for the key between her breasts. He didn’t pull it from her neck. He only held it in his large, calloused fingers. She looked from the key up to his eyes. He loomed over her, but it wasn’t fear she felt at his sudden nearness. No. The thrill in her veins and the rush on her skin was something besides fear. Awareness. Expectation. In the meager sunlight, she noted that his irises were brighter than the snow. His pupils had retracted, allowing lighter green and gold flecks to glow. The lightness softened his otherwise forbidding expression. His hair had been loosened around his face by his exertions, and glossy chunks of it threatened to come free from the leather cording.
If he sought to intimidate her, he succeeded, but only because she was intimidated by his accessibility. Why did she notice indications of softness that were probably a lie? And why did she feel as if she was missing a truth she needed to see?
“You gave me the key. And I chose to unlock the door,” Elena said. She still didn’t mention the call that made it impossible for her to hide. There was something here she needed to find. Something more than a man and a wolf, but they were part of it, she was sure.
“I can’t decide if you’re brave or foolish,” Romanov said. His gaze was intense. His hold on the key between her breasts was tight. She couldn’t back away. She was caught and held—both by his hand and his eyes.
“Careful and brave rarely go hand in hand. Brave is doing what has to be done, no matter the risk,” Elena said. “My mother was brave. She gave her life to call forth an ancient binding spell so that I could live free. I’m only just learning how to be brave for myself.”
He leaned slightly, bowing his head toward her face. At the same time, he pulled the key slightly toward his chest. It was an infinitesimal movement. But the chain definitely tightened against her neck. Her neck and his hand were engaged in a silent tug of war that mimicked the tug of war she was battling between the magnetic pull of his broad chest and her trembling body.
Why did the courtyard seem like the final destination in the long journey she’d taken? And why did she look for softness in this legendary man? Because she wanted him to tighten his grip on the key and tug harder. He was powerful. He could narrow the gap between them without her permission. It would absolve her of the bad decision she suddenly wanted to make.
Because in spite of the talk of being brave, all she could do was lower her attention from his angry eyes to focus on his mouth. Somehow, the truth was there for her to see. The swell of his sensual lower lip belied his talk of her foolishness. He wanted her here. He wanted her close. Deep inside, a liquid tightening coiled and a hunger rose. She wanted to kiss him. Never mind that he was an angry warrior who claimed he wanted her to stay locked away until she could leave. He held her for a reason. He stood tense as their bodies paused in the nearly touching position. Her breasts were inches from the warmth of his chest.
She lifted her gaze quickly to see what he would do. But his eyes were shadowed now by a thick fall of wavy black hair that had escaped its confinement. His irises glittered with an emerald sheen behind those snow-dampened locks. But his expression was obscured. She could only take in the rise and fall of his chest—it seemed slower than it should be, as if he controlled his breathing or even...did he hold his breath? Her own breath was shallow and quick. Her body held still as she waited to see what he would say or do.
“You are brave. Braver than I hope you’ll ever know,” Romanov said. It was almost a growl, uttered past a tense and tightened jaw.
“What is it I should be afraid of? What could possibly be worse than being captured by the witchblood prince who stalks me?” Elena asked. She closed her eyes and willed away the hot moisture that threatened to rise behind her lids. She’d already betrayed too much of her vulnerability to him and he refused to be moved. She wouldn’t give him her tears too.
“I don’t know the prince of whom you speak. And I know many monsters. Some man, some truly beast. The Ether claims more of my humanity with every Cycle. And you ask what you should be afraid of as if a threat doesn’t stand before your very eyes,” Romanov said. His voice had dropped to a low, agonized whisper. It seemed confessional. Yet he told her nothing she didn’t already know. He was dangerous. She could sense it. She could see it. But he was also so much more. Compelling. Alluring. Seductive. More attractive to a civilized woman than he should be.
“I will not give up. I will not go away,” Elena insisted. A sudden persistent pull on the silver chain caused her eyelids to open quickly. They were closer. There was only the slightest brush of contact between them, but the tips of her breasts burned. She did hold her breath then because respiration caused an agonizing allure of friction she couldn’t resist.
But she didn’t pull away.
And she didn’t close her eyes again.
There were no tears now. Only a giddy heated pleasure radiating from her distended nipples to the rest of her body. The glittering intensity of his gaze was locked on hers, but he must have known the chain was indenting the nape of her neck because he allowed the silver links to go slack. Now it was up to her to stay close or move away. He no longer held her in place.
She stayed.
And the attention of his eyes fell to the key in his hand. She watched him as he focused on placing the key against the hollow of her neck. The heat of his hand had warmed the iron. Nevertheless the contact sent shivers down her spine, especially when he allowed the key to fall. It slid down until the hollow of her cleavage caught it. The warmed iron between her breasts caused her to gasp. But then when he lifted his free hand to touch her, the sudden weight of his calloused fingers and palm cupping the back of her neck was so much hotter. Her gasp became a trembling sigh and then a whimper when his fingers brushed under the chain as if to soothe the mark it had left on her skin. He was moved, but she wasn’t sure what to expect. She suddenly feared she’d woken a sleeping giant, one that might consume her body and soul if he decided to stay awake.
“I won’t send you back out into the snow. But you won’t find what you seek at Bronwal. There are no champions here. Only heartache and defeat. Only darkness and danger,” Romanov warned.
Elena breathed freely now. Her whole body burned and she didn’t care. For so long she’d been harassed and harried. She’d been injured, physically and emotionally. Plagued by nightmares and loss. Desperation hadn’t been the only thing that drove her to climb the mountain, but it was desperation—a different kind—that caused her to lift her arms. She placed her palms against Romanov’s sweat-dampened chest. She felt the thudding of his heart, his powerful muscles and his heat. He jerked at the contact. But he didn’t jerk away. He stilled as she slid her hands up inch by inch, measuring his height and his solid reality, until she held a broad shoulder in each hand. She didn’t understand what had called her to Bronwal, but she understood this.
Her hands had been trained to be a graceful expression of her art, but in that moment they were strong. They held a legend. And he was the one who trembled beneath her fingers. His mighty form reacted to the delicate intimacy of her touch.
His hand tightened on the back of her neck. She was held again. And she didn’t mind. For the first time in a long time she focused on pleasure instead of pain. It was warm and immediate and all else fled from her thoughts.
“One word and I’ll let you go. I’m not so Ether-addled that I have no self-control. I will be a man, not a monster, for as long as I’m able. For now, I’m able. Walk away from me,” Romanov said. But as he spoke he pulled her close and it was gentler than she could have imagined. He didn’t crush her against him. He pressed and her curves complied until they were melded together.
She tilted her chin to meet his descending face. And still he paused. Their lips were only millimeters apart. His warm breath tickled her slightly open mouth.
“I’m a dancer. I’ve spent more time as a swan than as a woman,” Elena said softly. The tears were back, burning her eyes. She ached to kiss him. And more. He was big and powerful, and when his other arm came up to press against her lower back the sensation of being held, safe, away from all that had come before, left her light-headed. But she was at a loss off the stage. She didn’t know how to claim a new life now that her old life was over.
“No. I’m holding the woman. Without a doubt, it’s the woman’s mouth I’ll taste,” Romanov said.
Elena drew a shuddering breath of air as he traversed the last distance left between them.
Their lips touched and his mouth moved with eager hunger against hers. In nightmares, she’d endured depravity. This was pure, human and real. She tightened her hands on his shoulders as her stomach swooped and soared and her legs went weak. She also opened to the masculine seduction of his rough, slick tongue teasing between her lips.
Living off the stage was more instinct than practice. She swooned into the kiss without thought to form or precision. Romanov was all heat and pleasure and he consumed her easily. The thrill that rushed beneath her skin echoed the call she’d followed up the mountain. She couldn’t separate the sensations. She’d wanted his hair unbound because she wanted this wildness. He’d seemed to offer it with every glance, with every move, even though he’d withheld it.
Her tongue hungrily licked past his lips and twined with his. He held her tight as if he hadn’t been offering to let her go seconds before. She didn’t want to go anywhere. Her search seemed to be over. The call was silenced because it had been answered, somehow, someway, by his lips and teeth and tongue.
“You risk much. This woman is protected by her mother’s spilt blood and claimed by Grigori, the witchblood prince. You might be Vasilisa’s plaything, but that won’t stop him from torturing you for eternity if you despoil his prize.”
Romanov tore his lips from hers and whirled around to face the interruption. A man had entered the courtyard from the keep. Elena immediately found her footing as she was shoved behind the warrior she shouldn’t have been kissing.
Her life wasn’t a life free to indulge in sensual assignations. Especially with the legendary master who refused to help her engage the help of the alpha wolf.
The man who had entered the courtyard cautiously approached them. Of course, he was no man. He was Volkhvy. And judging from his intimate knowledge of her tormentor, he was Dark, not Light.
“You’ve come for the Romanov blade, but you’ll find it buried deep in a cross purified by generations of my honorable men. It won’t come to you easily, and the sapphire has long lost its glow,” Romanov said. He’d placed himself between her and the Volkhvy. But he had no weapon in his hands.
The Dark witch was dressed in black leather from head to foot. He shone like obsidian in the winter sun. His white hair was braided in a thousand plaits and piled on top of his head, and his movements were young and quick. He was at least as tall and strong as Romanov himself. Elena’s heart pounded, overwhelmed with the rude transition from passion to fear. The wolves would come. Surely, the wolves would come.
“Grigori will kill you for taking the taste he hasn’t been able to take himself. He will cut out your bold tongue,” the man said. He laughed when he said it. And he attacked.
Elena was startled by another sudden shove that sent her sliding backward in the snow away from Romanov as he pushed her several feet before he and the Volkhvy collided. She didn’t fall. She kept her balance as only a woman with years of physically demanding training could have. Her knee screamed, but it didn’t give way. Her arms flew out to automatically aid her equilibrium, and anyone watching would have thought she had merely been landing from a smooth pirouette.
“You grow weaker with each materialization, old man. The stone can be recharged. I’m not sure the same can be said for you,” the witchblood man said.
“Try and try and try again. But always empty-handed in the end. Right, Dominique?” Romanov taunted in return.
“You know this man?” Elena asked. She’d immediately recovered and gone to a weapons rack where practice swords and daggers were hung in a rough array.
“Him. Many others. They’re all the same to me. They come for the sword Vasilisa gave my father,” Romanov said. “They leave without it.” His blows connected powerfully with the Volkhvy’s abdomen, chest and jaw. The witchblood man recovered from each blow much more quickly than a mortal man would. But after one particularly hard connection, he did spit blood into the snow. “Sometimes they don’t leave. Perhaps it’s your turn to die, Dominique.”
“Romanov!” Elena shouted. She threw a short broadsword high into the air. It flew in a wide arc and then down into Romanov’s hand. She grabbed two daggers for herself, but as her hands closed over their hilts, something drew her attention across the courtyard. Her eyes fell on the sword Romanov had buried deep in the scarred practice form. Her feet carried her closer to it of their own volition. One step and then another. The sapphire didn’t look that dull to her. It seemed to sparkle in the sun.
“No. Go inside,” Romanov ordered. She ignored him. The Volkhvy had drawn a blade from a sheath on his back. His leather trench coat whirled around his legs as he brandished it. It wasn’t jeweled, but the metal itself glowed in his hands.
Elena had gone for the easily accessible weapons because that’s where she’d ended up when Romanov had shoved her away. Now she tucked the daggers in her back pockets and went for the more powerful blade. It was buried deep in the wood of the cross. So deep that it held her entire body weight, such that it was, when she grasped its hilt and tried to pull it free.
“I’m not running away. Not anymore,” she said through clenched teeth. She refused to let go even when the hum of power in the sword caused her arms to go numb. Romanov was wrong. There was power left in the blade. It hummed like bees beneath her skin, vibrating her body as she pulled. She braced her feet against the practice form. Her knee screamed, but she used all of her strength to push with her legs and pull with her arms at the same time.
“It won’t matter. Running, hiding, making a stand. He’ll have you in the end. There are many that claim to be Volkhvy, but only Dark Volkhvy royals can trace their lineage back to Baba Yaga herself. The witchblood prince won’t be denied. Oh the pretty tales he’s told about his future plans for you, my pet. Or I should say his pet,” the Volkhvy said. His laugh was cut short by a sudden fierce attack by Romanov. The powerful warrior hacked and hacked until the muscles on his back stood out in bunches and the witchblood man was driven to his knees. The Volkhvy, Dominique, parried as many blows as he could, but others connected with him until his white hair was painted with crimson flecks of blood.
“You should have given up. This will be your last attempt,” Romanov said.
Elena suddenly fell to the ground as the Romanov blade came out of the practice form. She cried out as the fall jarred her knee and she closed her eyes against the pain, but she didn’t drop the sword. She landed on her back with the sword grasped in both hands. It took long seconds to catch her breath and regain her feet. Seconds Romanov didn’t have. As she opened her eyes and stood, the Volkhvy’s hands glowed. His blade had been knocked from his fingers, but he looked prepared to unleash some kind of spell against the man she’d been kissing minutes before.
“No,” Elena shouted. She ran toward the men with the sapphire blade held high.
But there was no time for spells or the Romanov blade. Romanov plunged the dull practice sword into the Volkhvy’s chest. The rusty metal must have penetrated the witchblood man’s heart. Thick black blood bubbled up from the wound and from between the man’s lips as he fell to the snowy ground.
Romanov fell to his knees beside his old adversary and grasped him by the lapels of his leather trench coat. He jerked him up toward his face. Elena stopped dead in her tracks and lowered the Romanov blade before the gruesome scene.
“Take Grigori a message. Tell him Elena Pavlova belongs to no one but herself,” Romanov said. “And that Bronwal is defended. For eternity.”
Elena started and dropped the Romanov blade when the bleeding man hazed before her eyes and disappeared leaving nothing but a puddle of steaming black blood on the ground. The sword fell with a solid thud that caused Romanov to rise to his feet and turn as if he was prepared to face another challenger.
“It’s a defense mechanism. Volkhvy fade back to their home when they’re gravely injured,” Romanov explained. There was black blood on Romanov’s sculpted cheek. From it a slow curl of steam rose in the air. His hair was loose now. It had come unbound during the fight. Long black waves framed his face. His hands were clenched. His chest rose and fell from the exertion of defeating a magical foe. But it was his eyes that caught her attention. They tracked from the sword on the ground to the practice form, to her face and back again.
“You tried to bring me the Romanov blade,” he said.
“You warned Grigori away,” Elena replied.
He stalked toward her looking battered and bruised, but the confident look in his eyes and the puddle of Volkhvy blood on the ground made him seem invincible. Why had she been so desperate to help him when he had refused to help her?
The answer came from the things he’d said to the witchblood man.
She thought he would pick up the blade she’d dropped, but he stepped over it instead. He’d already recovered. His breathing was no longer labored. As she watched, the black blood completely evaporated from his face. He ignored the sword and came to stand directly in front of her, his attention fully on her. His penetrating gaze caused a flush to rise as she remembered her hungry response to his kiss.
“I’m no longer Vasilisa’s champion against the Dark Volkhvy. I’m no one’s champion. But I am the last Romanov and I stand to defend Bronwal. Forever. I warned Grigori away for that reason and that reason alone,” Romanov said.
“Why didn’t the alpha wolf...or any of the wolves come to help you?” Elena asked. The courtyard was empty. The sunlight was hidden behind clouds that had drifted in sometime during the fight. New snow fell in soft silence. Fluffy white flakes contrasted against Romanov’s dark hair for brilliant seconds before they melted. The black waves released from his queue grew damp once more.
Romanov laughed softly and the snow globe the world had become suddenly crystallized and warmed at the same time. Elena hugged herself to keep from reaching out to him because his laugh was hollow rather than happy.
“I don’t need wolves to fight a Volkhvy of Dominique’s degree. Only the lesser witches come for the Romanov blade in its current state. Its power has faded. It holds no attraction or appeal to greater witches,” Romanov said.
“Grigori would never fall to a common sword. Even if it pierced his heart,” Elena guessed. Deep down she’d already known. That’s why she’d sought the help of the alpha wolf.
“This blade is far from common. But it is also far from what it was when it was given to my father,” Romanov said. He turned away to bend and retrieve the jeweled sword. The sapphire in its hilt winked dully in the cloudy light.
Elena reached to touch the sapphire. She wasn’t sure why. The dark gem was cool and damp beneath her fingers.
“It’s very old,” she said.
Romanov had frozen and she was reminded of her first glimpse of him last night. He stared at her face as if he saw something in it that caught his attention and wouldn’t let him look away. The snow was falling more heavily and it swirled around the place where their bodies kept it from the ground. But when she looked from the gem up to his eyes he was no longer a legendary figure come to life. He was a complicated man. One who swore he was no hero while at the same time warning her greatest enemy away.
“It isn’t age that diminishes the stone. It’s dishonor,” he said. “It wasn’t meant to be brandished by a traitor.”
Elena withdrew her hand and Romanov blinked and looked away from her face. He lowered the blade until its tip pointed to the snowy ground.
“You’ve carried the weight of your father’s mistake for a long time,” Elena said. “But I can also see that you aren’t bowed beneath this burden. You might doubt that you’re still a champion, but your body knows. You don’t fight like a man with nothing to lose. You fight like a man with everything to lose. I can see that the stone doesn’t shine,” Elena continued as she turned to walk away through the accumulating snow. “But I can also see that you still do. You shine. And you could help me if you would.”
He didn’t reply and she didn’t pause. She left him and his dishonored blade in the whiteout of falling snow. She wouldn’t kiss him again. She would avoid him while she sought the alpha wolf. The ferocity of his unexpected needs drew her, as did the skin-to-skin electricity between them. But she hadn’t climbed the mountain to find a seductive lover. She’d answered a call that couldn’t be denied and she’d come to find a way to defeat the witchblood prince.
Chapter 5 (#ue243427a-3fef-5d70-9f6e-5b1affd3a2df)
She’d tasted like honey cakes and her scent had been feminine and minty sweet. The combination had gone to his head like a mead brewed for maximum potency and pleasure. Romanov sought out his rooms and the cold comfort of a bath to wash away the remnants of his long training session and his battle with Dominique. He used a rough cloth to sluice icy water over his skin. Crazy that he should kiss her. But it was a crazy inspired by sizzling attraction that clouded his thinking and burned in his blood. She should have been frightened away by his brothers, by the castle, by his tales of Ether-mad people wandering the halls.
Instead, her body had melded against his chest in his arms. She’d reached for him. She’d held on tight. She’d eagerly welcomed the thrusting of his tongue. She’d tasted him. She’d moaned and sighed as if her body craved more intimate contact with his than could be had in a courtyard in the snow.
The cold water was useless against the onslaught of sensations his mind insisted on recalling—one by one in slow, torturous succession. He hardened with the memory and he was glad he’d filled his own tub. He didn’t need an audience for his body’s reaction half an hour after Elena Pavlova had allowed—nay, participated in—an embrace and kiss that shouldn’t have happened.
Once again, he’d been surprised by how powerfully muscular her seemingly delicate dancer’s body could be. He’d wanted to rip her clothes away so he could explore and appreciate every taut line, every smooth curve. Not to mention the soft, full breasts that contrasted with her spare frame and the warm, hidden crevices he could only imagine.
Oh damn, how he could imagine them.
Many Cycles had come and gone since he’d been alive enough to feel like this. And even more since he’d been foolish enough to act on the feelings. He was cursed. He wasn’t free to crave and savor and...
His body was reddened from its rough washing when he stood to allow soapy cold water to run off his skin. He wouldn’t indulge his erection. He left the bath instead, wrapped in a sheet that was tattered and faded. No one had been prescient enough to mend or replace linens in a long time.
He walked to the window and pressed open the stained glass that had been added centuries after the castle was constructed. Throughout the castle there was evidence of the passage of time. People had tried to carry on. Some still did. The window’s iron hinges protested, but the cold air rushed in, bathing his moist face and chilling his body temperature. He needed the blast of winter air.
Dominique wasn’t dead. A normal blade would never kill a Volkhvy. His bold message would be delivered to Grigori. He’d told Elena he wasn’t a champion. He’d told her the alpha wolf wouldn’t help her. Both of those things were true. But he was a defender of his family’s enclave and he would be here when Grigori came for the dancer he had claimed.
If he assumed wolf form to fight the witchblood prince, he might lose himself to it as his brothers had. Bronwal would be deserted and the Romanov blade would be up for grabs. The Dark Volkhvy might gain a foothold that couldn’t be dislodged without a clearly sentient person to stand against them.
He couldn’t risk the shift even for Elena Pavlova.
From where he stood he could see the ravens that circled around Elena’s tower. They soared like feathered shadows around her room. It seemed a dark foreshadowing of what was to come.
His only option was to force her to leave Bronwal.
Cruel that he should continue to taste her and recall with perfect clarity the bold strokes of her tongue.
He wasn’t sure how he would drive her away when everything in him wanted her to stay.
But he had no choice.
She’d fallen to the ground when she’d pulled the Romanov blade from the practice form in the courtyard. It had been a hard, bone-jarring fall. The blond waves of her hair had tumbled into her face and her eyes had closed. She hadn’t seen what he’d seen as her body flew backward. It hadn’t been the weight of the blade or the momentum of her jerk that had sent her to the ground.
The dormant, fading sapphire in the hilt of the Romanov blade had flared in her hands. A powerful force had radiated out from the awakened gem. It was that force that had sent her petite body to the ground.
The stone had dimmed immediately after and it hadn’t glowed again when she rose to her feet and picked it up. But it hadn’t been his imagination. The sapphire had reacted to Elena’s touch. He shouldn’t be surprised. He’d felt the same awakening in her presence. Not to mention what her touch did to him. An hour later, and the blood in his veins still thrummed from the fleeting kiss they’d shared.
As the ravens swooped and soared, he lifted his hand to feel his lips as if he would be able to feel the ghost of her heat on his mouth as well as he did within.
The wolf he kept buried howled deep in his chest, but not as deep as it had been before Elena arrived. She tested his control. She tempted him to give in to the passions he’d denied for so many Cycles with ease.
He had no choice but to send her away when the weather allowed it. He’d almost shifted when Dominique had taunted him in the courtyard. He couldn’t risk what he might do if Elena was still at Bronwal when the Volkhvy came to gloat at the Gathering.
