Crave the Night (5 page)

It soothed away the heat of her
burning face.
How dare he?

She wasn’t even sure what she meant by the
question. How dare he upset her? How dare he resist? How dare he be
justified in objecting to absolutely everything she was doing?

Maybe, how dare he be so damned
appealing? She’d got an eyeful of werewolf
au naturel
earlier, but he was just as good
eye-candy fully dressed. Added to that, he had that smouldering
aura of a male beast in his prime. There’d been moments when she’d
been infinitely grateful for the silver bars between them. And yet,
even when he had been wrestling her to the floor, he hadn’t hurt
her. Rafe Devries might be a beast, but he wasn’t a
brute.

Perhaps that was her,
La Belle Dame sans Merci
.

She kicked off her shoes and padded to
the edge of the pool. The lights from the house reflected in
ripples from the dark water, dancing in time with the breeze. She
knelt by the edge, trailing her fingers through the pools of
brightness.
I was so sure what I was
doing was right, but every day that goes by makes me doubt more and
more.

Her vows had been hasty, made in passion.
Made in front of her entire tribe of fey. She hadn’t thought
through the consequences, but the heart she’d poured into the act
had bound her fast. Fey held their honor dear, and promises bound
them tight.

Lila never did things half-way when her
blood was up.

Conjure in haste, regret
at leisure
. One of her father’s favorite
lines.

But her intent had been pure. She sank
both hands into the water, cupping them to catch the water. She
raised the bowl of her palms, letting rivulets fall between her
fingers to bubble and splash in the pool.
Show me
, she willed the water and the
moonlight.
Remind me why I do
this
.

Magic rushed through her like bubbles
through champagne. Borrowed magic, sacrificed by her two sisters
for a year and a day because Lila had forfeited her own long
before.

The bubbles in the water began to multiply
and seethe, taking on new colors and forming into hills and trees.
The scene grew larger as more and more of the water drained into
the image. The trees stretched and grew, rising high above Lila as
the vision filled the pool to the very edges, floating above the
rim. The deep glow of spellcraft shimmered around it, like a nimbus
of starlight. Lila leaned closer to the scene, her throat aching
when she recognized the familiar landscape of home. Like a camera
coming into focus, every blade of grass grew clear as she
watched.

People began to emerge from the shady
grottoes, clad in the dark, rich shades of bark and loam. They had
the same slender height, the same pale hair as Lila. Each was a
face she knew and held dear. These were the light fey, going about
their nightly rounds before settling down to sleep.

Two little boys chased a moth, tripping over
their feet and each other in the game. She could hear their piping
voices in her mind. Her sister Arabelle’s sons, the eldest only
four. The sight of them filled her with longing and amusement.

Lila waved a hand, turning the scene to see
different parts of the forest. The fey dwellings were vibrantly
painted, every surface a rainbow of colors. It was happiness that
gave their magic-built houses their brilliant hues, and none were
white like Lila’s hilltop prison. There was the great meeting hall,
a few young people dancing on the lawn before it, one of them
playing a flute made of bone. Wherever there were fey, there was
always music. Silence was a rare thing when there was someone to
play, and someone to listen.

She turned the vision again. Ah, there was
her father, standing outside his home and watching the stars. He
did that for a few moments every night, with two or three of his
students waiting patiently nearby. Though the king, her father was
also a teacher of history and fey lore. He hadn’t understood why
Lila wanted to wander the bustling cities. For him, everything one
could ever want was in their private forest home. And yet, he had
made it possible because he loved her, even if she walked a
different path.

So Lila had given up her magic for twelve
years so that she could explore the human world. That had got her
an education, an apartment, and everything else a young woman could
desire. Most of all, it gave her a chance to find out who she was
without spells and enchantments.

It also meant she was powerless when she
needed her fey heritage the most. The twelve years weren’t up when
Masterson came on the scene ready to destroy their tribe. Lila knew
the ways of human cunning and was the best equipped do battle, but
she had no magic. Her sisters had come to her rescue, giving her
their strength for the year and a day of the vow—and their battle
for survival.

Lila wasn’t sure she would have had their
courage. Arabelle had left her little sons behind so that Lila
could fight for their future.

They are all counting on
me.
Lila pressed her face into her hands.
That is why I must do this. If I don’t, they
will be destroyed. There will be no forest, no fey, no
family.

But it was so difficult. It wasn’t as if she
could zap Masterson with a spell. Magic couldn’t change a person’s
essential nature. Change an evil man into a bug, and he would strip
the leaves from every tree in the forest. Change him into a leaf,
and he would carry the blight that poisons the land. Kill him, and
his evil would simply be free to find another host.

But she had come up with a plan. A perfect
one.

One that now depended on her wits and one
stubborn werewolf. It suddenly seemed too fragile.

Lila stared at the image of her home,
wishing she could walk into it, back to the secure happiness of her
childhood.

The only thing missing from the conjured
vision was the shadow that would end it all.

“
Who’s there?” Rafe demanded of the
darkness.

A low, chittering laugh was the only
response, followed by footsteps that sounded like claws on stone.
Rafe backed away from the bars, sitting on the end of his narrow
bed. It had been like that since Lila left, hours ago. Rustling
wings. Whispers in a tongue he’d never heard before. Scents he’d
never encountered anywhere. No doubt Lila’s invisible servants were
standing guard, and the two gargoyles were only part of the
crew.

So what was with the creepy-assed help,
anyway?

Lila was one scary babe, even though she was
beautiful beyond any woman he’d ever seen. Still, it didn’t take a
genius to figure out that she was in trouble. He’d seen her tears,
smelled the subtle change in her body chemistry that said she was
afraid. When he’d touched her, she’d jerked away like a frightened
bird. Her tough exterior was about as sturdy as an eggshell. For
all her powers, she was terrified of Masterson. Why?

He was certain that answer was key to
everything, and he had to discover it. If he could solve her
problem, maybe she’d stop being his.

Something walked by his cell,
footsteps shuffling like a giant sloth in mule slippers. A few
seconds after that, he heard the buzz of dragonfly wings.
What the hell are those things?

Rafe lay back on the bed, but every muscle
was tensed into a hard knot. The strangeness of the situation
reminded him of the desert patrols, never sure what creatures the
enemy had stalking the night. The Wolves hadn’t been the only
non-humans who’d joined the war.

As the Alpha heir, he’d gone into the army
because he knew sooner or later he’d have to look after the Pack.
It was the best way to see the world and sow a few wild oats before
bowing to the weight of a leader’s responsibility. It also eased
the inevitable tension between the Alpha and the Alpha-in-waiting.
He loved his dad, but Wolf Creek was a little small for the both of
them.

Rafe rubbed fatigue from his eyes, pain
dragging at his limbs as he moved. Werewolves healed fast, but the
gargoyle-inflicted bruises still hurt.

The Desert Wolves had been an eye-opener for
Rafe. There hadn’t been as much carefree oat-sowing as he’d
planned. He’d led a lot of patrols and learned what being in
charge—an Alpha—meant. He was responsible for every life in his
care.

Those lessons had stuck. Now the Pack’s
future was on the line. He had to step up.

And that came back to Lila. He and Darak had
already established they couldn’t outmaneuver her with brute force,
but maybe he could beat her through subtler means. Time to take his
own advice and slather on the honey.

He’d have to keep it real. There was no way
he could out-trick a fey—and to be honest, that wasn’t a game he
wanted to play. If Lila was backed into a corner, and he was pretty
sure that was the case, the smartest thing he could do was to give
her a safe exit.

Rafe surprised himself by actually
falling asleep for an hour or two. When he awakened, his clothes
were washed, mended, and folded neatly at the end of the
bed.
Creepy
. He hadn’t heard
a thing.

A breakfast tray sat on the floor, still
piping hot. When he lifted the domed lid, he found coffee, eggs,
ham, and biscuits dripping with butter. Taking a gamble that it
wasn’t poisoned or enchanted, he ate hungrily.

When he had drunk the last of the coffee,
the door to his cell swung open, and he smelled gargoyle. “Come,”
said a voice like stones grating together. “You have questions to
answer.”

After a long march through the mansion, the
invisible creatures shoved him through the door of a large room
with a view from the cliff top. Rafe stared a moment, distracted by
the broad expanse of blue sky, before his guards dropped him into
one of the side chairs. The touch of scaly claws withdrew. Rafe
barely resisted the urge to scrub at the places where those talons
had been.

Lila was sitting at a large, pale gray desk
that would have looked more at home in an office building. Today
she was wearing a sleeveless black dress that made her hair and
skin look nearly white. The surface was clean but for a laptop
computer, a lamp, and a telephone. He searched in vain for a
picture or a plant, but there was nothing personal anywhere in the
room. If Lila vanished, there would be no clue that she had ever
existed. Maybe that was the point.

After a moment of typing, she closed the
laptop and folded her hands on the dull surface of the desk. He
noticed a thin, jagged scar on the inside of one bare arm, pink
against the subtle blue of her veins. A knife wound. It made him
curious.

“
We need to talk,” she
said.

“
You sound like my old
girlfriend.”

That earned him a slight lift of her brows.
“I need to understand why the Pack won’t bend, even to save their
most respected members.”

“
I answered that.”

“
Your answer was
insufficient.”

Rafe let the silence stretch a beat,
weighing how much he should say. How much might she use against
them? “Do you have children?”

She balked, as if reluctant to give away
anything about herself. “No. My sisters do.”

Rafe thought he heard stirring from one of
the invisible gargoyles, but then silence resumed. He hated talking
when he had no idea who—or what—was in the room. “Then you know
there’s nothing a family won’t do for the future of their
kids.”

The lids slowly lowered over her intense
green gaze, shutting him out. One hand travelled to the scar on her
arm. “I understand.”

“
And if you touch one of our pups I
will personally end you.”

Her gaze snapped back to his face. “Touch
one of the . . . ?” There was anger, even offence, in her
expression, but it slowly faded to her usual impassive expression.
“Then I need to know how to win, because I don’t dare lose.”

The harsh statement didn’t measure up to her
shock of the moment before. She was talking tough, but she was no
threat to a child. Good to know. “Losing well is no dishonor.”

“
It’s not about honor
anymore.”

“
Then what is this about?”

The conversation stalled until Rafe itched
to leap up and pace the room. He could sense her struggle, but if
he was going to figure her out, he had to let things unfold at her
pace.

At last she sighed, leaning forward until
the lush fall of pale hair hid her face. “I made a bargain. A vow.
That’s all you need to know.”

“
A blood oath.”

She looked up sharply. “How did you know
that?”

“
Your scar. I wouldn’t think the blood
necessary for a magic user. Vows spoken in the presence of a fey,
and all that.”

“
A blood oath is stronger.” She put
her hand over the scar, hiding it. “It’s only used for the most
important promises. I wanted to make a point.”

Rafe watched her, wondering what it was she
wanted to conceal. “That takes guts. Shedding your own blood takes
more courage than people think.”

“
That depends on what’s at stake.” Her
voice was low and husky, almost a dare.

“
How much are you going to lose?
Because you will lose. Wolves are stubborn.”

She gave a low laugh that was surprisingly
frank. “This negotiation is more complicated than you may
think.”

“
I think the kidnapping and
brainwashing is a pretty good clue how far you’re willing to
go.”

She lifted her eyebrows. “Is that how you
see my little parlor tricks?”