The Queen's Bargain Read online

  “Doesn’t matter.”

  Jillian’s heart pounded. Prince Falonar had been Yaslana’s second-in-command before he tried to take control of the valley and become the ruling Warlord Prince. When his followers were defeated, he was sent away to a Rihlander Queen’s court and disappeared shortly after that.

  “I’m thinking that Rothvar spending time with your sister, spending time in your home, has stirred up memories that are causing you some trouble,” Yaslana said.

  “Lord Rothvar hasn’t done anything wrong,” she whispered. “He’s not Prince Falonar.”

  “Your head knows the difference, but your skin and your back remember the strapping Falonar gave you, and your heart remembers the pain. It’s going to take time for you to trust Rothvar because things turned sour for you after Falonar became Nurian’s lover and thought he had the right to control you. There’s nothing wrong with you feeling cautious. I just want you to know that if Rothvar hurts you in any way, he’ll deal with me.” Yaslana released her hair and stepped back. “Of course, if you think that gives you leave to act like a bitchy brat in order to make him miserable, you should also know I won’t hesitate to put you over my knee and whack some sense into your ass.”

  He meant it. All of it.

  “I don’t think that’s where sense is stored,” she said, trying for a lighter tone.

  “You’d be surprised how much sense can be acquired when it hurts to sit down,” he replied dryly. Then he gave her a lazy, arrogant smile that had her nerves humming. “Let’s review the rules.”

  She would have rolled her eyes if it had been anyone else saying that, but he was the Warlord Prince of Ebon Rih and he wore Ebon-gray Jewels, which made him the most powerful male in the Territory of Askavi—and the second most powerful male in the entire Realm of Kaeleer. No one rolled their eyes at him.

  “I know the rules,” she said.

  “Then you won’t have any trouble repeating them.” His smile had an edge now, warning her that he would ignore all his duties and they would stand out there all day if that was what it took for her to answer him.

  She sighed. “Look equals tell. Touch equals tell. Permission before action.” That last rule made her very uneasy, because she’d broken it—but just a little. And not intentionally. Not really.

  If she said anything now, after the fact, Tamnar would get into trouble, and he didn’t deserve Yaslana’s anger. Not for something that had barely broken the rule.

  She eyed him and wondered if he already knew about the barely broken rule.

  “Something else you want to tell me?” Yaslana asked.

  “No, sir,” she said quickly. Too quickly?

  He studied her until she wanted to squirm, then said, “If someone tries to hurt you, what are you going to do?”

  He’d asked that same question decades ago when he found out Falonar had strapped her, so she gave him the same answer. “Kick him in the balls.”

  Yaslana huffed out a breath that might have been a laugh. “Before that.”

  She pretended to ponder the question. “Put a defensive shield around myself and holler for you?”

  “That is correct. And then, witchling, you fight with everything in you until I can get to you. You understand me?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Yaslana looked toward the eyrie. “Did you get any breakfast?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Then go eat.” He lifted his chin to indicate Daemonar and Titian, who were heading into the eyrie. “You can do some sparring after school.”

  Jillian turned toward the eyrie, then hesitated. “I brought another bottle of tonic for Lady Marian.”

  “It’s appreciated.”

  She took a step away from him and felt something wash over her—a heat that made her nipples tighten, that made her feel warm and tingly between her legs. That heat was almost a scent in the air. Sheer intoxication, like catnip for human females.

  She knew what it was—not because she’d felt it before, but because Nurian had told her about it when she had wondered why some women acted . . . odd . . . when Yaslana and Marian attended a play or some other public event.

  “Jillian?” Yaslana sounded puzzled and—maybe?—wary.

  She gave him a distracted smile and bolted for the eyrie.

  Sexual heat. It was part of a Warlord Prince’s nature, something he could keep leashed to some degree, but it was always there, a lure designed to attract females, because Warlord Princes were dangerous, volatile, extremely aggressive men who were born to stand on killing fields. A Queen’s living weapon. A man like that was feared, but a man like that also needed a way to keep a woman with him in order to sire children and continue his bloodline.

  Nurian said Warlord Princes usually kept the heat leashed as much as possible when they weren’t with their chosen lovers, but it still pumped out of them, washing over everyone, producing a kind of scent that made women feel womanly—and desirable. But that leashed heat was no more an invitation to sex or an indication of carnal interest than the scent of moon’s blood was an invitation to attack a woman during the days when she was vulnerable and couldn’t use the reservoir of power in her Jewels to defend herself.

  When she reached the eyrie, Jillian looked back. Yaslana was going through the movements of the warm-up—and he looked wonderful. He looked like a man.

  She blinked, felt her face burn with shame for thinking such a thing. He was Yaslana, the Warlord Prince of Ebon Rih. She worked for his wife. And until today, she had never thought such a thing about him.

  Until today, when she felt the sexual heat for the first time. He wasn’t any different than he’d been yesterday. She was the one who had changed. Warlord Princes didn’t pick up the scent of moon’s blood until they reached a level of maturity during adolescence, so it stood to reason that a level of physical maturity was also required before a girl—a woman—reacted to a Warlord Prince’s sexual heat.

  Woman.

  Jillian smiled.

  Swelling breasts and moon’s blood were signposts that a girl was becoming a woman. She had a feeling that today she had just reached another significant signpost.

  Then she was in the kitchen and in the middle of the noise and chaos that made up mornings in the Yaslana household and didn’t give the man another thought for the rest of the day.

  * * *

  * * *

  Lucivar went through the warm-up a second time, increasing the speed of the moves. Normally he’d be in the kitchen helping Marian feed the children and get them ready for school. But he’d seen something in Jillian a few minutes ago that kept him outside.

  The girl had been running tame in his house ever since Nurian signed a service contract with him decades ago and came to Ebon Rih, claiming her younger sister, Jillian, as her dependent. He’d been busy getting the Eyrien adults settled and couldn’t say exactly when Jillian became Marian’s “helper” in looking after Daemonar. His boy had been a toddler then—an ever-moving bundle of arrogance and energy—and having Jillian around to keep hold of the little beast had allowed Marian to get some of her own work done.

  Didn’t take long for him to stop seeing the girl as someone else’s dependent. Sure, she’d gone home most nights, but she was in his home so much she became his to protect—an honorary daughter in the same way his father had been an honorary uncle to most of the Territory Queens in Kaeleer.

  Now he wondered if that was going to be a problem.

  The potency of sexual heat was linked to the power that flowed in the veins and made the Blood who and what they were. The darker a Warlord Prince’s power, the more potent the heat. It made a kind of sense for preserving the darker bloodlines and keeping a woman in thrall long enough to make a baby and carry through all the years after until paternal rights to that child were formally granted. But it could be damned inconvenient the rest of the time, since a
man let the heat slip the leash in order to seduce a lover and give her a very good ride, but even leashed, it could create too much unwanted interest from other women.

  Unlike his brother, Daemon, who could seduce anyone and everyone just by walking through a room, he hadn’t had to deal with much unwanted interest for one very simple reason: he had a reputation for being violent and vicious in bed—a reputation he had earned when he’d been a slave in so many courts in Terreille. The stories of how he’d savaged the Queens who had tried to use him had found their way to Kaeleer with the people who had emigrated to the Shadow Realm. Because of that, he was feared more than other Warlord Princes. Women might enjoy the feel of the heat as he passed by, but they were also grateful that he had a wife and wouldn’t look in their direction.

  Jillian wasn’t afraid of him, and that could be a problem. He hoped she would be able to accept the sexual heat as something that had always been there but was only now being noticed, and shrug it off the same way all the Queens who had been part of Jaenelle Angelline’s coven had shrugged it off. If the girl couldn’t ignore it, he’d have to bar her from his home to keep her from making a lethal mistake.

  He watched Jillian, Daemonar, and Titian fly toward the eyrie where Lord Endar taught the Eyrien children.

  Vanishing the sparring stick, Lucivar crossed the yard and went inside.

  Marian—his wife, friend, and partner, and the love of his life—smiled when he walked into the kitchen. She poured a cup of coffee and handed it to him. “You missed breakfast. And you missed the chaos.”

  “Did you notice how much quieter it was last week when Daemonar was visiting his uncle?” Lucivar asked.

  “Oh, I think everyone in Riada noticed how much quieter it was,” Marian replied. “But he is your son, after all.”

  “You had something to do with him being here,” Lucivar protested.

  “Not that part of him. That all came from you.”

  Hard to argue the truth of it. His son was growing into a formidable—meaning a pain-in-the-ass—Warlord Prince whose Birthright Green Jewel almost matched Rothvar’s Green Jewel of rank in strength.

  “I saved you a plate of food,” Marian said. Then she frowned. “Lucivar?”

  She insisted she was fine, but she hadn’t regained her strength or energy since baby Andulvar’s birth. He knew she wasn’t happy about his lack of enthusiasm for sex and had started wondering if he no longer found her attractive, which was so far from the truth it was laughable. He wanted her desperately some nights, but even when he was gentle and careful, their lovemaking seemed to devour her strength.

  He’d insisted that she go to the Healer who served the Queen of Amdarh, Dhemlan’s capital city. Lady Zhara’s Healer couldn’t find a cause for the slower-than-normal recovery from the birthing. Like Nurian, Zhara’s Healer tacitly agreed that something wasn’t right, but neither of them could find anything wrong. And Marian insisted she was getting better, so there wasn’t much he could do—and the only person whose opinion could have made a difference had died years ago.

  Still, with Marian feeling sensitive about their restrained lovemaking, he needed to tell her about Jillian.

  “Jillian felt the sexual heat when we were outside talking.” The words felt like splinters of glass ripping up his throat.

  Marian set the plate of food on the table and gave him a puzzled look. “She’s growing up, Lucivar. It was going to happen sooner or later.” She paused. “Is that why she was here so early?”

  Lucivar shook his head. “That was because of Rothvar. His being in Nurian’s bed has stirred up memories of Falonar.”

  “Him.”

  His darling hearth witch didn’t usually put that much venom in her voice. Then again, Falonar had arranged for him to stand on a killing field alone against all the Warlords who had wanted Falonar to rule Ebon Rih. He hadn’t thought about what he’d looked like after that fight, hadn’t considered how a wife would react to seeing her husband drenched in his enemies’ blood.

  Just as well the man had disappeared after being sent to Lady Perzha’s court.

  “Yeah, well, Falonar didn’t hurt Jillian until he became Nurian’s lover, so it’s going to take her some time to accept that Rothvar filling that spot isn’t going to mean he’ll change and try to control either of them,” he said.

  “Rothvar will just have to be patient with her—and so will you.”

  The words were a small slap, but still a slap that shouldn’t go unanswered.

  Lucivar gave his wife a lazy, arrogant smile. “I’ll remind you of the need for patience the first time Daemonar catches the scent of moon’s blood and gets bossy.”

  She looked like a bunny that had run straight into a pack of wolves.

  “Well, you’ll just have to explain things.”

  She sounded so flustered—and appalled at the thought of two Warlord Princes fussing over her—he set the coffee on the table in order to take her in his arms and give her a long, sweet kiss.

  “Don’t worry,” he said, grinning at her. “I promise to explain everything.”

  TWO

  Sitting on the side of his daughter’s bed, Daemon Sadi, the Black-Jeweled Warlord Prince of Dhemlan, turned the last page of the book and said, “And they all lived happily ever after.”

  ٭Because they had steak,٭ Khary said.

  Daemon eyed the furry companions who had joined his girl for storytime—the young Sceltie Warlord who had spoken and the younger Sceltie witch, who just wagged her tail at him. “Yes,” he replied dryly. “They all lived happily ever after because they had steak.”

  “And cake.”

  Now he eyed his daughter, who entertained his mind and delighted his heart. Jaenelle Saetien had the black hair and gold eyes typical of the long-lived races, but her skin was closer to her mother’s light sun-kissed brown than his own golden brown tone, and she had the delicately pointed ears of the Dea al Mon race. In fact, except for the eyes—Surreal’s eyes were gold-green and slightly oversized—Jaenelle Saetien strongly resembled Surreal at the same age.

  “And cake,” he agreed. Recognizing her intent, he vanished the book and pounced first, tickling Jaenelle Saetien, causing her to squeal in delight as the Scelties barked and bounced on the bed. “They had cake with buttercream icing that was decorated with mounds of pink and blue flowers.” Which was his girl’s favorite kind of cake.

  He eased up to let her catch her breath—and she jumped him, as he’d known she would. Being an obliging father, he fell back so that she could have her turn to tickle. Of course, him being prone also seemed to be an invitation for the Scelties to pile on. Thankfully it was Morghann, the smaller of the two dogs, who planted a paw on his balls before he thought to put a shield over that part of himself.

  “I give up,” he said, laughing. “I give up.”

  Jaenelle Saetien sprawled over him so they were almost nose to nose. Morghann had a piece of his jacket sleeve between her teeth as her small claim to him, and Khary, who had recently had his Birthright Ceremony and now wore a dark Opal Jewel, stood behind his head staring down at him.

  “Papa?”

  “Witch-child?”

  “Wouldn’t you like to have cake?”

  Ah. So that was where they were going with this. “Decorated cakes are made for special occasions.”

  “But I have a special Jewel now.”

  And she did. A Jewel that was like no other. A Jewel that had been created especially for her by the Queen who had been, and always would be, the love of his life. But there were responsibilities that came with guiding a young witch who wore a Jewel like Twilight’s Dawn—responsibilities not just as a father but as a Warlord Prince. Lines could be gently drawn, but they had to be drawn.

  “You do have a special Jewel, and we celebrated when you received it. As I recall, there was a very big cake with mounds of buttercream f
rosting that Mrs. Beale made for that celebration.” Just thinking about that frosting made his teeth hurt.

  Of course, that cake might have been partially responsible for him and Lucivar having to deal with overexcited children during that party. Not that he would ever say that to the large Yellow-Jeweled witch who was his cook here at the Hall.

  “But that was forever ago,” Jaenelle Saetien protested.

  A few weeks. But even a child from the long-lived races measured time differently from the adults.

  “I take it you asked Mrs. Beale to make a cake.”

  “She said she’d already made out the menus for the next fortnight and cake wasn’t one of the sweets.”

  “Well, then . . .”

  “But she’d make a cake if you told her to make one.”

  Every time Mrs. Beale felt she had something to discuss with him, she brought her well-sharpened meat cleaver to the meeting—and even though she wore Yellow and he wore Black, he would admit to himself, if to no one else, that he felt a tiny kernel of fear when he had to deal with her directly. He much preferred going through Beale, the Red-Jeweled Warlord who was the Hall’s butler as well as Mrs. Beale’s husband, whenever he requested a particular dish or special treat.

  “She might,” he agreed, “but as I just pointed out and as you already knew, those cakes are made for special occasions.”

  “But, Papa . . .”

  “No.” Daemon kissed her cheek to take the sting out of the word, then sat up, bringing her up with him—and dragging Morghann as well, since the Sceltie didn’t let go of his sleeve.

  After convincing the dogs to settle into their baskets and tucking in his girl for the night, Daemon walked down the corridor to his bedroom to get undressed before he tapped on the door that connected his suite of rooms to Surreal’s. Whether they had sex, made love, or just cuddled a bit before going to sleep, he spent most of his nights in her bed. Her bed, her rules—and he the lover who had the privilege of pleasing her.