I turned onto my stomach in the bed, feeling the soft, golden brown fur against my bare body, angrily knocking aside the silver chain. I might have been exhausted the night before, but I had no trouble remembering what had happened once we’d run into Daldrin—or Dallan, as his name really was. Aesnil and I had been handed over to the drin and his guardsmen without a murmur, no more than disappointment coming from the l’lenda who had been holding me, in reaction. The Prince himself had condescended to take me on his own seetar, and the men who had found us laughed when I’d tried hitting him in the face with my fists, then had ridden away. Aesnil had been silent and woodenly numb when she’d been given to the man Ferran to ride with, but she’d continued to hold her head high with a martyred look, like someone awaiting inescapable execution. Dallan, holding onto my wrists, had stared at her until the men who had found us were gone from sight and hearing, and then he had grinned.
“Greetings, Cousin,” he’d said, his amusement dry. “I’d had no idea you meant visiting here, else I would have arranged a proper greeting. Your loveliness and graciousness warms us as always.”
Aesnil had gone pale at the first sight of him, and her color still hadn’t come back. She’d stared into thin air while he’d been talking to her, and didn’t move or change expression when he’d done.
“I hear no matching words of greeting from you, Cousin,” Dallan had pressed, his tone still mild. “Such surliness is not to be understood—save that discomfort may be at the root of it. Of course! Excuse me, Cousin, for not having seen it and seen to it the sooner. Ferran, my cousin fairly swoons in this oppressive heat. Remove that cloth covering her legs, and allow her a breath of air.”
“No!” Aesnil had shrieked, losing her silence and pallor together, but yelling and struggling hadn’t helped her. Despite her screams and very evident embarrassment, her trousers were pulled off and tossed away. The shirt she wore came down to the middle of her thighs, but its presence hadn’t been the comfort it should have been. Her legs were long and lovely, and the laughter of the men all around us seemed to acknowledge that fact, making her blush even more deeply. Ferran had set her astride his saddle again and held her before him, and Dallan had chuckled when she’d leaned forward away from the man with a gasp.
“Much better,” he’d nodded, not missing the way she was then avoiding everyone’s eyes, rather than ignoring them, and then he’d looked down at me. “What has befallen you, wenda?” he’d asked, a frown replacing his amusement. “There has been so little of struggle and words from you, that I might have mistaken you for another. Are you ill’?”
“I am no more than weary,” I’d told him, moving my wrists in his hand as I’d looked up into his eyes. “Weariness passes much sooner than illness, therefore you would be wise to release us immediately. To wait till my weariness has passed would be foolishness.”
“Perhaps.” He’d nodded, pursing his lips to hide his faint grin. “And then again, perhaps not. In any event, we shall surely see. At the moment, we return to my home.”
They’d all turned their seetarr around then, but I’d missed the grand home-coming. Once we’d started moving I’d been attacked by waves of sleepiness, driving in at me from all directions. I’d tried resisting them but Dallan had been holding me to his chest, trying to make me as comfortable as possible. Unfortunately for me he’d succeeded, and the last thing I remembered seeing was a deeply embarrassed Aesnil, trying to keep her nearly bare bottom away from the grinning man who held her.
I turned to my right side in the bed furs, this time ignoring the chain, sending my mind out again as far as I could reach. I’d searched for Aesnil’s mind trace right after I’d awakened, but it hadn’t seemed to be anywhere in range. There were plenty of other mind traces out there, male and female alike, but all of them were from strangers. I gave it up in disgust, wondering if she was in the same place I was, wondering what was happening to her, then I began wondering what would happen to me.
Dallan and I hadn’t parted enemies, but we hadn’t exactly been friends either. I knew he wanted me, but he also had certain things to get even for; maybe if he decided he wanted me badly enough he’d forget about getting even, and I’d have a chance to work on him.
Five minutes later, all the worrying and planning I’d been doing was abruptly terminated by the opening of the door in a wall. If I’d been paying attention I would have known Dallan was close by, and his abrupt entrance wouldn’t have surprised me. I grabbed the fur covering me and pulled it up to my chin, and he chuckled as he closed the door behind him and came closer to put down the tray he was carrying onto a small table near the bed furs. I still wasn’t used to seeing him wearing the dark red haddin of a free man, and the sword hanging at his side was equally disconcerting.
“I am pleased to see that you have recovered from your weariness,” he said, grinning as he removed his swordbelt and put it aside. “When I placed you in those furs last darkness, you made no effort to hide your loveliness.”
“I was not awake!” I snapped, feeling the heat move into my cheeks. I felt like an idiot for blushing, but I couldn’t seem to help it. When the men of that world looked at a woman, there was nothing of the casual glance about it.
“I am aware of that.” He nodded, stopping at the side of the bed furs to look down at me. “Had you not been so soundly asleep—and so clearly in need of that sleep—you would not have found yourself alone in the furs.”
“You have not the right to touch me,” I said, feeling myself move back from that unwavering blue stare. “We aided each other when we both had need of aid, yet that need is no longer with us. Unchain me and return my clothing, and allow me to be on my way.”
“Your way has led you here, and will not lead from this place again,” he said, his mind warm as he spoke the words. “It was somehow clear to me from the first that your l’lenda would be unable to hold you, yet I shall find no similar difficulty. When you are banded as mine, wenda, you will not run from me.”
“And is this the manner in which you mean to hold me?” I demanded, raising a section of the chain to shake it at him. “I am not a slave to be bound so, and will take great pleasure in proving the fact to you!”
I began reaching toward him with my mind, angry enough to do to him what I’d done to those virenjj, but he must have been expecting the move. He suddenly came up with a blood-curdling scream that sounded like, “Hai-yah!” startling me out of my skin, at the same time diving at me. When his arms closed around me I did some screaming myself, not to mention kicking and struggling, but that didn’t stop him from pulling the covering fur away. I don’t know what I expected him to do then, hurt me, possibly, but controlling me was more what he had in mind. As soon as he touched me I should have known what he was after; unfortunately for the sake of thinking, I was too busy gasping and trying to get loose.
“Ah, I see you remember my touch, wenda,” he said, holding me down with his body as his hand worked between my thighs. “I, too, recall certain things, and therefore have no need of chains with which to hold you. Force me from you, wenda, cause me to lose my desire for you as you once did.”
His tone was mocking then, knowing as he did that he had already rattled me out of the control I needed for projection. His body was hard and warm against mine, his mind growling low in pleasure, his free hand coiling in my hair. I tried to ignore what he was doing to me and pull together the necessary calm the control required, but it was patently impossible. My body had been trained to respond immediately to those Rimilian beasts, and I hadn’t been given the time to forget that training. My hands closed on biceps like metal as I shuddered and closed my eyes, and Dallan laughed low, then pulled my head back by the hair so that his lips could reach my throat.