All the King's Men (20 page)

His gaze darted around him in a pattern formed of long years
at Shivar’s side, seeking the slightest disturbance in the air, looking for the
smallest sign of aggression. There was no one. For the first time in eight
years, Kirel found himself outside the castle walls completely alone.

He sucked in a deep breath then another. The sheer freedom
of the act smacked into him like a punch to the gut. Suddenly he knew how
Nelina had to feel as she ran toward the mountainside. Out here there was no
thought of duty, no demands made upon his every move. He could choose to let
his feet carry him in any direction he wished and the Tradition with all its
absurd ultimatums and stipulations couldn’t do a damn thing about it.

The surface of the swirling stream glittered in the stray
rays of sunlight that fought to penetrate the dark clouds. He hurried toward it
and paused just long enough to wash the blood from his torn skin before setting
out in the direction in which he’d seen Nelina disappear.

During the extensive training that had prepared him to take
his place as the king’s Guardian, he’d been taught to track the movements of an
enemy should such a need arise. It hadn’t in the past, but now he found he
could easily call upon those skills to follow Nelina’s trail.

The wind picked up, snatching his hood back with a
malevolent whistle. He could feel the chill all the way down to his bones and
every whiplash of the gale heightened his anxiety for Nelina.

“Hang on, sweetheart,” he murmured into the rapidly building
storm. “I’m coming for you.”

* * * * *

He found her just after nightfall, huddled beneath a serrated
rock that seemed to burst from the mountain itself. Its sharp end gave way to a
flatter outcropping that provided just enough shelter for her slender body if
she crouched low and brought her knees up beneath her chin.

He’d been tracking her for hours. The trail she’d left would
have been easier to follow had the storm not kicked up into a frenzy of dust,
wind and rain that tore at his clothes and limited his visibility to less than
a foot in front of him. The marks she left in the thick sand were concealed
beneath a flurry of red dust almost as soon as she removed her foot, leaving
him with little more than faint impressions and a gut feeling to follow.

Still, he’d pursued her with the single-minded tenacity of a
true Guardian, a man with a mission. Turning back had never been an option. Not
even when the particles of red sand raked his eyes with every sweep of his
lashes.

When he finally came upon her, he was relieved but not
surprised. From the moment he set after her, he’d known he headed in the right direction.
It felt almost as though an invisible silk thread bound them together and he
simply had to trust it would lead him to her before it was too late.

Thankfully it had.

The wind billowed a sheet of dust around him, muffling any
noise made by his footfalls, yet he approached her slowly, cautiously, hoping
not to startle her. She’d curled up around herself, resting her forehead on her
knees. Her brown hair fell in a tangled sheet around her cheeks and her smooth,
flawless skin was coated in grime. Only the steady rise and fall of her
shoulders gave any indication she was still breathing.

As he’d searched, it felt as though his heart had shriveled
up in his chest. He’d blocked all his emotions, concentrating on nothing but
finding Nel. He had no idea what he intended to do once he’d caught up to her.
And now, standing mere inches from her in a cloud of dust, both the future and
the past seemed very far away.

Kirel dug into his pack and pulled out the blanket he’d
snatched from his bed, thankful he’d thought to bring it. Only the red moon
offered a mere sliver of light through the heavy cloud cover, tinting the rock
beneath which Nelina sat a color so crimson it looked like freshly spilled
blood.

He ignored the shiver of apprehension snaking down his spine
and crouched down, turning his head away from the worst of the wind. Reaching
out to drape the blanket around Nelina’s shoulders, he slid beneath her stony
shelter and pulled her to him.

She lifted her head a fraction and glanced at him through
glazed eyes. When she parted her lips, the words she uttered were lost to the
storm. The side of her body molded to his and whatever feeble self-control he
might have possessed before that moment shattered beneath the onslaught of all
the emotions he’d pushed aside while searching for her.

Without stopping to consider his actions, he yanked down his
mask and brought his mouth down on hers, hard. A small huff escaped her lips,
though whether it was one of anger, surprise or arousal, he didn’t know and
couldn’t bring himself to find out. He dug his fingers into her upper arms,
clinging to her as though he were drowning and she was his only lifeline. In
that moment, she was all that and more.

A low, guttural moan slid from her mouth into his, causing a
rush of blood to swiftly surge into his cock. He thrust his tongue against
hers, tasting the dust she’d inhaled, clinging to the flavor of her mouth,
sucking it deep into his lungs.

A heartbeat later his hands were everywhere—smoothing the
damp hair from her forehead, cupping her face, drifting downward to cup her
breasts. She shivered against him, her slender body quaking with the
bone-chilling cold. He gathered her to him and pressed her tightly against his
chest, willing all his body heat to seep out of him and enter her.

Gods, she was so fragile, so vulnerable. And so damn
independent it broke his heart.

“Are you here to bring me back?” she asked when he released
her mouth to trail his lips down the column of her throat.

“I’m here because you need me.”

“I don’t—”

He kissed her again, silencing the inevitable protest. This
time the kiss was slower, gentler, fueled by the enormity of his love and the
magnitude of what he’d done—what he was about to do—as much as by his passion
for her. She responded with a greed that kindled his own, nibbling at his lower
lip, sucking it between her teeth and swirling her tongue over the spot she’d
pinched to soothe the pain.

“I didn’t think this through,” she admitted, pulling back
just far enough to speak. Her lips brushed against his with every word and her
cherry-tainted breath filled his nostrils. “But that doesn’t mean I’m going
back.”

Kirel swallowed hard. He’d expected her to say that. And
Gods help him, he didn’t care.

“I know,” he whispered. “Shivar may never forgive me. The
Tradition won’t either. But I can’t bring you to the castle only to turn you
over to another man. It’s absurdly selfish and yet I can’t even bear the
thought of you in his arms. I can’t—” He bit off the rest of his words, took a
deep breath then continued. “I can’t spend the rest of my days as a Guardian
trailing the happy royal couple like a forgotten toy that had long ago been
kicked aside. I couldn’t bear to watch you touch him, kiss him, lean your head
on his shoulder and giggle softly as he—”

“Ssshhh…” Nelina smoothed her fingers through his hair and
brought her head closer to him so their cheeks touched. Her lips brushed his
ear when she spoke. “I will
never
mate with the king. Not for the
Tradition. Not even for Aris itself. The planet has survived without a queen
for more than a decade. It will continue to do so until the seer chooses a more
suitable bride for the king.”

Kirel drew in a sharp intake of breath. “What really tears
at my soul is knowing there is no more suitable queen. Have you seen yourself?
You move with the bearing of a woman who deserves to rule a planet. You’re
hard-headed and strong, which means you’d never back away from telling Shivar
exactly what he doesn’t want to hear if he’s making a decision that’s wrong for
Aris. Face it, Nel. The Tradition made the perfect choice.”

She sat still and rigid against him for a long time, not
bothering to reply. Kirel tugged the blanket higher around her shoulders and
head, blocking the storm from entering their feeble shelter. The thudding
rhythm of her heartbeat against his both soothed and frightened him.

At long last she pushed away from him. He reached for her
but she quickly nestled back against him, only this time she’d climbed on his
lap. Her thighs were open, her knees digging into the rocky ground on either
side of his legs. He could feel the warmth of her sex emanating through the
fabric of his
skella
, threatening to scorch him with its luscious,
fragrant heat.

“What’s going to happen to you?” she asked, trailing a
fingernail over his chest.

He shrugged. “I don’t know,” he answered honestly. “I don’t
think there’s a precedent for something like this. No other Guardian has ever
dared defy the Tradition. It goes against everything we’ve been taught.”

Nelina’s hand dipped lower over his stomach to reach between
them and grip his straining shaft in her hand. With expert fingers, she untied
the drawstring of his pants and pulled down the fabric to grasp his cock in her
delicate fist.

“Then come with me,” she said, stroking him. Her palm slid
across the bulbous tip of his rod, causing him to grit his teeth as a burst of
raw pleasure settled deep in his taut balls. “We can be off this planet before
anyone even knows we’re gone.”

For a moment he forgot to breathe. The thought of running
away with Nelina was so tempting, he almost had himself convinced it was the
right thing to do before common sense took over.

He couldn’t. He
wouldn’t
.

He owed his loyalty to Shivar and as much as he hated to
admit it, he also owed it to Thor and Domenic, who’d done everything in their
power to help him deal with losing the woman he loved.

He couldn’t take the coward’s way out and abandon them. But
he could ensure Nelina was safe and as far away from Aris and the destiny the
Tradition had chosen for her as possible.

He grunted something non-committal, hoping she wouldn’t
press him. He didn’t want to think about what would happen in a few hours when
the storm quieted and dawn broke over the mountain.

Just once he wanted to live in the here and now, to forget
about the duty that awaited him at the end of this heavenly night. Because even
though the brutal gale continued to sputter and howl, it provided the perfect
protection from the rest of the world. No one would be able to look for Nelina
in a storm like this. Or him for that matter.

Kirel slumped down slightly, giving Nel a little more room.
The enclosed space beneath the rock was cramped, making it impossible for
Nelina to lift her head. She nestled her cheek against his shoulder as her
sensual, talented hands trailed a drop of pre-cum over his shaft until it was
coated with the slick liquid.

He bucked upward and thrust into her hand, a groan ripping
from his throat. Leaning the back of his head against the cliff face, he
shifted so the tip of his cock pressed against the mouth of her weeping slit.

“Think of it,” she murmured as she slid forward and back a
fraction of an inch, parting her sex lips with every pass over the head of his
cock, “just you and me…traveling the universe. No one to stop us. No one to
tell us what we can do, where we can go…who we can mate with.”

Her words had lulled him into a sensual trance. They’d
brought him inside a world where duty didn’t exist and loyalty was merely a
word instead of a way of life. He lingered there, lost in a haze of lust and
love and raw, primal heat until with a sudden jerk of her hips, she slammed
down on him, plunging his erect shaft into her dewy opening.

The muffled whimper that blended with the howling storm
could have come from either of them. Kirel’s hips thrust upward of their own
accord, driving deep inside her wet and swollen pussy.

Nelina nipped at his shoulder, sinking her teeth into the
flesh. Pleasure-pain arched through him like a bolt of lightning. Nelina held
herself still, propping her weight on her knees while he cupped her ass and
plunged into her, again and again and again.

He whispered her name like a mantra until her intoxicating
scent, the sound of her name on his lips and the feel of her tight cunt wrapped
around his cock were all-consuming, drowning out the rest of the world.

Fucking her felt natural, as though he’d done it a thousand
times. And he had. In his dreams, he’d spent countless nights thrusting inside
her heated channel but it was always she who screamed his name, she who
quivered with barely contained lust as he plunged inside her heated depths.

But here, at the edge of Tradition Mountain, defying the
Fates themselves, it was Kirel who found himself on the brink of madness.

“Eight years…” Her husky voice slid right through him,
burrowing in his balls and drawing his sac up sharply against his groin. “I
never thought I’d feel you in me again.”

“I’m sorry.” The words sounded feeble and insignificant but
he couldn’t think of anything else that would explain how he felt.

And then…he could.

“I love you,” he said as she slid down the length of his
cock.

She gasped and lost her control of the sensual rhythm,
sinking down all the way to the base of his cock, embedding him so deep inside
her he felt the tip of his shaft nudge her womb.

Kirel ground his pubic bone against her mound. “I always
have.”

Nelina came with a powerful shudder, her cries echoing off
the stone enclosure. Her pussy squeezed down on his cock, milking him, sending
him tumbling over the edge with her. The climax burst from his agonized balls
and spilled from his cock in hot, eager spurts that coated her still-spasming
channel. She clung to him, her nails digging into his arms as her inner walls
trembled, clutching him in a fist-tight grip.

Gasping for breath and finding a lungful of dust, Kirel
tugged the blanket up around them. It had fallen from Nelina’s shoulders at
some point during their lovemaking but he couldn’t say when that had happened.