Guiding (6 page)

He stood in front of Teyha and took her hands in his. “Congratulations, new daughter of shadow. May your souls twine brightly.”

Looking at Daphne, she shrugged, “Um, thank you?”

He snorted and patted her on the shoulder, his face in a wicked grin. “Close enough.”

Chapter Nine

Teyha was nervous as she went through her daily tasks of cataloguing the few photographs from her first visit to the Temple of Shadows. She hadn’t put them into the archive, because they were her last link with her parents and their last trip together.

It was that emergency that necessitated the flare system at least once per day or at scheduled times.

She tried to remember them in everything that she did, and her job of archivist and guide crossed both of their disciplines. She hoped that she made them proud.

The access to the Shadow Land had been an alternate from the one she had first taken with her parents. The first route was faster but far less stable as her parents had found out after she had left them to engage in a meeting with the faculty of the Gaian University. Speaking engagements had been arranged, and she had returned to her parents as quickly as she could. She was too late by twelve hours.

It was something she lived with every day that she walked into the archive and saw the discoveries of her family posted on the walls.

A shadow caressed her arm, and she turned to see Ekinar in the doorway. She wanted to tell him that he startled her, that she was surprised, but she had felt him coming, and he had known she was expecting him.

Teyha tried to keep her mind blank as she walked up to him. “So, I hear that we are a pair now.”

He didn’t say a word but lifted her off her feet and pressed her against the wall, his lips found hers and shadows covered her completely, wrapping her in a cocoon that felt like being surrounded completely by the man holding her.

His lips teased at hers, and she gave into him without a second thought. She wrapped her thighs around his hips and hung on as her body soared under the all-consuming touch that was not barred by clothing.

Ekinar’s kiss lit a fire in her that burned along her limbs until she bucked and shivered in his arms from no more than his lips on hers and his shadows around her.

She gasped and waited for the trembling to subside. He slowly, deliciously, let her body slide down his until her feet were on the floor.

“I believe that Apolan has some information for us so that we may complete this bonding with a bit more dignity than a wall in an office.” He trailed her lips with a tendril of shadows.

When Teyha turned her head, Reesha was staring from the hallway. “I was coming to tell you that you had a visitor, but I am guessing that you know that.”

Reesha’s unacknowledged talent was to share vision. She could touch your head and project what you saw through your own eyes. It was one of the spookier talents that Teyha had met in her life and not one that you wanted enacted on you.

It took a few tries, but Teyha said, “I figured it out. Reesha, this is Ekinar Rossing, Emissary of the Shadow Folk, and he will be requesting that I help with explorations of the ancient cities.”

Reesha nodded. “Of course. There is no one better. Do you want me to cancel the readings to the children?”

Teyha frowned. “I have not thought that far ahead.”

Ekinar put an arm around her. “I have an idea for that, and I am sure that Apolan will be amenable if you can take the journal you were reading from along with us.”

Teyha shook her head. “No, but I can make a copy.”

“Good. I would hate to disappoint those little faces. They were hypnotized by your voice.” He squeezed her waist.

“Okay. Can you suspend my speaking engagements at the Uni? I get the feeling that I will be a little distracted for the next few weeks.”

Ekinar didn’t give Reesha a chance to continue the conversation. He used his grip on Teyha’s waist to lift her up and out of the archive to a waiting transport.

She didn’t make a noise, her body was completely supported by the shadows, and they had chosen interesting areas to support her.

“How much can you lift with the shadows?”

He smiled as they sat in the transport and the driver aimed for the Embassy of the Nine. “Up to five hundred pounds. Your weight barely registers.”

She snickered and let second thoughts creep in.

“What are you thinking?”

“Is this correct for you? I mean, I met your sister, and she is obviously wed to another of the Shadow Folk. Isn’t there a dark, mysterious woman out there for you somewhere?”

He held her close. “I have been actively seeking a mate for ten years. You are the only woman who has woken my senses and made me want to be at your side all times, day or night.”

Instead of going inside the embassy, Daphne met them at the cul-de-sac and spirited Teyha away to get her dressed in a lovely tissue-thin gown that wrapped her in all the right places.

“The ceremony is finalised with an exchange of blood in complete privacy. You don’t drink it, he bites you and you cut him. Then, you slip the dagger into the stone it came out of, and it registers you as a bound couple. It is a lovely ceremony and very above ground.”

“That is a strange non-sequitur.”

“I will tell you about it one day, but it caught me by surprise.” She winked.

With the bride ready, they walked to a huge garden at the back of the property. White flowers gave off the most calming scent, and when Ekinar took her hand, Teyha smiled.

They entered the garden with a shield snapping into place behind them.

It all went as Daphne had said, Ekinar bit her, she used the knife in the stone to slice his wrist, and when it was over, she slid the blade back into the stone. The kiss took her by surprise, but she leaned into it, her body pressed to his in an intense need that swept through her.

“I think we need some privacy.” Her voice was low and husky to her own ears.

“Excellent thought.”

He lifted her in his arms, her skirts foaming around her legs as he carried her into the embassy.

The floor of the Shadow Folk was surprisingly bright. She didn’t have a chance to admire the décor though. He carried her into one of the guestrooms and set her on her feet.

“My bride, I have waited for you, hoped for you and dreamed for you. To have you here within my touch is enough.”

From inside her, the words came. “My husband, I have hoped for you, waited for you and now that you are here, I wish for nothing more than your embrace.”

To her shock, his shadows moved away from his face and body, answering a question that she had never dared ask before. “Oh, so you do wear pants under the shadows.”

He laughed and took her in his arms, bearing her to the bed and using the remaining tendrils of his shadows to peel her gown from her and wake her body using delicate touches.

Ekinar removed the impediments to her seeing every inch of him, and while he was chalk white, his muscles were well defined, and there was nothing untoward about the erection that called to her with silent desperation.

Smiling, she rolled him to his back and woke his body the same way he had woken hers, but she had to use her fingers, and his shock and arousal finally necessitated her joining their bodies and beginning a slow dance that ended with their room covered in darkness and their bodies glowing within.

Epilogue

After they had gone through every inch of the Valley of Shadows, they had moved onto the Wilding Lair. It was a larger site, and it proved that the Wildings were highly territorial.

Teyha loved exploring with Ekinar at her side, and he gave her surprising insight into the purposes of most of the buildings.

“When are we getting the new interns?” Ekinar returned to base camp, his shadows flickering as he bent to kiss his mate.

Teyha smiled for a moment before she remembered what he had asked. “Oh. This afternoon. The mother ship has sent them down, and they are at the archive getting basic orientation with the Gaian volunteers.”

It had rapidly become apparent to her that once they identified the traps at a site, it was the perfect educational tool for bored teens. Hiska and Ritgar were going to be seeing the Wilding site along with three Gaian teens who had an aptitude for history.

“Then, we should probably take this time to enjoy our fleeting privacy, my love.” Ekinar lifted her from her desk and swept her to their large bunk at the back of the tent. Life of exploration was not for everyone, but he had taken to it with ease and grace, and when she woke in the dark of night and his beautiful features glowed pure and bright, she knew that her adaptation had come full circle as well.

Life and love with a strange warrior, not knowing when or if they would have to re-join the mother ship gave their time together a sweetness that it wouldn’t have had otherwise. They had been forced together rapidly and that forging had made them strong.

About the Author

Viola Grace was born in Manitoba, Canada where she still resides today. She really likes it there. She has no pets and can barely keep sea monkeys alive for a reasonable amount of time. Her line of day job tends to be analytical which leaves her mind hopping to weave stories. No co-worker is safe from her character analysis. In keeping with busy hands are happy hands, her hobbies have included cross-stitch, needlepoint, quilting, costuming, cake decorating, baking, cooking, metal work, beading, sculpting, painting, doll making, henna tattoos, chain mail, and a few others that have been forgotten. It is quite often that these hobbies make their way into her tales.

Viola’s fetishes include boots and corsetry, and her greatest weakness is her uncontrollable blush. Her writing actively pursues the Happily Ever After that so rarely occurs in nature. It is an admirable thing and something that we should all strive for. To find one that we truly like, as well as love.