Obsessed (3 page)

A man. Grabs me from behind. He’s taking me—

“No!” The scream pierced the tavern’s clamor, and Liana’s eyelids flew open. Her body turned to ice as she realized the scream had come from her own throat.

Nira dropped Liana’s wrist and staggered back, her blue eyes wide with terror. “Witch! Get outta me tavern afore I throw ye out.”

Liana’s tresses vibrated as she stared at the sea of faces gaping at her in the now silent room.

“It is too late,” she whispered.

* * * * *

At the same moment Aric heard Liana’s scream from inside the tavern, he caught the sound of flapping wings. Powerful wings, bearing down on the village of Fiorn.

The irani. Coming to take Liana to the Sorcerer!

“Gods, damn,” Aric shouted as his gaze raked the sky.
Where is Jalen? And what of Renn?

But it was not his brother Renn flying toward him. It was the irani. At least a dozen of the massive beasts.

Fury pounding in his temples, Aric cursed again and plunged back into the tavern. Even as he shoved his way through the crowd, the beasts’ eerie shrieks rent the air.

“The Sorcerer’s devils!” shouted a woman. “They be coming for us!”

Pandemonium exploded throughout the tavern. Men yelled. Women screamed. Tables and chairs crashed to the floor.

Hot bodies thrust past Aric, impeding his progress. It took all the strength he had to keep from being swept with the crowd back toward the door. He had to get to Liana. Had to spirit her away before the irani found her.

He heard thumps on the tavern roof and knew at least half a dozen of the irani had landed on the thatch. Aric had only moments before the beasts would be inside.

A bar wench jumped from a tabletop, in her haste knocking over a lantern with her hip. Flames shot across the rush and ale covered floor. Smoke gripped Aric’s lungs and blurred his vision. He saw the gishla being grabbed from her dancing table, and then the brunette vanished into the mob.

Aric resisted the impulse to help the gishla. His eyes watered from the smoke as he searched for Liana.
There.
Over the crowd he could just make out her small form. She had a stool in her hands and was swinging it at a windowpane. At the same time she screamed, “Ranelle! Over here!”

As the glass shattered, more irani shrieks echoed throughout the village. More pounding on the tavern roof.

Smoke and fire engulfed the room. Timbers splintered and cracked as the irani ripped into the thatch above.

Aric stumbled over a body, the poor soul trampled from the stampede of people. He did not dare stop. He had to reach Liana.

He was within feet of her as she swung the stool at the window again, breaking away more of the glass. She reached toward the opening at the same moment an irani thrust its hideous head through, its jaws wide.

Aric ripped his dagger from its sheath. Liana screamed as the irani clamped its beak around her wrist.

The irani yanked Liana forward, dragging her half through the window. Smoke burned Aric’s eyes as he lunged forward and clasped Liana around her waist. At the same moment, Aric sliced the jagged edge of his dagger through the irani’s thin neck, severing the beast’s head from its body.

Liana screamed and fought against Aric’s hold, obviously out of her mind with terror. Heat from the fire burned at his nape as he struggled to force the Tanzinite maid through the window. He coughed, near overcome from smoke as he shoved her over the sill, while at the same time trying not to tear her delicate skin on the remaining shards of glass.

She cried out as she tumbled through the window and landed on the dead irani. Aric started out through the opening, whistling for Toen and Baethel as he climbed. Glass scraped his skin as he forced his huge frame through the window and then jumped to the ground.

Liana scrambled to her feet, moonlight illuminating her face and sheer clothing. Even as smoke billowed from the window, she attempted to force her way past Aric, trying to get back into the tavern.

“Are you daft, wench?” Aric grasped her around the waist. She kicked and screamed as he threw her over his shoulder. “You’ll get yourself killed!”

“Ranelle!” Liana shouted. “I must help Ranelle!”

The sound of pounding hooves alerted Aric to Baethel’s approach. The stallion rounded the corner of the burning tavern, galloping straight toward Aric and Liana. Toen howled as he loped at the horse’s heels.

“If your friend is still in the tavern,” Aric said as he lifted Liana to toss her onto Baethel’s back. “She’s as good as dead now.”

“No!” Liana shouted, her heart leaping into her throat. “Let me help her, you—you son of an irani!”

Coarse hair chafed Liana’s skin as the man ignored her cries and flung her across a horse’s withers. Her thin gown hiked up to her waist, exposing her bare bottom, and she screamed with rage as she fought to free herself.

The stranger easily pinned both her wrists to her backside with one hand as he mounted the horse. No matter how hard she fought him, she could not free her arms from her captor. Before she knew it, he had tied her wrists together with a strap, just above her naked hips.

When she again shouted at him to let her go, the stranger slid a piece of cloth into her mouth and tied it behind her head, gagging her. Liana went limp, realizing it was useless to fight. She knew had to conserve her strength and use her wiles to escape.

And escape she would.

“Toen, search for Jalen and Renn,” the man commanded. From her upside down position, Liana could barely make out the form of a white wolf as the beast howled and then trotted into the crowd of screaming villagers. Heat from the fire warmed her skin and she could barely breathe from the smoke.

The stranger kept Liana face down, her belly across his lap, her hands still tied behind her back. Her hair fell forward, covering her face, and her gown hiked even farther, almost up to her breasts. “To the Elves’ pool, Baethel,” the man growled.

The horse bolted into the night, jolting Liana and rattling her thoughts. The stallion galloped so fast that soon the screams and shrieks from Fiorn faded, becoming fainter the further away they traveled. As she hung from the stranger’s lap, she saw only the moonlit blur of jensai blooms, brush, rocks, and ground through her curtain of hair.

Cuts on her arms and legs burned, but she knew they were minor. Somehow when the stranger had thrown her out the window, he had kept her from being seriously injured.

The stench of smoke still filled her nostrils and clung to her tresses. The smoke muffled each strand’s normally attune senses. It was as though a part of her was blindfolded, unable to clearly see, and she had to struggle to hold back the panic that threatened to overcome her.

Liana tried to calm her thoughts as the horse sped from the seaside village toward the forest. Her belly rocked against the stranger’s hard waist and she wondered how she would escape such a powerful man.

Cool evening air caressed her naked buttocks as they traveled. Her breasts rubbed against the man’s breeches, her nipples tightening as hard as ansi stones. The intimate place between her thighs tingled as their bodies moved together on the horse.

Ye, gods. The man had her bound and gagged, and was kidnapping her, and she still wanted him.

If the hardness against her belly was any indication, the stranger wanted her, too.

Not that she had had any doubt since she had seen the vision of the two of them back in the tavern. Maybe that was why he had kidnapped her.

But why then had he walked away?

Perhaps he meant to take her to the Sorcerer.

No!

Liana forced her mind away from such a hideous thought and focused on her friends. She was certain Tierra had escaped the fire since she was home ill in their cottage by the sea.

But Ranelle…no matter what her own destiny was, Liana had to know Ranelle’s fate. If she concentrated, she should be able to discern whether or not her heart-sister still lived.

Soul heavy with fear for her friend, Liana did her best to relax her body and slide into a trance. She blocked out everything but her search for the knowledge of what had happened to Ranelle. Searching for her halia’s lifeforce.

Back, Liana’s own lifeforce traveled. Back to the chaos in Fiorn. Where people still shouted and screamed and cried. Not only was the tavern engulfed in fire, but the fishmonger’s and the butcher’s, too.

Soon the whole village might be aflame.

A twinge of empathy gripped Liana, sadness for any lives that might have been lost in such tragedy. But she felt no such compassion for the place where she had been abandoned at birth. Where all but Ranelle and Tierra, her heart-sisters, had treated her as an outsider from the time of her arrival. The whole of Fiorn could burn to the ground for all Liana cared, as long as her friends were safe.

Circling above the village, massive winged beasts appeared to be searching for something…beasts like the one that had grabbed Liana’s wrist at the tavern.

She shuddered at the thought, and again turned her thoughts to her halia. Ranelle was all that mattered now, and Liana knew with certainty that her heart-sister wasn’t there. She was nowhere to be found in Fiorn.

Liana choked back a sob at the absence of her halia’s lifeforce. Could Ranelle be…dead?

But wait. Liana’s consciousness grasped a thread of hope. Her essence followed the feeling. Farther away, along the shore…she saw Ranelle fleeing, stumbling over a log on the sand. Her heart-sister was alive!

Liana frowned when she realized Ranelle’s dress was in shreds, and she might as well have been naked. Her golden skin shimmered in the moonlight, her large, firm breasts bounced as she ran, her mahogany tresses floating behind her in the wind. Ranelle paused to look behind her.

Then Liana caught the awareness of something—or someone—following her heart-sister. Liana’s skin chilled as she struggled to find out what could be chasing Ranelle.

Before Liana could determine if the being pursuing Ranelle was evil, a sensation on her backside brought Liana out of her trance.

She blinked, again seeing through her curtain of hair bits of moonlit ground flashing by as the horse galloped farther from Fiorn. The gag in her mouth remained, but felt as though it had loosened. Her body rocked against the stranger’s…

And she realized his hand was stroking her naked hips, just below her bound hands.

He was touching her almost reverently.

“Zjenni.” The stranger groaned as though he was in mortal pain as his palm caressed her buttocks, sliding over each smooth cheek.

Liana’s eyes widened and she caught her breath as the man moved his hand. Her core ached with wanting as he fondled her, his palm sliding down her thighs to behind her knees, and back to her hips.

“Sweet zjenni,” he murmured, his words deep and throaty as his knuckles grazed her backside. “So beautiful. So soft.”

The timber of his voice set Liana on fire. It was rich and sensual. And when he eased his hand down the crevice of her buttocks, lower and lower yet, she nearly came undone. Her heart pounded hard and fast. She barely noticed the movement of the horse beneath their bodies as the stranger’s fingertips brushed the tangle of curls between her thighs and teased her clit.

Liana trembled, a moan rising in her throat behind the cloth in her mouth. The man’s woodsy scent surrounded her, fueling her desire for him. In the back of her mind she knew she should fight the erotic sensations, but she was powerless to stop them—and she wanted him too badly.

She closed her eyes as the stranger’s fingers slid into her slick core, and she grew impossibly wetter yet.

The man thrust one finger deep inside her. “Gods. You are so tight.” He groaned again as he rammed deep, down to his knuckles and back out again.

His finger was so big, and she was so small, that Liana would have cried out from the surprise of the sensation if it were not for the binding in her mouth. She moaned as he continued to move his finger in and out, matching the rhythm of the horse’s gallop. Before she realized what she was doing, Liana found herself instinctively rocking against his hand, raising her hips on his thighs, begging without words for more.

She felt his other arm move, and then the horse’s reins fell across her back. In the next instant, as he continued to thrust his finger inside her, the stranger yanked her gown up higher, above her breasts with his free hand. He then slid his hand beneath her and onto her breast. The contact of his hot palm nearly drove her wild as he kneaded her nipple. Liana couldn’t believe how erotic it felt being stroked and touched as she lay bound across the stranger’s lap.

“Come for me, zjenni,” he all but growled. “I want to see you climax. I want to feel it.”

The stranger’s motions intensified, and the sensations within Liana grew. So powerful, so unbelievable. Again the vision filled her mind of his massive body sliding between her thighs and into her moist folds. Their slick, naked skin as they pressed their bodies together, his broad chest rubbing against her nipples. Her legs wrapping around his waist as he thrust his cock inside her, again and again.

Liana’s muscles tensed, and in the next moment a muffled scream rose behind her gag as an orgasm ripped through her body. Brilliant flashes exploded behind her eyes, blinding her in their intensity. Her breathing grew hard and ragged, a fine sheen of perspiration coating her skin as tremors shook her body.

“Yes. Yes, zjenni,” he whispered as the spasms continued to grip her.

But the stranger did not stop. As the horse raced through the forest, the man continued teasing the nub between her thighs, and thrusting his fingers inside her core until she climaxed again.

And yet again.

Until her body was limp with exhaustion. Until she slid into a deep sleep.

* * * * *

When Aric realized Liana had fallen asleep, he reluctantly removed his fingers from between her thighs. He caressed her buttocks with his palm as he drew in a shuddering breath.

“Ah, zjenni,” he murmured, again uttering the Nordain word that meant most precious. His cock ached so badly to take the maiden that he feared he might spill his seed in his breeches.