6. Naked Jealousy

It was all but physically painful to leave Lexi with her hound. Keilain had been mine for a long time, but the prince he”d once been had possessed a strong sense of self and a will forged in the flame of war, and unlike many others who ran before me, he was still a man. His devotion was that of a hound, though, even though he could think and speak, and a dog”s love is given without reservation.

I growled with frustration as I stalked through my palace, the black hounds staying well out of my way. What woman can resist unconditional love? For that matter, what man can? Beautiful Keilain, prince and loyal hound, would surely become her beloved companion. He wasn”t the cruel creature I”d first met, and I doubted he could return to the man he”d been before he”d given himself over to the Hunt. Change can never be fully undone, even by great strength of will, and he had no reason to want to hurt her.

Surely they would find a balance of affection, whether as hound and mistress or as prince and princess. Perhaps they would even forge a path of their own, twining together like a linden and an oak-tree, inseparable in their love.

But as for me…

I raked the dull claws of my left hand through a rotting painting on the broken wall, a snarl twisting my expression. I wasn”t tame. I wasn”t safe. A hound may bare his teeth in protection of his master, but a hunter is not a protector. You run with the Hunt or you race before it, and Lexi had been willing to die human before becoming my possession or my prey. I wanted her with a reckless desperation I didn”t understand, and I had no idea how I could ever have her.

The reflection of my antlers in a window caught my attention, my focus whipping towards the view of the wild lands outside the Ruined Palace before I realized that the prey was merely a phantom. I clenched my hands into fists, bitterness twisting in my gut.

I”d killed one of Sarcaryn”s many sons, worn his antlers and won them for my own. I was the Hunter. I”d blooded the Stag himself, and now look at me. Wracked with desire, a woman sleeping on my bed who I couldn”t even fucking touch, who I had to give over to one of the hounds—

He didn”t just lean on Faery’s power, I realized with a sinking sense of horror. He leaned on me.

Nothing else made sense. I”d spent tens of thousands of years untroubled by desire for companionship, let alone the raw intimacy of sex. I hadn”t even pleasured myself for centuries, satisfied by hunting and killing. Yet I couldn”t stop thinking about Lexi—her creamy skin marked by my hounds and my power, the sweetness of her mouth, the defiance as she looked into my face and laughed.

I dropped heavily into my throne, burying my face in my hands. Sarcaryn couldn”t create what wasn”t there, but he could certainly inflame, and though it was many eons past, I had once been a stallion as much as a man. I still bore the proof, my horse”s tail as much a part of me as my beating heart.

What stallion can resist the mare? He can think of little else besides her scent, of burying the thick length of his cock to the hilt in her heat, of breeding, of flaring, of filling her with his seed over and over and—

Without thinking, I licked my fingertips, hungry for even the faintest traces of her skin, and finally, finally realized what my body had known all along. Lexi was in heat, that brief window of fertility mortal women experienced alongside the patterns of the moon. I shuddered, forcing myself to lower my hands from my face, my pulse throbbing through my stiff cock and my jaw aching from how hard I was clenching my teeth together.

She was in heat, and I”d left her to the care of a dog. If he hurt her—

He won”t.

Though Keilain was no longer mine, he”d run with me for many centuries. Once, I would never have trusted him to guard someone from harm, but his nature was no longer merely that of the prince he”d been. He belonged to Lexi, and to her went his whole heart. He”d probably try to kill me if I offered her harm.

The thought amused me. A hound”s loyalty is total. It wouldn”t matter one whit to Keilain that I couldn”t be killed. He would savage me without hesitation.

I knew when Lexi set her foot on the stone of the Ruined Palace, her feet bare and stride precise. I followed her through the palace with my connection to it, eyes closed and head leaned back against the stone of my throne. A smile tugged at my mouth as she started exploring her connection to me, commanding my hounds with a far gentler touch than I ever used. It pleased me for her to do it. Perhaps if she found pleasure in my power, she would find something kinder than horror to feel for me.

Keilain walked beside her on all fours, keeping pace with her. I had no hope of stifling my envy for that position. I didn”t even try. I wanted her at my side, and I wanted her there because she wanted to be there as badly as Keilain wanted to be at her side.

I”m going to make that fucking Stag pay for this, if it takes me until the end of time.

I didn”t move when they came into the throne room, laughing together. I didn”t think I could look at them without all of my hunter”s focus coming down onto her, let alone my naked jealousy.

She fell silent. I knew she”d seen me—that she was standing there, looking at me. It was unbearable.

”You”re Nuada.” She took a deep breath. ”Nykhir.”

The sound of my true name in her voice made me shudder with pleasure. It didn”t matter that she said it with the wary concern of a doe observing a well-fed wolf, nor that Keilain stood so close to her that I knew he had to be leaning against her hip. She said my name, a thing I hadn”t heard spoken aloud since Boenn had stolen my headwaters from me.

She knew my soul, down to its darkest depths.

I opened my eyes, turning my face towards her. ”Alexis Sharpe,” I said, tasting the words for the first time. ”Welcome to the Ruined Palace.”

She regarded me with a level gaze that gave nothing away, though I could scent the brightness of adrenaline on the air. Her hand was on Keilain”s shoulder, the black hound watching me with the casual focus of a guardian. I watched her fingers tighten on his wiry fur, my chest hurting from the force of my heartbeat. Would she hate me for what I was? What I couldn”t help being?

”You”re less frightening when you”re not wearing a skull,” she said, lifting her chin and looking at me through her lowered lashes. A small smile twitched at the corner of her full mouth. ”And when you”re sitting down.”

”I was sitting when you first met me,” I replied, smirking as the hackles on Keilain”s back lifted. I wasn”t the only one who was jealous of Lexi.

”You were mounted.” Lexi started walking again, strolling towards my throne with a casual saunter, her hips swinging. ”That”s different.”

I had to drag my attention away from her body, not wanting to frighten her with my physical desire. She was mortal, and mortals inflicted sexual cruelties on each other with vicious frequency. The mare may always refuse the stallion if she so chooses – will crack his skull open with her hooves if he insists – but humans didn”t have the same defenses. I didn”t want her to fear what my desire meant, not comprehending that she merely needed to withhold her invitation if she had no interest in mating me.

What if Sarcaryn intended that she never—

No. He”s not more powerful than Faery itself. He can only influence. If I feel this way, even if it was his doing… Faery brought us together. Surely there”s a chance.

Don”t ruin this, Nuada. Control yourself.

”If you prefer me seated in my throne instead of mounted on a horse, I suppose I can remain in such an attitude for the moment,” I said, slouching lower in the throne, my legs splayed and my arms resting on the stone of the throne. I rested my head on the knuckles of my silver hand, watching her approach. ”Is there aught else you desire from me?”

Such as my cock—

—Stop. Don”t even think it. Don”t frighten her.

Surely an impossible task for one such as I, but I could at least make an attempt to be non-threatening. Perhaps I would appear as a contented hound lying in the sun instead of a hungry wolf licking his chops.

”Answers, if you”re willing to give them.” Lexi hopped up onto a chunk of stone that had fallen from the ceiling, the ancient painting of warring monsters still visible in places.

Keilain took a seat at her feet, placing himself between me and her. I”d asked him to do it, and believed his protection and her sense of safety important, but I still disliked having the hound between us. If anything, Lexi belonged between the two of us, a god at her right hand and a hound at her left. I only hoped it could end that way.

”I suppose it depends on the questions,” I replied, trying to keep my eyes on her face instead of caressing her curves.

”How long have I been here?” she asked, without further preamble.

”Less than a day.”

”Why”s my hair blonde, then?”

I breathed a laugh. ”My power healed you, including your hair. It”s a wild power, and answers to my soul, and thus to yours. You are as you believe yourself to be.”

”Oh.” A soft sound. She touched her hair, then bared her shoulder, revealing one of the bite-mark woad tattoos. ”And this?”

It was difficult not to pay attention to the fact that she was dressed in my clothing. I made an effort, nonetheless.

”A natural effect of my healing. It will fade over the years, just as if they were natural scars.” My lips curled up into a smirk. ”Else I suspect I would be blue from head to toe.”

She laughed, a sharp bright sound that made my breath catch in my throat. How long had it been since I had been the source of any laughter? Of happiness of any kind, aside from the fierce joy of blooding the kill?

”Is this one an actual tattoo, then?” she asked, tapping her throat.

My enjoyment of the moment died, my skin going cold. Of all the names I bore, none were so cruel or full of horror as the Dullahan. Yet I couldn”t hide who I was from her forever. If we were ever to find balance, it would need to be with our eyes open to the truth of the other. There can be no eternal balance built on lies.

”I am more than merely immortal, unlike the hound at your feet,” I said with care, tension making my thighs bunch and shoulders tighten. ”I am one of the Deathless. Even beheading cannot kill one such as I.” I drew in a breath when she didn”t blanch, trying not to dig my claws against the stone. ”For a god to die, he must be first slain, and then forgotten utterly. As long as even one person remembers me, I will go on. I suspect that even if one scrap of paper were to survive bearing my name, I would endure.”

”That mark hasn”t faded,” she said, her voice soft.

”I doubt it ever will,” I replied, watching her.

”He is the Dullahan,” Keilain said, his voice rumbling. ”The Master has many names, but that”s one of them.” If hounds could have smirked, I suspected he would have. He licked Lexi”s bare foot, the contact making me grit my teeth as raw envy flooded my veins. ”It”s not only as the Hunter that he”s ridden the mortal world.”