9. Leashed

It had been eons since I had allowed anyone, even myself, to leash me. It went against my very being. I was no tame creature, nor a caged beast. I was wildness itself, the great Hunter of the Tuath Dé: untameable, uncageable, unchangeable. Every screaming instinct under my skin told me to give chase to the woman in my palace, and with great care, I set them all aside.

I was a predator, but Alexis Sharpe was not a doe to be run down and slung across my saddle as prey. She had chosen death instead of such a thing. It was one thing to hunt and kill. It was another entirely to claim from her the things I wanted in all their brutal glory.

If I was ever to have her, she would need to choose it. She would need to choose me.

I had no idea how to begin to convince her to want such a thing.

Though I”d given him the command to defend her from me, it burned me that every time Lexi came to my side she had Keilain at hers. It was wise. If she were alone – if we were alone – I wasn”t sure I could hold back. She was so lovely, the lush curves of her body begging for the grip of hands and teeth, her full breasts the sort a man could lavish his attention on—or rut between. It was all I could do to keep myself still and calm when she was near. Sarcaryn”s power had woken the stallion in me, and I wanted her, desperately.

The enforced distance and stillness chafed on me. My hounds were happy to loll about in the Ruined Palace, but their Master was not a restful creature. I yearned for motion. Yet I could not bear the thought of stepping into the true wilds of Faery and stepping out of Lexi”s life. The streams of time were too changeable. The risk of leaving, of losing her forever, was far worse than merely being trapped.

So I remained leashed. I paced for hours like a restless beast, trying to burn off my instinctive need for movement, and I climbed to the heights and watched the birds fly like a hawk tied to the mews. I sat for hours in places where Lexi might come to find me, but away from her chosen paths, so that she might not startle like a doe at the sight of me and trigger my every hungry instinct. A sighthound cannot help but chase when his prey flees—and I was so much worse than even they.

It grew more difficult day by day. Lexi walked my floors and slept in my bed. Her scent settled into the air of the palace, so that sometimes I would step around a corner and find myself panting with need, the taste of her skin on my tongue and my cock so hard it ached. She came to me, from time to time, and never once asked for more.

I couldn”t trust my senses around her. Sometimes the air sparkled with adrenaline or grew heavy with desire, but who was I to say that such things were more than the reaction of one body to the presence of another? Who was to say that they were not merely reflections of my own desires, brought into being by the power of the Hunt?

If we were animals, such a thing would be an invitation not to be denied. A bitch in heat does not deny the wolf when he has her neck in his teeth and his cock in her heat. The temptation to do exactly that snarled from inside me with every smile she gave me and every glimpse of her smooth skin, but she was no beast of the fields. She was a thinking being, one whose rights over herself were inviolable.

I struggled to remember that I, too, ought to act like a thinking being.

A footstep startled me from my reverie. My head came up, ears snapping towards the sound, and I caught sight of Lexi.

Alone.

That was so startling that my instincts settled, leaving me bewildered, defenseless before the arch look of challenge in her eyes. I blinked at her, my mouth slanting up. ”Alexis Sharpe,” I said, savoring the taste of her name. ”I”m surprised to see you without your hound.”

She lifted one shoulder in a shrug and sauntered towards me. ”Keilain isn”t always by my side, you know,” she said. ”He rambles on his own, or plays with the other hounds. I”m an independent girl. I don”t need him to dance attendance on me.”

”And yet you come to me,” I said, lifting my chin with a heavy-lidded look of answering challenge.

”And yet,” she said. Lexi took a seat next to me, looking out across the open forest and the sunsetting sky. ”Here I am.”

”Hmm.” I turned my eyes to the same sky. Though I didn”t reach out to touch her, knowing I would never be able to stop myself if she pulled away, it pleased me to be sitting on the same rampart, watching the same sun set. I waited in silence for her, basking in her presence. I could never be content with merely that, but after the long hours and days without her, the warm scent of her skin and the sounds of her breath and beating heart were like a clean spring in the summer heat.

We sat there for a while with the shadows growing longer around us. I dared to look down at her, admiring the smooth line of her throat and the softness of her body beneath my robe. Though I knew she was intended as a punishment, and though the double handful of days that had slipped through my fingers had already been torture enough, with Lexi beside me I couldn”t find it in me to rouse my rage at Sarcaryn. The Great Stag had bridled me at last—but perhaps he had forgotten how a brook horse might learn to love.

Only under the hand of a woman who had bound him could a brook horse shake his wildness for long enough to form an affectionate connection. Just so had Boenn claimed me, slipping a cow-halter over my muzzle while I slept next to her, so assured of my security and my knowledge of her capture that her sweet lullaby had stripped me of all defense. Though I wore no outward bonds, the soulmate bond that tied me to her was far more secure than any cow-halter. For her I would defy my own nature.

”Was it always ruined?” she asked, when the darkness grew deep and the stars began to show.

I rumbled a laugh. ”No, of course not,” I said, smirking down at her. ”Many thousands of years ago, this palace was the heart of a Court, one that lasted more centuries than many in the Shifting Lands. It fell to enemies, but such places maintain a spark of what they once were.” I patted the stone like one of my hounds. ”The Ruined Palace isn”t a fully-woken palace, for I have no Court, but I roused it and claimed it as my own when I returned to the faery wilds. It”s good to have a safe place to return, and for the hounds to rest when I roam alone.”

She swung her legs with an irrepressible girlishness that woke a surprising tenderness in me. ”It”s a nice place,” she said, startling me.

”Oh?” I asked, tilting one ear towards her. ”I struggle to imagine this being a finer home than what you”re used to in the mortal world.”

”Eh,” she said, shrugging one shoulder. ”I”ve never been one for endless luxury. I spent my money traveling and having adventures. Experiences are more worthwhile than fancy clothes and caviar. Besides,” Lexi added, flashing me a smirk of her own, ”this place suits you. It”s grand enough for a fae lord without implying you”re some sort of popinjay. I can”t imagine a man with claws and antlers being at home anywhere that wasn”t a bit wild.”

I snorted at that, and reached up to knock a knuckle against one of my antlers. ”I imagine they”d catch on the chandeliers.”

Lexi”s bright laughter rang through the night air. Every predatory sense locked onto that vivid joy. Her throat bared as she threw her head back, her body at ease, those dimpled fingers almost brushing my thigh where she braced herself on the stone—

No.I turned my face away before she could catch the flash of red in my eyes. I would not take anything from her she didn”t offer. I would not.

”For the sake of the chandeliers, I”m glad you have a home like this,” she said, smiling up at me, far too bright and beautiful.

I didn”t look. If I looked, I would slide my fingers into her hair, and tighten them into a fist to hear her whimper, and then I would break.

”It pleases me,” I said, my deep voice rougher than the topic deserved. ”I”m glad it pleases you, too.”

A deep woof! echoed up the stairs: Keilain. My nostrils flared with ire even as I recognized the rescue for what it was. Every moment, every heartbeat, every breath alone with my Alexis was another chance for me to hurt her. I”d already run her down once; set my hounds on her and left her savaged and dying. I couldn”t bear to break her spirit the way I”d broken her body.

”Yon hound isn”t patient,” I said, sighing through my nose. ”I suppose I shall bid you farewell.”

Lexi got up, casting me a sharp glance. It struck me as irritated. Dare I hope that she wanted to be here—to stay with me? That the warmth of her company was from an appreciation of my companionship, not merely an escape from boredom?

But the look was gone as soon as it came, a brief flash of an expression, and I doubted myself as soon as her smile returned. Stay, I silently pled, looking up at her. Better yet, ask me to follow.

”Farewell,” she said quietly, and left me alone.