Passion Untamed (Feral Warriors #3)(16)

She leaned forward and stroked his chest. "I don't know if it's the only reason I'm drawn to you, but it's the only reason that matters. I draw my power through the animals."

With that, she crawled off the stone, unbuttoning the front of her bloodstained dress as she walked past his head to the far end of the room. He tilted his head back and watched as she tossed the dress aside, revealing a too-slender form of such delicacy it made him ache.

Reaching up, she turned on a crude water spigot and stood under the harsh rush of water. She picked up a bar of soap from the floor and washed the blood from her face, hair, and body, then turned off the water.

"The water doesn't flood the room?" he asked.

She grabbed a threadbare towel from a small pile on a rock in the corner and dried herself with it. "The floor's not even, and there are small gullies in the rock that run beneath the walls."

"How long have the Mage lived in this place?"

"Since the last war with the Ferals."

The war that came to a head with the Mage's capture of three newly marked Ferals - 1738. After Lyon captured nearly a dozen Mage sorcerers and sentinels, and killed their high leader, the Elemental, he'd demanded peace. And gotten it. For 270-plus years, the two races had lived in strained harmony, basically ignoring one another. A cold war that was cold no longer.

He watched her drop the towel and pull a navy blue dress off one of the hangers. "How long have you been here?" he asked her.

"I don't know." She shrugged the dress over her head. "Time has no meaning in this place."

"Were you born here?"

"No. I was eight when Birik claimed me from my mother, taking me as his apprentice. He's an enchanter, too, though his gift isn't nearly as strong as mine. He mostly just calls snakes." A small scowl marred her features, hinting at a temper he'd yet to see. "He taught me, forced me, to draw my power for his own use. I haven't been off this mountain since."

"What was happening in the human world at the time you came here, do you remember? Did you know?"

"They were sending men into orbit around the Earth. They were trying to reach the moon."

"The 1960s. You've been down here about forty years. You're still very young."

She quirked a brow, a glimmer of a challenge in her eyes that pleased him. "And you're older?"

He smiled, surprising himself. "Almost four hundred."

An answering smile broke over her face, bright and amused, but gone almost as quickly as it appeared. Yet in that fleeting instant, in the brief radiance of her smile, he felt as if he'd been sucker punched.

Skye pushed her sleeves to her forearms and came over to him, her natural grace back in full.

But when she stopped beside him, her gaze wouldn't quite meet his. With her hair wet, her features so achingly delicate, she looked as fragile as a sapling in a storm. A need to protect her rose fiercely within him.

Her pensive, fathomless gaze finally rose to his, pressing into his chest, into his heart.

"It's been a long time since I had someone to talk to. Someone who offered a little sympathy." She bent and laid a feather-soft kiss on his chest.

A pressure built inside him, squeezing at his heart.

"Thank you," she said softly.

He met her gaze. "You're welcome."

She turned and started toward the door.

"Where are you going...Skye?"

"To the woods." She glanced back at him with pensive eyes. "I need the woods." A sanctuary and the protection he couldn't provide.

As she disappeared around the corner, he stared at the empty doorway for a long, long time. A hundred dire problems pressed on his mind, yet all he could think about was her. Skye.

Without a doubt he'd been enchanted. The question was, by magic?

Or by the woman herself?

Hours later, Skye finally left the forest to return to the caverns, another doe by her side and a plump woodchuck in her arms. Though it was a day away from another midnight, she felt the need for their company. As she descended the cavern stairs, a pair of crows circled her head. Two more squirrels scampered around her feet.

She set the woodchuck down and slipped into the kitchen to fetch her Feral some food. She knew he had to be hungry though he hadn't asked for anything. Besides, she felt this soft need to bring him something. A gift in return for his kindness. Not the gift he wanted, of course. She couldn't free him. But food she could manage.

She wrapped several thick strips of roast venison in two pieces of cheesecloth and slipped one wrapped package into each of the deep pockets in the seams of her dress.

With the woodchuck once more in her arms, she led her little troupe down the stone stairs that ran throughout the cavern. Spying Birik deep in discussion with two of the sorcerers and the Feral, Vhyper, her heart lurched. The doe, feeling her distress, pressed her head against her hip.

As always, she tried to pass without drawing his attention, but Birik's hand snagged her arm roughly, dislodging the woodchuck. The creature fell to the rock at her feet with a squeal and waddled behind her as Birik's flat eyes pinned her fast.

"It worked," he said coldly.

Skye nodded, holding the man's gaze for only a moment, before looking away. She fought not to tremble.

Vhyper laughed darkly. "I told you it would. Paenther's too much of a knight not to come to the aid of a damsel in distress." His gaze flicked to her hip. "I smell food. Taking him lunch? A treat for a performance well done?"