Into the Dreaming by Karen Marie Moning Page B

mixed with the blood of a creature even the Fae hesitated to name. His shadow moved unnaturally as he rose, slithering around him, wont to move independently of its host.
    “You seem unperturbed by your defeat, dark one,” she probed, determined to savor every drop of her victory. “Care you not that you have lost him? Five centuries of work. Wasted.”
    “You presume you knew my aim.”
    The Seelie queen stiffened, staring into his eyes for a moment longer than was wise. “Pretend not that you intended to lose. That I have been manipulated.” Her voice dripped ice worthy of his kingdom.
    “Loss is a relative thing.”
    “I won.
Admit
it,” she snapped.
    “I doubt you even knew what game we played, young one.” His voice deep, silky, and mesmerizing, he mocked, “Did you come to gloat because my defeat made you feelpowerful? Did it make you feel safe in seeking me? Careful. A being such as I might be inclined to find you reason to condescend. To sink to my depths.”
    “I have sunk to nothing,” she hissed, feeling suddenly foolish. She
was
young by his standards, for the king of darkness was ancient—sprung from the loins of an age she’d heard of only in legend.
    He said nothing, merely regarded her, his stare a palpable weight. She repressed a shiver, remembering her last excursion to his land. She’d nearly failed to summon the power to leave. But, she conceded with a thrill of sexual anticipation so intense that it nearly brought her to her knees, she’d not quite been in a hurry to leave the dark king’s dangerous bed. And therein lay double the danger …
    “I came to offer my condolences,” she said coolly.
    His laughter alone could seduce. “So offer, my queen.” He moved in a swirl of darkness. “But offer that for which we both know you hunger. Your willing surrender.”
    And when he was upon her, when he had gathered her up and his great wings began to flap, she let her head fall against his icy breast. Darkness so thick that it had texture and taste surrounded her. “Never.”
    “Heed me well, light one, the only thing you are never with me—is safe.”
    Much later, when he possessed her completely, a full blood moon stained the sky above the Highlands of Scotland.
    Aedan made love to Jane like a man who understood that this day, this moment, only this
now
was securely in the palm of his hand, taking her with the passionate urgency of a tenth-centuryScotsman who knew not what tomorrow might bring: brutal war, drought, or crop-destroying tempest. He made love like a drowning man, desperate for the surety of her body—she was his shore, his raft, his harbor against what storms may come.
    And then he made love to her again.
    This time, with exquisite gentleness. Brushed his lips against the warm hollow of her neck in which her heartbeat pulsed. Kissed the slopes of her breasts, tasted the salt of her skin and the sweetness of her passion glistening between her thighs, and flexed himself deep within her innermost warmth.
    He became part of her. Finally, he knew the kind of loving that made two one and understood Jane was his world. His ocean, his country, his sun, his rain, his very heart.
    And that sleek, iced citadel behind his breastbone—behind which he’d concealed from the dark king that which was most infinitely precious to him—cracked at the foundations and came crashing down.
    And he finally remembered what he’d sealed away there … his Jane.
    “Jane, my own sweet Jane,” he cried hoarsely.
    Jane’s eyes flew wide. He was buried deep within her, loving her slowly and intensely, and although he’d called her name aloud many times during the loving, his voice sounded different this time.
    Could it be he’d finally remembered all of it? All those years they’d spent together in dreams, playing and loving and dancing and loving?
    “Aedan?” His name held the question she was afraid to ask.
    Framing her head with his forearms, he stared down at her. “You came to me.