The Faery Bride by Lisa Ann Verge

Author:Lisa Ann Verge
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Medieval
Published: 2013-11-25T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twelve

There existed in Ireland an herb called faud shaughran, the faery grass. Whosoever was fool enough to tread upon it would find herself tearing mindlessly through night and day, through brambles and woods too thick for sun to penetrate, over choppy seas and up the cliffs of mountains, so fast and furious it was like flying, it was said—a mindless headlong journey that paid no attention to exhaustion but forced the enchanted one on, for the herb rendered her powerless.

So here Aileen stood, sucking air into her lungs and trembling fit to shake her bones out of her skin. Rhys ridged his teeth against the heel of her palm. She stood snared in the blue blade of his gaze while her heart raced, raced, and all her body shuddered with a fierce, unyielding emotion.

He pulled her toward the tiny hut with its frosted thatch and pitted walls. She was gliding, not walking, and the wind itself pushed the door open for them. He thrust her forward. She edged around the cold black ashes of an evening fire and stopped in front of a makeshift pallet of fir boughs. The light sifting down through the smoke–hole dusted the edge of the crumpled blanket.

He came up behind her and snapped the netting off her hair. Burrowing beneath the tumble, he sucked his way down the line of her neck then came up short on the edge of her mantle. Throwing an arm around her shoulder, he pinned her against him and then tore the ties asunder. He yanked the mantle out from between them and sent it flying across the room. Every hard inch of his big body pressed against her back—heaving, just as she heaved—and radiating heat like a kiln.

Then she was leaning back into him, willingly, savoring the feel of his body so close, savoring the touch of hard man’s muscle. She bent her head back at the shock of his lips on her shoulder. She curled fistfuls of her tunic as her mind separated from her body and her body fluxed to the commands of some primitive instinct. She did things with a shift of her hips that she’d never dared imagine. And she did them to a man with half a face and a slipping grip on reason.

Oh, but hadn’t she spent the last fortnight weighing the risks and the consequences of seeking him out? She couldn’t shake him out of her thoughts. Hadn’t she brooded all through a gloomy Christmas while her heart battled with her mind, her instincts with her sense? She’d told herself, aye, he’s a warrior, an unbeliever, a man she should hold in contempt. But her heart screamed to heal the wounds that festered inside him. It wasn’t in her power to wipe away a thousand whispers of contempt, the sword–slice of betrayal, the unhealed bruise of constantly witnessing fear and disgust in people’s eyes, not with her salves or even her healing hands. But Da’s teachings rang in her ears.

There are many ways to heal, Aileen—with your herbs, with your hands, and with your heart.

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