Devil Man

DEVIL MAN

Vonna Harper

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Warning This e-book contains sexually explicit scenes and adult language and may be considered offensive to some readers. Loose Id® e-books are for sale to adults ONLY, as defined by the laws of the country in which you made your purchase. Please store your files wisely, where they cannot be accessed by under-aged readers.

Devil Man Vonna Harper This e-book is a work of fiction. While reference might be made to actual historical events or existing locations, the names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Published by Loose Id LLC 870 Market St, Suite 1201 San Francisco CA 94102-2907 www.loose-id.com

Copyright © January 2009 by Vonna Harper All rights reserved. This copy is intended for the purchaser of this e-book ONLY. No part of this e-book may be reproduced or shared in any form, including, but not limited to printing, photocopying, faxing, or emailing without prior written permission from Loose Id LLC.

ISBN 978-1-59632-180-9 Available in Adobe PDF, HTML, MobiPocket, and MS Reader

Printed in the United States of America

Editor: Ann M. Curtis Cover Artist: Croco Designs

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Chapter One

Ancient Somerset

The woods closed in around the young Quantock witch Demelza. Despite her quick pace and the hooded, ground-length cape she wore over her gauzy dress, she shivered. At her mother’s prompting, her ebony hair flowed down her back instead of being caught in its usual braid. “Loose hair makes you appear innocent instead of what the spirits made you,” her mother had explained. “And when the devil man sees you in a cloud-like gown, he will think only of his man needs. Rendered stupid in the way of most males, he will not sense why you sought him until it is too late.” Casting aside soul-deep uncertainty, Demelza turned her thoughts to the terrible burden and responsibility that had brought her to this foreboding place. She was here to kill. But first, she had to seduce the dark and deadly man who lived with the creatures everyone called the devil dogs. She’d do so by offering her hot-blooded flesh to him. Holding

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nothing back, she’d grant herself full release, seduce and enchant. And when she and the stranger had finished turning their bodies into one, she’d bury her knife in his heart. There was no alternative. Aware of the deep shadows and fast-dying day, she pondered what she’d have to do to keep the devil man’s frightening companions’ fangs off her throat. At her witch-mother’s side, she’d learned calming chants and prayed she could reach the hellhounds like she could human hearts. But if the beasts were immune to her spells, she’d have no choice but to slit their throats as well. And if she failed… A low, deep sound tore at her thoughts. Stopping, she listened. Her muscles became taut as bowstrings. She smelled bark and earth and saw dense, tree-cast shadows and nearly lost herself in the sensations, the quiet that was part of the wilderness. The only sound to reach her was the strange distant howl. “Hear me, Morning Ghost,” she prayed. “You have long guided me and turned my hands into healing tools. I beg of you, stay by my side today. Guide me and give me courage.” Strengthened by the wispy, smoky essence that was her spirit guide, she forced herself to walk in the direction the howl had come from. With each step, fear diminished and her determination grew. Sensing Morning Ghost’s sunlit presence beside her, she reminded herself of why she was here. “Please, place your wisdom and courage in my blood. Make me strong for what I must do. The man I seek is not human. No matter what he looks like or how his hands and body might feel against mine, I will remember that he is evil and must be destroyed.” The howl grew stronger. She, a spell-spinner, should be immune to it, but she’d never heard anything like this before. The harsh yet seductive note circled around her and ignited her nerve endings. She could dance to the deep sounds, spin and twirl, her body melting

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with each move. Most of all she could cast aside her deadly task and become a woman, only a woman. Seal her aching body to a stranger’s, take and give, surrender. No, she didn’t dare! Wouldn’t! The howl had been coming from a part of the forest so dense, she’d never been there. As she pushed her way into the vegetation, Demelza didn’t feel apprehension so much as the conviction that her life had never had greater purpose. Movement! Stopping, she stared. Her heart raced, and she had to fight the urge to run back to her mother’s arms. But she was no longer a child. A snow-white dog nearly the size of a pony stepped from behind a thick tree. Her breath caught. White? The devil man’s companions were all black. At least, that’s what Nyghal had told everyone as he lay dying. Nyghal had been right about one thing; no nightmare could equal the impact of this beast. The motionless animal regarded her with bloodred eyes. She’d never heard of a huge white dog and certainly had never seen one this size, this potent. But what did it matter? Nothing like what now threatened her people had ever happened before, either. There were no guidelines for what she now must do, just her witch’s heart and courage. Another dog joined the first and then a third. The newcomers were winter-night dark and moved like spirits, reminding her of smoke. Although she remained wary and alert, her soul had no room for fear because, in their own way, the wolves were beautiful and compelling. “Where is your pack leader?” she finally thought to say. Then, because maybe they couldn’t understand spoken words, she asked the same question in her mind. “Are you ruled

by the white beast or the human?” “What does it matter?” came the response. “Because I want to speak to your leader, not those who follow.” “You think we are nothing, impotent? Come to us. Surrender yourself.”

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“No,” she answered and gathered her witch gifts around her. “I am not a simple and

foolish woman. Feel my strength!” “Strength from a girl? Do not make us laugh.” “I am no child,” she retorted, mentally cursing her slight build and height. “Can a child

speak with her mind or touch from a distance?” Giving weight to her words, she mentally stroked their broad heads. As one, the black beasts shuddered. “We sense…something.” “Do more than sense. Believe.” “Why should --” “I wrap power from the ancients around you”, she interrupted, once again touching their heads. “The ancients’ spells, born of earth’s center, are inescapable.” As one, the creatures all but turned to stone. Just the same, she knew she didn’t fully control them. Yet. “Ancient powers borne of my witch parents -- my father is dead -- flow through my

veins. I draw endurance from the immense fires that dwell deep beneath our feet. Yet more of my strength comes from the sun, wind, winter storms, and spring’s growth. Those gifts protect me from all evil. From you.” “Surrender,” the hounds repeated. “Become one with us.” Sensing hesitation and question in the response, she folded her arms over her breasts. “I

will not surrender, ever! Instead, that is my command to you.” Determined to prove herself, she ran imaginary fingers from their heads to their noses and from there to their gaping mouths. She brushed a fingernail over sharp fangs. “Careful,” one of them -- she couldn’t tell which -- warned. Even as she acknowledged the warning, she relished the opportunity to pit her witch gifts against worthy foes. Soon, she told herself. Soon she’d do more than freeze canine muscles.

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Unless the devil man commanded all her attention. She was still tamping down on her excitement, anticipation, and hesitation when the white dog slowly and laboriously separated itself from the shadows and started toward her. Instead of stripping its strength from it, she relaxed her control over the creature. Larger than the others, it carried itself like a lord, despite its struggle to move. Lightning and thunder lurked in its deep-set eyes. Fear, admiration, and awe licked at her. “Magnificent,” she whispered. She was tempted to drop to her knees in surrender, but the open mouth and killing fangs kept her on her feet. “Magnificent?”

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Chapter Two

Whirling, Demelza stared in the direction from whence the word came. At that moment, she ceased to concern herself with the dogs. After what was both a lifetime and a blink of the eye, a man eased himself from his living shelter. Became real. Apparently, she’d entered his territory/domain without even knowing it. She’d expected her foe to be on horseback, because that was how he’d appeared to Nyghal, but he was on foot. Just the same, fear jolted her system. The newcomer carried a silver sword strapped to his side but otherwise appeared unarmed. His glowing eyes made her think of morning embers waiting to be blown into flame. What would it take for them to rage? And if that rage was aimed at her, would he kill her? The question helped her battle her fear into submission. If he sensed her primal reaction, he might use it to his advantage. He had to see her as strong and powerful; his equal, if not superior. From the waist up he was naked, his body hard and well muscled. Well-worn cloth clung to his hips and caressed his solid, strong-looking legs. His boots, although dirt caked, appeared well made. Long, dark hair framed sharp features. There was nothing soft about

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him. Drawing a deep breath, she vowed to show no weakness. His body was male, nothing more. Except for an undeniable, soul-deep loneliness. “Run, maiden,” he said. “If you want to live, run.” His voice put her in mind of a trumpet in the hands of a master. She should be fighting the impulse to run, but against all reason, she’d never wanted to touch a man’s flesh as much as she did at that moment. His voice commanded. Beguiled. Seduced. Despite the fifty-some feet between them, heat radiated from him, threatening to burn her. As it had been when she faced down the dogs, she embraced the challenge. “Are you the danger?” she challenged. “I should fear you more than the beasts?” If her question confused him, he gave no indication. He glanced at the dogs, then frowned. “They are frozen. What --” “My doing. I do not want to risk being attacked. This is between you and me, not them.” “You… Listen to me, girl! I grant you this single warning and no more. If you do not heed it, I take no responsibility for what happens.” “What is going to happen?” “What are you, a foolish child? You don’t see their fangs?” “Of course I do, but I’m no child.” I’m not sure I ever was. “Then you are mindless.” “You know nothing of me.” “That’s what you think?” “More than think. Know.” Meet me strength for strength; make the coming battle

everything my life has been about. “My mother used her witch-knowledge to study you for several days,” she told him, when perhaps she shouldn’t have. “Because you live among

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animals, you believe everyone is like them, all instinct. How can you look into a human’s heart and mind, when maybe you have never truly been one?” Instead of responding, he ran a broad, long-fingered hand down his chest. Her heart jumped. The place between her legs heated, forcing home the knowledge that not all battles pitted muscle against muscle. She hadn’t expected that from him. “I loved the innocent old man your beasts attacked.” Fighting her reaction to his primitive sexuality, she slid her hands into the pockets of her cape. Although her fingers closed around the dagger hidden there, the time to turn killer hadn’t come. “I worked to keep him alive. Dressed his wounds with a salve made of damiana, guarana, aloe, and cardamom. Held him as he died. His soul entered mine. My prayers guided him to the spirit world.” His head snapped back, as if she’d slapped him. “His soul entered… You speak nonsense.” “Never, devil man.” “Devil man.” His deadly beautiful eyes flashed. “Yes, I am that.” “I know.” “How can… If you saw his wounds,” he said, his tone cold, “you know you should not be here.” “Do you think I want to be?” “Then why are you? A promise you made to some old man? If so, you are beyond foolish.” “At least I am not like you, a human beast who allows -- who orders -- death without reason. Do you have a soul? Knowing what you did, I do not see how that is possible” Kevern of Wessex, who’d once ridden alongside his king as a trusted knight, willing to lay down his life for his lord, looked down at the fawnlike creature who gazed up at him. Even more unbelievable, courage wrapped her in its strength. Folds of rough fabric hid her

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shape, but her features were delicate; her loose, glossy black hair alone cast a spell over his sex-starved body. Still barely believing his eyes that a woman -- a beautiful and brave woman -- stood before him, he breathed deep and caught a whisper of cinnamon, a scent that took him back to when his mother and sisters prepared the family’s meals. How long had it been since he’d allowed himself to think of his childhood and the innocent he’d once been? The dogs that now were his only companions watched silently, their great heads lifted and fangs exposed, reminding him of what passed for a life these days. Kevern’s cock twitched. “She is not yours,” he told the hellhounds. “What do you want with her?” the white one asked. “Heed my words. She is not what

she seems, a helpless child. There is power inside, deadly power.” Rocked by the statement, he studied the woman before him. Had the dogs deduced more than he had? Was this female creature what he’d worked night and day to strip from his thoughts? He squinted, and then knew. It was no child who stood before him. Under the cloak lay a woman’s soft, warm form. If he touched her sleek flesh with knowing fingers, maybe she’d surrender to him, part her legs, and welcome him into her secrets. Perhaps loneliness would seep from him, and he’d become human again. Maybe. “I claim her.” “She does not belong to you,” the white dog continued. “And even if you capture her

and force her to worship your body, you would be a fool to trust her.” “It does not matter,” he retorted. “Nothing does except mating.” Maybe. “Careless human. Do you want to risk death?” “Would you want my life?” The white dog didn’t answer. “You tried to save the old man?” he asked the woman, belatedly remembering what she’d said. “Are you a healer?”

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He couldn’t be sure but thought she smiled. How long had it been since he’d witnessed a woman’s smile? A lifetime? “Call me what you wish,” she said. “Tell me, dog-man. What is your name?” “Why do you care?” He could easily break her fragile bones or, if the fire within him raged beyond his control, pin her to the ground and mount her. The thought of housing his cock in her depths caused it to swell even more, but although he lived with beasts, he hadn’t fully become one -- yet. But close, so close. Death might be better. “I wish to know who I have come to see,” she said. “You seek me?” “Yes.” A lifetime had passed since he’d touched a woman. His memory of their beguiling bodies had faded. Or maybe the truth was he’d learned that only pain accompanied thoughts that went back to when he didn’t sleep alone, and had forced those thoughts from his mind. “You sought me out, even though you knew I am with these creatures? What is it, maiden? You wish a swift death?” “My name is Demelza, and I have no wish to die today.” “Then you are slow-witted.” She shook her head, her sleek hair dancing with the movement and threatening his fragile grip on sanity. “If I was, I would not be gifted with healing skills. Believe me, I am not an innocent.” “Not a virgin?” Her gaze remained steady. “No.”

What are you telling me, that you want sex, with me? “Married?” “No.”

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His throat tightened, as did his cock. He fought the need to tend to that part of his body he had no control over. “Are you a whore?” “No.” “Then what are you?” “Alive,” she whispered. The faint sound swirled around him and fueled inner fires. “Hot-blooded.” She paused, making him wonder if she’d deliberately chosen the words in an attempt to drive him into madness. Maybe she’d succeed. “When the need for sex overtakes me, I find a man willing to satisfy me.” She dropped her gaze. “But none has asked to become my husband.” “Why not?” Her head came up, and she faced him again. “Because of who I am.” What a mystery she was. Intriguing. Maybe dangerous. “And what are you?” “That is for you to discover.” Hit with the challenge from the small, misty creature, Kevern stepped closer. He expected her to bolt like a frightened deer. If she did, he’d charge, knock her to the ground, and cover her. His greater strength would part her legs, and then he’d fuck her. Take her hard and hot. Instead of running, however, she stood fast. The dogs remained in place, prompting him to again acknowledge her powers. He’d expected to have to battle the beasts’ instinct to tear the outsider apart, as they’d done to the old man the other day. If only he’d stopped them back then… But had he wanted to? “Demelza,” he echoed. Something clawed at his heart, and he now smelled more than cinnamon; the musky scent of a woman. Was that why she’d frozen the dogs, so they couldn’t come to his defense? Had she created the unique aroma to entice him to his death? Beyond caring, he stood on slightly spread legs muscled by a lifetime of battle and training. The sensation that had

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touched his heart a few moments ago returned. This time, it felt less like punishment, more like a caress. “Those who once spoke to me called me Knight Kevern,” he told her. Her gray eyes took in his form from head to worn boots. For the first time in many moons, he was aware of his ragged clothes. “You are a knight?” “Once.” Those remarkable eyes of hers asked why he no longer was, but she remained silent, studying him. He wanted to do the same, but her cape hid so much. No matter; he’d soon strip the unwanted garment from her. And then? “You are still a knight,” she said at length. “You carry yourself like one.” “Do I?” “Yes, but I’ve never seen a fighter with such sorrow in his heart.”

My heart? How can she know what I lost, the pain I live with? Unnerved, he killed the space between them and grabbed her shoulders. Eyes wide, she jerked back, then stood her ground. He, who’d known little except the taking and giving of blood, of war, revenge, and battle, wanted nothing of gentleness. A woman’s body weakened a fighter. If he ever allowed himself to relax his grip on his defenses, it might mean his death. But he was no longer a fighter, and he didn’t want this life.

Then why do you do what it takes to stay alive? a voice inside asked him, not for the first time. What are you waiting for? For your lord to return and forgive you? For the woman

whose body you couldn’t resist to slip into bed next to you? Neither of those is going to happen. There’s only today -- and endless, lonely tomorrows. A familiar heat warned him that his eyes were becoming inflamed. Surely that would frighten her, as it did every living creature except for the dogs. How wise she’d been to call him devil man. “You cannot know what lies in my heart,” he belatedly thought to challenge her. “Just as I cannot feel yours -- except like this.” He placed a hand over a breast.

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Immediately, he knew he shouldn’t have. A brief, fleeting contact with this creature would never be enough. A lightning-jolt hit his fingers, warned him to release her, which he did. Even stronger than the pain, though, was the hunger tearing through him. Determined not to let her control him, he slipped a hand beneath the cape’s front opening. The other hand remained fastened to her shoulder, holding her in place. Just the same, he waited for her to bolt. And if she did, what then? Should he let her go? Could he? “Your eyes,” she muttered, “are on fire.” “Yes.” “Why?”

Tell her nothing! Remain silent. Except he couldn’t. “Emotion,” he said. Only her head moved, nodding slowly. “Can you control it?” “What do you want me to say?” “The truth.” “The truth! Why should I tell you anything?” “Because so much is tangled within you.” She spoke calmly, as if his outburst had had no impact on her. “Unless you free yourself, you will never again experience life’s blessings.” Determined to cast off her words before he became tangled in them, he guided his forefinger over her collarbone. “Answer me this. When I touch you here, what do you feel?” “My pulse races.” She continued to stand her ground. Instead of acknowledging her honesty and courage, he closed his fingers around the full, high breast. Despite her admission of lovers, surely someone as young as this female who called herself Demelza had scant understanding of her body. He could force her to accept what it was to be a woman, awaken her, ravish her, and leave her ruined, his fury satiated. At least for a short while.

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Before self-hate stalked him. The burning sensation in his eyes intensified, frightening him, but his fingers on the filmy fabric over her breast distracted him from the dark mood that had been his hated yet familiar companion for so long. “Do you hear my heartbeat?” she asked. “No.” “You lie.” “Why should I?” “Because you are afraid of revealing yourself to me.” “Me, afraid of you? Never.” Smiling faintly, she leaned forward to gift his palm with her fullness. “Not yet, but you might soon be.” “Might? You don’t sound as sure of yourself as you did a moment ago.” “Feel me, knight,” she said in response.

Knight. Like a starving animal facing his first meal in years, Kevern released her shoulder and claimed her other breast. She lowered her head, maybe because she didn’t want him to read her expression. Her breathing quickened. Warning himself not to frighten her with his ferocious hunger, at least not yet, he drew her breasts into his grasp and lifted them. They’d been made to be fondled, loved, worshipped. Her cape had fallen back into place, so he couldn’t see what his hands held, but he didn’t need to. He tried to capture her small, hard nipples between thumb and forefinger, but his fingers kept sliding off her gown. Spotting the dogs out of the corner of his eye, he forced his attention on them. No longer rooted in place, they were creeping closer, fangs exposed. His captive muttered something he didn’t understand. As one, his companions stopped. Although they trembled, none moved so much as an inch.

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“Come,” he ordered. “Do not harm her, but approach and learn all you can about her.” “We cannot.” “Why not?” “The woman.” “What about her?” “She has stripped our muscles. Her strength overpowers us.” Deeply shaken, although he’d already suspected that, he returned his attention to her. Sudden anger flowed through him. This was his pack, his only companions! How dare she try to steal them from him! Releasing her breasts, he yanked on the cords at her throat that held the outer garment in place, untying them. He’d strip her, reduce her, turn her into a whore, if that’s what it took to exert his authority! And if he couldn’t face himself after he’d finished -No! He’d remain in the moment and live only to satisfy himself. Was it enough? It had to be. Standing tall and steady, she studied him. “What are you thinking?” he demanded. “I am trying to understand you.” If she did, then she would know more about him than he did, a thought that chased a brand of fear he’d never felt through him. “Don’t!” His fingers clenched. “You won’t like what you find.” “Just because you hate yourself does not mean I will feel the same way.”

Hate? Unnerved by her perception, he yanked the heavy fabric off her shoulders and threw it onto the ground. Then he stepped back so he could study this woman who’d come to him. If she ran, he’d pursue her like the animal he’d become, drag her to the ground,

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mount her. Imprison her. Give her full reason to loathe him. Once she did, she’d stop trying to probe his layers, and he’d be safe. Isolated, but safe. With a shake of his head, he tried to cast off the thoughts that had been with him since he’d first spotted her. These moments were about self-pleasure. Nothing else. She was indeed small, a slight, pale figure with ebony hair. The fabric hugging her form was worthless as warmth and protection. The woman from his past who’d been his undoing had dressed in garments that seduced and taunted. They’d been made with gatherings and ties that lifted her heavy breasts and hid her loose belly -- not that he’d cared, once she’d filled him with passion. In contrast, Demelza’s form needed no concealment, and her dress provided none. She wore fog, mist, a glimmer of cloth that slid over a young, ripe body. If not for her breasts and hips, it would have hung in a straight line. But her curves gave it life and issued their own challenge.

Remove me; the garment seemed to be commanding him. See all of me. Touch and take me. Be changed by me. Panic assaulted him, but he pushed it away, just as he’d learned to cast off regret. He, who’d been condemned to hell, had been given a gift, and he intended to take and use. First, though… “You say you are not a whore, and yet no man seeks to marry you,” he said, his hands fisted by his sides to keep them off her, his cock aching. “Why do you speak in riddles?” “Not a riddle.” She’d glanced down at herself when he first undressed her but now stood as if her body meant nothing to her. Her unwavering gaze feasted on him. “The men of Quantock Village where I live, as well as the men from neighboring villages, are afraid to share their huts and beds with me.” “Why?” “Because I am a witch.”

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A witch. Powerful, perhaps deadly strength. His eyes narrowed. “That is how you stripped the strength from the pack, isn’t it?” He indicated the waiting, watching dogs. “Yes.” “Can you stop their hearts from beating?” “No. And even if I could, I would not.” “Why not? After what they did to that old man --” “They are animals, ruled by instinct. Or by you. Did you order them to attack?”

No! “What does it matter? He was ancient. His time on earth was coming to an end.” “Do you know anything about him? Do you?” Her question and fierceness set him back. How brave she was, courageous in the face of danger. “No,” he admitted. Her fingers fisted as his had, but what held his attention was the moisture that had gathered in her eyes. “His name was Nyghal.” She spoke in a near whisper. “A farmer with a gray-haired wife, three grown daughters, and numerous grandchildren. He raised sheep and a few goats. He was good and pious, a hard-working man, who should not have come to a violent end.” He’d been off by himself watching a couple of playful fawns when he heard the howls that day. After commanding the fawns to run for safety, he’d headed for the sounds, but by then the dogs had surrounded the old man and were taking turns leaping on him. Why? he’d demanded of his companions.

Because we can, they’d replied. Although he’d wanted to strike down their savage reason, they wouldn’t have listened. By then, the damage had been done. In many ways, the seasons he’d spent in their company had made him one of them. Death came to all things, some of it violent. The attack had happened. “His wounds were terrible,” she went on, breaking into his thoughts.

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“He spoke of what had happened?” When she nodded, he guessed she’d heard every word. Maybe those words had found their way into her dreams and brought her nightmares. “He said he’d been attacked by the hellhounds of legend,” she told him. “But he spoke only of you and black dogs, not the white one. Where --” “Snow-hound does not always travel with the pack. Like me, he is different.” Creases formed between her eyes. “The attack was savage and should have killed him. Tell me, did you let Nyghal live?” “What makes you think I had a say in what happened?” “I don’t know. I’m trying to learn the truth.” He should throw her to the ground and force her legs apart, so she’d stop talking. “Perhaps I wanted to send a warning to your village,” he said, although that was only part of the story. “One that says you and your pack have claimed these woods, and my people no longer have any right to them.” An eyebrow rose. “My pack? I am not their leader. I am one of them.” “Are you? You are human, filled with thought and not just instinct.” Hadn’t she already said that of him? “Once. No more.”

Why? She gave him a questioning look. What happened? “Don’t ask,” he warned before she could speak. “My story is none of your concern.” “Yes, it is. You are why I’m here.” “Risking death? Walking alone and unarmed? If you were wise, you would leave the forest to me and them.” He jerked his head at his silent companions. “I cannot. Don’t you understand that?”

Who are you? What drives you? “Tell me.”

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“The woods help sustain my village,” she said, seeming not to have heard his sharp tone. “Many creatures that provide meat for us live in it, and women have long collected seeds and berries and dug for roots and other foods. Nyghal was attacked coming back from visiting his ill brother at another village. The path he was on is the only link between the two villages. You and the devil dogs cannot ask us to give up what we need, what has always been ours.” “That isn’t my concern.” “Then I feel sorry for you. You have lost your humanity.” Humanity? What was that? Just some emotion that had been stripped from him, like so many other things. Yet, despite his anger at her for forcing him to face things he didn’t want to, heat coursed through his veins. He’d held off as long as he could. If she indeed was a witch, she’d sense what was coming. He felt no need to warn her when he reached for her. Roughly grabbing her wrists, he forced her slim arms behind her. She, doing so, filled him with a power he believed he’d lost when he’d been forced to surrender his knightly weapons. Leaning into her, he brought his teeth within inches of her throat. “You are right. I am no longer human. I do not want to be.”

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Chapter Three

He cannot control his fury and the fire in his eyes? Those things exist beyond his command? Do they also match the scars on his soul? Despite the frightening questions, Demelza didn’t panic. She’d never felt physical confinement in her life, and yet what Kevern had done to her didn’t frighten her. Instead, she longed to explore the heat spiraling throughout her body. Accustomed to a life of relative physical ease, because her value came from her mind and soul, her gift, she wasn’t as physically strong as many of the village’s women. But strength came in many forms. “Remember your task,” she heard her mother command. “His death may mean freedom

for our people.” But he was more than a monster after all, as were the beasts he ran with. Despite their fierce appearance, she felt drawn to the animals. As for the man…he was more complex than she could have imagined. More than that, he spoke to her on a base level she found compelling. And overwhelming. The wisp of clothing she’d agreed to wear rendered her next to naked, female to his male. Her untouched breasts ached. She fed the hard hunger by pressing them against his

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naked chest. The rough contact brought new life to the space between her legs. Captured by energy, she increased the contact and widened her stance, bringing her crotch closer to him.

Be careful! Your task is to seduce him, not allow the same to happen to you. I know, she answered her internal voice, but even as she did, she wondered if she spoke the truth. And if she didn’t, would she survive? Still holding her wrists, but with a single hand now, he reached behind her and pressed his other hand against her left buttock, forcing a long, smooth moan from her. His fingers traveled over the swell of flesh to the joining between ass and leg and then inward, sliding over the back of her thigh. She shuddered but didn’t try to break free. Back when she’d started experiencing the crawling, her mother had encouraged her to satisfy the sensation by slipping her fingers inside her sex opening. Over time, she’d learned that the greatest pleasure came, not from silencing the crawling, but by teasing the sweet sensation while her body shuddered and wept. A man’s cock provided the same delights. Dangerous, yes, but like flying. It brought with it a closeness she didn’t experience when she was alone. What she hadn’t anticipated was how quickly this man’s presence ignited the crawling. Could she control it? Could he? And if he turned out to have command over her, would it extend beyond her body? Maybe he knew how to tap into her emotions. The thought frightened her. “Tell me this, witch,” he muttered. “Where is your power now, your spells?” “There is more than strength of the body,” she retorted, determined not to let him know what she was thinking. “More than spells and magic potions.” After a moment, he loosened his grip on her. Just the same, she made no move to flee. Over his shoulder she saw that the watching dogs had formed a semicircle. With him controlling her, she could no longer concentrate enough to keep all the strength from their

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muscles blocked as she’d done earlier. If they perceived her to be a threat to their human companion, they might attack. “Stay where you are! This is between the man and me. Later, I pray, you and I will

learn about each other.” Lifting its great and deadly head, the massive white dog glared at her. “No!” she commanded. “This is between the man and me.” “Is he human?” the white beast demanded. “Can you be certain?” “Does it matter?” By way of answer, if that’s what it was, the white beast flicked his tongue over his fangs and then closed his mouth. He continued to regard her, but his muscles no longer trembled. “Good. Watch, nothing more. Our time will come.” When the creatures continued to stand where they were, she turned her attention back to her captor and the question of whether he was more human or animal, and what the answer meant to her survival. By the spirits, he was incredible! Like an ancient oak, he seemed capable of weathering fierce storms. Going by what little he’d told her, he’d stood up to more than one storm in his life. “What brought you and them to this forest?” she asked. “This matters to you?” “Yes. Does that surprise you?” Although she couldn’t be sure, she sensed that the last thing he expected from a human was curiosity. Fear, certainly, but nothing else. Maybe getting past his barriers, more than living up to her vow, was what kept her near him. That, and his rough sexuality. “Travel is a way of life for us,” he said, bringing her back to reality. “If we remain on the move, no one can stalk or surround us. But these woods provide many hiding places; we feel no wish to leave.”

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“So for as long as you’ve been with the dogs, you call no place home?” He looked down at her with eyes that burned even brighter than before and yet chilled her soul. “I do not know.” “You have no knowledge of how this union with them began?” “Why are you asking these questions?” he snapped. “If you think I owe you an explanation, you are wrong.” “I cannot believe you have not asked yourself the same things.” Damn her. “I want to remember as little as possible, all right. I have become instinct, not reason.” Although he straightened so his body no longer blanketed hers, he made no move to release her. She did nothing to try to break free. “Is that why the dogs accept you?” “They see me as one of them, a soul mate.” If her hands were free, she’d stroke his cheek. Instead, she shook her head. “You are mortal, a man, not one of them.” “Are you sure? You can see into my heart?”

No, but I want to, so I can understand your suffering. “You are not simply a killing beast. You are human, like me.” “Human?” he challenged. “We are both more.” He was right, and although she might never fully comprehend what separated the two of them from everyone else, right now, being in his grasp was all she could concentrate on. In truth, his presence had become everything, her entire existence. “There is so much I want to learn about you,” she admitted. “Why?”

So I know who I might be forced to kill. “These woods are vital to my people. I promised to protect them.”

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“With the strength of your great muscles?” He gave her a small sneer. “Perhaps you have hidden weapons in your gown with which you will slit the dogs’ throats? Maybe you have vowed to sever mine as well?” He yanked the fabric up over her buttocks and made a great pretense of looking. “No, no daggers here.” Shivering, she willed herself to stand her ground. “A witch does not need sharp stone.” “Listen to me, witch.” Wadding the fabric just below her waist, he ran his hand over her rounded flesh in back. She was forced to clench her teeth to keep from moaning. He stopped with a finger nestled in the crack between her ass cheeks, and her thoughts spiraled. “I do not care whether I live or die.” “So you say, but that cannot be!” “No? Would you want this existence? To know you’ll never again feel human touch unless you force it?”

No, of course not. What mortal would? “What did you do? What crime could you have committed that --” “My crime?” The fire in his eyes raged. “I was sentenced to this hell life because I took liberties with a woman I had no right to, a woman who danced with my cock inside her.” “I…” “No response, witch?” His finger was on the move again, finding her sex lips and parting them, reaching her opening. Before her brain registered the act, her flesh settled around his finger. He’d captured her, stripped reason from her. But did she want to be free? Perhaps she’d spend the rest of her life like this. “I made that woman sing for me,” he continued in a tone that slid over her like a hot summer wind. “It was easy, hardly more than what I’m doing to you.”

Do not leave me. I need… “Why?” “Why did I seduce her?” “Yes.”

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“Because I was a fool.” “You, a fool? I do not…” By the spirits, between his touch, tone, and eyes, she was falling apart. “Where is she?” “I do not know.” His breath started, snagged, finished. His finger bore deeper. The invasion took her even further into herself. “I do not care. The song did not last, or perhaps the truth is, despite what she told me, she never heard it.”

You have me! Just like that, you hold the power. “She was untruthful?” “To me, yes. To herself, perhaps.” “I am sorry,” she told him, when the truth was she could barely make sense of his words. Her flaming body was responsible. “Sorry?” His muscles tightened, accompanied by an even deeper assault on her core that forced her onto her toes. Her mind began splintering. “When we were discovered, she attacked me, scratching and screaming.”

Concentrate, somehow. “Why?” “To save herself,” he said bitterly. “What queen would not?” “Queen? You fucked --” “Yes!” His all-powerful invasion kept her silent and waiting. Scared, yet feeling so much more. “As for my reasons, stupidity. That, and blind passion. A youth enticed by wisdom of the body.” Lost in a swirling whirlpool of sensation, she struggled to keep her feet under her. No words sorted themselves out, forcing her to wait. “She told her king,” he said after a short silence, “her lord and husband, that I had placed a spell over her, rendering her helpless. But she and I knew it was a lie.” Drawing out his finger, he ran his damp knuckles over her buttocks. The touch stole her breath and kept her at the whirlpool’s edge. “She could have walked away if she wanted to…just as you can.” “How? Your strength --”

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“Yes, that.” He raked his teeth along her shoulder blade. “Stop! Please, stop.” “Too late, little one.” Shaken by his ominous tone, she tried to break free, but he easily held on to her wrists with a single powerful hand. The whirlpool had faded while she was struggling, but it swiftly returned. It would be so easy to step into its depths. To surrender completely. To stop being a woman and become an animal. “How weak you are,” he taunted, as if he’d seen into her thoughts. “It is a good thing you are a witch, because you are useless for anything else.” “Does this make you feel like a man?” she asked, stung. “It makes me feel like what you called me, a devil. Go on, little witch. Show me some of your power. Don’t give up so easily.” Her attempt to kick him earned her a sharp slap to her buttocks. Before she could guess what he had in mind, he released her wrists. But a heartbeat later, he’d repositioned her arms in front, restrained them as he’d done before, and was driving her backward. If not for the tree behind her, she might have fallen. Rough bark raked her ass and thighs. His free hand pressed against her throat. She stopped struggling. Fear nibbled at her nerve endings, but even as she tried to convince herself she wanted none of his manhandling, Demelza sank into something dark, warm, and filled with raw energy. He was more than a simple oak or whirlpool, and she ached to explore and be explored by this complex man. To become something she’d never been. “So fragile,” he muttered, gliding his fingers along her veins. “It would be so easy to kill you.” “If that had been your intention,” she muttered, “I would already be dead.” Embracing the danger inherent in his rough fingertips, she arched her neck and increased his access to her. A wild flame seared her senses.

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“What are you --” “Do it, just do it.” “Yes, I will, little one. Whatever I want.” The fingers on her throat relaxed, and he stroked what he’d nearly punished a moment ago, pulling her into the swirling water. This was floating, drifting aimlessly in a heated sea. “Your skin is like morning mist. But unlike the mist, you will not disappear. I can keep you with me forever, explore your secrets, have you help me give my life meaning. Turn you into my slave and captive.” Disjointed images spun off his words, and she imagined herself walking behind him along a leaf-carpeted trail through the woods. He’d tied her hands behind her. Another rope circled her throat, and he held her leash, ensuring that she’d always follow in his footsteps. He’d announced that he’d keep her naked, and to that end, had burned her clothing. The shadows caused her to shiver while his occasional glances at her breasts or sex turned embers into instant flames. Watching the fine play of his flexing buttocks and thighs ahead of her, she’d lose herself in thoughts of what the night would bring. If he was in a mood to grant her pleasure, he’d order her to crawl onto his body and lower herself onto his rod, where she’d ride it until they both climaxed. But if he’d decided to remind her of her role as his possession, he might secure her to a tree with a teasing rope against her pussy. By the end of the night, she’d beg him for mercy, which he might or might not grant. All because she’d lost command of her body. “If abusing me gives you a reason to live,” she blurted, determined to distance herself from her thoughts, “I feel sorry for you.” “Don’t!” he snapped, his hand harsh again. “I want no one’s sympathy.” Of course he didn’t. Knowing someone cared about him would test his self-imposed isolation. But what he clung to and what she believed he had a right to lived in different worlds.

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Tangled in her thoughts, along with remnants of her fantasy, she was slow to realize what he was doing. Gentle once more, he explored her from her chin to the valley between her breasts. Whether he touched naked flesh or reached through the barrier of her gown made little difference; it was all good, all unnerving. She should have been able to anticipate, should feel her own power. But this dark man had become a midnight storm, and with her senses under assault, she lived in the moment -- his moment. One of the dogs growled, a low, lingering sound. The beasts represented primitive life and danger, wild and unpredictable strength. And the man who’d claimed ownership of her body lived with them. Forgetting that would put her life at risk. Right now, he’d chosen to be gentle and that was the heaven and hell of it. In contrast, there would never be anything gentle about the dogs. But at least for this moment, she’d succeeded in commanding them to observe and perhaps learn about the female who’d entered their world. “Look around you. See the beauty in the sun streaming through the trees. Celebrate a

soft place to sleep and cool water to drink. You were created by dark spirits to act as guardians to hell, but you do not live in that place.” “My mother, who is also a witch, dreamed of you,” she said, struggling not to be distracted by the rough fingernail now circling a breast. “I told you that already. In…in her dreams, you are astride a great stallion. Nyghal saw that same stallion. Where is he?” “I gave him his freedom.”

Will you do the same to me? “Why?” “He deserves to run with mares instead of being trapped with me.” “That is what your life feels like, a trap?” “What else would you call it?” She heard the vexation in his voice. “I tried not to look into my horse’s heart, but I couldn’t stop myself. He longed to return to what he had before I

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entered his life.” He shook his head. “I cannot change my existence, but I had no right to condemn him to the same hell.” “I see no hell here,” she muttered. A measure of sanity had returned while she listened to him. “Because you aren’t looking at it through my eyes.” Twisting her wrists, she freed herself. For a moment, she imagined herself leaping up and into the breeze, floating back to her world. Instead, guided by something she couldn’t name, she stroked the taut skin over his ribs. Tense, he studied her. “What is it?” she asked. “You are afraid of me?” “I have forgotten what it feels like to be touched, that is all.” A moment of sorrow for everything he’d lost nearly swamped her. His nail pressed lightly against her pale, full breasts to further tangle her mind and body. Her loins ached. Sex. Fucking. Nothing else mattered at the moment. “Kill him. Make my people safe.” She whimpered. “Must I?” Denying her dark mission, Demelza pressed the heels of her hands just below his nipples. When she made a circular motion, he arched away, and his hold on her throat tightened once more, keeping her against the tree. They’d become adversaries in a battle without rules. But was battle the only thing that existed between them? Shaking off the question, she set herself to learning what she could about his limits and control. He could just barely handle her fingers on his breastbone, but couldn’t when she touched his sides. Whenever she did that, he yanked her hands off him and glared at her like a trapped animal would, his eyes flaming. He wanted her. Yet at the same time, he didn’t. Even in the act of sex, she seldom ever touched a man’s penis. When she went to a male patient with healing herbs, she left that part of him alone, because men carefully

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guarded their most precious possession. Thoughts of caressing this man’s cock, of it swelling her sex and sealing their bodies together, made her shake. “What?” he asked. “You are cold?” “No.” “Then what --” “Do you not understand?” Instead of explaining further, she slid a hand under his ragged clothing and touched his navel. Releasing her throat, he captured the cloth over her breasts, tearing it a little. “Who dressed you to seduce me?” he demanded. “That is what you think?” “I am not a fool. It is insanity for a woman, even a witch, to walk nearly naked through these woods.” “I wore a cape.” Laughing, he lifted up on the nearly nonexistent fabric until the hem ended at her knees. “A cape, which is now on the ground. Tell me! Who commanded you to try to seduce me?” “No one commands me. I do what I believe I must.” “And this time, it was to seduce a stranger. Was anyone part of your decision?” “Does it matter?” A sound akin to a wolf’s warning growl rolled out of him. “Perhaps not.” The quiet words swirled around her. Instead of trying to respond to his comment, she ran her fingers first over and then inside his navel. Not stopping her, he continued to slowly disrobe her. When the garment reached her breasts, she lifted her arms, and he drew it over her head. It had hidden nothing; yet, she now felt exposed and rawly naked. The dogs’ gazes fixed on her.

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“You aren’t standing with your feet in hell, are you?” she asked him. “Today is about life.”

With a hiss, Kevern stepped back, taking the fabric with him. Draping it over his shoulders, he crossed his arms and studied her. Trembling a little, she forced her arms to her sides and faced him. Her breasts felt tight, taut, huge. Her womb seemed to be melting, and wet heat moistened her outer sex. She’d never felt this small, this delicate. This alive. “You want to fuck me?” he challenged. Fire raged in his eyes. “Is that what you think? That you are so seductive, no woman can resist you?” “I’m only interested in one woman. You.” Cocking his head a little, he fixed his gaze on the joining between her body and legs. “What will I find there, moisture? Your body preparing itself for sex?” “Yes,” she snapped, unable to lie. “Why? Damnation, why?” “Does it matter, Kevern of Wessex?” Cupping her breasts, she lifted them as if offering them to him. “These are my gift to you, them and what lies between my legs. Unless you lack the courage.” His hands became fists. She imagined them holding his sword or other weapons. “You ask too much of me, witch. I have not had sex for too long.” A moment ago, she’d been wrapped in strength born of her witch’s blood. Now, she couldn’t speak. “You have seen a stallion go after a mare in heat?” he demanded. When she nodded, he went on. “That is me, a stallion, a stag. Once started, I will not stop. I cannot.” “What if I begged you to?” “Is that what you want?”

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Yes! She drew a deep breath. “No.” Despite her promise to destroy the enemy, the thought of silencing his heartbeat went against her soul. If there was any other way to protect her people, she had to try. For both their sakes. “You know what I am going to say, that I came here because my village’s survival depends on keeping the dogs from them. You are one with them. They will obey you. Please, take them far from here. Continue your endless travel.” Only his mouth smiled. “What else? Are you offering yourself to me in return for your people’s safety?” Unable to evade, she nodded, and with the gesture came renewed determination. She wouldn’t attempt to master him with her birth-given skills, as she’d thought she’d have to do. Instead, she’d face him as a woman faces a man. Turn them into equals. Sliding a hand between her legs, she held up her fingers so he could see the moisture she’d collected. “This, too, is my gift to you. I give it freely, but it comes at a price.” “What price?” “In exchange for me, the dogs must leave.” “What about me? Do I go with them, or stay and continue to feed off you?”

Stay. Feed. Make me scream. “Which do you want?” “You ask that of a sex-famished man?”

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Chapter Four

Kevern looked down at the witch now lying on his sleeping pad. He remembered picking her up and carrying her to the flat spot where he’d spent last night. He had a faint recollection of depositing her on the leaf and bough mattress, and his calf muscles still retained the aftereffects of standing back up. Leaving her instead of throwing himself on her had taken great effort, but he needed time to reach for a measure of sanity and self-control. Time to anticipate. Setting aside his sword, he kicked off his footwear and reached for the tie holding up his trousers. Her gaze never left him, and her hands resting on her belly gave nothing away of what she felt. He smelled her arousal. The cock-heating scent made him long to know how best to acknowledge her condition, but he’d been alone for so damn long. Starving. A witch. He shook his head. The first woman he would have in ages, and she was a spell caster.

Does it matter? Does anything? Risking what little self-control he maintained, Kevern pushed his trousers down over his hips, revealing a cock so swollen and taut, it felt as if it had taken on a life of its own. Glancing at it, he could barely comprehend that this monstrous organ was part of him. Then he turned his attention to her. Her eyes darkened,

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and her lips parted. Needing to further test her reaction, he slid a hand under his penis and cradled the throbbing organ. A wrong move on his part and it would explode. “Look. Prepare,” he ordered, hoping he sounded more in control than he felt. “This will fill you. You may fight the invasion, but it will happen.” “I…know.” Before, she’d sounded confident. Now he saw her for what she really was, a naked, slightly built young woman with a fuck-starved devil man standing over her and a pack of hellhounds that had followed them standing a short distance away. A sense of power, of rage even, filled him. None other than his lord’s personal sorcerer had sentenced him to this hellish life. Now he would have his revenge with a witch. Overwhelmed by possibilities, he dropped to his knees beside her. She continued to regard his every move. It occurred to him that she might cast a spell over him, rendering him impotent, but if that had been her intention, she would have done so by now, wouldn’t she? Perhaps she’d convinced herself that she could control him with nothing more than her voice, hands, and body. But she was wrong, so wrong! Relishing his physical superiority, he spread his hands over her thighs and pressed down, pinning her to the earth. Instead of trying to free herself, she gripped his shoulders, surprisingly strong fingers biting into his muscles. “You do not want to fight,” he told her as heat ran through him and flames all but blinded him. “It will do you no good.” “I did not come here to fight you.”

Then what? But he didn’t want the answer. His cock needed one thing -- now! And yet, he closed his mind off from the allencompassing hunger. Determined to have a goal beyond letting fire rule him, he slowly, gently, worked his hands up from her thighs. At the same time, he applied pressure to their

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insides and opened her to him. She was a flower bud about to blossom, spring and a hard wind all rolled into one. “I smell you,” he told her. “It is a woman’s scent.” Gripping his shoulders, she nodded. “You do not deny --” “Why would I want to? The truth exists.” “Not all women admit their bodies’ weakness, especially with a stranger looming over them.” “I am who I am, Kevern, just as you cannot change what you are.”

What am I? Wondering if he had the courage to ask her the question, he turned his attention to thinking of her as his captive. In his mind, she became a doe, one who didn’t yet know if she was being stalked by a stag or a cougar.

Let her wonder. Make her taste fear and anticipation. Because he saw himself more as a stag than a predator ruled by the need to kill, he imagined himself stepping slowly and regally toward an unsuspecting doe. He’d hold his head high; broad, heavy antlers proclaiming his right to rule his herd and claim any and all females he came across. At some point, the red brown doe would sense his presence and lift her own head. Her muscles would shiver, her tail twitch nervously. Instead of bolting, as she would in the face of a cougar, she’d sniff the air. Her lungs filled with the scent of a male in his prime, she’d whistle a soft welcoming call. Nervousness would continue to float over her muscles, but because she was in heat, the need to mate would override all other emotions. Supremely confident, he’d close in on her. Because he’d expect her nerves to shortcircuit, he’d be ready when she whirled and bolted. Embracing life, he’d charge after her, easily overtaking her much smaller form. He’d match her stride for stride, his superior

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muscles and longer legs and swinging sex seducing her. Finally she’d stop, sides heaving and head sagging in defeat. But when he planted himself behind her, reared up, and rested his forelegs on her back, she’d spread her hind legs and offer her core to him. Arching his spine, his cock would slide between her legs and into her. Stab her. They’d mate, quick and harsh, streaming sweat and screaming their shared release. Although Kevern ached to rush the act he’d foreseen in his fantasy, he struggled to keep the journey slow. After all, he was human, or, at least, more human than anything else. And she was female, woman. A reason to embrace life. His every touch made Demelza shudder. Whether he stroked her belly, thighs, hips, or breasts, she whimpered, and she clawed at his arms with sharp nails. Her eyes became smoky and her breathing harsh. He sensed her struggle to stay on top of the sensations his hands brought to life, but he had no intention of giving her the time, because if he did, she might no longer want him. Surely she’d fight to break free of the hell-darkness he lived in. Trying to put himself in her mind, he lightly brushed his nails over her outer lips, barely suppressing a grunt of anticipation and gratitude when she lifted her hips toward him. Roughly forcing her legs wide apart, he positioned himself in the space he’d created. As he did, he couldn’t help wondering if his lord’s sorcerer was responsible for this moment. Maybe this was a fantasy created to turn him into a madman. She might disappear. Maybe she existed only in his tortured mind. When he leaned forward and blew his breath over her moist flesh, her fingers spasmed, drawing blood. Even as he bit back a grunt of pain, she released him. Her arms fell to the ground. Could an illusion make him bleed? As long as she remained on her back, he had total access to her sex, but he needed more than to control and rule. He needed her.

Weakness! Do not risk…

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Too late. The journey had begun. Scooting closer, he again crouched low, not to torture her with his breath this time, but so he could study her woman’s place. To believe. Her sex lips were plump and dark, the tiny clit barely visible. Moisture wept from the sheltered opening. Her, anticipating him? Even though his nostrils had already brought him proof of the answer, he couldn’t quite believe. “What are you doing?” she asked, her tone breathy. “Getting to know you.” To his surprise, she chuckled, although the sound reverberated as uncertain. “If someday you think you see me again, you will spread the woman’s legs to be sure?” Something about her question caused his heart to skip, but he refused to search for the answer. The vixen had foolishly come to him for reasons she’d barely explained, but instead of simply watching her, he intended to feed off her. When he could eat no more, when she had nothing left to give him, he’d walk away.

Walk away? What had happened to his mind? “Be still,” he ordered. “Close your eyes and anticipate. We will fuck. Now.” “No doubts or hesitation?” “None,” he snapped, despite the conflicting emotions swirling through him. Demelza shuddered. Almost against her will, her eyes closed. Surrounded by emotion, she waited as he’d commanded. Her heart slammed against her chest while the forest winds cooled her heated vagina a little. She imagined the devil man staring at her, comparing her to other women he’d bedded, particularly his queen. For her part, she had no memory of those she’d allowed to bury their cocks in her. How could she, when anticipation drove her? He’d take her hard and fast, animal to animal. Somehow, he’d sense how his greater size intimidated her and use it to his advantage. Like a seasoned buck, he’d chase her, a yearling doe, into the trees that grew so

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close together, she couldn’t get through them. Knowing she was trapped, she’d force herself to face the larger, stronger form. But even as she shrank away, her blood would rage. His massive cock might tear her apart, yet she’d take the chance. Had to, because she was a female in heat. Casting aside caution and the instinct for survival, she’d stretch her neck toward him and touch her muzzle to his. He’d return the gesture, his blood-heated breath raging through her. Eyes downcast, she’d surrender everything to the need for his seed. No matter that he fastened his teeth over her flesh, she’d thrust her rump into the air. Juices flowing and legs dancing, she’d silently beg him to spear her. And he would. Again and again. Filling her with his hot seed. Something touched her clit, shattering the images that had formed in her mind. Frightened and excited, the woman she’d turned back into waited for this man, her master. After a moment he touched her clit a second time, with what, she couldn’t be sure, maybe a leaf or fern. Again and again, the rough-soft item glided over her center. In her mind she saw him smile knowingly as he teased her, and her breathing sobbed. As he broke her down. Back when she’d agreed to risk her life for her people, she’d convinced herself she’d effortlessly call on her soul and body to enslave the devil man. She hadn’t expected the half human to be so knowing and strong, or for her to need him so desperately. But even as she fought his power over her, she didn’t want him to stop. She’d become almost accustomed to the rhythm of his blatantly intimate strokes so that when the anticipated contact didn’t come, she tensed. After an aeon of waiting, he ran a finger the length of her secret place, and she nearly lifted off the ground. Desperate to experience fully, she reached for him. Grunting, he again captured her wrists and held them against her belly. In danger of exploding, she thrashed under him, fought for a freedom she wasn’t sure she wanted.

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“No!” he commanded. “Don’t struggle.” “Don’t?” she gasped. “What do you --” “Listen to your body. Feel it. Do nothing else.”

Yes, yes! “While you do what?” she asked, suddenly more afraid of herself than him. “I will not hurt you, at least not now.” “But later?” “I cannot say what the future brings. Can you?” She once thought she could; now, she wasn’t certain of anything. Still immobilizing her hands, he stroked her inner sex lips. With each touch she shivered and ground her buttocks against his bedding but no longer tried to break free. The dogs? What did they matter? “You are hot, little witch. And hungry. For me.” Eyes resolutely closed, she ground her teeth together. “What is it?” he asked. “Are you afraid of speaking the truth?” “Don’t ask, devil man! What I fear or don’t is not your concern.” “That’s what you think?” “Yes!” “Then the lesson continues.” After blowing his warm breath on her breasts and belly, he took hold of her labia while continuing to immobilize her arms. His grip on her sex was both gentle and firm, a brand of imprisonment she’d never believed possible. He easily kept her legs splayed while exhaling on tissue that ached with each assault. He did so over and over again until she sobbed. Her legs shook. “What is this?” he asked. “Proof that you are more woman than witch?” “Human,” she got out. “I am…human.” Barely.

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Releasing her wrists, he shifted his hold on her sex, stretching the heated tissue with one hand while the other danced over what he’d revealed. He began near her anus, then stroked upward until he reached her clit again. “By the spirits,” she cried. “No spirits, just me, the devil’s own.” “Enough! I cannot take --” “Yes, you can, my little captive.”

Captive? The word echoed as he repeatedly teased her pussy. Having back the use of her arms made no difference, because she couldn’t think of what to do with them. She should attack him somehow, force his fingers off her traitorous flesh, but would she survive if she succeeded? He seemed to know just how much she could handle without allowing her to climax, bringing her to the brink again and again, only to quiet his movements just as she reached the peak. She became a leaf caught in a raging current. Again and again, the current threw her toward the shore, only to snatch her back before she could escape. Biting her lower lip hard enough to draw blood kept her from screaming at him, but just barely. “We watch,” the white dog told her. “We see your weakness and need.” “What do you care? This has nothing to do with you, nothing!” “Doesn’t it?” Alarmed, she tried to shake her head. “I can only give you the truth,” she finally confessed. She barely existed anywhere except where Kevern touched. The devil man knew her body far better than she could ever hope to. Fool that she’d become, she turned her being over to him, surrendered. As for whether she trusted him, she couldn’t say.

No, she forcefully reminded herself as a finger slid into her. She didn’t trust him! But danger and threat were heady drugs, potent wine. Like a careless child standing at the edge of a cliff, she let him draw her closer to the moment of ultimate weakness and release.

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Something pressed against her inner channel. Whimpering, she froze. Moments later whatever it was filled her. Changed her. Struggling to step back from the precipice that would change her forever, she realized a second masculine finger had joined the first. “No, don’t.” “Too late, witch. Too late.” “Why? By the spirits, why?” “Because I must.”

Must. In and out his fingers journeyed, in and out. At the same time, he pressed down on her mons. If she’d felt trapped by him before, the sensation paled before this new experience, this heady, yet dangerous, assault. Mindlessly arching her back, she again lifted her pelvis off the ground in a determined, desperate attempt to increase the contact. I need, I need…

No, she silently ordered herself, but even as she fought to ignore the shrill scream building deep inside, she knew she couldn’t heed the word. He was right; it was too late for anything except this. “Milking,” he muttered. The penetration deepened even more, lasted longer. “I am milking you.” “Why?” By the spirits, why? “Because I can. Because I must.” The explanation was beyond her. Her mind offered up flashes of her village and those she called her kin, the watching dogs, the all-encompassing forest. But those images soon shattered and blew away. His fingers, coated with her juices, moved effortlessly within her. Her breathing sounded as if she was being punished, but she wasn’t. Then he suddenly, roughly withdrew, gripped her hips, and lifted her. Holding her off the ground, he slid his knees under her before letting her down so her ass rested on his thighs.

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“Listen to me,” he ordered. “I will try to be gentle, but the time will come when I cannot control my actions. The animal in me will spring free.” Where was the humanity she’d convinced herself lived deep in his gaze? Right now, she saw only a stag, a buck. “I am not an animal. Do not treat me as if I am.” “You try to command me?” he shot back. “Have you forgotten how long I’ve slept alone? I’ve become more predator than human.” “Surely you remember what it was to be human.” “Maybe.” He shrugged. “Maybe not.” Alarmed, but desperate to see this necessary task through, she struggled to say nothing. The moments of convincing herself that they were equals, man and woman, were behind her. Although he’d aroused her and in some ways, she loved him for the way he’d played her body, she didn’t dare forget why she was here. Flinging an arm up over her head, she stared at the sky. Her other hand found his forearm, and she held onto his potent strength, waited, breathed. “Me, yours to claim,” she told him in her mind. “Our bodies exploding as one, melting

together, merging into a single, fiery light.” “And after we have fucked?” the Kevern in her mind asked. A hideous, bloody image of her knife protruding from him invaded her mind and turned her veins to ice. Before she could block it out, he powered forward and against her. His penis slid over her inner thigh, claiming too-willing flesh and pulling her back to the present. When he lifted her, she bent her knees and planted her feet on the ground. Gave herself over to him and her clawing hunger. His next movement brought his cock to her entrance. Calling on hungry, desperate muscles, she handed herself to him.

No thoughts beyond this moment, none! Can you do that? a part of her demanded. Yes! No! I don’t know, her inner voice silently wailed.

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He slid in, killing her inner struggle. Then he stopped with perhaps half his length inside her, and her existence began and ended with the invasion. Even as she shuddered, her inner muscles contracted, welcoming and resisting him at the same time. He might have called her a witch, but at this moment, she couldn’t remember what that meant. Whatever powers went with the word were lost. “Do not fight. I will have my way!” “This is not fighting. I…have no…” Hers became a woman’s body, all soft, hot hunger. Instinct took over, easing and drawing out her involuntary muscle contractions and lubricating both him and her, helping her remember other, distant times when sex became everything. Sighing, he granted her a little more of his hard, hot, full member. This time, her body didn’t protest but sucked him deep. “Damnation, witch,” he whispered. “Damnation.” “If I’m damned, you are responsible.” “True.” Mumbling something she didn’t understand, he pulled her closer and spread her legs even more. They’d joined, sex to sex. Man to woman. Fresh tension hardened him even more than before. “What?” she managed. “Are you afraid --” “Silence, witch, silence!” The words said, he drove slowly but steadily into her. Overwhelmed by his power and her need for that power, she dug her nails into his arm. Then he was embedded so deep in her that she couldn’t tell where she left off and he began. It didn’t matter. Distracted by the chill pressing against her forehead and the sides of her neck, she struggled to make sense of what was happening to her. Instead of the witch-vision she’d become accustomed to, she felt herself being sucked into a vast darkness. At first, she

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thought she was turning back into a doe being fucked by a great buck, but then the black lifted a little. Who was the small, naked woman kneeling before a well-armed knight? Slipping closer, Demelza recognized herself, but why were her arms behind her back, and what made her cheeks bulge? Shivering, she floated toward the pair. Ropes laced her wrists, and another rope circled her neck. The faceless knight gripped the end of the neck restraint, forcing her head upward. But although she was helpless, her shadow-self showed no signs of fear. Quite the contrary; she smiled up at her lord and master, her eyes saying what she couldn’t utter because his cock filled her mouth.

Thank you, her eyes conveyed. For gifting me with yourself. The knight, who she had no doubt was Kevern, started to speak, but before the words could reach her, the image disappeared. Reality returned. “Now! Now!” Kevern yelled. “Yes,” she bit out. “Now.” He was trembling. Concerned, she blinked him into focus. His eyes were nearly closed, as if lost deep inside himself, and she comprehended the vast amount of self-control it cost him to treat her like a woman and not a bitch in heat. Would a true devil man be capable of this? Unable to find or face the answer, she noted how soft, warm, and full her womb had become. Everything about him inside her felt right. “This is mating,” the white dog told her. Lost, she lowered her arm from over her head and lightly touched her breast. Her nipple tightened, compelling her to massage it. As she did, he moved inside her, hard, quick thrusts that shook her entire body. Pressing down on her breast, she imagined that he was manhandling her there, sending messages of domination throughout her system. Her grip on his arm relaxed, and, barely aware of what she was doing, she stroked what she might have punished.

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Rolling her head to the side, she spotted the white dog. His hot eyes chilled her, so she returned her gaze to Kevern. His eyes remained unfocused, as if he was looking inward, concentrating on his body. Yes, she could do the same to herself, become self-absorbed and selfish. Her pussy heated and flooded, muscles gone, to be replaced by nerves and sensation. Flames sucked her into them. She went willingly, eager to be consumed. Again, again, and yet again, he filled her. She embraced the sliding, gliding friction, the sense of being one with him. Long, smooth movement shortened, jerked. Pushing back at him, she met equal with equal. Her fingers rode her breast and his arm. Sweat filmed her skin. And the fire grew. “Coming!” He gasped. “Coming!” Caught in her body’s gift to herself, she cared about nothing else. Her flaming muscles clenched, wave after wave of energy assaulting her. She hadn’t wanted this! Success hinged on remaining in control and mastering, not allowing herself to be mastered. It was too late, but still she tried to rein herself in. Swimming against the tide, she fought to remove herself from the mating. She didn’t trust him, hated him for his role in an old man’s death and her people’s fear. They weren’t having sex! Instead, he’d forced himself on her, forced her body to turn on her. He’d pay! By the spirits, he’d rue this moment! The vast current grew. It pushed her upward, propelled her to the summit, flung her into space. Catapulted into the sky, she forgot everything except the earthquake shaking her. “By the spirits!” she cried. Kevern, her enemy, held her close and kept her from crashing to earth. What he said made no sense, not that it mattered. His arms were everything. His legs. His demanding cock.

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Chapter Five

Crying children. Women with hollow bellies and haunted eyes. Hunters stepping into the woods, never to return. Fangs tearing flesh apart, and blood seeping into the earth. Dogs howling. The devil man watching. “I will end this! I must.” “How?” the devil man challenged. “Your strength is nothing next to mine.” “I hate you, hate you!” “I know.” Demelza returned to consciousness by degrees, but even as her nightmare faded, its impact remained. She’d learned that she could exact a measure of control over the dogs when she was near them, but once she returned to her village, the beasts would revert to what they were, killers with their souls trapped in hell. If she couldn’t find a way to compel them to leave her people’s forest, she had only one recourse. To destroy them and their human companion. Opening her eyes, she studied the man stretched out beside her. For too long, her mind refused to think beyond the sex they’d shared. Then she faced reality.

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Back when she’d promised her people that she would do whatever she had to in order to ensure their future, their fears had been replaced by hope. Elderman Petrok, who had been standing on the stone reserved for the village chief, had placed his hand on her head and led the prayers for her success. Surrounded by those she both loved and felt set apart from, she’d looked at one face after another until their collective trust had settled in her heart. Only her mother knew her deepest thoughts. “I do not understand this enemy,” she’d admitted. “For as long as anyone can remember, our safety has been jeopardized by warriors from other tribes who fight with weapons similar to ours. But how do I go to war against devil hounds and the man who runs with them? How does anyone confront those ruled by hell-spirits?” “Maybe with the weapons given to a woman who is also a witch,” her mother had replied. “How I wish I didn’t have to tell you that, but it is the only answer I have. The man leads the beasts. End him. In doing so, you have robbed the hellhounds of their leader.” Kill someone she’d just had sex with? She’d learned that he wasn’t their leader as much as their companion. “The witch awakes,” Kevern said and sat up. “As does the devil man.” “Is that what your people call me?” “Did you expect something else?” she asked, studying him. “No, I don’t.” He drew out the words. “I have no reason to hope it could be otherwise.” Although she didn’t want to, she felt sorry for him. “You brought this upon yourself when you decided to run with the beasts.” “What were my options, witch? To walk alone?” “Maybe. Not that it matters now.”

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“You’re right. It’s too late to change anything.” He rested a hand on her thigh. “What happens now? Perhaps you have had your fill of me and want to go home.” “Would you try to stop me?” “I do not know. Tell me something.” Sliding a hand between her legs, he sheltered her sex. “If I threw ropes over you, would the knots hold? Perhaps you have the power to untie them.” “Perhaps I will cause the ropes to burn up before they touch me.” “You have the power to do that?” “You doubt me?” “No,” he admitted after a moment. “What are you thinking?” “Thinking?” He sighed and stared up at the hazy sky above them. “Sometimes, I look at the world through the dogs’ eyes and see the powerful forces that made them what they are, hell’s guardians. Because I experienced the strength of your spell over me, I believe I understand what rules them.”

It was no spell. “Do you? Tell me, what do you feel when you see and experience my spell-strength?” “Weak,” he said through clenched teeth. “Weaker than when I was banished.” Unwanted tears burned her throat. This man, who had wanted nothing more than to be a knight, was now forced to live apart from human contact. Anger, regret, and loneliness had cast their spell over him and turned his heart into that of a predator. For as long as he lived, a killer’s heart might beat in his chest, the same as his canine companions. If that was true, no woman would welcome him into her home, and no children would call him father.

Do you want death? Instead of trying to stop me, perhaps you want me to release you from this hell.

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But it wasn’t that simple. They’d fucked. His heart had beaten near hers; his heat had bled into hers. His cum still filled her passage. Most of all, she felt his pain. “What would make you feel strong again?” she asked. “You think I’m weak?” “Answer me, devil man.” She thought he wouldn’t. After all, he owed her nothing. “The dogs give me strength,” he said after a silence. “Do you want their gift?” “What choice do I have?” Then, although she could have slipped out from under him, she lay there while he straddled her prone body. His buttocks rested on her hips, immobilizing her legs. Leaving her arms free, he closed his fingers around her nipples. The instant he did, her entire body awakened. By turns, he drew her breasts toward him or pulled them as far apart as the swollen tissue allowed. Her nipples tingled; she couldn’t keep up with the constant movement, could only slip into heat and pressure. “Tell me to stop, witch,” he taunted. “Stop calling me that!” “Why? It’s what you are, same as I’m the devil’s spawn.” Instead of responding, she turned her head to the side. Struggled to calm her breathing. The dogs sat there again, calmly watching. For the first time, she saw more than deadly fangs. Once these creatures had been puppies, playful and trusting. “I love you,” she told them. “No longer fear, but love and understand.” “Are you sure?” “You feel nothing,” Kevern interrupted her thoughts. “Is that what you’re trying to tell me?” “I tell you nothing.”

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“Oh?” Releasing her, he pressed his palms against the outside of her breasts and forced them together. Her breath snagged. Under his weight, her legs shuddered. “The truth speaks behind your silence, witch. Honesty crying out.” No man had ever manhandled her like this. None would have dared. Instead of outrage and fear, however, she came to life under his take-charge manipulation. Yes, he was testing how far she’d allow him to go. He hadn’t come close to her limits or needs, but she had no intention of remaining passive. One more moment, one more sweet, shining sensation, and she’d pull herself back together. And when she did, she’d strip the strength from his muscles until they became like water. Yes, that was how she’d battle him, and how she’d win. In a moment. In the meantime, his savage potential rolled through him. She had no doubt of the raw rage waiting in a dark corner of his being. The wrong word, a slap to his cheek, trying to close her legs, might force him over the edge. He’d kill her as mindlessly as the dogs had attacked a gentle old man.

Gentleness. Kindness. Had he forgotten the meaning of those words? Perhaps he’d never known them. The possibility that he’d been bred and raised to fight and defend distracted her from the rough way he’d pinned her shoulders to the ground. Maybe as an infant, he’d been taught not to cry. Caring and tenderness had been declared forbidden emotions, so he could face death and take life without losing courage or feeling empathy. If that was true, no wonder he’d made the devil dogs his family. They represented what was familiar to him. But there was another way to live. If only he wasn’t too far gone to understand. If only she could reach him before he decided to kill her. Shaking off the chill that went with the thought, she forced herself to focus on those whose welfare and very lives depended on what she accomplished. When she closed her

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fingers around his wrist, he jerked free. Instead of heeding the unspoken rejection, she waited until he pressed on her shoulder blade and then again laid claim to his wrist. This time he held his ground, as did she. She stared into his glowing eyes. Had they ever danced with laughter, bloomed with love? Was his soul open to either emotion? What about his fanged companions? Did they comprehend the meaning of love? Making every move slow and deliberate, she brought his hand to her face and planted gentle kisses on his palm. His eyes smoked, the fire in them banking down a bit. Feeling in tune with his needs, perhaps more so than he was, she turned his hand around and slid her lips over the back. Slowly, softly, she covered his flesh and gently curling hairs there with butterfly kisses. When, finally, she’d left no part of his knight’s hand untouched, she guided it to her throat and left it there. “I could kill you,” he muttered. “Then do it.” His gaze burned deep and low as he lightly stroked her from chin to breast. As he did, something shifted between them. It was as if they now breathed with a single pair of lungs. His weight made her legs tingle from lack of circulation and served as warning that she couldn’t maintain this position indefinitely. As the dense forest cast shadows over him and the watching dogs rumbled deep in their throats, she ran her knuckles along the vein at the side of his neck. “This is your life force,” she told him. “My nails are strong, my witch’s fingers powerful. I could kill you.” Alarm briefly contorted his rugged, yet beautiful features, but died as she continued stroking him. “What is it like to be a witch?” he asked. “Maybe you have become a bear or cougar.”

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No one had ever asked her that question. “I have never used my powers to take life. I am a healer…unless I have no choice.” “Choice? I am beyond healing. Surely you know that.” His words were still settling in her when he lifted himself off her. Unrestricted blood flowed into her pelvis, hips, and legs, and heated her core. Struggling not to let the sensations overtake her, she sat up. His taut, tight body spoke of his deep pain, his desperate loneliness. “Someone practicing black magic banished you and compelled you to live with devil dogs?” she prompted. “Have you tried to fight the spell?” “Yes.” “What did you do? What happened?” “I tried to return to my home, only to discover that it had been destroyed. When I tried to speak to men I’d once considered my brothers, they turned their backs on me. One, a man whose life I’d once saved, said he would kill me if I remained.” “No! Kevern, I am so sorry.” “Don’t be. I soon understood that although I’d left the pack, I remained an outcast. Whether I raged or begged forgiveness, I’d been banished.” “Your family --” “My mother is dead. In my father’s heart, I am dead, because I brought our king’s wrath to our family. My siblings never want to see me again.” “That’s when you returned to the dogs?” “Yes, after a while.” “But first you tried surrounding yourself in isolation. Is that what you’re saying?” His silence supplied the answer. Life with no one to share it with? Even though all she’d done was look at him, touch him, she couldn’t comprehend what he’d endured. Aching for him, she scooted closer and

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wrapped her arms around him. Naked flesh kissed naked flesh. In some ways, they were alike because, except for her mother, she was set apart. But while he’d been condemned to a solitary existence, she was part of her village. She had value and purpose. “You are not alone today…or tonight.” Taking a shuddering breath, he wrapped his arms around her. They remained locked together for long moments, saying nothing. Then, driven by instinct and need, she took his face into her hands and kissed him full and honest. His breath snagged; his body froze. Her heart caught and then resumed beating. “Accept my gift,” she muttered. “Do not fear --” “I fear nothing!”

Neither do you embrace anything. “I will remember that, knight. Just as I want you to always remember this.” Leaning forward, she touched her lips to his. His muscles still tense, he kissed her back. Moisture gathered in her eyes as she parted her lips and set her tongue to exploring. In her mind, her tongue became a cock, his mouth her womb. She, not he, instigated. She set the pace, taking not just him but herself beyond what had existed between them before. She, who’d never run her tongue over a man’s teeth, did so boldly. Growing even more confident, she slipped between his teeth, then stopped, giving him the opportunity to bite down. Instead, he met her tongue with his own, sliding and pushing, taking her moisture and depositing his own. A long shudder rolled through her to gather in her crotch.

These moments. Nothing else. Driven by a sudden, potent hunger for more, she broke off the contact. Unable to remain still, she stroked his arms, shoulders, neck, then moved to his chest. Taut flesh stretched over muscles and bone, making her long to press her ear against him there and listen to his heartbeat. How could his king have been so cruel! Surely he’d seen the loyal and well-trained knight standing before him and not just a man who’d surrendered to his queen’s

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charms. Another liquid wave swept over her, prompting her to touch her teeth to Kevern’s small, hard nipple. It wasn’t fair! He deserved so much more than what he’d been condemned to. “Watch it,” he warned. “What? You are afraid --” “No! Never.” “Aren’t you?” The blood in her temple pounding, she planted her hands on his chest and pushed until he was stretched out on his sleeping pad, his legs twisted to the side. Giving her a sideways glance she couldn’t fathom, he straightened and folded his hands over his belly. “You think you’re strong, do you?” “Strong enough.” Long and naked with dark hair shading his chest and navel, he was magnificent! How could she have believed in her strength, when just looking at his swollen cock sent fire throughout her? But because she’d boasted of her power, she leaned over and ran her tongue over his pubic hair. As heat sparked through her, he sucked in his breath, and his knuckles whitened. “I barely touched you, beast man,” she challenged, determined not to give away her weakness. “Are you ready to surrender?” “You don’t…know what you are doing.” “Do you?” Not giving him time to respond, she ran a reckless fingernail around his cockhead. His jaw clenched; his gaze narrowed. Continuing the risk, she closed both of her hands around the hard length and rested her lips on his tip. A bead of moisture formed in his slit, and she sucked it in. The sweet, wild taste feeding her courage, she closed her mouth over as much of him as she could. She’d never done this before, never been given the gift of a man’s most precious possession. Did that mean…?

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A harsh tug on her scalp stilled her question. He’d taken hold of her hair and now gripped it much as a horseman might control his mount. “Careful,” he muttered. “One wrong move and…” Men were so protective of their manhood, so insecure. Instead of telling him that, however, she touched her teeth to his length. If she bit down… “A spell,” he muttered, tightening his hold on her hair. “The witch has cast a spell over me.” Wondering if he had any idea how far removed she was from casting any spell, she lightly ran her teeth over him. Feeling reckless and wild, she took him deeper into her throat. Going utterly still, he drew in a long, low breath. Satisfied that she’d made her point and not trusting herself to step any closer to the edge, she released him. After a short while, he did the same. Although it took a measure of courage, she looked him in the eye. “Not a spell, Kevern. Today, I am a woman, and you are a man. Nothing else.” “A hunted man. Condemned.” “But not for these moments. Concentrate on that, only that.” When he didn’t reply, she again drew his cock into her mouth. Although he gripped her arms, he made no move to free himself.

This is my gift to you, to both of us. You are a man, not an animal. For now. His solid cock hardened even more until in her mind, it became a spear shaft in the grip of a warrior. How much longer could he contain himself? If the need to have him inside her pussy again wasn’t so powerful, she’d tease and tongue him for as long as he’d let her, see if he’d explode in her mouth. But if that happened, he might accuse her of using her witch’s powers, and she didn’t want that. She wanted him. Although she hated doing so, she drew back until just his head and then only another drop of what she chose to believe was his gift to her remained in her mouth. Thinking to

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keep him from feeling the loss, she closed her fingers around his cock while she straddled him. Then she released him and positioned herself so his man-weapon settled between her sex lips. He met her gaze with a fire-filled one that put her in mind of a volcano. Had he ever seen a mountain explode, smelled the acrid stench, experienced the awful and exciting heat, felt small and weak and helpless as a result? Did he comprehend, as she did, that some forces were beyond human comprehension? So much she wanted to learn about him. So many experiences she needed to share with him. A long, hard howl sliced the air. Shaken by the distraction, she looked for the dogs. Only the white one, open muzzle pointed at the heavens, stood out from the shadows. She could barely see the others. “What is he saying?” she asked, the image of a sheet of fire searing the earth still strong in her. Instead of answering, Kevern filled his lungs and howled. The lingering note seemed to come from every part of his body. Moments later, numerous canine voices responded. “What?” she demanded, trembling. “They want you gone. Or dead.” “What about you, beast man? Do you want me dead?” she asked around the knot in her throat. Despite his ominous words, she lowered herself onto him a fraction. “Damn you.” “Yes, damn me.” Dismissing the creatures that were capable of tearing her apart, she slowly, steadily settled her body over his. His cock invaded and expanded her and made her more than she’d ever been. Lost. She was lost because of him. They’d become, not partners in sex, but fused entities. “Do not hate me,” she told the dogs. “I love you for what you are.” “We are monsters.”

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“Not to me.” Fear at the thought of losing her mind and soul to Kevern made her tense. Doing so caused her pussy muscles to clench and pull him in even more. The line between them faded. Perhaps sensing her vulnerability, he arched upward so that his full length speared her.

Too late. Too late. We are one. Surrendering, she became one with the devil man. Lost herself. She rode him as he drove into her, both of them breathing fast and hard, her thoughts splintering. Leaning back, feeling the air on her exposed skin, she relished the sliding, gliding sensation. Yes, everything she’d ever wanted, yes! She dimly felt her straining muscles, the still staring dogs, something sharp grinding into her knee, but those things were nothing. Everything was him inside her, and her asking for nothing more. From forehead to feet she was on fire, a volcano of her own making. Her swollen cunt wept and gave way before his power. Starved for his liquid offering and the promised release now tearing at her, she closed down with every bit of strength in her core. She lived only between her legs, became a whore, a cunt. Wanton and wild. Slick against slick, heat building upon heat, slapping his chest and the sharp sting of his palms against her buttocks. The rougher his blows became, the more she pounded him in return, but even as she imagined attacking him with every bit of strength she possessed, she knew he wouldn’t do the same. This bred-for-battle man understood his greater strength. He’d taken his measure of her, assessed her smaller bones and weaker muscles. She mattered to him. Unless the beasts he ran with tore his humanity from him. “Come at me with everything you have,” he told her without uttering a word. “I’ll take

your punishment and turn it into pleasure. I'll feed upon your energy and slight womanstrength and taste life.” “I give you life, pleasure, reasons to laugh and cry.” “Not tears,” he responded. “Never that.”

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“Because you’re incapable of shedding them as long as the dogs --” “This is about us, only us!” “I want to believe you,” she confessed and squeezed her eyes shut against tears she had no control over. “You can. For now.” Familiar images of a rutting stag slamming into a doe in heat filled her. The first time she’d seen deer mating, she’d been alarmed by their frenzied fuck. Now she understood the potent instinct behind the act. Now she too became frenzied. “Watch us,” she ordered the devil dogs, her body driving and breasts shuddering, pummeling the man’s cock with her cunt even as he did the same to her. “Understand that

this man no longer belongs to you. You have lost him.” “Have we?” their leader questioned. “Maybe it is you who is lost.” It didn’t matter! A whirlpool swirled around her, lifting her up and then pulling her down, cutting off her breath and taking away her need to breathe. The heat was everything, shared and swift, expanding, promising magic. Then she was gone, drowning, screaming. Flying off in all directions and collapsing at the same time. Only when she stopped screaming and sank, cunt still shuddering, onto him did she understand what had happened. She hadn’t just had sex with the devil man; the dogs who were his only companions had participated in their own way. “Why?” she asked them. “Are you determined not to let him do anything without you,

even fuck a human?” Instead of answering, they looked at each other, their mouths open and tongues protruding, ears back. “Tell me the truth, please! Have you made him one of you? He’ll never be free?” “No.”

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“No?” she repeated, horrified. “Why not? What do you hope to gain by --” “That’s not what we mean. He has more than paid for his so-called crime. He deserves

his freedom.” “You mean it?” Her heart pounded so, she wondered if it might explode. “What

changed your minds?” “You.” “Me?” “We love you,” the white dog said, “enough to leave you.” With that, the animals turned as one and disappeared into the wilderness, but even as their final words sorted themselves out in her mind and she fully believed what she’d just heard, fear remained. What would become of Kevern without his pack?

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Chapter Six

Night slid closer. Before much longer, the sun would give up its weakening hold on the forest. Drawing the witch closer, Kevern placed his mouth over her breast. Although tonguing her nipple satisfied him, he limited their contact to that. Despite still being wrung out from their second and even wilder fucking, the session wouldn’t be enough, not after his long, painful abstinence. She’d gone slack and boneless. He loved the feel of her next to him, her womansoftness nestled against him in surrender and maybe, at least briefly, trust. Alive. Human

after all, he reminded himself. A solitary outcast, his inner conscious taunted. Destined to travel alone. Her doing. Her mound still in his mouth, she turned her head and studied him. After a moment, he lifted his own head, letting her breast slide free. “What are you thinking?” he asked. “Of the dogs.” “Don’t! They aren’t everything; at least, they won’t be, if you won’t let them.” “I wouldn’t be here, if not for them.”

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And the two of us wouldn’t have mated. “Speak your mind, then.” She remained silent long enough that he knew she didn’t want to do this. But if she didn’t, he’d have to. “Wolves kill to eat,” she said. “But these creatures are different, savage. They destroy because they can.” “You believe that because of what happened to one old man.” “He won’t be the last. Those killers --” “Killers? I am one of them.” “Are you?” she asked, echoing his own doubts. “Have you truly tried to be anything else since you were banished?” “You know nothing about me. You have no idea what my life has been like.” “In some ways I do, knight.” “Because you are a witch?” “That is part of it. The truth lives in your eyes.” Rolling toward him, she kissed each eyelid in turn. “When I first saw you, fire raged in them, the same flames that exist in the dogs. The fire became even more intense while we mated, but it has gone out.” She was right! Wonder filled him, along with hope. He no longer felt the consuming heat that had become part of him and gave him identity. Shaken by the loss, he propped himself up on his elbow and looked around for the members of his pack, but the forest had swallowed them. Either that, or… “You are responsible!” he accused and sat up. She remained on his sleeping pad, her slight, sex-scented body vulnerable and exposed. “What have you done?” They were the only

contact I have with anything living! “You did not answer me. Why did you live with them?”

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“I told you, I’d slept with my queen. She was lonely, and I took away her loneliness. I wish I hadn’t, that I’d had wisdom instead of a youth’s hot and unwise blood. My king, a man I would have died for, found out. He did not want her, but he would not allow anyone else near her.” “Why did he not kill you?”

I wish he had. “I already told you --” “Not enough. Kevern, please.” “He chose to condemn me to this living hell,” he answered, because he had no defense against the witch’s plea. “My king commanded his sorcerer to cast a spell over me. My queen would not risk her life protecting me, and I did not want her to.” “The spell…” “Forced me to spend the rest of my life apart from other humans, hated and feared by them. People look into my eyes and see fire. They know a sorcerer has marked me. Only devil dogs with eyes the same as mine allowed me near.” “Until I came. Kevern, you tried going back to what you once had, connecting with your family. When that didn’t work, you tried living alone. I understand why you didn’t want to continue that way, but running with beasts everyone fears has made you even more of an outcast.” “More? Until you have walked in my steps, do not think you know what I have endured! The dogs accepted my anger and hatred. They shared their strength with me.” “They no longer accept or want you.” Feeling as cold as death, he gaped at her. “I watched them leave. They will not be back.” “You cannot know…” “Yes, I can. Kevern,” she said gently, “even after I could no longer see them, we continued speaking with our minds.”

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“That is how I always communicated with them. You have no right --” “Not a right, a responsibility. They told me about the dark spirits that ordered them to stand guard over the entrance to hell. Their job is and will always be to keep the newly dead at the door to hell while their lives are judged. They understand why you are drawn to them, but they never wanted you to join them in their task. The black dogs do not fight their fate. In fact, they embrace it. But the white one stands apart. If he could, he would flee.” “Where are they?” “I do not know. I begged them to leave.” “Why?” “To save you.” How wrong he’d been to have thought of her as weak and slight! Despite the physical difference between them, she’d twisted his life in ways the sorcerer had been incapable of. Barely able to control his fury, he surged to his feet, hauling her up with him. Grabbing her arms, he pressed her against a tree. “Where are they?” “I told you, gone.” “Gone where?” “It does not matter, because you are not one of them. You are human. They understand that better than you do.” “Human? I am an outcast!” Suddenly afraid of the rage boiling through him, he stepped away but not so far she could escape. “You left me with nothing.” “And my people are safe from hellhounds.” “I should kill you.” “Do it then.”

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His thoughts, influenced by her naked and vulnerable body, splintered. Did he truly hate her enough to end her life, if she allowed him to? “Because you believe you have fulfilled your task by protecting your village, you do not care whether you live or die?” “I knew what might happen,” she said with her head held high and proud. “That we might become locked in a battle only one of us would survive.” “I do not believe you.” “Why not? You were willing to sacrifice a life that meant everything for your queen. I am the same.”

No, you are not. You are gentleness and light, spring and sunlight. Shaking, he retrieved her clothes and threw them at her. “Leave! I will not make my hell yours.” Her head snapped back as if he’d struck her, but after a moment, she slipped into the gown. It slithered down her body, hiding nothing. Fighting her impact on his senses, he went deep into his mind, searching for his companions. At first he thought he’d lost everything. Then he saw the ghost pack with the snowcolored dog at the lead, loping along a stream bank. They were indeed heading away from here, and him. “Stop them. Make them return.” “No. Kevern, you are still human.” “Go! Leave me!” Instead, she draped the cape over her shoulders but didn’t tie it. Stepping toward him, she reached out. As she did, the cape slid onto the ground. Something caught his attention. He picked up the long, slender dagger. “The witch brought more than her body,” he said without emotion. “She also carried the means to kill me.” Instead of trying to deny it, she returned his gaze. Still feeling nothing -- or was it that he felt too much? -- he pointed the tip at her. “You should have used it while we fucked. I was weak then.”

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She continued to regard him. “Answer me, Demelza!” He touched the tip to the hollow in her neck. “Did you intend to kill me?” “If I had no choice, yes.” He could have pointed out that she had scant chance of besting him in a struggle, but what did he know of a witch’s power? Just the same, he wanted her to cower and beg for her life. As a knight, he’d seen the enemy grovel and cry. Instead, she did nothing to try to protect herself, said nothing. Her eyes were killing him. “What if I give this to you now?” he demanded in an effort to deny his emotion. He indicated the dagger still kissing her flesh. “Would you use it on me?” “I do not know anymore,” she said in a near whisper. “Kevern, there are times when I hate being a witch. The responsibilities, the isolation… I watch other women and envy their freedom, their easy laughter.” “You do not laugh?” “Sometimes. Not often. What I want…” She looked down and stared at the ground. “What do you want?” he fairly shouted. “Children. A baby at my breast. What other women take for granted.” “That is denied you?” “I am denied a man with the courage to put those babies in my belly.” Except for him, a devil man with a mortal’s seed and starving body. A foolish human’s weakness for her flesh. Damnation! Because of the time he’d spent with the hellhounds, he’d learned how to hunt and attack. He’d refused to allow himself to remember how it could be between a man and a woman, the softness. Tenderness. Not feeling, not caring, not needing made survival possible.

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Until she’d tried to change everything. A howl rolled up from deep inside him. Throwing back his head, he lamented what he’d lost. He had stopped fighting dreams of his own -- sons to follow in his footsteps and daughters he would die for. The dagger slid out of his fingers. “What are you thinking?” she whispered when he looked at her, her eyes hot and bottomless. “Nothing I will share with you.” “Why not?”

Because if I do, I will have nothing left to call my own. No secrets. Only nakedness. He didn’t take his gaze off her as she removed the gown she’d just put on and dropped it on top of the dagger. Stepping toward him, she closed her arms around his neck. Her breasts kissed his skin, making him feel as naked as she was. “Look forward,” she whispered, as if she knew what he was thinking. “Embrace tomorrow. Let yesterday die.” “Tomorrow? I have none.” “Then take today. And me.” Animal heat flowed through him as he backed her against the tree again. Pulling the heat around him, he thanked the dogs for leaving him with something after all. Hooking his hand under her knee, he lifted, exposing her core. Instead of struggling, she rose onto her toes and tipped her pelvis toward him. Little more than a heartbeat ago, his cock had been limp, but no longer. Like a lost creature coming home, he slid into her. He took her hard and hot, the remnants of his rage and desperation driving him. She freely gave her body to him. The animal he’d been for so long behind his strength, he pinned her between him and the tree, then lifted her so she could wrap her legs around his hips. Pumping, driving, punishing, he drove out the devil that had resided over his soul. Opened himself to something he didn’t understand.

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“Let it go,” she whispered. “Have the courage to be what you’ve never been.” With her words floating through him, the flame faded to be replaced by a floating sensation. He was being stripped clean, emptied. Her smaller form blanketed his. She shared her heartbeat with him, and her woman’s place cried in welcome and superiority. When he climaxed, he howled again, long and strong at first and then dying. Lowering her to the ground, he stepped away, his legs trembling. He remembered her teeth on his cock and wondered what words or spells she’d used to banish his companions. Wondered how long it would take her to kill him. Understood how much she was like his king’s sorcerer. “Done,” he said. “Done?” “Finished with you.” “What? No. I --” “Silence! You took away the only thing I had left. You believed you were doing what you’d been sent here to accomplish, but you do not know me after all.” “You’re wrong. I --” “I had no defenses against the sorcerer who stripped my life of meaning, but I do now, little witch. Go back to your village. Tell them you have won, because I am no longer here.” “No, please. It does not have to be like this.” “But is what I want.” She shook her head so violently that her hair flew about. “Do you want me to beg your forgiveness? If so, I --” Grabbing a handful of her hair, he stopped her thrashing. Then he let go of the soft strands and brought his face within a finger’s width of hers. “I want nothing from you. Understand?”

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Eyes shimmering, she dropped to her knees and touched her lips to his dying cock. “You do not want this? Do not want to make me scream again?” “I want to be free.” With that, he whirled away.

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Epilogue

Demelza stood to the side, watching the women gathered around the central fire. Hunters had killed two deer today, and now their wives and daughters were preparing the meat. She wasn’t expected to help, and there were those who believed that neither she nor her mother should touch shared food, because they might taint it with their power.

What power? Yes, she’d ended the bond between the hellhounds and the man, and the dogs had left the woods that sustained her people, but tonight, as every night since she’d fucked and been fucked, she fought regret. Her mother had offered sympathy and compassion, but she wasn’t ready to explain what had happened, not even to the woman who’d given her life. Instead, forcing emotion from her voice, she’d told the villagers that she’d used her witch’s strength to compel the dogs to go elsewhere. Her mother’s gaze revealed her concern for her daughter, but the others had been content with the incomplete explanation. How many times had she slipped into the forest in recent days? No matter how forcefully she ordered herself not to give into pain, the shadows had called to her. She’d walked endlessly while searching for Kevern’s presence. But she hadn’t found him.

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Because he’d gone after the pack? Because he’d ended his life? Because he’d found freedom in his solitude and needed nothing else? It didn’t matter. She’d stopped her search, because being surrounded by cold, silent air hurt too much. Tears stung her as she slipped away. The other day, she’d asked a visiting trader if he’d heard anything about a knight being banished for sleeping with a queen, but the trader couldn’t answer, as he seldom got to lands ruled by kings. Too familiar emotions washed over her, and this time, she didn’t bother blinking back her tears. Maybe she should ask her mother for a spell to make her forget. Yet, even if her mind lost the memory, her body wouldn’t. Couldn’t. Recalling despite herself how Kevern’s cock had felt inside her, she lifted her skirt and pressed her hand between her legs. Thanks to the night, no one could see her and maybe, finally, somehow, she could silence the terrible ache. She didn’t believe herself. As she slid a finger along her labia, she sensed a change in the air. Thinking someone might be nearby, she shook her skirt back into place. The sensation intensified. “Demelza.” Even before her mind pulled out the truth, her body knew. “I am here,” she whispered. “Where are you?” “Watching you.” She turned in a quick circle but still saw nothing. “The dogs left me with something I didn’t expect, a gift perhaps.” Kevern’s voice was like mist sliding over her skin. “Their sight. Night means nothing to me.” Wondering if the demented red glow had returned to his eyes, she studied her surroundings, but when she finally spotted him, his form, not his eyes, was what held her

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attention. Her legs unsteady, she stepped toward him. He did the same. In seconds, they stood close enough to touch, arms at their sides. Not breathing. “I was wrong,” he said. “I did not want you out of my life after all.” “I looked for you, and then I stopped.” “I know.” Trembling, she curled her fingers into fists to keep them off him. Please. Please. “I have been alone for so long, Demelza.” His warm breath stroked her forehead. “Solitude embraces me, and in turn, I embrace it.” “Oh,” was the only thing she could think to say. “Yes, I ran with the dogs of hell, but my heart beat alone. I had to be certain I was ready for that to end. That I dared risk having my heart touched.” “I do not understand.” Who was the witch now? Not her. She was as weak as a newborn, a spent doe. “When I saw what you were doing a few moments ago, I knew I had touched you.” He’d known she’d been trying to silence her longing, her sex-need. “I did not sense you.” “No one sees a devil dog unless he wants it.” Just like that, her trembling quieted. “They taught you a great deal.” He held out his hands, and although she was still trying to make sense of everything, she placed hers in them. “Enough so I am worthy of a witch?” “You want…?” “You, yes.” “Just like that?” “It is simple, at least for me. What about you? Do you want me?”

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Want you? By the spirits… “You are the only man I’ve ever… You will stay here in my village?” Closing his arms around her, he held her against his heart and ready cock. “With you, yes. But not if my presence makes you an outcast.” Suddenly, she understood the other reason he’d kept his presence a secret. “Kevern, my people need and believe in my power. This village can become your home.” “Because you order them to accept me?” “No. Because I am your woman. Also…” “Also what?” As she started swaying, she wrapped her arms around his waist for support and held his cock between their bodies. A soft smile played upon her lips. “The devil man’s seed grows in the witch’s belly.”

Vonna Harper Mild-mannered, mostly harmless, with out-of-control imagination. Loves mountains, early morning walks, her grandchildren, and “hot” books. Has no marketable skills beyond writing which is no problem because there's nothing else she'd rather do. The product of the ultimate in a rural upbringing, Vonna has no interest in cities or panty-hose, but is passionate about plant nurseries and baseball. She's had over fifty books published, all but one fiction. Visit Vonna on the Web at http://www.vonnaharper.com.