Lord Of Danger by Stuart, Anne (free ebook reader for android txt) 📗

He nodded, momentarily distracted by her voice. By the fact that the dress had loosened in sleep and was drooping around her slender shoulders. She had beautiful pale skin. “He wanted to make certain you survived your ordeal,” he said.

“He wanted to make certain I had an ordeal. Did you tell him you declined to deflower me?” She spoke the words boldly, but the color still flushed her pale cheeks.

“I didn’t consider it his business. He’s already planning my successor as it is.”

“He wants a new wizard? I mean, advisor?”

“He wants a new husband for you. Though he’s strongly considering the convent.”

“I don’t want to enter a convent.”

“That was your original request. What made you change your mind?”

“You.”

The word was simple, her voice was husky and beguiling, and he knew he couldn’t resist her. He stayed where he was, rooted to the stone floor, telling himself he didn’t need to do it. She sat in his bed, her gown drooping around her, her hair a curtain down her back, and he wanted to go to her. To lay her back among the fur throws and cover her body with his. And he knew he wasn’t going to resist her.

And then he froze, as she lifted his goblet to her lips and drank deeply. Of the honeyed wine. And the sleeping potion.

Chapter Eighteen

He heard the sound from a distance, a great roaring noise that somehow came from his own throat. “Noooooo!” But she’d already brought the goblet, his goblet, to her lips, and he threw himself across the room, onto the bed, covering her, dashing the cup away from her so that it skittered across the floor, the drugged wine soaking into the rushes.

Alys sat utterly still, gazing at him in shock. He was straddling her, and he cupped her face in desperation, staring into her eyes, looking for signs of death or madness. “How much did you drink?” he demanded hoarsely.

He’d frightened her, but he didn’t care. It took her a moment to answer, and her voice was quavery. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t think you would mind if I had a sip of your wine.”

“How much did you drink?” he repeated.

“Not much at all. Just a sip or two, I think. Is there something wrong with the wine?”

He closed his eyes for a moment, forcing himself to breathe slowly. When he opened them she was staring up at him, her expression bewildered. “It will just make you sleepy,” he said in a deceptively calm voice, praying it was true. “I was working on a simple sleeping draught. Lady Hedwiga has need of it.” It was a stupid lie, but he was much too shaken to think clearly.

“Why was it in the goblet?”

“I planned to test it on myself before giving it to others.”

“You were planning on spending the night in a drugged sleep?” She sounded more confused than outraged, and he could see by the darkening of her pupils that the drug was beginning to work. She would be unconscious in moments, and she wouldn’t remember a thing of this conversation.

“It seemed a practical enough idea. It would be the only way I could sleep beside you without touching you.”

“Why wouldn’t you touch me?” she whispered.

She wanted him. His sweet little virgin bride, convent raised, afraid of horses and thunderstorms and most men, wanted him, the monster of Summersedge Keep. She didn’t know what she was asking for.

He tilted her head back, and her neck was long and delicate beneath her stubborn chin. He wondered what she would do if he put his mouth against her pulse.

She was slipping down on the bed as the drug took possession of her, slowly, languorously. “I’m afraid of you,” he said, knowing she wouldn’t remember. “I’m afraid of loving you.”

She blinked, dazed. “You’re afraid of making love to me?” she said, her voice gently, sweetly slurred.

“No,” he said bleakly. “I’m afraid of loving you, when I haven’t loved anyone in years. It would destroy me.”

Her eyes drifted closed, but a sweet smile curved her mouth. “Then perhaps,” she whispered, “you need to be destroyed.”

She was asleep. But whether it was simply a deep, restoring sleep or a more wicked one, leading towards death, he couldn’t tell. He could only watch her, the rise and fall of her breasts beneath the rumpled gown, the faint tremor in her blue-veined eyelids, the sleepy whispers as she shifted and stirred.

He stretched out beside her on the bed, his body shielding her as she slept. She was a restless sleeper with the drug working its wickedness—she moaned and stirred, and strange words tumbled from her mouth, words of fear and longing. She opened her eyes once, to stare at him in drugged confusion, until she managed to focus on his face. He half expected the terror to increase, but instead she sighed with relief and closed her eyes again, trusting him.

He hated that trust. He hated her. He hated the tenderness he felt for her. He could summon Godfrey and have him keep watch over her. Godfrey was a learned man; he would be more than capable of observing her reactions to the drug, more than capable of writing them down. There was no need for Simon to lie there beside her, watching, worrying, needing her.

He couldn’t move away from her. Occasionally he let his hand drift across her, across her sleeping face, across her restless body, his scarred hand a contrast to her unmarred skin. He had no idea what he would do if she died. Too many people had died, too many women, too many children, too many brave young men and old cowards. Too much death, and if she died at his hands he didn’t think he could bear it.

It was close to dawn when she opened her eyes once more, and they were clear and calm as she looked up at him with no surprise whatsoever. He had seen death