Jayr groaned as her fluids made them both slick, and then felt something close over her clit and tug at it. Not his fingers, but something narrow and tight.

Byrne went still, his face drawn and hard with excitement. "Look, lass," he whispered. "Your jewel is kissing my cock."

Her eyes went wide as she saw that her clit had penetrated the slit in his crown. She was inside him. When she tried to draw back, he held her still.

"Let them have their kiss," he said hoarsely, holding his shaft and gently pumping. His slit worked over her, tightening as the head around it and her clit swelled.

Jayr's head snapped back as the friction and the clasping pull tossed her body into a bonfire of fear and delight, consuming her in its relentless inferno. Byrne caught her scream before it left her mouth and shifted, plunging his cock into her convulsing slit as she exploded.

"Now, my lady," he said, panting into her mouth, "it is my turn to fuck you."

He gathered her hips with his hands and lifted her, pistoning his shaft into her body with deep, soul-shaking power. Jayr's hands anchored onto his arms, her eyes fixed on his as he plowed into her, holding nothing back, forcing the slick tightness to give way to his need. He felt too big; he would surely split her in half. And then another heat began to grow, one devouring both of them, clawing and dragging until it seemed they became one thing, all motion and fire, and the agony of being so near became too much. Byrne rammed himself into her, grunting with the effort of holding her down as she answered, her body molten fire under the hammering, inescapable weight of him.

Byrne's arms locked, and then his big body began to shake as if it might fall apart under the strain. He slowed, almost unmoving, and then stabbed deep, holding himself in the quivering clasp of her body as his semen pumped into her.

"Christ Jesus." He fell on her, pulling her to him as he rolled to his side. "So that's what it's like to fuck your way to heaven and back. I've always wondered."

"Aedan." Jayr realized she had scored both of his arms with her nails and reached up to touch his mouth, her fingers bright with his blood. "I didn't know it would be so..." There weren't words for it. "Unusual."

"Lass," he said, and laughed a little. "Let me say this now, so that there's no confusion later. Anytime you want to feel unusual again"-he kissed her mouth-"you come to me."

Alex hadn't planned on dozing off during the archery contest. But one minute she was sitting with Michael and watching men shooting very long arrows from enormous bows, and the next she was walking through Dundellan.

During her abduction Alex had become very familiar with the layout of the castle, first during her escape attempts and later while trying to find a cure for Richard Tremayne's condition.

Everything looked just as it had when she had been held hostage, Alex thought. Torches burning in iron wall holders, cats wandering all over the place, the smell of dust, leather, and silent despair. She didn't remember the cold stone halls being filled with purple-blue dragonflies, but maybe Gabriel Seran was visiting, too. She certainly remembered the swarms of bugs Gabriel could summon and control with his talent. He'd used them like a weapon when trying to get to Nick, the woman he loved.

Dreaming of Dundellan seemed a little pointless, though. Gabriel and Nick were off somewhere being happy, Richard was undergoing successful therapy that was changing him from cat-man to vampire-man, and all the bad guys were dead or locked up where they couldn't hurt anyone anymore.

Alex stopped and looked around. "Why am I here?"

The dragonflies all flew down the hall and landed on a door marked with a glittering golden apple. If that hadn't been clear enough, a shaft of purple-blue light poured out of the keyhole.

"Gotcha." Alex walked to the door, stepping over a few fat cats sprawled on the floor along the way. It was nice to see that the felines were so healthy. Until she had come up with a treatment, Richard had been living on their blood.She knocked and politely waited. When no one answered the door, she reached to check the knob and watched her hand move through the wooden door panel. All it took was a breath and a push, and she was on the other side.

"Alex." The blond giant sat holding an oiled rag to the blade of a long broadsword. He dropped both as he rose and came to her. "You came."

"You called me. I heard you." At least, she was pretty sure she had. She looked up the muscled wall of his chest at his face. "I know you." She glanced around them. "You brought me here when I was hurt."

"I did." He went down on one knee. "But I am the one in need of healing now, my lady. Will you come back to me now?"

"I hated Ireland," she said, walking around him to avoid his hands. The walls of the room faded from stone to canvas, and Alex tripped over a pillow as she turned and found herself back in the desert tent. "I'm not too crazy about this place, either."

The blond man, who was now lying on a pile of furs and silks at her feet, reached up and pulled her down to him.

"Stop thinking, love. We have all night." His scent poured over her, bathing her in larkspur as he rolled over her. "I am at your service."

It may have been his words, or the absence of the dragon-flies, or the way he ripped open her blouse. Whatever it was, it brought everything back to her: the attack by Richard, the wounds she had suffered, and waking up alone with the captain of the guard in his room. At first Korvel had tended to her injuries, but then he had used his talent on her to make her imagine being with him, just like this.

"You son of a bitch." Alex grabbed a handful of his hair and yanked his mouth from her neck. "What did you do to me? Did Richard put you up to this?"

Korvel's eyes, the irises gone almost entirely purple-blue, darkened. "I did nothing. Richard knows nothing. Kiss me." His head snapped sideways as she clouted him with a fist. "You came here of your own free will."

"The hell I did. Get off. Off." Alex shoved at his chest until he rolled away. She scrambled out of the tangle of furs and pillows and moved until she had half the tent between them. "Where are we? Oh, tell me you did not kidnap me again." He said nothing. "Unless you'd like your head hanging from the nearest pole, Captain, you'd better start talking."

Korvel gestured around him. "It is as you see." He picked up a gauntlet and tossed it at one wall of the tent. It didn't bounce away but slid through it, leaving gentle ripples in its wake. "Nothing but a dream. If you do not care for this place, we can return to the castle. You have only to say."

"Are you telling me that I'm asleep?"

"We both are."

"Okay." Alex had a feeling that part was true. "And you just happened to stumble into the same dream I'm having?" She held up a hand before he could reply. "Wait, I remember what you said the last time. You told me that I sent smoke signals for you or something. And you came, and decided to... pick up where we didn't leave off. I'll bet you did something to my memories so I wouldn't fight you, too."

He shrugged. "It was not permanent."

"How nice." Alex folded her arms. "Did you forget whom I belong to, and how consummately he's going to kick your ass for doing this to me?"

"I cannot enter your dreams without an invitation," Korvel said softly. "You were correct. This is no real place, and we are not here. You are in America; I am still in Ireland. Only our minds have come together. But you initiated the contact. You reached out to me. And you came when I called for you."

"Across the Atlantic Ocean." She planted her hands on her hips. "Telepathically."

"Our minds are one. No distance can separate us now." His eyes, hot and dilated, moved over her. "You can be with me here, Alex. Anytime you wish. We have but to sleep. He cannot read your mind. He will never know."

Incredibly, part of her wanted to jump him and finish what they'd started. A mindless, slut-eager part that, as soon as she woke up, she was amputating. "I'll know."

He shrugged. "You knew in Ireland."

"I know that your talent makes human females want to screw you." She needed three hours, a tub of hot soapy water, and a hard-bristled scrub brush. "It affects me the same way, and you knew it. I stayed away from you because of it. That's what I know."

Korvel's mouth flattened. "Then why have you been summoning me all these weeks? You can call Cyprien just as easily. More so, for you are bonded to him by blood. His sygkenis, his woman, his life companion. He created you. He commands you. If he is, as you say, your love, why is he not here in your dreams, Alexandra?"

She knew where he was going with this. "Nice try, Captain, but I'm only going dutch on this little guilt trip. You knew this was wrong. You could have stopped it from your end."

"I had no choice."

"Right. Well, dream's over. Go home." She went for the tent flap.

"Please, Alexandra, don't leave me again." His voice wound around her, a warm and unbreakable rope of velvet. "I came because I could not help myself. I fell in love with you in Ireland. I am still in love with you."

She glanced back. "To repeat for the thousandth time, I'm in a committed relationship. I do not bed-hop, even in my head. I'm taken."

"I don't care." The proudest and most reserved Kyn Alex had ever met now looked prepared to grovel. "I will take whatever you give me."

"If you're telling me the truth, all you can have is my sympathy. Good-bye, Captain." Alex stepped through the tent wall.

The tent, however, wouldn't let her through. Alex hung, trapped in the cold, stinging gel of the stuff, dead dragonflies floating in front of her eyes. She opened her mouth, but no sound came out, and behind her the purple-blue light blazed, scorching her back, until she felt the skin start to shrivel and blacken, and knew she was going to die.

The tent wall shook, and then it dissolved as two long, beautiful hands caught her as she fell through the light and the darkness.

Open your eyes.

Alexandra, I am here.

Come to me, cherie.

Alex heard Michael in her head, felt him in her blood. He was holding her, kissing her, and if she didn't wake up he would die with her.

Alexandra."Michael."

Alex opened her eyes. She was back in the infirmary, on the floor this time, and Michael hovered over her, pinning her shoulders down, his eyes a solid amber and his mouth white.

He looked awful. She'd never been so glad to see him.

"Hey." She wriggled her shoulders and winced. "Don't I rate a bed?"

"Mon Dieu. You are awake." He lifted her gently into his arms. "You were in the bed," he told her as he carried her back to it.

"You had a seizure and went into convulsions. After you fell I was afraid to move you."

"Don't you sound all medical." That explained the sensation of falling. "How long have I been here?"

"Three hours. You fell asleep at the archery contest. When I couldn't wake you I brought you here." He tried to smile. "I would call a doctor, but the only one in the house is on vacation."

He thought she was sick, physically sick. She had to tell him now.

"Michael, I know this is going to sound a little weird, but I had a bad dream. I've been having a lot of them." As he laid her down, she caught his hand. "I need to tell you this before I forget, or he makes me forget, or whatever happens to me when I wake up."

Alex told him everything, starting with what had happened at Dundellan after Richard's attack, how Korvel had tended to her, and the bizarre attraction she had felt for him, thanks to being exposed to his talent, which made every woman desire him.

She didn't make any excuses for herself or the captain, but gave Michael the facts as she remembered them. She described the dreams that she could remember, and repeated what Korvel had told her.

"That's all I've got," she said at last. "Whatever he's been doing to me-and I think my subconscious might have helped-it's over. If it happens again, I'll tell you."

Michael sat holding her hand and looked at her without saying a word. His eyes had faded from amber to turquoise, but she couldn't read any expression in them.

"You can yell at me if you want," she told him, his silence making her nervous. "I was practically cheating on you in my dreams."

"It is not your fault, cherie." He stood and moved away from the bed. "Korvel bonded you to him while you were being held by Richard. Possibly after the attack, as you suspected."

"How could he do that? I hardly knew the guy."

"He likely used his blood to help heal your wounds. At that time the bond you and I share was weakened because we were kept apart. He created a new bond before ours was severed." He shook his head. "All this time you have been caught between the two of us. That is what has been making you suffer since your return. You cannot belong to two masters."

She didn't think the Darkyn could hard-wire monogamy into a relationship, but there was still a lot about them and their condition that she didn't know. "I love you. You're not my master, but I love you. I may have been influenced by his talent, but I don't love Korvel. I don't even like him anymore."

"It has nothing to do with your emotions. The blood bond between a Kyn lord and his sygkenis is exclusive, unless he dies.

Many times the sygkenis dies soon after, but some can bond with another lord. You are not like us in many ways; perhaps that is why you bonded with both of us at once." He took a deep breath. "Do you still want to go to him?""I don't know." Alex didn't like the way this conversation was heading. "Am I in trouble for this? Are you kicking me out?"

He hunched his shoulders. "I will let you go. If that is your wish. I will... I will try."

"I wish," she said carefully, "that you'd come over here. You have a gorgeous ass, but I'm tired of talking to it."

Michael came to her. The torment in his eyes made her heart wrench. "Will you stay with me?"

"Baby, I'm not going anywhere."

"Alexandra." He took her in his arms and held her close, tucking her head under his chin. "What have I done to you?"

"This wasn't your fault. Richard grabbed me. Korvel was nice to me. And then somehow he messed with my head, but not at my request. I just waited for you to come and get me." She snuggled against him and felt a deep, abiding joy spreading through her. "I was afraid that the only reason we were together was because of the bond thing. That it was making us love each other.

But it wasn't. It isn't."

"The bond is very strong," he admitted, kissing the top of her head, "but it cannot create love where there is none."

"Yeah, I just found that out. Korvel fell in love with me, but the feelings were not reciprocal." She sighed. "So it looks like you're stuck with me, seigneur. Unless you're tired of this yoyo we have for a relationship. In that case, I guess I could call the airport and see when the next flight to Chicago-"

He tilted her head back and smothered the rest of what she meant to say with his lips.

Chapter 17.

The exile stood in the guard tower and looked out over the land. Now that Aedan mac Byrne was dead, it would be his: the bloodright denied him ever since his father had learned of his existence and sent him away so that no one would know he was his true heir.

He had had a bad moment when he had seen the girl ride out to the grove. She had already ruined everything for him once; he could not permit her to do so again. But then, to his delight, she had fallen into the trap. This time he had ensured that it was deep enough to prevent any escape. It would keep her where she belonged-in the ground.

It would be foolish to ride out again to gloat over the lord's dead body. It would be foolhardy to go only to assure that the girl could not escape. Of course, if he were caught, he could easily shift the blame.

He looked out over the land. Whatever he did, it would be his by next moonrise. By bloodright.

Robin of Locksley left the keep and walked over to the stables. At the entry to the barns, Nottingham's seneschal, looking comically small atop one of the largest of Byrne's chargers, nearly ran him over.

"Pardon, my lord," he shouted, trying to control the steed and nearly losing his seat. The big animal snorted and bucked once before leaping into a gallop.

"Damned fool," Harlech muttered as he strode out. "I told him that horse is too much for him."

Rob looked up at the sky; dawn was only an hour away. "Where goes the finest horseman in all of Florence?"

"Back to Italy, I hope." Harlech spit on the ground. "If he does not first fall in the lake and sink like a stone."

Rob saw Skald's mount change direction and grew thoughtful. "Harlech, saddle that ivory gelding Byrne refuses to sell to me."