Abhainn's Kiss Read online

  Michael relaxed and straightened. “Thanks for the help,” he said dryly.

  The elf raised an eyebrow, as if he were actually offended. “You did well enough on your own. Had you needed it, I would have intervened. The Lady chose well.” With that, the elf sauntered away into the trees.

  “I will never get used to these people,” he muttered, turning toward Abby as thunder rolled overhead.

  Abhainn still hadn’t changed back from the block of ice. It was a perfect replica, captured just as she had been sitting on the rock.

  He crouched by the rock, afraid to touch her. “Abhainn. Abby, can you hear me?”

  Huge, fat raindrops began to splat the ground.

  Maybe she can’t change back.

  His mind kicked into gear, looking for a way to keep her from melting and running in rivulets down the side of the rock. But as the first drops of rain struck her head, she shifted back into normal form and fell, shivering and blue with cold, into his arms.

  “Jesus, you scared me, woman,” he said, gathering her closer, rubbing her arms. The bare skin under his hands felt like the ice from which she’d just shifted. He quickly lifted her hair to examine the back of her neck. Relief flooded through him. Her skin remained unbroken.

  “I…I…knew not…I c-c-could do that,” she managed through clattering teeth. “I-I-I sensed the Mei was behind me and-d-d it j-just happened!” Then, incredibly, she began to laugh. “I wonder…w-w-what else I can do?”

  Before he could stop it, anger flared white hot in his chest. How could she laugh? She had come within a hair’s breadth of death, and yet she laughed!

  Shaking, not trusting himself to speak, he scooped her up in his arms and strode toward the caravan.

  “Mícheál?” she gasped between giggles and shudders of cold. “W-what is it?”

  “The fate of your people depends on you,” he gritted out. “And you sit there laughing when your quest almost came to nothing.”

  She leaned back in his arms, her laughter fading to a gentle smile. “But it did not,” she said simply. “I have you to protect me. All is well. And I have found that I have powers I knew not I had. Why not enjoy the moment?”

  He stopped dead in his tacks, light rain tapping on his head. He had no answer for her.

  “Mícheál,” she said gently.

  He shook his head, surprised at his inability to speak, jaw clenched tight. She could have died. She could have…

  “Mícheál.” This time her lips touched his ear.

  At the touch of her breath on his skin, he drew her to him tighter still, buried his face in her hair, inhaling the fresh-rain scent of her. He could find no words to say other than her name.

  The skies let loose with a torrent of rain.

  Michael staggered a few steps into the shelter of a tree, then sank to his knees on the soft grass. She shifted, wrapping her slender legs around his waist, grabbing handfuls of his shirt and pulling it off his shoulders.

  “Warm me,” she demanded, throwing back her head and offering to him her throat.

  He rubbed his open mouth over the smooth skin, feeling it heat under his lips. The cool tips of her breasts brushed against his chest, and he covered them with his hands. His fingers felt big and clumsy on her small frame. She exhaled sharply, arching her back to thrust her breasts more firmly into his palms.

  Would it surprise you do know that Abhainn is older than you?

  Nuala’s off-handed question drifted across his mind as Abhainn finished removing his shirt, tossing it aside onto the rain-soaked grass, and her hands boldly explored his bared skin. The Faery child he had known as a boy was now full-grown liquid fire in his arms, weaving her magic all through his senses. He forgot to be worried about hurting or frightening her. It was clear Abby knew exactly what she wanted.

  He sought out her mouth with his own, but she drew away, a mischievous sparkle stealing into her eyes right before she shifted into a cloud of blue mist. He held perfectly still, imprisoned by an assault of sensations, as she moved all around him, caressing every inch of his bare skin, front and back, sides, head to foot.

  Between his legs.

  He forgot to breathe.

  She condensed behind him, laughing into his ear as she slid her arms and legs around him again. She teased his chest with her fingers, then slid them low under the unbuttoned waistband of his jeans. He groaned, his body hard and aching, as he swept his hands along the smooth thighs locked around his waist.

  “I wonder what else I can do,” she said low in her throat.

  He flipped around and bore her toward the ground, but poof! she misted once again. Though his body was taut with desire, he sat back on his heels and, finally, laughed out loud.

  “That’s better,” said her disembodied voice. She condensed, on her knees before him, but she held up her hands when he reached for her. “Move not,” she warned. “I am new at this kind of play.”

  She touched his eyelids, bidding them close.

  He spent the next several minutes immersed in Abhainn’s version of a Faery hot tub, all steaming and bubbly, complete with cock-stiffening games that featured ice cubes applied to his nipples, traced from his lips down his throat, on down his torso to the very tip of his erection.

  Near to bursting, he managed, “Damn, woman, you learn fast.”

  He opened his eyes to find himself enveloped in licks of blue-green tongues of mist. It flowed all over and around his naked body. At some point he’d lost his pants, and he didn’t even care that he was lying stark naked under a tree, flat on his back, writhing in pleasure, ignored by a dozing horse and its napping Equillian.

  Fascinated, he lifted his hands, running them through the Abhainn-mist, spreading his fingers to stroke and play with the swirling colors dancing around him. She sighed and giggled, dripping playful drops of alternating hot and cold water all over his body. He heard her breath catch when he extended his tongue to taste the part of her hovering just above his face. In a swift, silent shift, she condensed back into her solid form, already wrapped tightly around him, trembling with need, taking him inside her warm, wet passage before he had a chance to prepare for the intensity of the sensation.

  One hand wrapped in her hair, the other pulling her pelvis tight against his, he rocked into her hard, shouting his release into her mouth as she shuddered and sobbed with her own.

  In the aftermath, Michael found the strength to lift his hand to capture the single tear that traced a path across her nose. As he watched, it turned to silver, then sank into his skin. Abhainn, still lying on his chest, propped her chin on her hands, and for just one luxurious moment he let himself drown in her sun-on-green-water eyes.

  “What amuses you?” she said, her voice sated and husky.

  He laughed. “Your tear tickled my finger. I remember now… It did that once before. Long ago.”

  In the distance, cows mooed, bringing Michael back to the present. A little of the joy faded from Abhainn’s eyes.

  “We mustn’t linger,” she murmured. “Already the sun is high. Eoth told me if you let her drive this time, we will reach Dun Laoghaire by nightfall.”

  He rolled them both to their feet, setting her off to gather her clothes with a playful pop to her backside. In a wink she dodged his hand, hopped up lightly and nipped his ear.

  “Ow!”

  “Start not what you cannot finish,” she cooed.

  “I’m way bigger’n you, sugar.”

  “I have way more friends in the immediate area than you, fool,” she laughed. “We may be smaller…” Pinch. “But we are quicker!” Another pinch, too quick for him to retaliate.

  Then his grin faded as realization struck him. “You mean we had an audience?”

  She shrugged into her clothing, apparently unabashed. “I doubt it not that every tree, rock, and Fae creature within earshot found us more interesting than yon kye.” Right on cue, a shaggy-haired cow looked up from a nearby pasture and mooed.

  A strangled noise crackl
ed from inside the caravan. Before their eyes, a waist-high creature, with blue and brown mottled skin, dull yellow eyes, dressed in odd bits of birch bark and sporting an oak leaf cap, appeared in the door. It coughed and grabbed its throat.

  “That thing doesn’t sound too healthy,” Michael said, observing that the random appearance of odd Fae creatures no longer alarmed him.

  Abhainn had different ideas. She grabbed his arm and dragged him backward. “It’s an Utchin!” she cried. “Touch it not!”

  The Utchin went limp and fell headfirst out of the caravan, hitting the ground with a solid thunk.

  Its fist opened, and out rolled a half-eaten piece of the fennel bread Nuala had sent with them from Inisghriann.

  All her gaiety gone, Abhainn shuddered. “If the Mei and this dimwitted creature both found us so quickly, it won’t be long until word reaches Berchta and others come looking for us,” she said. “We must fly! Now!”

  Michael ran his hand over his hair, trying to think. Even with Fae magic, the sturdy little draft horse wouldn’t be fast enough to stay ahead of the trolls and whatever other foul creatures allied with Berchta’s army. Not far away, he picked up the whisper of early morning car traffic. “Where are we?”

  Abhainn, her nose wrinkled in distaste, was using a stout stick to roll the Utchin away from the caravan. “Eoth told me a village called Rathdrum lies just over the hills.”

  “Tell Eoth to take the pony home. We’re going to have to find some way to get you inside a car.”

  Chapter Eight

  “Are you burned anywhere?”

  “Hic. Just here.” Abhainn showed Mícheál a small spot on her left ankle.

  He drew breath through his teeth and fished in his rucksack for the flagon of stone-spring water. “When did that happen?”

  What seemed like mere inches outside the ferry’s main cabin window, the Irish Sea rolled under threatening skies. So much water. So much open water. She turned her face away tried hard not to shake. The other passengers on the last ferry out of Dun Laoghaire bound for Wales were beginning to stare. “Hic. When you picked me up and put me in the car. My foot brushed up against the metal door.”

  Mícheál’s brows drew together. “You sat there for two hours and didn’t tell me?”

  She dropped her voice to a whisper. “I wanted not to alarm the beast’s driver hic.” Rain splashed against the glass, and she flinched. “Are you sure this curragh is seaworthy?”

  “I won’t let you fall into the ocean, darlin’. Don’t worry. Besides, if the worst happens, remember that ice floats. Just turn yourself back into an iceberg and I’ll push you home.” He slipped the water back into his rucksack, then grimaced and pulled out a battered loaf of fennel bread. “I could use this as a float.”

  She allowed herself a giggle. Vibration from the ferry’s engines thrummed rhythmically against her back, almost as soothing as Mícheál’s warm fingers that continued to caress her ankle long after the spring water had had its effect.

  But he looked not at her. His granite-grey eyes scanned the cabin without being too obvious about it. Surreptitiously she followed the path of his eyes. It struck her that save for herself, she was the only Fae creature of any substantial size on the vessel. Oh, here and there a creature poked its bony face out of a handbag, a pocket, or a slipped-off shoe, but nothing anywhere near her size.

  We are unguarded.

  Her and Mícheál’s gazes met. The smile he gave her didn’t quite reach his eyes.

  “Hic.”

  He tweaked her nose, then his attention was drawn to something outside the window. This time his eyes crinkled with a real smile and he pointed. “Look out there.”

  “Hic. I don’t want to look at the water,” she whispered.

  “If there’s one thing I’ve learned about Selchies, they’re a snobby crowd. I’d acknowledge their presence if I were you.”

  She quickly twisted around and pressed her hands and nose against the glass. There! A safe distance from the ferry’s wake, one, three, then seven slick, dark heads surfaced, snorted, then dived under again.

  “No trolls or tempestaries will get you out here.” He leaned close to her ear. “Your Lady has not forgotten you.”

  Yet even as he said the words, he continued to scan their surroundings, never resting.

  Fog closed in, enveloping the churning ferry in a curtain of grey, obscuring everything within inches of the window. At least, blessedly, she was spared the constant reminder that the open sea lay just a few feet away.

  Mícheál leaned back on the bench and stretched out his legs, lifting one arm so she could curl up under it. Nearby, a nosy matron eyed them over the rim of her glasses, then went back to her knitting.

  She curled into the curve of his body, and she observed that he somehow felt different. Gone were the lines of tension that bracketed his mouth and creased the space between his eyes. A new light glowed deep in his dark eyes, the light of a man looking forward to the next twist or turn of events. His body rested in a relaxed position; yet a fine, alert tension hummed just under his skin. Like a man who would not welcome battle, but neither would he run from it.

  A true knight, she thought with a secret smile.

  She leaned her head on his chest. The heartbeat that thudded there was quicker, lighter. Unburdened by the old walls set there by the harsh lessons of his world. The world that had tried to drum into him the idea that magic wasn’t real.

  Ah, but now he believes. I feel it.

  Mícheál murmured into her hair, “This will all be over soon. Then I can take you home. Your mother’ll be glad to see you. Although,” he chuckled, “I doubt she’ll be particularly happy to see me. I’m sure she’s hoping I get some vital part of me lopped off by one of Berchta’s finest.”

  Abhainn’s belly clenched. She drew away and sat facing him, drawing her legs underneath her.

  “Nuala didn’t tell you.”

  “Tell me what?” The wary darkness returned to this eyes, dimming the boyish light of a few moments ago.

  She released a little sound of frustration from her throat. Oh Màthair, what have you done? The old woman had told her much of what would be expected of her once she reached the Great Gathering, but apparently had left deliberate gaps in Mícheál’s knowledge.

  “Once I take my place in the circle, I can never return.” Aching, she watched his face for a reaction.

  He leaned forward, propping his elbows on his knees, and let his head drop forward for a moment.

  “One representative of a race must stay on Avalon at all times,” she continued, “or the power of the Circle will not hold. I am the last of my kind…”

  Mícheál sat back. “She did tell me. Nuala warned me not to set foot inside the circle. She told me you must go in alone, and my human presence would ‘contaminate’ it.”

  “Ahhhh,” she whispered, letting a new smile widen her mouth. She knew Mícheál would not listen. She knew he would stay at my side until the end. Just because she had told him not to.

  “She just wanted to pound it home that I was to keep my paws off you, so not to distract you from your task,” he muttered, brows drawn together. He patted at his shirt pockets. “Damn, I wish I still smoked.”

  “No, no!” she insisted, moving closer. “When she saw the stone you carried, she knew you had your own destiny to fulfill. Don’t you see?”

  He frowned in confusion and opened his mouth to speak, but the unmistakable sound of a seal bark shattered the drowsy quiet inside the cabin compartment.

  Their eyes met a split second before the ferry lurched violently, its port side rising up, up, up. The fiberglass hull and superstructure groaned under the strain.

  “It’s going over!” someone shouted.

  Only Mícheál’s arm shooting out at the last second kept her from sailing headlong to the far side of the cabin along with the rest of the passengers. He’d managed to snake his other arm around a steel support pole and wrap an ankle around a leg of the bolt
ed-down bench. Swinging from his arm, Abhainn glanced out the window. She hiccupped so hard, the pain of it stole her voice, but only for a moment. She managed to sob out one word.

  “Larvae!”

  Unearthly screeches filled the cabin, drowning out the cries of the alarmed passengers. The ferry’s hull slapped back down onto the water with a sickening crunch, and the engines died. Wind and rain whistled in through broken windows.

  Sounds that might have been mistaken, by inexperienced ears, as a strong storm, Michael recognized for what they were. The Selchies were once again battling for their lives. The eyes that Abby had magically opened for him with her kisses now revealed the creatures of the dark underbelly of that world—long, bulbous, pasty white wormlike monsters, armed with rows of tiny needle teeth in deceptively small mouths, rose and plummeted in the waves just outside the window, flinging Selchie bodies in every direction.

  One quick scan of the other people in the cabin, who were just beginning to pick themselves up off the floor. Crew members shouted directions, something about donning life jackets, that no one was to leave the cabin just yet.

  Abby clung to him. He tightened one arm around her and groped for his rucksack. Got to keep her out of the water, no matter what.

  Then in a crash of violence, the large grey-brown body of a seal and a shower of broken glass rocketed through the main cabin, landing lifeless and bloody against a bulkhead.

  He felt rather than heard Abby’s scream, for her face was buried against his chest. Pandemonium ensued, and crew members began attempting to organize stampeding passengers to evacuate on lifeboats.

  “We have to get out of here,” he said in a low voice. “If they make us get on the lifeboats, we’re dead.”

  Abby clutched his arm. “I…I can’t go out there! The water…”

  “We’re not going in the water, sugar. We’re going up top. Quiet now, we don’t want the crew to catch us slipping out, okay?”

  Within moments they had managed, in the confusion, to slip out the rear bulkhead door. The waters around the boat suddenly quieted. No Larvae broke the water’s surface. Tellingly, no Selchie heads did, either.