Tilting his head down to gaze into her beautiful face, he slid his hand along her fine jaw as he teased a lock of her hair. “But that didn't matter.

What tore his heart out was losing the girl he'd danced with for centuries, though it only seemed a heartbeat of time.”

She laid her hand over his. They'd stopped inside the boundary of the forest, the shadows now cloaking them. “I forget you used to tel stories on the Ren Faire circuit, Sir Vagabond. Sir Knight. You stil have a good touch.”

Before he could respond, a rustling in the grasses drew their attention back to the meadow. A blink later, a large bird with crimson feathers erupted out of the wheat-colored grass and spread his wings, dislodging a handful of petals from the gold and silver flowers as he soared into the purple starlit sky.

Sparks showered off the wings as he took flight.

“A phoenix,” Lyssa whispered. Her gaze moved westward, where the field folded downward into another shal ow tier. “Jacob, look.”

A pond of silver glass lay in that direction. Ripples coursed gently across it, the result of two unicorns foraging on water weeds in the shal ows. Nearby, swans slept as they drifted, heads tucked under their wings. Perched on their backs in smal circles, as if taking an evening tea, were more clusters of the firefly Fae.

While the two of them had discovered remarkable things together, Lyssa knew those things mostly involved the exploration of their own souls as they'd bonded. This was the first time in their relationship that they were seeing something new and unexpected for the both of them. She liked that.

However, a blink later something disrupted that pleasure in his mind, an unsettled, scattered feeling entirely unlike Jacob.

Worried that his need for blood was becoming more critical, she looked up to gauge his pal or. He was stil staring at the lagoon, but his gaze had shifted from the unicorns. On the far bank, there were more Fae, only not whimsical fireflies. They were human-sized females, with glossy ebony hair and skin like smooth dark chocolate. Perched on rocks, they brushed one another's hair and braided flowers into it. The wind rose as if a Goddess was breathing, and that breath brought their voices. They spoke in murmurs that floated across the consciousness like a pleasant dream.

Jacob shifted forward a step. Even at that distance, several turned their heads in his direction.

One smiled, the face of desire, and a single, pure note of song broke from her moist lips, a greeting and invitation.

“Water nymphs,” he said hazily. “Like sirens. We should ask . . . they may know . . .” Lyssa locked both arms around his waist and gave him her firmest, most not-to-be-messed-with queen's voice. “Definitely not.”

Jacob shouldn't be as susceptible as a mortal male to the all ure of the creature, but the nymph had detected something vulnerable in him and capitalized on it. He was weak and needed blood.

Lyssa tried to draw him deeper into the forest, away from the lagoon, but she was too late. He was already dragging his feet, glancing back at that pond with blind longing in his gaze. The singing was growing stronger, more enchanting. He was far too pale.

She slid her hand into his front pocket, closing her fingers on that same switchblade she'd borrowed from him earlier. Just as it had then, it all owed her a provocative tease of his upper thigh. Since his mind was already swimming in a lust as murky as that silvery lagoon, his confused attention turned her way.

Before he could dismiss her and focus on the sirens again, she opened the blade, brought it to her throat and jabbed her carotid with pinpoint accuracy.

The blood flow was an immediate rush, one that could make her dizzy and wobbly.

The result was all she intended, however. Her servant's ful focus snapped to her. His lust had been coaxed to the forefront; now she brought bloodlust into the equation as well. Given how pale he was, she thought blood need was more accurate, an undeniable hunger.

Letting go of him, she backed into the forest, provoking the predator she knew lived within him, on several different levels. Her bare feet found a trail, perhaps used by deer or those unicorns. The wood closing around her was centuries-old, populated with trees perhaps even older than herself. The breath of ancients dwel ed in their canopies. Power. It reminded her she had power of her own.

She stopped. She was aware of how she looked poised there, the sinuous line of hip and length of leg hinted at beneath the thin cloth of her dress. The upward tilt of her breasts as she cocked her hip. The pale fragility of her throat, marked by bright blood, was a contrast to the chal enge in her green eyes and the curve of her moistened lips.

“You can have your sirens, Jacob, or your Mistress. Choose, and I may let you have what you real y want.”

He was on her in a heartbeat, pushing her against the broad trunk of one of the trees, trapping her. His warrior instincts were intact, for his hand closed first over her wrist, fingers sliding along the sensitive Venus mound of her palm to take the knife from her. He caressed the erotic beat of her pulse.

The weapon fel point first, sinking into the earth clear of their feet, but he didn't intend her throat to receive such a pardon. Sinking his fangs into the flesh at that nicked artery, he wasted no time with it, his hunger making him pul hard at the sustenance she offered.

The ever-present desire for him sprang to ful , vibrant life, strengthened by the pulsing magic that existed here. She didn't resist the urge to rub against him, to make sounds of encouragement, tiny sensual noises that told him she wanted him inside her right at this moment, wanting to join in the celebration of that life force all around them.

Normal y she would have been the aggressor, taking control despite his best alpha efforts to hold on to the reins, those efforts only arousing her more deeply. However, as he returned to himself, a growl rose in his throat. She felt his black anger that the nymphs had been able to distract him from his devotion to her for even a moment, a blink of time he could never get back.

It was overwhelming, feeling how furious that made him with himself. The depth of his devotion was breathtaking. For all the complexity of the love that had grown and spread between them, the root of it was so primal. She was his, the only one he wanted, and he would prove it right here.

Opening his jeans, he held her against the tree with a body that had become all hard, tense muscle.

She moaned as he shoved into her without preamble, already knowing she was wet and ready for him. With no underwear beneath the skirt, he'd had to do no more than lift it, spread her thighs and wrap her legs around him.

Her breasts ached against his chest, and an odd yearning rose in her then, intertwined with the powerful desire coursing through her. Perhaps because she was both lover and mother to vampires, the sense of loss she had for their son, that she couldn't hold him, feed him, came to life now along with her need to nourish Jacob.

Jacob understood the melding of the two deepest cravings of her life. As he thrust into her, he left her throat and pul ed her neckline down, off her shoulder so he exposed one breast. When he punctured her at Kane's favored nursing point, it made her cry out in throaty pleasure and pain at once, arching against him as he laved at the blood and her nipple, teasing her.

It was all animalistic, but as he drank, she sensed the keen, intel igent mind steadying. He would take this as a near-miss lesson. He wouldn't delay feeding out of pride again, not when her protection was at stake. Balance was needed, in body and soul, and the best way to achieve that between them was with a simultaneous blood and carnal connection.

As she pressed her skul back against the rough trunk, another guttural sound coming from her throat when he thrust deeper, she saw eyes peering at them through the branches. Animal and Fae eyes both. She sensed no harm from any of them, just curiosity at these new beings among them. Stil , Jacob's whimsical, sad story held a warning. The Fae girl had meant no harm to the boy who wasted away dancing with her. For her, it was simply one night.

Jacob brought her nipple farther into his mouth, making her gasp at the searing pleasure that arrowed down into her pussy, intensified by the ful penetration of his thick cock. He lashed at the taut peak. As she cried out again, he used his hips and cal used palms to press her thighs back, widening her to an even more arousing angle. She caught her fingers in his hair, digging into his nape, and his arm banded around her middle. Taking her away from the tree, he laid her on the mossy carpet of the forest floor. As he did, his eyes met hers, and she felt the shift, knew there was a deeper component to it now.

It had unsettled him, how quickly this strange new place could drive a wedge between them. He needed to grasp that connection between them, reassure himself of it.

She reared up against him, tel ing him what she wanted so that she was able to push him to his back and straddle him. Her hair tumbled forward over her shoulders, sliding along the stil -damp blood staining her neck.

No reassurance needed, Jacob. The magic between us is uniquely ours. Long before I had faith in it, you believed it was so powerful that nothing could destroy it. And you were right. Have been right, every time.

Don't taunt Fate, my lady. His blue eyes were dark as midnight.

Trailing her fingers over his lips, she took away some of her blood and tasted it, winning a renewed flare of desire. His cock was hard inside her, but he held back now, letting her take the lead. His strength was returning exponential y, she could feel it. She would match that strength in him, play with it like her toy, as she was wont to do. Tightening her inner muscles on him, she gave him an arch look laced with arrogant chal enge.

Water nymphs, Sir Vagabond? You've been collecting punishments all day. Her green eyes fastened on his. I will take my climax, but you will hold yours, let your longing to spill your seed in my cunt grow until it rages.

6

SINCE the growth of her Fae powers and Jacob's turning, she hadn't often exerted the sexual power of a Mistress over him. There'd been far greater concerns facing them. Plus, that theme ran through their relationship in many subtle ways, not always requiring the overt ones. However, something about this strange yet altogether familiar world, the way it made her feel recharged, like the queen she'd always been, activated it strongly, no matter the unusual timing or circumstances. She saw him register it, felt his thigh muscles tense beneath her, his beloved face settling into the expression she knew so well. His alpha nature resisted her dominance, but he would serve her, because that was what he'd pledged to her. Heart, soul and body.