"Is it food?" she asked, crawling around to sit beside him. "Because I'm starvin'."
"I'll rustle us up some game." He chuckled, meeting her gaze in the firelight. "Och, Kirstin, yer so beautiful ye make me chest hurt."
She smiled at him, bemused. This man said the most extraordinary things.
"Is that a book?" She blinked in surprise at the leather-bound tome in his hands.
"Aye." He nodded, flipping through the pages. "I got up t'build a fire, and one of the stones at the bottom had come loose from our... uh... acrobatics. When I went to seat it, I found this..."
"Mmmm." She snuggled closer at the memory, her sex pulsing already, wanting him. How was it possible to want someone so much? "Is that... that's a wulver!"
The drawing was unmistakable. She recognized the half-wolf, half-human form, and more than that, the drawing itself had been done by a wulver hand. Wulvers were all amazing artists and could draw nearly anything. Their style was definitive.
"Aye." He flipped to another page and Kirstin squinted at it in the firelight, seeing a drawing of a birthing wulver and her pup.
"'Tis a midwife's text!" she exclaimed, taking it from his hands and pulling it into her lap. "Look, there are drawings of plants-it's full of them!"
"Yer pleased?" He smiled as she turned more pages, wishing she could read the text.
"Oh, aye," she breathed, looking up at him with bright eyes. "Sibyl and Laina'll be pleased, too."
"I do'na care 'bout pleasin' Sibyl and Laina." He pulled her into his lap, settling her there, and she felt his erection begin anew against her bottom. "I care 'bout pleasin' ye, Kirstin MacFalon."
"Ye do please me." She turned her face to his to be kissed. She would never get enough of this man's kisses, until the day she died. "Ye please me greatly, Donal MacFalon. I can'na wait to call ye husband as well as mate."
"And I can'na wait to mate wit' ye as yer husband." He used her hair to pull her head back, exposing her throat to his hot, hungry mouth.
"Aye," she agreed happily, lost in the fantasy of being his, even if the reality of being The MacFalon's wife meant something else altogether.
"No, I meant it, I can'na wait," he breathed, taking the book out of her hands and pushing her back onto the deerskin. "I want ye now."
She opened her arms and surrendered herself to him.
5
Kirstin's hackles rose before she even knew the man was in the room. She turned to see Lord Eldred standing near the back of the gathering hall. He was dressed as an English lord today, not like the huntsman she'd met him as, but there was no mistaking those keen eyes. They surveyed the room quickly and she straightened when she saw his gaze hesitate as he came to her. A small smile flitted over his features and he gave her a brief nod before turning to someone at his side who wanted his attention.
"Kirstin?" Laina slid into the chair beside her, breathless from her race down the stairs and into the gathering room. "Did ye hear?"
"Hear what?" Kirstin's attention moved from Lord Eldred-she still didn't understand why he raised her hackles the way he did-to Laina, although her gaze stopped at Donal, sitting like a king in full dress plaid at the front of the room. The ceremonies were getting close to starting-the hall was filling up with people-and while Donal smiled and nodded to the man who was bending his ear, Kirstin could tell he was impatient.
"Lorien's back." Laina told her.
"Aye, I saw 'im." Kirstin smiled at the memory of the big wulver she'd greeted when he came into the castle. Donal had frowned at the way Kirstin hugged him, the way he swung her up in his arms and kissed her cheek in greeting. "He brought word from t'king."
"Aye, so y'know 'tis good news?" Laina asked.
Kirstin nodded. Lorien had been happy to give her the news, even before he told Donal, which had irritated Donal even more. But Lorien had been like a brother to her since she was small. They'd grown up together, played together, and yes, so they'd been together, when they were adolescents. For a while, Kirstin thought Lorien might be her true mate, but once she'd seen Laina with Darrow, and now Sibyl with Raife, she knew it wasn't meant to be. He was a friend, sometimes lover, but not her one true mate. She'd never gone into estrus around Lorien. Her body knew what it wanted.
And it wanted Donal
Lorien had returned safe and well, though, and that made her happy. And he had confirmed what Lord Eldred had told them in the forest. King Henry was honoring the wolf pact. It should have been a relief, but for some reason, Kirstin's hackles remained raised.
"Does Raife know? What 'bout Sibyl?" Kirstin looked around for both of them.
"I think they know. I'm jus' so relieved." Laina gave a happy sigh. "Our bairns'll be safe from war and strife."
Kirstin nodded in agreement, the mention of bairns sending a sharp stab of pain through her heart. She shook it off, glancing back to where Lord Eldred was shaking hands. Her mistrust of him had been based on her fear that he was lying about the wolf pact, that King Henry had actually been behind Alistair's plan all along. But mayhaps she was being too cautious. If Lorien had returned with word-she still marveled at his travel time, but wulvers could travel very fast, over long distances, without wearying-then she had to trust it.
Didn't she?
"How did ye hear?" Kirstin asked her pack-sister, frowning. "Did Donal tell ye?"
"No, I saw Lorien jus' a few moments ago," she replied. "He came up t'see Darrow. I had to practically tie that man to his bedposts to keep 'im in it, in spite of t'sleep-stuff Sibyl had 'im drink."
"And how's Darrow healin'?" Kirstin asked. She'd come to nurse her fellow pack mate and she'd spent all her time so far with Donal. She felt a little guilty about that-but when her gaze found Donal's and he pinned her with those glittering, steel-blue eyes, she didn't feel too horribly bad about the way she was spending her time at Castle MacFalon.
"He's well." Laina smiled. "Truth told, he's ready to travel, and itchin' to get home. We hafta get Raife and Sibyl reunited, and soon, or Darrow's goin' t'ruin everythin'."
"Tell 'im he has to keep up the ruse," she insisted. Donal's gaze hadn't left her, although someone had bent to tell him something. The way he looked at her made her feel as if he was stripping her bare with his eyes alone.
"I promise, I'm doin' m'best t'distract 'im." Laina sighed, tossing her long white-blonde hair over her shoulder, turning more to face Kirstin. "And ye've been distracted yerself these past few days."
"Aye." Kirstin flushed, when Donal dropped her a wink and she felt her blush deepen, hearing Laina laugh beside her. Were they so obvious? She wondered.
They'd met for the past three nights at the spring. Donal told her they could spend the night in his room and no one would care-he was the laird, after all-but Kirstin didn't want everyone in the castle talking, any more than they already were. Besides, their reenactment of Ardis and Asher beside the spring in the wulver den felt right to her. She was at home in the first den-and in Donal's arms.
"Yer so in love wit' him." Laina nudged her with her hip, laughing softly, delighted.
"Aye, I am." Kirstin admitted. If she couldn't admit it to her sister, who could she admit it to? She was completely besotted. There was no getting around it, no more denying it. She had fallen like all wulvers do-hard, fast and without warning. It was like waking up finding you'd fallen asleep on a charging horse with no saddle and no reins, and you could do nothing but hold on for dear life and enjoy the wild, albeit slightly terrifying, ride.
"Have ye told 'im?" Laina lowered her voice, so the people filling the chairs around them wouldn't hear. Kirstin was saving the seat beside her for Sibyl. "About... how't works, for wulvers? Or does he know?"
"I... I do'na know what he knows. We haven't really talked overmuch..."
Laina chuckled knowingly at that.
The truth was, she was afraid to tell him. More than that-she was afraid of the truth herself. Her body was changing. She could feel it, in every cell. It wouldn't be long-another week, maybe two-and she would change. And she wouldn't be able to do anything about it.
If Donal had been a wulver warrior, they would run off under the full light of the moon when her estrus-time came and mate like the animals they were. But Donal wasn't a wulver, he was a man.
A very powerful, handsome, and virile man, to be sure. Their lovemaking had been wild, raw and abandoned. Kirstin had surrendered herself to him completely, and he had claimed her as his own. She couldn't have wanted any more from a wulver lover. In fact, the words he spoke into her ear while he was inside her, the things his hands did to her woman's body, far surpassed the animal act wulvers performed under a full moon. To Kirstin, their lovemaking left nothing to be desired-just thinking about it made her feel warm all the way to her toes-except for one thing.