Those were for better men. Never were they meant for the likes of him.
And as he lay there, harder than hell, the unthinkable happened. She trailed her hand down his forearm until she laced her tiny fingers with his. Then she brought his hand up to rest between her breasts so that she could snuggle against it.
“Why do you tremble so?” she breathed.
Because her gentle touch humbled him. It wrought a foreign tenderness inside him that wanted to protect and hold her forever. But he would never admit that out loud. “I’m trying to respect you, my lady.”
Mara rolled slightly so that she could meet his gaze, which swam with emotions she’d never seen there before. The moment she did, she felt his erection against her hip and saw the vibrant red color of his eyes. “Are you angry?”
“Nay. Too hungry to feel any other emotion.”
“Then you should eat.”
He gave her that handsome, adorable, crooked grin of his. “It’s not food I be craving.”
Her heartbeat picked up speed. “Would it take my mind off the storm?”
Again, he tried to pull away. But since he didn’t use his powers, she knew that he didn’t really want to go.
“Duel?”
“You have to leave, Mara. So long as you’re here, I can’t do what I need to.”
“And what’s that?”
“Stay focused on closing the Carian Gate.”
“If I go, a regular ship can’t protect you or the crew the same way I can. You know that. It’s why you awakened me from hibernation.”
“I’m a Deruvian, too. I can do it.”
She arched a skeptical brow. “Have you ever?”
He looked away.
“Nay, you have not,” she chided gently. “You’ve spent the whole of your life hiding those powers, haven’t you? And you’ll find it’s not as easy as you think. You learning to bend the laws of nature to make and run a ship would be the same as my trying to learn swordplay. You can’t just pick up and run until you’ve mastered crawling. And you have yet to stand on your own with those powers.”
Refusing to release her grip on his hand, she pulled him back into her arms. “We have been together far longer than we lived as single beings, Dón-Dueli. By Deruvian law, we would be considered married.”
Devyl swallowed. What she said was true. Deruvians considered marriage to be any communal arrangement where two of them took care of each other and cohabitated. Where two unrelated by blood were dependent upon each other. As much as he wanted to deny it, he needed her with him. He always had. “And what about your sister?”
“She’s a widow by her own hand. You’re free to marry another.”
Dagda’s hairy toes, how he wanted to believe that.
Nay, he needed to believe it, but …
“Is this a trick?”
She pulled her necklace over her head and placed her harthfret into his palm, then closed his fingers around it. “No trick, Du. The more I think it through, the more sense this makes. I’ve known no man save you. I can’t imagine my life without you aggravating me.”
He laughed bitterly at those words. “I aggravate you?”
“’Deed you do. All the time.”
Sinking his hands into her hair, he kissed her playfully. This was all kinds of madness. To even contemplate it …
But as she said, he couldn’t imagine his life without her in it. And if she would have him, then he had all the more reason to fight Vine and win. All the more reason to see this through to the end and come out of it alive.
If Mara truly meant what she said, then he would see his soul redeemed. Her words gave him hope for the first time in his life. A reason for living past the closing of the gate.
And he was desperate for that future. For any future that didn’t leave him alone.
She pulled his shirt off.
Devyl froze, half expecting her to change her mind and order him from her room.
Instead, she ran her hand over the scar across his ribs where he’d been stabbed centuries ago in battle, and then to the jagged remains of where Vine had cut out his heart. That gentle touch set fire to his blood, but not half as much as when she dipped her head and replaced her fingers with her lips.
The chills and desire awoken by her breath on his flesh wrung a fierce groan from him. Never in his life had he experienced anything like this.
Unable to stand it, he lifted her across his chest and rolled so that she rested on top of him.
Mara smiled before she nipped at his whiskered chin. This was a miracle and she knew it. For the first time, she didn’t see his mistakes or shortcomings when she thought of him. She saw only all the thoughtful things he’d done for her over the centuries. Such as making sure she was cared for. That she had her own small nemeton in the courtyard grounds of his hall when they’d lived in Tintagel.
Small matters, really, and yet he’d taken great care of them all, to ensure that she had everything she needed.
Closing her eyes, she held him close as she remembered the way he’d looked just a few months ago when he’d awakened her from her slumber.
She’d been so angry to find him in the shadows of an abandoned abbey. So terrified of the foreign landscape that had seemed eerily familiar and completely alien. “What is this? Where am I?”
“You swore an oath to protect the Myrce.” It was, after all, what her name, Marcelina, meant. “They’re being threatened and I need your help to banish their threat back before it eradicates the last of the people you guard.”
Stunned, she’d stared up at him in total disbelief. “I saw you dead. How are you here?” Dumbfounded, she’d glanced around the overgrown courtyard. “How am I?”
“I was returned to life to fight the threat. Because I’m back, so are you. Are you with me for this?”
She’d nodded without full understanding of what he was proposing. Without knowing about Thorn or his Hellchasers, or the fact that it was her sister they’d be up against.
While her people weren’t warriors like Duel’s, they did use their magick to control the elements and to shield those who came under their protection. Their idea of battle and war was vastly different than his.
And his people had no concept of love.
At least that was what she’d always been told. But as she met his gaze and saw his tender expression and felt the hesitancy of his touch, she finally knew better. He did know what love was. It showed in everything he did for her. All those little things that he’d gone out of his way to ensure were done to make it easier for her, such as having food ready, or lodgings. To guarantee that she was always respected.