Dark Song

She rushed the confession, ashamed that she couldn’t think of any other solution than to suicide when she had been told the Carpathian hunters in the monastery had endured for centuries and locked themselves away because they hadn’t believed in meeting the dawn and giving up on their lifemates. That was only showing him once again that she was a . . .

“Do not.” He hissed the command at her in obvious displeasure. “If you persist in thinking you are a coward, I will insist on punishing you, Elisabeta, and I promised myself I would not frighten you. Still, it is there in your mind. I see the image as clear as day. You continue to view yourself as a coward in spite of my dictates to you. This is a clear rule I have set for you. One of the very few I have given you.”

She tried to duck her head, but his hand under her chin refused to budge. It was true. He hadn’t really given her too many rules. That was probably part of the problem she was experiencing. She needed clear lines at all times. She couldn’t help trembling a little, wondering what her punishment was going to be. Ferro was a very big man and extremely strong.

The pad of his thumb slid gently over her bottom lip twice. “I told you what your punishment would be, piŋe sarnanak. Surely you listened to me.”

Panic rose. What had he said? Had she blocked it out because it was so terrible, she couldn’t face it? Over the centuries, Sergey had subjected her to so many punishments, she was fairly certain she had managed to encounter all of the nonlethal ones.

Ferro bent his head toward her, a faint smile in his eyes. “I do not think minan piŋe sarnanak listened at all,” he murmured, not sounding angry.

He sounded velvet soft. Like faint paint strokes brushing gently over her mind. Something else she couldn’t identify, something that turned her inside out. His lips brushed hers with such exquisite gentleness her heart turned over. Everything else in her froze. He kissed the corner of her mouth and then his teeth tugged at her lower lip and every nerve ending in her body leapt to life. She had never been so aware of herself as a woman. Her breasts ached and felt swollen and hot. Her nipples tingled and felt like hard pebbles. Lower, between her legs, she went damp and her sex clenched.

“Do not think you are a coward, Elisabeta. You are a very courageous woman. You are my woman. I am one of the most feared hunters on the planet. You are my lifemate for a reason. You are hän ku vigyáz sívamet és sielamet, keeper of my heart and soul, and you did just that. You guarded both for centuries under the worst of circumstances. I want you to remove my shirt, piŋe sarnanak. I have something to show you. Something that is for you alone.”

He stepped back and she actually felt the loss of both his strength and heat. Her hands went to the buttons, little squares she recognized as old-fashioned. Her lifemate hadn’t caught up with the times in his clothing as he had with hers. She pushed the little squares through the buttonholes and the edges of the material fell open so that he could shrug off the shirt. She took it automatically, rather than allowing it to fall to the floor.

He had tattoos scarred into his body, inked in the ancient language. He turned so she could read what he had so painstakingly put into his skin when Carpathians rarely scarred.

Olen wäkeva kuntankért. Staying strong for our people.

Olen wäkeva pita belső kulymet. Staying strong to keep the demon inside.

Olen wäkeva— félért ku vigyázak. Staying strong for her.

Hängemért. Only her.

Elisabeta read the lines several times, wanting—no—needing to commit them to memory. Seeing the words inked into his skin, knowing he had to have had them done repeatedly in order for the scars to actually take effect, nearly brought her to her knees. Staying strong for her. She had tried to stay strong for him. It was the only thing she had held out for. The only thing she had managed to keep from Sergey—Ferro’s soul. His light. She had that in her keeping and she had steadfastly refused to give it up no matter what he had done to her or to others.

Ferro slid into his shirt easily, and turned back to her, standing still, as if waiting for her to button it for him. Elisabeta did so with shaking fingers.

“That is the creed of our brethren, our code,” he said, as she slowly slid each button through the buttonhole. “It is what we sometimes chanted through the nights to keep ourselves from stepping off the path and losing honor. Always, our lifemates saved us. You saved me many times, Elisabeta, in my darkest hours. So many times through the centuries, I can’t even tell you. Never say to me, or to yourself, that you are a coward.”