Temple of the Winds

She stuffed her arms through the lovely pink robe Nathan had bought for her. She snugged the ruffles up around her neck and then tied the silk belt. She wiggled her toes in the thick carpet, luxuriating in the feeling.

Nathan was at the writing desk, bent over a letter. He smiled up at her as she stood in the doorway. "Sleep well?"

Clarissa half-closed her eyes and sighed. "I should say so." She grinned. "What sleep I got, anyway."

Nathan linked at her. He dipped the pen in a bottle of blue ink and went back to his scratching. Clarissa strolled around behind him and put her hands on his shoulders. He was wearing his trousers, and nothing else. With her thumbs she kneaded the muscles at the base of his neck. He made an agreeable sound deep in his throat, so she continued. She liked to hear his sounds of pleasure, and liked even more being their cause.

As her thumbs worked along the muscles of his shoulders, she glanced down at what he was writing. Scanning the letter, she saw that it was instructions about moving troops to places she had never heard of. Nathan wrote on, admonishing a general about the bond to the Lord Rahl, and the dire repercussion should he ignore it. The tone of the letter was the same authoritative tone he used when he expected people to treat him as the man of importance that he was. He signed the letter: "Lord Rahl."

Clarissa bent and nuzzled his neck, giving his ear a little nip. "Nathan, last night was beyond wonderful. It was magic. You were magnificent. I'm the luckiest woman in the world."

He gave her a roguish grin. "Magic. Yes, there was some of that in it, too. I'm an old man; I need to use what I've got."

She combed her fingers through his hair, ordering it. "Old man? I don't think so, Nathan. I hope I was half as pleasing to you as you were to me."

He laughed as he folded his letter. "I guess I did manage to keep up with you." He slipped a hand inside her robe and pinched her bare bottom. She jumped with a squeak. "It was one of the high points of my life, to be with such a beautiful and loving woman."

She hugged his head to her breasts. "Well, we're still alive. No reason we can't reach for some more of those high points."

His sly smile grew as he put his hand back on her bare bottom and gave it a squeeze. He had that lusty twinkle in his eye.

"Let me dispense with this bit of business, and we'll see about getting our money's worth out of that big bed."

With a diminutive copper spoon, he scooped little nuggets of red wax from a tin and dumped the tiny spoonful on the folded letter.; "Nathan, silly, you're supposed to melt the sealing wax onto the letter."

One of his eyebrows arched. "You should know by now, my dear, that my way is better."

She let out a throaty laugh. "My mistake." He twirled a finger over the nuggets of wax. Sparkles of light danced from his finger onto the lumps of wax. They glowed briefly and then melted into a red puddle on the letter. She gasped with delight. Nathan was one never-ending little surprise after another. She felt her cheeks warm as she remembered that his fingers were magic in more ways than one.

She bent and whispered intimately in his ear. "I'd like you and that magic finger of yours back in bed with me, Lord Rahl."

Nathan lifted his magic finger in proclamation. "And it shall be, my dear, just as soon as I send this letter on its way."

He again twirled the finger over the letter, and it lifted off the desk as if of its own accord. Clarissa's eyebrows rose in astonishment. The letter floated in the air ahead of him as he walked to the door. He twirled his other hand dramatically, and the door glided open.

A soldier, sitting on the floor in the hall, leaning against the opposite wall, rose to his feet. He saluted with a fist to his heart.

Nathan, standing there in only his trousers, with his white hair hanging down to his shoulders, had the look of a wild man. She knew he wasn't, but standing there, as tall as he was, as commanding as he was, she knew he must look that way to others.

People were afraid of Nathan. She could see it in their eyes. She could understand their fear, though; she remembered how much she had feared him, before she had come to know him. She could hardly remember, now, just how much the sight of the towering prophet had terrified her.

When he turned those azure eyes on people, and his hawklike brow lowered in displeasure, she thought he could make a whole army turn and run.

Nathan stretched his arm out, and the letter floated to the grim-faced soldier. "You remember all my instructions, don't you, Walsh?"

The soldier snatched the letter out of the air and stuffed it inside his tunic. This soldier, though respectful, didn't seem intimidated by Nathan. "Of course. You know me better than that, Nathan."

Nathan lost a bit of his lofty attitude and scratched his head. "I guess I do." Clarissa wondered where Nathan had found the soldier, and when he had had time to give him instructions. She guessed he must have gone out while she was asleep.