Dreams Made Flesh

cock than the woman who had given everything she had to defend and protect all of them.
    Jaenelle should have let them all die, should have let them all choke in the twisted, vicious cruelty Dorothea had spawned in Terreille before Witch had cleansed the taint of Dorothea and Hekatah out of the Blood. She should have…
    "Is this the response of a Warlord Prince, to tuck his tail between his legs and hide in his lair instead of standing up for himself?"
    That wonderful, chilling midnight voice shivered over him. Despair clawed his heart, leaving it bleeding, as he turned around.
    Mother Night. Jaenelle.
    She was still painfully thin, but standing there, dressed in a rose silk shirt and soft sapphire jacket and trousers, she looked like the woman he'd known and loved before she'd torn both of their lives apart to save Kaeleer. She looked like the Queen of Ebon Askavi, strong and powerful, despite the fact that it was Twilight's Dawn and not a Black or Ebony Jewel hanging from the gold chain around her neck.
    And her eyes… Feral. Angry.
    Witch. The living myth. Dreams made flesh.
    He wanted to kneel before her, wanted to surrender everything he was and could ever be, wanted to offer his life in any way she would have him.
    But she'd obviously heard the rumors. She knew what was being said about him. That's what had brought her here. Someone's vicious lies had created a chasm between them, and if he didn't find a way to bridge that distance, if he lost her now…
    Despair and fury twisted together, became a roar of pain. " I have not been unfaithful !"
    "Do you think I don't know that?" Jaenelle replied. "I know you, Daemon. I know you. Even if there had been no hope of me healing, you would have stayed with me, celibate and faithful."
    "Of course I would have. I love you." The bitterness under her words frightened him, but the fury was turning cold and sharp.
    "I know." Jaenelle looked away, adding, "Maybe it would have been better if that weren't true."
    "Meaning what?" he asked too softly, taking a step toward her.
    "If you were capable of infidelity, it would be easier to believe you were staying with me because you wanted to stay and not because you felt you had to stay."
    "What in the name of Hell are you talking about?"
    "I'm talking about you… and me." Pain flickered in Jaenelle's eyes before she looked away. "I know I don't look… that a man wouldn't be attracted…"
    "Damn you." He didn't think about it. He grabbed the back of a stuffed chair and let his rage flow.
    The chair exploded. Startled, Jaenelle stumbled back a step.
    Daemon smiled bitterly. He'd instinctively created a bubble shield to contain the debris so that nothing sprayed over the room, so that not even the smallest sliver would strike Jaenelle and possibly harm her.
    But that release was enough to shift ice to heat, so he snapped the leash that held his temper. "Is that why you've been pushing me away? Because of how you look?" He moved away from her, needing whatever distance he could get within the confines of the room as the insult churned through him. "I waited for you my whole life. Yearned for you my whole life. After Tersa told me you were coming, I spent seven hundred years searching for you in the court of every Queen who had bought my service as a pleasure slave. I searched in every Territory in Terreille that was within reach of wherever I'd been sent. For you. For Witch. For dreams made flesh. I never gave a damn what you might look like…tall, short, fat, thin, plain, beautiful, ugly. Why would I care what you looked like? The flesh was the shell that housed the glory. It was a way to connect with you, please you, be with you. Even if I couldn't be your physical lover, there are other ways to be a lover, and I know them all. So don't stand there and tell me what I feel for you depends on how you look !"
    "Doesn't it?"Jaenelle snapped, her voice shaking with anger and hurt. "I'm healed, but you still can't bring yourself to touch me, can't even hold my hand…"
    "Do you think it's because I don't want to?" Daemon roared. "I can't touch you!" His breathing hitched, surprising him, as the guilt he'd tried to lock away broke through. "It made me sick when I realized that no matter how careful I was, I couldn't touch you without hurting you, that even the lightest brush of my fingers left bruises smeared on your arms and hands, that when I helped you sit up in bed, there would be dark bruises in the shape of my hands on your back