Medieval 02 - Forbidden

Duncan.
    Or from throwing herself into his arms.
    “Are you afraid I will take you?” he asked.
    “Yes,” she whispered.
    “Would giving me the Paradise within your body be such a terrible thing?”
    “No.”
    Amber took a deep, aching breath and opened her eyes. Duncan was watching her with such tender concern that she longed to reassure him.
    “For me it would not be a terrible thing,” she said in a shaking voice. “For you…ah, dark warrior, for you I fear it would be the beginning of Hell rather than Paradise.”
    Duncan smiled. “Fear not. You will please me to the soles of my feet. I know it as surely as I know the hammering of my own blood at the thought.”
    The sound Amber made was half laugh, half cry of despair.
    “And then what?” she asked. “What if I am the maiden you don’t believe I am?”
    “I will keep my vow.”
    “We will marry?”
    “Aye,” he said.
    Amber took another deep breath. “And in time you will hate me.”
    At first Duncan thought she was teasing him. Then he realized she was not.
    “Why would I hate the girl who is sweeter to me than I ever dreamed a woman could be?” he asked.
    “Dark warrior,” Amber whispered.
    Her voice was so soft he could barely hear it, just as the brush of her lips over his hand was so light he could barely feel the caress.
    “Tell me,” Duncan coaxed, “what saddens you so?”
    “I feel the restlessness in you,” Amber said simply.
    He smiled. “The cure for it lies within your warmth.”
    “For the prowling hunger, yes. For the part of you chained within shades of darkness, unsettled, troubled, hungering for a life that is no more…I have no cure for that.”
    “I will remember someday. I am certain of it.”
    “And if we are married before that day? What then?”
    “Then you’ll have to call your husband by another name in public,” Duncan said, smiling, “but in the bedchamber I will remain your dark warrior and you will be my amber witch.”
    Amber’s lips trembled in an attempt to smile.“I think—I fear you would be my enemy if you remembered.”
    “And I think you are a girl who fears that I will force the gates of Paradise.”
    “’Tis not—” Amber began.
    Her words ended in a startled sound as Duncan lifted her from the saddle and settled her across his lap. Even through the thickness of her mantle, she felt the hard, blunt ridge of his desire pressing against her.
    “Fear not,” Duncan said. “I won’t take you until you ask for it. Nay, until you beg for it! Bringing you to that pitch will be a sweet, agonizing delight.”
    Duncan’s smile was both tender and hot with sensual anticipation. It made Amber’s heart turn over with emotions she was afraid to name, much less to speak of aloud.
    “I have neither family nor high station,” she said desperately. “What if you have both?”
    “Then I shall share them freely with my bride.”
    Hearing her dream spoken aloud did nothing to stem the hot glide of tears down Amber’s cheeks.
    Is it possible? Can Duncan come to love me enough to forgive me if his memory returns ?
    Can such a rich life come from such a dark beginning ?
    Duncan leaned forward and caught tears from Amber’s eyelashes with tender kisses. Then he brushed his lips across hers in a kiss that was surprisingly chaste.
    “You taste like a sea wind,” he said. “Cool and faintly salt.”
    “You taste like a sea wind,” he said. “Cool and faintly salt.”
    “You taste the same.”
    “’Tis your tears on my lips. Will you let me taste your smile, too?”
    Amber could no more help smiling than Duncan could keep from sealing his mouth over hers in a kiss that was as deeply seductive as his first kiss had been restrained. When he lifted his head, shewas flushed, trembling, and her mouth followed his blindly.
    “Aye, lass. That is how it will be. Your lips parted, full, flushed with hunger for me.”
    Duncan was bending down to Amber again when the outlaws struck from all sides.

11
    T HE men were armed with knives, wooden staffs, and a makeshift pike. Hampered by having Amber in his lap, Duncan wasn’t able to fight effectively. Leaping and snarling like wolves, the outlaws dragged Duncan from the horse, and Amber with him.
    When one of the outlaw’s hands closed around Amber’s arm while he clawed at her valuable necklaces, she gave a terrible cry. Part of her hoarse shout came from pain at being touched. Much of it came from pure rage that an outlaw would dare to take the