6

Chapter Six

Brianna turned away from her sister and headed for the silence and hopefully the privacy of the gardens. She had lied to her sister, and she knew this well. Her heart beat faster when in the presence of the Wizards, her body heated and longed for them in the darkness of night, but she could not imagine giving herself heart and soul, as Cauldaran males demanded.

She slipped into the velvety shadows of the night, the gardens welcoming her, the scents of blooming night flowers and the sultry heat of the darkness embracing her with tendrils of sensuality.

The thin fabric of her gown seemed confining as it stretched across her breasts and brushed over her abdomen and thighs. Her flesh demanded that she release the ties at her shoulders and allow the silken fabric to fall to her feet, but she refrained from such a move. Roaming naked through the gardens was all well and good, but only when there were no Veraga Wizards around to take advantage of such a move. Not, she figured, that clothes would do her much good against their determination.

*

Drago and Lasan watched Brianna leave the ballroom, following her every move until she was out of sight with a sense of hunger that burned in their loins. The pure white of her gown skimmed from her full breasts to her dainty toes, outlining the curvaceous, tempting body it covered. Her power was nearing its full strength. Soon, she would come into a phase where it would be all or nothing. Were they not there to share in the surge of white-hot energy and magick absorption, then they would never forge the bond with her that was imperative between Cauldaran and Covenani Consorts. Wizards and Sorceress must come together at the exact time, during the peak of her energy level. That time was nearing. It showed in the glitter of her violet eyes, the restlessness of her walk and the peak hardness of her nipples whenever they neared her.

But most surprising of all had been the flare of corresponding power that had surged from her to both Drago and Lasan when they had knelt before her. Observing the old rules of Binding, Drago and Lasan had knelt before the one the Wizard Sentinels had assured them was their true Consort. Shock, and a pleasure unlike anything they had known had immediately surged through them.

By placing themselves beneath her, and centering their power on her, it had allowed the matching female center of her magick to flare outward, connecting and centering within their own male force. The reaction had nearly been climactic. Lasan well understood why such practices were observed in only the strictest settings before the separation of the Covenani and Cauldaran.

It had, unfortunately, embarrassed and frightened their Consort, though. Which was making the courtship proceed at a ridiculously slow pace. She had refused to so much as be in the same room with them since that day.

She was their natural Consort. Created for them alone by the gods. They had feared it would be impossible to gauge the time of her magick fertility so well. But even so, she was wary and frightened, knowing little of their ways, and it was forbidden that they should explain it to her.

The magick of their planet, Sentmar, was steeped in mystery to most. Only a certain handful of the Wizard Twins were given the knowledge to gauge the wondrous gifts that the planet could bestow upon them. It was the energy of the gods. It flowed from the very ground they stood upon, lingered in the air, filled every cavern and flowed through every drop of water. But only a few were deemed deserving to know the secret of drawing it forth. Lasan and Drago were two of those that the all-powerful Wizard Sentinels had come to, to tutor in the ways of Sentmar magick.

One of those lessons had been the bond that tied Wizard Twins and Covenani Sorceress. Each was separate parts of the same magick. The Wizard Sentinels directed male magick, the Sorceress Matriarchs directed the female sect. If the two remained separated, then the magick that filled their planet would slowly weaken. For one was ineffective without the other. A thousand years of separation had allowed the humans in the far provinces to gain ground already. They could allow this to go on no longer.

To reunite the two, the Wizard Sentinels had informed Lasan and Drago of the one Sorceress created to be their other half. A gift from the Sorceress Matriarch to the Wizard sect. That woman was Brianna, the most wary and stubborn of the ruling house of Sellane.

“She’s frightened,” Lasan murmured to his twin as he watched Brianna stalk from the crowded room.

“But receptive.” There was a trace of satisfaction in Drago’s voice. He burned for her, just as Lasan did. The fire threatened, on more than one occasion, to consume them and to rush the completion of their mating with her.

The fear she displayed concerned them. They marked it down, though, to fear of the unknown.

“Receptive is not always enough,” Lasan warned him with an edge of worry. Drago’s inclination to rush her could be their downfall if they were not extremely careful.

He could feel his brother’s impatience beating at him, feeding his own. It was their curse; Wizard twins were receptive to each other in ways that most others could never understand. They were two halves of a whole, in strengths as well as weaknesses. They knew each other’s hungers, dreams and desires, shared them and fought for them. And they knew the same sexual needs. Those needs had focused on Brianna Sellane.

“She hungers for us as well, Lasan,” Drago murmured in lustful satisfaction as he glanced over at him. “I can feel her heat whenever we are near her.”

And she did burn. They were more than aware of the heat and hunger she was not yet experienced enough to hide.

“Will you go to her, or should I?” Drago asked, though they both knew the answer. They could ill afford to push her into a reckless course of action right now.

Taking a deep, control-fortifying breath, Lasan followed her. They knew that for this night, Drago’s forceful personality would only frighten her further. His body was hard, his cock pounding, the blood thrumming through his veins at the thought of catching her alone in the gardens. A chance to touch her silken skin, to inhale the sweet scent that was hers alone. Perhaps to taste her, hear her throaty moans of pleasure. He had been unable to do that but once in the past year that they had sought to court her. Not that Lasan was better off, but his natural patience made him the less volatile of the two.

Brianna Sellane was a most difficult female to court. She had outright refused them after their first overture during a Covenani visit to the Wizards’ lands. Her decision had not changed, despite repeated journeys by them to the Covenani Palace and the Queen’s acceptance of their attentions to her daughter. The woman ran from them at every chance. She sneered at their desire for her and ridiculed their proposal. The time would come and soon, were she not careful, when she would not be in a position of such easy denial.

Lasan found her alone as he had hoped. Wrapped in the night, her flame red hair falling down her back, caressing her hips. Her back was to him as she stared up at the twin moons of their world. Lasan could feel the sadness of her thoughts, but not the reason for them. That sadness pricked at him and he knew Drago felt it as well. They would have her filled with happiness and laughter, not gazing into the stars as she sought answers to questions that disturbed her.

“They say it is the twin moons that decide the births of the Wizards,” Lasan reflected as he moved up behind her. “Displease the gods of the moons and no twins will be born of your Consort’s womb.”

He watched her stiffen, felt the air shimmer with her nervousness. She turned slowly, staring up at him, then beside him, then peeking around him. In confusion, Lasan glanced back, but saw nothing to explain her actions.

“Where’s your shadow?” she finally asked him, her voice filled with ire.

Lasan’s lips quirked in amusement as he felt Drago’s snort of disgust at her words. “Drago is still entertaining the various human women your mother and sister have thrown at us since our arrival. Would you like me to call him to us? I am certain he would be more than pleased—”

“No.” She shook her head quickly. “Why don’t you join him? I’m sure there’s enough women surrounding him for the both of you.”

She spoke with insulting ease of them going to others for their satisfaction, yet Lasan saw the flare of anger in the crystalline depths of her violet eyes.

She may speak easily of it, but he knew she had no desire to see either of them falling for the attention of any of the human females who watched them with lustful, greedy gazes.

“We would prefer to surround you, dearest Brianna,” he told her, allowing his voice to soften with the gentleness he felt for her. “Yet you run from us at every chance.”

She frowned up at him. Her fingers gripped a small fold of her dress, creasing it with her nervous movements.

“I do not wish to be a Consort to you and your brother,” she bit out. “What must I do to convince you of this, Lasan?”

Lasan sighed deeply. He could hear the fear in her voice and that hurt him as nothing else could. They did not want her to know fear, only happiness. The centuries the Covenani had spent away from their natural partners had instilled a growing wariness in their females that was damned near impossible to breech.

“To convince us, do not tremble when we are near, Brianna,” he told her, his voice soft as he moved closer to her. His hand reached out, cupping her neck, as he demanded she hold his gaze. “To convince us, do not let your nipples harden until they are nearly cutting through the cloth of your dress and do not let your eyes darken, betraying your thoughts, your curiosity.”

Her breath caught. Lasan glanced down, seeing the hard tips of her nipples beneath the cloth. He wanted to groan in hunger. He wanted to pull the cloth away from those generous mounds and taste every sweet inch of skin.

“You are bewitching me.” He could hear the confusion in her voice, her fear of her own responses.

“I do not bewitch you, dearest,” he assured her. “You know a Wizard cannot ensnare the Covenani through magick or any other means. Especially not one their hearts, bodies and minds have chosen as a Consort. Your own Sorceress Matriarch forbids it.”

Beneath his palm, the blood thundered through her veins. She was aroused and fighting it with all the determination her youth could afford her. Lasan was certain it would not be enough to sustain her in this battle of desire.

“I do not wish to be your Consort,” she bit out roughly, jerking away from him.

Lasan sighed with weariness. His body ached with need for her. His soul clenched with the power he would give her on their Joining. She did not know what she refused from him. And he could not tell her.

“Brianna.” Lasan fought to keep his impatience under control. His needs, Drago’s needs, they beat at his brain, making control a bitter beast to master. “Choosing a Consort is not a matter of just what we would wish. Do you know how difficult, how rare it is, for Wizard Twins to find their one true Consort? The woman who meets both their desires and needs?”

He moved to her once again, his hands settling on her bare shoulders, his palms soaking in the warmth of her, the heat of desire and of fear. The intensity of her own needs frightened her as much as any he and Drago had.

“Do I act as though I care?” she snapped. “I am not your Consort, so it makes no difference to me.”

Her denial pricked a vein of impatience that Lasan did not know he possessed.

“We want to touch you, Bri,” he told her, needing to make her understand. “We need to hold you, love you. You are a part of us, and you don’t even realize it.”

Her violet eyes flashed in the moonlight when she turned back to him. Power surged through her body, causing Lasan’s cock to tighten with a desperate need to share that surge of energy with her.

“And do my needs, my wants not matter?” she questioned him fiercely. “Am I permitted to decide for myself who I shall Consort with?”

Lasan stepped forward closely, watching as she backed up. She moved hesitantly, almost fearfully, until with a gasp, the thick trunk of the tree behind her stopped her retreat.

“Does your cunt not throb with need for us?” he asked her as he stopped, barely a breath from her body.

Lasan looked down, watching as her breasts rose and fell rapidly, her hard nipples so close to brushing his chest that all he had to do was breathe deeply to meet the contact.

“It is not natural,” she whispered, shaking her head, trembling before him.

Triumph exploded in his loins. He knew Drago was slowly making his way from the ballroom, unable to stop his need to join them, to touch her, to be a part of this initial bonding. It was too natural to them. Too much a part of who they were.

“It is entirely natural, Brianna,” he soothed her softly, his hands going to her arms as he pulled her against him. “Drago and I are a gift to you from the Wizard Sentinels, just as you are a gift to us from your Matriarch Sorceress. There is nothing so natural as this need that courses through your body.”

He felt her breathing accelerate further, felt the heat of her body, the fierce throb of her desire echoing beneath his flesh. She stared up at him, her violet eyes glittering in the darkness, her flesh kissed by moonlight, shimmering with satin translucence.

As he moved her carefully, positioning her to allow Drago to ease into their embrace, his hand came up, cupping her soft cheek. She bewitched him. She accomplished what he and Drago were only accused of. She mesmerized them, staring up, so innocent, half fearful, half curious, all woman.

“I hunger for you,” he whispered. “Since the moment my eyes touched yours, I have hungered, Brianna, in ways you could never know.”

He watched her swallow tightly, her tongue moving to dampen her lips. That small action had his cock jerking in need. He wanted her to lick his lips, his body. Sweet Matriarch, she was destroying him.