Zacarias tipped her chin up so that she had no choice but to drown in his eyes, in those dark, black pools of deep liquid ice—so cold sometimes they burned with a deep midnight blue. He could take her breath away with just one smoldering look. The idea of him inspecting her body so closely every evening sent a million butterflies winging through her stomach.
He took her hand and tugged until she followed him into her now steamy bathroom. Very gently he lifted her, settling her in the deep water of the clawfoot tub. He tipped her head back against the raised, sloped side.
“Close your eyes and let me do this. I want you to know that not a single spider is anywhere near you when I am finished. Do not think about anything,
She sank into the depths, noting the water was a lagoon green, and felt like heaven. She closed her eyes and went all the way under at the urging of his hands, soaking her long mass of hair. She let the hot perfumed water and the mesmerizing sound of his voice allow her to drift on a tide of happiness. Zacarias was alive and he was with her. Whatever else happened, she knew now she wanted the man he was—primitive and always alert for trouble. Capable of exploding into violence when needed. A demanding lover. A demanding partner.
Would he be easy? She didn’t try to fool herself that he would be. He had entrusted her with his spirit, his very essence, and in doing so, she saw all of him, shared all of him. She knew he wouldn’t ever feel as a normal mated Carpathian would unless he was anchored firmly in her—but what he might never understand was that it terrified her to think of him hunting without that darkness in him to give him that extra edge. She wanted that for him. He would never stop his hunt to eradicate evil. Never. Nor would she ever want him to be anything else than who he was.
With her head resting in the curve of the tub, his hands massaging shampoo into her scalp, Marguarita floated in a dream world. He murmured softly in his own language, a dark singsong chant in his rasping velvet voice, and she went out with that tide, giving herself into his care. There was only this moment, Zacarias and the pleasure of the hot water on her body.
She had no idea of the passage of time. The water stayed hot while he rinsed her hair and then began a slow washing of her body, first her face, and then a meticulous and incredibly gentle care of her body. Tears burned in her eyes. She had never imagined him so tender. She doubted that he had known himself capable of such tenderness. Her body began a slow burn, heat building from smoldering embers, his hands going from lingering, memorizing, to claiming. He dried her with the same care, taking his time with her hair, drying it himself while he brushed it out. Only then did he lift her into his arms and carry her to her bed.
Zacarias laid Marguarita down with an exquisite gentleness. There in the darkness, with his extraordinary vision, he inspected her body, once again needing to memorize every inch of her, to see for himself that no hint of the conversion, of DS’s assault on her remained. His tongue slid over her mouth, fingertips caressed her breasts, slid down to her ribs, and then over the curve of her hip. He wanted to taste every inch of her, suddenly greedy for her. She was his, the only one who would ever fill his life, fill his heart and repair his soul enough to give him back life.
His mouth returned to suckle at her breast as his hands kneaded and teeth tugged, tongue laving and rolling. Her body heated and he nudged her legs apart with his knee. He wanted to take his time, to drive her so high she would never come down, but he desperately needed to be inside her, to join them, body and soul, skin to skin. He had to feel whole again. The darkness had to recede so far it would take weeks to come back.
He had never admitted his need of anyone before. He felt her move in him, that impossible light, so warm, so filled with an emotion he could never hope to understand. The feeling overwhelmed him, and as always he was tempted to push it aside, but not now. Not this night. He slipped his hand between their bodies to feel her welcoming liquid. He was large and entering her was always a stretching burn for her. He didn’t want to take a chance of hurting her no matter how eager he was to be inside of her.
He stared down at her face, wanting to watch her every expression as he slowly pushed into her body. He felt her tight sheath, velvet soft, giving way for him as he invaded. All the while she poured warmth into him. Love. He felt surrounded by her. Home. He had truly come home. When he had buried himself to the hilt, touching her cervix, rocking both of them, he stilled, his hands reaching for hers, fingers threading through hers.
“I will make you crazy sometimes, Marguarita, but I swear I will try to please you. I promise you with all my heart, give you my word of honor, that I will always do my best to make you happy. There are some things I am not certain I can change.”
She smiled up at him.
He withdrew and plunged deep, watching her eyes glaze. He loved that look on her face, that wild shock of pleasure. He loved knowing he put that there. Once again he went still. “I have brothers, you know that. When we are with them, I will not be able to be far from you. I need you to connect with that emotion I have so long been without.”
A slow smile teased her mouth. Teased his mind.
He was well and truly lost and he was grateful for that feeling. He began a slow, sensual assault on all her senses, sharing his mind, sharing the building pressure, the exquisite pleasure. She would always be his world. He would have to share her with this world she lived in—and loved—but for her, he could manage.
He bent his head and took her breast into his mouth, his weight on his elbows now.
He
He kissed her as his hands took possession of her hips, lifting her to him in preparation for a wild ride.
And that was his truth. He finally belonged somewhere—to someone. Marguarita was his home.
APPENDIX 1. Carpathian Healing Chants
To rightly understand Carpathian healing chants, background is required in several areas:
1. The Carpathian view on healing
2. The Lesser Healing Chant of the Carpathians
3. The Great Healing Chant of the Carpathians
4. Carpathian musical aesthetics
5. Lullaby
6. Song to Heal the Earth
7. Carpathian chanting technique
The Carpathians are a nomadic people whose geographic origins can be traced back to at least as far as the Southern Ural Mountains (near the steppes of modern-day Kazakhstan), on the border between Europe and Asia. (For this reason, modern-day linguists call their language “proto-Uralic,” without knowing that this is the language of the Carpathians.) Unlike most nomadic peoples, the wandering of the Carpathians was not due to the need to find new grazing lands as the seasons and climate shifted, or the search for better trade. Instead, the Carpathians’ movements were driven by a great purpose: to find a land that would have the right earth, a soil with the kind of richness that would greatly enhance their rejuvenative powers.
Over the centuries, they migrated westward (some six thousand years ago), until they at last found their perfect homeland—their
