“You want to drink from me again.” Aine’s voice trembled.

“I do. I will always want you.”

“Your need is especially intense now because of your injury.” She concentrated on him, staring into his eyes. “It would help you heal, wouldn’t it?”

“Your blood has the power to heal me, body and soul.”

She did pull her hand from him then, rubbing at the spot that was still warm from his touch.

“Aine, I gave you my word I would not drink from you against your will.”

“What if it isn’t against my will?”

“I want you to drink from me and be healed. Then I want you to return to your people,” Aine said.

“You want…” Tegan began, trying to reason through the haze of desire her words had caused to pulse through his body. Then all of what she’d said broke past his need. “No. I won’t leave you.”

“You have to. It’s only a matter of time before the Guardian Warriors find you. They’ll kill you. They won’t care that you’re not a monster-a monster is all they’ll see.”

He touched her cheek. “Then I am not a monster to you?”

“How can you be? You’re in my blood. I feel what you feel. I’d know if you were a demon, and you’re not.” Aine pulled a small knife from within the urn. Without looking at Tegan she drew the blade down the inside of her forearm. Then she turned to the winged creature beside her, offering him her arm. “Drink.”

“You don’t know what you’re doing to me.” Tegan’s voice was rough, but he cradled her bleeding arm gently in his hands.

“I do. I can feel it, too.”

With a moan of ecstasy, Tegan leaned forward to touch his tongue to the narrow slash in her skin. At the first taste of her, his wings shivered.

“So beautiful…” Aine breathed the words. She ran her fingers along the soft down that covered the underside of them.

He gasped her name. Pressing his mouth against her arm he sucked and licked, causing pleasure to ripple through her body. She lost herself in sensation, thrilled by the power in the wings that were unfurling over her. Tegan continued to drink from her as he pulled at her clothing. Dizzy with need-both his and hers-Aine helped him, until she was naked.

Tegan took his lips from her arm. Reverently, his hands glided over her body, pausing to cup the fullness of her breasts.

“I’ve never known such sweet softness.” He touched his tongue to the pink tips of her nipples. As Aine moaned with pleasure he sucked the delicate buds into his mouth, gently grazing them with his teeth.

“Tegan, please.” Aine’s hips lifted to rub herself against the hardness sheathed in his pants.

Tegan pulled away from her so that he could look into her eyes. “I can stop now. I will if you wish it. You must know that if we do this-if we join-then we will be fully mated, and I will not, can not leave you.”

Aine tried to think, but all she could do was feel. She felt his passion and need, along with the heat of her own desire. Then she realized that she could feel something more than raw lust. Aine could feel Tegan’s kindness, and along with it she sensed a soul deep sadness born of loneliness and isolation.

“How long have youbeen alone?”

“Longer than you’ve been alive.”

“No more,” she whispered.

She felt his despair before she saw it reflected in his eyes. He pulled out of her arms and turned away from her.

“You don’t see me as a demon, but that does not mean it is your wish to be mated with me.”

“You misunderstand.” Aine sat up, wrapping her arms around his shoulders and drawing him back to her while the tips of her fingers splayed across the inside of his wings. “I meant that you will be alone no more.”

Tegan kissed her with such fierce joy that it made her cry out. He released her instantly.

“Did I harm you?” He smoothed her hair back, peering anxiously into her eyes.

“No, love. Always remember, I’m stronger than I look.”

She smiled as she worked the ties of his breeches, finally pulling the throbbing heat of him free. Aine stroked him with her hands, marveling at the thick stiffness and length of him.

He moaned her name and she straddled him, slowing impaling herself. Aine closed her eyes and arched back, taking him fully within her. With a snarl, Tegan wrapped his arms around her and shifted their bodies so that he was on top of her. Aine bared her throat to him, pulling his mouth down so that he could drink from her as her hips thrust up to meet his again and again.

With wings spread erect and pulsing over them, Tegan claimed Aine as his mate and spilled his seed deep within her.

“Don’t go,” Tegan said sleepily.

Aine looked up from lacing her dress. “If I don’t return the warriors will come looking for me. They may be able to track me to you.”

“Then we’ll find a new place-deeper in the mountains. Just don’t go.”

Aine stroked the downy underside of his wing. It quivered, causing Tegan to close his eyes and moan softly.

“I will come back to you.” She kissed him.

“Tomorrow?”

“I’ll try. Rest and finish healing. I have a plan.”

He raised a brow. “A plan?”

“I’m going to tell the Lord of Guardian Castle that I’m not happy there. They’ll have to find a new Healer. It won’t surprise any of them. Maev was my only friend, and now that she’s gone there’s really nothing for me there.”

“Then you will come to live with me?” Tegan rolled a dark lock of her hair around his finger.

“Yes.” She was unable to keep the sadness from her voice.

“Why does the thought of being with me sadden you?”

“My family is going to have to believe I’m dead. That’s what makes me sad.”

Tegan didn’t speak. There was no other way. With what was coming no one would accept their love-Aine wouldn’t even accept it if she knew. That was why he had to get her away from here-before what they had was destroyed by an evil he couldn’t stop.

“Perhaps you and I will begin a new family.”

She looked startled. “Can we?”

He smiled and shrugged. “After the miracle of you, I believe anything is possible.”

Tegan thought she looked a little dazed as Aine wrapped her cloak around her shoulders. He stood up, flexing his leg, pleased at how good it felt.

“It’s much better,” she said.

“Because of you.”

Even when they couldn’t walk beside one another, Aine and Tegan made sure their bodies touched. She brushed his wing with her fingertips. He stopped often to pull her into his arms. By the time they came to the edge of the mountains, dusk was near.

“I have to hurry.”

Tegan kissed her once more, long and possessively. “Come to me tomorrow.”

“I’ll try,” she assured him.

He watched until he could see her no longer.

“Healer! Where have you been?”

The Monro’s gruff voice accosted Aine as she slipped quietly inside the front gates, thinking she was well hidden in the deepening shadows of dusk.

“I went to-” Aine paused. She’d left the funeral urn in Tegan’s cave! Thinking quickly, Aine glanced around them. They were alone with no Edan nearby to contradict her. If she was lucky, he’d been hunting all day and hadn’t even spoken to the Chieftain. “I went to Maev’s pyre and offered more prayers for her.”

“You should have been here. You’ve been needed.”

“What is it?” Aine frowned. The Monro’s words weren’t slurring, but he smelled like a pub. How could the Chieftain of a Clan, and Lord of Guardian Castle be a drunk?

“The warrior Edan was wounded while he was hunting. It was that same Goddess-be-damned boar.”

“Edan! Is he in the infirmary?” Monro’s drunkenness forgotten, Aine began hurrying through the castle grounds.

“No. We thought it best not to move him. His spine may be broken. You’ll have to go to him. He’s not far outside the rear gate.”