BronzeQuest
Ellora's Cave
ISBN 1-4199-0172-9
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Excerpt
The
King of Serendonia suffers from an injury that won't heal. Legend
says three magical objects might cure him, but all are difficult
to obtain.
Nonetheless,
the king's three children vow to find and retrieve them. The king's
oldest daughter has returned with the silver platter, and now it's
time for her brother, Prince John, to leave on his own quest for
the second object, the bronze lance.
The
journey promises to hold stern tests of his courage, honor, loyalty,
strength and endurance. The night before he leaves, a strange woman
appears to him in the darkness. Although she's beautiful, it's a
frightening, ferocious beauty that terrifies him. When she tells
John she is his destiny and he'll be coming to her, it makes the
prospect of the quest all the more terrifying.
Her
touch sears him like a brand, bringing both pain and ecstasy. John
sets out the next day on a journey that will take him up the side
of a mountain, through a series of sexual adventures, into dangerous
confrontations with creatures that aren't what they seem, beyond
terror and courage to an unexpected destiny with his dark lady and,
finally, into a climactic contest with a dragon.
Excerpt:
His
older sister, Riva, had already returned from her quest, bearing
the silver platter that was the first of three magical objects needed
to cure his father's wound. He'd never doubted Riva would succeed.
She always accomplished anything she set out to do.
John wasn't so confident of
his own success and feared failure far more than he would let anyone
know. It burned in his gut that he might be the one responsible
for his father's continued suffering if he didn't accomplish the
part of the task appointed to him. An extra hour of sword-practice
that afternoon helped take his mind off it for a while, until the
toasts at dinner brought it right back to mind.
Riva and Daniel, the husband
who'd returned from the quest with her, drank to his success, along
with his father and Lia. Their confidence in him added to his state
of nerves, though he kept his smile in place and refused to show
anything but utter confidence. Perhaps no one would notice how little
he was able to eat.
Riva sought him out after dinner
and called him to speak with her privately. John followed her to
her quarters, hoping for some last-minute advice that would ease
his way.
"You leave tomorrow on your
quest," she told him needlessly. "If you're half as terrified about
that as I was, it's churning up your insides."
"I don't believe you were ever
so frightened as that," he answered. "You're always so calm and
so competent."
Riva smiled at him and shook
her head. "I wish it were so. I cover it well, just as you do. But
going off to an unknown place, with the promise of hard tests and
danger, leaves few untouched and uncaring." She stopped and sighed.
"I know you hope I can tell you what to expect, what dangers to
avoid, and how to proceed to ensure success. I wish I could give
you help in that way, but I cannot. Not because I don't want to.
But I'm quite sure your tests will not be the same as my tests."
"You've never said much about
what happened to you, other than that you were fortunate to have
Daniel as a guide." In honesty, John would have to admit Daniel
intimidated him a bit. Riva's husband was strong, handsome, confident,
and the most accomplished swordsman John had ever seen. He didn't
speak often, but when he did, everyone listened and respected his
comments. Even Riva, his hard-headed, strong-willed sister, looked
up to the man and submitted to him.
Riva nodded and for a moment
her expression softened, no doubt thinking about the new husband
she so obviously loved and admired, but it quickly faded back into
concern. "It was a difficult journey with trials of various sorts.
Tests of courage, compassion, restraint, nerve, and wisdom. I'm
not sure it would be wise for me to tell you the exact nature of
those, since yours will surely not be the same. It might do more
harm than good to have you expecting one thing and getting another.
Know this, though. There will be trials, and some will not be easy.
Keep your wits and your courage about you, think about each situation
as it arises, and do what your heart and your mind tell you is right.
The most honorable solution should always be your answer."
A smile broke across her face
as she watched him. "I know your heart and wits, John, and I trust
them to carry you through all challenges. You've grown into a man
I'm proud to claim as a brother."
John blushed and wondered if
she'd feel the same way if she could truly see into him. He felt
himself lacking in all the areas she'd named: courage, compassion,
restraint, nerve, and wisdom.
He wanted to deny her praise
but couldn't without confessing his faults. Instead he answered,
"You've changed much yourself, Riva. I've admired you always, you
know that, but since you returned, you're… different. Quieter, but
in a good way. Not as harsh, yet more confident in many ways.
"The quest does change one.
It teaches you much and forces you to confront unpleasant things
about yourself. At least in my case, it did. It wasn't easy and
at times it was quite painful. But it was worth it. It helped me
learn how to become a better person, a person worthy of the happiness
I've found with Daniel."
John's stomach lurched. He
drew a deep breath. "I fear I don't have your strength or resolution."
He hated making that admission, but his courage fled with each word
of hers.
"You have it. Perhaps you need
this to help you unearth it and learn to live by it."
"I don't have your ability
with magic, either."
"You won't need it. My own
talent is small and I found little use for it on my quest in any
case. What you need for this, you already have inside you."
"I don't know if…" He could
barely meet her eyes.
"I won't tell you it will be
easy, but having lived with you all our lives, I do know that you
have the heart to succeed. One more thing I can tell you. Listen
carefully to all advice given to you, especially if it comes from
an unexpected or surprising source. Show respect for all, but do
not believe that everything is what it seems."
Riva bend forward to kiss his
cheek, then stood up. "That's all the help I can give you, save
to repeat that I believe you can do this."
When she left, the room seemed
very empty indeed, despite the clutter of packs assembled for the
journey, the piles of clothes left, the arms he'd scattered as he
tried to decide what to take. He prepared for bed and lay down,
hoping sleep would come.
He tossed and turned for a long
time, running all sorts of imaginary tests and trials through his
head. The journey might be so long he'd be an old man before he
found his destination. He might die on the way. Demons might attack.
Or wild beasts. He could get lost or fail the tests and die. So
many bad outcomes. So few good ones.
Whether what happened next was
dream or vision, he couldn't tell.
As he slipped into the half-dozing
state that precedes sleep, the shape of a woman formed, materializing
against a dark, rough backdrop that might be the mouth of a cave,
a black hall, or the side of a stone cliff, but almost certainly
wasn't the tapestry-hung wall of his room. Long and lean, slender,
but with full breasts and rounded hips. The only light on the scene
came from the figure herself. Pale radiance glowed from her lush,
bare, white body. Long, midnight-dark hair rippled with some unfelt
breeze, while her eyes, a dark, dark blue, stared straight at him
with implacable intensity. Reddish glints shone from the depths
of them. Breasts and hips formed perfect, graceful curves that demanded
mens' worship. She had an uncanny loveliness, but the ferocity of
her expression filled him with dread. When her lips curved into
a small, cruel smile, it did nothing to soften the terrible visage.
Or its wicked beauty. Her small, white teeth all ended in sharp
points.
His body reacted immediately,
stiffening with longing. A longing he would deny with every particle
of his being, had he any choice.
"Come to me," she said, holding
shapely white arms out toward him. "You're mine."
He lay on the bed and couldn't
retreat, but if he could have pressed himself down into the mattress
any farther he would have.
Her body swayed and drifted
with fluid grace as she took two steps toward him. "You fear me.
Yet your journey will bring you to me."
He wanted to deny it, but the
sounds stuck in his throat. This had to be a temptation away from
his quest. Surely.
She drifted closer to him. "We
have so much to learn. Let me show you what I have for you." Her
voice, low and hoarse, rasped in his ears.
"Who are you?" The words felt
dragged out of him. He didn't even know if he spoke them aloud or
just in his head.
She heard. "I'm your destiny.
I'm what you most want and most fear." She hovered over him. He
tried to roll over to avoid her, but his body refused to answer
the demand and remained frozen in place, unable to move at all save
to breathe and blink.
"I'm your greatest challenge.
Pleasure and pain, lady and whore. I'm what you want more than life
itself and fear even more."
A pale hand, with long, white
fingers, reached forward and touched his face. The feel of it sent
a jolt like a lightning bolt through him. It burned with a deep,
fiery pain, yet it lit his insides with need.
"I'm your dream and your nightmare.
The one you long for and the one you dread."
"No." The word came out on a
bare wisp of air and lacked conviction.
A smile curved her ripe, red
lips. "You say 'no' and mean 'yes'."
He tried to shake his head,
to deny it.
"You want me. Will you give
yourself to me?"
His mouth refused to shape the
words of denial that sprang to his tongue.
She ran pale, cool fingers down
his cheek. Fire and ice touched him, drove into him. It burned both
hot and cold. The sensation grew until he didn't know if he could
bear it without screaming. Yet pleasure, deep and rich, almost brutally
strong, mixed in with the pain. She lifted her hand from him and
it stopped. He drew in a deep breath. Part of him missed the sensation
and wanted more. It fired his blood and sent waves of need racing
along his skin. He'd never felt anything remotely like it.
"You want it." She waved her
fingers near him, but not touching this time, reached for a fistful
of the bed covers and pulled them down and off him, revealing his
nude body. She stared for a long moment at his engorged cock. "You
want to resist, but you yearn for it, even as it burns you."
Again he tried to deny it and
found himself unable to.
She laughed lightly and the
sound rasped against every nerve. "You're mine. From here--" She
touched his forehead and shards of pleasure/pain ripped into him.
"--to here--" Toes, this time, and he had no idea those useful appendages
could feel so much. "--to here."
Her fingers rested lightly on
his cock. He drew in a sharp, hard breath as his body turned molten,
a huge lava-flow of sensation that buried him. Thoughts disappeared.
Knowledge blanked out. He was a mass of flame, a blaze consuming
him. It set his insides burning with a pain that clawed along his
sinews and made him want to writhe to get away from it. Yet at the
same time it felt wonderful, better than anything ever had in his
life. He tried to scream, but it came out as a long, animal howl.
She laughed lightly. "Your body
acknowledges what your spirit refuses to admit."
Her fingers squeezed his cock
lightly, almost gently, but it sent a deep, raging fire spearing
into him. Before he could think or move, his body spasmed and his
seed spurted from it in a release as deep and thorough as ever he'd
experienced, though it had taken only seconds to bring him to it.
She stood next to him, watching dispassionately as the orgasm shook
him, transported him, then dropped him, joltingly, back into his
body.
"You're mine," she repeated.
"You're coming to me. And I'll have you." She shimmered oddly for
a moment, like a candle-flame flickering in a breeze. "You'll free
me--if you're the man I hope you are. Let it be so." The last sounded
almost like a prayer.
The light glowing from her body
dimmed. She faded out, blending into the darkness, until nothing
remained.
