Mona Lisa Blossoming

Chapter Four

The rest of the introductions flowed forward like fast streaming water, filling the vessel of my mind with a general feel for the whole, but slipping away if I grasped for much detail. Like individual names, for instance. They were a glittering throng, dressed in their best to meet and greet their new Queen, the women sweeping the floor with their gowns like antebellum beauties, the men dashing and neat in their formal wear. They fit into the grand ballroom like naturally extended props because the fashion could have been set back a couple of decades or even a century. Sashes accented men's waists. Bow ties, neckties, even knotted cravats topped off crisp white shirts. In general, there were many more men than women, as seemed to be the norm among the Monère. But there were at least twenty women here; the whole number I had expected to rule. By the count of their women alone—those rare precious women—this must have been considered a quite prosperous territory, even though it was still recovering from the ravages of Hurricane Katrina.

With the ceremony completed, refreshments were served and we were expected to mingle. I was never good at mingling. I grabbed Gryphon and slipped out onto a balcony, closing the French doors behind us. The cool night welcomed us with an airy embrace, a breeze rifling through our hair, over our faces, kissing our skin with refreshing grace.

"Gryphon, are you all right?" My question was like the night itself. Soft, natural. A whisper of sound. I touched the side of his face and Gryphon brought his hand up to cover mine, as if he would keep it against him always. Turning, he pressed a gentle kiss into my palm.

"I am well," he said quietly.

"You were here before."

"Yes."

"You met these people."

"Some of them."

"Did you…" I hesitated. "Did they…"

A breeze rustled the leaves, swaying some of the giant trees in the distance.

"Do I need to kill anyone here?" I asked abruptly.

Gryphon laughed but it was a sad sound that made you want to weep instead of smile.

"No, my heart." He called me that but it was the other way around. Gryphon was my heart. My reason for being here. "No one. Mona Louisa was selfish. She desired the gift of walking under the sun only for herself first before any others. I shared no one else's bed here but hers."

Gryphon was able to venture out without impunity into the light of day now, a rare ability for a cold-blooded Monère. Not many things could kill the Monère but the sun was one of them. Stick them under the hot rays and it fried them, literally. One hour and they would be lobster-red and panting. Four hours and they were covered in sores and great boils, their skin sloughing off. And they would die without a healer's aid. That's what my dear mother, Mona Sera, had done to Amber. A remembered shiver rippled over me at how Amber had looked when she had done that to him.

I had passed on my ability to Gryphon to withstand the sun when I had taken him as my lover. For the Monère, sex was much more than the slaking of lust—it was also away to gain new powers and abilities. Another reason why promiscuity was the norm. Mona Louisa had tried to acquire that ability by sleeping with Gryphon in turn. I wonder if she had been successful, if the sun's heat was nothing but a mild kiss upon her skin now. I sincerely hoped not. I hoped that when she stepped out into daylight, it burned her fair skin to a dark red charring crisp.

Dropping my hand, Gryphon stepped back from me, leaving me feeling coldly bereft. His voice was a low barren sound in the night. "When you took me back, even after knowing I had been in Mona Louisa's bed, I could not believe it, that you still wanted me, desired me. I considered it a miracle. A miracle that I cherished with all my heart. But I knew it could not last." His blue eyes drifted close, his heavy lashes casting delicate shadows over his cheeks.

"There are things about me, about my past that I would have kept from you always, were I able to. But you can never out-run your past, even if you have wings," he said, with a small wry smile. In his other form, Gryphon was a falcon.

Then his smile dropped away. "There are people in there who know me. Know of my past. They would have found a way to whisper it into your ears. I have found that I do not wish to wait in agony, in unknowing torment. I will tell you myself and have done with it."

Faint light streamed out from inside the ballroom, allowing me to see those beautiful eyes weighed down with deep shadows. His voice dropped until it became a bare whisper of sound. "In other places, other courts, with other Queens, I have done things with women… with men. I've done things you could never begin to imagine. Done and had things done to me…" His voice shook with remembered pain, with remembered shame.

I reached up and kissed his trembling lips. To stop him, to take away his pain.

"Shhh. It's all right," I murmured, stroking the dark silk of his hair. "That's all behind you now."

Gryphon was only seventy-five years old. Considered young, especially to have acquired so much power. But even among the lovely Monère, where the plainest of us still drew a human's eyes, he was exceptionally beautiful. Many Queens would have welcomed him in their beds. Until he had become too powerful for them.

I knew that Gryphon had been part of a caste of what they called comfort men and comfort women. Mona Sera had used him to whore with humans in return for business deals and monetary concessions for what she wanted. But he was speaking of times and experiences even before Mona Sera. Quite frankly, I couldn't imagine what could be worse than being used as a whore for humans. Monère received no pleasure in mating with a human. I knew that fact personally. I had taken two human lovers to my bed before I learned of my Monère heritage and had gotten pain instead of pleasure. I'd thought I was frigid. As usual, it had been the sticky matter of bedding the wrong men. Or in my case, the wrong species. Finding Gryphon had been like stumbling upon an unexpected treasure when I had given up all hope.

"I love you," I said with soft fierceness. "I will always love you. Always want you. Nothing you say or do—what anyone says—can change that."

Uncertainly, Gryphon's hands came to rest lightly against my back. "Truly?" His forehead sank down to lean against mine, as if his head were too heavy for him to hold up. His rigid body softened against me and his harsh breath blew in soft puffs against my lips.

"Oh, Gryphon. You are my mate." I would tell him this over and over again until he finally believed me. What a sad pair we were. Both of us expecting the other to leave. "You are my heart. I will love you until the end of time."

His arms crushed me to him and he buried his face in my hair, murmuring my name. And I wished the crowd gone. I wished us alone so that we could touch each other, reassure each other, kiss each other. Not chaste kisses but hot, wet ones, our tongues merging, twining together even as we merged, and twined our bodies as one.

Loud voices from inside suddenly intruded upon our stolen solitude. We drew apart, looking at each other, and I watched as Gryphon drew composure down across his face like pulling on a smooth blank mask.

"It seems we are needed inside," he said.

I nodded. He opened the door and we stepped back into the room.

One nice thing, we didn't have to push our way through to the commotion in the center of the vast room. People stepped back, parting for us like the Red Sea, and then merging seamlessly back together again once we had passed.

Blond, handsome Dontaine was faced off against Amber. The air bristled and crackled with the energy and tension between the two men. Chami and Aquila and the rest of our little group stood in silent solidarity behind Amber. So much for mingling.

"What's going on here?" I demanded, stopping before the two of them.

"Dontaine has issued me a challenge," Amber said. His low angry rumble filled the room.

"A challenge?" I repeated. "For what?"

"For you," Gryphon said quietly. "Or rather for the right to you."

"What?" I wasn't sure I'd heard him correctly.

"I've issued Warrior Lord Amber a challenge to a Battle of Strength," Dontaine said, watching my face. "For my Queen's favor."

"How," I asked clearly and carefully, "can you hope to win my favor by fighting with one of my men?"

"I, too, am now one of your men, milady," Dontaine said.

Okay. Bad phrasing.

"Challenges are a traditional way for warriors to pit their strength one against the other in a permissible manner, abiding by rules," Gryphon quietly explained. "It is one way a strong male can rise above another."

"Like a cockfight?" I asked, lifting my brow.

Gryphon bowed his head. "Quite similar, yes."

"And the winner? Gets what?"

"The winner assumes his defeated opponent's rank if it is greater than his own."

"Don't tell me you can acquire the title of Warrior Lord that way." It was more than just a title and the nifty medallion necklace they wore. That was just window dressing for the power beneath it.

"No, milady, you are correct. Men cannot become Warrior Lords in that manner. If Dontaine defeats Amber, he would merely be acknowledged as the dominant male." Gryphon hesitated, and I was coming to learn it was never a good sign when he did that. "The overall winner, however. The one who defeats the Queen's champion, is usually taken to her bed."

"Is that a requirement?" I asked blandly. If it was, things were going to change pretty darn quickly around here.

"No. It is just what Queens usually do."

Silly women. Turned on by all the blood and macho violence, no doubt.

"Dontaine's not following the rules," Tomas said with quiet aggression. His voice also twanged with shimmers of the South, but it was a different flavor from the others here. "He has to start from the lowest in hierarchy and battle his way up. Not the reverse order."

Dontaine glared coolly at Tomas. "I shall be happy to do so. Do I start with you?"

Tomas bristled at the insult.

We didn't have a pecking order, really. And I'd hate to have to have an official one. But, yes. Amber pretty much was at the top.

"No need," Amber said. "If you are foolish enough to issue me a challenge, I am more than happy to accept it."

_ What was Amber doing? And here I was, just about to forbid it. Only if I did that now, I'd be going against Amber, challenging him, setting it up so that one or the other of us would have to back down. Mentally, I threw my hands up in the air. Amber was a big boy. As a Warrior Lord, he was essentially my equal. I had no right to tell him what to do. Even though I badly wanted to.

Almost as one, first Dontaine then Amber turned and strode to the balcony from where Gryphon and I had just come. With a graceful leap, they jumped over the railing to land blithely on the grass twelve feet below. Like water pushed by a strong current, the people streamed outside, some following Amber and Dontaine's path, jumping down lightly like cats, others going out the front door. Still others flowed out a side entrance. Everyone seemed to know where to go. Eager excitement filled the air as hundreds of people merged into the forest and disappeared like pale moths suddenly swallowed up by the night. Picking up my skirts, I hurried after them with Gryphon at my side, tracking the men by sight and sound.

"Why is Amber doing this?" I whispered, my tone low and furious, angry that I couldn't do anything about this.

"It is inevitable that challenge be given," Gryphon murmured beside me. "It is the normal course of events when taking over a territory, the strong men jockeying for position and rank. It is better that Amber meets the challenge now rather than one of the others. One decisive defeat may stop other challenges from arising."

We came to a clearing. Amber and Dontaine were removing their jackets and shirts, and a ring of spectators had already gathered around them. Bernard had his arms around his wife and daughter. Worry marred the smooth line of Margaret's brow but excitement glittered in Francine's fey gray eyes. The moonlight cast deep shadows over her sharp features, throwing an almost wolfish cast suddenly to her mien.

We were just coming off a full moon. The waxing moon cast an almost perfect circle of light around the clearing, glowing with pale light upon Dontaine's rippling muscles. He was tall and well built. But Amber stood a head taller; Dontaine didn't even come close to matching Amber's weight and sheer massive bulk. God, was Dontaine crazy? How could he hope to win?

"One thing I want made clear, Dontaine." My voice sang out into the clear eager night. "You will not come to my bed this way."

He looked at me, a question in his eyes.

Oh, hell. Anger was making me stupid. The way I'd phrased it made it sound as if he had a chance when he truly didn't. Maybe it was time for some plain speaking.

"Frankly, you will not come to my bed in any way. Not any of you, other than those who I have already chosen, Lord Amber and Lord Gryphon." Announcing that I had two lovers didn't cause a single Monère to blink. I, however, couldn't help blushing. My human upbringing was showing.

Dontaine kicked off his shoes, peeled off his socks, and cast a cocky grin my way. "I would hope to change your mind, milady."

"Trust me. This is not the way to do it."

Amber unbuckled his sword, handed it to Aquila, and stepped out of his shoes. "What shall it be, Dontaine?" Amber growled.

"Two-legged form. Upright," Dontaine answered. "I'll even let you keep your dagger, Lord Amber. Non-silver."

Generous of him, but not as much as allowing a silver dagger would have been. Wounds inflicted by a non-silver weapon healed almost magically fast, while wounds made with silver healed human slow.

"Challenger sets the rules," Aquila murmured to me from my left. The others had joined us.

"That doesn't seem fair," I muttered.

Aquila shrugged. "The defender is presumed to be stronger."

Amber drew the dagger Dontaine had allowed him. Light glimmered off the knife's edge and the sharpness, the lethalness of the blade, made me shiver. "They're not allowed to kill each other. Right?"

Silence.

I turned to look squarely, demandingly at Aquila.

"It happens at times, though rarely," Aquila admitted.

I suddenly found it hard to breathe. "What?"

"Where's your dagger, Dontaine?" Amber asked, drawing my attention back to the inner circle.

"I shall not be needing one," Dontaine replied, and a sudden wash of hot energy filled the air. It was similar to what he had done when he had kissed my hand. But more. Much more. Waves of incandescent energy started pouring out from him, and Dontaine's image suddenly wavered slightly, as if a pebble had been cast into a pool of water and was rippling the clear, unblemished surface of his skin. It was like the wind blowing over a field of grass. Like a trick of light that made you want to rub your eyes and make sure that what you were seeing was real. That the sight of bones snapping, stretching, and reshaping was reality. That the image of nerves, tendons, and muscles all glistening wetly was not an unpleasant dream. That the fur suddenly flowing over his skin, and the snout that was slowly distorting Dontaine's face with an obscene crackling of shifting bone was not something in a nightmare.

Dontaine's beautifully tailored dress slacks were beautiful no more as he grew taller and yet taller, the sucking wet sound of muscles and flesh and ligaments stretching and popping, realigning, making me nauseous. The sturdy cloth ripped with a sharp sound and the tattered hems of his pants came up to his calves like little boy's britches, much too small. The top button had popped off and the lower seams had split right up the sides. The zipper, though, was still holding valiantly, sturdy thing.

I'd seen others change into their animal form before. It had been quick, beautiful, and natural. A shimmer of energy and light and it was complete. This was nothing like that. This change was slow, painful, and obscene. A stretching out, slowing down of the process, arresting it in an unnatural state. And the result was monstrous.

The creature—for that was what it was—threw back his head and howled. Pure liquid joy. Something wild freed. A wolf on the hunt, only he wasn't a true wolf. It was as if Dontaine had arrested the transformation halfway to completion so that he stood even taller than Amber, massive in height and weight. Half-beast, half-human. I'd seen something similar once before, but that had been down in Hell. This… this thing that lurched before me was covered with fur, truly more beast than man. He wasn't quite as big, as bad, as ugly as the alternate form the demon dead took, but it was close.

Dontaine's hands abruptly shot out to the side and spasmed briefly. Great hooking claws popped out from the tips of his fingers, making my heart stop.

"Dear God," I breathed. "What is that?"

"Half Change," Gryphon said quietly. "A rare ability."

I remember embracing my beast. I had done so for the very first time a few days ago, loosing the tiger within me that I had caged all my life. I had called it forth to save my brother and when I changed, I had broken free of the demon chains that had bound me. Chains that I could not break free of in my human form. We were stronger in our animal form. And I had a terrible feeling Dontaine was harnessing that greater power in his Half Change state.

With a roar, Amber rushed him. They sprang in the air, flew at each other and met with a stunning, reverberating impact that had to have been felt by everyone there. They thudded to the ground, shaking the earth, lifting dust into the air, rolling, grunting, growling, claws raking, dagger flashing. Blood flowed like thick black liquid under the silvery moonshine and screams of pain rent the night, both Amber's and whatever Dontaine had become.

"Stop it! Make them stop," I said, clutching Gryphon wildly, my eyes on those terrible claws, remembering vividly how with one swipe of claws like that, a demon's head had rolled onto the ground, severed from his body. That was one of the ways to kill a Monère, taking out the head or heart.

"Challenge has been given and accepted." Gryphon's eyes, dark in the night, watched the battle without emotion. "I cannot stop it now."

"He's stronger than Amber, isn't he, in that form?"

"Yes."

"But that's not fair."

"They abide by the rules set."

I wanted to scream. "Can Amber do that?" I asked. "Change halfway?"

"No."

Gryphon might have lied to me in the past, even slept with another. But he'd done so to save my life. In his own way, he was honorable; true blue like the color of his eyes. He followed the rules. I turned to another beside me who was less honorable. One who did not follow the rules set by others.

"Help me," I said to Chami, my chameleon. My assassin.

"What would you have me do, milady?" Chami asked quietly. Before I could speak, he lifted me and carried me swiftly back several yards as Amber and the beast—it was hard to think of him as Dontaine—tumbled mere feet away from us.

This close I could see Amber's heavy bunched-up muscles straining as the wolf man slammed him down into the ground. Both of Amber's wrists were trapped in his grip, pinned, the dagger useless in Amber's right hand. The creature's claws were contained, busy restraining Amber, but he still had another weapon that Amber did not have, not in his human form. The wolf beast snarled, his lips curling back. Blood and other fluids glistened on his wicked, sharp fangs. He lunged with those deadly teeth for Amber's throat and my scream of horror ripped through the air.

With a massive effort, Amber twisted to one side and those sharp, ripping teeth missed, just grazing his skin, leaving a sharp line of blood like a liquid necklace to pool around his thick neck. Another bunching of his muscles, a heavy grunt, and Amber lifted Dontaine just enough to get his feet between them. With a sudden heave from both arms and legs, Amber tossed him off and was on his feet, magically fast. He crouched and sprang after Dontaine.

I gripped Chami's hand urgently. "Help me stop them."

"Do you wish me to kill Dontaine?"

I blinked. "No, I don't want anyone dead. I want to stop them before someone dies."

Chami hesitated. "If you are going to break a rule, it should be done cleanly, completely."

"I don't want you to kill Dontaine, Chami."

He looked at me, his narrow face tight and troubled. "Milady, I do not know how to stop him without killing him."

I blinked my eyes and it was as if I suddenly saw clearly what was before me, like a blind man regaining his vision. Wiry, slender Chami stood before me, a fragile looking creature compared to the monster I was asking him to face. Chami's strength lay in his stealth, in his ability to creep upon his victim undetected. His strength was in killing his prey unseen, not in fighting.

I backed away from Chami as I realized that he would not be able to help me either. Whirling, I turned and ran into the clearing, toward the combatants.

Behind me I heard Gryphon yell, "Mona Lisa, no!"

"Stop!" I shouted as I ran to the grappling opponents, a struggling mass of fur and flesh twisting on the ground. "I command you both to stop!"

Writhing and thrashing, the two locked combatants twisted and rolled over me, knocking me to the ground. I felt the heavy crushing weight of them briefly, endlessly, then they were off me and I was gasping. Turning my head, I looked up into Dontaine's eyes. Disoriented, I noticed his eyes were still the same shape, like a human's. But what looked out from within them was not human. His jade green eyes had melted to the color of glittering honey, with that odd clarity that animal's have, as if you could see clear through them. Wolf eyes. Amber lay pinned beneath him, both of them an arm's-length away from me.

"Stop it! Both of you!" I cried in a harsh breathless whisper. It was desperately lacking in forcefulness as a command, but I was trying to regain the air that had just been squished out of me.

"I will be acknowledged Master of Arms?" Dontaine growled. His voice was deeper, rougher, like it took great effort to force a human voice through that harsh animal snout.

"Yes," I instantly agreed.

"That is not all I desire," Dontaine rumbled, his voice painfully deep. This close, the brush of his power was different, odd, more electric. His beast's power washed over me and made me gasp, made me writhe. It beat upon me and was almost pleasurable, but it contained that edge of pain that threatened, that made it sweet. It called to something within me. Something that wanted to rise up and meet it.

It took all of my effort to concentrate on Dontaine's words, his meaning. He was saying that he wished to be my lover. And I understood then why Gryphon had left me to go to Mona Louisa's bed. What did sleeping with another matter? As long as the one you loved still lived and breathed.

"I will take you to my bed once," I said to that half-human, half-animal face.

"No!" Amber roared, and that one word tore through him like a cougar's scream. He gave a sudden, powerful shove and the two of them rolled away from me, wrestling, grappling once more, illustrating the sad truth that it takes two people in agreement to maintain peace, and only one to start a fight or continue it.

Hands snatched me up in an almost painful grip, dragging me back safely to the crowd of onlookers. I turned to see Gryphon, his eyes blazing down at me. "What are you doing?" he demanded harshly, no longer calm, far from detached.

"I'm trying to stop them," I replied shortly. "Almost did."

Gryphon's eyes swirled with fear and anger but the rough screams, the piercing cries, the growls and grunts of rage—animal, human; no difference—drew our attention back to the center. Amber and Dontaine had separated. Both had sprung to their feet. Both were bleeding and battered. And both were fiercely determined to win. They came together in a blinding rush and Dontaine's claws swiped down in a tight slashing arc, ripping with ease through Amber's chest and shoulders.

Amber stood there, unguarded, and let Dontaine rip into him for an unbelievable moment. Then reaching up with an almost casual grace, Amber grabbed Dontaine's unprotected neck with his right hand, dug in assuredly, and ripped Dontaine's throat out. A thick chunk of meat and cartilage spilled from Amber's hand onto the ground as if in slow motion. There was a moment of sheared silence, of stillness. And then came a slow gushing of blood, a dark spurting of fluids. Dontaine fell onto this back, writhing, twisting, his chest heaving, struggling to take in air and unable to do so. He gurgled, emitting wet guttural sounds as if he were drowning in the wash of his own blood and fluids, lying there on the ground helpless.

"Oh, my God!" I broke from Gryphon and threw myself down beside Dontaine. His odd brown eyes, like clear honey, looked frantically up at me. I reached a tentative hand out toward the raw gaping maw of his throat, but stopped short of touching it. The glistening bones of his white spine gleamed visibly. I turned helplessly to look up at Amber. He stood over his fallen opponent's head, gazing impassively down.

"Is he dying?" I asked. It was hard to believe otherwise, looking at Dontaine desperately gasping like a landed fish for air. I knew that to kill a Monère you had to take his head or heart or poison him with silver or the sun. But surely this much strategic damage would kill him, too.

"No. This will not kill him," Amber said. "He will be uncomfortable until he heals and is able to breathe once more, but he will not die." The calmness of his deepened voice contrasted wildly with his eyes. Eyes that had turned feral yellow. Eyes that were screaming inside with the aggression of his beast, triggered from the recent battle.

My hand lowered hesitantly like a fluttering butterfly undecided where to land. I finally touched Dontaine's shoulder, reeling thick fur brush coarsely against the smoothness of my palm. The creature reached up as if to grip my hand. Then remembering his own claws, he dug his hands into the ground instead, sinking the long sharp nails deep into the dirt, forcing that part of him, at least, to lie still while the rest of him spasmed and shook. His chest bucked and heaved, trying to draw in breath. But how could you breathe when your windpipe was torn out?

I felt Dontaine quiver under my hand. As I touched him, his power zinged into me and my palm started to tingle. Nothing unusual with that. I was a healer and I wanted to heal him. But then my whole body started to tingle, to pulse, and that was not usual. The smell of blood and the scent of raw meat filled my senses, blinding me until it was all I could see, smell, taste. I could almost roll the coppery sweet tang of blood on the back of my tongue and taste the salty sweetness of warm tender meat in my mouth. My skin began to itch, to burn, to heat. And the cloth rubbing against my skin suddenly seemed unnatural, unwanted.

"Her eyes," I heard a woman gasp.

"She's changing," Amber said. "Dontaine's beast is triggering her own."

It took a moment before I understood what he had said. I was starting to lose myself. "No," I growled. My voice was rougher, deeper, as if I had swallowed gravel and it was rubbing against my throat. I lifted my eyes up to Amber and shook my head, fighting it. "No."

Gryphon spoke quietly to Amber, gazing down at me. "Take her, watch over her."

"No," I gasped, fighting desperately not to rip my clothes off and free my itchy, prickly skin.

Amber scooped me into his arms like a little child and ran from the clearing, away from ail the people, the curious watching eyes. He loped into the woods, away from all that raw pungent meat. But the smell of blood still rode thick in the air, right beside me, up against me.

I turned my head and like a magnet, my eyes were drawn to the blood seeping down Amber's chest, his slashing wounds looking like dark lines of melted chocolate in the night. But chocolate could never taste this good, this rich, this alluring. Like an irresistible summons, it drew me. And I answered its call, lowering my mouth, letting my tongue press deep inside, digging into the fresh wound as I lapped up the sweet liquid elixir of his life. Amber groaned in painful pleasure, his breath coming heavily, his slow heart thudding loudly. We were deep in the forest now.

"What will it be, Mona Lisa? Sex or meat? We can change and hunt. Or we can fuck."

Dimly, I realized those were the only two ways to channel my beast's energy. It was there just below the skin, a waiting tension, like water ready to spill over the brim, just barely contained. And fresh from battle, with bloodlust singing in his veins, Amber needed the release, too. He was giving me the choice. And he was warning me. He'd said fuck instead of make love. That was what it would be if I chose that option in both of our heightened aggressive states.

But it wasn't really a choice. Changing into my beast scared me spitless, because the beast, once loosened, took me over completely. I lost all sense of self and just became the animal with its need to kill and eat blood and meat, to tear into flesh and sate its hunger. They told me it would get better. That as I changed more, I would gradually be able to control my beast better. That I would be able to retain my sense of self. Control it. But I had run from it my entire life, suppressed it, scared of losing my precious necessary control. I couldn't face it yet. Not yet.

"Sex. I choose sex." His eyes gleamed brightly as I drew his head down to me and pressed my mouth hard against his. He let me slide down from his arms onto my feet as his tongue swept inside, tasting his own blood on my lips. He growled and lifted me up, pressing my hips hard against the solid thick ridge of him that had risen up. I made a hungry mewling sound and rocked my pelvis against him in hard pleasure-seeking surges. He pushed me away before I could wrap my legs around him, and unbuckled my belt with two rough pulls. It clanged to the ground with the weight of my daggers.

"Lift your arms," he commanded. I did so and he swept my gown from me. All that covered me now was ivory lace panties, a fragile barrier. Amber cupped a big hand there between my legs, his thick fingers pressing against my moist lips.

"You're wet," he said.

My breath caught as with a rough twist, a sharp pull, he ripped the cloth away. And then I was completely naked. Amber pushed down his pants, stepped out of them, eyes blazing, and I let my eyes feast upon him.

How magnificent he was. My vision was sharper, clearer somehow and I saw things in the minutest detail. His yellow eyes glowed in the dark, a bright feral gleam. I could see every separate striation in his irises; they were liquid pools of swirling amber. His brown hair flowed in thick waves, wild and untamed, each strand clear and distinct to my eye. Ribbons of blood decorated him like trophies from his battle. He stood before me like a giant monolith, his shoulders so wide that they would block out the moon when he lifted himself over me and covered me. His arms bulged with a thickness that was greater than my thighs. The flat plane of his stomach narrowed down to slender hips, and his abdomen rippled with living ridges and valleys, dipping and flowing. His legs were like two strong columns, beautifully carved, bulky sinew and muscle. And between them rose his sex, heavy and proud. A rampant rod that was in perfect balance to the whole size of him in thickness and in length. He was a big man, all over, his strength great. And I suddenly couldn't swallow. We'd made love before, never fucked. But it wasn't fear that dried my mouth. It was hunger.

I moved to flow against him, but Amber stopped me. With his broad hands against my shoulders, he spun me around. But instead of drawing me back against him, I felt his teeth press against the back of my neck. He nipped me. Hard enough, pleasurable enough to have it actually hurt. He'd always treated me with the gentlest of care before. Startled, I looked back at him and met those gleaming yellow eyes. His cougar eyes. They glowed eerily in the dark; alien, other. He was bent down, crouched over me, and I became sharply aware of the sheer size of him, of how much bigger he was than I. The solid mass of him, the heavier weight, his greater overpowering strength. He was a natural predator and the sharp blade of fear prickled my skin, pleasant and not, raising goose bumps upon my shivering flesh. My nipples tightened and drew to pebble hardness. His pupils expanded, widened, almost swallowing up his irises and his nostrils flared wide, as if he had smelled the tang of fear mixed with my arousal, and found it intoxicating.

A low rumble started deep in his chest and my heart fluttered in the cage of my chest like a captive bird.

"Run," he growled.

I stared back up at him with wide eyes, fear and desire twin captives within me, merged and inseparable.

"Run!" he repeated, his voice gravel rough, barely recognizable.

I turned and ran, my senses quivering with that odd heightened alertness, my strength boundless. He gave me a few seconds head start then came after me. I didn't hear anything, just felt the heavy waves of his power pounding behind me, closing in. Just before it touched me, I veered sharply to the right. I laughed tauntingly as he overshot me, then laughed again, a teasing invitation as I looked over my shoulder.

"Catch me if you can," I challenged in a low husky voice.

He turned abruptly and came after me again, a silent shadow, white teeth gleaming in a wicked grin, his feral eyes dancing with the joy of the hunt. I screamed as he pounced and darted to my left. He was big but I was quicker. I feinted and darted, his hands gliding over me, missing me, and grasping air. Touch then go. Pounce and evade. Fleeing, chasing. Dangerous foreplay that somehow felt natural to the cat within me, a wild courtship that heated me to liquid softness so that my musky scent wafted behind me, an invisible trail to tease his nostrils, driving him even more aggressively forward.

I feinted to the right. He grabbed my arm and I turned and raked him with my nails. I snarled, teeth snapping at his hand and he released me and I was free once more, laughter trailing tantalizingly behind me. I faked left, darted right, and glanced back to see him right behind me, eyes intent, a great silent stalking shadow.

He leaped and tackled me. His massive weight hit me hard, rolling us both to the ground. I scrambled to my knees and tried to crawl out from underneath him, my heart pounding, my eyes gleaming with excitement, but he captured me, one hand clamping my waist with an iron grip. One twist and my hair was wrapped tightly around his right hand, trapping me, holding me still with rough firmness. His teeth sank into the back of my neck, not breaking skin, but almost. The delicious promise was there in the edge of his sharp teeth, the threatening pressure, the warning growl, the forceful shake. All of it came together like proper ingredients thrown serendipitously together.

Submission clicked in me like a switch thrown and I stilled, shuddering, no longer wanting to run from him. Purring, I arched up and pressed back against those delicious teeth, my hands braced on the ground. His restraining hand relaxed, opened, and left my waist. A flat palm smoothed down my buttocks. I pushed my eager bottom back against him with an inviting wriggle. Gasped as his fingers slipped down my back crevice, lightly passing over a hole he shouldn't have touched and continued forward, seeking and finding and sinking into my wetness with two big fingers. I groaned, panting, as I was stretched and opened. I felt his chest rumble against my back, a trembling vibration that passed through me and caused me to tighten around his thick fingers. Then they were gone, those stretching invaders, pulled out from me despite my body's greedy, grasping clutch.

"No!" I cried.

His teeth released me and he shifted, aligning his body behind me, both hands gripping my hips.

"Brace yourself," Amber grated. Then with one wild plunge, he crammed himself into me, pushing ruthlessly through my folds, forcing me to accept him. All of him. It was too much.

I screamed, bucking. His teeth clamped down on my shoulder, a sharp stinging bite, and again it was like a magic switch being thrown. I subsided beneath him, quivering, and he released my shoulder and pulled out of me at the same time.

"Take me," he muttered and plunged back in, sinking deep, cramming me full once more, making me cry out. Stunning me with a brilliant rainbow wash of sensation that was almost too much, so that I couldn't tell if it was pleasure or pain. Or both.

I moaned as he pulled nearly out all the way, a sucking, sliding sensation that washed another rough wave of incredible pleasure through me. I felt every last vein and ridge of his full shaft brush across my screamingly sensitive, quivering nerve endings on the way out. I felt like an accordion. But instead of air, I was being pumped and filled with pleasure. Explosive pleasure coming in. Hot devastating pleasure pulling back out.

Gathering himself, Amber speared into me again with a heavy grunt, with the full force of his hips and back behind the thrust, forcing a sharp stabbing pleasure on me that was almost beyond bearing.

"All of me," he grated hoarsely.

God, I was full. So full. So unbearably full.

"Take me, take me," he chanted, sliding out, surging back in. A fast desperate rhythm. Full force. No holding back. Pounding into me, making me cry out with twisting delight, making me writhe with exquisite agony. Light exploded from me, shining from within me. Shooting from us both. We glowed from deep within where the light of our mother moon dwelled within us. We were but vessels holding the shafting radiance sent down from the moon until its release. And it came spilling from us, flooding the dark night with dazzling brilliance, with incandescent joy.

Amber pulled back and plunged into me with pounding force, again and again, as fast as he could go, as if he would force himself out the other side of me. It was a steady, unthinking, forceful drive to the finish, naked of all restraint. An unvarnished taking.

One final ramming thrust that drove deep, deep inside of me, farther than I knew it was possible to go, farther than I thought it possible that I could take or accommodate, and then I was screaming, coming in a violent, convulsive, seizing release that felt as if it would rip me apart as I pulsed and pulsed in blinding, agonizing ecstasy.

I felt Amber clench his teeth and groan harshly, gutturally, as he came, too, ejaculating in a series of great shuddering spurts that seemed to go on and on, flooding his hot seed within me as I clenched and quivered and shook about him. I sucked air into my lungs, shaking, still shimmering though the light was fading, giving a final sweet moan as I felt him pull his heavy length out of me. My arms gave out completely and I collapsed to the ground, unable to move, the cool earth pressed against my cheek.

I felt him fall heavily to lie beside me and listened to our panting breaths for a moment. Then Amber moved and rolled me onto my back. Braced on his elbow, he loomed over me, looked down at me, a little hesitant. His eyes were back to his normal aquamarine. His beast, his bloodlust was gone. So was mine.

His body was whole, smooth. All the gashes and tears and claw marks were healed, even though I hadn't touched him with my hands. Those handy appendages had been buried in the dirt, too busy holding me up as he pounded into me. Apparently all I had needed was just skin-to-skin contact to heal him.

My shoulder twanged where he had sunk his teeth into me and bit me. He'd broken skin. I could smell my blood in the air, and it hadn't healed. Why? Was it because I hadn't wanted it to? Bite marks from a lover were a compliment. A form of the highest praise among the Monère, a sign that you were a most sensuous, pleasing lover. Had I been able to control what healed and what didn't? I testingly moved my shoulder and winced.

"Are you all right?" Amber asked.

All right. What a mild word. I laughed and winced again. "I think so."

"Did I hurt you?" A soft question.

"No." I shook my head, smiled. "Although you almost killed me… with pleasure."

He crouched between my legs and spread them, gazing intently at where we had merged. It was silly to feel shy after what we'd just done, but I couldn't help it. He was looking at me. Down there. I felt the force of his attention there almost like a palpable exam. My hands came down instinctively to cover myself.

"Amber…"

"Shhh. Let me see with my own eyes that I did not truly hurt you." With soft insistence he moved my hands away and I let him, squeezing my eyes shut, feeling him gently spread my swollen folds.

Just that careful touch sent sharp sensations zinging through my oversensitive nerves and I gave a little whimper. "Amber, please. Enough."

Something soft touched me between my legs, and I opened my eyes to see him lifting his head. He'd kissed me. His fingers released me and his eyes lifted to meet mine as he crouched between my legs. I froze, and the sharp awareness that I was a woman and he was a man, that my body was made to receive his, passed between us.

He shifted back to my side and pulled me into his arms, lifting me so that I sprawled on top of him, his heart thumping in slow steady beats against me, his large splayed hands caressing my back. Possessive fingers brushed over the bite mark at my shoulder.

"You used your full strength, didn't you? You never did before."

I murmured against his chest. He'd always been so careful with me, so very careful, slowly and diligently working himself in until his full length was rooted deep inside me, and then keeping to an easy, gentle rhythm.

I'd known he'd held back. I just hadn't known how much.

"I did not know before that your other form was a tiger. You are even larger than I am in my cougar form. Just as strong, if not stronger than me," Amber said, and he sounded pleased. "Your eyes had changed. Your beast had partially emerged, giving you some of its power. I knew you would be able to take my full strength. And just once I did not want to hold back."

He was so big, he no doubt had had to be careful his entire life, to always be in control. This was probably the first time in his life that he'd let himself fully go during sex, that he hadn't had to taper his great strength. And he was right. I had taken his full strength—and it had been an incredible amount—and I had survived it whole, unharmed. Of course, I hadn't thought I would, during the time. But I had. And I was suddenly glad I'd been able to. How hard it must be, to have to control yourself always, while your partner lost herself completely in her rapture. To have to always reign in your strength, never let it go. To never loosen your control. That was the true joy of sex—letting go of your every inhibition and casting free from your moorings completely, surrendering to the unthinking heat and feel of it. How hard that must have been—to get a taste of pleasure but never truly taste the full bounty just within reach.

"I'm glad," I said, sighing, running my hand over his damp chest, petting him. "I'm glad you took your pleasure fully. You returned it in much greater fold."

"Mona Lisa." He breathed my name and hugged me to him like something precious.

I knew that my eyes had changed back to their normal brown.

That my beast was gone. "My eyes," I said. "What color were they?"

"Green," Amber answered. "Pale green."

I froze as I felt the beast within me stir, lift up its head, and look at me with pale, shimmering eyes. Soon, it promised. I'll be free soon. Closing its eyes, it returned to its slumber.

I shivered, goose bumps spreading over me as if a ghost had walked over my grave. Pushing myself up, I looked around for my dress and, finding it, pulled it on.

"We should get back to the others." Not that I was eager to, with all those people back there. They would know what had transpired between us the moment they smelled us. That was the problem with such acute senses… you couldn't hide anything from them.

Amber donned his pants, held his big hand out to me. I took it.

Fingers intertwined, our scents intermingled, we headed back.