Written in the Stars Read online

  At the far side of the pool they came to the limestone rim, which was festooned with vines and heavy purple blossoms.

  Laughing, she slipped off her kid boots, slowly uncoiled her celestial girdle and placed it carefully on the ground. Wearing only her loose gown with hanging sleeves, she walked into the shallows.

  Turning back to him, her thick, wavy hair cascading over her breasts, her huge eyes lit by the setting sun, she beckoned to him.

  “Come, Will. Join me in paradise.”

  Leaving most of his clothes in a pile next to hers, Will waded toward her. He felt the warm spring water rush over his feet and calves.

  To him, Elizabeth was a creature of magic, of desire, of love he would follow through eternity.

  She arched her back gracefully over his arm and he twirled her around, the water tugging at the fabric of her gown.

  Closing her eyes, she smiled. “My old nurse, Cybil, taught me to always submerge my body in life-giving water.”

  They held one another in a wet embrace, his desire matched by hers.

  “My grandfather taught me the same.” With one movement he drew her from the pool and carried her to the flat, wide limestone shelf.

  Her gown, heavy with spring water, clung to her. Slowly his eyes traveled over her body to rest on her wide gaze. “You are the giver of life, Elizabeth. For me. Always. I know this is our destiny.”

  …

  Elizabeth pulled him closer until she was inside his embrace, her lips open to the heavy strokes of his tongue.

  Ancient wisdom guided her to strip him of his garments, his body beautiful in the light of the waxing moon. Blood spinning through her veins, she felt like a new creature.

  He slid his palms along her spine, curled his fingers over her shoulders, and freed her gown so that it fell to her hips.

  She felt no embarrassment, no instinct to cover herself. Instead she pushed her gown down her body and over her ankles to pool on the smooth, cool stone.

  She wanted to be as naked as Will. She wanted no scrap of clothing, nothing, between them.

  She felt the beating of his heart as her heavy breasts moved against his warm, damp chest. His fingers fanned across her delicate skin, lifting her breasts, his thumbs brushing gently across her nipples. A sweet throbbing began deep inside her. He moved from nipple to nipple, sucking each deeply into his mouth. The pleasure drove her to feverishly whisper his name over and over.

  “Yes, love. I know. I want to bring you even greater pleasure.” He nuzzled her throat with his warm lips and moved down her quivering stomach, leaving a trail of fire. She gloried in the sensation that was like a carillon ringing through her. She arched to press closer to him, her thighs restless and hot beneath his kisses.

  He cradled her hips and then so very slowly he slipped two fingers inside her. She sobbed once and felt the pattern of his breathing change to meet hers.

  Holding her gently, he eased her thighs apart on the cool stones. “Elizabeth, I want to be a part of you,” he whispered.

  He entered her slowly, filling her completely, and becoming a part of her forever.

  The fit of their bodies was exquisite.

  Fever racked her body as they moved to a primal rhythm from the beginning of time. It was soul meeting soul in a blinding radiance, leaving his image imprinted on her forever.

  …

  Elizabeth fell asleep while their bodies were still tangled together. Will tried to rouse her with whispers into the sweet shell of her ear.

  “You have imprinted your soul on mine, Elizabeth. For eternity.”

  Her fragrant hair tickled his face as he dragged slow kisses down her nose to her parted lips.

  “Yes. As you have on mine. It is our destiny.” She sighed, her eyes still heavy with sensual fatigue.

  Folding her into his arms, he felt again the need to protect her. “Come with me to a safe haven.”

  They left their clothes spread to dry across the limestone and walked naked, save for the golden girdle coiled around Elizabeth’s beautiful hips, to the back door of the cottage.

  Will led her up the narrow steps to his room. There he slowly removed the jeweled girdle from her warm flesh and laid her gently back on the pillows.

  “Rest, love. Tomorrow will be a new day for us.”

  He climbed in bed beside her and they curved together as if they were one. Elizabeth in his arms, her hair ebony silk across his chest, her breath warm on his throat, Will felt complete.

  Is this what my parents felt together? Like they were one? How could they live without this? Without one another?

  Fear torched through him like a blaze destroying all in its path..

  Elizabeth is betrothed to my brother. This new day must bring an end to that. Together, Elizabeth and I shall forge a new beginning with honor.

  Smiling, he watched Elizabeth curl onto her side, her palms together as if in prayer. Unable to resist, he pressed a kiss upon her slightly parted lips before leaving her.

  Dawn had barely lit the sky when he found his grandfather beside his forge. Will saw that he had found their clothes and brought them near the fire to dry.

  “I have been waiting for you, Will. Hold out your hand to me.”

  Not understanding, but obeying nonetheless, Will held out his hand and his grandfather placed two warm rings of gold on his flat palm.

  “Read the inscriptions, Will.”

  He lifted the smaller ring, reading it in the flickering light of the flames. “Doubt the stars are fire.” Then he slowly rotated the larger ring in the glow of firelight. “Yet never doubt my love.” He placed the rings together and saw that stars encircled the word love and on Elizabeth’s ring the crescent moon was slightly raised. He realized it mirrored the waxing moons on her celestial girdle. Mirrored the one above them last night when they had made love.

  “I saw this day coming, Will. I have used a special combination of elements with a strand of your hair from when you were a babe and silken strands of Elizabeth’s from the night she watched over Laurel. These rings will last for eternity if your love is true. When joined, they will produce an unconquerable power. Are you prepared to face the future with Elizabeth?”

  Will took a long, silent breath of flame-tinged warm air. “I want eternity with her. We can forge it with the love and support of you and my father. Our choices are made, we shall have no other love.”

  Charles Grey’s Cottage, England, 1601

  This day set our path for eternity. We reached this firmament through valleys of despair and danger.

  Will believes his honor demands he leave me to marry his brother.

  I learned the fear I felt with Carlyle is real and his evil runs deeper than anyone knows.

  He is a creature of the dark magic. How powerful I have yet to discover.

  Yet I know nothing is powerful enough to keep Will and me apart.

  I wait for him here in this bed still warm from his body, his scent perfuming my flesh.

  I wait for his touch, his kiss, our bodies and souls to become one.

  I wait for him to return to the sweet, safe haven of my arms.

  My choice is made, and there shall be no other.

  Chapter Seven

  Carlyle’s fiery rage drove him from the dying embers of the fireplace to the door of his dark chamber again and again. At last he heard Florea’s shuffling footsteps. With deliberate care, he lit two torches, holding them up to further heat his flushed face.

  Flinging her palms out in front of her eyes, she fell back one step. “What has happened to anger you so?”

  “You lied to me, old woman.” His breath hissed between his clenched teeth. “I did as you commanded. I showed Elizabeth my altar. Told her what we shall be together and her magic flung me away. Rejected me! Not embraced me as
you promised!”

  Her milky eyes narrowed. “I tell you, the old gods have spoken to me. You are the chosen one who shall release Elizabeth’s powers. You know well the way is not always clear. You must make the proper sacrifice to the old gods to show you the future. I have taught you how it must be done, have I not?”

  Mollified, knowing she had showed him paths to power others could never understand or would be too fearful to follow, he blew out the candles, plunging them into welcome darkness.

  “So be it. Tomorrow it shall be done. Then at last I will take what is rightfully mine.”

  …

  In the quiet light of dawn, Will entered his old room, swiftly shed his clothes, and sat beside Elizabeth on the bed. He found the underside of her chin and with gentle fingers tilted her face up toward his.

  The faint shine of her eyes, like emeralds, took his breath away. He found the power to draw air into his lungs once more and smiled.

  “Wake, love, to a new day.”

  He rose to his knees on the bed and she joined him, her naked beauty unearthly in the frosty light of the warm room.

  He took her hand, carrying it to his lips, before he slipped the ring upon her finger. “Doubt the stars are fire, Elizabeth,” he whispered.

  Her eyes widened and she took the second ring from his outstretched palm. She glanced at it for two heartbeats before lifting his hand to her lips and placing the ring upon his finger.

  “Yet never doubt my love, Will.” Emotion scratched her voice.

  His need for her flamed through him. “Come to me in love.”

  …

  Will’s face softened in a longing Elizabeth felt low in her body. Her heart seemed to stop, then start once more, the tightness in her throat spreading down to her breasts.

  She wanted him to touch her and said the words aloud. “I love you touching me in love, Will. Please never cease until the end of time.”

  His hands moved down her back to cup her hips and press her to his, sending shivers through her.

  “Open yourself to me,” he murmured against her quivering lips.

  Dizzy with pleasure, she would have collapsed had he not caught her to press her down among the pillows and covers.

  “Lie with me forever, Elizabeth.”

  His whispers of love warmed her throat and her breasts, his mouth soothing the throbbing ache there. Her flesh grew hot under his touch.

  She arched herself into him, wanting his hands and mouth to feed the need growing within her.

  With shaking hands, she cupped his face with her fingers to gaze into his eyes. “I want this for eternity and beyond.”

  He kissed every part of her and she neither knew nor cared about naught but this hot, wet ecstasy.

  She wrapped her legs around his body and held him tight, feeling his deep shudders each time he thrust inside her. At a moment suspended between exquisite pleasure and pain, her release matched his and she wept for joy, feeling cherished in his arms.

  Will was so beautiful lying beside her, his skin alive with fresh color, his eyes watching her.

  “Wait for me here. I shall return and together we will go to the duke to declare our love before him. Honor demands that I first speak to my brother.”

  Fear surged through her. She flung herself onto his chest to stop him. “No! Do not go! You know Carlyle has become a creature of darkness.”

  He soothed her with a kiss on her brow. “Yet he is still my blood. Do you trust me?”

  “With my soul. Always,” she whispered, an ache at the back of her throat.

  “Then I promise we shall have nights like this through eternity. Wait for me, love. I will return to you.”

  …

  Carlyle rode into the quiet glade and, leaving his horse tethered, quickly retrieved his robe and jeweled dagger from their hiding place.

  The cold air felt heavy today as if a storm might brew, yet the sky remained cloudless. The bright sun showed him his snare held a struggling prize.

  The hare was fat, its fur thick. A worthy sacrifice to the gods.

  Chanting the incarnations to the old, dark practices taught to him by Florea, with one hand he held the frightened, fighting animal high above the altar.

  “You shall show me the future,” he cried and plunged the jeweled dagger deep into the hare’s beating heart.

  He opened his fingers, knowing the way the sacrifice’s limbs fell upon the stone altar and the direction the blood spurted and flowed would reveal what was to come.

  What he saw took his breath away. For one heartbeat, a crumbling remnant of regret and fear for what he must do stirred deep within him. Acceptance of what this would bring to him extinguished all other feelings save triumph. He sucked blood-perfumed air into his lungs and smiled.

  …

  Will carried the image of Elizabeth in his heart and mind as he rode back to the glade where he’d known Carlyle would be with her yesterday.

  He smelled the blood before he saw his brother’s hooded figure holding a jeweled dagger and the rabbit sacrificed upon the altar.

  Sickened by what his brother had become, Will ran quickly to grab his shoulder, twisting him around. Carlyle’s eyes were wild with a look Will had never seen before and his lips were smeared with the rabbit’s blood.

  “This is madness!” Will flung his brother away in disgust.

  Carlyle pushed back the hood and, smiling, lifted his fingers to spread the blood over his face.

  “It is the old magic of the gods, Will. Its power shall soon be known by all.”

  Will’s hand rested on his sword. “Never will I allow this darkness to touch Elizabeth or any who I love. Nor will I repeat the mistake of the past.” He stared into his brother’s eyes. “Out of the love we once shared I have come to tell you Elizabeth is mine. Our love is true and everlasting. I will go to our father to ask for your betrothal to be severed and gain permission to marry Elizabeth.”

  Carlyle’s heavy shoulders tensed and his breath hissed. “Always the favorite son asking our father for more bounty. No doubt he will grant you all you desire.”

  “I pray it be true.” Regret sliced through him, for in the depths of Carlyle’s mad eyes he had glimpsed a glimmer of pain. Despite his loyalty to his blood, Will wanted to be away from this place of darkness. Away from the evil he had tried to deny in his brother.

  “Save yourself and end this,” Will pleaded and turned away.

  “I shall. For now I know what is to be done,” Carlyle laughed.

  Excruciating, white-hot pain exploded in Will’s back, dropping him to his knees. Shock rendered him sluggish, and he struggled against the nausea rising in his throat. Knowing to survive he must defend himself, he pushed to his feet.

  A blinding kick to his head knocked him to his side.

  Looking up through a red haze of agony, he saw Carlyle standing over him, his bloodied dagger in his fist.

  Rage, disbelief, and the desperate need to return to Elizabeth gave him the strength to rise to fight his brother for his life.

  Snarling, Carlyle kicked him in the gut, and the violence of the blow exploded such pain through his body that Will fell back, struggling to draw air in his lungs with his brother’s spurred boot pressing hard into his chest.

  Smiling, Carlyle knelt and ripped the Posey ring from his finger. “I know what magic this represents. I will cast this ring into the darkest deepest pit of the sea. Powerless, there it will rest in its watery grave forever. As you will lie eaten by worms in your earthly grave for eternity.”

  Tasting blood in his mouth, feeling life draining from his body, Will summoned the strength to spit in his brother’s face. “It matters not what evil you do,” he gasped, pain all he knew. “Elizabeth shall never be yours. Now. Or ever. Our love will endure beyond this life.”r />
  Carlyle leaned closer and Will saw the madness in his eyes.

  “Fool! My magic will always be more powerful than eternal love.” Carlyle frowned, his eyes suddenly those of the young brother Will had known. “Ah, brother, you look pale and in such pain. I loved you once when we were boys. Before I realized the truth. To honor that, I shall be merciful.”

  He flicked the tip of his dagger across Will’s wrist, the sting short and sharp, the blood warm dripping into his cupped palm.

  “Yes, Will, you will die quickly now. And I shall be the one to soothe your loved ones. Think on that in your last moments of life.”

  His words gave Will a rush of adrenaline to roll over, to try to rise, to refuse to give in to the agony ripping his body apart.

  Laughing, Carlyle moved aside thick branches, shed his robe in their small dark cave, and mounted his horse.

  He pranced to where Will, fighting with all his draining power, had risen to one knee. “Stop struggling, brother. It is your destiny to die here this day.”

  Will watched him ride away through a thickening darkness in his eyes and an icy chill shuddering through his body. Gathering the last of his strength, Will called to the winds. “Elizabeth, come to me.”

  Charles Grey’s Cottage, England, 1601

  In these last hours I have discovered where the sun is born.

  His image is drawn on my soul, and he is imprinted upon my heart.

  It is Will’s smile. Will’s touch. Will’s kiss.

  We have become one in all ways.

  We have pledged our love with Posey rings which will last for eternity. And so we will confess to the duke, who I know will bless our love.

  In joy I have made my choice.

  Yet in this moment, my joy is turning to fear. Is it because I know Will, out of honor, has gone to Carlyle?

  The winds call to me and I hear…