Her Reaper's Arms, Charlotte Boyett-Compo [world best books to read .TXT] 📗

protecting her, she closed her eyes and finally drifted off to sleep, the

strange quiet of the saloon helping to ease her.

21

Charlotte Boyett-Compo

Chapter Two

Bevyn was disoriented when he woke the next morning and more than a little hung

over. His belly was cramping and he lay there realizing he hadn’t eaten at all the day

before. He was famished and started to turn over only to find his arm held fast. For just

a brief moment panic seized him and he snapped his head toward whatever was

fettering him to the bed. When he saw the sweet, smiling face of the most beautiful girl

he’d ever encountered looking back at him, his body relaxed, the previous day’s

memories coming back to him like a soft, gentle breeze.

“Good morn, milord,” she said.

“Good morn,” he said, struck anew by her beauty and realized it was indeed a very

good morning. He didn’t feel the overpowering sense of dread that always

accompanied him upon opening his eyes.

“Do you want me to go downstairs and have water drawn for your bath?” she

asked.

He shook his head. “That can wait. I’m hungry,” he said. “Starving actually.”

“That would be my job,” she said, and started to get up only to find his hand lightly

gripping her wrist, restraining her.

“Let someone else do it. You are a servant no longer, wench,” he said. When she

laughed—an easy, unforced sound that pleased him greatly—he found himself wanting

to kiss her, couldn’t take his eyes from her lovely lips.

“If we had to wait for someone else to fix your meal, milord, we would be waiting

until one of the housewives got up the courage to volunteer. The women here at the

White Horse do good just to boil water.”

“Then I’ll help you,” he said, and let go of her wrist, bounding out of the bed too

quickly for the all-but-forgotten hangover he had. He staggered, his hand to his head,

and his handsome face turned a particularly odd shade of green.

“I think you’d best rest here while I see to your food, milord,” she said with a

giggle. “I’ve no desire to clean up your puke.”

Bevyn sat back down on the edge of the bed, his hand to his forehead. “How much

did I drink?” he asked.

“One and a half bottles, I believe,” she said, drawing on her tattered stockings and

rundown boots.

“Damn,” he said. “No wonder my head hurts like a herd of cows stepped on it.” He

smacked his lips and made a terrible face. “And left behind their droppings.”

“Your saddlebags are outside the door,” she told him with a laugh. “I did not want

to wake you to tell the stable boy to bring them in.”

22

Her Reaper’s Arms

He stared at her. No one had ever refrained from waking him while he slept and to

know that he had not awakened once during the night to prowl the streets, to sit in the

saloon and drink himself sick, only added to his sense of wellbeing.

She went to the door, opened it and bent over to retrieve his saddlebags. “Do you

have something in here for a hangover?”

“No, but I’ve something else I’m in bad need of,” he said, eyeing the saddlebags.

“Bring them here, wench.”

She came over to him and handed him the saddlebags. When she went to leave, he

bid her stay.

“I would teach you to do this for me.”

She nodded as he opened the saddlebags and rummaged inside. Her brows drew

together when he pulled out a vac-syringe and an ampoule. “What is that, milord?”

“Tenerse,” he said as he loaded the hypodermic. “A Reaper must have it to

maintain his cycle.” He thumped the air bubble down inside the glass cylinder then

explained to her how she was to administer the drug, drawing up a small bead of his

blood first. He expected her to recoil but she took the implement without comment and

did as he asked, although he could tell it bothered her to do so.

“Was that a test, milord?” she asked as she handed the vac-syringe back to him. She

had not missed his indrawn breath or the slight flinch that accompanied the injection of

the thick purple liquid. Without missing a beat, she put her fingertips to the puncture

wound and massaged his flesh gently.

“Did the sight of my blood disturb you?” he asked, enjoying the feel of her cool

fingers on the burning sting of the wound.

“No, but hurting you did,” she answered truthfully. “I knew your blood would be

black. Everyone knows that.” She met his eye. “Why is that, milord?”

“It is the parasite within me that causes it,” he answered truthfully, and saw a slight

flicker flash through her gaze.

“Can it be passed from you to me?” she asked.

“Not unless you want me to give you one,” he said. “There are advantages to it,

wench.”

She shook her head but didn’t say anything.

“You’d live a long, long time and never look any older than the day you accept it,”

he said. “You’d have strength and…” He stopped for she was shaking her head faster.

A frown had appeared between her lovely gray eyes and then she shuddered. “I

would not want to have such a thing inside me,” she said. She held his gaze. “You

won’t make me take it, will you?”

“Not if you don’t want it,” he said, disappointed.

“I don’t.”

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Charlotte Boyett-Compo

“Then you need not worry on that score, wench.” He pulled his legs up on the bed

and stretched out with his knees crooked, giving the tenerse time to work.

“You rest and I’ll fix your breakfast,” she said.

He nodded although he hated to have her leave him. Once she was gone, she

seemed to take the brightness of the day with her. Her refusal to take a parasite

concerned him but for now he’d let it ride.

Turning his head, Bevyn stared out the window at the sunshine. He could not

remember sleeping so soundly since he had become a Reaper. No nightmares had come

to drag him out of the bed. For the first time in a long, long time, he did not feel the

nearly unbearable loneliness that accompanied his every waking breath.

“Lea,” he said, her name rolling off his tongue like warm