The Winter Bear's Bride Read online

  Asshole men who wouldn’t listen. Analise grumbled under her breath as she reset a young warrior’s forearm. Binding it tight to a splint with efficient movements, she gave the warrior, barely more than a boy, a stern look. “No shifting until sunrise, or you’ll twist it out of place and I’ll have to reset it again, understand?”

  His gaze shifted to Kelda, the cook, and the heavy-duty sledgehammer she carried. He nodded quickly, his skin pale from more than the pain of his injuries. A fully shifting bear female, Kelda had the size and strength to wield the hammer, using it to re-break bones whenever Analise needed to reset a limb…and sometimes to break up fights that had broken out in the impromptu infirmary. Bears, as a rule, needed space, and so many of them crammed in so small a space when they were in pain was a recipe for disaster. It was like running a nursery for toddlers with short tempers and enough strength to hurl mountains at one another.

  “Good, as long as we understand each other.”

  Rising to her feet, she moved around the impromptu infirmary on silent feet. They’d sustained so many injuries that the hold women were forced to work in shifts patching them up. Yet as soon as they were anywhere near capable of popping claws or holding a weapon, the warriors were gone, back into the fight. Only to come back the next day with a different set of injuries. Sometimes ones so bad they didn’t make it back out to the battle on the blood-reddened snow.

  That wasn’t for her to question, though. She rubbed the small of her back. It was late at night, but there was no sleep in her immediate future. There were linens to wash and more bandages and medications to prepare for the wounded she was sure would flood in after her father’s planned attack in the morning.

  A wave of weariness assaulted her at the thought. Her father was determined to best Scar and wipe the Einar off the face of the planet, but even she could see things were not going to plan. Far from the uprising being crushed swiftly and decisively, the rogue clan was proving a far harder and more dangerous enemy than any of them had expected. It didn’t help either that the commoners in their villages supported the rogues. She didn’t blame them. Anything was better than living under the rule of the clans with her Father as Elder.

  Sighing, she grabbed a basket of bloodied sheets and carried them out of the hall. Tiredness dogged her steps as she lugged them down to the washrooms, then turned and retraced her route to head toward the pharmacy. The name was misleading because really it was just a room near the back of the hold where she kept her books and any medical stuff the scouting parties who ventured into the old towns below the circle brought back. There she attempted to piece together lost knowledge that might help when any of their people were ill, which, thankfully, was not often. Even a hint of bear blood made them resistant to most of the illnesses that had plagued plain old humanity in days past. But there were still a few nasties out there that she wanted to be prepared for.

  The hold was dark, few torches lit in the corridors because most of the men were either on the walls, or worse, in the main hall injured. It didn’t matter to Analise. She knew the hold like the back of her hand, even in the darkness. What she didn’t expect, though, was for strong arms to wrap around her, pulling her into the shadows.

  “Whmmmpphhh!” She squeaked, her cry of surprise cut off by the big hand over her mouth. The smell of snow and man made her panic, and she started to struggle, until a deep voice murmured in her ear.

  “Shhh, my lady, you’re safe. It’s just me.”

  She stilled, eyes wide over his hand.

  Scar.

  Analise stilled in his arms, and he breathed a sigh of relief.

  It had been difficult enough getting in here, what with the hold on high alert, so the last thing Scar needed was an armful of screaming woman to warn his enemies he’d slipped through their defenses. Which was, he admitted, a completely insane move, but he’d had to see her. Hadn’t been able to think of anything else but her since their encounter in the garden a few days ago.

  Stepping farther back into the darkness, he felt the shiver roll through her slender body and pulled her closer to the heat of his. The need to protect her warred with the other needs surging through his body. She was his enemy, but he couldn’t stay away. Was risking everything in this war to make her his.

  “What are you doing here?” she hissed, small hands clamped around his wrists as she tried to pull his arms from around her waist. Her strength was no match for his, and he bit back his smile as she shot him a frustrated look and gave up. “You can’t be here. If they find you…”

  She shoved against his upper arms this time, but he didn’t think it was to get away. Instead, she seemed more interested in leaning back to check the corridor was clear. It was. His hearing was excellent and the way the Asmundr warriors clomped about, he’d hear them well before they were seen.

  “Don’t worry. They won’t find me.”

  Her eyes flashed fire. “I’m not worried about you, idiot. I’m worried about them. I have far too many warriors to patch up as it is, without you damaging any more with this fool stunt.”

  “Ouch,” he gasped, pressing a hand to his heart as though he’d been mortally wounded. “And there I was thinking you were worried about me. Your heart is hard as nails, my lady.” His gaze dropped to her lips and he murmured, “Perhaps I should see if I can soften it up somewhat…”

  “No, don’t you dare!” she exclaimed, trying to struggle from his embrace, but he held her easily.

  She’d thwarted him the last time, in the garden, by nestling against him, her smaller body tense. It had triggered all his protective instincts, his bear not letting the man have what he wanted. Her. He wanted her. Wanted his cock buried deep in her softness and to claim her soft cries of surrender as he took what was his.

  Now, though, she wasn’t trying to get away. Not really. All she had to do was scream and he was done for. The fact that she didn’t gentled his hold on her, soothed the male beast within intent only on possession, and allowed the man to focus on seduction instead.

  She was so small and delicate that he worried about hurting her as he pulled her closer and covered her mouth with his. Like before in the garden, everything around them ceased to exist as he teased his lips over hers.

  They were soft, warm and silken…and just the feel of them under his drove him near crazy. A growl in the back of his throat, he slid his hand up her back, fingertips sweeping against the bare skin above the neckline of her dress until he cupped the nape of her neck. The fragility of her slender neck gave him pause. He could crush her so easily, physically anyway. The force of her personality…that was another thing entirely.

  She sighed softly, the sound lost in his mouth, but he felt it. Felt the small surrender as she gave herself up to his kiss. Triumph surged through him at the victory, a tiny one in the scheme of things, but a victory nonetheless. Taking advantage of her parted lips, he teased the underside of her upper lip with his tongue, then held her head still, tilted up to where he wanted so he could plunder the softness of her sweet mouth.

  Kissing her was like nothing he’d felt before. He wasn’t innocent by any stretch of the imagination. Oh no, Scar liked women in all their various shapes and sizes and he’d never denied himself the comfort of their soft bodies or gentle caresses. But no woman had ever affected him this way. Made him want to spend hours kissing her, learning the lines of her body and all her responses so he could bring her pleasure.

  He’d never been an asshole when it came to bedding a woman. He’d always made sure his lovers left his bed more than satisfied, but only as a by-product of his own pleasure. This was different. This was an all-consuming need to have her shivering and crying out with pleasure under him, time after time, before he finally allowed her release.

  She whimpered again, the soft, sexy little sound almost driving him insane, and he turned them to cage her between his bigger body and the wall. His tongue slid against hers, a torrid slip and slide that echoed what he wanted to do to her body. He controlled
the kiss, one hand in her hair and the other on her hip. In charge. Until she moaned and stroked her tongue against his. Kissed him back shyly.

  His world imploded, the feral growl in the back of his throat rumbling through the whole of his suddenly tense body. As hard as a rock, his cock throbbed savagely, demanding to be released from the confinement of his breeches as he pushed her up against the wall, parted her legs…

  He dragged his lips from hers, his breathing ragged. The need to shove her skirts up and bury himself balls deep in her softness almost overwhelmed him, but he gritted his teeth and rode through it. He would not take her here, in a rush against the wall as they hid from her father’s men.

  “You can stop all this, my lady,” he murmured, his voice husky. “Any time you want.”

  She looked at him in confusion, her eyes slightly unfocused and a flush of arousal on her cheeks, and he bit back a groan. If his cock could have kicked his ass for denying them the pleasure that was there for the taking, it would have.

  “For snow’s sake, don’t look at me like that,” he growled. “Or I’ll forget all about giving you the choice and just take you now.”

  “W-what do you mean I can stop this?” she asked, her voice barely more than a whisper. “Stop what? You? This situation?”

  He managed a swift smile. “Not me. I want you and I intend to have you. But you can stop anyone else getting hurt.”

  Letting her go, he put distance between them.

  “Agree to be mine and the attacks…this war…will stop.”

  Agree to be mine.

  Scar’s words haunted Analise over the next few days. After their kiss and the warning, he’d urged her back into the corridor and, stepping back into the shadows, had simply disappeared.

  For hours after, she’d held her breath, jumping at the slightest thing as she expected the alarms to go off at any second to announce his capture. The enemy he might be, but she couldn’t bear to think of him captured and at her father’s mercy. Her father had no mercy. She’d found that out years ago, back when she’d thought her opinions and her happiness still mattered.

  They didn’t, and it had resulted in a young boy, Aevar—her childhood friend—being cast out injured into the snow to die.

  Worrying about him did one other thing. It allowed her to not think about the kiss in the corridor. Sudden heat hit her cheeks as she ladled soup from a large cast iron pot into bowls. Bending her head, she rested her hands against the table. Shamefully, she’d wanted more. Far more. She’d wanted to be somewhere, just the two of them. What did that make her?

  Moans of pain from behind her drew her attention. Rows of beds still occupied the main hall, but there were fewer than before. The fighting had gotten worse, but fewer were coming back injured. She didn’t want to think about the ones who didn’t come back. Those that did survive watched her with narrowed eyes, hostility radiating from them like heat from a fire.

  It’s not my fault, she wanted to scream back. All he had to do was agree and this wouldn’t be happening.

  Guilt lay heavy over her shoulders as she turned and started carrying bowls over to beds. Her father could have just handed her over to Scar and none of these men would be here. There would be no piles of dead men outside, waiting for funeral pyres to be lit and send them on their way to the Halls of Victory in the heavens.

  All he’d had to do was say yes and rid himself of a daughter he’d hated from the moment she was born, but he hadn’t. Even now he was out on the battlefield, determined to crush Scar. Fear gripped her heart. This wouldn’t end until all the clans were dragged into it, bringing their entire race to almost extinction like the last world war had destroyed humanity.

  The sounds of a war party returning through the front gates filtered through to the hall, and she steeled herself for more wounded men as the doors crashed open. But the warriors carried in only one man on a stretcher. A huge mountain of a man, his arm falling from the pallet as they rushed across the room to place him on the main “operating” table, where the light caught the ring on his finger.

  The ring of the Bear-Clan Elder.

  Her father. Her father was injured… Was he dead? For a moment, sheer relief gripped her. It was over…he couldn’t hurt her anymore. Less than a second later, guilt and fear wrapped its coils around her. The bowl she carried crashed to the floor unheeded as she raced across the room.

  “Is he… He’s not…is he?” she asked, shoving warriors out of her way with more strength than she thought she had to get to his side.

  “Not quite, my lady. They almost did for him, though,” Brutan, her father’s captain, replied in a growl more bear than man. “Took four down with him before they got a spear in his side.”

  Her heart clenched hard as she stepped up, carefully peeling the ruined armor away to check on the wound. Blood poured in rivulets down his side and onto the table, then the floor around her feet.

  “Rika!” she shouted, glaring at the warriors around them to move out of the way. “Get my basket and heat up the blades.”

  In an instant, the woman was at her side, her experienced eyes flicking over the torn skin and mangled bone. Then her gaze flicked up to their patient’s face and she sucked in a breath. Analise knew what Rika saw because she saw it, too. The deathly white pallor, the waxiness of the skin…all signs a warrior was flirting the line between life and death.

  “My lady.” Rika took her arm and carefully pulled her to the side. “I’m sorry, but we need to take him out into the snow.”

  Into the snow.

  Analise closed her eyes, her heart aching. It was their weapon of last resort against horrendous injuries. When a warrior was too bad to treat, they took him outside. The brutal cold was the only thing that slowed the bleeding, taking the human body deliberately into hypothermia and trusting that the bear inside was strong enough to bring them both back to the land of the living. It was a brutal, kill-or-cure method and one they only used on fully-grown, strong warriors.

  She opened her eyes and locked gazes with Rika, her torment on display. For a moment there, she’d thought he was dead, that this nightmare was over. What kind of daughter wished her father dead?

  “My lady…” The tone in Brutan’s voice made her look up to find all the warriors around the table staring at her. Her world shifted. Only now her father lay on his deathbed did any of them actually see her. Anger curled in her heart, and she gritted her teeth to stop it spilling forth.

  Of course they would start to pay attention to her now. She was her father’s heir. While he’d been alive and healthy, even without his true-mate, it was possible he could have fathered a male heir. She was sure his many concubines held out the hope of a pregnancy each and every month. But it hadn’t happened…so now, with him being taken into the snow, a place from which many didn’t return, she was it.

  Her spine straightened, and a sense of purpose grew within her. She had his power and knew exactly what she was going to do with it.

  She was going to end this bloodshed, whatever it cost.

  Chapter 5

  Deciding to negotiate with Scar, the fearsome leader of the rebel clans because it turned out the Einar were comprised of more than one, was very different to actually doing so.

  Analise was dressed as befit her new status as heir-apparent to the Asmundr clan. The thick cloak had been purloined from the closet in her father’s rooms, as was the jeweled headpiece, once belonging to her mother. Borrowed finery to bolster her courage made her glad she wore her own gown, the one she’d worn the night of the ball Scar had crashed. At least it was the right length and she didn’t trip over it.

  Unlike the cloak. Made for someone taller than she was, it meant she needed to keep a grip on it for fear she’d catch the edge and face plant in the snow. Which was so not the impression she wanted to make.

  She was, however, glad she’d listened to Brutan and Rika’s advice to wear the cloak. A blast of frigid arctic wind whipped, trying to sneak beneath the heavy cloth an
d freeze her to the bone as she climbed down from the carriage, drawn by two shifted warriors, which had brought her to the meeting place.

  “Lady Asmundr, a pleasure to see you again.”

  The big, blond warrior she’d seen with Scar before stepped forward from the side of the tent erected in deference to her non-shifter status. Normally, negotiations would take place in the open, but even wrapped in the thick cloak, she ran the risk of freezing to death. It was a little consideration she hadn’t expected, but was welcomed. Not that it would affect her decisions in the negotiations either way, so if they’d intended it to soften her up and influence her, then they would soon find out it was pointless.

  She straightened her spine and stepped delicately over the snow toward the big warrior. Brutan and three others followed in her wake.

  “The pleasure is mine…Arick, wasn’t it?”

  The big bear smiled, his eyes alight with pleasure that she’d remembered his name. “It is, my lady. If you’ll accompany me, Lord Scar awaits you inside.”

  He extended his hand to steady her footing over the treacherous snow and ice, an act that earned a growl from Brutan. Analise ignored him. It wasn’t her fault a rogue warrior had better manners than bears born and bred in her father’s own hall.

  Arick’s hand was large and warm, gentle as it cradled hers with a consideration she hadn’t expected from such a rugged-looking warrior. As large and, she had to admit it, roughly handsome as he was, he didn’t elicit the same shivery feeling in the pit of her stomach as his leader did.