Read Online Fires of Delight by Vanessa Royall - Free Book Online

his body to her own. But nothing seemed to happen; no charged current came from him to her. In truth, it could not. They were already the same. She did not yet know, had not yet learned, that they were both possessed by the power of pure impulse, that they shared heartbeats with a rare, feral universe.
    “I killed the puppies too,” he had told her casually, “except for one I brought back home. He was a symbol of the fact that I had sacrificed what I must, but also spared what I could. Wolves cannot be domesticated, but I cared for him until he was able to fend for himself, then set him free. I think of him sometimes, roaming those Highlands of mine, and I feel gladness for him and for me.”
    “And you chose his image as your own.”
    He had, and it suited him. Although, Selena had come to believe, there were differences. The man who seated her at the table now and wrapped more tightly around her the blanket in which she sought to warm herself, the man who brushed her foreheadwith his lips and poured her a glass of red wine, no, that was not a man who would roam wild ever again, nor set the selfish interests of lust and lucre above those of compassion and love.
    Yes, she had gentled him and turned him from his willful ways.
    “To us,” he said, sitting down at the table with her and raising his glass.
    They drank.
    “To victory,” she said, and they drank again.
    Selena attacked the bread and cheese, even gulped the wine, as if she would never eat again. She’d had no idea how hungry she was. Royce sipped wine, smiling indulgently, but he cautioned her too.
    “Don’t overdo it, darling. You’re not used to this fare.”
    Already, she felt the effect of the wine, a slow, soaring light-headedness, a voluptuous ease spreading through her body. “I never want to see barley porridge again, not for the rest of my days. I think I lost three or four stone in prison.”
    “Spirit is the thing you cannot afford to lose, and you haven’t, as far as I can tell. Weight can always be regained.”
    “But not too much!” Selena cried, laughing and increasingly giddy from the wine. “Or would you love me fat?”
    “Time will tell.”
    “No, I’ll never get fat,” she babbled, cutting an immense wedge of cheddar and putting it between two crusty slabs of bread. “When I was locked in the fortress, I thought—” She was about to tell him of how, lying half-famished on the plank bunk in her cell, she had sometimes recalled the great holiday feasts of her youth, of lamb roasted in spices and basted with sweet wine, of pheasant stuffed with honey and butter and baked, of bread, soft and white as clouds, of apples and pears and candies, of tangy sausages and cold, strong ale. She meant to tell Royce about those delicacies, but the wine intruded, and she remembered what he’d said earlier.
    “Why are we sailing to the Caribbean?”
    Was it the influence of the grape on her perception that made Selena think he looked startled by her question?
    “I think it would be best if we absented ourselves from this part of America for a time. It is hardly safe for either of us, I’d say.”
    “But, darling, but, darling—” Now what the deuce had she been planning to say? Oh, yes, it came to her “—but, darling, ifWashington succeeds against Cornwallis at Yorktown, the war will be over. Don’t you want to be here for that? Don’t you want to enjoy the victory for which we’ve all struggled so long?”
    “Of course I do.” He reached across the little table and took her hand. “Of course I do, but there are…but there are other things that require—Let’s talk about it later,” he concluded lightly. “I think you’re well on your way to sailing three sheets to the wind.”
    “What? What? No, I’m not!” She started to stand, but suddenly the candlelight danced oddly, in leaping patterns of colors, like a bouquet of flowers, and—she was very, very sure—the room had begun to move like a slow carousel.
    She sat