Chapter One

Today was Katsu Shinobi’s thirtieth natal day. She’d heard such milestones upset Human females. They were considered “on the shelf” once they hit the third decade mark. Given that her race could expect to live centuries, at thirty Yama were scarcely adults. Consequently, it was not the weight of the years she’d experienced that lay heavily on Kat, it was the years she had left to go.

Her natal day was the one day she and her father always spent together. They’d share a pot of Imperial White at her dead mother’s favorite teahouse, then reminisce with pleasant stories over platters of savories.

Because that was not to be this year, Kat closed her rim-to-rim silver eyes and tipped her lovely face to the morning sun. She reminded herself she had reasons to be thankful. She might be exiled, but she was safe and her enemies far from her. The Human world, so encroaching in other places, had made few inroads here. Ever since the Humans discovered a hidden Yamish city forty years before, Kat’s people had put up with being called demons. She supposed it natural her race would seem infernal to the more primitive Humans; they’d barely invented electric power, after all. Also natural was the fascination the other race’s emotions held for her kind. Human energy affected Yama like a drug—something sensible people avoided. This province where Kat had been banished lay far from the peninsula that connected Yamish lands to those of Humans. The area was less novelty-loving than the capital. As a result, it remained culturally unconfused.

Perhaps just as important, spring had reached Ningzha. The sky was a bird’s egg blue, and the scent of cherry blossoms lent a kiss of sweetness to the soft air. The lush walled garden in which she sat was an ode to nature and the landscaper’s art. Dragonflies flitted from bloom to bloom, their colors as carefully selected by the master gardener as a princess’s party gown.

“Cousin Kat!” cried the very voices she’d been hoping to avoid today. “Why are you hiding all the way out here?”

Quashing her dismay, Kat turned on the rustic bench to greet her three female relatives. The girls were fifteen, seventeen and twenty, all blessed with the ruler-straight blue-black hair that was the Yamish ideal. Their ankle-length silk robes—only two layers in this nice weather—boasted the latest fashionable hues: lemon, lime and orange, as it happened. All her cousins were pretty; Yamish genetics rarely left room for ugliness. They were not, however, as elegant as their youth led them to believe. Jules, for one, should have eschewed anything to do with yellow, no matter how popular it was that season.

“Good morning, cousins,” Kat said calmly. Her overgown was a less fashionable but flattering bronze, the color suiting both her milk-and-roses skin and the antique brass undernotes in her black hair. Satisfied with her appearance if not her prospects, she smoothed the silk neatly down her thighs.

“Is it true?” Jules demanded, her flush betraying an undignified excitement. As the eldest daughter in her family and of marriageable age, she merited a pair of guards. The two males who accompanied her this morning were not the House of Feng’s shining best. This was probably due to Jules being the eldest daughter of a junior branch of that illustrious family. Though tall and muscular, the guard to Jules’s right had eyes in slightly different shades of silver. The one to her left was marred by a strawberry birthmark stretched along one cheekbone. Presumably, the imperfections had no bearing on their competence. Certainly, they were too professional to react to Kat’s quick perusal of their persons.

Rather, they almost didn’t react. The one with the birthmark, whose face was as smoothly sculpted as a statue, shifted the merest bit in his parade stance. Kat pulled her gaze from his otherwise handsome features with a small effort.

“Is what true?” she responded to her cousin.

“Did Prince Avel’s eyes turn black for you at his dinner? Did Aunt Miry exile you because she was hoping Cousin Mara would snag him?”

Both claims were accurate. Prince Avel had displayed the involuntary ocular reaction that signified sexual and genetic compatibility, without which no blue blood’s marriage could be sanctioned. Other classes might find spouses where they liked, but royal genes—and royal libidos—were demanding. Producing heirs required close matches. It was also true that Kat’s stepmother had hoped to catch the prince for her daughter. Neither of these facts, however, were politic to acknowledge.

“What did your mother tell you of the matter?” Kat evaded.

“She said it must have been a trick of the light, but I don’t believe it. When that other prince’s eyes turned black for you last year, Aunt Miry sent you away then too. I think she’s annoyed your mother passed better genes to you than she did to her own daughter. People still remember Miry ‘discovering’ her royal blood.”

Kat remembered this herself, for it had caused quite a stir. Mara’s birth nine months after Miry’s marriage should have put the whispers to rest for good. A prince couldn’t get a child on a nonroyal. Sadly for Miry, her daughter’s inability to attract a mate resurrected the wagging tongues. Now people claimed her line wasn’t royal enough.

“Aunt Miry says you’re coarse,” Jules’s middle sister, Jade, piped up—in what she must have thought was a superior tone. “She says your pheromones call to so many princes because you don’t have a perfect mate.”

Not as confident as her older sister, or as respected as Katsu, Jade was prone to envy. Because Kat knew this and remembered what it was to be seventeen, she answered the girl gently. “I imagine that could be true. Not every princess has one ideal husband.”

“Aunt Miry says I will,” Jade declared.

Her little sister, Joy, was young enough make a rude noise. She was also smart enough that, when Jade spun to face her, she’d retrained her countenance to proper Yamish stillness. Kat had to tip her chin down to hide her smile. Once her amusement was under control, she looked up. To her surprise, the handsome guard with the strawberry birthmark was gazing directly into her eyes.

Perhaps he was as shocked to be caught staring as Kat was to be stared at. The circumference of his pupils jumped wider. Kat blinked, then he did, and then both of them looked away. Kat thought the other guard might have glanced sharply at his partner, but managed to control herself enough not to check. Her thighs were dangerously warm, and her face threatened to become so. It simply wasn’t done to connect with servants in a personal way. She wished she hadn’t noticed how good looking the guard was, in spite of his facial flaw. His shoulders were positively monstrous in his gray fighting robes. He’d been bred to be strong, of course, but it was too, too trite for unattached Yamish females to develop yens for their protectors.

Kat had her quirks, but she trusted being trite wasn’t one of them.

“We’ve planned a boat ride on the lake,” Joy said, thankfully oblivious to Kat’s struggle. The girl was bouncing just a little on the balls of her jeweled slippers. “We’re hoping you’ll join us.”

“Do say you will,” Jules seconded more moderately.

Kat rose from the bench she’d intended as her sanctuary. The lake was an easy walk outside the garden’s wall.

“It would be my honor,” she said. Maybe she’d have been more peaceful without the girls’ company, but she was fond of them, and her youngest cousin was a very likable wild thing. Joy didn’t have much longer to be irrepressible: two years, at the outside, after which she’d settle into being a well behaved young lady. Today, that inevitability made Kat reluctant to miss a minute of her effervescence. In truth, it made her a little sad.

It had been too long since Kat herself had been inappropriate. In the deep dark privacy of her mind, she sometimes thought it would be fun to live as freely as the primitive Humans.

True to form, Joy ran ahead of her sisters, her expensive gown trailing damply in the flower dotted grass. To Kat’s surprise, and a little to her discomfort, the handsome guard fell into step beside her. He was very tall—at least a hand span above her own royal height.

“You don’t travel with an escort?” he commented quietly. His gaze was on Jules’s back—where indeed it belonged. As was also right, his partner guard walked by the other girl.
Kat should have had an escort. She was the eldest daughter of the Shinobi clan. Regretfully, her stepmother had resented her from the start. At first, the cause was the respect with which Kat’s father and the House retainers regarded her. Later, it was her father’s failure to leave off honoring—if only occasionally—his first wife’s memory. When Katsu’s greater appeal in princely circles became apparent, distaste turned into hostility. Kat saw little use in complaining to her father. He wasn’t unhappy in his second marriage, nor was Miry the sort to change her behavior for anyone. She’d simply have become slyer, and Kat preferred her enemies out in the open.

“Bringing an escort would have caused my House an inconvenience,” she said aloud. “I’m sure no harm will come to me here.”
S
The guard said nothing, though he did glance at her again. He walked an arm’s length away, his strides shortened to match hers. She supposed his question could be professional. If she had no guard, he might be expected to protect her. Though this was the likeliest explanation, she couldn’t deny her skin tingled on the side of her body nearest his. Annoyed by her lack of discipline, she sought to push the sensation from her as they reached the reed-fringed bank of the sparkling lake. Two light rowboats were tied to the wooden dock. Their lack of a power source increased their picturesque appearance. This boat ride, evidently, was to be an old-fashioned exercise.

“You’re in my boat,” Joy announced to Kat. “You too, Hattori. We’ll trounce Ciran and the others with no trouble.”

Hattori seemed to be the name of Kat’s walking companion. He bowed to Joy as if she hadn’t committed a breach of etiquette by not calling him Citizen.

“As you wish, Princess Joy,” he said gravely.

Joy giggled, and the back of Kat’s eyes actually stung at the merry sound. If she was this emotional, maybe her uncelebrated natal day was affecting her. Both guards stepped into the rowboats to steady them, their highly trained grace barely causing the hulls to slap against the water. Nimble as an elf from a Human story, Joy hiked up her gown and hopped into Hattori’s boat without help. Then Hattori held his hand politely out to Kat.

It was natural that their eyes would meet, but not that her heart would start beating faster. Hattori’s pupils were more enlarged than before, like ink shining in his molten silver irises. Kat put her hand in his and he clasped it firmly. His skin was warm, his palm callused from sword play over most of its surface. She couldn’t help imagining that roughness sliding over her breasts.

“Princess,” he said low and huskily.

She nearly stumbled at the gravelly sensual sound. He had to catch her elbows to help her sit without falling. When he released her, confident she wouldn’t capsize the boat, his narrow nostrils flared.

Kat’s hand fluttered to her throat before she could stop it. Hattori had an erection. She didn’t dare look at it directly, but the engorged shape had altered the fall of his fighting trousers. The knowledge of his arousal ran through her veins like fire, swiftly heating the soft flesh between her legs. The wetness Hattori had probably scented grew. She was more affected—more aroused, to be frank—than she’d been for Prince Avel at his dinner.

With the slightest hitch in his movements, Hattori lowered himself to the seat that faced hers. He’d be rowing backwards while she and Joy rowed ahead. From the tiny flickering grimace of his facial muscles, Kat concluded sitting down was uncomfortable. The glimpse she’d caught of his genital bulge suggested he was endowed as well as erect, perhaps approaching the size of a royal male. The men of her class were the most prodigious of all Yama: longer, thicker, and so addicted to sex when they were in heat that they literally lost all sense. The lower classes didn’t experience rut, but if Hattori’s organs of procreation were as large as a royal’s, his pain might indeed be considerable.

Kat’s desire to steal a longer look was shamefully strong.

“Grab your oar,” Joy twisted around to urge her from the front of the boat. “We need to be ready when Jules says go.”

“We’re not racing,” Jade insisted with icy seventeen-year-old scorn.

“Oh let’s,” Jules pleaded, causing Jade to frown at her older sister’s betrayal. “I’m not too old for a bit of fun. And if our boat wins, I’ll give you that diamond hairpin you’ve been pestering me to borrow.”

Pretty jewels were Jade’s weakness, which Joy could not fail to know. “Race,” the youngest Feng daughter chortled, her fist pumping the air with delight. “Race, race, race!”

Both the guards nearly smiled.

“Around the rock and back,” Jules said, laying out the rules. “First one to touch the dock again claims the prize.”

The guards, Hattori and Ciran, wrapped their hands around their oar handles, each in the center position of their respective boats. Ciran’s shoulders were as broad as Hattori’s, though his overall physique was leaner. Both guards looked a good deal more purposeful than the girls, who had one oar to the men’s two.

“Ready,” Jules said, her voice vibrating with anticipation. “Set . . . go!”

They set off with a lot of splashing, but not much momentum.

“In synchrony,” Hattori instructed, as if Kat and Joy were students. “Dig your oars into the water at the same time as me.”

Joy was laughing so hard she was gasping, but their crew still coordinated itself first. Suddenly they were shooting forward at an impressive clip.

They weren’t the only ones to find this breathtaking.

“No!” Jules cried. “After them, my hearties.”

Kat suspected her cousin was mangling the Human phrase, but it hardly mattered. The empress’s ridiculous Human Fiction Channel, approved for broadcast six months ago, provided all any of them knew of pirates—or manual boats, for that matter.

“Arrhh,” she growled in same spirit. “Look sharp, or you’ll walk the plank!”

The lake wasn’t very large, and they were almost to the ornamental boulder Jules had named as the turning point.

“Rock,” Hattori said, nodding to show he’d spied one to his right under the water.

“Rock!” Joy crowed, mistakenly assuming he meant to exhort her on. She dug in her oar and struck the very obstacle Hattori had been warning her about. The collision of stone and paddle unbalanced her. Quick as thought, the guard reached back and grabbed her waist sash to keep her from falling out. Unfortunately, his speedy reaction startled Joy even more. Her weight swung wildly as her arms pinwheeled. Caught unprepared, Kat found herself catapulted over the side.

The lake was little better than ice melt this time of year. The cold shock of the water closing over her was succeeded by a sharp crack against her skull—probably the rock that had started the trouble. Kat inhaled water, which her body tried to expel before she could surface. Choking pulled more water into her, but her legs wouldn’t kick her upward because her gown had tangled around her calves. Her hair was doing the same to her face and neck, like a nest of weeds strangling her. She heard a splash, and a vise seemed to seize her ribs as her vision narrowed to one gray spot. The fear that gripped her couldn’t be described. She was only thirty. She wasn’t prepared to die.

She returned to consciousness with her head safely above water and her throat raw from coughing up half the lake. Hattori was behind her, towing her toward the shore, his hold a warm and reassuring band beneath her shivering arms.

Kat thought she’d never felt anything so lovely.

She didn’t have long to enjoy it. Horror assailed her as she spotted the sinking nose of the overturned rowboat.

“I can swim,” she gasped, trying feebly to do it. “Please make sure Joy is all right.”

Given the circumstances, Hattori might be forgiven for snorting out a laugh. “Your cousin is halfway to the dock already. You’re the one who passed out with her scalp bleeding.”

“Oh dear,” Kat said. They were going to be in so much trouble.

* * *

Hattori carried Kat up the path to the unoccupied stone guesthouse that overlooked one end of the lake. She was dripping like the Humans’ horrific loch monster. What had been a mild spring day became dead of winter now that she was soaking wet. As she shuddered in Hattori’s arms, the guard’s striking face turned grim.

“Curl closer to me,” he said harshly.

Kat couldn’t disobey the order. She felt better as soon as she gave in and clung to him. Despite his own dunking, Hattori’s body was fever warm, already starting to dry his clothes. He made a sound as her face snuggled to his throat where his now limp undercollar left bare skin. If her closeness pained him, he wasn’t shying away from it. His nose was against her cheek, smelling her.

Jules used her thumbprint to key open the guesthouse’s faux wood door. In actuality, the entrance was solid plasteel, as secure as a diamond safe. The interior maintained the rustic pretense, though of course it had the standard amenities.

“I’ll find blankets,” Hattori’s partner said.

“Find some for Joy,” Kat reminded through chattering teeth.

Hattori’s arms tightened around her. Rather than release her, he sat in a big leather chair with her in his lap. The heat in the guesthouse had been shut off, the exposed wood framing of the slanted ceiling only visually cozy.

“I’ll activate the power grid,” Jade volunteered.

“I’ll find the first-aid kit,” Jules said.

“You should be seeing a physician,” Hattori muttered under his breath. “You might have a concussion.”

They were alone in the dim stone-lined room. Hattori didn’t move, just closed his eyes and hugged her to him—as if grateful she was alive. Kat doubted she’d ever been held like this even as a child. The upper classes didn’t believe in displaying affection. Hattori’s arms were big, his muscular thighs like iron under her. Throwing appropriateness to the wind, she pulled her shivering legs to her sodden chest. To her amazement, his lap was hotter than the rest of him. She shifted in surprise, and the skin of his eyelids tensed.

“Are you all right?” she asked softly.

His lashes lifted, his pupils huge. His gaze was glassy enough to be drugged.

“Sorry,” he said, even more quietly than she had. “Everything about you does it for me.”

She blinked at him, her body proving it did have heat in it. As she stared, lips parted for her quickened breathing, the guard’s erection lurched under her bottom. The wet silk she wore was thin, and there was no mistaking his hardening. In truth, she wasn’t certain he’d been completely soft in the cold water.

She tried to speak but didn’t know what to say. She had one hand flattened on his chest, and his heart thudded strongly against her palm. The tip of Hattori’s tongue came out to wet his upper lip, exposing the dark forked marking that had inspired Humans to label their race demons. Yama considered showing one’s lamril a sexual display. Probably Hattori was just nervous, but Katsu’s cheeks heated with a flush anyway.

That was a signal he couldn’t miss.

“Princess,” he whispered in soft longing.

“We are in so much trouble,” Jade moaned mournfully from the door.

Kat started guiltily, though she doubted her cousin had noticed what was transpiring between her and the guard.

With a slump that would have done a sullen young Human proud, Jade switched on the smokeless gel burning fireplace. As the blue flames rose, Ciran reappeared with an armload of green blankets. Unlike his partner, he was perfectly dry.

“I can take her,” he said to Hattori. Hattori shook his head tightly.

Close as she was, Kat saw the meaningful look that passed between the men. Did Ciran guess what Kat’s presence in his partner’s lap was hiding, and if so, did he disapprove? If he did, he wasn’t going to press the issue. With a face as uninformative as a royal’s, he bundled blankets around them both. The heavy wool felt delicious, and Kat’s shivers relaxed at last. Her head fell to Hattori’s muscular shoulder, causing him to let out a silent sigh. She was almost too comfortable to notice when Joy padded into the room in her own blanket. With her wet hair draggling around her, she looked closer to five than fifteen.

“You’re bleeding again,” she announced, coming to a halt in front of the chair.

“I could stitch her up,” Ciran offered. A hint of unsureness colored his professional tone. “Or possibly a doctor would be better.”

“No,” the Fengs said in a hasty chorus. As if to emphasize their preference, Jules handed Ciran the first aid kit.

“If Father heard what happened, he’d dismiss you first and ask questions later,” Joy explained. “You need to hole up here until Kat is healed. Jules can say she decided Kat should have you as guards instead. She can tell Mother she got tired of looking at Ciran’s funny eyes and Hattori’s funny face. Mother’s certain to believe her. We don’t mind how you look, but she’s snooty about those things.”

“Your father might be justified in firing us,” Hattori said slowly.

“Pshaw,” Jade scoffed. “Joy would have taken that boat with or without you, and Kat would have gone with her. Joy is her favorite. What if they’d fallen in when you weren’t there?”

“I am stupid enough to have gone rowing by myself,” Joy confirmed cheerfully.

“Kat ought to have a guard,” Jules added with older sibling finality. “Just because her stepmother is a viper doesn’t mean our family should pinch credits. I’ll get new ones, and Kat can borrow you.”

All the Feng sisters seemed to think the question settled—the prerogative of princesses, Kat supposed. Less sure, and perhaps unused to being defended by teenage girls, Hattori and Ciran exchanged another look. Under her now warm bottom, Hattori’s cock continued to throb. Under the blankets, his right hand patted her side.

It was a strangely gentle gesture, as if he were an old friend of hers.

“It would be better if we didn’t risk separation,” Ciran agreed carefully, “which might happen if we’re dismissed.”

Kat thought this an interesting warning, though no one else noticed it.

“It’s decided then,” Jules said. “We’ll tell Mother and Father that Kat’s feeling sulky on account of being sent away from the prince. We’ll convince them she doesn’t want to inflict her low mood on us.”

This excuse was closer to the truth than Kat wanted to dwell on. If her stepmother had her way, she’d die unmated.

She wasn’t the only one who fought a grimace. Jade cursed as her tiny pocket communicator buzzed to signal a call. She dug the walnut size crystal out of her inside sash pocket.
“Balls,” she said, checking the readout that was now projected into the air. “It’s Mother.”
The three girls hustled out of the guest house, where they could ill afford to be seen by the miniature holocamera. Kat heard them arguing about how far Joy needed to stand to be out of view.

Their girls’ departure shifted the mood. They were three adults now, if not precisely three equals. Ciran looked at Kat. His eyes weren’t funny, they were beautiful. One was silver-blue while the other was touched by gold. Kat felt dizzy staring into them. The guard was calm, but she sensed him measuring her.

It was an unusual look for a social inferior. Though Yamish age could be hard to judge, the way he studied her gave the impression that he was older . . . or at least more worldly.

“I wouldn’t do anything to harm either of you,” she promised. “You probably saved my life today.”

A smile broke shockingly across Ciran’s face. Kat gasped, because full-grown Yama—low or high—simply didn’t expose their feelings this way.

“You won’t harm us,” he repeated humorously.

“Yes, yes,” she said, recognizing that she’d been mocked. “I’m sure you two are dangerous characters.”

Ciran’s smile faded to a wry glimmer. “You’ve no idea how dangerous we are . . . and we’ll try to keep it that way.”

* * *

Fortunately, the first aid kit included a small surgical stitcher. Hattori continued to hold her while Ciran closed the sluggishly bleeding gash at the edge of her hairline. Kat was proud of herself for not making noise or squirming. After her impromptu surgery was over, Hattori patted her again, then carried her into the large shower room. He seemed willing to help her undress, but Kat drew the line at that.

“I won’t faint,” she swore as she pushed him out. “I’m only staying under the water long enough to warm up.”

His eyes glowed with the intensity of his interest, which he seemed less able to conceal now that the girls were gone. “You make one noise and I’ll be by your side, princess.”

His words sounded more like a warning than a promise of rescue. Kat shivered in response, but not unpleasantly.

The sound he made on seeing her reaction was very close to a growl.

She shouldn’t have been surprised that the steaming spray took little time to thaw her. What was surprising was the nervousness she felt when she emerged—warm and dry once more in a silk bathrobe. She’d been with men before. The premium royals placed on emotional restraint didn’t extend to sex. In that arena, they were inclined to indulge themselves, males especially being driven by their hormones. The lower classes were reputed to like sex too, but Kat had never indulged with them. She’d heard rohn males could ejaculate any time they wanted, instead of only at the height of their cycles. Unlike royals, they didn’t need a biologically suited mate to achieve a wet release.

She admitted she’d entertained a fantasy or two around that topic. It seemed so abandoned for a man to spill when he pleased, though perhaps it robbed their climaxes of suspense.
She shook her head at herself as she wandered into the now empty living room. She had no business contemplating the different classes’ sexual habits. She wasn’t planning to seduce Hattori, no matter how willing he was to succumb. She pressed her lips together, searching the room for signs of where her supposedly assiduous bodyguards had gone.

So much for Hattori leaping to her rescue if she uttered a sound.

Her irritation at their absence pointed up her arousal. The flesh between her legs felt swollen, both tender and hungry. Evidently, her body had its own ideas about what she ought to do.
She heard the faintest murmur behind her, where a hall led to two bedrooms. She followed it, assuming the men were there. One door was ajar. Overcome by curiosity and built for stealth like most Yama, she crept silently to it.

She wasn’t sorry she’d been quiet. The tableau she found was unexpected—and too personal to walk in on. Ciran and Hattori were standing very close together in front of a small window. Wisteria shrouded the thick security panes behind them, the alarm wires forming little diamonds inside the layers of glass. Despite the foliage, the sun penetrated brightly enough to light their profiles. Ciran looked troubled, while Hattori seemed a shade angry. One of Hattori’s hands rubbed up and down his own chest. This wasn’t just an unYamish gesture, it was unguardlike too. If her people had a deity, it was self-control.

“You can’t give in to this,” Ciran was saying. “You have to fight your attraction.”

“I can’t help the way I’m reacting. It’s as if my body recognizes her.”

“You’ll give yourself away. You’ll endanger both of us.”

“I know that,” Hattori said with clearly fraying patience. “I’m telling you I can’t help it.”

The hand that had been rubbing his chest slid down to between his legs. He was still hard, the bulge his fingers closed on larger than Kat had imagined a rohn could get. Perhaps he’d meant to prove his point to Ciran by underscoring how stiff he’d grown. If so, the grip did more than he’d intended. He squeezed the shape that pushed out his gray trousers, gasping for air as pleasure made his spine roll.

“Don’t.” Ciran clamped Hattori’s wrist and tried to pull it away. “You’re going to make it worse.”

Abruptly Kat realized how raggedly the second bodyguard was breathing, how his fighting trousers had arched up from his groin. Tingles of surprised excitement swept down her spine. Unable to wrest Hattori’s grip away from his cock, or to stop the knuckle-whitening massage it was engaged in, Ciran shoved his hand under Hattori’s between his thighs. As shocked as Kat was by this change in tactic, Hattori gasped at the cupping pressure around his balls.
This was a favorite caress of royals, because their seed stored up between cycles. Giving their sacs a good, deep rubbing helped relieve tenderness. Kat had never been with a prince in rut, but her experiences with them at other times had familiarized her with their general preferences. What she hadn’t known was that rohn would also enjoy this, but perhaps some pleasures transcended class. Ciran certainly was proficient at the trick—not to mention extremely bold. As Hattori spread his legs wider, Ciran edged his chest to his.

They stood as close as lovers about to kiss.

“Let me try to bring you off,” Ciran said. “Maybe you’re not too far gone.”

Hattori’s head fell back as Ciran’s fingers kneaded him. His ready acceptance of the help suggested they’d done this before. The pressure Ciran used was strong enough to have the tendons in his wrist cording.

“I’m . . . pretty sure . . . it’s too late.” Hattori’s voice was strained by his obvious urge to groan. His own hand still tugged his shaft, though he was careful not to interfere with the aid his friend was supplying.

“Still,” Ciran said throatily, “if there’s any chance you could spill . . .”

Something snapped in Hattori. Without shifting his right hand from its apparently crucial task, he started tearing at the tie to his outer robe. Before he could even fumble, Ciran used his free hand to help.

Evidently, Ciran wasn’t that much more sensible than his friend.

“Yes,” Hattori said, his chest heaving up and down beneath his undertunic, his fight for oxygen frantic now. Waves of heat flooded Kat’s body. As one, the guards reached for his trousers. They were too impatient to undo the drawstring. As they yanked, the waist caught the head of Hattori’s erection. He hissed through his teeth. Ciran pulled harder, and the monster won its freedom.

At the sight of it, Kat bit her lower lip. Hattori’s vein-girded cock was as thick as a woman’s wrist and as dark as if it were sunburned. Blood pumped through its tissues in heavy surges, the marvel so stretched the head was strafing Hattori’s ridged abdomen.

His phallus was as regal as any emperor’s.

She didn’t blame Ciran in the least for falling to his knees like a worshiper. Somewhat to her disappointment, he didn’t pull Hattori’s trousers down all the way.

She supposed this didn’t matter to Hattori. He could see what he wanted to. His hands fisted in Ciran’s hair, his fingers getting a firm grip on the blue-black locks. Ciran’s hair only reached his shoulders, but it was long enough to steer with.

“Lick it,” Hattori whispered. “Squeeze me and lick the top.”

Ciran licked him with the flat of his tongue, wetting him with saliva as he surrounded Hattori’s scrotum with both his hands. Ciran didn’t seem to mind when Hattori thrust the slickened knob in between his lips. He let it in and sucked him harder, pulling deeply enough to hollow his cheeks. Coupled with the firm kneading of his sac, this was more than his fellow guard’s control could withstand. Hattori shuddered and urged him closer, biting his lip until it whitened. If he’d been royal and Ciran had been his mate, he’d have been spurting kith by then. Saliva contained triggering hormones to draw the aphrodisiac substance free.

“Wetter,” Hattori urged, his head arching back as his hips rocked forward. Ciran widened his jaw and took him, but the change didn’t help. “Shit. I don’t think I can come.”

Ciran released him, resting his brow on Hattori’s hip. “Your balls are pulsing,” he said, his fingers still working them. “They feel to me like you can.”

The growling noise Kat had heard before rumbled in Hattori’s throat. “Fuck Muto Feng. Fuck him and his experiments.”

Kat didn’t know what any of this had to do with the ruling prince of the House of Feng—not that she was going to ask.

“Shh,” Ciran soothed, kissing Hattori’s shaft—a futile bid for comfort, if ever there were one. His cock had already received too much stimulation. At this point, its skin was so red it glowed.
Unable to resist, Hattori steered the swollen head back between the lips that tormented it. He swallowed a groan as Ciran swallowed him.

“Fate take it,” he swore. “I don’t want you to stop.”

Ciran didn’t want to stop either. He sucked him inward fearlessly, sounding as if he were getting him as wet as he could. Ciran was making soft eager noises, his bobbing motions impressively loose and swift. His ease could only be the result of a lot of practice. Imagining how he’d gotten it, Kat pressed trembling thighs together. To her, watching Ciran give such skillful head to his friend was incredibly erotic.

The skin of Hattori’s penis shone with spit each time it pulled free of Ciran’s lips, its shaft swelling strangely thicker in the middle—not just from the veins but the flesh itself. The organ looked like it was ready to burst and Hattori like he very much wished it would. He’d been watching Ciran work, the way most males would, but his eyes now screwed shut in agony. Kat was so caught up in their drama, she’d begun to hold her breath.

Her lungs let it out again without warning, and both men froze at the sound.

“Shit,” Hattori said, catching sight of her first.

Ciran let go of him and turned. “Princess . . .”

“I’m sorry,” she said, retreating with her face aflame. “I shouldn’t have spied on you.”

Hattori moved so fast she let out a very unYamish shriek.

Before she could stop him, he had her by the wrists, pinned back against the wall just outside the bedroom. Every inch of his violently aroused body blazed heat at her.

“I won’t tell,” she promised, squirming under his weight. He hadn’t yanked his pants up, and his cock remained bare. Considering how wound up he was, she guessed he couldn’t help grinding against her. Even through her robe, she could feel his prick hadn’t shrunk any. Between that and her voyeurism, she was embarrassingly wet. “I know it’s none of my business!”

“Do you even know what you stuck your nose in?” Hattori demanded.

That forced her addled mind to think. He didn’t mean having sex with a fellow guard. Fraternizing might be considered unmanly in some quarters, but it wasn’t against the law.

“Your genes,” she burst out. “Someone spliced royal genes in you.”

“And she guesses it in one,” Ciran observed drolly.

This was more problematic. Their culture’s survival depended on the social strata staying distinct. Guards were selectively bred, and that included genetic adjustment. Giving them upper class traits, however, was prohibited. Commoners weren’t even supposed to know what upper class traits were. Knowledge was power, and daimyo preferred to reserve that for themselves. On the other hand, what top-ranked royal thought he had to obey the rules? A prince like Muto Feng wouldn’t think twice about experimenting for his own benefit.

Then a new thought occurred to her. If Hattori had royal genes, something more than strong attraction might be unfolding here.

“Are you going into heat?” she asked curiously.

Hattori’s fingers tightened on her wrists. “Halfway there,” he growled, apparently familiar with the term. “Just enough to bung up my normal responses.”

“You’re responding to me,” she deduced. “I triggered this reaction.”

Hattori blew out his breath on a sigh. He released her wrists a moment later, though he didn’t move otherwise. Maybe his body wouldn’t allow him to. He braced his palms on the wall instead, doing a kind of arrested push up in front of her. He was looking down at her breasts, at the tightened thrust of her nipples against the silk bathrobe. Despite the evidence of her interest, he didn’t press closer.

“I know you didn’t mean to wind me up, princess.”

His eyes rose to hers and held there, the expanded black of his pupils nearly swallowing his irises. Staring back at him, Kat felt unexpectedly shy. He was just a man then, not her inferior.

“Could I help?” she asked, trying to control her flinch when his body jerked. “Obviously Ciran has some genes that yours are fond of, but maybe his profile isn’t close enough.”

Hattori gawked at her for a moment. “You want to help me get off?”

“Some people would say I owe you.”

Hattori shook his head firmly. “Saving you was my job.”

Kat swallowed, her tongue curling out nervously. Hattori’s eyes darkened at the sight of her lamril. He looked like a prince with his gaze gone so close to black. The thinnest rim of silver was all that circled his pupils.

“Admit you want him,” Ciran advised. “He won’t accept your offer unless you do.”

He seemed calm—watchful maybe but not like the thought of her wanting his friend bothered him. The mystery intrigued her. Who were these men? What were they to each other?

“I do want him,” she acknowledged, though she blushed for the confession. She looked back at Hattori. “It’s like you said. Everything about you does it for me.”

He moved as if afraid to scare her, one big hand coming up to conform itself to her cheek. His thumb smoothed her eyebrow around its arch. Simple thought it was, the contact tingled powerfully through her skin. “I doubt I’ll be what you’re used to.”

“Who says what I’m used to is what I want?”

His lips curved slightly. “Would you let Ciran join us?”

“I don’t need to—”

“Yes,” Hattori said, cutting off his friend’s demur. “You know you like it when we share a woman. I’d like you to share this one, if she’s agreeable.”

Kat would have felt shut out if Hattori’s hips hadn’t settled on hers just then. His bent knees evened out their heights, pushing between her thighs to brace his weight on the wall. He rolled his pelvis to her, the motion luscious and arousing as it squeezed the living heat of his erection into her mound. He sighed with pleasure and she did too. He felt so good it took a moment for her brain to turn over. When she spoke, her voice was husky.

“You and Ciran have been together a while.”

Hattori was dragging his smooth-shaven cheek up and down her neck. “Fifteen years. Since we were assigned to the same dorm room at the Feng palace. Ciran’s talents saved my sanity more than once.”

He turned his head to lick a bead of sweat from her collarbone. The wetness of his tongue shook her knees. Fearing she’d lose her balance, Kat clutched his broad shoulders. “He’s very fond of you.”

Hattori hummed his agreement against the crook of her neck, then stiffened and drew back. “He likes women too, Kat. You don’t have to worry about that.”

His hands slid to her waist as if he couldn’t stop touching her. Kat realized this was the first time he’d used her name.

“It’s true,” Ciran said from closer than she expected. “I guess you could say I’m omnivorous.”

Hattori’s diminishing self control cut short the debate. No permission beyond a lack of protest would be required from her. Abruptly breathing harder, he tugged the tie of her robe loose. When her front was bared, he took half a step back to look at her. Kat knew she was pretty, maybe even prettier than most. Her breasts were high and pointed, her limbs graceful and firm. When Hattori’s gaze ran over her curves, she truly felt beautiful. She let the robe drop from her shoulders.

“Princess,” he said, her title a word of praise.

He surprised her. He reached for one small breast with two hands, molding it higher as his thumbs rolled its painfully tight nipple. Ciran stepped next to him, shoulder to shoulder, and began doing the same thing. They were one person in their dexterity. Both were hard, both gentle, both blessed with the swordfighters’ calluses she’d dreamed of touching her. Kat’s nerves took about two seconds to overload. She cried out as the men bent to kiss her nipples. Their lips molded around her, their tongues flicking the aching nubs in identical rhythms. The simple sight of their hair mingling together made cream run from her body.

This was a fantasy she hadn’t known she harbored. She wanted to memorize every detail to replay later, but the myriad pleasures were too much for her blurring brain. Their strong hands held her as she began to thrash.

“I can scent her,” Ciran gasped against her breast. “She smells of lilacs and cinnamon.”
Hattori moaned at the reminder of what he already knew. “Lift her for me,” he said, his voice almost too thick to decipher. “I need to take her now.”

His eyes were completely black, his muscles shaking with a fine tremor. Kat was shaking too but not as subtly. She was so ready to be ravished she needed new words for it.

“Step forward, princess,” Ciran instructed.

She stepped and the second man moved behind her, between her and the wall. Hattori uttered a longing sound. Plainly, this was a scenario he enjoyed playing out.

“Twine your arms around his neck,” came Ciran’s quiet instruction.

Kat complied, then jerked as Ciran’s hands took a firm grip on her rear end. His skin was almost as hot as Hattori’s. “His clothes . . .”

“We don’t have time to take them off. It’s enough that you’re naked.”

Was this true, or was it part of the men’s mutual fantasy? Kat didn’t have breath to ask. Ciran was lifting her and so was Hattori, his hard hands gripping her thighs to spread them around his hips. He was narrow here compared to his shoulders, but wide enough to stretch her groin muscles. She twitched as his juddering length met the wet pulsing of her folds. Her sex was smooth, as was the fashion, and the slide of those satiny surfaces against each other made her spine dissolve. Hattori’s breath rushed out of his lungs loudly.

“I’ve never done this before,” she blurted. “I’ve never taken a man in heat. No male ever spilled in me.”

Hattori’s Adam’s apple bobbed. Like most of his gender, he liked staking claims. “I’m going to flood you,” he rasped. “If the Fates allow it, I’m going to drown you in seed.”

She was going to drown him herself. Pressed tight behind her, Ciran reached between them to shift his friend’s rigid cock to the right angle. Hattori shuddered as the flaring head found her drenched entry.

“You burn,” he breathed and began pushing.

Kat hissed at the instant bliss of his penetration. Ciran added his strength from behind. Like Hattori, he’d shoved his trousers under his cock, his shaft and balls squashed against the curve of her ass. Though he wasn’t as big as his partner, his blood beat faster. Maybe it was fickle to enjoy that, but Kat couldn’t help herself.

Despite the assistance she was receiving, getting Hattori in her wasn’t easy. He was very thick and there was a lot of him to engulf. His breath whined out when he was halfway, sweat rolling like liquid diamonds down his temples.

“I can’t,” he said, the muscles in his jaw clenching. “I’m trying to make myself smaller, but I just can’t.”

Most Yamish males could contract or expand their erections at least somewhat. This was under normal circumstances, though. No sensible royal female expected her partner to constrict himself when he was in heat. Instincts more powerful than he was didn’t allow for that.

Feeling for him, Kat stroked the side of his worried face. “Don’t try. Just go as far as you can.”

“I want all of you, Kat. I want my cock all the way inside.”

His guttural admission almost made her smile. She pressed her lips to the strawberry mark that was supposed to mar him, then brushed her mouth softly over his. A small, resonant sound broke inside his chest. To Yama, kissing was more intimate than sex. Married couples didn’t always do it, but Kat wanted to with him. She licked his lips with her lamril, causing them to tremble and part for her.

“Yes,” he sighed. “Oh please, yes.”

Their mouths sank into each other, tongues reaching deep and stroking, the fit immediate and welcome. Kat’s arms wound tighter behind his neck. Doing this felt illogically right to her. He tasted like some sweet tangy wine she’d been waiting all her life to drink. They hummed their pleasure into each other’s throats.

Perhaps sensing her relaxing, Hattori gathered his muscles and thrust his hips at her. Ciran did as well, his mouth open on her shoulder. Their coordinated efforts gained Hattori another inch into her.

“Fate,” Hattori moaned, drawing his tongue out only to push in and suck again. “Oh princess, you’re paradise.”

His hands ran over her body, as if he wanted to memorize her. His rocking thrusts continued, gradually working him deeper. His movements weren’t hard, but they were getting harder, so she supposed the female essences in her cream were having an effect. Neither he nor Ciran seemed to mind bumping each other’s hands as they caressed her. She could tell the inadvertent touches excited them, and their excitement excited her. Ciran only hesitated when his big hard palm fanned her flat belly. His fingertips were inches from where his friend entered her.
Sensing it wasn’t her the guard hesitated to reach for, Kat drew one hand down from Hattori’s neck. She smoothed her fingers over Ciran’s.

“Ring him,” she said. “Rub his cock where he can’t shove it inside of me.”

Ciran did it. Both men must have enjoyed this, because the pressure of the big hot bodies on either side of her increased.

“Shit,” Hattori hissed.

Ciran had taken her suggestion one better. He was twisting his thumb and two fingers around the base of his friend’s erection, as if it were a jar in dire need of unsealing. The men found this game as thrilling as she did. Hattori heaved at her, groaned, then set his feet and did it again.
Her body was too excited to resist the extra force. He was in her then, penetrating her completely but for the ring Ciran’s fingers formed. She and Hattori both moaned loudly. The head of his penis was squashed to the end of her. It amazed her that she could feel it, that she had nerves to register this deep intrusion. She couldn’t remember feeling this with other men. Hattori seemed to relish the sensation. His hands clamped around her bottom, like he’d stay right where he was forever.

Kat knew he wouldn’t. No matter how good he felt, his body was incapable of remaining still. As if to prove it, he ground ferociously into her for about five heartbeats.

“Fuck,” he snarled and let loose with all his might.

Ciran couldn’t shove then. All he could do was protect her from being battered against the wall. She gave thanks the females of her class were resilient. Hattori’s thrusts were glorious: long, thick, with that wonderful extra swell in the middle of his shaft. The added pressure did things to her sexual nerves, things she hadn’t known them capable of. She gasped for air as a quick orgasm struck like a lightning bolt.

She knew she’d just gotten him wetter.

“Again,” Hattori ordered, his hips working like he wanted to paint every cell on his cock in her essence, and from every possible angle. “Princess, do it again.”

Ciran grunted, his muscles straining stiff as stone behind her. His cock strafed up and down the curve of her ass. From the feel of it, he was very close to going with her. Hattori must have recognized the warnings.

“Don’t come,” he said harshly. “You know where I want you when you spill.”

Ciran cursed but stopped rubbing himself against her so hard and fast.

Brief though it was, the exchange opened a window to their sexual preferences. Hattori liked being fucked, and truly it was no wonder, if his experimental genes were doing what she suspected. Royals had kith glands piggy-backed on their prostates. In the later stages of heat, they craved few things more than having both well pounded. If nothing else, the predilection pushed the upper ranks to erotic adventurousness, whether through toys or additional partners.

“Do you itch yet?” Kat asked, unable to contain the intrusive question.

“Like I’d welcome a regiment back there,” Hattori admitted ruefully.

“Has your kith ever risen?”

Hattori jerked his head no. Now that she was looking for signs, she noticed he was squeezing his ass together each time he thrust into her. “It just . . . feels like it should.”

He groaned as he treated her—and himself—to an especially lengthy plunge. “Sorry,” he said. “Don’t think I can talk anymore.”

She let him focus on his pleasure; let him focus on hers, if it came to that. He knew how to make her come, and Ciran knew how to help. She didn’t think she could have stopped them even if she’d been inclined to. Too many fingers were finding too many sensitive spots. She lost count of her orgasms though, strangely, none prevented her from wanting more. Each time she grew creamier inside, Hattori’s efforts became more crazed. She wondered if they ought to stop. If he couldn’t come, maybe continuing would be cruel. The arousal of males in rut could rise indefinitely, but—without release—might not recede for days. Hattori hadn’t even had a dry orgasm, which normally he’d have done.

Then, all at once, everything he did slowed down: his breathing, his thrusts, the long, low moans that escaped from him. He was driving into her just as hard, but he was really paying attention.

“Fate,” he breathed, his eyes nearly rolling back. “Ciran.”

Ciran kissed the back of her neck. “That’s my cue, princess.”

Hattori had lost his strength to hold her, or maybe he just wanted his weight powering into her from above. As Ciran slipped out from behind her, Hattori lowered her to the polished wood of the guesthouse hall. They lay at a slant, because the hall was too narrow to accommodate their height. The hardness of the floorboards couldn’t lessen the pleasure of being ravished in this new position. Ciran watched them revel in it as he tore off his clothes. She was glad he wanted to be naked. His body was hard—and more dangerous looking than she’d foreseen. Pale thin scars marked the lean muscles of his chest.

“Wait,” she panted as he prepared to kneel.

He looked at her. Despite the thick hot organ being drawn so deliciously in and out of her, she was caught again in the spell of Ciran’s bicolor eyes.

“Let me kiss your cock,” she said. “Let me do for you what you did for him.”

Ciran didn’t expect that, and neither did Hattori. His tantalizing thrusting slowed even more.
“You want to suck me,” Ciran verified.

Kat didn’t understand his doubt—unless the women he shared with Hattori somehow failed to notice him.

“Yes,” she said. “I want to, and not just to thank you for the pleasure you’ve given me.”

Hattori didn’t add his opinion, maybe because he couldn’t speak. Instead, groaning, he tipped her up until they were coupling on their knees. This position had new charms, but his head turned to his partner, gesturing Ciran closer with a jerk of his chin. Hattori’s pulse drummed visibly in his neck. Kat could think of only one reason why this would be.

Hattori was looking forward to watching her fellate his friend. Happy to oblige, she smoothed her hair neatly behind her. That earned her a twitch from the organ inside of her.

Without taking her left hand from Hattori, she let her right smooth over Ciran’s hip. The tensing of his tendons enchanted her, the hair-trigger responsiveness of his nerves. In return, Ciran laid a hand on her shoulder. His light clasp moved with her as Hattori’s rolling thrusts rose and fell.

Clearly anticipating going weak in the knees, Ciran braced his second palm on the opposite wall. “He can’t stop while you’re doing me. He’s too far into arousal.”

Kat sensed this wasn’t a complaint. It wouldn’t have been for her either. They’d happily work around Hattori’s needs.

Ciran sucked in a breath as she leaned to him. She licked his cock just for pleasure, tasting his sweetness and swirling around the head. Beads of pre-ejaculate welled from its center, which she found rather flattering. His penis trembled, so she took him.

He slid into her mouth like steel wrapped in satin, hot and thick and just long enough to give her a sense of accomplishment. Evidently wanting more control over her, Ciran’s hand moved from her shoulder to cup her skull.

“Oh that’s nice,” he said, guiding her to him as he thrust carefully. “Kat.”

She loved the way this pair said her name. “Ciran,” she murmured around him, and thrilled to his small shudder.

Excitement building, he pushed farther into her mouth. Hattori’s breathing quickened as Ciran went in and out. His hands squeezed her hips, ensuring she didn’t stray too far from his thrusts. Instinct told her he wished he were licking Ciran.

“You’re as good at that as he is,” he gasped.

She wasn’t. No one could be. Nonetheless, it couldn’t be denied that the second guard was having trouble holding back his climax. The noises he made were broken, his guiding fingers stiff. Sucking him harder felt wonderfully mischievous.

Hattori seemed enthralled by his friend’s struggle. “It’s usually him going down on me. I never knew he’d look like this.”

This was reason enough to ring her lips beneath Ciran’s rim and focus some good licks there. The taste of him grew stronger, the fluid that wasn’t seed yet increasing in volume. She held tighter onto his hip, some deep part of her longing to make him forget himself. He groaned at the intensification of her tongue’s pressure.

“Enough,” he said breathlessly, pulling free of her. His cupping hand slid down the side of her hair. “Thank you.”

Hattori’s fascinated gaze was locked on Ciran’s exceedingly upright cock, at the evidence of her suckling shining bright on that taut flushed skin. As if the sight were too much to bear, he closed his eyes and turned back to her. His arms hugged her close as he buried his face against her shoulder.

He almost looked frightened by what was coming.

Kat didn’t think that was true, though he trembled and held her tighter as Ciran moved into place behind him. No, what caused this big, lethal man to vibrate like a tuning fork was that he needed this so much. He was vulnerable—not only to Ciran, whom he knew and trusted, but also to her. Yama didn’t fancy being vulnerable, and guards liked it even less. Ciran smoothed Hattori’s hunched shoulder muscles and tucked himself close to him.

“She licked me,” he whispered next to Hattori’s ear. “You’re going to feel her essence on me when I push in.”

If Ciran meant this as a warning, it didn’t prepare his friend. Sound rattled in Hattori’s throat at the first intrusion. Apparently, her genetics suited him, sensitizing his anal passage as Ciran pushed into it. His spine stretched, his mouth, his breath coming hot and ragged on Kat’s neck. He caught her hips to him in grips of iron. He couldn’t thrust now, or at least he couldn’t withdraw. Her cream had bespelled his cock, and he lusted after her depths too much. Helpless to move other than squirming, he had to rely on Ciran to push him over that final edge.

Ciran wasn’t shy about exercising power. His lean features hardened with purpose, each strong thrust targeting the aching gland his friend hid inside. Over and over, his drives massaged it, his angles shifting but not the force he used. Kat could only imagine how that smooth swollen crest would feel. Hattori moaned with pleasure, straining desperately for climax. When the extra thickness in the middle of his shaft pulsated, Kat’s desire coiled in sympathy.

“Almost,” Ciran rasped.

And then Hattori began to go.

She felt his face twist against her shoulder, felt the sudden liquid heat shoot inside of her. Hattori let out a muffled shout and ground his glans crazily deeper. He must have craved the extra friction, but the pressure so deep within her sex triggered a fierce climax.

The effect of her added wetness was dramatic.

“Move,” Hattori begged like he was dying. “Both of you, move faster.”

She and Ciran obeyed, humping him wildly from either side. It didn’t matter that they weren’t in synch. Hattori writhed between them, gasping, seized by more ecstasy than he could handle . . . or get enough of.

“Never,” he choked out a minute into it. “Never like this before.”

On and on, he abandoned himself to it. This much seed must have been storing up for cycles, and understandably Kat was a partner he was eager to take full advantage of. He flooded her as he’d promised, but she loved the messiness of it. The profound relief he was displaying moved her, his intensity catching. She was no more able to stop climaxing than he was. Somewhere in the middle of the madness, Ciran groaned and went over too.

He pressed his face to Hattori’s shoulder, his hands clamped on Hattori’s heaving pectorals. The contortions of Ciran’s expression suggested he’d needed this release as much as his lover.
Seeing this satisfied a tension Kat hadn’t known she had.

When all of them were sated, she sagged in Hattori’s lap. The men weren’t as flattened as she was, but they hadn’t been coming since the start. Hands ran soothingly over her, mouths pressed by turns to her skin. Though these men were strangers, she’d never felt so cared for. If it were an illusion, she didn’t want to know. Perhaps they understood the yearning. Two male sighs echoed in her ears.

“There’s a prince-size bed in the next room,” Ciran observed to no one in particular.

There was, and Hattori carried her to it, only staggering slightly as he went. He lay down with her in his arms, then drew one hand down her front and tucked it between her thighs. She suspected he liked the feel of his seed marking her. Kat didn’t mind. She could shower later. For now, she was too relaxed.

His other arm made a perfect addition to the pillow.

Close as they were, her hand rose naturally to Hattori’s face, tracing its smooth carved lines. He lay on his left side, and the pillow hid his birthmark. The perfection of what remained was new and interesting.

Hattori’s eyes crinkled as he pretended to bite one curious finger. “You all right? No headache or dizziness?”

Kat’s eyebrows quirked. “Now you’re asking me about signs of a concussion? After you introduced me to your personal earthquake?”

“I checked your eyes when I pinned you to the wall earlier. Your pupils weren’t uneven.”
She remembered how blazingly angry he’d been—and how blazingly aroused. “You’re a man with great powers of concentration.”

A cloth dropped to the carpet beside the bed. Though the platform was sturdy, it creaked as Ciran’s weight descended on the mattress. Hattori’s gaze flicked watchfully to his friend’s approach. Kat didn’t think the reaction was jealousy, more like he wasn’t certain Ciran would be welcomed.

“Your stitches didn’t strain while you were blowing me,” Ciran said.

Hattori made a sound that could have been a chuckle. “That I didn’t notice. I was too busy watching the show.”

Ciran grunted, sighed, and snuggled up to the lower part of Kat’s body. His head rested on her side above her waist, his groin finding a comfy home against the back of her legs. He’d tidied up with the cloth he’d dropped. His smooth lax penis was warm and clean. The carefulness of the action struck her. When it came to sex, these men knew how to please a woman. They were as skillful as they were passionate. That being the case, the intimacy of cuddling—and whether she’d like him doing it—had to be what he was insecure about.

Kat moved her hand to rub Ciran’s side. He butted her shoulder blade with his silken hair, a hunting dog asking soundlessly for more praise. Thinking he deserved it, Kat reached back to stroke his head.

“You’re so sweet,” Hattori said in a marveling tone.

Kat snorted, unconvinced that what she’d done with them fell under that term.

“You are,” he insisted, and again came that note of the tentative. “Sweeter than either of us scarred blades deserve.”

Kat thought before she spoke. She knew their previous assignments couldn’t all have been as innocuous as guarding her cousins, but neither could she believe them undeserving of kindness. Deep down, she knew they were good men.

“You showed care for me,” she murmured. “And for my cousins. And each other.”

“You see,” Ciran teased his friend from her side. “You and I are sweet too.”

Hattori laughed, soft but unmistakable. He petted the long straight locks that had fallen across her breast, not arguing any more. The niggling tension in all of them released.

“Happy natal day,” he murmured.

Kat lifted her sleepy head from his arm. “You know about that?”

“Princess Jules instructed her sisters not to mention it this morning. In case it bothered you.”
Overcome by emotion, Kat hid her face in his shoulder.

“Good present?” Ciran suggested, wriggling higher to share the pillow. His long arm draped her companionably. She was glad he’d decided this wasn’t presumptuous. When his fingers started playing over Hattori’s bicep, her smile broadened. Hattori must have felt her mouth curve. He let out a low and satisfied rumbling sound.

“The best present,” she felt bold enough to confess. “In fact, this year’s gift was so good I might have to open it again tomorrow.”

Hattori’s cupping hold on her breast tightened. His thumb fanned warmly over her nipple. “All summer, princess,” he corrected. “We three are going to get to know each other much better.”

“Much, much better,” Ciran emphasized.

Kat’s bright grin couldn’t be contained. Surely no exile had ever been as nice as this one.

© 2011 by Emma Holly. It is illegal to reproduce or distribute this work in any manner or medium without written permission of the author.