Lord of the Abyss - By Nalini Singh Page 0,22

can see in the dark."

She startled. "Can you truly?" But she knew it was no lie. How else would he hunt in the pitch-black of night?

He started up the stairs again without answering, his armor gleaming even in the muted light. Staring at it, she had another thought. "How do you bathe?"

"Mistress Liliana, you ask the most peculiar questions." Turning, he pinned her with a darkly intrigued look. "Do you wish to share a bath?"

"I meant the armor," she said, cheeks burning. "It doesn't come off - does it?" If it did, that meant her father had made a mistake. Please.

He paused, his hand on the railing. "It must, for I am clean." But he didn't sound too certain. "I don't remember bathing, but I know I do."

It was a puzzle, she thought, one she'd have to stick close to him to figure out. No hardship, that. And it wasn't because the Guardian of the Abyss was a monster most beautiful. She'd seen beauty in her father's castle - the Blood Sorcerer himself was an ugly man, but he surrounded himself with the most exquisite courtiers male and female. It had only taken a few overheard pieces of mockery, a sneer here and there, for her to learn that outward beauty was no measure of the person within.

But the Guardian - there was a strange charm to him, a wildness that was as innocent as she was not. He truly appeared to have no comprehension of the impact of his looks, trapped as he was in the Black Castle and regarded with fear by both his prey and the people of this realm, but he knew his own intelligence very well. And Liliana was discovering that a lethally fascinating mind was a temptation as sinful as those lips she wanted to lick.

"Surely you don't wish me to expire before we get to the bathing chamber," she said in an effort to derail the thoughts that had a sumptuous warmth uncurling low in her body. She couldn't afford to feel anything for him, for even though he would never look at her the same, that way lay distraction and failure. Her task was to awaken and return him to Elden so that his kingdom could breathe again, its people no longer crushed under the steel boot of the Blood Sorcerer's brutal reign.

"So weak, Mistress Liliana?" Stopping at the top of the staircase, he held out a hand, his green eyes intent. "Come."
Chapter 7
Her hand was halfway to his when she pulled it back, suddenly afraid that he'd sense her tainted blood. "I'm dirty, my lord. You said it yourself."

His hand curled into a fist even as his eyes darkened to black. Turning, he pushed open a door and she had the terrible feeling she'd wounded him. That could not be. For she was a hook-nosed, raw-boned, ungainly thing. What man would be offended that she didn't take his hand?

But he is ensorcelled, whispered another part of her mind. He hasn't known friendship or love, or the touch of a woman's softness.

Liliana was the last person to teach anyone those things, but even she'd had the friendship of the cook as a child. She was starting to fear that the Lord of the Black Castle had had no one. Biting her lip, she walked into the room to see him staring out the window, his back to her. "In there." He pointed to his right.

Peeking in, she saw a stone pool filled with cool, clear water, a bar of soap set on the edge beside a thick towel. When she sniffed the soap, she smelled the freshness of herbs, the scent sweet, the softness of the soap a luxury. Eager to begin, she dipped her finger into the water and winced...had an idea.

"The water is very cold," she said, stepping to the doorway. "I shall shrivel away to nothing."

He said nothing.

Taking a deep breath and hoping she wasn't about to humiliate herself, she crossed to him and very carefully placed her hand on his back, just below his shoulder blade, shocked at the warmth she sensed in the armor. It had been cold before, she was certain, but now it seemed to pulse with life, as if it was an extension of his skin. "Please, my lord. Will you not use your magic to heat it for me?"

She could've used her own, but that might give away her identity as a blood sorceress - and he was a Prince of Elden. He