She took another cautious step back as Cededa went rigid, his fingers clenched so tightly around the glaive staff, the skin of his knuckles looked ready to split. Something ignited in those cold eyes.

Imogen’s fearful cry of “Stop!” went unheeded as he dropped the glaive and closed the distance between them.

“Don’t touch me!” She struggled in his grip, overwhelmed by his sudden embrace and frightened by the expectation he'd drop lifeless at her feet. He couldn’t help her if he was dead, either with the key or her curse.

A cool, bare hand grasped her chin, digging into her cheek to hold her still. He needn’t have bothered. Imogen froze, eyes wide as she stared into a colorless gaze blazing with euphoric wonder.

Moments passed with the slowness of days to her shocked senses, and still the king held her, very much alive and obviously immune to her lethal power.

“Why?” he asked softly.

“Why what?” Her mind was mud, too stunned to accept what her eyes showed her.

“Why shouldn’t I touch you?”

“Because you’ll die.” Her thoughts reeled, blotting out reason and even simple intellect. He was alive. His strong, fine-boned hand caressed her jaw, the underside of her chin, her cheek, before coming to rest against her collarbone.

Her heartbeat thundered in her ears, roaring in a rush of blood as great as the river below Tineroth’s ensorcelled bridge. This king, ancient and nearly forgotten, touched her skin to skin, and that heated contact was both agony and ecstasy. Her knees almost buckled as he explored the patterns of the Tineroth key welted under her flesh with a callused palm. Deprived of another’s unadorned touch all her life, Imogen drowned in the pleasure of his caress.

"Sweet poison," he said in a reverent voice. "I am dying. Merciful gods be thanked. After four thousand relentless years, I am dying."

CHAPTER SEVEN

“No one here, Doyen.” The soldier bowed before Dradus, his gaze on his boots.

Dradus growled under his breath, his anger bubbling to the surface. “Someone tell me how a young woman with no magic and no woodsman’s skills managed to walk into the forest and disappear without any one of you imbeciles noticing?”

The two scouts tasked with keeping an eye on the witch’s hovel hunched away from his wrath and said nothing.

Dradus slashed his riding crop down on the shoulder of the scout closest to him. The man flinched away with a gasp and clutched his injured arm. “Well?” the mage said. “I’m waiting.”

The unharmed scout stepped farther out of striking range before answering. “She must have left when we were in the village,” he mumbled.

Were he not so disliked by Hayden’s army and the general populace of Castagher, Dradus would cheerfully turn both men into torches with a few carefully recited spells. Such an action, however, guaranteed he’d never make it back to the city alive. This troop was loyal to its king, not him. Any unfortunate accident might happen on the return journey. The soldiers assigned to help him find the witch and Varn’s daughter would offer platitudes of false regret and swear each other to silence over their roles in his demise.