Marie Treanor

Some Other Sea - NOT CURRENTLY AVAILABLE

In 1068, Gizella, a lame but forceful Hungarian nun, travels to Scotland in the train of the Princess Margaret who, with her family, is fleeing the England of William the Conqueror. Before they even land, an unseen hand pushes Gizella overboard during a storm, and she is rescued by the charming if enigmatic Ruaridh, who's loyalty keeps everyone guessing, and whose undoubted attractions threaten Gizella's vocation from their first meeting.
But someone keeps trying to kill Gizella and as she tries to discover the truth among the webs of intrigue surrounding the Scottish throne and the exiled court, she is desperately afraid that the culprit is the one man she wants most to trust...

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Reviews:

"I enjoyed this story of two people with too many secrets and too much pride. There was some language that I felt was too modern for the story, but I found the writing and storyline enjoyable, and the sex hot. I see myself picking up another book by Ms. Treanor." - 4 1/2 wands, Tralana, Enchanted Ramblings

"As I started to read The Other Sea, I was all set to brave Triskelion and buy all your backlist at once..."

"Overall, my impression of this book is favorable. You have a wonderful, little used setting (1068 in Scotland or Scotia as some of your characters call it) and you appear to have done your homework regarding the politics and people of your story ... You use period names ...instead of incongruously expecting us to believe that medieval women were named Chelsea or medieval men were called Cody. Your descriptions seem accurate and thank God you don’t attempt to have the characters speak in dialect nor use anachronistic words. Huzzah!"

"I like that you don’t spoon feed us by stopping to awkwardly insert information nor dump a history lecture on our heads. But perhaps a short glossary of terms and people would have helped until we could stop and research on the Internet. I appreciate that the characters are well rounded and you don’t hesitate to give them both good and bad qualities. And that they act consistently with your descriptions of them and the backgrounds you’ve given them. I think your use of the first person POV and restraint in revealing information that the heroine, Gizella, couldn’t possibly know (no “later I was to find out…” or “at the time no one knew that…”) adds to the suspense and made me really sit up and pay attention to your narrative so I wouldn’t miss anything..." - Jayne, Dear Author.com

Excerpts:

Here's my hero and heroine's first meeting, after he has saved her from drowning. If you'd like something a little hotter, scroll down to the next excerpt!

     I had wakened in so many strange places just recently that for several moments I kept my eyes closed, letting my senses rather than my memory tell me where I lay.
     From somewhere came the knowledge that I should not have been warm. I should have been very wet and very cold. Instead, I was perfectly dry and really quite cosy; and I could feel a definite source of heat close by. In a moment I could hear too the crackling of flames, smell the sweet scent of wood-smoke and something else which seemed disconcertingly out of place – wine perhaps?
      I was outside, in the open, lying on something hard and blessedly still. Hallelujah. I was on dry land.
    I could hear the wind rushing on its way, but muffled now, rustling, as though through trees, and I could feel its breath, unexpectedly gentle, on my cheek. The rest of me, from head to toe, was all covered, wrapped close in warm woolen blankets and below, something soft and protective.
     Unable to put it off any longer, I opened my eyes. And looked straight into a man’s. I could not tell their color – they looked silver and gold and orange by the flaring light of the fire in the gloom – but they were gazing unblinkingly down at me. Their owner sat facing me on the ground, one elbow resting comfortably upon a drawn up knee.
     Something about his shape, his vaguely slouching posture, told me it was the man from the rowing boat, the lunatic singer who had saved my life. Damp black hair hung in tangles about his neck and shoulders. There was a shadow of unkempt stubble upon his jaw and chin. I found neither point reassuring. Nor could I tell his age, for though something about his posture proclaimed youth, the firelight showed me many lines about his face that seemed too deeply etched. He still wore no cloak, only several course, heavy over-tunics, one at least of hide, gently steaming by the fire, and a belt around his waist from which hung a vast array of things that might have been tools. Or weapons.
     That was not reassuring either.
     Abruptly, I sat up – and made several other discoveries. I was at the edge of a make-shift shelter, rudely constructed from tree branches and leaves, which, presumably, was responsible for keeping the wind at bay. The rain appeared to have gone off. The fire was really very close, and spread before it, drying, were my gown and veil and chemise. Worse, the softness next to my skin was finer linen than I had ever owned.
     Involuntarily, I made a strangled noise in my throat; and irritatingly, the stranger understood at once. Even more annoyingly, his eyes smiled, lazily and quite without embarrassment.
    “That was my slave-girls,” he said blithely, in Saxon. “Unfortunately, they had to rush off.”
      “To prepare your supper, no doubt?” I retorted, freeing one hand from the blanket long enough to push my thick, not-quite-dry hair out of my face. The stranger continued to watch me tranquilly, his eyes traveling openly from my face to my hair, and to the slipped blanket. Too late, the draught of cold air on my shoulder and breast warned me that the shirt, though deliciously warm and comfortable, was too big and loose at the throat to cover my modesty. Suddenly, my body felt unaccountably hot.
     Hastily, I snatched the blanket back up to my chin, and the stranger’s eyes came with it.
    “No doubt,” he agreed peaceably, belatedly answering my last jibe. And then, since I have never troubled to hide my anger: “What’s the matter? Are you afraid I ravished you while you slept?”
     “Hardly,” I said acidly. “I have always found this habit and this face protect me from that particular form of abuse.”
     His eyebrows twitched upwards. “What a sheltered life you must have led.”
     “It goes with the profession,” I said icily.

Excerpt is unedited and unproofed and may differ slightly from final published version. Copyright Marie Treanor 2006
*

A more intimate moment...

“Where” was his own house, a large chamber warmly lit by two lamps. Fresh rushes covered the floor, silken hangings decorated the walls. Three bound books stood on a long shelf hanging above two half-open chests with clothes flung hastily on top of them. And at the far end a large, carved bed, half exposed, wholly dominating my mind and body from the moment I saw it.

The next time, the next time...

Before I knew it, my cloak and my veil and my neck scarf had been discarded, dropped on the floor among the rushes like so much rubbish, and his hands were in my hair, his mouth whispering against my ear, “Oh I have missed you.”

I swallowed. “I have been here.”

“Not here,” he said. “Not here.” And he began to kiss me, his mouth sinking into mine as if he never meant to leave it, as if he meant to devour me.

Just as before, my body’s response was instant. Everything in me leapt to meet him. My mouth opened wide under his onslaught, my tongue, my teeth clashing, caressing, fighting with his. Already held tight against him in his strong arms, still I pressed closer, desperate to be one with him again. His erection pushed back, rock-hard against my straining abdomen. I flung my arms up around his neck, tangling my fingers in the hair at the back of his head, and when he broke the kiss to speak, I pulled him down again, breathlessly refastening my lips to his, writhing against his erection with the urgency of my need. I wanted him inside me, right now, pounding me, harder than before, and I could not wait.

Gasping, I pulled back at last, so that my trembling hands could slide down his broad, muscled shoulders and chest, over his flat, hard belly to the thrusting bulge below. At the touch of my hand, the breath hissed out between his teeth. When my fingers closed, he groaned aloud.

His arms moved. With one tug, my drab gown fell around my ankles. Two more and my chemise joined it and I stood before him totally naked. Agitated and appalled, I dragged my hair around to hide myself.

“Don’t look at me,” I whispered, reaching for him blindly, to use him as more cover, I think.

“I want to look. I have to look.” Taking both my hands in one of his, keeping his eyes on mine, he lifted my heavy hair behind my shoulders. Then he moved lower to caress my breast, catching my nipple between his finger and thumb. Only when I gasped out my pleasure did he smile and drop his eyes, drinking in my throat and shoulders and breasts. Slowly, his head bent lower and his mouth took the nipple not already covered by his hand. The flood of moisture which had pooled between my thighs overflowed and trickled down my legs. I wanted him so much it was a physical pain, and yet if he stopped what he was doing now I would die…

Still licking and teasing my breast, he moved his hand lower, across my stomach and round across my bottom, caressing.

“Ruaridh,” I whispered helplessly into his tangled hair. “Ruaridh, please…”

“No hurry,” he said, his breath whispering new delight all around my nipple. When he moved his head I could see it standing out huge and dark against the whiteness of my breast. Hard and taut, it ached with my need. “This time, we do it slowly. I want to know every inch of you. In fact, I’m going to have to kiss every inch of you before I take you…”

My overheated body felt ready to burn up in flames. “So what will I do?” I managed to ask as his arms closed around me once more, lifting me like a baby against his chest.

“Tell me if I miss anywhere,” he suggested, carrying me across to the big bed. “Or any bits you’d like kissed again…”

“Can’t I kiss you?” I asked, greatly daring now.

“Oh yes,” he said fervently. “But you’ll have to wait your turn.”

Deposited on the bed, I watched with excited new pleasure as he tore off his own clothes. The muscles rippled up his arms and chest as he stretched. He was long and lean and hard, and I had never wanted to touch anything so much before.

I almost moaned when he joined me on the bed, pulling the furs over us for warmth. Not that I felt in the least cold, and his skin was fever-hot where it touched mine. As I ran my greedy hands all over his back and shoulders and hips, he began the promised kissing at the top of my head, moving with agonizing yet delicious slowness to my ears and cheeks. When he moved, his hard cock nudged at my legs. It made me gasp, just as his lips got to my mouth and there was another long, long kiss before he moved on to my chin and throat and shoulders.

By the time he reached my naval, my fingers were clawing at the sheets for him to back up, to fill me with his manhood. Maddeningly, he moved on down my hips to my thigh. When his mouth traveled inward, a new tingling began between my legs, a desire for…I didn’t know what.

“You like that?” His voice was breathless, almost ragged. I had time to wonder how just kissing me could do that to him and came to the conclusion that it was the anticipation of what was to follow. Well, I couldn’t wait for that myself. I nodded, and he gently pushed my legs apart so that he could reach my inner thigh more easily. It felt very strange, very immodest. I found myself tugging insistently at his hair to bring him back up into my arms. Ignoring that, he found the crease at the top of my leg and slid his tongue along it. Involuntarily, my hips arched upwards. The throbbing of my cunny was suddenly unbearable. I thought my pleasure would come without him. But he had no intention of allowing that. To my utter amazement, his lips moved among the fluff between my legs, whispering among the soft folds beneath. I couldn’t breath. I couldn’t stop the trembling. I couldn’t…

“Oh!” I gasped in wonder as his mouth nuzzled me, as his tongue explored, gently lapping the bud of my pleasure. That made me cry out.

“Shall I kiss you there?” he asked, still in that low, breathy voice that drove my senses even wilder.

“I don’t know what you mean,” I gasped. “You can’t…It isn’t…oh!”

Excerpt is unedited and unproofed and may differ slightly from final published version. Copyright Marie Treanor 2006