“I haven’t gotten that far yet. What I expected to find was a spoiled princess who complained entirely too much, which you’re not, minus the complaining part. I expected to come here, to retrieve a bride and do what was needed. Instead, I get here and find the most beautiful creature that world has ever created, and she fucking hates me. Soiled whore? Never, you’re perfect, innocent, and fire. So you can feel sorry for yourself if you want, but your sister? My sister, she had to hide from you because of that hate you’re allowing to consume you. You sit in a fucking pile of ruins and stew on shit that you couldn’t change, that we couldn’t change. Have you considered what she felt, what she endured? You walked into the chaos, she survived it.”
Lilith fought the tears as his words hit her. “Because of what she is, and all she had to do was tell me. Lying to me has put my life on the line, and not even you can question that law. She lied to me, my own sister who cried with me, who mourned the loss of our mother together. I told her everything, I trusted her enough to let her see my flaws, to know my weaknesses, and the entire time, she didn’t trust me enough to tell me hers in return.”
“And you can’t get past that, or is it because she’s what you hate most?”
“There’s that too,” she admitted as she ducked out of the cage his arms had created and started down the hallway.
“I’m not done talking,” he snapped harshly.
“I’m freezing, so if you plan on finishing your little speech, you’ll do it in the bedroom,” she snapped back, her tone low as her teeth began to chatter as the cold in her bones mixed with the weariness and exhaustion she felt.
She dismissed him, only to scream in shock as she was lifted easily from the floor into his massive arms. She shrieked as his arms tightened and then the world rocked and spun around her as they appeared inside her bedroom. Her fingers bit into his flesh as the room continued to spin out of control around her. Lilith opened her mouth to speak but something soft and welcoming pushed against hers.
“Don’t do that!” she hissed.
“Don’t do what? Sift, or kiss you?” he laughed huskily. “I don’t have to like you to fuck you, Lilith. You do respond so sweet to this fucking heathen king that it’s hard to ignore or forget. Even if you do call me your heathen king, you enjoyed what we did last night, even if you regretted it afterwards.”
“Well…work on it,” she said as he gently set her down, ignoring the wide round eyes that stared up in shock at him. There was something hard that was very hard to miss as he’d set her down. She took a generous step away from him and let her eyes slowly lower to what had rubbed against her belly on the way down. “I’m…I should leave.”
“It’s your room,” he noted huskily.
“Excuse me?” she uttered thickly as her eyes lifted to his, finally realizing she’d been staring at the obvious erection that his jeans did little to hide.
“It’s your room,” he said with a sexy grin lifting to play across his lips. The green in his eyes brightened, glowing as his hunger became evident. “You’re trembling, little queen.”
“I’m cold,” she lied, because she was no longer trembling from the icy cold dress that clung to her like a second skin; no. Before her was a very virile, tough male who knew her with carnal knowledge and had apparently enjoyed what she had to offer him. “I should bathe.”
“I’ll join you, wife,” he mused, his tongue slowly running over his full bottom lip as he watched the panic in her eyes spread. “Let me help you,” he continued, snapping his fingers, and then she was naked in all her glory with a single thought of his mind.
The bathtub behind her hit her knees as she slowly backed up, and then she cried out as she fell into the warm water, heated by his magic as well as filled to the top. She spattered as she sat up, righting her body to glare up at him where he stood, sexual tension filling his endless emerald depths as he stared at her naked breasts.
Her hands came up to cover her nudity. A deep red blush ignited in her cheeks as she worried her bottom lip as her eyes closed against the lust she had seen banked in his gaze. She wanted to splash him with the heated water, to curse him to the gates if the underworld, and yet she did neither.
Her eyes peeked open as splashing sounded, and a stifled scream threatened to escape as she took in his cock at eye level. The thing was larger this close, and against her better judgment, she wanted to feel it, to test its weight in her hand. She hadn’t been entirely naïve about sex, or what happened with a man and a woman, but neither had she expected to enjoy it. She’d heard enough grunts and screams of pain in her father’s court to expect it to hurt, but that had quickly been replaced by pleasure.
“You keep looking at it like it’s one of the Seven Wonders of the World and it won’t ever go down, my little heathen queen.”
“I’m not a heathen,” she growled as she stared up into his heady gaze with anger boiling in her depths.
“You live in the ruins of a castle, you hunt meat for substance, and live like a lavish cavewoman. If that isn’t a heathen queen to my heathen king, I don’t know what is. Scoot your ass over unless you’re planning to sit on my lap, which I’m not against. In fact, I’d rather you did with how hard that pretty stare of yours made my dick.”
“You’re crude and uncouth.”
“And you’re not? You rode my dick last night, so what does that make you, Lilith?”
“Desperate,” she said. “Horrible, a traitor to my crown, and now because I actually liked it, ruined.”
“And why would it make you ruined? Because you enjoyed sex? You’re Fae; we fuck to feed, and because we enjoy it. There’s nothing wrong with liking it. It makes you one of us.”
“I’m lesser Fae; we do not feed by fucking. We need sustenance, and our status is defined by the character of the laws and rules we adhere to. You and your kind are ruled by emotions, by a need to fuck and destroy everything you touch. You are not the same as I am, and finding pleasure with you is against what the lesser caste will consider pure. If I’d hated it, hated you enough to make it a chore or a wifely duty, it would be different,” she said thickly, her throat tightening with her words. “Instead, I found pleasure with you.”
“And you don’t want to?” he asked as he tipped his head as he sat in the tub, watching as she backed up as far as she could to keep from touching him.
“No, I wanted to hate it as much as I hate you.”
“You don’t hate me, you hate what I am. That’s fine; most of the world hates the Horde. It comes with what we are, and what they construe us to be. Hell, my mother wasn’t even from this world, and her people hate us too. We are the creatures of nightmares, the things that go bump in the night and legends you and your people use to keep your children in line. It doesn’t mean we are what they say we are,” he shrugged as he waved his hand and night bloom petals filled the tub, glowing as the floated above the surface.
“You and your people took my mother’s corpse, hanging her on the gates of the Horde stronghold as a warning to the other castes of what happens lest they forget or be unable to pay the tithe. She hung there until I was sixteen, and her corpse became nothing but bones and eventually fell to the ground before your gates, forgotten. I took her then, brought her back home to bury. I don’t even remember her or what she was like. I don’t remember my people, or who they were before they became dust upon the floor of these ruins. Yet here, among the corpses and the dust, I stayed, away from court politics or drama. I could have gone home, could have brought Lara as a servant and given her a better life, but I wasn’t willing to ask that of her. To ask her to pretend to be anything other than my sister seemed wrong. You want to know why I hate your kind. Because to me, you weren’t legends that we used to keep our children in line, you played out every horror they’d ever whispered, proving it true to the children whose lives you ruined when you turned the Court of Shadows into a Court of Ruin and Ghosts that continue to haunt me.”
“I didn’t do this,” he uttered
as he ignored her stiffening as he pulled her closer, settling her astride on his lap. “The tithe has always come at the same time since the courts began to grow. If a court were unable to pay, the king would forfeit his life so that another in his line could secure it and their reign. It was like that before my father ever settled his murderous ass on his throne, and it was created by your people. We didn’t make the rules of how much or how little was demanded. We didn’t decide on the price that was paid for being unable to pay the tithe to the Horde. Your people did, and with it, they sealed their fate. I met your grandfather many times, and he was a warrior, Lilith. Proud, strong, and truthful. He fucked up, though; he told other courts to stand with him, and, to get out from beneath his thumb, they told my father what he planned, and sealed the fate of this court.”
“That can’t be true because who in their right mind would try to take on the High Fae? That would be suicide.”
He lifted a brow, staring at her as his mouth slowly lowered, kissing the hollow flesh just above her collarbone. “I’m starving, wife,” he murmured before his hands captured her hips, lifting her until she was poised above his cock. “Will you feed me?” he asked, knowing she had no idea that her pain was calling to him, luring him into her mind as it rolled off of her in powerful waves.
Asrian’s mother was a pain seeker, a demon who sought those suffering and fed until they were nothing more than a corpse. His Fae side had muted the call for death, instead allowing him to leave those he fed from alive. But Lilith, Lilith was a fucking buffet of endless food.
“I don’t really have a choice, do I?” she whispered as she moaned, unable to contain it as his mouth continued to trail over the sensitive flesh.
“You do; you can choose to let me starve. You can deny what you want,” he growled as her pussy rubbed against the hardened silk beneath the heated, fragrant water that was working against him like some aphrodisiac that was sending both of them to the point their need was painful. She rocked her hips, chewing her lip before she released it to stare him right in the eyes.
“I can choose? I choose to let you starve, heathen king,” she hissed as she stood, ignoring the tightening of his hands on her hips. He snarled as he took her back down, pushing her beneath the water before his mouth crushed against hers beneath the floating petals.
Just as quickly as he’d done it, he disappeared. She rose from the water, peering around the room at the empty space. She rose, stepping from the tub into the silence of the room. Once dressed for bed, she sat on it, staring at the empty side. No matter what had happened, she hated losing Lara, and yet she felt her downstairs, bonding with her newfound family as surely as she felt her heart slowly cracking in fractured pieces. Walking away by choice was easier than knowing Lara would choose them and to be among them. And why wouldn’t she? They could give her everything, and Lilith only had this place, this empty palace to offer her sister.
The candles in the room extinguished as she rested her head against the pillows, refusing to feel sorry for herself. Life had a way of knocking the ground out from beneath you, and she wasn’t any different. Today, though, today had rocked her fucking foundation and left her trembling on unsteady ground. She felt as if she’d become lost in something the Court of Nightmares had attacked her with.
The door opened, and she sat up, watching as Asrian strolled in. He was dressed in nothing more than sweatpants that hugged his form snugly, doing little to hide the bulge that she’d only moments ago been touching her most intimate places with.
“I don’t care if you plan to starve me, my sweet heathen queen, but I’m not leaving your bed. You don’t have to touch me; hell, you don’t have to want me here, but I’m here, and you’re my wife. Most men wouldn’t think twice about feeding elsewhere, but I’m not most men. So for a year, I’m yours, and you’re mine, and we will be faithful to the vows we took before the Gods and Goddesses. So, you’ve been warned. If you touch another man, I will make your life hell, and his will end. You can promise me the same fate, but I doubt you’d care either way.”
“Get in bed, I’m exhausted, and you’re ruining my beauty sleep, Asrian.”
“Not heathen king? That’s progress.”
“No, it’s not heathen king, sleep.”
“You got a smart little mouth, you know that, right?” he chuckled.
“So I’ve been told.”
Chapter 10
Lilith awoke being crushed to death. Something hot and heavy was crushing the air from her lungs as it pressed against her. She pushed at it, prying her tired eyes open to peer up over at the giant Fae who held her. She lifted her body, staring down at the giant brute that was larger than anything she’d ever imagined him to be. He looked peaceful, almost…normal in sleep. She silently took in the sinewy curves of his muscles, the ripple of washboard abs that bespoke of strength.
She inhaled the masculine scent he exuded. Before she could think better of it, she lowered her nose to his chest, inhaling of his unique scent. Her lips pressed against his flesh, slowly exploring the contour of it as her hair trailed over it. Lilith exhaled as a soft moan of desire escaped.
“You’re molesting me in my sleep?” a sleepy tone filled the room, and Lilith lifted a guilty stare to the man she’d been exploring languidly, haphazardly against her better judgment. “No, no, continue. I’m here for your pleasure, wife. Take it in, it’s all yours.”
“I…I…fuck,” she groaned as she lifted her body to her knees, staring down at his amused smirk as his sleepy eyes took in her oversized nightgown. “You were crushing me in your sleep.”
“So you decided to sniff and molest me?” he shrugged as he rested his hands behind his head in a lazy, relaxed pose. “Sounds legit, I mean, when I’m being crushed, my response is to sniff my prey first, fight later. Having all the strategic information about my crusher is important,” he mused.
“You’re making fun of me?” she asked as she fought against the smile that tried to tip the corners of her lips. “Whatever, you smell…nice,” she admitted. “Different than other males,” her voice came out throaty, husky, and sounded like it belonged to someone else.
“You’ve spent a lot of time sniffing other men? No wonder you prefer to remain here, what would the rumors be if the queen went around sniffing everyone?” he chuckled.
She placed her red face into her hands and shook her head. “I’ve never sniffed anyone else before, nor have I woken up next to anyone other than my sister. I also tasted you, so there’s that if you want to throw it at me.” She dropped her hands and chuckled, staring at him as a smile played over her face and his went still, staring up at her as if something was wrong. “What?”
“You’re fucking beautiful, but when you smile, you’re fucking stunning,” he admitted as he continued to look at her, his hand lifted, brushing over her cheek gently as he watched her smile fade.
“Thank you,” she muttered, embarrassed at his compliment. It was something she hadn’t had many of since the Night Court was filled with blonde beauties with matching eyes and then there was her, darkness in a court of people who shone beautifully beneath the moon that fed them power.
“This is where you tell me how fucking handsome I am,” he explained as her eyes rounded and she continued to stare at him.
“You’re…” she stopped as she swallowed deeply and frowned.
“Wow, okay then. I know I’m not pretty like Cailean or Tor, but I didn’t think I was that bad,” he laughed.
“You’re rough, which is different considering you’re Fae. You smell like spices, mixed with fire and yet there’s something else mixed into your genetics. But no, you’re not displeasing to look at. In fact, I think I like looking at you, heathen king,” she said, adding the last with a cheeky smile.
“Yeah? Wow, that’s a high compliment from you,” he laughed and then sifted. She stared at the spot he’d just been in and started to turn when he pushed her to the bed, claiming her mouth in a hard kiss that tore a deep moan from her lu
ngs. Her nightgown vanished with his clothing, and she wrapped her legs around his waist, coming undone as his magical lips consumed her mind, as if he was literally sucking her will out through the kiss.
“Asrian,” she whispered once his lips lifted from hers and he stared down at her, silently asking permission to continue.
A knock sounded at the door, and he growled as he turned his head, staring at it. She blushed as she waited, wondering who was outside the door and how they’d explain their current state of arousal should they enter to find them like this.
“Asrian, get it done already you slow-moving fuck,” Tor shouted through the thick door. “We got things to do, and your wife’s freshly plucked lady parts were not on our list today.”
“Shut the fuck up you prick,” Asrian snapped. His eyes heated as he slowly brought them back to Lilith’s mortified face. “We’ll be ready in a few minutes.”
“You need help?” The awkwardness of the question hung in the air.
“No, Torin, I don’t need help, nor does my wife,” Asrian hissed beneath his breath as he lowered his mouth and kissed her forehead. “Pay him no heed, he’s a heathen, like me. Get dressed, we can continue this later.”
“I don’t think that is wise, not unless you want a child,” she said.
“I wouldn’t mind kids; those little monsters tend to be a pleasant surprise. My brother and his wife, they have the triplets and those little ones, they’re smart. They already sift, which is pretty unheard of at their age. But back to the point, I wouldn’t be against a child if it happens, Lilith. And I’d be around to watch it grow. I’m not the type to ignore my responsibilities.”
A Demon's Plaything: The Elite Guards Page 6