Two Worlds of Dominion

by Angelina J. Steffort

  Seri half-lifted him down the stairs and into the square, out of harm’s way.

  One by one, her guards emerged and then the pack—turned back into their human shapes so they wouldn’t scare the crowd. But Jemin was still nowhere within sight.

  “Where is he?” Maray’s eyes squinted as she tried to see through the rolling wall of dust that rumbled in the entrance, and Heck grabbed her other elbow as he noticed she was subconsciously inching toward the looming suffocation.

  “They were right behind us,” Feris coughed. “But the Shalleyn hit him pretty badly…”

  Maray’s chest tightened in the already restricting corset—as if that was possible—and she wanted to curse herself for not having thought about it… To have Feris shield Jemin instead of her.

  The warlock gave her a look that said it wasn’t her fault. And she could already hear Scott’s comments if she spoke her thoughts. That it didn’t matter. That if given the choice to protect Jemin or the Queen of Allinan, it was always going to be the Queen of Allinan—her.

  In the background, the chants gradually died away, and instead, murmurs filled the air. Maray didn’t react. Not yet. Not until Jemin was safe.

  “Jem!” It was Heck who noticed him first as he descended from the dust, supported by two soldiers whose faces were unrecognizable beneath the layers of dirt which had settled all over their faces.

  Maray cringed as she noticed the gaping wound at his side where the Shalleyn must have smashed him into the pillar. His forehead and left temple were covered in blood, and his limp let Maray guess that more than bone was broken.

  “I’m fine,” was all Jemin squeezed out between gritted teeth as the guards sat him down on the ground.

  “You don’t look fine,” Heck countered. “You look horrible.”

  The crowd’s chattering grew louder as they, too, spotted the wounded soldier.

  “He’s the one the demon picked,” someone in the front rows called to the eager ears of the spectators, and the news seemed to spread further to the back, second by second. But Maray hardly heard them, heart beating wildly as she studied the wounds from afar.

  “Nothing that Master Feris can’t fix, right?” Jemin’s lips twitched, but his eyes searched Maray from head to toe, assessing whether she had been hurt, his gaze caressing her face as it lingered there.

  Maray’s eyes stung with something more than dirt as she fell to her knees beside him and took his hand.

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I’m so sorry. It should have been me.”

  Jemin shook his head at her, leaning his cheek into her palm, bright-blue eyes burning with fire despite the pained twist of his features. “It shouldn’t have.”

  Maray felt it, deep in her heart, that she was no longer willing to live without that flame that seemed to spark for her—and only her.

  She didn’t care that they were all there—the council members, the court officials, the guards. She didn’t care that the people of Allinan, who had put their trust in her, were scrutinizing every single one of her movements. She no longer cared about what traditions and protocols said. On her mind for a brief moment, there was no other thought than that, after everything they had gone through, she was going to claim him as well.

  She sat back on her legs and lowered her head to his and whispered in his ear, “You’re on guard duty tonight.”

  Jemin’s eyes widened as she drew back and gave him a smile, the fire behind his irises now blazing.

  He lowered himself back to his elbows and gritted his teeth as Feris went to work over his wounds, but the fire didn’t die away as he held her gaze, letting her know he was going to be there.

  “Stop her!” The shout of a woman tore through the mingling of voices, making every guard within view draw their weapon as they assessed the danger.

  Maray whirled around, bracing for the worst, heart launching into her throat and fingers shaking as she let go of Jemin’s hand.

  Scott and Heck were both blocking her from the audience’s view the second the scream echoed away, but to her surprise, it wasn’t Gan Krai. It wasn’t a demon who had come to attack. Instead, Maray spotted a small figure approaching them across the square. A woman ran after the little girl who was now peeking at Maray through the gap between Heck and Scott.

  “Let her through,” Maray ordered, and hesitantly, the two soldiers stood down, making way for a brown-skinned girl with shiny, black braids dancing across her shoulders as she bounced excitedly.

  “For you, Princess Maray.” She held out a twig decorated with bows made of thread and yarn.

  Maray gaped at the item for a moment before she realized it was supposed to be a gift.

  The world around her seemed to hold its breath—including the mother, who had frozen a step away from Scott and Neelis, who had joined them from the other side, her eyes wordlessly pleading for her daughter.

  “Queen,” the woman hissed in correction.

  Scott had his weapon ready just in case…

  “I apologize, Your Majesty.” the woman whimpered at the sight of the blade too close above the girl’s head. “I couldn’t hold her back… she slipped through the barriers and…” The woman was breathless from the sprint, her cheeks flushed with red blotches.

  Maray measured her face for a moment then eyed the girl, a smile on her lips. “What a lovely bouquet you have there.”

  The girl returned her smile, a gap where the left front tooth had once been, and held the twig further toward Maray, and Maray took it, earning a giggle of delight from the child.

  “Thank you… What’s your name?”

  “Nama,” the girl sang in a thrilled tone as Maray examined the twig with a smile, careful not to damage the neatly-arranged colorful threads. “It’s for good luck,” Nama added.

  Maray looked up and inclined her head to the girl, her crown shifting half an inch as she did so, and said, “Thank you, Nama.”

  The mother blew out a breath of relief as her daughter returned to her, unbothered by the three intimidating soldiers who were armed to the teeth under their gala uniforms.

  As they walked away, cheers erupted from the crowd, loud and clear, shouting Maray’s name.

  “Long live Queen Maray!”

  And just like that, if only for a moment, the horrors that was Gan Krai were forgotten…

  When Jemin knocked on the half-open door a couple of hours later, Maray had already gone over the specifics of what had gone wrong with the trap—everything.

  They hadn’t been able to control his grand entrance. There had been too many civilians nearby, and not enough armed soldiers. Not enough warlocks. The Yutu hadn’t been able to track him out of the building, for he had simply retreated back into the folds between dimensions, and tempting as it might have been to send troops in there, Maray already had two spies positioned right under Gan Krai’s nose…

  But the worst mistake Maray had made was taking away their own advantage by blasting the building. She didn’t even know if she had taken down the Shalleyn in the process, if she might have hurt Gan Krai… if only a little scratch. At least, that would implode that image in her mind of an indestructible immortal who would outlive all of them on a battlefield. Which was where this was headed. They needed to take him down before he could take her down. She shuddered and sat up on the couch where she had just rested her head for the past couple of minutes after a long, long day.

  “Come in,” she said, not bothering to speak up, knowing that Jemin could probably hear her heartbeat from the hallway.

  He entered promptly, looking thoroughly healed and cleaned; his fresh armor shirt the same color as the brocade sofa Maray was resting on.

  “You look destroyed,” he noted as he strolled inside the room, his gaze sweeping over her still dusty dress.

  She hadn’t had as much as a minute to sit and eat, let alone shower. All she’d managed was to wash up her hands and face and neck. Which left the rest of her as dirty as the collapsing hall they had escaped from.<
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  “Thank you,” she muttered and rose to her feet. “Shall we?”

  Jemin wordlessly stepped past her and climbed into the fireplace, leading the way to Pen’s cabin.

  As it grew darker in the passageway, Maray summoned a flame to light their way. The orange tint made Jemin’s curls seem like dancing flames themselves as he glanced back over his shoulder to reassure himself she was all right. Maray’s breath caught as his lips curved into a sweet smile and parted slightly as if he had words he needed to get out. But he didn’t speak. Instead, he took her hand—the one that didn’t have flames in its palm—and closed his fingers around hers, sending a tingle along her hand, up her arm and shoulder, through her chest, and right into her heart.

  Maray studied his neck and shoulder blades as he turned back to the corridor ahead, leaving her with the breathtaking view of corded muscles under thin Thaotine. She swallowed and almost forgot to move her feet until Jemin tugged on her hand just a little.

  The path felt longer than it was, Maray’s chest tense with anticipation. She hadn’t talked to Jemin in weeks, let alone seen him properly. She didn’t truly understand what it meant that he claimed her, but something inside of her urged her to no longer shy away from him, from what was between them, from the draw he had toward her, more even than before he’d turned into a shifter. There was something deeply unsettling about this new Jemin and something so familiar it made her feel like she didn’t need either of the two worlds, as long as she could have him.

  “There should be food at the cabin,” he informed her, apparently having much more practical thoughts than she was. “Pia said she’d arrange for it.”

  Pia took her job as a handmaiden seriously, and even when she didn’t spend the night taking on guard duty, she made sure everything Maray could possibly need was arranged for.

  As if it was listening, Maray’s stomach growled.

  When they entered the cabin through the door in the wooden-paneled back wall, Jemin didn’t let go of Maray’s hand. Even when Pen, who jumped up and down in greeting, screeching softly as he rubbed his nose on Jemin’s knee before he noticed their laced fingers, rolled his black eyes and trotted out the front door, he held fast.

  Maray smothered a giggle.

  “I’m on guard duty tonight,” he said as if that explained everything. And that giggle slipped from Maray’s lips.

  “Dinner?”

  Jemin pulled her along as he lifted a silver dome off a pale-blue plate to release the scent of steamed salmon, rosemary, and lime. Maray nodded, hiding her grin as she pulled out a chair with her free hand and sat.

  He took a seat across from her and pushed the plate toward her, his fingers reluctantly letting go as he watched her struggle to cut the fish with her fork alone.

  “You’re a mess,” he noted, face bemused, and not giving her time to ponder his words, added, “a beautiful mess.”

  The fish went down Maray’s throat more loudly than she had intended. “But still a mess,” she suggested.

  “Not as much as the last time we talked.” His smile was still there, a quiet happiness which she had never noticed on him before.

  “When was the last time we talked,” Maray challenged between two bites and earned a raised eyebrow.

  “Don’t tell me you don’t remember,” he chuckled. “For I do. I always will.” He sniffed the air between them as if he could smell her as intensely as the day he had pressed his nose to her chest, reaching across the table with his hand once more as if he could hardly keep himself from taking the knife out of hers, placing it next to the filled water glass in the center.

  Maray could have been chewing cardboard, and she wouldn’t have noticed. The only thing filling her senses was Jemin’s sudden lightheartedness as if someone had lifted a spell off of him.

  “What’s different?” She cocked her head as she measured his expression.

  Jemin leaned forward a bit, as if letting her in on a secret. “You are a free woman. You are the Queen of Allinan. And you set the rules.”

  Was it really that simple?

  “Last time…” His features twisted for a second at the memory. “It wasn’t planned… I never meant to…” He searched for words. “To force myself on you like that.”

  “You didn’t force yourself on me,” Maray corrected and went back in time in her memory. “You claimed me.”

  There it was. And this time, it didn’t bring forward brooding Jemin, but charming, smiling Jemin, who lifted his hand again, this time not hesitating and letting her finish her next bite. Taking the knife from her hand along with the fork, he gently pulled her forward by her wrists until she leaned in across the table the same way he did. “I sure did,” he purred, his tone sensual and deep and full of meaning.

  A shiver ran over Maray’s spine as the fire behind his irises lit once more. It was there in his eyes, the primal instinct, which let her only guess what would happen if she handed over control.

  “And now I am what?” She asked and held his gaze, letting his fire burn into her. He didn’t blink.

  “My mate,” he whispered, and his tongue slid over his lower lip once, drawing Maray’s attention away from his eyes to his curved mouth, to the feral smile that had spread there.

  “Your mate,” Maray repeated and thought of the first time he had told her that his Yutu-side would be looking for a mate… He had thrust her against the dresser in her chambers back then, and she had been ready to let happen what may… Heat rose inside her chest, and her skin tingled where his gaze grazed over her.

  “You need a bath.”

  “What?” Maray shook her head as if diving out of a trance.

  Jemin’s laugh filled the room between them like the golden light of dawn filled the shadows on a spring morning.

  “You are covered in dirt and dust.” He gestured at her hair and dress before his gaze turned tender. “You need a bath.”

  He beckoned at the narrow door behind the kitchen area where the small bathroom was located.

  Maray followed his gaze and agreed that a bath was exactly what she needed after a day like that. But she left out that after everything that had happened, her diversion still stood—she was going to claim him.

  “After you.” Jemin rose to his feet and bowed slightly, back in the role of the soldier for a moment while he escorted her to the room where, with a flick of his fingers, hot water started pouring into the bathtub.

  Steam instantly filled the narrow space, and Maray remembered how much she ached to get out of that corset.

  “Help me?” The words were out before she could think them over, and Jemin, with an inaudible sigh, tucked her shoulders and carefully spun her around so he had access to the lacing Pia had installed this morning.

  His fingers lingered there on the neckline where, above blue and gold brocade and dust, her skin emerged. He brushed along the seam so lightly, Maray wasn’t even sure he was touching her, his breath tight behind her ear.

  “Are you particularly attached to this dress?” Maray could swear there was a mischievous smile carrying in his voice. She shook her head, a new sensation hatching in her stomach as she realized this time there would be no Heck to interrupt them, no Pia, no court officials, or even evil masterminds. This time, they were alone.

  Jemin’s mouth grazed along her earlobe, down the side of her neck until he lingered where his hands hooked into the stiff fabric, and with a low growl, he ripped it apart.

  Maray’s body shook as he tore the entire bodice, releasing her chest and making her feel as if she was breathing for the very first time—deeply and greedily.

  “You can always say it was damaged in the attack…” he mused onto her shoulder blades, his mouth now roaming the areas he had freed to her bare skin.

  Maray’s breasts tightened as his hands slid down, further down, until they reached the edge of her skirt and trailed along the seam to her stomach. He inhaled deeply, audibly, as if her scent was all he needed to make his blood boil.

 
; “I don’t think you’ll need this either in the bath…” Maray held her breath as his hands grabbed into the fabric, which was still intact, and tore it off her hips, less gently this time. Then, he chuckled into her ear as he studied her over her shoulder. “And you are by far more beautiful without it…”

  The dress flopped to the floor with a thud, leaving space for Jemin’s hands to brush down her thighs.

  She was naked—completely naked except for the crown, which she hadn’t bothered to dig out of her hair and set aside. And against her back, she could feel Jemin’s rock-hard stomach and the planes of his chest like a living, breathing statue of marble.

  “Tell me if you want me to stop,” he whispered, his lips now grazing her shoulder while his fingers slid up the inside of her thigh.

  Stop… no, she didn’t want him to stop. She wanted more, needed more, needed him closer.

  Jemin seemed to read her silent request and spun her around once more so she faced him, one hand brushing idly up and down her hip. In the background, the water gurgled into the bathtub, hiding Maray’s ragged breathing.

  Maray bit back a moan as he lowered his face to her collarbone and slid his lips down her chest lazily, as if there was nowhere he’d rather be in either of the worlds, and Maray felt it, that it was true. She was his. He had claimed her, and she had become his.

  The moan slipped from her as Jemin got down on his knees, bracing his hands on her thighs, his eyes blazing with blue fire, piercing right into hers.

  “My Queen,” he whispered, awestruck, voice rough. And Maray said nothing. She just lifted her hands to her head, pulling out that circlet of gold from her hair, and got to her knees before him. She dropped the crown on the fabric on the floor and unbuttoned the collar of Jemin’s shirt before she grabbed its hem and pulled it over his head, his arms shooting up to help her free him. And when she went to work on the buttons of his pants, this time, he didn’t rein her in but rested his wrists on her shoulders, his fingers stroking her cheek, her jaw, her throat.

  And when her hands trembled and failed on his pants, he reached down to aid her until there was nothing but him, as God made him, in all his glory…