Eledan lifted a hand and the dreamscape swirled, as though Valand were nothing but a curtain he’d ripped off to reveal Arcon beneath.
This was the room he’d almost killed me in, only now it had a throne made of tree roots. He fell into the throne and sprawled carelessly across it like it was someone’s used couch. “I should have visited your dreams much sooner. You’re very entertaining.”
“Fuck you. Tell me the message and leave. Some of us have real lives left to live, not fantasies.”
“Hmm…” He ran his finger along his jaw in thought. “Do you believe you know your messenger?”
And here it came, his attempt to undermine everything I’d built with Kesh. His illusions were games, and I wasn’t playing. Folding my arms, I stuck to my silence.
The prince’s right eyebrow twitched, and the wall to my right disappeared, revealing an Arcon corridor. I’d looked before it occurred to me not to. Kesh and Eledan. He had her against a wall, one hand in her hair, the other pulling her close so her body melded to his. I tore my gaze away too late to tear the image from my mind. “You think I care about a kiss?”
“This was before I made her mine, made her dream. Even you, with your limited vakaru imagination, know where it went next—again and again. The pleasures we took in each other, and the dreams we made. She fucks with the same passion as she kills. Did you know that? Hmm…” His smirk stabbed where his words could not reach. “No, I see you haven’t had the pleasure.”
Jealousy reared its ugly head, and I felt the same twisted ache as when I’d learned she had been with Devere. I’d wanted to have Kesh that way, the way Devere had, the way Talen had. But I’d only been with Kesh in my dreams, and dreams meant nothing.
I smiled, hastily masking the hurt. “But none of it was real.”
His grin cracked and fell apart, as fragile as glass. I’d found a choke point.
“It was all fantasy,” I added, watching his face fall. “She doesn’t want you, not really. You fucked with her head. The only thing she wanted from you was your heart so she could crush it.” I strode closer and looked down at the prince draped across his throne with fury burning in his wild eyes.
“Whatever she told you, it was a lie to string you along. You made a deal. Do you think that means something to her? She was made to lie.”
“She’ll keep the deal,” he said, but his confidence had crumbled.
“You’re naïve to trust her.”
“Doesn’t that make two of us?”
He didn’t know her at all. “I trust her to be anything and anyone to get what she wants. She will tell you what you want to hear, prince. She’ll whisper her promises in your ear while she stabs you in the back.”
“Or the heart?” Cold malice sharpened his words.
What was this act? He didn’t have feelings for Kesh. Fae like him didn’t feel much of anything. But his expression wasn’t guarded; it was open. Could his pain be real?
Eledan had fallen into her trap. By cyn, that made three of us. Four, if I included Arran. Fools. All of us. But at least we knew it. This prince had deluded himself.
Eledan’s playful smile sprang back to life. “Do you think me besotted?” He shoved from the throne, straightening an inch from my face. “Do you think I could fall for a lowly saru?”
I grinned back at him. My gums tingled, fangs extending. “A thousand years away from your Faerie. You’d fall for anything with a heartbeat and a touch of magic.”
“She told me to ask if the two of you were still okay and to tell you she did not leave of her own free will.” His top lip rippled in a snarl. “Apparently, your opinion of her is important, although, for the life of me, I have no idea what she sees in an animal like you.”
I huffed something like a laugh and turned my back on him, pretending to admire the office. Kesh had gotten to him. She’d cut her way into his heart. I trusted her to be the Messenger, to do anything to free her people and help Halow. She would lie, cheat, manipulate, and kill. Those traits were her greatest weapons. Eledan was another one of her victims.
“Do you wish for me to return a message to her?” he asked.
“No.” He would twist whatever I said like a knife in a wound. It was better to stay silent.
She knew me. I wouldn’t let Eledan warp what we had. She was alive and powerful enough to have the Dreamweaver delivering messages for her. That was all I needed to know.
“A deal on Faerie is a deal. It cannot be broken without severe consequences.”
I laughed, even as his words roused all my worst fears. What deal had she made with him? Something that had him on the end of a hook. “You really are mad. Nothing on Faerie can touch her.”
He snarled, and with an angry gesture, he changed the room back to Valand, where my people screamed and their remains turned the air acrid. “You should have died with the rest of your world, vakaru.”
“And you should have died when you lost your heart the first time. Lose it to Kesh and you’ll see that the same fate still awaits you.”
He clicked his fingers.
The room I woke in was a blur of dreams and reality. I was in my Excalibur cabin. Tek had my senses itching. Outside a narrow window, Calicto’s green marble stood out against Halow’s black starscape, its luminous magic-drenched surface more Faerie-like than ever before.
Kesh was alive. We had a warcruiser and a Sol Alliance ship.
My lips curved into a smile.
And now we had the Dreamweaver.
Chapter 9
Kesh
* * *
The Dreamweaver built layers. He wove time and desire into a tapestry that surrounded and bespelled. So, I knew, when I woke on Valand with the silken drapes fluttering, that I hadn’t woken at all. This was another layer, and the night I’d promised Eledan was far from over. Minutes might have passed on Faerie, but my time with Kellee, the feel of him holding me close, his kiss stealing my tears, that had been timeless. Eledan had given me a true gift. The bastard.
“How was it?”
Ugh.
Ignoring him wouldn’t make him go away, not in this world.
“You already know.” I pulled the sheet to my neck and sat up. “It was all you.”
He leaned against the far wall, his dark clothing contrasting with this world of color and light. I wanted to rip that all-knowing smile from his lips.
“You thought… that was…” He approached, his swagger twisting my disgust. “…me?” He pressed a hand to his chest, playing at being flattered. “You’re wrong.” He sat on the edge of the bed, dipping the mattress, and lifted my hand to his lips. “You know exactly how I fuck.” His dark eyes lifted as he brushed a petal-soft kiss on the backs of my fingers. “You know that wasn’t me inside you. I’d have drawn your pleasure out much longer than that beast.”
I would have pulled my hand free, but I oh so wanted to believe his next words. “If it wasn’t you, then… Kellee was here?”
“His intention was. Although, I’m sure he’s already forgotten it all. He’s a long way from any magical font and my reach. But with you so close, I borrowed a little of your gift and combined it with my own to weave your two dreams together. Dreamweaving really is an under-appreciated art.”
Kellee had been real? Everything Kellee had said he had meant? I touched my cheek. I could still feel his kisses as they’d taken my tears.
Eledan’s gaze darkened. “He didn’t know this was your dream, which was why he was so free with his inhibitions.”
I pulled my hand from his. “And I suppose you watched it all?”
His smile ticked.
I had asked for this. None of it should have surprised me, yet I still wanted to take a swing at him, to blame him, to rage at him.
His smile soured. “You knew it wasn’t me, and you knew I was watching, so don’t paint me as your villain.” He stood and moved to a window, its light framing him. Valand’s warm breeze played with his dark, silken hair. “I know you and your desires too we
ll for that.”
“You knew my desires.” I couldn’t escape this dream until he let me go. I had to play along and give him what he wanted, else this would never end. “I’m not the Wraithmaker anymore.”
“So you keep saying.”
The sweet scent of night lilies dallied around me. A temptation, a tease, a promise. Talen. But he wasn’t here. He couldn’t be here.
A smooth, warm but ghostly touch trailed up my thigh, and despite it being on top of the sheet, Talen’s touch burned through. I closed my eyes and tried to block it all. The kiss that settled gently on my naked shoulder buzzed through my body, bringing parts of me to life. Opening my eyes again, Eledan still stood at the window. Talen’s touch wasn’t real, but my body ached for it to be. Talen’s bond inside me, the one I hadn’t felt in days, beat alive. Oh, he would have me dream Talen next… this was too cruel.
“Don’t do this.” I meant for my voice to come out strong, but in my head, it sounded like, Please do this. And Eledan was rooted deep inside my head. He knew the truth. Knew how much my body and mind ached to have Talen close again.
“Your silver fae… your hidden Nightshade.” Eledan’s fingers caressed the drapes, and dream-Talen’s fingers circled and teased up from my hip into the dip of my waist. He gently pushed my arm aside, bringing me around to face him, and there he was, the secret smile on his soft lips, the hunger in his eyes, wide with desire. It wasn’t real, and when he pushed up, brushing his mouth over mine, I didn’t care that this was a fantasy. He sensed my acceptance, and the kiss deepened. My hand was locked in his long braids before I could think to resist.
Talen’s tongue swept in, his mouth demanding more. Wrong, wrong, wrong… But the roll of his shoulders and the hard curve of his back beneath my hands felt right. And when I switched one hand between us, my fingers fit perfectly around his strong, proud erection. He gasped into our kiss, coming to life in my hands. Magic sang between us, the bond bright and sharp.
My lashes fluttered, revealing another fae beside the door, hands clasped in front of him. One of those hands shimmered with silver tek. Sirius watched as Talen balled the sheet in his fist and tore it out from between us. Watched as Talen’s scorching mouth trailed kisses down my neck, his teeth scraped my breast, and his tongue flicked at my nipple. My body wasn’t mine anymore. It had turned into a liquid thing made of feeling and need and want. Down, Talen’s tongue swirled, swooping over the warfae marks beginning again near my belly, and lower still…
Sirius swallowed. He hadn’t blinked or moved but for that one betraying gulp.
He might be real…
No, no. Not Sirius. He wouldn’t…
He will watch.
He always watches.
Oh, by Faerie, I didn’t have the strength to stop this. I wanted it all, needed it all. And I wanted the guardian to witness it all.
Talen’s tongue teased and pleasure fluttered. Again I sank my hands into his hair, holding him right there, right where I needed him. His mouth closed. He sucked and worked his tongue so achingly lightly over me that with every stroke I fell deeper into madness—until I fell too far. The pressure built and the moment stretched, about to burst apart.
Talen grabbed my hips, yanked me down the bed, and thrust inside in one perfectly synchronized jerk of his hips. I cried out, said words that meant nothing, and twisted my fingers into the sheets. I felt him deeper than before, each thrust teetering on the edge of pain in a way that had me sinking my nails into his ass, demanding more.
I’d seen Talen fierce, seen him on his knees with tears in his eyes, and seen him hurt, but now his lips were parted, tongue touching the corner of his mouth, lashes falling over deep, silvery eyes. He was darkness and light poured into something unreal, and he was mine.
Movement at the edge of the room pulled my gaze from Talen’s rapt expression. Sirius’s tek hand removed the latch of his cloak. He dropped it in a puddle of fabric at his feet and stepped forward. The sword belt went next. Another step closer.
“Distracted?” Talen’s kiss was a hard, hungry thing. His body was hard too, hips thrusting, driving himself in deep, over and over, riding my pleasure ever higher.
Sirius was at the bedside, his tek fingers flicking open the hooks of his shirt. His green eyes rode over Talen’s arched back and up to me, and for a terrible second, that disgusted downward tilt of his lips had me believing he would stop this. Fear fluttered around my saru heart. Then he tore off the shirt, flung it to the ground like it had offended him, and started angrily on his pants fasteners.
Oh cyn… this was so wrong.
Talen slowed and withdrew, leaving me cold and aching for him to fill me again. I reached for him, canting my hips. No, no, this was how the dream would turn, how Eledan would make it hurt… but it wasn’t ending. Sirius let his trousers ride down over his hips, freeing his erection, and it was all I could do not to stare. He took the shaft in his tek hand and shuddered, either in pain or pleasure. His eyes rolled back, teeth sinking into his bottom lip.
I didn’t think, just needed. I crawled forward and touched his tek hand. He stopped caressing himself and looked down. I’d never seen that look on him. One of rawness, of an open desire, of a need… for me. I touched his hip to steady myself, sparking a sudden heat, and held myself high enough to take him in my free hand, and lowered my mouth over him. A flick of my tongue summoned a moan from the guardian. I very much wanted to hear that again. A swirl and he jerked, trying to stop himself from plunging in. Saltiness and his warm spicy magic sizzled on my tongue.
His hand clamped against the back of my head as Talen’s hands found my ass and his fingers spread me open. A push at my core had me briefly frozen, my mouth around Sirius’s cock. Talen eased in, so fucking gently that I clenched Sirius tighter. The guardian hissed a Faerie curse. I took them both in deep, forgetting everything, just feeling and nothing else. Pleasure rolled through me, pouring over me until I was lost to their synchronized rhythm. Sirius’s fingers dug into the back of my head and Talen’s reached around my hip to the nub between my legs. He pressed his hot chest flush against my back. His long hair tickled where it fell down my side, his kisses strumming my spine. He twitched his fingers over my swollen, needing clit, rearing me up, off Sirius. The guardian pulled me in close against his chest and bowed his head, taking the kiss I offered, tasting his seed and magic on me. Talen’s touch carved off all reason, stripping me bare. Their bodies burned, trapping me between them, and the power within me sang inside their joining.
Talen stopped.
Sirius became a cold and unmoving thing.
No, no…. you Faerie-damned piece of sluagh-bait!
“Beg me to have them finish you.” Eledan stood to my left, silhouetted by the light streaming in through the window.
My skin tingled, and my body throbbed, hot and wet and used in every right way.
“Beg, Wraithmaker…” he purred.
“I hate you.” I spat the words, but I truly wondered if it was him I hated or myself.
His cool fingers grabbed my chin and forced me to look up at him. “You haven’t changed. All you’ve ever wanted was to have them at your mercy, to make them your puppets, to have them love you like they forced you to love them. You wanted to kill the queen. You wanted this war so you could sate your desire to right all the wrongs they’ve done to you. The people believe in the Messenger, but I know her, and deep inside, she’s just a ruined saru addicted to fucking the fae over. Admit the truth. Beg for more and I’ll blow your sweet fucking mind, Kesh Lasota, Mylana, Messenger, whatever you call yourself.”
I hated him so much that the pleasure turned to fury and churned like a storm but we both knew how this would end, because we’d been here before.
He smiled and leaned in closer, his mouth a hot temptation inches from mine. “Beg. Me.”
He was right.
The good messenger was a myth. The truth of me wasn’t a shining star of hope at all.
I was full of holes and
wrongs and broken things, the pieces of which I’d picked up and tried to fix but none of it had fit. I did want to fuck them over. I did want them to bow to me, to kneel to me, to need me like I needed them. I’d wanted it since the first lash of Dagnu’s whip. I didn’t even need to beg. Eledan saw the truth inside me, saw the want and need in my eyes. I wanted all of them on their knees, all of them beneath me.
He tore his hand from my chin and laughed that fucking laugh.
Talen came to life, tilted my hips and plunged in from behind, skin on skin. I cried out and arched, throwing my head back to find Sirius’s gaze locked on me. His emerald eyes sparked with magic. Sirius’s tek fingers slipped between my legs, setting me ablaze. I wanted him in my hand, in my mouth, but Talen’s pace was building, his panting cool against my slick neck, and Sirius’s tek fingers knew exactly how to dance and pluck at the strings of lust. I had one arm over Sirius’s shoulder. The other I wrapped around his steel erection. His fingers danced, and my hand pumped, and Talen fucked me from behind until it all blurred into one scorching, numbing, beautiful song. My release tore me out of myself, made me bright and free. Sirius twitched, let out an angry growl, and pumped his seed into my hand. Talen’s thrusts juddered, his body wringing him tight until he also came with a feverish cry.
It was over, and the come down sank feelings back into my skin. Anger. Shame. Hatred.
Eledan slow-clapped. “Well done, little star. You made two powerful fae yours just as you’ve always desired. You know I can make all your dreams come true outside this realm too…”
He clicked his fingers, and my two fae dissolved into smoke, leaving me wretched and spent and bone-cold on my knees.
I lifted my chin and locked my glare on him. “How long have you had me in this dream?”
“Not nearly long enough.” He grinned. “Shall we go again?”
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