by Kim Knox
“What?” He marched out through the double doors and into the light of the courtyard. His shoulders lifted and he took a deep breath, tilting his chin up to the sun. Golden energy swept over him. “Fuck, I wanted to stick my hand in his chest and yank out his heart.”
“You wouldn’t have found it.” One of his eyes opened. She smirked at him. “And his diet? His offal wouldn’t make good eating.”
“No. Still, cracking him open. It has its merits.” He tugged at his tunic, straightening it. “The library.”
Ava led the way through the twists and turns that wound throughout the palace into the Institute, the scurry of civil servants replaced with the slow strut of the mages. She belonged in neither place and had always been grateful for the shadows to hide that fact. With Heyerdar beside her, it was less easy to hide. But then the captain didn’t belong either. He simply didn’t care about it. She was not admiring that about him either.
The library sat at the end of a long, wide corridor in the north wing of the Institute. Heyerdar traced over the insignia of the Highest Mage’s office cut into the surface of the heavy wooden door. The whisper of magic burned in the air, igniting against his fingertips.
“You are to stay silent.”
Ava pressed her lips together and Heyerdar narrowed his gaze.
“And after this, I fuck you.” His gaze slid over her, hot and molten, and she ignored the little twist of hunger and need in her belly. “I’m more than ready.”
“You’re...” Ava bit back the need to swear. It had been a deliberate taunt. Heyerdar was a complete fuck. “It’s business, Captain.”
“As I said, I kill thieves. I don’t fuck them.” He gave her a sharp smile. “You’ll be the first to be under me. Hot, sweaty, naked and desperate.” His gaze burned. “I promise.”
He shoved open the doors before she could bite out her reply. They slammed back against the smooth stone of the walls, the sudden fierce clank and thud echoing across the silent library. “Master Pio Dorien.” Heyerdar’s voice boomed just as loud. “You and I will have words.”
Ava stared after him, her jaw dropping. He really didn’t give a shit what they thought of him.
“Left Hand!” Dorien banged his hand down against his desk, a thin mist of dust and sand rising. “How dare you—”
“How dare I?” His voice dropped to a hard whisper, and the overblown dramatics fell away just as quickly as his booming voice. He closed the distance between them and planted his hands on Dorien’s cluttered desk. “You insulted one of my men. Spat on my warrant from the emperor. Did you think this would go unnoticed?”
Dorien blinked three times before his spine straightened. “These events are not the concern of the mages.” He lifted his chin. “Your man insulted me and this institution. And as for allowing a thief access to our most precious books—”
“Thieves broke through your wards. They are in the city.”
“Killing wastrels, I know...”
Heyerdar’s jaw tightened. “They threaten the palace. Anything that threatens the palace is my concern. I need everything you have on thieves.”
Dorien’s beady gaze darted to her. “You have a thief with you. I cannot allow—”
“Scared she’ll find out what she is?” Heyerdar voiced what Dorien seemed reluctant to say. Ava’s gut squeezed. “You keep a thief, you accept what they are. Not whatever the fuck you mages are doing with her.”
“Captain!”
“Get me the books, Dorien.” Heyerdar spread his hands on the desk. The heat of his energy burned in the air and spidered across his skin to bite into the wood. Something in the wood...changed. Ava could almost taste it. A hint of hot sunlight, warm earth and rain and a sense of stretching, growing... The desk creaked. Tendrils sprouted from its surface, catching Dorien’s sandpot, inks, the ancient tomes piled in one corner. Other roots took nothing. Weaving through the air. Hunting.
“Captain!” Dorien’s voice rose to a terrified squeak. He tried to scramble back, but his chair wouldn’t move. “You’re not allowed—”
“The books. Or this desk shows you how much it loves you.”
Ava pressed a hand to her mouth to stop her guffaw. Dorien would hate her forever, but this single moment was worth it. Completely. Utterly.
Mages moved out from the marble and shadows, slow and wary. Not one moved to help Dorien. They were witnessing the power of an elemental. Someone who brimmed with power, someone who used it, not hoarded it like they did. He brought life where there could be none, and it held them transfixed.
Dorien stared at the roots swaying before him. They dipped and wove, catching the dust and the flicker of lamplight, reacting to his every flinch. His breathing quickened and he pressed his arms to his chest. Hands clenched into bloodless fists. Terror held him, broke him because not one flicker of magic pushed out in its usual rhythm from his skin.
“Or would you like me to leave you alone with your desk? It’s eager for you, believe me.” Heyerdar took a step back. “I can hunt out the books myself.”
“Stop this at once. You are the Left Hand. To abuse your power, to abuse me—”
Roots wrapped around his arms and chest and lifted him out of the chair. He dangled in the air, his robes flapping.
“Last chance, Dorien.”
The old man swore. “Highest Mage Reist will hear about this.” A root twined around his skinny calf, slithering upwards, and he squeaked. “Gabra, Sanat. Gather the books.”
“And the ones from the special collections.” Heyerdar’s shout followed them as they ran. He returned his attention to Dorien.
“You can’t. With her.” Dorien glared at her, his hatred palpable. A root grabbed his other calf and started the slow, dry push up to his thigh. “Yes!” He shrieked the word. The roots stilled. The old man sagged, the roots supporting him, cradling him. “The special collections too.”
Heyerdar took another step back and waved Ava forward. “Feed.”
She stared at him. “What?”
“I bring life. You bring death.”
He wanted her to take the magic from the desk, to return it to its inanimate state. But his way of putting it? The thief in her liked the twist, and the way Dorien had paled. Magic flickered at the edges of his skin now. It was an insult. His fear of Heyerdar had paralyzed him. Her? He could fight back.
She gave the cold thief smile to Heyerdar and didn’t miss the heated spark in his gaze. He liked her hungry and empty soul. Were all elementals as fucked up as him?
She slapped her palm on the table, and the scorch of his living power raced back up her arm. Just for her, not for sharing, not for pushing into Fallon and twisting the future. Just her. Fuck. Her knees almost buckled, and her greedy soul opened, desperate, eager to consume the power lacing the wood.
The roots burned away to insubstantial columns of ash. A heartbeat later, they crumbled. Objects clattered to the stone floor and Dorien hit the weakened desk with a dull thud and a shriek. He groaned and the desk creaked, followed by a distinct wobble to one of the legs.
Ava pulled herself back, the fire in her veins simply delicious. She caught her fingers in her hair, her mouth slack and panting. She shivered as Heyerdar put his hot hands on her hips. His lips brushed her neck, teasing the skin just below her ear.
“Enjoy yourself, little thief?”
He’d made her life harder with the mages too. But the rush in her body for that long moment, the lick of every inch of his incredible power over her skin, meant she didn’t care. “You’re a bastard.”
“I’ve never known my ancestry. You could be right.”
His smile was sharp. With the heat of his magic, she could almost sense the essence of him inside her. Her belly tightened. The memory of his mouth on her breasts, between her thighs, ate away at her. The hunger increased. He wanted
to fuck her out of curiosity as well as their deal.
“Aren’t you curious too?” His breath pricked her skin. “Here are your books.”
Dorien’s two assistants trundled forward with a wooden cart. Books were placed on its two narrow shelves. Eight in all. All of them leather bound with plain lettering pushed into the covers. The hint of age, dust and vellum filled the air. What she was, all that she was, lay in those books. Heyerdar’s fingers dug into her hips, pulling her mind back to him and how his body surrounded hers. Reminding her of her other hunger.
“And it’s time I had you.”
Briefly, Ava closed her eyes. “I know.”
Heyerdar sucked in a breath and released it as a low growl. Her breasts tightened and the solid pulse of want between her thighs said she couldn’t fight the need her body had to fuck him. It was still business. Her flesh might want him but her heart...her heart was fixed on another.
“I’ll more than prepare you for your beloved Reist.”
He waved back Gabra and Sanat, another quick surge of his magic wrapping around the cart. One moment, it was there, the next...there was a drift of a cool, grass-scented breeze, and the cart and the books were gone.
Heyerdar eased his hands away her body. “We have work to get to.” He took her hand and she could only follow, the mutters and complaints of the mages stabbing at her until the doors slammed shut.
He didn’t speak, just set a steady pace down to his chambers. Her heart was in her throat, nerves making her skin hot and her body tremble. A few days before, she’d been so confident, so sure of herself and of him. Now...now, she didn’t know what the fuck she was doing.
She was using him for Reist. She was. She repeated that over and over as her boots beat out a rhythm between his solid steps. Fucking him was a one-time deal. A way to get Fallon back into his overcrowded bed.
“No crowds today. Just you.” He shoved open the outer door to his chambers. Lamp stands picked out the familiar images from the tapestries covering the rough walls. The heavy scent of stone mixed with the deep hum of old magic filtering through the ground.
Ava reached out to consume it, wanting the magic to steady her, to feed her so that the coldness of her nature could offer some form of stability. “How do you do that? Know what I’m thinking?”
“Secrets.” The word was a dark promise, and a flicker of fresh need chased through her. He yanked open the inner door and paused to look down at her. His finger traced a slow line down her jaw, his gaze distant, turned inward. “So many unanswered questions.” And then his attention was back. Sharp. Heated. Her breath caught. “But knowing how it feels to have you wrapped around my dick won’t be one of them.”
Chapter Ten
His bed was huge. It seemed to swallow up her vision, and she found herself moving, scuttling back until her spine hit a thick tapestry and the smooth stone of the wall.
Heyerdar stood before the fireplace, the spark of a fire flaring before it roared into life. Golden light splashed over him, bathed him in liquid flames. The beauty of it caught her and her nerves deepened.
“Perhaps I should go through those books?” She pointed back to the room—on the other side of a thick wall and locked doors—where the cart stood, the books untouched, unopened. She needed an excuse to escape. “This can wait.”
He held out a little cup, heat churning around his palm to warm its contents. Magic stirred within it. “Whitebane tea,” he murmured. He waited for her to lift her hand and placed the cup there, his fingers enfolding hers. “No ripened belly for you.” His mouth twitched. “This time.”
Ava gulped down the bitter tea, ignoring the sting of the whitebane at the back of her throat. The sliver of magic fed her hunger. Had she ever thought about children? The memory of seeing Heyerdar with little Kaia burst back over her thoughts. He’d made it look natural...but then he was a force from the earth. He brought life.
“You didn’t imagine little Reists peppering your long future? And it would be long with him. Fuck him, and you add decades to your life with his magic.”
She hadn’t considered it. Was that strange? She had imagined life continuing on as it did, their meetings, a shared breakfast, meals, friends with the added extra of him touching her, of pushing her back and taking her mouth.
“You didn’t.”
“Mages don’t have families till late.”
“Still...” He placed the little cup on the high mantle. Firelight danced across his face and caught in his eyes, making them impossibly golden. “Not one dark-haired little boy with your eyes?”
Anger twisted her belly. “What I want has nothing to do with you. We have a deal. Nothing more.”
He inclined his head. He unfastened his belt and propped his sword in a heavy, high-backed armchair. His tunic joined it. His undershirt gleamed white in the shadowed room. “You won’t reach out to Fallon until my dick is inside you.”
Ava blinked. His sudden practical coarseness surprised her. “Why?”
“That should be her memory, shouldn’t it?” He waved his hand at her. “Strip.”
She unbuckled her sword belt, threw it to the chair, and her fingers trembled as she yanked at her tunic. She willed herself to pull it over her head. It was happening...and not in the way she expected. He’d taunted her for days and now it was as businesslike—she winced at that thought—as someone in Madam Lunete’s brothel. It was what she wanted. Heyerdar wasn’t the one to seduce her.
She stilled, her tunic obscuring her face. She’d never imagined him gentle, but something in her had thought that this moment would be hot, consuming, not...impersonal.
“You remind me often that we’re a deal.” He pulled her tunic free and it joined his own on the armchair. A dark smile touched his mouth. “Now you want me to forget it?”
“No.” She tugged off her boots and rolled down her trousers. The warm air, touched by his magic and the heat from the fire, brushed against her skin. Her gaze darted away as Heyerdar exposed his chest. She’d seen him naked every day for years, yet in the small, stonewalled room, with the fire warming his skin and thickening his delicious scent...she was embarrassed. Nervous. Scared.
Heyerdar looked up from removing his boots. He frowned. “You’ll enjoy your time with me.”
“Like everyone else?” She pressed her lips together. Where had that come from? She wasn’t jealous of the scores of woman who had had him before this moment. She wasn’t. “What Fallon accepts from you is your business.”
“True.” Golden light gilded his skin, the lick of flame somehow natural, necessary. He was beautiful. She couldn’t deny that. He held out his hand. “Come here, little thief.”
Ava moved without thought, letting his fingers envelop hers. She didn’t look down, her gaze fixed instead on the solid muscle of his chest. Of course, she’d seen an erect dick before. It just hadn’t been pointing at her.
“This has to go.” He slipped through the ties that held her breast band. “And these.” His thumbs dipped into her shorts and eased them down over her hips. It brought him closer and his hot breath burned her skin. “Has anyone else seen you naked?”
She stepped out of her shorts and closed her eyes. She bit her bottom lip. “No.”
“Good.”
She stared at him. “Good? You like women who are...well used.”
His mouth lifted with the dark, predatory smile that made her heart drum. She almost took a step back, the ache, the hunger, within her mixing with her fear. His thumb touched her cheek, hot but unexpectedly gentle. “They don’t trust me with women like you.”
Ava swallowed. What had she fallen into? “Trust you?”
“Virgins,” he murmured, crowding her, urging her back to the high mattress. “A virgin to an elemental is temptation itself.” He lifted an eyebrow as she plopped onto the bed with a sque
ak. She scrambled back across the cold covers but Heyerdar didn’t move. “Maybe that’s your draw? I haven’t had a virgin in...forever.”
“Why?” She tried to pull the coldness of her soul over herself, to find her courage in it. But panic ate at her. Yet, she didn’t put an end to it. That thought alone surprised her. For Reist. The thought pushed at her. She was having sex with Heyerdar to bring her one step closer to having Reist as her own. “What’s so special about someone who hasn’t fucked?”
“You watched the apprentices and envied them, didn’t you?” His tongue wet his lips. “Watched them suck and fuck. Imagined you were the one in the tangle of bodies.”
Ava wrapped her arms around her legs, making herself small and hiding herself from him. How could he pull the thoughts from her head? No one knew a thief. Not like this.
Heyerdar knelt in front of her, his face in shadow. A halo of gold shrouded his skin from the light of the fire. His hands cupped her knees and slowly, oh-so-slowly, he eased her legs down. “With every touch I know you more.”
Her heart squeezed. Could she allow that?
His laughter wrapped around her. “It’s too late.” His hands slid up her thighs, pressing them to the cool blanket. His body blocked the light and let shadow settle over her. “I want to savor whatever this is.” He eased back and drew her with him, until she was lying on her back staring up at him. His eyes were molten. “You won’t come until I’m inside you.”
She wanted to laugh. His slightest touch scorched through her body. She was embarrassingly responsive to him.
His lips brushed hers, brief, aching, and the burn of his magic teased her tongue. She wanted to consume him, take him in a rush. Then it would be over with. Done. And she wouldn’t be able to feel the want in her flesh. Wouldn’t enjoy the way he groaned as she took his power into her body—