“Hm,” he hummed without reclaiming his lips from her. “Retribution,” he finally answered.
“Starting fires you cannot extinguish?” she suggested, using his words from his earlier warning.
“I had absolutely no intention of extinguishing this fire,” he stated. He lifted her legs and wrapped them around his waist and Veria felt her insides melt like wax near flame as he set his cold lips on her chest.
Moans escaped them both, and she was certain she could not wait another second for him to claim her.
“You were right,” Veria muttered through both his lips and her own.
“I generally am,” he replied, “but what specific instance are we referencing?”
“The talismans,” she answered. “They work.”
“Ah, that they do,” he said. “Congratulations. You have just firmly seated your place in Mager history. How do you feel?”
“Ask me again in a few moments,” she whispered, seductively.
He smirked his roguish smirk, and she realized she had utterly forgotten everything she knew about him before she came. The thoughts of his history, his age, the impressions she had brought with her about his danger and mystery and debauchery—it had all been replaced by adoration for his skill and enthusiasm, his knowledge and power, his strength and vitality, his passion, and the way he seemed to feel about her. She stared into his dark eyes, and he into hers, and she realized she was entranced, and infatuated, and it was all her own doing, and not his.
“Now, Strelzar. Please,” she begged, her lips on his ear. “I am yours.”
He pulled his head back and looked at her gravely, and spoke with earnest. “My dear Veria,” he said, “you belong to no one.”
Strelzar took her to the remaining stone wall from the duel and secured her against it, more gently than he had in the heat of the elemental battle. When his hands were free, he ripped at the white shirt he had provided her not long before.
“You are going to run out of clothes at this rate,” Veria teased, tightening her legs around him.
“You say that as if I am a person who is fond of being clothed,” Strelzar responded, before abruptly setting his lips on hers and stealing the breath from her mouth. She twisted impatiently, and almost begged him again, but remembered that her words were a waste—he knew all her desires, could hear everything she wanted him to do. “I would normally suggest we go somewhere a little more comfortable, but—” he pressed her into the wall and she gasped in pain as her spine protested the forceful meeting with the hard stone—“we still have some time left on the dragonskin.”
“And what a shame it would be if it went to waste,” Veria replied in mock demurral. Again, she clutched at his chest, her hands in claws like a predator. He dropped his head back in delectation and laughed softly.
When he brought his head back to rest against hers, still pressing her into the wall with most of his body weight, Veria found just enough energy to connect with the smoke and ash in the air of the cavern. With a quick flash of searing heat and blazing flame, Veria set Strelzar's clothing on fire. He jumped and stiffened against the burning, but seemed to relax and accept, even savor it as the final sputtering of flame sizzled against his skin.
“You are in trouble, Birdie,” he teased, leaning in so his lips just brushed against hers. “That was one of my favorite shirts.”
“I apologize,” she whispered, their lips rubbing lightly against each other with every word she spoke. “Let me make it up to you.”
“I fully expect you to,” he muttered.
The remaining effects of the dragonskin were not wasted, and the cavern echoed with their fiery roars of satisfaction.
-XII-
Awaking amongst the silk bedding and various furs with a gaping yawn and contortionist stretch, Veria only had vague recollection of the trek back up the spiral stone passageway from the chamber. She expected Strelzar to be next to her, but when she rolled over, she realized he was not. Before she could even look around or wonder where he was, he revealed his position by speaking:
“How did you sleep?”
Veria sat up slowly, and found him—slouched over his work table, poring into books and scribbling with a large quill—exactly as she had found him upon her arrival to Plazic Peak, black robes and all.
“Just fine, I suppose,” she answered, suppressing another yawn. “And yourself?”
“I did not sleep,” he replied, not looking up from his work.
Veria surveyed him carefully, sitting up a little straighter in the bed. Something was off about him, or at least different from the short time she had been with him in his home, which she realized was probably not long enough to use as a base for opinions regarding his normal behavior. As she stretched her arms in front of her, a warm pain radiated through her shoulder.
“I think we outlasted the dragonskin,” she purred, playfully. “There are teeth marks on my arm—”
“You have to leave,” Strelzar said abruptly.
Veria was taken aback. Her mouth gaped, her lungs stopped their normal work, and she was sure that even if her brain could form a response, she could not have actually spoken if she wanted.
“Gather your things,” he said, still not looking at her.
“I did not bring any things!” Veria protested, shooting out of the bed.
“Well, that was stupid,” he chortled.
“I have no clothes—”
“I had my maid run down to the nearest town and fetch you something,” he answered quickly, obviously anticipating her remark. He pointed absently in the general direction of his wardrobe, and she saw a luxurious black silk dress and black fur coat hanging on its door.
Veria fumed and stomped her foot. “You have been thinking about this all night—that's why you did not sleep?” she accused.
Strelzar sighed and clenched his fists. “I have been thinking about it since I was prevented from sleeping by a slew of messages from a very, very, very old friend of mine—a friend whom I try not to think about because it distresses me and makes me question my life choices, which is not something I like to do.”
“What are you talking about?” Veria questioned.
Shuffling through a stack of papers on his table, he produced a few crisp leaves and flicked them toward Veria with antipathy. They fluttered down to the floor in front of her, and she crouched down to pick them up off the cold cave floor.
The first two were messages from her mother, who claimed she had been trying desperately to locate Veria because Lady Irea had fallen ill. The third message was from Daloes, expressing that he hoped she was being cautious in her investigation, and urged her to return to Londess.
“You have a child?” Strelzar asked, quietly.
“Not that it matters to you—”
“You have a child!” he yelled.
“And you probably have littered the world with your progeny, given your extensive history of dalliances,” Veria retorted, mustering as much nonchalance as she could, “so I still do not see how this is relevant.”
“There are people looking for you, Veria,” he said through gritted teeth, “and you have a life that is not in here.” He gestured to the cave with both hands, but his eyes bored into hers.
“What did you think?” Veria scoffed. “I had no past, no responsibilities, no relationships to speak of? I was not some blank slate or hollow shell you could fill with whatever pleased you.”
“That is not what I meant,” he corrected, “but I do find it very interesting that you did not have any thoughts about your own flesh and blood the entire time you have been here.”
Veria narrowed her eyes and crossed her arms. Her heart thumped with hot, angry blood. “I am not a perfect mother, nor did I want to be a mother. I love Irea, but she is better off without me,” she muttered.
“That is what your mother said about you,” Strelzar snarled. “She used to write me letters—would you like to see them?—when your birth did not immediately result in some kind o
f beneficial arrangement for her. She wanted to come back and study with me and leave you with her father. Take a minute to think about what your life would have been like if you had been raised by your dear Papa Sarco.”
They stared each other down in silence, and Strelzar raised his brows in challenge.
“You have no idea,” he finally said, shaking his head, “but I can tell you. He would have sent you out in the streets to work at whatever age he felt you could walk the distance to town from his hovel in the forest of self-imposed exile. Mines, seamstress, cleaning filth from gutters or climbing up chimneys—of no importance to him. You would have been required to pull your own weight. His, too, for that matter, because I hear it is somewhat difficult to find a job when you are Red-Listed.
“And then, when your powers revealed themselves, which I assure you, happened much sooner than you realize or have been allowed to remember, he would have submitted you to incessant and brutal abuse because you are not of his kind.”
Veria went rigid and swallowed hard, but tried to keep a calm facade. She felt as though she were being lectured by her father, even though her father had never actually lectured her.
“Would you like to meet him? He lives in the town,” Strelzar mocked.
“What?” Veria asked, even though she had heard him clearly.
“I relocated him here about twenty years ago in the chance that your mother actually did go through with your abandonment, so at least someone could keep a decent eye on you,” he explained.
“You...” Veria could not even finish the thought.
“Yes, you and I go back a little farther than I care to think about given the past few days,” he muttered. “But I think that gives me the leverage to say whether or not I think this is an acceptable way for you to live your life and that I will have nothing to do with your neglect of your daughter. I have done this before, had this exact conversation, and I am not doing it again. In fact, the very specimen that stands before me proves that I was right back then—you are very charming, unnervingly clever, and highly skilled, and still in one piece, which are testaments to your mother's guardianship. My tolerance for giving advice to intelligent, powerful women when they have made some ridiculous mistake because of a man is dangerously low, if not basically non-existent,” he added, in his haughty, know-it-all tone, turning back to his studies at the table.
“You think because you saved me from my grandfather you can tell me how to live my life?” Veria snapped.
“Yes, that is exactly what I think,” he stated plainly.
“What if I am not done learning?” she asked, desperately grasping for any reason to stay, if not out of stubbornness, than out of sheer panic that somewhere inside, she knew he was right—maybe staying would be a mistake.
“You are done learning from me,” he answered nonchalantly. “You moved a stone dragon and burned another person's clothes off their skin after but a few hours of my tutelage. I think you are fine—”
“I want to learn more, Strel—”
“You did not come here to learn!” he yelled, slamming his fist into the work table. He stood and rounded on her. “You came here to get some information out of me on your nonsensical quest to find answers about the death of a man who did nothing for you in his lifetime, except provide your mother with seeds and farmland,” he growled in her face. “And when you walked in—”
He stopped short, a frustrated roar rumbling in his throat as he searched for words.
“There was a version of you that I had created in my head,” he said, a bit less sternly than the rest of his tirade, “and when the actual you was standing in front of me I—I made a mistake.”
“This was a mistake?” Veria spat, her throat tightening and breath quickening.
“I made the mistake of letting my desire to have you cloud my judgment!” he clarified.
“Oh, you poor thing,” Veria mocked. “I am sure that has never happened to you before.”
Strelzar chuckled, his grin parting his lips, that hint of sparkling teeth breaking through.
“You are right,” he conceded. “And you were right before—I did look at you like a blank slate, like a toy I could play with—like this perfect thing that had been created just for me, out of everything I had ever wanted but had never been able to find...” He trailed off, and brushed his smooth fingertips lightly across her cheek and down her jaw. “So, I did not even stop to think that there were people out there looking for you more than I had looked for you, needing you more than I needed you.”
“Is that what this is about?” Veria asked, her face scrunching in tight disapproval. “You are afraid that people will come looking for me? Anything to protect your precious solitude and anonymity!? No one is going to come looking for me, Strelzar. They may wonder where I am—”
“The man you think about,” he said softly. “What about him?”
“I do not think about him,” Veria argued.
Strelzar cocked his head at her. “You want him,” he murmured. “He's in here,” he touched her head at the temple, then ran his fingers through her hair. She inhaled sharply and bit her bottom lip to keep it from quivering. “Will he not come looking for you?” he asked.
She shook her head. “No. He wants nothing to do with me, in fact.”
“Then he is an idiot,” Strelzar uttered. “And I do not particularly see you desiring the company of fools.”
“He is an idiot,” Veria agreed, “and I do not desire the company of fools. Which is exactly why I stayed. And why I had planned on staying longer—”
“You cannot stay,” he dropped his head and shook it in discord.
“What happened to 'marrying me and taking over the world'?!” she snapped. “What of all this talk about how incredible and superior I am—how I belong to no one and should never let anyone have power over me?” she challenged him.
“I meant every word of it,” he hummed.
“Then why are you trying to control my life, Strelzar?!” she cried in frustration.
He surveyed her carefully, and spoke in smooth thrums: “I have no power over you. I cannot control your life,” he said, and then leaned in and let the brims of his mouth taunt her ear and clenched jaw and delicate neck as he continued, “and you know as well as I do that if you wanted to stay, you are more than capable of bending me to your will, making me succumb to your desires and influence.”
With the backs of his hands, he traced the sides of her body, up the hipbones and the ribs and the shoulders. Her skin came alive in every area he grazed with his feathery touch, and her breath lost rhythm and became labored, but she tried to resist him. She was furious at him, after all.
“You have that boring little bracelet,” he whispered. “You can make me change my mind—you could have made me change my mind and had your way with me by now, and this whole ordeal would be over. But you have not. For one simple reason.”
“And what reason is that?” she questioned, her voice so constrained it was almost a whisper.
“You know I am right,” Strelzar answered, lifting his head and looking her straight in the eyes.
Veria's chest slumped forward with the full weight of realization, and the unbearable depression she felt toward the situation.
“Ah, there it is,” he said, rubbing her shoulders in an affectionate manner. “Now I hear it.”
“Hear what?” Veria pouted.
“You want to see her. You want to go home. You need to take care of her.”
“I still does not mean I want to leave here!” she argued.
“Oh, trust me, I understand completely your stance on that issue,” he laughed. “You have made it crystal clear. But that is what it means to have responsibilities, especially to other people. Doing things you do not want to do.”
“That is why you have no attachments to anyone?” Veria objected. “So you do not have to do anything you prefer not to? What about the people from your past that make you question your life choices? No responsibilitie
s to them?”
Strelzar squeezed her shoulders, and lowered his voice to a low, warning growl. “This is not about me! But if you insist on knowing, I have plenty of attachments to people. I am doing something I would rather not do right now. You can be upset with my decision, but do not dare insult my dignity, Veria! Do you think I want you to leave? Do you think I am happy that I created this mess?”
“First, I am a mistake and now I am a mess?” she interrupted, but he ignored her and continued.
“I should never have let this happen. You deserve better than to get tangled up with a crazy old recluse,” he said. “I cannot give you what other men can give you.”
“I do not want what they have,” she argued.
“Maybe not now,” he conceded. “Maybe not ever. Are you wishing you had developed your skills in a different way now? You could see the future. You could be standing there, right now, confident in what your decisions would bring.”
“Knowing the possible future does not bring confidence in decisions,” Veria corrected, “Only more doubt.”
“Your vernal wisdom shall never cease to astound me. Daloes has taught you well.”
“Daloes is not my only Master,” she said.
“Mm,” he hummed, closing his eyes in gratification. “I am going to miss that. You had better leave before I lose all this resolve I spent the entire night collecting. I think you do not comprehend how difficult this is for me. You are in the tattered remains of my night clothes, you know.”
Veria rolled her eyes and sighed, walking past him to the wardrobe without a word and taking the new clothes down from their hanger. While she dressed, she tried to compose herself. He was right. She was still angry, but he was right. She wished he was wrong, that things could go her way for once, but he was right.
Of course he was. He had said it himself. He was always right. Which enraged her stubborn side, but settled the part of her that had grown accustomed to being given direction in her life. Something very strange inside her—was it a bit of precognitive skills she had decided not to develop emerging from their suppressed depths?—told her that this was not the last time she would see Strelzar. And why it mattered to her was a mystery in her swirling, buzzing, thought-riddled mind. A few days before, he was a figure in some stories, a villain to the world of truth and honor, a man she would have avoided meeting under any other circumstances.
The Second Talisman: (Book II of the Elementals Series) Page 11