“Rxa, I don’t regret what we did. I needed a push. You were right. I was trying to deny the truth of our situation, and I was only lying to myself. Last night was easily the most incredible night of my life.” She smirked. “Even if I’m going to pay for it for a few days.”
He lifted his head, propping himself up on his elbow to watch her in disbelief. “You said you wanted me. You said you needed me. I know I’m not too messed up from the neck down, but I…”
She put her finger to his lips. “No. No more of that. You lectured me about lying to myself. Now, I’m lecturing you. You are beautiful. I know you can’t see that. I know you can’t believe that. And that’s okay. I can’t even imagine what you’ve been through. But these scars of yours…I don’t think they detract from you. They add to you. They’re also the least alarming thing about you.”
He grinned and leaned down to kiss her cheek. He hesitated for a moment before kissing her lips. She felt him shudder at the gesture. When they parted, he was smiling sadly. “I’m still getting used to that.”
“And I’m still getting used to this.” She placed her palm to his cheek again and caressed him. He leaned into her touch. “Whatever this is.”
“It’s complicated, I’ll give you that. Do you regret last night?”
“No.”
“Are you angry with me?”
“No. You were right. I’m not going to hold a grudge against you because I was being stubborn and foolish.” She let out a breath. “And…I look forward to our next wrestling match. I just want to wait until I don’t feel like my crotch lost a bar brawl.”
He grinned and kissed her again. “I could get addicted to this.”
After a moment’s hesitation, she decided she had to try one more time. “We could stay here, Rxa. Away from all the people you hate so much. Call off your war. Let the drengil return to death. Stop all this madness. It could be just you and me. Like this. Together.”
Frowning, he let out a long sigh. “You have no idea how tempting that is, Ember. How much I would adore to stay here, at your side, and make love to you until you grow old and die. But I cannot let Aon and the others exist in this world for a moment longer. Once they’re gone—once I’ve made them pay, and the void starts to consume Under like it should have done before—then we’ll come back here, and you and I can watch the stars blink out, one by one.”
“If you were trying to make that sound romantic, you fucked it up.”
He laughed and tucked his head against her shoulder for a second. “I fuck everything up, darling. Fair warning.”
“I have to try to stop you, Rxa. I have to do what I can to save this world. Even if…like you said, things are complicated now.”
“Well, you never know. Many men have been swayed off their course because they found a partner who was really good at sex.” He snickered. “Maybe you still have a chance.” He left her then, climbing off the bed, and stretched. “Let me go get your breakfast before it gets cold. Then, that hot bath.”
It did sound like a fantastic idea. She yawned, stretching again. It made her muscles feel far less abused. “Then world domination?”
“Then world domination.” He smiled at her. “Don’t move. I’ll be right back.”
“I won’t argue with that plan.”
He left, but not before glancing at her with an expression she couldn’t quite name. It was affectionate. It was peaceful. And it might have been something more than that.
With a long, wavering sigh, she shut her eyes. The pillow was warm. The bed smelled like him. Like incense and spices. She nodded off.
Rxa strolled back into the bedroom, carrying a plate of food and a mug of hot coffee. He couldn’t help but smile when he saw Ember lying in bed, her eyes shut, her lips parted. His poor little dove had fallen asleep again. I did run her ragged last night. He grinned at the memory. It had been so wonderful, feeling her beneath him, surrendering to him. They had both needed it to be violent, if for different reasons.
He hadn’t ever really scratched that particular itch in his former life. It hadn’t been his style. He was the gracious, gentle lover. He was the prince in shining armor that all others had wished him to be. He had never, not even once, been given the opportunity to take.
Let alone be invited to do so.
Oh, Ember had put up a good fight. But deep down, they both understood the game. That she wanted to leap from the cliff into the lake below, she was just too afraid to do it. She had felt trapped by dogma and her training, and what her moral high ground had demanded of her. She could never willingly lie with the enemy. Even if it was painfully clear that was what she wanted to do.
And he was more than excited to have taken the choice away from her, if only because she wanted things to be simple. If she had really meant her resistance—if she had really begged him to stop—he would have. In a heartbeat.
But even as she had protested, she was leaning into his touch. Arching into him, even as she weakly tried to kick him away. Even still, he had wondered if she was going to hate him the moment she woke up. But his little zombie hunter had proven to be a surprise once again.
She had enjoyed it.
She really thought he was beautiful.
He placed the tray of food on the nightstand and gently sat next to her on the bed. He leaned an arm close to hers, where her hand curled by her cheek. Now he truly felt like Prince Charming, come to kiss his Sleeping Beauty awake. If only she might blink her eyes awake into a real storybook romance, where he might sweep her off her feet and carry her off into the sunset.
Not into the end of the world.
Not into his reality of carnage and death.
He was the curse, not the cure.
But he could still kiss her, couldn’t he? He smiled. It was a very addictive sensation—those soft, tender lips against his. He leaned down and did just that. He kept the kiss gentle, not wanting to startle her, even if he had to fight the urge to flip her onto her stomach and rut her like a wild animal once more. I do have to get used to the idea of her seeing my face. I’m not used to making love to someone like that if I intended to feed from them. He had never shown his face to anyone, in all his five thousand years of wearing his perfect, porcelain mask. There had never been any need. They loved him all the same.
And it was all a lie.
Darkness stole into his mind again, but it was swept away as she let out a quiet, contented noise and stretched beneath him. The moment she awoke fully, her hand darted under the pillow, clearly searching for a knife that wasn’t there. He chuckled.
What a terrible storybook couple they made.
She blinked her eyes awake and looked up at him as he lifted his head from hers. “Welcome back, sleepyhead.”
“Sorry,” she said through a yawn. “I must have dozed off.”
He stroked her cheek with the backs of his fingers. “You have every right to be tired. I feel like you’ve earned the right to sleep for years, and that’s before you take into account what we did last night. I’d let you sleep, but…your food’s going to get cold.”
“No, I’m glad you woke me up.” She stretched, and he couldn’t help but stare as the sheets drifted south of her bare breasts. She caught him and poked him in the chest. “Hey.”
“Sorry, sorry.” He grinned playfully and rested his palm against her side. “Just enjoying the view. You know, it should be a criminal offense to keep these works of art tied down so tightly. Not to mention…can’t imagine it’s comfortable, what with their—eh—heft.” He studied her breasts thoughtfully, considering it. “Yes. Definitely a crime. I’d alert the authorities, but I think I already ate them.”
She smacked his chest playfully and, laughing, rolled onto her side to climb out of bed. “Can you find me a shirt, at least?”
“Beauty like that demands to roam free!” Sighing in false dramatism, he stood and wandered to the wardrobe. “But fine. Can’t have you getting cold. It’s a tit nipply out, after all.” A pillow whacked into
the back of his head, and he cackled in amusement.
He found a shirt and a pair of linen pants. When he turned back, she was sitting on the edge of the bed, sipping the coffee, looking down at it thoughtfully. “I shouldn’t like this stuff, but I do.” She sounded confused. “It should be disgusting.”
“That’s coffee for you.” He placed the clothing on the bed beside her. She set down the mug to dress, and he sighed in disappointment when she was finished.
She shot him another smile and shoved his shoulder lightly. “Thanks.”
“Anytime.” He sat down on the ground next to her feet and leaned against her leg, resting his head on her knee. It was a strange gesture, and he wasn’t sure why he did it. But he had felt the urge and had followed through on it before he could second-guess himself.
But when she stroked his hair, combing her fingers through the strands, he didn’t regret his choice. He heard her pick up the fork and begin eating with one hand, even as she kept caressing him. Letting his eyes slide shut, he felt the tension melt from him.
Why had he been nervous?
“You were afraid you really did hurt me, weren’t you?”
Damn her for seeing through him. Or maybe it was obvious, and now he was just too broken to understand his own mind. “You did tell me to stop. You did tell me no. Several times.”
“We’re complicated. You said as much.” She paused. “I was almost raped once. I know the difference. Last night was…not that. It didn’t even come close. I wanted it. I was just too afraid to accept it.”
“What about now?”
“I want to stop you. But I want whatever this is. Shit, your hair is soft.” She chuckled. “What’s the secret?”
“Conditioner. I’ll show you once you’re done eating, and I can make good on my promise of a hot bath and a long massage.” He smiled. “Will you let me braid your hair?”
“Why?”
“I want to see what patterns I can make with the white and the black strands. I’ve wanted to play with it ever since we met. It’s just a weird thing to ask. ‘Oh, hey, can I fuck your brains out, drink your blood, and then braid your hair into pretty-pretty-princess patterns?’”
She laughed. “It wouldn’t be a surprise coming from you. And yes, of course you can.”
He nuzzled into her leg. “When you say you want whatever ‘this’ is, what do you mean? You mean my excellent cooking and my even better dicking?”
She laughed louder and lightly smacked the top of his head. “You’re terrible.”
“I’m not wrong.”
“You’re still terrible.”
He turned his head toward her leg and bit her. He barely put his teeth on her, but he growled and nibbled on her anyway.
When she tried to push him off, still laughing, he turned toward her and, after a short tussle, had her on her back on the bed beneath him. She was still laughing and squeaking as he fake-bit her wherever he could reach. “Stop!” She laughed. “That tickles!”
“Oh right!” He sat up. “I forgot you’re ticklish.” When a slow, fiendish grin spread across his face, she went still, and her look of amusement turned to horror. “Oh…my little dove.”
“Don’t you d—” Her protest broke off in a scream.
As he began tickling her into oblivion.
27
Dtu was on his feet before he was even fully awake. He smelled them before he heard the screams.
The dead had come for them. He threw open the window, the cold blast of air and the slamming of the frame jolting Jakob awake.
The merchant was no stranger to sudden danger, it seemed. He did not question what was happening. He leapt to his feet and began dressing without even a word from Dtu. “How many?” he asked with barely a hint of sleep in his voice.
“Many. Stay safe, Jakob.” Dtu climbed out the window and jumped. It was a second-story fall, and it bothered him none. Especially since he was in his wolf form by the time he soundlessly hit the ground. Kamira was already atop one of the buildings, and with a loud roar alerted any of his shifters that were not already at work.
But there were many of the dead who had come for them. They were flowing out of the woods like a wave. He snarled and dove forward, swiping through several of the drengil and tearing them to shreds.
This is bad.
Where had they all come from? He had set scouts. He had made sure that their perimeter was watched! Any of the dead traveling in such a large pack should have been noticed. They should have had warning.
Chaos was thick in the streets within seconds. Teeth and claws met teeth and flesh. Dtu and his people were stronger than the hungry carcasses that set upon them with a singular purpose. But they were vastly outnumbered.
This is very bad.
But he could not spare a thought to worry over Jakob and the others. He had to focus on the job at hand—to defend the survivors. To kill as many of the drengil as he could. The taste of rancid blood was thick in his mouth as he ripped into the corpses as fast as possible.
Flashes of blue light and crackles of power to his left revealed Ini had joined the fray. He knew the Queen of Fate would do her best to protect as many as she could.
Through the sound of screams and death, of flesh being rent asunder and bones crunching in jaws, he could see the truth that was hard to ignore. They were going to lose. They were going to be overrun.
And they were surrounded.
But how? How had this happened? The question nagged at his mind. How had so many of the drengil descended on them with what seemed to be a coordinated attack? These were not the roving packs of mindless creatures he had seen so far, aimlessly drifting through the woods and along the roads in search of victims.
These dead had come for them.
How?
Rxa was nowhere near, at least not as far as Dtu was aware. Who had commanded them?
It did not matter. They were all going to die. All of them.
His heart cinched in his chest at the thought of Jakob as one of the rotting, glassy-eyed, drooling dead. The image of him reaching out to Dtu not to embrace him…but in a mindless need to feed hurt him in a way that stabbed at his soul.
There was nothing he could do to stop it.
I failed. And I do not know how or why.
But he would fight to the death. He would lay down his life before he allowed the vision in his mind to come to reality. He would not let Jakob die.
Not alone.
Dtu found himself backed into a corner, outflanked and surrounded. No matter how he swiped at them, no matter how he tried to frighten them back, they did not care. They did not feel pain, nor did they wish to preserve their own existence.
He shook off one that climbed onto his thigh. His hide was thick in this form—far too thick for them to bite through. But they would wear him down in time. And with enough effort, they would tear him apart.
For all the times he thought he might die, for all the ways he imagined his end might come, being devoured by the dead was not on the list. He supposed he should give the Ancients more credit for their creativity.
I am sorry Jakob.
I am so very sorry.
A loud “scree!” split the air overhead. Something heavy landed in front of him with a thud that shook the ground. Something large, with plated armor for flesh, and leathery wings. Flashes of red and crimson slashed through the horde of the dead.
Shouting joined the screams. The sound of swords and axes—metal cleaving flesh. The dead turned to face the newcomers.
Dtu did not pause to examine the situation. He took his opportunity when he saw it. Diving into the crowd, he began to rip the drengil to pieces with renewed vigor. They turned their backs on a wolf, and that was never wise.
Hope bloomed in his heart.
He recognized the figure who jumped from the huge, lizard-like monster that had landed in the middle of the fray. She was shorter than her predecessor, and far smaller. Easily a fourth the size of the man whose throne she had b
een given.
But she was no less formidable. No less vicious. She was swinging her axes around her, hollering her battle cry at her empty-eyed foes.
Evie. The Queen of Flames.
Perhaps today was not the day he died after all.
Lydia walked up to Aon where he stood at the lip of the hole he had excavated into the prison he had built so long ago. Meant to hold Qta, and then her, and now…Rxa. The poor bastard. Only terrible things happened in that pit of despair that the King of Shadows had made.
He was staring down into it, his clawed hand folded at his back, the blades of his finger and thumb slowly running along each other. He was deep in thought. She placed her hand in his human one and laced her fingers into his.
He squeezed her hand just barely. She leaned her head on his arm and looked down into the hole. Stairs, carved into the rock, wound around the exterior as it descended deep into the ground.
She hated that place.
She hated it with every ounce of her soul.
“I don’t like the idea of putting anyone in there,” she murmured to him. “Not even Rxa.”
“Shockingly, neither do I.” He sighed. “I thought perhaps after what he did to you—after what he nearly achieved—I would hate him. And I suppose I do. I enjoy torture as much as the next despot, but…” He trailed off for a long moment then shook his head. “I do not have friends, Lydia. I do not have allies. But if there was one other royal to whom I could say perhaps that was true, it was him. We were never at odds. We never warred. I thought he would be—and it was foolish naivety on my part—happy for me. That I finally had that for which I had searched for so long.”
“He betrayed you. He betrayed me. He betrayed everybody.” Lydia shut her eyes. “But he thought he was doing the right thing.”
“I should hate him. But knowing what I must do—how I must hurt him—it does not bring me joy. This is odd for me.”
She laughed quietly and let out a long breath. “What are you planning?”
Grave of Words (Fall of Under Book 2) Page 24