His fingers never stopped moving over my sex.
“You have such a pretty pussy,” he whispered. A finger dipped inside before he went back to tracing the folds. “Ride me, Kimber. We’re both too tired to play games, but I want to be inside you.”
Kicking the covers back in the same motion, I hiked a leg over him and straddled his thighs as my hands caressed his pecs.
“Clothes off,” he hissed. “I want to see those tits.”
I tossed the shirt away in a heartbeat and brought my hands back to his now hot and hard cock. My palms stroked leisurely over the velvet-on-steel erection.
I had never been needy or forward before with the men I had bedded—or those who had bedded me. I always let them set the pace and happily enjoyed the ride.
Now, I was starting to think I had been missing out on a lot of fun.
Rising up on my knees, I pressed his shaft to my entrance and lowered myself onto him, just a little at a time. I savored each small distance I pulled him in, delighting in the sensation of being possessed by him. Enjoying the push of his erection as it opened me up and intruded deep into my channel.
Finally, I was seated on him and him in me. I rocked my hips, lightly, forward and back. I had no interest in rushing this. We were both tired, and this was exquisite.
What kind of lover would Master Dorian be?
I swallowed my gasp of shock. That was not a question I wanted floating in my head when I was riding another male.
My male. My potential mate if we agreed.
The idea of mating Elex flashed through me uncomfortably. Something about the concept didn’t sit well in my mind. I couldn’t put my finger on it, but it was yet another strange thought to have while impaled on his erection—and very much enjoying him.
Now, Roran and Rilen…
Oh, gods! What was wrong with me? Now the twin masters—who were clearly more inclined to the male side for sex!
I needed to think about the male I was in bed with, the man who had waited patiently for me to realize he was someone this could happen with.
Adding a little bounce to my rhythm, the impact of his cock deep inside me brought me slamming back into the present. At least now, I had a chance to enjoy myself and to bring Elex some pleasure.
I closed my eyes and posted up and down his shaft, little ripples of excitement fluttering through my pussy. I wanted to come, soon and…
Dropping back down on him, he didn’t quite fill me this time. Confused, I opened my eyes as I heard the smallest snore from his chest.
“No…” The word was whispered in shock.
I leaned forward and put my hands on his chest—and another snore, tremendous this time, ripped from his throat.
“Elex, are you kidding?” I patted his shoulder.
The response was yet another snore.
My jaw dropped. He’d fallen asleep while I was fucking him.
If that didn’t murder my sexual ego, nothing would.
Disgusted and disappointed, I climbed off him to find he had indeed fallen asleep—and gone soft.
What a waste.
* * *
The mug of hot cocoa felt good in my hands. There was a slight chill in the air, but that was all of winter S’Kir would ever get. It only snowed, rarely, in the very north and at the top of the Spine.
I hadn’t been able to sleep at all after Elex passed out. I was bothered, hot and bothered, and discontent.
Before we’d had a chance to talk the next morning, he’d gone sprinting from the temple grounds with a messenger.
I guessed we weren’t going to talk about the night before. He was exhausted every night of the week, crawling into bed and falling asleep. I wondered what they were doing at the university that was running Elex so ragged.
I was feeling a little sexually frustrated if I were honest.
Masters Bebbenel and Argo showed up at the door to my apartments the first morning and nearly dragged me down to the practice room. Master Bebbenel threw spells at me while I chased Master Argo around the space.
Despite my complaints, no one seemed to believe me that I had to have Master Dorian as my teacher. There was no one in the temple good enough with the sword and who used magic the way I was being taught except him.
I didn’t want to fight Master Dorian. I didn’t want to learn from him. The man considered me a stain on his shoe. The ridiculousness of what happened in the training room was a perfect example of that.
I’d spent the entire time beating back Master Argo and dodging Master Bebbenel’s magic. It was ridiculous. There were some feints and parries that Master Argo could barely counter—as if he hadn’t used a sword in years.
Decades.
Maybe even a century or two.
He’d eventually worn down, and the two masters dismissed me as if I had learned something from the lesson.
A lesson. They were probably going for something more but they sucked with swords, and I still wasn’t good with my magic.
Elex still wasn’t back for the night. It was past dinner, past sunset, and I was sitting in the garden.
My only comfort was the cocoa at that point.
It was about to be literally a cold comfort. Too much time thinking.
“Kimber.”
I jerked around. Someone had called my name, but there was no one in the garden.
“Kimber!” The voice was a stage whisper and had come from stage left.
Carrying my mug of cocoa with me, I walked to the heavy wrought iron gate that locked the garden from the rest of the lawns.
Just in the shadow of the giant tree there, I could make out someone in a cloak. They stepped forward—
“Jallina?” I whispered back.
She tipped back the hood of the cloak. “Hi.”
“What in the name of seven hells are you doing here?”
“There’s a meeting tonight, of your group of informants.” She grinned. “Come with me. Meet them.”
“Now?”
“Now.” She looked around and held out a cloak.
It felt wrong to sneak away. There were duties I had to attend to in the morning before practice. I needed to take care of some judgments that were sent to me—one of my new duties, though they were low level, and…
Well, why not? Everyone else around the temple shirked their responsibilities as they saw fit, and I refused to lose contact with the people outside the walls.
In a small victory for myself, my attempt to unlock the gate with magic was completely successful.
Spoiled only by the loud creak as it swung open.
I grabbed the cloak from Jallina as I ducked into the shadows of the tree, easily closing the gate with magic as well.
She led me along the edge of the wall and building so that anyone casually looking into the night wouldn’t see us. The path led past the arboretum and out to the back gate, all in shadow.
Beyond the gate, there was a steady stream of pedestrians. I’d forgotten the city was still alive after dark.
Jallina motioned me down the street to an alleyway. She turned the corner as if she lived in the neighborhood. I followed a moment later, as a lantern flared to life.
Drez was sitting in the carriage. “Good evening, Mistress Kimber.”
Offering a hand, he helped both Jallina and me up into the seat with him.
“Good evening, Drez,” I finally answered. “Were you this confident I would sneak away?”
He and Jallina shared a look. “You’re our friend, and you’re still looking to make a bit of trouble.”
“Nope,” I answered. “You imagine things. What’s going on?”
Drez slapped the reins, and the horse started its trot out to the main street and into the night. “We’ve sent you a dozen letters in the past month. All asking you to come to coffee with us. That’s all they were asking.”
A chill went down my spine. “I haven’t received a thing.”
“That’s what I was afraid of,” Jallina said.
; “Someone is censoring my mail?” It was new to me to think in terms of conspiracies, but I knew I had to do it.
“Yes,” Drez said. “I’m certain of it.”
Jallina sighed. “It’s inside the temple. We had several hand-delivered to the courier at the door, and you say you haven’t gotten anything.”
“Nothing personal at all since we’ve been in the dorm. Why would anyone want to censor my mail? I’m the newest and youngest temple master. I have no clout.” I chuckled. “Less than no clout. I’m a negative influence.”
“You think that?” Drez asked after he and Jallina traded looks.
“In the temple, I know it. There are fourteen masters. I have exactly five who would give me the time of day.”
Or their balls in my cup of tea, but they didn’t need to know that.
“You’re hugely popular,” Jallina smiled. “Hugely. S’Kir adores you. You’re young, you’re likable. You seem irreverent.”
I threw my head back and laughed hard. “I’m irreverent? The absolute last thing I am is irreverent. Good gods, no.”
Drez chuckled. “They don’t know you the way we do. There are bets in the parlors on who is going to bed you first in the temple.”
My jaw dropped. “What?”
The smirk on Jallina’s face was clear in the lantern light. “Indeed. Most people want to see you with Vitas, but a lot of people have also said you’d be drawn to Argo.”
I choked on my next breath. “Master Argo?!”
“The place is a hotbed, excuse the pun, of partner swapping.” Drez pulled the horse to the left through some more noisy neighborhoods. “Which, incidentally, I had no idea of. Apparently, the last time this all went down, we were still quite young, just in university.”
“The bets were put down on Vitas when he first got there.” I slapped a hand on my forehead. “Is it common knowledge that I have Elex in my bed?”
“They really don’t seem to care.” Jallina shrugged.
“I’m not going to be bedded by anyone else but Elex. He was invited to the temple to stay with me, and that’s how that’s going to remain.”
I was mortified that people were betting on who was going to sleep with me. Was that something they really needed to bet on? If that were true, I needed to invent a new sport—and not one that involved bedroom antics.
Drez and Jallina chuckled the rest of the trip quietly. I wasn’t sure where they were taking me, but I was happy to seethe in amused silence for a little while.
I took a quick look to my left at Jallina. “How did you know I was going to be in the garden tonight?”
She smiled. “Luck. I’ve been hanging out there for three nights, hoping that you would come out at some point. I know you like the moonlight in the garden.”
“Good guess.” My friends really did know me well.
The carriage eventually pulled to a stop in front of a small, squat building that simply had the word “Ale” painted on the front. It wasn’t exactly seedy looking, but it was closer to that than a fair or nice establishment.
Jallina motioned me off the carriage and hopped down after me. She pulled me into the shadows next to the door.
Drez moved the cart to the holding area next to the building with several other carriages and saddle horses, then hurried back.
Walking in, I could tell it was important no one got a good look at me. I carefully adjusted the hood and hid my face in the shadows a little more.
Jallina spoke with the bartender, low and quiet, and he nodded sharply at one of the curtains toward the back. Jallina walked ahead of us, and Drez took my elbow to guide me back.
The dark was also permeated by a horrible stench behind the curtain. A set of stairs led down into a dimly lit cellar.
The stairs themselves were terrible. They were cracked and chipped, and parts of them were missing. There was no railing once we were below the wall, and I was honestly afraid they were going collapse beneath me.
The single lamp sat on a bench on the right side of the cellar, and Jallina turned us left. It was so dark I couldn’t see much of anything, and resisting the urge to call up a light was getting harder and harder.
Drez stepped ahead of us and pulled a bookcase away from the wall.
The light finally spilled into the cellar and revealed a room beyond the bookshelf. Drez led us into the room, and Jallina pulled it closed once she was in.
The room was below the horses’ rest area next to the bar. It was really quite clever. There were just a few people sitting on benches around the space, and they were all engaged in small conversations.
Drez cleared his throat. “Ladies, gentlemen.”
Their heads all swiveled to the door where we waited, and the conversations died off.
“Thank you all for trusting me about this. I know we’ve been talking about this for weeks now, but there was a complication.”
“Complication?” one of the women.
I pushed my hood back, taking advantage of the dramatic moment. “Someone has been stealing my mail.”
“Oh, you’re really here.” The woman swept off the bench and rushed toward me.
I stepped back and went to reach for the sword I didn’t have.
Crap.
Drez grabbed the woman by the shoulders. “Come on. How many times did I tell you not to do that, Mela? Kimber is a temple master. You have to be careful, or she’ll attack.”
I wanted to laugh. I was as fierce as a kitten. I didn’t let it out though. Let them think what they wanted.
Jallina stepped up next to me. “This is Mistress Kimber Raven of the temple of the Lost God, the youngest of the current temple masters. She is who I’ve been talking about. She is why I didn’t want a lot of people here except those we really trusted.”
A man walked out of the shadows at the back. “And you’re the one who wants us to spy for you.”
“I don’t know that the word spy is right,” I said. “I don’t wish to be as removed from the everyday life of S’Kir as some of the others are. I would like to know what’s going on out there. The walls can be very high, and after the death of Mistress Danai, I’m afraid they are going to build them even higher.”
He studied me a moment longer and nodded. “I can understand that. It’s a wise move to have people you can trust outside of your circle, Mistress.”
Jallina motioned me to sit on a bench. “So, Ki—I mean, Mistress Kimber asked me to help her set up a network that can funnel her information. I didn’t want to make the network too big. I felt it was important she meet all of you, so she knows who you are if you have to approach her.”
“Smart,” her sister, Jennila whispered.
Drez nodded. “To that end, let’s introduce ourselves to her.”
I counted the people in the room. There were only nine of them, for a total of twelve of us. I didn’t need more than that to keep abreast of what was going on.
I needed to thank Jallina for being so forward thinking about this.
Then, I had to find the person who was stealing my mail out from under me. That was scary. This meant there was someone in the temple who wasn’t loyal.
Each person who would be reporting to Drez and Jallina introduced themselves, and I made sure to remember their faces. I didn’t want to get caught not being able to identify them.
“Would you like to say anything to the group, Mistress?” Drez asked, motioning to the people sitting around me.
I started with a simple thank you to all of them—and then the tremor started. Jallina looked terrified, and her sister fled for the door.
I slapped my hand on the wall and tried pulling back the magic. It was unruly—and slippery. It kept sliding through my grip, and I couldn’t see the colors well in the dark.
I need to get out of the basement.
“Come on!” Jennila was shoving the door open and waving wildly at us.
“No!” Jallina snapped, grabbing her sister back. “We’ll be killed if we go up through the tavern!�
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“We’ll die if we stay here!” Jennila answered.
I stood, giving up on trying to pull the magic back for the moment. “Go. All of you. Up the stairs. There’s a backdoor.”
“The building—” Jallina gasped.
I caught her elbow. “Trust me.”
At some point, I had to start trusting me as well.
They shoved out through the door, with Jallina, Drez, and me following behind. The stairs were deadly, and each of the meeting attendees ran up one at a time, trying not to tax them.
The tremors were getting worse. I had to get up and out to see what was going on. I couldn’t seem to see the colors in the dark of the basement.
“Go,” Drez said, pointing up.
I ran, as fast and as hard as I could up the wobbling stairs to the top.
At the top, I stopped and spun around to wait for Jallina. She had already launched herself halfway up the stairs, and I grabbed her hand, yanking her to the floor.
Drez was last.
Halfway up, the staircase and the left wall of the building decided to give up and collapse.
In almost slow motion, Drez pin-wheeled forward, about to crash into the bricks that were raining down on him.
I snapped my magic out and caught him, freezing him in place. Jallina leaned over the ledge and grabbed his hand, and between the two of us, we hauled him to safety.
Bands of gold snapped around their hands where they were joined.
They had mated. Jallina and Drez were mates.
I wished I had more time to process that, but the rest of the walls were threatening to fall as the tremors kept growing.
“Out!” I screamed, wrapping my hand around Jallina’s arm. I yanked them to the back door, and we all stumbled out and away from the crumbling building.
I turned to the mountains in the moonlight and tried dropping all my walls once more.
S’Kir lit up like a bonfire, and the magic pulsed everywhere again, creating a second skin for the reality around me.
Blue.
Everything was blue.
This time, the mountains were not angry, but slumberous. Sleepy, lazy, tired.
Which explained why the tremors seemed slow and lazy, and not in any rush to get anything done. I watched the power slide toward the Spine. As it got closer, it changed color to a brighter blue, and I knew that it was gathering energy there.
King of Gods (Vampire Crown Book 2) Page 7