by Zoey Draven
“Life is very different here,” I said softly, scrubbing at my arms, avoiding her question. I was growing used to bathing every day as well, to my hair always being clean and my skin being streak-free from dirt and grime and sweat.
“We do not know much about the vekkiri settlements. I have never seen one,” she commented.
Pray that you do not have to see one, I thought.
“I will begin on your clothes regardless, lirilla, later in the season,” she told me. “You never know. You may decide to stay.”
I didn’t think it was up to me, but I kept quiet.
“As for the frost feast,” she continued, sighing, “perhaps I can alter one of my old gowns for you.”
I frowned. “The frost feast?” I repeated.
“Lysi,” she said, smiling up at me as she began to hem the pants. “There is no set night for it yet, but I suspect the Vorakkar will announce it soon. We celebrate the beginning of the cold season with a feast. Usually a few days after the first frost comes.”
“And…I would need a special gown for this?” I questioned.
“Lysi,” she replied, frowning. “Of course.”
My lips twitched at her slightly offended expression and I nodded. “Alright then.”
“There is much to do before then,” she said. “But I will alter one for you. Do not worry, lirilla.”
“Do you need help?” I questioned, watching her fingers work over the cloth. I’d crafted my own clothes before and I’d quite enjoyed it. I liked that it kept my fingers busy, that it required quiet concentration and carefulness.
“Help?” she asked.
I bit my lip. “It’s only that the Vorakkar told me he would find a task for me to do through the cold season. To earn my keep here.” The seamstress blinked. “I was thinking that perhaps I could help you, if you need it. I might not be good at first, but I learn fast.”
Something in her expression softened and she let out a small chuckle.
“Lysi,” she said. “If the Vorakkar says that you can, then I would welcome your help. Females and males alike have already been making orders and requesting repairs. It is always like this during the cold season and there are only so many seamstresses among the horde.”
“I’ll ask him,” I said eagerly, hopeful for something to do during the day other than wander around the encampment.
She inclined her head and we lapsed into a small stretch of silence as she finished taking off a finger’s worth of material from the pants hem.
After I finished scrubbing my body with the washing rag, I glanced back over at her, only to notice she was looking around the tent in between her sewing.
When she saw me looking, her head ducked and she smiled, though it seemed sheepish. “I have never been in Vorakkar’s voliki before.”
I thought of the females that brought our meals in the evenings and remembered the demon king’s words about them, how most aspired to be Morakkari.
“Does that mean you’ve never vied for his attentions?” I asked without thinking. It took me a moment to realize that the question may have come off as rude and my face heated. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it the way it sounded.”
She didn’t seem offended, which made relief rush through me. I liked her and I wanted her to like me. I wanted to be friends, so the last thing I wanted was to offend her.
“Nik, I never sought his attentions,” she murmured, looking back down at her work. “When we came to this horde, I had a mate and I was pregnant with his child. I was in love and when you feel that kind of love, of Kakkari’s light, you look at no other. Not even a Vorakkar.”
The reverence in her voice pulled at my chest and I felt longing at her words.
“I wondered if you had a mate,” I commented, thinking of her son.
Even from the short distance, I saw her lips press together. “I do, but he is dead.”
I sucked in a breath, stilling in the bath.
“But for me, matehood is lifelong. He is still my mate and always will be. I will not take another. I could never, knowing that he would never measure up.”
Her pain was palpable, as tangible as a solid thing.
“I’m sorry, lirilla,” I whispered. “I didn’t realize.”
“You could not have,” she said, threading another stitch and glancing around the voliki again. “He was a warrior for the horde. He died in battle, earlier in the year.”
I remembered the day I met her, when the warrior training had begun at the training grounds. I remembered her face when she heard the ringing metal and the hiss of blades. I’d thought at the time that I had somehow made her uncomfortable, but perhaps the sounds had been a reminder of her warrior mate.
“I’m sorry,” I said again, not knowing what else to say, frowning. I knew loss, but I didn’t think I could ever understand her kind of loss. Being in love was a luxury few experienced. Only three couples in my village were love matches and I remembered watching them, thinking they lived in their own world, where it was just the two of them. I remembered being envious, all while knowing I would never experience something like that. Not there.
She waved her hand and gave me a small smile before refocusing her attention. “He gave me many wonderful years and a son. I could ask for nothing else, though sometimes it is painful to be here.”
“Have you ever thought of leaving the horde?” I asked softly.
“Nik, never,” she replied. “My son is happy here, my father loves horde life, the freedom of it. My mate grew up in a horde, as my son will, and I feel closer to him here.” She looked back up at me. “As for the Vorakkar…well, most would follow him anywhere. He is good and fair. He wants what is best for us all. So, nik, we would never leave.”
I could believe that, that many were loyal to the demon king.
We lapsed into silence again and when my skin had begun to soften and prune, I stood and dried off with a spare fur.
When I reached for my new sweater—since the thought of putting on the demon king’s tunic once more left with me a strange sensation—the seamstress said quietly, “Lirilla, you are bleeding.”
My brow furrowed and I looked down my body, turning my arms, searching. “What? Where?”
But then I saw it. A trail of red blood leaking down my inner thigh.
I stilled, my lips parting. I hadn’t bled for four or five months, so the sight surprised me at first.
“Oh,” I murmured, biting my lip. I looked at the seamstress and said, “I need some…”
There were scraps of spare cloth from her bundle and she grabbed one and brought it to me.
Pressing it between my legs, I said softly, “Thank you.”
Chapter Sixteen
She was sitting at the low table, quiet and still, looking down at the half-eaten meal laid out before her.
“Thissie,” I called, ducking low into the voliki, but remaining near the entrance. Startled, she looked over at me, her back straightening ever so slightly. “You have eaten?”
“Yes,” she replied.
I’d been gone since morning, meeting with my pujerak and the elders before checking the fence, checking in on the injured warriors—who’d suffered a few broken bones, but were on the mend—checking in on the pyrokis, on Lokkas, whose nests had miraculously avoided destruction last night. Then I’d helped with the volikis’ construction and repairs once the freezing rain had ceased. They would be finished by tomorrow afternoon, even Nelle’s promised one, and a part of me was tempted not to tell her quite yet.
“Then come,” I murmured. “The winds have stopped.”
She blinked, looking around the voliki as if she could discern the truth of my words with her eyes and not her ears. But after a moment of quiet, she said, rising, “So they have. I didn’t even realize.”
She was wearing a fresh pair of clothes and I saw a new pelt of white lying across the edge of the bed. One of the seamstresses must’ve come that day and I was pleased that she would have something warm to wear that n
ight.
She approached me after looping the pelt around her shoulders and toeing on her boots.
“I’ve offered my services to the seamstress,” she informed me, slipping from the tent when I held the heavy flap open for her.
Following her, stepping back out into the icy air, I felt my lip quirk. Something had loosened in my chest at the sight of her, at the sound of her voice. I’d found myself thinking of her much too often that day. She was slowly becoming a distraction.
When I said nothing to her words, she looked back at me and raised her brow.
“What are you asking, rei thissie?” I murmured, amusement helping to unknot the tension I felt in my shoulders from the long day.
“Can I work for her?” she asked, falling into step beside me. “You said you would assign me a task through the cold season and I think I would like to help her with her work.”
“I was going to assign you to her father,” I informed her, glancing over to judge her reaction.
She blinked. “Her father?”
“He is a weapons master. Trained in Dothik, one of the best,” I told her. “Since you are so fond of your arrows, I thought you could assist him in making more for the horde. Our hunting season begins after the thaw.”
The prospect intrigued her, I could see it plainly on her expressive features.
“I can do both,” she offered quickly. And with those wide eyes, I could deny her nothing. That should have made me wary, but I ignored the warning in my mind.
“If you wish to,” I told her. “You can work with her father in the mornings and with her in the afternoons, lysi?”
She nodded eagerly. “Now, with that out of the way, are you ready to negotiate for your name?”
A surprised chuckle escaped me. “I thought you would not miss again, so is there a need for negotiation?”
“I still want my own voliki,” she reminded me, her tone going a little low and quiet, “in addition to your name.”
I sobered slightly, reminded that her new home would be ready tomorrow.
“But perhaps I can negotiate a practice shot in?” she murmured, casting me a hopeful look. “Just one?”
“Now you are being greedy, kalles,” I rasped, the training grounds coming into view.
The encampment was mostly deserted that time of night. With the winds gone, it was the quiet before the storm. The frosts would come soon, perhaps tomorrow or even during the night—I couldn’t be certain.
“But since we are friends,” I murmured, that word bringing a flurry of amusement into my chest, even as a darker need and a wicked idea mingled with it, “I will give you the first shot for a price.”
“What is it?” she asked, her tone tinged with suspicion.
I hopped the barrier of the training grounds and reached out to pull her over easily, if only to get my hands on her again. She sucked in a surprised breath when her feet left the ground, but I resettled her close so that her breasts brushed my chest when she breathed.
Nelle blinked up at me and my eyes settled on her lips, desire beginning to pulse through me. I remembered my reaction to her when I’d seen her skill with the bow. I remembered her easy confidence, her intense, quiet focus that felt erotic to me. I remembered my need for her, even as I remembered her professing her immunity towards sexual desire and arousal.
Vok, I cursed silently, before releasing her. A part of me wanted nothing more than to test her words and make a liar out of her. Perhaps I would.
As I walked over to the weapons rack, I tossed over my shoulder, “For your first shot, if you fail, I want a kiss.”
Silence.
The request was innocent enough, yet I held my breath as I waited for a reply.
After I collected her bow and a sheath of arrows, I turned back to her. She was watching me. Unlike the bewilderment I’d expected, she looked pensive. Her watchful eyes tracked me carefully, as if I were the intended prey for the head of her arrow.
I felt my cock thicken in a dizzying rush and my hand squeezed around the bow. Sometimes I did not understand my own reactions to her, as if she controlled my body and played with it as she pleased.
“How is that for a starting negotiation, thissie?” I rasped down to her, my voice husky from my thoughts, before handing her the bow.
“Very well,” she said.
I stilled. “Neffar?”
“You did not expect me to accept?” she asked. Now her expression veered towards bewilderment even as she plucked an arrow from the sheath in my hands. “A kiss is a very small thing, isn’t it? And this is a very large bow. I would be foolish not to accept so I can practice at least once.”
She explained it so matter-of-factly that I could only stare as she nocked her arrow.
“The same target as last time?” she asked, her eyes already tracking to the post on the far end of the training grounds. She’d nearly hit it before with a bow twice the size of her old one, made of heavy Dakkari steel. I was certain that if she didn’t make the first, she would surely connect with her target on her second attempt.
“Lysi,” I said, though my voice came out more like a growl.
Her eyes flicked to me, connecting. Her lips parted even as her gaze narrowed. I could practically read her thoughts.
Demon king, her eyes said.
Demon thissie, mine said back.
She jerked her attention back to the target. Her hand was exposed to the icy air and looked pink, her veins a mixture of green and blue. I didn’t want her outside for long, given what happened last night, but at least the rains and the winds had ceased…for now.
I heard her soft inhale, saw the way her lips pursed, how her features relaxed.
On her release, the arrow flew, whizzing past me, and I heard it connect with the fence.
When I turned, a sizzle of victory burned down my spine.
“When do you want it?” she asked, staring at her arrow, which had gone only a finger’s width too wide.
“After,” I rasped. “If you do not make this next shot, what will you give me, rei thissie?”
Her lips settled into a hard line. She plucked her second arrow from the sheath and had it nocked before I could blink.
“Now negotiation will not be necessary. I won’t miss this time. I’m certain,” she informed me. A second later, her arrow flew and I couldn’t stop my grin from forming when I heard it thud.
I didn’t even need to turn to know she’d finally hit her target. Her expression was pleased, her accomplishment settling over her shoulders as surely as her fur pelt.
“My voliki?” she asked, her breath fogging silver in front of her, her cheeks pink, and her eyes wide.
“It will be ready in the afternoon,” I assured her, taking a step closer until she was within arm’s reach. “This will be your last night in my bed.”
Her eyes darted between my own. When I looked down, I spied the chain of the necklace I’d given her earlier underneath her pelt and the thick sweater. Reaching out, I touched the chain. It was warm from her skin. Her skin was soft underneath it.
Nelle’s breath hitched, but she didn’t look away.
“And your name, demon king?” she whispered.
Vok, I wanted to taste her lips.
And I can, I reminded myself, my blood pulsing and hot at the thought. I will.
Threading my fingers into her hair at the nape of her neck, I pulled her closer and dropped my head.
Her surprised exhale whispered across my lips, small and hot. I stopped before our lips touched.
“You are the one who owes me the kiss, kalles,” I purred, feeling my bottom lip brush her top one, and I felt that contact all the way down to my cock.
Her solemn, wide eyes were dark. I felt her heartbeat thrumming between us. Underneath my thumb, I felt a vein in her neck throb wildly.
I saw when her mind was made up. She leaned forward and pressed a chaste, short kiss to my lips before trying to pull away.
A dark grin curled my lips but I kept h
er in place, dragging her forward when she tried to retreat.
“Nice try, Nelle.”
Her eyes widened when I took what I wanted from her, how I wanted from her.
I kissed her. Hard yet gentle, slow, and consuming. My hand tightened in her hair, my amusement dying quickly as realization and lust took its place. Just like last night, holding her in my arms, this felt right. Fated. A deep growl rose in my throat.
Her lips were as soft and sweet as they looked and I felt her shuddering sigh between us as a shiver racked her body. I groaned, pressing closer, pressing her closer. I could never be close enough. Her heart raced under my fingertips but I was certain the pace of my own matched hers.
She pulled away after another moment. Too soon, but I let her retreat. Placing a palm on my chest, she used me to steady herself. Her eyes were half-lidded and wild, her lips red.
Her expression was slightly frightened, as if she was now just realizing that she wasn’t nearly as immune to me as she first believed.
But we’d made a deal. She’d held up her end of the negotiation. I would hold up mine.
“Seerin,” I murmured softly to her. Under a dark sky and in the quietness of that cold night, I told her my name, which I had not spoken in a long time.
Her eyes were capturing my soul even then, the little demon that she was. How much of it had she taken already?
I rasped, my voice dark and low, “My name is Seerin of Rath Tuviri.”
Chapter Seventeen
Throughout the quiet night, I slept restlessly beside the demon king. My dreams were filled of strange things, of warped memories, and when I woke, I was sweating and a throbbing, dull pain was radiating from below my abdomen.
The demon king was still in bed when I came awake.
Seerin, I corrected myself quietly. Seerin of Rath Tuviri, whose kiss made the whole night sky spin.