Rose led me to the on-duty guards’ quarters but refused to go any further.
“I would caution you against going in,” she said. “But I suppose Winter’s Blade fears no harm.”
There was a snide tone to her words, but like most Tuatha, it was impossible to read her.
She left pretty quickly too, and I was faced with a door and my own wits.
I took a deep breath and knocked.
Please let him be here.
The door was opened by a Danaan guard with snake eyes. “Human?” He frowned, “There is only one human in the Keep right now, which means you must be Winter’s Blade.” He looked me up and down. “You’re smaller than I expected.”
“I need to speak with Slade.”
Another face appeared in the doorway, the guard from the night, or morning, before. “Slade?” He studied me for a long beat. “Your hair… Wait.”
Fuck, he couldn’t recognize me, could he?
I narrowed my eyes and painted a stern expression on my face. “Where is Slade?”
“Off duty right now. I can take you to his personal quarters.”
“That works.”
Turned out that Slade, as Airm Marfach and Regency bodyguard, lived on an upper level of the Keep. We took a pod, similar to the one that had taken me to the surface, then we were in a different world. A world of silver corridors lined with windows. Real windows, not holoscreens. These were slender strips of thick glass that showcased the world outside. The morning sun streamed in, painting the metal in golden hues.
My heart lifted and my shoulders felt lighter, as if an invisible weight had been lifted off them.
Danaan were rife on this level, dressed casually in tunics and slacks, and chatting as they went about their business.
“What is this floor for?”
“Domestic,” Jonus said. “Most of the staff live and work up here. It’s where the cogs of the Keep reside.”
Strange. I would have expected the Tuatha to want to live up here with the sun, not underground in the claustrophobic environment without windows or fresh air.
Jonus led me down a long corridor lined with windows with a view of the inner city. Middale was visible below us in all its winter glory, glistening as if it was draped in diamonds.
We veered away from the windows, through an arch, and up a flight of steps to a hallway with only one door.
Jonus stopped outside this door but didn’t knock.
Um… “What is it?”
“Slade doesn’t like to be woken up when he’s asleep,” he said.
Oh, for fucksake. I pushed past him and knocked on the door myself. Silence greeted me.
“He’s a heavy sleeper,” Jonus explained.
Yeah, and I was good at waking people up. I needed him. I tried the door, and it opened.
“What are you doing?” Jonus looked perplexed. “Slade does not like being woken.”
“And yet you brought me here.”
He frowned. “Yes, I probably shouldn’t have done that.”
Not the brightest Tuatha, it seemed. “I’ll take the consequences of Slade’s wrath. You can go now.”
He stared at me for a beat longer. “Wrath?”
I didn’t have the energy to explain the damn emotion to this automaton. “I’ll deal with Slade’s displeasure.”
“Ah, okay.” That seemed to satisfy him, and he left me to it.
Tuatha felt minor shit, of course. Emotions such as annoyance, displeasure, and irritation, but excesses of emotion like terror, love, and rage were out of their spectrum.
I stepped into the dark room. It smelled like oranges and something else sweet and cloying. I gave my eyes a moment to adjust. There was a window opposite me with the blinds drawn, but some light peeked through, enough to make out shadows and forms. The huge shape to my left was the bed, and the lump sprawled across it was Slade.
“Slade.” I strode over. “Slade, wake up.”
I looked down at his sleeping form. He’d stripped down to his boxers. Tight boxers. No, don’t fucking look. Shit, his thighs were huge, and his chest was an expanse of taut muscled flesh. Fucking hell, he was massive.
I focused on his face, on the serenity that had stolen the fierceness of his Danaan features. Even with the tusks and the horns, he looked vulnerable and harmless while unconscious. I needed to wake him up.
“Slade.” I reached out and prodded his shoulder with a finger. “Slade.” This time I poked his cheek.
His chest rumbled in protest.
Was he waking up? I leaned in slightly, bracing myself on his huge bicep and resisting the urge to give it an experimental squeeze. “Slade?”
He rolled suddenly, his free arm coming up to hook around me and drag me off the floor and onto his chest.
My yelp cut off as my face was crushed to his shoulder. He hugged me to him, muttering stuff under his breath.
Oh, fuck. I couldn’t breathe. I shoved at him, managing to turn my head to the side to suck in air before he rolled with me and trapped my lower body beneath one of his epic thighs.
“Slade!” I squirmed. “Fucking hell, Slade, wake the fuck up!”
He began to stroke my hair with his large hand, and something hard and huge swelled against my belly.
Wait, was that…?
Hell, no.
“Slade!” I yelled his name loud enough to make my ears hurt.
His whole body turned to rock against me. I raised my head, ready to order him to release me, but my words dried up as I fell into the liquid depths of his honey eyes. His hand slipped from the back of my head to my throat, barely touching me, then he gently gripped my jaw and dipped his head to mine.
He was going to kiss me again, and my heart was a staccato rhythm of confusion in my chest because this was wrong. I needed to pull away, but then his mouth was on mine, soft, teasing, and questioning. His silken hair brushed my cheek. I wanted to feel it between my fingers. I wanted to explore this beast that could be so gentle. I abandoned myself to sensation for a moment, sliding my fingers up his firm, stubbled jaw, and sinking them into his hair.
Muscle rippled beneath my hands as he groaned and deepened the kiss. Then I was arching up, opening for him, hungry and wanton and throbbing in all the places I shouldn’t have been. This was bad, so very bad, but it felt so fucking good.
To my shame, Slade was the first to break the kiss. His chest heaved, and he closed his eyes, breathing through his nose. He was pulling back to collect himself. Good. That was good, so why was my hand fisting in his hair and tugging him back to me? Why were my lips pleading for more kisses?
He groaned. “Danika…”
Oh god. I dropped my hand, cheeks heating.
He looked down at me and blinked slowly and deliberately. “What can I do for you, Danika?” His voice was a husky abrasion to my senses.
My heart fluttered in confusion. How could I feel this way? I loved Killion. What the fuck was I doing? I scrambled out of his arms and off the bed. He didn’t try to stop me. Instead, he lay back and crossed his arms under his head.
“You wanted me?” he said, all casual-like.
I think I liked it better when all the shining ones were wankers and didn’t have feelings.
I straightened my clothes and smoothed my hair. “Blossom’s gone. She’s like you and can feel emotion. I think they found out and took her.”
He sat up suddenly, abdominal muscles contracting with the motion. “Blossom is your maid?”
“Yes, you know her?”
“I make it my business to keep tabs on the feelers. If they’ve taken her, they’ll be keeping her in the sublevel of the Keep somewhere, but I’m sorry, Danika, not even I know where that is, and even if I did, I couldn’t get to her.”
I stared at him as the implications of what he was saying sank in. “You mean…there’s nothing we can do?”
“They’ll test her. Let’s hope she passes.”
“If she fails?”
His eyes were fil
led with sorrow. “Then we won’t see her again. I wish I could do more, but she isn’t the first to be taken, and she won’t be the last—unless we stop this.”
Five days… I could get Killion to help me get her out if she could last five days.
“How long do the tests take?”
“I don’t know for sure, but rumor has it they can last anywhere from a couple of days to a week.”
Let’s hope she had a week. As much as I wanted to help her, there was a limit to my reach.
Slade scratched his pec, then rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly. “I’m sorry about—” He jerked his head to the bed. “Antics.”
My neck heated. “No, um, forget it.”
He muttered something that sounded like easier said than done, but I couldn’t be sure.
There was nothing more for me here. “Can you take me back to my room?”
He looked at his wristwatch and sighed. “Actually, I’m supposed to be on Winter’s Blade duty in half an hour, and according to my schedule, you have a meeting with Aspen about the Summer blood trial, which takes place tomorrow.” His expression was grave.
The first one was tomorrow? Shit. With Blossom being taken, my own predicament had slipped my mind.
“Are you prepared?” Slade asked.
“How can I be prepared for something when I have no idea what that something will be?”
He bridged the distance between us and cupped my shoulders. “You prepare mentally—for anything.”
I understood that. I’d done that for the games. I could do this.
“You need to survive,” he said, echoing Killion’s words. “Survive, and tomorrow will be another day.”
I nodded and looked up at him. “And you need to put on some clothes.”
He gave me a lopsided grin. “Is the sight of all this Danaan flesh too much for you, little human?”
A fizz shot through my veins. “Hardly. It’s just that your nakedness hurts my eyes.”
He released me and walked away, chuckling to himself. “Keep telling yourself that.”
The washroom door closed behind him. I exhaled sharply and summoned Killion’s face. The tumult in my chest ebbed, and a calm settled over me.
What was I doing kissing Slade? Why hadn’t I pulled away or tensed to ward him off like I had with Magnus? What was wrong with me? I took another deep breath.
Everything would be okay once I was with Killion again. The unwanted attraction to Slade would be gone. It would be Killion and me against the world, just the way it’d always been.
I just needed to get through the next few days.
I just needed to not die.
10
Slade escorted me to Aspen’s quarters and waited outside as I went in.
The bastard prince wasn’t alone. He was sitting with a small, wizened Danaan, drinking from a fancy teacup. A fire had been lit in an elaborate hearth I hadn’t noticed the last time I’d been here, but then, Aspen had been busy chiding me and being his usual enigmatic, intimidating self, so I could forgive myself the oversight.
And here he was now having a tea party for two? How fucking quaint. “You wanted to see me?”
“Yes.” Aspen set down his cup.
He was dressed in Regency blue today, hair slicked back, antlers all shiny. His moss-green eyes were sharp in his face, almost as if he was excited. “Carkal, tell her what you learned.”
The tiny Danaan turned his beady, little eyes on me, and licked his meaty lips. “Oh, Lord Aspen, you did not tell me how wonderful she would smell.”
Aspen’s arm whipped out to slap the Danaan sharply on the back of the head. The shrunken creature’s mouth smacked into the lip of his cup, and whatever was in the damn thing spilled everywhere.
“Winter’s Blade is not for consumption,” Aspen said coolly. “You will not sniff her or lick her, and you will certainly not try and take a bite. If you make any attack on Winter’s Blade, you will be mortally punished.”
The Danaan eyed me up with longing and licked his lips again. “Of course, Lord Aspen.”
Aspen waved me over and patted the seat beside him. I had to duck slightly to avoid his antlers as I perched my butt on the sofa, much closer to the bastard prince than I would have liked.
“Now, speak,” Aspen instructed Carkal.
“The Summer blood trial takes place at the stones,” Carkal said. He sniffed, eyes rolling. “Mmmm, and yes, the stones are a sacred place. A place for the dead and…” He inhaled again and licked his lips. “Four Summer champions, but not warriors, no. Mmmm. No, these are scholars.” He inched forward in his seat, and beside me, Aspen tensed. “Scholars to perform a ceremony of some sort and—”
He leaped at me so suddenly, my body froze in shock, but Aspen’s hand whipped out to grasp the man by the neck. The Danaan growled and snapped, his eyes bleeding to red as they remained fixed on me.
I pressed back into my seat to get away from the rabid thing. Aspen stood, still clutching the creature by its neck and dragging him away from me.
“I warned you, Carkal,” Aspen said. “I warned you of the consequences of an attack on my Blade.” He said it with a possessive edge. “Now, you must pay the price.”
“No, Lord Aspen, please.” Carkal kicked his legs and flapped his arms. “I repent. I repent.”
But Aspen carried the man toward the huge hearth, and with a flick of his wrist, threw him into the flames.
The Danaan screamed and tried to climb out, but Aspen kicked him back into the fire that roared up to devour him.
Aspen sighed. “A shame. He was a good spy.”
The stench of burning flesh stung the back of my nose, making me gag and my eyes water.
“The smell will subside in a moment,” Aspen said coolly.
He strolled over to a trolley holding a water jug in the corner of the room, poured a glass of water, and handed it to me.
I took it on autopilot and downed it. Anything to wash away the taste of charred Danaan.
“Now.” Aspen took the seat opposite me. “The stones have been there for a long time. Some say it’s a graveyard for the ancients’ gods.”
My gaze flicked to the hearth, and Aspen clicked his fingers in my face.
“Focus,” he said. “This is important.”
Shit. Okay. “Gods?”
“Our gods, members of our race that are older than time. They were the first of us to arrive here.” He gave me a sly look. “They were the pure Tuatha de Danaan, before we segregated into Tuatha and Danaan.”
Why was he giving me a history lesson? “So, the stones are a graveyard.”
“Yes,” he said. He poured some more green liquid from a pot into his cup and sipped. “Carkal mentioned scholars not warriors, which means in this blood trial, you’ll be hunted by the dead.”
Wait, what? “The dead?”
He nodded. “Clever bastards, Summer. They know you have skill with the sword, but you can’t kill something that’s already dead.”
“But it can kill me?”
“That’s what the rest of Carkal’s report said. If these scholars succeed in raising the dead warriors and controlling them, then the dead will be able to hurt you. There is only one way you can fight them.”
“And what’s that?”
“You’ll have to die.”
* * *
“You’re insane.”
“No. I’m smart. Death doesn’t have to be permanent. I’ll give you an herb that will stop your heart for several beats. On this side of the veil, you’ll be dead for three minutes, but on the other, you’ll have three hours. One hundred and eighty seconds to three hours. You’ll be able to maim the warriors and slow them down. Then return to your body before your time is up and evade them until sunset, at which time the trial will be over.”
He made it sound easy. “And what if I don’t get back in time?”
His expression hardened. “That’s not an option. You will get back to your body in time, no matter what.”
I flinched. “And what about my weapon. If I’m dead, then—”
“As long as your weapon is on your person when you die, you’ll take it with you.” He sipped his drink again and gave me an arch look over the rim of his cup. “And have you decided what weapon you will take?”
It was time to test my theory about the sword. “I’m taking the sword I had in the games.”
He made an ‘o’ with his mouth. “Has it found you?” He looked intrigued.
“They say the sword finds its true wielder.”
It was now or never. If I lied and said no, he might not agree for me to have the sword because it hadn’t found me. Telling the truth was the only chance of getting to keep it.
I took a deep breath. “Yes. It came back to me. I have it.”
He sat back and shook his head. “I was right about you, Danika. My gut was right.”
“What do you mean?”
“My gut told me you were exactly what I needed.”
I kept my expression neutral and dropped my gaze, not wanting him to see the contempt in my eyes, because like hell would I be his pawn, his blade, his anything.
Five days and I was out.
* * *
Turned out I had Slade for the rest of the day, which for some reason made the nerves in my belly less active. Aspen had assigned him to me, instructing him to fit me with my blood trial outfit before transporting me to the trial location.
We were back on the upper floors now, in a room that reminded me of a school cafeteria. This was where the domestic Danaan got their meals, and Slade liked to eat.
The table was piled with plates of various meats and steamed vegetables, and I had to admit the food was delicious.
Slade kept adding stuff to my plate every time it was almost empty, and it hit me how little I’d eaten since being here and how hungry I was.
“I like a woman with an appetite,” he said.
I looked up from my plate to find him watching me intensely. His tongue flicked out to run up his left tusk, and for some reason, the action was provocative. I dropped my gaze.
“I didn’t realize how hungry I was until now.”
“You’ll need the fuel for the trial. Dying and coming back will take a toll.” His jaw flexed. “Fucking cold ones,” he whispered.
Feel My Power: The Iron Fae book 2 Page 6