Fae Champion (Royals of Embermere #2)

17. The Mighty, Sacred Bejeweled Wand

17. THE MIGHTY, SACRED BEJEWELED WAND

I had so many questions: What was the real reason for the queen’s leniency toward me? Did she expect whatever was going to happen tomorrow in the ring to be worse than whatever punishment she could have dealt tonight? Or was she simply too consumed by thoughts of the debauchery to come to care? That seemed unlikely, but I’d seen her enthusiasm for her “dancers” firsthand. The woman who’d claimed outrage at her husband’s adultery openly indulged in seduction with others—while the king did the same.

And that was only the beginning of the many questions that should have been spinning through my thoughts. What had Millicent done to receive the queen’s favor? Had she betrayed me—or Rush—somehow? And how could Finnian have done that to Sandor? I was no fan of the man who’d been key in my abduction, but I’d believed Finnian to have integrity—or at least, more so than most of the fae at court, who appeared utterly unconcerned by their moral turpitude.

On and on the doubts and questions looped through my mind, but like the musky, innocuous smoke of the hall we were rapidly leaving behind, they swayed and sifted past, slipping from my grip.

In truth, I didn’t want to snag on to any one of them. There was too much I didn’t know, too much danger, too little time assured. And the man I wanted beyond reason walked beside me, the heat of his desire pumping off his skin like vapor.

Fully decided I’d enjoy the moment instead of engaging the thousand worries flitting through my thoughts like moths escaping the darkness for light, I shoved them away and tightened my hold on his arm. His muscles were coiled beneath my grip, as if he wanted to sprint toward my rooms but wasn’t out of deference for my stupid heels—or perhaps he didn’t want to appear too eager.

I asked, “Will the guys stay?” My voice slunk out in a slow, seductive drawl I hadn’t intended. Perhaps there’d been enchantments in that fog, in the suggestive, thumping beat of the music.

“They will,” Rush answered, his voice deep as the bass that still thudded through my veins. “Don’t tell me you wish they were here with us?”

“No,” I replied, too quickly. “I just didn’t think that’d be their scene.”

I felt Rush’s gaze on me, and I glanced toward those molten eyes. His brows were raised in amusement. “ The three of them enjoy the delights the court has to offer plenty. Roan too. If we must suffer, then we may as well take advantage of the good things along the way.”

“And that, back there”—I gestured behind us with a tilt of my head—“that was good?”

His brows lowered, his lips turned up at the corners, revealing a hint of the dimples I hadn’t seen in a while. “Well, it definitely wasn’t bad.”

Had Zako been here to witness the blatantly sexual energy pulsing in the hall, he’d have turned red in the face while having a conniption.

The automatic thought hitched along with my breath. Zako— not my father—had lied to me about everything important. Maybe he’d fucked in the middle of the dance floor while everyone watched, and then had the gall to insist I remain “pure” until I was too old and gray to care.

“What is it?” Rush asked, slowing.

I tugged on his arm to get him moving again. “Nothing.”

“That was definitely something.”

I tsked . “Of course it was, but I don’t want to talk about it. And given how many secrets you seem to keep, I wouldn’t push me about it if I were you.”

“Fair enough.” His mouth had lost its playfulness, his stare suddenly far away.

My mood turned stormy. “So you have to stick to me like glue, but only till the end of the match tomorrow, right? ”

His pace slowed anew. “Yeah, I suppose so. I’ll win, and you’ll be finished with the trials. The queen will send you home while I advance to the Nuptialis Probatio.”

“Where you’ll pick out your wife,” I grumbled, and even I noticed how bitter I sounded.

“Yes.” He somehow made that one word sound just as remorseful. “Or it’ll be the first step to that end anyway.”

I forcefully shoved aside images of Rush and Natania, of Rush and Coretta, Eliana, Malina, and the dozens of other aspiring princesses whose names I’d never learned on purpose. Of him, with his long, silky moonlight hair and matching eyes, rolling across the sheets with the women, eagerly spread out before him, prizes offered to him on sparkly platters. His muscled body, slick with sweat of their joined passion, him grunting as he thrusted inside them—any of them—his erection glistening with their combined arousal…

Rush’s hand grasped my arm as he stopped, turning me to face him. “What is it? What’s going on?”

“Nothing’s going on,” I snapped.

Once more, those brows rose. “You were growling.”

“I most certainly was not.”

“Elowyn,” he said, my name a caress slipping between those full lips.

My eyes raked across them. “Whatever. Let’s go. We need to get our sleep before the fight tomorrow.”

I started walking again; my rooms were nearby. Reluctantly, he followed, offering me his arm another time as if he were a gentleman instead of a man who was part beast, ready to rut with any of the women throwing themselves at him, all but spreading their legs wide for him in the grand Hall of Mirrors.

I halted in front of my door and waited, well aware of his routine. With one hand pressed to the door handle, the other to the hilt of his sword, Rush asked, “Is that what you want? To sleep?”

Of course that’s not what I want! Agitated irritation roiled through me with such unexpected ferocity that I probably wouldn’t wind down enough to rest at all before the match tomorrow.

“Yes, I want to sleep,” I snarled, even as I wondered why I’d say such a stupid thing.

His shoulders lowered, and his “Okay” was soft, a whisper that felt like defeat. Then he swept into the antechamber to my room holding me against him, and shut the door. Orbs awakened, glowing warmly, as he searched every corner of my rooms for intruders.

When he finally turned toward me again, his silver eyes swirling with a conflict he didn’t share with me, he announced, “It’s safe.”

Only … he was my number one enemy.

With him, I wasn’t safe at all.

Without warning, and without even knowing I’d do it, I slammed my mouth against his, our teeth clashing during the instant it took him to dispel his shock and respond. Then his fingers dug into my hips while his tongue parted my lips. He tugged me flush against his body and consumed me—my tongue, my breath, my lips, all of it melded with him.

And still I wanted more.

He wanted more too, the fire West had doused earlier with his interruption reignited. Rush’s hands trailed across every part of my body with a frenzy that suggested he wished he could touch me everywhere at once—if only!

I returned the favor, squeezing his shoulders, firm behind, and raking my nails across the hard ridges of his abdomen and back, his muscles prominent even beneath his shirt and coat.

I slapped my hands to his ass again and jerked him against me while I wrapped my leg around his hips and balanced on one spindly heel. With the proper motivation, I was a damn goddess in these ridiculous shoes. I never wanted to take them off so long as there was no ceasing what we were doing.

His mouth insistent on mine, he groaned into me as his large hand ran the length of my leg, holding my calf tightly against his delicious rear end. I half tried to climb him while I kissed him with the kind of abandon that pushed away any thoughts of my inexperience. The extent of my practice might have only been a few makeout sessions with Xeno, but I’d imagined going farther than that plenty of times, and Rush wasn’t complaining.

His dick was hard as stone against my pulsing core, my skirt draped around my thighs, exposing my bare flesh.

He scooped a hand under my behind and pulled me upward. As if I’d been doing this with him all our lives, I knew what he wanted, and easily wrapped my other leg around his waist, hooking together my ankles.

He moaned against my mouth as if I were the most scrumptious fruit he’d ever tasted, and I thought I might lose my mind with all its stupid, useless worries.

First, he slipped one hand under my skirt, then the other, until both hot hands gripped my ass cheeks around a scrap of lace Pru had picked out for me. He squeezed them and thrust, the hard ridge of him sweeping across my soaking center.

When he trailed his tongue across my throat, I threw my head back to give him better access, and he lapped at the point between my collarbones where my pulse was erratic, frantic, desperate for so much more.

“Bed,” I muttered, my usual eloquence distilling to grunts and monosyllabic orders. “Now.”

I hoped Pru would know to stay away. After the interruption with West, I wasn’t going to stop for anyone.

The guys were otherwise occupied, and Pru had to know I’d be as dangerous as the queen herself if she were to try to interfere now.

Rush thrust against me another time, and I threw my head back so far that I could see the ample bed behind me.

“Bed,” I repeated.

He nipped at my earlobe, I yelped, and he ran to the mattress, tossing me onto it with such delightful abandon that I bounced, laughing as if I hadn’t a care in the world. A second later he was on top of me, his arms caging me in as they had the first night we’d kissed.

Like a beast, he growled, his eyes flaring. I squirmed beneath him as excitement zinged up and down my body, leaving my extremities tingling.

Finding his belt buckle, I unclasped it. He jumped off me, lightning-fast, knelt on the bed, slipped off his sheath and belt, and placed them on the bedside table. In the next breath he was on me again, kicking off his boots. They landed loudly on the floor— thump, thwump .

I struggled to remove his jacket, so he helped shrug it off. I yanked his tunic over his head, then flung it with such abandon that it snagged a light orb on its way down, deepening the shadows across his face, sharpening the line beneath his cheekbones, the stubble across his jaw.

Unabashedly, I licked my lips, running my hands all over his chest, up and down, side to side … then I slipped them below the waistband of his shorts.

He stilled and grabbed my fingers, dragging tender kisses up and down my arm before lowering to the bed beside me. He propped his head up with his hand and looked at me.

I rolled to the side and hooked my leg once more around his hip, pulling him toward me.

He resisted, though his erection was straining to reach me so ferociously that its tip peeked out above the waistband of his shorts. It glistened and throbbed, a swollen, desperate pink.

“What is it?” I asked—a throaty rasp.

“You’re barely not a virgin anymore.”

Immediately, my teeth clenched and I stopped trying to tug him against me, no longer strained to line up my core with his.

“Seriously? This again?” I asked, disappointment and annoyance threading through each of my words.

He went to run his fingers down my cheek. I pulled away.

He smiled gently, perhaps sadly. “No, not ‘this again.’ What we did earlier … there’s no going back with that. You’re not a virgin anymore even if West, the bastard, wouldn’t leave us alone. But…”

He reached for my cheek again, and this time I let him. Like feathered wingtips, his first three fingers alighted along my skin. And though his touch was infinitely light, I felt as if it reached deep inside me.

“You’re probably sore,” he said.

“I’m not,” I assured him right away, though I was so tender I didn’t forget what he and I’d done for long.

He smiled gently, as if he knew I was lying. “And you hurt your wrist earlier.”

“My wrist? What wrist?” I flopped it around. “This thing? Nah. It’s fine.”

He chuckled, also softly, even though I hadn’t meant to be funny. My body and mind were at odds with each other. My body wanted only him, and all my energy was going to that end, too little left for silly things such as coherence and socially accepted behavior.

“Just outside you said you wanted only to sleep,” he continued.

“Mmmhmm.” I tapped the heel of my shoe to his back and pulled my leg closer against his bare waist. “Clearly I’ve changed my mind.”

The whirling of his eyes stilled and the mirth vanished from his features. “You’ll be fighting tomorrow. You need your rest.”

“Same goes for you.”

“Yeah, but?—”

“Don’t you dare start with the ‘you’re a male and I’m a female’ talk again.”

A deep chuckle tumbled through him, wiping some of the seriousness from his face. I breathed more easily. He rolled his hips against mine, his dick hard as before.

“I haven’t lost sight of how you’re a female since I first met you. I’d think that’s obvious.”

For a few beats I stared at him. Even in this dim light I could make out his beauty. I’d never seen a man more gorgeous, even among the fae, and many of them were graced with otherworldly—almost too perfect—looks.

“Do we have to talk about the fighting? About tomorrow? ’Cause I don’t want to. This might be our only chance for … this.” I pumped my hips against his.

Deep in his chest, a groan rumbled.

“Let’s leave the queen and whatever she might try to do tomorrow out of this. Right now it’s just you and me. Tonight, you aren’t my enemy, you aren’t the queen’s spy, and you aren’t my opponent in the ring. You’re just my…”

Rush wrapped an arm around my shoulders, its muscles firm as he dragged me across the bed to press against his chest. My dress was made of gossamer chiffon, light and airy, and yet it felt as substantial as a stone wall between us. I wanted it all gone. I wanted us stripped bare for each other.

“I’m your … what?” Rush asked.

My enemy was the only answer that popped into my mind, but it didn’t feel entirely true, even if it was.

“I don’t know, Rush,” I said. “I really don’t. But I do know … whatever comes tomorrow, I don’t want to look back to tonight and think I wasted our last chance to experience whatever this is between us.”

His laughter was arrogant. “You mean my dick?”

I rolled my eyes. “There you go with your ‘sacred bejeweled wand’ again.” But I was teasing; the man had every reason for his assuredness. I was no dick connoisseur—but Rush was obviously remarkable in every way. Everyone who encountered him recognized that, even the queen.

His eyes danced with his amusement. “Is that your new nickname for him? Your ‘sacred bejeweled wand?’”

I shrugged, feigning disinterest. “Seems like first you should prove to me he’s worthy of the moniker.”

His smile grew until his dimples showed. “Challenge accepted. But no matter what you say, I’m going to take it really slow and be gentle with you. You deserve for every part of you to be revered, and our first time together hardly counted.”

Our first time together . Did that imply there’d be more beyond this night?

Don’t be foolish, Elowyn , I reprimanded myself. There was no place for me in Embermere, not when the queen wanted me gone at best, dead at worst. Besides, I was reading meaning into Rush’s words that hadn’t been there.

“You okay?” Rush asked.

I forced a smile to tilt my lips. “Yes, definitely, though…”

Those fingertips trailed another delicate line across my cheek, down my throat, then my breastbone. I shivered.

“Though what?” he asked.

“I am bleeding.” When his eyes clouded over with concern, I hastened to add, “But just really lightly, like, hardly at all. It’s nothing to be concerned about. Unless…” I studied him; his mouth was tugging down with worry. “Unless you don’t want to, you know, with me … because I’m bleeding?” I’d almost said make love , but that wasn’t what this was going to be. It would be attraction and sex, despite being pitted against each other at every turn.

“Are you kidding me, El? I’d want to make love to you even if you were covered in a thick coating of gore. Even if you’d showered in blood. ”

My face screwed up in disgust. “Ew.” But my heart thudded at his words, odd as they were.

“Are you completely certain you want to do this?” Rush asked, serious once more. “With me?”

I stared so deeply into his eyes that I thought I could sense the goodness in him. “Yes, I’m sure. Now, enough with the talking and get inside me already.” I slapped a hand to his hip as if to pull him against me again.

“While I appreciate your enthusiasm,” he said on another of those deliciously deep chortles, “I’m going to take my time, just like I said I would. I don’t care if you’re writhing, squirming, and begging, calling out my name, you’re going to get what I think you deserve.”

I couldn’t decide whether that was a kind promise or one that would deliver me torment, but when those fingers slid that tender touch to the thin strap of my dress and slipped it off my shoulder, I stopped thinking entirely.

His tongue licked the swell of my breast as he tugged down the fabric, and I let myself get carried away in his current. Wherever he wanted to take me, for this night alone, I’d let him.