Chapter Twenty-Five
Oleander
Kai and Vale hold me tightly from dusk until dawn every night. Not a peep from either of them about the close proximity to each other, but then again, nothing sexual happens. They just need to touch me. And I need it too.
The destruction of the battle had been gut churning. But the loss of Lilac is what makes me wake with tears streaming down my face.
My friend. She was my friend.
I replay that moment over and over again. My hand hovering over his face. The heave of Vale’s talons on my arm as he hauls me off. Lilac falling.
I shouldn’t have hesitated. Of course it was a filthy lie. And it cost Lilac her life.
Why had the villagers started fighting the Monkwick guards? Just pent up aggression from years of abuse? Where had the leaders of the armada, the commanders been? It had been chaos. Nothing organized. Literally a melee fight, combatants all mixed together like pebbles in a stream.
Lilac’s body slammed into mine, forcing me off the guard, who must have been raising a blade. A blade to kill me. But killed her instead.
And then I think of Rosie and I collapse into tears, only to be found, minutes or hours later, curled on the stone floor by one of my loves.
I need my Finn. He needs to be here.
Watching the Mother attack him, her skeletal arms and legs wrapped around him as she bit him again and again plays in my nightmares.
He and Lonan had written, sending Cill, the oldest of the Daven sisters, with their notes assuring me that he was healing well under the care of the two healers of Thistle Grove.
I lay awake, the dim light of earliest morning streaming in the balcony.
I had had the Mother and Father’s rooms cleared and scrubbed.
I made a nest of mattresses and pillows and blankets on the floor so when Lo and Finn return, we can all fit.
A proper bed has been commissioned from some timid craftsmen in the village, shocked to be paid for their work.
The clangs of swords and the screeches from the griffons and dragons alike ring in my ears from my dream.
I lay still, purposefully slowing the rise and fall of my chest as I listen to the crash of the waves against the cliff.
The sound and almost-not-there vibration is soothing and I wonder, again, if perhaps I have some water in my line.
I slip out from their warm bodies, as both of them run hot, and pad quietly out onto the balcony.
I’m in a thin, sleeveless top and my panties.
The salty air is refreshing and I breathe deeply.
If I lean against the parapet and look west, I can see the isthmus, the winter wildflowers trampled—but quickly recovering—the skeletons of the boats on the beach.
But instead I look east and watch the turquoise water, so choppy on this side of the island.
I’m quickly falling in love with the Monastery Isles. I know a reckoning is likely coming, as soon as word of this gets out; with Ordained and soothsayers returning here from their places all over the realm. But I intend no quarter for them. They can pledge loyalty or die, I do not care which.
But the servants here, and the townsfolk. They are kind, and scared, but hopeful. I will protect them. Their former masters were cruel, and power hungry, and stingy. Unsurprising for those who were seen as the heads of the church.
But the Goddess is everywhere. She needs no representative here, not when every tree, every dancing shadow, every wave, is already her.
The Monkwick coffers had been found yesterday; down one of the underground passageways.
Bags and chests of coin, dating back thousands of years.
They kept detailed ledgers, I will give them that much.
I have one of our archers, Maria, and a keen servant here, Regan, going over them and categorizing them by families loyal to my brother and those that support Misery’s Militia or are undeclared.
Of course, I’ll be seizing the funds of those that support a tyrant.
I had had Kai incinerate the bodies of the Mother and Father. Was it ridiculous? Maybe. But I wasn’t taking any chance that they could regenerate.
Today, I have to face the townsfolk. I sent out word to the two taverns for the last few days that I’d be in the town square as the sun drops to the horizon. I want to tell them that I’ll be a fair ruler, a younger sister of the evil King Alder, bent on righting his wrongs.
I hear Kai approach and his arms cage me in. I lean back against his broad chest, allowing myself to take strength from him.
“Princess,” he purrs directly into my ear, and as I press backwards against him, I feel his big, hard cock.
“Vale told me you need a good spanking, baby.”
I snort, “Since when do you do his bidding?”
He chuckles quietly. “Such a little brat needs a proper attitude adjustment.” He purrs, the rumble diving right into my panties.
A slithering along my calf.
“Do we need to fill her greedy little holes together, Kai?” Vale whispers as he comes around me, slipping between me and the railing.
Kai just grunts, and a flicker of concern fills me. He might not be ready.
Vale says no more, just holds my leg with his tail and pulls my body into his.
But just as I sink into them, my body relaxing, there is a caw and a thump and Kai has pulled his blade even as Vale shoves me behind them.
There, on my balcony, are Lonan and Finn. Lo is removing reins from the griffons. As my eyes search Finnick’s body, the griffons take off.
I run across the balcony, throwing myself at them both. Lo holds me on one side, Finn on the other. I start to cry without intending to.
“Shh, it’s alright, wife,” Finn reassures quietly and I cling to him harder. “I’m fine. Mostly healed up,” he continues.
I pull back and slap his chest, hard. “It’s not that.”
My thoughts are jumbled and I’m not exactly sure why I’m crying.
He looks down at me, surprised.
I look between them all as I wipe my nose.
“I had no one to help me pick fabrics for curtains,” I deadpan.
He studies my face a moment before wrapping me in a tight hug, my face pressed to his chest which always smells of a cold winter morning.
Instead of the chuckles I was expecting from my boys, I feel them surround me silently.
“It wasn’t your fault, Ollie,” Finn whispers into my hair. “Not what happened to me, and certainly not what happened to Lilac. None of it was your fault.”
A broken sob escapes my aching throat.
How dare he say it?
“That’s what we’ve been telling her,” Kai rumbles as I feel his hand on my hip.
“I’m sure she listened as well as she does about everything else...” Lo says, kissing the top of my head.
“Which is to say, not bollocks.” Vale’s tail wraps around my thigh.
“Shut up!” I gasp, laughing as I swallow my tears.
“She’s right pig-headed,” Kai agrees.
“Alright listen, when I said I wanted you two to agree on things, this is not what I meant,” I mutter.
Now they all laugh, and something inside my chest eases.