Chapter 7
ARIEL
W e’d returned to the others just long enough for me to choke back some bitter ale and compose my emotions before Filsen stopped chasing his brothers around the fire and pointed at the staff resting next to my seat.
“What’s that?” he asked. His brothers slammed to a stop at his sides to see what he was inquiring about.
I picked it up and twirled it in my hand. “ This is my beloved staff,” I said with a smile. I leaned in conspiratorially. “It's rumored to have been carved from a magical tree.”
His mouth fell open as he stared. “A magic tree ?”
I nodded. “One that cannot be burnt or broken.”
“That can’t be true,” Alred argued, folding his arms. “All wood breaks—and burns.” He pointed to the fire behind him lighting the small clearing.
“Are you certain?” I asked, slowly rising. “Shall we test your theory?”
As I walked toward the fire, the younger two shouted, “No, Aima Kori . Don’t do it!”
“Do what?” I asked, winking at them over my shoulder. “ This ?”
Without skipping a beat, I thrust the end of my staff deep into the coals. They flared an angry red at the disturbance, and flames erupted around the magical wood. But the longer we waited, the clearer it became to them that nothing was going to happen. And when I pulled the staff free, completely unmarred, they clapped and cheered with delight.
“It is magic!” Filsen and Doret shouted as they ran around the fire. But Alred just stared at me, suspicion filling his hollow eyes.
“Why do you have a magic staff?”
Warning snaked up my back as I realized how much I’d revealed. The ale had addled my mind just enough to forget the pretense we’d been keeping, and I could see as much in Shayfer’s eyes when I dared a look. Details, both true and false, ran through my head as I tried desperately to come up with an answer that would meet his aforementioned criteria.
When it became apparent I could not, Shayfer rescued me from my silence. “It belonged to her father,” he said. “A fearsome soldier of the Nychteride army.” My eyes went wide at his words, and he rose to join me, sliding the staff from my hands as he gave me a familiar look that said ‘trust me, Ariel dear, and play along’. “I don’t recall how Lord Kaplyn came to have it, but Hemming found it stored away somewhere in the mansion and gave it to Ariel.”
“And what happened to her father?”
Shayfer, choosing the power of shock over the subtlety of details, replied simply. “He was killed.”
That somber sentiment hung in the air until Eldrien broke the silence. “Kaplyn would have been livid that someone impregnated her. Your father surely died at his hand,” he said softly. “Once Anemosia is restored to her former glory and our people are renewed, we will have our vengeance. Kaplyn will pay for what he’s done.”
“We’ll help!” Filsen shouted as he took my staff from my hands and attempted to spin it as I had earlier. It fumbled from his grip and whacked Alred in the back of the head. Doret collapsed to the ground, holding his belly as his raucous laughter echoed through the night, and Filsen soon joined in. Alred, however, held a rage in his eyes that I’d seen before in the warrior behind me. The circumstances of his life had hardened him in a way it hadn’t yet his younger brothers, and it hurt my heart to see it play out in his fearsome stare.
Hemming lifted his mug of ale to drink, but Alred snatched it from him before it could meet his lips and swallowed back half its contents before shoving it back at Hemming, wiping his arm across his mouth. Instead of irritation, I found an odd look of respect in Hemming’s eyes.
Alred, however, turned his suspicious stare back to me. “So, your father was a warrior?”
“Yes. The most brutal kind, if the rumors are to be believed.”
“Did he teach you to fight?”
Remember the lie , I told myself before answering. “No.” But in truth, that wasn’t a lie at all. My real father hadn’t taught me to fight; Kade had.
“Why do you want to know?” Hemming asked in his commanding tone. “Do you wish to challenge her?”
At that, he took a small step back. “No…”
“A wise choice, my young friend,” Shayfer said as he bent down to face the young boy, “because your Aima Kori is a fearsome creature—one that should not be underestimated.”
“So she can fight?” Doret asked as he darted over to Shayfer on his little legs.
The fae spy’s smile gleamed in the firelight. “She can indeed. And she’s quite a force of nature when she chooses to be.”
“I want to see her fight!” Filsen shouted as he stumbled into the other two.
“And who would you dare to place in such danger?”
The trio did not even pause to consider Shayfer’s question. Instead, they turned their heads in unison toward Hemming, mischievous looks on their faces. Doret thrust his finger toward the Nychteride warrior masquerading as fae and shouted, “ him ! I choose him!”
I cast a nervous glance at Hemming, but he didn’t return my gaze; his ability to keep up the charade far surpassed my own. Instead, he slowly rose to his full height, towering over the young boys, and said, “I accept.” His sword was drawn and ready before I fully realized what was happening, and he made his way to a small area clear of where the onlookers sat but still within the dim light of the fire.
Apparently, this was where he and I would spar.
Once that realization fully settled, I collected myself and smiled at the little one who’d incited this whole thing. “You’ve decided to go easy on your Aima Kori ,” I said, ruffling his hair as I walked by. “I shall remember this kindness.” Hemming kept his expression impassive at my playful slight, but I knew I’d pay for it before the fight was over.
“I’m not sure this is wise,” Eldrien said as he stood to object.
“It most certainly isn’t,” Shayfer replied dryly.
The Minyade leader shot the fae a confused look, but I had no time to observe their interaction further. All I could focus on was the wall of warrior waiting for me in the near darkness and my pulse pounding in my ears as I watched him flip his sword over in his hand while his eyes tracked me like a hawk.
I didn’t want to fight him. I wanted to pull his body against mine and let his strong hands rip my leathers free and explore my body until I was a writhing, panting, witless ball of need beneath him. But that was not to be.
Not yet, anyway.
“Fear not, Eldrien. I won’t hurt him too badly.”
That time, Hemming couldn’t help but take the bait. “We’ll see about that, mikros drakos .”
“Get him, Ariel!” Doret shouted. I snapped my head around to smile at him, and Hemming capitalized on the moment. With a flick of his wrist, his blade swung around me and caught the end of my braid, slicing off the very tip. The cord securing it fell to the ground along with the length he’d trimmed off.
I gaped at him through my wild locks now blowing free in the wind.
He smiled unapologetically. “You needed a trim.”
I mirrored his expression. “And you’re going to need a healer.”
The second those words left my mouth, Hemming launched himself at me. I barely had time to get my staff up in front of my face to block the blow that would have cloven me in half. Hemming pushed in hard, leveraging his size against the blade, forcing my arms to strain against his weight. The smug smile on his face as he pressed forward should have enraged me, but instead, it stirred something else—especially when he dropped his head close to mine and whispered, “is this all you’ve got, Princess ?”
Fire brewed in my belly.
I smiled at him before lifting my front leg to slam it into his shin. The blow landed with a nasty sound that had the little boys cringing. It might not have driven Hemming back far, but it was enough to make him buckle and lose his advantage. His sword slipped off my staff, and I rushed forward while his balance was off. I drove my shoulder into his gut and took him to the ground. His arm clamped around my waist before we hit, and I quickly straddled his chest, staff wedged against his throat. He released me and his sword to deal with the staff choking him, as I knew he would, but I pushed back harder, folding my upper body over him until my lips were at his ear.
“Are you even trying?” I whispered softly as I squeezed his torso tighter with my thighs. My hair spilled around us like a cloak of invisibility that made me bold, and my tongue shot out and trailed along his earlobe. For a fraction of a moment, the fight left him entirely.
But it returned with a vengeance.
My arrogance proved a weakness, and before I realized what was happening, I was flipping through the air backward, Hemming and me both still holding my staff until I crashed onto my back—him atop me.
How quickly the tides had turned.
Our positions now reversed, he loomed over me, an ominous force, but though he looked to be trying hard to force my surrender, I felt nothing.
Well, almost nothing.
His hips pressed between mine as he leaned his weight against me, and I fought harder against my reaction to his arousal than I had anything else so far. The desire to wriggle beneath him and pull him close was maddening, and I wondered for a moment if this was his strategy to win the fight.
“You seem to be in a rather precarious spot, Princess ,” he said, all amusement absent from his expression. All that was left in its wake was raw desire that flooded me with need. “I wonder what you’ll do about it.”
And oh, what I wanted to do…
Had our circumstances been even remotely different, I would have pulled him into the shadows to pick up where we’d left off against the willow tree the night of the eclipse. I would have ripped off that ridiculously tight shirt and cut him out of his leather pants if necessary to get to the strength beneath them, currently pressed so tightly against me, I was afraid I’d come undone right there.
“Get him!” the boys yelled, snapping me from the lustful thoughts running through my mind.
“Yes, Ariel,” Hemming taunted as he shifted his tantalizing weight against me, “ get me …”
I bucked against him, lifting him with my hips, which I quickly turned into an evasive maneuver to get out from under him, not that I wanted to. I combined the move with a sharp elbow to the face, which upset his balance enough for me to slip away and dive for his blade. As he recovered and shot upright, the tip of it pressed against his neck. Though I knew it couldn’t hurt him because the blade wasn’t obsidian—the only kind that could penetrate his rock-hard skin—the others did not.
Silence fell upon the group.
“Do you yield?” I asked him, breathing hard from exertion—and from the throbbing sensation between my legs I fought hard to ignore.
He stared up at me from his knees, eyes burning with the same heady feeling clearly coursing through him as well. “I yield.”
I dropped the blade and reached out my hand to help him up. The force he used to hoist himself up nearly pulled me down, and I slammed against his hard body, steadied only by his hands around my waist. He murmured something under his breath before he released me and took back his sword. Then he walked off as though we hadn’t almost given ourselves away to those looking on; ourselves, as well as our dignity.
As I watched him go, his parting words rang clear in my mind.
“ Only to you.. .”