Chapter Forty One
Daphne
When you tear everything down, you’re left with only what matters. Then you can rebuild not to someone else’s specifications, but to your dreams. The possibilities might be terrifying, but they’re worth it.
The stripping of Idol power and its return to the realm isn’t announced with trumpets and grand gestures. It’s in the eyes of every creature we pass on our way back to the Hallows. They’re disbelieving, but hopeful. Is it perfect? No, absolutely not. It’s messy and glorious.
I sleep on and off against my knights as they pass me between them, needing to convince themselves that I am still here.
They need to have more faith. Our bond is deeper than blood and stronger than any higher power, formed by conquering death.
Never once did I falter in the belief that their love would always catch me.
My body is tired, though, and for the first time in forever, peace settles in my bones. Not an emptiness, but a destiny fulfilled, and now I am free to follow my own. Will it be any less chaotic? I hope not.
“Daphne, we’re here,” Hart murmurs against my temple as my feet touch the floor.
I lift my head, finding we aren’t at the stables, but inside the Living Library which is bustling with happy creatures.
I turn my head and note the tunnel connecting the Hallows castle library and this one is now a defined and connected walkway.
The All Knowing has opened the gates, the freedom of knowledge available for those who seek it.
We aren’t gatekeeping, and we can’t and shouldn’t hide the past.
The lessons learned have been hard and should not be forgotten, or we risk slipping back, and that I cannot abide.
A pair of familiar older men argue good-naturedly from between the stacks. Wilhelm and Jacob Grimm.
I blink at them as they walk toward us. Wilhelm looks me up and down. “Well, you look a lot less dead than the last time I saw you.”
“And you look alive,” I point out.
Clearly, they are alive. What I mean is, they aren’t tired, hopeless beings living on the outskirts of some forgotten corner of the realms.
Jacob snorts. “I believe we owe you our lives.”
I shake my head. “You owe us nothing. I don’t want to start my future—” I slide a glance at Gwyneth because this affects her too. She nods in agreement. “—with a debt.”
“I told you,” Wilhelm says, bumping shoulders with his brother.
“Yes, yes,” Jacob grumbles. “You did.”
“Told you what?” Gwyneth asks.
“That you two are the two. We waited a long time for a pair to appear in our bloodline who wouldn’t be tainted by the temptation of the Idols’ power,” Jacob explains.
Wilhelm points at Gwyneth. “I knew when you passed the first test.”
“What test?” she asks.
Oh...
“The shoe,” I whisper, glancing at a grinning Charming. “The shoe was your test, sister. And you refused the seduction of power.”
Charming shrugs. “The only kink in the road was me actually falling for you.”
The knights go completely still as we absorb the role this idiot played. It’s almost unbelievable. Almost.
“Then you denied it again and again,” Jacob says with a soft smile. “Every rebuttal of power dropped in your lap made me believe in the magic once more.”
I rub my temple. Everything was planned?
“No,” the All Knowing says. “Not even in the slightest. But while you were tested, your choices were your own.”
Poseidon descends a curved metal staircase and strides over to join us. He looks lighter, happier. He folds his arms and smiles. “I knew you could do it.”
Him too? I can’t fathom the forces at work to bring us to this point.
“I think I need to lie down,” Gwyneth whispers.
“And you’ve earned it,” Charming says, sweeping her into his arms with ease.
The knights all stare at me, ready for whatever comes next.
I hold my finger up. “I have some of my own promises to fulfill before I rest.”
“They can wait,” Nash growls low.
I shake my head. “No, they cannot.”
“We’ll be right here when you are ready,” Jacob calls out as Sir Sweeps-A-Lot fusses around him.
“Rest, or go have cake,” I instruct Genie. “The choices are yours now. You are no longer bound by magic. You are the master of your own destiny.” He blinks as if he hadn’t thought of that, and then salutes and poofs out in a show of rainbow glitter.
Poseidon stretches his arms in the air and sighs. “Ah, to be free.” He slaps Jacob on the back. “Come, my friend, we have a game of chess to finish.”
Jacob rolls his eyes. “You are likely rusty from all that sea salt.”
Their good-natured barbs echo as I stride to our private quarters with the knights on my tail. I pause on the threshold of our chamber and turn. “I need a little time to myself. To bathe, to sleep, to breathe. Can you let me do that?”
Nash nods once. Theo looks like he might dragon out any tempo. I kiss his cheek. “I’m just on the other side of this door. I promise I’m not going anywhere.”
I hug the twins at the same time. “For everyone’s sake, find somewhere safe to stick your judgy swords because I don’t want any commentary in the chamber.”
Hart huffs a laugh, and Malachi hiccups into my shoulder.
I step backward into the room and shut the door, leaning against it with a deep sigh, my eyes fluttering closed.
I suck in a deep breath, noticing how the air seems different.
The pulse that echoes in the realm beats with the quiet promise of the revolution we started.
A grinding noise has my eyes snapping back open, and a doorway appears where there wasn’t one before. Oh goodness. What now?
I pad across the room and fling the door open to find a natural pool hiding in the newly formed bathing chamber. This place shifts like the tides, giving us everything we need.
I hiss as I step into the steaming pool and sigh as the dirt and destruction of the last few days seeps from my pores and gets swallowed by the salts and minerals.
I linger to wash my hair, scrub between my toes, and marvel at the lack of any wound or scar from Hart’s sword.
It truly is a miracle, and to think the Hallowed have been harvesting those magnificent beings for their ability to become freaking shiny.
No more. No one will suffer again for the arrogant few.
I don’t rush as I climb out and pat my body down with big, white, fluffy towels.
I feel calm, but sleepy. Oh, the power of a hot bath.
Our chambers are empty, but on the table rests a platter of various fruits and meats, including a selection of sausages.
I’m a simple maiden at heart because this makes me insanely happy.
Once I’m full of food and relaxed, I debate whether I should go in search of my knights, but instead succumb to the allure of the enormous, cloud-like bed. When they’re ready, they’ll find me. Until then, I believe I’m going to need my strength.
Soft fabric whispers against my face. My nose scrunches, and I bat it away.
“It’s me,” Hart murmurs against my ear. He’s behind me, curved around my back. The fabric tightens around my eyes as he secures it. “It’s our wedding ceremonial ribbon.”
“What are you doing?” I whisper.
“Worshiping our queen,” Malachi rumbles from in front of me.
My body tingles with awareness of being naked between the twins.
“Make sure she can’t see,” Nash says from near my feet.
I turn my head toward him, about to reach out, but someone clasps my hands and guides them over my head. “And I’ll make sure all she can do is feel,” Theo murmurs as the ribbon binds my wrists.
My breath catches. They’re all here. Finally.
No more walls, no more hesitation, no more saving the realm. Just me and these four wonderful males who know my heart.
Someone rolls me onto my back, and I can feel their gazes sweeping over me. I tug on the material, finding it secured to the head of the bed.
They move around me, and my brain tries to keep up with who is where. Then a mouth closes over my nipple, sucking hard. Theo, I think.
Teeth graze my stomach. Nash?
I wriggle against my bonds, but the simple knots hold me tight. Another mouth on my other breast short-circuits any need to figure out who is where.
“Just feel,” someone whispers, but I can’t make out their voice. “Don’t overthink it.”
They’ve done this for me. I’m nervous. What woman wouldn’t be when faced with four burly knights? I know they’d never hurt me, but pushing me to my limits? Yes, they relish that.
“Someone needs to kiss me,” I demand.
Heat abandons my breast and covers my mouth. Definitely Malachi. His kisses are tender yet demanding at the same time, as unique and special as he is.
A hand circles my ankle and kisses curve up my calf before something secures it to the corner, followed by the other, stretching me wide open. A pillow is guided beneath my ass, lifting me to a better angle for...
Oh, yes. Yes, yes, yes.
Hot flicks of a tongue cross my clit, manipulating that bundle until it’s throbbing. I feel empty and needy. “Please,” I beg.
“Don’t,” Nash warns. “Make her wait. She isn’t nearly needy enough yet.”
“A maiden could grow to hate you,” I snap.
He huffs a laugh. The heat from my breast disappears and soft, subtle leather slides between them. What are—
The lash catches me by surprise, but not from pain. The pleasant sting stirs something inside of me, and I arch my spine, reveling in the warning of the leather resting across my chest. “Again.”
“You are fucking perfect,” Nash growls. The next time lands a little harder, and fire laces my spine while my core clenches around nothing. Someone covers my mouth with theirs, swallowing my moans and claiming them.
The leather moves lower before resting between my legs. Whoever is kissing me breaks away, both of us gasping and breathing each other’s air.
“You want this?” Nash murmurs in my ear as someone pinches my nipples.
Wait. I thought he was the one with the leather? “Yes.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, please,” I beg.
“You hear that, brother?” Nash says. “How prettily she begs for your belt?”
Oh, that’s what it is. A breeze whispers through the air, and the strike lands on the bundle of nerves.
It’s purposefully softer, but by design pushes me so close to the edge I think I am about to fly.
My thighs tense as heat floods between my legs.
Even I can sense how wet I am, and they’ve barely begun.
The belt slides between my legs. “Again?” Nash asks.
I nod, but nothing happens. Damn knights. “Yes.”
“Beg,” someone else demands, knowing how close I am and reveling in the fact that once more will be enough to push me over the edge.
Leather shifts over flesh so sensitive it borders on pain. Being me, I don’t give in, because while they enjoy testing my limits, I like to push theirs right back.
Lips whisper across my inner arm. Delicate, teasing, frustrating.
“You really want to play this game, Daphne?” Nash rumbles before his teeth graze over my calf. When did he move there? I thought for sure it was his lips on my arm.
“I do,” I breathe.
“Let’s see who taps out first,” Theo drawls.
“You know, most maidens who save an entire realm would be worshiped by their knights and given everything she wants. Maybe I need some new knights?”
Dangerous, very dangerous game. I want more.
“I don’t know whether I’m impressed or irritated,” Hart grumbles.
Ah, so it was he kissing my arms.
“Both,” Malachi decides.
“No more talking. You’ll pay for that, Daphne. Do you remember what word will end this?” Nash asks.
“Stop,” I reply. My throat is thick with emotion, but the most prominent one is excitement.
“Good girl.”
No one else would ever describe me as such, but for them, I can be.
Shuffling occurs around me along with the sound of breeches being shed, but now I don’t know who is where. I bite my lip and wait in silence. My senses are on high alert, every whisper of air like ghostly touches.
Heated fingers knead my breasts, sliding over the flesh. Some kind of warm oil that feels divine drips over my body, and they massage it in. But there’s no time to relax. The leather shifts, my thighs tremble, and then the hit brings the sweetest of bliss racing down my spine.
Curses surround me as I spiral in an ocean of pleasure. Lips seal around my nipples, and teeth graze the peaked, overly sensitive tips. Each tug draws out my orgasm. Leather collides again. I climb higher, impossibly so. This is freaking fantastic. I should play dangerously more often.
The restraints around my ankles loosen and release.
One of them slides inside my still-clenching core, and my legs wrap around him.
With a few flicks of my clit, my back arches, and he hits something that makes my breath stutter.
And then there is no more thought. Only feeling. Caresses, teeth, lips, tongues.
They flip me over, and I find myself sinking down onto another of the knights, while someone pours more of that heated oil down my back and massages it against my ass. Hands grab my hips, making me freeze with whoever is beneath me, buried deep.
Kisses dot along my shoulder and fingers press inside my ass, stretching, testing, and seeking permission.
“Yes?” someone growls in my ear. “Or no?”
“A thousand times yes,” I murmur.
Whoever it is lines up and pushes inside. Shivers break out down my spine as they whisper how beautiful I am.
“Let me see you,” I beg. “Please?”
The fabric tears free, releasing my hands. I smile down at Nash beneath me before turning to find Malachi buried deep inside my ass. He raises a brow in challenge. I did not call that.
“You good?” he checks.
I lean back and capture his lips with mine in answer, then I start to move between them with a slow circle of my hips that makes Nash hiss and Malachi groan. I feel like a goddess.
“Because you are one,” Theo adds. “Our goddess.”
He kneels on one side with Hart on the other, both stroking their hard cocks in slow, firm pulls that make my mouth water.
Unleashed, I fall into a rhythm of pleasure, desire, and love that transcends anything I’ve known. My body aches as it’s pulled from one knight to another, but throughout it all, I feel precious.
Their pleasure bleeds into our bond, the echoes driving all of us mad with need until we’re a perfect mess of satiated naked limbs on this ridiculously large cloud bed. I could rest here for an eternity, but there’s one more thing I have to do, after making “floof” the official word of the realm.
And it’s perhaps the most important thing of all.