Chapter 6
Chapter six
Pleasure pulses through my veins, golden and glowing. It swells my lungs and passes my lips in a soft exhale.
My hips move, and dazedly I begin to wake. Slowly, reality forms around me.
It’s morning. I’m in bed, lying on my back. Dyfri is sitting cross-legged on the mattress next to me, a bored expression on his face. And his hand is stroking my cock.
I yelp and scuttle away, taking the sheets with me and nearly falling out of bed. Somehow I find my feet and manage to cover my bits with a sheet.
“What the hell are you doing!” I yell.
Dyfri stares at me with that carefully blank expression of his. His long white nightgown is making me feel even more naked. My pyjama trousers are down near my ankles and my shirt is unbuttoned, but I don’t want to drop the sheet to deal with either.
“Being a good consort,” Dyfri says.
I shake my head at him in bewilderment.
“You were hard,” he adds as if that explains anything.
I suck in a deep breath. It does nothing to calm my raging heart. “You can’t do that! You can’t just grab people! Have you never heard of consent?”
Dark eyes stare back at me. Uncaring. Unremorseful.
I take another breath. “How would you feel if I did something to you without asking?”
Dyfri’s lip twitches. The beginning of a sneer. “You are my husband. It would be your right.”
My mouth opens. I close it again. Wait. What the hell did he just say?
“I would never!” I exclaim in horror.
He rolls his eyes and looks away. He makes a sound that is unmistakably a scoff.
My chest feels as if it has been punched. “Is that what you think of me?”
His dark eyes are back. Glaring now. “That’s what I think of everybody!”
There is vehemence in his words. Thick and coiling. I take a step back away from it.
“Why?” I blurt out helplessly.
He frowns, a deep downturning of his lips that doesn’t at all detract from his beauty. “Because they have proven it over and over again.”
My mind whirls. Thoughts spin. I drag my free hand through my hair in an effort to collect my thoughts.
I just flipping woke up and I’m having to deal with this.
Dyfri behaving abhorrently. Deeply inappropriately.
So much so that my stomach is still twisting with it.
Yet, his demeanour and words are pausing my outrage in its tracks.
There is definitely a lot to untangle here.
“You can’t assault people before breakfast,” I say weakly. “Or at any time.” Surely I don’t have to explain this?
Dyfri slides off the bed with predatory grace. “I didn’t realise you found me so disgusting.”
What the fuck? “Dyfri, that’s not at all…”
“No need to explain further. I understand. I shall not touch you ever again.”
He turns and strides away, towards his bathroom. Shoulders rigid and fury in every line of his body.
My feet stumble towards him. I can’t let him go like this. I need to explain myself.
I reach for him, and the next thing I know, my back is against the wall and there is a wickedly sharp dagger at my throat.
My lungs freeze. Every single muscle in my body stops. My eyes lock onto his. Where the hell did that dagger come from? And how the hell does he move so fast? He really is a black cat and now he truly is showing me his claws.
“I think there has been a misunderstanding,” I say softly.
His eyes narrow, but the dagger moves away from my jugular. Only a fraction of an inch, but I call that progress. I don’t think he is going to kill me. Purely for diplomacy reasons if nothing else.
“I don’t think you’re disgusting,” I say. “I do think touching people without gaining their consent first is wrong.”
His brow furrows. “Humans,” he mutters. “I’m not a virgin,” he adds inexplicitly.
“What?” Oh lord am I so confused right now. What even is happening? “I mean…neither am I?”
“It seems as if half the humans who end up at the fey court are.”
“Well, that’s a statistical anomaly for sure.”
He tilts his head. “You’re not disgusted that I’m not a virgin?”
“Of course not! Holy Christ, I never would have expected you to be.”
“Then why are you so angry?” His eyes are blazing now. Hurt swirling with his fury.
My shoulders slump in defeat. It doesn’t seem as though I’m going to be able to explain this in a way that Dyfri can understand.
“I’m used to consent. Asking before touching.” I sigh. “Waking up like that was a fright. It made me feel violated.”
Dyfri’s eyes widen. The dagger disappears, and he takes a step backwards.
“I apologise. That was not my intention.”
There is sadness in his voice, real sadness. A splash of ice after the heat of his fire. Instinctively, I step towards him, wanting to offer comfort. But he dances backwards, wariness flashing in his eyes.
“Let’s make a deal,” he says hastily. “I will not touch you. You do not shout at me.”
My heart pounds. It takes up a new rhythm. I’m a big man, and I was shouting at him. Probably looming over him too.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.”
Dyfri crosses his arms over his chest. I fully expected him to reply by snapping that I didn’t scare him, or that he doesn’t scare so easily. But he isn’t saying anything. He’s just staring at me with those impossibly dark eyes.
The sheet slips down my body, and I move to grab it. Dyfri flinches at my rapid movement. I freeze.
He’s still scared of me. I’ve frightened him. He is my husband. He is living with strangers in a strange place. Dealing with a different language, new customs and unfamiliar clothes. As well as a whole new set of morals, it seems. And I’ve gone and scared him. I’m such an oaf.
“Sorry,” I repeat uselessly.
Dyfri nods. He moves carefully past me. Walking silently to his bathroom.
I watch him go. I watch the door shut behind him. Then all the oxygen leaves my body and the gravity seems to lighten.
That was a fucking disaster. The way he flinched is going to haunt me forever.
Suddenly, a memory slams into me. Vivid and picture-perfect. Dyfri recoiling when the water spilled at dinner last night. The look of terror on his face. The image merges with the words he said just now.
That’s what I think of everyone. Because they have proven it over and over again.
I stagger over to the bed just as my knees give out. Oh gosh. I can see it now.
Dyfri has every reason to act like a black cat. He’s clearly been very badly hurt by people in ways I can’t imagine. He has been gravely let down. In all sorts of ways. People have hurt him over and over again. He practically spelled it out for me.
I don’t think his inability to grasp the concept of consent is purely a fey thing. I think it is also an experience thing. He’s never been granted it, so he doesn’t know what it is. And therefore, he doesn’t expect it from me. He is expecting the very opposite.
The cold certainty of my insight seeps into my bones. I feel sick to my stomach. I hate that he sees me that way. I hate that the people who should have loved and protected him have instead painted his worldview in such dark colours.
My hands curl into fists. People have hurt my husband, and that makes me so fucking angry.
I need to do something about it.
I’m drawn to the living room by the sound of voices. Is the TV on? I open the door and pause. Dyfri is not alone.
He is sitting at a table that is piled high with small sandwiches and cakes and a very fancy tea set. At the table with him, is a strikingly beautiful young fey man with purple hair.
I blink. That is Prince Mabon, Dyfri’s brother, but how did he get here? There was no doorbell. No announcement of any visitors.
Prince Mabon looks up at me. “Oh, here is the brute. Come join us.”
Robotically, I walk across the room and sit in an empty chair. I’m not entirely sure if it’s of my own free will.
Mabon scrutinises me intensely. “He’d look much better naked. With a collar.”
My jaw drops open. No words come out, which isn’t surprising as there are hardly any thoughts in my head right now. Shock has cleared out my mind.
Mabon picks up his teacup. “Is his cock as big as the rest of him?”
“Yes,” replies Dyfri calmly as he carefully smears cream onto a scone.
Mabon makes a noise that sounds like a happy sigh. “I bet it is not as big as Mr Dinky, but that’s still nice for you.”
My jaw, somehow, drops even lower.
Mabon’s eyes suddenly widen. “Oh. I guess for you, it is not so ideal.” He turns to his brother with a look of real concern in his eyes.
Dyfri looks up and winces at Mabon’s expression. “It’s fine. I can handle it.”
Mabon frowns and glances back at me. “Have you put him in his place yet?”
“He is not my pet, he is my husband,” says Dyfri before taking a delicate bite of his scone.
The purple-haired prince makes a dismissive gesture, one that rattles all the silver bracelets on his narrow wrist. “Meh, same thing.”
My jaw snaps shut, and I find myself glaring at my uninvited guest. Mabon’s eyes are a purple several shades darker than his hair, and they narrow at my stare, but I don’t care. He is rude.
And far worse than that, I suddenly realise as my slow mind eventually catches up, Mabon didn’t stop whatever terrible things happened to Dyfri. He can’t have.
All my thoughts and conclusions from this morning are rushing back. My mind is whirling, putting the jigsaw pieces together, and it’s presenting me with an indisputable fact. If this man sitting at my table was a good brother, my husband would not be scared of people.
Mabon’s lips curl down. “Dyfri, why is it glaring at me?”
Dyfri doesn’t look at me. He just shrugs. “How should I know?”
The snooty, lilac-haired prince makes a displeased sound before turning his attention back to his brother, dismissing me entirely.
He takes another sip of his tea, then unexpectedly he squeals loudly.
Dyfri doesn’t flinch or look up from spreading jam on his new scone. It seems he is used to his brother being dramatic.
“Oh! How could I forget that you are no longer a rho… I mean, I can give you braids now!”
He jumps up from his seat and hurries over to my husband. He stands behind him, plays with his long dark hair for a moment, before selecting a strand and beginning to weave a plait in it with nimble fingers.
All without asking, I notice.
“First, a brother braid,” he chats happily. “Then a best-friend one.”
Dyfri nibbles his scone, but I see the small, pleased smile.
“Rhydian will have one for you,” Mabon says breezily. “As will Tristan and Selwyn. You can visit Loo-loo for his. Jamie will have ones to give you, and Laurie owes you an apology braid.”
“No he doesn’t,” Dyfri says quietly. “It wasn’t his fault, and he’s already banished his mother for it.”
Mabon clicks his tongue, but he doesn’t argue. He ties off the second braid he has woven into my husband’s hair, right next to the wedding one I gave him. Then he shrieks again.
“Oh! I can do all your victories! You have so many! You aren’t going to have any hair left free at all!”
Dyfri laughs. A real laugh. Full of joy and happiness and glee. It makes my chest hurt and it causes something to twist deep inside me. I want to make him laugh like that. But all I do is make him scared. Even though I have caused far less harm to him than this purple-haired idiot has.
“But first, let’s go get your others! You can see how smooth the door Selwyn made me is!”
Mabon grabs Dyfri’s hand and pulls him to his feet. He yanks him over to the wall by the window. And then right through it.
I blink. But my eyes still tell me the same thing. My husband and his brother just walked right through a solid wall and disappeared.
I sigh and pick up a discarded cake. What does it say about my life that watching people walk through walls isn’t even the strangest thing that has happened to me lately? It barely even registers.
As for that conversation? They were speaking English, but I didn’t understand a word. And I don’t have a clue why Mabon was braiding my husband’s hair. I clearly have an awful lot to learn about fey culture.
I take a bite of the cake. It’s delicious. A riot of exquisite flavours are exploding over my tongue. It is amazing, but it does nothing to quell my growing unease.
Mabon just dragged Dyfri back to the fey court. I understood that much at least. The same fey court where people proved to Dyfri that they would hurt him over and over again.
Is he safe? Will Mabon be of any use in keeping him from harm? Are my conclusions even correct? Do I know anything at all?
I sigh and think about the large stack of briefing notes I was given about fey culture. The ones I didn’t read because I assumed they’d be too difficult to understand.
But now I know I need to start somewhere. And at least I have something to do while waiting to see if my husband ever comes back.