Chapter 10 Meryn
MERYN
I desperately need to move my body so I don’t fall apart thinking about the Bonded I’ve killed. Or the tattoo I’m about to receive—and the way my skin might feel when Stark licks it.
My face flushes. The last time he tattooed me, when we were at the war camp in Grunfall… something almost happened between us, even though I was with Killian, even though I was sure I hated Stark. And that was when we were in a tent, with other soldiers on the other side of the thin canvas.
Busying myself, I grab a matchbook and light candles and oil lamps around the living area until there’s enough light for us both to see clearly.
“Where’s Anassa?” Stark asks, still not looking at me.
“In the woods.”
He nods toward Saela’s room. “And—”
“She’s asleep.”
Stark gestures toward the room before him, now obvious in its disarray. His upper lip curls in disgust. “What is this?”
It’s not just my bedroom that looks like an avalanche of things has collapsed on it. The living area is covered in clutter.
All the outfits Brionna had me try on are scattered over the furniture.
Used tumblers of water sit on at least four surfaces.
There’s a half-eaten plate of fruit on the dining table from this morning that is emitting a slightly rotten sweet smell.
A pile of books on the floor must’ve toppled over at one point and is now just… a mess of books, I guess we’d call it.
“What do you mean?” I ask innocently.
He steps closer to me, a dangerous, quiet rage alighting in his gaze. “I noticed this in your bedroom the other night, too. Are the servants refusing to attend to you? That is not acceptable. I’ll speak to Matron Alienor immediately and—”
I hold out a hand. “Stop. I appreciate all the, uh, angry energy you’re willing to toss around on my behalf, but I do have a primary attendant now.”
He looks back at the room in confusion. “She needs to be replaced, then.”
“I told her to leave the stuff,” I tell him. “It’s a disaster and I caused it, so it’s weird having her clean it up. I’ll do it myself. Eventually.”
Stark huffs, a vicious blast of air. “That is her job, Meryn. She is paid to clean it up. Are you truly comfortable living like this?”
I shrug. “I’m not used to having this many things. It’s kind of nice.”
“I’m sorry, but that’s disgusting.” He scowls deeply at me, and I realize he’s used to getting what he wants with this look. It’s the warning rumble of thunder before the sky splits violently apart. “Clean up your fucking mess, princess.”
“What happened to ‘my queen’?” I ask, bristling at his commanding tone.
“Act like a filthy little princess and get treated like one, Your Highness.”
My eyes widen, and heat, needy and insistent, pulses through me. I cough and look away, hoping he didn’t see the absolutely ridiculous effect his bossy words had on me.
“I’ll keep that in mind,” I say mildly, a more than casual curiosity starting to build. Just how would Alpha Stark treat a filthy little princess? Noemi could probably tell me. Goddess, this is not what I should be focusing on. There’s a reason he’s here. “Anyway, the tattoos?”
“There isn’t much precedent for this type of marking,” he tells me, and gestures to the ink. Thank fuck, he’s letting me forget any of that happened. “Bonded rarely kill their own outside of training, so you can choose where you want them placed.”
The words spin me back into the gravity of the situation.
Bonded shouldn’t kill their own outside of training. It’s not what we do.
Only someone horrible would kill one of their own—never mind a dozen.
“It can be anywhere,” he says, interrupting my spiraling guilt like he saw it happening in my head and spoke to shut me up.
I swallow, thinking. “My ribs, then.”
Near my heart. So that if someone were to kill me the way I killed Henrey, they’d have to push their blade through the designs. It will be a permanent reminder of the pain I caused and how badly I need to control my power.
Stark doesn’t move, and I realize he’s waiting for me.
Jerkily, I reach up to untie the silk knots at my hips, then I pull my tunic from my shoulders. The undershirt beneath doesn’t provide much warmth, and the cool air nips at my bare skin.
Stark takes off his jacket and rolls up his shirtsleeves, exposing his muscular forearms. The veins beneath his tattoos flex as he moves, and suddenly it’s entirely too much like we’re undressing for each other.
I look away.
Stepping to the chaise, I shove some of the clothes off it and onto the floor, ignoring the disapproving way his eyes track the movement. Then I sit and curl my fingers under the thin fabric of my undershirt.
I pull it up to just under my breasts, exposing the area where I want the needle. When I look up, Stark’s still standing there, not moving, staring at me.
“Stark,” I say. I sound calm, but the air in the room is suddenly thinner.
He turns and picks up the ink. “Your clothes may chafe,” he tells me in a level voice. “When we’re done, keep it bandaged until it heals.”
When his dark eyes land on me, tingles race along my arms and my exposed side. He kneels beside me, gaze unyielding. “Lie down. It will be easier that way.”
“Bet you say that to all the girls,” I crack, and then my traitorous mind goes instantly to Noemi and imagines the two of them tangled up in all sorts of positions.
He doesn’t respond, and I realize his eyes are locked on my exposed expanse of skin.
After that, I can’t find words. Or maybe I could, and I just don’t want to.
His tattoos flex around his fingers as he methodically readies the pen.
One of his calloused hands slides forward on my stomach, and I stop breathing entirely. The warmth of his palm presses into me, holding me steady. I haven’t been touched like this, skin on skin, since Killian. I thought I would find the sensation repulsive after everything.
Instead, it soothes me. Heals something deep inside.
I meet his eyes, and it feels like a lightning strike through my body. Quickly, I avert my gaze, desperate to stop the blush spreading across my cheeks.
Stark frees me from this torture by pressing the needle into my skin.
The bite is a welcome relief from the turmoil in my head, the reminder of why I’m getting these tattoos in the first place. Normally, I’d lean into it, let the physical pain ground me in my body. Free me from the chaos thriving inside my head.
But then I remember his words from the other day. “Hit me. Hurt me.”
And I know that using one type of pain to cope with another probably isn’t the answer.
So I take a deep breath and try to let myself experience… all of it. The sting of the tattoo. The crushing guilt. This bizarre, unwelcome draw to Stark and the jealousy it provokes, and my still-broken heart, and my twisting confusion.
The storm of feeling rages through me, and I embrace it. It aches inside me, pressing on my heart, my lungs. His presence is crushing in its intensity.
I breathe through it.
Eventually, my heart rate lowers.
“When are you leaving?” I ask quietly. I try for casual, but he’s so close to me. It comes out shaky.
Stark pauses and wipes at his work with a clean cloth, then the needle starts again. “The Sovereign Alpha wants us to leave tomorrow morning.” His jaw tenses underneath his dark scruff, and for a moment, I think he’s going to say something more. But he doesn’t.
It’s maddening. This whole thing is maddening.
I don’t want him to go, I realize. And it’s not just about all this disorienting… whatever. His presence makes me feel safer.
Lately, it’s as if I’m standing on a frozen pond, just waiting for the ice to give out. Stark is a hand offering to pull me back to shore.
“Stop moving,” he says in a slightly raspy voice. I try, but my chest hurts almost as much as my ribs.
While he focuses on what he’s doing, I focus on him.
The flick of his eyelashes as his gaze darts over his work. The strong line of his stubble-covered jaw and the hidden scar I see for just a second when he turns his head. The slight crinkle at the corners of his eyes as he squints to lay down the finer lines.
His hands are gentle despite their size and strength—despite what they’ve done—and I can’t shake the idea that there are depths to him I haven’t seen. That maybe no one’s seen.
Well, no one except perhaps Noemi.
The tap of the ink bottle returning to the table jars me from my thoughts. He’s finished. For a long moment, I consider asking him to continue, just to keep his hands near my skin.
I’m losing my mind.
I blink rapidly and twist slightly to see what he’s done.
It’s a beautiful series of interlocking runes, incorporating a bit of each of the four pack symbols. Without counting, I know there will be twelve lines, one for each of the lives I took. It’s unfair that he made something horrific look so lovely on my body.
Stark’s hand is suddenly on the bend of my waist, and my stomach swoops. His fingers press lightly into my skin, pricks of searing heat. He holds me still and leans forward.
So much for my lowered heart rate.
Then he dips his head and opens his mouth. His breath heats my skin, oversensitive from the needle.
And his tongue is on me. Over my ribs, below my heart, so close to my now-aching breasts. He drags it in long paths over the markings, and I hold my breath to stop my audible reaction.
Just when I think he’s going to stop, he traces the entire thing again. His tongue presses into me harder this time, like he’s devouring me. Like he’s ravenous for the taste.
When he finally sits up, I’m half delirious. His eyes open and meet mine.
I can’t move for a long moment. Or breathe. Or blink. The entire room falls away. There is no Killian. There is no coronation. There is no rebellion.
There’s just Stark.
My hand moves of its own accord to the edge of his jaw. I trace the rasp of stubble, then smooth scar tissue hidden there. My lips part.
He’s breathing heavily now, too.
I’m not in control as my fingertips trace up the side of his face to his cheekbone, his temple. They sink into his thick, dark hair. My body lights up with sensation. His hair is soft, and his breath is on the inside of my wrist as my fingers tease the locks apart.
I tighten my grip in his hair. He leans almost imperceptibly closer to me.
Every inch remaining between us is a living, electric thing. I can feel the slightest twitch of his muscles, see the smallest changes in his face.
His eyes lock onto mine, and there’s a strange burning in their depths, like a fire that’s been raging for eons. His breath stills, and my eyes go to his mouth.
Arousal sears through me.
It feels like we’re each daring the other to close the distance. Do I have the courage to do it?