Chapter 17
Cyderial would not stop smirking my way.
One mention that I felt warmness for him, and he was radiant with pride. Almost boyish, yet somehow regal. Intimidating, no matter the softness around his eyes.
If I ever told him I loved him, I would be done for.
Thayer had been ordered away, Cyderial not interested in sharing me a moment longer but still eager to show me off.
His admittedly affectionate mate.
Which I reminded myself I shouldn’t mind. Personal discomfiture aside, I had to consider the example my behavior set for the avaricious men of my species. May they learn from him.
May they wish to have the same, if not better, from their mates.
Unsure what the future held, learning to manage the overwhelm, I sat beside him as we sipped steaming drinks.
Considering how little time was left, I even offered him a gift. “You do deserve my gratitude for the way you have treated me. I might even thank you one day for keeping me ignorant of this city for so long.” Deep in thought, I chewed my lower lip a moment, then added, “It is a shame you seem singular amongst the males. Even with your guidance, Thayer is…. I don’t trust that he will be able to control himself and treat her as more than something fun to have sex with.”
Not after watching him twitch every time I said Maeve’s name.
Another sip of the steaming drink, and I said, “I think my experiment might fail. He’s not like you. He won’t be able to let her out.”
My mate was not interested in discussing other men, other couples, or anything but us. Eyes burning, he took my cup from my hands, set it to the table, and issued an order. “Tell me you love me, even a little.”
The man was no saint, no matter how many hybrids seemed to worship the ground he walked on. He was a coldhearted devil with the face of an angel and strength I could never match.
I liked the look of that face, the shape and taste of his body.
How he felt inside me.
The way he took such care in crafting my meals and rubbing my feet.
His knowledge and patience.
Seduction, it seemed, I had been ripe for.
His strategy ultimately paid off. My confession was soft. “I am growing fonder of you.”
Reaching to cup my cheek, he seemed to read my mind and did not want me to view my feelings as a loss to his victory. Smiling with joy, he said, “I am irrevocably in love with you. It is more than your song, beautiful Lorieyn. I wish you might understand the lengths I will go to for your happiness at my side. It would frighten you if I told you all that I think, how I watch you sleep while I breathe in your soft exhales because they are mine. You demand little and give so much of yourself, even to me. You are brave and kind, impetuous and cunning. Love me completely, and I will lay the world at your feet.”
Love him completely? That would take more than a couple of weeks and a great deal of surrender. That would take a life together.
Which was soon to be dramatically altered.
That would distract me, even as it flayed me alive.
Maeve would do her part. Thayer would try to do his. And it would not be enough if I did not do mine.
“Do you know why Maeve insisted you pass me a note?” I asked, already tucking away the more vulnerable parts of my heart. I would need them intact if I was to survive what was coming. “It wasn’t to assure me she would serve female kind by submitting to Thayer. She had come to that decision as soon as I explained what was at stake. It was to remind me I too had a job to do.”
“Lorieyn—”
I was going to be sick. “She knows me. Better than even you do. Maeve knows I want to back out.”
The flickering truth of a baby would soon take my attention from him, from any growing affection… from everything else. Then there was the worry of what would follow. I did not know if I would be capable of fully loving a man who could support a world that might take my child from me. Who would expect me to send her to a horrible place where her little fingers would be broken, so she might die for humans who did not love her as I did.
But I could change the world for the better, even if it was only just a little. And that ultimately would benefit her too. So I told him what he must have already suspected. “I intend to be pregnant by the time Maeve graduates. I am choosing to have a daughter in hopes it might make the world a better place for us all. But I’m afraid.”
The softness around Cyderial’s eyes vanished, the smirk evaporating. Expressionless and sinister, he asked, “Should you not wait to see how Thayer and Maeve fare?”
“No. Because I realize you may support me, but you do not support them. Not in that way. How could you? Thayer cannot be the man you are. Maeve is not the woman I am. Their journey will be personal, and I pray it goes well. But it was unfair of me to lay so much at her feet.” I hoped to God it might work out between them, trusted her to put on a show. But ultimately, even if her behavior was perfect in all ways, the unmated generals made their demands clear. The responsibility was on my shoulders, and Maeve could never assume it. She would have her own battles, but this one was ultimately mine.
Miranda was right; I was more powerful than I’d understood.
Taking my cold hands in his, Cyderial warmed them, watching me closely as he waited for me to confess every last thought in my troubled head.
“I worry. The kids at the academy… they are so sweet, Cyderial. I can’t bring myself to hurt them, even if it might be for their own good. But that’s what you expect of me. Our children suffer.” My lip shook, voice wavering, as I whispered, “I will bring a daughter into a dangerous world where she will be tortured, where at least three powerful males will try to take her, and I am forced to admit that doing this thing may ultimately make her world—every hybrid female’s world—a better place. At the cost of our child, who should never forgive me.”
Pleading, I squeezed his hands and entreated, “You will keep us safe. I know you will.” He had to, my eyes begging that my burgeoning faith not be misplaced. “Or I will slit your throat while you sleep and burn this city to the ground. Okay?”
One single blink. The strongest statement a fully-engaged hybrid male might make. “You would destroy the human’s city for your child?”
I would. She was already real to me—had been for days. A little fascination I could feel as if she had already awakened in my womb. “Yes.”
“Innocents would die,” Cyderial said, leaning closer and smelling the air between us.
My voice was barely above a whisper. “Only if they threaten my daughter.”
Something in my scent earned his hyper-focused attention, changed his eyes in a terrible way I could not describe. “Do you understand what you are doing right now?”
No. Maybe?
I was getting warmer yet shivering. Waking up yet growing sleepy.
Aware something had begun, I instinctively knew I would be pregnant by morning.
Nostrils flared, Cyderial sucked in a deeper breath, eyes flashing in a way I had never seen before. “It is time I return you to our nest.”
“Not yet.” I wanted to finish my drink and work up the courage to confront Miranda, who was waiting for me, staring at us from across the courtyard. “Let me have one more night.”
His hands holding mine shook from how hard he was holding himself in check, Cyderial scenting the air between us once again. “I can give you five more minutes.”
Then I had better hurry.
I stood, pretending I didn’t see how Cyderial gripped the table as if holding it might keep him off me. My scent had changed; I could feel the change too, and it was even more than a man with his fortitude could withstand.
His obvious need ran deeper than any torment of the song.
And as far as I knew, hybrid males had no manuals on a mate ready to invite a daughter to life.
Marching to the women who had chosen to abandon their mates for female company in the evening breeze, I recognized many from that first night and nodded a greeting.
Yet, I did not give Miranda the chance to speak first, as I announced to them all, “I will bear a daughter, but I will not do it alone.”
She cocked her head as I continued, my eyes marking every last face at that table. “Every single one of you who asked this of me will bear a female child now as well. All of you. Those who refuse, I will remember. If you really want change, the sacrifice must be more than my own.”
Miranda, belly fat from her mate’s attention, stood with her signature unhinged grin. “Every woman at this table will do as you have ordered. And not just this table, but every female hybrid of worth. All of us will help you carry the banner, or they will answer to me long before they might be known to you.”
“And you.” My final words were for Miranda alone. “Do not think I failed to recognize your machinations at work here. Everything aligned just as you hoped.”
Those green eyes looked as if she might actually feel fondness for me. “You are so much more than anything I could have hoped for.”
And that reverence, that insanity, had to stop. “You may think of him as your king, but I am not your queen.”
Lifting her wine glass in a toast, the ageless woman narrowed her eyes. “Not yet.”