Chapter 15
Chapter
Fifteen
When Aowen opens the door to our quarters, at least one of my questions is answered.
Vesper zooms between the sitting area and a room to my right.
She halts in mid-air when we enter, then zips into a leather valise and pulls out a dress fit for a doll.
She flies toward me, hovering while she holds the tiny garment up to my cheek.
It’s a soft shade of green—somewhere between sage and olive.
“Food,” she nods. “Fancy food.”
“Don’t mind her,” Aowen says before shooing Vesper away. “She’s spent the past twenty-four hours setting up your wardrobe. Taking a considerable amount of pride in it. Though based on that welcome, I fear her efforts may have been wasted.”
I do not believe Aowen is being intentionally cruel. Careless, surely, but not malicious. If Duke áine rescinds my invite or refuses to share his clue, the consequences for me will be far more dire than a few lost hours of closet arrangement.
But at the moment, I haven’t the energy to bring it up. It’s been a supremely exhausting day, and the only thing I want to do is find out if my bed is as uncomfortable as the furniture here in the parlor—all sharp glass and stiff cushions—appears. I sincerely hope not.
The door clicks shut behind the footman, and Lachlan strides over. “Did they leave her anything to eat?”
Aowen aims a finger at the moon, then twirls her hand before sinking down onto a pale sofa. A cloched platter appears in a flash of white light on the dining table behind her. “Vesper and I ate already.”
Lachlan lifts the cloche, and a billow of steam reveals a full roast chicken, seasoned potato hash, and a pile of buttered baby peas.
My stomach blurts out the loudest grumble it’s ever made. I rub a hand over it, embarrassed, before Lachlan pulls out a chair. “You first.”
“Nonsense. You haven’t eaten all day either. There’s plenty for both of us.”
He shakes his head, refuses to sit. “I need to check your rooms. I’ll eat whatever you don’t finish. Aowen, may I speak with you alone for a moment?”
Aowen cocks a brow at me, muttering, “Am I in trouble, Sir?” before following Lachlan into another room. I dig into my meal, inventing tales of what they’re talking about.
I doubt it’s anything good.
Twenty minutes later, belly full yet mind still a-churn, I stand before a four-poster bed which does not seem at all conducive to sleeping.
The frame resembles overlapping tree roots, and sharp branches shoot over the edges of the mattress.
One unconscious flop during the night and I’ll be skewered.
On the other side of the room sits a chaise lounge and matching armchair that look to be fashioned of polished metal.
The furniture is luxurious and well-formed. Sets a tone, for certain. I’m just not sure that tone is welcome, please make yourself comfortable.
Lachlan performs a final check in the mirrored armoire, inside which he finds a very dangerous collection of shrunken outfits.
There are no windows in the room, but a pair of double doors open onto a balcony above a steep drop to the walkway below.
“Well, no one will be getting in.” Lachlan doesn’t say the other half of the sentence which I’m sure we’re both thinking—under the wrong circumstances, we may not be getting out.
He looks tired. I have an inappropriate urge to invite him to remove his leather armour and let me rub his neck.
Maybe ask if he wouldn’t mind spreading out on the floor and letting me sleep atop him?
He looks far more comfortable than that bed.
In fact, sleeping atop him looks like one of the most comfortable things a woman could do.
Instead I ask, “What did you need to speak with Aowen about?”
His lips flatten. “Nothing you need worry yourself over. Are the quarters to your liking?”
“If they weren’t?”
He smiles softly. “I’d go downstairs, knock a few heads together, and get you something a bit less …”
“Pointy?” I burble a small laugh, then run my fingertips over my forehead. “I’ll be fine. They’re more than adequate.”
He stares at me for a long moment. “I’ll be just next door if you need anything. You can reach my room through our shared bathing chamber.”
Our shared bathing chamber. Oh.
I bite the inside of my cheek. I will not imagine my bodyguard standing naked in a tub and soaping up his muscles, I really will n—
Too late, there it is.
I wonder if he has piercings anywhere else. I add a few to my mental image, then tuck it away to enhance as soon as I am alone in bed.
“There’s one final security measure we need to attend to before I let you go for the night.”
Right. The top-up. “Yes. How should we—”
I choke back a shriek as Lachlan appears in front of me faster than my human senses could track.
He’s extremely close and so much larger than me, but somehow it’s not menacing.
He’s placed his back toward the corner of the room, allowing me a clear path to both the bathing chamber and the door to the parlor.
Providing me an escape route if needed. Ensuring I do not feel trapped.
“If at any moment you feel uncomfortable—during the feeding or after once the connection has been formed—all you need do is say no, and I will end it.”
My brows crease. “But don’t we need the connection to—”
“The only thing we need,” he growls, “is to keep you safe. And that includes your mental well-being. If you don’t want to do this, we’ll find another way.”
“And that would be?”
He shrugs. “I remain glued to your side at all times. You go nowhere without me, including outings with the dukes. You’d have no shred of privacy.
” I raise a brow. How is giving him access to my mind any less invasive?
“No physical privacy. At least with the diamhrán, you can decide whether to let me in or not. You’d be able to maintain your peace but still reach me if you’re in distress. ”
I want to tell him that I don’t mind having him around. That his company is more pleasant than I anticipated.
But perhaps he does not want to spend his time here glued to me. He likely has appointments to conduct, politicking to do, arrangements to make on behalf of his duke for whatever Otherworld will emerge from the Wild Hunt.
I lift my chin. “Do it.”
He tucks his fingers between my braid and my neck, then pushes the hair away from my throat and strokes his thumb across my unsteady pulse.
Languid heat spreads down my chest. To other places as well.
Charlotte, he is your bodyguard, not your suitor. My heart is ignoring my head’s gentle reminders.
He squeezes my nape, a silent request to tilt my head and give him better access. The tip of his nose brushes my jaw and I fist my hands at my sides as I pinch my eyes shut.
“Relax.” His breath is hot on my neck and I’m going to combust and he has no idea that I’m not scared of the bite but rather what else I might beg him to do to me after he sinks his teeth in. “Quick pinch, a few swallows, and this will be over before you know it. Deep breath.”
I do as he says, filling my lungs. Buried beneath the evidence of our journey—road dust, damp forest, the metallic burn of the luxbridge—is something earthy and fiery and slightly sweet. Like woodsmoke and figs. His own scent.
I swallow, try to compose myself. There’s a thrumming inferno between my thighs, and my nipples are so painfully tight that I’m sure he can see them beneath my chemise and silk shirt. He must sense his effect on me.
And I cannot decide whether I’m relieved or insulted that he hasn’t acknowledged it. His muscles are tense, a coiled tightness throughout his powerful body. As if he’s leashing himself. Against what, I dare not ponder, lest I turn my head and lick his mouth.
God, why I am like this? Insatiable.
New Charlotte needs to get a hell of a lot better at controlling her impulses. And quickly.
He inches closer, the cool metal of his lip ring dragging against my overly sensitive skin. “Ready?”
I relax my shoulders and part my lips and I’ve barely said yes before his fangs pierce my flesh.
I gasp and arch up into him.
He threads his other arm around my waist, releasing a groan that I am fairly certain is involuntary based on how swiftly he swallows it. His tongue and lips press against my throat where he’s drinking from me. It’s hot and wet and dreadfully painful.
But there are other sensations as well. Tiny zaps across my nerve endings that melt into something pleasant and achy.
I sip shallow breaths, my soft chest heaving against his hard one. His fingers stroke the base of both my spine and my skull, soothing me.
That familiar tingle warms my hairline, glowing hotter as he gulps down my blood. His voice materializes in my mind, low and sultry.
That’s it. Good, Charlotte. Just a little more. You taste so fucking—
He abruptly retracts his fangs and pulls me against his chest, his heart drumming madly as he rests his chin atop my head. I try to pull back, to look into his eyes, to read what he’s thinking.
Because old Charlotte desperately wants to know how he was going to finish that sentence.
But he’s gripping me too tightly, won’t allow it. Whatever he thinks I might be able to read in his gaze, he’s not willing to share it yet.
I stifle my ridiculous disappointment. What does it matter?
I am not for him.
After what feels like an eternity, he takes a step back, his long-fingered hands coasting up to my shoulders as his eyes search mine. “Are you alright? Did I hurt you?”
I shake my head, releasing a trail of wetness down my neck. It’s almost certainly staining my white silk shirt. Vesper will be furious. I can imagine her squeaky, Food. Bloody food.
Come to think of it, she might prefer the shirt this way.
I chuckle, and the corner of Lachlan’s mouth kicks up. “What’s funny?” His silver hoop glints in the light from the leaf-shaped sconce on the wall.
My chipmunk brain latches onto my earlier curiosity about the light source, and I’m not sure if I actually care or if I’m just trying to distract myself from the relentless want pounding through my body when I ask, “What kind of light is in those lamps? It doesn’t dance like a flame.”
“Could be from any number of celestial sources,” he murmurs, wiping his thumb through the blood on my neck and pulling me toward the bathing chamber.
“Sometimes, it’s debris from shooting star trails.
Other times, sections of moonbeams or spears of sunlight.
There are craftsmen throughout each territory who make them. They’re called shardlights.”
He explains that the energy from celestial light can be used for all sorts of magic, and I am so fascinated that until he finishes, I don’t realize I am seated on a stool with a soft bandage wrapped around my throat. There’s a coolness underneath, as if he’s rubbed an ointment over my wound.
I pry a finger under the cloth, but he clucks his tongue and pulls my hand away while helping me off the stool. “Don’t touch. It should be healed enough by morning that you can remove the bandage. There should be no scabs or bruising.”
I nod. I’m not sure what else to say. Lachlan seems at a loss as well. So, we just stare at each other, me holding my arm at my side to keep from futzing with the bandage.
After several charged seconds, his voice unfurls in my mind, louder and clearer than before. I’ll be right next door. If you need anything, anything at all, just call for me.
How?
Say my name in your mind. It might take a few tries. The diamhrán will connect us more quickly if you’re feeling a powerful emotion.
What kind of emotions?
“Fear, distress, anger,” he says out loud. “If I sense those, I’ll come for you immediately.”
I cock my head. “What about other powerful emotions? Those on the more joyous end of the spectrum?”
He smirks. “I’ll be able to sense those as well. But I’ll check with you before I come barreling in to spoil your fun. It is a courting Season, after all.”
What would be the harm, really? To have a tryst with any willing suitors while I’m here?
Desmond said a human and a faerie cannot produce children, so I know I can’t get pregnant.
And one of the dukes will make me his queen, after all.
Desmond himself is absurdly handsome. We can probably do better than yesterday’s farewell kiss.
Not exactly the toe-curling encounter I’d anticipated when I first saw him.
Certainly nothing compared to the life-altering bite I just received.
“Am I limited to my suitors?”
God, where did that question come from? Sleep. I need to go to sleep.
But there’s no judgment on Lachlan’s face. If anything, he looks … intrigued.
“As future queen, it would be inadvisable to seek companionship with anyone other than your intendeds. But you’re a grown woman, Charlotte.
” There’s a small drop of my blood staining the corner of his smirk.
He holds my gaze as he thumbs it across his plush lower lip, then pushes it into his mouth. “You can do whatever you want.”
Whatever or whomever? All I manage in response is a soft, “Hmm.”
The last time I ignored propriety and did whom I wanted, I ended up tossed out like yesterday’s kitchen scraps.
Lachlan casually places a hand on the knob to his bedchamber door. “Do you require anything else of me before you retire?”
I choke on a laugh. Lachlan is the chief knight of my most ardent suitor. The suitor who Lachlan himself wants upon the throne. Which makes the ten very specific answers that spring to mind highly inappropriate. I’ll probably sketch a few of them as soon as I—
Drat. I’ve got nothing to draw with. I sigh, “No, thank you.”
He bows, hand on his chest, his deep blue eyes latched to mine. “Right next door. Anything at all.” He angles his broad shoulders through the door and slips into his room.
I trail my fingertips along the edge of the bandage, the sting of his bite a disappointingly distant memory as I stare at the space he occupied for far longer than could be considered normal behavior.
Crossing into my own room, I search the armoire for something to sleep in and decide on a doll-sized pair of silk pajamas. I have no earthly idea how I’m expected to fit into—
They expand as soon as they catch the moonlight. Marvelous. I undress and slip on the top and pants, finding they fit better than anything I’ve ever worn. Aside from the traveling clothes I just shucked off.
I climb into bed, twisting around the sharp branches, and fall asleep as soon as my head hits the pillow.
When I wake the next morning, awaiting me on the vanity in the bathing chamber is a sketchbook bound in soft pink leather and a case of pencils.