Chapter 10
Aeldryc
The first tactical error was letting him stay.
The second was the weight of his head on my chest, the slow, even puffs of his breath against my skin.
The sum of these errors was a fire I was meant to contain, now roaring out of control.
And there was nothing I could do, not with him curled against my side.
Because I couldn’t possibly ask him to move.
He was sprawled against me, with one leg hooked over mine, his head on my chest, his breath slow and even against my skin, and it was far too perfect, which made no sense.
Not because he was a man, but because I didn’t do passion, or perfection, or snuggling, for that matter.
I was a soldier, and had always been a soldier, and the entirety of my sexual experience had been about meeting base needs.
I didn’t cuddle a pretty young thing and think about how perfectly his body slotted against mine.
And I definitely didn’t wash my lover’s undergarments and hang them by the fire to dry.
But I had, because I wanted to see him wearing that scrap of fabric like it was an acceptable item of clothing again.
Preferably every single goddamn day. Preferably in my bed, back arched as he begged for me to use him in every filthy way imaginable.
I traced a hand down the supple curve of his spine, and he made a happy sound and snuggled closer.
His breathing shifted with a small catch. His eyelashes fluttered against my chest, and his body stiffened for a fraction of a second before it relaxed again, and I cupped his ass, hauling him closer, rewarding him for that.
“You’re sleeping with me,” he said. His voice was sleep-thick and unguarded, different from his usual cheer. He pressed his face into my chest and the shape of his smile pressed against my skin. “What time is it?”
“Late. Past the evening bell.”
“We slept that long?”
“You slept. I was thinking.”
He lifted his head. His hair was a mess, pressed flat on one side and spiked upward on the other.
There was a crease on his cheek from where it had been smashed against my chest, and still he was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen.
He also looked like someone who had been thoroughly ruined and was pleased about it.
His lips were swollen, his eyes still a little glazed.
“Thinking about what?”
About seven hundred and fifty years of impeccable self-control unraveling in two days. “Military strategy.”
“Liar.” His finger traced a slow line down the scar on my chest, the long diagonal from the Battle of the Ashenmoor, three centuries old. The lightness of his touch was at odds with the gravity of the mark, full of gentle caring that I was not accustomed to.
“Pip.”
“Aeldryc.” He drew out the syllables, savoring them.
“Fine. I was thinking about how you came to be here.” Also a lie, but I couldn’t very well tell him I’d been thinking about how his cute little round ass fit perfectly in my hand. “Perhaps you could tell me the story with every detail you remember.”
He was quiet for a moment. His breathing slowed, and his finger stopped tracing the scar.
“Why? Are you trying to send me back where I came from?” The tone was light, but the words held a note of fear I couldn’t dismiss.
“Pip, I can’t protect you if I don’t have all the details. If you are a pawn, you are in danger.” I let my hand settle on the small of his back, the solid muscle there a surprise. He was stronger than he looked, a compact line of coiled energy beneath my palm. “And I will protect you.”
“I think I told you everything?”
“No detail is too small. Just tell me what you remember from the beginning.”
“Club Vortex, I think I mentioned Club Vortex? It was this brand new club, in this strip mall near downtown San Jose. I know, a night club in a strip mall sounds so tacky, but it was pretty nice. It was a basement, with a sexy underground vibe. Anyway, we were getting ready for opening night.”
“Tell me what you do at this club.”
“They have music, and people dance. Like a… well, I don’t know what you have here. A tavern?”
I nodded. “We have taverns.”
“This one is for gay and bisexual men.”
I frowned. “These terms aren’t translating for me.”
“Men who are sexually attracted to other men.”
“Fae do not categorize attraction in such a way.” I thought about explaining the ways in which we did categorize attraction, but it felt like too much. I had never experienced this particular category of attraction before, and now was not the time to tell him about it.
“Have you been with other men?”
“No, but that’s not saying much. I don’t engage sexually with much of anyone. Not unless the base need grows too strong to ignore.”
He laughed, pressing closer. “Well, perhaps we’re ill suited, because my base need is always too strong to ignore.”
“I suppose we’ll see if I can satisfy you,” I said, letting my hand roam lower, pressing between his cheeks. “But let’s try to stay focused. Tell me about the club.”
“This club is a hook-up spot for men looking to fuck.” His words were crude, but unbothered at the same time, as if this was how people talked where he was from.
“I’m a dancer for a production company that owns a few clubs.
I dance on the bar, or in a cage suspended from the ceiling, wearing clothing that you wouldn’t approve of. ”
“Do the men fuck you?”
“No, they just look. I’m part of the… ambiance.”
“In tiny sparkly trousers.”
“They’re called shorts. But yes, that was one of my costumes. Our dancing sets the mood, gives the whole atmosphere sexy vibes.”
I closed my eyes, imagining him dancing in a cage in the smallest trousers in the known world. “Like the… twarking?”
He laughed. “Twerking, yeah, and other sensual dances.”
“So that’s what you do for employment?”
“Yes, for now, anyway. I’m trying to get more education, but it’s expensive. I’m… do you have peasants? I grew up very poor, and my parents weren’t in the picture for most of my childhood.”
“A peasant. But you can read?”
“Where I’m from, most everyone can read,” he said. “Even peasants. Well, I mean, we don’t call people peasants. Just, you know. Poor.”
“We don’t use that term. Here, a person is their purpose—a farmer, a soldier, a smith. There is value in the work.”
I let my hand drift lower, over the swell of muscle at the base of his back. His backside was a work of obscenity, round and firm. It fit in my palm as if it had been designed for that purpose. I cupped it and he pressed closer, moaning softly.
“Keep talking,” I said.
“That’s—very distracting. Your hand is very big, and very… good.”
“You seem like someone who can manage multiple things at once.” I squeezed, gently.
He made a sound that was half laugh, half groan, his back arching as he settled into the contact. His voice found its rhythm again. “So I was there with my friend Sky. You’d hate Sky. He’s louder than me and twice as chaotic.”
“I don’t know if I could handle two of you.”
“Probably not. Anyway, the dressing rooms for the dancers weren’t done yet, some issue with the painting contractor, so everyone was getting dressed in this back bathroom, rushing around, excited for opening night. And, okay, this part is a bit stupid.”
“Nothing you have said to me has sounded stupid. Confusing, frequently. Inappropriate, often. Stupid, no.”
“We were twerking. Sky and I get a little competitive.”
“Twerking? Perhaps you could show me.” I cleared my throat. “I mean, for… research purposes.”
His eyes lit up. “Research purposes?”
“We’d better wait until after you tell me the rest. Then I’ll be able to imagine it thoroughly and determine if the dance was a factor.”
He laughed, and I could tell he didn’t believe me, but it didn’t matter.
He propped himself up on his elbow, animated now, his free hand gesturing as he spoke.
“There’s this big mirror in the bathroom.
It looks old, like it was already there, I guess.
Not like the rest of the decor. Anyway, we were kind of checking ourselves out, vibing, getting excited for being in the cage.
And Sky’s a great dancer but he’s a menace.
He doesn’t check his radius, and he bumped me. ”
“How?”
“Hip-checked me. I went flying.” He demonstrated the trajectory with his hand, a small body sailing through space.
“Oh! That’s right. I fell toward the mirror.
And I remember thinking, oh shit, the glass is going to break, and I was afraid I’d get hurt if it shattered. Because my health insurance is shit.”
He paused. The animation drained from his face, replaced by something thoughtful, uncertain.
“But the glass didn’t break,” he said.“I think I kind of went through.”
“You think? You don’t know?”
“I wasn’t facing it when I fell, but I know I fell in that direction. And when I would have expected to hit the mirror, it was like the surface gave beneath me. Like falling into water, except it wasn’t wet. It was…” He shook his head. “I don’t have a word for what it was.”
“Then what?”
“There was no transition. One minute I was falling, spinning around to try and catch myself, the next I was in a field with a mouthful of grass.” He let out a breath.
“So, the mirror was some sort of magical portal or passageway.”
“Is that a real thing? Going through a mirror? We have a story like that, where I’m from. A girl goes through a mirror into another world.”
“I’m not familiar with such magic, but that doesn’t make it impossible. The Fae tap into base elements like iron, water, and wind. The elves draw power from living things. A mirror portal... that is something else entirely. Perhaps its nature is tied to the one who passes through it.”
“What about humans?”