52. Well, That’s New
52
Well, That’s New
Aliza
F rom the moment I’d returned to Cerios Manor, I’d been unable to stem my tears. They’d come fast at first, accompanied by another round of sobbing that had my companions fearing for their lives, but through my despair, I’d managed to remember Mabli’s words. I’d kept my emotions, and my magic, in neat little stacks. Guilt and despair towered over everything else, threatening to topple and obliterate all in their path, but by some miracle, I held them steady as they consumed me.
Now, the tears leaked, silent but incessant from my puffy eyes. Outwardly, I was calm and controlled. Inside, I was at war. The only thing keeping me in place was the fact that Bryn had teleported to Tir o Haf with a promise to discover as much information as he could. He would return this evening, and then…
Then I had no idea what we’d do, but we had to do something . As far as I could tell, Maelgwyn wasn’t the type to rush into an execution. He had let me stew in the dungeons for days, and Idris had endured more than a week between Taryn’s death and the casting of the curse. Besides, the shrivelled old prick of a sorcerer had a flair for the dramatic. He could have killed me quickly and quietly, without fuss, but instead, he’d chosen to go for a grand affair. Maybe my escape had taught him a lesson, but I couldn’t quite believe it. Maelgwyn wouldn’t act until I was there to see it. He revelled in the reaction of his target audience, and tonight, that was me. Mum and Dad were alive. They had to be. We had time. We could whisk them right out from under Maelgwyn’s nose. I wouldn’t consider any other scenario.
“Glaring at the clock won’t bring Bryn back any quicker.”
I stirred from my trance. Idris was framed in the bathroom door, his sleeves rolled back to his elbows with glistening clouds of bubbles clinging to his skin. The burns I’d inflicted had long since disappeared. He crossed the room and dropped to one knee before me, where I was curled up in a chair with my feet tucked under me. He was too beautiful to be allowed, even with worry written into every line of his furrowed brow.
He sighed heavily and reached for my face, grazing his thumb over my cheek. It would take more than that to dry my tears. I lifted my hand, wrapping my fingers around his bare wrist, and attempted a small, quivering smile.
“Thanks for staying with me.”
He’d spent the morning plying me with tea I hadn’t been able to bring myself to drink, or else perched on the arm of the chair, allowing me to lay my head in his lap while I wept, heedless of the burn risk.
“Always.” He said it as though there was nothing in the world he’d rather do than stroke the hair of tae woman who could incinerate him at any given moment.
I lowered my gaze, unable to bear the love and concern shining in his eyes. I didn’t deserve it. More tears leaked over my lower lashes.
“Come on.” Idris got to his feet. As his fingers fell away from my face, he caught my hand. “Bath time. ”
Having a bubble bath seemed like an outrageous use of my time when, at that very moment, my parents languished in a dungeon. Who cared if I stunk of smoke and stale wine? Who cared if my makeup was smeared all over my face?
“We might well need to leave at a moment’s notice when Bryn returns. You want to be ready, don’t you?”
Manipulation at its finest. I scowled at Idris but unfolded my stiff legs and allowed him to pull me to my feet. Maybe he had a point. His arm slid around my waist, guiding me to the bathroom as though I was learning how to walk for the first time. My filthy, ash-stained dress dragged behind me, hissing on the plush carpet before gliding over the porcelain tiles. My poor sequins were muted by a coating of ash and smoke stains.
The bathroom was as grand as I’d expect for a royal residence, but not as whimsical as the one at Nairsgarth. The bath, though as large as a hot tub, wasn’t made of crystal. Pity. I could have used some of the calming energy that pulsed from the rose quartz. Failing that, a great big shot of sedative. A wall of steam filled my nose with a rich, creamy scent that, under normal circumstances, might have been enough to lull me into bone-deep relaxation, but today, nothing could ease the tension from my body.
I shuffled to the tub and peered inside. Puffs of bubbles awaited me, scattered with a rainbow of dried flower heads and petals.
“Do you have everything you need?”
In my haste to spin, I stumbled on my hem. Idris, still lingering close by, grasped my arms .
“Don’t go.” I couldn’t stand to be alone with my thoughts. Even if he didn’t speak, just having him in the same room dulled the edge of my panic. Without him, I would crumble. “Please.”
The muscles in his jaw flickered as he nodded and gave my arms a gentle squeeze. “If you’re sure?”
I managed a small, watery smile. It wouldn’t be the bath we’d planned when we’d woken this morning, still riding a high after last night. It wasn’t the lazy, blissful day we should have had. “I am.”
My fingers found the buttons of the shirt he’d changed into after our stint in the grounds, and I focused on meticulously unfastening each one, exposing that beautifully carved chest. Idris waited in silence until the shirt fell open, then he touched my chin, tilting my face, and lowered his lips to my cheeks. His touch was as soft as a butterfly’s breath as he kissed my tears before attempting once more to wipe them away.
“You’re fighting a losing battle,” I admitted. It seemed I had an endless supply of lacrimal fluid.
“I’m still going to try.”
With one more kiss, this time on my forehead, he shrugged off his shirt and set to work gathering up my skirt, before slipping my dress over my head. I lifted my arms and the fabric slid away, revealing my naked body. In my haste to dress when Bryn had arrived that morning, I hadn’t bothered with underwear. Idris didn’t allow his eyes to wander. Instead, he grasped my shoulders and ushered me to the bath. I was fairly confident that, even in my overwrought state, I could clamber in without assistance, but he took my hand, steadying me as I dipped one foot, then the other, into the steaming hot liquid .
The heat embraced me as I sat down with a sigh. Within seconds, Idris stripped off his remaining clothes and joined me, setting the water sloshing slightly. His long legs tangled with mine below the surface and his wet hands slid up my arms, gliding water over my skin. His touch was gentle but precise and firm, and I sagged deeper into the bubbles as he eased the knots from my muscles.
“Turn around,” he murmured.
I obeyed, nestling between Idris’ thighs as he knelt at my back. Hot water poured over my hair, and then his fingers were on my scalp, moving in firm little circles. I couldn't help my groan.
When he’d finished washing it, he swept my hair over my shoulder and set to work elsewhere, massaging and kneading and dousing me in hot, soapy water. I’d been to a couple of spas before, but those massages were feeble in comparison to Idris’ slow, thorough sweeps. Though dread still gnawed at my gut, though my eyes continued to leak, I softened, turning to putty beneath his hands. Maybe the tension had been a shell, holding my emotions inside, because in its absence, I began to cry in earnest.
Were Mum and Dad afraid? Did they know what was happening to them? What if they were being kept apart? They’d been together for almost forty years, separating them was a crime.
My shoulders heaved and jerked under the strain of this fresh wave of despair. Idris wrapped his arms around me and pressed me close, as he had done when we flew together. His body absorbed every shuddering sob. He didn’t bother to waste his breath by telling me it would be okay, and I was glad of it. Lies would have only made the truth harder to bear. Instead, he pressed his face to my neck, laying gentle kisses on my damp skin as he held me and let me cry .
I’d led Maelgwyn’s spies to my childhood home. I’d shown them the way. If I hadn’t been so stubborn, I could have asked Idris to take me. He’d been there before. He’d have been able to teleport directly into the house, as he’d done today. Nobody would have been able to follow. But no. I’d gone through the Blood Gate to the Fairy Glen with Mabli, despite knowing what had happened to me the last time I’d tried to take that route without the prince. Naively, I’d thought being fae made me safe. That the presence of Mabli, a powerful female herself, would be enough to deter any potential attacks. I hadn’t even considered the possibility that someone would follow me for hours, that I’d lead them to the people I cared about most.
“This is—this is my fault, isn’t it?” I gasped between sobs.
Idris’ grip tightened. “It’s Maelgwyn’s doing, not yours.”
“I can’t stop thinking about it. About how if I hadn’t gone back, none of this would have happened.”
“It’s your home. Of course you went back.”
“I was stupid.”
“Of all the things you are, Aliza, stupid has never been one of them.”
Finally, I smiled through my tears. “What about the time when I invited a vampire into my room and told him to feed from me?”
Idris’ arms tensed. “Well…”
“And then when I stole a horse I could barely ride and—”
“Reckless, perhaps, but not stupid. And might I remind you that spending time with the people we love falls into neither category.”
Great, now I’d put my foot in it. In the short time we’d known each other we’d barely touched upon the subject of his son’s death. I wouldn’t be the one to bring it up; he would talk about it if and when he was ready, but he didn’t need to tell me anything. He would undoubtedly give anything for a chance to spend another day, another hour, with his little boy.
What if my parents died? What if Idris and I were all the other had left?
That all-consuming sadness unfurled in me again, spreading like wings. I fought against it, focusing on Idris’ arms, cradling me, on his skin, slick with silken water, on his lips at my neck.
Despite everything, the muscles in my belly tautened in response to his body pressed against my back. What was wrong with me? How could I be turned on at a time like this? Was I a monster? Did it even matter if I was?
“Distract me,” I croaked, battling a fresh batch of tears. “Make me forget for a while.”
For a moment, he did nothing, but then the prince kissed my neck again. This wasn’t a chaste little peck like the others. He lingered, his breath joining the steam as it curled around my throat. His lips caressed me, exploring, slow and gentle, and then his tongue slid over my skin, and my eyes fluttered closed. Tears rolled down my cheeks, dropping from my jaw and landing on my bare chest. Maybe they landed on Idris’ arm, too, because he shifted, his palms flattening against my skin as he coasted them up my ribcage, his fingertips skimming the undersides of my breasts.
His touch sent heat pulsing along my nerves, and I arched, willing him to give me more. When he glided higher, cupping my breasts fully, my breath left me in a sigh. My chest heaved, glistening with water as it rose and fell. The air was cold compared to the heat of the bath, and my nipples peaked between his spread fingers .
I wanted him to touch them, to pinch and squeeze, lavishing them with the attention he’d devoted to them last night. Instead, he only held them as his mouth travelled up the column of my neck to nibble on the lobe of my ear. The sharp graze of his canines speared through me, sending a bolt of pleasure to my core, and I sank my own teeth into my lip, biting back my moan.
One hand glided over the tight peak of my breast, each finger strumming my nipple as it passed, travelling over my chest and past my collarbones before closing gently around my neck. With a soft pressure, he eased my head back until it lolled against his shoulder, and then his other hand tightened on my breast. He plucked my nipple, and I cried out as he released it. He skimmed it again, twirling around it with a featherlight touch before pinching tight.
My body jerked, sending water slapping against the edge of the tub. It pulsed back and forth, shimmying over my sensitive skin. Its touch was too delicate, too soft. I needed something more. I writhed against Idris, only to find his erection pressing between my cheeks.
That was what I needed. That would drive every thought from my mind. He could fuck me into sweet, ignorant oblivion.
My hands found Idris’ thighs on either side of my hips, where he knelt behind me, and I sank my nails in, pressing my arse back against him. I wanted him inside me now. I wanted my memory wiped clean.
But instead of bending me over the edge of the tub and fucking my brains out, he held me to him, back to chest, and sent his hand inching down my belly, lower, lower, until he paused on the cusp of where I needed him.
“Idris.” I tried to rise, to offer his cock access, but he splayed his hand, pushing me back. “Please. ”
A single finger dipped between my thighs, and when I bucked my hips forward, my head lolling back against his shoulder, that finger slid along my centre. I trembled, letting out a long breath. He circled my clit as he had done my nipple, then pushed his finger inside me. My moan was still echoing off the tiles when he withdrew, only to send it gliding straight back in. I shuddered as each touch lifted me higher, glittering over every inch of my skin.
More. As good as it felt, a finger wasn’t enough to break apart my mind and all the horrors within. I needed more , and I needed it now.
The hand around my throat tightened slightly, not enough to restrict my breathing, but enough to claim me, to let me know exactly who owned me.
Another finger joined the fray, stretching me, filling me. My breath came faster, but Idris refused to move in time to the frantic rhythm of my body. He maintained his slow, tormenting stroke, and continued to nibble and lick my ear and neck with the softest of maddening touches.
No man had ever had this effect on me, this ability to drive me to the edge of insanity. I’d always enjoyed sex, but this… this was something different, something carnal and all-consuming. My body moved and responded without thought. I couldn’t remember how to do anything but exist, to stay alive, to survive this exquisite torture.
I squirmed, seeking more, seeking fullness and pressure and friction. Idris withdrew his hand, and its sudden absence left me whimpering.
“On your knees,” he whispered, and the sound of his voice cut straight to the apex of my thighs .
In my hurry to obey, I sent water slopping over onto the tiles. I braced my hands on the rim of the tub and held my breath in anticipation. The air was cold on my body, hovering a whisper above the hot water lapping at my thighs.
Idris took his sweet, infuriating time, splaying his hands over my slippery cheeks and squeezing. I pushed back against his touch without shame, baring everything to him. Every part of me belonged to him, so what did it matter?
“I’d tell you how beautiful you are,” he purred, “but I think you already know.”
I did. I’d seen it in the way he looked at me. Felt it in the way he touched me. Revered me. I heard it now in the low, husky rasp of his voice. I didn’t need to glance over my shoulder to picture his hungry, awed expression as he gazed at the secret parts of me that were only for him.
“I still like to be told.” I almost whimpered the words as my body ached for the fullness only he could offer.
Idris’ chuckle pulsed in my bones. “You, my love, are the most exquisite creature I’ve ever seen. I sometimes wonder if you’re real, or if this is all part of the curse, some cruel dream that’s going to be taken away from me.”
He squeezed harder, his blunt nails digging into my generous curves, and then his thumb trailed along the bared crease of my arse.
Muscles tautened and my breath caught in my throat as he went lower, circling my hole. This was something new. Did I want him to touch me there? Would it hurt?
“Breathe,” he hissed, and at his command, my lungs sucked in a gasp of air .
Distracted by the strange new sensations he offered me, I only noticed what he was doing when the tip of his cock nudged against my drenched lips, parting them. I twitched at the contact, then he pushed his way inside me with one long, slow stroke. There was no careful inching, no time to adjust, just a gentle but exceptionally thorough claiming.
My moan bounced off the walls as my body stretched around him, accepting him, embracing every glorious inch of him, until he was seated fully, as deep as he could go.
My thoughts scattered like startled rabbits, dashing away, far and fast, as though they’d never been there at all.
Idris withdrew fully, leaving me empty and aching, but his thumb pressed against my other hole. The strange bolt it sent through me wasn’t unpleasant. Before I could wrangle this new feeling, he thrust back into me, deep and claiming.
Out, and in. Out, and in. Each penetration dissolved the tension in my body. Each withdrawal dragged me further from reality. Each languid roll of his hips obliterated another part of the world.
No more rifts.
No more kingdoms.
No castles, or caves, or mountains, until nothing existed beyond this tub, beyond him and me, and his body in mine.
With his next thrust, the pressure on my arse increased, and resistance gave way as his broad thumb slid inside me. His groan combined with a garbled scream that shattered from me without warning. My arms buckled at the shock of surprising pleasure .
The unyielding rim of the bathtub was like ice against the overheated skin of my chest, but I clung to it, quivering and twitching at the overwhelming filling of my body.
The tips of Idris’ fingers sank into my flesh as he gripped my hip and held me steady, thrusting again. He didn’t withdraw this time, didn’t leave me empty and wanting as he pumped into me, again and again.
It was all I could do to remember how to breathe, each exhale a raw moan. My body was going to break. I was going to fall apart, harder than I ever had before. A violent, messy, consuming oblivion.
To my surprise, the feel of his thumb in my arse was exquisite. I wanted more. Could I take his cock up there? Probably not, but at that moment, I craved it. Who was I, and what had he awoken in me? I loved this. Loved that he had claimed me, that I was powerless, that he fucked me so thoroughly. I was his to do with as he pleased, and I wanted everything he had to give, every filthy, secret desire he had yet to reveal.
His breath left him in ever heavier pants, and I loved that too. As helpless as I was, I did that to him. Me. My body. It made his self-control fall away. It stripped off the haughty veneer and exposed the male underneath. A male who was just as feral as I was. A beautiful, wild, broken mess. Mine.
And I was his. Completely, irrevocably his.
I arched my spine, pushing my hips back in an effort to take more. My greedy arse clenched around his thumb, sucking him deeper. Idris flexed his digit, sweeping in time with his thrust.
Release hit me like a thunderbolt.
I was nothing and nowhere. A helpless autumn leaf caught in a cyclone, torn apart by forces I couldn’t comprehend .
My sobbing screams ricocheted, setting the chandelier quivering as I bucked and spasmed, shoving my hips back. Idris met me unyieldingly, allowing me to wring myself out until I was as limp as a wet rag, sagging over the edge of the bath as the water pulsed and sloshed around me.
Withdrawing his thumb, Idris bowed over me, trailing kisses over my slick back.
“I love you,” he whispered against my spine, then he gathered up my wet hair, wrapping it around his hand, and straightened.
The sweet, sharp pressure on my scalp arched me out of my slump, though my limbs were little more than jelly.
“I fucking adore you.”
He slammed into me with a wet slap, and another cry burst out of me. Gone was the slow, gentle, prince. He took full advantage of my newly relaxed state, pulling my hair taut until my neck ached as he plunged in and out of me with feverish speed and power. My skin stung with every smack of his body against mine. He was relentless, and I had no control over my animalistic wails.
For all my past experience, I was only just beginning to learn about multiple orgasms, but so far, they seemed to be stronger and less predictable than the first. Considering how thoroughly ravaged I already was, the slow building of heat in my core was almost frightening. The inevitable loss of control. That reduction to my barest, rawest self. But I couldn’t fight it even if I’d wanted to.
Idris’ balls slapped repeatedly against my over-sensitive clit, and my muscles fluttered and clenched, and clenched around him. My knees slipped against the bottom of the tub every time he thrust into me, spreading my legs wider and wider, granting him deeper access. He only tightened his grip on my hair, not giving me an inch of leeway. I wasn’t going anywhere. There was no escaping him, however overwhelming it got. My body had no choice but to take everything he gave. I didn’t want a choice, but if I had one, I’d still be here, in this moment, with him.
With one final ram, Idris bellowed, spilling into me with a hot rush. His fingers bit into my hip, restrictive and sharp and claiming, and his ragged groans shoved me gracelessly into oblivion again. We fell together, him finally still, me writhing against him, milking every last drop from his pulsing cock. My vision faded into popping white lights. I couldn’t hear my own cries over the blood rushing in my ears. I was blind and deaf and numb to everything but the shockwaves of release shattering through my poor, useless flesh.
When I came to my senses, it was to find myself crushed against the cold porcelain, with Idris collapsed on top of me. His chest heaved against my back as he wrapped his arm around my belly and straightened, taking me with him.
My legs shuddered, unable to support me, but he held me up, his other hand trailing to my jaw. Gentleness restored, he steered me, twisting my neck until my lips met his.
“Are you alright?”
It took a moment for his words to wade through the sludge of my melted mind, for them to mean anything, but when they did, I nodded. Speech was beyond me.
He kissed me again, then stood, scooping me into his arms as though I weighed nothing at all. Maybe I didn’t. Maybe I was just a puff of consciousness, drifting on the winds of fate. Water streamed from us, but he stepped out of the bath and set me on my feet. I sagged, but a thick, soft towel swaddled me, and then the floor disappeared and I was floating again. Idris swayed as he walked, making my lower legs swing, but then he jostled me and I was cradled in the soft, pillowy embrace of a duvet.
My eyes fluttered shut, but before sleep claimed me, a distant kiss brushed the tip of my nose, and some muffled words filled my ears like cotton wool. Something about love. Something about forever.