Chapter 26 The Songbird
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
THE SONGBIRD
Haze blurred my vision, but I recognized the glass panes of the king’s window in his chamber on the Ever Ship. I was bleeding atop the soft blue quilt on the king’s cot. My eyes cracked enough to see strong hands on my blood-soaked skin, tenderly washing it away with a thin linen.
I knew those hands. They’d loved me since my earliest memories.
I tried to call to him, wanted to see the laughter I knew so well in those dark eyes, but words dried to ash in my throat, and I fell away into heady black.
When I woke again, I knew nothing of how long I’d been sleeping, only that it must’ve been a great while. My lips were cracked and dry, my throat parched and desperate for water.
I squinted and peered out the bubbled glass. Sea—beautiful, cerulean Ever Sea surrounded me at all sides. Ghostly mist hovered over the white tips of waves, but a sliver of golden sunlight was chasing away the bleary night.
A soft groan slid out when I rolled onto my shoulder. Beside the bed was a clay basin and ewer. With wild hands, I snatched the ewer and tipped it against my mouth, drinking and drinking, until my tongue no longer stuck to my inner cheeks.
When I returned the ewer to its place, I startled.
There, seated in a wooden chair, his dark stubbled chin propped on the claw of his hand, was the first man I ever loved.
My father’s sleeping face was fatigued, but strong as always. Youthful, yet ancient with worry. Blood stained his hands, mine or his, I didn’t know. His breaths were steady as he slumbered, but his body was clenched in unease, as though he might step into battle at the slightest sound.
I sat up, the creak of the bed fluttering his eyes. My father dropped his arm, peered around the room for a breath, until his eyes locked with mine.
One heartbeat, and his face pinched. Two heartbeats, he shot off his chair. Three, and his arms, safe and strong, were holding me, the way they’d always done.
I clung to his neck, desperate to keep in the wet rattle of a sob in my chest.
“Livie,” he whispered against my hair. “Gods, I’ve missed you.”
My ambition to keep my wits cracked. Shattered, more like it.
I clung to my father’s tunic and sobbed.
Tears fell for the ache of missing him and my family, the ache they must’ve felt.
I cried knowing he’d come after me, for the truth that I would tell him, and how it would break his heart all over again.
That I loved them all so fiercely, but the Ever was my home.
All the while, Valen Ferus said nothing, merely let me cry.
I wiped at my eyes. “Daj, you’re here.”
He cupped my face in his palms, a wet smile on his face. “Always.”
“How . . . how am I even alive?” Only hints of fleshy scrapes lined my arms when it had felt as though every bone in my body had shattered.
My father hesitated for a breath. “Seems there is powerful healing blood aboard this ship.”
Erik. To heal so much, it would’ve been dangerous for him. I opened my mouth to press about my king, I needed my eyes, my hands, on him soon, but voices beyond the door cut me off.
“Hello? We’ve waited long enough.”
I pressed a hand to my chest. I knew that glib tone.
A few clicks, a few moments, and the door swung open. A frenzy of bodies stumbled through, all speaking at once, but one boomed over the rest.
“Livia, I will have it known I have fought the hardest to get back to you, first damaging your lover, in your honor, of course. Then pleasuring a lovely Rave to free him—do not tell my mother, Valen—and I expect the fiercest thanks.”
“Jo—” I couldn’t finish his name before Jonas Eriksson descended upon me like a wild storm. He held me, squeezed against his broad chest, and I thought there was a soft shudder in the way he let out a breath.
“Missed you, Liv,” he whispered.
My mouth hung open, stupid and stunned, when Sander took me next, muttering about all he’d been studying of the Ever, thoughts on the fading isle, and where he’d like to research next before Mira shoved through.
She crushed my windpipe against her shoulder. “We are never going to be allowed at a ball again,” she said, snickering through her tears. “Unless you hold one, of course. Queen.”
Gods, they knew it all.
“You . . . all came for me?”
Jonas rolled his eyes. “She says that like she actually thinks we wouldn’t.”
“I’ll likely be named a traitor, or at the very least lose my standing in the Rave, but it was worth it.” In the doorway, Aleksi smiled, leaning one shoulder against the frame.
My father helped me to my feet. Every joint ached, every muscle protested, but greedy pain burned fiercest in my chest, one I could not sate if I did not find him soon.
“I love you all.” I hesitated. “But I need to—”
“Out there.” Mira pointed toward the main deck. “I want to know everything.”
I spared a glance at my father; he seemed torn on letting me out of his sight. Perhaps it was selfish of me to desire to be anywhere else, but when he shook his head and waved me away, my feet could not turn me around swiftly enough.
The crew busied about their duties. At the sight of me, they would dip their chins, smile, greet me with a soft, “Welcome back, lovey.”
I did my best to respond, but my pulse was frantic. I scanned bodies, looked to the helm, desperate to find . . .
Crimson eyes lifted over the shoulder of a man I did not know. Hunger lived in those eyes, beautiful, consuming, mine. Erik’s top was unlaced over his chest, revealing his scars and the dark ink of waves on his chest.
“I’m trying to set the spell. Hold still.” The tall man in front of the Ever King barked orders. Erik paid him no mind and shoved past with the strength of a dozen men.
I did not meet my king gently. My arms, legs, all of me wrapped around him, forcing his back to strike the rail.
Erik swallowed me up in his arms, his face burrowed against the slope of my neck.
His body slid to the deck, my legs straddled over his hips, his back against the side, arms around my waist. He breathed deeply.
His fingers curled into my flesh. I dug one hand into his hair before I pulled back, studying his face.
Sharp lines, that scar through his top lip, the points of his two elongated teeth visible in his parted lips.
His thumb brushed over my cheek, once, twice, then his mouth crashed to mine. There wasn’t anything sweet or gentle about the kiss. It screamed of greed, of a restored addiction after being deprived for too long.
Erik’s mouth claimed every bit of mine. One kiss slid to the next.
“Songbird,” he uttered against my neck, low, almost a growl.
My fingers glided under the neckline of his top, tracing scars along his shoulders, his back, reveling in the heat of his skin after so long of being without, wondering if I might ever feel him again. Erik shuddered and pulled me more tightly against his body, deepening the kiss.
His tongue swiped against mine—gods—his taste. Salt and fire, all of it collided in my mouth, and I let out a groan. I could not get enough.
Until a throat cleared.
We pulled apart, his brow on mine, our harsh breaths a song between us. Erik didn’t look away but smiled at me. A true smile, the most beautiful sight.
“I want to say I will murder whoever has stopped us,” he whispered, “but I can hardly draw up a drop of anger, not with you here.” His palms stroked my hair, my neck, my shoulders, like he was proving his words true.
I kissed the hinge of his jaw. “I never wish to be anywhere else.”
“Good hells. They’re awful.” Jonas groaned behind us, drawing a few laughs.
It was then I realized my father was an unwitting spectator to my moment of passion. As was—all gods—Stieg was here. My face heated. I cleared my throat and unraveled myself from the Ever King’s lap.
“Erik Bloodsinger!” I pawed his ribs. Fresh blood soaked his tunic. “What were you thinking?”
The tall man hissed a curse. “This is the last time I’m going to set this damn wrap. If your horrid blood kills me, I’ll have you know my mate will come for you for robbing my children of their father. Catriona is rather skilled at hexes, and she will not hold back for royalty.”
“If you’re going to keep whimpering, have one of us crewmen do it,” shouted Skulleater. “Longs as we’re on our ship, we be safe.”
“No. Now, it’s simply become a challenge I must conquer, you sod,” the man retorted and dug back into Erik’s wound.
Perhaps it was the blood loss, maybe Erik was delirious with relief much the same as me, but instead of scowling, he murmured under his breath, “Do your littles look at all like me, Tavish?”
The man’s hands halted over the herb-soaked bandage. “Such questions should not be asked without a hefty ewer of strong mead, King. But I wonder if you’ll ever dare ask my father the question you long to ask.”
“Doubtful.” Erik waved him away, keeping his heated gaze on me. “Tavish is aggravated with me, Songbird. Seems when you are on the brink of death, I lose my mind and slaughter myself.”
This damn man. I gave him a withering look that could only hold for a moment before it dissolved into something stronger, more lascivious.
“I’m still trying to puzzle out what sort of spell caused all that damage,” Tavish murmured, focusing on the bandages.
“I was told blood spells kept me on the isle so long as Fione remained,” I said, voice soft. “Only death of the caster or a forced removal would break them entirely.”
“Your father broke the soil and tore us away,” Erik said through a wince. “It forced you to leave.”
I nodded. “But the blood . . . I was told, removal from the isle was fatal.”
The man wrapping Erik’s waist paused for a tense moment.
“Then it is a remarkable blessing the king was there to heal you. Dark blood spells as that—I’ve never heard of anyone surviving.
The good news is there is truth to a forceful severance of blood bonds.
The wards they created no longer exist. We can set foot on those shores again without the marked bone. ”