Chapter 13 River
RIVER
The sun hasn’t cleared the smog-drenched rooftops by the time I find him.
Cervantes waits in a little courtyard choked with dead ivy and crumbling statues of gods no one names anymore.
He’s perched on the edge of a fountain that hasn’t burbled in years, one leg crossed over the other, a silver flask glinting in one hand.
A coil of incense smolders beside him, pungent and sweet—meant to mask the scent of blood, I’d bet.
He looks at me like a cat sizing up a mouse that wandered back willingly.
“River,” he drawls, voice like velvet dragged over glass. “I was beginning to think you’d stood me up. I would’ve been heartbroken.”
“Your heart’s been dead a while,” I say. “Don’t pretend it can break.”
His smile flashes—too white, too fast. “Touché. But a man can still pretend, can’t he?”
I don’t answer. Just fold my arms and stare.
He sighs and stands, brushing imaginary dust from his immaculate coat. There’s not a crease on him. His boots gleam. His cravat’s pinned with a blood-red gem. He smells like sandalwood and danger. Like temptation soaked in centuries of bad decisions.
“You’re late,” he says, not unkindly.
“You’re early.”
“I’m always early. It’s a terrible habit.”
I cut through the pleasantries. “You said you had the papers.”
He makes a show of being wounded. “Straight to business? And here I thought we’d have a little flirtation first. I even wore my best smile.”
“You always wear your worst intentions.”
“That’s what makes me interesting.”
I roll my eyes, but my mouth twitches. Bastard’s infuriating, but at least he doesn’t lie about it.
Cervantes reaches into his coat, slow and theatrical, and withdraws a thin bundle wrapped in oilskin. He hands it to me with a wink.
“For you, my dearest war criminal.”
I unroll it. There it is—a perfect replica of a House Laertiez invitation. Gilded ink, crimson seal, the sigil pressed deep and sharp.
“Convincing enough?”
I run my thumb over the wax. “It’ll do.”
He steps closer, close enough I can smell the iron under the perfume. “You’ll make quite the noble,” he murmurs. “All you need is a mask and a little less murder in your eyes.”
I look up at him. “If I do this, and I get caught—”
“You won’t.”
“If I do.”
He shrugs. “Then I’ll mourn you for at least five minutes. Maybe six.”
“I’m serious, Cervantes.”
“So am I.”
There’s a glint behind his eyes now. A stillness. He drops the act just long enough to let me see what lives underneath the silk and smirk.
“You know I’m playing both sides,” he says. Not a question.
“I’d be stupid to think otherwise.”
“And yet, here you are.”
I fold the invitation and tuck it inside my coat. “Because I don’t need loyalty. I just need you to play mine a little better.”
That grin spreads again, lazy and sharp. “Gods, I do love you rebels. Always so dramatic.”
“Just keep your end of the deal.”
He leans in, breath cool as grave-dirt against my cheek. “I always do.”
I step back before he can linger, before he can tempt me into forgetting why I hate him less than I should.
Because he’s useful. Because he wants to live. Because chaos is his religion, and today, we pray at the same altar.
I turn to leave.
“Tell me,” he calls after me. “Does the beast know how you look when you want to be touched?”
I stop.
Don’t turn.
Don’t flinch.
“Because I’d pay to watch him lose control,” he adds. “You’re fire under all that frost, River. One kiss away from burning down every wall you built.”
I walk away.
He laughs. Not cruel—just entertained.
It’s only once I’m out of the courtyard and back in the filth of Lowtown that I let myself breathe.
Because damn him—he’s not wrong.
All morning, Kragna’s been in the corners of my thoughts. Not his words. His hands. His heat. The ache in my chest when I pulled away. The promise I didn’t let bloom. Not yet. Not here.
Not when ghosts still cling to the walls of every place we sleep.
My fingers brush the invitation again.
Masquerade.
Velvet masks and whispered lies. Silk gloves and poisoned smiles. It’s been years since I was that girl in a borrowed dress, taught how to curtsy before she was taught how to run. I haven’t walked among the gilded wolves since the night they put me in chains and called it a dowry.
I’m not sure I can do it again.
But I have to.
For the Rangers. For the ones still in collars. For the promise I made to myself the day I escaped.
I bite the inside of my cheek until I taste blood, then spit it on the cobblestones.
It’s not fear. It’s fury. It’ll carry me through.
The inn’s hallway is quiet, save for the faint creak of boards under my boots. No shouting tonight. No clattering mugs or off-key singing from the tavern below. Just the hush before something breaks.
I open the door slowly.
The scent hits me first. Warm skin and cheap liquor. Soap and smoke. Him.
Kragna sits by the hearth, bare-chested, his shirt hanging open like an afterthought. His hair’s damp, curling at the nape of his neck. A bottle rests in one hand, his thumb hooked through the glass ring at its neck. His eyes are half-lidded, golden even in the firelight.
Not drunk.
Loose.
There’s a difference. I can feel it in the way he looks at me—not hazy or stumbling, but unguarded. That’s more dangerous.
“You’re back,” he says, his voice low and rough at the edges. Like it’s been worn down by too much silence.
I nod. “Cervantes sends his love.”
He huffs something like a laugh and takes another sip.
“He’d send more than that if he thought he could.”
I peel off my coat and hang it on the bedpost. “I told him I wasn’t interested.”
Kragna watches me, unmoving. “Good.”
That word hangs in the air between us like smoke, curling at the edges of something unsaid.
The fire burns low, casting a flickering copper glow across the ruined walls.
My knees are drawn up to my chest, arms wrapped tight, and I stare into the embers like they’re supposed to hold the answers I can’t ask.
The silence between us is heavy, but not empty.
It feels alive—thick with all the things unsaid.
I don’t have to look to know he’s watching me. Kragna doesn’t fidget, doesn’t shift like a human man might. He simply is—a massive shadow in the amber light, his presence a gravity I can’t ignore. My skin hums with it.
When he finally moves, it’s subtle. A shift of weight, the moss beneath us sighing. My throat goes dry.
“You keep looking at me,” I murmur, my voice rough around the edges, betraying more than I want it to.
His answer rumbles low, deep enough I feel it before I fully hear it. “I’ve never seen anything like you.”
I turn my head slowly, deliberately, forcing my eyes to meet his. “You mean a girl covered in bruises and dried blood, too stubborn to die?”
Those eyes lock onto mine, unwavering, dangerous in their honesty. “I mean a girl who still carries fire inside her when the world tried to drown her.”
The words hit too close. I flinch away, gaze dropping back to the fire, but the silence that stretches now isn’t the same. It thrums, tight as a bowstring drawn too long.
He stands.
My breath catches as he steps over the fire pit with impossible grace for his size. The air shifts with him, and then he’s kneeling in front of me, filling my vision. Shadows cling to him like worship, but his hands—his hands tremble as they hover near my face.
“Say no,” he whispers, voice dangerous and raw, thick with restraint.
I don’t.
Instead, I lean forward, closing the distance myself.
The kiss is fire. Not warmth. Not comfort.
Fire. It eats through every wall I’ve built, licking into the cracks until there’s nothing left but him and me and the raw ache in my chest. His lips are firm, searching, desperate in their patience.
My hands clutch at his shoulders, rough muscle shifting under my grip, and I sigh into him like I’ve been starving for this.
His palms finally touch me—one cupping my cheek, the other sliding down to claim my waist—and my pulse explodes.
I break the kiss just long enough to whisper against his mouth, “You sure?”
His only answer is to lift me. Effortless. Like I weigh nothing at all. My legs wrap around his waist before I think, and I gasp when my back presses to cold stone. He pins me there, suspended between the earth and the sky, kissing me like he’s waited centuries.
“River,” he breathes against my jaw, his lips trailing fire down my neck. “You don’t know what you do to me.”
I fist my fingers in his mane, tugging his golden curls hard enough to make him groan. “I think I do.”
I feel him—heat, stone, hunger coiled and straining against the hold he keeps on himself. He could break me in half without trying, and yet every move is careful. Measured. Patient. That patience undoes me more than brute force ever could.
“I want all of you,” I whisper fiercely, voice trembling. “No more holding back.”
He freezes, forehead pressed to mine, breath shuddering. “I’ll break you.”
“Try,” I growl.
Clothes vanish between us—mine tugged, torn, cast aside like they never mattered.
His leathers fall heavy, ancient armor finally abandoned.
My eyes drink him in even as my chest heaves—broad shoulders carved of stone, skin the hue of dark steel, golden veins pulsing faint beneath the surface like fire caught under rock.
His cock is thick, heavy, proud, curved with veins that burn faintly with heat.
I lick my lips.. “Gods.”
He chuckles, the sound low and wicked. “Too much?”
“Not enough. You’re still not inside me.”
He lowers me gently onto the furs, my body sinking into their softness as his weight blankets me.
His hands roam—large, reverent, claiming every inch.
Palms span my stomach, my breasts, my thighs, as if he needs to map me with touch, brand me with memory.
Every brush of his calloused fingers is a vow.
His mouth follows, trailing heat down my throat, across my chest, pausing to savor my hip before moving lower.
When his lips finally press to my center, I cry out, a sharp, unguarded sound that fills the ruin.
My hand flies to his horns, gripping the curling gold as his tongue works me with torturous care.
“Kragna—” My voice cracks.
He groans against me, and the vibration sends me arching off the furs, gasping. My thighs quake around his broad shoulders, my body unraveling as pleasure shreds through me, raw and sharp and blinding. I break apart on his mouth, clutching him like I’ll drown if I let go.
When he pulls back, lips wet, he crawls up my body, kissing me hard, letting me taste myself on his tongue. His eyes burn hot when he rasps, “Ready?”
“Yes,” I whisper, and it’s both permission and plea.
The first push of him makes me gasp, nails digging into his back. He stretches me inch by inch, overwhelming in his size, filling me until I can’t breathe. It hurts in the best way, fire and friction and something holy.
“Tell me if it’s too much,” he murmurs, voice shredded with control.
I shake my head violently, words gone. My body is nothing but fire, nerve endings singing.
He moves—slow, steady thrusts that build and build, a tide threatening to swallow me whole. His grip on my hips is relentless, his mouth everywhere—my lips, my throat, my collarbone. He whispers my name like it’s a prayer, like he’s afraid if he stops saying it I’ll vanish.
The pressure snaps, and I cry out, body locking around him, shuddering through the quake of release. He groans low, rhythm faltering, before driving deep, roaring into my skin as he comes undone inside me.
We collapse in a tangle, sweat slick, trembling, breath mingling in gasps. The fire beside us crackles soft, furs tangled beneath.
I turn my head, lips brushing his jaw, and whisper, “You didn’t break me.”
His chest rumbles with his ragged laugh. “No. You broke me.”
For a long time, neither of us speaks.
He lies beside me, arm slung low across my waist, thumb tracing lazy circles against my hip. I stare at the ceiling, heart still hammering, chest rising and falling in sync with his.
“I should regret that,” I say quietly.
“You don’t.”
“No.”
He presses a kiss to my temple. “Me neither.”
We don’t sleep much after. Not because we’re restless. Because we don’t want to sleep. We take our time. Taste each other again. And again. Until every inch of skin feels claimed.
Until there’s nothing left but breath and silence and heat.
I wake just before dawn, tangled in his arms.
And for the first time in a long time—
I feel safe.