Chapter 23
Quinn
For six days, I resisted Westwater's generosity. Refusing gifts was easy until I was locked inside Ravana’s room, where suggestion after suggestion wore me down. Slowly, I gave in… and I couldn’t even pretend to regret it.
I lay on the massage bed, face in the cradle, arms draped over soft pads while lilting harp music floated from the corner.
The masseur’s velvet-strong hands slid warm Majekah into my back, heat spreading through every taut muscle until he found a knot.
His fingers pressed deeper, the pleasure sharp enough to sting before it broke with a shuddering release.
A groan slipped out, low, needy, and almost indecent.
It wasn’t the kind of release my magic craved, but the way his skilled hands worked me over came close, teasing the restless boil of power under my skin.
I’d never built magic this fast. In my time, nothing flowed. Everything came from me. Now, thanks to one shiny belly-button ring, energy swarmed me like Wi-Fi. And losing it? Way worse than never having it at all.
It wasn’t just my magic I missed.
My guys.
I didn’t know what I wanted when I took Ravana’s hand. I do now.
Yes, they tied me in knots. Yes, it wasn’t perfect. But, if a fairy tale romance dropped into my lap right now, would I get lost in it? Or be so suspicious that I couldn’t enjoy it?
Sometimes I wished I didn’t know myself so well.
“You’re wound tighter than a bowstring,” the masseur rumbled. “I’ll get you relaxed, and then you tell me what you want. I’m to be at your disposal for anything.” He dragged his hand down my spine. “I’m very good at what I do, Quinn. I can give you release without touch. That’s my Majekah.”
My face heated, not that he could see it.
Ravana said he would offer, but I didn’t even understand the logistics of how that would work and was too embarrassed to ask.
The masseur found a knot on my left shoulder and pressed.
I hissed with momentary pain before the muscle slowly released, and bliss took its place.
With trials looming in under three days, maybe a clinical orgasm wasn’t the worst idea.
The masseur’s touch vanished from my back, replaced by a strangled, desperate attempt at words.
Steel whispered free. The harp cut off mid-note.
My stomach dropped. I opened my eyes to the white carpet beneath the table, heat cones flickering like nervous candles in honey-colored magic. A shadow far too big for one person spilled to my right.
I swallowed hard, every instinct screaming to move—and every instinct knowing better. I was naked, with only a blanket thrown over my backside, pulled down so low it exposed the tops of my butt cheeks. My heart raced.
“Are you hurt?” Ezra’s voice could cut glass.
I turned my head. Ezra stood there, shortsword to my masseur’s throat, hand clamped over his mouth. It took me a moment to process. “Ezra?”
The shadow mage’s dark-purple gaze smoldered. “Do you not remember me?”
“No, I do.” I tried to push up, and the little sheet slipped. I stayed down. “No. I definitely do. I didn’t expect to see you here, now.” My neck ached. I put my head back in the hole. “This man was giving me a massage. He’s a professional. This is his studio. I’m on a massage table. Think, Ezra.”
The harp music plinked.
“If I lift my hand, you stay silent,” Ezra stated.
The masseur must have nodded.
“I was only doing my job,” the masseur said quickly, without any of the deep ease he’d spoken to me earlier. “Muscles are my Majekah. Does this look like a torture chamber?”
Ezra grunted. “You wanted this, Quinn?”
“Yes. I was enjoying it, a lot.” Maybe too much, but adding that wouldn’t help this situation at all.
Ezra was here, in the heart of Westwater territory… alone. My heart lurched, thudding once before racing with fear for him.
“How did you get in here?” Fear and unhealthy humor made my voice shake.
“I shadow-walked.” His voice was calm, too calm. “You were in pain.”
“It’s—” I squeezed the table, wishing I could see his face.
“It’s complicated. It’s a deep-tissue massage.
A good one.” Tension crept back up my back, despite my attempt to stay relaxed.
“Ezra.” My voice cracked when I said his name.
“You shouldn’t be here. The Westwaters closed their borders…
they’re going to hurt you.” My shred of humor died, and my body knotted back up. “Please, I don’t want you hurt.”
“That’s all my hard work gone,” the masseur mumbled.
Ezra whispered something to the masseur, who whispered something back. Ezra’s sword hissed back into its sheath. My stomach dropped; he’d made himself an easier target.
“I could scream,” the masseur said.
“You won’t,” Ezra said confidently.
“Ezra—” I started to beg him to leave.
“You felt her muscles,” Ezra said, cutting me off. “I feel her magic. Work with me, or die for touching her.”
I froze.
“You’re as unreasonable as the rumors say,” the masseur said, controlling the panic in his voice. “You appear in my home, threaten me, and then expect me to help you?”
Ezra’s calloused hand pressed against my bare back, rough, unyielding, nothing like the masseur’s polished touch. Tingles sparked over my skin at the contact. “I’ll handle this. Tell me where to press. I don’t need your gifts. My knowledge of muscle and pain is enough.”
The man scoffed. “Teach you or die. I guess I have a student until the rest of the family finds you and kills you for trespassing.”
“Let them try,” Ezra growled.
I rolled my eyes, but some of the tension turned into hesitant excitement. Ezra was risking everything to stay.
“Start by washing your hands,” the masseur said evenly. “At least roll up your sleeves; even better, take off all that leather. You want nothing to drag on her skin that is not in your control.”
“And leave me defenseless for your family?”
I had no idea what body language the two exchanged, but after a beat of silence, the sound of leather unstrapping and clothing dropping to the floor filled the room.
“Hells,” the masseur breathed.
I turned my head again, catching sight of Ezra’s perfect upper body.
Ezra put his hand on my back. “Head back down, now.”
I put my head back in the hole.
Oil slicked my skin, but the fresh, cold drizzle made me shiver, nerves sparking awake.
Ezra slowly lowered his hands, rough heat against the slippery glide, and my magic flared in answer.
The room was warm, almost stifling, yet power still surged out of me, spilling into the cauldrons until crystals blazed with rainbow light.
It wasn’t enough, but it was a start.
The masseur let out a slight gasp before humming appreciatively.
“Follow the line until you hit the knot,” the masseur instructed.
Ezra hesitated, then pressed deeper, rougher. It took him a few minutes to get the pressure right, but the shadow mage was a quick study. His calloused palms carried a rough, intimate heat no professional could mimic.
Tension melted as tingles raced over my skin. I groaned, sinking into the padded table.
“Lower back, palms just cresting her hips. Lengthen the spine,” the masseur instructed.
Ezra pressed. My body resisted, then yielded. He lingered before cupping my ass through the thin sheet, knuckles grazing the curve of my cheek. His thumbs traced lower, brushing between my thighs. The slow burn erupted into an inferno.
“I didn’t tell you to do that,” the masseur stated.
“You didn’t have to,” Ezra purred.
“Maybe I should leave,” the masseur muttered.
“Maybe you should,” Ezra replied, voice flat as steel. “Come alone with what you want charged. Bring others, and the conversation changes.”
The sound of the door thumping open and closed again was barely audible over the still-singing harp.
My heart beat in my chest. I missed Ezra so much, but… I started to sit up.
Ezra pushed me back down. “I’m working.”
“I don’t want you to get hurt.” I squeezed my eyes shut. “Put your armor back on and get out of here.”
“The Alun’s magic let me step this far,” Ezra said. “I can’t replicate it.”
My heart sank.
“Even if I could. I wouldn’t. That man wants your magic.” Ezra rubbed his fingers against my skin. “The Westwaters are cutthroat. We will play this by ear. Trust me.”
“I do trust you, Ezra,” I said, only realizing how true it was after I said it.
Old Quinn would have worried. Old Quinn didn’t want to be a problem.
But I hadn’t been Old Quinn in a long time now.
Ezra was a badass fighter who could step into people's shadows and use magic. He chose to be here. I wasn’t the problem.
A slight smile pulled at my lips. Ezra broke every rule because he thought I was in danger, and now he played a dangerous game to stay at my side.
I stopped resisting, sinking into the table with my arms loose at my sides.
I couldn’t see his smirk, but I felt it in the deliberate way he folded the sheet to keep me modest, before sliding lower, kneading my thighs, working down to my calves, my ankles, my toes.
Each stroke unraveled me. My body loosened as heat pooled deep inside—slick, insistent, tingling through every inch of skin he touched.
A knock sounded at the door. “It’s just me,” the masseur said.
“Enter,” Ezra responded.
The door opened and closed.
“Use your knuckles on the arch,” the masseur said. “Is this too many?”
A box shook, and Ezra dug his knuckles into the arch of my foot. I half groaned, half moaned.
“It’s a good start. What’s your name?” Ezra asked.
“Mott,” the masseur responded.
After a guarantee of work, if Mott ever found his way to the Architect’s Castle, I found a box of precious stones and two steampunk-looking mechanical devices placed under the table within easy grasp.
“Fill them, Quinn,” Ezra commanded.
I swallowed. “What if I break them?”
“Don’t.” Ezra’s hands dug into my thighs again. “I’m not Xan. I won’t coddle you. Control the flow, or you’ll destroy something precious and the tentative ally I’ve found in the Westwater walls.”