Chapter 5
Nearly dying hadn’t saved me from royal festivities. They were a death in themselves. One of boredom. Repetitive fucking boredom.
When I entered the ballroom, Carmine was waiting inside the doors.
I rested my arm on his offered arm, then curled my fingers over his fist. “You felt me coming.”
“I did,” he answered.
In the midst of all the turmoil lately, I’d forgotten that gem. After joining, we could feel one another’s whereabouts. Good for me, to aid in avoiding Carmine. Shit for me, because I could no longer visit Adeuto.
Carmine led me to the thrones in the center of the room. “You look incredible.”
Shaved head and all? I glanced down at my outfit, and couldn’t recall why I’d selected it. This ensemble was almost a loincloth.
Gold chains connected two panels of gauzy, see-through fabric, which failed to cover the sylk, crimson G-string beneath. The gauzy material covered my ass and the middle of my thighs, leaving the sides of my legs bare as it flowed to the floor.
A fancy loincloth. I couldn’t believe I’d dressed in this.
Had I blacked out again?
The top was more substantial than nipple string. Not by much. I wore a halter neck bandeau that I also couldn’t remember putting on.
Too late now, but I’d burn everything crimson in my wardrobe tonight. My stress levels were too high. I was losing my mind.
Carmine was watching me, and I forced a smile, then sat on the smaller throne beside his.
Music struck up. Demons preferred seductive beats and low bass, dotted with some pluckings and moaning. I had to admit, the music did seduce.
And the goal of the surrounding demons was to seduce Carmine and me. Seeing as the demon king recently decapitated a crimson male who’d asked for my kiss, I didn’t have any contenders tonight.
But females flocked to their king, never coming close enough to touch, but definitely close enough that the fabric of their barely there outfits brushed his legs. Close enough that he got an unimpeded view of their goods.
Me too.
This whole display used to make me livid. But now it was laughable.
Except wasn’t there something really disrespectful about dancing for a king who had a mate-intended or a mate? Was I meant to sit here and take it?
My complacency sent a message to all the demons here. That I wasn’t satisfying the king. Which was completely true. I’d deny the lust until I couldn’t any longer.
But I did intend to kill Carmine one day. Then I would rule until Adeuto could. I’d risked everything in Tiers to that end, but also to win the respect of the realm.
Yet I was sitting here while at least twenty women attempted to seduce my mate.
A growl rose in me, earning me a curious look from the king himself.
Darthy danced forward, and fire smoldered in her gaze. She’d graced Carmine’s bed before my arrival in the realm, and perhaps since—I didn’t know. Truly, I didn’t care beyond the fact she believed she could do that with no repercussions from me.
Before five years ago, I hadn’t been here to deal out consequences. Now I was.
She was dressed in artful nipple string. Threads of small jewels dangled from it to the ground. She wore a G-string too. Like me. Which only served to heighten my fury. Because why was I wearing a G-string for Carmine? In the color of his smoke.
Darthy sank to her knees before him, and spread them wide. She palmed her breasts, then rose in time to the beat.
And when she did, I wrapped my hand around her throat.
She was crimson, and perhaps she’d seen me blur here.
She wasn’t powerful enough to dodge me. Those in the fortress were the most powerful in the realm, but most of them were lazy in exercising their power.
There were reds and purples in the outer realms who trained their magics, who could probably beat many in this ballroom.
“Darthy,” I said pleasantly. Enjoying the way her eyes bugged. She lifted her hands to my wrist. No use.
I asked, “Is there a reason you feel that it’s okay to seduce my mate? As if I’m not sitting right here?”
I relaxed my pressure slightly.
“Not personal,” she gasped. “It is just done.”
I rested my cheek next to hers. “I agree. It is done.”
Understandably, the rest of the females had stopped dancing. They weren’t stupid.
I announced to the ballroom. “Any female who wishes to touch my mate may do so. I welcome you. Darthy, why don’t you start? On your knees. Get your mouth ready.”
I gripped her hair and shoved her down in front of Carmine.
Whoa. I hadn’t meant to take things in this direction.
Carmine watched me over Darthy’s head, but said nothing.
“Go on,” I told her, shaking her. “Take out his cock. Taste it. Do you remember how delicious it was?”
Gross. What was I doing? Yet releasing her seemed impossible. The words were leaving my mouth before I could think better of them. This ritual had truly fucked with me.
“He is yours to enjoy, mate-intended,” Darthy hushed, her voice cracking. “I meant no disrespect.”
“Ah,” I said, crouching next to her. “But you did disrespect me.”
The other females were gone.
Darthy started to shake. “It will not happen again, my queen. I swear it.”
She’d gone and called me queen, which just flat out stroked an ego that I hadn’t known existed in me. “Don’t be silly, demon. You may dance for the king whenever you like. Do whatever you feel like,” I said in her ear. “Behave as if I were not here.”
I released her hair, and she scurried back, toppling on her ass before continuing to scramble away.
Humiliation felt good. I inhaled. Really good. I should have tried it earlier. There was a slight bitter taste in my mouth from my Magus side. But I could ignore that.
I sat down. On Carmine.
His hand immediately curved around the chain dangling over my hip. He drew me back against his hard length.
This was never the plan.
He rested a kiss against my bare shoulder blades, and I shivered.
“I never expected to see you jealous again,” he said quietly, for our ears only.
Shame swept in suddenly and strong. I was released from the cold jealousy that had filled me, and I lifted a hand to my temple in the wake. I’d just demanded that a demon suck Carmine’s cock. Then I’d sat on him.
The woman who’d entered Tiers would have punched me in the face, and yet I could barely feel what she’d felt. My breath quickened. “Something is wrong.”
Carmine’s thumb halted its stroking sensations that were driving my lust higher with each passing second. “What do you mean?”
I recovered. “Something is wrong with these traditions.”
He didn’t resume his stroking. I wanted to get off his lap, but that would be interpreted by every demon here as me backing down.
Shit, I couldn’t breathe properly. They’d see my reaction. If I left, then I was backing down too.
Calm, Syera. Recenter. Find your balance.
Balance didn’t exist in this realm.
“Carmine—” I gasped.
“If you want to get out of here, you need to play along,” he answered without hesitation.
I glanced back. “Huh?”
The demon king captured my mouth in a kiss, forcing me to arch back with an iron grip on my neck.
I started to pull away, then came to my senses. This was our excuse to leave. He’d taken a risk of me rejecting him in front of everyone.
Lust had plagued me night and day for three years and counting.
Every fucking second of every waking hour.
I’d had to be so strong for so long. But tonight, I felt fragile enough that the need to escape this room had evaporated the last of my defenses.
That, and the stronger lust crashing over me since our last ritual.
I twisted on his lap to straddle him on the throne, gripped his face, and gave over to the kiss I’d wanted for so long.
My lips pressed against his like I could merge with him somehow. My tongue sought every remembered part of his mouth. My hands pushed through his black hair, and traced his jaw, only to roam over his chest and shoulders after.
And his lips were as soft as mine were brutal. His tongue flicked while mine plunged. He trailed gentle kisses down my neck while I raked my fingernails over him.
When I arched, he closed over my nipple through the sylk bandeau. My moan was breathless with want.
“It’s done.” He slid me down his body, and I startled, glancing around. We were out of the ballroom. In the hall and alone.
I hadn’t felt him moving.
I peered down. My clothes were still on. My body trembled with need unlike I’d known. I’d given over to it, and now my lust was out and had no desire to back down.
Sulfur filled the air, and I snapped my head up in time to see Carmine disappear through a portal.
Not a chance in hell.
I portaled into his room after him and had the glee of witnessing his shock at seeing me again.
“Syera,” he said in warning, backing away.
The demon king. Backing away from me.
I stalked forward. “Carmine. Mate.”
“You’re not yourself,” he bit out, and I imagined that doing so took everything he had. He was trying to deny the very thing that I’d relinquished power to.
I nuzzled his neck. “I know. I don’t care.”
“But you do.” He tilted my chin with a finger, and I gripped his fingers, guiding his hand down the length of my body.
I pulled aside the scrap of my underwear with a tendril of smoke, then set his finger at my entrance. He’d stopped breathing. Power pulsed through me as I pushed his finger inside.
Our moans tangled together. He was shaking.
My knees were barely holding me upright.
Carmine jerked his finger away but remained close. “This isn’t what you want.”
“I’m telling you it is.”
“But you don’t mean that.”
“I can’t be bothered stopping it anymore,” I whispered, sliding my hands to rest on his chest. “How can you resist?”
He snapped, “I fucking can’t. I can’t resist you, Syera. That’s why you need to hate me.”
“Who said I didn’t?” I smiled, then leaned forward to kiss one of his designs—the first he’d received in our mating, an H, but the horizontal line was slanted downward. From all my readings on the topic, I knew the design meant uncontrollable force or chaotic change.
“Where is the woman who despised me?” he demanded. “The one who has denied me and our mating time and again since I dragged her back to the fortress? What does she have to say about this?”
I rested my hands on his shoulders. “She’s tired. And she wants you. I’m here, Carmine, and I want you so badly that I hurt. I need my mate to help me.”
I pushed down on his shoulders, and he didn’t resist. The demon king was on his knees before me. I pressed his face to the top of my thighs, and listened to his inhale. His curse.
His shaking hands gripped my thighs.
“Put your tongue out,” I begged.
I knew his tongue wouldn’t be nearly enough to make up for three years of this torture, but that was where we’d start. Maybe after a week in this room, we’d feel better.
“Syera.” His tone was guttural.
“Three years, Carmine,” I whispered. “You haven’t touched me since the night I left.”
He stiffened. “The night you left.”
“I came back.”
Carmine pulled away and stared up the length of my body.
“And what for? Are your mother and grandmother less dead than when I murdered them and lied to you about it for two years? Is your twin less traumatized after five years in my dungeon that I also concealed from you? Look at you, pressing yourself against me like an animal. What would they all think of you if they saw you like this?”
His words were like a wall of flame so hot that I had to stagger back or be burned. They melted away enough lust that I could stare at him from three feet away.
The demon king rose to his feet. “I should fuck you and describe how your mother screamed before she died. I’ll make you come while I do.
I should bury my cock in your throat and tell you what sounds your grandmother’s bones made as I crushed them.
Maybe I’ll relive all the times that I kissed, fucked, and feasted on you while you had no idea I’d murdered your loved ones. ” He walked forward.
Horror was ice in me, and the shame and shock of what I’d been doing finally reached me.
“You wouldn’t mind that, would you?” he sneered. “Because whatever self-respect you tricked yourself into believing has already disappeared. Gone. So soon. Crumbling just like I said it would.”
Tears fell from my eyes, and I dropped to my knees. What was I doing? What had I done and chased?
Carmine freed his cock from his trousers. “Let’s get started. Open your mouth. I’m going to use it while I relive that night.”
I fell back.
Just as Darthy had done. That wasn’t lost on me. This was meant to be humiliating, and I’d given him the fuel to do so.
I crawled away, then used a chair to stand.
“No?” Carmine murmured. “Then bend over that chair so I can’t see your tears. If that doesn’t appeal, then go get Darthy for me.”
Enough.
I didn’t manage to say the word aloud, but it rang within me and shattered some of the lust that had claimed my mind.
His laughter echoed after me as I staggered out of his chamber.