Chapter 20 #2
“Well, I…” I searched Brad’s cell and found it glowing with an eerie scarlet light. “That’s not me,” I said.
Noth put himself between us, Nightmare limbs starting to sprout from his body.
“Help me!” Brad screamed.
Somehow his slow slide into the center of a sigil I hadn’t drawn was more terrible than just killing him.
The magic glowed with a dark, pulsating red like it slowly chewed Brad into a doorway.
We could do nothing but watch in horror until the door closed over his head.
The portal spat out his wig in a belch of magic.
A throat cleared behind us. Both of us startled and the monk in a deep scarlet robe ducked just in time so as not to lose his head to Noth’s strike. It was the same one that interrupted my and Dolly’s cleaning adventure.
“Finally. Bradley Morgan has been a tough one to collect. If you could just sign this paperwork, please?”
The monk stood at middling height in a standard-issue blood-red wool robe, but his cincture consisted of nails, digging into his waist. Ouch.
“You again?” Still full of power, I stepped in front of Noth to defend him. His long claws held me back.
The robed figure held out a stone tablet with an ancient dead language on it.
“Don’t look at it, Pumpkin. You might go mad trying.”
The monk shook the tablet. “The transfer will be complete when you sign on the dotted line. This one will never bother you again.”
“He’s our prisoner,” I said. Noth deserved all the retribution he could extract.
“Go ahead. If the Followers of Virtue want him, they are welcome to have him. He won’t last much longer in my care anyway.”
I held out my hand for whatever would write in rock and the Follower cut my finger.
“In blood, really?” I groused, but signed my name anyway, smudging the stone.
“You’re all set! Thank you for your donation to the Followers of Virtue. Your gift is tax deductible and you will receive confirmation in the post.”
The red-robed figure popped out of space and time with a cheery wave.
I stared at Noth. “You sure you’re okay with that?”
“It’s time to move on,” Noth assured me.
“How did he get into the palace?” I worried my braid between my fingers. The Council had gotten bolder and bolder since Noth’s return. It had made us more and more paranoid, even if we never spoke directly about it.
“I will find out. Go to Yaya. You will be safe.”
Great, relegated to “need to know” status again. Noth shoved me into a portal and I fell out into the training room before I even had time to answer. Yaya stood in the center of the mat with a slice of her cake.
“Are you okay? The alarm makes this place an echo chamber.”
“Just the usual weirdness. He dumped me into your care in case things got any weirder.”
I really needed some cake after my rude dismissal, but she slapped my hand when I went to grab it. “For after the workout.”
My head hung to my chest. “We’re still going to work out?”
I don’t know what magic that cake possessed, but I was hooked.
I went feral every time I saw a slice, and consequently, Yaya used it as a carrot to get me to train.
She used an actual stick during training.
I thought learning my meditation forms from Rue was hard.
Yaya turned out to be twice as demanding.
If Noth had learned how to fight from her, I would be a killing machine in no time.
Too bad I didn’t feel any desire whatsoever to try it on Noth.
The closest I came these days was the craving to have him roll around with me on the floor to see what I’d learned. Which, of course, led to more sex.
That was about all we got to before we had to go to sleep and the day started again. We didn’t talk politics, or what he had been up to with the territory. Brad made me realize I didn’t want the throne. I wanted into Noth’s life.
“Pick your weapon.” Yaya’s sharp command snapped me out of my roiling thoughts.
I picked up a wooden dagger and a wooden short sword. She hadn’t graduated me to anything sharper.
“First form.”
I stepped onto the mat and raised my dagger over my head. “Please give me a second-”
Yaya dead-legged me with her own practice sword and I gritted my teeth to stay upright. I wasn’t supposed to ask. I just had to do it.
“Sorry,” I said.
She swiped at me again, right in the same spot so it would hurt even more and I blocked. I kept control of my temper because the one time I let loose, she made me attack her until my muscles failed and I fell into a jelly heap.
“Use all that breathwork you learned," she ordered.
I exhaled as we went through a few forms. Yaya said I would be able to graduate to improvisation when I mastered the basics and how to deploy them.
Magic would come last since, according to her, I was an overpowered baby.
Just as likely to destroy everything as to help.
It wasn't an easy truth to swallow, making a surly to start to the session.
“Wrist aligned. I know you can feel it flopping around up there.”
“Why aren’t you married?” I blurted out.
Yaya paused in surprise. I didn’t press my advantage because I actually wanted to know the answer.
The Elf stepped off the mat to toss me another, heavier wooden sword. “One hundred lifts.”
My mouth quivered to contain my groan. That only got me two hundred of the hated wrist exercises that lifted the wooden sword into the correct stance until my bones ached.
It wouldn’t do to think Yaya was letting us talk instead of train, when she watched every repetition of the exercise like she was grading me. Which she was.
“Who could ever settle down with just one?” she started. “Elves don’t have mates like Nightmare Walkers do. More’s the pity sometimes. Maybe we would have more children.”
Yaya kept time as her practice sword hit the mat in the rhythm I had to maintain.
I couldn’t imagine children at the juncture where I barely saw Noth other than to fuck. I never removed the sterility spell from him and he never asked.
“You could…” Her sharp glance almost caused me to back up. “I mean, if you wanted to.”
“I’ve done a lot of work on my life to be happy as I am. This is exactly what I want, youngling. I’m not missing something by not being in a permanent relationship. I have Noth, my hobbies, politics and now I get to torture you. Do I need anything more?”
What was I asking? “How did you realize you’d found what you wanted out of life?”
“I did a lot of work to clean up my long history, explore, make mistakes, and I continue to do it. No one can do it for me.”
I didn’t mean to, but the truth spilled out. “Nothing approaching permanent has ever worked out for me. Noth and I are feeling flimsy at best. I can’t practice this. It’s clear your people will never have a witch on the throne.”
“Is that what you want? The crown? I don’t think you give yourself enough credit.”
I opened my mouth to say ‘yes’ and shut it again, focusing on my exercises so my wrists didn’t snap. I really didn't know. But resolve filled me. I needed to.
When Yaya finished torturing me, I sent a note to the kitchens and roused the royal taste tester so we could have a dinner we might actually eat without Noth poking at it like it called him a Fae.
I took the rest of the day to get ready for dinner. Not like there was much else to do. I dressed carefully in a liquid black dress that made me feel beautiful. When I looked in the mirror, I still saw the miserable girl I used to be. That didn’t help this situation with Noth.
“You look pretty,” I told my reflection. I felt stupid saying it out loud. I started to braid my hair to make it more controlled and stopped. “You look pretty as you are.”
Noth was the only one who said it like that when others had only meant my skin and muscles. What was I doing? My hands shook. Yaya was right. I needed to clean up my side of the street but damn if I wasn’t scared.
Jax burst into the room with our dinner, followed by servants carrying a table and table settings. Noth’s new bodyguard kept hold of the food as Noth himself entered and took one look at me before he ordered everyone out with a feral bark.
He fell on me before I got a word out, his shadows slipping over my skin, his tongue curling into my ear.
All this for me?
My thighs loosened even though I resolved to keep them closed.
But I was a bad, bad girl and wouldn’t say no to the slip of his fingers against my clit as he held my hands above my head.
It was the kind of selfish I needed to work on as he expertly stole my breath with his tongue licking my mouth and his fingers plunging into my dripping pussy.
He was just too good at playing my body.
I came in a mess all over his hand and sagged against his hold.
“I made you dinner,” I said as I panted, hiding my face in my arm.
He chuckled but stopped when he saw I was serious. Noth helped me put my dress to rights, cleaning between my legs so I didn’t ruin his furniture. I uncovered the favorite dishes Yaya had mentioned and he froze.
“Pumpkin?”
“Rat Face?”
He smiled at that.
“What’s going on here?”
I served him some food to work up the courage for this conversation.
“This is going to come out blunt, Rat Face, but I don’t know how else to say it and you want me to use my words.”
I had his full attention. The meal cooled on his plate. I ignored what I dished onto mine.
“I have work to do before we can start any sort of life together.”
“Your life is here with me,” he said automatically.
I would have liked more conviction in his voice. Some part of him understood how off this was too. Noth wasn’t stupid.
“As your… what? Your bed slave? Get me the halter top and the see-through skirt now.”
He leaned on the table, charming as ever. A smirk on his face. “Would you wear that?”
“Don’t deflect,” I said quietly.
He sat up straight. “You’re angry?”
“I'm not angry.” And I wasn’t. “I’m frustrated. Because we can be better than this.”
“This is as good as it gets, Pumpkin. I’m King. I can give you anything. Everything.”
“I want to be at your side,” I said.
He paused and the muscles of his jaw worked. “That can’t happen right now. You would lose your head before you wore one and I can’t hand my crown to someone else. What can I be for you if I'm not a King?”
“That’s not what I’m asking,” I said, working the tablecloth into a knot.
He leaned forward. “What are you asking then?”
“I don’t want to be hidden in your shadows. Or my own.”
What Yaya said about finding what I wanted was just the start. My life had been a string of decisions I needed to clean up beyond me and Noth. The realization dawned that I had some groveling to do. Evie was owed an apology and I couldn’t even contemplate what I should be until I finished that.
A desperate edge entered his voice. “You hate my Nightmare Walker? I will do a better job of controlling him.”
“No, this isn’t about us. I thought it was. I want us, Noth. I do. But I need to go back to Ward’s keep.”
“Are you… breaking up with me?” The outrage on his face would be almost comical if I didn’t feel his confusion and heartbreak through the bond. Noth’s ego didn't make this easy. No. That didn’t give him enough credit. The love between us didn’t make this easy.
“You can't get rid of me that easily. You're lodged in here like a Devil’s Bell thorn.” I touched my chest.
“You're my mate!” His Nightmare crawled into his voice.
“Exactly. I want the best for us, not half a life for either of us. That won’t change with my location. I don’t know how it happened but you’ve upended my life, Noth. You’re a merciless, arrogant ass who has helped me in too many ways to count. I need to deserve you.”
“I like you the way you are. You’re the prettiest witch in existence." He meant it inside and out.
“But I don't like myself. And until I fix that, I will only be half a mate to you.”
He rose from his seat, his shadows at his command. “I will tie you to that chair if I have to.”
“You can, but we would both be dead of a broken heart in a few months.”
He collapsed into my lap and I instinctively ran my hands through his long hair, letting it wash over both of us. “I don't want to let you go.”
My whole body quivered but my resolve did not. I sat him up and traced a sigil on his chest, releasing him from the infertility spell I had slapped him with. “I'll be right here.”
I was the only thing standing between us and eternity.
Kissing him with all the love I had to give, I left.