Chapter 25
Chapter Twenty-Five
Nyneve
Mordred slammed the door so hard that the entire cottage seemed to shake. Refusing to look at him, Nyneve poked at the hearth even though the fire was going just fine.
“What in the name of the fucking gods were you thinking?” he demanded in a low voice that was much worse than any threatening yell or snarling roar.
Nyneve scoffed, hanging the poker back on its hook. “Oh, my apologies for not having a better idea after being terrorized by your people,” she snapped, whirling to face him. “It bloody well worked, didn’t it?”
“It worked because I made it work, and you know that,” Mordred replied, pinching the bridge of his nose.
Unfortunately, Nyneve did know he was right.
She’d thrown out an utterly absurd line and let Mordred use every bit of charm he possessed to convince Arthur and his retinue.
To her chagrin, she’d been forced to come to terms with the reality that the faerie knight possessed a good deal of charm—he just seemed to primarily use it on people who were not her.
“Well, you haven’t been outed as a changeling, so you’re welcome,” she retorted.
Bitterly, she thought about how she had lost that leverage over him.
If the truth came out, her standing would suffer greatly now, too.
“You know, it’s actually insane how much mortal men will accept if they think love is involved.
Dare I say that Arthur is perhaps even happy about it? ”
“I hardly give a damn about Arthur’s happiness if his sights are set solely on whatever Merlin says and the mischaracterized words of the Resurrected God,” Mordred spat, advancing on her. He moved with a lithe, predatory grace that set her entire body on edge.
Nyneve should have been afraid of him, she knew. She had witnessed the extent of his might less than an hour ago, that unexplainable darkness deep within his Threads that he could apparently summon at will. What even was he, truly?
“Now, in addition to all the other lies you and I are telling this court,” the faerie knight continued, one arm caging her against the cottage’s wall, palm flat on the stone, “we have to keep up a ridiculous charade of courting and love.”
The problem with his unspoken threat, Nyneve thought distantly, was that she rather enjoyed it when he pinned her up against a wall. “What, as if it’s difficult?” she demanded. “You didn’t seem to struggle much with the idea when you had your tongue inside me last night.”
Mordred cocked his head at her, and she noticed all at once that he’d let his glamour drop. It was just the two of them in the cottage, but she hadn’t thought he would let her see him like that. Not above the faerie hill.
The knight slid his thigh between her legs.
“That is hardly synonymous with love,” he murmured, though she could feel the hard press of his desire against her belly and burned with frustration over how much she liked it.
His long fingers captured her jaw as he leaned in closer.
“Is that why you made such a claim to Arthur, Nyneve? Do you need my mouth between your legs again so terribly?”
In all honesty, she did, but Nyneve certainly wasn’t going to confess. “I would hardly have to go to such lengths to get you in my bed,” she scoffed.
Knowing full well that she was playing with fire and likely to destroy herself in the process, Nyneve raised one hand, brushing the muscles of his chest. The knight said nothing, though she watched his breath hitch.
Without a word, she traced the centerline of his abdomen, her hand meeting the front of his trousers as she found the long, hard length of him pressing against the linen.
It did not matter, she told herself, that her clothes suddenly felt too tight and her blood thrummed at the apex of her thighs.
“See?” Nyneve murmured with a teasing stroke, meeting his dark, fathomless gaze. She stood up on her toes, stretching to bring her nose almost to meet his as he bowed over her. “I can have you whenever I want you.”
The changeling watched her, his body entirely still like some great beast about to pounce. Nyneve wondered if he wanted to kill her or fuck her, or if maybe for the Fey, the impulse was one and the same. It had certainly appeared that way during the fete.
Suddenly, Galen burst through the cottage door, arms filled with the tiny bottles they used for tincture dosing. Mordred pulled away from her so quickly she almost didn’t process it, but that hardly stopped Galen from coming to an awkward halt in the middle of the cottage’s front room.
“Ah,” he said, raising one heavy brow. “So it’s true.”
“What’s true?” Nyneve sputtered, having hit her limit of what she could handle with poise.
“The love match,” Galen replied gruffly, depositing the bottles onto the counter.
Then he straightened, taking them both in.
Mordred was, as always, an incredible help, remaining completely silent at her side.
“Exactly what I was worried about, lass.” He eyed the knight then, who held his own under Galen’s intense scrutiny.
“Could have made a safer bet, at the very least. I’m always patching this one up. Though I admit I’m also fond of him.”
“Neither of us have any intention of altering Nyneve’s work,” Mordred said in a measured tone, so different from how he’d spoken to her only a few moments ago.
“To be frank with you, Galen, we care for each other, but it is also a rather convenient match given the increasing pressure on both of us to marry.”
Nyneve fought to hold her face completely still. “It’s true,” she said with a shrug, trying to affect ease. “But you know how people are. Mad, ravishing young love always goes a bit further.”
“We wanted you to know, but we would also deeply appreciate it if you could keep our arrangement to yourself,” Mordred finished for her, like they had practiced for the conversation.
Galen looked from one of them to the other, his face impassive save for one raised brow.
“So you two aren’t going to be lying about, moaning with lovesickness when one has to go away?
” he asked. “You’re not going to steal the best apprentice I’ve ever had for romantic moonlit walks and leave me to birth twins on my own, or what have you? ”
Mordred and Nyneve exchanged a glance, and she couldn’t help but notice how good it felt to be on the same side. “No,” she said with a firm shake of her head. “No, Galen, it changes nothing. Beyond whatever extravagant wedding the king might wish to have, everything remains the same.”
Galen considered this. “Oh,” he finally said with a bright smile.
“In that case, many congratulations to the happy couple!” He moved past them, toward the large chest of stores, patting Nyneve on the shoulder.
“I will be godsdamned livid if I hear as much as a peep, but if you must . . . exercise those passions of young love, the cottage is much more private than the knights’ quarters, and safer, too. ”
“Galen!” Nyneve barked at the same time Mordred muttered a curse under his breath.
Stooped over the chest of stores, Galen threw one hand in the air.
“I prefer to be realistic, Lady Nyneve,” he said, his voice muffled as he sorted through the tins, jars, bandages, and splints for whatever he was after.
When he surfaced, he turned to meet Nyneve’s gaze.
“If I thought you’d any interest in marriage, I might’ve picked this one for you myself,” he said, gesturing to Mordred.
Nyneve’s face went red.
“Lovely conversation,” the knight said with a stiff bow.
“I am afraid I must take my leave, as the king has urgently called me to his side.” Without another glance at Nyneve or Galen, Mordred strode out of the cottage, pulling the door shut behind him.
Perhaps it was only the wind that snuck in, but Nyneve was surprised to find she felt colder in his absence.
“No one made you do this, eh?” Galen asked without looking up from the tincture he was decanting into the smaller bottles.
“No, Galen, nothing like that,” Nyneve said, grappling for the back of her chair and leaning forward, letting some of the blood return to her head.
“Should’ve known when you gave him that first token,” the physician said, squinting to line the dropper up with the bottle’s mouth. “It was all over your face.”
Nyneve straightened in surprise, trying to disguise her reaction by walking to the south-facing window and opening the heavy wool coverings. Light pooled across the worktable.
“What was all over my face?” she asked slowly.
Galen turned to look at her, the dropper poised over a bottle. “That he made you feel something you hadn’t felt before,” he replied. Then he shrugged. “And for people like us, sometimes that’s the closest we get to love.”
Nyneve returned to her chair, her tongue pressed against the back of her teeth.
She’d tried to ask Galen about his life before Camelot a thousand times, and he’d never given her anything but noncommittal statements.
“Is that the closest you ever got to love, Galen?” she asked the physician, sinking into her chair.
He finally looked at her, a smile tugging at his mouth.
“Clever girl,” he said appraisingly. Then his expression folded in on itself, the strength of his features waning.
“No. I got close to love, I’m afraid. Too close.
” He sighed, filling another bottle. Nyneve held her breath, not daring to speak. “I’m not sure I recommend it.”
She laughed at that, more a release of the building tension than anything else. “I’ll let you know what I think, if I ever get there,” she said, beginning to bottle the dosing tinctures.
Galen’s eyes slid to meet hers again, an expression on his face she could not quite place. “Oh, silly girl,” he sighed, sitting back in his chair. “You’re already there. Or so close that there’s no longer any going back.”