21. Regent
REGENT
Esther might think she’s good at hiding her expressions, but I’ve become accustomed to the subtle changes on her face.
A murderer. How interesting.
Yet, the information is vague, and in the way the pain marred her features, I question whether it was regret or something far more behind the accusation of killing her king.
Rain pelts against the roof, and I fish out the rusty key in my pocket for the second room on the left upstairs.
The door creaks open, revealing a small bed in the corner of the room, barely able to fit two, not that I have any intention of sleeping in it.
A singular fabric chair is positioned in the opposite corner with questionable stains.
A wooden chest of drawers is close to the window, and a long mirror in the corner beside the fireplace offers a somewhat luxurious touch. However, the room is charged too high a price for what it actually is.
Esther pushes past me and sighs with relief as she throws herself onto the bed. I walk over to the fireplace to setting the preset wood on fire. Then I head to the window, looking down on the muddy terrain, watching a drunkard stumble around the corner, likely to enter the tavern.
I remove my swords and leather coat. Beyond the illegitimate tax gate is the forest edge of the Passage of Child.
I chose not to explain to Esther why we had to make it to this village by nightfall.
Considering how much she closed up after asking about the woman who died amid the fight she’d lost control in, I suspect she knows the truth of what happened.
For locals, it’s widely known that anyone caught in the Passage of Child at night would never return. The Boey Jungle is a birthplace to many dark beasts. The Passage of Child, however, is overrun with only one breed.
The worst kind and one of the hardest to fight off, since the maze-like forest grows around an abandoned Felia temple.
Felia worshippers originally came from the East, quickly trying to monopolize and sway those in favor of Neina.
Some temples and places of worship remain.
However, those abandoned or despised grow into something vile themselves.
The Passage of Child is one of the worst I’ve seen.
Even I might not survive an ambush in the dead of night passing through the Passage of Child, and as my luck would have it, we needed to venture through it to find Feodore Thelme.
I’m not at all surprised that the asshole has found himself in a shady village like this.
If anything, he’s likely en route for the Volmere auctions himself.
Now I just have to wait for his signal.
I remove the magic around our faces, and Esther immediately sighs in relief as she reaches for her face. She walks over to the mirror, dropping to her knees, the bottom of the coat pooling around her as she looks this way and that, mesmerized.
“That’s some terrifying magic.” She removes her pin and runs her fingers through her braid, her hair falling into bountiful red curls as she shakes it out.
Beautiful.
Like living flames.
“It’s practical magic,” I say, as I approach her and peel the coat from her shoulders. A shudder runs through her when I lean over, brushing carefully along her arms. I watch her through the mirror, those seductive forest-green eyes move against the flickering flames with a daring intensity.
Fuck or kill. That seems to dance in her eyes a lot lately.
My cock twitches, enticed by either, or maybe both.
I clear my throat, walking away to throw her hood over the wooden rack as I place my own beside it.
Behind the dressing screen, I notice the bucket of water, cloth, and change of leathers I’d requested from the woman downstairs.
Grimace scuttles across the floorboard, his tail shifting back and forth as he leaps onto the bed and buries himself beneath the pillows.
I haven’t had company for many years, but even I know how strange this makeshift party is.
“I’ll be leaving later tonight,” I tell her. “Make sure you stay in the room while I’m gone.”
She stands with a coy smirk. “You seem to have too much faith that I’ll listen to what you say. Sometimes I think it slips your mind that we’re enemies.” She taps a finger on my chest daringly.
I thread my fingers through her hair, pulling it back and exposing the delicate skin of her throat. She looks up at me, the bob of her throat giving away her game. “I think it’s what excites you most, Denva.”
“I don’t think there’s too much to be excited about.”
The edges of my lips tilt. This little greer is always playing with fire, and a part of me that I don’t entirely understand wants to play. It takes all my restraint not to act on it. I unthread my fingers, my cock straining against my pants.
An enchantress, perhaps, that’s all I can put it down to. Her hand catches my leather shirt, silently insisting I stay. I place my hand on hers with every intention of shoving her off.
“This does not end well for us, Denva. I still intend to put you through the auction. Seducing me will not work in your favor.”
“Isn’t that for me to decide?” she huskily asks. A piece of firewood crackles, my cock having ideas of its own, led by our forced proximity. I’ve done everything since the bathhouse to keep my distance from Esther, because every part of me wants to simply grab her like this.
This woman knows her body well and fills every fucking space we step into. I’m so aware of her every move, and it irks me the way she can easily get under my skin.
Her hand slowly slides down my chest, and I press it hard against my stomach before she gets to my belt. I bring my other hand to her waist, wrapping around the handle of her assassin’s dagger as I throw it to the side.
It skids along the floor, and she side-eyes it. “Did you really think I’d fall for that?”
She retracts her hand and turns casually, shrugging. “Worth a shot.”
I pull her back by the hips, pressing my cock against her ass. “There are consequences when you act like a brat, Denva. Punishments even. Perhaps you should stop playing with fire, and it’ll make this next week easier on you.”
Her jaw tightens when she slowly turns, purposefully sweeping her peaked nipples along my chest. Her hand slides down, and she grabs the outline of my cock through the leather pants. “Perhaps we can make this next week less stressful for one another.”
Her palm slides up and down my cock, and the beast within me so quickly wants to succumb to her as if being patted and placated. Though it’s the challenge in her gaze that keeps me alert.
My cock grows harder, painfully straining. “I am not someone you want to lie with, Denva,” I warn.
“Who said anything about lying with? I’m just after a fuck,” she says with a crooked smile. Which often means, I just want to forget.
Her fingers fold around the bottom of my shirt, and she slowly peels it over my shoulders. I shouldn’t act on it. I should step far away from her and the calamity and complications she brings.
Her eyes scan over my body, the jagged edges of scars and my vine-like markings. A tick runs through my jaw as I become uncomfortable with the way she stares as her finger trails against the recently acquired scar on my arm.
“I almost wish I put that there,” she says with a savage smile. I scoop her up by her hips, my hands on her ass as she wraps her legs around my waist, and I carry her toward the edge of the bed.
“If you were going to leave a scar anywhere, Denva. It would be at my chest, because your dagger most certainly would’ve gone for my heart.”
Her cruel smile stretches as she winds her arms around my neck. “And you say you don’t understand me.”
I throw her onto her back, and she bounces, the springs groaning in complaint. Grimace scuttles out from beneath the pillow and across the room, hiding beneath the chair. Her fiery hair spills around her as the rainfall grows noticeably harder outside.
“That attitude gets you into trouble,” I say, tugging her by the ankle halfway down the bed so she’s in the position I want her.
I lean over, fighting and resisting to little avail.
My body yearns to touch and explore hers like when I first discovered my own magic.
The temptation growing too great not to.
Her fingers trace across my face as if she’s exploring the same, and I can feel the tingles of her magic against mine, electrifying against my skin.
Whatever this thing is between us, it is alive.
Her eyes scan mine, and I wonder if she can sense the same.
I think back to another time when I once felt like this. Tricked by a greer who only wanted me for what I was worth. It immediately snaps me out of the transfixion, but she grabs me by the hips and curls her legs around me, those sharp nails of hers digging in like claws.
A guttural noise escapes me in warning. “You don’t understand what you’re playing with, little greer.”
“Show me,” she whispers.
I can smell her arousal, her nipples peaking through the fabric of her shirt as her hands move to my belt. I pin her by the throat, my body at war with trusting or breaking her. My cock springs free, and her eyes grow a fraction wider as she stares at the size of it.
I can’t help but smirk as I say, “What’s the matter, little greer? Are you scared now?”
Her expression shifts into one of determination as her comparatively small hand wraps around my cock, and I hiss under the pure bliss of her touch.
Dangerous.
Addictive.
Problematic.