Chapter 35
Ash
There is a long pause as a pain buried so fucking deep inside me detonates through me. Not cleanly either. Like shrapnel. Invading my veins with iron.
All I can do is stare at the fire pit. The cooling coals. The empty chairs where two men should be sitting.
The fear of not being enough for someone to stay bubbles up and up and up to the surface.
They left.
They left and you weren’t worth staying for.
I know it’s not rational. I know there’s probably an explanation. But the part of me that learned abandonment before I learned to walk doesn’t care about rational. That part only knows the hollow ache of an empty space where someone should be.
“Ah.” Orion grunts from somewhere in the darkness.
A loud crash clatters to the ground, firewood from the sound of it, and my heart stops. Just stops. Waiting to see if the sound is him or something wearing his voice.
Then he steps into the firelight, dirt on his cheek, leaves in his hair, grinning like he didn’t just take ten years off my life.
He’s here. He’s real. He didn’t leave.
The relief hits so hard my knees almost buckle.
He wags his brows a few times. “More fire.”
I can’t speak. My throat has closed around something sharp and desperate and he had no idea the heart attack he almost just gave me.
Where’s Kieran? I need to know where Kieran is. It feels like a compulsion inside me, not magic, just need. The kind that claws at your chest when you can’t find the people you love.
Movement at the tree line has my heart pounding and my neck snapping when I turn too fast.
Kieran walks out of the Dark Forest, swatting something that tries to follow him back. No logs. Just annoyance written across his sharp features.
When he sees me, though—when those ice-blue eyes find mine across the distance—the world snaps back into place.
That’s when it hits me.
I would burn down this forest to get these two back.
Not metaphor. Not exaggeration. I would set fire to every ancient tree, every wrong-eyed creature, every mile of glowing moss that just tried to kill us. I would watch it all turn to ash, and I wouldn’t feel a single thing except relief that they were safe.
I’ve never loved anything enough to destroy for it before.
Turns out I love three things that much.
And if it weren’t for Morrigan telling me exactly where Finnian is, I’d have already started.
I want nothing more than to murder Amarantha. But it’s not for me.
I would, though. And I think that’s what matters. That’s what is well and truly important.
Even more? Death is the easy retribution.
See, if anyone hurts these men. These Fae who somehow became the only solid ground I have left. I’d torture them.
I’ve done it. I’ve spent long hours watching men twitch as I pull their nails off one by one, all while singing the theme song to Strawberry Shortcake.
The eighties version.
It’s honestly incredible to see how fast they break over that.
Truth is, one day I woke up and realized I just didn’t want to be that person anymore. Told myself I’d changed. Evolved. Become someone who didn’t need the control, the power, the way their screams meant I was the one in charge for once.
The darker truth? I got off on it.
I’d do it again. And again. And again. Just to make sure every night these men are beside me as I fall asleep.
The person I was trying to stop being? She’s still here. She’s just found something worth being monstrous for.
Maybe that makes me a villain. Fae, even.
Or maybe, just maybe, that makes me theirs.
“What is it?” Kieran steps close, his eyes flickering between mine. Reading me the way he always does. Seeing the fractures, the fear, the feral protectiveness I can’t quite hide.
How do you tell someone you love them so much you’d kill for them?
I mean honestly, if I overthink it—and I’m going to—we’ve only been really together a short time. If that’s what you’d call it.
Besides, it’s not dating. That word is too small.
It’s so much deeper than that.
“Thorn?” Orion casually steps over the scattered logs to reach me. His hand finds my hip like it belongs there. “You’re looking at us like—”
“Like what?” My voice comes out rougher than I intend.
“Like you want to devour us,” Kieran finishes, hunger flickering behind his eyes. “Or destroy something.”
“Both.” The word tears out of me. “Definitely both.”
“Uh.” I clear my throat. “Finn is in the woods. He was sent to kill Tiana.”
I blink. Right. Information. Important information that should probably take priority over the feral need currently clawing at my chest.
“By the gods!” Orion grumbles when I don’t respond. “That bitch!”
I agree. But that’s not what’s making my blood sing right now.
“That’s not the reason you’re looking at me like that,” Kieran observes, stepping closer. Close enough that I can feel the cold radiating off his skin. “Tell me, troublesome thing. What put that look in your eyes?”
“What look?”
His lips twitch. One finger hooks under my chin, tilting my face up to his. The touch burns cold, winter against my jaw. “The one that says you want to be taken apart. Thoroughly. By someone who knows exactly how to put you back together.”
My breath catches.
“Such things,” he murmurs, thumb brushing my lower lip and leaving cold in its wake, “are made for the private.”
“I agree.” Orion’s voice drops to gravel as he swoops me off my feet, tossing me over his shoulder in one fluid motion. “Let’s go.”
I don’t fight him. Don’t want to.
The tavern blurs past as he carries me through the main room, past the bar, up the stairs. I catch a glimpse of the Morrigan watching us go, silver eyes knowing, mouth curved in something that might be approval.
Then we’re in a room. Door kicking closed behind us.
Orion sets me down slowly, letting my body drag against his until my feet find the floor. But he doesn’t let go. His hands span my waist, thumbs pressing into the space above my hips.
Kieran locks the door.
The click echoes through the room like a promise.
“Now.” Orion’s voice has gone rough. Raw. “Tell us what you need.”
I should use words. Should explain the fear and the relief and the desperate need to feel them, to know they’re real, to prove to the broken part of my brain that they’re not going anywhere.
Instead, I grab Orion by the shirt and drag his mouth to mine.
He groans against my lips, one hand fisting in my hair while the other yanks me flush against him. He’s hard already, pressing against my stomach, and the knowledge that he wants me this much makes need unfurl and sink deep into my core.
Cold hands land on my hips from behind.
Kieran.
Cold seeps through the fabric of my shirt where his fingers grip. Orion’s chest burns against my front. And my body doesn’t know which way to fall, toward the fire or into the cold.
So I stop choosing and let them both have me.
“Demanding little thing,” Kieran murmurs against my ear, winter-cold lips brushing the sensitive skin. “You could have just asked.”
“This is asking.” I break from Orion’s mouth long enough to gasp the words. “This is me asking.”
“Then allow us to answer.”
Four hands. Two mouths. Ice and fire bracketing me between them.
Orion kisses me like he’s trying to consume me whole while Kieran’s teeth find my throat, biting down just hard enough to make me cry out against Orion’s lips.
The contrast breaks something in my brain.
A hot tongue stroking mine, cold teeth stinging my throat. Every time I lean into one, the other pulls me back. I’m shaking between them and I don’t know if it’s from need or from the temperature war being waged on my skin.
“There she is,” Kieran murmurs against my pulse. “Our responsive little thing.”
“Too many clothes,” Orion growls, breaking the kiss to yank my shirt over my head. “Way too many fucking clothes.”
The cool air hits my bare skin and goosebumps race along my arms. Two sets of eyes follow.
“Look at you.” Kieran’s voice drops to that sexy gravel that curls my toes. His fingers trace along the thorn patterns spiraling across my ribs. “Every time I see you, there’s more of the real you showing through.”
“Less talking.” I reach for Orion’s belt. “More touching.”
“Bossy.” But he’s grinning as he helps me strip him out of his shirt, and gods, he’s built like a wall. All broad shoulders and defined abs and that trail of dark hair leading down to where I want to put my mouth.
“On the bed.” Kieran’s command cuts through the heat.
I raise an eyebrow. “Excuse me?”
“You heard me, troublesome thing.” He steps closer, crowding me backward until my knees hit the mattress. “On. The. Bed.”
That’s hot as hell and I don’t know if I remember how to breathe.
Good thing I sit.
Two predators stalk toward me with matching hunger in their eyes, and I realize I don’t want to fight this. I don’t want to be in control. Just this once, I want to be taken apart by people I trust to put me back together.
Orion reaches the bed first, settling between my thighs. His hands hook into my pants and drag them down in one motion, taking everything with them.
“Fucking perfect.” He breathes the words against my inner thigh. “I’ve been thinking about this for days. About getting my mouth on you again.”
“Then do it.” Yes, he should absolutely do just that. “Make me forget my own name.”
He laughs, low and dark. I feel that laugh teasing my g-spot. No idea how. But right there it went. “That’s the plan, Thorn.”
“Yep, don’t stop until I see stars.”
His nose drags along my inner thigh first. Scenting me. A growl rumbles through his chest, it vibrates against my skin before I hear it.
“Dangerous thing to say to a hungry Fae.”
His mouth makes contact and I arch off the bed.
Hot. Blazing. His tongue drags through me like he’s trying to taste my soul, and the sound that rips out of my throat isn’t human.
Not that I ever was.
“That’s it.” Kieran’s voice comes from somewhere above me. I force my eyes open to find him kneeling beside my head, still fully dressed, watching Orion devour. “Let him taste you. Let us see you fall apart.”