Chapter 14
The corridor is longer than I remember.
Renan walks beside me, not touching, not speaking. Just present. Matching my pace even though my pace is shit—slow, uneven, my ribs screaming every step like they're personally offended I'm vertical.
My lips are still tingling.
Great. Wonderful. My body is now fixating on the exact sensation of a god's fingers brushing my mouth. Really productive use of my remaining brain cells.
The stone is cold through my shoes and I focus on that instead of—
His thumb catching the juice. Bringing it to his own lips.
My stomach clenches. Lower than my stomach.
Shut up. Shut up.
I'm thinking about his hand on my hip and getting wet in a stone hallway like a fucking idiot.
"He does that," Renan says. "Runs. When things get too close."
"I didn't ask."
"I know."
The door to Koshin's chambers appears. Renan opens it, steps aside.
"Rest," he says. "He'll be back eventually."
"Where is he?"
"Somewhere he goes when he needs to think." Something shifts in Renan's expression. Almost soft. "He has a lot to think about."
I step through. The door closes.
Silence.
One lamp burning low. The bed in the corner, sheets still rumpled from before.
And in the other corner—
A cot.
I stop walking.
It's small. Narrow. The kind of thing you'd give a servant who pissed you off. The mattress is thin enough that I can see the frame through it.
This is his new bed.
The thought lands wrong. Sideways. He's a god. He could sleep anywhere—could probably conjure a second bed out of spite and divine willpower—and instead he's been folding himself onto that sad excuse for furniture so I can have the actual bed.
No. Stop it. It doesn't mean anything. It's practical. He's just being—
Nice. He's being nice to you.
When has anyone ever been nice to me.
My throat closes. My eyes sting.
Absolutely not. I am not crying over a cot. I am not going to stand here having feelings about sleeping arrangements like some rescued damsel who's never seen basic consideration before.
Even if I haven't. Even if this is the first time in years someone's given up something for my comfort without expecting payment.
I cross to the bed and plop down. My ribs scream.
The room is too quiet. No city noise, no footsteps. Just me and my stupid emotions and the ghost of his hands on my skin.
I should sleep. My body's exhausted. But every time I close my eyes—
His breath on my neck.
I lie back. Stare at the ceiling.
You smell honest.
My face goes hot. All of me goes hot.
This is pathetic. I'm pathetic. I'm lying here like a Victorian heroine, getting the vapors over a man who fed me bread. What's next? Fainting because he looked at me too long?
My thighs press together.
Oh, fuck off. Fuck off. I'm not doing this.
Except I am doing this. My body has apparently decided that near-death experiences and hand-feeding are foreplay, and now I'm lying in a god's bed with my pulse between my legs like some kind of feral raccoon who's never been touched kindly.
Which. Fair. I haven't been.
That's not an excuse. That's just sad.
The hours pass. Or don't. No windows. No way to tell. The lamp burns lower and I don't sleep.
Every time I drift, the kitchen comes back. His hips between my knees. The groan he made when he pulled away. The way he looked at me after—hungry and horrified at his own hunger.
He stopped.
That's the part that won't let go. He wanted something—I could feel how much he wanted it—and he stopped anyway.
Nothing in my experience explains that. Powerful men don't stop. Powerful men take what they want and call it their right. I've spent twenty-four years learning that no doesn't mean anything when the person hearing it is stronger than you.
And he stopped.
I don't know what to do with that. Don't know how to fit it into the framework that's kept me alive this long.
So I lie here, running the same loop, my body refusing to calm down.
His fingers in my mouth. The sugar. The way he watched me swallow.
The way he pulled back like it cost him something.
My eyelids are heavy. The loop keeps running but the edges blur—his hands, his voice, the heat of him three inches away—
I should stay awake. I should think this through. I should—
The thought doesn't finish.
Something pulls me back.
Not a sound. Not a touch. Just—awareness. The prickle at the back of my skull that says someone is in this room.
My eyes open. The dark has shifted. Softer now, the fire burned low.
He's sitting in the chair by the window. Watching me.
Of course he is.
I don't know how long he's been there. Don't know how long I was out. My mouth tastes stale and my neck aches from the angle I fell asleep at and there's a god in my room who's been watching me unconscious and I should probably be more alarmed by that than I am.
"What is this."
The words come out before I decide to say them. My voice sounds scraped. Hours of not sleeping—or maybe hours of sleeping wrong.
Nothing.
"I'm serious." I sit up. Face him. "What is this. You drag me out of Coin. You put me in your rooms. You—" The kitchen. His hands. That sound. "You do that and then you disappear for hours. What am I supposed to do with that?"
"Go back to sleep."
"That's not an answer."
His head tilts. Considering.
"You're still pushing."
"I'm asking questions."
"Same thing." His mouth curves. Not quite a smile. Something sharper. "You do that. Push. Even when you shouldn't."
"Maybe I should. Maybe someone should push back instead of just—"
"Instead of what."
"Instead of letting you make decisions for everyone."
He laughs.
Short. Wrong. The sound bounces off the stone walls and his eyes stay fixed on my face, bright and amused in a way that makes my skin prickle.
"You think I make decisions." He stands. The cot creaks. "You think any of this is—" His hand gestures vaguely. At me. At the room. At whatever the fuck is happening between us. "Decided?"
"You decided to come for me."
"No."
"You decided to put me in your bed."
"No."
"You decided—"
"I didn't decide anything." He takes a step toward me. His head tilts again, that wrong angle, watching me with an interest that should probably scare me. "My body went to Coin. My hands killed Kairis. My arms carried you through the tunnels. I was just—there. Watching it happen."
"That's insane."
"Yes." Another step. He's smiling now. Actually smiling. It's not comforting. "That's what I keep telling everyone. Insane. The Mad God of Discord. And yet you keep asking me questions like I have answers."
"Then give me something. Anything. What do you want from me?"
He stops. Close enough that I can smell a fresh breeze still on him from wherever he just came from.
"What I want."
"Yes."
"That's a dangerous question."
"I don't care."
His smile widens. His head tips to the side and he looks at me like I'm something fascinating.
"I want—"
He stops.
Starts again.
"I want to know what sounds you—no. That's not." His jaw tightens. "I want to know if you're loud. When you. If you—"
His hand drags through his hair. Frustrated.
"I want to know what your face does. When you stop thinking.
When you just—I want to see that. I want to be the one who—" He cuts himself off.
Laughs again, that sharp wrong sound. "I can't even say it.
Can't even get the words in the right order.
Do you know how long it's been since I couldn't say something? "
My mouth is dry. My pulse is everywhere.
"I want to taste you." Quieter now. Rough. "Everywhere. I want to find out which parts of you are sensitive. I want to spend hours—days—I want to take you apart so slowly you forget you were ever whole."
Heat. My face, my chest, between my legs.
"But I can't." His voice goes hard. "Because you'd let me. And I don't want—"
"Maybe I want it."
He goes still.
"Maybe I want it," I repeat. "Did you consider that? Or did you just decide for me? Because that's what powerful men do, isn't it? Decide what I want, what I should feel, what's best for me—"
"That's not what I'm doing."
"It's exactly what you're doing. You stopped because you assumed I was just going along with it. Because you couldn't imagine—"
"I stopped because I wanted to fuck you on that counter."
My brain whites out.
"I wanted to spread your legs and put my mouth on you until you screamed." His head tilts again. That smile is back. Something darker underneath. "I wanted to find out what you taste like when you come. I wanted to bury my cock in you and watch your face when I—"
"Then why didn't you."
The words fall out. I didn't mean to say them.
His smile freezes.
"Why didn't you." I'm standing now.
When did I stand?
"You wanted it. I wanted it. Why did you—"
"Because wanting isn't the same as choosing." His voice is tight. "Because you've spent your whole life letting powerful men take what they want from you. Because I couldn't tell if you wanted me or if you just wanted someone, anyone, who wasn't going to hurt you."
"And you get to make that call?"
"Someone has to."
"Not you." I step closer. "Not without asking me. Not without—"
"You would have said yes."
"So?"
"So I needed the yes to mean something." His jaw is tight. His hands are fists. And—
He's hard.
Straining against his trousers, obvious even in the dim light. And he's not hiding it, not adjusting, just standing there with that wrong smile while his cock makes it very clear how he feels about this argument.
"You're enjoying this," I hear myself say.
His eyes lock onto mine.
"You're standing there getting hard because I'm yelling at you."
"Yes."
No shame. No excuse.
"That's—" I don't have words. "That's fucked up."
"Yes." Still smiling. "It is."
"I'm telling you you're wrong and it's turning you on."
"Everything you do turns me on." He says it like it's obvious. Like it's boring. "You breathing turns me on. You sleeping turns me on. You standing there getting angry at me is—" He laughs. Short. Rough. "It's the best I've felt in centuries. Keep going."
"You're insane."
"Still yes."
"I'm not going to just—you can't just—"
"Can't just what." He steps closer. That tilt again, watching me with an intensity that makes my skin burn. "Tell me. I want to hear you say it."
"You can't just stand there with a—with that—and expect me to—"
"To what?"
"To keep arguing with you!"
"Why not? You were doing so well." His smile sharpens. "I like it when you push. I like it when you don't back down. I like—" He stops. His eyes drop to my mouth. "I like your voice when you're angry. The way it gets rough."
My face is on fire. My whole body is on fire.
"So keep going. Tell me I'm wrong. Tell me I'm fucked up. Tell me—"
"You need to stop talking."
"Make me."
My breath catches.
His smile doesn't waver. His head tilts further—too far, watching me with those bright eyes and a harder cock and absolutely no shame.
"You won't," he says. "You'll keep arguing. You'll keep pushing. And I'll keep getting harder and we'll keep doing this until—"
"Until what."
"Until one of us does something about it."
"Like what."
He moves.
His hand is on my jaw, tilting my face up, his body close enough that I can feel the heat of him. His cock presses against my stomach through our clothes.
"Like this." His voice is low. "Or—" His thumb drags across my lower lip. "Or I find something better for your mouth to do than argue with me."
I should slap him. Should shove him away. Should feel threatened or angry or—
I ache. Right here.
He feels it. Has to. His eyes go darker and that smile turns into something else, something hungrier, and his thumb presses into my mouth. Just past my lips. Just enough to feel.
"That's what I thought."
He pulls back.
Steps away. Crosses to the cot. Lies down on his back, one arm over his face.
I'm still standing in the middle of the room. My pulse is hammering. My jaw is tingling where he touched it. Between my legs I'm—
Don't.
I walk back to the bed. Stiff. Wooden. I lie down.
The silence is wrong now. Heavy. Charged.
Something better for your mouth to do.
My face burns.
He's not asleep. The quality of his breathing is off—too controlled, too deliberate. He's lying there three feet away and neither of us is sleeping and he said that and he's not taking it back.
He's not taking it back.
I should feel used. Threatened. Disgusted.
I'm wet. I'm so fucking wet it's embarrassing, and he's right there, and my body wants—
Nope.
The lamp burns lower. The room goes dark.
I lie in his bed with my thighs pressed together and my pulse refusing to slow and I do not think about his thumb in my mouth.
I do not think about what else could go there.
I do not think about the way he smiled when I pushed back, that wrong tilt of his head, like my anger was the most entertaining thing he'd seen in years.
His breathing doesn't even out.
Mine doesn't either.
I can still feel his thumb. The pressure of it against my lip. The way he pushed just past—just enough to feel the wet inside my mouth before he pulled back.
My tongue finds the spot. Traces it.
Stop.
Feet away, he exhales.
Yeah, sleep isn't happening.