Chapter 35 Eryx
Eryx
“Just look at this mess. What were the two of you doing?” Nancy fumes as she enters the dream room, pushing her vacuum. “Look at all these roses. And the walls are crumbling. You don’t expect me to fix this, do you?”
She stops and folds her arms, glaring at me.
I do the only thing I can—I scratch the back of my neck sheepishly. “It, er, was a spell gone wrong.”
“What kind of spell?”
“The kind that destroys rooms, obviously.”
She frowns. “Uh-huh. And why did you do it in here? Knowing full well I had to clean today?”
She’s glaring at us. Make her stop.
It’s not my fault.
It really is your fault.
What did you want me to do, stop making love to Chelsea?
Is that a trick question?
Shut up, Nightmare.
I rush over to Nancy, hoping to solve this before she starts a world-class mutiny among my staff. “Tell you what—you can have today off from my room. I’ll get this fixed and we can recalibrate.”
She eyes the flowers, the shattered glass, the crumbling walls.
“Good. Because I don’t even know where to begin.
I don’t get paid enough to deal with this shit.
” She turns around and starts to walk out.
“And don’t think I won’t mention this to Stave.
He needs to know you’re trying to get us all killed. ”
“I would be disappointed if you didn’t.”
“That’s what I thought,” she says before walking out of the room and closing the door behind her.
Once she’s gone, I exhale, releasing tension from my shoulders. “You can come out now.”
Chelsea slips out of the bathroom where she’s been hiding. She has a black silk sheet wrapped around her shoulders. I found it in one of the drawers in this room. She had to wear something since most of her clothes were, um…ruined.
Her hair’s mussed and she smells like us—sweet and musky. She whispers as she tiptoes over to me, “Do you think she’ll come back?”
“Not for a while, so you won’t have to hide from her again.”
She glances around at the destruction—roses growing through stone, glass glittering everywhere, walls that look centuries older than they did last night. “We really did all this?"
I follow her gaze. The room looks like a battlefield between beauty and chaos. "We did."
“Is that normal?"
No, Nightmare answers. That's unprecedented.
"No," I say carefully. "That's not normal."
Chelsea touches a rose petal, then pulls her hand back like it might bite. "Should we be worried?"
Probably. But I can’t scare her. Not when she's standing here in a silk sheet, looking at me like I'm something worth keeping.
"We'll figure it out," I say instead.
She cringes. “Sorry. I just didn’t want her to find me here and realize—”
“That we’re married?”
“No.” She rolls her eyes. “That I’m guilty of making the mess, too.”
“Don’t worry. I’ll gladly take the blame for your messes every day of the week.”
And I mean it. Every word. The truth of it squeezes my chest tight.
“You don’t have to do that.” She eyes me hungrily and kisses me slowly, making my body go rigid.
She wants us again.
Correction—she wants me.
You don’t have to be so snotty about it, Nightmare grumbles.
When the kiss ends, I murmur, “You keep kissing me like that and I won’t have a manor left.”
Chelsea laughs and wraps her arms around my waist. I wrap my arms around her and let myself drink in this moment. Never have I been so…what’s the word?
Happy. You’re looking for happy.
Nightmare is right. I’ve never felt like this before. This woman, what she does to me, it’s life-changing.
I should tell her, let her know. But something inside me resists. It’s still so new. She’ll think I’m only saying it because of what just happened, and not because of how I really feel.
I plant a small kiss on her mouth. “Tell you what—why don’t we get dressed, I’ll clean up this mess and we’ll go down to the kitchen for something to eat?”
She eyes me warily. “What about your wounds? You need to rest.”
“Somehow I’m feeling a little better.”
Because of her, Nightmare murmurs.
Because of her, I agree.
Chelsea grins and my pulse kicks into high gear. “That sounds perfect.”
Chelsea sneaks back to her room so that the servants don’t know that she’s, um, roaming the halls half-naked, and I approach the destruction.
I save all the roses, obviously, and fix as much of the stone as I can, making a mental note to tell Stave we’ll need stonemasons to fix the worst of it, where the stone crumbled to dust.
Dust? Actual dust? Nightmare asks.
See for yourself.
I scoop up a handful of powder and let it fall between my fingers.
Eryx, this isn’t just power. This is pure creation and destruction in one breath. In one combined magic.
I know.
It’s lethal.
I know that, too.
What are we going to do?
Divorce her.
WHAT????
I’m joking. But the last thing I want is to rein her in, or rein us in.
Nightmare quietly says, Because she’s spent a lifetime being reined in?
I don’t know about that, but I know she hasn’t had many choices lately—
Nightmare quietly says, She didn't tell me directly. But I heard her thoughts. When I was inside her mind. She's afraid of marriage—thinks it means being taken advantage of. Joyless.
A sharp pull tugs just under my collarbone. She never said that out loud to me. No. But I felt it. The fear underneath everything—that marriage means losing herself.
And now she's chosen us anyway, Nightmare murmurs.
That she did, and just thinking it makes warmth spread over my chest. Yes, she chose us.
I stare at the dust for a moment, trying to figure out how to move forward without taking any steps back, and for the life of me, I can’t figure it out.
The dust worries me.
Normal magic damages. Strong magic destroys.
But this? This is beyond destruction. We didn't just break stone—we unmade it. Reduced it to its component parts.
That's not power. That's something else entirely.
A small knock comes from the door. I look up and see Chelsea standing there, wearing an oversize gold sweater, jeans, and those sparkly sneakers.
She grins. “You ready?”
She's glowing. Not literally this time, but there's something different about her. Brighter. More alive.
We bonded last night. Something shifted. Something permanent. And I'm not afraid of it.
“Yes.” I brush the dust from my hands. “Let’s eat.”
“It’s the lovebirds,” Darla announces when we enter.
I sneak a glance at Chelsea to see if she’s embarrassed, but she only smiles at my cook.
Our cook, Nightmare corrects.
Yes, that.
“You’re here just in time for lunch. I’ve just made stew and bread. How does that sound?”
“Perfect,” Chelsea says, and I squeeze her hand.
Darla starts to serve, and I shoo her away. “I’ll serve. Don’t let us bother you.”
“Nonsense. Bother me. The only company I ever get is Nancy, and she’s always in a bad mood.”
“I heard that,” Nancy yells from down the hall.
Darla dismisses her with a wave. “Don’t worry about that one—her bark’s worse than her bite.”
Chelsea laughs. “I know. She helped me get ready for the party the other night.”
“Did she? Well, looks like Nancy might like you more than she likes the rest of us.”
“I heard that, too,” Nancy shouts.
I grab bowls and start to pour up the soup, beating Darla to it. She shrugs and wipes down the counter. “Do you two have a big day planned? Shopping? Meeting people?”
I grimace. “No, we’re taking it easy.”
Darla’s expression falls. “Oh, right. Stave told me about that.”
A heaviness blankets the room for a moment until I gently push Darla toward the table. “Go sit. We’ll all eat lunch.”
“You sure?”
“Of course. Go on. I can pour soup and put out napkins.”
She pats my arm. “I knew I’d taught you well.”
As I make bowls of stew, Darla tells Chelsea all about her kids and her life, and Chelsea asks her what they like, how old are they.
When I place a bowl in front of her, she takes a moment to acknowledge me, smiling. “I didn’t know kings served soup.”
“Only on rare occasions,” I reply, smiling back.
“Only when hell freezes over or they just got married,” Darla says with a laugh.
And as I sit with them, I realize this feels good.
Better than good, Nightmare corrects.
It’s right. This feels better than that. It feels right, like this is how my life should always be.
When we finish, I tell Darla to take a break—I’ll clean up.
She lifts her brows. “You don’t have to tell me twice.”
Then she heads out of the kitchen and Chelsea joins me by the sink. “She really loves you.”
“Does she?” I ask, letting warm water run over my hands.
“She does.”
We stand there for a moment, staring at one another. I want to kiss her until I’m drunk. Take her again, right here, in the kitchen, but I’ll wait. Sometimes waiting is better.
She wraps an arm around my waist and drops her head to my shoulder.
I close my eyes and just soak up the moment, relish the feel of her touching me, her skin, her scent, all of her.
I’ve just sighed into her when Stave enters. “Sorry for the interruption.”
“You’re just the man I’m looking for.”
I shake my head as Chelsea straightens, pulling her arm away.
I’m officially pissed off at Stave.
Stave lifts his eyebrows. “Yes?”
“We need to search for her.”
Beside me, Chelsea stills.
He nods. “Done. I’ll send men out today.”
I turn back to Chelsea, but Stave hasn’t left. I frown. “What is it?”
He clasps his hands behind his back. “There was a magical surge last night. You might have felt it.”
Felt it? We created it.
“Yes, um, that happened in the dream room.”
Stave nods, probably knowing as much. “The power rippled out, through the district. From what I understand”—his eyes cut quickly to Chelsea and then back to me—“it was also felt in Castleview.”
“That far?”
Stave nods. “Which also means if anyone was looking for that kind of power, sir, they would have felt it.”
The sorceress wants power. And last night Chelsea and I just lit up like a beacon, broadcasting exactly where to find it.
Shit. This is a problem.
We can fix problems. We’re good at that. But after we braid her hair, maybe?
I push Nightmare out of my head. It’s not in the mood to focus on anything except Chelsea.
Trust me, I understand the feeling.
“Is something wrong?” Chelsea asks.
Stave looks at me and I nod. “That power surge might have caused us trouble. If the person who sent the monster felt it, then they might do something to get it.”
She frowns. “Something like hurt my family?”
“It’s not out of the question.”
Chelsea squeezes my arm. “Then we need to go there. Now.”
Her family. Of course that's her first thought. Not her own safety. Not the threat to us.
This is who she is. And because she loves them, I will protect them.
I turn to Stave. “You heard the queen. Have my car brought around front. We’re going to Castleview.”