Chapter 18
Chapter Eighteen
NISSIA
Our horseback ride is... surprisingly pleasant.
I can tell that Vizarios is truly trying to make conversation with me, asking the occasional question about my homeland and my life back in my father’s kingdom—when I started sword fighting, how I learned to ride.
My brother had no interest in such things, and it was my mother who taught me my way around a horse.
I picked up swordplay when I was old enough to blend in as a young man and learned to hunt from the other soldiers.
We finally reach the edge of the city, where we pass through a guarded gate to go beyond the stone walls.
More ancient stone homes are built into the mountainside, surrounded by evergreen forest. I must admit that Selvumrrest is a beautiful place, if much colder than my homeland.
I draw my cloak closer around me as the afternoon sun is blocked out by the tree branches.
“Do you... miss home?”
I glance at Vizarios, surprised by the timidness of the question. He looks strangely unsettled, almost guilty.
“Every day.”
He fully turns his head to look at me. “Every day?”
“My handmaid, Ari, was supposed to come with me, but something came up and she had to stay behind. We grew up together. She’s my best friend, and I miss her the most out of anything.” Even more than my brother or father, who haven’t even bothered to write to me since I left.
The king doesn’t speak right away, seeming contemplative as the trees grow denser around us, the scent of fresh pine everywhere.
“I didn’t expect you to say someone,” he says. “I think that I have had an image of you for some time that is not accurate to who you are.”
I cock my head, curious what he means by this, but he doesn’t elaborate.
“I think we all do that,” I say after a while. “I mean, judge people before we get to know them. It’s a shortcut to make thinking about other things easier. Especially when you’ve been hurt.”
I am toeing the edge of what I think Vizarios might be willing to talk about. I remember how Syzari told me that his mother died, and he hasn’t been the same since. I still wonder if this might bridge the gap between us.
He glances at me out of the corner of his eye. “I don’t know what you mean,” he says, tone guarded.
I sigh and turn back to the road. I should have known it was too soon to try to pry open that oyster.
“My mom died on my twenty-second birthday,” I say instead. “Do you remember the fever that passed through our kingdom?”
He nods somberly. “I do. Many died, or so we heard.”
“That’s what killed her. She was everything to me. She was trying to prepare me for this, for marrying you and becoming queen. When the fever took her, I feel like that’s when I lost hope for the future.”
Vizarios finally turns to me, his brows raised. “You don’t seem like the kind of person who has lost hope.”
“Sometimes it helps. If you don’t have any hopes, nothing can disappoint you.”
Behind us, I hear Ragnakor urge his horse back onto the road, a reminder that he and Quillion can hear everything we’re saying.
“Has Selvumrrest been a disappointment?” Vizarios asks. I can’t decide if he’s trying to goad me into an argument or not.
“I had no expectations. How can you be disappointed if you were expecting nothing?”
He seems to contemplate this for a few moments. “I see your point.”
When he doesn’t continue the conversation, I fall quiet, simply enjoying the wilderness around us.
Occasionally other horses come from the other direction, dragons traveling from one place to another with wagons and donkeys and carts.
When they realize it’s the king and queen on the road, they step off to the side and bow low, tails thumping the ground behind them, which seems to be a gesture of respect here.
After a time, the sun dips lower, and Ragnakor clears his throat. “We ought to turn back, Your Majesties.”
I’m about to rein my horse around when Vizarios holds up a hand.
“We’re almost to the lake,” he says. “Just a few more minutes. Then we can go back.”
I sit up straighter. “Lake?”
He just nods and waves for us to continue. Soon we branch off on a smaller path, which has lower-hanging branches. Sure enough, it’s only a few minutes more before the trees part in front of us, revealing shining water.
The afternoon sun has turned the surface a majestic orange, but I can tell the lake is crystal clear. A fish jumps, creating a splash. Bugs are swarming, getting ready to be eaten when the sun sets.
“This is beautiful,” I say, bringing my horse to a stop at the edge of the lake. Vizarios simply nods as he stares out over it.
“My mother died, too.” He tips his head up, the light catching on his green-blue scales. “Though you already knew that.”
“I did.”
He closes his eyes. “She was my closest friend. My father died when I was still just a hatchling, so I only ever had her. She taught me everything she could. That is, until she was taken from me.”
He falls silent, and we simply stand there, looking out over the lake.
After a while, I speak again. “I wish I knew what to say. But nothing will ever make it better. That hole in my heart will never close.”
Vizarios nods, and I can tell he understands.
“Still,” I continue, “that doesn’t stop me from digging more holes.”
His eyes snap over to mine.
“Letting in someone new doesn’t diminish what I had with her. It doesn’t diminish any of the other places people hold in my heart. It still hurts to know I loved someone and then lost her, but I’m glad that I got to love her at all.”
The king lets out a derisive snort. “Very poetic.”
I sense the moment his fortress returns, protecting him, keeping me at arm’s length.
“It’s just my truth.” I turn my horse around. “Thank you for showing me the lake. I’d like to come back here.”
He grunts to let me know he heard me, and we all head back to the castle. Ragnakor’s brows rise as I pass him, and I wonder if maybe I was able to make some headway today.
RAGNAKOR
I was pleasantly surprised by the king’s willingness to hold a conversation with Nissia. It’s encouraging to see, though I lament that he closed his doors and raised his walls just when he might be close to having a real and open conversation with her.
Still, it is leaps forward from where they were before.
Both are quieter on the return home, and after some time, the queen turns in her saddle and calls back to me.
“Do you still want to train tonight, Captain?”
Vizarios gives only a twitch to acknowledge that she spoke.
“If you are not tired from your ride today,” I answer.
Her laugh is surprisingly happy. “I have plenty of energy after letting my horse do all the work for hours and hours.”
Even the king smirks at this.
When we return to the castle, I follow Vizarios back to his room, but he waves me off.
“Go, go,” he says with a resigned sigh. “I know she’s waiting for you.”
There’s a tickle in my gut at his words. The queen did seem pleased when I agreed to spar with her again tonight.
“You could always come and watch,” I suggest.
Vizarios freezes where he stands, taking off his outer robe. I realize only after I’ve said the words that it sounds rather like a proposition.
Immediately, I imagine myself on the pedestal, fucking the queen while he stands in the audience.
“Watch you two play at sword fighting?” Vizarios says haughtily. “I think I have other ways to entertain myself.”
I shrug, then depart, letting the door fall closed behind me as the night guards take their positions.
Tonight, it is hard to keep my mind on the task at hand.
As we fight, Nissia bites her lip between bouts, drawing my attention to her mouth again and again.
When she gets tired enough that she’s panting, I remember her touching herself while I was inside Vizarios, her hot breaths coming fast and shallow.
At one point, I manage to get one of her legs out from under her, and she goes sprawling. But I catch her just before she hits the ground and haul her back up into my arms.
And oh, is she soft in my hands, pliable around her hips where I’m holding her in the air. Nissia’s big brown eyes get even bigger, and she clutches me, hanging on to keep from falling. Everywhere she touches my bare scales, it’s like a fire has been lit underneath them.
I help the queen back to her feet and quickly release her. It’s inappropriate of me to touch her that way, I know, so I clear my throat as I stand up straight again.
“Thank you,” Nissia says in a whispered breath, gazing up at me with parted lips. “Even though you’re the one who knocked me over.”
I rub the back of my head. “Apologies. I got carried away.”
“No, you didn’t.” She picks up her training sword. “You were fighting. Dirty trick, but a good one.”
Then she winks, and the steady beating of my heart erupts in a thundering storm.
I am far less focused the rest of our bout, and Nissia manages to skirt my defenses twice. When we’re finished and hanging up our swords on the rack, she gives me an odd look.
“You weren’t all there today, Captain. Something on your mind?”
I startle. She noticed?
“N-no, nothing.” It sounds uncertain even to my own ears. “It was a long ride today.”
The queen arches an eyebrow like she doesn’t believe me for a moment, but she doesn’t pry further. Once we return to her room, I bend my head in respect, and we say goodbye.
When I’m safely back in my room, I rest against the door, unsettled. I love Vizarios. I truly, truly do, more than I’ve ever loved anyone.
I should not, should not, be lusting after his wife.
And yet, I unlace my workout pants and take my cock in hand. It thickens and rises as I remember the feeling of Nissia in my arms, her soft curves giving under my fingers.
It is a strange and unfamiliar sensation, to find myself attracted to a female. I’ve always preferred males, which everyone around me has accepted. Still, I remember the queen up on that pedestal, naked and gasping as Vizarios sunk inside her. Could I make her scream the same way?
I grunt weakly as I pump my hand harder and faster, the guilt and the shame and the need and the pleasure all whirling up into a monstrous storm. I shouldn’t think of her this way, shouldn’t think of anyone but my king this way, not even him—
When I jettison everything out, it splashes across the floor. I groan because I should have been better prepared.
Now I’ll have to clean it all up.