29 Imogen #3
“Wait.” I put a hand to the center of his chest and pressed. “Have you pieced it together like I have? What Halla and Nivala want?”
His brows dove. “What?”
Suddenly the distraction of him was not enough to keep my anxiety caged.
“This.” I turned the hand I’d placed on his chest face up, so he could see my scars.
“They want a child with your blood in its veins. They want your child to feed Eusia, just like I have. Nivala was meant to give her a Gods-blooded child to feed from, but instead she had a mortal child with Nemea.”
Theodore reared back, face slackening.
“I should have figured it out sooner.” As I spoke, Theodore reached up and took my scarred hand in his, holding tight, like he could steady us both with the gesture.
“Eusia must have commanded both Nemea and Nivala to do the same thing: have a child with Gods’ blood that she could feed from.
Nemea succeeded, but Nivala didn’t. Nemea tricked her and she broke her bargain with Eusia.
Now Eusia will not grant her another ‘miracle’ until her debt is paid.
I don’t know if Nivala is forcing Halla to give Eusia what she didn’t, or perhaps Halla is doing it willingly—regardless, Halla is a threat to you. ”
I’d grown frantic. Theodore cradled my face in his hands.
“Imogen. Breathe. Halla’s only strength is her mother.
” His steady gaze held mine. “She’s a pawn.
Her attempts at seduction were tears and threats of her mother’s strength.
She is no danger to me. There will be no child. No one will have my blood.”
I held tight to his wrists. “Eusia is determined, Theo—child or no—”
“Immy, I’m safe.”
“I can feel her hunger for you. By the water, there would be times that I couldn’t tell if it was my want for you or hers…”
He tipped my face up, forcing my eyes to his. “And up here in the mountains… Can you feel her up here?”
I stilled. It was as if time slowed at my realization. That thumping in my stomach was gone. That constant hum of instinct was quiet. “No,” I whispered. “I can’t.”
Relief and a decadent, languid heat began to stretch through my body.
We were safe and alone and warm, and I had the stark awareness that this moment might very well be the last we had like it.
It filled me with a ferocious mix of panic and joy.
I reached up to kiss Theo, to throw my arms around his neck.
He stopped me by the shoulders, his lips hovering above mine. “Slowly.” His breaths were rough, the soft command sounding like it was meant for him as well. “Remember?”
I made a pained sound when he brushed his lips across mine, only to tuck his finger into my bodice and coax the lace free of its next loop.
My fingers worked on the first clasp of his shirt. “We don’t have time.”
He took my wrists in his warm hands and set a kiss to each one.
“We do. We have guards in the hall. A locked door. No one needs either of us tonight.” He kissed the far corner of my mouth.
“I’ve had to endure the sight of you—” He set another soft kiss to the end of my nose.
“For days and days, I’ve had to watch the wind tangle your hair and the sea flush your cheeks and feel envy that it’s not me making you look so mussed and surreal.
” He moved his lips toward the pulse in my neck, and I tipped my head, letting out a heavy breath when his teeth scraped across my skin.
“I want to take your gown from your body and learn every inch of you in the light.”
My hands rested on his hard chest, where I could feel the thud of his heart. “You’ve seen me already,” I said through a smile. “We’ve already…”
My voice trailed off as he started undoing the gold clasp at the front of my bodice.
He shook his head. “No. I’ve consumed you like a man dying of starvation.
” His voice was so rough I could feel its vibration.
He tugged and tugged at my laces, until he was able to peel away the boning and the heavy velvet sleeves.
“I’ve only been able to gulp you like a drowning man would air, but I want—”
He lowered his mouth near mine as he reached around me for the clasp and ties of my skirt.
“You want?”
“I want—” A kiss. “To go—” Another. “Slowly.” He fumbled and pulled at my clothes as one kiss melted into the next.
Every stroke of his tongue was slow, deliberate, slipping over the soft skin just inside my lips, and a sweltering haze settled over me.
It was as if we’d stepped from the stone chamber into a balmy summer night.
My skirt fell to the floor and I heard a small, muffled clink.
I jerked away with a gasp. “Oh Gods.” I fell to my knees, frantic, searching for the last remaining vial to see if it was still intact. Theo’s fingers curled into my hair, obliviously guiding me toward him, but I swatted them away. “Shit, shit, shit.”
“What’s—What are you doing?”
“I forgot.” I felt the hard glass through the fabric and noted it was still blessedly in one piece.
“The severing draught.” I held it up between us.
With all that had assailed me, the strange sensations in my body, the visions, the realization of the empress’s scheme, I’d entirely forgotten about the missing vial.
“The Mage Seer’s draughts.” My stomach swooped with panic. “One is gone.”
He fell to his knees in front of me. “Where did it go missing? On the ship? Or since we’ve been in Obelia?”
I paused. “I’ve traced and retraced our arrival. They were in my pocket when we got on the carriage from the ship. I rode with Aleka and Markis and fell asleep as we rode up the mountain. Then Markis drunkenly groped me, and maids came to dress me, but I kicked them out.”
“Markis did what?” He scraped a hand through his hair and peered into the fire with a furious, troubled look.
I stood and started redressing as quickly as I could.
Theodore’s hand clamped around my wrist. “Imogen…”
I reclasped the heavy skirt and started on the bodice. “I have to go search for it.”
He stood and grabbed the laces from my fingers. “Search where? How? Drag the guards into the unknown maids’ quarters with you—in the night?” He swiped a hand down his face. “This is no place to be caught snooping.”
He was right, but my whole body was wrung tight. “You suspect the maids?”
“I don’t know—” He cut himself off, looking betrayed. “It could be any of them, I suppose, but that makes the most sense.”
“Gods. But how would they know that—”
He grabbed my waist with both hands. “Breathe.”
“I—”
“We still have this draught, and we’ll keep it safe.” He gave me a gentle shake. “Take a deep breath.”
I listened, the breath trembling as it came and went.
“Good,” he crooned. “Another.” This time he breathed with me.
Again. And again. Finally, when I’d calmed, he let his hands skim over my skirt, down my hips, my thighs.
He lowered himself to his knees, lips grazing over the bare skin above my chemise as he went.
“Better. That’s better.” He looked up at me with a wry and fervid gaze.
I waited, for him to undo my skirt, to pull the chemise from my shoulders.
Instead, he quirked his devastating lips and said, “You should rest.”
I’d not realized that I’d grabbed a fistful of his hair. I knotted my fingers deeper into his silken waves. “No,” I whispered.
His brows rose, eyes going soft and eager. “No?” The word was a deep rumble. He undid the clasp of my skirt, and it fell around my ankles. “What then?”
If tomorrow were to usher in a tempest, I would bask in his ardor and calm before it did. “I would like to go slowly too.”
I dragged my fingers through his hair, down to undo the top buttons of his shirt.
When I bent down to set a kiss to his newly revealed skin, he stopped me.
He held me still and took in the lines of my body though my chemise in the firelight.
“I couldn’t have dreamed you,” he said, as his hand glided up the center of my stomach, over the thin linen, to stroke my breast. He let out a slow breath, and I knew how fiercely he held himself back.
He brushed a thumb across the heavy curve before he set his lips over the fabric, around my nipple, and wet it with his tongue.
The sensation hit me at the knees. He swiped his tongue across me again, coaxing a breathy moan from me, then reached behind him to pull the furs from the bed to the floor in front of the fire.
His teeth grazed and a bolt shot through me.
I wound my fingers back into his thick hair, guiding him to my other breast, which he lavished with the same attention.
“Do you remember…” he said, pulling at the tie of my chemise, peeling back one side of the garment so my breast was now bare. He made a low, desperate sound. “Do you remember when I asked you what you wanted? After we’d been to the Mage Seer.”
He didn’t wait for my answer before he dipped his head again and took my nipple into his mouth.
“I—” I gasped. “I remember.”
His lips brushed my skin as he spoke. “You wanted a home. Wanted to feel safe.”
I nodded as he pulled the other side of my chemise away with a frustrated tug.
The thin fabric ripped, but he was undeterred.
For a moment, he lost his hold on himself as he guided the linen down my upper body with one hand and lifted it up from my legs with the other until it was a wrinkled band around my waist. I helped him pull his shirt from his body, his trousers, and the rest, until the entire canvas of his golden-brown body was bare.
He wrapped his arms around me and guided me down to the furs.
Eyes dark and breaths heavy, he stared as he slowly guided my knees wide. I stared back. His hair was properly disheveled, his handsome face hopelessly riddled with lust. His lids drooped and his gaze lit with a fire so hot I could feel it radiate across on my dampening skin.