3. Human Heart #2
A loud bang had them whirling back around as the barman slammed three copper cups of red wine down.
“Here you go, ladies.”
He trudged down the bar to help the next person vying for his attention.
Lyra studied the sloshing red wine in the glass before glancing over her shoulder to lock eyes with Wilder as he slipped out the front door.
He was getting away.
No.
She had wanted that human for a sacrifice, and she was going to have him.
“You two enjoy,” she said. “I’ll meet you back at the castle.”
Seraphina rolled her eyes and grumbled, “Lyra always gets the nicest things.”
Marina clutched Lyra’s hand and gave it a squeeze. “Careful.”
Lyra sauntered through the tavern without a reply. The stench of unwashed bodies and cloying perfume assaulted her senses with each step. She was surprised she hadn’t noticed that before, but several women caught her eye on the way out.
They were sitting on the laps of men, brushing hair out of their faces or whispering in their ears. It was a strange sight to behold. That kind of behavior was forbidden in her kingdom.
She stumbled through the doorway and out into the clear air. Inhaling a lungful, she closed her eyes, feeling a thrill roll through her, like she had managed to escape.
“I hoped you would follow me,” Wilder’s voice came from behind her.
He was making this all too easy.
Lyra blinked open her eyes and feigned surprise.
“Sir! You have given me a fright.”
Wilder leaned one shoulder against the stone wall of the tavern. Half hidden in shadow, he looked delectable. His cape was pulled around him, but it did nothing to hide his muscular frame.
She briefly wondered if his backside was just as well-built as his chest and thighs. The excitement in Lyra’s veins scorched. She could make her sacrifice and have time for another if she felt like it, which would increase the fertility magic of her realm.
Or she could walk alone, enjoying her solitude while it lasted.
“So you’re saying you didn’t come out to find me?” His voice was seductive, and it reeled her in.
Lyra clutched her chest and forced a breath before approaching him.
Or she could try out these new legs and wrap them around his face first. She had never been intimate before, but the pounding between her legs made her want to try.
Lyra had never felt that way about Drystan. Most days, she couldn’t fathom his being her first encounter of intimacy. Ruining herself now might put an end to the wedding tomorrow, too.
What was that human phrase? Two birds, one stone.
“That’s not what I said at all. Do not put words in my mouth,” she spoke with insinuation, a smirk to her lips, and a sashay to her hips as she approached him.
Heat coiled in her veins, ready to strike.
His eyes flared a fraction.
It was working. He was falling under her spell already.
She stopped a hairsbreadth away from him, accidentally kicking the pack at his feet as she leaned in close to breathe him in.
He smelled like how she would imagine the air from high up would smell, crisp and light.
Not at all like the air coming off the muck on the street or the stringy weeds between buildings.
Wilder took her in, from her boots sinking into the mud, the navy gown splattered in vomit, and the pieces of auburn hair that dangled from her updo and grazed her collarbones.
If he appreciated what he saw, he didn’t let on, which only spurred her on.
“Now why would you be out here waiting for me?” she asked, leaning towards him.
Her attention was so raptly focused on his face, the moonlight that lit high cheekbones, and up-tilted eyes. He looked nothing like the humans in the tavern. They were all marred with some kind of flaw. But not him—he was perfect. Beautiful, even.
It was almost a shame that he was about to die.
His arms moved from across his chest to his sides, allowing her another step closer. Lyra pressed her breasts against the space where his chest met his stomach. Her nipples pebbled as she strained to press harder against him.
The friction of the fabric was infuriating. She wanted to bare herself to him, or the caress of the air. Anything would be better than this confining fabric.
When he didn’t answer her, she tried again, walking her fingers up his stomach and to his chest.
Right where his heart thumped beneath his ribs.
“Did you like what you saw—”
Wilder grabbed her hand and slung her around.
Her back and head crashed against the rough stone.
Sharp pain lashed down her spine, and her head pounded; stars erupted across her vision.
It took her a second too long to figure out what had happened.
One moment she had been standing there, pressing her breasts against his body, and the next she’d been slung and pushed against the wall, a steel blade angled at her neck.
Wrath twisted Wilder’s beautiful features into something terrifying—something from her worst nightmares.
Elf. He was a godsdamn elf.
“Because I have been ordered to,” he spat, pressing the blade to her throat as he answered her former question.
The edge nicked her pale skin.
The scouts had been right. But what could the elves possibly want from her? No one knew about her magic.
Her nostrils flared, catching the scent of her blood.
No—no, it was supposed to be his blood, his heart, she was consuming.
Lyra licked her lips and leaned forward against the blade, daring him to end her, and testing the boundaries of his orders.
Would she be the one who didn’t return from the Tithe?
No.
Fury flooded her mind, clouding her vision and skewing her thoughts. Lyra needed to return to Atlantis—she had a fiancé to kill. And then her life would be better.
She would be free of her father and the court.
The only sound that reached her ears was the crash of waves against the stone. It echoed the roaring in her head.
Wilder’s eyes narrowed, and he leaned away from her, moving the blade enough that it didn’t slice through her.
She had called his bluff, and it had worked. So, he had been ordered to take her but not kill her.
“And who ordered you to?”
Wilder smiled, and it was savage, wicked even.
A small divot formed between her thin brows. She didn’t know which side of him she preferred. The beautiful male or this wicked creature.
“You’ll see soon enough.”
His hand slipped around her throat like a large, tight necklace. Her blood heated at the scrape of his calluses against her flesh, causing her breathing to stutter through her lips.
Lyra didn’t see his arm move before his fist connected with her jaw.
Blackness erupted, and she was gone, lost, floating in the spaces between the stars.