Kilthorne

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE #3

She then turned to Fela, and they began to embrace, their lips colliding. And my initial fear of being inappropriate was promptly set at ease with the displays of affection going around the table. I glanced up to Sebastian.

“I told you we’re from different worlds,” he murmured.

The sudden screeching of wood against marble made me jump.

Odette stood. “This has been a lovely evening, but I must retire to my room.” Her words were heavy with annoyance and anger. She stalked off.

“Are you going to speak to her?” Shouldn’t he formally end things? Or should he end it at all if our betrothal wasn’t even real?

“She got the message,” he said simply.

“Wasn’t this all a little harsh?” I mean she was still human—vampire—after all.

“That’s the difference between you two. You still care about her despite the wickedness she just showed you, but she doesn’t care about you at all. She would pounce on the opportunity to take you down. She’s probably plotting to do so now.”

“And you never ... you weren’t ever ...”

He seemed to read my mind. “I was never interested in her. Odette was the product of my sister’s meddling.”

Queen Sindri gave us a sharp glance at that and then her shrug was followed by feigning exhaustion. She must have wanted Sebastian to marry for quite some time now.

Part of me was relieved that he hadn’t fancied her.

Maybe it invalidated the allure of who I was supposed to be, who my mother wanted me to be.

Maybe I just couldn’t ignore that part of me any longer, that part that burned at the thought of him with someone else.

And when would I have to acknowledge that part of me?

The part that craved the very thing that would only cast me further from society.

I wondered if he was lying for my expense, though there shouldn’t have been reason for him to lie.

But judging by the way he hadn’t spoken to her and how he didn’t even look at her once, I believed him.

* * *

Once we retired to his rooms for the night and I was ready for bed, I hadn’t realized I was standing before it staring it down until Sebastian came up beside me.

“I can sleep in the sitting room.”

“Oh, no, it’s not that.” Maybe it was. Flashes of fangs and writhing beneath him fled through my mind, heating my skin.

The moment we had never formally addressed.

What we had been pretending just didn’t ever happen.

When I orgasmed on his face. My cheeks flushed. “I can’t kick you out of your own bed.”

And there we were again, laying beside each other like the night we had traveled to the Hushed Woods.

“Who is Alaric?” Though I tried to keep it soft, my voice still cut through the silence.

I knew Sebastian was still awake, but the way he stilled, I would have thought he was dead.

“You haven’t told me much about him. I feel like I should know more if he could turn me and bond me to him at any moment,” I continued as if I needed to convince him. I’d even beg him at this point. “You said your world had let him down. What did you mean by that?”

After a long, stretching silence I figured he wouldn’t respond, and I gave up, waiting for sleep. But then he finally spoke.

“When my father was alive, he had many mistresses. Alaric’s mother was one of them.

” That meant ... “Alaric is my half-brother.” I remained perfectly still, as if any movement would make him stop talking.

“I didn’t find out until he was ten. I was fourteen at the time.

My father’s affairs that resulted in pregnancies were not allowed in his fucked up world.

That’s why Alaric’s mother fled the kingdom when she knew she was pregnant.

But my father found out somehow, took him years to finally track them down.

Alaric was eight when my father’s men killed his mother.

They tried to kill him too. But Alaric has always been smart.

And his abilities, especially illusions as you unfortunately know, were the best I had ever seen.

Even as a child. He escaped, and he continued to escape for two years before my father finally saw something he wanted.

“The most powerful kingdom in all of Dreigo couldn’t catch a kid.

My father decided to stop trying to end him but use him instead.

Alaric didn’t want to run anymore, so when my father finally offered him a deal, he accepted.

He had told me he knew it could have been a trick, but he didn’t want a life on the run and the memories of his mother’s death, so he accepted his own death. ”

He scoffed. “A ten-year-old accepting death. My father brought him home, not as his son, no, he made Alaric swear to keep that part of him a secret. Anyone who spoke of it would be executed, including him. He would be some sort of prodigy, my father’s special project.

He was going to be the best warrior Svealin had ever seen.

“Since we were close enough in age, we would train together. My father wanted us to because he was hoping Alaric’s talents would rub off on me.

Though we only ended up fucking around.” He paused, and I could tell he was smiling.

“But he did teach me a lot about illusions. I don’t think I’d be half as good as I am without him.

” I remembered the illusion he had shown me of Svealin.

It felt as if I was really there. “We would disguise ourselves to get out of classes. We were able to convince the staff that a ghost haunted the castle. Some would actually run screaming into the night from our illusions.” He paused another moment.

“That might have been when Alaric picked up his love for haunting. Sorry about that.”

I chuckled softly, rolling my eyes at the casualty, the absurdity, the trauma.

He continued, “The tales of the Red Woman still make rounds in Svealin.”

“The Red Woman?”

“She wore a red dress with a red veil that covered her entire body and dragged behind her. Before she’d arrive, the room would turn red. People would scream just at that, knowing she would appear at any moment.”

“You two were terrible,” I teased.

He chuckled. “Yes, we were.”

“But over the years Alaric’s anger grew.

My mother had told me he was my brother.

She was a lot smarter than my father ever gave her credit for.

She saw me getting close to Alaric and wanted me to know.

In case anything ever happened to him. I told Alaric I knew about him and what our father did to his mother.

I was the only one he could confide in about it.

But it wasn’t enough. Rightfully, he could never move past what happened.

He had nightmares every night. How could you not after witnessing your mother’s murder and barely escaping your own.

” He scoffed again. His tone turned darker.

“I saw him slipping. Anytime he was around my father, he lost his grip on his control.

He started talking about revenge. My father was certainly no saint, and we never got along.

His policies were fucked and many around Dreigo wanted him gone.

He brought our kingdom to power but at a cost that would never be worth it.

“My father tried to beat Alaric into submission. Force him into loyalty. But as Alaric grew older, he only grew stronger and more resentful. Alaric ended up trading information with the rebels who staged the coup. My father was killed that day. My mother fled. She had been ready to leave the kingdom for a while. She saw her chance. We were able to negotiate with the rebels to change policies and create a better system, that’s when Sindri took the throne.

But after that night, Alaric disappeared.

It was around the same time the portal appeared. ”

“And he wants to rule over Kilthorne,” I murmured.

“Yes. I don’t know why he chose Kilthorne. Every kingdom on Dreigo fears him, and he has the support of the rebels. He could overthrow a kingdom here if he wanted to rule. I don’t know how he managed to open a portal, let alone even discover another world.”

I felt for Alaric. It didn’t justify all he had done, the lives he had taken, but at least now I could understand him or at least where he came from. What drove him to this.

And then I remembered his words that now took on a whole new meaning.

I know what it’s like, to have your own family be your end.

You are surrounded by people content to toss you out at the slightest crack. I was merely showing you how those that are supposed to love you truly feel.

I shivered at the realization, the sinking, the undoing, that maybe he really was trying to protect me, in the only way one lost to the dark knew how.

And I didn’t know what to do with all that I knew now.

Or how to move through the complications, the nuances of a mind overtaken by revenge and grief.

I turned onto my side, facing Sebastian. He did the same. The moonlight that spilled through the curtains illuminated bits of his face, casting the rest in shadow.

“You miss him.” It wasn’t exactly a question. I could feel it in his voice as he talked about him.

“Yes,” he said simply.

“Do you think he will ever stop?”

“No.” And that word was anything but simple. Loss seeped from each edge of each letter. It burned, searing deep into bone. A branding. A tragedy. A complete loss of control, a terrible accident already set in motion, impossible to stop. A brother, a friend, he could never get back.

Before I could stop my wandering hand, I reached out to him.

My fingertips ghosted across his temple, then I added pressure, gliding across his skin.

Tracing his cheekbone, his jawline, back up, along his hairline, then I lost myself in his hair.

Fingers tangled within the silky strands.

A low growl rumbled through his chest as he suddenly snaked his arm around my waist, dragging me closer to him.

Our bodies were still inches apart, but the heat between us filled the empty space.

I ran my hand back down, cupping the side of his face.

His heavy hand remained at my lower back, gently caressing.

His warmth bled through the thin silk of my nightdress, seeping into me.

Our breath mingled. My eyes lost in the shadows of his, like two inky pools of black.

And he appeared every bit of the demon my world claimed him to be, but I only inched closer.

Slowly, my leg ran up his own, electricity sparking between us as skin met skin.

I hooked my leg around his hip, and his hand ran from my lower back, across my hip, along my thigh, fingers digging in.

Suddenly I was on top of him. Straddling him.

My aching center pressed up against his erection.

I rested my hands on his firm stomach. He cupped the sides of my face, as if to keep me away, yet still possess the control to drag me closer.

My hands slid up his stomach, up his chest. His warmth was addictive.

The hard planes of his body. His soft skin.

Without thinking, I ground my hips against him, gasping at the friction.

And then I was on my back. And he was over me.

His massive form, half shadowed, looming.

He spread his legs, spreading mine in the process as he settled between them.

I clenched my inner thighs against his hips.

He lowered himself, propping himself up, each forearm beside my head.

I tangled my hands within his hair again.

He rested his body over mine, his chest flush against me.

I reveled in the weight of him. He could easily crush me, and that was oddly arousing.

And his hard length pressed into my center once more.

I moved my hips against him, desperate for friction.

But he pressed his weight into me, stilling me.

“You don’t want this, killer.”

I was lost in the shadows of his face. “I ...” It was a breath. I do. Did I?

He brought his hand up to cup my face. His thumb caressed my cheek once, twice. Until it slid down my neck, stopping at my throat, gripping tightly. “I’m the enemy, remember?”

No. I forgot. I’ve been forgetting a lot of things.

He dipped his head down, his lips over my pulse point.

They were soft as they grazed over me, sending pinpricks scattering across the back of my neck.

And then I felt the sharp points of his canines.

He dragged them across my neck like a knife’s edge.

I stilled. Completely frozen as the blood drained from my face.

“Now you remember,” he murmured, and I felt his smirk against my neck.

I let out a breath. “You wouldn’t hurt me.”

He raised his head, so his eyes met mine. “Wouldn’t I?” A warning. He cocked his head to the side, and in that moment, he looked all the part of the predator. And I was afraid. And I was painfully aware that he knew it.

“You wouldn’t,” I repeated.

And he seemed disappointed in that truth. As if he should hurt me. As if he was supposed to.

He pressed a kiss to my pulse. “Get some sleep, Charlotte.”

And the sudden absence of his warmth was awakening.