Chapter Twenty-Three
Piris
All Piris knew was rage. It dove deep, pushing everything else to the side, filling her to the brim with a surging anger she’d never known before.
“I love you.”
He’d said it, soft but clear in her ears, before he was buried by a pile of boulders. Buried by the Fae standing in front of her.
She surged upward, jumping to her feet in a quick motion based in years of training. Monti turned, in no rush, to look to his captive, and his eyes flared at what he saw. On pure instinct, she called on her magic, the dark, seething well of it in the pit of her gut. The vastness she so rarely used because she feared it on some level, feared it as others did. Piris knew it lurked, waited, and that was part of what made people so afraid of mimics. The potential of what they could do if they wanted to, or if they were pushed to act.
With a blink, the ropes at her wrists went up in flame, a flash of light before they crumbled to ash at her feet. Confusion crept up Engad Monti’s face as he shifted into a defensive stance. Like everyone else, he’d thought her a null. Like everyone else, outside her friends, her parents, and her Jarok, he’d thought her nothing, something to use or discard as necessary for his plans. She growled, low and deep, flashing her teeth before she took one large step back. Her foot landed in a shadow and she vanished.
She stalked the darkness, the shadows teeming as they echoed the magic and hate coursing in her veins. Monti, shocked, pulled his sword from its scabbard, turning in circles to try to track an opponent he could not see.
“What are you?” he called into the blankness of the cave.
Piris hissed, stepping out of the shadow. Stone pillars jutted out, twisting up Monti’s arms in a curling gray embrace. She used his own magic to pin him, force his weapon away.
She moved in front of him, bending a moment to pull the small, wickedly sharp blade from an ankle holster. She flipped it in her hand, as Gem had taught her, and the thought of her friend and her blood still lingering on her clothes caused Piris’s rage to become a consuming inferno in her gut. “I am Piris Volesion. No more, no less.”
The man steeled himself, rising straight as he could in his stone chains—stone he tried to melt down with his own magic, but hers was stronger, more overpowering. Always had been and always would be, despite her need to hide it away. “You are a monster,” he rasped out, the smell of sweat and fear tinging the air.
“No more than you. I suppose it takes a certain type of monster to kill one.”
Monti looked frantic then, twisting with all his effort, getting nowhere. “I surrender,” he gasped out, a selfish man’s final act. “I surrender. I will not escape, no longer fight. Take me to the Winterlands Palace for a trial.”
He’d made a crucial mistake, thinking Piris was Prince Ghel or Princess Strella. Thinking she was someone who could let the hurt and pain of her friends, her loves, stand. Still, she’d called herself a monster, but she wouldn’t let herself be one. She saw him for what he was and decided to give him enough rope.
Without a word, she dropped the stone shackles. Monti went to a knee, head bowed as if in defeat, but the hard lines of his back told her to brace.
He came up clutching his sword, swinging hard and fast upward in an arc. There was enough force behind the weapon to cleave her from belly to chest, rip her open as one of his men had ripped through Gem.
Yet his sword never met flesh. It stopped, Piris’s hand now cast in stone, gripping his weapon tight as it hovered around her thighs. “No honor? No surprise,” she hissed, pushing back with expert strength, toppling the man to the ground.
He scrambled back and attempted to right himself, but she stomped on his chest with a foot, a foot imbibed with the mass of magical strength one of her father’s guards possessed. She watched a crackle of light skitter across his chest, the flare of a symbol pulse there. A ward, then. Wards protected, but they could be busted open. Which she did, pressing harder and harder with her foot until a final white flare rose in the cave and a hard sizzle sounded. The death of a ward of protection.
Engad Monti gasped out a plea, but it was ignored. Piris instead pressed again. Without the ward, his chest caved in, cutting off the horrible scream he half released at the pain of being stomped through. She thought of Jarok’s final whisper of love, how he hadn’t screamed out when he had been crushed, and she raged again. Twisting her foot free of the cavity in Engad’s chest, she reared it back and kicked him in the chin with all the magical might she had passing through her. With the years and years of secrets and hiding. The force of years of people not knowing her, not caring, and the love of people who now did, always would. A sharp crack rent the air, then silence. No breathing sounded except her own.
Piris stood there, over a dead Engad Monti, breathing deep, lost for a moment at what she’d done. She remembered Jarok, buried under heavy stone at her side, and she sprinted toward him. Flinging his own wind as she did, she rolled rock after rock off the pile in waves, the rocks landing on the Monti, crushing his body more. When she saw Jarok’s black, floppy-haired head in the middle pile, somehow not crushed, she finally stopped using the rebel’s powers. She switched to strength, shoving rocks aside, ripping her nails down to stubs as she dragged his body free.
Jarok lay unmoving, and fear clawed at her. Then there was movement. His chest rose and fell once, twice. Three times. A mangled cough came from him, and he groaned around it.
“Jarok? Jarok! Please, say something.” She didn’t dare touch him, too afraid that whatever god had saved him would take their blessing away.
He rolled over, looked up into her broad, so-often-stern face, and gave a watery version of his cocky smile. “Why so frantic? Do you actually care about me? I never would’ve guessed.” Jarok’s smile disappeared as soon as he started coughing again, his wind’s way of helping him get the stone debris out of his lungs.
All Piris could do was scoop him in her arms, hug him to her body, and whisper over and over again, “Thank the gods.”
It was nothing, with the magical strength still close at hand, to hoist him into her arms and make her way out of the cave. When she emerged, Jarok was awake but remained limp. Cylian was on her in a flash, helping her lay him on the ground. He looked her over with concern, and she read the intentions of his actions. He guided them both down partially so the prince was stabilized, and partially to not show the strength she wielded to the various Fae still lingering around the cave.
The Autumnlands lord took care with her secret, even after an intense battle—just as Piris had paused for a moment to do inside the cave, when she had known Jarok was fine and she’d made sure the tumble of rocks hid what she’d done to the Monti with her mimic powers.
“Prince, are you okay?” Worry marred Cylian’s gold-and-silver eyes.
“I’m fine, Cylian. Just fine. How is Gem?” Wasn’t too fine if he used the word he hated, but Piris wouldn’t gripe about it.
She said nothing and let the Fae lord answer. Took in the field before her as Cylian said all was well with his cousin. The healer had already stabilized her and taken her back to the boat, saying she expected a swift, full recovery. In front of the cave, Darin squatted, letting another healer bandage his chest. Soldiers toiled around them, securing the few remaining Benders and moving the bodies of the fallen from the slush of mud, snow, and blood at their feet.
Darin was up before she breathed a word, stalking toward them, those stark green eyes nakedly roving her and the prince as he checked for any signs of damage. When he was close enough, he asked, “Monti?”
“Dead.” Piris felt the word like a stone in her gut, but she wouldn’t regret what she’d done. Not with Gem safe on the ship and Jarok warm and breathing in her arms, a whole land now minus one selfish, hateful man bent on power at any cost.
Darin stepped close, green meeting bronze, and after a moment, gave a deep nod. No, not a nod. A bow. A sign of respect at what she’d done and an acknowledgment of the good and bad in the action.
She almost crumpled then, would have if she hadn’t felt Jarok reach up and touch her face. “Love,” he said, his voice hoarse from his ordeal and the emotions whirling in his eyes.
She steeled herself with his word and called to no one in particular, “The prince needs a healer. Now.”
One came running. When she growled at the man after he told her to step back, he hesitated a touch but redirected quickly, doing what he could as Jarok stayed in her arms. Eventually she would need to drop her arms, but not here, in the blood and mud of a spent battle. She’d let him go, told herself she would have to, but not quite yet.
Two days on the ship, and Piris prowled the deck with restless energy. She’d been to visit Jarok in his single quarters several times, watching him sleep as he healed. Same with Gem. The healers had put both in a magical sleep to help them recover, and neither had stirred since they’d been placed on the ship headed back to Volesion Peak.
She’d not had much sleep, spending most of her time with Cylian and Darin above deck, discussing everything and nothing to pass the time. They were one night away from her home, and additional healers if they were needed, but she wanted Jarok and Gem to awaken before then. See with her own eyes they were well and whole once again.
Darkness had crept up from the deep-orange sunset sparkling on the Great River when she heard a bellowed, “Where is she?”
Up and running before another sound was uttered, she raced through the low door leading below deck, twisting through the tight quarters until she reached Jarok’s room. Piris entered without a knock and saw him sitting up in bed, his face all hard lines and angles, his brows slashing down like black blades.
The healer, the woman taking care of both the prince and Gem, spun around with quick grace to see who entered. Jarok already knew and growled at the other woman, “Out. Now,” without once looking at her.
She turned from Piris to Jarok and made the best decision for her safety and sanity, slipping from between them and closing his door as she exited.
Piris stood in the middle of the small room, barely breathing. All she could do was stare at his golden face, dark eyes, and quirked slash of an eyebrow. It soaked into her, warmed her to her bones, to see him up and animated. Alive.
“Come here,” he said, his voice gravelly from healing sleep. Jarok opened his right arm, flicking his head toward it, and Piris needed no more. She eased into the space he created for her. He pulled her in close, tight, as she did. Her head fit perfectly there in the crook of his shoulder.
For long minutes she sat there, still and content, feeling his pulse against her ear like a steady drumbeat. When she needed to see his face, hear his voice, she moved up slightly, though the loss of his heart at her ear pained her. “How are you? Really.”
He chuckled, reaching up to tuck a stray strand of auburn hair behind her ear before he grabbed her chin, gentle yet firm in his touch. “I’m well. Truly. A little sore, a little bruised, but no more.”
“Your wind buffered you. Saved you from the worst of the rockfall so you weren’t crushed.”
“You saved me,” he insisted, shaking her chin slightly in the process. “You, Piris. My wind may have helped, but it was you who saved me.”
Her heart fluttered in her chest, wishing for more, but hope was a bird she kept caged tight. Instead of voicing her hope, her need, she reached up and skimmed a hand over his face, lingering on a purple bruise blooming on his high, sharp cheekbone. He didn’t wince, didn’t pull away. Jarok leaned into her touch. Savored it. Then turned his head to give her a soft kiss on her open palm.
Piris shuddered at the feel of his lips on her skin. He was injured, true, but she thought there was one thing they could risk. She pulled away. His eyes flickered with sadness and loss but widened when he watched her crawl backward down his body, taking his covering with her as she did.
“Piris—” he croaked, his voice dry and yearning.
She went to untie his loose pants but stopped to ask, “Will this hurt you?”
“Not in the way you think,” he muttered before he gave a chuckle. “No, Piris. If you truly wish to take me, you can have me. All of me.”
She didn’t reply. Couldn’t say anything to what she saw in his dark eyes when he looked down at her, what he’d already confessed to her inside the cave, so she decided to occupy her mouth in other ways. Piris freed him from his pants, his hard length warm and heavy in her hands. She angled his head up, then took him slowly in her mouth, keeping her eyes on his as she did.
Her eyes closed a moment at the taste of him, salty winds and spice so strong on her tongue, and she moaned around him. When her eyes popped back open, his head was tipped back, his muscles stretched in his neck, a hard line of desire, need, and restraint coiling up his body. The most beautiful sight she’d ever seen.
Piris took him down, inch by inch, until she could take him no farther. She nearly choked on him, but the feeling of fullness—rightness—made her want to push herself.
Jarok stopped her with a hand on her head. She saw the need to do more written across his body, so she let him take over as he saw fit, adding a flick of her tongue on the underside of his cock as he pulled her head up.
Jarok paused, staring at her as they both caught their breath, then gave a gentle push to the top of her head, gripping her tight at her crown. She followed his lead, taking him back in her mouth, sucking hard as he pushed and pulled her head. In short time he held her stationary, pumping his hips up toward her. She took it all, savored his grunts of pleasure as much as the taste and feel of him in her mouth.
Too soon, he stopped his hips and pulled her head away from him. She popped free and looked up, her eyes questioning as she licked her lips.
“Gods save me.” He groaned as he looked down at her. “Turn around,” he growled.
She tried to ignore the request, go back to his hot, hard length inches from her face, but he held her head tight.
“Come up here,” he said, the note of command dark and promising.
Her brow furrowed and she asked, “What of your bruises?”
“Damn my bruises. I need to taste you.”
Her core ached and dripped. Had for some time, but the words, in his voice, his face stark with need and want, made her shift her thighs together. He huffed at her, stretching down to grab her under her arms and try to twist her around as he wished. Afraid he’d hurt himself worse, she cooperated, moving to straddle his head, her knees digging into the mattress by his ears.
He gave a hard groan, and she felt the touch of his nose trailing up her slit through her pants. “Damn, you smell so good.” Without warning, he nipped her through her leathers, sending a zing of pleasure up her body.
She moaned, loud and low, and he patted her ass, hard.
“Pants off. Now.”
Driven by her own desire, she no longer hesitated. She shimmied out of her pants as quick as possible, then resumed her position.
“Perfection,” Jarok whispered as he gripped her hips hard. Pulling down with a firm jerk, he brought her to his mouth and gave her a long, hard lick.
Piris stuttered out a breath, the pleasure overwhelming.
When he pushed his tongue into her entrance as he flicked her clit hard with a finger, she shuddered. Before she lost all control, she moved her mouth back to him, sucking him deep as she moaned from the ministrations of his tongue.
They hovered like this, every lick and kiss and suck jolting through their bodies like a velvet blow. In a handful of moments, Piris’s legs were shaking as she moaned around his cock, her focus waning. Finally, she popped him free from her mouth, ground her hips on Jarok’s face, and took only pleasure. A few beats later, she exploded, her orgasm coming in hard waves washing across her body. She trembled, from sensation and emotion, and buried her face in Jarok’s hard abs as she screamed through her release.
When she caught her breath, she moved back to him and took him deep, sucking hard and wanting to give him an equal measure of pleasure. A few bobs and he was straining, as if he’d only held out for her. His legs and voice were stiff.
“Piris.”
She doubled her efforts, twisting one hand at his base as she focused on his head.
“Piris,” he cried again and held her ass in strong hands as he pushed upward with his hips. He came in her mouth, as she just had with him, and she loved every second of it. The sound of his deep groans, the salty clove taste of his release, the sensation of him jerking in her mouth… She took every bit of what he gave her and was more than happy to do so.
When he finished, she rolled off him, spent and satisfied. Jarok moved, crunching up to grab her and pull her to lie beside him so they could be face-to-face. He kissed her deep, their tastes mingling in her mouth in a delicious echo of what they’d just done.
He pulled back, and she saw a small strain around his eyes. Piris stroked down his face. “Rest,” she ordered.
“Will you stay with me?”
She nodded, deciding to stay while she could. She could give him, and herself, this.
He smiled, a bright but tired upturn of his lips, and pulled her close, burying her face in his chest. His heart once again beat against her ear, harder and faster than before but still a comfort. As she snuggled deeper in his arms, he kissed the top of her head. “I love you,” he said, the words ringing clear in the quiet room.
She didn’t say it back; she couldn’t because of who they were, what she was. Without words, she pulled him closer, squeezed him as tight as she could, and lay with him as he drifted off to sleep, telling herself over and over again she should be happy to have had this short time with him.