Chapter 21
TERRAN
The ship’s captain had trained in Thalassaria many moons ago, before the Gate’s opening.
Though Gyorians were still welcome in Elydor’s southernmost kingdom, they were becoming less and less so as my father’s policies discouraged everything from trade to knowledge sharing.
The old queen, though no lover of humans, refused to take a stand against Galfrid, angering my father.
How he and the new queen, Nerys, would fare was still unknown.
But I had more pressing problems.
Namely, being stuck on a small ship with only its captain, one more reticent than even the most stalwart Gyorians, and Lyra.
I’d paid him handsomely to ensure no others sailed with us, but as the morning dragged on, unless I wished to remain in a cabin so small, I couldn’t do much more than sleep in it, it was evident we couldn’t avoid each other.
“He talks less than you,” Lyra said.
We stood at the bow of the ship, scanning the horizon.
“Chaleo is a vaelith whose Fading time has come.”
“You obviously trust him. Most would not wish to smuggle their prince away from its king.”
“He bears no love for my father. With Thalassari deep in his lineage, an expert sailor, he once refused my father’s bid to serve him.”
We fell into an easy silence.
Too easy.
“Did you sleep well?”
“Have you thought much on the topic?”
“Of you sleeping?”
“Aye. Or in my bed. Though I will admit, the cabins are smaller than I’d like—”
“Terran,” she warned.
A warning I didn’t heed.
“But since you’ve been given the captain’s quarters, perhaps I can visit you this eve instead?”
Lyra tugged her hair to the side and began to braid it.
“Don’t,” I said, the word coming out more like a command. There was a time and a place for that, and this was neither. “Or rather, I’d prefer you not braid your hair.”
“Why?” she asked, Lyra’s question without censure.
“I like to watch it catch in the wind.”
The admission did not put me at ease. Though Lyra and I were bound together until Aetheria, we were far from allies. I would do well to remember that.
“You once told me my hair reminded you of the river mist at Elydor’s edge.”
She remembered.
Lyra had attended the Rite of Stone and Soil with her parents.
They had been given a seat of honor in the hall after her father negotiated safe passage for Aetherian travelers.
I’d caught her looking at me, but instead of acknowledging it, she lifted her chin and refused to glance my way for the remainder of the meal.
Her haughtiness had irritated me, hence the insult.
“I lied.”
“A particular habit of yours?”
“Of mine?” Ironic, Lyra asking such a question.
“You lied also, insisting you weren’t watching me during negotiations. Do you remember that?”
“I remember everything, as I told you. Including the way your body responded to me in my bedchamber.” My gaze dropped to her lips. “How your mouth fit perfectly with mine. Even now, they part, begging me to slip my tongue between them.”
I was warming to the topic.
The sea breeze. Open ocean and calm waters lulling us into forgetting, if just temporarily, the chaos we’d left behind and one we sailed toward.
“I don’t beg.”
It was the gauntlet I hoped she’d throw down.
“Do you remember me telling you that you would? Beg for me?”
“Aye.” She breathed in the salty air, ignoring my presence and looking out to the horizon as if completely unaffected.
I knew otherwise.
“You said, ‘I don’t have a deferential bone in my body.’ Do you remember that?”
She could pretend all she wanted.
“I remember something of the sort.”
“Then you will also remember obeying me when I told you to turn around. Or does that not meet your definition of deferential?”
I tried not to smile as Lyra rolled her eyes.
“An innocuous enough command.”
I had no doubt Lyra goaded me on purpose.
“It will be less innocuous when you’re kneeling naked in bed, with me behind you, and I demand you on all fours before I lick you from behind from front to back.”
There was no time to relish in her expression. I wasn’t quite finished.
“And when you do beg me to make you come with my tongue, I’ll bring you to the threshold and remind you who decides.”
I leaned forward, whispering into her ear.
“I do, Lyra. I decide when you come. How hard you come. And maybe, just maybe, if you beg loud enough, I’ll allow it.”
Being hard enough that it was painful was little price to pay to watch the ice lady thaw.
“When I do turn you over.” I swung my body in front of hers, planting a hand on each side of the rail, trapping her. “Dripping wet and calling my name, I plan to ride you so hard that every time you take a step the next day, you think of me.”
Our bodies were touching.
Our mouths so close that I only had to lean forward and claim her lips. Lyra would melt into my arms. But we couldn’t finish it. Not here. Not on this ship.
“Do you want that, Lyra?” I asked, my gaze holding her. “Do you want me?”
Her nostrils flared. She alternatively hated that I asked and craved to let someone else take the reins for once.
“Say it. Tell me you want me as much as I want you, Lyra.”
So proud.
This time, when I whispered into her ear, it was accompanied by the feeling of our bodies being flush together, her breasts pressing against my chest. No doubt she could easily feel the evidence of my desire.
Pinned against the railing, flush against me, Lyra could easily summon a wind gust with her fingers that could toss me over the side of the ship.
Instead, she tilted her head, giving me better access to that pretty neck of hers.
I took advantage, flicking my tongue first and then trailing a kiss toward her ear once again.
“Say. It.”
“I want you.”
I smiled against her ear. “Voren vel’kora,” I whispered. This time, it neither slipped out nor was spoken unintentionally.
This… thing… between us. It was more than lust. I’d desired women before. But this?
“Don’t mean to disturb,” Chaleo said behind us, “but we’re being approached.”
I didn’t jump back right away. Wouldn’t have at all, Chaleo be damned, but if we were being approached, it was likely my father’s men.
“We’ll finish this later,” I whispered finally, taking a step from Lyra and addressing the captain.
“Vel’kora dra’ven.”
I froze. Turned. The approaching ship forgotten.
Our eyes met.
“You know ancient Gyorian?”
“Of course.” A slow smile curved her lips. “You’re not the only one with dangerous secrets, my prince.”