Chapter 46
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
The power is a drug, and the queen is addicted. It is tied to our bond, and I’m learning to control it.
—Hidden correspondence from Bayne to Khato.
The whir of a tea kettle brought me back to consciousness, and I blinked my eyes open as Marian’s forest green dress swished past. Cedar swarmed my senses, and I stiffened. I was back on the Hydra.
“How is your head?” Marian signed as she approached.
I closed my eyes, pinching the bridge of my nose as I did so, the head in question absolutely pounding.
“Why am I on the Hydra?” I asked, doing my best to keep the bile in my stomach down.
“Prison’s been attacked,” Marian signed back.
The world spun as I sat up.
“What do you mean? When?” I asked, frantic. This could not happen again. The bloody fields of Odessa hovered like a wraith in my mind.
“It’s under control,” she signed back, placing her hands on my shoulders and easing me back down. “Aquila spotted them through the clouds. Minimal casualties.”
Shit. Shit.
“We need to get to Skyscape Pass now,” I said, realizing Marian was right and that I needed to keep horizontal, for now.
She nodded as she poured a mug of tea. “They are on their way,” she signed before handing it to me.
I opened my mouth, and she let out an exasperated sigh.
“We’re sailing around the south of the continent to reconvene with the rest of Lord Astraeus’s forces and meet up with the Rising in Khasimir.
Vulcan, Vienah, and Evony are here. Well, Evony’s somewhere.
Probably out for a ride on your caeluma.
That girl,” she signed, shaking her head. “Adolescent and pigheaded.”
Marian rolled her eyes as she moved to the corner of the room where a washbasin sat. I leaned back, heaving a disgusted sigh.
“You are concussed,” she signed, turning toward me once more. “Don’t think about taking Tiberius for a ride. You’ll tumble right off.”
By the next evening, I was steady enough to wander above deck to find a group of men huddled together, many kneeling on the ground as they tossed three six-sided dice to the ground.
The various celestial symbols on their sides somersaulted before landing, causing a chorus of hollers to rip through the crowd.
The loser stood and shook his shoulders out, cracking his neck as he raised his fists and turned to face a hulking form standing to the side. Vulcan, I realized, as his brows narrowed in anticipation and a hint of a smile tugged at his lips.
They sparred for less than a minute before Vulcan pinned Astraeus’s man to the deck. The pirates howled in laughter, cheering in delight as they exchanged wagered goods.
I crossed my arms as I approached, doing my best to blend into the men in the back and stay unnoticed. Vienah moved to my side, grinning as she watched.
“It’s called Goddess Gift,” she whispered, nodding to the game. Her grin widened as she took in Astraeus, crouched at the center, grinning from ear to ear.
To my greatest displeasure, Astraeus’s dark gaze found me. Vienah blossomed as his eyes skipped to her, and she straightened, striding forward as his men parted and finding a seat on his knee.
“Join us,” he called, raising his dark brows at me.
I pulled my gaze away and looked pointedly at Vulcan before arching a brow.
“When you all are done measuring the lengths of your swords,” I called, glancing back at Astraeus, “I’d have a word with you.”
Astraeus’s grin widened, and the enderleaf smoke between his lips dipped. His white teeth flashed in the lantern light as Tiberius’s hooves pounded down the deck.
I whirled toward Ti and gaped as Evony slid off his back, beaming ear to ear. The game picked up again behind us.
“You were out flying?” I asked, incredulous.
“The night is the best!” Evony exclaimed. “The stars are incredible. Being so close, I feel like they are mine.”
I stared for a moment before whirling toward Tiberius.
You’ve been taking her out at night?
Tiberius snorted.
Are you kidding me? I told her I’d keep her safe!
Tiberius pinned his ears as he snaked his head toward me. Are you implying I’d let her fall?
My molars scraped. I didn’t mean it like that…
She’s been underground for months.
I swallowed, turning to Evony, whose eyes hopped between the two of us.
“Are you seriously talking about me in your heads?” she asked, her voice pitching in outrage.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I don’t mean to hover. I just—”
“You’re not my mum, Lyvia,” Evony said, her temper rising rather quickly.
I blinked. “I’m not trying to be. I’m trying to keep you safe—”
She bristled before rolling her eyes and storming below deck. My mouth fell open, and Ti blew out a low snort that sounded dangerously close to a laugh.
Evony was a teenager. Was that the otherness I sensed from her? Was I like that at her age? Gods, what I’d give for a swig of ridecus right now…
“Dathuil,” Astraeus purred as he sauntered up to us, a woody wave of enderleaf smoke wafting with his voice.
I blinked.
“Your word,” he said, smirking as he flicked the joint over the edge of the ship.
I bristled, my irritation growing by the second. “What?”
“Dathuil. Handsome… Dashing… Charming. In old Votruvian.” He cocked his head as he looked down at me. “You asked for a word.”
I blew out an exasperated sigh, doing my best to quell the rising annoyance.
“Evony and I will leave in the morning. They need us at Skyscape to pass through safely.”
We’d talked it through already. Evony agreed her little friends would feel more comfortable letting the group through if we accompanied them.
“No, you won’t,” Astraeus said, authority rumbling through his tone. “That would be foolish. You’d risk exposing yourselves over the Rellenor Fields, where we know Saros’s forces are stationed.”
I straightened my shoulders, doing my best to paint Nerissa’s look of superiority on my face, to look down my nose at him despite needing to crane my neck to meet his gaze.
“Then we’ll take Vienah with us for cloud cover,” I said, matching his tone.
“Vienah’s going nowhere,” Astraeus growled, his voice lowering.
“Vienah will go wherever the hell she wants,” I snapped.
“What’s going on?” Vienah asked as she approached behind Astraeus.
Something flickered in Astraeus’s eyes at the sound, and muscle feathered in his jaw.
“I was just telling Astraeus that we plan on leaving tomorrow morning to accompany the Rising through Skyscape Pass.”
Vienah’s eyes softened on mine, and her strawberry blonde brows tilted up. She glanced at Astraeus, who slid a hand around her waist, before agreeing with the pirate lord that it made most sense to stay on board.
My anger strained against its leash. I leaped on Tiberius’s back and shot into the night sky. Astraeus’s gaze lingered as we disappeared into the black, moonless night.
Between Evony’s adolescent cheek, Vienah’s unending need to ravage the pirate lord, Vulcan’s unexpected geniality toward the Hydra’s crew, and Astraeus’s incessant arrogance, my mood improved very little over the next weeks. My powers simmered deep below.
Patience.
Tiberius echoed the prayer as we trained daily. We would slay one monster at a time. And when we returned to Lotrennia, we’d bring the full force of the Bellator powers with us.
I tunneled my focus into my training sessions with Vulcan, passing them on to Evony when she would listen. Astraeus’s wind, a musky combination of leather and cedar, quickened our travel to an impressive level. The dull shores of late autumn Sultira were now in sight.
My eyes blinked open to darkness. The door to the cabin swung open, and the captain’s dark figure filled the space, the soft blue of midnight illuminating his silhouette. An intoxicating breeze followed as he stalked forward, raucous laughter and music beckoning beyond the open door.
The space between us went taut. My heart thumped wildly in my chest as a longing snaked its way down my lower abdomen, heat quickly pooling between my legs. We only had a few precious minutes of time together. And we’d waited so long. Too long.
He crossed the space in two strides, and his rough hands slid into my unkempt hair, his fingers twining and twisting through the strands as his smooth lips crushed against mine.
My arms wrapped around his neck as his lips slid to that space beneath my ear.
He nipped at my lobe before his teeth slid to my neck, my blood pulsing beneath the skin where his tongue touched.
More.
More of this, my body, my mind, my soul screamed at me. My hands slid down his chest, too quick to register anything but the feel of his skin and the goal of reaching his pants.
A howl of laughter bellowed from outside the door.
Hurry, I urged him, please.
We moved, and my backside thumped into something hard.
A bed, a desk, I wasn’t sure, because my hands found the warm, hard length of him.
His thick, bulging cock tightened as I palmed him above his leathers, and he let out a groan, the sound pure, primal desire.
I smiled against his lips, teeth grazing against his own.
My fingers loosened the ties, and he was free. And damn was he perfect.
“How do you want it?” he murmured against me.
I melted at the sound of his voice, an octave lower than I’d ever heard it.
“Fuck me,” I rasped, my words a desperate whisper.
His lips curved into a wicked grin. He flipped me around, hands at my hips, sliding to my own leathers. Another burst of shouting and laughter echoed from beyond.
“Please,” I breathed into the darkness.
My hands slapped against the cool desk as he yanked my leathers halfway down my thighs, the laces ripping free.
His hand slid up my shirt with swift ease before he cupped my breast, as claiming as the teeth sliding across my neck.
His other hand slipped between my legs, and he let out a soft string of curses as his fingers brushed against my soaked center.
And then he was in me.
He wasted no time. He thrust himself, filling me to his hilt, the stretch a delicious burn.
He hit that inner wall, and I bent forward over the desk, the cool wood smooth against my cheek.
I slid against it. Over, and over, and over again as he moved inside of me.
He gripped my hip with one hand as he drove home, the other sliding up my back beneath my shirt.
He moved perfectly within me, burning and pulsing combined in a mad array of pleasure.
“Fuck me,” I moaned.
He went deeper.
His hand left my hip and slid to the front of me, his fingers meeting the drenched bud of nerves at my center as he slammed in from behind.
My breathing hitched. Two rising, pulsating sensations collided as stars exploded behind my eyes in waves of pleasure.
I convulsed, my body a distant, uncontrollable thing as warmth flooded through me and a whimper of pleasure escaped my lips.
He growled in response, as if the sound itself was his undoing, before withdrawing to the tip and slamming back in. The movement came faster the next time, and he roared into the darkness of the cabin, the entire ship shaking with his completion.
His scarred chest was on my back as he slumped over, hands sliding along the smooth desk and under my own. I interlaced my fingers with his as his breath tickled my ear, his lips leaving little prints of kisses along my neck. My finger rubbed against the cool metal of his rings…
Rings…
Since when had—
Pain ripped through my forehead as it slammed against the beam of wood that jutted off the ceiling of my bunk on the Hydra. I pinched my eyes shut as my head fell back onto the mattress.
A dream.
I wiped my soaked fingers on my leathers, which were in fact unlaced, as I realized what had happened. And who, exactly, I’d been dreaming about while I…
I searched the dim room in a panic. Mortification sliced through me as I poked my head over the bunk to peer down at the slim mattress below mine.
Evony’s chest gently rose and fell, her breathing heavy.
Thank the gods, she was asleep. I was certain I’d die from embarrassment.
I eyed the small window and sent a silent prayer of thanks to Ganmira as the tip of her crescent shape illuminated the opposite wall.
I had to get the hell off this ship. I sent a tendril of power into my bond with Tiberius and sensed his response.
I crept from our small room and up the stairs, a cool breeze slipping past the barrier around the ship. My hands found the wide edge of the rail, and I closed my eyes as I waited for Tiberius.
A door clicked, and I whipped my head around to find Astraeus standing in the doorway of the captain’s quarters, rage simmering in his dark irises.
Shame snaked its way through my chest at the sight of him, equally disheveled and flustered despite his fury.
A small part of me sagged in relief at his lack of elf senses, certain Bayne would have scented me a mile away.
He bared his teeth as he reached the edge of the quarterdeck and flung his feet over the side, not bothering with the stairs as he stormed toward me, a ringed finger pointed at me in accusation.
“YOU!” he whisper-screamed at me. “Stay the fuck out of my head—”
Oh gods… What the fuck had just happened? Had he shared the dream with me?
He was feet away, his cheeks red in either anger or equal embarrassment. Humiliating dread raced through me as he closed the gap, and I spun toward the rail, planting my hands and vaulting over its edge.