32. 31 #2
He took a deep breath, and then let it out in something akin to a chuckle. “I wasn’t honest.”
My heart shot up, the words loosening it like one of those colourful cannons down in the square. But I couldn’t let this happen again. Tonight was entirely perfect. We were caught up with the moment. The Prince and the Maiden. The fire that painted the sky.
Whatever we said to each other now, in this midnight moment… I didn’t want it to die with the dawn.
I swallowed. “How drunk are you?”
He paused, and then shrugged. “A little.”
I bit my lip. “Me, too.”
Davian studied my face, and lifted his hand so slowly, it made me ache. Then he brushed his hand over my flushed cheek. “It suits you.”
I reached my hand up and cupped his hand. Then I stopped whatever he was about to say next. “I can’t have you say something you don’t fully mean.”
His brow creased, and the reluctance was just my name. Always my name on his tongue, burning me from the inside out. “Annie.”
I smiled, truly. “Can we talk tomorrow? When we’re both clear headed.
I don’t want either of us to say anything we regret.
” He still seemed unsure, but I nodded at him.
I wasn’t trying to prevent whatever he might want to say, I just had to know it was true.
This wasn’t about him, it was entirely the weakness in me. “I couldn’t deal with it.”
He did not lower his hand, rubbing his thumb across my cheek again. “I understand. We’ll talk tomorrow.”
We stood there, words unsaid, but so close to one another they hung like the moon nonetheless. Davian’s eyes darkened as his hand slipped down to my neck, and I inhaled sharply.
He groaned. “I’d really like to kiss you again.”
I barely breathed. “Then, kiss me.”
He stepped forward, and I back as he pushed me with his light grip on my neck. My shoulders hit into the window, and the cold frame of glass seeped into my skin and made me gasp. He closed the final step with a growl, and his leg pressed between my thighs.
My head tipped back as he breathed against my ear. “Do you want me to kiss you?”
If his question was ragged, my reply was ruined. “I don’t think I’ve ever wanted anything more.”
“See?” he growled, his other hand gripping the curve of my waist and squeezing it. “That wasn’t so hard.”
Only the cold of the glass, and the hands of him, spanning across my flesh, kept me standing.
I whimpered, and then his mouth was on mine.
This wasn’t the kiss from the chariot. This was more.
So much more. It seared me, his lips nudging and nibbling at my lower lip, and then I was gasping into his mouth and his wine-slicked tongue was on mine.
He consumed me, his tongue exploring as my hands shot into his hair and I pressed my lips against him with a hunger that felt years old.
His other hand came down and pushed between my legs, and his fingers were exactly where I needed them, wet with my readiness, before I had even blinked. I gasped against his mouth, and he laughed into mine, rubbing my apex in small circles and biting at my lower lip.
I smothered my noises as best I could, and those I didn’t, he swallowed with his kiss. With the wine heightening everything, and lowering any of my embarrassment, I arced into his hand, my own hands clinging to his arms to keep myself steady, and to rock against him.
He whispered against my cheek. “That’s it. Good girl.”
Not a minute later, I came on his hand, faster than I ever had, and he was holding me up, his fingers still inside me as his thumb stilled, the pressure holding against my waves of pleasure. Ten above. Fuck. “Davian.”
He kissed me as he slowly pulled his fingers from my shuddering body. Once I was steady, he drew back from me and in the moonlight, I watched with a dazed expression as he put his glistening fingers into his mouth and sucked them clean.
In the name of all that was… Fuck.
“Delicious,” he said.
I beckoned him back over, but as I did, a rattle came from downstairs. A door opening. Heavy boots.
We both froze.
“Who's in here?” The yell was gruff and common.
I pushed myself from leaning against the window to standing, my legs still wobbly. The voice was from the storeroom downstairs.
Davian cursed under his breath. “Oh, for fuck’s sake.”
“What should we do?” I whispered.
Davian lifted me by my waist and swept me around, so we were both out of the immediate line of sight if he opened the door at the bottom of the stairs.
“I’m going to find you,” called the man, who had to be a guard. He was still downstairs, but he’d find us soon enough. “You can’t hide from me.”
Davian pressed his finger to his lips, the same one that had been inside me not one minute before. We listened to the boots move below. They paused alarmingly close, maybe beside the door we had gone through. Shit.
“He’s approaching up this side,” Davian said, so quietly I could barely make it out. He pointed down the corridor. “I’ll barrel past him, catch him off-guard. You go down the corridor, hide there until he chases me out the front way, or see if you can find another way out.”
I bit my lip. “What about you?”
He grinned, and it was alive with a thrill and a carefree happiness I had rarely seen on him. “On the off-chance he catches me, then I’m the Prince of Darkness. It’s all part of the show.”
I shook my head, hating the idea of leaving him now. “I’ll stay with you.”
The man opened the door at the bottom of the stairs and my heart skipped a beat. “Just ‘cos it’s the Night of the Dead don’t mean the laws are off, ya know!”
Davian’s words were fast and impossible to argue with. “A devotee breaking into a room to see his own show is one thing. A man caught with a blushing lady is another.” He swiped his helmet off the floor, and settled it on his head, just as the man started up the stairs. “Go now.”
I nodded, and squeezed his hand. “We’ll speak tomorrow.”
The Prince of Darkness placed a kiss on the back of my hand. “First thing, my maiden.”
Then, with a boyish grin and a heated look, he yanked open the door and barrelled down the stairs. A loud yelp followed a clattering noise, and I stifled the laugh as best as I could.
The sun hit me, and I was filled with regret for not thinking to close the curtains before falling into bed.
“Ow.” I covered my eyes with my hand.
I blinked my eyes open, rubbing the gunk out of them and groaning at the dull rhythm pounding like those drums from last night in my head; I realised it was long past dawn.
The sun was nigh on at its peak, and I had a moment of panic.
Then I realised I was here in the House of Pain, and not in the Ekrissian dorms. There was nothing here to get up for.
Nothing, except… Him.
My hangover fell into the background as I swung my feet free of the bed and felt a jolt of anticipation.
He had said we would talk first thing, and this was far from that. But last night had been heavy, and the glimpse I caught of him dancing with a group of people in the square as Fella and I stumbled home was enough to confirm he’d been out later than I had.
Home. This wasn’t home, was it? Ekris above, maybe it was. Depending on our next conversation, it could be. That was terrifying.
Regardless, Fella had walked me here, and then returned into the night, even though there was surely only an hour to pass until dawn. She had said she was going to track down Camriel and finally say what was on her mind, and I wished her luck.
Hopefully, they had made up again, and the House would relax. Maybe everything would work out, after all.
I sniffed, and realised the sour scent in the air was my own body. I had washed yesterday in preparation for a much earlier bed time, and yet the drink alone had me smelling as if I hadn’t washed in days.
That needed to be fixed first.
Half an hour later, I padded back to my room with towel-dried hair dampening the front of my nightgown. Another five minutes later, I was dressed in my simple chiton with my hair plaited down my back.
The shadow dancing at my door made my heart skitter as I opened the door, but there was no one waiting there. I looked down, to find Whip twirling at the threshold, hoping to come in.
“Hi, Whip,” I greeted him as he sauntered past me, pressing his side against my dress. “Where’s Davian?”
He meowed once, then hopped up on the end of my unmade bed and perched himself on top of the square of folded blanket I hadn’t bothered to move before I had crawled in.
I smiled, and left him there, curling in a shaft of light, and went downstairs. The dining room was empty, and the maids were in the process of clearing the breakfast. I managed to grab a pastry before it all went, and took a bite as I moved back through to the lounge.
There was still no sign of either of them. Eliza was there, but she only confirmed she hadn’t seen them yet today. I sat down on one of the low cushions beside Carnage, feeling uncertain of what to do with myself.
The little white cat hopped up to my lap, and I finished the pastry quickly before she tried to take it from me. Eliza offered to bring me a pot of tea, since she was making one for herself, and I accepted gratefully.
“They must have it worse than me, huh?” I said, stroking my hand down Carnage’s back. She rolled onto her side and lazily wafted a paw in my direction, and I sighed.
It was probably just the hangover, but I didn’t like leaving our conversation last night without the resolution.
Everything was too on edge; my entire future could hang in the balance of what he wanted to say to me.
And despite all of my past experience, I wanted to believe that he would say all the right magical words.
I hated myself for my optimism, but I couldn’t help it.
So when Eliza brought back the tea, I drank mine far too quickly, and then poured another. I left the room, making some excuse for a headache, and then I climbed the stairs with the cup in both hands.
Holding the peace offering, or bribe, or whatever this tea represented, I knocked on his door.