“As you wish,” I press down hard and fuck my way into her in long, slow strokes that make my own teeth grind together. The clench of her body is surreal. I planned on prolonging this, but there’s no help for me, no use other than to come with her—
Throwing my head back, I bite my lip and spill my seed within her.
Vi shudders, her body trembling with aftershock. Little lightning jolts go through her with every brush of my hands on her hips, her thighs. I can barely hold my weight off her anymore, and as my cock slips from her warm body, we tumble into the grass together, breathing hard.
“You’re beautiful when you beg me,” I whisper, drawing her back into my arms. Her eyes are glazed, hair tangled across her lips. “So fucking beautiful.”
Vi sinks her hand through my hair and pulls my face down to kiss her.
“You’re the beautiful one,” she admits, her voice rough and low as we break free of each other.
“Mmm.” I brush the slickness of my seed across her thigh. “You know how to be careful?” It honestly didn’t occur to me to ask last night. I took one look at her and lost all hint of common sense.
“Careful?”
I draw back to look at her. “You have a sachet of bitter nettle tea to drink?”
Though children are rare for the fae, accidents do occur. Most of the females attending the rites bring little sachets with them.
Vi sits up sharply. “Oh. Yes. Yes, I can get my hands on some.”
So she wasn’t planning this…. Not beyond yesterday, anyway. I don’t know why I like the thought of that.
Or maybe I do.
I didn’t want to be just a body she chose to lose her virginity to.
“Mmm.” I kiss her arm, her shoulder, her—
“Vi!” someone calls.
Her head shoots up, attention locking on the voice like a deer scenting the hounds. Shifting onto one hand, I rest my chin on her shoulder. “Who is—?”
“Vi!” Another low hiss of the word. “Where in the Underworld are you? Mother’s looking for you.”
Vi?
I try to reach for her but she’s gone, vanishing from my arms as if she’d never been there. Whipping to her feet, she snatches at her dress and then her shoes, clearly trying to find her underwear.
“They’re ruined,” I remind her, lying back on the grass and rubbing the heels of both hands over my face. “You don’t have to go.” I shoot her a lazy smile. “Your mother won’t mind if you’re a little late, I’m sure.”
Vi shimmies into the gown, draping its loose straps over her shoulders. She shoots me a look. “You don’t know her.” The words are dry, and then she lifts her voice. “I’m here, Andi. Just… give me a moment.”
A shadow pauses outside the thicket. “Vi?” the woman hisses. “What—? Are you—?”
“Not alone,” I call out, which earns a certain scalded silence.
Vi crouches before me.
“Thank you, my handsome prince.” There’s an edge of wistfulness to her. “Thank you for giving me a night to remember.”
Light’s starting to creep through the thicket. Her gaze drops to the shadows of Darkness obliterating my chest.
“Here,” she murmurs, gesturing to the back of her neck. “There’s a tiny button there. Can you—?”
I brush her hair aside, finding the little pearl button among the dripping lace. It’s ridiculously small, and my fingers too clumsy, but I manage it, even as the woman outside our little nest paces.
Unable to help myself, I press a kiss to her neck. “Will I see you tonight?”
She hesitates.
“I want to see you again.” Another glancing kiss. I’ve only just found her. I’m not letting her go now.
“I shouldn’t.” She glances back over her shoulder, biting that lip. “I shouldn’t have given you even this. My mother….”
“Fuck your mother.” I capture her chin, and with it, her mouth. She tastes like sweet hesitance, but the second my tongue darts against hers, she moans and kisses me back.
“You don’t understand.” Vi trembles as she presses her forehead to mine. “My mother will kill you if she hears of this.” Fingertips brush against my cheeks. “I just wanted…. Once. I just wanted a single night to pretend I was free to make my own choices.”
Don’t we all?
But there’s something in the way she says it that makes me draw back and consider her heart-shaped face.
She doesn’t want me to know her name.
She’s scared of her mother.
There’s no reason to connect the dots, but a lead weight starts to settle in my chest. Premonition, perhaps.
Then she’s gone.
She peers out through the brambles, dawn’s soft light pouring over her as she winds her hair into a knot and pins it atop her head. Without the cascade of her hair, her back is revealed. The dress cuts wide and dips low, revealing all of that smooth, olive skin. Skin I never truly noticed last night, when she danced in my arms. Gold flashes on her back. Gold and black and red…. It’s a tattoo that runs down her spine, one I never noticed in the light of the stars.
One by one my eye picks out roses, and then the gold begins to make sense…. Thorns. Thorns and roses, and a gilded half-sun.
Everything within me goes cold.
My mother.
She’s got the royal fucking crest of Asturia on her back.
“Vi.” Relief floods the stranger’s voice, and there’s a whispered half-exchange between them that ends with, “What were you thinking? Staying out so late? She’s already asking for you!”
Vi.
Not Violet.
There are two daughters. Andraste, the Crown Princess, and…. “Iskvien.”
It captures her attention. Dark eyes meet mine as I slowly push to my feet, and she looks a little confused, as if to wonder how I know her name. “Goodbye, my prince.”
There’s no guile in her expression.
No hint she even suspects.
She doesn’t know.
And then she’s gone, leaving me with the reeling sensation that Fate just kicked me in the teeth.
And a single starburst mask, lying forlornly in the grass.
“You ruined everything,” Thalia accuses, the second I’m back within my tents. “Princess Lucere was there to meet you, and you barely even looked at her, before you ran off with another woman.” She rakes her hands through her hair. “I can fix this,” she says, half to herself. “I can—”
“No.” There’s no point in playing alliances now. “There will not be a marriage between Evernight and Ravenal.”
Thalia pales. “What?”
I can barely breathe as I turn away from her, rubbing at my knuckles. Eris remains a silent shadow at my back. She knows. The queensmoot may be the only time when murder and treachery is forbidden, but I still don’t go anywhere without at least her or Baylor at my back, and it seems Eris drew the short straw last night.
She’d have given me enough distance to have some semblance of privacy, but when I finally exited my heather-scented bower, she’d arched an eyebrow at me.
“Out.” I tilt my head toward the door. I need to bathe and dress. I need a fucking moment alone to still the thoughts circling my head like sharks.