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When I’m empty, I sit back, and Beth wraps her arms around me.
“Parnon?” Silmaran slaps his face, each thwap harder.
“Please, friend.” Nemar kneels on the wet floor. “Please.”
His chest doesn’t rise, and no breath passes his lips.
“Parnon!” Silmaran yells and smacks him harder as Chastain clasps his hands in prayer to the Ancestors.
“Come on, come on, come on.” Beth rocks gently.
I want to shield her from this, from all of it. But I can’t. Not in this horrible place where the high fae have become monsters. She knows far too well the sting of slavery, the death of freedom.
A small sob escapes her, and I enclose her tightly in my arms. “Everything will be all right, my beloved.”
She hiccups on a sob. “It’s just the cruelty. It was so easy for them to kill him. As if he were nothing more than a fly to swat.” Tears roll down her cheeks, and she buries her face in my chest.
Silmaran sits back and hangs her head. “Parnon.”
Chastain finishes his prayer and puts his hand on her shoulder. “I’m so sorry. I should have done something.”
“There was nothing you could do.” She swallows a sob, her back shaking. “You couldn’t do anything to save him. They would have known you were part of the resistance.” Her shallow shrug is hopeless. “Maybe they already do.”
“If they truly suspected Chastain, they would’ve arrested him.” Nemar puts his hand on Parnon’s forehead. “Rest now, my friend.”
Silmaran drops her head into her hands. “You will be avenged. I promise we will continue the fight.”
“And you’ll lose it without me.” Parnon groans the words, then takes a huge breath, his eyes flying open.
“Brute!” Beth leans forward as Silmaran jerks to attention. “You made it!”
“Everything hurts.” He coughs weakly, water flowing from his mouth.
“We need to dry him out. Hurry!” Silmaran takes his arm as if she can lift him on her own. He doesn’t move.
“Stay close.” I kiss Beth’s crown and set her aside, then scoop Parnon into my arms.
“Heavy, right?” Parnon’s tone is half-dead, half-cocky.
“As light as a newborn winter realm babe.” Something cracks in my back, and I grit my teeth as I carry him down the long hall.
Nemar runs ahead and throws open the back door. A sandy patio lies beyond, the high walls hiding us from any onlookers as a darkening sky looms overhead.
“On the sand.” Silmaran yanks away some lounge chairs, and I lay him on the baked ground, still hot despite the sun’s absence.
Parnon lets out a long sigh as water begins to sluice away from him, his skin giving up every ounce of water as his color returns.
Silmaran sighs with relief and falls into one of the crooked lounge chairs. “By the Ancestors, I thought it was over.”
“It would have been if not for you.” Chastain looks up at me.
I shift from one foot to the other. “It was nothing.”
“You saved him.” Beth jumps at me, and I catch her in my arms.
“For you.”
Her kiss is a wild thing, fast, fierce, unexpected, and entirely welcome. I take it and deepen it, running my tongue along the seam of her mouth and gaining entry. Our tongues caress each other as I lift her higher and angle her head so I can taste her fully. She wraps her arms around my neck, her breasts pressing against me as her scent clings to the air. This is what I was made for. To love this changeling, to keep her safe, to give her everything she needs.
Someone clears their throat. I keep kissing her, giving a master class on how to make a female curl her toes.
“Oh, for the love of the Ancestors.” Chastain huffs. “Is no one going to mention that he claimed he didn’t have healing magic after he beat the Spires out of me?”
Parnon’s laugh rumbles all around us, and my beloved smiles against my mouth.
5
Beth
Parnon eventually grumbles all of us away. Silmaran stays behind, one hand in his as she lies next to him beneath the stars.
“He’ll need to sleep on the sand to regain his strength.” Chastain leans against the wall just inside the house. “I can’t thank you enough for saving him.” His eyes shine with true gratitude. “He was one of the first slaves Silmaran ever freed. I’m afraid she’d be lost without him.”
“It was nothing.” Gareth hastens down the hall, almost carrying me along at his side.
“You are incapable of taking a compliment.” I elbow him lightly.
“Though I’m still a bit miffed you let me go on like this.” Chastain glances down at his already-healing body. The bruises beneath his eyes are just faint shadows, and he’s lost the limp Gareth gave him.
“You’ll live.”
“We have two rooms prepared for—”
“One room.” Gareth scoops me into his arms.
“I can walk.”
“Not fast enough. Where’s the room?”
Chastain tries to hide a grin, but fails, and hurries past us down the hall.
“You are growing more feral by the second.” I tug on his long hair. “Imagine what all the stuck-up high fae in the winter realm would say if they could see their prim, proper nobleman acting like an uncultured beast.”
He leans down and nuzzles against my ear. “If they could see what I’m about to do to you, I can assure you they’d have no words at all.”
Ancestors, help me. My thighs go up in a flash of heat, and I can’t seem to think of a witty response. In fact, I can’t think of anything except the large fae warrior carrying me unerringly toward the kiss I promised him. Saving Parnon was just a temporary distraction for him. When he looks down at me, the gold in his eyes tells me he’s only thinking of one thing. It takes my breath away when it truly hits me that the one thing is me. Just me. Scars and all.
Chastain throws open a door and waves us in. “This suite is nicely appointed. In fact, my parents often claimed that Queen Aurentia’s mother once stayed here during one of her royal processions.”
Gareth carries me inside, the sheer opulence of the room overwhelming me. Fine silks, high windows, priceless rugs, gilded tapestries—the entire room is a work of art.
“As long as it has a bed, it’s perfect.” Gareth carries me straight to it.
“In that case, goodnight. We have much work to do, but it can start in the morning.” Chastain gives us a bow, then closes the door.
Gareth sits me on the bed, then drops to his knees.
“Don’t you want to celebrate saving a life or maybe discuss this whole Bazaar thing that’s—”
He presses his big palm to my chest and pushes me back until I’m staring up at the bed’s canopy, the golden fabric strung with crystals and gemstones. “We’ll talk after.”
“After.” I gulp in a breath as he slides his hands up my thighs.
“If you aren’t hoarse from screaming.” He laughs low in his throat, the sound coating my mind like warm honey.
“Cocky.”
“You have no idea.” He grips my hips. His hands. My bare skin. Nothing between us.
Pushing forward, his broad shoulders spread my legs. I’m so exposed, and just the feeling of his breath against my sensitive skin sends me to a level of arousal I didn’t know existed.
His long inhale is crass … and perfect. “You smell as wild as the winter wind, delicious as a snowberry ripe on the vine.”
I grip the rich blanket beneath me, my fingers curling into the fabric as he slides his tongue along the outer edges of my sex.
He presses his palms to the insides of my thighs, spreading me even wider. When his tongue swipes again, a deep groan resonates from him, and I can’t stop the tremor that cascades through me.
“My beloved, what a treasure you have for me.” He licks, the broad side of his tongue a velvet torture.
My back arches, and I gasp when he fastens his lips around my sensitive nub. I moan
and murder the blanket, my hands seeking something to hold onto, but there is nothing that can hold me back. Nothing that can stop what he’s doing to me. Nothing to stop how badly I want this.
When he moves lower and presses his tongue inside me, I can’t keep his name from my lips. He moves his hands to my ass and lifts me up like a platter, his mouth devouring me in an obscene banquet. He purrs, his chest vibrating deeply as he licks me in earnest, each stroke of his tongue fanning the flames.
I want more, want to share myself fully with him—as fully as I can without breaking our deal. I slowly pull up my dress. He pauses, his gaze locked on my hands. When my breasts are free, I touch them as he watches me. When he growls, I slide my fingers to my nipples and twist them.
