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Grieve let out a gasp as I stroked him with my tongue. He tasted like salted caramel and I closed my lips around him, increasing the suction as I took him in long strokes. He reached for my hair, sweeping it out of the way. I looked up at him, wanting him to see my lips fastened around his girth, and his eyes grew wide and luminous. Knowing he was watching sent me spiraling into another orgasm, and I let out a choked moan, lightly scraping my teeth along the ridges of his cock.
Grieve grunted, deep and throaty, then leaned forward, slid his hands beneath my arms, and dragged me up to face him. He cupped my chin in his hands, saying nothing, but then, slowly, the mood changed, became darker.
I knelt on the bed, resting back on my knees, as his gaze fastened on my face. His dark eyes were unblinking and he began to breathe harder. In the dim light, his razor teeth—needle sharp—gleamed. Never shifting his gaze from my face, he raised my wrist, staring at me through those heavily lidded eyes. I caught my breath as he lowered his lips to my skin, brushing his teeth along the inside of my wrist, just avoiding the artery. A thin red line welted up as he broke through the skin. He slowly licked the blood off, one long stroke after another as more of my life welled up through the wound.
The venom of his bite rushed through me like a white-hot flame of hunger. While I was now immune to the charm it cast, the feel of him feeding on me sent me reeling, and I came hard and quick yet again, letting out a sharp cry as Grieve smiled triumphantly.
And then he stopped and brought his lips to my own, and I tasted my own blood on his tongue as he quietly laid me back and finally slid inside me, filling me full with his cock, stretching me wide and making me ache with hunger. He began to move, slowly at first, then driving into me with long, steady strokes. The world seemed to hang in stasis. Time stopped as he fucked me.
I drifted, rising higher with each thrust, and then, suddenly, we were flying, together. All I could feel was his skin, his hunger, the pulse of his breath matching the beating of my heart as I gave him everything, losing myself as I fell into the dark stars of his eyes.
Grieve stiffened, moaning softly, and then, slowly, came to rest with his head on my breast. “I am your King,” he whispered. “And you…you are my Queen.”
I couldn’t say a word, I was so exhausted and so satiated, but he snuggled me under the covers as I slipped into his embrace, resting on his outstretched arm.
“Sleep, my love. Tomorrow, we have so much to do.”
And—too tired and relaxed for words—I kissed his lips, and fell into a deep, undreaming slumber.
I managed to wake up before my lady’s maid showed up. Having a stranger insist on helping me dress made me uncomfortable, but it was just another aspect to being a queen that I was going to have to compromise on. I slipped out from beneath the quilt, taking care not to wake Grieve as I did so. I needed a little time by myself, and as long as I stayed within the realm of Summer, I should be safe.
I missed being high up—missed opening the window and being on the second story. Hell, I missed even having windows to open. Shrugging into a cloak, and not much else, I quickly padded through the Barrow. Most of the people who were up were servants and tradesmen and whoever it was that kept the palace running smoothly. I had pulled my hood over my head so no one would pay much attention to me, and before long, I stood at the edge of the Barrow, staring out into the early hours of Summer.
Inhaling a long, slow, deep breath, I shook off the feeling of claustrophobia. I honestly didn’t like living underground and hoped to hell that the realm of Winter wouldn’t have the same makeup. I needed windows. I needed the ability to look out and see trees. I needed the open sky.
As I raced toward the tree line, I heard someone behind me and whirled around. There, a sheepish grin on his face, was Check.
Ducking my head, I gave him a rueful smile. “I promise, I wasn’t trying to leave the realm. I just need to…to…fly.”
He cocked his head, then somberly nodded. “I understand. At times my nature calls me to go running through the woods.”
“What are you? What do you shift into?” I hadn’t yet figured that out, but, being Cambyra, he would be a shifter, too.
He shrugged, breaking into a smile. “A fox, my lady. I am a fox-shifter. Which is why I camouflage so easily in the woods. It is my nature.” He glanced around. There was no one else near us. “You take your flight and I will stand guard by the tree. This is the tree that His Highness—your father—often comes to. I find it interesting that you should single it out.”
I gazed up at the oak. It was gnarled and ancient and had been struck by lightning several times but rose dizzyingly into the sky. I glanced back at Check, then slipped out of my robe, naked except for my pendant. As I swung up to the lowest branch of the oak, I tried to avoid bark burn. I crouched, getting my bearings as I gazed up at the network of branches and limbs above me.
Standing, I balanced with my hand against the trunk, and then, in what was becoming familiar and easier moves, stretched up on my toes, grasping the branch above me. I used my feet to walk myself up to where I could swing onto it and then repeated the move, working my way up the thick trunk until I stood some thirty feet from the ground. I inched out along the limb, wincing as stray splinters caught hold of my pubic hair, but nothing seriously injured me, and then—I was overlooking the ground, with space enough to shift as I went into free fall.
I leaned my head back, staring at the sky, knowing that outside these protected walls, the long winter waited for me. And then, sucking in a deep breath, I spread my arms and legs wide, captured my courage, and toppled forward, into free fall.
There’s something exhilarating about free fall, about watching the ground rush up to greet you. The rush of wind through the hair, the sudden plunge as you barrel toward the ground and then…and then…and then the shift…
My body began to morph, fingers to feathers, arms to wings, legs to taloned feet, shrinking in mass, transforming into a being so alien to myself and yet so familiar.
My Cambyra nature was that of a barred owl, and though I had yet to see myself in a mirror, at one point when we weren’t on the run from Myst, Rhiannon had taken a picture of me in owl form so I could see what I looked like. As I had held the photograph, staring at the image, it struck me so odd that the creature in the picture was me. And yet so utterly familiar, even after such a short time.
In the picture, I was poised on a branch, my wings outstretched. My talons curved over the limb. My wings and tail feathers were a study in shades of grayish brown, striped with white, and my head and body, a blending of the two colors, interspersed almost as if I were a tortie cat. My yellow beak was the only pop of color on my body.
Now, those wings were standing me in good stead. I’d had to train them when I first began to shift…or perhaps, adapt to using them would be a better way to phrase it.
With a satisfied sigh, I caught the updraft and—Ulean laughing in glee beside me—swept up, buoyed on the currents in her wake. I spiraled, turning, twisting, rising to the top of the tree where I could survey the pale dawn.
The air swept past me as I glided, my wings riding steadily on the breeze. A rumble in my stomach told me I was hungry, but I reined in my desire to hunt. Mice didn’t set well in my stomach, nor did rabbits, and as good as the warm blood and fur felt going down, it felt equally bad coming back up when I was back in my regular form.>A tear squeezed out of the corner of my eye. I hated disappointing people. “I really am sorry.” I tried to look away, to look down at my feet, but she would not let me.
“And another lesson to learn. A queen, even should she be required to apologize, must never lower her gaze. Never again, Cicely Waters, will you lower your gaze to me, although I expect your obedience until the day you take the throne.” Without waiting for my reply, she dropped her hand, turned, and, without another word, swept back to the Barrow.
Left alone with Grieve, Fearless, and Check, I wasn’t sure what to say. They were all waiting for my word, and I realized that this would always be the way. Although Grieve would be my King, the queen of the realm held the reins of power. From now on, even when I was speechless, I would have to speak. Even when I was uncertain, I would have to make decisions. Because an entire realm would look to me for leadership. And that meant showing some measure of wisdom. I’d always felt responsible for keeping my mother and me alive, and now—when I thought I was free of that—I was responsible for an entire kingdom.
