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Prince Daein doesn’t return until the start of the end of the First wind, which has me sitting in the kitchens, arms folded, and boot furiously tapping on the floor.
Hilda, standing over me, fixes the braids on my head. I’m not so good at them.
I can’t go to bed until the prince returns. And when he finally does, he’s ordered for his meal to be brought to his bedchambers and not the Hall.
That relieves the other house slaves. Archer and Gary leave the kitchen without a word, Terry pinches my arm in reassurance before she heads out, and Hilda is quick to tie up my loose braids into a bun at the nape of my neck, leaving some curls free to fall down my back, just how she prefers it.
The tray is ready within moments, and I take it up through the slave staircases to the prince’s wing. The further down the last corridor I walk, the better my nerves get of me.
It’s more than knowing that he will focus his attention on me. It’s a pattern now. But it’s knowing that I’m in need of the white powder again and realising that Terry is right—I can get through this bargain.
I will fulfil this bargain.
And really, I think I already did accept it in the parlour room. That, or he gave me a taste of what he could offer to lure me into this moment; where I would have little choice but to take the deal and soothe the blossoming ache in my chest, that familiar sensation that comes before a cough is eternally brewed deep inside there.
But as I near the last door—the one that leads to his bechamber—I start to worry myself. What if he strips me down to my bare body and doesn't like what he sees? The natural swell of my belly is unlike that of any fae I’ve seen before. Their bodies all seem to be sculpted from marble. Mine is very muchhuman. And that means hair, too. I have it. And I have no means in my shared bedroom to remove it for this bargain.
He might not like that about me.
What if he decides at the last, vulnerable second that I’m repulsive to him in all my human flaws and he kicks me out of his bedchamber?
The mere thought of it is humiliating, so much that my face is a bright red by the time I’ve shifted the tray onto one arm and wrapped my hand around the doorknob.
I slip my way inside before rebalancing the tray.
And that’s all I manage to do before I’m knocked back against the door—slamming it shut—and the prince’s meal goes crashing to the floor. Curtains fall over me, a hard body pressed against mine, pinning me to the door.
Stunned, I look up at the prince’s face—at his burning blue eyes, like the flames in the lanterns. He burns with a hunger that terrifies me.
“Your decision?” he all but growls, unwinding a shudder throughout me.
My voice is an uncertain squeak, “Yeah ... I ... I want the powder again.”
That’s it. That’s all it takes before he’s reaching down my side and lifting up my heavy skirt. He pushes himself between my legs, my skirt sitting around my waist, then lifts me up against the door.
A shaky breath escapes me.
Dipping his head, his mouth latches onto the nook of my neck. His teeth bite and nibble there, hard enough to make me wince and flood my veins with desire. His hold on me slides down to my bottom, where he grips hard. He lifts me away from the door, keeping me hooked around his waist, and carries me over to the bed, never stopping his attack on my neck.
He falls onto the bed, taking me with him. I’m wedged between the softest mattress I have ever known and his solid body.
The prince’s patience has cracked, long before I came to his bedchambers. The hunger burning inside of him is too wild to be tamed. He barely manages to draw away from me for a moment just to reach out for the tree stump beside his bed. There, he scoops up a finger-amount of white powder from a dish and brings it to my mouth. My lips part, allowing the dose to touch my tongue.
There’s no care in the way he slides his finger into my mouth. It’s all rushed, and I’ve barely had a moment to swallow before he’s ripping at my bodice strings.
My core burns for him, desire pulses throughout my tense body—and yet, I’m entirely rigid with fear. This is so unlike my fumbles with Jasper, so far away from the moments the prince has stolen with me before.
This is terrifying me.
I feel every bit the human with a dark fae prince. Prey and the predator.
There is little care for me or my pleasure as he flicks open the buttons of his breeches, freeing himself.
My cheeks burn hotter than flames and I flick my gaze to the side, watching the crumple of the spider-silk sheets glimmer in the candlelight.
I feel the graze of him pressing against my opening. Hastily, he enters me in one fluid strike, filling me whole.
A choked sound catches in the back of my throat.
