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“Good girl.” His purred praise returned my gaze to those green eyes that narrowed. Turned gray-brown, glinting with disdain. “I want you to hurt.”
I woke with a start.
Not again!
My pulse thudded loudly enough between my ears, it overwhelmed the morning symphony of the songbirds that roosted in the rushes and reeds outside my window. But it had nothing,nothing, on that violent throbbing between my legs. Gods, I was aching!
I blinked around my empty chamber, hand slipping underneath the quilt and between my legs. When my fingertips dipped into the slickness the dream had left there, I stroked around my heated flesh. Dipped, prodded, and stirred until pleasant tingles spread from my center, chasing relief but…
It didn’t come.
I clenched my eyes shut.
Gave it all my focus.
Sebian appeared against the black backdrop of my imagination, muscles on his stomach shifting as he drove his cock into me to the rhythm of my fingers dipping slightly into my channel. He lowered his smirk to my mouth in a slow, languid kiss that made heat crest around my sex.
Close. I was so close.
Until Malyr appeared once more. He suckled my bottom lip between his teeth before he bit down, letting it throb with an intensity that matched the wild pulsing between my legs as blood ran—
No!
I quickly pulled my drenched fingers from underneath the quilt and clamped my arms down by my sides. Gods be damned, how could I be so wicked? It was bad enough that I fantasized about Sebian, but Malyr…?
That was sick.
Deranged.
Rising in defeat, I slipped out of my shift, skin pebbling under the chill of the morning. The sleeping embers in the hearth barely offered any warmth as I walked over to the wash table. At the bottom of it, a streak of blue against the gray stone caught my attention. What was it?
I clasped the little shiny thing and held it against the light of the window. A blue silk ribbon, some parts slightly faded, others a bit stained, but beautiful! How had this gotten here?
And then the memory of that stormy night struck me. Was this what the raven had dropped from its beak? Maybe.
Using nails and teeth, I tied it around my wrist, then turned to get ready. I quickly washed myself, including the unholy mess between my legs, and dressed. How much longer until I could finally leave this place behind?
After a moment’s consideration, I turned toward my door. Perhaps Sebian had news of Tidestone? If he was even in his chamber. The morning after the storm, I’d woken alone. I hadn’t seen him since, and—
“Gods…” A start sent such a spasm through my muscles, I jumped and stumbled backward against the wooden partition that secluded my sleeping area. “What do you want?”
Malyr sat on the blue velvet couch beside the door, the black vest he wore over his white shirt finer than any other before. How long had the prince been sitting here?
My stomach dropped. How much had he seen through the intricate carvings of the partition?
“Do you often moan in your sleep?” he asked, answering that question and weaving strands of shame through me all at once. “A pleasant dream, perhaps?”
“A nightmare.”
“Ah, does fear arouse you, then?” he asked. “Presume it explains why humans dread my shadows with an intensity they piss themselves, whereas they make my little dove drip something entirely different down her thighs.”
Fighting the heat that pricked along my neck, I held his stare, pretending I didn’t know what he was talking about. His shadows didn’t rouse anything contemptible in me—no pleasant tingles, no floods of heat.
But the longer I gazed into his two-colored eyes, the higher his lips curled into a smirk that would look cheeky on Sebian, but on Malyr? It stripped me down. Exposed my unspoken lies, my body’s crooked reactions.
I couldn’t stand it, which made my gaze drift to the door. If only I could escape into Sebian’s cham—
“He isn’t there. Given the state I found him in behind the tavern earlier, I assume he is still dragging himself back through the great hall as we speak.” Malyr rubbed his thumb over his bottom lip as if in thought, his gaze going empty before he shook his head. “The Tidestone delegation ought to reach the castle within the hour.”
