AllFreeNovel
Share Us
CHAPTER TWENTY
THE SERPENT
Tonight.I would have my queen in my arms tonight.
After the dream, I woke with an aching cock, the taste of her skin on my tongue, and her sweet smile in my mind. I wouldn’t accept less.
The obsession for Livia Ferus had never faded, but now a fire had ignited in my chest. I would not wake to see the dawn, as if the absence of her were the greatest poison, if I did not feel her hair entwined in my fingers, her breath on my skin, and her body pressed to mine.
Sulfur burned in the air. We were on the edges of the House of Blades.
When I woke from the sleeping draught, I shouted endless threats about dousing the king again, which were fiercely ignored, and we spent the early chimes of the morning planning.
Jonas and Sander were rather frightening in their ability to scheme, even in a realm not their own. It was as though a simple sketch of the House of Blades, a primary description, had ignited a dozen detailed strategies in their brains of how we’d get in, destroy, and leave with our way to Livia.
There was a heady gratitude and loyalty taking shape inside—no one hesitated to fight for her. It was no wonder why she loved her folk.
I could admit to myself alone that I was relieved earth fae were aboard the Ever Ship.
Confidence bled through the laths, but there was more. Something feral, something vicious, permeated the air. No matter how short a time Livia had been on this ship or in the Ever, she’d claimed us all. The crew was loyal to me, but part of me wondered if they’d be at the ready to fight simply to avenge the wrongs against my songbird.
Like she’d become part of the crew as much as its king.
Princess Mira painted the faces of her fellow royals. Every earth fae lined their eyes in dark kohl, runes drawn down their throats. Next, Mira dipped her fingers in a wooden bowl filled with silverfish blood and dragged her fingertips over their noses and cheeks.
Celine gawked at Alek when he shoved through the crowd, blood on his nose and lips. “You look like a feral merman, Bloodsummoner.”
Alek ruffled, seeming pleased, until the twin princes stepped forward and Celine let out a squeak of horror.
Blood dripped onto Jonas’s white teeth when he smirked. “Exactly the reaction I wanted.”
“What is wrong with your eyes?” Celine said, nose wrinkled. “They’re damn wretched.”
The whites of their eyes were swallowed in glossy black, like endless night lived in their gazes.
“Sods,” Alek grumbled when Celine went to gawk at the princes and listen to their explanation of their nightmare magic.
“Bloodsinger.”
Valen and Stieg approached, blades sheathed, faces coated in their wild earth fae markings.
I cursed the shock of unease in my blood, a boyish fear risingagain from a battle long ago when I watched Valen Ferus defend his lands with a brutality of beasts. He looked much the same now.
Through the whole of the scheming, Valen had observed, as though testing my word, my power aboard my own ship. As though he wanted to prove I had no authority . . . or wanted to prove that I did.
The earth bender unsettled me in many ways, but in these waters, on this ship, I thrived.
Valen leaned onto his elbows on the rail. “You say this noble house will have many warriors?”
I faced the shock of red across the horizon. “Yes. All skilled with the blade.”
Valen rubbed his chin. “Any thoughts about this permanent mark?”
“No, but I plan to give Hesh no option but to tell us. He revels in bloodshed. I will do the same.”
“If he is such a wretch, why not oust him?”
Irritation boiled under my skin. “I took the throne at four turns, Earth Bender, left to submit to a wicked uncle who allowed such men to rule in noble houses. Then, once more, I was left alone to fight for the respect of an entire kingdom in the aftermath of a war at age fourteen. In a world of the power-mad, it has taken a great deal of intricacy to crack through the Ever of Thorvald and every damn king before him.”
