A rush of thicker incensed air billows out when the door creaks open, a male who can’t be much older than I am pushing his head past the threshold. “Ah, Princess, we’ve been expecting you.” Despite his relaxed tone, his black brows draw down towards the center of his nose, like he isn’t sure if my arrival was indeed expected or not. I walk past him, careful not to let my garments brush against the dark brown robe he wears, a silver chain belt holding it closed.
Once I’m past the door, he lets it shut, and the space plunges into silence. I wait until he walks past me, keeping arespectfuldistance between us. Visions of what it would feel like to plunge a blade into his shoulder works to calm my heart rate, and by the time I’ve been guided to the main prayer room, everything I feel about this impending meeting is hidden behind a mental shield.
“He will join you here in a moment.” The brother leaves through a small side door, a whisper of air sounding as it seals me in the room. I turn my attention to the dais at the front, each step lined with a bundle of thick pillar candles, their flames casting small shadows on the pulpit that sits centered at the top.
I interlace my fingers together in front of me, the pulsing of my blood somehow louder in this space—a place so devoid of anythinggood. Not that I deserve such a thing. There was a time in my life, long ago, when I thought I might. When I strived to be devoted to the teachings. To be asobedientas possible. It took far too long to realize that was a futile effort, that the nature of having a womb would automatically make me a target for things far more sinister than praying away the evil they claim I have within me.
The door behind me opens, but I stay facing the dais, staring at a painting of a god that takes up the entirety of the wall there. His dark hair is cropped close to his head while his goldeneyes glow in sharp contrast to the dark pigment of his skin. He is a beautiful male, his pointed ears marking him as fae. The gods and goddesses are always depicted as some version of fae or mortal, a fact I find heinously ironic. If one were truly all powerful and all knowing, why would they dress themselves up as their more common parishioners? I don’t adhere to the belief that there are gods—benevolent or otherwise—watching over us, but I do believe in the power of a different source.Dragons. I will not cower before an invisible deity based on the rantings of supposed holy males, but I will bend the knee in honor of a different beast. One that rules over sky and flame. Freedom is a luxury granted not to those who are worthy of it but to those willing to fight for it. And only dragons have the power totakeit.
“It seems you can’t go more than a few weeks without earning a reprimand,” Father Yamin says as he steps up to my side, the sneer on his face evidenced by the disdain in his voice. As if he hasn’t looked forward to anotherdiscipliningsession with me. When I don’t respond, he blows a heavy breath past his thin lips, and I know a cruel smile shapes them without having to look. “Why must you rebel against those who want only the best for us?” Again, I say nothing. “Your father, our great and magnificent king, has spentcenturiestrying to rectify the consequences of the war. Our dragons are being turned against us, the gods so displeased with the faithless in this land that they are taking away that which is most precious to us. And you act as nothing more than a petulant child. One who digs her heels in to the destruction that she’s brought upon the land.”
Destruction.His dramatics, as they usually do, draw a smirk to my lips. The action is hidden by my veil and mask, but Father Yamin must sense it in his ancient bones because he abruptly grabs my arm and yanks me forward towards the first step of the dais.
“Repentance is the only way forward for someone likeyou,” he snarls. I let him push me down onto my knees, my bones slamming into the stone with a deafening crack. “You will repent until your sins no longer stain this kingdom.” His hand lands on the middle of my back, and I go willingly as he forces my upper body to bow. “You will pray until your knees bleed and I no longer sense such unholy defiance within you.”
Seconds drip into minutes that burn into hours, the pain in my body nothing compared to the fantasies that drift in my mind. There is no praying anymore. There is no begging to be something other than what I am. There is only the vision of my knife in my hand, the blood that it spills for those who deserve it. My piety now starts and ends at the altar of my blade, and I vow to myself as the father’s hand grips on to my shoulder roughly that I will one day sacrifice the entirety of the church to that altar.
Chapter Ten: Rhea
Iwakefromanight of dreamless sleep, stretching my arms overhead before turning onto my side and finding Nox still asleep. Tucking my hands beneath my pillow, I let my gaze roam over the perfect lines of his face, his expression soft and relaxed in a way he rarely lets anyone else see. I smile at how his onyx waves tumble over his forehead, the ends pointing in every direction as if they can’t decide which way to settle. It’s the only part of him that has always shown up as less than composed, a small detail that is just so entirely him.
My eyes work their way down his throat to his bare chest, the memory of the taste of his skin an unexpected pleasure I never even considered experiencing before. In truth, every part of him was both unexpected and immensely pleasurable. Tugging my bottom lip in between my teeth, I replay our joining from the night before in my mind. I didn’t know what to expect when it came to physical intimacy. I suppose, in some small way, I thought that it might not ever compare to the way my heart leaps at the sound of Nox’s voice or how he continually finds pieces of my soul that are rough to smooth out with his words and his actions. How can anything compare? How can it be any better?
And yet there was capacity for more.
Nox’s attentiveness while pleasuring me went beyond anything I could have imagined. I didn’t just feel loved when he moved inside me—when his mouth and fingers did things I had only ever read about before. I feltworshipped. Every time we came together, he looked at me with the same momentous awe that I felt deep inside. And I wonder, studying him now, if losing myself in him is both the smartest and the most reckless thing I have ever done. I love him, so much that I would sacrifice myself a hundred times over for him. But in that love—that all-consuming, impossible love—was there anything Iwasn’twilling to do? If it meant keeping him just like this? Safe and at my side and filled with my devotion? I had read enough to know that love like that could be as devastating as it was beautiful, and hadn’t I begun to see that play out with Nox and his struggles with the council? Their insistence that he marry Haylee instead of someone without a title and with no claim to anything other than his heart?
Nox left no doubt to where I stood when compared to his priorities, andIhaveno doubts about where he stands within my own. I would move worlds to be with him. But I can admitto myself here, in the quiet early morning, that a part of me is terrified by that notion.
Reaching my hand out, I brush his hair away from his forehead, my smile growing when his waves just tumble back.
“You’re beautiful when you smile.”
My fingers curl back, a laugh spilling out of me. “You can’t even see me.” His eyes are still closed.
“I don’t have to see you to know you’re happy, Sunshine,” he says, blindly reaching for my hand and bringing it to his mouth. He plants a kiss on my palm, his own lips curling up. “I can feel it. I can feelyou.”
I can’t explain why that makes a knot form in my throat or why it also makes my thighs clench together. A confusing juxtaposition if there ever was one. “I am happy,” I whisper, earning the cracking open of one eyelid followed by the other.
His hand releases mine only to cup the side of my face, letting his thumb trace along my lower lip while his eyes watch the movement. “Tell me that you love me,” he says, his voice hoarse in a way that isn’t due to him just waking up.
Laying my hand over his, I wait until he meets my gaze, his star-flecked eyes focused so intensely that for a moment, I forget how to breathe. “I loveyou.” As if someone’s tugged on the invisible string connecting us, Nox and I both move towards each other, and before long, I’m lost once more in his body and his breath. In the way his lips pray against my own—worshipping.
I’m lost in him, and I never want to be found.
“Rhea.” My name is called gruffly while cool fingertips drag along my jawline. “It’s time to wake up.” The sweet memoryimmediately gives way to terror as my eyes flare open and I suck in a short breath. “There you are.”
Jerking upright, I push his hand away from me only to be met with a sickening wave of unrelentingagonythat sends me right back down on the bed. Everythinghurts. The muscles of my feet and legs feel as if I have been flexing them the entirety of my time asleep. My back and chest throb to the beat of my heart, the ache that radiates through them enough to cut each inhale short. But, gods, myhip.It is as if the flesh is being pulled back layer by individual layer, followed by someone lighting a match and holding the open flame to the exposed nerves. It is a misery I’veneverfelt before and one that sends panic flitting through me, quick as a lightning strike.
“Careful,” King Dolian says, drawing the word out. “I need to check your wound.”
I heave my breaths through gritted teeth, my head too clouded with the pain of the brand to verbalize a retort.Brand. Hebrandedme.
“Did you hear me?” The bed dips under his weight, his knee driving into the mattress while his hand reaches out to touch the side of my face. In my shocked stupor, I don’t fight against his hold, even as he guides my gaze to his. His thumb traces a nauseating line beneath my trembling lower lip as he looks me over. “Gods, you are beautiful,” he rasps, the words rough.
I don’t want compliments from him. I don’t want him to look at me like he’s unearthed buried treasure. And Icertainlydon’t want the feel of his touch onanypart of my body. But the misery that cascades through me at the memory that I’ve beenbrandedovershadows any of those thoughts.
He moves to pull the rest of the blanket off of me from where it’s gathered at my hips, and I gather enough awareness together to clutch it tightly before he can. His hazel eyes narrow. “Show me what I want to see,Rhea.”
