The crew exchanged uneasy glances as we followed Thessaly through corridors that shouldn’t connect. The Wild Hunt. Even Sarnyx looked shaken, her usual bravado dimmed. Vashael walked close to Elle, protective. Eltrien had gone very quiet—more quiet than usual—his expression unreadable.
“Try to rest,” I told them as Thessaly began assigning rooms. “We’ll strategize after dinner.”
Elle caught my eye as she was shown to her door. The uncertainty there made something in my chest tighten painfully.
The rooms were each impossible in their own way. Mine had walls that aged and renewed in constant cycles, furniture that existed in multiple time periods simultaneously. I changed into the formal attire that had appeared—dark leather and silver thread that made my carved marks look intentional rather than the slow death they were.
I was adjusting the damned collar when there was a knock. I expected Nimor with some security concern.
I got Thessaly, wearing something that left very little to imagination and nothing to propriety.
“Hello, Kaelren,” she purred, not waiting for invitation to enter. “I thought you might want… company before dinner.”
“No.”
She blinked, clearly not expecting the flat rejection. “No? You never said no before.”
“Things change.”
“Do they?” She moved closer, trailing a finger along my arm. “Or is it that someone else has caught your attention? The little redheaded human with her impossible marks?”
“Leave, Thessaly.”
“She can’t give you what I can. Her marks would kill you if you even kissed her properly.”
“I said leave.”
Something in my tone finally got through. She stepped back, studying me with those amber eyes. “You’re different. Harder. Colder. She’s done something to you.”
“No,” I corrected. “I did this to myself.”
She left without another word, and I tried not to think about why rejecting her had been so easy. Tried not to think about green eyes and red hair and defiance that made me want impossible things.
I adjusted my collar again. Checked my marks in the shifting mirror—silver-black lines spreading like frost across my skin. Dying slowly, as always. The formal attire made them look intentional, decorative even. A lie wrapped in leather and silver thread.
The walk to Elle’s quarters gave me time to rebuild my usual control. By the time I reached her door, I’d almost managed it.
Then she opened her door, and every carefully constructed wall shattered.
She was wearing starlight. Or spider silk. Or condensed moonbeams. The dress moved like water and light, revealing nothing and suggesting everything. Her marks looked like sunlight on her collarbones, seeming to pulse in rhythm with the fabric. Her red hair was pinned up, exposing theelegant line of her neck.
Peeble sat on her shoulder, looking remarkably dignified despite being a beetle. They’d somehow acquired a tiny bow tie that matched Elle’s dress.
My body’s reaction was immediate and mortifying. Heat flooded through me, my cock hardening so fast it was almost painful. I literally stopped breathing, frozen in her doorway like an idiot while every drop of blood in my body headed south.
“Well?” she asked, and there was uncertainty in her voice. “Is it too much? Thessaly said—”
“You look adequate,” I managed, the words coming out strangled. I shifted my weight, trying to adjust without being obvious about it.
“Adequate?” Her eyebrow raised in that way that meant she was about to eviscerate me with sarcasm.
But then something shifted in her expression—recognition, maybe, or understanding. Her eyes flicked down briefly, then back up, and a faint flush colored her cheeks. She’d noticed. Of course she had.
Instead of the verbal destruction I’d been bracing for, she just pressed her lips together, fighting what looked suspiciously like a smile. “Court standards. Right.”
“For court standards.” I turned abruptly, offering my arm with stiff formality before she could say anything else. Before she could acknowledge what we both knew she’d seen. “We should go. The Duchess doesn’t like to be kept waiting.”
She took my arm, and the contact sent electricity through every carved line in my skin. I tensed, controlling the reaction ruthlessly—both the marks’ flaring and the persistent evidence of my arousal that walking through the Court’s corridors did absolutely nothing to diminish.
