“Can you hold yourself upright?” Keane asks smugly.
“Your words,” I pant into his shirt, “they…”
I shake my head against his shoulder, unable to finish my thought as his fingers pull out and then thrust back in. I cry out as Keane chuckles under my ear, his arm tightening around my waist and gripping my ass harder.
“You like hearing them, don’t you?”
“Yes,” I answer shamelessly, running my hand down his still half-hard length, “and I need you, too, Keane. I don’t know how much longer I can go without feeling you completely inside me.”
The ground below us begins to shake as Keane quickly pulls out his fingers. I let out a whimper and then gasp when both of his arms quickly wrap under my ass, the Prince picking me up in a fluid motion until I’m looking down at him from above.
“I need to hear you say the words, Alexis,” his intense brown eyes greet mine, “say the words that you know to be true in your heart.”
I nod down at him slowly, thinking of the city of Gaumond and the black walls of the imposing and proud castle. I think of the Shadow Oak and how it will greet us in hidden welcome when we arrive. I think of all the different rises in the city and how they host so many different pleasures, humans and Discerni enjoying them all,together.
Gaumond.
His Gaumond.
The Warrior capitol that now calls for my heart.
Or is it him?
Is he the one calling for my heart?
Yes. And I know I want him in whatever way he’s willing to give me. The desire I have for this man is stronger than anything I’ve ever experienced in my life.
But does that mean I’m ready to give up my old home to be with him? My old characteristics?
Yes, my heart answers steadily while my mind is quick to tell meno.
Because joining the Court of Warriors should never mean that I have to discard any parts of me. It should only ask that I embrace the new ones, the stronger ones. Keane knows that. Has known that since our first encounter under the Shadow Oak when the same battle raged within me. I don’t think he’s asking me to give up Knowledge completely, only to accept the Warrior parts that I’ve quickly come to love.
I reach down to kiss Keane in confliction, moaning when his tongue pushes into my mouth with a hard intensity. His kiss tears me away from my thoughts, as if he knows where my mind is heading and he wants to remind me of all the reasons why the two of us fit so well together. He tightens his arms in a full embrace as I wrap my legs around him, kissing him back without any hesitation as my tongue tangles with him in demand. I need him how much closer I am to giving him what he wants, that I’m nearly at the point where I can give him the words that he so desperatelycraves. So I kiss him in a way that lets him know just that, genuinely looking forward to the day when I can finally lay it all out for him.
After we collected ourselves in the clearing and I grabbed my dagger from where it was still embedded in the ground in the woods, Keane and I decided to take the path back towards the sleepy village of Fumagalli, despite how much I wanted to visit the Hidden City. Not only was I completely weak from his touch and exhausted from the night as a whole, but Iwasfreezing, and that cold hit me like the thirty-second height of Pyre once my adrenaline had calmed.
Keane had removed his thick tunic from his body and placed it around my shoulders the moment we got to walking. He held my hand in the moody forest and lead us through the darkness, asking very bluntly for me to tell him what happened before he arrived.
I told him everything I could remember, about the Ancient’s desire to restore magic to the Old World, alluding to his want of humans to no longer be mortal. I told him how Hirovale planned to use me to that end even though I still didn’t know how or why. I told him how thinking of being used as such made my blood boil, and then promised to myself silently that I would do no such thing.
Keane listened with a quiet calmness throughout my entire rant, and the only time he showed any sort of emotion was when he heard me speak about how the Ancient could watch me through Stormfall whenever he wanted. He smirked at the idea, as if it amused him, and then grinned even wider when I told him that Hirovale had indeed been watching me since the arrival of his Bird of Ash and before. He even narrowed his eyes on my lips when I told him that Hirovale caught every call to the Ancients that I’ve ever uttered.
We ended up talking about the dinner after that, how the tension in the room stayed even after I walked away. He spoke about how him and his brother tried explaining their rationale and their reasons for inquiring into Holis and Mana, their initial distrust of the twins expanding from their father. He told me how the group became worried when they saw Golem return to the inn alone and how that worry led to a small understanding and makeup between the men. He regretted the way he handled the dinner and blindsided Cal and the twins, but he didn’t regret his requests for all the missing information. He, too, has been just as in the dark as I am from his father’s secrets, and I had to remind myself of that again as we walked. Both him and his brother have been dealing with everything in their own way, just as I have.
No one was awake in the village when we walked down the road and headed to the inn. The pub was deserted when we entered, everyone either sleeping in their rooms or spending the night in the Hidden City. Keane left to go change in his room, promising to meet me at mine when he was done, and I was just bending down to add another log to the fireplacewhen he entered without knocking, my body covered in only my emerald green slip for the night.
“Your ass, Alexis,” he groans quietly from the doorway.
I immediately stand up and turn around with a blush, finding his brown gaze narrowed on mine.
“Neverhide from me,” he shakes his head.
I smile and tilt my hip to the side so he can still see the curves.
“I think you have a small obsession with my ass, Highness. I’ve never had someone grab it as much as you do.”
Keane closes the door quietly behind him, his eyes raking over the full of my body in the firelight. He takes a slow step towards me and runs his gashed hand through his brown hair as a mischievous glint reaches his gaze.
