“Absolutely not.” I traced lazy patterns along his wing, and his eyes fluttered shut at the touch. “I’m clearly a terrible diplomat. I started a war.”
“Worth it,” he murmured, pressing a kiss to my temple. His wings shifted, loosening their protective cocoon around us but not withdrawing completely. “Besides, we were probably heading for war anyway. You just... accelerated the timeline.”
I traced my thumb along the curve of his wing one more time, savouring the way he shuddered beneath my touch, the way his hips jerked involuntarily against mine.
“We should probably find the others.”
“Mhm.”
“Figure out a plan. Damage control. Something resembling strategy.” I gestured vaguely at the wreckage around us. The splintered desk leg, the scattered papers, the books that had tumbled from their shelves in our wake. “Maybe clean up the disaster we just created.”
“Yes.” His mouth found my pulse, teeth grazing lightly. “We should absolutely do all of that.”
“Varyth—”
“Soon.” His hands slid up my thighs, thumbs tracing idle circles that made my breath catch. “But I’m not done with you yet.”
The words sent heat coiling through me. “We just—the desk is literally broken.”
“I noticed.” His smile was pure sin. “We’ll use the floor next time.”
“Next time?”
“Or the wall again.” He kissed me, slow and deep and thorough. “The bookshelf. That chair in the corner. I’m flexible.”
My laugh turned into a gasp as his hands slid lower, as his mist coiled around my wrists with deliberate intent.
The others could wait. The war could wait.
For now—for just a few stolen minutes—there was only this.
Only him.
43
ASHTERION
Ashterion didn’t flinch. Not this time. He hung from the ceiling, arms stretched high above his head, the chains cutting into raw, tender flesh.
His toes barely touched the stone floor, enough to keep him conscious, but never enough to bring relief. Blood dripped down his sides in slow, steady trails, each one a thin red thread pulled loose from the tapestry of his silence.
Xyliria stood before him, poised, calm, immaculate.
“You embarrassed me,” she murmured, soft as velvet, lethal as the edge of the blade in her hand.
It gleamed faintly in the candlelight—curved, elegant, custom-forged.
Xyliria stepped closer, the train of her crimson gown pooling around her feet. She pressed the blade to his chest, just beneath the collarbone, and began to carve.
A curved line. Then another.
Blood welled and spilled, warm rivulets tracking down his torso. He kept his breathing measured, his face impassive. After centuries of this, he had learned that reactions only fed her cruelty.
“I asked you to do one thing.” Xyliria’s voice remained conversational, almost tender. “Stand beside me. Look powerful. Remain unmoved.” The blade twisted, digging into muscle. “And yet, you couldn’t even manage that.”
The flinch. That damned, involuntary flinch when she’d touched him during the meeting. One moment of weakness, witnessed by Varyth and his court—and worse, by that human female with her too-perceptive eyes.
Ashterion met her gaze steadily. “It was a momentary lapse. It won’t happen again.”
