“There’s nowhere more important for me to be than at your side.” The words escaped her lips before Azaleen could filter them. It didn’t matter. It was true. “You saved my life, Lark. Now I’m going to take good care of you.”
“Ahhh.” Lark’s breathing was labored, as if taking extreme effort, but she breathed. That’s what mattered. “I’ll be fine. This place has good drugs.”
“Yes,” she laughed, cheered by Lark’s good humor. She wanted to touch her, to hold her hand, brush her face—something. Azaleen hesitated. “How? What made you run across the stage? It all happened so quickly, and you were just there. Camille said you moved faster than a speeding arrow.”
“Automatic reflex, I suppose,” she answered. The heart monitor beeped in a steady rhythm, granting Azaleen assurance. “Couldn’t let you get shot.”
Lark gazed at her with a dreamy look in her tawny eyes. She reached a hand, cupping Azaleen’s cheek. “You’re so beautiful,” she murmured. “Outside, sure, but inside too … like a rose edged in molten silver …” Her lids lazily fell and reopened. A horrified look blazed across Lark’s gaze before she lowered it, snatching her hand back as if burned.
At once, the sting of disappointment assailed Azaleen’s emotions, her countenance falling. “Why’d you pull your hand away?” Maybe she had this all wrong. Maybe Lark wasn’t attracted to her. Might she think of her as a mother figure? After all, Azaleen was a good deal older. A mortified panic fluttered in her chest. The queen squelched it.
“I’m sorry,” Lark drawled. “It’s not my place. You’re the queen; I’m a swamp rat.” Her eyes drifted shut.
A sharp temper put fear to flight. Indignantly, Azaleen scooped Lark’s hand into hers, lacing their fingers together. “You are no such thing! You are a bright, talented, courageous woman with a heart of gold who charms everyone she meets. You defy gravity—and cheat death. And, and … you have warm hands,” she added, grasping at straws, gently massaging her hand—a hand that, though rough, had felt so pleasurable when pressed to her face.
In a voice so soft Azaleen almost couldn’t hear it herself, she said, “I don’t mind if you want to touch me.”
Lark opened her eyes, gazing questioningly, hopefully, and probably intoxicatedly at her. “You don’t?”
She looked so sweet, so innocent and vulnerable, lying there with tubes and drips and stitches. The expression Lark offered snuck past Azaleen’s last line of defense, through some crack that must have hidden in her armor. It wrapped around the queen’s heartstrings and yanked. Though it made no sense, Azaleen wanted only to taste her, to know how her lips felt. Would they thrill her to the soul—or leave the hardened queen unmoved? It had been so long since she’d let anyone in—not since Aren died.Ten years?
Her mother had been right when she’d quipped, “There’s always a girl.” She’d been hopelessly in love with a young woman her age before the political marriage. To remove temptation, the king had transferred Hellen’s father to Marchland, and her whole family moved away. Throughout her marriage, she’d sustained herself with imaginary girlfriends, deriving pleasure in bed by picturing one of them on top of her, gliding feminine hands across her flesh, ravishing her in secret fantasy. Azaleen had always respected her husband and tried to please him. It wasn’t her fault if her body didn’t respond as expected to a man. It wasn’t his either.
She knew better than to give in to weakness, to let sentimentality and hormones rule over her better judgment. But she realized this wasn’t simply a fleeting emotion or physical stimulus. Azaleen was drawn to Lark like the gravitational forces of stars and planets that couldn’t escape their orbits if they wanted to. She could continue to deny herself or take a chance. No one would accuse Queen Frost of timidity.
Leaning forward, she touched her lips to Lark’s, her heart leaping in her chest. It broke every protocol, crossed every line. So why did it feel so right? Her lips were both soft and firm, tasting lightly metallic from the anesthesia. Lark responded enthusiastically, embracing the kiss, moving her lips in harmony with Azaleen’s.
When doubts and questions battered Azaleen’s brain, she drew back, peering at Lark for a sign. A silly grin stretched across her mouth, and she batted her eyes. “Is this a dream? Because I dreamed this before, you know.”
There was no containing Azaleen’s delighted smile. She kissed Lark’s hand as proof. “No, not a dream, my dear. Whatever is between us is very real.”
Lark’s glow sucked her in again, and Azaleen bent, kissing her for a second time—deeper, harder, longer, their lips and tongues waltzing to unheard music that pulsed in their veins. A rush of euphoria shattered her last defenses. Why couldn’t she have this and still be queen? Was it so wrong for her to be happy, even for a moment?
But Lark was injured, in the hospital, hooked up to machines. Azaleen eased away, still squeezing her hand. “Thank you,” she uttered in sincerity. “Thank you—for saving my life, and for not pushing me away.”
“Is that what this is, a thank you?” Lark’s brows drooped. Azaleen noticed her heart monitor had been racing for a minute.
She caressed Lark’s cheek, drawing her fingertips along her jawline, her thumb over her chin and lips. Azaleen felt the urge to trace every inch of her fabulously toned body. Instead, she did something she’d dreamed of for weeks—slid her fingers through Lark’s unruly hair.
“It’s thank you and more. Tell me what you want, how you feel. You’re in no condition for more now, but … maybe when you’re better.” Azaleen brushed her lips to Lark’s knuckles, then let go, bringing her hands to rest in her lap so she exerted no pressure on her potential lover. Is that how she saw her?Too much adrenaline; too many hormones.
“Now I’m sure it’s a dream,” Lark whispered, her lids closing once more. “Of course I want you. But in what world would you want me?”
“Lark,” Azaleen began, trying to form the right words, though she had no clue what they would be.
The door threw back, and Skye burst into the room. “Queen Frost, we just received a pigeon from General Stark. You need to read this.” The urgency in her voice set off alarm bells.
“You rest now,” she said to Lark and brushed a kiss to her forehead. Leaving her bed, Azaleen crossed to Skye and exited the hospital room with her. “Yes?”
Skye’s long legs set a brisk pace down the hallway to where the rest of VERT waited. Luke handed the tube to the queen. She spilled out the note and read it.
Word from Whisper. Crane dead. Irons mobilizing. Invasion two weeks. Swinging north, crossing in the borderlands, spearheading south to hit Marchland. Coastal incursions, probable. Will be less than two weeks now. Please send orders at once. I’ve put our troops on alert. —Stark
“This is really happening.” In an instant, all thoughts of pleasure vanished as Azaleen faced the reality of war. “We can’t possibly be back in time.”
“Maybe not, Your Excellency,” Luke admitted, “but we can get to Nelanta ahead of the Iron Army.”
“It also depends on what our informant means by two weeks,” Wes suggested. “Two weeks until Irons’ troops leave Fort Rustin, or two weeks before they cross our border.”
