“Why, thank you,” Valen says, smirking a little.
To both our surprise, the Sorceress burst into peals of tinkling laughter.
“Oh my dear!” she exclaims. “I am sorry, but the way you said that…”
“Well, it’s true,” I insist. “You saw the size of his Drake’s, er, equipment last night! And Valen himself isn’t that much smaller than, you know, his other half.”
“My Drake says to tell you thank you as well,” he says dryly. Then he looks more serious. “You know I’ll be gentle with you, sweetheart—we can take it slow and easy,” he promises.
“Thank you,” I whisper, feeling my cheeks get hot again.
“It’s good to know that your man is a gentleman,” the Sorceress remarks. “But you need not worry about being unable to accommodate him. For once the magical honey from the bathing flowers has entered your system, it provides a permanent benefit.”
“What benefit is that” Valen asks, frowning.
“Why, the ability to accommodate a lover with a very large shaft,” she says. “You ought to see my Horatio without his pants on—he’s positively hung like a horse.” She laughs again. “I know one isn’t supposed to have favorites amongst one’s husbands, but I must say, he’s the one I enjoy the most.” She shakes a finger at us. “But don’t tell my other two men!”
“No, of course not,” I say, feeling the strange urge to giggle. Then the feeling passes and I’m just scared again. Am I really going to have to do this?
Apparently so, because the sorceress is rising from her chair and placing her empty teacup on a nearby table.
“Come,” she says to me and Valen. “We must strike while the iron is hot!”
And so we follow her out of the room, but I can’t help wondering how I’m going to get though this.
67
VALEN
My curvy little Princess is scared to death—that much is obvious. I take her hand as the Sorceress leads us down another long wooden corridor.
“It’s all right, sweetheart—we’ll take it slow,” I murmur to her.
She gives me a grateful glance and I squeeze her hand. She squeezes back.
The corridor comes to an end in front of a vast, round black door. The curving surface of the door is covered in flowing, golden runes which wind in a spiral all the way to its center.
The Sorceress touches one of the runes and speaks a word in a language I don’t recognize. The runes light up at once, glowing against the black of the door. It opens and swings inward silently, revealing a vast black space.
The Sorceress speaks another word and low, golden lighting illuminates the room.
I put my arm around Irena’s shoulders and step inside, keeping her tucked safely against my side. The room is circular, the walls made of some kind of slick obsidian-like stone, veined with crimson threads that pulse faintly, like veins beneath skin. High above us, the ceiling glimmers with stars—no, not stars—floating sigils. Runes I don’t understand, drifting lazily through the air like they’re weightless, suspended in an invisible current.
In the center of the chamber is a dais—wide, round, and low—made from the same black stone as the walls but etched all over with intricate spellwork. A set of silken restraints—blood-red and glimmering faintly—rest at its edges, neatly coiled like snakes waiting to strike.
I hear Irena suck in a breath.
“What is it, baby?” I murmur, looking down at her.
“This dais—it’s…it’s just like the one in the vision the Door showed me,” she whispers back. Somehow it seems wrong to speak at full volume here—every part of my being tells me this is a sacred space—a magical place that has to be respected.
Above the dais, suspended in a web of silvery branches that weave down from the ceiling, is a globe of molten gold. It pulses softly, as though it has a heartbeat.
“What is this place?” I murmur, drawing Irena a little closer.
The Sorceress smiles indulgently, like she’s amused by my protectiveness.
“This is the Heartwell,” she says. “The root chamber of Thornmere. This room draws in magic from the rest of the fortress and focuses it here. The Healing Draught you seek must be brewed from your joined essences—collected during the act of union, of course. This globe—” she gestures to the glowing sphere above us, “—is a reservoir. It will capture the fused magic you produce together. When you’ve finished, we will distill it and make the elixir for the Healing Draught.”
