She thinks, all these years, she stuffed Theo into a box in her brain. If only to survive the loss of him. But now, with him inside of her, Aerin remembers. She remembers everything. And it’s glorious.
Theo sets a brutal pace, and Aerin comes around him again and again. After the fourth orgasm Aerin is limp, wrung out.
“That,” he says, slowing down, “that is the expression I was looking for.” He spreads her thighs and leans down to kiss her. Aerin grips him closer, wrapping her legs around his hips and her arms around his neck, holding her to him as he lazily thrusts in and out.
She lets him pull back, only enough to look into his bright green eyes.
“I will never let them separate us again, Theo. Never again.”
Aerin promises both herself and him.
Theo trembles, his lips crashing to hers as he loses his carefully crafted control. He cums inside of her with their bodies pressed as close as possible, their lips interlocked, and Aerin’s heart full.
Aerin listensto Theo draw the bath from her comfortable spot on the bed. She doesn’t want to move, doesn’t want to think, doesn’t want to shatter the bubble she finds herself in.
Theo comes back into the room, leaning against the doorframe to the bathroom in all his naked glory. He smiles and Aerin swears it warms her. Like he is her own personal sun. She takes him in, takes in eight years of subtle changes.
Theoden is older than her, nearing a hundred now. Fae, Mer, and Shifter age is always hard to discern, considering they age so slowly, but Aerin can see the years in small things. In a small silver scar just over his hip bone. In the start of creases in his smile line. In the way his mass of muscles has increased, falling somewhere between Khortland and Malice.
Theo’s hair is braided back away from his face on one side, the braid intertwined with evidence of the ocean. The other side has small braids throughout, the ends of his hair hitting mid-peck. Aerin has always loved his auburn-colored hair and the way he styles it so proudly Mer.
“Come on Pretty Girl, time to get cleaned up.” Theo breaks the spell between them, moving to her side. Aerin lets him help her up and before her feet can touch the floor, he sweeps her into his arms.
Aerin doesn’t protest, planting a kiss on him instead, allowing the floaty after-sex feeling to last a bit longer. Theo takes her to the bathroom, the large tub filled to the top with bubbles. The room smells like the ocean: salt and seaweed. Aerin smiles, warmth filling her chest once more.
Gently, Theo sets her down near the tub, holding her hand as she steps inside. The water is the perfect temperature, and the salts clear her head and relax her muscles. Theo gets in as well, water sloshing on the floor. He sits at the other end, settling in before his tail forms, so long the end tips out of the water and over the edge of the tub near Aerin’s shoulder.
Theoden’s tail is the most beautiful Mer tail Aerin has ever seen. It always has been. It’s multiple colors: copper, iron, cerulean, and deep-sea green. Each scale is different, with varying colors and textures. Some have raised stripes, like a scallop shell. Others have raised dots. Some have raised borders, and others are perfectly flat. The scales are hard to the touch and rough, like a metal, but they move seamlessly and soundlessly with one another. Each scale is as much a part of Theo as a fingernail. At the end of his tail sits a massive, translucent, fin. The thicker parts of the fin are the same mix of copper and blue-green as his scales, and despite looking fragile, the fin is strong. The scales rise high up his hip bones, lining the V-cut of his abdomen. The weight of his tail along her leg and up her side is a comforting pressure.
Breaking the silence, Theo says, “Are you ready to talk about it?”
Aerin sighs. She is, but she isn’t. She desperately wants to speak to Theo, to hear his thoughts. He’s the only one whotrulyunderstands everything: Fae culture, being royalty,her. He knows her better than anyone. All the things she’s hidden, all the things she’s done.
“What do you want to know?” Aerin finally concedes.
“Everything. Tell me everything,” he requests.
So, she does.
When Aerin reveals she cut Malice’s throat, Theo belts out a laugh so infectious it sets the room alight with joy. When he settles again, he looks at her and says, “A bit of an overreaction, don’t you think?”
Aerin smiles, and it isn’t forced, isn’t a part of any mask. She shrugs. “I was angry. At my father. At Malice. At the world.” His fin brushes intentionally against her shoulder.
“Is that what all the partying has been then? Rebellion against your father?” he questions.
“Yes and no. It’s one of the only freedoms I have. After a while, I saw what it could become: an illusion. If you tell them what to think of you, they don’t consider perhaps they should look further,” Aerin explains.
“And the Vipers, you trust them?”
Aerin nods. “I trust Vyx and Quinn implicitly.”
Vyx and Quinn may have had their own reasons for befriending her at first, but now, Aerin trusts them wholly.
Aerin continues on. Some things Theo knows, others he doesn’t. Every sentence she speaks feels like a bit of weight lifted off her shoulders and carried between them, lighter now that it’s been shared. From the weight of a brick to the weight of the bubbles around them.
“You’re still fighting with Bruin?” Theo asks. Aerin nods, playing with the foam in the water. “Are you still upset with him?”
Aerin’s eyes flash up to Theo’s green ones, curiosity filling them as he looks at her.
