I take them from him and fold them up neatly, setting them on the arm of the chair.
“That will be up to her. If she wants to come, she’ll come; if not, Eacon can come keep an eye on her while we’re gone.”
“She’ll come,” Riall declares, a smile hinting at the edges of his mouth. “She’s learning she needs the violence as much as we do.”
Curio grins at that, as though the statement is music to his ears. I know it’smynew favorite song. Death is an outlet for each of us. It’s a means to an end, but it also fortifies us individually and as a family. I never thought we’d find someone who would fit with us in the same way. A mate capable of appreciating the dark and the brutal things in life the way we do was more than I ever thought to hope for. Couplings like ours aren’t unheard of, but they’re few. Finding Auset is fate righting all its wrongs against us.
I exhale deeply, feeling some of the tension that’s been trapped in my shoulders since we brought Auset here start to slacken. I know there’s a lot of work to be done, that she’ll more than likely take a few steps forward and then go sprinting in the other direction when things start to feel too intense. But fuck if I don’t like the chase. I’ll like the catch even more, but tracking my prey has always been a favorite pastime. Pursuing Auset heightens the sweetness of it all even more.
Suddenly, Curio stands and starts collecting his things from around the study. Piling his clothes, daggers, and a few books in his arms, he surveys the space for anything else that belongs solely to him.
“What are you doing?” I ask, confused, as he grabs a tunic that’s been strung across the back of an armchair.
“I’m moving back into my room,” he announces, and my brow furrows with confusion for a second before understanding sinks in.
“Our Beasty might not take too kindly to you invading her space, regardless of whether or not it was your room first,” Riall points out, but the barely stifled laugh in his tone betrays just what he really thinks about all of this.
“Guess we’re about to find out,” Curio declares dismissively, and then he takes his pile and strides confidently away.
I laugh as he goes, Riall’s amusement quick to join mine.
“She’s going to slit his throat,” Riall states with a deep chuckle.
I shake my head, a wide smile affixed to my face. “She’ll try,” I agree. “But we both know that’s just foreplay to him.”
Riall pushes up to his feet, practically giddy as he stares at the study doorway that Curio just exited through.
He walks over to me and pats me on the shoulder, the mischievous gleam in his eyes a far cry from the desperate anger he was feeling when he first stormed in here.
“Don’t pull thatwatch from the sidelines and plotthing you love to do,” he orders warmly. “It’s all hands on deck now. She needs to know exactly where each of us stands if we’re going to convince her that we’re the right choice.”
“Don’t worry about that,” I reassure him. “I’ve got plans for our Little Dagger, and none of them involve playing it safe. When I’m done with her,yeswill be her new favorite word, and each of us will know exactly what it feels like for her to come on our cocks while she screams it.”
Riall groans and adjusts himself in his leathers. I laugh and stand up, grabbing the letters off the arm of the chair as I do.
“Patience, brother,” I warn playfully as I make my way over to my desk. I pull out clean parchment and ready a pen and ink for the replies that we just discussed. “This is about the long game,” I remind Riall, dipping my pen in the well and starting the first of the many missives I need to write tonight. “Auset’s about to learn that the Scorpions play for keeps.”
ChapterThirty-One
AUSET
My gaze darts over to where Curio is lounging in the bed, reading from an old hide-bound book. The silver paint of the title is so faded I can’t read what it says, and I refuse to ask the Scorpion, despite my curiosity growing by the day. Slowly, my eyes wander from the deep green of the ancient-looking book to the warm brown of Curio’s skin. I study the lines and curves of his shoulders and smooth chest.
Curio reaches up to turn a page, and I dart my stare from him to the rays of early morning light that are streaking through the small crack in the drawn curtains next to me. If he notices that I’m awake, he doesn’t say anything as he continues to read silently, something I’ve learned over the past month that Curio enjoys doing every morning. I try not to shift where I’m lying on the ground or draw any other attention to myself. Often, if I’m careful, I can watch him lazing about for a while before he gets up for the day.
When Curio first stormed in here to reclaim his bed and his space despite me still occupying it, I thought I’d go mad. I was on edge at first, waking up to him every morning and falling asleep with him in here every night. I threatened to move to another room regardless of the fact that they were empty, but for some reason, I never followed through with that threat. Instead, I anticipated his possible ulterior motives and watched my back carefully, but nothing ever happened.
Nothing bad ever happens with any of them.
Curio has long stopped trying to offer me half of his bed or eyeing my pallet of towels and sheets on the ground just under the windows with distaste. He’s keeping his grumbling to himself now, but I know he doesn’t accept that I’m more comfortable on the floor, no matter how true it is. He never forces conversation, but rather seems perfectly happy to sit in silence and just…be. I’ve never been made to feel unwelcome or uncomfortable in our shared space, and I’ve slowly come to terms with the fact that he’s always just there, sleeping at night, bathing in the mornings, reading, walking silently with me to breakfast. It’s strange, and yet studying him, watching him the way I do, has become an odd little routine of mine. I don’t really know what to make of that, so I don’t bother thinking too hard on thewhysof any of it.
I’ve been doing that a lot lately, just going with things instead of trying hard to puzzle it all out. Between training and eating, I’ve had far too much time to think, to process. I can’t say what I support or oppose anymore. I itch for answers about myself, which is inconvenient because at this point I might never get them.
Tarek has reached out to different contacts throughout the realms, but we’ve yet to hear anything back. It’s only been just over a month, but already I try to prepare myself for life to remain as much a mystery now as it ever was before. I thought if anyone could figure out who I am and where I come from, it would be the Order of Scorpions, but I might never know who I really am.
I started a list in my head of all the things I know but don’t knowhowI know. I can read, but I have no memory of ever learning. I know scents and the names of things that I never encountered at the ludere. Every bite of food I like, I grill Riall about where it comes from or how it’s procured. I thought it might help me narrow down a region or area to look at more closely, but all I really have is an infuriating list that doesn’t make any sense and still no answers.
I observe Curio as he casually turns another page in his book. Maybe mystery isn’t the worst thing to ever happen to me though. I don’t know what there could be to go back to even if the Scorpions do find something. I’m not the young fae I would have been when I was taken. Whoever she was died in the sands of a fighting pit. I rose in her stead. Maybe it’s better to never know what might have been and focus solely on what is happening now.
