Aurelius promises to burn his own kingdom down for them, but I will burneverykingdom.
Then we can always be together — safe and alive amidst the dead.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Royal Vampire Nest,Blood Kingdom
Daire
I padthrough the archway from the bathing chamber back into Lanlin’s warm room, which smells of sweet lotus oil and honeyed resin that is burning in bronze bowls.
I hum lightly under my breath along to the flute music that has started to play further in the palace, as the court wakes up along with the stars.
Today, the daft dragon, our Omega, and I may have all risked death, but I have never felt so alive as I did in that cave fucking on the bones of the dead.
As the King of the fallen fae, my bones will be joining them soon. Before then, however, I still have a few rolls of the die left.
My fierce Spark demanded that our dragon become a rebel, fighting Maximinus, before returning my kingdom along with her own.
And he agreed.
I didn’t expect that.
I glow, unable to stop smiling.
Nothing can give me back what I have lost, but Aurelius is trying to start something new in a genuine way that I’d once hoped he would.
Plus, Emperor Hadrian had been gloriously dark.
Did he think that I didn’t recognize him?
Now that Hadrian has fully entered this shadow game, things have become far more interesting.
Behind me, I hear Freya happily splashing around still in the large alabaster tub, surrounded by petals. We took turns scrubbing each other with strongly scented lotus oil, while swapping kisses, to wash the scent of Aurelius from our skin.
I appreciated the thorough way that Freya worked my wings at the same time as my cock.
I smirk, shaking my wet curls like a dog. I spray the papyrus scrolls on Lanlin’s desk with water droplets.
I have spent enough years bathing in rivers and air drying under the warm sun on their shores without the need to dry myself in perfumed, fluffy towels.
Water glistens on my pale chest and arms, as I slink across the bedroom to the carved cedarwood bed.
By the Shadow Devils, this is true decadence. Polished gold lion paws for legs? A headboard that is decorated with bat wings?
Yet I slept better in the company of my featherglass on piles of leaves. As much as I was sleeping next to killers then too, they were killers who I had trained myself. They were killers who were friends and family, who’d die for me, as much as I would die for them.
Who, precisely, is Lanlin?
The vampire is sprawled on his back in the incense scented linen nest. It is shocking that he is only dressed in a long, loose black robe but not any of his extravagant jewelry, make-up, or hair decorations that he wears like armor.
Not his gloves.
I climb onto the bed, hovering over Lanlin.
My breathing picks up.
Heisasleep, aye?
