“I’m fine,” I insisted. The stink of the feed was starting to permeate the air around us, stagnant. Alaryk took the bucket from me, hoisting it effortlessly, like it weighed nothing. And he took Syris’s too.
“I’ll see you there myself,” he rasped, jerking his head in a movement that made it clear I should start walking. “Get moving.”
His lipsnearlytwitched at the sharp look I cut at him. We didn’t need to bond our magic for him to hear the thought, loud and clear, that went sizzling through my mind.
Bossy.
His eyes dropped to my lips, his pupils flaring. I nearly sucked in a squeaked breath, but then I turned on my heel and trudged up the path, falling in line with Syris, who looked back and forth between Alaryk and me.
“I don’t want to hear it,” I said quietly.
“I wasn’t going to say anything,” she whispered back. She flexed her hand, a line of red cutting across her palm from the bucket’s rope handle. “I’m just glad I don’t have to lug that thing around.”
“You’re the one who offered to help Moak,” I pointed out.
She was wisely silent.
I cast a look over my shoulder. Moak was ahead of us on the pathway, but Alaryk was directly behind us. His blue eyes were piercing when they connected with mine. Then they flicked to my backside before running down the line of my long legs. Then back up again.
My belly fluttered. I could feel my pulse between my legs. If I swayed my hips a little more, knowing he was watching…well, I would never admit to it.
With Alaryk walking with us, no one looked in my directiononceas we passed. And the time to the hatchery was short considering I wasn’t carrying the hatchling feed up the incline.
My guard—Tybor—straightened, a look of dread passing over his face when he saw Alaryk with us. He’d been waiting at the entrance of the hatchery. Moak clapped him on the shoulder, as if in apology, and Syris followed behind him as they entered the door.
“I’ll speak with you later,” Alaryk told him.
“Yes,Karath,” Tybor said, keeping a brave face.
I gave Tybor an apologetic smile as I passed him and sensed that Alaryk was right behind me as I entered the atrium.
“You can just leave that here,” I told him, oddly feeling a little shy when I found we were alone. Ahead of us, I could hear Syris and Moak passing through the incubation room, their voices echoing before a door shut, and then there was quiet.
“Come with me,” he said instead, leading us through the hatchery as I followed behind him. Past the incubation room—six eggs left, I counted, most of them Rythbacks—we entered the hallway that led to the kitchens and the courtyard, the sleeping-quarter doors shut.
Alaryk left the buckets of hatchling feed in the hallway and then pulled me into my old room.
“What are you?—”
The moment he shut the door, his mouth was on mine. And I’d never thought of myself aseasy, but I submitted to his kiss almost immediately, folding like the fur blanket I’d straightened on the bed that morning.
He pushed me back into the door, the gold handle pressing hard into my spine, but I didn’t mind. My hand dove into his hair as he crouched, as I went on my tiptoes for more.
His tongue was hot as it tangled with mine, kissing me harder, a low growl starting in his chest, one that I knew might bleed through the wood door, out into the hallway.
When he tore his mouth away, it seemed like it was nearly infrustration. With my pulse jumping in my throat and my lips reddened, I watched him run a hand through his hair, looking around my old room with unseeing eyes, the front of his trews tented, his cock straining the laces.
I didn’t know what was happening, but this was Daylight Alaryk…and I hadn’t expected Daylight Alaryk to push me into a room and kiss me senselessly,hungrily, against a door. As if he couldn’t go a second longer without it.
I nearly grinned in victory.
Darkness Alaryk would do that. Darkness Alaryk would slip his fingers between my legs and squeeze my ass with his other hand. Darkness Alaryk would smirk as he watched me tug on his metal piercings with my teeth.
I’d been twitchy and aching between my thighs all throughout today already. He’d only made it worse.
“It’s flattering how much you want me,” I found my glib tongue commenting, trying to keep a straight face and failing. My words were meant to lighten the tension strumming between us.
Alaryk glared after he ran a palm down his face. “Just you wait until tonight,” he growled. He returned to me, pressing me back into the door. “Does that please you,mariss? That I’ve thought about you allfuckingday?”
