I should have taken the blow. Arran was the one who should have ruled. The strategic one, the commander, the most powerful fae in millennia. The greatest power Annwyn had ever seen. Lying prone and injured in the human realm because he had made the mistake of falling in love with me.
Elayne grabbed by my hand. This time she held it much tighter, so I could not twist away.
“It is not your fault,” she said. I recognized where Arran had gotten the steel that so often lined his words.
My lips were trembling. No, that was my chin. “I nearly killed my mate. The High King. Your son.” My entire body was shaking with the force of silent sobs.
I did not see Elayne shaking her head in the periphery of my vision until she lifted her free hand to my face and turned it, so I had no choice but to look directly at her. I did not have the will to fight. I was not even sure how I was still upright.
Her dark gaze bore into mine. “I absolve you.”
“You can’t,” I whispered.
She held my chin tight between her fingers. All the command of the Lady of Eilean Gayl, the female who had survived rape and torture and somehow found love, raised a male like Arran, was in her gaze and in her words. “I love my son. And I have no trouble at all seeing why he fell in love with you. He would be proud of you now for trying to do what is best for Annwyn.”
I tried to shake my head. She would not let me. I tried words instead. “I promised him a thousand years. I promised him I would wait.”
“For Arran, there is no higher calling than duty.”
“Except love.” I dreamed about the first time I’d realized it, standing on the cliff edge on the other side of The Crossing. When I closed my eyes, that was the moment that came back to me most often—not when he’d told me, but when I’d felt the absolute certainty of his love through the mating bond.
“Why must they be in opposition?” Elayne released my chin but waited, perhaps to see what I’d do. But I sat still. Frozen. Broken. “You can love Arran and your kingdom, Veyka. There is enough of you to love both.”
I actually laughed. A terrible, unhinged sound that mocked the word. “My mate, my friends, my subjects… the more I love, the more I stand to lose.”
“I see.”
She did not try to argue. I was thankful for that.
“You are soaked through. I will call for your handmaiden. How convenient that fire of hers must be at bath time. Then you are to bed.” She spoke with such calm conviction. Do this, then this, next this. Simple steps to move through the next minutes and hours, when nothing about my life was simple anymore.
“People do not usually give me commands,” I said vaguely.
A hand landed on my shoulder, squeezing. “Mothers are exempt from such strictures.”
I knew my chin was wobbling again, my whole body trembling as I looked up at her. Maybe it hadn’t stopped. I probably would not have noticed.
Mother.
I hardly recognized the word.
Understanding flashed in her dark eyes. I did not have the energy left to protest, to explain, to deflect… not as she eased me back onto the bed and walked to the adjoining door to summon Cyara.
“Rest, Veyka. You are safe for tonight. Tomorrow, we shall plan.”
32
VEYKA
The heat built in my body slowly. So deliciously slowly. Hands that were not my own stroked, reverently tracing every inch. They cupped my full breasts, teasing the nipples with fluttering touches until my breasts were heavy and aching. But then they moved away, tracing the midline of my body, pausing to circle my belly button and the soft rise of flesh above my navel.
Then the calloused fingertips disappeared, replaced by impossibly soft lips. Stubble scraped across the tender plane of my belly, just a little too rough, pushing me a little too close to the edge. Much more and I would lose control.
Control… an illusion. I was not in control of this. Had never been, since that first moment. This was destiny. This was a joining preordained by Ancestors and gods and whatever forces governed the endless realms of existence—human, fae, faerie… all bowed before our union.
Those soft lips kissed down my body, hands pinning my legs down and apart. A long lick of that sensitive seam where my body met my legs. Down, down, down towards my center. Until that was being licked, too. A long, luxurious lick up my slit, then back down again. This time, his tongue slid betweenmy folds, tasting the desire that was already flowing hot and fragrant.
I could smell my desire as he tasted me, hear his groan in my ears as he savored and nibbled at my flesh. It was so impossibly decadent, no hurry at all to those long strokes. We had all the time in the world for these touches. Unending minutes and hours and days to discover one another, to worship at the altar of our love.
