The room was a pain-filled blur at first, but my vision sharpened just in time to see Adara shove Prentis against the wall. A surge of emotion filled me at the sight of her. Sparks danced all along her skin and hair, her cornflower-blue gaze blazing with unbridled fury, and she looked like she was on the verge of combusting into a flaming supernova.
But Prentis was hardly cowed by the display of power, filled with his own righteous anger. “Why are you doing this?” he snarled, his fingers wrapping around the wrist of the hand that was pinning him to the wall. “How can you defend him when he mauled you like a savage anim—"
“He didn’t maul me,” Adara interrupted, her voice so frigid that it sent an icy shiver from my spine to my toes. “He bit me on the neck, because Iasked him to.”
I froze as the bald-faced lie dropped from Adara’s lips, shattering the tension in the air. “You didwhat?” Prentis asked, his face going slack.
“You heard what I said.” Adara’s cheeks were bright pink now, but she didn’t back down. “I told him to bite me. Iwanted it.”
Prentis stared at Adara for a long moment, his face frozen in an almost comical expression of confused horror. When he finally turned his head to look at me, I’d schooled my own features into a stoic mask. But privately, I was just as blown away by Adara’s statement as he was.
I’d expected Adara to condemn me for what I’d done, even if she didn’t yet understand the full extent of it. The violation I’d committed on her body was unforgivable, even under the laws of my own people, and if Prentis fully understood what I’d just done, he would have had me executed.
Yet not only did she not lash out at me, she’d put herself between me and Prentis and defended me. Had outrightliedfor me.
Shame burned at the corners of my eyes, and I had to resist the urge to hang my head.
Finally, Prentis shook his head and pushed Adara’s hand off him. He walked to the still-open door, then paused at the threshold, hand digging into one of his pockets.
“I came here to unlock your shackles,” he said. Something flashed through the air, and I instinctively reached out and caught it. “Lady Axlya said that since you’ve done the water realm such a tremendous service by fighting at Adara’s side, it would be remiss of us to keep you trussed up like a prisoner.” His jaw hardened as he met my gaze, his crystalline eyes sharp as fresh-cut glass. “I hope her faith in you is not misplaced.”
He strode out the door, leaving the keys to my shackles burning a hole in my palm.
16
Adara
“How are you feeling, my dear? All rested up from your travels?”
I sipped from my cup of tea as I pretended to consider Lady Axlya’s question. We were having tea in her sunroom, my legs tucked under me as I sat on one of the many large, plush pillows clustered around a low table. A spread of assorted cakes and sandwiches had been set out atop it, along with a crystal-blue tea service that had to cost more than my mother’s house.
“I’m feeling much better, Great-Grandmother,” I said, setting my cup of tea on the matching saucer. My neck tingled where Einar had bitten me yesterday, and I had to resist the urge to brush my fingers against the spot. It had healed in less than an hour, just like most of my injuries did when I wasn’t magically exhausted. Yet I could still feel the phantom puncture of his fangs in my flesh. It was if he were still inside me, as though he’d left a piece of himself within me, and while it didn’t hurt, I didn’t quite know what to make of it. “A good night’s rest was exactly what I needed after yesterday’s events.”
“I would imagine so,” she said archly. “You’ve been through quite a lot over the past week, not just yesterday.”
“It’s only natural that she would have been out of sorts,” Kalis, the fae male sitting on Axlya’s right, said. He reached over and plucked a sandwich from one of the trays, offering it to Axlya. I watched, slightly uncomfortable--and more than slightly fascinated--as she allowed him to feed it to her, licking the crumbs off his fingers before sitting back with a satisfied smile on her face. He’d been one of the fae sitting on the dais next to Axlya yesterday, and it had shocked me to learn that two of those fae hadn’t just been Lady Axlya’s advisors.
They were also herconsorts.
The consorts were with us this morning—Kalis, and also Ilsa, a female with short, wavy teal hair who sat on Axlya’s left. Axlya had introduced them when I’d walked in, and I’d had to clench my jaw to keep it from dropping off the floor when she’d told me about the nature of their relationship.
“We heard about the… incident, involving you, Einar, and Lord Prentis,” Ilsa spoke up. She picked up the teapot and refilled my cup, her lips curving with faint amusement. “It appears you’ve inherited your mother’s talent for fostering romantic drama.”
I stiffened at the implied insult. “I beg your pardon?”
“Don’t mind Ilsa,” Lady Axlya said. She gave her consort a mild look of disapproval, but Ilsa merely lifted a shoulder, looking unrepentant. It seemed that Lady Axlya’s consorts weren't especially subservient to her. “She lets her tongue run away with her sometimes, and she has a quite a taste for juicy gossip and rumors.” Her gaze flickered to my neck, and I had to fight against the blush threatening to creep up my face. “You haven’t actually engaged in relations with the dragon, have you?”
“No!” Heat exploded across my face, and the spot on my neck throbbed in response, sending a pulse of need straight into my core. It took everything I had not to bury myself in the pillows out of sheer embarrassment. “I haven’t engaged in relations with anyone.”
“Really? You’re a virgin? At your age?” Axlya clucked her tongue.
“I… is that a bad thing?”
“It’s uncommon amongst water fae for a female to remain chaste once she reaches puberty,” Axlya said in a matter-of-fact tone. She gave Kalis a sly smile, threading her fingers through his. “When I took Kalis to my bed, I was sixteen years old, fresh from my coming-of-age ceremony.” Her voice lowered into a sensual purr that made me want to squirm. “The chemistry between us was positively explosive.”
Kalis gave Axlya a wicked grin. “It was even more explosive once Ilsa entered our lives.” He met the other fae’s gaze over Axlya’s shoulder, the thoughts dancing behind his eyes so obviously carnal, I wondered if I should leave the room.
“I didn’t realize water fae were so openly sensual… or in the habit of taking multiple partners.,” I said, trying to draw their attention away from each other. I had no desire to witness my great-grandmother tango with her two closest lovers.
