He reached towards my waist, placing a hand on each hip,andpressinganother kiss on my stomach. My handsbeganto shake slightly, so I intertwined them into his chocolate-colored hair, wrapping the waves around my fingers.
Soon enough he had undone the buttons on my leatherpants, and I fear he had undone me, too.
Once the trousers were at my ankles, he carefully helped me step out of them. He reached up and grabbed the black silk pants on the lip of the sink, slowly helping me step into them and tying them into place at my waist. His fingertips grazed my skin, and it felt likeevery fiber of my beingwas lit on fire at the contact.
Rising from the floor, he slid the muted purple cotton shirt over my head. He paused to kiss the tip of my nose before the shirt was fully on, and Icouldn’thelp but grin. He guided me in turning me around, so he could button up the top of my shirt where the holes in the fabric were for my wings to poke through.
Coming around my right side to stand before me, he pulled me to him and wrapped me in his embrace. He rested his chin atop my head, and I buried my face in the tunic covering his sculpted chest.
“I thank the Stars for you daily, Avi,” he murmured, using the dead Northern language only him and I know,to saymy love. His grip on me tightened ever so slightly as he spoke.
I pulled back to gaze up at him.“As do I.”
Standing on my tiptoes, I grazed my lips againsthisin a feather-soft kiss.
“Your turn, my love,” I said, heading into the wardrobe to gather his sleep clothes.
Hedidn’tobject, and the rest of the night was full of tender love and stolen kisses,until I drifted off to sleep to the rhythm of his heartbeat and the steady feel of his chest rising and falling beneath my head.
Chapter Three
The slight heel of my black leather boots sounded across the stone floor as I made my way, step by step, down the damp spiral staircase.
Click click click.
That was the only noise I could focus on as it filled the space around me while I hurried down all forty-two cobbled steps. Once I arrived at the large, mostly empty, open room at the bottom of the staircase, I paused briefly,fishinga ring of keys out of the pocket of my navy overcoat. The silver threaded coat was so long it nearly reached my ankles, but Ididn’tmind so much.
It was attire like thisI’dseen Father wear so often during formal appearances, andeven tosimple meetings at times.
After all, it was his shoes I was trying to fill.
I made my way down the main corridor that acted as an artery to the dungeons below Gatlyn Castle, branching off in different directions.As I walked, I rubbed the edge of each key until I felt the groves of theoneI was looking for against the pad of my thumb.
Having turned into the west-branching corridor, I quickly arrived in front of the cell door I had been seeking out without truly realizing it. I had found myself doing that oftenlately—endingupat this cell, trying to get answers to questions I had no hope of solving on my own.
Not allowing myself to hesitate more than a moment, I shoved the key into the hole in the cell door and flicked it open.
Sweeping into the small room, the foul odoralways seemed to hitmy senses first.Naturally, as a Northerner, my eyesrapidlyadjusted to the dim light, making out thefaemale’s shape in the corner of the room.
When the prisoner seemed to let my presence go unnoticed, I ripped an unlit torch from the wall andcalled tothe power that felt like pure fury in my veins. Blowing onto the end of the torch, fire sprouted and grew from where my breath had touched.
The sudden light drew the fae prisoner from his slumber.
“Dimitri,” he breathed raggedly, dragging himself into a sitting position as his chains rattled with the motion.
With thealychitechains around his ankle being bolted to the floor, the malecouldn’treach my side of the small, rectangular room—at least not without cutting off his foot first.
Thealychitereallywasn’tnecessary with this prisoner, from what I understood. He had nozirilium, according to the accounts,and from what I had gathered myself over the past few weeks—almost amonth now.
Alychitewas one of the most valuable minerals the North was home to. With its ability to cut off a wielder from theirziriliumjust bymaintainingcontact, it had been used for decades by my father to helpmaintainhis control.
I glanced at the dark, heavy mineral in a rare moment of genuine curiosity. It was a wonder that the earth below naturally produced such a material. As if it always needed a way to keep usfaein check, just in case.
Fortunately for me, myself and those who had come before me mastered it beforeitcould masterus.
The prisoner slowly rose to his feet, his body stiff as he shielded his eyes against the torchlight.By lookingat only his mud-colored hair, he could almost pass as clean; it was the white streak covered in dirt and sweat that fell into his face which gave away just how filthyhe’dbecome in his time down here.
“Ezra,” I responded, my voice flat, with a practiced sort of coldness to it.
