Page 342 of Commanding Scythe and Sky

“Eat,” Cyrus demanded. I narrowed my eyes as I tore off a bite but begrudgingly had to admit the garlic-and-herb touch was really damn good—and fuck me, Cali or Gio must’ve been on kitchen duty.

“You eat,” I mumbled petulantly over my mouthful. All this needed was an orgasmic amount of spicy marinara and⁠—

“I did eat. Hours ago,” he said, leveling me with an arched eyebrow as he pointedly shoved a plate of bow-tie pasta slathered in red sauce toward me. Gio, then. None of the rest of us had ever mastered anything better than fettuccine, and mine still came out a fucked-up ball of gelatinous goo. Pretty sure Gio about pissed himself laughing the last time I tried.

Cyrus sat beside me, gingerly placing the enchanted journal Lana brought us on the table. In the next breath, he’d nicked his forearm with a blade, paying dutiful homage to the magic.

“Revela quod occultum est,” he said as I shoveled a forkful of pasta down the hatch. Reveal what is hidden.

In my opinion, spell weavers should be more creative. They seemed to despise naming things altogether—it was like calling a Chinese restaurant ‘Chinese Restaurant.’ I stuffed down another mouthful, only now realizing my stomach had that gnawing hollowness that came from skipping one too many meals.

Cyrus flipped the page, his eyes tracking between the journal and the two translation books permanently splayed open on the table. Somehow, with my mouth full of marinara, my gaze caught on the tendons and veins shifting beneath all that glorious ink, and then my core shifted for an entirely different reason.

My mate hadn’t kissed me since that day with Atreus in the pool house, much less moved any closer to doing anything else.

I didn’t know women could get blue balls until I spent four weeks side by side with Adonis himself, poring through tomes between watching him cut through demons like wheat and pluck mortals from their traps. Blue ovaries? That didn’t make any sense—I wanted to climb him like a tree, not have his babies. Maybe it would be easier if I didn’t know what he felt like ranging over me⁠—

“Freya?”

“Hmm?” I mumbled, swallowing so hard I winced.

“You okay?” he pressed, concern knitting his brows together.

“Fine, just thinking,” I said, taking another bite in a rush just for something to keep my mouth occupied.

“Mm-hmm,” he hummed, arching that brow again as he glanced down to the journal.

“Why? Are you okay?” I swallowed hard, wishing I was as adept at translation as he was. Latin, I had bits and pieces of, but this thing was a mix of Old English—the most forgiving of the texts—Scots, Umbrithan, and Gaelic. The enchantments weren’t the only defense Rhiannon had given her thoughts.

“I think… I think our fair mother, the late queen, had a lover.”

Pasta turning to stone in my throat, I forced a swallow that felt more like I’d taken a punch to the jugular, my eyes watering. “Before Koa?”

“Maybe?”

“That didn’t sound spectacularly certain.”

“Because I’m not. And—hear me out⁠—”

“Always an excellent way to start theorizing.”

“—she writes about him a lot. Golden hair. A sun-emblazoned shield.”

Blinking, I said, “The Roman?”

“I told you he was connected somehow.”

“Right but… how?”

“She has records of this warrior long before the deal was struck with the necromancers.”

“I thought the Scots were orators?”

“They were, but the Saxons wrote shit down.”

“Right, but she was⁠—”

“Objection, Your Honor. Relevance?”