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Soft, plaintive whimpers fell like rose petals from my lips as he slowly extracted his fingers, making a point to look me dead in the eye as he licked every one clean. “I do so love the way you push me, little bug.”

I was weak-kneed, shock waves of pleasure lacing with the softest edge of agony pulsed through me chasing every heartbeat. Without the wall of his flesh and the wall of stone behind me, I would have blown away in the wind and let it carry me and my pleasure away into those stars and their golden sun.

I smiled, unable to articulate any sort of thought as he swept me up into his arms. I buried my head into the comforting woodsy scent of him, breathing it in and cherishing every lung full of his essence. I didn’t even notice that we went down into the darkness again. Didn’t notice the long descent that spiraled stone staircase lined with guttering torches. I didn’t notice the way every time my lips came close to his bare skin he seemed to have to adjust me.

I did notice when we evened out and the warm torch fire puddled on the mold covered damp stone. “Don’t leave me in the dark again . . . please.”

The torchlight robbed me of the ancient woods of his gaze, but he watched me for a moment before nodding. “As you wish, little bug.”

He turned away from the Maw, and we descended farther into the darkness, the torches growing sparser until we, once again, leveled out into a stale smelling tunnel cut into the bedrock. Down in this area, there were no torches to eat up the thin air. Rows of pale ghostly blue light hung from the ceiling like strings of starlight casting eerie shadows as we moved through the tunnel. Rotten, moldering wooden doors remained silent witnesses as we passed them. None looked like they had been opened in a hundred or more years.

Cavernous black tunnels spiderwebbed off into the darkness from the light of our single tunnel. Small gusts of air came rolling through each one as we passed like the rock itself were breathing.

The last door was unlike the others. This one was delicately worked with a metal wrought scene of a stag pierced by the rays of a dawning sun. It was breathtaking craftsmanship cast as an overlay on what looked like the polished and well-oiled walnut burl of a heavy door. The shimmering ghost lights above us made the stag look like it was breathing, suffering through the spears of light that sliced into its iron flesh.

The Raven watched it for a moment and drew in a steadying breath before he reached out, took hold of the great curling root of an alder tree fashioned into the handle, and yanked it. The sound of bacon sizzling filled the otherwise hauntingly silent space before the scent of burning rotten flesh hit my nose.

“Holy Jesus. What the fuck is that smell?” I was clawing at my face before I realized that, despite all my attempts, I could neither free my hands nor get to my face, so I was just smooshing the cloak into my nose, trying to chase the offending scent from it.

“As ever, little bug, your manners are impeccable,” he grumbled, stepping into the darkness of the space behind the door. He took ten long-legged, counted steps forward, turned went three paces, and set me down.

I expected to be set upon rock or stone or some other horrible cold and uncomfortable thing, but instead, I was set down into the soft cloud of fabric. His footfalls were muffled by something, and I called out into the blackness, “Wait! Don’t leave me!”

“You asked not to be left in the darkness, little bug.” The velvet of his rich bass came from a distance, and I turned to it, hungry not to be left alone in the dark and the dank in an unknown place again. “And I won’t.”

Crackling, like the crunch of an old water bottle bending to the power of a fist, filled the chamber before a warm light chased away the silence, cold, and darkness. Light swirled around the room in a gutter carved into the stone near the ceiling radiating down off the painted stone ceiling to illuminate a lavish, masculine room.

“What . . . ?”

My eyes darted over every surface, trying to make sense of where I was and what was around me.

It seemed incongruous to what one would expect at the end of a creepy stone tunnel in what I was pretty sure was a dungeon. This room alone was more lavish than the entirety of the Ard Rí’s apartments. The bed I sat on was not as ornate, but it was carved walnut, just like the door, oiled to a high sheen and nearly glittering in the warmth of the strange light. The coverlet was a rich silken velvet of deepest dark green. There was a hand-woven carpet on the stone floors. Two armoires covered one wall. A cherrywood desk and matching chair on another. An arming stand in one corner. Artwork adorned every wall. Small items of lavish wealth but practicality were scattered on surfaces.

“Did you think I disappeared into the ether when I wasn’t attending to you?” He folded himself into the desk chair.

I couldn’t help but notice that neatly displayed on a shelf carved into the stone right above the desk were twenty pairs of black leather gloves. Nor could I ignore the two glass-like roses that were hung upside down from the shelf, their petal edges curling into a papery snow blue. I followed the line of the pillow that seemed to be most used and noticed that the shelf was perfectly center to where one would be sat if they were in the bed. Cute.

“Well, no, but . . .”

“So, I had to go somewhere, right?” He cut me a rogue’s grin as he gingerly peeled off the gloves and set them on the desk. The palm, fingers and thumb of the hand he had used to open the door were blackened, rotting and oozing with a dark ichor that did not look healthy at all.

“Raven!” I screamed and made to leap from the bed.

“Calm, little bug. It is but an iron bite. The Ard Rí has a sense of humor.” The top of a small pot was flipped open, and he fumbled to fish some of the ointment out.

“Here . . . let me hel—”

“Sit your pretty little ass on that bed, Cricket. If you put a foot on that carpet, I will string you up in the Maw and leave you for a week.”

The razor sliced through his calm.

I recoiled. “I just wanted to help.”

“I’m aware of what you wanted to do. And I tell you sit. If you wish to help, keep talking. Keep my mind from this bite.”

He was wincing through each word as he applied the salve.

“Where are we?”