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"Forbidden things have a secret charm."
─── · 。ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───
A TUG on my chin, and I rose to my feet steadily. Rhys dragged his eyes over me, roving over every inch of my body as he took in my appearance. The smug and dismissive air I had cast around myself. I was forced to wonder if it was truly all for show as his eyes glazed a bit.
He led me a few steps onto the dais—to the mighty throne. He sat, smirking faintly at his monstrous court. Owning every inch of the throne. Of these people. A cruel and unfeeling King and his smug harlot. What a pair.
With a tug on my waist and one graceful motion, Rhys perched me on his lap.
And I found that I did not mind in the slightest.
I situated myself, draping my limbs over his body and splaying myself across the throne in a way that accentuated every dip and curve of my lengthy limbs. My soft skin, the glittering fabric I wore, the wave of my hair, the white diadem resting atop my head.
At least I was a luxurious whore.
The part I had to play; the role I had taken. Rhysand's whore. Who I had been under the mountain. Who the world expected me to be. The dangerous new pet that Mor's father would now seek to feel out.
For the moment, I did not mind. Let them stare; let them wonder. I was a true mystery, a woman from Spring Court turned to the dark side with her traitorous sister. I did not care a lick about their indiscreet whispers.
After all, I was the one on the throne. Not them.
Rhys's hand slid along my waist in a fluid movement, the other running down my exposed thigh. Cold—his hands were so cold I forced down a reaction. As though his veins had turned to ice altogether.
I wondered if it was the mask he now wore and the power he let loose, or if it was simply the people around us.
He must have realized how cold he truly was because less than a heartbeat later his hands had warmed to the touch. His thumb, curving around my thigh, gave a slow stroke as if to say sorry. I ran a featherlight finger along his forearm to say it's alright.
Rhys indeed leaned in to bring his mouth to the shell of my ear, well aware his subjects had not yet risen from the floor. All of their heads bowed and looking down, hands on their knees as though they prayed. Prayed to some faithless god to grant them safety.
I could not deny some part of me felt a sick satisfaction.
The High Lord whispered to me, his words a soft caress while his other hand stroked the bare skin of my ribs in lazy, indolent circles, "Try not to let it get to your head."
I let the amusement shine in my eyes as I leaned back slowly, my back colliding with his chest. I felt the warmth radiating from him. The soft rise and fall of his chest as he breathed in and out. I inclined my chin to the side slightly, sparing him a glance from the corner of my eye before I purred back, "And what would that be?"
Rhys's breath circled my ear, his lips brushing against me as he gave one of his feline grins. "That every male in here is contemplating what they'd be willing to give up to have that pretty, red mouth of yours on them."
A soft and confident hum escaped from me as I turned my head to survey the crowd around us. Catching a few daring eyes who looked up, eyes who very quickly looked away as they saw the absolute menace of an expression on my face.
Not a blush to be seen. Why would I? It was true after all.
I was beautiful. I was strong.
I had survived and triumphed. Lost one battle and gained the war. I would not be so easily broken again. Would not retreat into myself as I would've months ago.
So I smiled as a laugh gave way, the first smile these people had seen. Let them see that pretty, red mouth, and my white, straight teeth.
Rhysand's hand slid higher up my thigh, the proprietary touch of a male who knew he owned someone body and soul. He'd apologized in advance for it—for this game and the roles we had to play.
He kept forgetting that I understood. That I knew this was simply a stage and we were the actors.
I leaned further into that touch, softly pressing myself further into his hard, warm body. Pressed so closely against him I felt the rumble of his chest as he at last commanded his court, "Rise."
As one, they did. I smirked at some of them, a smirk of challenge and amusement. A silent dare. My lips were parted ever so slightly as I looked across the crowd. Studying them with a lethal smile.
Rhys brushed a knuckle against the inside of my knee and my very being narrowed to that touch alone.
"Go play," He spoke to them all but his attention was not on them. No, I felt the pierce of his stare on me as he brushed his hands along my skin with a soft and yet clear touch. I didn't loathe the fact.
His subjects obeyed. Music striking up in some far off corner as the crowd dispersed, a soft chatter drowning out the looming silence that had been there mere moments ago.
"Keir," Rhys beckoned, his voice cutting through the crowd like lightning on a stormy night.
The mere whisper of a word from the High Lord's mouth was all that was needed to summon Mor's father to the foot of the dais. The blonde male bowed again, his face dancing with an icy resentment as he took in Rhys, then me—glancing once at Mor and the Illyrians.
Cassian gave Keir a slow nod that told him he remembered—would never forget—what the steward of the Hewn city had done to his daughter.
But it was from Azriel that he cringed away. From the sight of truth-teller; the look on the shadowsinger's face. One of pure darkness and an icy rage that would never melt.
Good on him. Keir should be scared, because if they did not kill him, I surely would.
Sadly, they had first dibs. Those three deserved it.
"Report." was all Rhys said, not deigning to even glance in the direction of the blonde man as his head sidled near the crook of my neck. He stroked a knuckle down my ribs, sparing a small dismissive nod to Cassian, Azriel, and Mor and the three disappeared within the harsh, chattering crowd of people.
Before Rhys, Keir was nothing but a sullen child. Yet, Mor's father had to have been older. Far older. The Steward clung to power, it seemed.
Rhys was power.
"Greetings, milord." He spoke. Ew. "And greetings to your...guest." he spared a glance at me, a hidden disgrace in his gaze. Oh, he did not like me at all. I suppose it was good that the feeling was mutual.
Rhys's hand flattened on my thigh as he angled his head to look at me. "She is lovely, isn't she?"
"Indeed." Keir said, lowering his eyes. "There is little to report, milord. It has been quiet since your last visit."
"No one for me to punish?" A cat playing with his food.
"Unless you'd like me to select someone here, no, milord."
Rhys clicked his tongue, "Pity." He again surveyed me, then leaned to tug my earlobe with his teeth.
I grinned. Damn me to hell, but I pulled my head back to rest on his shoulder. Draping my body like a sculpture. A motion I had done more times than I cared to count.
His teeth pressed down at the same moment his thumb drifted high on the side of my thigh, sweeping across sensitive skin in a long, silky touch. My body went loose and tight, and my breathing...
Oh, Cauldron damn me. I was doomed.
His touch was the sweetest form of torture. The best type of pain. A simple taste of the world's most irresistible drink. It was as though my entire body screamed at me, my skin crawling with warmth. The scent of him, citrus and the sea, the power roiling off him...my breathing hitched ever so slightly.
I knew he noticed. Knew he felt that shift in me.
His fingers stilled on my leg.
I wished they hadn't.
Bad, Dani. Play the part.
Keir began mentioning people in the court, inconsequential people I didn't really care to listen about. He rattled away, his voice monotonous as he spewed boring information. Bland reports on marriages and allegiances, blood-feuds, and Rhys let him talk.
His thumb stroked again, this time accompanied with his pointer finger.
I was going to die here. I was going to become such a roiling mass of traitorous thoughts and screaming urges, that I'd get absolutely nothing done.
A dull roaring filled my ears, drowning out everything but that touch on the inside of my leg. The music was throbbing, ancient, wild, and people ground against each other to it.
His eyes on the Steward, Rhys made vague nods every now and then. While his fingers continued their slow, steady stroking on my thighs rising higher with every pass.
People watched. Even as they drank and ate, even as some danced in small circles, people were watching. I was sitting in his lap, his own personal plaything, his every touch visible to them and I did not even care. It may has well been just the two of us.
Keir listed the expenses and costs of running the court, and Rhys gave another vague nod. This time, his nose brushed the spot between my neck and shoulder, followed by a passing graze of his mouth.
And I forgot why we were in this Court entirely.
My breasts tightened, becoming full and heavy and aching—aching like what was no pooling in my core. Heat filling my blood.
But Keir said at last, as if his own self control slipped its leash, "I heard the rumors, but I didn't quite believe them. His gaze settled on me, on my breasts, peaked through the folds of my dress, of my legs, spread wider than they were minutes before, and Rhys's hand in dangerous territory. "But it seems true: Tamlin's pet and his lover now owned by another master."
Pet? Really?
"You should see how I make her beg." Rhys murmured, nudging my neck with his nose.
You should see how I could make you beg.
Oh, my gods. That thought did not just cross my mind. Awe, hell, control yourself Danika.
Keir clasped his hands behind his back. "I assume you brought her to make a statement."
"You know everything I do is a statement."
Such a trend-setter, he was.
"Of course." Keir replied, "This one, it seems, you enjoy putting in cobwebs and crowns."
Rhys's hand paused, and my eyes finally drifted over to the man, cocking my head in a predatory expression. I looked at the disgust on his face; the absolute damning in his eyes. I smiled again, a smile that had Keir standing impossibly straighter. I said in a voice cool as stone, "Careful." My grin widened, "Perhaps I'll put a leash on you." He would be quite a pretty pet.
Rhys's approval tapped against my impenetrable mental shields, the hands at my ribs again making lazy circles. "She does enjoy playing." He mused onto my shoulder. He jerked his chin toward the Steward. "Get her some wine."
Pure command. No politeness.
Keir stiffened, but strode off as his master commanded. Which one of us was the pet again?
Rhys didn't dare break from his mask, but the light kiss he placed beneath my ear told me enough. Apology and gratitude—and more apologies. He didn't like this any more than I did. Parading around as though I was something to be claimed. And yet to get what we needed, to buy Azriel time...He would do it. So would I. And I'd do it with glee.
I wondered, then, with his hands beneath my breasts and between my legs, what he wouldn't give of himself. Wondered if...if perhaps the arrogance and swagger...if they masked a male who perhaps thought he wasn't worth very much at all.
That single thought gave me pause. Made me think and think again. Trying and failing to understand how he could possibly ever see himself that way and if he did at all. Wishing that he could see himself the way I saw him.
I twisted, studying his face. There was nothing warm in his eyes, nothing of the male I knew. I opened my shield enough to let him in just a little. What? His voice floated into my mind.
I reached down the bond between us, caressing that wall of ebony adamant. A small sliver cracked—just for me. I said into it as though it were the most clear thing in the world, Rhys, this mask does not scare me. You are kind. I see you beneath it.
It was so very obvious. He was kind and selfless and at times quite arrogant. But he was not cruel. Not ever. And I truly wished he saw that too.
His hands tightened on me, and his eyes held mine as he leaned in to brush his mouth against my cheek. It was answer enough, and...an unleashing.
I leaned a bit more against him, my eyes matching my words as I said into that sliver of mind, Why'd you stop?
A near-silent growl reverberated against me, he stroked my ribs again in time to the beat of the music, his thumb nearly rising high enough to graze the underside of my breasts.
I let my head drop back against his shoulder. And I just became. Let go.
I became the music, and the drums, and the wild thing in the High Lord's arms they all believed me to be.
His eyes were wholly glazed—and not with power or rage, that was clear enough. Something red-hot and edged with the glittering darkness of starlight exploded in my mind.
I dragged a teasing hand down his thigh, feeling the hidden warrior's strength there. Looking at him through hooded eyes, I dragged it back up again in a long, idle stroke, needing to touch him, feel him as though it had been ingrained in my veins.
Control. Something I had always struggled with when leashing my short temper. And yet I never thought I'd have trouble leashing...this.
Rhys shifted his hips, rubbing against me with enough pressure that i lost all sense of thought and reality. I didn't care about anything. Not the mission, not the Flame, not the fact Azreil was stealing the orb at this very second. I didn't give a lick.
I had been so cold, so lonely for so long and my body cried out at the contact, at the joy of being touched and held.
The hand that had been on my waist slid across my abdomen, hooking onto the low slung belt there. I rested my head between his shoulder and neck, staring at the crowd as they stared at me, savoring every place Rhysand and I connected and wanting more.
At last, when my blood began to boil, when Rhys skimmed the underside of my breast with his knuckle, I looked to where I knew Keir was standing. Watching us, my wine forgotten in his hand.
We both did.
The Steward was staring unabashedly as he leaned against the wall. Unsure whether to interrupt and half terrified to. I let my unbridled smugness shine, smiling at the man. A threat clear as day.
I knew Rhys was holding Keir's gaze as the tip of his tongue slid up my neck.
Oh, gods.
I arched my back, eyes fluttering closed, breathing uneven.
I think he's so disgusted that he might have given me the orb just to get out of here, Rhys said in my mind, that other hand drifting dangerously south. But there was such a growing ache there, and I wore nothing beneath at would conceal the damning evidence if he slid his hand a fraction higher.
Well, we put on a good show, I said back, my voice something husky and sultry.
His hand slid to my upper thigh, curving in.
I ground against him, in a slow movement. Trying to shift his hands away from what he'd learn—
To find him hard against my backside.
Every thought eddied from my head. Only a thrill of power remained as I writhed against that impressive length. Rhys let out a low, rough laugh.
Keir just watched and watched and watched. Rigid. Horrified. Stuck here, until Rhys released him. I Had the urge to laugh at the awful man.
Instead, I turned around again, meeting Rhysand's now-blazing eyes, and then licked up the column of his throat in an agonizingly slow movement I knew would send him into a mess.
I faced forward and Rhys dragged his tongue along the back of my neck, right over my spine just as I shifted into the hardness pushing into me.
This was it. This was all that mattered. This.
I felt hot all over. Like fire was dancing across my skin. Taunting me with its flames as it used my very desires and turned them into something bigger. Needs. As though my life depended on his hands roaming my body and the way his touch was like electricity shocking my veins.
He felt like every dark thought I ever had.
And I did not think I would ever get enough.
We'd danced around and teased and taunted each other for months, and that was all it had been. And yet, the taste of him threatened to destroy me, consume me, and—
Azriel. He returned, sparing his High Lord a quick and subtle nod. He'd gotten the orb.
Mor slid up to the spymaster, offering him a little grin that would no doubt spread rumors before she sauntered into the crowd again. Dazzling, Distracting, leaving them thinking Az had been here the whole time, leaving them pondering if she'd extend Azriel an invitation to her bed.
Azriel just stared after Mor, distant and bored. I wondered if he was as much a mess inside as I was.
Rhys crooked a finger to Keir, who, scowling a bit in his daughter's direction, stumbled forward with my wine.He'd barely reached the dais before Rhys's power took it from him, floating the goblet to us.
Rhys set it on the ground beside the throne, a stupid task he'd thought up for the Steward to remind him of his powerlessness. That this throne was not his.
"Should I test it for poison?" Rhys drawled as he said into my mind, Cassian is waiting. Go.
The High Lord had the same sex-addled expression on his perfect face—but shadows lay in his eyes.
Maybe after Amarantha, he didn't want to be touched by a woman like that. And I did not blame him. She had done such...horrific things to him I could scarcely think about it without the threat of my magic ready to unleash itself.
I had been tortured and tormented, but his horrors had gone to another level.
I knew that if I ever got the chance to go back in time to the moment of her death...I would do it myself. And I would make it last far longer than it had. Would make her suffer twice as long as her reign of Prythian. Ten times as long as the years she hurt him.
"No, milord," Keir groveled. "I would never dare harm you." The Stewards' eyes flitted to me, narrowing into slits as disgust marred his features. He looked me up and down, just as the entire court did.
I was forced to wonder how he had managed to stay alive this long as he spoke his next words to me directly.
The male's stupidity reached an entirely different level. Even with the High Lord at my back, Keir hissed almost too quietly to hear. "You'll get what's coming to you, whore."
Below us, I felt the low tremble of the mountain. The beginning of an earthquake powerful enough to lay waste to the world.
I felt the quickening of my heart beat as the rumble of Rhysand's power raced around the room, filling the space around us with a near suffocating display of magic.
It was as though I could see the High Lord's power beginning to lash out. A midnight hand reaching for Keir to grab with its dark claws, ready to sink its talons into the man without a beat of hesitation.
But I was more than happy to fight my own battles.
My own magic—one of lethal light and a scorching electricity—reached out a fist, grabbing Rhysand's power with an iron grip as I stopped the magic in its tracks.
Rhysand jerked in his seat almost imperceptibly, surprise racing down our bond as I threw his power back to him.
Keir was mine.
Rhysand's toned muscles had turned to stone beneath me. His body so tense I wondered how he hadn't snapped in two. He waited. Watching in his silent shock to see what I would do and how I would react.
I cocked my head at Mor's father, a predator through and through.
I had dropped the mask of Rhysand's little play thing. No longer his bold harlot, no, I was powerful.
White flames surrounded the pupil of my eye, igniting like the fire of stars as I bared my teeth at the male. The blonde's eyes widened into disbelief, I could have sworn his high and mighty demeanor stumbled.
My voice was no more than a sweet coated threat as I spoke softly, "I assume you haven't heard of my feats Under the Mountain, Keir." A slip in the sugar dripping from my voice, "Surely you wouldn't be so stupid as to make an enemy out of me otherwise."
He drew back his fear, steeling himself into the emotionless male I'd met less than an hour ago. "You entered our city with a display of power, intending to force our respect. But I assure you, I will not be fooled by your pathetic attempts at gaining the court's favor." he sneered.
I laughed out right, staring him straight in his lifeless eyes as I did. "Respect? Gain your favor?" Another laugh as I waved a hand toward him. "Please, you're hilarious." my smile faded into no more than void. "I would and I could snap your neck with half a thought at this very moment. A single will and you would be dead in less than a second."
Genuine fear flashed through his eyes. Fear that his life could be ended without a second thought. In the snap of a finger. Living then dead.
I grinned. A feral show of teeth that conveyed my intent perfectly. "They call me World Breaker, Keir." a small tilt of my head as I looked the male up and down, "Shall I break yours?"
A hot breath tickled my nape as Rhysand hummed in my ear. A sound of utter approval. "Please," he purred, "be my guest."
"Lovely." I whispered right back, drawing my chin upwards and lengthening the word barely more than a sick murmur.
My power cut through the world as though the folds of reality had been sliced right open. A sickening snap sounded throughout the room, Keir's scream following as he fell to his knees.
Everyone watched as bands of white light encircled his arms like snakes crawling up his skin until they surrounded his neck, squeezing painfully as the air was blocked from his aching lungs.
The male reached up, clawing at the magic choking him and yet both of us knew his attempts were futile.
I ran my tongue along my teeth, the sick smile returning to my mouth. Still seated upon Rhysand's lap, I leaned forward, bracing my hands on the arms of the throne as a dark calm replaced my wrath.
I looked at the pathetic thing I had reduced the Steward to, a certain smugness to my voice as I said, "Such foul words from that mouth." A smirk, "Tell me, can you speak them now?"
The blonde male still clawed at his throat mercilessly, his mouth beginning to turn blue. "No," I tsked, "I don't you can." I leaned back into Rhys again, releasing Keir from the unmerciful death I wished I could have granted him.
Keir gulped down breath after breath, falling to the floor as he clutched his throat.
Rhys, his voice no more than an icy void, was the first to speak through the ear splitting silence that engulfed the room. "Apologize." he said. And my heart thundered at the pure command, the utter wrath.
Keir did not reply, I was not sure he had the ability to with the ruses marring his pretty little neck.
"I said," Rhys intoned with a horrible calm. "apologize."
When Keir did not reply once more, RHys's power rumbled through the room again. ANd this time I did not stop it.
The Steward groaned. And when another heartbeat passed—
Bone cracked. Keir screamed.
I watched as his arm fractured in not two, not three, but four different places. The skin going taut and loose in all the wrong spots.
Ew.
Another crack. His elbow disintegrated.
"How tragic." I drawled, "I'm sure that must've hurt."
Keir began sobbing, the tears half from rage judging by the way he looked at the two of us. But his lips somehow managed to form the words, I'm sorry.
The bones in his other arm splintered, that time it took effort not to cringe. It looked absolutely vile.
I knew Rhys had a flare for the dramatic, but couldn't he make it look less...gross?
The High Lord smiled behind me as Keir screamed again, he said to the room, "SHould I kill him for it?"
No one answered.
Rhys chuckled. He said to his Steward, "When you wake up, you're not to see a healer. If I hear that you do..." Another crack, Keir's pinkie finger went saggy. Double gross. The male shrieked. "If I hear that you do, I'll carve you up into pieces and bury them where no one can stand a chance of putting you together again."
Keir collapsed to the floor as though a hand had struck consciousness from him.
Keir was quickly taken care of, dumped in his room with nothing but his thought's keep him company.
And with that small show, I rose from the throne with a flowing grace. Descending the dais as everyone watched me with prying eyes. Stepping back on occasion when I got too close.
I did not spare a glance as I walked out of the room.
And for a long hour afterward, my focus half remained on the High Lord whose hands and mouth and body had suddenly made me feel awake—burning. It didn't make me forget, didn't make me obliviate hurts or grievances, it just made me...alive. Made me feel as if I'd been asleep for half a year, slumbering inside a glass coffin, and he had just shattered through it and shaken me to consciousness.
The High Lord whose power did not scare me. Whose wrath did not wreck me.
And I did not know where that put me now.
Knee-deep in trouble seemed like a good place to start.
A/N: You know what they say, couples who kill together, stay together.
Hi all! I'm back again, and I finished my presentation and did really well! AHHHH, I'm now on break and intend to write a lot more. I'm also thinking of re-writing these books as soon as I finish the series, and yes it will be a series of like four or five books because I've got plans, baes.
There will also be at least 35+ more chapters in this book, but only three or four left till starfall
Also, half of this chapter is unedited, I apologize.