Total pages in book: 107
Estimated words: 100363 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 502(@200wpm)___ 401(@250wpm)___ 335(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 100363 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 502(@200wpm)___ 401(@250wpm)___ 335(@300wpm)
But the escape has set the court’s opinion. Why did he run if there was nothing to run from?
Because sometimes, running is the only option. There is no reason that I should run from Cassan, yet I wish to. I study his handsome, boyish profile. He looks exactly like someone whose affections I would have been eager to win in my human life. Though he is serious now, I know his smile is breathtaking. Though the crown somewhat flattens his messy black curls to the sides of his head, I have seen that without it, he appears rakish and wild, like a forest spirit disguised as a faery. I should want him.
I came to this court to be his queen, and now I am, though I will not be crowned before a respectful amount of time has passed in the wake of Arcus’s death. But without the prize of my revenge, my victory is hollow.
We lead the procession back to the palace, my arm through Cassan’s. The sky is uncharacteristically gray, and the strangest, most irrational rush of anger comes over me. How dare the sky mourn a tyrant king. How dare it mock the degradation I experienced simply because he willed it.
* * * *
After dinner, I find my way to the new royal chambers. Cassan has no wish to occupy the room his father died in, which I understand. When I am queen, I’ll request a change to my living quarters, as well.
Cassan’s room is both nothing that I expect and everything I would have guessed. The walls of the circular room are painted in shades of green ranging from sedate to garish. There is no fireplace or candles, but floating orbs of golden light drift about in the air to illuminate the space. Fire would be inadvisable, owing to the enormous tree that reaches almost to the top of the high, glass-domed ceiling. All the furnishings are of polished wood that matches the tree’s broad, sturdy trunk. I find that a bit ghoulish; the tree must stand among the mutilated corpse parts of its brethren.
My mood is perhaps too grim for the task ahead of me.
Cassan made it clear that after dinner, I was to meet him in his chambers. I assume he’s changed his mind about waiting to have me. Knowing what I know of him, he will expect a seductress, ready to please him in every way. And while I appreciate that his tastes don’t seem to run toward the painful, I don’t feel the enthusiasm for erotic congress that I once did.
How do these faeries stay interested for centuries and millennia? How do they enjoy themselves, night after night, in empty pleasures and shocking pain? I grow weary of it already.
At least, I was smart enough not to wish for immortality.
A staircase rises in a spiral around the tree, disappearing into the long chains of leaves that fall from its gnarled branches. The leaves part for me as I ascend, revealing a round bed nestled in the space where the branches converge. Without the benefit of magic, I must remove my own clothes. I drape my gown over the railing and set my slippers carefully aside, where they won’t trip Cassan when he comes to bed. Nude, I arrange myself on the green velvet coverlet, spreading my hair out like an aura of copper around my head and tilting my legs just so, to hide the most tantalizing part of my anatomy. I pluck at my nipples to harden them, then languidly pose my arms above my head.
This will be the first time Cassan fucks me, and I want it to be perfect for him. So perfect that he won’t have any thoughts of ridding himself of a human queen who will not last long. I want him too drunk on lust to ever suspect me of his father’s death at all.
“Cenere?” he calls from below. I say nothing, so as not to spoil the effect. His boots thunk on the stairs as he approaches. He reaches the top, and his eyes go wide as he beholds me.
“I’ve been waiting, Your Majesty,” I purr, and shift my legs slightly, offering just a flash of the curls at my center.
He groans and smiles. “You are too tempting.”
“Am I tempting, or are you simply eager to give in?” I ask, arching my back. I lay a hand between my legs and gasp at my own touch. “I’m eager for you.”
But he doesn’t make a move toward me. “I didn’t ask you here to fuck you.”
I don’t mean to drop my seductress act so easily, but I blurt, “What?” so forcefully, there is no reasonable way to return to my simpering. “I thought you changed your mind.”
“I want to,” he quickly assures me. “Believe me. I’ve been endlessly counting down the days.”