Chapter 11

CHAPTER11

“You’ve barely touched your pastry,” Gavril said from my side before slowly pushing my braid over my shoulder. “Is this not what you want?”

Of course, this wasn’t what I wanted. I wanted to be back in Evren’s room, wrapped in his arms, before the guards had knocked on his door and broken the illusion I had fallen into. He had somehow made me forget where I was. He obliterated any thoughts of duty.

The only sense of responsibility I felt was that of my own wants. I felt no obligation to the prince who sat at my side. Instead, I longed for the one who had dropped me back at my room as if he were in pain to do so.

“It’s fine.” I smiled up at Gavril before lifting the cup of warm tea to my lips. “I’m just not very hungry.”

“That’s all right.” His fingers trailed over my shoulder before slipping around my back. Gavril tugged my chair closer to his, and I feared that he would be able to smell the traces of his brother on my skin. “You smell divine.”

“Thank you.” I looked away from him just as two women around my age walked into the room. Both of them were eyeing Gavril as if I wasn’t there, and I didn’t blame them. He was as handsome as he was powerful, and I should have wanted him.

“Adara, have you met Quinn and Lydia Etkin?” Gavril nodded toward them, and both women quickly dropped into perfect curtsies.

“I have not had the pleasure.” I smiled even though I had no interest in meeting these women.

The one with long brown hair sat at my side and smiled at me. “It’s an honor to meet you, Starblessed. We have heard so much about you.”

“Yes.” The one with hair of honey sat near Gavril, but now her eyes were only on me. “We have heard many tales of what you offer to our kingdom and our soon-to-be king.”

“Quinn.” Gavril said her name with exasperation, and his hand tightened around my shoulders. “Quinn and Lydia are both daughters of Nobleman Etkin. We have all grown up together in the palace.”

Quinn nodded her head with a smile before studying me. “We know the crowned prince better than most, so if there is anything you have questions about, please feel free to use me to help you with your betrothal.”

I was startled by her words, but Gavril didn’t seem bothered by them in the least. His fingers were still trailing over my shoulder as if the woman in front of me wasn’t letting me know that she had already had my soon-to-be husband.

“I will keep that in mind.” I balled my hands into fists in my lap. It didn’t upset me that she had been with him before me, but it infuriated me that she had the gall to say it to me without a trace of unease.

“And Evren?” she asked casually.

“What of him?”

Her gaze slammed back into mine at my question. “I was just asking the prince if he has seen him. I would love to be able to spend some time with him before he leaves once more.”

I gritted my teeth as my heart began to race and my head ached. This woman had not only had her hands on the crowned prince, but now I was imagining her touching my prince. And the second thought infuriated me far more than the first.

“So you know both of the princes well?”

“I do.” She nodded as her smile widened. “If it wasn’t for you, I would be in line to be betrothed to Gavril.”

I could practically taste the venom in her words. “I bet you hate me then.”

Gavril laughed at my side, and Quinn’s face fell. Perhaps she hadn’t expected me to have a backbone.

“I don’t think there are too many in our kingdom who do like you, Starblessed.”

“Quinn.” Gavril sat up straight as he chided her for her words, but I wanted to hear them.

“No. It’s fine. I’d actually like to hear what she has to say.” I leaned forward and pressed my elbows into the table. “I’d love to know why I’m giving up my entire life for a kingdom that doesn’t want me.”

Everyone was silent as my words rang through the room, and Gavril’s hand stilled on my shoulder.

“Please, Quinn.” I motioned my hand in her direction. “Don’t hold your tongue now.”

She simply stared at me without saying a word. She thought that she could intimidate me with her intimate knowledge of a man I was supposed to fall for, but all she did was fuel my hate.

“Am I interrupting?” Everyone looked toward the doorway where I knew Evren now stood, but I kept my gaze on Quinn and watched the way she adjusted her hair as she looked at him.

“Prince Evren.” She and her sister quickly stood and dropped into a bow that didn’t dip nearly as far as they had with Gavril, but they were showing him honor just the same. “I was hoping to see you before you left.”

“I’m not heading out until after the ball.” Evren moved toward the table, and I finally looked up at him when he stopped directly across from me and lifted a strawberry to his mouth before nodding in my direction. “Starblessed.”

“Evren.” I watched as he bit into the berry, and I couldn’t look away as he traced the juice from his lips with his tongue.

How could that one move turn me on far more than his brother caressing my skin with his fingers?

“Prince Evren, are you attending the ball alone, or are you bringing someone?”

I tensed against Gavril as I heard the question. I hadn’t even thought of Evren bringing someone else to the ball. I hadn’t thought about what it would be like to watch him with someone else the way he was forced to watch me.

“It will just be me and my sword.” Evren smiled at her and my chest ached with jealousy. “I am a member of the guard, remember.”

“And a member of the court.” Quinn smiled up at him playfully. “I can remember several things that you’ve done that had nothing to do with your duty to the guard.”

“Hear, hear.” Gavril chuckled as he lifted his glass of wine, and I turned to him to avoid seeing the way Evren was now looking at her.

Gavril looked back at me, a smile playing on his lips, and he ran his fingers back over my braid as his gaze ran over me. “Duty and pleasure.”

“Is that what you and the Starblessed are calling it?” Evren asked with a laugh that felt like a curse. “The two of you look awfully intimate over there.”

“We make a beautiful couple, do we not?” Gavril looked back to his brother, but I refused.

“That you do. Adara will make the loveliest queen we’ve ever seen. Don’t you agree, Quinn?”

I looked back at him then, and I watched as Quinn looked back and forth between the two of us quickly.

“She will. Absolutely lovely.”

Gavril’s hand slipped from my hair and fell against the small of my back. He pressed his hand there, drawing my attention back to him as the feel of him thrummed through my mark, and he lifted his other hand to trace along my jaw.

“And she’s all mine.” He smiled up at me, but I could see his possessiveness staring back at me. Gavril was being kind to me, but everything about him felt like a game.

“Well, and the kingdom’s.” Evren chuckled as he took a seat at the table. “She is here to save us, after all.”

“True.” Gavril nodded but didn’t pull his gaze away from me. “But everyone else can simply look upon her. They can dream of what her mark will feel like under their fingers and running through their veins. None of them will ever be able to truly experience that besides me.”

I glanced up at Evren just in time to watch his jaw tense. This was exactly what Gavril wanted. Brothers or not, Gavril was making it clear where things stood.

“Can you imagine the envy in their eyes?” Gavril chuckled before slowly running his hand down my arm.

Chill bumps broke out across my skin, but it wasn’t because I was liking what he was doing.

I wanted him to quit touching me.

Especially in front of Evren.

But he did no such thing. His hand tightened along my forearm, and he lifted my arm. His fingers tangled with mine before he gently turned it over and exposed my wrist to him. He looked back up at his brother then, just as he was lowering his mouth to my skin.

“I would be wild with jealousy if I wasn’t able to taste her.”

I went rigid against him, but he didn’t notice. He was too busy watching his brother for a reaction.

A reaction that Evren refused to give him.

“It’s a good look for you, brother. Although, I can’t imagine you tied down to just one woman. That’s going to be a change of pace for you, isn’t it?”

Gavril laughed although it held no trace of humor. “I’m more than willing to pass them all down to you. Give you your fair share of the spotlight.”

Quinn and Lydia both snickered, and I wanted to demand that they stop. Instead, I stood, pushing my chair back with my knees, and Gavril finally looked back at me.

“I’m going to the library.” I wasn’t asking his permission or waiting around for his approval. I may have been his betrothed, but I refused to sit here and listen to this. Especially when I was dying inside to look to his brother and never look away.

“Are you all right?” he asked as if he couldn’t possibly see why I’d want to leave.

“Of course.” I nodded. “I’m just tired and would like to read for a bit.”

“Okay.” He stood and placed a soft kiss on my forehead. My gaze met Evren’s as soon as Gavril’s lips were pressed against my skin, and he looked as if he was ready to come across the table. “Join me for dinner tonight?”

I nodded because I didn’t trust my voice. Not when Evren was looking at me like that.

Gavril held my fingers in his until I walked away and forced him to drop them. I didn’t look back as I pushed out of the room. I didn’t say a single one of the million things that was running through my head.

And I didn’t let the whispers of Quinn’s voice as I left the room run through my head over and over. I didn’t like that girl. It wasn’t because of the way she acted in there or the fact that she made it clear that she had been with my betrothed, but I couldn’t stop imagining the ways she could’ve possibly touched Evren as I sat down in the library and grabbed a book.

I slammed my book closed in frustration and walked back to the shelf to grab another. I didn’t know what I was looking for as my hand trailed over the leather spines.

I just needed something, anything, to take my mind off of him.

My hand stalled next to a solid black book with no writing on the spine. I pulled it from the bookshelf, and the front looked the same. Not a title or marking anywhere in the leather.

I walked back to my seat with the book in hand and searched the doorway before I sat. My fingers traced over the black leather, feeling the supple fabric that had to be much older than me before I slowly opened the cover.

I was greeted by yellowing pages with black handwritten ink. This wasn’t just some book; this was a journal. I flipped through the pages as I scanned over the writing. There were notes of the palace and a hand-sketched map of the grounds.

I flipped past those quickly, and only stopped again when I noted the words curse of the stars staring back at me. The words looked like they had been scribbled so quickly that I could hardly read them, but below them was a sketch of a woman with dots spread out across her chest and running down the center.

An arrow pointed toward the markings and the words star mark were written alongside it.

My gaze ran over the page looking for more information, but it was basic things. Things I already knew. I flipped to the next page quickly, devouring the information and searching for more.

It wasn’t until I got to the final page of the book that I found what I was looking for.

Starblessed are a blessing and curse on our world. Their power can be extraordinary yet wicked. A mated Starblessed equals a threat.

I read the words over and over, but I was confused. I had never heard of a mated Starblessed before. Only fae mated, and even that was rare. It was another thing that I had only heard of in stories passed down to me by the mouths of those in my village.

But no one had ever spoken of a mated Starblessed.

“Have you gotten your fill of reading yet?”

I slammed the book shut in my lap and snapped my head up to look at Evren. He was standing in the exact same spot he had been the first time he found me in the library, but something seemed different about him.

Dangerous almost.

“Is there something I can help you with?”

“I don’t know, princess. Is there?” He ran his hand along his jaw as he watched me, and I felt like he was eating me alive with his gaze alone.

“I don’t know.” I pressed the book to my chest as I stared at him, watching every move he made. “You seem upset.”

He pushed away from the wall and took two small steps in my direction. “Frustrated.”

“By what?”

His gaze ran over every inch of me, and he didn’t hide a moment of it. “That my brother can touch you, can talk about you like you’re his.”

“I am his, Evren. We’ll be married soon enough.”

His gaze darkened as he stepped closer, and I could see the barely tamed fury that hid there. “You will never be his, princess. I don’t give a damn if your hand holds his ring or if your head holds his crown. You still won’t belong to him.”

I swallowed hard as I stared up at him and watched him approach. I wished with everything inside of me that his words were true, but I knew they were nothing more than a fantasy. I couldn’t be married to one man but belong to another.

My heart wouldn’t allow it.

And Gavril would kill me for it. He didn’t need me to love him to be his betrothed, but I knew the future king would never allow the woman that was meant to be his to fall into the arms of another. Especially not another that shared his blood.

“This book.” I held it up just as he stood directly in front of me. “It says that Starblessed can be mated. Is that true?”

His brow scrunched in confusion, and I had my answer before he even spoke. “I’ve never witnessed it, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t true. What else does it say?”

I was hesitant to show him, but I still flipped to the back pages of the book before handing it over.

“Extraordinary yet wicked.” He chuckled softly as he read the words aloud. “That sounds just like you.”

A blush crept up my cheeks as I thought about the ways in which he had made me wicked.

Him and no one else.

“I’m not wicked.”

“Aren’t you?” He cocked his head to the side as he watched me. His fingers tightened around the book as he pressed it closed. “You’re the most wicked little thing I’ve ever met.”

I shook my head even as my chest tightened.

“Only someone wicked could make me want to fall to my knees before her and pledge my loyalty to her with my tongue. My family be damned.”

“I haven’t asked for your loyalty, Evren.”

“No?” He stepped even closer to me and ran his knuckles along my hand. “You’ve simply demanded it of me with every breath you take. You may not have asked, princess, but gods, you have it regardless.”

“And what if I don’t want it?” I raised my chin and my stomach flipped. Gods, I wanted it. I wanted anything he was willing to give me.

“We both know that’s a lie.” He lifted the book in his hand and ran the supple spine against my wrist before slowly moving it up my arm. Everywhere it touched, chill bumps followed behind, and it felt impossible that he was capable of making me squirm while not even touching me with his skin. “We both know you are dying for things you shouldn’t want.”

He pressed the book edge against my collarbone before slowly dragging it along that sensitive skin to meet my neck. He didn’t stop there. His gaze led the trail before the book slowly followed down my chest, between my breasts and over my belly button. My stomach tensed beneath his touch, and he slowed.

He was barely moving as his gaze dipped between my thighs. “I think that you want it right now. I think that you would give almost anything for it.”

He moved the book at a painful pace as it dropped lower and lower, and even though I knew I shouldn’t have, I spread my legs almost unnoticeably.

But of course, he noticed.

A smile graced his lips, but he didn’t pull his gaze away from my thighs. “That’s a good girl, princess.” He pressed the spine against my lower stomach, and I gasped for breath. “Open for me.”

“Evren,” I whispered his name, and his gaze flew up to meet mine.

“Yes, princess?”

“We can’t do this.” I shook my head, but my legs still inched wider. My mind and my body disagreeing with one another.

“Why not?” The book dropped lower and lower until I felt nothing but the pressure of him and that spine pressed against the spot where I needed him most.

“You heard what your brother said before.”

“What was it that he said?” He cocked his head to the side as he watched my lips open in a sigh. “That no one else can touch you.” He pressed the book harder against me, and my back straightened against the chair. “Technically, I’m not laying a single finger on you, princess.”

He moved the corner of the spine in small circles against my sex as if he was trying to prove his point. A moan slipped past my lips, desperate for more of what he was giving me.

But he simply kept up his teasing pace as he watched me. Not an inch of his skin touched mine, but I could feel him all over me.

“He couldn’t be threatened by a book, could he?” Evren licked his lips as he watched the work he was doing with the book against me. I wrapped my fingers around the arms of the chair, and my knuckles turned white as I tried to keep myself from calling out for him. “I told you, princess. You’re a wicked little thing.”

Moisture pooled between my thighs, and I pushed my hips forward, chasing the feeling he was giving me.

“That’s it,” he encouraged me, and I bit down on my bottom lip as I began moving my hips in the smallest circles. “Take from me what you know he’ll never be able to give you.”

I reached out for him, but he pulled back slightly out of my touch before shaking his head. “No touching, princess. That’d be breaking the rules.”

“I think we’ve already broken them, don’t you?” I answered him breathlessly before closing my eyes and pressing my head back against the chair. My stomach tightened as my pleasure built inside of me. Warmth rushed through me and my marks were aflame. He wasn’t even touching me, and still, my mark knew him.

My body would know him without a single word or sight. There was a feel of him that was vastly different from everyone else.

“Eyes on me, princess,” he commanded, and my gaze snapped open to meet his. “I want to watch you while you fall apart beneath me. Let go. Let me see all of you.”

I fell apart as soon as he spoke the words. He pressed the book harder against me as I clamped my thighs closed around it. I moaned his name softly, desperate to taste it across my tongue.

“Good girl. Come apart for me right here in the library where anyone could catch us.”

“Please, Evren.” I slammed my head back against the chair as wave after wave of pleasure shot through me.

Evren’s hand finally touched me then, his thumb stroking roughly against my bottom lip, and when I opened my eyes again, he was staring back at me with so much lust I could choke on it.

“Open.” He pressed his thumb against my lips, and I did as he said. He slid his thumb into my mouth, tracing my tongue with the tip of his finger as he slowed the movement with the book. “Suck it for me, princess. I want to imagine you with your mouth open and my cock sliding along your perfect lips when I take care of myself later.”

I closed my lips around him and hollowed out my cheeks as I sucked his thumb. I rolled my tongue along the bottom, and he groaned before slowly pulling it back out and shoving it back in. He did that over and over, fucking my mouth with his thumb, and I reached forward because I was desperate for it to be something else.

I wanted to see him, to touch him, to taste every part of him that he would allow.

My hands connected with his thighs, and he growled low and deep but never took his eyes off my mouth. “You’re so fucking perfect.”

He pulled his thumb away with a pop and saliva fell against my lip.

“I want to touch you.” My hands dug into his trousers, and he ran his hand along my jaw.

His hand was rough and frantic against my face, and I knew that the prince was so close to losing every bit of control he still managed to possess.

“Not tonight.” He shook his head gently as he stared down at me, but I didn’t want to listen to him. He had brought me pleasure twice now, and I had yet to touch his skin beneath my fingers.

“Please, Evren,” I begged. I actually begged this man in front of me who I should have been walking away from.

“You’ve given me more of yourself tonight than I should have ever asked for, princess. Let me escort you back to your room.”

He reached his hand out for me, but instead of taking it, I dropped to my knees before him.

“Fuck.” He ran his hand over his mouth as he watched me before quickly looking back toward the library door.

I wasn’t prepared for his power or the effect it had on me, and I gripped onto his thigh as a swarm of black magic fell from his fingers and filled the room around us. It encapsulated every inch of the library except exactly where we were.

My spine straightened as his magic met my skin, and I felt that shock of him all the way to my core. I raised my trembling fingers to the top of his trousers, and although I had no idea what I was doing, I was still desperate to try.

I wanted to bring him pleasure like he had given me. I wanted to erase anyone who had come before me out of his mind.

“Can I?” My hands hesitated at the buttons on his trousers, and when I looked up, Evren was staring at me with so much want that it made me press my thighs together with need.

“You can do anything you want with me, princess. I’m yours.” He ran his hand over my hair almost lovingly, and I concentrated my attention on getting his buttons undone with my fumbling fingers.

Evren didn’t rush me. He stood above me wordlessly as I finally lowered his trousers enough to see him. I swallowed hard at the first sight of his length. I slipped his trousers lower until his cock was released, then I brought those same trembling fingers to meet his skin.

He was soft, so much softer than I had imagined. I hadn’t known what to expect, but I felt desperate to figure out every part of him. I wrapped my hand around the width of him, squeezing tightly as I tried to press one finger to my thumb, and he hissed.

I pushed my fist up and down his length, testing the feel of him in my hand, and his hand tightened in my hair.

“Can I taste you?” I asked as I looked up at him, and Evren clamped his eyes closed before quickly opening them back up to look down at me.

“Gods please, princess.” He buried his fingers against my scalp. “I’ve been dreaming about what that mouth of yours can do.”

I looked back at his cock, and I was so intimidated by the size of him. I had no idea what I was doing, but I knew that I wanted to feel him in my mouth in the same way I had just felt his thumb. I wanted to create that same reaction in him as well.

I licked my lips and moved closer to him, and I glanced up at him just as I ran my tongue over his tip.

“Fuck,” he growled and his hand tightened even further in my hair. There was a bite of pain there, but it felt like it was directly connected to between my thighs.

I ran my tongue along the underside of his cock, tasting the entire length of him, and his thigh shook beneath my hand.

“Am I doing this right?”

Evren chuckled as he let out a harsh breath. “There is nothing you can do that would be wrong, princess. However you want to touch me is more than I could ever beg of the gods.”

I took his words as encouragement and wrapped my lips around the tip of him. My mouth felt so full as I slowly slid him inside me, pressing my tongue flat against the underside of him. I did exactly as I had with his thumb, and I hollowed out my cheeks as I took him in farther and farther.

I took him until he hit the back of my throat, and I gagged around the tip of him.

“Fucking hell.” Evren pulled my head back by his grip on my hair before he slowly slid back inside. He did that over and over again until his handle on his control seemed to slip away.

He really began to move then, his cock slamming into the back of my throat before almost pulling completely out of my mouth. I stared up at him as he did so, and I had never been so turned on in all my life.

Evren was always beautiful, but unhinged was a stunning sight.

I let my hand fall away from his cock and held on to his thigh as he slammed into my mouth over and over. My body shook with pleasure as I stared up at him and saw the way he was watching me.

It almost felt lewd to watch him as he came apart as if this was the most vulnerable Evren ever allowed another to see him, but I couldn’t look away. Even as I lifted the skirt of my dress and slid my fingers beneath, I still watched him.

My fingers met the exact spot where he had been working the book against me only moments before, and my legs trembled instantly. I was so close to falling over the edge already, the feeling of Evren in my mouth was more than I could handle.

I dipped my fingers inside myself, gathering the moisture that pooled there before lifting it back to my cluster of nerves and rubbing small circles. I tried to keep up with the pace that Evren was setting, but once he saw what my hand was doing, it became almost brutal.

His other hand pressed against my jaw, his thumb caressing my skin as I continued to take him, and I knew he was close to falling over the edge as his thrusts became merciless.

“I’m going to come, princess,” he warned me, and I moaned around him as I felt myself chasing that high that only he had been able to give me.

I sucked him harder into my mouth as his magic seemed to surge and swirl around us. My marks were aflame against my skin. I felt it touching every inch of me, and even the hand that was buried between my thighs didn’t feel like my own.

I felt the first release of his pleasure hit the back of my throat, and I moaned around him as my fingers could hardly keep up the pace. I was falling apart, harder than I had earlier, and I was drinking down his pleasure as eagerly as I chased my own.

He roared in pleasure, and I watched him as he bared his teeth and the sharp points of his canines seemed more predominant than earlier. I should have been fearful, but pleasure still coursed through my body.

Evren slowed his movements, and his hands loosened their hold against me. He pulled out of my mouth before he gently ran his thumb along my swollen lips. “Are you okay, princess?”

I nodded because I wasn’t sure I was capable of words. Evren’s magic still swirled around us, and I didn’t know if it was by choice or if he simply had lost control of it.

But I welcomed it either way as he pressed his hands beneath my arms and lifted me on shaking legs.

“Like I said. A wicked little thing.” He leaned forward and pressed his lips against mine, and I never wanted to leave the cloak of him or his magic.