8. Hello, Soulmate

Hello, Soulmate

C ass was perfect. I didn't think there was any other way to describe him. He looked like someone had been told to sculpt the ideal man, then dedicated their entire lifetime to the task.

Broad shoulders. The sort of powerful chest that belonged to a man who could bench press twice his bodyweight. Thighs that demanded standing in a power stance.

Jaw-droppingly sexy didn't even begin to cover it.

I stared. He stared back.

Since neither of us were speaking, I didn't fight the urge to take him in. I dropped my eyes to his feet and slowly dragged them back up, appreciating every inch of the King of Mercy.

Someone brilliant had put him in the fae version of black leather cavalry boots and an outfit that looked like military regalia. Black pants emphasized his powerful legs, pulling against his calves and thighs when he shifted his weight. A heavy belt of silver ornamentation drew attention to his toned core, resting in the groove of his hips.

I tried not to linger, failed, and decided I'd experienced enough of his orgasms to indulge my curiosity regarding the bulge under his pants. He could handle a little ogling.

It was visible, but tastefully so. I cursed the tailors I'd just been blessing. It was very rude of them not to show off what I knew he was packing.

I made my eyes travel further north. His formal jacket had three rows of buttons up the front, dividing it into quarters, with silver braid in a willow-leaf pattern connecting the outer rows to the central one. The sword hanging at his waist looked like it had never been used, with a polished onyx cabochon for a pommel. His broad shoulders pulled the jacket tight across his chest, and the deep slit collar revealed only a high-collared gray shirt instead of skin.

His body promised brute strength. He could probably have carried me with one arm. Hell, he could probably have carried two of me with one arm, and not broken a sweat. Big hands, currently fisted. I liked the shade of his skin, a warm brown that showed the kiss of the sun.

The wings half-mantled behind him were like angel wings, if angel wings were made of blackened bronze gleaming with the same menace as a sword. The edges looked wickedly sharp, and not one of them showed any wear, not even a single scratch. They were as much a weapon as a tool for flight.

I liked that, too, probably more than I should have.

When I finally met his gaze, he was as stiff as a statue, the tension transferring to my own shoulders and spine. I took a deep breath, feeling the muscles of my chest pull, and didn't stop examining him.

That face was stern, with a square jaw and low, heavy brows. A straight nose cut vertically down his face, never broken—or, at least, showing no evidence of the breaks. His black, wavy hair was braided and pinned back in intricate whorls, but he must have been flying, because some loose strands dangled down, framing his strong face.

The eyes were the ones I'd imagined in those first terrifying moments of being bound to the Court: black-irised with dense lashes, the corners angled slightly up, set deep beneath his black brows. Flecks of gold gleamed like sparks, clustered around his pupils. I didn't remember those. They were pretty.

I wet my lips. "I have no idea what to say."

The corner of his mouth twitched back. "Nor do I," he admitted.

He had a voice as perfect as his sculpted body, deep and rumbling and a little rough. It was the sort of voice you could listen to late into the night, no matter what it was saying, just because the sound soothed the soul.

Cass took a deep breath. My shoulders relaxed alongside his, following the choices he made for his body. He gave me a half smile. "That outfit suits you," he offered, glancing sideways, "though I'm surprised Vaduin was willing to lend you his gems. I haven't known him to share his hoard with anyone but Dani."

Vaduin – who I hadn't even noticed was also present in the room until Cass' eyes flicked in his direction – grinned like a shark. "They're Dani's gems, too," he said in a wicked purr. His tail flirted through the room. "She's allowed to share them if she likes."

"And doesn't she look just lovely?" Danica said, sounding delighted about it.

Cass swallowed, throat bobbing. "Very," he said, meeting my gaze with his brows slanted and pointed ears held low.

I bit my lip. I had no idea what to do in a room like this, wearing a dress like this, while the hottest man in the world stared at me and his two best friends watched us with wolfish grins.

"Come on, princess, let's give them some space," Vaduin said. He held out his arm, looking extremely pleased with himself. "We only have a few minutes until we need to be in the sky. "

She sauntered over and hooked her arm through her soulmate's. "Have fuuun," she said, putting a lilt on the word.

Vaduin laughed and swept her out of the room.

Cass and I kept staring at each other.

After a moment, Cass said, "This surely must all be bewildering."

"Honestly?" I said. "It was bewildering for about the first week or so. At this point, it's mostly a pain in the ass."

He flinched. "Ah," he said again. He worried his lower lip between his teeth. "Is there anything I can do? To make it less… unpleasant?"

"You could jack it a bit less," I said flippantly, before I could consider how bitchy that would sound.

His whole body went tense again. One of the oil paintings on the wall crashed to the floor, making me jump.

Cass looked like he might be sick, the skin around his eyes going tight and his ears turning back like an animal about to be struck by an angry master. "You can—" He sounded horrified. "You can feel that?"

"It's, uh, it's not a big deal," I said, holding up my hands, my eyes darting from the broken painting back to him. "I'd be dead in a bunch of ways if it wasn't for, uh… you. I can handle the weird side effects. But maybe we can talk about, like, a schedule?"

He turned away, wearing an expression of nausea, his wings moving as he panted. "Gods," he said in a guttural moan. "I didn't mean for any of this to happen. I had no idea you were… Quyen," he said. He knew my name without me telling him, just like I knew his. Cass looked back over at me, his dark eyes tormented. "I had no idea I was doing that to you. I know that doesn't make the… the experience of it better, but—"

"Hey," I said, lowering my hands, surprised at the vehemence of his unhappiness. "It's seriously not a big deal." I started walking towards him. The gown made shushing sounds against my legs as I moved. "I didn't mean to sound pissy."

I reached out to touch him, trying to be comforting, and he jerked away.

"Don't," he said, his whole face going tense. "Don't touch me."

My brows snapped together. I crossed my arms over my chest, as if I'd meant to do that all along. "Sure. Fine. Whatever."

His ears pinned flat. "I'm a reflexive command healer," he gritted out between clenched teeth. "You're my soulmate. If you touch me, I'll surely affect your body with the same intensity as I do my own. Whatever you're dealing with now—"

The door opened. Cass stopped talking, his expression going flat.

"Your majesties," the fae woman in the doorway said, her eyes flicking between us. She was a pear-shaped woman, with thick thighs, a soft stomach, and small breasts, giving her the look of an ancient fertility statue. "It's time."

Cass glanced over at me. "Did Dani tell you what's happening?"

"She gave me a rapid-fire runthrough," I said with a shrug of one shoulder. "Walk up a bunch of stairs, kneel, get crowned, sit on a throne, receive a bunch of important people. Sounds like a misery, but she asked me to play nice, so here I am."

"I appreciate that you are," he said softly. His eyes flicked back over to the fae woman waiting in the doorway. "Let's get this over with."

The woman's eyes narrowed, her expression going hard. She didn't like Cass, I thought, and that dislike probably extended to me. Given the silver tears painted on her face, her elegant bearing, and the general confidence with which she moved, I suspected she was a powerful person, and since Danica's list of people I needed to look nice for included a high priestess, she was probably religious.

So I smiled at her, giving her a slight incline of my head. "It's been a trying morning," I said, keeping my voice even and polite. "The timing of my arrival was rather miraculous, but miracles aren't very comfortable, are they?"

She made a thoughtful sound, nothing more than a hum, but her expression did relax, the pinchedness around her nose and mouth easing. "The gods are fierce creatures, so surely their miracles are no less fierce," she said in her pleasant voice. She stepped back and bowed, holding her arm out. "Your majesties."

Cass stalked out. He walked like a soldier, with total command of his body, his strides eating the ground. I would have had to jog to keep up with him, so I didn't bother trying. I kept my head up and stalked down the hallway in his wake, fixing my eyes on Cass' back and cooling my expression as I paced after him.

It took him until he reached the door to the outside to realize that he'd left me halfway down the hall. My cheeks went hot with his embarrassment, the blush showing on my face when it barely rouged his darker skin.

I didn't hurry my pace. I made him wait there, holding his gaze with my expression aloof, and when I reached him I stepped up to his side, looking away. "Walk slower, your splendor."

His wings made a metallic scrape as he folded them tighter. It wasn't an unpleasant sound; more like the slide of a knife across a sharpener than anything squealing or sharp. "I ask your forbearance," he said in a calm voice belied by the tension in my shoulders and thighs. He felt like he wanted to launch himself into the sky. "I'm unused to measuring my strides for a partner."

I gave him a nod.

"Do we just walk up?" I asked after a moment, when he made no move to do so .

He exhaled through his nose. The tension dissipated, a purposeful relaxation that probably reflected his control more than his emotions. "Yes." He still didn't move.

I rolled my eyes. He'd had six weeks to get used to being King, but I'd had an hour, tops, to do the same. Whatever dislike he had of the coronation itself, he needed to get over himself.

In silence, I started forward without him.

He caught up to me in two strides, then had to pace himself for my significantly shorter legs. I didn't even come up to the man's collarbone. It made his pace stately and mine purposeful, a pairing that I thought would work visually, as opposed to making me look like a child next to him. In the fancy clothing and sparkly jewels, I looked like someone rich and famous, and his military-style finery and deadly bearing made his slower pace look deliberate instead of lazy.

The landscape on the walk up reminded me of some of the wildest forests I'd bushwhacked through on my way to Cass. Dense evergreen trees with short needles played host to small birds and fluffy, vivid green lichen. The stone steps were swept clean of needles, but they were shrouded with lichens and mosses, and in a few places enough dirt had collected for tiny plants to take root, leaving the steps spangled with tiny pink and white flowers.

Unlike the wild forest, though, this one seemed aware. Birds paused in their singing as we passed, hopping onto branches and watching us with dark eyes, heads cocked. A small lizard scuttled out onto the stairs ahead of us and flared a cerulean-blue frill at me before ducking back into the leaf litter. Even the breeze seemed to parallel us, stirring the leaves and flirting with my loose hair.

I reached out and brushed my fingers against a low-hanging branch. The leaves curled up into small knots in a heartbeat, retreating from my touch as if I'd burned them.

I yanked my hand away, and didn't try again.

We broke into the dawn sunlight after the first hundred stairs or so, the dense trees giving way to low brush and meadow, and then to naked stone. The stone speared up into the sky, growing narrower and narrower until it was no more than forty feet across, with the stair zig-zagging up its back. The stark beauty of it all made me want to stop and enjoy the scenery, but Cass didn't pause, so I didn't, either.

The stone steps led up to a flat span of bedrock, with the sky on all sides. It wasn't the highest spire of the mountains, not by a longshot, but that didn't detract from the three-hundred-sixty-degree view. It felt like I could look in any direction and see the entire Court sprawled out beneath me like a lover.

Two thrones sat on the top of the spire, all one piece with the bedrock. The heavy arms and straight sides were carved with twisting, naturalistic thorned vines, with stylized rosettes on the front of the arms and at the very top of the back of the throne, almost like a sun. The backs themselves weren't wide planes of stone, but shaped like swords, with the tips pointed up. The side bars of the hilt arced up from the seat into sharp-pointed crescent moons, and the foot-wide back was enough to lean on while still making room for wings.

Both sat on a platform of stone that had three natural ledges leading up to it, like a fancy stage, and their seats were at the same height. They were the thrones of equals, meant for a King and a Queen.

One was sized for Cass, and the other, for me.

"Wow," I whispered, struck by the absolute strangeness of the world I'd been thrown into. Danica had said I was the Merciful Queen, but I hadn't really believed it. Standing there, looking at a throne made for me, it was inescapable.

A fae woman clad only in a corset of woven willow branches and a drifting skirt of gauzy dark green cloth got up gracefully from her cross-legged position in front of the thrones. The green willow-leaves shrouded her breasts and fuzzed the outline of her body, so fresh I knew she must have been woven into it this morning. Her long hair was bound back in a heavy braid that coiled on the ground, and she had narrow braids of it woven into a net on her arms.

She had silver tears painted onto her face and dotted on her chest, a more intense version of the decorations the first woman had worn. This, then, was the high priestess.

She lifted one hand and looked up.

The Archangels dropped out of the sky.