15. Caspian

They always climax too soon. Or not soon enough.

The pretty ones I plied for Cassius. I'd touch them with hateful hands and feed them lies. I'd look at them with this pretty face, and they would simper, whimper, and moan. They'd orgasm all at once, or in a drawn-out display.

None of it fucking matters. None of them are memorable.

But she…

I slam my length into that tiny cleft and make every inch fit. Her eyes widen. Then she grips me back, clinging to my body like she has a right to. A need to. Like she can't fucking breathe without me deeper. Harder. So deep it hurts, and she gasps. Then moans and pleads for more.

More more more.

She needs more. More of my cock inside her. More of my mouth on her skin. More of my fingers caressing every fucking inch. It's never enough.

She writhes for more.

The feeling of her orgasm, her body clenching me like a damn fist, isn't enough. Isn't long enough. Intense enough. I make her do it again. Unravel again until her body is drenched, her throat is sore, and she can barely make those noises again.

Then she does. I slam into her for the millionth time, and she moans my name.

Over and over.

And it. Is. Fucking. Never. Enough.

One whimpered, whispered Caspian is worth a lifetime with Cassius. Two, and I'd give the bastard my soul. A third time…and she has me, stupid little fae. Beautiful fucking, foolish fae.

She says my name, and I'd give her my heart in a bloodied fist. Don't know why. Don't care to know why.

I'll take every grated, whimpered noise until I silence that voice forever. Until she can't say a fucking word ever again.

Until Cassius chokes on his own twisted jealousy. I feel him. Hear him raging in a wordless howl.

The fae chokes out my name again, and he falls silent. Cassius is dead fucking silent. And it is her doing. Her fucking power.

She makes him disappear. At least until my orgasm steals the last of my strength away, and I go limp, crushing her pale body to the stone floor, devoid of everything.

We're alone in here, but it doesn't fucking sound like it. Her panting breaths echo back to me. Cassius' shouted cries echo back to me. Oh, I've done it now. He is so fucking angry.

Good. He should be.

I never wanted him.

Always hated him.

His anger is now so great that he has decided to put an end to this game. Angry enough to send his army of mindless toys after me. He'll have me dragged back and locked away. Perhaps with Cassiopeia, perhaps without. He'll make me repay my debt to him.

And he'll take my fae toy away.

No. I won't let him.

She stares up at me as I stand and wrench my pants back into place. She watches me, naked and breathless and fucking beautiful—no, she isn't. She isn't.

I snatch her robe and throw it at her. "Get dressed."

We don't have long. Mere minutes before the vamryre hoard descends, and my punishment begins. Oh yes, Cassius, bring them all. It will take all of his collective minds to bring me down. To take me back.

I'd rather die than go back.

She'll die then. He's angry enough to let them do it—rip her to pieces right in front of me. Teach me a lesson that will really sting. That's why he's so angry. So furious. So vengeful.

I wanted to fuck her, and I enjoyed it. More than any other time he made me dance and preen and fuck for him. I enjoyed it. I'll do it again. All over again.

I'll pay her stupid price.

"Something's wrong." Her voice is so hoarse, but it still breaks. She can sense the tension in the air. Cassius' anger is audible from his damn mansion, even for fae ears to hear.

But no. Her black eyes are focused inward, and she shakes her head, sweat-damp hair clinging to her skull. "Something's wrong. I…" Suddenly, her eyes widen, and she takes my hand. Clings to it. "Day! I hear him!"

"Who?"

The male fae. He never left. He listened at the door and heard her whimper. Heard me claim her. He heard his little piece of prey be fucked by another monster—and enjoy it.

She closes her eyes, her mouth an o of pure pain. "Oh no. Oh no?—"

"Hush," I tell her. I need to think. I need to move before the hoard reaches me. I start forward, intending to leave—but my hand is still in hers, only I'm the one gripping tighter. I tug her along, and she scrambles to keep pace.

Right to the door, she struggles. Digs her heels in and tries to resist. "Not that way. I can't?—"

But it's the only way. Through the door and past her stupid, male fae. He gapes, wide-eyed, but he's already a shadow, fading in the distance. I need to move. Through the courtyard. Up to the main tower complex.

After that, I should face my punishment. Face my dear brothers and sisters. Rip them to shreds.

I shouldn't keep moving, blowing past the main door. Then, toward a staircase?—

"Wait!" She tugs on my hand. Makes me stop. "Please!"

She wants a detour. Down a short hallway paved in stone. Up a rickety set of stairs. Into her little hovel.

My ears twitch, picking up a distant toll. An alarm bell. Oh dear. The little fae are all riled up. Soon they will amass, joining the vamryre already on my heels.

Oh, what fun.

"Come," I snap at her.

She does, shuffling toward me with a bundle under her arm. It's square-shaped, wrapped in a set of torn robes. My nostrils flare, catching the faint, rotting scent of a rose.

"I'm ready," she says, just as shouts rise up in the distance—near the archive. Too many voices. Too many fae to fight off at once.

Don't fight, the monster in my head growls. Stand and face me, Caspian! Face me! OBEY ME?—

I snatch for the fae and he's gone. Her wrist in my grasp, I head in another direction. Down a dusty, narrow passage that opens onto a larger one with pretty paneled walls and plush green carpeting. I don't recognize it… No, wait, I do.

The ceremonial antechamber. Don't know how I remember that name. Remember this place or the fact that if I open a set of gleaming black doors I will find a forgotten staircase. It leads to a dusty dead end: a landing piled high with crates and cobwebs. A deceitful illusion. If one shoves aside a stack of junk, it reveals an old statue carved into the very wall.

The statue of an old, hunched fae with one staring, carved eye and a space where the other should be. If one sticks his finger in that hole, he'll feel a pinch—the bite of some unseen mechanism. Fed just a mere drop of blood, the sated statue will spin to reveal a doorway. Old. Crumbling.

Behind it lies a space where an indigo light emanates.

A forgotten cavern. Here I need to run, too fast for the lazy guards to catch. Deep down into a tunnel that cuts beneath the earth—beneath the very realm.

"Oh, my…" The fae breathes and her steps falter. She slows me down. Makes me stop. Has me staring as she reaches out a trembling pale finger toward a wall of glistening black stone. Embedded within it are glowing things. Strange things. "Fae stones," she whispers, hesitating before touching one. "Such magic. I never thought?—"

"We need to go," I tell her, dragging her along, deeper into this winding space.

A tunnel that Cassius has made me forget. This far from him, I start to remember. It was at his request that I sneaked down this tunnel now and again. A snaking protrusion of stone, embedded with the rocks the fae claim are magic; the same magic that ripped our realm from the mortal one in the first place.

They claim the official portal above is the only way to leave. A lie. There is also this way, discrete enough for a devious vamryre to tiptoe up to the mortal realm and lure any unsuspecting prey back. It's forbidden—not allowed.

Cassius doesn't fucking care. They are fae rules. Fake rules. When he kills the high council, there will be no more rules.

That's why he so flagrantly had me take a mortal here, a mortal there. For years, he's had me creep and take. Some to be bled dry. Some to be fucked and swallowed into the mindless collective.

But I was his only one. His trusted one.

Because as long as he kept Cassiopeia close to him, I would always return for her. My sister. My lone ally in war. My other half. The only one who truly understood what it meant to resist him, and hate him, and endure him.

Until he took her away from me, and he crushed all traces of this tunnel from my memory.

The sick bastard did so out of fear. He knew that without her…

I'd find this tunnel and follow it all the way to the end. I'd climb up the worn metal ladder heading toward a heavy trapdoor made of stone. Once I shrugged off that final barrier, I'd be free from him. I'd run and keep running.

I would never fucking go back.