Chapter 6

As Arnwell predicted, Jakol does take it well.

“Some of my people will return home, but many will choose to stay if welcomed this way.” Not only is he taking it well, but he’s smiling a big, dumb grin that, as much as he tries to put it away, remains on the edges of his mouth. I’ve made him very happy by inviting his people to stay, and I don’t like how satisfied it makes me.

“It will ultimately be better for both of our countries,” I say. I have to be practical about this. I can’t change who I’ve married, so I have to find the best path forward for the sake of my people. They are as wise as they are kind, and I’m sure they will treat their new Burbarre neighbors as neighbors.

“I’ve always so deeply admired your people and their earnestness,” Jakol says. “It is no wonder they chose you. I knew that I could learn much about how to be a better ruler from you.”

He, too, is in charge of the well-being of thousands, maybe more. I wonder what I could learn from him and the way that he rules.

“I suppose you could come to the office with me for part of tomorrow,” I say. It will have to happen eventually if we are to do this together. “I should know as much as I can about your country if I am going to be of any help to you.”

“Of help to me?” He seems perplexed. “And you want to know more about my homeland?”

“It’s not a matter of what I want.” I should make this clear to him. “This is how I become the best guardian for my people that I possibly can—by making this professional relationship work.”

The big grin melts away. Jakol just nods. “I understand.”

“Good.” He looks chastened, but it doesn’t make me feel better to be the one who did it. I push my food away and sigh. “Perhaps we should go for an after-dinner walk.”

A brightness returns to him. “I’d love that.” Jakol is on his feet right away, and I remember just how tall he is when he stands next to me, more than a head and a half above mine, before the horns start.

When we’re outside, he holds out one arm to me, and my better manners lead me to take it. Then he guides me into the garden behind the castle that overlooks the cliff.

“An interesting decision to build here,” he says, coming to a stop at the wall closest to the edge. “A little close for comfort.”

“Do your kind not build this way? We always have put our castles and fortresses atop hills and cliffs.”

He shakes his head, and I realize that his eyes are a little too wide. I think he’s afraid of heights. “No. We build low to the ground, sometimes inside hills or caves. Not as much anymore, but that’s where we’re drawn.”

Then it’s even more brave of his own people to relocate here. “Luckily, most of the new settlements are down in the lowlands near the farms and ranches,” I say. “Your civilians should be more comfortable there.”

Jakol gently caresses my arm, then moves down until his hand is cupping mine. I don’t pull away—that would feel impolite. “Thank you,” he breathes, and it’s so low I almost can’t hear it. His voice has dropped to a tenor I’ve never encountered before. “That means the world to me.”

Suddenly, very much against my better nature, I want him to breathe like that against my neck the way he did the other night. I want to feel his warm hand against my skin. Before I realize it, I’m staring up into his big, dark eyes, and he’s looking right back at me.

“I hope that I can truly earn your affection someday,” he says, still using that deep, quiet voice, his fingers entwined with mine. “I will do whatever it takes to make you feel happy and comfortable with me.”

But can I promise the same? My instinct is to harden myself to him, to wall my heart off. He forced me into this. I can hold it against him forever and make him wish he had never done it at all—punish him for his selfishness for both of our lifetimes.

There is a second option I hadn’t considered. Maybe, if I tried to make this work, it wouldn’t be as intolerable. Maybe I could come to like small things about him enough not to drag my misery into every other part of my life. I would hate to become a bitter old queen who takes it out on those around me.

“I will try,” I say at last. “I will try, as much as I can, to find that happiness.” It almost gags me coming out. I feel like I’m betraying everything about myself. It is against my deepest principles to allow myself to want this man—no, this beast. But I’m also tired of fighting the truth that down in some darkened place, I want a repeat of the wedding day when he teased my mouth open and his hands pulled me flush against his nearly bare chest. No, I wouldn’t terribly mind that.

Jakol’s hand grips mine a little bit harder, and I find myself stepping into him instead of away. I can hear his heart beating faster as he leans toward me, so far down that his mouth is just a breath away from my ear. “Thank you,” he whispers. “You will not regret giving me a chance.”

Already the feel of his words against my neck has sent a signal straight down into the cavity between my legs. It’s like the first time we met, and he kissed my knuckles, but now I don’t need to imagine what King Jakol looks like underneath his coil. I already know how he kisses, what he smells like as he sleeps, and what he looks like all over.

Gently, his lips press to my neck just underneath my ear. I can’t help the little gasp that escapes me, followed by another when he moves his mouth further down. He doesn’t try to pull me closer or block off my escape—I could draw myself away from him at any time, and we would no longer be touching.

But I don’t. My breaths are coming faster when he stops at my collar and raises his head to look into my eyes. He doesn’t say anything to me or ask any questions. He doesn’t need to because I can see in his eyes what he’s planning when he leans in to kiss me.

This time his mouth is more aggressive, and I find that mine immediately opens for him without my consent. He traverses my lips, memorizing them, teasing them, and sucking them until I wonder if they might bruise. Then he invades deeper, and again, I let him. I want to get pulled into this sudden vortex I find myself in. As I return the kiss just as fiercely, my mind’s eye is racing through a million possible scenarios. It’s been so long since I had any intimacy with anyone that I’m suddenly overcome by trepidation. I don’t know what could happen if we move further than this.

Jakol must feel me freeze up, because he carefully pulls away from the kiss and peers at me. “Is everything all right, my Queen?”

“Dienne,” I say. “C-call me Dienne.” It doesn’t feel right for a king to refer to his wife that way. It makes us seem like strangers when now we are anything but.

The smile that takes over him is grateful but also veiled, like something more sensual and hungry lies behind it. It’s the same look he got in his eyes when he found me staring at him in our bedroom, and then that white fur at his crotch parted?—

“Dienne.” He says my name like he’s turning it over in his mouth, wrapping his tongue around it in a way that makes me wonder what else he could wrap his tongue around. “I have always thought it a wonderful name.”

When he kisses me again, he finds me pliable and willing because already I can feel myself hungering for more. A little animal inside me has come to life that I had forgotten even existed, and it is scrabbling at the doors to be let out.

No. It is much too soon to be thinking these sorts of thoughts, surely—far too premature to be imagining what he looks like when he emerges all the way out of that fur pouch.

That’s when I remember that I am, in fact, now married to him. All pretense is gone. There is no last barrier left to climb. It is not only encouraged but expected of us.

When our mouths part again, Jakol and I are both gasping. He sets me down, and only then do I realize he had been holding me so tight that he lifted me up off the ground.

“Dienne,” Jakol says, not releasing me from his embrace, “shall we go inside now? It is beginning to get chilly out.”

He’s not wrong. While he might burn hot as a furnace and come equipped with built-in cold weather gear, I am woefully bare in my short sleeves and lightweight pants.

“Yes, please.”

Jakol doesn’t release my hand as we make our way back across the garden to the rear entrance of the palace. There are a few staff still milling about, but when they see us coming, they scurry away to give us privacy.

What will happen when we return to our quarters? It’s as if some initial wall has been breached between us after those kisses, and I’m not sure if we can go back now. What if he wants something more? Do I want something more?

Jakol twines my fingers with his. “What is on your mind, my Queen?”

“Um...” I try to find the words. “Maybe we could keep walking before we retire?” Perhaps I can delay it a little longer.

He gives an easy nod and gestures for me to lead the way. “I would love to.”

A tense air follows us as I lead him through different rooms he hasn’t seen before—the ballroom where we host the regional leaders when they visit, the library, and the conservatory. This is where I most love to go and spend my few free hours. As I crouch down to smell a flower, I hear Jakol’s low chuckle.

“So this is your place, is it?” He kneels beside me and delicately inhales the flower’s sweet scent. “Ah, it smells good, like you.”

The compliment sets me off balance for a moment. Then I remember how it felt to wake up in his arms this morning, surrounded by the warm, hearty taste of him. Maybe I do understand.

“You like how I smell?” I’ve never had anyone say that to me before.

“Oh, very much,” Jakol hums, rising to his hooves once more and offering me an arm to help me up. This time, I take it. Strength ripples through him as he easily brings me to my feet. “You smell like spring. Like a daisy taking its first breath. But you also have a sweeter scent when you sleep.” Still holding me close, Jakol leans down and inhales against my hair, ruffling it. “That’s when I’m reminded of home, of playing in meadows as a boy and swimming in clear lakes. You take me back to that place.”

I’m still as a rabbit as I take these words in, tasting them, learning them, filling my heart with them. But I must remember that being good with words does not mean anything. It is actions that truly speak.

I’ve gotten much too comfortable, much too quickly. When I step away to move onto my roses, Jakol’s hand falls to his side. He pauses, watching me as I depart as if he is analyzing what’s made me flee.

When we’re finished with the conservatory, we enter the hallway outside and come face-to-face with the painting—the one that looks as if it could be a portrait of King Jakol himself. His steps halt when he catches sight of it. He searches the painting, eyebrows drawn down, and the silence stretches between us. Then he turns to me with a strange, serious look.

“Where did you get this?” he asks carefully. I don’t know why it sends a shiver down my spine to see him so severe.

“It’s always been here,” I say. “Since I was inaugurated. It is the only depiction of the Burbarre in the whole castle.”

Surprise flashes across his face. Then, shaking his head, he returns to studying the painting.

“What is it?” I ask.

“It’s much too strange,” he says. “That I would have you, and you would have me.”

“Is this really you?”

At my question, the tension in his face eases. “Yes.” With a great sigh, he reaches for my hand and sweeps it up into his. “Down to the scar on my forehead.”

“I hadn’t noticed a scar,” I say.

He tilts his head down and arches an eyebrow, observing the vast difference in our heights. “How would you?”

I have to chuckle. “Good point.” Surreptitiously I straighten the painting, as I always do when I pass down this hallway. How many times have I stopped and stared at it, and it turns out that I was looking into my future husband’s face? He’s at the peak of his young adult years in the painting. He looks harder, angrier, more terrifying. Was that who he was, once upon a time?

“How did this happen?” I ask.

“I’m not sure.” A faint smile is catching on his lips. “But isn’t it strange? I had no idea that you knew me already.” I don’t like the hint of knowing in his eye, as if he sees something that’s invisible to me.

“I didn’t. It’s just a painting.” And yet I remember how it made me feel the first time I saw it: I admired, even desired, the primal power visible in his every muscle and the fierce intensity in his eyes.

“Of course it is,” Jakol says amiably. “Perhaps the same traveling artist passed through both of our kingdoms. I have had many portraits painted over the years. I can’t possibly remember all of them.” But I’ve gotten to know his tells now, just a little, and I sense this holds greater significance to him than he’ll admit.

I can’t help but wonder, as Jakol takes my hand in his and we continue down the hall, if the paintings are a sign I don’t know how to read yet.