36. Chapter 36

Chapter 36

I t took Mikael all of ten minutes to work his way down to the bar, grab a bottle of wine and two glasses, and make his way back up to the suites. He regretted those ten minutes the moment he saw the hostess walking back down the hall with a predatory smile on her face.

“I got that sweet little thing loosened up for you. Seemed nervous,” she purred, patting Mikael’s chest. “She’s in number eight.”

Mikael stared at her, nudging her hand away. “What did you do?”

“Oh, she just smoked a little ‘lock.” The hostess scoffed and brushed past him, waving her hand in the air. “Enjoy your evening, Your Highness ,” she crooned.

Mikael sighed.

He should’ve just brought Cyril back to the damn barracks again.

When he made it halfway down the hall and pushed open the door to suite eight, he swore quietly.

The air was hazy, and there was no mistaking that cloying smell.

In the center of the room, Cyril stood with uneasy stillness, her arms hanging at her sides. Mikael took a few purposefully heavy steps towards her and sat down the wine bottle and glasses with a clatter, but she didn’t move.

He put out the half-burned faelock roll that was smoldering in an ashtray on the table.

“Cyril?” he said.

Silence.

He brushed his hand up her back and her body went rigid, wide eyes darting back at him. It took a long moment, but her features softened and she smiled.

“Come with me? I want to go look,” she said as she wrapped her arms around his middle and tipped her head toward the balcony. As if the few feet over there somehow required him to escort her personally.

Which he did, awkwardly, with her refusing to relinquish her hold on him.

“Trust me, okay?” Mikael said as he peeled Cyril’s hands off of him. He turned her around, planting her hands on the railing instead, and stood beside her.

Her eyes didn’t leave him.

“I know I’m nice to look at, Cyr,” he chuckled, “but I think it’s a bit more interesting down there .”

Mikael tipped his head to the floor below and, slowly, Cyril’s attention drifted down. Her eyes widened, and she took a half step closer to the railing.

Down in the main room, all the dark corners and moving bodies made it easy to lose track of what you saw at ground level, but that wasn’t the case up in the suites. From the balconies, you could see everything.

From the more reserved patrons, chatting and dancing casually wherever space allowed, to the duos and trios that retreated to the walls and soft surfaces, their hands and mouths all over each other.

They had a front row to every bit of it, with the added benefit of being mostly shrouded in shadow magic—a little perk of being an upper-class patron.

Despite not a single bit of this going any way he planned, the awe in Cyril’s face did wonders to ease his simmering annoyance.

All Mikael had wanted was for her first night out to be a memorable one. A night she’d look back on fondly weeks, months, or even years down the road, wherever she was. Now they’d be lucky if she even remembered being here.

But, truthfully, as long as Cyril's first night out at The Stairs wasn't anything like Mikael's first, he would be happy.

Which, considering she wasn’t sixteen and being forced into a room with a courtesan, and told she couldn’t come out until she’s thoroughly made a man …her prospects looked alright.

A resigned sigh left Mikael.

He leaned over Cyril, his hands grasping the railing on either side of hers, and quietly asked, “Have you ever been somewhere like this?”

The answer was something Mikael already knew, but he wanted to hear the wonder in her voice.

“ No . I…” Cyril’s eyes didn’t leave the crowd as she shook her head. “I’ve never seen ...” Her lips parted, and she fell silent.

She had seen none of this, he was sure, from the glorified prison Dion kept her locked away in. For a woman who probably knew how to kill someone six different ways with her bare hands, her sheltered upbringing still struck him as the strangest fucking thing. Not that he was going to bother ever trying to understand Dion or his reasons for doing anything.

No, that seemed like an utter waste of time that would be better spent showing Cyril every worldly wonder that he could manage.

With nothing but selfish intent, Mikael swept her loose braid over her shoulder. He grazed his lips over the crook of her neck, breathing in her cinnamon warmth, and kissed his way up in slow, purposeful movements. When he reached that soft, sensitive junction of her jaw and throat, Cyril shuddered . A breathy, sensuous incantation of, “ Mika,” left her lips and went straight to his cock.

He didn’t have a doubt now about how thoroughly the faelock had saturated her senses.

Mikael smiled and eased back from her.

“You feel good?” he asked, equal parts safety measure and sanity check.

The first foray she’d taken into the stimulant hadn’t gone exactly what he would call well, and they weren’t close to home this time.

Her hummed, half-hearted response as she shifted her weight from side to side gave Mikael no reassurance. Hells, she probably didn’t even know what he said.

“Cyr, look at me for a second.”

He brushed a hand up her back, and she made a noise that sounded vaguely like a protest. Of course, nothing could ever take away the edge of her attitude.

It seemed to take a concerted amount of effort, but her head turned and her eyes drifted up to him. Nothing but a thin, shimmering strand of gold clung to the edge of her pupils, and an amused sort of smile tugged at her lips. The woman had to be soaring by now.

“You feel good?” he asked again.

Cyril held his gaze for a few seconds before she nodded. Her attention waned and her eyes drifted back to all the wonders that lay beyond the railing.

Mikael cupped her face, drawing her back. “If that changes, tell me. Okay? Or if any of this feels like too much, tell me and we’ll go.”

She nodded again, and Mikael let her go. There was an entire bottle of wine with only his name on it now, after all, and a bit of privacy to take in the sights was the least he could give her.

Cyril had other plans.

He made it all of two steps toward the sofa when she snagged his arm and hauled him right back beside her. She clutched at his bicep with one hand, her eyes fully hooked on the floor below.

Mikael leaned back against the railing with a sigh.

Babysitting it was.

Considering he was certain Cyril had never indulged in something like smoked faelock before, she was tolerating it remarkably well. It probably helped that the woman could put back more liquor than someone her size had any right to and still keep her wits somewhat about her.

There was a bit of restlessness in the way her free hand flexed and slid along the railing and the near-endless shifting of her weight. But that was all standard operation for faelock rolls. It hit everyone a little differently, but the blend circulated in the club was…specific.

It was in their best interest to have their patrons blissful, loosened up, and with just enough aphrodisiac in their blood to partake in the staff services, regardless of cost. Cyril, thankfully, hadn’t seemed to tip too far into the latter yet.

When her cheeks flushed suddenly and she stared up at him with wide eyes, Mikael couldn’t help but chuckle as he said, “What did you see?”

Her uncle seemed pretty high on the list of traumatizing options, but anything was possible at The Stairs. The chaos on the floor below made it impossible for him to pick out anything in particular.

“I saw…” She turned back and pointed vaguely to where seating cubbies lined the far wall. The velvet drapes were closed on all but one.

“Oh,” was all Mikael said.

Cyril coughed quietly.

“Is she…”

“Getting thoroughly fucked by…” Mikael made a point of counting slowly enough that Cyril’s cheeks took on nearly a shade of burgundy, and she pressed her face into his chest. “Two—ah, three people? Yes, she is. Talk about making use of every available—”

“ Mikael ,” Cyril groaned into his shirt.

“What?” he laughed, easing his arms around her. Softly, he added, “Does that sort of thing interest you, wrath?”

Cyril stared up at him, eyes wide, and she looked scandalized .

She was quiet, though, for a long moment, and…

Fuck him.

She was giving it thought.

“No, I…” Cyril nestled her face back into his chest. “I just want you.”

Raw male pride swelled up in his chest with such ferocity it nearly ached. There was no shortage of possessive, smug things that threatened to tumble out of him, but he reined it into a single question.

“Do you want to watch them with me?”

Cyril didn’t even look up as she shook her head, and Mikael breathed a quiet sigh of relief. He would have entertained any damn thing she asked of him, but that would have been a particularly cruel form of torture.

“Come sit, then. I can feel your damn knees wobbling,” he said as he took Cyril’s hand and led her away from the railing.

She dropped into the corner of the velvet sofa with a sigh, leaning back against the arm. Her eyes fell shut as she stretched her legs out over his lap. He had no issue splaying a hand over the thighs so generously presented to him, and it was prime time to get a bit of that wine in his system.

Mikael wrenched the cork from the bottle with his teeth and spat it across the room. The smell of what would surely be a headache in the morning wafted—

“I don’t know anything about you,” Cyril said so quietly he nearly missed it. Her eyes were half-open, fixated on the rolled cuff of his sleeve as she toyed with it.

He set the bottle down and squeezed her leg, but Cyril just blinked at him as he said, “What do you want to know?”

A sheepish smile formed on her lips. “…Did I say that out loud?”

Mikael nodded.

“Oh,” she chuckled. “Sorry.”

“That’s alright,” he said, “You can ask me anything you’d like.”

It’s not like she would remember most of it in the morning. But Cyril did not miss a beat. Immediately, she asked, “How old are you?”

Right to the practical questions.

“Twenty-seven.”

“Oh.”

“What do you mean, oh ? Is that bad?”

“No, I just didn’t know. When were you born?”

Mikael smiled at her. The temptation to say twenty-seven years ago was painful to pass up. Instead, he said, “Dead of winter, a month after the solstice.”

“How about…” she hummed thoughtfully, her eyes drifting around the room for a moment. “Favorite food?”

“Anything grilled.”

“Of course.” She rolled her eyes. “Favorite color?”

Mikael hesitated. “Green?”

“ Green ?” Cyril squinted at him. “I’ve never seen you wear anything green.”

He shrugged. “I still like it.”

Cyril stewed on that for a while, her brow low and nose wrinkled.

But when Mikael reached for the wine, he garnered all of her attention. Her eyes followed the bottle as he tipped it back and took a healthy swig of the not-overly-pleasant, dry red.

“Can I…” The damn woman looked like she was salivating over wine that wasn’t worth it at all.

Against his better judgment, he poured her a short glass. Faelock rolls and wine weren’t a friendly combination, but it was better than risking her wrath or handing her the entire bottle.

She clasped the glass between her hands and just stared at it.

Just when Mikael was about to give her a gentle nudge back down to reality, a noise that sounded somewhere between a laugh and a snort left her.

“What’s so funny?” he asked, wholly bemused.

“What do you ”—Cyril stifled a half-laugh, half-hiccup—“do for fun, Prince Mikael?”

“What do I— oh, you snarky arse.”

“Do you not paint , or…or sew— ” Cyril lost the tail end of her words to a snort of laughter. The wine glass in her hands—and its measly contents—hit the floor before Mikael could grab it.

Cyril stared at Mikael, a hand clamped over her mouth and her eyes wide.

“Gods, I can’t take you anywhere, can I?” He laughed as he shook his head. “Come here, you difficult woman.”

It took a moment of maneuvering, but Cyril was more than pliant and settled into his lap with ease. She slipped her arms around his neck, nestling her face in close. And gods— she radiated heat like a damn hearth.

“Your turn, Lady Cyril ,” Mikael said, as he settled his hands around her hips. His own masochist streak may have had him pulling her body a little more snugly to his.

“For what?”

Oh, her sweet, faelock-addled mind.

“This isn’t just interrogate Mikael time, wrath.” He kissed the top of her head, and the quiet, contented noise she made just about cleaved him in two. “Same questions. Your turn.”

“But you know everything already.”

“Not everything. I know you are twenty-one, and you love cake. Oh, and you are also a lady of culture and violence, with no shortage of hobbies.”

Cyril laughed.

“But I don’t know when you were born, or what your favorite color is.”

“Samhain,” she said with sudden softness.

“…You were born on Samhain?”

He wasn’t sure how they regarded the day in Helia, but in Reykr they always said it marked the start of darkness. Shorter days, longer nights, and, the worst part, cold.

He felt the warm puff of her sigh on his neck.

“Unfortunately, yes.”

“What’s wrong with—”

Mikael was a gods damned idiot. Of course, her birthday was a sensitive topic. Cyril had already made her thoughts on the matter of her existence crystal clear.

He wouldn’t drag her back down that road again tonight.

“Nevermind. Favorite color?”

“I like the colors of our crest.” She sighed again. “Red. Orange. Yellow.”

Mikael really had a grade-fucking-A talent for putting a damper on Cyril’s evenings.

The woman hated the entire notion of being born and was undoubtedly homesick, and he had her thinking about both. At least on the solstice, he had a day of drinking to blame for his idiocy.

“You look good in orange,” he said, but Cyril was quiet.

Mikael ran his hands up her back, and warmth radiated through the damp fabric of her shirt. One of the unfortunate side effects of the stimulant running its course, and the downfall of many an over-eager reveler. He’d lost count of how many guardsmen he’d helped haul back to the city station to ply with tonics.

“How are you feeling?”

Other than a soft, contemplative noise she hummed into the crook of his neck, Cyril didn’t answer right away.

She shifted and fidgeted in that same uneasy way she had all night, with the added torture of doing so directly in his lap. He adjusted them both as discreetly as he could, trying to relieve some of the merciless friction he was in no position to act on.

“Cyr?”

“I feel…” A rush of air left her lungs. “Tired, but I don’t want to sleep. And my body, it…it’s buzzing. And…” She laughed, quiet and almost sheepish. “It feels really nice when you touch me.”

Ah, she was in the thick of it now.

Better her thinking about that than anything else.

“I’m sure it does.” Maybe to appease them both, Mikael slipped his hands under her shirt and splayed them across the damp, bare skin of her back. Skin that was fucking hot to the touch. “Cyr… You’re really, really warm.”

“Mm. That too.”

“That means we should think about leaving.”

This may have very well held the record for his shortest night out at The Stairs, ever. Not how he envisioned their night going by any means.

Cyril sat back on his thighs, her cheeks stained red and eyes glassy, and fixed him with a wholly disappointed stare. “But downstairs… I wanted to go and…”

The woman had the audacity to pout .

“Maybe another time, when your uncle also isn’t downstairs?”

Her eyes flared.

“Did you forget about that?”

“I… Maybe.” She clambered out of his lap with the sort of urgency that he found humorous. That bit of information had absolutely vacated her mind.

Not that her mind had a fighting chance of holding onto much of importance, anyway. And honestly, that was probably for the best. Seeing as her firsthand experiences with carnal pleasures amounted to, well…nothing, a front-row seat to a public foursome might have been throwing her far into the rapids.

Cyril reached for his hand, clear concern contending with the euphoric haze that painted her face for the last couple of hours.

“Mika, let’s go. If Dion sees me…fuck. He’ll kill me. And gods , you too, for bringing me here.”

She swore again, fucking colorfully at that, and her eyes darted to the balcony.

“Do you think he…? Fuck. What if he already—”

Mikael stood and cupped Cyril’s face in his hands, shaking his head. “He hasn’t seen you, Cyr, and he won’t see you, either. The balconies are glamored for privacy, and we’ll just go out the back.”

She stilled, and he could see her spiraling thoughts come to their screeching stop. The crease between her brow softened, and she smiled lazily as she said, “Right.”

One crisis avoided.

Now he just needed to get her home in one piece.

Mikael took one final swig from the wine bottle—he’d need it, he was sure—before he steered Cyril towards the suite’s door.

Navigating the hall? Arguably one of the more challenging parts of their night.

Cyril was unsteady at best and clutched at his hand like it was the only thing tethering her to the damn earth.

Nearly every sight and sound they encountered in the walkway made her stop and stare, and Mikael had to pull her along every damn time. She wore one hells of a sheepish smile, but he just focused on steering her this way and that to avoid the staff and patrons moving to and from the other suites.

She climbed the stairs tucked discreetly at the end of the hall with ease, and for that, Mikael was grateful. Playing babysitter was a wholly different experience when he wasn’t just keeping an eye on another guard with a half-vested interest.

And that wasn’t even considering the complete and utter hells he’d end up in if a single damn thing happened to Cyril under his watch. He was more scared of his mother than he was of Dion, truthfully.

“G’nite lovebirds. Keep each other warm, yeah?”

From half a flight of stairs up from where they were, a boulder of a man stood up from a chair tucked by the back doors.

Keep w arm ? They weren’t even a couple of weeks out from the Summer Solstice. Reykr was about as far from cold as it would ever be.

The one eye the man still had picked upon Mikael’s confusion and he jerked his head towards the door. “Started pissin’ rain an hour ‘go.”

Fucking hells.

Now that the rumble and buzz of the club had faded back into the depths of the stairwell, he could hear it pelting away on the street beyond the door.

Cyril, bless her strange and loaded little heart, just looked up at him and grinned, saying, “I like the rain.”

“Ah, ‘am sure you do, sweetheart. Get on then, night’s callin’ ya.” The man chuckled and shook his head.

The metal door squealed as he nudged it open.

He clasped Mikael on the shoulder as he walked by and gave him a knowing smile as he said, “Good luck, friend.”

He was going to need it, too.

Out in the middle of the alleyway, Cyril basked in the downpour, with her arms splayed out wide and her face upturned to the sky. She was wearing the most shit-eating grin he’d ever seen.

All Mikael could think about was the fact he had to get this woman onto a damn horse and keep her on it.

Gods help him, truly.