67. Chapter 67

Chapter 67

M ikael hadn't been sure if there was ever another time the sight of those looming sandstone and steel gates ever brought him so much relief. He saw it in Ari too, in the immediate sag in the captain’s posture once they rounded the last bend in the road.

And it wasn’t for a lack of time spent away from home, either.

Even in Mikael’s relatively short tenure with the guard, their trips number in the dozens. From training exercises to assignment rotations, he spent weeks upon weeks away from home every year. Often by choice, when the palace and his duties, and even his own family, felt suffocating.

The trips usually just didn’t involve bearing such devastating news.

Mikael also never had someone he was desperate to get home to before.

He struggled to sleep most nights with that last glimpse of Cyril's face in his mind. Her eyes tear-filled. Her face battered. Her body broken.

Walking out of her room that day gutted Mikael in a way he hadn’t been prepared for.

He knew Cyril would be well tended to with his mother and Wren, and every working member of the palace at her disposal. But Mikael also knew he hurt her when he left, and that still didn’t sit well with him. The needs of another were never a factor in his decisions before, so duties always came before all else.

That was going to have to change.

When he and Ari finally made it into the royal stables, silence greeted them. Not surprising given just how late—or early—it was, but the lack of conscious stable hands meant another delay.

“Just go,” Ari said as Mikael stared despondently at his saddle and travel bags. “I’ll deal with all this and dump your things in your office.”

Mikael cast him a sidelong glance.

“That hardly seems fair.”

Ari shrugged as he started working through the fastenings of his own saddle.

“If it means I don’t have to watch you pout anymore, I’d say it’s perfectly fair.”

“ Pout? ” Mikael stared at him. “I have not been—”

“Oh, you have,” Ari chuckled, “So get your ass moving and go see her. I’ll take care of this.”

That nagging pull was far too strong for Mikael to resist.

“I owe you, Ari, seriously,” he said, his feet pulling him halfway down the aisle.

Ari just waved him on and laughed, and Mikael took off running.

He ran from the stables, through the pathways, and straight into the palace. It felt like a wicked form of torture to run right past her room and into his own, but he had days’ worth of travel clinging to his skin that felt prudent to deal with.

His clothes clung to his still-damp skin when he was back at Cyril’s door, knocking with as much patience as he could muster.

The door swung open on his third attempt, his hand still midair.

“Hi, wrath,” he said.

Cyril’s dark, tired eyes went wide, and a long second of silence passed.

“You’re back,” she breathed, like she didn’t quite believe what she was seeing in front of her. The smile that bloomed on her face made his legs feel unsteady.

“I am.” He smiled at her as he leaned against the doorframe. “Can I come in, and can we please go to bed?”

That shook Cyril out of her half-asleep stupor.

She blinked, laughed a bit awkwardly, and stepped aside to let him in.

“Gods, it feels good to—”

The door had barely clicked shut behind Mikael when Cyril collided with him.

Her face nestled right into his chest and her arms wrapped around his midsection, squeezing him tightly. A remarkably emotional noise left her.

“I missed you, you arse,” she grumbled, muffled by the fabric of his shirt.

And just like that, Mikael felt like he was finally home.

“I missed you too,” he whispered.

And for a while, they just stood there.

Mikael was far too content to hold her close, brushing a hand over her back while he carded the other through her soft, inky-black hair. It was even shorter than when he last saw her, but Mikael was certain now she could pull off anything. He focused on that, and the sheer warmth of her body tucked against his, instead of the way the angles of her bones dug into him.

The road to getting her healthy again was going to be a long one.

But she was alive, he reminded himself, and everything else just needed time.

When the sobering reminders of why he was so grateful she was alive became too hard to ignore, Mikael eased back from her. He notched his fingers under Cyril’s chin and tipped her face up.

The faintest trace of sun-spun gold shimmered in her eyes and, for now, he would take that.

“You’re feeling better?” he asked, even though the answer was obvious. After all, she was up and walking on her own. Lucid, too.

A far cry from the condition he left her in.

“So much better,” she said with a smile that made him want to believe it was the truth. “I’m just tired now.”

As she was still speaking, Mikael started easing Cyril backward. One shuffled step at a time, towards the bed that he was desperate to crash into.

“That makes two of us. I haven’t had a good night’s sleep since—”

Cyril planted her hand on his chest.

“Wait a second,” she said, and Mikael stilled.

He didn’t even get to ask why before her other hand slipped up the back of his neck, tangling into the damp strands at his nape. He caught just a sliver of her wry smile before she pulled him down and pressed her lips to his.

Gods . He missed this too.

The physicality that inevitably came from being in her presence.

For being a woman who had self-proclaimed ineptitudes with her feelings, physical affection was something she had no issue with. Mikael was just happy to be on the receiving end of her attention, and her unfathomably soft lips.

That first kiss was tender, carrying a weight of relief with it. But another, and another, followed it until Cyril’s lips lingered with restrained eagerness, and both her arms slid around his neck.

Mikael's blood warmed thoroughly.

As he started guiding her backward again in slow, measured steps, he didn’t dare pull his lips from hers. Not with how easily they parted for him, that first brush of her tongue triggering a honey-like drip of need down his spine. The soft, breathy noise Cyril uttered when the backs of her thighs hit the bed was all the confirmation he needed that sleep could wait a little while longer.

He helped her up onto linens that felt like fucking silk after a week in bedrolls and inns, and let her pull him right in with her. Only then did he let that molten, indulgent kiss falter, as she settled back into the plush duvet and Mikael kneeled above her.

He took a single look down at the wisp of fire-made-flesh that turned his life upside down in ways he could never imagine, and words just tumbled out of Mikael.

“Cyr, I love you,” he said, and Cyril stilled.

Her hands hovered on his arms, braced on either side of her, and she looked thunderstruck.

“I love you so much,” he repeated, a little more softly, because he needed her to hear it again, “and it was like fucking torture being away from you.”

It was the honest to gods truth.

Mikael had known for longer than he cared to admit that it wasn’t just some fleeting physical interest he had in Cyril.

He was enamored—no.

He was fucking infatuated with every part of her being.

That night in the cellar, faced with the possibility of an existence without her, only solidified what he’d been too afraid to admit to himself. And the turmoil he battled, leaving her behind? Confirmation he was a coward for not telling her.

His words hit their mark this time.

Cyril’s eyes softened, and Mikael was certain he grinned like an idiot when a smile tugged at her own lips.

“Come here,” she said as she cupped his face and guided his forehead to rest against hers. Quietly, she added, “I love you too.”

That felt as good as if she screamed it from the fucking rooftop.

Cyril kissed him again, and Mikael let it consume him.

The warmth that licked out in every direction from his core was unlike anything he’d ever felt before. A smoldering spark of need ignited within him, and Mikael felt desperate to be closer to her. Her fingers carded through his hair, nails raking across his scalp, and a groan slipped out from somewhere deep in his chest.

Mikael wasn’t sure if it was possible to want someone more than he wanted her at that very moment.

His body ached for every inch of contact it could get and, in the most primal way, he just wanted to be inside of her. He wanted to feel that slick, snug heat that drove him fucking mad .

One pointed graze of his hand up the soft, irresistibly warm flesh of her inner thigh, and Cyril yielded to his whims entirely.

Mikael settled between legs that parted so fucking easily for him and rocked himself selfishly against her core. The needy whine she uttered against his lips had an ache of want running right through to his cock.

He groaned and gripped her thigh, dragging her impossibly close.

Her wince was sobering.

“Cyr…” Mikael eased back, looking down at her.

And what a mistake that was.

Just the sight of her with that silky burgundy slip gathered up around her waist and her knees splayed for him had Mikael fighting to hold on to any rational thoughts.

“I’m fine, I’m fine!” she said, a breathy and desperate edge to her voice. But Mikael was not convinced.

“Are you sure this is a good idea…?”

“Positive.” Cyril eased a hand between them and palmed at his aching length. “And you don’t get to tell me you love me and just kiss me goodnight like it was fucking nothing.”

Mikael wanted to laugh, tease her even about just how hot and bothered his declaration made her, but he could only groan instead. Just a simple and insistent touch and she had dangerous heat pooling at the base of his spine. He was wound up so fucking tight it almost spelled disaster.

Mikael set his hand over hers, stilling her movements.

Sheepishly, he said, “I won’t last if you keep that up, wrath.”

Amusement flickered in her eyes.

“I’m not sure what you’re waiting for then,” she said, her voice low and rough in a way that did precisely nothing to help. She completely disregarded his hand too, and started tugging the laces of his pants. A few deft movements, and she had her hand wrapped around him.

That first languid stroke had him biting back a string of curses.

He slipped his hand back up the inside of Cyril’s thigh and tugged aside the scrap of black, lace-trimmed fabric she liked to call underwear, bearing the slick and molten heat waiting for him. He eased a finger into her, followed quickly by a second, and rocked them slowly as she arched into his touch.

“Mika…” Cyril said softly—submissively, almost. She tipped her head back and Mikael was on the verge of losing it completely.

He pumped his fingers faster as he pressed his lips to the expanse of throat she bared to him, working a path away from where he was desperate to mark her. When he met that soft, delicate flesh at the base of her jaw, he rumbled, “Are you ready for me, wrath?”

Her whine and nod were all he needed to replace his fingers with his cock and let her touch guide him home. Three slow, languid thrusts and a full-bodied groan had his hips flush with hers.

He didn’t have words for the sated thrum that trickled through every fiber of his being. And Mikael knew there was never a time where being buried in her body didn’t bring him to some blissful plane of existence.

But this was something else entirely.

And he was still at a loss for words when she tangled one hand in his hair and left the other between their bodies, working herself to release.

Mikael was certain he was dreaming.

Against every instinct to savor this moment, to take his time and watch her indulge in a way she’d never dared to in front of him before, Mikael couldn’t hold himself back.

Every rough pump of his hips flooded his spine with inexplicable pressure and warmth, the cruelest test of his fleeting restraint. Hells, the soft, needy gasps she uttered threatened to spell his end on their own. But he held out, teeth gritted and a bruising grip on her backside, until every muscle in Cyril’s body tensed.

“Mika, I…”

The most intoxicating whimper of a moan left her lips.

Mikael completely lost his rhythm as her back arched and she came undone around him.

A few more ragged, groan-laced thrusts, and he fell right over that edge with her, his release stealing every bit of breath from his lungs. Little tremors of utter bliss rolled up his spine as he rocked against her slowly, riding out every last bit of pleasure he could get.

And when Cyril cupped his face, kissing him slowly as they both struggled to catch their breath, Mikael had never felt more sated.

Lying there with Cyril, and soaking in that hazy afterglow that had her eyes hooded and her smile bright, was all Mikael needed to live. Food and water be damned.

But she had other plans.

“Can I ask you something?” Cyril said quietly, a hint of breathlessness still in her voice.

That didn’t bode well.

Her hands skimmed up his shoulders with an almost tentative touch and Mikael hadn’t even realized he was still fucking dressed.

No wonder his body felt like it was damn near on fire.

“Should I, uh…”

He glanced between them.

Cyril had the audacity to look embarrassed as she unwrapped her legs from his waist and nodded.

Mikael bit back a groan as he eased out of her and pried himself away for long enough to rid himself of his pants and shirt. Cyril had already nestled in under the blankets by the time he settled back in.

“Alright, wrath,” he said, extending an arm out in invitation, “Ask your unsettling question.”

She laughed nervously, and Mikael sighed.

“That is not helping at all, you know.”

“I know, I know! I just…”

Cyril eyed him before she sagged into his open arm, tucking herself right up against his side. At least she was exactly where she was supposed to be when she unloaded whatever fresh hell was important enough that it demanded an answer now.

“You just…?”

He felt her sigh.

“When you were away…did you feel it too?” Her question was such a hesitant, cautious thing, as she splayed her hand low on his chest. Just below where his heart was finally slowing its frantic pace. “Pain, here?”

“ Pain ? I…” Mikael went still. “Yeah.”

Hells, his entire damn body felt foreign in the days he was gone. He just chalked his aching chest and crawling skin up to the unimaginable shitstorm that happened before he left. Thought the stress had finally caught up with him in those first quiet moments that he had to breathe, to process it all.

That pain now though?

It was like it never existed.

No, something contented and sated thrummed in its place instead.

And for her to ask if he felt it too…

Mikael’s brows climbed just as Cyril softly said, “Our bond.” The breathy laugh that slipped out of her sounded far more anxious than it did humored. “I think it was pretty pissed with us.”

Fuck him.

Their bond .

It happened so quickly…

Bonds could take years to form with the right person, if they even formed at all. There was no guarantee that it ever would. Couples could be madly in love for centuries and never have a bond form. It was a matter of luck, and fates and destinies, as his mother would prattle on about.

And while it certainly fucking explained things, Mikael was stunned and, gods, he was fucking elated . A bond was a gift beyond gifts, but Cyril’s tone…

“You don’t sound happy about that.”

She stared up at him with wide eyes.

“No! That’s not it at all.” Cyril’s features softened and she dropped her gaze. “I’m so happy, but it…”

She made a quiet noise, her fingers flexing against his chest.

“ It what?”

“It terrifies me, Mika.”

“The bond?” he asked, and Cyril nodded.

“The bond. Loving you. Caring about you like I do.” She exhaled shakily. “I know you love me now, but when is it going to stop? When are you going to get tired and change your mind, like…”

Everyone else.

Cyril didn’t even need to finish the words, and his heart still ached for her.

Mikael shifted onto his side and Cyril didn’t resist when he notched his fingers under her chin, tipping her face up. Her eyes were full of so much conflict.

“Never, Cyr. Never,” he said softly. “You have no idea how much purpose you have given me, or how lucky I feel when you look at me, and I know that you see me as much as I see you. I love you, and there are no conditions with that. Not now, not ever, okay?”

Mikael trusted Cyril understood precisely what he was talking about. That she knew he would never treat her like that fucking waste of air did.

Whatever freedom she wanted, it was hers. Hells, he’d even be the one to push her from the fucking nest if she was afraid of spreading her wings too far. And whatever brought her happiness, he’d see that she had so much of it she got sick of it.

But what he would never do was use the condition of his love to get what he wanted from her.

“Okay,” she whispered, and that was all he needed for now.

Mikael kissed Cyril’s forehead before he circled his arms around her and drew her in close. “Can we sleep now? I’m fucking exhausted.”

Days of travel, a quick fuck, and an emotional outpouring? Mikael wasn’t sure how his eyes were still open.

A quiet, breathy laugh left Cyril, just a puff of warm air against his skin, and she said, “Me too.”

Mikael was grateful it only took minutes for him to feel Cyril’s body go slack, for her breathing to settle into something deep and rhythmic. He let himself slip away then too, to make the most of the few hours of rest he’d get before the sun rose and brought his duties with it.