12. Rusalka

12

RUSALKA

The moment Belladonna orgasms, I wonder if this is a mistake. Because it should be my mouth urging her to new heights, my claws scraping gently over her skin, my arm holding her steady as she comes apart.

And yet, it can’t be me.

Because even now, I’m fighting the urge to tell my court to keep going, to see if we can draw another of those sweet cries from her lips, to see if she really did scream my name as she orgasmed. To urge her to do it again and again.

At the same time, I want to rip into them. To tear them away from her for daring to coax unrestrained pleasure from her when that’s all I want. I can’t decide if this is because I haven’t tasted and touched Belladonna properly yet, or because I’ve suddenly started to see the advantage to monogamy. Either way, it would be the wrong call.

She just had a life-altering experience, and pushing her too far, too fast will harm her. Allowing my jealousy to slip its leash is dangerous, too; she’s likely to misread it and think I’m judging her for the pleasure she just embraced.

It’s right and good that Inna is slowly easing their ministrations and stroking her thighs soothingly. That Zhenya is pressing a tender kiss to her lips before ze resumes the rhythm that will send zir over the edge as well. That Danik squeezes Belladonna’s shoulder comfortingly, continuing to offer his steady support, even as he grips Zhenya’s hip and urges zir faster.

Belladonna is limp, but her energy is good, smooth and relaxed. The orgasm will dispel the magic, and I want her to come down softly before that damned shame rears its ugly head.

I could leave her here to my court’s tender care. I trust them implicitly, even in this, even with her, but the strange jealousy is threatening to take root in the base of my spine, is spiraling upward and threatening to take over my mouth. It doesn’t make sense. Jealousy can be a delightful edge to introduce into sex games, but it has no purpose beyond that. I have shared every partner I’ve ever had, happy that there were others who could meet their physical and emotional needs because my main priority has always been being a good leader. Doing so means being a shitty partner, but with good communication, most of my past lovers have been understanding of my emotional limits. Belladonna isn’t even truly my partner to feel possessive over. It’s disconcerting in the extreme.

That doesn’t stop me from rising and crossing to sink down on her other side.

Inna moves back, shifting over to Danik and Zhenya, then Inna grins at me, their eyes too knowing. “We’ll be going for a while yet, and I took the liberty of inviting more to join us once you’ve tucked our delightful Belladonna into bed.” Their smile goes tender. “You were right to pick her.”

“I know.” I scoop Belladonna’s limp body into my arms just as she begins to stir. She’s too fucking cute, nuzzling against my throat. It makes me tighten my grip on her. It makes me want?.?.?. A lot of things.

Instead I summon a wicked smile for my Insomnior Court. “Have fun, my darlings.” Then I stride out of the room without looking back. Voices whisper from downstairs, the invited guests. I pick up the tones of Feofan, two incubi who have been courting Zhenya—and each other—and several others I can’t immediately place. It will be a party, indeed.

Any other night, I would be eager to rejoin them and immerse myself in the varied pleasures offered. I would be impatient to return to the room and the temporary escape it offered, at least for a few hours, before I needed to get back to work. Instead, I slow my steps, taking my time as I make my way to Belladonna’s room. Prolonging the comfort of holding her in my arms.

Even with the leisurely pace, I still reach her room far too soon. “You can open your eyes, little one. I know you’re back with me.”

She obeys, just like she always seems to. I expect her to drop her eyes, to hide from me, but when I look down, she’s studying my face as if attempting to memorize every line and curve. She wets her lips. “You gave me a long list, I said yes to all of it, and they didn’t even take my clothes off.”

“Yes.” I shift my grip on her so I can open the door.

“But . . . why?”

As if on cue, her shame arises in a wave meant to kill the unwary, unseeable as it is. I press my lips to her temple but don’t set her down. “What part of what happened is causing you to feel this way?”

She parts her lips like she might lie but finally shifts uncomfortably in my arms and says, “I liked that you watched. I liked imagining it was your mouth on me.”

My knees go a little weak, but I’m not leader of this territory through sheer charisma alone. A leader must learn when to dissemble and when to be explicitly honest. Showing Belladonna my shock would only reinforce her shame. So I merely smile. “I want that, too.”

“Then why—” She cuts herself off, shakes her head sharply, then seems to force herself to continue. “Why not do it?”

There’s no good reason to keep holding her, so I set her on her feet, even though I can’t quite manage to release her. I skate my hands over her hips and then cup her elbows. She smells of sex, a growing need, and something floral that I can’t quite place.

In that moment, when I finally meet her gaze, I don’t see unrestricted desire there. If I had, I don’t know that I would’ve remembered myself enough to avoid kissing her. But that’s not what I see. There’s desire, yes, and need so strong that I can’t help leaning toward her.

And, underneath it all, a shame so thick that I want to spit and clear its taste from my mouth.

“Because.” It takes conscious effort to release her, to step back, to allow the air to rush into the new space between us. “I want you, Belladonna. Desperately, in fact. You’re beautiful and you’re kind and you’re strong. Not to mention your desire is strong enough to drown cities.”

Her cheeks deepen into a crimson color against her tan skin. “Then why not take me?”

Gods, if she understood the effect her words have on me.

I clear my throat. It does nothing to negate the knot forming there because the knot isn’t real. It’s all emotion, messy and illogical. “Because, little one.” My voice is raspy, but I can’t help it. “Because, when I take you, I want you fully in possession of your faculties—not lust drunk on my power. I want your need for me to overpower the shame your people have cursed you with.”

“Cursed.” She frowns. “It does feel like a curse, doesn’t it?”

“You would know better than I.” For all my experience with humans’ dreaming selves, I’m still an observer. I can see the desires, see the things blocking those desires, but I’m not the one experiencing them. I’m not a mind reader. I can’t reach into Belladonna’s soul and pull her shame out at its poisonous root.

She rubs her chest as if she can feel my violent desire. “It was so easy in there. I knew what I wanted, and I went for it. I didn’t doubt.”

“I know.”

She ducks her head, letting her hair fall forward and hiding her expression from me. “I want you, Rusalka. I want you so desperately, it feels like a spell, even though I know it’s not. But I can’t?.?.?.” Belladonna makes a frustrated sound. “I hate this. I hate that I know what I want and can’t make myself reach out. I hate that I’m not even sure I believe in hell but I’m still scared of going there for wanting things that aren’t a nice churchgoing husband and a life spent giving him obedience and children. I hate that I can hear their voices in my head.”

Even as I tell myself to give her space, I can’t resist stepping forward and gently drawing her into my arms. She doesn’t hesitate to wrap her arms around me and hug me tight, her body shaking with the force of the conflict inside her. “If you want to talk about it, I’m here.”

“I never fit,” she whispers. “It started before I was born. My first memory is my mother telling me that the whole congregation knows I’m a sinful little beast and will do nothing but bring sorrow down on everyone I encounter.”

“How old were you?”

“I don’t remember exactly. Four or five.”

Once again, murderous desire rises in me. I close my eyes and try to breathe through it, to keep my flames from betraying my rage. “You were a child. An innocent.”

“No such thing according to our church.” Her voice has gone a little watery. “Born with sin and all that. I made it to high school before I realized there was nothing I could do to earn their love. No matter how hard I tried, I would always be flawed in their eyes.”

I swallow down the poisonous words I want to spit about her parents. “You mentioned a sister.”

“I did.” She sighs, slumping against me. “I love her so much. Ruth is a genuinely good person, but once I walked away from the church officially, it seemed like she had to try to love me back. It wasn’t effortless or easy, and even when she said she loved me, there was an asterisk attached to it.” Belladonna hiccups. “Hate the sin, love the sinner. But the so-called sin is me.”

I stroke a hand down her long hair and hold her until her tremors ease. Only then do I guide her through the process of getting ready for sleep and tuck her into the massive four-poster bed. She looks young like this, innocent and scared. “I’m sorry, little one.”

She swallows hard. “No, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have put this on you. You gave me a lovely night and I responded by weeping all over you.”

I have to pause to make sure I can modulate the fierceness of my tone. “You have nothing to be sorry for. I will take your tears any day, Belladonna. They are as much a part of you as your laughter and your desire.” I press a quick kiss to her forehead. “Sleep, little one.” It’s tempting to press a little magic behind that command, but I resist.

I don’t go back to the party. I certainly don’t go to bed. Instead, my footsteps trace the path to my study. As much as I’d like to spend my time out amongst my people, these days the true battles are fought through paperwork. Predatory trade agreements are just as threatening as a sword and offensive magic. Our territory isn’t particularly rich in resources outside of lumber. We have small swaths of farmland, but only certain types of crops prosper here. We need trade with the dragons for wheat and the gargoyles for the medicinal herbs that grow in their mountains. Even with the krakens for the deepwater fish that could feed a small village for weeks. As for the bargainers, they deal in more elusive products, ferried back from other realms.

And none of them will commit to a long-term trade agreement between territories.

That leaves me begging for scraps from individual traders, most of whom are only too happy to raise their prices to predatory heights. Like the current asshole I’m engaging in a continued battle of letters with. He’s a dragon who wants to pay half of fair market price for our lumber and for us to pay double for the wheat he has excess of.

I’m still hunched over my desk, cursing under my breath, when Danik steps through the door sometime later. His shirt is unbuttoned, and his eyes are heavy-lidded, but he seems alert enough as he drops into the chair across from my position behind the desk.

“You should be at the party,” I say without looking up.

He raises his brows. “You either get me or you get all three of us. We had thought—hoped—Belladonna arriving in the territory might help you recover a little balance, but?.?.?.” He waves a hand at my study. “Here you are, and there she is alone in her bed.”

“She’s been here a day,” I snap.

“I know. Talk me through it. What’s wrong?”

Damn it. I should have known that they noted my mood and decided to do something about it. I know what the proper thing to do is. Smile and make a joke, send him back to the revelry, continue my slow seduction of Belladonna, allow her to have a baby to benefit the territory and everyone who lives in it. That is the only course of action that will result in the outcome of what I’ve been working so hard for the last few years: to be a leader powerful enough to make the other territories pay attention, a fact that will be doubly true if Azazel has his way and finally puts us all on even territory.

I know that, and yet I can’t banish the anger that roils inside me, sickening and so strong that it’s no wonder the people who care most about me noticed. I grip the edge of my desk and barely resist the urge to sink my claws into the wood. “They harmed her. Her parents. Her community, if you can call it that. Even—maybe especially—the sister she sacrificed everything for.”

“Yes.”

I love him all the more for not arguing with me. “We can’t kill them.”

His voice is even and calm, a direct counterpoint to mine. “We don’t have access to humans in the physical realm. We literally cannot kill them, morality arguments aside.”

Which isn’t to say we shouldn’t. I study Danik, taking in the barely banked fury in his crimson eyes. “You’re angry.”

“Of course I am.” He nods sharply. “Even though she’s only been here a short time, we can tell she’s a good girl, sweet and kind. In the midst of your magic, even with Zhenya boosting it with everything ze has, none of us missed the soul wound Belladonna carries. She didn’t acquire that on her own.”

No, she didn’t. There are names behind that wound, names of people still walking around, benefiting from her sacrifice.

My claws prick the surface of the desk, and I make an effort to raise my hands and place them on my thighs. “Danik.”

“I’m listening.”

“Find them.” I should feel guilt for this order. Succubi and incubi may have a shitty reputation, but for generations we have tried to feed ethically. There are plenty of willing dreamers, happy to entangle themselves in our spells of lust—more than enough for our entire population to gorge nightly, even with the toll it takes us to reach across the distance between realms.

“Find them,” I repeat. It’s on the tip of my tongue to expand on that, to tell him that they aren’t to get another peaceful night’s sleep. We can do that. We may prefer to feed on lust and desire, but we can feed on fear all the same. It’s not as satisfying for anyone, but it is possible.

Frustration flares and I close my eyes, allowing the emotion to slice through me. “Just?.?.?. find them.”

“Rusalka.”

Reluctantly, I open my eyes. "What?”

Danik watches me closely. “I’m angry, too, but even knowing Belladonna as short a time as we have, you must know that she’d never agree to you hurting her parents—even in their dreams. And doing so might violate her agreement with Azazel, which would potentially send her back to that realm early.”

I don’t want to hear what he’s saying. I hate that he’s right. “Then what would you have me do?”

He’s silent for long enough that my patience wears thing. Finally, Danik says, “Care for her. Allow her feel at home here. Give her the space to heal.” A longer hesitation. “Maybe even allow her the opportunity to discover that true love comes without strings attached.” He turns and walks away, calling softly over his shoulder. “In a year, if you still want me to find her parents, I will. But not before then.”