The horror on her face brought a startled laugh from my throat. “I’m just a woman. A harvester in fact,” I admitted, ignoring the strange prickle of discomfort that made me flush. Would I…have a title?
Oh, fuck that.
Caldris appeared in the doorway from the back, where the wooden walkway extended around each home. His shirt was missing, his trousers slung low on his hips. I was fairly certain that my hair was a matted mess given our activities of the last countless hours, but his lay in perfect waves to his shoulders. The crown was missing from the top of his head, tossed to the side at some point after we’d ended up in the hut.
The events of the early part of the evening were slightly hazy, as if I’d experienced them from behind a fogged window and only been a witness to them instead of an active participant.
The woman gaped at him, watching as he closed the distance between us and leaned down to touch his lips to mine. It soothed the part of me that was tempted to rise up, which was so possessive of him that I wanted to smack him for daring to expose any part of himself to wandering eyes.
When he pulled back, he smirked down at me as if he knew the exact thoughts in my head. I realized with a shock that he might not know the choice words swirling in my head, but he knew the feeling. He knew the jealousy and possessiveness that consumed me, because he could feel it.
He grinned, wrapping himself around my back and resting his chin on top of my head. “As the Crown Princess of the Winter Court, her formal address would be ‘Your Highness’，” he said, brushing the mess of my hair to the side and leaning down to lay a quick kiss upon my neck. I shivered, both from the touch and the callous reminder that I wasn’t my own person any longer.
“We aren’t married,” I said, swallowing my nerves as Caldris walked around the village girl. She flushed at him, spinning and pressing a hand to the wall behind her as he lowered his hands into the water and leaned over the bowl. Raising handfuls of water, he splashed it onto his skin. His face was beaded with water when he turned his heated stare my way, taking the small, folded linen off the table and using it to dab himself dry.
“Aren’t we?” he asked, the teasing lilt in his voice making me shake with laughter. From what he’d said, there would be a ceremony if I were to accept the mate bond. Something that would mark the acceptance of one another as our fated match, that was when I would consider us wed.
I laughed, the sound sharp and full of disbelief as I gaped at him. “Not even close, you arrogant prick,” I said, crossing my arms over my chest. The girl rounded her eyes, staring at me as if I was either very foolish or very brave.
“Hmmm,” my mate hummed, stepping around the table to close the distance between us once again. He snagged my chin, staring down at me intently with gleaming blue eyes. “We’ll have to remedy that then.” Everything in him seemed more, both pleased and empowered by the step we’d taken toward the completion of our match.
My nerves made me want to slam the metaphorical window in his face, to close myself off once more, but…I couldn’t quite bring myself to do it. I liked having him in my head, experiencing everything he felt. I thrived off of knowing what emotions surged through him and feeling the way he saw me. If loving him was wrong, if feeling whole with the connection blazing between us was a sin, I never wanted to be virtuous again.
“This is the part where I think it would be wise to give us some privacy,” Caldris said, turning to quirk a brow at the girl watching his display with wide eyes. She scurried from the hut, grabbing the door by the handle and pulling it closed behind her. It slammed in her hurry to leave, making me gasp and smack my palm against his chest.
“That was terribly rude. She was kind enough to bring me fresh water for the morning. I’ll need it to make my hair resemble something other than a bird’s nest, thanks to you. And Void knows I cannot climb back into the tub again,” I said, glancing toward the metal basin. I’d lost track of the number of times Caldris had submerged us in the water, cleaning my body of the evidence of his love making just to cover me in it all over again.
I didn’t even want to think about all of that being in my hair.
Maybe I should go submerge myself in the Black River. It was probably cleaner.
“They would bring you fresh bathwater if you asked,” he said, grinning at the disgust on my face at the thought of it. I’d only been half-aware of what was happening the night before, when they gifted us with the hut for the night, warming water in metal buckets by the fire and filling the tub until the steam filled the home.
“Just because you’re comfortable being waited on, does not mean I am,” I argued, pulling my chin out of his grasp. The people of Black Water had already done far more for me than they needed, mistakenly believing they owed me a debt for extinguishing the flames.
Guilt lanced through me, knowing that hadn’t even been my intention. I was just…angry.
I was tired of the useless, senseless death, and seeing the boy lying dead on the bridge for absolutely no reason or fault of his own had been enough to set me over the edge. I longed to hunt down the Mist Guard who had cut him down, to return the favor so slowly he had no choice but to watch himself be skewered by my sword.
“Hey,” Caldris said, drawing me back from the moment of rage. “Until we understand what’s going on with the dark-eyed little monster you harbor, I think it’s best that we keep your more…volatile emotions under control.”
“Did you just call me a monster?” I asked, narrowing my eyes at his face. “I’m fairly certain you admitted that you were a monster, just last night.”
He shrugged, dropping his hand, then moved to the bed, sitting on the edge and leaning forward. With his legs spread wide and elbows on his knees, he steepled his hands in front of him and stared at me with a playful smirk on his face. “Who says we can’t both be?”
“It isn’t funny! I need to know how to control the Viniculum so it doesn't happen again. I don’t—” I paused, considering the admission. Even though he had to know how I felt about it, the broad strokes didn’t necessarily communicate my horror. “I wasn’t in control.”
“Come here, Little One,” he said, beckoning me to him when I hesitated. I shoved aside the self-doubt, walking toward him finally. When I stood before him, he reached forward, snagging me by the hips and guiding me until I straddled him and sat on his thighs. The fabric of his trousers rubbed against the most intimate part of me, eliciting a shock to the oversensitive flesh from our night of passion.
The interlude had been exactly what I’d needed. The perfect solution in the moment to the pain coursing through me and the fact that I felt like I would come out of my skin at any time. Like my body could no longer contain what crouched inside of me, waiting for a moment to break free.
“What happened last night wasn’t because of the Viniculum,” he said gently, his hands gliding down to touch the bare skin of my thighs. He slid his fingers beneath the hem of his tunic I wore, the gentle caress dancing over my bare skin and drawing a sigh from me. With the bond linked between us, one more step taken to unite our souls, everything felt amplified. I couldn’t be certain if it was because I could feel his desire for me mirroring my own, but something in it was incredibly empowering.