It made me feel free, rather than tethered. As if I could conquer the world with him at my side.
“What are you talking about? Of course it was,” I said, laughing as I stared down into blue eyes that held mine.
“The Viniculum gives you access to my abilities through the bond. I do not have the kind of power you displayed last night. I’ve never controlled the darkness itself, min asteren. That had to come from something inside of you that has been lying dormant all these years because of the Veil,” he answered, distracting me from his words with the slow, methodical circles he drew on my thighs.
“But I’m human,” I protested, shaking my head. I had a human father and mother, a human brother.
“As far as I can tell, yes. You feel very human, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t something in your bloodline. Maybe the Fae Mark awakened it, or maybe the surge of power from the collapse of the Veil caused it. We’ll never really know how the Veil might have influenced magical beings who were born in the human realm and never knew access to their power,” he said.
“If I’m not human, what am I?” I asked, not wanting to consider the possibility of being Fae.
“I’m not sure, and unless you take the time to reawaken that part of you further when we’re in a safe place, we may never learn the truth of your lineage. You could be descended from witches, Fae, Daemons…the list is never-ending, min asteren.” He shifted his hand closer to my ass, brushing his fingers over the skin there and grinding me down on his lap.
The distraction served its purpose, sending a pulse of pleasure through my body, but I didn’t miss the diversion for what it was. “You’re keeping something from me again,” I said, gasping as one of his hands left my rear and slid between our bodies to touch my core. He stroked his fingers through the wetness there for him, always ready at the slightest encouragement for the mate I hadn’t wanted.
For the male I couldn’t seem to get enough of, no matter what that said about me.
He stroked my clit with his thumb, slipping two fingers inside of me. My body stretched to accommodate him, a twinge of soreness making me clench down on him as he worked me open slowly. “I have a suspicion, but I’m not certain about it. If there comes a time when I believe it to be true, I’ll tell you. Until then, I won’t have you worrying over something that could be nothing. Is that fair?” he asked, curling his fingers to make me throb with need.
“Nothing is fair when you’re doing that with your fingers. I can’t think straight,” I admitted.
He chuckled, leaning forward to nip at my bottom lip as he pressed harder on the spot inside me. “That is entirely the point, Little One. I want you mindless with need for me.”
“It’s working, you twisted bastard,” I said, but I smiled in spite of myself. As much as I wanted the answers to what he suspected about me, there were far more pressing matters at that moment. Especially when I could feel the emotions motivating his silence and avoidance.
Whatever it was, he genuinely wanted to protect me from it, and if Caldris thought I needed to be protected from something, I was inclined to agree with him.
Some secrets were better left in the dark.
He dropped his other hand to the laces on his trousers, unknotting them quickly and lifting me so that he could shove them down his thighs. His cock sprang free between us, pressing against my core as he removed his fingers from me. “Now come sit on my cock, my star.”
Now that was not something I would argue with.
16
ESTRELLA
I ran a hand over my perfectly braided hair, my mind flashing back to the tender way Caldris had brushed it, dipping the brush into the fresh water to help tame the frizz as he worked through the snarls. The action had been so at odds with our position, me facing him, staring into his eyes with his cock softening inside of me, after I’d ridden him to my orgasm and then he’d fucked up into me to achieve his own.
Now, my shackles clanked as I lowered my hands again to the horse’s mane in front of me, the return of the metal chafing against my wrists. “How do you know how to braid so well?” I had asked, leaning into his touch as he managed a perfect fishtail braid and draped it over my shoulder.
“I have lived for countless centuries and experimented with all manner of hairstyles, min asteren,” he’d answered, the honesty in the confession soothing the rising jealousy inside of me. I wanted to ask if there had ever been anyone who’d mattered to him on an emotional level before me, or if I was the first he’d ever showed such care to. “What has my star feeling jealous now?” he asked, leaning forward to murmur the words into my neck. Beneath us, Azra’s gait was slow but steady, navigating the white plains back toward Mistfell and the boundary that would take us to Faerie.
“Have you ever loved someone before me?” I asked, wishing I could take the words back the moment they were free and hanging in the air between us.
“No,” he said, touching his lips to my mark before he pulled back slightly. “Even before you were born, I knew I was just passing the time while I waited for you. That probably sounds horrible, but the Fae know the score. They know that for most of us the mate bond is the goal to achieve. That is when love comes for us.”
“Does anyone ever reject the bond?” I asked, turning to look at him over his shoulder.
“Sometimes,” he said, his voice sad. “Not everyone can love the person The Fates choose for them, unfortunately.” We rode in silence for a little longer, Caldris understanding that I needed the time to consider the information he’d given me over the course of the morning. I wasn’t human, and the Fae believed that love was the most important thing; it was important and worth protecting, no matter what form it chose to appear in.
While humans forced their women into loveless marriages with men who would never appreciate them, the Fae protected love at all costs.
I sighed, my body twinging with discomfort when Caldris went solid at my spine. The procession halted, pausing in the road as he pulled Azra to a stop. Above the path up ahead, something swayed, hanging from the canopy of the trees.
The strength of the winter winds was enough to force the object to move despite its size, the tree limb creaking with the strain. Rope wrapped around the branch, digging into the bark and dangling down to wrap around the neck of a woman. As her body spun in a circle, I caught sight of the tipped ears that marked her as Fae. Her chest was torn open, ribs bent outward, broken and dangling from her torso with torn, red flesh clinging to them.
Her heart was missing from her breast, no doubt burned in the small pit in the ground beneath her where the snow had melted and the grass was burned from the soil.
Caldris leaned into me, swinging his leg over Azra’s rump. He didn’t glance back at me as he walked toward where the Fae female hung from the tree, but something in the rigid posture of his body felt dangerous. There was nothing coming down the bond, no overwhelming sense of fury or even the slightest tinge of anger. “Caldris?” I asked, flinching when he swung his sword to the side. He cut the rope where they’d entwined it with the tree to wrap around the trunk and pull it taut.
The woman’s body fell to the ground in a heap—lifeless in a way that even a human couldn’t have reincarnated from. Even if she became animated by the God of the Dead, she wouldn’t be alive. She’d be a walking corpse.