Page 45 of King of Storms and Feathers

With my eyes downcast, I stood loose-limbed between Arrow and Raiden’s chairs while servants served the soup course. I fixed a mask of bored disinterest over my face as Arrow engaged the burly, bearded man seated to his right—Raiden’s father, Stormur—in heated debate.

The king wished to close an official trade route because black marketers used part of it to transport gold to camps in the Earth Realm, something he seemed passionate about preventing. But Stormur believed the financial gains justified keeping it open.

Stormur’s wife, Ildri, sat beside him. She was an elegant redhead who wore ear cuffs resembling forked lightning and turned her mouth down each time she glanced at me.

After servants cleared the first course away, Ari served the king a plate of crumbed fish, liberally doused in white sauce. Arrow’s arm wrapped around my waist, and he pulled me onto his lap. “You shall feed me, little Leaf.”

Not this again. Why was he so obsessed with feeding me and being fed? Keeping fury from my expression, I held a piece of fish in front of his mouth.

His eyes fixed on my face as he took slow bites and sauce dripped over my fingers and down my wrist. When he had eaten the last piece, he sucked my fingers, licking them clean.

“You’ve made a mess,” he said, pointing at splotches of sauce on my thigh. With his hands on my waist, he raised me to my feet, then knelt in front of me. “I despise waste,” he murmured, as if that was an excuse for depravity.

To block out the sight of the court, I closed my eyes, which had the adverse effect of heightening the sensation of his tongue on my skin.

As the king opened his mouth and sucked gently, my legs quivered, my heart fluttering like the weak wings of the auron kanara against my ribcage.

I fought the need to knock his crown of feathers off his head and weave my fingers through his dark gold hair. I locked my knees together and imagined plucking a poison feather from his chest plate and stabbing him in the eye with it.

I promised myself that one day, I would do just that.

He took his time, drawing out the ridiculous display just to spite me. Soothing images of the forest flowed through my mind. The comforting smell of decay, the humidity and feel of sweat on my skin as I ran through the trees until my muscles ached. And when I finally opened my eyes, I found my fingers curled in the king’s silky hair, gripping hard.

Dust save me, I was an idiot.

I gasped, and silver eyes met mine, a wicked smile on the king’s lips.

“Well done,” he purred. “It’s your turn to eat. You must be famished.”

He took his seat and drew me onto his lap, waving a hand at the Sayeeda. She stood against a carved wall of massive golden wings at the rear of the dais that reminded me of the ones on the king’s throne. But at his signal, immediately started toward the kitchen stairs.

A few minutes passed while Arrow conversed with Raiden and Stormur. They both ignored me, perched there on the king’s lap as if I was an auron kanara he’d let out of its cage for entertainment.

Surrounded by the chaos of the court’s revelry, I forced my mind to linger in the forest, where everything was calm and safe. The opposite of how I felt.

Ari returned, placing another plate of fish on the table. Arrow ran a piece through the white sauce before holding it to my lips. “Blow first, or you’ll burn that stubborn mouth of yours.”

Starving, I obeyed without delay, unable to drop my gaze from his as I groaned in pleasure. It was delicious. The Sayeeda was most definitely an excellent kitchen mistress who planned the tastiest menus, but she was very wrong about the king. He clearly enjoyed tormenting me. The evidence was outlined in his leather pants, pressed against my thigh, too sizable to ignore.

Unashamed, he gave me a smug smile. There was no denying Arrow was the most attractive man I would ever lay eyes on, but he wasn’t right in the head.

Swallowing self-disgust along with the fish, I ate quickly and licked his fingers like a good little slave when he gave the order. I’d had many sips of wine from his cup, and before long, my head spun with the effects. I stared brazenly at the courtiers on the floor of the Grand Hall, daring them to mock and laugh at me.

“Will you dance for me?” Arrow whispered, stroking my gold collar.

Not understanding what he wanted, I shook my head. With a dark chuckle, he lifted me by the waist and arranged my legs, spreading them on either side of his lap so I faced him. “Show my court what an obedient slave you are.”

Silent, I held his gaze and raised a brow.

A smirk curved his mouth. “Go ahead, dance for me.”

Instead of smacking him, I held the image of the family I longed to return to in my mind, pressed my palms against his chest, preparing to stand.

“No. Stay where you are. Haven’t you seen a lap dance before?”

Of course the asshole wanted a lap dance. I’d seen many of them performed in the hall—designed to humiliate the giver and tease the receiver into a frenzy of lust. Could I do it in front of the fae of the Storm Court? If it would keep me alive and give me time to learn the city’s weaknesses, then yes, I’d do almost anything.

Gritting my teeth and staring at the king, I rested my palms against his shoulders and raised my hips, my thinly covered ass on display for the entire hall to view. Slowly, I undulated my hips over the leather-covered bulge in his pants and pretended Stormur, Raiden, and Ildri weren’t beside us.

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