Page 67 of Chosen By the Fae King

I groaned in annoyance. “I was doing my best to stay alive and to keep the other two alive.”

“Lorne told me exactly what happened. You tried to distract it. When he was pushed back by the tree, you decided you had to do something on your own. Rashly making a move when Lorne was already coming at it from behind.”

“He'd already tried. Stabbing it did nothing. Their magic can't counteract dark magic.”

Nox gave me the look my father used to when I was having a tantrum. The only thing it did was dampen my libido.

“Both Lorne and Sofiya knew this. They had a plan.”

“What?”

“They knew it was dark magic. They knew they couldn't fight it directly. Sofiya was going to use her earthen powers to get it on its back so he could cut it into pieces too small to be able to harm anyone. Neither you nor Sofiya had to be anywhere near it for that to happen.”

Like a fish gulping for water, my mouth opened and closed. “What do you mean they had a plan? There was no planning! We only had seconds!”

“Part of Lorne's magic is having another sense, like an inkling of what will happen if he does something specific. He only needed four seconds to tell Sofiya what to do.”

Holy shit. That was almost the same as Sofiya's, only hers was completely random and rarely showed up at opportune times.

Nox bent so our noses were practically touching. “He knew what to do the entire time. All you had to do was stay safe.”

“Great. Wonderful. That might have been useful information to have beforehand, Your High-handedness!”

He ground his teeth. “The next time we're in bed, you'll call me Nox or I swear to the gods I'll take my hand to your ass.”

I stilled. Frozen. Stunned. Horrifyingly interested, too. I begged my brain to burn away the image of us naked in bed, my bottom covered in red handprints.

He stared at me as his eyes filled with a mix of challenge and desire. I felt a jolt of heat shoot through me, igniting a fire deep in my core. It was the kind of fire that only Nox could ignite, the kind that made me forget all rationality and surrender to the raw passion between us.

But amidst the intoxication of his touch and the allure of his dominance, I couldn't help but feel peeved. Nox had kept vital information from me, information that could have saved me unnecessary pain and risk. And yet, even in my anger, I couldn't deny the undeniable magnetism that pulsed between us.

I took a deep breath to steady myself and cleared my throat. “Nox.”

His eyes flickered. “Aeryn,” he murmured.

Finding courage I didn't know I had, I lifted my palm to his face. He leaned into it, stealing a little piece of my soul.

“I won't apologize for what I did,” I said. “I can't. I wouldn't mean it. And berating me only makes it worse.”

“Then help me understand,” he said. “Before you drive me completely mad. Because I'm not sure that knowledge of Lorne's gift, meager as it is most times, would have been enough to stop you.”

My hands itched to grab him and pull him down to the mattress. His proximity was giving me too many ideas.

Fortunately, as much as I wanted to kiss him, I also wanted to make him understand. “Do you remember what I told you at dinner in the Grand Hall?”

For a long moment he simply looked at me. “Every damned word.”

I took a breath. “I was ten. Alone. I had a small cottage and some land, but I was ten-years-old. Truthfully, my parents had left me long before. They were husks by then.”

“I'm sorry.”

I smiled sadly. “Thank you. But I'm not revisiting this to make you feel sorry for me. I'm doing it to convey how very alone I was. Helping them work the land turned into working the land while they slowly died. No dolls. No toys. No dresses I could have spun around in with matching heels that I possibly enjoyed wearing.”

Nox chuckled. “I doubt the part about the heels, but I understand your point.”

“Good. My real point is that Sofiya came into my life at a time when I needed someone. Broke into it, really. I was awful to her. Angry and lashing out. She wasn't much older than me but she knew exactly what I was doing. She didn't let me wither away as I could have.”

“What did she do?”

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