Page 77 of A Kingdom of Pleasure and Torment

He nods sharply. “As I said, I don’t know what kind of life you had. But the emptiness within you was too much to bear. And this was the only way I could show you kindness.”

Of course, it was. If he’s lived his whole life at court—with the exception of his time in the Sorrowlands, which I ache with curiosity about—then how could he have learned anything of gentleness or tenderness that didn’t involve sexual pleasure?

Still, it rankles to hear him admit that he’s just fucked me senseless out of pity. “I thought it was because you desired me.”

“If you think I could have managed this without desire, then you have a very high opinion of me.” He smiles slightly, and it transforms his serious, brooding face into something more boyish. I see the resemblance to Cassan that I didn’t notice was missing, before.

There is such a difference between the two brothers. I wonder how that came to be.

“I do desire you, Cenre,” he says, his eyes roving over my face, my neck, my breasts. “If a single faery at court says they don’t, they’re lying. You can’t possibly see yourself the way we do. There’s a light around you, an energy of youth and newness that we rarely see.”

“Yes, I’ve noticed there are no children at the palace.” Obviously, that’s for the best, I think.

His brow crumples. “There are no faery children at all, Cenere.”

This isn’t something my mother ever told me. “I’m not sure of what you mean.”

“We’re the mingled essences of our parents, born of wisps of light.” He seems truly astonished to have to explain this to me. “We come into being in the nursery hives, grow through the seasons, and are delivered back to our parents fully formed.”

“Through the seasons?” I shake my head. “You mean, one cycle of the seasons and you’re… like this?”

“We’re immortal creatures, Cenere. We’re born with all of the knowledge that we need to survive. From there, it’s matter of refinement to fit into your court. If that’s how you choose to live.” He pauses. “You didn’t know any of this?”

“I assumed there were children…” My mind wanders to my mother’s wish. Why, if faeries didn’t have children, would my mother have wished for one? “My mother never told me. And I don’t understand. Why did she want a baby, if that was never to be a part of her life, anyway?”

Kathras’s brows rise as he considers the answer. “Perhaps she simply saw the way humans are with their young, and wanted it for herself?”

I wish I could ask her. I wish I could demand an explanation for my birth, for Luthian, for her expulsion from the Court of Seasons. She died and left me nothing but unanswered questions I never knew to ask.

“We should return to the palace,” Kathras says, pressing a kiss to my forehead. “I think we both know that this can never happen again.”

My heart sinks, but he’s right. It’s too dangerous. Even being here with him now is a mortal gamble. I think of the cephalopire’s teeth and shudder.

As if he can read my thoughts, he lifts my chin. “I promised you that you would never suffer that terror at my father’s hands again. I do not break my promises, Cenere.”

He steps from the pool, and I look about for my gown. “I can’t return to the palace naked—”

My words are no sooner uttered than I am blinking in the harsh white of my new chambers, reclined in the crescent pool, now filled with water from the faery bath.

* * * *

The next morning, the court is called to assembly by a rage of bells in the corridors.

It takes me some time to find my way out of my mirror-paneled room. The door isn’t readily apparent. I begin to panic that perhaps there is no door, and that I am here at Arcus’s whim, to be released as he deems necessary. But finally, I find the handle and push out, directly into the hall leading to the throne room.

I think of how the door to Luthian’s house opened onto the hall to the king’s chambers when I needed to go there. Perhaps all the rooms in the palace function in that way, anticipating where one needs to be.

I’m not certain it’s something I can get used to, but I suppose I will have to, once I become Arcus’s queen. And then Cassan’s.

Because Kathras will be dead, too. I swallow down the panic that rises in my chest. I still feel his hands on my body, his strong arms holding me suspended in the air. There must be a way to dissuade Luthian. Some way for him to install Cassan on the throne without harming Kathras.

Perhaps if I tell Luthian that I owe Kathras my life…

The crowd of courtiers moving along the hall sweep me into the throne room, but once inside, they part to let me move toward the dais. I am, after all, their future queen.

Arcus stands before his throne, fury scrawled over his expression with a heavy hand. He looks coldly over the assembled courtiers. Though he sees me in the crowd, he doesn’t motion me forward.

“A great wrong has been committed against me.” As he speaks, his voice rises in anger. “One of you has stolen from me and returned the item in deeply damaged condition.”

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