Page 79 of Heir to His Court

For years I'd used war and wine to drown out my need for him, even when I hadn't remembered it was he I craved. I'd teetered on the edge of different addictions and managed to pull myself back in time.

There would be no pulling back from Raniel. Once I had him, I would be lost.

“You are already lost, my halfling,” he whispered against my skin.

His hand on my breast tightened, massaged. Fingertips moved between my thighs, sliding up and down between my folds. Light, taunting. Waiting for me to voice a demand we knew hovered on the edge of my tongue.

“You are already mine. Already bound.” His lips trailed up my neck, along my jawline. I turned my head, just barely brushing his mouth. “I've been patient. I did not want to be my father.”

“What did your father do?”

“He did not ask. He took. By the time my mother was strong enough to fight him—and it took centuries—it was too late. She no longer desired her freedom. She is utterly his.”

“And. . .he doesn't feel the same?”

He nipped at my bottom lip, then drew away. “I would say the inverse. I would say he feels too much. He is the Ancient of Storms, Aerinne. He must be. . .impenetrable. She does not discuss what goes on between them in private. He would not allow it, even were she minded to speak. That he married her when her power was still in doubt was obvious weakness enough. He might still resent the appearance of it, though multiple millennia have more than vindicated his judgment.”

Storms. I had heard that before, but I'd always interpreted storm using French or English orEverennesse, the bastard mongrel child of the former languages and Avallonnian. Raniel, as usual, spoke in his birth tongue. The word storm did not denote weather.

I chilled. Assariel was an Empath.

“I'm making a mental note to stay far, far away from your father.” The visceral terror I felt at the thought of an Ancient being able to feel and manipulate every emotion as easily as one breathed. . .Realms. How had Nayya taken a monsterinto her bed?

Right. She had had no choice.

I almost laughed. “And you think I'm strong enough to fight you?” Had he inherited any of his father's ability?

His arms tightened, his eyes flashing in warning. He knew my unease, of course, and was displeased. Fearing his cock, evidently, was fine. Fearing he would stoop to manipulation of my emotions—as if he could not get what he wanted from me any other way—well now, that was just insulting.

Males.

“I am trying to give you the choice.”

I grimaced. I didn’t think we understood the word choice the same way. “Maybe Raniel, but not Renaud.”

“Even Renaud, in his way. He is not so easily controlled.”

Turning in his arms, I straddled his waist, undulating my open thighs against his erection once, twice. “Areyouso easily controlled, Raniel?”

He stared at me a beat, then said, “Test it, my halfling. Test me. Discover how deep my weakness for you runs, if you have the courage.”

If I wanted to deny the challenge in his voice, the hands gripping my hips warned metime was up. We had not eaten, but I figured he'd planned on saving the food for after, when we would really need it.

Raniel rose smoothly out of the water, holding me with effortless strength as I wrapped my legs around his waist and my arms around his neck. He left the pool and strode back into the bedroom where someone had pulled aside the billowy drapes to let in the moonlight.

The Prince lowered me onto the bed, bracing himself so his full weight didn't crush me.

“Is there anything I cannot do to you tonight?” he asked, twisting one of my curls around his finger.

“I truly have choice in the matter?” I congratulated myself for restrainingmostof my mockery.

Midnight blue eyes brushed mine. “Tonight, with me, you do. I can give you that much.”

Raniel would remain in charge, at least for now. I relaxed.

“I don't know,” I said. That was part of what disturbed me. “I don't know what I don't want you to do to me. I want everything,things I think might hurt me, just to see that look in your eyes.”

His thumb caressed my cheek, then my bottom lip. “What look, my halfling?”

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