Page 27 of Fae Crown

You’re a warrior, I reminded myself.You command troops. This is just another battle. It’s only your body. It doesn’t have to mean anything more.

Apparently it didn’t matter how many times I told myself this. I still didn’t believe the lie—and oh how I wanted to.

When the bed hit my thighs, I stopped. Several additional silver orbs raced in, illuminating my body. The indignity of the queen’s treatment hadn’t been enough, obviously.

I pretended not to notice the lights, or how thequeen examined my dick like it was a curio she had every right to collect, to handle, to possess.

I’d been mistaken to imagine umbrac poison had any chance of dulling me enough. An entire jug of it wouldn’t be sufficient. It would just kill me—very possibly a more welcome option.

“Well,” the queen commented, her voice uncommonly thready. “The rumors about youdon’tdisappoint. How very refreshing.” A theatrical breath, then, “I’ll derive much pleasure from your … equipment.”

She trilled as if that were the cleverest thing to say in the entire fucking universe. I very nearly wished for my dick to shrivel up and fall off, just to elude her touch.

One moment she’d been on her back, leaning onto her elbows, the very next on her knees, her hands reaching toward my “equipment.”

Before I had the opportunity to steel myself, her fingertips, unexpectedly gentle, trailed along the length of my dick. I tensed all over before I hurried to make myself relax.

I failed.

A whimper sounded from our audience—Elowyn, I suspected, not that I’d heard her before—and her protest seemed to encourage the queen. Her fingers caressed me with the gentleness of a lover.

I wanted to recoil, to abandon my skin and flee with my heart while it still beat in a familiar, recognizable rhythm.

Gulping subtly, I wondered how thefuck I’d find the arousal needed to perform for the queen. If I couldn’t summon an erection for her, would she order my dick sliced off? She’d murdered men for far less than rejecting her.

Fast, againtoofast, both hands slapped around my hips and tugged me down onto the bed. I fumbled to land with my hands on either side of her so as not to crush her, or press along her body as a lover would.

My arms bracketed her face, and beneath me she spread her thighs, pressing them to either side of my hips.

Maybe this was better. Perhaps this would be a fast pump-and-grind, then dismiss me so I could puke in private.

“Undress me,” she ordered as if her patience were wearing thin.

Don’t think. Don’t feel. Just do.

I pressed back onto my knees, grateful for the slight distance between our chests, until her thighs pressed my hips. She arched her body, scraping her pelvis against mine.

My next inhale trembled but I guided the thin silk of her gown up her torso and over her head. Beneath it, she was as naked as I was.

She’d demand my appreciation, so before she could I made a show of studying the appeal of her many curves. Objectively, the woman was stunning. And if she hadn’t been so damn ugly inside, she would have been one of the most beautiful women in the entire kingdom.

But shewasugly inside, so fucking ugly.

I leaned into the dullness of the umbrac poison as I took in the graceful features of her face, the seductive curve of her mouth, the wolfish arch to her brows. She blinked long, dark lashes as she studied me back, and it was almost easy to imagine the queen was Elowyn.

My sight grew purposefully hazy, blurring as I imagined Elowyn in this body.

Forgive me, Elowyn.

When her mouth opened to bark her commands, I slid back down between her legs and kissed her.

As if those very same lips hadn’t ordered the death of my sister, the terms of my captivity, and the torment of innumerable of her subjects, I kissed her.

Elowyn. It was a fantasy, but one that wouldn’t hurt the woman who’d never be the wiser, and one that might preserve some part of me that would otherwise become irretrievably broken.

When she moaned wantonly and parted her lips for me, I pushed my tongue between them, pretending I was the one in control, who wanted this. Her tongue was hot and soft against mine, and yet the taste of her was bitter with what I feared was the tang of blood.

Elowyn, Elowyn, Elowyn, I chanted through my muddled thoughts as if she were a lifeline. As if the stranger could keep me tethered to the body I wanted so desperately to abandon.

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