Page 67 of Blackwarden
There were ancient stories about marks left by magic. Stories of things like Fate Marks and brands that showed up when two Fae claimed one another as mates. But Rosalin wasn’t Fae. Still, I couldn’t deny what the symbol looked like. It was the Blackwarden family name in Old Fae. I touched my chest. I’d left my pendant behind in our mad rush to get through the portal. Not that it mattered. I knew what it looked like.
I swallowed hard. The guilt that welled in my chest as I realized I might have claimed her without her consent was painful. It burned deep, like a thousand fire demons trying to rip their way from my ribcage. I squeezed back tears that I refused to shed. I couldn’t feel sorry for myself, I needed to do better, tobebetter. I never wanted to ensnare someone after I’d been chained to a heartless bitch for five hundred years. I hadn’t exactly asked Rosalin what she wanted when I bit her neck in a moment of vulnerability, and I refused to take someone’s choice away from them.Never again.I would let her choose, even if it meant she’d likely return to her family and leave me alone with my Gatehouse.
I would always let her choose.
“I don’t entirely know what it means.” My words were misleading, but true. I didn’tentirelyknow. “Is that all that’s troubling you?”
She watched me carefully, her glittering eyes burning into me. I was certain she could see the tears I’d refused to shed, the pain that was searing a hole through my lungs. She knew I wasn’t telling her everything. After a long moment a smile tugged at her lips.
“You know, right now, I can honestly say there’s nothing.”
It took all my strength not to let out a massive sigh of relief, a sudden need to have her closer, to have her skin against mine gripped my insides.
“There is one thing wrong,” I said as I lifted a corner of my blanket. “You’re entirely too far away from me right now.”
She snuck beneath the covers and straddled me, her lips immediately falling on my neck, hands smoothing over my chest. Her lips found mine, a slow and lingering kiss heated my blood as her tongue explored. This hadn’t been my intention, but the last thing I was going to do was push her away. I’d been forced to do things I didn’t want to do, with people I definitely didn’t want to do them with, for so long that being kissed by her was like being kissed for the first time. And I refused to be embarrassed by how she made my body respond.
I gasped at her touch, so soft and gentle, as though she knew that it wasn’t just my overuse of magic I was recovering from. She sat up, her hands whispering across my chest, eyes wide as if asking permission. I struggled to pull myself up to her lips, but she stopped me, pushing me back down onto my pillow with a slow head shake.
“You’re recovering, Keres.” A mischievous glint overshadowed the look of seriousness she tried to wear as she kissed down my chest, slipping beside me and pulling the blankets back as she continued to my stomach.
“Rosalin...”
“Yes, Keres?” she asked as she circled my navel with her tongue then kissed lower, her fingers feather soft as they pulled my pants further down.
“You don’t have...” The rest of the words slipped away as she wrapped a hand and her lips around me.
Every muscle in my body tightened as her other hand splayed across my abdomen. Fuck, her mouth was...
“That’s...” I couldn’t hold back a whimper as she licked up the length of me. “...so good. So...”
“Something the matter, Keres?” she asked before she took me back into her mouth.
I tried to speak, but all I could manage were breathy moans.
––––––––
When the curse broke, other things changed. I didn’t entirely understand how, but I felt different. Perhaps it was because I was in the human world, wearing my own skin and not a glamour created to make me seem less Fae. Every lie I’d been forced to wear had been stripped away. I had the overwhelming sense that while I’d been given a rarely bestowed second chance, it could so easily be taken away.
I stood in front of the portal, hands clenched tight at my sides. I couldn’t risk Bevgyah coming through. Maybe she wouldn’t. Maybe she’d send an assassin to do her dirty work, but I couldn’t take that chance.
There were more portals. Ones that lead to the other courts. There were ways Bevgyah could get here even without using this particular portal, which made me all the more certain of what I needed to do.
“Here you are.” I flinched as Rosalin slipped her hand into mine and leaned her head against my shoulder. “I know what you’re thinking, but I worry if you destroy this portal, you’ll...” She choked on her words.
I already knew what she was going to say. I would no longer be immortal. I’d lose my connection to the Unseelie Court. As a Fae, I needed a tether to the Earth Mother’s magic and the way I did that was through this portal.My portal.Which meant, I wouldn’t have my shadows either. I swallowed, wondering if the Gatehouse would suffer as well. It wasn’t entirely made of Dark Fae magic, but something much older.
“But that means...” Rosalin gazed up at me, fear in her eyes. “You’ll grow old and die.”
“Grow old and die,with you,” I said as I leaned my forehead against hers. “Maybe I don’t mind that so much.”
She stepped away from me, that adorable frustration wrinkling her forehead. “Keres, I can’t ask you to—”
I pressed a finger to her lips. “Ms. Greene.”
She just stared at me with wide eyes, and I couldn’t help the smile that spread across my lips.
“You didn’t ask. The last time I opened my heart to someone, I didn’t have an opportunity to give myself to her entirely before she was taken from me.”
