Page 121 of Royal Captive
I tried to swallow around the vicious lump in my throat.
Viana awkwardly patted my shoulder. “Please don’t cry. I don’t know what to do with people who cry.”
Tears leaked defiantly from my eyes. “Too bad,” I whispered.
Ellis whined in his throat, crawling forward on his belly and nudging my stomach with his snout.
I put on a brave smile for him.
“It’s all right. We will figure something out. The fae are here now, and will help us with this magick. It will be like it was in the beginning. Whatever that was like.” I frowned, realizing none of us even knew what the original agreement had been.
Ellis flapped his wings and buffeted my hair, pointing with his head over at his shoulder.
Viana grinned. “Excellent idea.”
“What—” I began, but Viana tugged me over to Ellis and gave me a boost up, helping me settle between his wing joints.
“You’ve earned the first ride, I want the second!” she called out.
Ellis stood up before I could protest, forcing me to hang onto the spiked horns along his neck for dear life. “Ellis!”
With a grunt, he ran and pushed off the ground, the wings on either side of me flapping hard. Amazingly, we lifted.
Ellis rose steadily, circling around the castle. The air was cold but purifying as if freezing away all of my past hurts and worries. Heat radiated up through Ellis’s scales, keeping me warm despite the wind’s frigid touch.
I relaxed into him, letting a smile crack through the worry and anxiety.
I was in the air! I was flying!
Laughing wildly, I threw caution to the wind and held my arms out as if they were wings. We wheeled and soared over the kingdom, and Ellis roared happily. People spilled out from the castle onto the yard, pointing upwards and waving.
This wouldn’t be easy, but it would work.
For the first time since I’d stepped into the grand hall knowing I was to be sold off to Lord Cadgan like cattle, I felt hope for the future.
One year later, I was outside gardening. The gardeners hated it when I did so, saying it wasn’t fit for a queen. It didn’t matter how much I explained I grew up on a farm manor.
“Your highness, at least let me cut the thorns off. You—”
—hornier than a goddamn cat in heat.
I jolted so badly that I jabbed the stem I was holding straight into the fleshy part of my palm, proving the gardener’s point for me.
“Ach! You see!”
I thrust the rose at her blindly and walked away, wondering if I was hearing voices now like Ellis used to. But the voice sounded like him—so much like him.
I glanced up, but his large form was nowhere to be seen.
I’d imagined it, likely. I simply missed Ellis, and being intimate with him. It was natural to—
—pin her down and make a permanent Eve-shaped indent on the mattress.
I choked.
“Ellis?” I called out, feeling only half like an idiot.
Some use it is. Can’t even jerk off without starting a forest fire. I—
