Page 94 of Pirate Witch
“Danika summoned me,” I whisper. “Well, she summoned all of us, really. But I was going to grab you all something to eat from the kitchens and bring it back here.”
After all they’ve done for me, and how hard they’ve worked to bring my former home back to some semblance of normality, it’s the least I can do.
Even Val’s been helping, by using his magic to clear up the streets. As a mage, he can clear things in minutes which would’ve taken us hours. And, as an added benefit, the downtime has given him an opportunity to experiment with how far he can go from me and the ship now that we’re mated. Even when he’s across the city from me, he doesn’t feel any negative effects, though we haven’t tried anything longer than a few hours, just to be safe.
“No need,” Kier sits up, wings stretching as he gives away the fact that he’s also awake. “We’re all up.”
At his admission, Val’s eyes snap open and Rysen rolls onto his back, almost crushing Klaus in the process.
Nos snorts. “Well, Cas isn’t, but you wore him out before bed.” He elbows his twin, who wakes halfway through a snore.
My grin only gets wider at the reminder of how I rode my shifter mate while Ry fed from my neck.
“What is it?” Cas grunts, surveying the room until he finds me. “Why aren’t you in bed?”
Ry snorts as he tugs on his own boots. “I’ll be right back with food,” he promises me, opening the door and leaving in a burst of vampire speed.
I roll my eyes and perch on the corner of the bed, tugging on my second boot.
“I was trying to do something nice for you guys,” I huff. “You’ve been feeding me all week.”
Klaus tumbles out from under the covers completely naked, the muscles of his ass tensing as he bends over and rummages in the pile of clothing by the bed for his kilt. Nearly every one of us has offered him a coat since we arrived, but he insists that the temperature at the seabed is colder than Coveton, and his body—like mine—is adapted to deal with the chill.
The way my siren talked about the weather, as if the near-permanent two foot dusting of snow which covers the city is a nippy breeze, made me laugh.
I’m not going to complain. I like his body just fine.
“And you’ve been busy helping us.” Cas draws my attention away from the half-naked siren and back to him. “Don’t think we didn’t notice you negotiating trade with Danika yesterday.”
They weren’t supposed to hear that!“Well, when the Eagle is dead, we’re going to have a ship. It won’t hurt for us to do somelegitimatetrading which will benefit the coven.”
Val groans. “I’m a pirate, not a fucking merchant.”
Of course hewouldsay that. “And if we happen to pirate something particularly useful, or come across another artifact, we now have a written promise of fair compensation from the High Priestess if we bring it to her first.”
Whatever the others might have said is interrupted by Rysen’s return. The vampire’s arms are laden with food, and the smell lures the twins out from under the covers. They dive on his offerings like starving piranhas. They’re not too distracted to forget me, though. Nos hands me a plate full of syrup-soaked pancakes, and Cas pours me out a steaming cup of tea.
The others grab their fill as well, and soon only Rysen isn’t eating. Not that he can be hungry after how he fed from me last night. Goddess, I won’t forget the look on the others’ faces as they watched his fangs slide into me and I orgasmed on the spot. Pure lust.
Cas was the only one who acted on it. The others aren’t quite in the position where they feel comfortable sharing me among the whole group yet, but my shifter mate has always been more in tune with his baser side. Maybe when all of this is over, I can convince them all to take me at the same time… I trail off into my musings, wondering how to broach the Lunar love of orgies with my harem.
“So what does Danika want?” Rysen asks, dragging me out of my erotic daydream.
“She wants me to summon Acelin,” I admit around a mouthful of pancake. “She thinks we can negotiate for his help in Cawshome.”
Kier cocks his head to one side. “You don’t sound as if you agree.”
I shake my head. “He made it clear it was a favour for a favour. I destroy the mines, he helps us. A one-time deal. And… I don’t think Cawshome would fare as well as the people here did. The people of Coveton trusted the witches enough to stay home. In the capital, they haven’t had functioning temples in years. Innocents could easily get caught in the crossfire. It would be a massacre.”
Now that I’ve walked through streets soaked in blood, I have no desire to do so again. What the wraiths did wasn’t war. It was a slaughter.
I’ve made it clear to the high priestesses that I’ll be happy if we never see another wraith again.
My pirates and I finish eating in silence, each lost to our own thoughts. Even leaving the apartment is quiet, our conversation muted.
Danika and the other high priestesses have decided to try to be as accommodating to the wraith as possible, so we have to trek outside of the salt wall. I bring my athame, but my men are still on edge, and I don’t blame them. What they witnessed in Coveton was haunting. They twist this way and that as we walk, and I know they’ve arranged our party, so Rysen is closest to me—as a vampire he has the best chance of outrunning the wraith.
I don’t point out that plenty of vampires have died at the hands of wraiths before, but I’m also not about to mention all the times I flew over ‘wraith territory’ on my way to Isablis either.
