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Chapter 14

Eren

Allie falls asleep in my arms, and only half-wakes when I lift her from the tub and pat her sleepily dry.

Picking her up and carrying her, I walk into the bedchamber and hesitate for just a moment after I’ve deposited her in bed under the thick covers.

“Stay,” she whispers, eyes still closed.

As if my heart weren’t already a battered, broken thing in my chest.

When I slide into bed she’s right there, curling herself into me, choosing me even in her sleepy stupor. I wonder if I’m taking advantage, pressing where I shouldn’t, but there’s no force in this realm or the next that could make me move from this spot when she falls asleep on me.

I brush a length of hair back from her face, over her shoulder, and it exposes the bite mark I left on her neck. The painful spike of lust and possessiveness the sight of it inspires mixes uneasily with my lingering guilt and regret.

Allison Amethyst Ashblood was always meant to be mine. Already my life seems brighter with her in it. When was the last time I felt this alive? When was the last time I felt this hopeful?

If I’m being honest with myself, I haven’t felt this kind of light in nearly two decades.

It’s been almost eighteen years since my mother died trying to bring a child into the world, and the babe with her, and sixteen since my father followed, dying more of a broken heart than anything else.

Since then, I’ve been mostly alone. Sure, I have my court, a handful of those I call friends, but years of grief and the exhaustion of running a realm have made for a mostly lonesome existence. Even fleeting affairs and lovers who do more to ease the aches of my body than those in my heart haven’t brightened the passing years much. Perhaps I’ve forgotten how to love in that time. I’d almost believe it, by the way my days have grown solitary and monotonous.

Until a woman with spring-green eyes and a scent like summer rain found me in a twilight clearing.

Allie stirs gently against me in sleep, and I wish I knew what she was dreaming of. Maybe she sees her home and all she’s left behind to be here with me. Or maybe it’s a less pleasant dreamland she walks, one with threatening, jagged mountain peaks and fraught magick that stings against the skin.

Settling myself back into the warmth of the pillows and furs, I pull her tighter to me. Surely there’s nothing so broken between us we cannot fix.

Where Allie and I go from here, I don’t know. What waits for us tomorrow when we face my court and a realm on the brink of chaos, I don’t want to think of, not right now.

Instead, I close my eyes and will her to find a measure of happiness, if only in her dreams.

Chapter 15

Allie

I wake cocooned by a sturdy black wing. The heavy leather weight of it above me and the furs wrapped tightly around me keep out any cold, as does the firm demon body I’m pressed up against. I don’t remember coming to bed, don’t remember Eren joining me here or pulling me to him while I slept. Now that I’m here, though… I can’t say I hate it.

Still, a slightly sick, unsettled feeling lingers in my stomach over how we left things last night, and the way I absolutely lost it at his revelation about us being mates.

Mates? Goddess above, the word still sends a shiver of fear down my spine. It’s fear that all of this is going to disappear as fast as it came, fear that everything I’m already feeling for Eren and whatever he feels for me is only a trick of magick and biology.

Gently, I crawl out of the nest we’ve made and scoot to the side of the bed without waking Eren. He only shifts, wing unfurling and still-naked body curling into the space I’ve just left. He exhales, and his face grows tight and worried, but he doesn’t open his eyes.

Padding softly away, I ignore the slight tightening in my chest.

As I go, I glance to where the mountain stone is still open wide to the balcony we landed on last night. There must be some kind of protection spell in place, because even though there’s a storm raging outside this morning, the thunder is muffled and the wind isn’t blowing in. Puzzling over it a moment more, I shake my head and head toward the adjoining door.

In the bathroom, I use the surprisingly modern toilet and step over to the sink to freshen up. Staring at my own naked body in the mirror, I’m struck again at the impossibility of my same old face staring back at me. My eyes catch on a flash of pink on the side of my throat.

Eren’s bite.

I run my fingers over the marks, much more healed than they should be after only a few hours, and narrow my eyes as I study them.

“They heal faster because we’re mated.”

Glancing over my shoulder, I find Eren in the doorway, watching me. He’s as nude as when I left him in bed, and I try not to let myself stare.