Page 46

I can’t stop the growl that rises in my throat, can’t fight back the urge to lean in and run the tips of my fangs over the mark at her throat. It’s almost healed again after all the hours we’ve spent apart, and just the sight of the faded punctures makes me ache to reopen them. I want to sink into her, draw from her, remind her who exactly she belongs to.

I’m about to do just that when a sharp knock at the door draws both our attention.

“Oy,” Felix’s good natured, teasing voice comes from the other side. “Lunch break’s over, your majesties.”

When I look back at Allie, I find her blushing scarlet all the way from her forehead to the neckline of her gown. Delicious. The color of her makes my fangs ache and my mouth water for a taste.

Another knock at the door shakes those thoughts right out of me.

“Coming,” I say curtly.

The knocking ceases.

“Are you alright here for the rest of the afternoon?” I ask Allie, holding out my hand to help her up. “If there’s anything I need to say to—”

“I’m perfectly fine,” she says with feigned brightness, placing her own hand in the middle of my chest and pushing me back as she sits upright and arranges her skirt back down over her legs. “Now, where were my—”

Before she can finish the thought, I scoop up an indecent little scrap of cream-colored lace off the floor.

Allie holds out her hand. “I’ll take those back now.”

“No,” I tell her, sticking them into my back pocket. “No. I think I’ll keep them.”

Allie sputters for a moment like a fish on a riverbank, and it’s one of the most endearing things I’ve ever seen. She lunges for me, hands going around my waist to claw at the fabric stretched tight over my backside, and I capture her wrists.

“Eren,” she hisses, too quiet for Felix to hear on the other side of the door. “Give them back.”

Releasing her, I run my hands over the silk of her dress, cupping and skimming along the delectable curves. “Do you intend to bare this body of yours to any other demon?”

The question draws a glare from her. “Of course not.”

“Well then,” I say, dipping my hand between her thighs and pressing the silk against the heat of her. She squirms. “There shouldn’t be anything to worry about.”

Pulling my hand away and striding quickly toward the door, I give her a last glance over my shoulder. Allie is standing in the middle of the room, orgasm-flushed and beautiful, and it takes every last bit of strength in me to walk out of the room and back toward my duties.

Chapter 22

Allie

It’s well after dark by the time I'm ready to leave the library and head back upstairs. The light shining in from the greenhouse’s wall of windows has waned, and I’ve lit a few candles around the space to keep enough light for reading.

Vayla left a couple of hours ago with a stern warning to stay away from whatever she’s brewing in that cauldron of hers, and the peace of working the rest of the day alone was more than welcome.

Being here is… nice, strangely. The scent of herbs and incense, the fresh tang of the plants Vayla was chopping for her potion. Even the dimness of the candles and the slight, lived-in dustiness of the space isn’t unpleasant. It reminds me of my mother’s house and of the coven hall, and even with the weight attached to some of those memories I still enjoy being here.

My skin is also still strumming with the remnants of magick from earlier, and not just the magick I was able to draw from the book. My face gets hot just remembering Eren kneeling between my legs, the things he did with his mouth… his fangs. And that magick.

I may have seriously been missing out on sex magick all these years.

Whatever happened with us this afternoon wasn’t anything I did on purpose, but the feeling of all that power breaking over my skin when I came was incredible. Slightly worrisome, too, because I don’t know where it came from or how to control it, but really, really fucking hot at the same time.

The fact that Eren could feel it too, that he’s been able to sense my magick this whole time… damn, it makes me more than ready to get out of here and go find my demon.

Standing up and stretching some of the stiffness from my body after sitting over a work table for so long, it suddenly occurs to me I don’t actually know how to get back to the throne room from here, or whether Eren would still even be there. For all I know he’s off somewhere else entirely tending to whatever duties the king of the demon realm handles.

I close the book I’ve been working on, saving my place with a piece of parchment, and make my way back through the map room and the library to the door leading out into the corridor.

Tentatively, I open the door and peer into the hall, wondering how absolutely embarrassing it’s going to be to have to flag down some passerby demon and admit I have no clue where anything is in this place.