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Not for anyone.

And this …thiswas what glory felt like.

I came back to myself on the cold marble, overwhelmed and undone, on my side, my breath in tangles. Creon’s arm lay around me, pressing me to his chest. His cock throbbed softly against my bare lower back; his thigh lay between my legs, pressed against my sex – grounding me with every convulsion shuddering through my body until finally, slowly, the last of the madness seeped out of me and left me perfectly, deliciously empty.

It seemed unlikely, I considered with an odd, detached calm, that I would ever be able to walk again.

For this victory, that did not seem too outrageous a price to pay.

‘Have I told you,’ Creon muttered against the crown of my head, ‘how much I’m planning to enjoy the next few centuries, cactus?’

I let out a choked laugh, turning in his arms to meet his gaze. My limbs were floppy as jellyfish. My mind felt even less coherent. Above the ruins, the endless starry sky stretched over us, promising forever. ‘The big question is whether we’ll ever find time to rebuild this court at all.’

‘Five minutes every now and then, perhaps. In between more urgent activity.’ His fingers lazily circled my breast, thumb brushing a nipple through my dress, as he nodded at my bunched-up skirt. ‘Spread your legs.’

My breath caught. ‘What?’

‘What, what.’ A slow, wicked smile spread over his face as he lowered me to my back, then sat up, raising an eyebrow at me. ‘You didn’t think I was done making you scream, did you?’

Gods help me. I came up on my elbows, my arms quivering beneath me. ‘I don’t think there’s any air left in me to—’

‘Legs, love,’ he interrupted sweetly. ‘You’ll scream exactly when I want you to.’

And damn him …

I did.

Dawn found us rumpled and sticky, sore and exhausted, in the wild grass of the gardens where we’d tried to go to sleep for a few minutes and failed miserably. At the eastern horizon, the sky paled, then turned a brilliant blossom pink – the very first sunrise in over a thousand years that wouldn’t be witnessed by the Mother’s eyes.

And gods, it was a gorgeous one.

Next to me, Creon lay sprawled out in the grass, shirt gone, trousers sloppily buttoned. In the blushing morning light, even the sculpted ridges of his abdomen looked gentler, the hard lines of his face mellowed; the colours of the sunrise reflected in his eyes, and for a moment every trace of darkness was gone, every last glimpse of the shields and thorns he’d built around his soul. Just a tired, tousled, dazzlingly beautiful male, soaking up the first rays peeking over the edge of the world. Just …

Mine.

I didn’t seem able to stop smiling.

It was in that rosy light that Alyra found us not much later, soaring out from behind the court’s weathered walls. She was hauling a linen pouch along in her claws, flapping furiously to keep herself aloft despite the extra weight; when she dropped itinto the grass at my feet, half a loaf of bread, a chunk of cheese, and a wrinkly pear came rolling out.

I stared at it, and only then did I notice my own rumbling stomach. ‘You found usbreakfast?’

She gave me a long, unimpressed look as she landed beside me, beady eyes trailing from my thorn-scratched calves to my sticky thighs to the traces of seed clinging to the collar of my dress.I did, the disapproving impression on her face said,and looking at you now, I regret I didn’t pick a bar of soap instead.

‘Just wait until you meet the eagle of your dreams,’ I told her, suppressing a yawn behind my hand. ‘You’ll understand.’

She looked even less impressed by that argument as she hopped off to find some worms for herself to eat.

I tore off a handful of bread, gave the rest to Creon, and spent the next few minutes chewing in drowsy silence, watching the sun rise over the otherworldly landscape of the Cobalt Court. In the peachy light, the black beaches on either side of our cliff glowed a rosy pink. On the rocky plains ahead, the grey-green eucalyptus trees rustled softly in the morning mist, and beyond, quartz veins shimmered in the dark mountain slopes, waterfalls rushing down the jagged rocks like ethereal veils sparkling in the gold and pink morning light.

The Crimson Court and its scheming seemed an eternity away already.

I’d host a summer festival here one day, I thoughtfully decided as I chewed – a long night of roaring bonfires and too much honey mead even for Edored to devour. I’d make my parents come over for dinner every week. And on quiet winter mornings, Lyn might like to visit me, and we’d sit in the library together, gazing out over the chilly sea and sipping piping hot tea as we browsed our books …

Creon was talking to me. I didn’t register his voice until several seconds too late – ‘… should be able to find them …’

‘Wait.’ I jolted up, blinking, shaken roughly from my daydreams. ‘What were you saying?’

He stuck a last bite of bread into his mouth, nodding at me with an amused lift of his eyebrows. ‘I was asking whether you were planning to appear before the gathered kings and queens of the world in this state. Or before your parents, for that matter.’