Page 9 of A Song of Air (Fae Elementals #4)

A sheen of sweat coated ’s skin. Her heart beat in time to the rhythm of her hips slamming down against Clay’s. With every move of her hips, he thrust deep inside of her, sending jolts of pleasure to her clit.

Clay’s blunt nails dug into her hips, his grip tight against her as he moved her up and down against his shaft.

A soft whimper escaped Corvina’s throat when he pressed deep inside, hitting a spot that made stars dance behind her closed eyelids. She quickly opened them, not wanting to miss a single moment of staring at Clay’s face as they moved in tandem.

His golden hair clung in strips against his forehead and cheeks, bright against his tanned skin. His strikingly green eyes were half-lidded, his teeth clamping down tightly against his bottom lip. With his expression contorted in pleasure, his dimples were much more prominent on his cheeks and chin, endearing in a way that had Corvina smiling.

The smile wiped off her face as his fingers went between her legs, finding the spot where they were joined. He touched her clit and the orgasm came as a surprise. She cried out and her entire body shuddered. Her hips moved against him, faster and faster so she could chase that sensation that once upon a time had been foreign to her.

She never knew orgasms could feel like this. She never thought she could have sex like this. Where she was in complete control. Where she was on top, taking and receiving pleasure as she desired, instead of someone else finding pleasure within her and leaving her hurting and in tears.

Her magic sprung out with the force of her ongoing orgasm. It lashed out like whips, water wrapping around Clay’s wrists and bringing them slamming down against the top of the bed. She didn’t care that she was wetting the sheets or that the cold water was in perfect contrast to their fevered bodies.

This was about control and her taking it back.

“Oh, fuck.” Clay arched up as the tendrils of liquid cut around his wrists. Inside, she felt him grow bigger and he throbbed, every pulse building an ache. She knew it was on account of his own magic. Blood magic that he used to rip fulfillment from them both.

Just as she started coming down from her high, he blinked and brought it up again. It was there in the beating of her heart, the rasping breaths as her blood heated and traveled lower and lower right to the center of her clit. He didn’t even need to touch it because she felt the heat as if he were. It felt like there were phantom fingers against her body, throbbing with her gasps and heartbeats and cries.

“Clay...” Her voice pitched.

“Yes, mate,” he hissed. His magic pushed her body to the edge, left her dangling over it. And the smirk on his lips let her know he meant to keep her there, to tease and wring the desire out slowly, drop after torturous drop.

Two could play at that game.

Her own magic crept out, a cold whip of water wrapping around the base of his cock. As he slammed up, the water against her clit made the both of them groan together.

“Mate...”

“Yes?” she asked innocently, even as she commanded her magic to encircle his engorged member and tug at the base of his balls. It pulled, wrapping around him as sensual as a hand. Turning, tugging, squeezing. She put different amounts of pressure against him, teasing him the same way he was teasing her, driving him close to his own release just before pulling away completely.

“You’re...” He snapped his hips up. “...killing me...”

She smiled, feeling suddenly wanton. There was something freeing about being on top, about driving a man like Clay Valentino completely mad with want. She never knew it could be like this. That she could feel... powerful.

It’d been days since she’d accepted him as her mate. Days they’d spent exploring one another. Days in which she relearned her body and herself and what she liked when it came to moments like this. There were some things of course she felt she wasn’t brave enough to try yet, if she could ever. Things that she knew would trigger her, like hands on her neck, like pressing her face down into the sheets... Maybe one day she would get over the trauma and wounds of her past. The ones that Tobias, her deceased bastard of a husband, had inflicted. But for now, she enjoyed this.

Riding Clay. Snapping her hips against his. Feeling him inside, pulsing and hot, and the overheated sensation just beneath her skin.

“It’s time to come, mate.”

That was the only warning Clay gave her before multiple orgasms crashed over her. One after the other, without even being touched. He consumed her whole, and she squeezed him with a cry, her own magic tightening until he pulsed inside her and cried his own release to the ceiling.

Once the sensation ebbed, she sprawled across his chest. Her curtain of golden-brown hair splayed across his body. Her magic swept away, seeping into the mattress beneath them. For a moment, Clay lay there breathless before his hands reached up and pushed her hair away, cupping her cheek with his palm.

The smile on his face was a radiant thing, like staring directly into the heat of the sun. It warmed her, threatened to blind her. It was always like that, his smile. It felt open and vulnerable, like an echo of what she felt in her own soul whenever she was with him.

Her mate.

Her mate.

For so long, Corvina had dreamt of meeting him. When she was a young girl, she’d craved it. But when reality came crashing down and the war progressed, she’d been forced to set aside those dreams as passing fancies. Her father, the High Lord of the Golden Court, had gifted her to the humans in exchange for her court’s survival. She’d been married to Prince Tobias of Dana, and yet her court still fell.

That was the beginning of her nightmares.

All Corvina had known in the human lands was cruelty and abuse. Until the Resistance. Until the Elementals. Until Clay.

She’d learned what it meant to be strong. And even if her gnarled, twisted fingers could not properly hold a sword, she had other things at her disposal that could bring down kingdoms. Her magic.

And her love.

Raw emotion tugged at her heartstrings the more Clay looked into her eyes and said nothing. She was only just learning about pleasure and what an honest relationship really looked like. Clay was looking at her with that open sincerity, and she felt she could read everything on his expression.

“You’re perfect,” he whispered. “Perfect.”

Her heart warmed. He’d been doing that for days. Like he meant to remind her every chance he got just what he thought of her. And she loved every second of it.

The most important reminder of course would always be of her own making. She needed to feel comfortable with herself and her own body, to value her own worth regardless of what anyone else said or how the ghosts of her past tried to haunt her. Sometimes, it was just nice to hear it said aloud.

“Much as I’d like to have you ride me forever, it’s time we got up.” He curled his stomach with a groan, lifting. Her legs splayed open at the action, her thighs encircling his waist. His arms wrapped tightly around her hips, and he looked up at her through bright lashes. “Although, this position feels too good to change.”

The tip of his cock stirred against her entrance. Wetness pooled between her legs all over again. She let out a soft mewl of want.

“We can’t.” Clay lifted her slowly. “They’re waiting for us, and the hour is already late.”

Much as she loathed to get up, he was right. It was late in the day already and she needed to check on Basil and her maids— friends , she amended. They weren’t her maids any longer, not since her husband and the entire Wes family had met its end. Not since the Resistance and enslaved Fae in Dana rose up in arms and destroyed the kingdom, letting the Seelie Prince take over.

They no longer had a duty to Corvina, and yet they still did her favors in watching Basil while she...

Corvina’s face heated. A part of her wanted to be ashamed, for the fear to rise up and rear its ugly head. But the greatest threat to her safety was gone. Her husband was gone, and nothing could harm her or Basil again.

They began dressing in comfortable quiet. Corvina still shied away from his gaze as she dressed. Her body was not the perfect specimen for a Fae. She was covered in scars from years of abuse. Even her fingers were gnarled and twisted and shook as she tried to pull her ribbons through her dress.

“Let me,” Clay offered. His hands covered her shaking digits. His palms were smoother than hers and for a second, she felt self-conscious because of it. She had been a princess only days ago. Princesses were not supposed to have calloused fingers. But there were many parts of her body that she found ugly. Parts of her that had been tortured with iron so badly, they’d never healed the same.

Like her ears. The tips of them weren’t pointed like other Fae’s. They’d been cut through with an iron knife until they’d bled and healed into twisted wreck of flesh. She wanted to hide them for a moment, to drop her hair over the tips so others could not see what all Tobias had done to her, even though they already knew and had witnessed the abuse for themselves.

Slowly, Clay’s hands pulled her out of those dark thoughts. He yanked on her ribbons, tying them into place. When he finished, he turned her, pushing aside her hair behind her ears. Almost as if he knew in which direction her thoughts had strayed.

“Beautiful,” he said. “Perfect.”

Her face flushed with warmth. The words she wanted to say got stuck in her throat. They tended to do that when he was near. It was still hard to believe he was real. This was real. That she had her mate in front of her and he was... perfect.

“Shall we go?” she asked.

He smiled as though he knew what she already wanted to say before he took her hand in his. Her fingers ached with phantom pains, but once his palm swallowed hers, she forgot all about that.

He led her outside of the room. The halls in the castle were very familiar to her, and their feet led them to the throne room where the others were waiting.

Julius whistled. “About damn time, you two.”

Julius was Clay’s best friend. A mountain of a Fae, he was leaning a muscled shoulder against an ivory pillar, flashing white teeth through his ginger beard in their direction. His ruddy cheeks flushed red with laughter at his own clever joke and beside him, his mate snickered.

Clay flipped Julius the finger, causing Iona to cackle with laughter.

Iona was a beautiful, if intimidating, Fae who was nearly as tall as Julius. She was muscular and curvy, with an expanse of smooth ebony skin and white curls shorn to her scalp.

The room was actually filled with the rest of their companions. The Resistance, or at least the inner circle of it. A few key players were missing, like Weylyn and the Seelie King, but everyone was otherwise in one spot.

Shula and Ryker, the fire Elemental and the group’s scarred healer. They sat in wait with Basil in Shula’s lap like it would become his permanent home. Her old maids, Gale, Juniper, Wren, and Dawn, stood off to the side with bags piled on their backs.

Corvina knew they were carrying her things. She’d told them that they were no longer bound to serve her, as she was no longer princess and Tobias was dead. They were free, and in their freedom, they could choose to do whatever it was they wanted.

What they wanted was to stay with Corvina.

She was humbled when they’d all said the same thing. Humbled that they liked her enough to stick around, even when she had no means to free them of their chains in the past or help them through life in the kingdom. They’d known that she was as much a prisoner as they were, even if she wore finer silks and gowns and jewelry.

The fact that they didn’t look at her and have the urge to flee the other direction meant a lot to her.

Though she would have to take them aside and remind them they didn’t have to carry all of her belongings. She could do it herself. There was nobody alive who would reprimand her for doing it.

“So, when are we leaving?” Clay asked, drawing attention away from them and the activities they’d been doing.

Prince Valerio stood gloomily to the side next to his guard, Uric. They both seemed particularly put-off today, and it seemed like shadows had perpetually settled over their heads.

“As soon as Weylyn deigns to grace us with his presence,” the prince said.

Julius snorted. “As soon as he finishes sucking off—” Iona’s elbow to his ribs stopped him from finishing that sentence.

He didn’t even need to.

They’d all known what he meant.

Since they’d brought Corvina into the fold, there was something she’d realized about the inner workings of the Resistance. It was by observing, listening, and looking at things from an outside perspective.

It was the way Valerio stared at Shula that spoke of extreme pain. It lived on the expression and the panes and lines of his severe face. Much the same way Uric looked when he stared at the prince.

Corvina knew that Julius and Iona were a pair made from Mana, and their passion burned as hot as the Danarish sun.

She knew that Shula and Ryker were tentative, quiet lovers.

And she knew that nobody, not a single one of the Fae present, trusted Weylyn Xanth.

Which was a shame, she thought, because she found the mysterious, golden Fae rather lovely.

Even when nobody else did.