Page 45 of A Taste For Lies (The Apex Kingdom #1)

Chapter 45

ALORA

I know I sounded full of conviction when I told them the linking wasn't necessary. And sure, Rule Number Two: The first thing is first. Access to Taran’s Apex sense isn’t strictly needed when I already know the location of the amulet.

But when you’re facing a difficult heist, every bit of leverage you can swing to your advantage becomes consequential. Which is why, after over eight straight failed attempts, I find myself once again in the hollow of the Sacred Redwood Tree, staring into the quicksilver hunter eyes of the prince of Veridia.

“This isn’t working.” I break Taran’s gaze and throw my hands in the air. “We’ve been at this for hours, and we’re no closer than we were before.” Worse, there’s been no sign of my lynx, which really would be an advantage tomorrow night.

Taran sighs deeply but doesn’t disagree. He taps his foot, thinking. I take the opportunity to drop into my stretching routine, my body stiff from standing in the misty chill for so long.

“What about a change in scenery?” Taran asks suddenly.

I pause mid-lunge. “ I thought we needed to be within this extra-special holy tree or whatever your book said?” I’m being snide, but in my defense, I’m cold, stiff and filled with eight attempts worth of stifled tension.

“Well, ideally, but that’s not the actual situation we’re going to be doing this in, is it?”

I finally break out of my routine. “No…”

“We’re going to be far from each other, not looking into each other’s eyes.” Taran warms to his subject. “And definitely not inside a supposedly sacred tree.”

“I just thought…” I blow out a breath. “I thought we would make the connection here and then hopefully be able to replicate it under more difficult conditions tomorrow.” The idea is even more pathetic when said out loud. “This is hopeless.”

“No. No, I wonder if—” Taran’s eyes catch mine, and there’s a determined expression in them that’s new after hours of failure. “Do you trust me?”

I cough. “What?”

“Do you trust me?” he asks again.

There’s a pregnant pause. Do I? I shouldn’t. It’s quite literally the first rule of the guild. But he’s been there every time I’ve needed him, even putting himself at risk in favor of my safety. He’s made no secret of the fact that he’s drawn to me, apparently since before we even met. The idea of him betraying my trust like that boy in Heshan feels laughable.

When the silence drags out and it becomes evident his question is not actually hypothetical, I finally admit, “Yes.”

“Come with me. I want to show you something.” I barely have time to blink before he grabs one of my hands and starts tugging me along.

We make our way back through the palace passageways, hidden inside our hoods, backtracking to avoid any night guards that Taran senses. I have no idea where we are when he finally swipes his finger against the wall (I cannot wait until I finally get to do this myself) and opens a door into…his chambers?

He drops my hand immediately, hurrying into his bedroom. I follow more slowly, taking a moment to examine my surroundings .

The bedroom is large, as befitting a prince, but other than big clear skylights, it’s more of an inner fortress, lacking the big windows overlooking the sea from his sitting room. It feels dark, secretive.

At the center stands the prince’s wooden sleigh bed—enormous. Big enough for the giant stoneclaw of a man and possibly two partners. My pulse kicks up at the thought. It’s tastefully decorated with dark gray bedding. Masculine.

Taran finds whatever it is he’s looking for in a chest of drawers and whips around triumphantly. When he sees where my focus is, a teasing smirk curves his lips, but he stops short of saying anything.

Instead, he crosses the room in two giant strides, holding out a miniature portrait of a beautiful woman with dark ebony hair and deep, liquid eyes.

“My mother.”

So this is Queen Kora. I examine the portrait more carefully, looking for signs of her son in her features. For all that Taran is King Nyxley through and through, there is something of the prince there in the queen’s devastating smile. In the bronzed tone of her skin and the slight waves of her midnight hair.

“You have her smile.” My eyes lift to meet Taran’s, questioning. Why has he shown me this?

He clears his throat. “Yes, Maeve says much the same. Will you sit?” He gestures to the bed behind us, the only place to sit.

I manage to nod and sit beside him, my back ramrod straight.

He blows out a deep breath, still clutching his mother’s portrait in his hands. “I think, perhaps, we need to…talk.”

“Talk?” I can’t hide my overt skepticism.

“Yes. My creature—” He takes another breath and starts again. “My stoneclaw seeks to protect me. I imagine your lynx is the same.”

He takes my silence for acquiescence and continues. “Can I ask you something? Something personal.”

“You can ask. I can’t guarantee I’ll answer. ”

“That’s fair.” Taran sets the portrait aside and takes my hands in his. “You didn’t ask me to come with you and Eleni to Thalassar.”

My lips part. “That didn’t sound like a question.”

“I need to know. Is that because you wanted to get away—from me?” There’s no way for him to ask this question without revealing his emotions about it. My eyes jump up to meet Taran’s, and the vulnerability in them hurts my heart. I open my mouth to tell another mostly true lie, and I just…can’t.

My throat closes on the words like my body won’t allow me to speak them. Whatever I say next, it will be the truth.

“When I lived in Shanterra, my life never quite fit. Now I know why of course—why I always felt out of place, broken. But it was more than missing my creature.” I sigh, embarrassed to share this story but knowing it's the only way he’ll understand. “I was…teased for my Veridian heritage. Never truly accepted by the other guild members. I didn’t have it as bad as Eleni, but it compounded with the feelings I was already experiencing from being without my creature. You told me one time I couldn’t imagine what it was like—one moment to be sure of your place in the world and the next—”

His hands squeeze mine. “Of course you knew what it was like. That was foolish of me.”

My words are coming out all wrong again. Why do the perfect lies slide easily from my tongue while the truth gets caught in my throat? “No, it wasn’t. I didn’t even know the truth of my past then. Anyway, in Shanterra, I kept searching for a way to belong—to feel complete, you know? There was this boy.” I sigh. “I thought he loved me. He said all the right things. But after I—gave myself to him, I overheard him bragging about it to his friends. About stealing the foreign whore’s virginity. It was all a lie. A prank meant to mock me.”

Taran grazes a knuckle over one of my reddened cheeks. “Don’t you dare feel embarrassed for even one solitary second over that idiot. You gave your heart willingly. That takes courage and is nothing to ever be ashamed of.” He pauses. “What’s his name? ”

“Why?” I ask warily.

He shrugs one shoulder. “I’m going to kill him.”

My lips kick up at the corners. “Let me finish first. You have here in Veridia what I’ve always wanted. A home. People who love you. Carter, who is like your brother. Maeve, who is like your sister. Astrid, who is…”

“Astrid,” he finishes with a smirk. “But I take your point.”

“Being here, with all of you these past weeks, I’ve felt more at home than I did the entire time I lived in Shanterra.” I shake my head. “I can hardly believe it, but it’s true. I would never ask you to leave that for me. Never.”

His eyes soften. “My turn?”

I nod.

“You already know I’ve been fighting this connection to you since we met. When I first emerged, I had little control over too much power and a creature that wouldn’t be contained.” His jaw clenches. “I’ve been holding on so tightly for so long that I’m not sure if I know how to let go. Everything in my life is lies on top of secrets, secrets on top of lies, and I’m terrified that the few people I still have left will be hurt if I can’t maintain them all. I still worry about the power of my stoneclaw around you, especially while you’re apart from your creature and your own power. Maybe I always will. But, My Lynx—” He cups my face. “In this one area, I am done fighting. I want to be with you more than I want air to breathe. More than I want my kingdom. More than I want that fucking amulet I’ve been chasing for eight long years.” I suck in a sharp breath. “Alora, I thought I needed that amulet to avenge my mother, but if you knew her, you would know vengeance is the very last thing she’d ever want me to devote my life to. If she was here right now, I know exactly what she’d tell me to do.”

“What?” I whisper, captivated by his words, my gaze holding his, taking in every single thing about him.

“Go with you.”

My eyes widen. “What about—”

“I don’t want to leave the others in danger. We should still do everything we can to get the amulet tomorrow. And when you do, because I know you will, we’ll take it with us across the ocean, far away, so it can’t hurt anyone in Veridia ever again.”

“I can’t ask you to do that—”

His lips curve into the devastating smile his mother gave him. “We already established that you’re not asking me.” His smile falters. “Although, if you don’t want me to—”

“I do,” I interrupt. “I do.”

We stare at each other, just basking in the glow of that potential future.

“Let’s try the linking again,” I say impulsively. “Right now.”

His hand drifts down from my face to clasp mine again. “If you’re sure that’s what you want…?”

“I’m sure.”

Eyes screwed shut, I take a full breath in and let it out slowly. I concentrate on the sound of each of our heartbeats, like I did in the redwood. But this time, instead of trying to clear my mind and be open for the prince to share his power, I turn inward, the way I did on the hunt. To my own creature. To the lynx that’s hidden from me for ten long years. The part of my soul still trapped inside an invisible cage.

I hyperfocus on my hearing, trying to amplify it the way an auditory Apex would be able to. The sounds sharpen. My heartbeat. Taran’s. The blood pumping through our bodies. His steady breaths, the slight catch that means he’s found his own connection. I can easily pick out the strain in Taran’s low voice when he asks, “Are you ready?”

“Yes,” I murmur.

We open our eyes.

The first indication it’s worked is the overwhelming rush of his scent—pine and rain. Then, other scents flood in: the wood of the bed frame, gods, even the tang of dust motes in the air.

But this time, the connection holds.

A surge fills me as Taran’s power merges with mine, and I moan out loud, Taran echoing me. My shoulders push back as I feel the strength of a stoneclaw fill my limbs .

I could take on monsters and win.

I gasp, and as if the sound is a trigger, Taran lunges towards me, close enough to draw breath, grasping my face firmly with both hands.

“Say my name.” He bites out the harsh command.

And the sweet smell of his breath fanning my face makes me murmur back, unthinkingly, “I want to taste you.”

I try to lean forward, but he holds my face frozen in his grasp. “First, drop the link.”

“What?” My mind is muddled.

“Drop the link, Alora.” His voice is tight, and his hands, where they clutch my face, tremble slightly. “Please.”

It’s that vulnerable “please” that ultimately breaks me out of the trance that I’m caught in. The connection severs, and the overwhelming scent and feelings of power ebb until it’s just me in my own head.

Taran’s hands drop from my flesh like it’s on fire. “That was…” He shakes his head. “I don’t have words for what that was.”

It was intense.

And suddenly, I find myself saying, “We should try again. Make sure it wasn’t a fluke.”

His face slackens.

“What? You don’t agree?”

“No, I absolutely do. I’m just surprised you want to. It was…intimate. To say the least.”

I crack a smile. “Still want to hear me say your name, Your Highness?”

He stares at me, unblinking, like he can’t believe I just said that. But then his lips kick up into a smirk, and he purrs back, “Still want to taste me, Lady Lynx?”

I swallow. Hard. I’m sure the answer is plainly written across my face. And probably just as easy to read in my scent.

The prince drops my hands suddenly, jumping to a standing position. “Maybe we should try standing this time. And, uh, not looking at each other. See if we can still manage it. ”

My mouth curves, and I rise to stand a few steps away from him. “Like this?”

That muscle feathers in his jaw. “A little farther.”

I huff and take two mockingly long strides away from him. “Better?”

“That’s fine,” he says, but his voice is tight, and his hands are clenched. It was all I could do to keep my hands to myself.

Since it worked this way before, I shut my eyes and concentrate on my auditory sense. Despite the relative physical distance between us, an immediate connection to Taran, combined with the orgasmic rush of his power, fills me. I can’t help the moan that floats from my lips at the delicious feeling.

“I have something in my chest of drawers. Tell me what it is,” Taran challenges.

I intentionally focus my borrowed olfactory sense on the chest, letting Taran’s own overwhelming scent fade into the background. I sniff experimentally, then—

“Chocolate? You keep chocolate in your bedroom?”

His grin widens. “Midnight snack.”

But now he’s spoken, my focus automatically shifts back to the prince, and my mouth starts to water with the need to taste. Not the chocolate. His scent turns deeper, muskier. I wet my lips.

“Alora.” He speaks like he’s in pain. “I’m going to drop the link.”

My eyes track his mouth as it forms my name. “I like the way you smell.”

He shuts his eyes, and then all at once, I’m pushed almost violently back into my own body, his power once again draining out of me. I sag with the loss of it, shaking my head to clear away the fog. Slowly, I peek up at him from beneath my lashes, a bit embarrassed at getting so carried away.

He’s breathing heavily, his quicksilver eyes alight and fixed on me where I still stand across the room.

“Tare?” I venture.

As if my saying his name snapped something in him, Taran eats up the distance between us with two long strides, pulls me close with one hot hand against my back, cradles my head with the other and crushes his mouth to mine.

He tastes just as good as I thought he would. Even without the link.