Page 78 of Death’s Kiss (The Order of the Tide Raiders #1)
“Quite,” I agree with a short nod. Then I lean in close enough so that he can clearly hear my next words, dripping with lethally sweet venom. “Because you’re nothing but an arrogant, spoiled, unloved , asshole. Who—when it comes right down to it—is all bark and no bite .”
Captain Agni bends forward against my blade to lower himself closer, not caring one fucking bit as the gilded edge cuts into his skin. My gaze flickers briefly to track the ruby pinpricks drawn in its wake before returning to burning ember-eyes, now less than an inch from my own .
“Then. S trip .” He sneers.
My focus narrows in on his gaze but otherwise I don’t move so much as an increment.
My affinity begins stirring restlessly beneath its restraints the longer Agni appears serious.
After a moment, his lips pull upwards slowly in smug satisfaction.
He leans back against the wall, watching me with cruel amusement at my utter lack of movement.
“Come on, Boreas, we don’t have all night.”
Vindictive prick.
“You don’t actually want to fuck me—you just want to lick your wounded ego,” I point out, his unwavering arrogance holding me physically hostage.
“Maybe it’s both,” Agni argues in a voice like scorched gravel before making a counter maneuver that’s too swift to be possible. Quicker than a heartbeat, he leans into my sword, grabs me both wrists, and uses his weight to spin us until the hilt is forced from my grasp.
My mouth parts in angry shock as my blade hits the sandy passageway’s floor with a muffled ‘thud’. Glancing upwards, I find fresh blood forming a perfect circle around his neck. His blood.
Agni’s formidable hands find my waist with ease. He pulls me flush against him before turning us over until it’s my back flat against the wall. I’m reminded again just how much bigger he is, how much larger and stronger every plane that belongs to the body now cages in mine.
A memory flashes of that day in Preceptor Oplon’s course. The sensation of his body on top of mine. His weight between my thighs. The flash of his scar as he drives me down into the mat.
My pulse quickens without permission.
I find myself scrambling for a taunt to brandish. "Oh, of course . I should have known manipulation would be your kink. Not very original for a highborn, but I guess I’d just assumed your palette was less debased . ”
Agni’s hands, still secure on my waist, set me evenly against the wall. My pulse is like a living breathing thing, trying to physically escape my person by any means necessary.
“Manipulation is hardly a fair accusation.” His head tilts to study me with raised brows and a deep-set frown. “You certainly seemed eager enough a moment ago. As I recall, you yourself just verified your own willingness, did you not?”
My lips flatten at his apt recount, I have no retort to give.
Agni leans down closer, and a hint of citrus begins to tease my senses with the movement. His voice now simmers with unexpected anger when stating, “Maybe I do enjoy a game or two but I am nothing if not a captain of my word. You are the one who just put that into question.”
My swallow is thick.
“So Boreas, who is bluffing here?” Agni asks, his arrogant face turning insufferably smug while looking down at me, waiting expectantly for my waver. “Just say the word, admit to your own terribly played posturing scheme and I’ll stop.”
My jaw clenches while meeting his stare. I absolutely refuse to be the one to lose this match.
He pries a ring-adorned finger inside the neck of my uniform and releases the tight fabric against my skin with a brisk 'snap ’ . A snarl is barely held behind my clenched teeth at his brazen affront while holding onto his searing gaze.
Agni smirks down at my outrage. “Alright then, let’s go, Captain —stop dithering.”
My eyes remain narrowed on his face, still searching for the hesitation I was so certain would be revealed. Instead, Agni’s striking features resemble those of an iron veil forged from cruel amusement that then begins lowering itself closer. He pauses when his lips linger beside my ear.
“Boreas,” he whispers, soft as ash. “Are you waiting for my help?”
Something unspeakable flutters wildly inside my chest as his thumbs then deftly find the hem of my shirt. The very tips of his fingers begin grazing ever so slightly along the skin of my waist and I have to choke down on the sudden urge to gasp.
I know what he’s doing—trying to force out my hand.
I’m lightheaded while trying to come up with a strategy.
Any sort of strategy.
“Now that I think about it…” His nose traces the shell of my ear before drifting down to the top of my jawline. The movements send a wave of mortifying tautness throughout my entire being.
“You do seem to require an awful lot of my assistance in particular. Don’t you?
” His taunting words stroke across my throat while his fingers continue trailing softly up my sides.
A heat I refuse to acknowledge begins manifesting in my core, intensifying in slow, torturous increments as he lowers his head further with maddening deliberation.
“I wonder why that is,” he murmurs, seemingly to himself, before using those sordid lips of his to run up and down my throat before kissing the spot directly beneath my jaw.
It might as well be a knife thrust between my ribs with the way I gasp.
My palms press flat against the stone at my backside in an attempt to rally myself in this newest game between us when a stream of brilliant light flares out behind me. I physically jolt at the unexpected sight of it spilling out and down into the dim tunnel.
Agni’s hands drop away from me immediately and he steps back entirely. I notice then that at some point I stopped breathing. Precious air begins to fill my lungs in steady waves of barely concealed respite.
Avoiding the sigh of him altogether, I spin back to face the fossilized wall now rippling with bright, radiant, white symbols. Symbols that—that seem to ring a very old and long forgotten bell. The lines that string together my affinity mark begin tingling in response.
I stare at the emblems in quiet perplexity as they continue to unravel themselves further down the kórallian wall .
“Saved by the light, Boreas,” Agni says, stealing back my attention with his dark chuckle.
There’s a hidden level of humor in the undertow of his words. I’m struck with the most peculiar sense that I should somehow know the additional meaning behind them. Like he’s just told me some sort of multilayered punchline but I simply cannot remember the joke.
Glancing over a shoulder in question, I find him studying me and the luminous wall intently.
His thoughts are entirely indecipherable.