Page 9 of Fey Empire (Fey Lords #5)

Chapter nine

O n the other side of the doors, footsteps drift away. The bedding party has left. They have returned to the feast.

Now I truly am all alone with Prince Selwyn.

I can’t look at him, I can’t. All I can do is stand here and stare at the polished floorboards. The air feels thick and heavy. The hiss of the candles as they burn, sounds far too loud. The smell of beeswax is strong. Time has slowed. Each breath takes a hundred years.

I am supposed to say, ‘ How may I please you, my lord husband?’ But my tongue is firmly stuck to the roof of my mouth.

If I had been married to a duke, there would have been a tea served to me at dinner. An aphrodisiac and a sedative. Maybe I would have been served one tonight, if Prince Selwyn had not whisked me away so very early in the evening.

But that’s fine. Being drugged and addled would be awful. At least this way I have my wits about me. It makes me a little less vulnerable.

“Laurie,” Prince Selwyn whispers softly.

I look up .

His mahogany eyes look so sad, and confused. “Why are you so scared?”

“S… sorry,” I stammer.

He stares at me for a long moment. Then, he picks up my hand. The one that is still tied to him with red ribbons, and will remain so until the druid cuts them in the morning.

He places my hand on his firm chest, over where his heart would be if he were human. He places his hand on my chest, and the heat of him seeps through all my layers of silk.

“Can you not feel it?” he says.

I can’t feel anything, save for the intricate embroidery of his outer robe. He has far too many layers on for me to be able to feel his heart beating, if that is what he means. He even has a layer of soft leather, unlike me. He can probably feel the racing of my heart, but I cannot feel a thing.

I stare up at him and bite my bottom lip.

He stares back at me. Searching for something. Sadness swirls and grows in his eyes the more he looks at me.

Eventually he sighs and drops his hand. I allow my hand to fall away too. Now we are no longer touching each other. The ribbon is the only thing connecting us.

The weight of his gaze continues to bore into me.

“The wedding needs to be consummated tonight in order to be binding. Healers will come in the morning and examine you.”

I nod my understanding. I know he has to take me. Fey wedding customs aside, I am his vessel now. If he doesn’t untap my magic, it will be clear to everyone.

“Yes,” I manage to say. “I understand. I have been trained for this. I know all the sixty-nine positions. ”

One of his elegant eyebrows lifts. “Sixty-nine positions?”

Despite everything, my lips twitch. “Yes. It is a source of a great many crude jokes.”

“I can imagine.”

He stares at me for a moment longer. Then he walks away, over to a cabinet. He pours a golden liquid into a beautifully carved wooden goblet. He returns to me and hands me the goblet.

I take it and gulp down the sweet liquid. Mead. Fermented honey. I can’t taste any drugs in it, but that doesn’t mean anything.

I look back up at him and wait to see what he wants me to do next.

Selwyn frowns. “Getting you drunk will not help, will it?”

It might. If he got me so drunk I passed out, he could simply arrange me on the bed in whichever way he saw fit. But my trainer said some men don’t like that. They want their consort to be conscious and aware.

He takes the goblet from my lax fingers and sets it down on the floor. All while his eyes never leave mine.

“May I see you?” he says softly.

My heart slams against my ribcage. My body belongs to him now. He doesn’t need to ask.

Weakly, I nod.

He takes my wrists and guides me over to the bed. Gently, he sits me down on the edge. I swallow and stare unseeing straight ahead.

His nimble fingers go to the laces at my neck. He tugs for a moment. Then he slides the soft silk of my robes off one shoulder. I shiver even though the room is not cold .

His hand moves over to my other shoulder. He pulls the silk lower until it slips off.

Both of my shoulders are exposed. Out of the corner of my eye, my skin looks pale. Soft and smooth thanks to fey lotions.

His finger runs down the curve of my neck and continues down, over the slope of my shoulder. The echo of his touch lingers all over my skin.

He traces along my collarbone until he finds the thin silver chain of my brace. He pauses and pulls the brace out of the silks pooled at the top of my chest.

“What is this?”

I lick my lips. Surely it is obvious? Strips of leather wrapped around a three-inch long piece of wood.

“It is my brace.”

Silence.

I swallow. “It is… um… for biting on. Clenching between your teeth so you can remain silent and um… brace yourself.”

All vessels have them. Or so I have always been told. A good vessel is a quiet vessel.

His fingers move to the clasp. He undoes it and lifts the chain off of my neck. The brace thuds on the floor.

“I want to hear you sing for me.”

My stomach does something strange. Sing? That has to be a translator glitch. Cry out, surely? Moan, perhaps? Hopefully, he doesn’t mean scream.

I bite back a yelp of surprise as Selwyn flows down to the floor. He sits cross-legged at my feet.

This is so wrong. He is a prince. But he clearly doesn’t want me to move. He chose to position us like this .

His hands go to my left ankle. Before I know what is happening, he has pulled the soft leather boot off. He does the same with my right foot. Then he pinches the silk between my toes and pulls. The silk stocking slides down my calf, over my foot and all the way off.

He moves to my other foot and takes ?hold of the thin silk. This time he pulls even slower. The slide of the silk down my leg feels like a caress. It glides, down and down, and off. Now my feet are bare.

His hands move to the skirt of my robes. He pushes them, up and up. Now they are pooling by my waist, and all of my legs are naked.

His gaze rakes down my left leg, slowly tracking all the way down to my toes. His attention flicks to the toes of my other foot. His gaze slides along, over my ankle, up along my shin. Over my knee. Sliding up my thigh until his gaze is stopped by all the silks pooling in my lap.

He flows gracefully to his feet. He steps in close to me. His hands brush along the silks at the top of my chest. He slides them down. Silk brushing over my nipples. Slipping lower still, over my stomach. Joining the silks of my skirt to pool at my groin.

Now, very nearly all of me is naked. Silks are bunched around my cock and hips, but that’s the only part of me that is covered. The rest of my body is bare before him.

His finger runs lightly over my exposed shoulder. Heat blazes along my skin. He traces to my collarbone, and then along. His finger continues down. He reaches my nipple and gently brushes over it.

I gasp and shudder. Sensation flares. It sparks and shoots along my nerve endings until it reaches every part of me and curls my toes .

Oh my. I was not expecting that. This is shocking.

He does it again. My lungs stutter.

The fingers of his other hand take my other nipple. He brushes it lightly. A small sound escapes my lips.

He flicks. Twists. Pulls. Both nipples at once. Sensation explodes. It surges through my body and leaves me trembling.

My head falls back. I gasp around stuttering breaths. Oh sweet goddess, what is happening to me?

The bed dips as he sits beside me, but his fingers never stop working. He gives the nipple closest to him a long pull. Then he releases it.

Suddenly, I’m crying out. Warm wet heat. He is lapping at my swollen nipple. I can feel his soft hair brushing over my naked chest. Prince Selwyn is licking my nipple.

Another cry tears from me. He has put his mouth fully on me and sucked my nipple into him. His hand is still flicking, tweaking and tugging on my other nipple. The dual sensations are racing through me.

He suckles and suckles. I feel the brush of sharp teeth. I moan. My fingers twist in the sheets.

He releases me with a wet plop. Only to turn his attention on to my other nipple. I groan as he latches on.

I squirm and writhe as sparks tingle throughout my body, setting all my nerve endings alight.

He releases me again with another wet plop. I gasp. His fingers leave me too.

I lift my head and open my eyes. My nipples are standing proud. Swollen and erect. Wet and glistening. Rose red instead of their usual pale pink.

Selwyn pulls at the silks below my waist. Opening them up, and revealing the last of me. My cock is hard .

His heated gaze drops to it and his eyes flash.

“Pleasure yourself. Show me what you like.”

My heart thumps. I hate to disappoint him, I really do. I want to obey and show willing. But I haven’t been trained for this.

“I… um… have never been allowed to play with myself.”

Gold-flecked eyes burn into me. “You were forbidden to bring yourself pleasure in the human way?”

I nod.

“And you are untouched by others?”

I nod again.

His brows furrow. “You have never experienced an orgasm?”

Heat floods my cheeks, and I drop my gaze. “I have. A couple of times. During training. Sometimes in sleep, when I was younger.”

Selwyn is silent, but I can hear his question, nonetheless.

“My trainer used dildos on me so I could learn how to take a cock.”

Selwyn makes a noise that sounds like displeasure, but before I can fret about it, he moves onto the bed and pulls me with him.

I end up with my back resting against his firm chest. My ass and legs nestled between his spread legs.

I’m assuming he is leaning back against the pillows and the headboard, but I’m far too distracted by the feel of him pressed against my back to really picture it. He is still clothed, but I’m naked.

It is quite something.

“Play with your cock. Discover what you like.”

Oh. My. Sweet. Goddess.

Behind me, he leans to the side, reaching for something. Then his hands appear in front of me. He unstoppers a pretty bottle. He tips it, and warm oil pours out. It lands on my hard cock and spills onto my stomach.