Page 26 of Golden Queen (Idrigard #1)

Eight

I met the Prince on Merchant's Square. He stood on the darkened street holding the reins of a single large horse.

He took one look at me and said, "That will never do," regarding the demure dress of pale gray linen. "But the hair—that's a nice touch."

I had used a tint on my white hair to turn it a soft shade of brown.

His approval rolled over me like warm water, making my cheeks burn. It almost shamed me that it could make me feel so fucking pleased. After all, didn't I already know the darkened hair was a nice touch? I didn't need anyone's approval.

We rode through the streets, his body behind me a presence that seemed to nearly scald me where his chest lightly touched my back.

When we reached the road leading to the Mercury District, he let the horse make its own pace.

He wrapped an arm around my waist to steady me, and my breath hitched in my throat.

Such a ridiculous reaction from so small a touch.

I was sure he could feel the shaking in my legs, the nervous energy coiling in my limbs in response to it.

I wanted to reach down and lay my arm across his, slide my hand down to his and feel the long fingers that ever so slightly curled around my side.

But I did not, and by the time we dismounted at Master Juriae's manse, my back ached from the tension of holding my body rigid so that I would not lean back and rub against him like a cat.

Since the Radune party was still ensconced in the castle, the house was empty save for a few servants and Aben and Britaxia. The two mages were lounging in a sitting room, looking for all the world like a couple at home for the evening, reading in front of a fire.

After the Prince explained what we needed, Britaxia smiled, rather like a cat herself, and led me up the wide marble stairs to her chambers.

It took going through the entirety of her very sizable wardrobe before we found something that would fit. A slinky, black dress with a vee so deep it nearly reached my navel.

I looked positively inappropriate. My cheeks burned with shame to even be standing in the privacy of Britaxia's chambers like that.

"You look delicious," she told me as she straightened the edge of the filmy material where it lay across my breast. I wore no undergarments beneath the dress, but at least the deep black color did something to hide the outline of my nipples through the fabric.

My own soft gray slippers finished the look, and by the time I was back beneath my cloak, and we re-entered the sitting room, I had convinced myself that I need not ever remove it. In that case, I could go through with this little adventure.

We left by carriage. It surprised me by turning further into the Mercury District instead of where I had imagined we would be going out to Antevemer street.

"There's a party of sorts at the home of a merchant called Mikas Terrathin," the prince explained after I asked where we were going.

He paused, mulling something over as he looked across at me. He shook his head. "We should not be doing this. This is a terrible idea. Maybe the stupidest thing I have ever—"

"I can do it," I interrupted.

"I have no doubt that you can, but this party...it's known to be wildly lascivious."

"Have you forgotten where we met? I am no blushing maiden, Your Highness."

He winced a little, and I hardly blamed him. I was not a good liar, and that was a particularly bold one.

But he surprised me. "Call me Io...please. At least where you can. And I won't be attending this party as myself, so the title and my other name will not do."

"Your other name?" I asked, perplexed. "So, Io is not a false name?"

"It's part of my middle name, Iomhar."

I wasn't sure why it meant so much to me that he hadn't given me a false name, but it did.

"Well then perhaps we should use a truly false one in case someone recognizes it," I suggested.

He smiled, almost ruefully. "They won't."

I had not been watching the scenery out the window, so I was surprised when the carriage stopped, and Io reached into his jacket to hand me something.

It was an elaborately detailed domino mask with long, sweeping feathers that would cascade back from the sides of my head in truly garish fashion.

"You're joking," I said, eyeing him. Though it did answer the next question I had been poised to ask: How did he possibly imagine he would not be recognized?

"I'm afraid not," he said, placing his own ridiculous looking domino mask over his face and tying it in the back.

I expected to laugh as I looked at him. His mask didn't have feathers. It was covered in tiny black crystals that glittered in the faint lamp light filtering in from outside the carriage.

Instead of humor, I felt heat sink low in my belly. Nerve endings all over my body came alive as though little sparks danced just beneath my skin.

He looked somehow much more dangerous in this glittering mask than he had without it. His lips, just below the edge, took all my focus. Until I met his eyes, at least.

I fumbled with my own mask, trying to cover the discomfort that came from looking at him for perhaps a heartbeat too long. He leaned forward and took it from me.

He was so close as he tied it that I could feel the faint whisper of his breath against my cheek. His arms on either side of my face and the feeling of his fingers behind my head made me visibly shudder.

And then he leaned back and surveyed me, letting the tip of one finger linger under my chin. "You look beautiful, Aelia."

I made no attempt to hide my smile as the compliment raced through me. I swallowed hard. "Sera. That is also my middle name—Seraphem."

"So it is," he said softly as the door was opened and a servant reached in to help me down.

I was surprised to find that we were not in front of a manor house. The carriage had stopped before a wrought iron gate at the base of a long, sweeping drive.

Io handed a guard at the gate something that looked like a black ribbon tied around a silver handle. The man nodded to another who turned to swing the gate open just enough for us to pass.

The metal of the gate clanking shut behind us was very loud in the silence of the night.

"Ominous," I said, turning to glance behind. I saw no other carriages, and the other side of the road was nothing but a tall, impenetrable looking hedge.

"Don't worry. Even if I could not take down the gate with ease, I happen to have wings in the sky, Sera. You are not trapped."

Wings in the sky, I thought, unable to stop the glance skyward. How easy it was to forget that the man at my side commanded dragons.

Though glancing at him, the tall, dark shape that took up so much space at my side, the memory of the power that had crackled through the godsgrass, and the certainty that I could not even fathom the true extent of the magic that lay under the surface, I found it rather easy to believe he could command anything.

And hard to believe I felt so safe with him.

Perhaps it was that ghost of a hand that lay at my back that gave me such a sense of security as we mounted the hill and saw the large, expansive manor house before us.

There were people milling about on the wide lawn. Another pair seemed to be just approaching the entrance as we came to the edge of a large fountain. A square of reddish light ran across the statue, illuminating it as the doors were opened to allow the couple to pass.

I immediately averted my eyes to what the square of light revealed.

The statue was of a woman, hyper realistic in startling detail.

She was on her knees at the feet of a man.

Her mouth was open, her face set in harsh lines of ecstasy.

A thin stream of fountain water shot across in an arch to land in her mouth.

..directly from the huge erect phallus jutting out from the marble man's forward thrust hips.

Urine..or otherwise, I could not have said.

I felt my face flame with embarrassment.

The chuckle that radiated from the man at my side did not help. "Are you sure about this?" he asked, without looking away from the wide stone steps we were approaching. "It's not too late to call it off."

"Of course," I said, affronted. I knew my behavior was giving away the lie of the air of experience I was trying to cultivate. I held my head high and hurried my steps, mounting the stairs until he had to catch up.

And then I heard the music....and my steps literally faltered.

He caught me, of course. The hand at my back slid around to curl fingers around my waist.

Suddenly the music, a deep pulsing beat of drums that had seemed so frightening only a moment before, began to feel different.

It seemed to echo my own thundering heartbeat.

The pulse of blood pumping through my veins went directly to that spot at my side where his fingers lay. And I could think of nothing but him.

Just inside the door, a servant moved to take our coats. The room was lit by red glass lanterns that bathed everything in scarlet. Even the doorman's skin was tinted red, making him look rather impish to my mind.

I watched Io's eyes sliding around the room, assessing, surveying, planning as he was helped out of his long coat.

And as another servant took my cloak, while the music still pulsed inside me, I simply stopped being embarrassed by the way I looked in that dress.

The air licked across my skin, down my exposed back all the way to just above the cleft of my backside...and it was delightful.

Something wicked was edging its way out of my soul. Something decadent, something dark, something that wanted to be there in the midst of that pulsating music.

I willed his eyes to me, but he was still taking in the room around us, looking for danger or information.

So, I stepped to his side and he absently slid that arm back around me. I felt him flinch as his fingers came into contact with my bare skin.