Page 96 of The Ever King

He laughed and pulled away, but held out a hand to help me up. I took it, almost on instinct, as if our dance kept us touching but too uneasy—perhaps too reluctant—to cross those lines again.

The king didn’t say anything before he turned away.

“Where are you going now?” Gods, I sounded like a child about to pout, but there was a growing side of me that didn’t like watching the back of Bloodsinger’s head walk away.

“Kingly business, love.” Erik offered his horrid, beautiful grin. “Miss me often?”

“Never.” I spun in the opposite direction, ignoring the way Sewell and Celine grinned like they knew something.

They knew nothing.

By the gods, I wasn’t certain I knew how to explain what happened to me whenever the damn Ever King came near either.

* * *

The king spoke true. He was absent enough sometimes I thought I might miss him. A bond from the claiming, no doubt. There must’ve been some kind of magic that tethered me to Bloodsinger, and it was aggravating when he wasn’t close.

Erik would slip into his chambers, take a moment to wash, dress, then leave again. For days he hardly said a word beyond a mere, “Songbird,” greeting.

I tried to ask Celine where the king spent his days. She’d tell me I shouldn’t pester him about his time, and insist I was aggravating. But after the feast, she rarely left my side. I didn’t think it was only on the order of the king.

Celine spent the days showing me the palace, introducing me to the wide-eyed servants who rarely spoke with me, and testing me on the numerous stairwells that led to the uneven levels of the palace.

“Well?” I asked a week after Erik claimed me as his. “What do you think?”

Alistair, the old steward, tilted his head, full lips pouted as he squinted at the window. “What is it?”

I balked. “What is it?” The paintbrush was still in my fingers as I opened my arms wide to the glossy window. “It’s Jormungandr! The great sea serpent. Who else would it be?”

Alistair sniffed and took another breath to study the black body wrapped around wild, blue waves. “I appreciate the artistic liberties, however, that is no Jormungandr I’ve ever seen.”

Celine snickered behind her hand. I puffed a strand of hair out of my face and glared at the steward as I packed the paint basket again. “Well, Alistair, I’m afraid I have terrible news.”

“What is that, Lady Livia?”

“You have no damn taste in art.”

Again, the man sniffed, but his folded skin lifted on his cheeks with a rare grin as he turned on his heel. “There are windows aplenty with which to practice upon, My Lady. Don’t lose heart just yet.”

* * *

More than a week after the claiming, Erik slipped into his chamber when the moon was highest. I pretended to sleep, grateful he’d left me in peace all day—perhaps a little frustrated he seemed content to avoid me.

He rustled through his wardrobe. After I’d listened to the sounds of him shedding off his clothes for clean ones, after I’d imagined the way his body looked with nothing on it, he stepped beside the bed.

My heart stilled when he gently eased the quilts higher on my shoulders, then the soft touch of his fingertips brushed away a lock of hair from my brow, a touch there and gone like the kiss of a breeze.

Then he left me alone.

Again.

* * *

“We call it the great hall,” Celine said, grinning as she turned around the throne room where the return feast had been served nearly two weeks before. “It’s what you call yours, too, right?”

I’d started to take note of the subtle ways Celine tried to find similarities between our worlds. Styles of hair, the way soil grew vibrant plants, even the shape of our ears.

“Yes,” I said. “We eat and revel in the great halls back home.” I dragged my fingertips over the filigreed throne made of black wood and engraved with crashing waves and sea plants across the back and armrests. I gave Celine a wink and started to sit. “Shall we see what it’s like to be Bloodsinger?”