Page 48 of The King has Fallen (The Kingdom of the Krow #1)

~ MELEK ~

We were still on the bed, though I’d stopped sweating. I was on my back, my head towards the footboard, my feet at its head. Yilan lay over me, her arms folded on my chest, her chin resting on the back of her wrists.

She gave me the most beautiful, soft smile as I stroked her jet-black hair back from her face, tucking it behind her ears. The bond hummed, warming my chest, prickling my skin—and reminding me that I was going to be forced to leave her soon.

God, even with the lies and my anger at her for it, I believed her when she gave me her word. The conviction was there in the bond. And in fact, as I lay there with her, the bond humming like a tuning fork, I realized it was becoming clearer to me. Or rather, she was. The bond wasn’t like reading her thoughts. It wasn’t like her ability to place images in my head. But it did give me insight.

And right now, she was happy. Relieved. And… in love?

I hardly dared hope that she felt as intensely as I did. She’d been more circumspect from the beginning. Unwilling to set her biases aside. Yet now…

She sighed and closed her eyes as I stroked her hair again and let my hand trail down her spine.

“Your touch feels so amazing, Melek,” she breathed, arching into my hand like a cat.

Seeing her, flushed from my love and smiling because of my touch, was the most gratifying experience I’d ever had. I would have given up everything else in my life to simply spend every day that way—with her, in the quiet, making love and seeing her smile.

“I love your touch too,” I murmured. “Feeling your weight on me… Feeling your claws in my back,” I rumbled, grinning and raising my eyebrows.

I smiled broader when her cheeks pinked.

“You big oaf,” she muttered, hiding her face in her hands.

I chuckled, but pulled her hands away from her face when it was obvious that she was truly self-conscious.

“Yilan, don’t be embarrassed with me. Ever. I adore it when you want me. God, loving you is the most thrilling thing I’ve ever done.”

She lifted her chin enough that I could see her eyes over her fingers. “Truly?”

“Truly,” I said. When she smiled and dropped her hands, I grinned again. “Definitely worth a few more scars.”

She spluttered and slapped my chest as I laughed.

But suddenly there were footsteps, the tent flap snapped and a deep voice hushed, “Melek, I found Gall— oh shit!”

Yilan gasped as I rolled to my stomach, pushing her to my side, snapping my wings out to cover her, and snarling at Jann. But even though he’d turned his back to give her modesty, he didn’t leave.

“Jann, get the fuck out of here, now!”

Yilan twitched under my wing, but didn’t push it back because she was completely naked.

‘I can’t—Melek, he’s coming. You have to—”

“Who’s coming?”

“Ga—”

Jann tensed as the tent flap twitched back again and Gall entered, a spear gripped in his hand, and in full uniform.

I frowned and lifted my head. “Gall, what are you doing dressed? It’s still the Days of Peace—”

“I asked him to show me where your tent was.” That voice, so deep and bored—and just slightly slurred—chilled my blood, because it was immediately followed by the appearance of Gault, the King. He strode into the tent, ducking to get in through the door, then stopping two steps inside to straighten and survey my tent with a pompous frown, as if he were slightly repulsed. “Is this truly how you live? How… humble of you.”

Under my wing, Yilan startled and twitched.

I froze, reaching out under my wing to grasp her hand but unable to find it and unwilling to look away from Gault.

The King. In my tent. And he’d followed Gall. His son.

My son. Who now stood a few feet inside the doorway, staring at me, his brows drawing tighter and tighter over his nose.

What the fuck was going on?

“Gault—I mean, Sire—”

“I’d heard you were busy, The whole camp heard,” he said with a leering smile, but there was a glint in his eyes that raised the hair on the back of my neck.

I looked at Gall, but he was staring at me with the strangest expression. I couldn’t tell if it was pleading, or hopeful, or… something else. I frowned, then turned back to Gault.

“To what do I owe this… unexpected honor?” I asked carefully, praying Gault wouldn’t notice my wing twitching as Yilan moved under there, presumably to pull the fur around herself. Still on my stomach, I leaned slightly away to give her as much room to maneuver as possible, praying she’d manage it in time. There was no way Gault was going to allow me to—

“Lift your wing, Melek,” he purred in a deep, guttural voice that filled my head with visions of slitting his throat.

“Sire,” I said sharply, then looked at Gall—whose face was pale. “He isn’t—”

“Lift. Your. Wing , Melek,” Gault said, no hint of a smile or suggestive purr this time, but every ounce of the entitlement of King who was absolutely within his rights to require me to reveal what I had hidden.

Praying she’d had time to cover herself, I ruffled my wings as if I was irritated, then drew them both back, never taking my eyes off of Gault.

“I only hid her from the boy. He’s still quite inexperienced with women—”

I was trying to distract him from Yilan, but Gault laughed. Which confused me. But it was Gall whose eyes went wide as saucers, then his face turned from pale to beet red. He gripped his spear as if he’d use it, then his eyes cut to me, and he snarled as fiercely as any Nephilim in his prime.

I snapped my head to look at Yilan, horrified and expecting to see her naked, reaching for a fur to pull over herself… only to find her laying on her stomach, her back bowed and both hands drawn back to meet her ankles which she’d pulled up behind her.

I was horrified at the sight—my precious mate bound and hobbled like a common beast. Until I realized what she’d done.

Using that looped cotton at her ankle, she’d twisted it so it looked as if her wrists and ankles were bound together. A close inspection would reveal that she could free herself at any moment, but from across the tent, and distracted by her nakedness… She’d made it look like I had her bhoar-tied on my bed. Her face was red and her hair messy from my wing. Her eyes shifting and darting with fear. If I hadn’t known better, I would have thought they’d caught me in the process of raping her.

Clever, clever girl.

But my breathless admiration was short-lived.

“How could you?!” Gall growled.

Shit. “Gall, this isn’t—”

“Oh for fuck’s sake, you idiot,” Gault sneered at him. “Grow up!”

Gall flinched when Gault snapped at him, then turned back to me, his expression one of horrified dismay. I tried to push up, to reach for him, scrambling for some signal I could give that Gault wouldn’t understand, that would let my son know I hadn’t done what he thought I’d done. But I was drawing a blank.

Jann slowly turned, keeping his pained and desperate eyes off of Yilan, but just as helpless as me.

“You said… You always said—”

“You are a man, not a fucking child,” the King snarled at him. “Where do you think you came from?”

I was stunned. Not once in Gall’s twenty years of life had I heard Gault acknowledge his connection to the boy. Gall and I rarely talked about the King, but when we did, it was to delicately discuss how to keep Gall out of his way.

How the fuck had they ended up together? And why now?

Gall stared at me in horror and rage. I stared back, silently pleading with him not to believe it.

“I need to speak with you later,” I said as quickly and casually as I could. “Much has happened over these Covenant Days. Why don’t you go rest and I’ll come get you when I’m done with the King?”

Gall didn’t respond. He didn’t react in any way, except to look at Yilan. I couldn’t follow his gaze, couldn’t see what expression she had, or whether she was even looking back at him. But I prayed he gave us both a chance to explain.

There was no choice now but to tell him the truth and hope he could find a way to keep it secret.

“You…” Gall said thickly. “You always taught me—”

“Oh, fuck off, you little toad,” Gault said, bored and irritated, flicking a dismissive hand at Gall as he stepped past him towards me.

I gave Gall an apologetic look, but raised my chin quickly towards the door, telling him to go ahead and leave. “I’ll find you when we’re done,” I said, praying he would wait and not run off again because he was stressed.

Because he was very definitely stressed.

Enraged.

His hands gripped the spear until his knuckles turned white. I was about to urge him sharply to go before Gault lost his patience, when Jann caught his elbow, leaned into his ear, and tugged him towards the door.

I sent Jann a grateful look, then pushed up to sit as Gault approached, completely ignoring his son as if Gall and Jann weren’t even in the tent.

Then they were gone, and my heart was racing, because Gault had come to stand near the end of the bed, his arms folded, looking down on Yilan with an ugly smile on his face.

“You clever prick,” he muttered, though he was still smiling. “You really did have us all convinced that you were too good for this.” Then he looked at me, and his smile faded, leaving only a dark, blank expression in its wake. “I thought the green eyes said it all.”

My blood ran cold.

“What… what are you doing here, Gault? It’s not safe for you to roam around camp with no one but Gall as a guard,” I said as casually as I could. “He’s strong, but he doesn’t have the skill in subterfuge. I know it’s the Peace, but still—”

“I gave my guards the day. I was bored, and he was returning from… somewhere. He knew where your lair was,” Gault said flatly. His eyes had returned to Yilan and the heat in them made my hackles rise.

No.

Absolutely not.

I cleared my throat to get his eyes back to me. “You needed me? You could have sent a messenger—”

“This isn’t a game, Melek. I needed to see what you were up to. Now I know.” he smiled again. “Interrogation, indeed ,” he said huskily.

Yilan paled, but bowed back as she was, she couldn’t move away from his gaze.

My heart broke. She must have been in so much pain. Her hands were turning bright red because the loops on the cotton were cutting off her circulation. I needed to do something. So I pushed off the bed towards Gault to cover her at least a little, and picked up one of the furs as I moved. “We were just having a conversation,” I said honestly.

Gault guffawed. “Is that what you call it? I call it rutting.”

Disgust and rage burned through my veins and my instincts began to scream. My throat wanted to scream.

I am not a predator.

I’d always known this about my people—especially during war. Especially out of the city. The Nephilim were a culture literally born of the rape of women by fallen angels. Of course their offspring were casual about it.

But I had chosen differently. Had led differently. Had seen changes in those closest to me. I had hoped that, with time and generations, our people could become… redeemable.

Then I’d see something like this—from the King, no less—and it turned my stomach and washed me in despair.

Tossing one of the furs over Yilan’s back and praying she could allow at least one of her hands some relief, I turned to face Gault and spoke through gritted teeth.

“I have only hours until I need to go. If you’re just being social—”

“Oh no, I’m not just being social,” he said, his eyes gleaming, licking his lower lip as he stared at my mate. “I need you to leave earlier. I have had some urgent news and it requires my immediate reply. Since you’re going anyway, and you have one of the beasts, you can travel faster and take it with you.”

I shuddered, hands clenched at my sides, twitching because I wanted to clamp them on his throat.

“That’s… well, I’ll be disappointed to miss the last Day of Peace, but I suppose I can pack now and then get moving. I’ll deliver her to you in an hour. Two at mo—”

“No, Melek,” Gault said, taking the last strides to the side of the bed and extending a hand.

There was a shining, crystalline moment where everything within me recoiled—and roared, my hands actually rose as I instinctively moved to catch him as he reached for my mate with his thick fingers.

But Yilan shot me a dark look past him and I froze.

Unaware of how closely I’d come to restraining him, Gault tipped up her chin and forced her to meet his eyes as he let that long tongue of his snake out to slowly lick his upper lip. He rattled an approving growl.

“The message must be delivered immediately. And I find I’m feeling like… celebrating. You go. I’ll have a servant pack for you and follow. Your things will reach you by tomorrow. I’ll take her now.”

Her eyes were wary and locked on him from under her lashes. She shivered. But I reminded myself that she wasn’t actually bound under that fur.

If only I’d given her a weapon. Fuck!

Then Gault hummed and pinched Yilan’s chin between his thumb and forefinger. “I will make you scream,” he said in a low, guttural rasp. “Even more than the General. I will make you wish you’d never been born.”

Panic and revulsion lit a fire in my chest. I had no way to slip her a weapon as he watched. And no believable excuse to take her away. But there was no fucking way I was leaving her with him.

When I looked from her to him and realized his breath was getting shorter, rage hit me in the solar plexus like a charging bear, so hard that I grunted.

I was shaking. My mind shifting to battle plan.

Ten feet to my weapons. Twelve at most. I could have my spear in my hand in two or three seconds. Gault was armed, though only with blades—could he throw? I didn’t remember. Fuck!

He was two inches taller than me, slightly broader, but not as fit. He had been well trained in his youth, but he hadn’t had to meet a true challenge in probably five years and he’d slacked on training during the war. He was a thick, brute of a Nephilim, and our King for a reason. But he was staring at my mate like she was a pig on a spit, and he was starving. And her eyes were swimming in fear.

Did she really believe I’d let him take her?

I could have his throat slit in seconds—but before he could shout? Jann had taken Gall out, but had he stayed outside? Had Gault brought other guards he’d left out there who might hear?

If I let him think I would give up Yilan, he might be distracted enough not to notice before I got the blade into him, but letting him touch my mate—even his fingers on her chin—was making me murderous.

I was going to kill him.

I was actually going to fucking kill him.

He plunged one hand into the pocket of his leathers and cast around in there so much I thought he was beginning to pleasure himself.

“Gault,” my voice was thick, my throat wanting to close as he stared at her with a sick light in his eyes.

He cursed, then looked down, dropping her chin and shoving both hands into his pockets, then others, then cursing again.

When his head snapped up, his eyes were glazed with lust—but also flashing with irritation. “Fuck. I’ve left the written message in my tent. We’ll go now,” he said, then turned for the door, snapping his fingers at me.

Relief rocked through me, a tidal wave ready to take me off my feet. But then he looked back once. “Bring her,” he said hoarsely, then reached for the tent flap. “You can leave her with me there.”