Page 19 of The Princesses of Ruin (The Princesses of Ruin #5)

Chapter seventeen

Alastair

“ F uck, fuckity, fucking ballsacks!” Liliana shouts at the freezing wind.

Her voice is muffled by the wrap around her face, but I can sense the words clearly. They are her favorite, after all. I wish I could pull her close, but we have many more leagues to fly.

We used modified harnesses based on Kazimir’s design for Alyse to carry our companions and supplies, though I am carrying the lion’s share. Liliana’s wings are too new, too fragile. Adrik is enough of a burden as he is.

I throw another ward out in front of me, blocking a punishing gust and pushing it below us. Captain Alejandra shivers against my chest as she clutches the supplies hanging off her front.

“How do you do that?” she asks, her teeth chattering.

“Do what?” My voice is deep and rough, making Alejandra shiver again, as my bestial presence usually does—save for with Lily.

“Use rune-script like that?”

Visions of Liliana splashing me with water at our camp play in my mind, wiping out the wall of white before us. She pulls and pushes, the soaked tent canvas getting drier with every flick of her fingers .

She told me how she did it, but her reasoning didn’t make any sense. It didn’t feel right. It took me several weeks of scribing midair to find a method that suited me.

“I envision that the world is a canvas, and I’m a painter.”

Alejandra laughs. “She said…you were a poet.”

She’s freezing. Liliana must be, too.

“We will break for tonight!” I call over the howling wind.

“We’re still too far!” Adrik yells back.

His face is chapped, gloved fingers curled and trembling.

“We will break!”

I tuck my wings and dive, not waiting for Lily’s consent. I know she’s chilled to the bone, too, but she’s so gods-be-damned stubborn. She wouldn’t stop if she was in Nol’Ther’s grasp, breathing her last breath. It’s maddening.

And so unbelievably attractive.

Trees rush up to meet me, and Alejandra lets out a startled yelp. I fan out my wings and catch the frigid wind. Pine needles tickle the sinuous material of my wings as we slowly descend. I land with a thump, making the good captain squeal again.

“I’m not scared,” Alejandra says. “It’s just…the sea is my home.”

I crouch and unsnap the harness, setting her free.

She straightens her coat and drops the supplies, then looks up at me. Her face is chapped, too, but I can see the color of shame in her cheeks.

“Don’t tell Adrik I screamed.”

“What scream?”

A loud, fearful shout is punctuated by a heady cackle that could only be my wife. She lands in a puff of white that glitters across her dark wings. She pulls them in and looks over her shoulder at me with a smirk that lights up her eyes .

“You won’t beat me next time.”

She unhooks Adrik and he stumbles to the ground.

“Come on, potion master. Let’s find some firewood,” Alejandra says as she reaches out for Adrik.

“And I thought flying with Kazimir was bad,” he mutters, then takes her offered hand.

She pulls him upright a little too hard and he lands against her chest with a fumbled apology. She smiles at Lily, who snickers. I can only roll my eyes. These lusty women and their antics.

Alejandra and Adrik walk into the forest. I would worry after Adrik, but with the sea captain and her blunderbuss, flintlock, various knives, and keen magical hearing, I know they’ll be safe.

Liliana sashays her hips and the snow moves out of the way. I’m captivated by her flushed beauty.

“You think I can’t handle a falcon dive?”

Her expression is playful, fiery, and it sets my blood ablaze.

“I didn’t say that.”

She touches my chest and warmth blossoms from every point of contact. I lean into her, drawn like a moth to the flame. Even at the end of the world I am undone by her.

“You’re testing me.”

“I’m always testing you.”

Her nails drag across my pectoral, and the beast in me trembles with restraint. My body swells in size and her pupils dilate. I can smell her desire.

“Did I pass?”

My hand is at the back of her neck before I realize what I’ve done. I drop my head and connect our lips. She opens her mouth and I force my tongue inside to taste her. I’m so hungry for her, so…fucking hungry .

She sighs into my kiss and repays me in kind, meeting tongue with tongue.

Fuck.

I grip her hair and pull her head back, claiming her deeper. She moans, her hands grasping at my thick tunic.

She breaks from my embrace. “We don’t have long.”

I reel her back in, pressing her flush against my body. “We have all night.”

She takes a hand off my chest and flicks it in the direction of the dropped supplies. They move effortlessly at her command, and I fall into her farther.

This powerful woman is beyond understanding, and I don’t want to. I don’t need to know how she directs the world around her with a simple gesture. I’ve grasped several of the rune-scripts to perform spells, but she has far surpassed me.

Another reason to love her fiercely.

My intrepid fighter.

My warrior queen.

White wind whistles around us and the world itself makes way as she sets up our dwellings. Rocks clank as a firepit forms at the center, and a rumble heralds the rolling of three logs that surround it.

With a final flourish of her hand, she smiles. “Woulda been a much nicer trip the first time if I could’ve done that, huh?”

I chuckle, but it hides a sense of dread I dare not voice. She was touched by Ashai. She was inhabited by her. Scarlett may have removed that piece, but Lily hasn’t been the same since. This display of power only makes my concern deeper.

Her expression droops. “You’re unhappy.”

“No,” I say, quickly. “No. I am…”

Her eyes widen as she stares up at me.

I let the demon recede and face her as the man I am.

“I’m worried.”

She gives me an incredulous smile. “What about now?”

“You.”

Her eyebrows drop and her face becomes neutral, sending my stomach through loops.

“Lily, I only meant—”

She pushes off me and turns away. “Don’t bother.”

“You’ve expressed more control over your power in the last week than any other time. It’s not coincidental. She changed you.”

She stops, the snow seeming to avoid her presence by blowing around her rather than touch her skin. My breath catches in my chest as I watch the very essence of Gaien bow before my wife.

Her voice is barely above a whisper. “And what if it was for the best?”

My tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth, still tasting the inside of hers but shocked into silence.

“What if…” She turns back to me, her eyes dark and skin pale. “I have the power to defeat her now?”

“You may, but it would be your death.”

We stare at one another as the shock holds me. I don’t know why I said that, or where it came from. I don’t believe it.

Do I?

The muscles in Lily’s jaw flex. For a fraction of a second, I sense her desire to do real harm to me. I drop to my knees in supplication, praying she can see my devotion.

“I only wish you will still be you at the end. I fear if you stay on this path, you’ll change.”

Then her killing intent is gone .

The crease between her eyes disappears and she gasps. In one, fluid movement she reaches out, pulling me to her chest. I wrap my arms around her back, melting into her, wishing to push her into me. If she lived inside me, I could protect her.

“My demon knight.” She breathes the words into my coiled hair. “You have protected me for so long. I understand that you think it’s still your duty to protect me. I do not need your protection.”

I’m pushed back. My lungs fill with a shock of cold air, snapping me into a place between awake and asleep. I sense the future, the past, the now. I can hear every creature on Gaien. I can smell fate. I can taste destiny.

She caresses my cheek. “But I do need your love.”

I can’t bear to tell her she’s wrong. She needs not my love, but she does need my protection. Her greed will subsume us to the never-ending war of the gods, and one day, sister will face sister.

In the depths of the nine hells, the heat of the inferno core of Gaien, they will battle to determine the fate of the daughters of ruin. To the monsters who claim their souls by rite, or to the fathers who cannot live to see them taken by beasts.

Fortitude knows the way. The goddess of Grit understands the sacrifice. But my love…

My sweet, bright, giving, caring, wife…she will crave her offspring more than she will respect the will of the gods, the fated bond.

“Alastair.” Lily’s voice calls me back from…

Where was I?

I turn and look at my surroundings. I’m where I’m supposed to be, the snowy forest of the north. Why is it I feel I’m not supposed to be here?

Lily’s palms are warm on my cheeks as she turns my face to meet her gaze. “My husband, what happened? ”

“I feel something,” I say, unable to formulate the words to capture the concept inside me. “Some deep…knowing. I know something bad is going to happen.”

Liliana’s shoulders melt and she kneels with me in the snow, folding against my chest. “Oh, Alastair. I’m so sorry.

I didn’t mean to worry you. I know my mother…

that Ashai has imbued me with power. The runes on my arms that she gave me as a child have been burning, and I know how to use them now.

I didn’t before, but you’re right. Something has changed, and I can feel the magic she’s bestowed upon me. ”

Her admission doesn’t put me at ease. Something else is wrong. Something…farther away.

“Am I experiencing a prophecy?” I whisper, my mind reeling.

“Are you two finished yet!” comes a shout from behind us. It’s the captain.

Lily jumps to her feet. “Nothing is happening! Trust me, if it was, the whole forest would hear us!”

The two women laugh. Alejandra and Adrik return with arms full of smaller branches and some dry kindling. They chatter as they make camp, but I’m trapped in the liminal space between the man I am now and the man I was ten minutes ago.

I get to work unpacking the cookware, but I can’t shake the feeling that the world has shifted. Even as I hunt, my demonic senses finding prey quickly, it tells me that something has changed.

Something is wrong.

And there’s nothing I can do to stop it.