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eighteen

Carnaxa

I t’s still dark from what I can see behind the giant of a man standing in front of me. The fire casts dancing shadows across the room and I know I’ve already been asleep for longer than I expected to be. I am tired of sleeping. I move the covers from me and hiss at the pain radiating from the burn. I couldn’t look at it the night we made it to Ereon’s room. I didn’t want to know what gruesome image the King had seared into my skin. My gaze falls upon the snake against my thigh.

“It won’t always be so swollen.” Ereon’s voice breaks the silence. “And I have some ointment that I need to get on the burn. It will help with the pain.”

“Okay,” is all I say. What else is there? As he walks to me, I notice that he has brushed back his hair and is wearing a silk robe over matching pants. He’s washed off the blood that was on him from the night before. Ereon kneels down beside the bed as I let my legs fall off the edge. He opens the jar and his fingers touch my knee slightly before pushing it apart from the other. I take a deep breath and try to forget about the pain.

“I haven’t forgotten what I asked you last night,” I mention to him as his calloused fingers slather the ointment across the injury before wrapping a piece of gauze around the wound.

His gaze flicks to mine before returning to his work. “What do you want to know?” He stands up, tossing the rest of the supplies on the bed behind us.

“Everything.”

He nods his head and runs his hand through his hair, debating. Then he looks at me and nods again. He sits across from me on the chaise.

“I’ll tell you what I know. I’ll start from the first time I met you.”

I don’t know how long Ereon has been talking. It could have been minutes or hours, but he’s kept his word. He told me of the way he felt when I entered my father’s throne room upon his arrival, of the way he acted when he realized I would often ignore the rules set out for me. He told me a tale of us walking on the beach, how I hated him, hated leaving Antalis, and how we traveled to Midaeliea and of my attack. How he was afraid he wouldn’t find me, and how Thylas and him agreed to a peace between them during that time. How the khind backed away when we were under threat in the Cartilen Pass, and how we all collapsed at the border of Shaston. Our trip to the village for medical care, and when he prayed to my goddess with Thylas. Some memories came back as he spoke, as if lit by candle light. A glance here, a word there. They aren’t complete.

But the part that I can’t seem to wrap my mind around is the story he weaves of the night after the attack. The moment he saw the twin drop ripples connecting me to both him and Thylas. I take a drink of the water, trying to find words. He’s been muted for a while now, letting me take in everything he told me.

“So the three of us ...” I stop, my cheeks heating. “You, Thylas, and I ... were together?”

He told me during the consummation that I wasn’t a maiden anymore, but I didn’t know why. I didn’t have time to think about it. From what Ereon tells me, I was in love with Thylas, and Thylas loves me still. Ereon did what he could by letting us act on those feelings. He chuckles under his breath and sits back down beside me on the edge of the bed. We’ve taken turns pacing the room, sitting on the chaise, moving from one area to another, but I always seem to come back here .

“No — you and Thylas were together. I was just able to join for a moment, by your choice. But I was there for you. The Captain — now the Ambassador — isn’t exactly my type.”

“And I am?” The words escape my mouth before I can stop them and I turn away from his stare. My fingers clutch my glass of water, causing my knuckles to turn white. What a stupid thing to say.

His fingers come under my chin, turning my head back to him before tilting it up to look at him. I can feel his breath on my nose and a shiver snakes down my spine.

“You are exactly my type.” He leans down and kisses my forehead. My shell starts vibrating faintly against my chest. I’m unsure if the vibration is visible, but it is definitely tangible.

He kisses the top of my nose and his beard tickles against my lips. He stops and I stare into his eyes, the beautiful dark brown. I let my fingertips trail across the robe he wears. The pull in my chest feels as if my heart will explode if I don’t get closer to him. He doesn’t move, neither away or towards me, as he lets me explore. Heat blooms from my core, circling and twisting.

“Princess...” He closes his eyes and reaches up to stop my hands. “I don’t know if we should.”

“I want this too, Naxa, but not like this.”

A glimpse of a memory trickles through. Thylas was there, holding me … above me. He had kissed me so much that it left lovers marks and I can still remember the sting. Then he left me, wanting and waiting .

The emotions scatter through me as if the events just happened. Those were words of rejection, just like I’m receiving now from Ereon. He said that we were all together; Ereon had me but a night ago — why would he turn me down now? Anger seeps into my veins and my hands grip into the collar of his robe.

“I’m so tired of everyone thinking they know what is best for me ...”

All the memories I have seem to be of people telling me what I will and will not do. My father told me I would be made to marry a Shaston Prince, and the only memory I have of Thylas is his rejection. Siphonie refuses to tell me anything because she doesn’t want to upset me. The words the attackers told me as they held me down. Everyone is constantly trying to keep me the weak, quiet, subservient woman they want. My mother was the only one who ever encouraged me to be bold and brave before her death, to seek my own desires.

“That’s not what I’m trying to do, Carnaxa.” His fingers move lazily across the back of my thumb he still holds. “There are more things you need to know ... about me. And you’re hurt. I don’t want you to feel pressured into anything. At Nle Shom , you didn’t have a choice.”

I pull him into me, our noses brushing against each other. “But I have one now.”

I crush my lips against his and for a breath, I think he will pull away. Instead, Ereon wraps his hands in my hair and pulls me closer to him. The sweet kiss turns into desperation, as if he can’t wait any longer, and he growls before he drops his hands to my waist. He pulls me to straddle his lap, never breaking our kiss. My thigh burns where the brand is as it rubs against the outside of his leg. The shell vibrates and warms as our tongues tangle with one another’s. Right now, he’s the only thing on my mind. I rub against his hard length, barely concealed beneath the thin pants he wears.

He kisses down my neck, biting the skin there, and I let my fingers dig into his scalp, pressing his mouth harder against my skin — wanting his marks on me. A primal need to show everyone that I wanted this. One moment to remind everyone that I can still be the woman I was always meant to be. A moan slips from my lip, and my hips grind against him more. I need more.

He wraps the roots of my hair in his fingers before tugging my head away from him. “I’ll ask one more time ...” His words come out in pants. “Are you sure you want this? Want me?”

His words stop me. I may not remember everything about our past, but he’s the only one who has been honest with me. The only one who has told me the good and the bad of what’s happened. I look between us and the shells that he found, recalling the words he said.

“Yes ...” I stare at him as he tilts my head more, letting his tongue lick up my throat. “I want you, Pri —” I stop speaking, remembering how he’s reacted before to his title. “I want you, Ereon.” Before the words fully leave me, he turns us around and has me lying on my back with him above me. His fingers trail up my calf and stop short of the burn there.

“I’m so sorry,” he says before he leans down, kissing his way down between my breasts and down my stomach. He raises the tunic, which I’m still wearing from the night before, and kisses lightly around the snake before he rises again.

“ Ryehro ... I —” A knock on the door halts us. He sighs into my hair and kisses my neck once more. “Anyone meaning harm wouldn’t have knocked. Stay right here. I’ll be back.”

He pulls himself away and I pull the covers up over myself. Ereon walks to the door before opening it with a grunt. A Shastonian guard stands with his eyes downcast. “Your father requests your presence.”

“He can wait till morning as per tradition. I have a few more hours yet,” Ereon says, his voice is full of rage.

“Prince Ereon, it is morning.” The guard ticks his head toward the balcony.

Ereon opens the dark, thick curtains that keep out the cold of night in front of the balcony. My heart races as he looks at me, his expression fills with dread. I look over his shoulder, and in the distance, the light of the sun starts to peek over the desert sand mounds.