Page 33 of Traitor Witch

“I think I will retire to my cabin to pray,” I mumble, keeping my eyes trained on his feet, hoping my flushed skin won’t give me away. “Perhaps another time.”

Rysen doesn’t bother to hide his disappointed look, and I feel a little guilty for deceiving him as I leave the room, tempering my usual strut into the demure, measured steps of a Solar.

RYSEN

I silently curse myself a hundred different ways as I watch my mate flee the galley in a whirlwind of white robes. I knew feeding from her would be sexual, but I was supposed to be treating her gently, like the precious gift she was. Instead, I rutted against her like a teenage vamp caught in bloodlust.

I’ve scared her with my sexuality, and that makes me lower than dirt.

What are the Goddesses thinking, creating a Solar witch to be the mate of five red-blooded, horny immortal males? They might govern over matters of life and fertility, but they’re also notoriously celibate.

Our Solar is a tiny, strange little thing to top it all off.

I should have stopped her. Convinced her to let the matter drop and gone back to feeding from the mugs of blood the crew donated.

I’m too big, too brutish, to touch someone so delicate. I was bred for war, not matehood.

I slam my fist into the wall, then grimace as the wall reaches out and jabs me in the solar plexus for my troubles.

Val hates it when I hit the ship.

I channel my energy into finishing the dishes for my mate instead.

Why have the Goddesses cursed her with me for a mate?

Even now, when I should be berating myself for how I treated her, I can’t get the feeling of her out of my mind.

She’s perfect. Just the memory of her taste makes me harder than steel. Her reactions, her cute little moans—shit! I can’t get her out of my head.

I slam out of the kitchens and up to the quarterdeck where Val’s staring down a stony-faced Kier. The captain has his hands on his hips, his eyes narrowed, and I get the impression the argument’s been going on for a while.

“What the fuck did the witch mean when she said you were cursed?” the captain demands.

Kier shrugs, but Val isn’t buying it. Neither am I.

But I don’t expect him to just open his mouth and confess.

I’ve known this fae for centuries. In that time, he’s spoken maybe a handful of words.

“You could have said something,” I grumble. “Is it to do with your voice? Why you don’t speak?”

Kier hesitates, then nods.

“We could have searched for a healer, a witch, or even asked Nos. You could have been cured centuries ago!”

He shakes his head but still doesn’t speak. His fingertipshave frosted over, the only indication he’s feeling anything other than mild irritation.

“We’ll ask Nilsa to help you,” I say.

Kier shakes his head just as Val yells, “Are you insane?” The captain turns his full glower on me. “That witch is the last person I’d trust to work magic anywhere near any of you.”

“She’s a Solar,” I say, “Committed to protecting life and healing.”

“So why the fuck is she accused of murder if she’s all innocence and sunshine?” Val grinds his teeth, his hands gravitating to the ship’s wheel as he speaks. “No, we’ll go to Alletta in Port Evert. She’s mad enough to be trustworthy. She can take a look and we’ll pay her price.”

Kier shakes his head. “Already asked. She refused.”

We both stare at him, and he shoots us a look of such exasperation that I grimace. “I suppose we’re idiots to assume you’ve not already tried every witch you could think of?”