by Olivia Hart
Finally, Rose stepped up to Enivyn and said, “I don’t have very much to give, Enivyn, but there is one thing that I can give.” She pulled the crown from the pouch and put it on his head, adjusting it so that it wouldn’t fall off.
“I’m a Queen so I get to do this. Today, I pronounce you Prince of Smiles as there’s no one in the village who can smile as big as you.”
The entire village seemed to laugh and cheer at the same time. Rose walked away as Andryn began to cut the cake. She seemed to have just as big of a smile on her face as Enivyn did.
“I think I understand what’s happening,” I whispered to her as she stood next to me watching the entire village laughing and talking.
“It’s a human thing. We’re born, we live some years, and then we die. So we count them and congratulate ourselves for living another year. More than anything, it’s a good reason to be happy to just be alive.”
“It’s not a bad tradition for humans,” I said.
“It’s not a bad tradition for anyone to be happy to be alive, Sebastian.” I looked at her and saw her watching the villagers.
“Maybe you’re right. Maybe it’s good to just enjoy the moment every now and then.”
“I heard that chocolate’s your favorite.”
“You heard right.”
“Then you’d better go get in line for some. I’m positive that those gnomes will gobble up every extra piece they can get their hands on.”
I laughed and grabbed her hand. “Fine. I’ll stop worrying for a minute and just enjoy a bit of cake.”
Chapter 29
Rose
I stood panting in the training circle that had been marked off. The villagers knew not to come near here as Sebastian, Cara, and I had slowly but steadily become more brutal in my training.
Mists crawled from the ground around my feet as I faced Cara. Using the Gift of Sacrifice, I followed Sebastian’s movements as he stood behind me. I knew that he was working the mists. The black shield that coated my skin held the mists back, and Cara shined her light at me which the shield blocked.
I felt Sebastian leap towards me, his daggers being called from the mist. I twisted at the last moment, shoving him towards Cara. He screamed as I pulled the hood back and he stared into her blinding light.
Leaping over him, my wings fluttering to lighten me and carry me over his body, I stood in front of Cara and felt my dagger coalesce from shadows in my hand. Her eyes went wide as the dagger pressed against her throat at the same time that I raised my other hand and encased Sebastian’s legs in stone.
“Dead,” I whispered to Cara. Sebastian pushed the stone away from him with his powers at the same time that I threw the dagger at him, hitting him in the shoulder as hundreds of tendrils of light burst from my hand and sought him out, wrapping around his arms and legs.
He began to scream as the tendrils of light burned him as they immobilized him. I took a step towards him, pulling the dagger out of his shoulder and putting it to his throat. “Dead.”
The tendrils of light evaporated, and both he and Cara were left panting as I put the dagger into the sheath at my side.
“Fuck, Rose. You’re getting good. How did you manage to make the stone cover my feet without touching the ground?”
“I turned the mist into stone. It wasn’t that complicated once I thought of it.”
“You… You can’t do that. It doesn’t work that way. The power of stone only manipulates what is already there.”
I grinned as he rubbed the healing burns. “The power of stone works that way, but the power of stone mixed with the power of mist doesn’t. It’s like how you replicate yourself.”
He blinked. “That’s genius. Why haven’t I ever thought to do that?”
“Because you’re male. Men are terrible at thinking.”
“Those light tendrils are interesting as well,” Cara noted. “I’ve never seen light manipulated that way.”
“That’s different. It’s a combination of the power of mist with the power of light. Just like that first time that I covered you in liquid shadows was a combination of mist and shadows. Shadows don’t have enough substance to do that, and neither does light.”
Sebastian rubbed his shoulder where his wound was still bleeding. “When we’re sparring, please leave the iron off the edge.”
Concern filled me as I realized that this wound wasn’t going to heal quickly like everything else. “I’m so sorry, Sebastian. I hadn’t meant to. It was just already in the sheath.”
“It’s okay, Rose. Not the first time that I’ve had a bit of iron in a cut. I’d just prefer it if you remember next time.”
He put his arm around me and pulled me to him. “I don’t think that I can teach you very much more. You need experience, but you’re finding connections that I’ve never even heard of.”
I looked up at him, distinctly aware of Cara’s eyes on us. She was afraid of me. Everyone was to some degree at this point just as they’d all been afraid of Sebastian.
“I’m proud of you, Rose. You’re not the scared girl that I dragged kicking and screaming into the Immortal Realm anymore. I think it’s time that we talked about what our plan is going forward.”
“What do you mean?” I pulled back. Was this the discussion I’d been dreading?
“Where do we go from here? Seraphina may not have found us by now, but Rose, we’re immortal. Eventually, she’ll hunt us down and kill us unless you decide to step up and become Queen. Or if we convince her that she doesn’t want us dead.”
I sighed. Cara sat down on a log to watch and listen. She would inform the rest of the villagers of what we were talking about. Even though Sebastian was the founder of the village, we were both still outsiders. Esteemed and loved guests, but still guests.
“Can’t we push this until later? Another month or two? I like it here. I’m happy.”
He ran his hand over his smooth cheek. “No. You’re ready. There’s no reason to continue putting the people in the village at risk like this.”
I turned around, looking out at the forest. Finally, I felt like I was home, and I was going to have to leave. I liked the people here. I cared about the people here, and they cared about me. Cara, Enivyn, Sinivyn, John, Kasia, her foals, the pups, Andryn, and everyone else.
This was everything I’d ever dreamed of. Sebastian thought that I needed to leave it all behind to take my seat on the Dark Throne. To go into another brand-new hostile world and have to prove myself all over again. To set myself in an opposing seat to the very woman who wanted me dead.
There would be no peace for me there. No happiness. At least not like this. I took another deep breath. He was right, though. We couldn’t just postpone things. That bitch Queen wasn’t going to stop looking for us.
“Why do you want me to take the Dark Throne, Sebastian?” I asked without looking at him.
“Because if you don’t, then there’s no one who will keep the Dark Court safe. If there was a Queen of the Dark Court, the Assassin’s Guild wouldn’t have been sent to kill you. No one would send me anywhere other than my Queen. The people will be safer if you’re there to be the wall between the Court of Light and the Dark Court.”
I snarled. “I don’t want to do that. I don’t want to spend my life ruling people and fighting. I want to play with wolf pups and ride centaurs and maybe find unicorns to chase me. I’ve spent my entire life being miserable. Do I really have to go in search of misery when I’ve found the perfect life?”
His presence hovered behind me, and I leaned back against his chest. “There’s no one else to do it, Rose. No one in thousands of years has had the power you have along with the correctly twisted bloodlines. You were created for the throne. A Dark Queen to hold back the light.”
I felt his hands on my waist, and I wanted to melt into him. I couldn’t, though. Not right then. I pulled away and turned to face him. “Sebastian, maybe one day I can be Queen, but not now. I’m not strong enough. I still don’t even understand t
he world. I’ve met a handful of people and barely understand them. I need more time. Much more time before I consign myself to that role.”
“I cannot force you to take the seat regardless of how much I want you to.” He set his jaw, frustration running through his face. I reached out and felt his emotions, using his powers to augment my own. It wasn’t anger like I’d thought it would be. Pure sadness. He was heartbroken that I wasn’t willing to take the throne.
“We’ll need to go to the Court of Light to see Seraphina, and I’ll have to do what she’s always wanted. I’ll give up my own seat, and along with it, the power that goes with the seat. You’ll also give up your seat. Formally. That way she has no reason to hunt us.”
I nodded, knowing how badly it hurt him. “You won’t be able to be Queen after that. Ever. No matter how bad it gets, you’ll never be able to sit on the throne.”
“I understand, but I can’t do it. I can’t be in charge of that many people. I’m still just beginning to understand the Immortal Realm. I can’t be the ruler of half of it.” The decision was made. A decision that didn’t make me feel any better.
Sebastian gave me a fake smile. “Then we’ll be free to live out our immortal lives in this village.”
Somehow, I knew that this decision was going to make him even more miserable than going to Court would make me.
But the decision was made.
Chapter 30
Sebastian
Tomorrow I was leaving for the Court of Light. I bit my tongue to keep from screaming. I must have done something wrong. Maybe I should have kept her running, never letting her settle down or find happiness. She had to be Queen. It was what she’d been made for.
Yet, if I’d kept her from the village, she’d never have become strong enough to take the throne. She’d never have learned just how strong and how incredible she was. No, I could think of nothing that would have changed this result. If we’d stayed with Astriel, she’d have fallen in love with people there. It was who she was.
A Queen who loved the people that would serve her and whom the people would love in return.
I looked at her. Wearing a simple linen dress with her long brown hair in a braided crown, she held a bowl of hunter’s chili. She was beautiful. And I was about to do a terrible thing. A thing that she may never forgive me for doing.
I put my hand on her thigh, and she looked at me with a smile. “So, tell me about this Court of Light. I tried to talk to Andryn about it since he lived there for a while, but he didn’t want to talk about it.”
“It’s a palace made of gold and white marble. Everything shines there, and the people shine as well. Just a touch of a glow. Their wings are made of pure light, bright and shining.”
“The palace is set on the top of a mountain to be closer to the sun, and a crystal-clear river runs around it. Everything about it is beautiful. Some of the Fae theorize that humans developed the idea of heaven from visits to the Court of Light.”
“It sounds kind of intense. Like, maybe it’d be nice to visit, but it probably isn’t all that fun to live in. How does anyone sleep when it’s always so bright?”
I grinned. “A question I’ve had for many years. I assume it involves excessive amounts of wine since that’s the only way I could imagine being there for more than an hour at a time.”
“That sounds terrible. What about the Dark Court? Is it just pitch black all the time? Because that’s what I imagine. Do you know how many times I would stub my toes if there was no light?”
“There’s light, Rose. We’re not the same as the Court of Light. Many of the Dark Fae live in the light, and we’re very welcoming of differences.”
I stretched my legs as we sat on the log. “The major differences between the Court of Light and the Dark Court don’t really have anything to do with how much light we enjoy. The split is two-fold. One, we care very little for bloodlines. Nobility is based on strength, not on who your grandparents were. Two, we don’t put very much emphasis on the past. We care about the now.”
“But the Queen of the Dark Court has to have both dark and light bloodlines, doesn’t she?”
I nodded. “That is the one position where bloodlines matter because she must be respected by both Courts in case the Queen of the Light dies and she must rule both Courts as Seraphina has been doing.”
“How is the Court of Light different?” I moved my hand higher on her thigh, and she smiled a little sheepishly at me. She was still more than a little embarrassed about our nightly enjoyment of each other.
“Bloodlines are the only thing that matters for the Court of Light. If you’re born of high nobles, you will be a high noble whether you are the strongest or most deserving of the spot or not.”
“Strange. I wonder why it’s like that, but that’s a question for another day.” She stood up and carried her bowl to the stack of dirty dishes that someone was in charge of cleaning. The job was changed every night, and not long ago, even I’d had to wash the dishes.
“Let’s get some sleep. Tomorrow is going to be a very tiring day,” she said with a half-hearted smile.
Yes, it was going to be a very tiring day for both of us. But it would be for different reasons.
I followed Rose to our hut and felt the people that we passed watching us. They knew what we were going to do. Some sided with me and others sided with Rose on what was the right decision for her, but all of them had kept their opinions to themselves. It was not their place to tell a Queen what she should do as they would never have to make that decision.
I walked into the hut after Rose, and she immediately closed the door, sliding the latch into place to lock it. Her hands slid under my shirt, pressing against my chest. Her touch was the purest magic I’d ever known, pushing my doubts and fears away as her fingers brushed against my skin.
“I need you,” she whispered. “If everything goes wrong tomorrow, at least give me one more night with you.”
I didn’t answer her with words. Words would never have been enough. Her lips called to me, and I answered them, bending my head down and pressing my lips to hers. I built the tether between the two of us that would allow me to feed and pull her into the dreamscape.
Lifting her, I felt her wings begin to move, lightening her until she weighed almost nothing. My fingers went to the back of her dress, untying it slowly as my other hand supported her weightless hips.
My lips never left hers as our tongues danced. A flurry of passion. She thought that we might die tomorrow, and she wanted to show me exactly how she felt about me. If only she knew that tonight was going to be our last night together.
She slipped the dress off her shoulders and let it fall to the ground. Her hands pulled my shirt off, and then she pressed her body against mine, skin to skin, power to power. I pulled back from the kiss and felt the mists rise around me, filling the room until she could see nothing but me.
I pulled on the tether that connected us, to connect the dreamscape to the physical, and her reality began to blur. I stared into her eyes, watching them dance between green and blue, the power of the fairy rising from inside her as I pulled at her very soul.
She felt so good in my arms, and the last thing I wanted was to leave her, but it was the only way. Power flooded my body as I transported us to the dreamscape and brought her to the four-poster bed in a recreation of my rooms in the Dark Court. Physically, I carried her to the simple bed that we shared in the hut. Laying her down, I controlled the dream that she experienced.
My lips clamped down on her neck in the dreamscape while I took off my pants in the physical. My teeth sunk into her flesh, and she moaned. Every sensation was heightened there, and all of them were pleasurable. Her body was mine to control, from the way she moved to the way she felt.
Mists wove around her, each tendril teasing her skin with soft kisses. In the dreamscape, even her wings could feel the embrace of the mists. She began to glow, shimmering between light and pure blackness, and I brought her back to the physical
as I crawled between her legs.
How had I lived before her? I may have survived, but I’d been so cold. Her very touch warmed me. I’d survived for a very long time, but it was only after I’d found this annoying fairy that I’d found life.
My lips found her breast as I ran my hands under her, my nails digging into her hard enough to bring tiny droplets of blood to the surface before healing over. Gods, I needed her. I pulled back again, panting because of the need flowing through me. Not hunger, but a desperate need to be closer to her. I was never hungry anymore. She gave me everything I could want and more.
Moans escaped her lips as I found her entrance. “Sebastian,” she cried out as her wings began to move, pushing her closer to me. The feel of her skin against mine was a fantasy turned reality. A fantasy that I’d never dreamt.
A fantasy I could never have imagined.
“I love you,” I whispered as I began to thrust. She didn’t need to say it back. It didn’t matter. This was not a game we were playing. There was no power exchange in this relationship. All I needed was for there to be no doubt about the way I felt for her. No question that I was willing to do anything for her.
Her hands ran over my body, and I brought her back into the dreamscape, letting the mists cover and tease her again. She began to shine with a light that eclipsed even the Fae in the Court of Light.
She screamed out a moan, and the wave of power flowed through the tether to me, stronger than I’d ever felt before. My thrusts continued, pushing her deeper into her bliss. Yes, I’d found the woman that had awoken my numb heart.
I bent down and kissed her again, not ready to be done. I would never be ready to be done with Rose, but I would be happy with at least a few more hours.
At least I would leave this world knowing that I’d finally found love. Finally found the only thing that was worth dying for.
