Kiss the Fae (Dark Fables: Vicious Faeries Book 1)
Page 26
The channel dumps me at a curtained doorway. I charge through it and stumble into the original corridor, except I enter from a different threshold. Muffled giggles trail from the masquerade. I scurry from the noise, locate another arched doorway, and hustle past its curtain.
As with all these drapes, the material blocks out titters coming from the hall. I barrel into a pocket of space so pitch black I can’t see a damn thing, not even my hand when I lift it and wiggle my fingers. Based on the absence of noise, and how loudly my heaving breaths thunk through this abyss, I wager it’s a cramped quarter.
My back presses into the grid of twigs and shrubs beside the curtain. Then I whirl and plant my palms on the lattice, my head falling against the entwined offshoots. “Fuck,” I hiss, the word trembling from my lips.
I didn’t want to leave him. I wanted to stay.
The wind strokes my back, and the scent of musk and tempests floats into my nostrils. An incense brewed from the sky.
A lithe shape moves across the ground. Clothes rustle, boot heels clank atop the floor, and a weight fills the room.
Tension seizes my waist. I know male bodies. This one pauses from behind me, his heat swarming me as his arm slips past my chest, the fabric scraping my bodice.
I go as still as a hare, recognizing the sound of him. Then his finger rests against my lips, as if I’d planned on speaking.
“Shh,” Cerulean whispers.
26
Hell no, I don’t shh. Not even close.
I roar, howl, and wail. That’s what my heart does, letting loose from the cell of my chest.
As for my mouth, it unleashes a disjointed gasp, my nerves cutting through the space.
I remind myself of the difference between then and now, the gap between his morals and mine, the chasm between his world and my mine. Then I follow the current of his voice and wheel in his arms. My breasts strain across his torso, the taut bodice and gaping shirt mash together, and I imagine them getting as rumpled as the rest of him.
He’s the sky, without limits or restrictions. He’s omniscient, knowing and seeing everything.
With only one exception: me.
He didn’t know who I was. Not until now.
In spite of the dark, I feel the weight of his eyes. For once, he doesn’t use the wind to touch me, because the contact is instinctual, magnetic instead of elemental. My lips tingle, parting and beckoning his gaze.
Through the slits in my lark visor, my own gaze searches for his lips. As I do, shallow pants rush from his mouth, the sound coarse around the edges.
We’ve been in this position before. Last time, we stood above the world, exposed by that infinite landscape. Tonight, we’re crushed together, ensconced in a cube of black.
No sound. No sights. No smells. No tastes. No textures.
Every possible distraction recedes. My senses narrow to one reality: Cerulean.
The taste of him on my tongue—blackthorn wine and rainfall. His abdomen flexing with oxygen. His loose shirt teasing the weave of my gown.
I shouldn’t be able to tell if he’s absorbing me in the same way, but maybe that link solves the problem, because I know the moment his tapered ears perk as my skirt licks the floor. Succinctly, I hear his nostrils broaden to inhale me. I’ve never felt so livid, so heartbroken, so chaotic.
Our condensed breaths and combined movements resound in my ears, louder than they should be. Out of nowhere, his knuckles ride across my jaw. I lean into the warm ridges, tilting my head into his touch.
Slowly, the Fae explores my face, traveling from the bump of my chin to the slope of my nose. His other hand ghosts over my right cheekbone, then traces my left eyebrow with his thumb. Those flutist fingers chart a riveted path along my hairline and down to my temples, where the loose feather dangles from my mask. He caresses it, remembering, rediscovering.
A marveled hiss escapes him, and I release a teary laugh, because yeah. It’s me.
“Lark,” he breathes in wonder.
My heart detonates inside my ribs. I nod and blubber, “Cerule—”
But his mouth swallows the word. His lips catch mine, slanting them together in a molten kiss. My mouth clutches on to his, buckling beneath him. Our tongues pitch forward, hooking onto one another with desperate jolts.
Cerulean licks into me, the rhythm of his tongue urging a mewl from my throat. It rumbles into the space and incites his own rasping groan. My hands fly into his hair, the tip of his blue feather swatting the top of my breast.
Our mouths switch angles, the kiss smoldering. But it’s not enough.
He agrees. The ground slips beneath my feet. Cerulean hefts me off the floor and braces me hard against the twig bars. My legs link around his waist, my fingers carve through his roots, and my thighs span his hips.
A pair of devious lips clamp on to the crook of my neck and—oh, Fables—draws on my flesh. I slump against the leafy wall. My head falls back, my mouth parting on a silent moan, the surrounding black amplifying my sensitivity.
Cerulean sucks me into the hot cavern of his mouth until I’m writhing against his firm length. Pulling back, he plants open mouth kisses up my throat, then drags his tongue under my jaw. I whine, damn near liquifying in his arms.
On an eager hum, he sinks into my mouth again, his pleasure prickling my skin from scalp to toes. We abandon words. Without hesitation, we leap over truths and questions and answers and reasons and explanations. There’s so much to say, but not now—hell, not now—because there’s way too much to feel.
The cleft between my legs wants more. The stiff ridge between his hipbones wants more.
At this rate, I’ll be riding his cock up against this partition, right outside the masquerade. This has to end, but it can’t end, because we won’t let it end. I’ve dreamt of this for nine years and need a reunion. If only for tonight, I want what we never got to enjoy. In these brief hours, I want to share a history with him, one that lasts more than thirteen days.
A history of quiet nights and loud nights, with games and fights, with laughter and secrets. A history of storytelling and truth-telling. A history without humans or Faeries. A history that leads to this.
I want his naked hips swinging in between mine. I want his clever mouth losing control. I want our bodies stressed out. I want our moans overlapping, working together.
But not here. As if he’d heard me, Cerulean breaks away. We suck in air, our heartbeats colliding. I scan the black for his face and know he’s doing the same.
Masked and in darkness, we return to that forge where we met.
Masked and in darkness, we finally see each other.
Cerulean drags his mouth against mine. “Come with me.”
His lilting accent sends a gust of excitement flying through my stomach. He reaches behind me, sweeps aside the curtain with his free hand, and leans forward to survey the vacant corridor. Torchlight blooms into the space, illuminating the fringe of his mask. Then he moves with swift intention, threading our fingers together and leading me down a series of curving, puzzling passages.
At last, we emerge into the wild, where the Middle Moon leaks chalky white onto the rowan trees. I glance over my shoulder. The colossal building stretches into the hemisphere. Under different circumstances, I’d have loved to stay there.
Instead, we leave The Night Aviary behind. The fusion of flutes and pipes fades. With him moving slightly ahead of me, I glimpse his hair brushing the coat’s high collar. The garment’s hem flaps against his long limbs, and my feathered gown hastens over the stones.
Cerulean doesn’t glance back, but he does clasp our hands tighter. He strides down the path as if harassed, rushing to escape something—or to reach it.
What would happen if I made him turn around? How strong is his self-control? What would it take to get him to snap?
I slide my thumb across his. His pace quickens.
Good. Misery loves company. Let him be riled up, so then I won’t be the only one…what is he doing?
I stumble in place, my mouth dropping open. Wings. Cerulean has fucking wings.
But I’ve seen his naked back. There were no signs of them, no slits or anything.
Flabbergasted, I stammer, “But…but when I first got here, you said…dammit, you said you didn’t have wings.”
“Oh, but I never said that.” His mouth crooks. “I simply said that I never said I had any.”
For Fable’s sake! “You sneaky—”
I yelp as he snakes his arms beneath my thighs and lugs me off the ground. Pecking my lips, he mutters, “Hold on, mutinous Lark.”
We launch into the air and cross over the valley. The loose feather detaches from my mask and seeps into the clouds. I watch it disappear, then clamp my arms around Cerulean’s neck, my head burrowing into his pulse point.
His wings fan out, buffeting the altitude. I’m torn between laughing and flirting, because he’s got one sensuous pair of flappers.
When the ridges of his abdomen rub against my hip, my thoughts turn racy. It’s all I can do not to drag my hand lower, grip his hardness, and whisper, “Fuck me with this.”
Cerulean must sense my agitation, because he nips my digits, silently insisting that I behave myself. We land at The Fauna Tower, where the wild residents lounge on the grass in puddles of fur and tails. He releases me, my front burning a trail down his pecs.
Growing bold, I run my fingers along the rails of his wings, sketching the vanes. Cottony feathers quaver beneath my fingers. Cerulean shudders as I lean sideways to get a better look. Enchanted slots camouflaged in the coat allow the panels to fold and slip inside without shredding the material.
“Where do they go?” I ask.
“Into the curves along my shoulder blades.” His voice turns gravely. “They shrink and seep into the skin, as mist or water does.”
Once again, he takes my hand. Yet he doesn’t budge from his spot, because this time, the contact is gentle and inquiring. It asks permission, which makes it the sweetest, sexiest touch I’ve ever known.
In answer, I relax my fingers in his. Satisfied, Cerulean whirls toward the haven and guides me through. He charts a path back to the secluded level where we bantered and sparred during our midnight stroll. This alcove separates us from the roaming fauna, albeit a safari of warbles, roars, bleats, and mews push through the leaves or shoot into the constellations, the echoes longer and vaster than any animals where I come from.
Cerulean releases my hand and retreats to the gazebo at the cliff’s edge. I stay put, tarrying a few feet behind him.
The park glows with torch poles. The flames simmer, tamer than at The Night Aviary.
That masquerade. That dance, which hadn’t felt real, which made it the most destructive time for him to figure it out. Irony sure has a sense of humor.
Yet here, in this park? This is real. It’s wrong, and it’s forbidden, but it’s real.
Why didn’t the mask’s enchantment work on him? Because he’s a ruler? Because of our inexplicable bond? And if he doesn’t know about that, what’s his own guess?
Does he want the girl from his past? What about the woman in his present?
Is he happy to see me? Is he plagued?
“I can’t stop thinking about you,” Cerulean says with his back turned. “As you once were, as you’ve become.”
My questions evaporate. His voice takes flight, whispering through the copse.
“You enchanted me then,” he muses. “A girl with a mortal voice and tongue. Such a vision. Such a vice. One moment, I was the caged prey of her people. The next, a cloaked human snuck into that forge and set my heart free, long before she unbolted the lock.
“I’d been young, smitten with an inferior girl from an inferior place. Mistaking her sass for a sanctuary and her laughter for a haven, I threw caution to the wind. Swiftly, I learned my error: She was never inferior. Indeed, she turned out to be my superior in every measure.
“Over thirteen days, I looked forward to her visits. Everything about her bewitched me, from her patched-up mask to her fanciful ideas about magical professions. I remember every octave of her words, a balm to my captivity. ‘What if you’re the world’s greatest bird watcher, but you don’t know it yet, because you’ve never tried?’ she asked, while I struggled to resist her, disgusted with myself for being entranced. I tried to convince myself I was merely desperate for comfort. Ashamed, I couldn’t forgive myself for the indiscretion that she’d been.”
That hurts, but hadn’t I thought the same thing about him? Even after believing he was dead?
“I scorned her for saving me, and I admired her for it,” Cerulean admits. “I respected her bravery, and I worshipped her recklessness, to the point where I’d have done anything for her. If given the choice, I might have considered staying in that cage until I knew everything about her, however long that took.”
The hurt ebbs, replaced by a vital emotion that wraps around my heart. My slipper heels burrow into the grass, the blades tickling my ankles. I need to feel the ground, otherwise I’ll launch across the park and interrupt him.
“How can the events of childhood lead to this?” he wonders. “How can a brief meeting leave such a scar, an imprint, a yearning? Had it been love, at that fledgling age? Maybe it was a certain slant of love. A precious one—far too precious to last, and too fragile for our own good.
“But tonight, she returned to me,” the Fae says. “For pity’s sake, recognizing her struck too many places at once. A throb in my temple, an ache in my prick, an itch in my palms.”
Cerulean wheels, a cluster of snowy feathers fanning from his mask. “She’s a woman now.” He abandons the gazebo and stalks my way, the wind sweeping through his clothes. “Yet before I realized who she was, every interaction has been a puzzle, a plague, a provocation.”
He closes the distance and backs me against a boulder covered in pillow moss, the ruffled ledge of my neckline fluttering against the V of flesh beneath his shirt. His labored breath stirs with my own. “I asked myself, why does she look at me like she misses me? Why do I recall touches that never occurred with her, words we never said to each other?” He tilts his head. “Or did we? For why does she remind me of someone I once knew? Someone I coveted for the briefest instant? A mere thirteen days might be long to a human, but to a Fae…”
His palms skim the backs of my thighs and lift me off the ground, depositing me on the mossy stone. My legs splay around his waist, my knees trembling. He steps into that slot, bracketing his hands on the boulder.
I reel my fingers around his nape and shimmy closer, bone sliding over bone. Cerulean twists, his bent head sneaking beneath my jaw, where he snatches the sensitive flesh between his lips. The universe reduces to that delicate spot, and I cling to him, my head lolling back.
He plants a single wet kiss there, then sketches the line of my neck. “She’s an infernal mortal, yet every time I’ve been near this woman, I’ve wanted to quarrel with her—” he nips my chin “—confess secrets to her.” He moves to my lower lip, which he traces with his tongue, coaxing it to drop lower. His hoarse whisper blows across my lips. “I’ve wanted to kiss her roughly and fuck her sweetly.”
Oh, my Fables.
Cerulean skates to my ear, drawing his tongue along the shell. “And now I know why.” He licks the lobe. “I haven’t slept since her arrival, and for that, I blame her as well.” His tongue probes my ear, that single erotic act fogging my consciousness. My body arches so far back, my tits are in danger of spilling from the neckline. “Her mutinous mouth is the cause of my physical upheaval. Her dust-swept cheeks are the culprit of my unrest. Oh, as a young Fae, I’d had the excuse of my age.”
He drags himself back, splays his fingers over the mask, and peels it from his head. Tossing it aside, his dilated pupil
s catch my hazy ones. “I have no such excuse tonight.”
So I’ve got one answer. As for the rest of my questions, the decadent rush of his voice makes it clear: Those questions are gonna have to wait. We’re not making it to them tonight.
We’re not even making it inside the tower.
27
It’s been too long. Nine years too long.
If I didn’t love him back then, I’m about to. I match his movements, slipping my own mask from my face, chucking it to the grass, and letting him see me.
Torch poles spray the park with sienna. The wind shivers through the rowans, their leaves and berries clapping, their branches shrouding the Middle Moon.
And me? I’m sprawled on pillow moss, my legs flanking the body of a forbidden Fae. My toes flex, loosening the slipper heels; they fall to the ground and land beside the mask. I taste the intoxicating burn of spirits from the masquerade, its residue coating my gums.
Cerulean’s blue eyes haunt me. I can’t get over the metamorphosis, all that hunger and wonder. “It’s you,” he says, gazing at me with bright eyes.
“It’s me,” I reply, my voice cracking.
“My mutinous Lark.” His hooded gaze lands on my mouth, and his ivories flash, the canines honed into points. “I want to pleasure you, as I did with the wind. Only tonight, I want to do it without help. Will you let me—”
This time, I’m the one who quiets him. My mouth crashes into his, splitting his lips apart. Cerulean growls and hauls me against him, his tongue diving into me and prying the seam wider.
I sigh, my fingers clawing through his hair. I’m here, and he’s here, and that’s everything I’ve waited for, and I want to cry, and I want to roar. And by the end of this, I’ll be doing both.
Cerulean licks into me with sure thrusts. With every pitch, I feel the undulating strength of his jaw. I take it all and give back, flicking my tongue with his.
My digits climb up his ears and reach the peaks, where I pop off the wing caps. My thumbs free the hard skin and fondle the tips. He hums, the effect tracking down his body—down to the erect length at the crux of his pelvis.