The Red Queen stormed out into the room naked, dark hair wet and skin slick with gleaming droplets, as beautiful as sin and smelling like the heavens. Aäron’s breath froze on his lips.
Mila stopped when she saw him and Nisuna. She placed her hands on her hips and glared at them. The servants gasped as they registered Aäron’s presence.
Nisuna gaped, grabbed Aäron by the arm, and wheeled him around with her until they both faced the door.
‘Princess, you have a guest!’ she squeaked.
‘I can see that,’ came the icy remark from behind them.
Out the corner of his eye, Aäron saw Nisuna look over her shoulder.
Redness stained her cheeks when she turned forward once more. ‘Hmm, would you mind getting dressed?’
‘Why? Is my nakedness bothering you?’
Despite the rapid drumming of his heart, Aäron could not help the chuckle that escaped his throat. He could just imagine the Red Queen’s pose. She had likely crossed her arms and would be staring at them with a sullen expression. Nisuna glanced at him, startled.
‘Does my question amuse you, Prince?’ said Mila.
Aäron hesitated. He took a shallow breath and turned to face her, his gaze focused above her neckline.
‘You possess the ability to distract anyone with a pulse, Princess, be it man or woman. You have an extremely alluring figure and face.’
She arched an eyebrow. ‘Only alluring?’
He looked down then, his gaze deliberately raking every naked inch of her from head to toe. From her pale eyes to her high cheekbones, from her full lips to her slim neck, from the swell of her breasts to her narrow waist, from the flare of her hips to her long, lithe, tanned limbs, she was the most perfect thing he had ever seen in his life. With his body reacting in ways that could only mean trouble, it took all of his effort to maintain a dispassionate expression.
‘You are pretty easy on the eye,’ he admitted calmly.
Mila’s lips twitched. She walked over to the elderly maid, took the bath cloth from her limp grasp, and wrapped it around her body, tucking the end in the valley between her breasts.
‘There, does this soothe your fragile sensibilities?’
Aäron heard Nisuna and the maids exhale.
‘Apparently so,’ he murmured.
They stared at each other across the room, neither blinking nor lowering their gazes.
‘Come, let us leave the prince and princess,’ Nisuna said breezily, breaking the charged silence. ‘They have much to talk about, I am sure.’
She herded her attendants out of the chamber and paused on the threshold. For the first time since he entered the room, Aäron saw genuine concern flash across her face. Despite their banter, he considered her his sister and knew she cared for him as fiercely as she did her own son. He dipped his chin imperceptibly. Nisuna responded with a small smile, her unease still evident.
The sound of the door closing behind her was deafening.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Mila observed the man standing across the room from her, skin hot from where his gaze had lingered on her body, heart drumming erratically against her breastbone.
Following the contest in the arena and King Gishur’s confession in the armory, she had been welcomed as a guest in the palace and had spent the day learning the details of how the extensive human army now under the control of the ruler of Parsah had come to be. It was a fascinating tale to hear and one that unknowingly earned the king and his predecessors her grudging respect. For them to have achieved all of this under the eyes of the Empire spoke of shrewdness and fortitude worthy of the Immortals themselves.
But what fascinated her the most, and unsettled her in equal measure, was the shocking realization that, in all that time, no human spy had ever sold out this information to the Empire. She knew well the greed and treachery that dwelled in the heart of man. After all, she had used it to her advantage over the years, as had her kin. Her observations could only lead her to one irrefutable conclusion. The coming war, if indeed there was one, was very much going to be about humanity against the Immortals. Deep down inside, she was not sure how she felt about that.
It was as they parted at the end of the feast held in her honor that King Gishur had finally asked the question likely on the mind of every commander and captain seated in the banquet hall with them. ‘What is your answer, Red Queen?’
Mila had paused, conscious of the stares from around the room. ‘I have still to reach a decision.’
Murmurs and frowns had broken out across the chamber.
The king had watched her steadily, his expression enigmatic. ‘Do you know when that is likely to happen?’
Mila’s gaze found Aäron. He studied her just as inscrutably as his father.
‘I have been the lieutenant commander of the army of the Empire for over four hundred years.’ Silence fell as her voice echoed against the marble pillars and high ceiling of the banquet hall. ‘The habits and duties of such a long life cannot be overturned in a single night.’
‘So you have made your choice?’ someone had called out from the floor.
Mila had scanned the sea of faces with a frown. ‘I am an Immortal. Although the sins of my father can never be excused, I am not so willing to go against the rest of my kin or help you do so.’ She paused and stared at King Gishur. ‘All I ask is that you grant me more time. Are you willing to do that, King?’
An expectant silence had fallen over the banquet hall as everyone waited for the King’s answer.
‘Yes.’
She turned and exited the chamber, aware that the king’s patience and that of his allies would only stretch so far. As evening melted into night, the nervous tension thrumming through her veins since the morning had grown until it filled her entire being.
More often than not, Kronos would come to her after the climax of a battle and they would mate with violent passion until they burned out the heated energy that followed a victorious campaign.
Yet, this fire in her body and mind was different. Mila felt as if she were standing on the brink of an abyss that filled the horizon from edge to edge, staring into a darkness so profound she could see no end to it, and no path to navigate it.
In the marrow of her soul, she had always suspected she might one day reach this point. More than Romerus’s murder, more than her father’s brutal acts over the years and his cruel determination to bend her to his will, she had always felt unease. Unease about the mysterious powers that were granted to Romerus’s two sons so many years ago. Unease about what it meant to be an Immortal.
Although she had been loyal to the kings’ wishes all of her life and helped them build their empire, it was as she stood staring out over the dark valley from the palace of the hidden Parsah that she finally acknowledged her doubts about the wisdom of their actions. For she could not help but feel that they, the ones who had inherited these unworldly gifts, the Immortals, were meant for more. More than absolute power over humans. More than dominion over the lands of this world.
But what that purpose was continued to elude her, as did the answer to the difficult choice she now faced. Days after the events that had precipitated her flight from the heart of the Empire, she was still mired in the shadows of her whirling thoughts.
She had decided a bath would be a good chance to clear her mind. Instead, she now found herself face to face with her second conundrum, one that continued to confound her just as much as the question the king had asked her earlier.
‘Why are you here?’
Aäron blinked at her harsh tone. His gaze grew shuttered, but not before she saw a flash of the same emotion she had seen the day before, when King Gishur had had her arrested upon their arrival on the palace grounds. Guilt stabbed through her as she finally recognized it for what it was. Hurt.
‘I want to talk.’
Mila found her gaze dropping to his lips as he spoke. ‘We have done plenty of talking for one night, do you not think?’
She
walked over to the bed, grabbed one of the bath cloths the maids had left, and started drying her hair briskly in front of the fire.
She heard his slow steps and straightened. Though the flames before her warmed her exposed skin, his presence when he stopped behind her scorched her even more.
A familiar heat seeped through her, one that sent a shiver down her spine. ‘What do you want, Prince?’
Shock darted through her at the sound of her own voice, causing her to stiffen. It had been low, throaty, a tone she did not recognize.
She frowned, allowing surprise to turn to irritation. ‘Are you here to fool me once more with your lies? To deceive and manipulate me into doing what you want me to do?’
Taut silence filled the space between them.
‘It was never my intention to deceive you.’
Mila twisted on her heels, hand rising toward his face, her temper finally snapping under the storm of emotions that had been raging through her since the morning. No, longer still. Since she witnessed Romerus’s murder.
Aäron’s hand snaked out and grabbed her wrist before she could make contact.
‘Stop,’ he said, his voice hard.
Mila’s breath stuttered. More than the strength in his grip, the feel of his fingers against her skin stunned her. It was the first time he had properly held her. She felt branded, forever marked by his touch, as if she would never be able to wash away the sensation of this connection.
She reacted the only way she knew how, her other hand rising to meet his face. He stopped her once more, his movement lightning fast, his fingers closing roughly on her wrist, setting her skin ablaze once more.
The motion brought them closer, their bodies almost touching as they stood facing each other.
Mila was afraid. Afraid to raise her head and meet his gaze. Afraid of what she would see. Yet, she tilted her chin. And felt air leave her lungs in a harsh gasp.
His eyes had turned the color of the storm-swept sea, pupils wide and dark, the desire burning inside them so fierce it almost blinded her. ‘God, you are beautiful.’
Her pulse jumped, weakness flooding her limbs for the first time in her Immortal life, her body betraying her utterly as it fell under the spell of the man who held her. His pupils dilated further when he registered the change under his fingertips. He lowered his head.
‘No,’ Mila whispered when his lips were but a breath away from hers. ‘Stop. We cannot.’
Aäron hesitated. He straightened and slowly released her arms.
Bitterness underscored his voice when he spoke. ‘Kronos?’
Mila whirled around, fingers shaking as she gripped the cloth covering her thighs and gazed blindly into the flames.
His tone turned leaden, devoid of the passion that had burned in it but a moment past. ‘Do you love him still?’
Mila swallowed. ‘He is the father of my children.’
Above the buzz of blood singing in her ears, she heard his breath catch in his throat.
‘But do you love him?’ A sliver of hope colored his voice. ‘Does he possess your heart, Princess?’
Mila’s eyes widened, his questions piercing her as thoroughly as a blade.
Though she wanted to lie, to dismiss his question, she could not help the words that spilled past her trembling lips. ‘No, he does not.’
Aäron moved then, his hand landing gently on her shoulder.
Mila shuddered as he turned her around.
‘Can I?’ His tone turned husky. ‘Can I possess your heart, my queen?’
It took all her will to look up into his eyes and finally acknowledge what she had denied for so long. She wanted this man. She wanted him, just as badly as he so clearly wanted her. But more than passion, more than the intense physical longing surging through her veins, Mila felt a hunger like none she had ever known before. A hunger that could not be explained. The hunger to possess him. To bewitch and enthrall him just as he had bewitched and enthralled her. To bind him to her and make him hers in every sacred and sinful sense of the word.
She rose on the tips of her toes and answered him the only way she could, with her lips. He froze for a moment, his eyes widening above her. Then he responded with a fervor that seared her senses and stole her breath, his eyelids fluttering closed, his tongue meeting hers in a savage dance that made her legs tremble and caused her to collapse against him.
He caught her and lifted her in his arms, corded muscles bunching beneath her as he strode to the bed, his mouth still ravaging hers. She gasped when he dropped her on the mattress and tore the bath cloth from her body, exposing her to his heated gaze.
She rose up on her elbows and watched him just as hotly as he stripped, his armor and chainmail tunic thudding heavily to the floor, the only other sound in the room but for the crackling flames and their labored breathing. Impatient for his touch, she climbed to her knees and grabbed his head, a sultry moan leaving her lips as she lowered his mouth forcefully to hers again. He finished undressing and joined her on the bed, his arms closing around her as he pushed her down and covered her with his powerful frame, a low sound tearing from him when naked skin finally met naked skin, his breath melding into hers until she did not know where hers began and his ended.
As the night wore on, as Aäron’s lips, fingers and tongue scorched and branded every bare inch of her, wrenching cries of pleasure from her throat, as she returned his ardor with equal passion and made him tremble and groan above and beneath her, Mila lost herself to the man who had forced his way into her life and shattered the impenetrable fortress around her heart. This was nothing like the desire she once felt for Kronos. It did not even compare.
It was not until daylight touched the land and the warm rays of the sun filtered through the curtains and kissed their skin that they finally collapsed in a tangled mess of sweaty limbs and damp sheets. As Mila lay atop him, her body weak and her mind numb, the most sated she had ever felt in her long life, Aäron stroked a lock of hair from her cheek, lifted his lips to her ear, and whispered the words that she dared not utter.
Part Three: War
Chapter Twenty-Six
Mila laid her hands flat on the table and narrowed her eyes at the man at the head of the room. ‘If we do this, we do it my way.’
It was midday and the palace’s council chamber was packed. Spread across the surface of the oak table dominating the floor was a large map of the Empire.
King Gishur observed her steadily from where he sat. ‘I am listening.’
‘First, let me make one thing clear.’ Her voice grew cool. ‘I have but one aim in mind. To stop Crovir. At all costs. I will destroy anyone and anything that stands in my way.’
Megash frowned. ‘Does that include the other Immortals?’
Mila hesitated, conscious of Aäron’s gaze on her face. Though he stood four feet to her right, he might as well have been touching her, so strong was the connection she now felt to him. She straightened, her stance causing a faint smile to curve his lips, and spoke the words she had already said to him that morning, while they lay in each other’s arms.
‘I need time. To set up a meeting with my kin. To talk to them about all that has happened.’
One of the commanders snorted. ‘Are you trying to trick us?’
Another glared at her as a drone of discontented murmurs rose around them.
He turned to the king. ‘She no doubt seeks to return to the Empire and bring the war to us! Do you not see that she aims to betray us?’
King Gishur gave the men a cool stare before meeting Mila’s gaze once more. ‘I see no such thing. If the Red Queen had wished to cross us, we would all be dead by now.’
‘I agree,’ said Aäron. He looked around the room. ‘I have lived among our enemy for a long time and I can tell you this with confidence. Not all the Immortals are our foe. I have witnessed their acts of kindness and their willingness to forgive.’ He stared at Mila. ‘Indeed, I am willing to bet that some will choose to stand by our side in the war to come.�
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Warmth flooded Mila’s chest as she gazed at him. The fact that he believed her filled her with fresh conviction; the decision she had come to that morning was the correct one, and the path she had chosen to follow would lead her and her kin through the darkness ahead and out the other side.
A change came over the room as the commanders and captains glanced at each other. In that moment, Mila glimpsed how highly they held Aäron in their esteem and how great a king the man she had begun to know could one day be.
‘What do you propose we do, Red Queen?’ said Megash.
They left the city at dawn three days later, a troop over a hundred men in strength at their side.
Instead of the tortuous path Aäron had used to bring her to the hidden Parsah, they took another secret route out of the valley and through the mountains, one that brought them onto the plains bordering the Zayande River.
From there, they split, the larger contingent heading for the Zagros Mountains while messengers disguised as the Empire’s soldiers started on the long journeys that would take them to the leaders of the human alliance spread throughout the kingdom, to the cities of the West Sea and the Nahal River, to the Indus Valley to the east, and all the way north, to the Toros Mountains and the Land of the Hatti, then up to the Caucasia Mountains and the Arals.
As she rode at the head of the company with Aäron at her side, Mila felt filled with purpose for the first time in over a hundred years. Now, more than ever, she was confident she had made the right choice by electing to stand at the side of King Gishur and the human army. All that remained to be seen was whether the plans they had made in the council chamber would come to fruition.
‘I still think they look strange!’ said Aäron as their horses pounded the foothills of the ice-capped mountains ahead.
‘What do?’
‘Your new weapons!’
Mila glanced at the fresh blades kissing the skin of her outer thighs. They felt cool now compared to their original state last evening, when she finished forging their shapes.
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