Cailan had the key to her cell in his hand, and a bottle of wine in the other. What in all of Rivaini was the Prince doing bringing her wine in the middle of the night? Did he want to celebrate her accomplishment? She stopped herself from frowning as he unlocked her cell, though she did wonder where the guard was. There was always one man or another on rotation. Her visitors never came alone, and they never carried the key themselves.
“Well, well. You’re up,” he mused. “Never would’ve guessed, given all the sounds of attempted escaping echoing down the hall.” He stepped into her cell, once again moving over the line on the stone floor. He had dark stains around his knees, but there was no light in her cell, only in the hall.
The Prince rolling around in dirt didn’t seem like a plausible conclusion.
“Why are you here?” Lena asked, figuring it was pointless to say she wasn’t trying to escape.
“I came to celebrate new beginnings.” He popped the cork and took a long swig. As he bent his head back, she noticed dark splotches on his neck. He moved, offering it to her with an easy smile. “Don’t worry, you won’t be stuck in here for long.”
Lena’s gaze once more dropped to his knees, at the two circles in his clothes. She breathed in as she slowly took the bottle, her chains grinding against each other as she tentatively lifted the top to her mouth. She didn’t drink, though. She didn’t drink because suddenly she knew.
Maybe it was due to her old connection to Zyssept, or maybe it’s because she’d been around it far too much lately, but she knew.
It was blood.
Lena studied Cailan as she drank a small, tiny sip of the aged drink. He walked with no problems, no visible injuries—which meant the blood wasn’t his.
He took her silence the wrong way; he took it as she didn’t believe him. “Trust me, Lena. I’m going to get you out of here, and when I do, you’ll never even think of your College again.” Cailan seemed proud, but it didn’t make any sense whatsoever to her.
Her mind went to a dark place. “My Prince,” her voice was low but steady. “Whose blood do you wear?” Would he even tell her? As a prince, as her captor, he owed her nothing. He didn’t have to tell her anything, but judging from the glint in his dark stare, he was dying to.
Dying being the operative word there.
Cailan took a step closer to her, moving less than a foot away from her as his hand slipped around hers, gripping both the bottle and her fingertips. He was warm, almost burning up. She didn’t even try to withdraw her hand because she knew how useless it’d be. She was alone here, with a demented prince who wore blood as if it were makeup powder.
“It’s my father’s,” he whispered. “It seems he had a little accident in his room.”
Based on the blood splatter on his neck and frilly shirt, Lena knew it was no accident. Her skin tingled when he brought his other hand to her face, lightly tracing her jaw, running his finger until he reached her lips.
“Do you want to know a secret?” Cailan didn’t wait for her reply. Honestly, she wasn’t sure she even could speak, given how terrifying the madman before her was. “I killed him. For you, for me…for us. I’m the king now, Lena, and under me, you won’t have to worry about being chained up ever again. You won’t be executed. Together, we’ll remake this city into something great.”
The crazy Prince-slash-King thought he killed his father for her? For them? For himself—that one she could possibly understand, but for her? Lena had never once asked him to do that, never once hinted at it during their encounters. He was truly mad indeed, a shame he was to be this kingdom’s next ruler—
Wait.
Together they’ll remake this city?
Lena shook her head slightly, and his finger never left her mouth. “Together?” she asked against it, not liking the way he stared at her, how he released his hold on her hand and the wine bottle only to set it on her waist. Like he owned her.
He nodded. “I suppose you do have the right to know. I’ve already decided—I’m going to give this city what it never knew it needed…a mage queen.”
Her heart practically stopped. She’d gotten out of her bargain with Zyssept, only to be immediately trapped in another? This one possibly worse, considering how mad Cailan acted in the moment. Lena had the worst luck of them all. It was a legendary unfortunateness.
“But I’m not—”
Whatever argument she had hastily planned, Cailan dismissed. “I’m going to have you graduated to an enchanter. You did survive an hour in the Veil. You’re allowed to marry. And I am the king. I’ll marry whomever I want, damned what everyone else thinks.”
“But you hardly know me.” Even Lena knew it was a weak thing to say.
Cailan smiled, murmuring, “There will be plenty of time for that.” Before she could say anything else, he silenced her the only way he truly could: he kissed her. His mouth met hers, and she was stunned. Stunned at the turn of events. Stunned at how terrible her luck truly was. And possibly stunned the most because his kiss was more tender than she thought it’d be.
If she closed her eyes and pictured herself somewhere else, it was an enjoyable enough kiss. It was one Lena had to play into, lest the Prince/King decide she wasn’t worth keeping alive. If playing along got her out of this cell, well…she had little choice.
She leaned into him, pressing her body against his, holding the wine bottle to the side. Lena felt the hand on her waist snake around to her back, holding her with a possessive strength. Cailan backed her up, pinning her to the wall. She dropped the wine bottle, its glass shattering the very instant it hit the stone floor, but he didn’t pull away. If anything, the sound made his kisses more fervent, hungrier. His tongue slipped into her mouth, and it took every ounce of willpower she had not to bite down on it and push him away.
His hips pressed against her, revealing the hardening in his trousers. Cailan broke away from her mouth, trailing his lips down her neck, hands groping her breasts through the fabric of her robes. Lena bit the inside of her cheek as she stared at the darkened ceiling. She would not fall prey to him as she did the demon in the Veil, no matter how much her body may have reacted to his physical touch. She’d been without her men for too long. If only it were one of them touching her, grinding against her.
If only.
This was a ruse which would be beyond difficult to keep up, she knew. But she had to. She didn’t have a choice. One way or another, she’d get out of here, and every man who thought they had the right to claim her without caring for her side of things? Every man who thought they could own her?
They would all pay.
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Blood and Sorcery: A Reverse Harem Fantasy (Unfortunate Magic Book 2) Page 19
