by Lili Zander
Nero thrusts deep into my throbbing, swollen core. Zeke grabs my hips and rams into my tight, clenched passage. I cling to them, shaking, throbbing with desire. Can they hear my heart race in my chest? Can they smell the need that pours off me in relentless waves as they fill me?
They move in unison. I’m trapped between their hard, muscled bodies. Their thrusts jolt me. Their strokes are bruising, powerful, forceful. I can’t hold back my moan of pleasure. I reach between my legs, my fingers grazing against their achingly hard cocks, and I rub myself, desperate and trembling.
Pressure builds within me, and I struggle to contain it.
Their breathing is harsh and labored. Their hands caress me, the gentle touch a stark contrast to the bone-jarring thrusts. Then their cocks jerk deep in me, setting off my own explosion. Clinging to them, I shudder as an orgasm rips me apart.
I collapse in a sweaty, sated heap. “Hard enough for you?” Zeke whispers, tucking me into his body.
“Mm-hmm.”
He chuckles softly, his breath warming my skin. “Good. Give us a few minutes to catch our breaths, and we’ll do it again.”
15
Raven
Saber’s back home in the morning. Or is it evening? I’ve completely lost track of time. When I wake up again, the bed is empty, and Nero, Zeke, and Saber are seated around a table in the living room, their expressions somber.
Fear trickles through me. “Did something happen?”
Saber looks up and forces a smile on his face. “No. Everything’s calm. For the moment.”
Nero gets to his feet and pours me a cup of coffee. I give him a grateful smile and take a sip. There’s a lot of human food that vampires can tolerate, and even enjoy, but coffee’s not one of them. More for me.
Zeke fixes me with a thoughtful look. “What were you upset about last night?”
Damn it. I was hoping he’d have forgotten, but I should have known better. My mind races as I try and sort out how much to tell them about my conversation with Ragnar. I have three vampire lovers, but I still don’t know their customs. How does a bô work? If you’re having problems with one guy, do you tell the others?
I don’t want to do that. For starters, I like to handle my own problems. Second, Saber, Zeke, and Nero are friendly with Ragnar, and I don’t want to get in the way of that. Had the prince tried to take me by force, I’d have no problems asking them to choose between staying friends with him or remaining involved with me. But that’s not what Ragnar did.
Yeah, I’m hurt this morning. I feel foolish and a little heartsick, but sometimes, that’s just the way life is. I’ll get over it.
“I was feeling a little homesick last night,” I tell them. It’s the truth, just not the complete truth. “So I talked to Joanna Placzek.”
“She worked with you in the mines, right?” Zeke asks. “And she helped Lula Kenner liberate the re-education camps?”
I’m impressed, and I don’t try to hide it. “Yeah, that’s her. She told me that Overlord Zimmer had left the mines in disrepair. The colony is broke. Lula Kenner is raising the blood tax.”
“Again?” Nero does not look happy.
“Yeah. People are barely scraping by, and now, there’s going to be another tax increase. And of course, the vampires aren’t affected, just the humans. It just sucks, that’s all.”
Zeke and Nero exchange thoughtful looks. Saber shakes his head. “It’s a bad idea,” he says. “If Kenner wants people to rally around her, she needs to show them that life has gotten better, not worse.”
“Joanna thinks everyone should be grateful that she’s not throwing them in the dungeons, the way Zimmer did.”
“That only goes so far,” Saber replies at once.
“That’s what I said.” I want to ask them for suggestions on what we should do, but I hold back. Nero, Zeke, and Saber look drained. Exhausted. I’m not sure Saber slept at all last night. Zeke and Nero couldn’t have got more than a couple of hours of rest.
They’ve got so much going on. I can’t ask them to solve this too. As much as I hate to admit it, Boarus 4 is not the most urgent problem right now. “Anyway. What are you guys doing today?”
Nero sighs. “After the meeting yesterday, Mazer and I tried to talk to people in the Frostbloom Deeps. We got nowhere. I’m going to see if Mitch will be more helpful.”
“Mitch, the bartender at Mirage?”
“Yes. The fire caused a lot of damage. Mitch is going to be out of work for a while. Maybe he’ll be persuaded to help us for a fee.”
Zeke gets to his feet. “I’ll be spending all day in front of a screen.”
“Looking for what?”
“Let’s assume a hundred thousand humans have been kidnapped,” he says. “Where is Levitan keeping them? He can’t imprison them in hundreds of locations. Hundreds of prisons will need hundreds of guards, and he can’t risk involving too many people in his plan. So we’re looking for ten, maybe twenty locations, each one holding five to ten thousand people.”
Still confused.
“They need food,” Saber explains. “They need to wash. They generate waste. So Zeke’s going to look for any sudden increases in consumption, electricity, water, that kind of thing.”
“That sounds hopeful, right?”
“Less so than you think,” Zeke replies. “Almost no-one in Starra ventures too far into the Deeps. Sure, well-to-do vampires go into the higher levels as a dare, but even Nero will think twice before venturing below Level 300. Once you go lower than Level 100…” He shakes his head.”It’s almost a separate world down there. If the prisons are located there…”
Not so hopeful. I turn to Saber. “What about you?”
“You’re looking at the acting Commander of the Imperial Army,” he grimaces. “I got a message from Astrid late last night appointing me to the role. Vincent Kevis, who was convinced the job was his, has already threatened me twice. I don’t care about the threats, but he takes forever to get to the point. I had to listen to him bitch and moan for thirty minutes.” He looks disgusted. “If I see Astrid today, I’ll have to remind myself that it’s a very bad idea to strangle her.”
Nero laughs out loud. “Congratulations, Colonel Hafsson. Or is it General?”
Saber gives him a black look. “Don’t you dare start with me,” he says. “Do you know what I have to do this morning? There’s going to be a military parade right after Astrid’s coronation. There’s a full-fledged rehearsal in an hour. The Empire frays at the seams, and I’m attending a fucking parade.”
Parades. Balls. Parties. I understand why we have to keep pretending that everything’s normal. But I agree with Saber. It chafes.
Saber turns to me. “I’m sorry I have to leave you alone so much,” he says regretfully. “I’d have liked to show you around.”
“That’s okay.” Everyone has a role to play. Except me. I feel completely useless.
Is now really the time for a pity party, Raven?
“Are you looking for something to do?” Saber does his mind-reading thing once again.
“Yes, please.”
Nero grins at my fervent tone. “Come with Mazer and me to the Deeps,” he says. “You’re human. Maybe someone will talk to you.”
I brighten up, and then I remember the ball tonight. My face falls. “I can’t this morning. I have to be fitted for a dress.”
Zeke’s comm beeps. He wanders away to answer it. “That was Tomas,” he says when he rejoins us. “We might have a lead. The doctors in the hospital found a chip embedded in the woman’s heel.”
“A tracker?”
“I don’t know. I told him I’d be right over.” Zeke brushes a kiss over my lips. “See you at the party tonight.”
He hurries away. Nero gets to his feet as well. “I better go,” he says. “Mazer’s probably been at work for an hour already. The guy makes me look like a slacker.”
Less than a minute after he leaves, the doorbell chimes. Saber hits the entry switch, and the front doo
r slides open. Two women stand there, a clothes rack between them. One of them must be the tailor.
The other?
Empress Astrid herself.
I have not had enough coffee for this.
Surprise flashes across Saber’s face. “Astrid, welcome. I didn’t know you’d be here today.”
“I had a rare free morning,” she explains. “And you know me. I love clothes.” She looks past him, and her grey eyes meet mine. “Hello, Raven.”
“Empress Astrid.” I slide off my seat and fall into a low curtsy. Should I kneel instead? Saber didn’t bow, but they’re distantly related, so I guess that’s normal. I have no idea what the proper protocol is here. “I’m honored by your presence.”
Saber knows I’m lying through my teeth. He’s laughing at my predicament. Jerk.
Astrid waves me up. “Please call me Astrid,” she says. “We are family, after all, and family shouldn’t stand on ceremony.” She turns to Saber. “Are you sticking around for the fashion show?”
Saber glances at the clothes rack, which is absolutely jammed with brightly colored dresses and gives the Empress an exaggerated shudder of horror. “Hell, no. Even the parade rehearsal sounds good in comparison.”
“Ah yes. I forgot I’m looking at the acting head of my army.” She gives him an amused look. “It won’t be for long. I want you on Council.”
“A lifetime of Empire politics?” Saber says dryly. “That sounds as delightful as sticking my hand into a snake pit.”
“A surprisingly accurate comparison,” Astrid quips. “Sorry, Saber. We do what we must for the good of the Empire.” She turns to me and smiles brightly. “Shall we get going?”
Saber kisses me on my lips and heads out. I’m left alone with the ruler of the Shayde Empire.
Oh fuck.
“Raven Unnuk, meet Talia Ebere. Talia’s the best dressmaker on Starra.”
The other woman curtsies. “You honor me, Empress,” she says, a pleased smile on her face.
“It’s the truth. Talia, Raven is part of Saber’s bô. Tonight will be her introduction to Shayde society.”
My stomach lurches. “There’s no way I can skip this?”
Astrid shakes her head immediately. “No. Saber is bonding with a human. That’s rare enough that you will be the object of scrutiny and gossip. You must be at his side tonight, and you must look like you belong.”
“Or what?”
“Or people will speculate that he is ashamed of you,” she says coolly. “Or worse, that I disapprove of his choice and am pressuring him to isolate you. Neither of those is an acceptable conclusion.”
I straighten my shoulders. The human members of Saber’s team died on Rothis, and he’s told me that people have doubted his commitment to equal rights ever since. If I stay at home, I’ll be fanning the flames of the rumor mill. I might not want to go to this ball, but I’d be damned if I’m going to let anyone gossip about Saber.
“He gave me the Daggers of Xerxes as a betrothal present. He’s not ashamed of me.”
Astrid nods, unsurprised. “Of course. Good. Talia, can we incorporate that into her outfit?”
“Yes, Your Majesty.” Talia circles me, her eyes assessing, then she takes a deep purple dress from the rack. Gemstones—real gemstones—are sewn onto the skirt, and they glitter under the lights. “Try this on.”
Two hours later, I’m exhausted, and we’ve managed to narrow down the choices to three outfits, each more expensive-looking than the next. A red dress with a moonstone-encrusted bodice. The deep purple dress, with its corseted top and flared skirt, and finally, a sleek, silvery, metallic dress that clings to my curves.
And when I say we’ve narrowed it down, what I really mean is that I stood in the center of the room while Talia treated me like a pincushion, and Astrid and Talia debated whether the deep purple brought out the color of my eyes better than the red, and if the silver was too simple for the bondmate of the head of Family Hafsson.
“Take them all,” Astrid says finally. “Saber will help you choose which one to wear tonight. They won’t go to waste; there’s a ball almost every day until the coronation.”
Take them all. I think it’s the cavalier way she says it that causes me to snap. The miners on Boarus 4 are eking out a subsistence living. The blood tax is about to go up, and I’m trying on one impossibly elaborate gown after another.
How much do they cost, these dresses? The red one has moonstones sewn onto it, for Spirit’s sake. Moonstones are rare. A stone the size of my thumbnail would pay the blood tax of every single miner on Boarus 4 for a month.
The waste of it is staggering. Stomach-churning.
I should let this go. I should bite my tongue and curtsy. But I can’t. The words pour out of my mouth, hot and furious. “I can’t do this.” I shake my head violently. “People are struggling on Boarus 4. They fed us in the mines so we wouldn’t faint on the job. We were that desperately poor. Month after month, I had to choose between paying my blood tax and having enough to eat. If I got sick and couldn’t work, I knew I’d starve.” I look at the costly laces and silks and velvets. “Is this what being the Empress is about? One pretty, wasteful dress after another?”
The tailor has gone deathly pale. I ignore her and plunge on. “Maybe it's so easy for you to ignore the concerns of normal people because you've never been one of them. You’ve never had to go hungry. You’ve never worried about being jailed. You can never put yourself in our shoes.”
A mask slams over Astrid’s face. “Talia, leave us.”
Talia bows her way out hastily, looking like she wants to be anywhere but here. My brain finally catches up to my reckless mouth, and horror fills me. I can’t believe what I’ve said.
Yesterday’s outburst was forgivable because one could argue that it was aimed at Ivar Karling. Not today. There’s no ambiguity here. I have insulted the Empress of the Shayde Empire.
I stare at Astrid, my heart beating in my chest. This is the moment where she is going to order me to her dungeons, and yet I'm not sorry. That conversation with Joanna is too fresh in my mind.
The Empress surveys me, a speculative gleam in her eyes. “Saber has chosen you,” she says finally. “Ragnar is interested in you. Neither of them is attracted to dumb women, so I’ll assume you’re not stupid.”
She leans forward. “You are human. Starra is, as Saber accurately described it, a snakepit. The moment you step out into the spotlight, vampires will see you as a threat, and humans will see you as a symbol.” Her eyes narrow. “But nobody, absolutely nobody, will just grant you power. You must fight for it. And the first way you fight is by always, unquestioningly, looking like you belong.”
I swallow hard. Of course, Ragnar only wants me for sex. The woman he chooses to be part of his bô would know all of this. She would fit in. She would belong. And she sure as hell wouldn’t shoot her mouth off like a fool. “I understand.”
“So what’s this really about?” she asks. “Is this about three dresses?” She tilts her head to one side. “You had dinner with Ragnar last night. Did he upset you?”
Damn it. How the hell does she do that? “No, Empress Astrid,” I force out through stiff lips.
“Astrid,” she corrects. “What did he say?”
I don’t care if she’s the Empress; she’s not going to make me talk about this. “Nothing important.”
There’s a long pause. “I was with my brother yesterday evening,” she says finally. “Nasrim Dimeh’s death shook him. I watched him call her bô and break the news to them. I heard Family Dimeh spit curses at my brother and tell him they regretted the day he entered Nasrim’s life.” She levels a cool glance at me. “Ragnar is a prince of the realm, answerable only to me. He took their curses and their blame, and he didn’t say a single word to defend himself.”
Oh. Poor, poor Ragnar.
“He didn’t have to talk to them,” Astrid continues. “He could have instructed Mazer to pay reparations; that’s what a Chief of Staff i
s for. But that’s not Ragnar. My brother cares deeply about the people around him, and he will never shirk his responsibility to them.”
She gets to her feet. “Talia will alter all three gowns for you. Family Hafsson is extremely wealthy. You can afford to waive the blood taxes for every single person on Boarus 4 for ten years if that’s what you want, and Saber wouldn’t even miss it.” She heads to the door. “I see the way Ragnar looks at you. He’s attracted to you.”
Hope wars with common sense. Common sense wins. “I am nothing more than a passing fancy to the prince.”
She raises one elegant eyebrow. “If it makes you feel better to think that, then do so. Personally, I've never seen the use in lying to myself.” She throws me a glance over her shoulder on her way out. “If I were you, I’d wear the red gown. And bring the daggers. You’ll need them.”
16
Ragnar
I’m late to the ball.
Astrid raises her eyebrow when I walk in, and I shrug. She’s just going to have to cope. I spent my entire day trying to track down where Harek Levitan is hiding, and I got nowhere for my effort.
Harek’s undoubtedly built failsafes into his plan. Finding him and threatening to kill him probably wouldn’t help. But it’d feel pretty damn good. I want to put my hands around the General’s neck and squeeze. I want to feel bones shatter. I’ve never wanted to kill someone so badly, never wanted to cause pain as much as I do right now. I’m not a fan of torture, but for Harek Levitan, I’ll make an exception.
I’m annoyed, and I have a headache, and as much as I like Kaleb Nedwa, I just want to go home and pound back drink after drink. Maybe then Nasrim’s dead body won’t haunt me. Maybe then I’ll forget the stricken look in Raven’s eyes when I told her I didn’t want anything serious with her. With enough slenti, maybe I’ll drown it all out.
Then I see Raven, and my tiredness vanishes.
She’s wearing a red dress. The bodice is jewel encrusted, and the neckline dips low, showing off the generous swell of her breasts. Her skirt floats in wispy layers, as light as air. And, to complete the look, the Daggers of Xerxes are slung across her back.
