The Cursed (League of the Black Swan)

by Alyssa Day

  When her stomach was full, she felt a little bit calmer, so Rio didn’t even flinch when the guards marched in with reports about the confrontation with Luke and the fact that he’d destroyed the guardhouse. The king, for she’d learned that indeed he was the king and also her grandfather, merely nodded and fixed his gaze on Rio.

  “I apologize for my friend’s actions,” Rio said carefully. “I promise you he will pay for the damage. He buys people new cars all the time, so replacing a guardhouse shouldn’t be any big deal.”

  Chance, who was lounging on a benchlike couch across the room from her, snorted. “Are you sure you know what you’ve gotten yourself into with this wizard, little sister? He seems a little dangerous.”

  Rio didn’t know whether to laugh or just fall off the bench. “You’re talking to me about dangerous? When you just took me on a tour that included regaling me with the stories of all the challengers you defeated over the years in that ring? I’m surprised there wasn’t a box filled with hacked-off arms and legs somewhere in a corner, just so you could admire your own prowess.”

  The king laughed, and Chance scowled at her, but then he tilted his head, as if considering the idea.

  “It is true that it would serve as a deterrent to hopeless challenges in the future,” he began, and she jumped up, shaking her head.

  “Don’t even think about it. It was a stupid comment, and I will not be the one responsible, as my first act as a new member of the family, for beginning the body-part box.”

  “And yet it is an idea fit for a demon princess,” her grandfather rumbled, looking proud.

  Her grandfather. The king. She still had no idea what his name was because demon names did not translate out of the demon language very well. They’d given her a suite of rooms, complete with a library and tutor, and expected her to begin studies of their language, culture, and traditions as soon as possible.

  She took a deep breath and asked the question for which she’d been building up her courage for the past three hours. “What were my mother’s and father’s names?”

  The guards lining the walls of the huge dining room all seemed to turn into stone simultaneously, as if they wished to be anywhere else but there.

  “We do not speak their names,” the king roared, and it took a few minutes for the walls to quit shaking, but Rio had had enough of being intimidated by arrogant men.

  “Then find me somebody who will, because I want to know about my parents,” she shouted right back at him.

  This time, even Chance looked like he wished he could disappear. The king, however, drummed his fingers on the tabletop—apparently it was a gesture her entire family shared—and stared at her as if she’d finally become worthy of his notice.

  “You dare stand up to me? You truly are my granddaughter, are you not? Of course, I’ll have to throw you in the dungeons for a week or two to teach you a lesson,” he mused out loud.

  “More ale,” Chance called out, and the servants in the room ran out, probably glad to have an excuse to leave. The guards, however, stayed where they were.

  Rio tried not to panic. “I’m sorry for shouting at you. All of this is very overwhelming. I can’t stay here, in the dungeons or not, although I’d like to return to visit quite often.”

  Chance shot a surprised look at her that she couldn’t interpret, and the king started laughing.

  “You’re not going anywhere. We have no idea what powers you might inherit at midnight on your birthday, and you are far too deadly a weapon for us to allow you anywhere near Winter’s Edge. You will stay here. Permanently. You are the princess of Demon Rift, and you will behave accordingly.”

  Before Rio could argue, or flee, or start shouting at her grandfather again, Kit magically appeared on the bench beside her. The Yokai was back to being enormous, and she wrapped her tail around herself and sat calmly, as if she’d always been there, and stared at the demon king.

  The king shouted something in his own language, and suddenly two lines of spears appeared in his guards’ hands, all raised and pointing at Kit.

  Rio jumped up and put herself between the guards and her fox.

  “No,” she shouted. “You leave her alone. She’s my friend.”

  The king grumbled but gradually settled himself back down in his seat, never taking his eyes off of Kit. “She is friends with the Yokai?”

  Chance, to whom the question had been directed, nodded. “Wizards, Yokai, goblins, ogres, and even humans. It’s the strangest thing I’ve ever seen. I heard a rumor that there was a mountain troll claiming Rio as a friend.”

  One of the guards muttered something and shuddered, and the king’s sharp gaze snapped to him.

  “You. What did you say?”

  The guard bowed, and his face flushed a hot, dark purple. “My apologies, sire. I was just mentioning that Alice put out the word that she claimed Rio as friend.”

  “Alice? Alice!” The name swept down the line of guards like a hailstorm, and Rio was bewildered to see so many enormous, terrifying-looking demons tremble at the name of the woman who’d spent part of her day making chili for Rio and Luke.

  The king narrowed his eyes. “She may become the first demon in our history to create connections across species, perhaps, but be that as it may, she cannot leave until we have finished her education. Perhaps in two or three years’ time—”

  “Years? Are you out of your mind?” Rio realized she was shouting, but she couldn’t help it. “You can’t keep me prisoner here after you’ve admitted that I’m part of your family.”

  “Actually, he can,” Chance said, frowning a little. “I have a cousin who has been in the dungeon for nearly twenty years for offending the king during a formal dinner.”

  “You can’t start out our relationship like this,” Rio pleaded, pinning her hopes on Chance. “You’re my brother, and we said we’d try—”

  “I serve at the king’s pleasure,” Chance said, icily cold, cutting her off. “If your Yokai wishes to visit the dungeons with you, she may.”

  He stared, hard, at Kit, and Rio almost thought he was trying to tell the fox something, but she didn’t have much time to wonder. Kit suddenly jumped up off the bench and nudged Rio’s hand until she automatically lifted it and scratched Kit’s ears. Chance, the king, the guards, and the dining room itself all vanished, and Rio found herself standing on shaky legs in the middle of Luke’s living room, watching him methodically hurl blasts of blue flame at his scorched walls.

  Kit’s voice rang in her mind.

  It was time to leave. I would like some sausage now.

  CHAPTER 25

  Luke thought he was having a hallucination when giant-sized Kit bounded past the corner of his eye toward her food dish.

  “I’m going to need to start buying a lot more fox-friendly food if you’re going to stay that size,” he began, turning toward her, but then he stopped.

  Stopped talking, stopped thinking, stopped breathing.

  Rio was back.

  He crossed the room in a half second and then she was in his arms and the world’s colors started to return, little by little. He was shaking, or she was shaking, or both of them were, with relief and fury and too many emotions to name, let alone feel.

  “You came back,” he said, and then words weren’t enough, could never be enough, and he kissed her.

  He captured her mouth like a conquering warrior, staking out his claim. Invading and possessing. Drinking her in, inhaling her essence. He needed more and more and more of her, and the beast inside him truly began to calm only when he realized she was staking her own claim on him.

  “I came back,” she finally said, when he released her mouth from his kisses.

  “We should talk about that stunt you pulled, but I’m too glad to see you to even think about arguing with you,” he growled in her ear.

  Kit yipped somewhere behind him, and he waved a hand at her. “Yes, yes, you are my hero, now go take a nap while I have a chat with Rio, unless you want to see my f
urry naked ass again.”

  Rio offered up a ghost of a smile, and not the laugh he’d hoped for.

  “What is it?”

  She shook her head. “I don’t want to talk about it yet. Is that Alice’s chili I smell?”

  He nodded. He hadn’t paid much attention to it before, but it was true that the aroma was tantalizing, now that he thought he might be able to eat again sometime in this lifetime.

  “Maybe we could eat some of that while we talk?” She was too quiet and listless, and Luke’s concern grew when she pulled away from him, stumbled over to the table, and practically fell into a chair. “I wish I knew what to do next, Luke, I really do.”

  “What did they do to you?” He followed her and lifted her head so he could check her pupils. “Breathe on me.”

  She pulled her head out of his hand. “They didn’t poison me. They’re not subtle like that. The king—who happens to be my grandfather; imagine trying to wrap your head around that—threatened to drop me into the dungeon for a couple of weeks to teach me a lesson.”

  “He did what?” Luke looked wildly around for something to incinerate, but Rio touched his hand.

  “No blowing up cars. I heard about the guardhouse, you idiot. I told them you’d pay for it.” A grin touched her lips. “It was an interesting conversation. Alice has quite some reputation, by the way.”

  Luke bent to kiss her again, and then he strode over to the kitchen to yank bowls and utensils out of cupboards and drawers.

  “Kit would like some sausage,” Rio said, folding her arms on the table and putting her head down. “You know, I’m suddenly as exhausted as if I’d been running a marathon. I wonder why that is?”

  “Oh, I don’t know. Maybe because you’ve been run through the magical and emotional wringer lately? Finding out you’re related to not one, but two royal families? It makes sense that you’d be tired.”

  Luke spooned chili into bowls, then filled a plate with sausage and gave it and a bowl of fresh water to Kit, who had returned to normal size.

  He put the chili down on the placemat next to Rio, but she didn’t even move, and he realized that she’d fallen asleep, right there at the table. He deposited his own bowl on the table and then gently lifted her into his arms.

  She barely opened her eyes, but she frowned at him. “I won’t be able to keep you, Luke. The curse—it’s too dangerous now for you to be with me.”

  Luke’s heart turned over in his chest, right there in the middle of his dining room, as he held Rio in his arms and she slipped into a deep sleep. He’d spent hundreds of years not getting close to anyone, for fear of what being near him and his curse might do to them. Now, for the first time in his long, tortured existence, this amazing woman was worried about any pain that being with her might cause him.

  “Time to rest, Princess El’andille,” he whispered. “Too bad I’m not Prince Charming, but I have to warn you that I’m never going to let you go.”

  He held her in his arms for the rest of the night, never once falling asleep himself, and plotted ways they could escape the potentially deadly consequences of Rio’s newfound heritage. By the time dawn’s first rays of sunshine tried to peek into the room, he thought he’d finally worked out a workable plan.

  Now he just had to persuade Rio to agree to it.

  Rio woke up in Luke’s arms—a new habit she’d grown to love far too much.

  “I need you,” he said, and his blue eyes shone with heat and hunger.

  “I need you, too,” she whispered, and it was all the answer he needed.

  In seconds, they were both undressed and lying wrapped together, and he was seducing her with long, slow kisses that began with her mouth, moved down to her breasts, and then began to fall all along every inch of her sides and belly and arms and legs. She caught her breath when he approached too near to her center and hot breath passed nearby. She needed him.

  She needed him.

  “Luke, I—”

  “I’m going to taste you now,” he announced, and then he parted her legs and moved between them, lifting her legs so they straddled his shoulders.

  He speared her with such a look of determination and desire that her words dried up in her throat, because apparently all the liquid in her body was heating and rushing to the very place he was bending his head to kiss.

  At the first touch of his tongue, she cried out and fisted her hands in the quilts, knowing only that she needed to hang on for this ride that threatened to take her deeper into sensation than she’d ever gone before. He licked and sucked on her, destroying her, sending sizzling heat shooting through her body; every nerve ending expanded and contracted in time with the touch of his tongue.

  Her hips moved rhythmically beneath him. She couldn’t help it; they moved on their own, trying to rush the pace and force the issue. Every inch of her body was straining and focused on what he was doing to her with his mouth.

  “Touch your breasts for me,” he said hoarsely, and she blushed again, but she touched her nipples, softly at first, and then pinching them the way he had done during one of the many times he’d driven her to incredible orgasm.

  He shot her a look so filled with masculine pride and possession that she almost laughed, but then he bent and fastened his lips around the most sensitive place on her body and she exploded beneath him. By the time she’d quit shaking, he was already moving up on the bed and then rocking into her, his hardness providing the perfect counterpoint to her sensitive flesh, and soon his steady, deep thrusts sent her over the edge again, and this time he tumbled over with her.

  “I love you,” he said, so quietly she almost didn’t hear him, so she could pretend he hadn’t said it at all.

  But then he took her face in his hands and said it again. “I love you, Rio.”

  Caught by his gaze—trapped by his honesty—she couldn’t lie to him. “I love you, too, but we can’t be together. My families, the curse—”

  “I have a plan,” he said, grinning smugly.

  He rolled over on his back, laced his hands together under his head, and began to whistle.

  She poked him in the chest. “Are you going to share?”

  “We’re going to get out of Dodge.”

  She sat up and stared down at him in bewilderment. “What?”

  “We’re leaving Bordertown.”

  CHAPTER 26

  “Get up, get dressed, and let’s get going,” Luke said, jumping out of bed after planting a resounding kiss on her lips.

  Rio didn’t move. She just watched him warily, like a zoo visitor might watch the tiger from behind the glass, and wondered if he’d been drinking Grendel venom. Doing shots of the stuff, maybe.

  “Luke. Luke! Listen to me. We can’t leave Bordertown. What about your business? Your house? Your things? And where would we go?”

  He paused in his apparent quest to throw the worst combination of clothing possible in a backpack. “I have a plan. I don’t care about the business. Alice will send me anything from the house that I want, and she can have the house. All I need is you, and we can live anywhere in the world that you want.”

  Luke threw one yellow and one blue sock and a red T-shirt into his bag, but then he finally seemed to realize that she wasn’t moving. He shoved the silky dark hair out of his face, and she was caught off guard and wondered what a man as beautiful as a fallen angel would look like in one blue and one yellow sock.

  Probably just as gorgeous. It was ridiculously unfair. Also, she didn’t want to talk about her new families and their schemes before she’d had even her first cup of coffee.

  “Is it only me, or does this feel like I’m caught in a magical episode of a soap opera?” She experimented with a sultry TV pose, letting the sheet drop down low, and had the immediate satisfaction of watching his eyes glaze over and his erection bob up to instant, interested attention.

  He groaned and covered his eyes, which left all of his other glorious parts still naked. “Rio, I’m trying to be serious. If we stay h
ere, your life will be a continual battle between trying to balance the demands of one family against the other. They’ll want to use you, and if they can’t use you, they’ll kill you,” he said seriously, and his erection and her silly mood both wilted at the thought.

  “I know, all right? I know. I just wanted to be able to have a family for a little while. Is that so wrong?” She sighed. “Maybe the Fae court—”

  “Rio, Merelith told me as much, right to my face.”

  “The king told me he planned to lock me up in my new suite of rooms in the palace for ‘two or three years’ until I was properly educated,” she reluctantly admitted, feeling torn in two despite the threats. “I know it sounds childish to say, but it’s not fair that I’ve only just found them, and now I have to lose them again.”

  “Tell me what you want to do. Whatever you want, that’s what we’ll do,” he said, holding perfectly still; a predator weighing options in order to make the most lethal decision. Except he’d just said he’d leave the decision up to her—nothing he could do would be better proof of his feelings for her.

  “We should go,” she said slowly, and then with more conviction. “We should go. To hell with them. They had twenty-five years to find me. I’ll call Clarice once we’re settled somewhere.”

  His smile was almost blinding. “Come on, then, the sooner the better, before one or both of your families sends armed guards to collect you. I could blast them, but it would attract a lot of attention, and we’re trying to do this quietly.”

  Rio loved watching him move; even watching him do something as mundane as shoving clothes in a bag was a treat. Especially since he was doing it naked. She smiled as the muscles in his back bunched while he reached up to the top shelf of his closet for a single electric-blue Converse shoe, considered it for a second, and then tossed it back.

  “You know, they have clothes and shoes in Paris,” he said, tossing his backpack on the end of the bed. “Why don’t we go there first?”