The Stone Queen (The Dark Queens Book 9)

by Jovee Winters

I was the god of war, godsdamn me to Tartarus! I should not have felt these strange quiverings fluttering through me, my knees growing weak and my stomach twisted up in knots. I should not have had this powerful feeling of breathlessness and a want so fierce it ate me up like a cancer.

  I hadn’t meant to make a sound. I’d intended to go, to leave her alone. The image of her in repose, of the night smelling of sea salt and water flowers, and hearing her breathy, soft inhales and exhales would be a memory I would treasure forever in those moments when I allowed myself to think of what could have been.

  But that was not to be, because I couldn’t keep from taking a sharp inhale of breath between my teeth at the sight of her perfect form.

  The female must have been as light a sleeper as I was, because she shoved up, eyes wide and mouth parted. We held eyes for what seemed like an eternity but couldn’t have been more than a few seconds at best. And I read the thoughts that scrolled over her face almost as though she’d spoken them aloud.

  Shock. Confusion. Surprise.

  And finally… “A… Ares? What? Why are you? What?” She glanced out the small window of her bedroom as though she would divine the answers from out there.

  Clenching my jaw, I wet my lips and tried to make sense of why my palms sweat so terribly. Why my body throbbed and my head ached and why I was even fucking here at all. “I—” I snapped my mouth shut.

  Why the fuck had I come here? Panic was starting to eat me up. I should go. I should rip open a travel tunnel and get the hell out of Dodge. And yet, my feet were like blocks of stone. I could not move.

  Panic was chewing me up worse than I’d ever felt before, and I couldn’t keep from gasping for air like a fish dying on land. I must have looked wild, manic.

  “Ares?” My name was soft upon her lips. Then she was up, and somehow, I was in her arms, and I didn’t even know when she’d moved.

  But the moment she wrapped her tiny arms around my waist, I calmed, and that terrible sickness started to melt away.

  “Come on,” she prompted, giving me a gentle tug as she moved us toward her bed.

  “I… I didn’t come to do… this, Medusa.”

  Her smile was soft, but even so, it pierced my chest like a fiery blade. “You never struck me as the type. But I am tired. I had a long day. And so have you, it would appear. So let us rest together. That is all. Nothing more. Yes?”

  She looked at me beneath her long lashes, and my world tipped. Aphrodite, the great love of my life, was off cavorting with my brother. They were making a happy home for themselves. I should have been at my lowest, and yet in Medusa’s arms, I barely felt the pricklings of that betrayal.

  Without speaking a word, I nodded slowly. Her bed wasn’t large. Not like my own.

  And it was hard as a bloody rock. Yet when she laid me down and crawled over me and stretched out those gorgeous wings of hers so that they covered us both almost like a blanket, I knew I’d never been more comfortable.

  I softly groaned, and the tension slipped out of me, second by second. She gave a little mewling sound, and I couldn’t begin to describe how I felt then. All I knew was I’d needed this.

  Needed to feel the touch of a woman and not just any woman but one who meant something to me. I’d fought like the devil to resist Medusa, and I hated and despised myself for my weakness where she was concerned. But tonight, I did not feel that holding her was a weakness.

  Hugging her tight, I kissed the top of her head, burying my nose in her brown curls, and my heart leapt when I sensed her smile upon my chest. She liked this. I knew she did. She did not find my touch one to be endured but rather one that she actively enjoyed.

  And just for tonight, I did not think once of Aphrodite. I simply closed my eyes, and for the first time in two weeks, I slept, dreaming of nothing at all.

  “Medusa,” I whispered before I even thought about what I was doing.

  In answer, she wrapped one long, lean leg around my thigh, and together, we fell into a deep and restful sleep.

  When Apollo’s steeds kissed the horizon line the next morning, I was already long gone. But I returned to her the next night. And the night after that. And before I knew it, she and I slept together every night.

  And when she would open her arms to me, I fell into them like a man saved from death’s clutches, and something terrifying but wonderful began to burn brightly in me again.

  Chapter 11

  Poseidon

  “Sister,” I drawled, staring at the delectable Hera as she stood up from the bathing pools of her bedchambers.

  Water dripped off her perfect nipples, and I smirked. Her eyes glittered with heat and other naughty imaginings too. Zeus, of course, knew I slept with his wife. It was not like the bastard cared. He’d not touched the gods in some time now, a century, at least.

  He quite hated his wife. I, on the other hand, rather enjoyed Hera’s inventiveness in the bedroom. Her passions equally matched my own.

  After grabbing a plush towel, she dabbed at her flat belly as she stared at me with heat in her eyes. “Lover?”

  With a hot growl, I shoved up off my seat and rushed to her. In less time than it took to blink, I was as nude as she, and we were panting and moaning. It’d been weeks since I’d fucked her as I’d wished to, and she made me pay for my lack of attentions.

  She was stabbing at me, literally, with her claws, drawing blood and licking her now blade-length nails with just the tip of her bright-pink tongue. Her flesh gleamed like mother-of-pearl from drinking of my blood.

  My cock stood ramrod stiff, ready to sink again and again into her wet, tight channel. The air smelled of dew, sweat, and us.

  Moaning as she swallowed the last bit of my blood, she slowly, torturously sank down on my cock until all I could do was moan with blind lust. Covered in tears and my own blood, the floor crawled with sea life birthed from our lovemaking. They would soon die if they did not get to water, not that I cared.

  She rode me like a hot mare, up and down, flexing her hips and making me moan with wild abandon. I covered her perky breasts with my large palms and squeezed them almost to the point of pain.

  Hissing, she tossed her head back, and I grinned as I memorized the pretty image of us.

  “What is that you wished to know, Poseidon?” she asked even as she rode me hard.

  My voice rough with desire and passion, I gritted out from between my teeth, “I worry about my nephew. He is seldom on Olympus anymore and never at night.”

  Her hands dug into my chest, making me hiss, and she stopped moving, her quicksilver eyes staring intelligently into my own. “Have you been following Ares, brother?”

  I shrugged and adjusted her so that she would begin her slow, torturous movements once more. We both moaned the next time she flexed her hips.

  Her skin was dewy and flushed, and I would never understand Zeus’s fascination with mortal women. There was no finer specimen in all the worlds than a sexually satisfied goddess.

  “I have noticed my son’s absence and have keenly felt his pain. He takes Aphrodite’s betrayal hard. I would kill Hephaestus for what he’s done if Zeus wouldn’t be furious at me for it.”

  I shook my head even as I shoved deep inside her soaking-wet pussy. Her muscles fluttered around my engorged cock, and I moaned at the same moment she did.

  “Fuck me,” she hissed.

  “Patience, my love,” I promised, and she moaned prettily. “But in truth, I wanted to know if you knew where the boy spent his nights. I am his uncle, and you know how much I love the brats.”

  “Poseidon.” She laughed lightly and slapped at my chest. If anyone knew the truth of me, it would be Hera. She and I were cut from the same cloth, we were so similar. But she didn’t know everything. Still, she was my confidant as I was truly hers.

  And we both knew that neither of us could fully trust anyone, not even each other. We would sell each other out if it advanced our agendas. Still, neither of us seemed to be able to quit the other, so we simpl
y dealt with our issues as they arose.

  “He sheaths himself in his shadow so that not even Hypnos can find him.”

  I snorted. “Earth, then. It’s the only place where he could do so.”

  She shrugged and wiggled just a little on me. My blood ran like hot lava through my veins, and biting down on my bottom lip, I clamped down onto her hips and speared upward. She screamed. The sound was perfectly haunting, then she growled, and we were once more fucking like animals on her bathroom floor.

  Once we’d both come, she lay upon my chest, swirling her fingers through my chest hair.

  “You know, Poseidon, you should follow him. See what that child is up to. I gave him time enough to get his feelings out. I’ll be damned if Hephaestus takes what doesn’t belong to him. Figure out who he’s with at night and then… take care of things. Whatever the distraction might be.”

  I stretched a brow upward. “Kill it?”

  She shrugged and pouted as though we spoke of nothing more consequential than ending a bug’s life. “If it’s distracting him, it doesn’t deserve to live. I want my grandchildren. It was prophesied. And not even he can deny them to me.”

  “Hmm. Well, Athena spoke to me a few nights past of her concern for Ares as well.”

  Hera palmed my chest and moved so that her face hovered over mine. Fury pinched her mouth tight. “Have you fucked her?”

  Jealously was such a turnoff. And yet, I had to admit that getting Hera this way had always made me feel halfway animalistic. “Don’t be crass, sister. Of course not. Everyone knows she’d prefer the beast’s touch to mine.”

  She sniffed, then she dived for my mouth, taking my lips into her own and kissing me with such force that her teeth cut through my flesh. I hissed even as I felt the stirrings of desire rocket through me.

  Gods, I hated how much I craved her violence. It was the one area in my life where I was just as based as the rest of the glittering throng. Furious that she made me feel the things I did, I rolled us over, and pinning my hands to her shoulder, I shoved into her angrily.

  She cried out in exultation, tipping her head back even as she screamed for more and more of my fury.

  Once we’d finished, I quickly pulled out of her and got to my feet, wiping off the still-bleeding cut with the back of my wrist before spitting on the floor.

  She sat up slowly, her head a tousled mess, and wore nothing but a smirk. “Blood suits you, brother.”

  I shook my head. “I’ve told you about your violence, Hera.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Don’t pretend like you don’t love it. You nearly split me in two.”

  Scowling, I snapped my fingers and quickly dressed.

  Now she did pout. She stood and came over to me and twice patted my chest. “You cannot hate me forever. You and I both know you crave what only I can give you.”

  I damned her even as I knew that she was right. Hera was my only true weakness in this fucking place. Always had been.

  With a furious growl, I took her lips for my own, barely keeping my anger in check so that I did not give her a matching split on her own lip as she’d gifted onto mine. When I pulled away, her eyes were glazed over.

  With a snarl on my face, I flicked my wrist to open a travel tunnel. I hated that I still burned for her. Hera was a witch, the devil woman herself. It wasn’t as though I didn’t know it. If I could free myself of her poison, I could rule Olympus. And yet no matter how often I’d tried, I’d never been able to get her out of me.

  “I will discover what your child is about and report back.”

  “Poseidon, don’t be angry,” she whispered urgently once I’d turned my back on her.

  Staring at the tunnel with furious eyes, I stood there taut as a bow, warring with my own desires versus what I knew I had to do. Never looking back, I stepped into the tunnel. Damn that viperous woman to Tartarus.

  Adjusting my cuffs, I waved my hand over my mouth, hiding the split in my lip with illusion. It was time, once and for all, to discover what was on Athena’s island, who this mystery woman was, and just what in the hell my nephew was getting up to now.

  The Fates’ words rang in my ears.

  “You will be the one to destroy the thing that could destroy us all. The time comes nigh, Poseidon, when the very fate of the Olympians will rest in your hands…”

  Chapter 12

  Medusa

  I was just leaving Athena’s temple for the night. Mother had slowly released her ridiculous grip on me, and I was once more allowed to walk to and from temple alone.

  If only she knew that her diligence in protecting my honor hardly mattered. A god had slept in my bed nearly every night for the past month.

  I fought the smile working so hard to free itself and lost that battle spectacularly. My cheeks stretched impossibly high, and my stomach felt like a nest of butterflies had just taken flight.

  My bed was not large. And Ares was so… so large. But gods, I slept so well in his arms as he stroked my back and wings, whispering words to me in a tongue I could not understand.

  Suddenly I was ripped from my daydreams when someone with a strong vise-like grip grabbed hold of my elbow and twirled me around. I gasped and nearly stumbled to the ground. Before I could even look up, I heard the high-pitched squeals of taunting laughter.

  I frowned, still so shocked by what had been done to me that all I could do was blink in mute astonishment as Perseus and a group of three boys and one girl stared at me with mocking, laughing eyes.

  Zephinia had her arms slung through the elbow of another boy I didn’t know all that well who stood just behind Perseus’s back.

  Her nose was curled, and her mouth arched in a high sneer of disdain. I narrowed my eyes at her. Why had she made me her enemy? I’d never done anything to her. All I knew was that if she was here in the company of Perseus, this was not good.

  Tamping down on my nerves, I flicked at my arm as though brushing Percy’s touch off me and lifted my chin in the haughtiest manner I could. “Perseus.” I said his name firmly, proud that my voice hadn’t quivered. “Was there something you needed?”

  As I spoke to him, I saw a plethora of emotions run past his tight features. Surprise first, possibly because I’d actually spoken to him. This had been our first interaction since that fateful day on the beach. Then anger, as he no doubt began thinking of how everything had gone down that day. And finally, craftiness. Of all his looks, that one made my skin crawl most.

  I swallowed nervously but outwardly plastered a tight, smirking grin on my face.

  “Is it true, then?” he barked without so much as a hello.

  Zephinia tittered, and the boys around her began to chuckle. My confusion was now mingled with faint threads of fear. What was going on? Why did I suddenly feel like I was prey surrounded by a circle of predators ready to tear me limb from limb?

  My wings tingled with the need to race away, but I kept my focus and did not allow any fear to show.

  “Is what true?” I asked casually, adding a hint of disdain to my tone. The effect on him was immediate. His eyes went wild, the whites looking as though they’d suddenly swelled to twice their size.

  “You know what I’m talking about. Stop lying.”

  He flung those words at me like a spear, and I hated that I flinched. The moment I did, the small gang behind him grew bolder in their laughter, and the air grew thicker with the charged threat of violence simmering just below the surface.

  I tried to take a step back, but I encountered yet another body I’d not realized was there. This one shoved me forward roughly, and again I tripped, but this time, the momentum dragged me to my knees, and I fell, scraping the skin right off and hissing as I felt the wetness of blood as it began to ooze out.

  “Just spit it out already, Perseus,” Zephinia scolded like a nagging shrew. “Mother expects me home soon.”

  It was ridiculous to expect any mercy from one such as her. But I could not fathom why another woman would do to me as she had. Resp
ect for the feminine was the one thing we were trained not to do at temple. We were to honor the sacred femininine which meant that if at all possible, we were to be friends with one another, never enemies.

  As though she knew my thoughts, she let her sinister smile stretch wider, showing off her perfectly straight white teeth in what could only be called a hungry snarl.

  Knees stinging, I gingerly made my way to my feet. My legs were quivering, and I knew I had to get away from here. Whoever Percy was today, he was not my friend. Not anymore.

  “I have to go,” I muttered. “Don’t ever—”

  I started turning, scared to unfold my wings in front of any of them, afraid of what they might do if I did.

  “You let one touch you. I know. My sister’s best friend said she saw you with him. And he was holding you!” It wasn’t Perseus who’d said such but Zephinia.

  I gasped, almost certain I knew who and when they were talking about. I’d been having a hard day. And as though he’d known, Ares had suddenly appeared before me in the daylight hours. He’d said nothing as he’d grabbed me and hugged me beside a hidden wall of the library grounds.

  But we’d heard a rustling, and even though we’d pulled away, I suspected that rustling must have been this friend of Zephinia’s sister.

  I jerked my eyes away from the furious superiority on her face and turned toward Percy. For a brief moment, I caught a flash of pain, but that was quickly extinguished and turned into a look of terrible wrath.

  “Deny it!” Percy screamed at me, looking like some snarling, rabid dog ready to tear me limb from limb. His hands were curved, and if he’d had claws, they would have been out and ready to slice through me.

  “Ares! That’s what Adelfa said, with his loathsome flames and dark, soulless eyes,” Zephinia said.

  Hearing her speak so ugly about Ares had me clenching my jaw tight. “You know nothing of what you speak,” I hissed between my teeth.

  “You whore.”

  I gasped and looked at my accuser. Percy didn’t scream the words, didn’t even go above a whisper, but I felt the sharp sting of his censure like a hammer fist to my soul.