Claimed by the Elven King: Part Four

by Cristina Rayne

  If only Limira could have heard all of that, I thought, my lips stretching into a smile. “I think so, too.”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  I knew he was behind me before I felt his arms encircle my waist, alerted by a strange thickening of the air around me. I turned away from the vast ocean I had been admiring, its waters reflecting a bright orange as the sun slowly sunk below the horizon, and smiled just as brightly up at Sethian as I leaned back into his embrace. He would probably scold me for being out of bed, but after lying in bed all day, I had started to get a bit of cabin fever and flat-out told my friends that I was getting up to watch the sun set out here on the king’s balcony as I had often done on my own over the past month. Our balconies luckily faced the same direction, so the same gorgeous ocean view was available to me here. It had become somewhat of a comfort to see that the sun still looked the same here in the elven realm.

  “You know what I am going to say, don’t you?” Sethian said, the amusement in his eyes taking the sting out of his words.

  “Fresh air is good for me, too,” I said firmly, turning completely around inside the circle of his arms. I wanted to see his face better while we spoke. “Besides, even the healer said it was fine for me to get up. She also did something like you did to ease my nausea when my morning sickness started to come back, something more permanent, she claimed.”

  He nodded. “Yara tended to the last of our pregnant women centuries ago.”

  “No wonder she seemed so—enthusiastic.” When the woman had placed her hands on my abdomen, they had shook, she had been so excited, but it was nothing to the joy she had expressed when she announced that she could feel the baby’s “essence” and that it was vibrant and strong.

  At one uncomfortable point, I had thought for sure that the healer was about to start crying just like Lariel had. It had made me wonder if she had never been able to have children of her own. Not that I would have dared asked.

  “I hear that the healer was not your only visitor today,” he said, his eyes daring me to deny it.

  The guards, damn them, must have blabbed to him since none of the girls had left my side for longer than a few minutes all afternoon. The fact that the queen hadn’t seemed worried at all about me ratting her out to Sethian really worried me, so I hadn’t really decided whether or not I was going to say anything to him about the awful things she had tried to get me to agree to. There had to be a reason for her fearlessness, and I wondered if she actually wanted Sethian to know she had done these things—as a warning, to hurt him, the list of possible motives was endless.

  I had suddenly found myself playing a game full of potentially dangerous pitfalls without knowing the rules, and I was scared.

  “You must have ears in all the walls,” I mildly accused.

  “Whatever Limira came here to say to you must have really upset you if you do not wish to speak to me about it.”

  I sighed and pressed my face into his chest. “She was really upset herself when she came to talk to me, so I’m not sure I should say anything about it at all. It couldn’t have been easy for her to hear about my pregnancy.”

  I felt Sethian suddenly stiffen. “Did she berate you because you are human?” he demanded, his voice tinged with anger.

  I looked up at him and was a little shocked at the level of anger that smoldered in his eyes. They were practically glowing with it, and the effect was more than a little unnerving. It made me wonder if they had argued about me concerning the very issues the queen had ruthlessly shoved in my face earlier.

  “Actually, she seemed more concerned with you,” I said hesitantly. It was probably a very bad idea to bring up the question of his mother’s true identity right now when he was already so angry, but for the sake of our baby, I needed to know the truth before he or she was born. “She mentioned your mother, that a lot of people suspected that she was like me, a human who had been transmuted. Only—your father went one step farther and had the mage change her to look completely like an elf and then lied about her being a member of the Nalldir royal family.”

  Sethian’s arms tightened around my waist in reaction to my words, but his expression remained angry and unchanged. “Yes, I have heard that particular tale many times. Limira is hardly the first person to think me a half-blood because of my facial features, and she certainly won’t be the last. What she probably failed to mention is that it is not unheard of for an elven child to exhibit a purely human trait. For me, it is the wider dimensions of my face, for others, it has been brown eyes or a more rounded ear tip. After all, we all possess at least a few human genes.”

  “She made it seem like half-bloods were looked down on by a lot of people.” His eyes seemed to darken with every word I spoke. I swallowed nervously and forced myself to go on, “She was worried that the people wouldn’t accept our baby as heir because he might just be more human than elf.”

  For one long, seemingly eternal moment, I forgot to breathe as Sethian’s eyes literally flashed brightly with what looked like rage. However, before my mind could really start to freak out about just how scary he now looked, he shut his eyes tightly and took a slow, deep breath in an obvious attempt to calm down.

  “No—I shall not play this game with her,” he said quietly, the anger gone from his voice. He took another deep breath and opened his eyes, looking down at me with an expression that was less angry and more grim. “Do not let what she has told you upset you any longer. Although what she has told you concerning the prejudices among the Sidhe in regards to humans is true enough, she has inflated the views of a very small portion of my people and hers completely out of proportion. They are deep-seated prejudices these individuals have held for longer than I have been alive and have nothing to do with your appearance here in the realm. The vast majority of the realm will accept our child as their future king with open arms and much joy. Your ladies-in-waiting reflect this attitude well.”

  I knew very well that he was just telling me what I wanted to hear, that the issue was nowhere near so simple. Had that been the case, he wouldn’t have gotten so angry at the mere mention of it. However, after the emotional upheaval the queen had put me through earlier, I was just too worn out to pursue it any further right now.

  “Yes, they were pretty ecstatic when I told them I was pregnant. I think it’ll be very hard for them to keep the news to themselves until you announce it. Saeria and Rinwen have been telling me for days how anxious some of their relatives are for the chance to have children of their own. I imagine they thought they would have to wait decades.”

  “For some of them, it may in fact be decades. The process of bringing human brides to the realm can be a long, complicated affair, and conceiving a child, even more so.”

  Sethian loosened his arms around me and pulled away just enough to grab one of my hands. “Come. I ordered dinner be brought to us before heading to the suite. I suspect you have several days of illness to make up for.”

  I was picking up the nightgown one of the girls had left folded at the foot of the bed when I abruptly felt Sethian walk up behind me and rest a hand on my upper arm. I paused and turned to look back at him over my shoulder quizzically.

  “Leave it,” he said. “Tonight I wish to feel the bareness of your skin all night. Undress for me?”

  That he had made it a request this time rather than a command was somehow more embarrassing. I could feel the fire in my cheeks before I could even turn my head back towards the bed. I had been feeling somewhat bummed out all evening since he hadn’t kissed me once, not even on my forehead, and now he suddenly wanted me to strip without any kind of foreplay!

  Feeling as awkward as I had the first time, I slowly pulled down the left sleeve of my dress off my shoulder, my mind going a mile-a-minute. I had no idea how to make taking off my clothes look sexy, but you were supposed to slide everything off slowly, weren’t you?

  I pulled my arm free of the sleeve, getting my elbow caught in it along the way which was definitely not sexy, and start
ed on my right. By now, it was all I could do to keep myself from hyperventilating, and I knew if I had not started this with my back turned to him, my head would have either exploded or I would have been unable to begin, period.

  My right arm was now out, and I started on unlacing the bodice. This part I knew I should turn around for, the revealing of one of the “main courses” in the feast for his eyes, but I just couldn’t make myself do it. I would definitely make the world’s worst exhibitionist, and I was certain that, at this point, Sethian was getting more than a little irritated with my performance so far if the dead silence coming from behind me was any indication.

  With my bodice unlaced, it became a simple matter of pulling the material apart and then either pulling the dress over my head or letting it fall to the ground. Knowing that hell would freeze over before I could make pulling the dress over my head into something erotic and appealing,

  As I clutched the edges of the material that was opened on either side of my boobs and prepared to allow them to spill out, I had a sudden epiphany. Maybe if I looked ridiculous enough, he would never ask me to do this again. I just had to turn around and convince him what a bad idea this had been.

  Taking a deep breath, made much more difficult by the huge knot of nervousness in my throat, I slowly turned around. At first, I couldn’t meet his eyes, looking at a point just over his shoulder when I took the plunge and pushed the material slowly down to my waist. You could have heard a pin drop in that room—well, in the space of time between each of my ragged breaths, I mean. The silence stretched on, to the point where my breaths were starting to sound a little panicky and I just couldn’t stand it any longer. I had to look at him.

  I don’t know what I really expected to see when I looked at his face. Irritation? Amusement? Bewilderment? Stunned at how stupid I looked? That’s why when my eyes met green eyes that were almost—spellbound as they stared at my semi-nude body, I was the one left stunned.

  Sethian watched with that same intense interest for a few more seconds before he reached over both hands and yanked the dress the rest of the way down over my hips until it fell to a heap at my feet. He then stepped back as I stood frozen, his eyes slowly running down the entire length of my body and then just as slowly back up again. It was almost as if he was licking me with his eyeballs the way my groan suddenly began to throb with arousal.

  He reached out a hand again, and my stomach clenched in anticipation of his touch. However, instead of caressing a breast or even tweaking a nipple as I had expected, his hand touched my breast bone lightly, as though afraid that my skin would shatter.

  “So lovely,” he said almost to himself. He ran the pads of his fingertips lightly across my chest, then moved his hands up to cup the side of my face. “It’s as though your skin is glowing from within now that you are with child.”

  He tilted my chin up and finally delivered the kiss I had been waiting for all evening. It was soft, and gentle, but did not go beyond a brief, pleasurable caress of the lips.

  “Although I enjoyed your efforts to please me just now, immensely, I did not mean to imply that we would make love tonight when I asked you to undress. I wish you to rest for tonight. The feel of your skin against my own will be pleasure enough for the moment.”

  If the floor suddenly opened up under me right now and swallowed me whole, I would have been grateful to the fates for saving me from the utter mortification I was feeling at the moment. Why, why did I keep turning every innocent thing from Sethian’s mouth into something dirty lately? I wasn’t so sure that I could blame my messed up hormones on sexing up my thoughts, either.

  Sethian released my chin and gestured for me to get into bed. I was beneath the blankets in record time, curled up on my side and my face buried into my pillow in a lame effort to hide from the world. I wondered if my face would ever lose its red tint of humiliation tonight.

  A few minutes later, I felt the mattress dip as Sethian slipped into bed beside me, as naked as I was, but I did not turn to face him until I felt his hand on my shoulder.

  “Lie on your back and draw the blankets down to your waist,” he instructed.

  Curious as to what he was up to, despite myself, I rolled onto my back as asked and looked up at him questionably. Sethian flashed me a smile before arranging himself on his side next to me and then laying his head carefully between my bare breasts.

  “This way I can hear you both,” he explained once he was settled.

  His words made something in my chest tighten almost painfully. That he wanted to hear my heart as well was just…

  I tentatively threaded my fingers into his hair and felt him sigh in pleasure against my skin. I had to say, this certainly was a pleasant way to end such a disquieting day.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  The way Sethian was currently scrutinizing my bare stomach this morning was a clear sign that the day I had been secretly dreading had finally come. I was now nearly five months along in the pregnancy, and my belly had grown to the point that my pregnancy was obvious.

  “Today is the first day of spring,” Sethian said with a grin. “I can think of no more appropriate day than this to announce the imminent birth of the first elven child in over five centuries.”

  “Then maybe now you will finally take me into Talloth like you promised,” I scolded in an attempt to hide the fact that my anxiety levels had just shot through the roof.

  “My people will probably wish to see you as well once the announcement is made,” he replied amicably. “Tomorrow, we shall make a day of it.”

  I blinked at him in surprise, not expecting him to give in so readily. Yes he had promised, but as the days turned into months and I still hadn’t been allowed to go anywhere outside the palace other than my garden, I had begun to think that it would never happen.

  “Now, I will leave you to your ladies to prepare. Make certain to wear a gown that accents your waist. I want there to be no question as to the authenticity of your pregnancy.”

  A few elven-marks later, I found myself standing outside the enormous double doors leading into the throne room on the verge of a panic attack. My friends had dressed and groomed me within an inch of my life, making me feel like a princess in a pageant—or more accurately, a princess doll in a pageant. I had never seen three women looking more gleeful than when they had been stuffing me into this convoluted piece of white cloth they called a dress I was currently wearing. I swear there had been at least a thousand ties and buttons that needed to be done up in the right order and/or configuration or it would not fit as intended. I never in a million years would have been able to put it on by myself.

  The least said about my hairstyle the better as far as I was concerned. I was sure that my scalp was going to ache for weeks after all the pins and clips were removed.

  It was utterly unsettling how much I had looked like an elf after they were done with me. Had I had the pointed ears and blonde hair, I don’t think anyone would have known I was actually human. Maybe that had always been their intention, to make it easier for the court to accept a human in their midst and thus easier on me, but to see myself unexpectedly looking so vastly different yet again was more than a little upsetting.

  I could tell that some of the guards that lined the walls on either side of the doors and along both sides of the wide corridor leading up to the entrance were staring at me, or rather my protruding belly, hard. The back of my neck practically itched with the feel of all those eyes fixed on me. It made me feel like a strange animal being paraded before a gawking crowd. To some in this crowd, the animal analogy might not be an analogy at all, I suddenly realized with some dismay.

  When the herald finally announced me, I grimaced at the long list of pretentious titles attached to my very mundane name.

  “Emily Ford, now of the Royal House of Elerren, Probationary Royal Wife of His Majesty Sethian of the Royal House of Elerren, King of the Second Realm!”

  Even with Lariel, Saeria, and Rinwen at my back, I felt horribly expo
sed the moment I stepped through those double doors and walked up the ridiculously long, center aisle that led up to the dais where Sethian sat on his throne looking every inch the regal and powerful elven king. The queen sat on the throne-seat to his left, her posture stiff and formal. The dais was too far away for me to see her face properly, but I swear I could feel her eyes trying to bore holes into my forehead.

  To keep myself from hyperventilating, I fixed my eyes on Sethian and did not move my gaze from his face as I slowly walked what felt like miles towards the two monarchs. Even when I heard the soft murmurs, the gasps of shock, and felt the stares of the nobles standing on either side of me, I refused to look at them. I didn’t want to know how many of those eyes held looks of disgust or even malice.

  Once I reached the dais, my three friends bowed behind me and then split off to the left to stand in a single-file line just out of direct sight of the king and queen. I bowed to both monarchs in turn, as well. The queen might as well have been a statue for all she even acknowledged me, or even moved for that matter. Sethian beckoned me closer with a flick of his wrist, and I started to climb the steps up to the king’s level.

  Once I stood before him, I bowed again, and waited with my hands folded over my stomach. Only then did Sethian stand and reach out a hand to me. He had explained to me that a Royal Wife could only be acknowledged within elven society as such if the king publically offered her his hand in front of the whole of the elven court. The deal was sealed when the Royal Wife-to-be accepted that hand publically. It was strange to me that something so simplistic had the power to make or break a person’s life in this particular society.