A Court of Earth and Aether: a Reverse Harem Fantasy Romance (War of the Gods Book 4)

by Meg Xuemei X

  I joined in his laughter, believing it was only fitting. “That’s very funny, Father. You have a brilliant mind and a humorous tongue.”

  “When all is done, Cassandra Saélihn, you’ll return to the Underworld and takeover my position as the new mistress of Hell. You’ll bind yourself to Hell and shall never leave it while I rule Mount Olympus and the universe. But before all of this happens, you’ll need to keep up your notorious attitude. You won’t even call me Father, in case your mates get a whiff of it before the time is ripe and I can reap the harvest.”

  “If I don’t call you Father, what should I call you?”

  He waved a hand in exasperation. It seemed he wasn’t a patient master. “Didn’t you always call me Hades and use a lot of f-bombs?”

  I nodded.

  His intense, dark gaze fell on me like a big, bad vulture. “Do you understand, Cassandra?”

  I grinned at him. “Yes, King of Dickshit.”

  Hades sent me an annoyed look. Well, I’d followed his instructions to the fucking letter.

  He called the storm back to him, and the darkness receded.

  Then it was just him and me in that room lit by the diamonds.

  “Now, Cassandra,” said the formidable God of Death. “I’m ready to teach you the death game that you’ll need to master in order to overcome the Olympian gods.”

  ~

  After Hades taught me the death game and how to reap living souls, I drained the color from all the diamonds in the room. Hades was taken aback at my savage hunger, and I grinned at him like a little monster. The God of Death didn’t pursue it further, since my mates started banging on the door outside in panicked rage.

  The Hell mountain had trembled when Hades and I dueled. He had defeated me, and I had surrendered.

  However, unknown to the usurper Lord of the Underworld, the living Death, an entity outside the control of any god, showed me something Hades didn’t intend for me to discover.

  Hades also didn’t realize that his dark power, no matter how ancient, abysmal, and dominant, could never penetrate the shield fortified by my immortal males’ mating bonds—four threads weaving into an unbreakable one—to me.

  With its light radiating inside my innermost place, with my mates as my anchor, I’d never waver. I’d never be lost. And no force could take me captive.

  Because even if I was lost to myself, I wasn’t lost to them, and they’d always bring me back.

  Hades saw only what I allowed him to see, what he wanted to see—the infinite darkness roaming and roaring in me that he could control, twist, and shape into his weapon.

  I doubt that he could recognize my mating bond to my mates and see its strength, purity, and beauty even if I flaunted it in front of him. The death god had no idea what true love was, nor its power, as he’d had to resort to kidnapping a woman and forcing her into a bonded sexual partnership with him.

  Yet I wouldn’t tell my mates what Hades had tried to do to me. They’d only be enraged and try to kill the death god who was beyond death. But I would deal a final blow at the last minute to strike down the serpent.

  Lorcan pulled me into his arms as soon as I stepped out of the Diamond Room. This time he beat the fae twins and had me first. My vampire mate no longer cared that fighting for a woman was beneath his High Lordship.

  “Why does Cass look so pale, Hades?” Alaric demanded.

  Pyrder and Reys moved toward Hades in matching aggressive prowls. “What did you do to her?”

  Hades lifted his hands in a mocking gesture of surrender as he warned them viciously, “Back off, barbarians! She’s my daughter. How could I ever harm her?” In response to my mates’ unrelenting distrustful glares, he added with an exasperated sigh, “My heir consumed her power, which was necessary during the intense training.”

  “It took a lot of energy to master the death power.” I smiled faintly at my mates. “But I got this. I’m ready to kick the gods’ fat asses.”

  CHAPTER 15

  Hades insisted on us staying in his realm until I regained my strength. The Underworld didn’t drain me as it did our immortal warriors but gave me a big boost with its dark energy.

  Hades also gave me a scrap of his power to enhance mine, but he informed me that it was only a loan.

  I knew what the loan shark truly meant.

  After I killed Zeus, the bane of his existence, Hades would not only take back his loaned power but also strip some of mine, expecting me to willingly offer it to him with gratitude and obedience. Then he’d leave me with barely enough to maintain Hell for him.

  He didn’t know that when he invaded my mind and bound me inside the dark storm, I’d also gotten a peek into his head.

  I convinced my mates to linger in Hell for a few more hours to get recharged.

  Mostly I needed to take care of Reys before we returned to the surface. Hades’s dungeons had weakened my fae mate. The gods could ambush us when we exited the Underworld, despite our army standing guard right outside the Hell Gate. I needed all of my mates to be in their best shape when the fight broke out.

  “Yep, we’ll stay for a couple of hours in Starfall Palace,” I told Hades. “And since this palace is now mine, as you said earlier, I want all of your personnel and guards out of my property. My companions and I need some well-deserved privacy. And I don’t want to be disturbed before we return to the surface.”

  Hades sent me a warning look, and I winked at him to signal I was following his order to behave as a rude, insufferable brat—my usual self.

  He should have made up his mind when he told me what he expected me to do.

  Clenching his teeth, Hades ordered his spies and guards to retreat.

  Pluto nodded at me in approval. “You’re young, yet you carry unconventional wisdom.” He turned to survey the hall. “Do you feel it?”

  I knew what he meant. As the former Lord of the Underworld, he’d sensed my connection to the core of the realm. Its loyalty did not belong only to Hades now. It had shifted more to me, for I wasn’t just the heir to the Underworld. It actually belonged to me, as the whole Earth was mine.

  “I’m bonded to both the surface and the Underworld,” I said.

  My mates wheeled their attention toward me in alarm.

  “What does it mean?” Alaric demanded, staring hard at Pluto.

  “We’ll see,” Pluto said. “No one has bonded to both life and death before Cass came on the scene.”

  Problem was, I’d have to die with the gods in the end, as Gaea had prophesized and demanded. Would I return to Hell as its new, true mistress after I died?

  Where would that leave my mates?

  They could visit me, right?

  But if I was Death, and they were the living—

  I shook the question out of my mind before it drove me insane.

  A tug, like a glimmer of hellfire, pulled me forward. Hell wouldn’t harm me now, so I followed its guide and led my mates to the heart of the palace, which turned out to be a nursery.

  It consisted of one bedroom, one training room, and two sitting rooms.

  I stalked into the pink bedroom, my gaze falling on a rocking cradle in the center.

  A realization hit me. This was the room where I was supposed to be raised. I tilted my head, regarding the sharp weapons surrounding the cradle and lining the walls.

  “What the fuck?” Alaric cursed.

  Pluto sucked in a breath. “Obviously, Hades planned to train a toddler Cass with all sorts of weaponry.”

  Pyrder bellowed, “That despicable fucker!”

  So, the alternative to my childhood was Hades honing me into cold-hearted weapon, his exacting blade instead of being locked away and starved in a magically enhanced cage. Just peachy.

  “I can’t stand to see this dark design for Cass,” Pluto said and waved a hand.

  The weapons in the room turned to dust and vanished.

  Without being restrained and deprived in the castle’s prison, the former Lord of the Underworld had gra
dually regained his power.

  Another flick of his wrist and a few cushions appeared in the room.

  “Do you require rest, Goddess Cass?” he asked.

  “Uh, yes, thank you,” I said. “I need some alone time with my mates.”

  Mostly I needed to be with Reys. I’d turned into a fucking dragon for him.

  “We’ll be in the outer room, mapping out a new war plan with Pluto, Cass baby,” Pyrder said. “Call us if you need anything.” There was intense need for me in his turquoise eyes that looked nearly exactly like Reys’s, albeit a shade lighter.

  He wanted to join his twin and me, but at the moment, Reys needed me more than anything, and I would give my undivided attention to him.

  Reys closed the door behind us and turned to me, black fire ablaze in his ocean-blue eyes. Just as I’d thought, he’d received my hellfire. Lorcan got the blue Earth fire, Alaric got the red dragon fire, and Pyrder got my wind and storm. Though none of them could use their new power in Hell, except me—Hell’s spawn.

  My heart fluttered as Reys stalked toward me, not as a predator but a desperate lover—well, the fae prince always acted a little predatory, which was part of his nature, but it turned me on.

  His unbridled male lust burned the path to me.

  Before I could take another breath to calm my heartbeat, I was in his arms.

  “You occupied my thoughts every second of the day. I nearly went out of my mind,” he said on a sigh, his mouth crashing onto mine, sealing a sob of joy and grief in my throat.

  Reys was one of the best kissers. The brief separation from him served to remind me of that fact again.

  His lips moved on mine, gentle at first, then hard and demanding and dominating, then shifting back to tender hunger. A jolt of pleasure rippled in me at his every touch. My mate held my heart in his palm, in his sweet net that I never wanted to leave.

  Dark fire, both his and mine, swirled around us.

  I parted my lips for him, and he didn’t waste a second as he thrust his tongue into my mouth, entangling it with mine and claiming me in a new way.

  Heat rushed through my bloodstream.

  I was never a patient woman. I liked to get to the point. I wanted him to lay me down and pound his hard cock into me. Or he could flip me over, press my shoulders to the floor, and thrust into me from behind.

  Driven by the feverish mating need, I stood on my tiptoes and rocked my crotch against his huge erection.

  He gripped my hips as he kept savoring me with his tongue, not in any hurry. He didn’t just want to fuck me. He wanted more. My Reys always wanted more. And he kept teaching me refinement every day.

  I poured my goddess energy into him through our kiss, and he rasped, his eyes glowing bright blue while dark fire blazed in their depth. And I got an idea. I pulled the energy from the burning fire in the core of Hell and sent it to my mate.

  “Cass,” Reys gasped. “My baby, my love.”

  He was the best choice for a recipient of the hellfire’s force, since he was the mate who got my death fire. But I wouldn’t neglect my other mates, either. Through our mating bond, I pushed the same energy toward them.

  I grinned as I heard their surprised and appreciative murmurs from outside the room.

  Lust burned hotter than any hellfire in Reys’s eyes. He’d been teaching me about patience while savoring me in a slow-burning fashion. Now he could no longer rein his disciplined, sexy ass in.

  The next moment, I was on the futon, my panties dropped to the floor, and Reys’s face was between my thighs.

  I moaned as his wicked tongue twirled around my clit and flicked it over and over. He was so skilled, his every stroke so erotic and stimulating that I orgasmed before I knew it.

  “Reys, I missed you so much,” I whispered.

  His mouth moved on my soaked flesh, and he thrust his tongue into my heat. When he pulled out and gazed at me, he said, “I know, baby. You have me now. I can never get enough of you.”

  “Take me however you want,” I said.

  “My love and desire for you never wane, Cass baby. But right now I need to fuck you hard before I make love to you.”

  My blood heated at the dark promise in his words, and I wiggled my ass at him. Reys stared at my bare pussy, the panther in him surfacing and peeking at me with scorching lust.

  The fae prince hovered above me with a single-minded purpose—reclaiming me.

  Spreading my legs, he lowered himself onto me. With one powerful thrust, he drove deep into my sleek heat.

  I gasped at the sensation, and he groaned in pleasure.

  He started moving on top of me, his chest rubbing my breasts.

  His large, hard shaft filled me, burning my skin with every urgent stroke, sending waves of pleasure to my nerve endings.

  My hands fell on his firm ass as he plunged into me mercilessly, his hard muscles flexing and rippling beneath my palms. The erotic sensation became too much. My fingernails raked across his muscles, and Reys only pushed into my heat harder and deeper.

  My inner muscles gloved every inch of his hard cock, squeezing it, milking it, staking a claim on it as he did to me.

  I couldn’t deny my dominant nature. I was an alpha female in every sense, just as my mates were alpha males.

  “You like it rough, Cass baby,” Reys rasped, my reactions making him pound into me harder and faster. “You like me fucking you hoarse. I’d wanted to pound into you when I first laid eyes on you.”

  He drove into me with abandon, pleasure coursing in my veins.

  Reys poured his fae warrior’s strength into me, and I cried his name over and over. His blinding rhythm drove me to the highest sky. Fuck, I didn’t want to come down. I wanted to be this high forever while we were fucking in Hell.

  Reys pumped all he had into me, and his beast roared in joy.

  Waves of rapture beat my body, as if both Heaven and Hell fires licked me all over. I exploded around his cock.

  A fang protruded from Reys’s mouth and sank into my skin. Fucking stars, his panther had indeed joined the claiming.

  My power surged into him, and Reys’s beast reciprocated, feeding me wild energy in return. As our powers merged, my primal magic shot toward my other mates through our bond.

  The door burst open.

  Lorcan, Alaric, and Pyrder stood in the doorway, staring at me in longing and passion as Reys pulled me onto his lap, his cock remaining hard in me.

  Pyrder inhaled sharply, ready to pounce on me.

  “Dulcis,” Lorcan whispered, hunger apparent in every line of his hard body.

  “What have we missed, sweetheart?” Alaric asked in a lust-laced voice.

  I flashed them a sly, seductive smirk.

  And all of my mates gazed at me with harsh desire in their glowing eyes.

  CHAPTER 16

  Just when my mates and I were about to dive into some ardent action together, commotion broke out from the outer room.

  “Seize her!” Ambrosia screeched. “She fits the profile described by Prince Reysalor. This woman is the most wanted criminal on our Cass’s hit list!”

  When had Ambrosia warmed up to me and started referring to me as “our Cass”? She always rolled her eyes at me, as if she was a highbred horse.

  Then the sounds of a table overturning and chairs breaking burst through the door.

  “What the fuck!” Alaric barked in naked frustration.

  “I mean you no harm,” a familiar sweet, innocent voice said, and my stomach lurched. I’d hoped I’d never have to hear that voice again. “You can bleed me, but not before I talk to my daughter. Cassandra Saélihn is my daughter.”

  Jezebel was here.

  We hurried into our clothes, and Reys yanked open the bedroom door.

  My eyes burning with hatred, I stared at the woman who had locked me in a cage for over a decade, tormented me with the nastiest spells, and then attempted to dismember me with her vampires.

  Lorcan reached Jezebel, pinned by Hector and Raine
r and held immobile by Pluto’s power. The High Lord of Night grabbed her by the throat and lifted her into the air, rage and revenge brimming in his stormy eyes. “You have the nerve to come here after how you mistreated my mate,” he snarled. “We’ll tear you limb from limb after we torture you first.”

  Murderous intent flashed in all my mates’ eyes. Alaric and Pyrder had never met her, but they’d heard about what she’d done to me.

  They stepped before me, forming a solid wall, their flaming swords materializing in their white-knuckled hands.

  “Break her spine first, then torture her slowly,” Alaric said.

  The innocent, pleading look in Jezebel’s big blue eyes vanished. She threw her hands out, power pouring out of her and breaking Lorcan’s grip. She landed on the ground with the bruises on her throat already fading.

  All of my mates lunged at her, but Jezebel spun, blue light and wind twirling around her and forming a protective circle.

  “Please,” she said. “I don’t bear any ill intention. I just want to warn my daughter of what’s coming.”

  She’d never had such power before. And she could even use her magic in Hell.

  But Hell was my realm now. I tossed dark fire toward her, my death fire wrestling with her blue light and wind until it encaged her.

  “Hello, Jezebel,” I purred, peeking at her through the space between Reys’s and Pyrder’s legs. “Whose pawn and spy are you this time?”

  “None,” she said. “Please, Cassandra, just hear me out. It won’t be long, and I don’t expect to get out of here alive.”

  “Then say your last piece, wench,” Alaric said. “If we don’t like what we hear, you’ll die a slow, painful death today.”

  I tried to push through between the twins, but they wouldn’t budge, especially Reys. He’d seen what she’d done to me.

  “It’s okay,” I said. “She can’t hurt me anymore. My hell power has bound her.”

  “You’ll stay behind us, dulcis,” Lorcan said, forming another layer to the wall in front of me.