Storm Princess 3: The Princess Must Reign

by Jaymin Eve

  “Yes.”

  “Good.” He turns back to the horizon for another long moment. “What about your brother and Jordan? Elise too?”

  I leave my post, carefully covering the distance to his side. “Yes, yes, and yes.”

  “What about—”

  I interrupt him. “Baelen.”

  “Yes?”

  I bite my bottom lip, reaching up to brush my thumb across his jawbone. A tiny leaf was stuck where he slept on it. “You missed a spot. Right here.”

  He remains perfectly still.

  I brush my fingers across his lips. “And here too.”

  He doesn’t shift but his breathing increases, washing across my fingertips when his lips part.

  I say, “You gave me the time I needed with my family. Now I need time with you.” I allow my fingers to drop to the curve where his neck meets his shoulders, running my hand down his arm and pulling it around my waist.

  He responds by drawing me closer, his gaze falling to the ribbon in my hair. Cautiously, he slides it loose, careful not to tug as he loosens my braid, allowing my hair to float around me in the breeze. He folds the ribbon into his fist but a smile breaks across my face as I decide it’s time to set that ribbon free. The last time we stood on this cliff, the wind stole my ribbon out of his hand. That was the moment I raced after him to tell him I loved him, only to be struck by lightning that turned me into the Storm Princess.

  I capture his hand, easing the ribbon out of it. Then I let it go, watching it twist and turn in the wind, disappearing into the blue sky.

  “There,” I say. “Not stolen this time. Given.”

  He matches my smile with one of his own, his full lips taking on curves that make my heart miss a beat.

  I reach up on my tiptoes, very slowly, and whisper, “Baelen Rath, may I have your permission?”

  With a fierce growl, he tightens both arms around me, pulling me flush against him. His kiss is more intensely demanding than it’s ever been before. I respond with a ferocity of my own, arching up against him, sliding my hands into his wet hair, every part of my body responding to his. My skin tingles from the top of my head to my toes and my breathing becomes erratic. I can’t get enough of his mouth on mine.

  He growls at me when I separate from our kiss. “Come back.”

  But his breath hitches when I slide off my jacket and pull my top over my head, abandoning both on the ground. I’m wearing underwear but it’s an elven bra that reveals more than it conceals. I crash back into him, all of me burning.

  I smile against his mouth as I kiss him again. “It’s been a week.”

  His muscles flex around me as he hesitates, pausing, taking a deep breath, creating a small gap between us. “We don’t have to rush this. You’ve been through a lot.”

  “So have you…” I kiss his jawline because unless he dips his head, that’s as far as I can reach. My heart rate is slowing, because Baelen and I still need to have a conversation about Grayson. “Baelen… I… About what you saw…”

  He stops me with a kiss, a gentle one that demands nothing in return. Then he draws back to give me a serious smile. “You bound yourself to me.”

  I bite my lip, a half-smile forming and fading, not sure what he’s thinking. “I did.”

  An answering smile breaks across his face. A grin, actually. The first today. “Then nothing else matters.”

  My heart expands. I rise up as far as I can, drawing his face down to me so I can kiss each corner of his smiling mouth, tasting his skin with my tongue, sensing his body respond to mine.

  I inhale his sigh. “Baelen Rath, thank you for being so protective of me, but I don’t want to wait.”

  His response is a slow ignition of lightning around his torso as his burning gaze zeros in on mine. Above us, storm clouds gather in the sky, forming out of nowhere, darkening the cliff face. My eyes widen as the clouds descend, stopping fifty feet above us where they curve and seal to the rock face, creating a cloak over the space at the top of the cliff. Within moments, Baelen drops us into darkness, our own safe cocoon, lit by a gentle spider web of lightning flickering inside the clouds.

  His grin turns into a lazy smile at my amazement. “Come here, Marbella Mercy.”

  My lips meet his and each of my heartstones bursts into life, making me feel like time is slowing down around us. Baelen lifts me up against him but he doesn’t carry me inside the cave—only to its entrance where the blanket rests. I should take a breath but I can’t stop kissing him. Or dragging my clothes off. Or tugging off his clothing. He slows us down, beats of time to kiss me everywhere: on my lips, my neck, my stomach, my thighs. Spreading the blanket across the ground, he draws me down to lie beside him.

  By the time he’s done touching me, I’m glowing. Everywhere.

  He leans over me, his lips caressing mine before he pulls me upward again so I’m straddling him. When our bodies join, time stretches. I have no idea whether it’s been moments or hours. I’m not afraid of the lightning that sparks between us or the glow from my heartstones that reaches out to meet it, the two powers winding into each other like a lattice that settles over our bodies as we move together.

  Even though we’re as close as we can get, I want more of him. I inhale the scent of his skin, the storm, and the condensation in the air, and drown in the intensity in his eyes as he reads my reactions. I tip my head back as he winds his hands in my hair and strokes its waves all the way to my lower back. Raindrops fall from the clouds and glide across his broad shoulders, down his hard chest. Moisture drips down my cheeks and arms, making my skin glisten.

  The lattice of power around us glows brighter as the intensity builds, my breathing goes wild, but still I want more. More of him. More of the storm. More of… my storm.

  I gasp as the lattice of storm and heartstone power contracts around us, sealing hard against our bodies, binding us together.

  “Baelen!”

  To my astonishment, he smiles. “Let go, baby. Don’t be scared.”

  He kisses my mouth and I grip his shoulders as powerful sensation builds inside me, shivers racing up and down my spine. I hold on tight, knowing I have to let go of my control, that I have to trust him. I crash against him, meeting his movements, abandoning my fear as a bright spark builds between us, a ray of light expanding and growing.

  At the last moment, right before I lose control, Baelen closes his eyes. When he opens them again, they’re full of lightning, full of storm. He flattens one palm across my heart, the other against my temple.

  He whispers, “Yours.”

  He lets go and my world explodes.

  Lightning pours from his body into mine. I scream and cry, soaking it up, drinking it in, absorbing the storm while every other part of me splinters into a thousand rocketing sensations. I fall into his arms as we shudder and tremble. We may as well have survived an earthquake, we’re both shaking so hard. All we can do is wait for it to ease. I slide my arms around him, dropping my head into the crook of his neck, wanting to find my voice, wanting to speak, but I don’t know how right now.

  He strokes my back, his big arms gentle and calm. “Marbella, baby. Tell me you’re okay.”

  “I’m okay,” I whisper into his neck. “Are you okay?”

  “Very.”

  “Did I… just get my storm power back?”

  His vocal chords rumble against my forehead. “Why don’t you try it and see?”

  Without shifting my position, still snuggled against him, I lift my hand to examine my fingers, the back of my hand, my forearm. Lightning prickles under my skin and tiny sapphire pulses flicker along my fingers. Its familiar crackling reaches my ears before I shut it off. I exhale my amazement. “Did you know that was going to happen?”

  “I suspected it might. Everything was different in the deep springs, but this is where you got your power. It’s right that you should get it back here.”

  I sigh into his neck, nuzzling his ear only to find that my hair tangles in his bristles. “It
’s time to shave this beard off, Baelen Rath. You don’t need it anymore.”

  I sense his jaw shift as he smiles. “Okay, Marbella, but first…”

  He lifts me up, muscles bunching, keeping my legs wrapped around him. A fat raindrop lands on my cheek a moment before he says, “Look up.”

  I tip my head back. A gentle rain shower patters down around us, rinsing the sweat off our bodies. I squeak as the river of water runs toward our clothing, but Baelen laughs. “Don’t worry, they’ll dry.” He lowers me to my feet, letting the warm water wash over both of us, following it with his hands, making me sigh all over again.

  I ask, “How did you get so good at this?”

  He raises an eyebrow at me. “Good at what?”

  I blush. “I mean controlling the storm.”

  “Practice.” He grins, water droplets running down his face as the rain shower eases. He shakes his head, splattering rain drops across the space between us, making me laugh. “Lightning is your strength, rain is mine.”

  Acid rain.

  I lean into him. “I want to try something… Do you remember when you were asleep? We combined our power without realizing.”

  “I remember.” The depths in his eyes pull me in. “I waited a long time for you to call me.”

  I entwine my fingers in his, closing my eyes, listening for his heartbeat like I used to. I sense the connection almost straight away. Sooner than I expect, his whisper reaches me as if from a distance, a rumbling laugh drawing me back to myself. “I don’t think we’re doing our clothing any favors.”

  I open my eyes. Crimson raindrops rise upward from our bodies, lifting into the cloud cover: raindrops in reverse. One of them loses altitude, drops to the rocky cliff, and sizzles right next to my jacket. I break the contact with an “Oops.” Baelen might be able to dry our clothes off but it would take a miracle to sew them back together.

  He pulls me close, brushing the hair out of my face. He exhales a long sigh. “Do you really think we have a week before the elves attack?”

  “I do. Grayson is unpredictable, volatile sometimes, but when he gives his word, he keeps it.” Sometimes for the worse.

  “Okay, then. I’ll reduce the patrols. Keep everyone rested.”

  It’s my turn to take a deep breath. “There’s something I need to do now that I have my storm power back. Senturi told me that my future depends on it.”

  “Yes?”

  “I need to see Elyria.”

  22

  Before we leave Rath land, we head back to the house to let everyone know where we’re going and to pack supplies in case we’re gone longer than expected. I consider testing out my new storm skills to fly to Elyria’s location, but only the Phoenix knows where she and Jasper are. After I call the firebird to me, we detour down the border where Baelen points out our defenses from his position sitting behind me, arms wrapped around my waist.

  I’m impressed to find that most of the outposts aren’t visible from the sky—which means they will be even less detectable from the ground. I remember the day we came across Llion after we rescued Talia: he’d camouflaged himself against the rock so we didn’t know he was there until he chose to reveal himself. Male gargoyles are particularly good at blending in to their surroundings. When Baelen points at the fifth invisible outpost, I squint back at him. “How do you know it’s really there?”

  His answer is to drop a tantalizing kiss on the side of my neck. He seems to be enjoying the fact that I’m snuggling up against him right now. He’s definitely a lot more relaxed now that he believes we have a week before we go to war. “Ask the Phoenix to take us down. I’ll show you.”

  The Phoenix circles a few times, finally locating a place to set down on a precipice at the top of a ravine. The firebird hops impatiently from side to side as if it’s standing on hot potatoes until Baelen and I slide from its back. Then it rapidly returns to the air. I’m not sure what all that was about until the ground shifts beneath my feet.

  “Whoa!” What I thought was solid rock isn’t rock. Instinctively, I harness the breeze around me, lifting myself and Baelen up and away from the surface.

  He seems pleased that I moved him instead of the other way around. “Look at you,” he says. “Taking a crash course in flying.”

  “It’s about time,” I growl, circling the structure and trying to find an opening, because one step on it told me that I was standing on a building, not a rock face. Baelen circles around with me, clearly amused at my bewilderment. He glides in close, slipping an arm around my waist. “You won’t see them until they want to be seen.”

  I clear my throat, peering at the structure that blends seamlessly into the cliff. There is a small platform on one side of it that I choose to descend to, finding my feet on what is actual rock. “They’re watching us right now, aren’t they?”

  Baelen makes a smooth landing right behind me. “Yep.”

  I straighten, attempting to appear as regal as I can. I am their Queen after all. Even if the way Baelen creeps up behind me and nuzzles my ear before stepping back again makes it look like he’s the one in charge. Hmm. If he keeps dropping kisses on my neck like that…

  The rock-like structure shifts. A male strides from an opening that quickly closes after two other gargoyles appear close behind him. He’s beaming at me.

  “Badenoch!” I hug him before he can take a knee. “Don’t worry about all the Supreme Incorruptible stuff. I’m honored to see you safe and sound.”

  He grins at me. He’s an older male who holds his wings in such a way that they always move fluidly with him.

  He says, “I’d like to introduce my son and daughter. They will fight with us.”

  Badenoch’s wife died soon after she was forced into Howl’s Harem. Badenoch told me his children were living in an orphanage. He’d gone to find them after the fight with Howl in Crimson Court. Two teenagers step up on either side of him. His son is a younger version of him but without the pale scars crossing his chest. His daughter is gorgeous and no doubt takes after her mother with mahogany hair and brown eyes shot through with silver flecks.

  I’m surprised. “Somehow, I pictured your children younger.”

  They smile back at me good-naturedly and bow their heads. “Supreme Incorruptible, we honor you.”

  “I am honored to meet both of you.”

  They show me inside what they call a ‘cavern’ and introduce me to the thirty other gargoyles inside.

  “It’s sort of like a mini Cavity,” Badenoch explains, showing me how the building is painted to look like the rocks around it and covered in strong, protective material that Talia has used her deep magic to conform and meld into the surroundings. I’m really happy this means that Talia is testing out her powers. I haven’t seen her since Grayson caught her on the cliff top.

  Badenoch shows me the openings in the base and top of the structure and the gazillion arrows stockpiled at one end. “If the enemy travels by foot through the ravine below us, we will use these openings to fire on them from above. If they fly over us, we will use the upper openings to shoot them out of the sky.” He reveals one basket of five arrows that are all gold-tipped with shimmer beetle husks. “These are only for a dire emergency.”

  These arrows can slice through any armor, even cut through a gargoyle’s wings. They will bring down the most heavily protected foe but the danger is that the weapon will fall into the enemy’s hands and be used against the gargoyles.

  “Only if absolutely necessary,” I say, thanking Badenoch again.

  Taking to the air with the Phoenix once more, two hours pass before we soar toward the north-western corner of Erador, the firebird’s steady wings propelling us around Mount Denrock and toward a lush, green mountain beyond it. Baelen rides behind me, arms wrapped around me, his head resting against my shoulder. He’s very quiet, relaxed. Somewhere along the way, I discover that he has fallen asleep and I don’t want to wake him.

  The Phoenix has been mostly quiet until now, but it sings in
to my mind: It’s lucky that you came back when you did. Baelen Rath was a burning candle with no wax left.

  You were checking up on him?

  He called me to help find you. I flew over Erawind many times looking for you but you were hidden from everyone. So were Elise and your Storm Command. Baelen did not sleep. Not even a Storm Prince can survive without sleep for a week.

  I pull Baelen’s arms closer around me, enjoying his trusting weight against my back. I’m determined that he will sleep in a proper bed tonight.

  I ask the Phoenix, What else did you see when you flew over Erawind?

  An army, Princess. Not only of elves, but of winged stallions, griffins, and giant eagles.

  During the trials for my hand, the Elven Command had called on magical creatures to fly the champions to Scepter Peak for the first trial. Now they will use those creatures against us.

  I say, The gargoyles won’t dominate the air like I hoped.

  I also saw cages filled with talon crows and pens of shadow panthers, the firebird replies. It will be a fierce battle in the air as well as on the ground.

  I say, We need to protect the deep springs at all costs. I won’t let our world collapse.

  The Phoenix’s voice is a gentle admonishment as it asks, Have you told Baelen what the Elven Commanders intend to do?

  Guilt rushes through me. I haven’t told him about the Commander’s plans to ascend and destroy the springs. I consider waking him up since our current location is probably one of the most private places we could be, but his deep breathing stops me. He needs to sleep.

  I will tell him as soon as I can.

  Very well. We are nearly there. The Phoenix circles over a valley nestled between two hills. From up here, I can just make out a cabin at the base of the valley next to a lake, but it’s the waterfall at the far end that catches my eye. From the air, the rushing water sparkles like diamonds. I imagine this is like the place Erit built for Indira—the beautiful valley she didn’t want to leave.

  The Phoenix lands beside the lake, several hundred paces from the cabin. I’m very reluctant to wake Baelen, but the firebird rustles its wings and it’s enough to cause him to raise his head. I swing to face him, careful not to kick him in the process. “We’re here.”