by A. K. Koonce
“You shifted, didn’t you?”
“In a small magic-fearing community like this? Never.” He shakes his blond head very adamantly.
“Lies.”
Beautiful, cruel amusement shines in his eyes.
“I got the blueprints you wanted.” Chaos interrupts, handing Sinister a crumpled and folded sheet of paper.
Sinister’s crimson eyes get an excited sort of look when he unfolds it and peers down on the straight, calculated lines of a ship.
“Perfect,” he whispers.
I tilt my head at him, my brows lowering to try to understand why he’s so obsessed with these blueprints. He’s so focused, his gaze shifting quickly over the details on the paper. It’s like I’m watching him absorb the information, and honestly, it’s strange but intriguing.
With a wave of his hand, the stacks of round logs slice themselves like soft bread. They lay in precise stacks on top of one another, and before I can even speak, he’s waved his slender fingers once more, instructing his powerful magic without a word.
Those boards clatter against one another. The freshly sliced boards cut themselves into defined angles, bending, curving just how they need to with the assistance of unseen magic. One swoops up into the air, and I stumble back against Chaos’ chest as it sails past. The floating boards dance around us, coming together here and there, nailing themselves into place while Sinister just examines the paper in his hands, his finger skimming along a little detail here only to flick his wrist and the lumber around us fall into place just as it would if several men spent days building what he’s building right before my eyes.
I’m too stunned to even speak. Until a massive ship on support beams rests in the center of the woods. A mile away from the sea. Just spanning several hundred feet like a goddess herself tossed the thing down here.
I swallow. Sinister glances at me. Rime and Chaos glance at each other, a pleased smirk resting on their lips.
“You guys can’t just toss a ship into the woods like this. This isn’t at all how things work here.”
“Why, because we finished a job in an hour instead of a week?”
“No. Because they have no way of getting this thing to the sea, Sinister.” I hiss his name at him, and he doesn’t even flinch. The fear I have crawling through my chest isn’t at all a worry for him.
“Then I’ll throw it into the sea, too. We’ll build the Prince’s ships in a few hours, spend some more quality time with your mom,” he pauses to give a wink that has me rolling my eyes instantly, “and then we’ll…”
“We’ll what?” The quiet whisper slips from me. I don’t know why I’m waiting for him to finish that statement. Maybe because I have no idea what comes after that. I want to leave this place but I have no idea where to go.
And a part of me wishes Sinister could just name a place and we’d go. Whatever place falls from his lips, that’s where we’ll go, and that’s where we’ll stay.
And life will be perfect.
But I know that’s not how this works. I’ve spent five years roaming around this kingdom. There isn’t anywhere. There isn’t anywhere in existence where my life will be normal.
Safe.
Except for that little beam of hope Ellise gave me.
Attika.
She was so adamant that Attika was the answer. That I could build a life there, and people like me, mages like me, we’d be safe there in the quiet kingdom.
My gaze drifts down to the angry scar lining my arm.
I have to find her. Maybe not to ride off into the sunset with her, but I have to know what she knows. She found me for a reason. I know she did. And she’s been a drifter for twice as long as I have. If there’s an alternative option for me, she’s the source to ask.
“Look, I don’t know. We’ll do what we’re going to do here, and then whatever happens after that, we’ll be together.” Sinister’s bright eyes shine with intensity as he stares at me, cutting off my thoughts with the sweet sincerity in his gaze.
I feel that look sink right into me.
“Okay.” I breathe the simple word out, and Chaos’ arms wrap around me from behind the moment I speak.
“Okay?” Rime repeats, arching a pale brow at me.
“For now, just…unbuild this monstrosity. Don’t draw attention to yourselves. It’s…not good here. Being different is dangerous here. Let’s work late tonight. Tonight, we’ll set up this structure again down at the shore when everyone’s asleep.” At least then it’ll seem like it took these men twenty-four hours. That’s better than throwing this shit together in ten seconds and pretending like magic had no hand in it.
A sigh slips from my lips, and all three men look at me with a cocky smirk.
Rime pulls me against his side, his arm slipping above Chaos’ as they hold me. “It’ll be fine, Tamer. Let us take care of this.” His lips brush along my outer ear, his words breathing warmth against my skin.
It’ll be fine. He’s right. It’ll be fine.
Unless these people gather up some pitchforks and run our asses out of town before we can fulfill my promise to the Prince of Minden.
Seven
Past and Present
“Well, that took ten seconds. Now what?” Sinister glances past Rime to look at me.
Sometime around three in the morning, a demon magically dropped a full naval ship into the sea while all the villagers slept blissfully unaware. He’s not wrong, it took less than half a minute for the boards to bend and weave into the beautiful structure floating before me.
“Do it again, we need several of these,” Rime whispers in a bored tone.
“No.” I hiss turning so fast that my dress wraps around my legs with the cool night breeze. “What part of inconspicuous don’t you guys understand? Did you see the way Brenton eyed you when he saw all that perfectly cut lumber?”
The workers and my own father’s eyes were so wide, and he’d looked fearful when he’d gazed at me. He’s always worried. Always so damn worried about me.
And he should be. I’m swanking around here with an entourage of magical men who have never had to lie low a single day in their lives. And Rime, Rime doesn’t understand it. I can’t tell Rime to play it normal when the man barely has a grasp for what normal is. Normal to Rime is brooding silence. Extra brooding if he’s really putting a good effort into it.
The less and less silence he clings to, the more and more I love him.
Right now, I wouldn’t mind just a touch of silence, though. Just the smallest, beastly smidgen of silence.
Is that too much to ask?
“Fuck Brenton.” Rime growls the words out, his arms folding across his chest, and Chaos’ lips pull at one corner with a half-smile at the sound of his friend’s words.
“No. Not fuck Brenton. Fuck us if they wake up to a floating fleet of demon magic and chase us out of here. Or worse. They know what Sinister is. They’re just hoping he passes through without causing trouble. Being a demon isn’t a crime. But fear of those who are different will always bring out the worst in people. They fear him. Just like they fear me. And it’s only a matter of time before something bad rises from that fear.”
Chaos’ pretty gaze softens the moment my desperate words quiet. With one big step, he pulls me hard against his chest. My tired eyes close for only a moment, and I let him hold me, let him dissolve some of that rising anxiety in me. His strength gives me the illusion that every little thing in my life will be okay.
If only he knew all the little things I push aside in my memories.
In my life, I’ve been accused once or twice, but it’s never escalated to something bigger. Sure, being burned at the stake sounds a little…big. Ish. But if those villagers had paused to alert the authorities, my life could have been over. My mother always told me about the two girls she’d grown up with. In Warf, there were three mages who were all friends. One was a beautiful and enchanting mage. King Barren himself oversaw the young woman’s death sentence. Somehow, they bled her out wi
th something more powerful than simple magic. As a young girl, I was told the bedtime story of how this woman died a slow and bleeding death until her magic as well as her soul disappeared just as Barren saw fit.
The other friend ran, choosing a life of solitude rather than death. I’m told she was a distant relative of the Solstice Queen, but that’s all I know of her.
My sweet mother, she pretends her magic doesn’t exist at all. She chooses to pretend she isn’t who she was truly born to be just to keep her life. A beautiful part of my mother lies dormant and dead inside.
King Barren may have only murdered one woman, but he killed them all in a way.
And that, that is what keeps me careful.
“I’ve seen the looks. She has to be cautious, Rime.” Chaos glances toward the ice dragon, and his calming words don’t do a thing to change the hard, glaring look in the shifter’s frosty gaze.
I know how Rime would solve a problem if anything bad were to happen here. And violence is probably not the solution… Yet.
“So, I’ll wait until tomorrow night and do another. And another. Each night until there’s enough, Yeah? It won’t take long. We just have to be patient.” Sinister nods as he tries to reason with Rime. Pale-blue eyes slowly shift toward Sin with a look of total frustration. The demon and the ice shifter might be friends, but they’re worlds apart. Sinister has the patience of a saint. Our relationship alone is a shining example. He waited for me. More than that.
He saved me all those times I thought I was drowning in the life I’d made.
And he’s still here, doing everything in his power to help me after all these years.
“Fine. Let’s get some sleep, and we’ll do this all over again tomorrow night.” Rime turns to leave, but my palm against his biceps stops him in his tracks.
“Actually, we still need to stain it with a fresh coat.”
I extend an old rag to him, and his quiet gaze drops to the towel. His lips part, but his hand doesn’t lift to take the thing.
“You literally have magic, Arlow.” His voice never raises. It’s an even tone of repressed exasperation, but the tone never reaches or trembles the way a normal person’s would.
“I-I like it. I like staining. And painting.” And cooking. Anything to work with my hands really. I guess it’s how I was raised.
His pale eyes narrow on me, studying my features as if he’s seeing me for the first time all over again.
That’s a lie, I suppose. The first time this sweet fucktile laid eyes on me, he looked like he was annoyed with me from the very start. Now that I know him, I think he was intrigued. He’s just really good at hiding it.
His fingers drag over mine, touching me more than is necessary, not that I’m complaining. The rag slips away, but his index finger trails down my palm ever so slowly. Rime makes the smallest touch feel sensual. He pulls away all too soon.
“This is like a date then?” Chaos’ voice holds an excited tone to it.
“Just like a date.” I nod to him, and his perfect smile only grows.
“This is not a date. This is very much free labor, don’t let her fool you.” Rime’s gaze shines with amusement, his lips never lifting into a full smile.
But he does get to work.
An hour passes in the night, and the four of us barely cover the front half of the fresh wood in the deep-cherry stain. Chaos and Rime whisper together a few yards away on the dock, while Sinister and I stand on the flat roof of the steam rooms. I watch them as Chaos gets a mischievous glint in his eyes before he throws the saturated towel with a slick slapping sound, covering the front of the ice shifter’s shirt with that deep brass color. Rime and every single muscle in his body tenses the moment the rag hits him. Rime’s head tilts down ever so slowly at the splattering stain on his white shirt. He seems to be trying to decide if that actually just fucking happened or not. He lifts his quiet attention, and that dangerous look rakes up and down the other shifter’s body, and Chaos only clings to his cocky smirk. Rime stalks toward him. Chaos never backs down. They meet each other, eye to eye. Challenging looks and tense posture hold in place.
I swear if they start fighting right now and destroy this ship, I’ll make them actually use axes tomorrow as punishment.
And then Rime fists the collar of the teasing shifter, pulling him closer and pressing his messy shirt into Chaos’. His lips skim slowly against Chaos’ as punishment. The taunting smirks gradually drift away when big hands push through pale-blond locks. Their bodies align just right, hips rocking as the two of them kiss so passionately it’s like a fight for control. Rime pulls back with a heavy breath, both of them leaning close, their mouths brushing while they gaze at one another with a different, softer gleam in their eyes.
“Is it strange to see the men you love, love one another?” Sinister watches them slowly pull apart.
His question has a hint of rasp to it that tingles over me.
Rime and Chaos get back to work, but their bodies brush here and there with nearly every move they make.
“It isn’t. It’s…natural? Sweet?”
“Sexy?” Sinister adds with a knowing smirk.
The breathiness of his voice is still doing dirty things to my body.
“Definitely sexy.” I nod.
“So it’s easy to watch because it turns you on?”
I shift as his low timber describes what I’m feeling. It’s so much more than that, but I have no idea how to describe it. The cold rag holds my attention. I twist it and unfurl it while I try to explain it to him.
“Maybe it seems strange, but it comforts me to know they’re close. I think we forget sometimes how much we subconsciously want the best for the people we love. You want them to have support in their life. Structure. Friendship. Love.” My gaze lifts to his slowly, and he abandons his rag entirely to the rooftop as he watches me. “I like that they have that and more. Our relationship between all of us is different, I know.” My stomach twists and I wonder what he’s thinking. Does he hate me for the relationship I have with him as well as them?
“What do you think about it?” I finally ask. My heart pounds so loudly in my ears as the span of three seconds passes before he replies.
He leans forward with a quiet whisper, the warm scent of cinnamon filling my lungs when he’s nearer.
“I just thought it turned you on the way it turned me on, love.”
Soft lips press to mine over and over and over again. Long fingers thread through my hair, and the feel of his chest against mine makes me realize how hard it is for him not to cover me completely with the strength of his body.
His tongue flicks slowly along mine, and I barely get to relax into the feel of the building energy coiling low in my core when a voice yells over to us, “Date night is really sexy and all, but we don’t have time for fucking. There’s another three hundred feet of ship left to stain, Dog-boy.”
At the sound of Rime’s sweet condescension, Sinister’s lips smile against mine. A beat passes before he pulls slowly away. Crimson eyes hold mine for several seconds, his dark hair brushing my forehead while he just breathes me in for a small moment.
“Did you say Chaos and Rime kissing turned you on?” I ask quietly with a smile.
His smirk pulls wider as his lips part without words. Dark lashes line his bright eyes, and it takes him longer than I expected to answer that teasing question.
“Not them specifically.” Another pause and another wolfish grin. “I just take things visually, I suppose. It isn’t them kissing that turns me on. It’s the hunger of it all. It could be Kain kissing Chaos, and it’d have the same effect.”
“Well, don’t hold your breath on that one.”
“It’s just people, I mean. Sure, it helps if they’re attractive.”
Sinister’s taunting friendship with Rime fills my mind.
“Is Rime attractive to you?” That has me hanging on his response like it’s the only thing in the world that’s giving me life right now.
�
��You are so far off base, you have no idea, Arrie.”
“Then tell me. Please. Explain in very descriptive details for me.” We’re still whispering close, never allowing more than half an inch to press between our lips.
“I’m not attracted to Rime. I am aware that he is attractive. I understand the attraction, the physical appeal of his features, muscle tone, the way he holds himself, and fuck is he hostile when he’s protective, and I get that women like that shit, but really, it’s like that for me with everyone I meet. I understand the allure of beautiful qualities. Like the darkness of your blue eyes. Or the perfect curve of your lower lip. Don’t even get me started on your other fucking curves, love.” A breath hits his lungs like it pains him when glances down at my breasts pressed against chest. “I understand all that. But it doesn’t really commute in my mind until it’s all physical.”
My brows pull low as he explains that he doesn’t really see beauty like the rest of the world.
“What makes someone attractive then?”
“The way someone shows desire. The way Rime kisses Chaos like their bodies are magnetic is blatant desire. The way you used to hesitate and think through so much before you simply touched me. You built up the sparking feeling inside my chest before ever laying a hand on me. It’s fucking torturous but it’s something that I can’t even explain that I love. You knew it could hurt us both in the end and yet just feeling my skin against yours was more important. The way you took care of me when I was cursed. The way you took care of so many creatures just because they needed you and they had no one else.” His words tumble out so fast before halting abruptly, his mouth making slow work of kissing me once again. Then he whispers against my lips. “That’s attractive, Arrie.” Another brush of his lips over mine, my lashes fluttering to remain open.
My chest aches both from want and from all the things he just said to me.
The cracking dip of my whisper stings my throat when I finally reply. “We lost so much time because of Kreedence.” We lost ourselves. I lean my head on his shoulder, and his palm slides along my neck, holding me and stroking my skin, making me shiver with every slow move of his hand.
