Page 65 of Courting the Fae Captain
“Wait!” my father called out. “Have mercy on your father.” He looked at my mother, pleading. “On your husband. Did I not take care of you? Keep you safe?”
“Safe?” she said, the voice ripping from her lungs with a vengeance. “You beat me, caged me, manipulated and gaslit me until I didn’t know my own worth and questioned my own sanity.” Tears filled her eyes, but she took a confident step forward. “You condemned me to that prison when I finally tried to break free and speak up. You took my daughter from me. Mercy?” She laughed, cold and mirthless. “You don’t know the meaning of the word. The pain you’re about to feel is but a fraction of the horrors you put me and countless others through. You deserve so much worse for what you’ve done. This death? Thisismercy.”
She stepped forward and sank the blade into my father’s chest with a fierce cry. Lorelia took one look at her, then at her husband, and followed suit. Portia stood back, pure satisfaction and feminine rage glittering in her dark eyes as she watched. And then Raithe moved with cold calculation as he sliced his blade across the lion’s stomach slowly, watching as the male’s innards uncoiled to the ground.
The males’ screams echoed off the walls, which suddenly appeared to be moving. I blinked as countless moths spiralled out of cracks and crevices, their wings rustling like the turning pages of a book. Gold glittered in every direction, the faces of a hundred skulls staring at me from the moths’ backs.I held a finger out and marvelled as one landed on it, its wings flexing and its antennas twitching as it moved gently. They were a symbol of death and mortality—a reminder of the fragile lifecycle we lived through. But to me, in this moment, they represented balance.
They were the closing of a chapter and the promise of a new one. They were not death. We were. These females, my mate … and me. Raithe finished the lion, then walked to my side. He intertwined blood-soaked fingers in mine, standing in silent solidarity as we watched the females before us.
The males weren’t the ones screaming anymore. Just the females as they sliced again and again, their battle roars and mournful cries more cutting than any blade. The bodies had long ceased moving, but I didn’t move an inch as they did what they had to do.
Raithe and I watched as the moths swarmed. We watched until the females turned around, covered in blood and gore. They each dropped their weapons to the ground.
“It’s over,” Portia said slowly, almost like she couldn’t believe it. “It’s done.”
“What do we do now?” Lorelia said softly.
“Now comes the healing,” I replied as I squeezed Raithe’s hand. “Now we get to live.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
‘There is no greater gift than love. It heals even the deepest of scars. It gives us hope when all is lost. But I didn’t lose today, I won. I found a family, and I found my future. That’s all I’ll ever need.
Journal excerpt, Aeris Lockhart
The sun’s rays streamed in through the floor-to-ceiling glass windows, painting the room in a halo of buttery light. I yawned, stretching my arms before nestling deeper against the warm body beside me.An arm wrapped around my ribs, tugging me closer as Raithe roused from his sleep. I smiled and pressed a kiss to the anchor tattoo over his forearm. It had been a week since we’d overthrown the Pentad, and Raithe had claimed the castle as its next lord. The battle had been short-lived once the soldiers received word that their master was dead. They had thrown down their arms afterthat and surrendered. They got to keep their lives, but Raithe sent them packing all the same.
As for the surviving males who’d come to see us die as mere entertainment? They remained under lock and key in the cells below the castle proper, but Raithe would have to let them go eventually. While they were despicable, wretched creatures who thrived off the pain and suffering of others, they hadn’t directly harmed anyone. It would be a little too suspicious if any more blood were shed under the captain’s orders. It would be seen as a coup for power over the entire court. As for their wives and families? Akira, Sherai, and Imighthave sent missives in the mail detailing all their extracurricular activities.
Most of the females from the past Rites had returned home to their families. Raithe had supplied provisions and protection for all on their journey home. Some remained, still healing from their wounds or receiving care that would better prepare them to rejoin the outside world. Others simply stayed because they had nowhere to go or no idea how to get there.We would house all of those who needed shelter for as long as they needed.
We.The thought was still so alien, so new. I wasn’t just Aeris, daughter of Lord Lockhart, Merchant Mariner, anymore. I was the lady of Castle Cliffscote, even though I’d insisted on leaving the title off. Raithe wasn’t having any of it, and I secretly loved him for that. Loved that he didn’t want to place me on a pedestal, but instead ensured that we remained equal, side-by-side in all things.
“What’s going through that beautiful mind of yours?” Raithe said sleepily.
“Just thinking about you, actually.”
He curled my hair around his hand, playing absentmindedly with the golden strands. “Ominous,” he teased. “And what conclusion have you come to?”
I turned so I could see his beautiful face. The light gilded the planes of his cheeks and the striking cut of his jaw. The way the blue in his eyes turned a light shade of cerulean when the sun hit them just right.
“I’m thinking that I love you, and I can’t wait to spend the rest of my life with you.” I pressed a kiss to his forehead. “I’m thinking I want to know every part of you.” A kiss to his cheek. “I want to explore the world with you.” A kiss to his other one. “And I want to live every moment, knowing you will be by my side.”
He kissed me on the lips, long and deep and achingly perfect. When he pulled away, he held my cheeks, then slid a hand down over my heart above the thin silk of my nightdress. “You hold in your heart my every intention and my utter devotion. I am yours until the end of time and beyond. I love you, Aeris. It was only ever you. It will always only ever be you.”
Tears sprang to my eyes as his thumb brushed my cheek. I had never dared hope for such a love. Such an adventure as the one he promised me. “Show me,” I said on a breath. “Show me your devotion.”
His delicious mouth curved into a deadly grin, and he said seductively, “As my captain commands.”
The hand over my heart slid down to cup my breast, my nipple pebbling as he ran a gentle thumb over it before he shifted and took it in his mouth. I moaned as he sucked and nipped, then laughed as he grabbed me and pressed me flat against the silky navy sheets.
“Hands up, baby,” he whispered into my ear as he led a trail of kisses down my neck. I arched my back at the touch, then giggled again as he slipped the nightgown up my body. Which simplyhadto get stuck over my head, didn’t it? I huffed as it finally tugged free and fluffed my hair. But I stilled at the utterly free laugh that escaped him, at the joy lighting up Raithe’seyes. “There,” he said after he’d tossed the nightgown across the room.“All mine to satisfy and surrender to.”
“But you’re doing such a good job,”I teased as I opened my legs. I wasn’t wearing any panties, and his eyes darkened as he drank me in.“I want you, Raithe. I want all of you with no holding back.”
“And you’ll have me,” he said as he lowered his head. “Right after I have my morning meal.” With that, his shadows grabbed my wrists and ankles and stretched me out until I was all but suspended at his mercy. Then he was upon me, all lips and teeth and sweet, blessed heat as his mouth closed over my pussy and he began to feast.
I writhed, barely able to lean into him as his shadows turned me over and stretched me deliciously tight. His tongue lapped at my sensitive clit, circling and swirling until my nerves were zinging with pleasure. My body bent and arched, the silky sheets rubbing against my nipples only increasing my pleasure.I was coming undone and being reborn all at once as he devoured me. As he turned me over once again, his black tousled hair fell over his eyes, the muscles in his back rippling as he worked his tongue and lips on me. I moaned, fisting a handful of sheets as the pleasure built and built, threatening to overflow like a dam.
