Page 165 of Promise of Darkness
Pleasure softens my fierce prince’s face. He captures my mouth with a swift kiss. “I forget what it’s like to be with you. You give me hope.”
I can feel the heated press of his desire against me. “That’s not all I give you. Clearly. I won’t be able to walk tomorrow.”
Thiago rolls over me, sinking between my thighs and resting his elbows beside my shoulders. “Were you planning on going somewhere? I was intending not to leave this bed for at least five days.”
“Then I definitely won’t be able to walk.”
He kisses the side of my jaw, his stubble prickling me. “I’ll carry you.”
A laugh escapes me, and I cup his jaw. This is what happiness is. The laughter eases as I stare into his eyes and realize the days are running out. That infernal clock in my head is ticking ever closer to the Samhain rites, when I’ll have to face my mother again.
I don’t want to let this moment go.
I want to bathe in it until the shadows of the future can’t touch me. I want to drink it in and use it as my shield against the coming confrontation.
I want a moment to remember, a moment that will brand itself on my skin until nothing can make me forget it.
“Kiss me,” I demand.
“As you wish,” he breathes, leaning in for a long, heated kiss.
And for the next few hours he makes me forget it all.
The curse. The approaching deadline. My mother’s wrath.
Only this exists.
Only us.
Only this promise of darkness.
41
Days pass. Then a week.
We spend the nights buried in each other’s arms, trying to ignore the tick of the clock. The days are given to courtly business. Angharad may have been driven back at Mistmere, but she’s out there somewhere, and Thiago is determined to find her. He sent an entire warband to clear the ruins and they returned yesterday, smiling with victory.
So far, there’s been no word of the Erlking, though the full moon has not yet come again, and, judging from how quiet Blaedwyn seems to be, I suspect he’s busy.
We argue about how to trap him again, and whether the Alliance should be alerted. But the Alliance seems to be shattered, my mother’s connection to Angharad making us wary. And the other queens may use the information to strike a cruel blow, rather than as the warning it should be.
With Thiago’s mind busy, I give myself over to the idea of breaking the curse. I know Thiago’s last hope lies in his faith that this time will be different, but I can’t accept that.
My mother’s stolen him from metwelvetimes.
I don’t want to make it thirteen.
Seven days until the rites, and I can feel the panic in my touch when I haul him into bed at night. At six days, I bury my nails in his back and make such marks they’re still there the next day. At five days, I tear the library apart, looking for answers. I still have Kyrian’s grimoire, but I’ve been through it a thousand times, and there’s nothing but lore about the Old Ones and black magic.
And then the morning of the third day from the rites dawns, and the moment I wake, I know thishasto be the day I find an answer.
Or else, all is lost.
I can hear Thiago arguing with Baylor in the stables as I hurry along the bridge that leads to the library. Most of the words are muted, but I can hear enough to know they’re arguing about Mistmere and the forthcoming rites.
I don’t want to speak of them anymore.
I am done with dwelling on my mother and her curse. I need a solution.
