Page 51 of The Barbaric Fae's Soul

It was an awkward press of lips on lips at first, but I knew that wouldn’t be enough to create a bond—or break the one I’d made and strengthened with Aev already.

So I parted my lips, and slipped my tongue into his mouth.

Teris kissed me back, but the motions were just… polite. There was no feeling behind it. It was the awkward motion of mouth on mouth and lips on lips, without any passion, or desire.

A minute passed before I finally felt the bond start to shift—and I was already pulling back from Teris when Aev tugged me away, pulling me into his arms and holding me tightly to him.

His chest was heaving, his bright eyes burning into mine as he held me tightly, gripping me in his arms.

Though I itched to press my lips to his, to replace the feel of Teris’s mouth on mine with a real kiss that would make me warm and happy, I knew I couldn’t.

So I just hugged him back, tightly.

“Let me know when you’re ready for that fight,” Teris told Aev. Our new bond had changed his scent slightly, making him smell more appealing, so I could tell by the change in smell when he walked away.

Aev made no effort to release me—and I didn’t ask him to.

A few minutes passed before his breathing finally started slowing to its normal pace.

“I’m sorry,” I told him again, my voice quiet.

“Don’t apologize for doing what felt right,” he murmured back, his voice straining a little. “I may not like it, but I do understand. And now, I would like to talk about those rules.”

“Okay.” I bit my lip. “I’m not sure where we can go. Your tent is dripping, and my house is…”Not a house yet.“Do you think some of the other guys would help build it? We can’t wait until I have the time to do it myself. I don’t want to bother anyone, but we need somewhere to go, now that it’s the rainy season and all. I’ll be fine with the magic not feeling completely like my own if it means somewhere dry to sleep.”

Aev looked up at the trees.

A male fae leapt smoothly from a branch far over our head, and then landed lightly on his feet. Two more followed.

“We’ll grab more help and meet you there,” one of the men said. I vaguely recognized him, but didn’t have a name to go with the face.

“That’s okay, we don’t need anything big,” I said quickly.

My protest was ignored, and all three men headed off in different directions.

Thirteen

Aev pulledme onto his back as he shifted, and I wrapped my arms around his neck, burying my fingers in his fur as I pressed my face to his warmth. The contact was soothing, and he still smelled nice, even without the added level of whatever the bond provided that had made him smell extra good to me.

He smoothly made his way through the trees, heading directly to the platform I’d created. It was on one of the far edges of the fae land, not on the seelie or unseelie side, but somewhere between the two. I hadn’t wanted to claim either group as mine—and I still didn’t want to, even though Summer kept trying to convince me to join the unseelies.

When he landed on my platform, I lifted my head from his fur and looked around with wide eyes.

There were already fae around us—nearly two dozen men.

We really didn’t need that many, I thought, but didn’t say it aloud.

Most of them were kneeling down with their palms on the smooth stone platform, and their eyes closed. It was already a few feet bigger on every side than it had been the last time I was there, and the tree branches above our heads seemed to be shifting.

The one man who wasn’t kneeling strode over to us, wearing a friendly grin. Aev shifted forms, wrapping his arm around my waist. The gesture was possessive, but in the best way.

The fae nodded at Aev, but looked at me when he asked, “What do you want it to look like?”

I glanced to the side as another handful of men arrived. We had to be up to nearly thirty of them—some were in the trees, at that point, not fitting on the platform even though it was still growing rapidly.

“Uh… walls and a roof? I’m not picky.”

“Give Firo permission and he’ll make you something that doesn’t even resemble a house, Thorns,” Aev warned me, his voice light.

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