“Mm. Okay. That…was actually good.”
“Was it?” I raised an eyebrow. “Not bitter?”
“No. Was it supposed to be?” She wrapped her lips around my fingers and sucked the other half of the gilly-fruit into her mouth in a manner that was admittedly making me feel as though I might need to claim her once more before the ceremony after all. “It’s really sweet, actually.”
“Good,” I said softly. “I am glad.”
I did not understand much about human pregnancies, but what I had gleaned from the other human females who had bred with Lunarians so far told me all I truly needed to know.
Swollen breasts as the milk ducts expanded, so the mother might nurse her cub.
An uneasy stomach and symptoms of nausea as the mother’s hormones shifted to prepare for childbirth.
And gilly-fruit, usually unappetizing to humans, suddenly turning sweet on their tongues when a Lunarian’s seed had taken in their womb.
“Let’s go then.” Atlanta took my hand and pulled me toward the door. “We wouldn’t want to keep your precious Lady Idria waiting, would we?”
“No. We would not.” But there was a smile on my lips as I placed the fruit bowl back on the table and allowed myself to be dragged along.
If it was Atlanta’s womb that Idria wanted, she would be waiting a long time.
In fact, she would be waiting for the rest of her short, awful little life.
A band played in the ballroom, traditional Lunarian harps and horns. Idria must have had them shipped in with the rest of the food and the decor for the wedding festivities. Certainly nothing like this had been available on Nightmoor previously. If it had been, I would have taken the chance to entertain Atlanta with my musical abilities. I could not carry much of a tune, no, but I could play a harp as fine as any minstrel could.
Perhaps when our cub was born, I would find one to pluck at while Atlanta rocked it to sleep.
“Apex…” Atlanta hesitated at the doors where I was to hand her off to Idria’s people. The thin-lipped, black-eyed Lunarian who had orchestrated this affair on Idria’s behalf waited just a few steps away, tapping his foot impatiently.
“Yes?”
“If this goes wrong…if you don’t succeed, or—”
“Shh.” I shook my head and gave her a smile. “Trust me, remember?”
“But if it doesn’t.” She looked down for a moment and bit her lip. “I love you. I just want you to know that.”
“And I you,” I returned quietly. It was unnecessary, but saying it made my cold, withered little heart flood with warmth and joy. “But do not worry. You will do well today, and I will not let you down.”
“I am waiting, Apex,” the Lunarian planner called out to us. “Hand the human over. We do not have all night.”
No, I thought as I watched her slip through the doors. You do not.
I took my place at Lieja’s side once Atlanta was gone. She brightened at my presence. A smile even found her lips as she twined her arm around mine. It was unusual to see her this happy, now that Idria was here at the palace. For too long, Lieja had enjoyed being the highest-ranking member at this farce of a court. But with Idria here, she was outranked handily.
Idria controlled Nightmoor. She was no queen—not yet—but she was free, whereas poor Lieja was a prisoner and always would be. I supposed her brief happiness had much to do with what Idria had promised her in exchange for the role that Lieja’s people had played in Atlanta’s kidnapping, and the kidnapping of so many others. But no matter what Idria gave Lieja, Lieja would still always be beneath Idria’s thumb. In Idria’s debt.
I did not envy her for it. It was a position I knew well myself.
“You look pleased, Apex,” Lieja commented with a girlish giggle. “And after I had worried so much that you would not like the way I asked Idria to make you a part of our little deal.”
“Your crown, your freedom, an alliance with Earth, Lunaria and Rutharia…and me. You are quite the negotiator, Your Highness. It seems that you are getting everything you could want.”
“The politics of it were inevitable.” Lieja preened. “But to claim Idria’s most valuable specter as my consort…mm. Yes. I have done well for myself, haven’t I?”
I stiffened as Lieja’s hand strayed from my arm to the lap of my trousers.
It was a blessing that this would not go on for much longer. I imagined Atlanta was tired of being passed around like an object, and I knew that I certainly was.
The musicians changed their tune to the Lunarian wedding march, a bombastic, joyous melody. At the head of the room, the Rutharian king stood cracking his knuckles and licking his lips. In anticipation for bedding his wife-to-be, perhaps—or perhaps he genuinely thought that I would allow him to have Atlanta as well.
These royals had no idea what fools they truly were for falling straight into my trap—but they would soon find out.
The doors to the ballroom were flung open by two Rutharian berserkers dressed in their finest armor. It was not saying much—even Rutharian finery was smeared black with ceremonial Rutharian blood. A hush fell over the crowd as Atlanta entered the ballroom. She leapt and twirled, throwing flowers that fluttered softly to the floor like fresh snow in her wake. She was a vision in white. Virginal. Pure.
And though I knew I had claimed that virginity myself, the effect was not lost on me. She was my goddess. My queen. Claimed by no one—no one but me.
Quickly, I ran the plan through my head once more. By now, knowing Ronan and Gallix, one of them had discovered that the chain connecting their collars to the wall in the dungeons could easily be pulled from its place. They had Atlanta to thank for that. I
