Empire of Storms (Throne of Glass #5)(108)

Aelin eyed his throat, his glorious body, and the face she had once so fiercely hated. And she wondered if it were possible to love someone enough to die from it. If it were possible to love someone enough that time and distance and death were of no concern. “Am I limited to your neck?”

Rowan’s eyes flared, and his answering thrust was answer enough.

They moved together, undulating like the sea before them, and when Rowan roared her name again into the star-flecked black, Aelin hoped the gods themselves heard it and knew their days were now numbered.





39


Rowan didn’t know whether to be amused, thrilled, or slightly terrified that he’d been blessed with a queen and lover who had so little care for public decency. He’d taken her three times on that beach—twice in the sand, then a third out in the warm waters. And yet his very blood was still electrified. And yet he still wanted more.

They’d swum into the shallows to wash off the sand crusted on them, but Aelin had wrapped her legs around his waist, kissed his neck, then licked his ear the way he’d nibbled hers, and he was buried in her again. She knew why he needed the contact, why he’d needed to taste her on his tongue, and then with the rest of his body. She’d needed the same.

He still needed it. When they’d finished after that first time, he’d been left reeling, to pull his sanity back together after the joining that had … unleashed him. Broken and remade him. His magic had been a song, and she had been…

He’d never had anything like her. Everything he’d given her, she’d given right back to him. And when she had bit him during that second coupling in the sand … His magic had left six nearby palm trees in splinters as he’d climaxed hard enough that he thought his body would shatter.

But once they were finished, when she’d actually made to walk back to Skull’s Bay in nothing but her flames, he’d given her his shirt and belt. Which did little to cover her up, especially those beautiful legs, but at least it was less likely to start a riot.

Barely, though. And it’d be obvious what they’d done on that beach the moment they stepped within scenting range of anyone with a preternatural sense of smell.

He’d marked her—richer than the scent that had clung to her before. Marked her deep and true, and there was no undoing it, no washing it away. She’d claimed him, and he’d claimed her, and he knew she was well aware of what that claiming meant—just as he knew … He knew it had been a choice on her part. A final decision regarding the matter of who would be in her royal bed.

He would try to live up to that honor—try to find some way to prove he deserved it. That she hadn’t bet on the wrong horse. Somehow. He’d earn it. Even with so little to offer beyond his own magic and heart.

But he also knew his queen. And knew that despite the enormity of what they’d done, Aelin had also kept him on that beach to avoid the others. Avoid answering their questions and demands. But he made it one foot inside the Ocean Rose, saw the light in Aedion’s room, and knew their friends would not be so easily deterred.

Indeed, Aelin was scowling up at the light—though worry quickly replaced it as she remembered the shifter who had been so thoroughly unconscious. Her bare feet were silent on the stairs and hallway as she hurried for the room, not bothering to knock before flinging open the door.

Rowan loosed a sharp breath, trying to draw up his magic to cool the fire still in his blood. To calm the instincts roaring and raging at him. Not to take her—but to eliminate any other threat.

A dangerous time, for any Fae male, when they first took a lover. Worse, when it meant something more.

Dorian and Aedion sat in the two armchairs before the darkened fireplace, arms crossed.

And her cousin’s face went pale with what might have been terror as he scented Aelin—the markings both seen and invisible on them.

Lysandra sat in bed, face drawn but eyes narrowed at the queen. It was the shifter who purred, “Enjoy your ride?”

Aedion didn’t dare move and was giving Dorian a warning look to do the same. Rowan bit down against the rage at the sight of other males near his queen, reminding himself that they were his friends, but—

That primal rage stumbled as he felt Aelin’s shuddering relief upon finding the shifter mostly healed and lucid. But his queen only shrugged. “Isn’t that all these Fae males are good for?”

Rowan raised his brows, chuckling as he debated reminding her how she’d begged him throughout, how she’d said words like please, and oh, gods, and then a few extra pleases thrown in for good measure. He’d enjoy wringing those rarely seen manners from her again.

Aelin shot him a glare, daring him to say it. And despite just having her, despite the fact that he could still taste her, Rowan knew that whenever they found their bed again, she would not get the rest she wanted. Color stained Aelin’s cheeks, as if she saw his plans unfold, but she lifted the amulet from around her neck, dropped it onto the lowlying table between Aedion and Dorian, and said, “I learned that this was the third Wyrdkey when I was still in Wendlyn.”

Silence.

Then, as if she hadn’t shattered any sense of safety they still possessed, Aelin withdrew the mangled Eye of Elena from her pack, chucked it once in the air, and jerked her chin at the King of Adarlan. “I think it’s time you met your ancestor.”