Chapter 95 Burned
❀ Maeve ❀
Body pliant and sated, I stretched like an eel in the slinky sheets. A stray sigh flowed from me here and there.
The only thing that could top this feeling was if we were bonded as we should be.
The curse of wrath arose in my mind, and I pushed the thought aside. I refused to dwell on issues I currently had no control over.
I turned onto my side, curious about my mate’s silence.
Nikolai lay on his side, one arm bent to balance his weight.
He’d been staring at me, lips twitching. Proud. Ego through the roof.
“Well?” he asked, voice rough from all the bellowing.
“Well what?” I returned, even though I knew exactly what he was asking.
The telltale burn of a furious blush spread over my skin.
Sometimes I hated how transparent I was.
He chuckled at the sight. “I think that answers the question.”
One large, perfectly toned arm stretched forward to scoop me closer.
Pressed flush against his chest, he wrapped an arm around me, his nose buried in my neck.
Bliss. Peace.
I clung to the mood like a rabid fox on a cut of meat, because I knew the calm always preceded the fall.
I took the fingers of his left hand in mine, playing with them, tracing the new growth.
“You’re finally healed. That must have been difficult, mentally. It was your sword arm.”
“Both my arms are my sword arms, love.”
“Right.” I kissed it anyway.
His body was warm, but noticeably less so than when we’d embraced in the ocean. And he hadn’t fed from me during our coupling.
My heart fell. Was he wary of catching the curse?
He’d said my exquisite blood was the only one he wanted.
Had he been feeding from others without my knowledge?
My stomach tightened with the all-too-familiar pangs of jealousy.
“Nikolai,”
I was squeezed tighter against him. “Mmh…”
He sounded drowsy.
“When’s the last time you fed?”
“Since you,” he said.
I blinked, feeling placated.
“That was days ago,” I insisted. I, on the other hand, preferred bloodmeal every twenty-four hours—
I froze.
How was I only just making this connection?
Was I even anemic? Had Gwen Till raised me on bloodmeal because she’d known I was a vampire?
The facts were too heavy to ignore. Too glaring to be untrue.
I sank into a black hole in my own mind, replaying every memory of my childhood in Blackbridge.
The isolation. The incessant hovering. Then the sudden freedom when I’d come of age.
Had she been worried someone would come looking for me?
If so, how had she even gotten a hold of me, since I wasn’t her daughter?
How had a mortal woman gotten close enough to the Wrathful Vampire Queen to steal her child?
My heart thudded.
I grasped Nikolai’s arms tighter against my chest.
He shifted until my back hit the bed and he hovered over me. “Your heart is racing. What bothers you?”
I stared at him, eyes wide, a horrible realization taking hold.
“N-nothing… I just…”
His gaze softened as he cupped my face. “Don’t lie to me.”
I melted, pouring my suspicions out.
“What if Lyssa abandoned me? And that’s how my mother—other mother, found me?” My voice broke as I spoke. “What if I wasn’t intended?”
His brows furrowed, jaw clenching. “Don’t say that.”
He pressed kisses to my nose, my eyes, my face, but I pushed at him, trying to sit up.
He didn’t let me.
I kept going. “No, really. Think about it. If this gets out, then Drusilla and everyone else would have a reason to deny me the throne.”
“The Crimson Stone chose you,” he said firmly. “It’s the highest authority, and no one on the face of this earth would dare go against your birthright.”
“Why?” I challenged. “It’s just a stone.”
No sooner had the words left my mouth than the mansion groaned, as if the very ground were quaking.
Ice slid down my spine. “Y-you get earthquakes here?” I whispered.
“No. Never speak against the Stone, Milaya. There’s more power at play than you understand.”
“I-I… should I apologize, or…?”
Shockingly, he burst into laughter. Then, “Not necessarily. Just be sure not to do it again.”
He maneuvered me back into our former position, my smaller body tucked into the bend of his.
My head rested on his arm, our legs intertwined, my hands clutching his like a child lost at sea.
Sentient stones. Lying mothers. A possible abandonment at birth.
It all kept getting darker and darker.
Worse, a memory surfaced again.
In the last blood-fog vision of Lyssa’s coronation, the crown had barbs.
I remembered the way blood had flowed down the former queen’s face when she removed it.
And how Lyssa’s scalp had bled when she’d donned it.
I shivered.
The crown was a thick gold band inlaid with shimmering crimson stones.
I would have to wear that. Have to feel that pain.
Resolute, I forced my racing thoughts to slow.
It would be a small price to pay for my freedom.
As queen, Nikolai wouldn’t be able to stop me from going on excursions, or even inviting a specific person into the kingdom.
At the thought of him, worry prickled my heart.
It had been months since I left with Nikolai.
Bastian would have found me by now if he wanted to.
Or was he trying—and failing?
I bit the inside of my cheek.
Jessica had said Veilmoor was overpopulated, and the castle and Nikolai’s mansion lay far from the city of the subjects.
My lycan mate would have to pass through thousands of wolf-hating vampires to reach me, secured by the most wolf-hating vampire of all—my crimson mate.
My head pounded.
“I can feel you plotting, worrying… yearning,” Nikolai’s deep voice rumbled. “You should be worrying about your training tomorrow.”
Grateful for the reminder, I swallowed and forced out a sigh.
The sooner I could trace, or be coronated, the sooner my problems would disappear.
A rare spark of excitement lit me.
Before long, I floated on the liminal edge of sleep—
and straight into a dream.
In it, the sun was high in the sky.
Birds sang. Creatures skittered.
I burst out of a cottage on my small legs, chasing a squirrel.
But when the sun touched my skin—
I began to burn.