Chapter 53 The Silver Captain pt4
I stare up at him wide-eyed and offended, but he doesn’t seem to care. As if nothing happened, he puts his hand back under my thighs and starts walking again. He’s taking me to my rooms, I realize.
I grumble against the gag, calling him every name I can think of, whether or not he can make sense of it.
“Sit still or I’ll throw you over my shoulder and carry you like I’m about to ravage you in your room.”
His tone is threatening, but it makes my body go hot all over. I hold my thighs together tightly as he walks through the castle. I don't say a word, not even when he starts climbing the staircase to my room.
When we get to the bedroom door, he kicks it open. He storms through Thorne’s area and kicks my door open too, before unceremoniously tossing me on my bed.
I spit my gag out and glare at him. “What the fuck, Zaries?”
“Where do you keep your clothes?” he grumbles, refusing to look at me.
I get my hands free and sit on my knees on my bed, ready to scream at him when I realize why he’s refusing to look at me. My breasts bounce as I move, and every single shift of my body makes Zaries’ face grow redder and redder.
“In the cupboard over there…” I point feebly, bringing the shawl back to my chest and covering my nakedness.
He finds my old cotton shift without much effort and returns to the bed. I expect him to hand it to me, but he climbs up on the bed behind me and starts unbuckling the rest of my armor and helping me out of my leathers.
He’s silent as he strips my ruined armor off. When I’m sitting completely exposed in front of him, he strokes his thick fingers down the melted skin on my back. I shiver as he caresses the scars from the dragon attack.
“Do you have any bandages in here?” he asks, his hands sliding to the wounds on my shoulders.
I nod, swallowing a lump in my throat as I reach to my bedside table and pull out my little bag of supplies.
Zaries rips it out of my hand and wets a clean rag. Without turning me around, he gingerly rubs the ointment against my skin, wiping away the blood with a gentle touch.
I can’t breathe right.
Every stroke of his hands on my nakedness leaves a streak of fire behind it. I feel my cheeks flush as he brushes the top of my breast, and then my ribs, the back of his hand slightly lifting the weight of my chest.
Heat blooms between my legs and I have to make a conscious effort not to sigh or moan as he tends to my wounds. I notice he stays behind me at all times, his eyes heavy and half closed. He’s trying not to look at me, trying not to see me for who I really am.
“Stay away from Steel, alright?” He strokes down my arm, marking the trail of poison and lightning scars left there from the maze. “I don’t trust him not to slit your throat if I’m not there to stop it.”
I nod mutely, trying to ignore the feel of his fingers skating on my skin.
His breathing comes in little desperate gasps as he helps me slip the shift over my shoulders.
Once covered, I turn to face him.
Zaries looks torn between lust and hatred. His skin is bright red and his brows are pinched together as he stares at me. “Tell me why you didn’t even try, Anara. Tell me why you did so well these last two days and yet you act dumb when facing me?”
“I didn’t act dumb, I thought we were having fun. Weren’t we?”
“Didn’t you want to win? Didn’t you want to cause me pain, to see me bleed as well?” he asks, snatching my wrists and pinning them in my lap.
“No!” I yell, trying to wrestle my hands away from him. “The last thing I’d ever want is to hurt you! I…I can’t do that. I refuse.”
He growls, yanking me so hard that I fly forward and hit his chest with my body, hard.
“You don’t get to be weak, Anara. You don’t get to make killing you easy for me. You fucking fight, do you hear me? You learn these gods’ damned powers and you don’t let anyone hold you back!” He pins me to his chest, glaring into my eyes furiously.
“Why not? You want to kill me so bad, why don’t you just do it?” I scream in his face.
Zaries growls, a low warning sound, before he shoves me down on the bed and pins me beneath his body.
“Because, when I kill you it will be hard for me. I despise seeing you hurt and watching you give up makes me fucking sick. So you will fight me or I’ll never let you die. Never let you redeem yourself! Do you understand me? You have to fight me, you have to make it hard and true, or I’ll never be able to…” His voice trails off, his eyes full of pain he can no longer disguise.
Tears burn my eyes as I stare up at him. I struggle beneath him, trying to push him off me, but he only presses in harder. Not only that, as I shift and beneath him, he winds up between my legs with my hands pinned above my head.
His own eyes mist over as he stares down at me in fury.
“You don’t understand how much I loved her, do you?” he asks, his voice weak.
I can only nod, trying not to feel my own hot tears.
“You two were everything to me, my only happiness. Knowing you were both going to be living in my castle after the wedding—” His words choke off, his fingers intertwining with mine above my head. “I loved her, Anara. I loved both of you, I—”
His body is hard between mine, the friction of just his leg before felt nothing like this. He’s lying between my legs, my thighs pressed to his hips, and all I can think about is leaning up and taking another kiss from him whether he likes it or not. I need him, need him in a way I don’t completely understand.
My body burns like it’s on fire, my mind begging me to rub against him, to entice him to do more. I close my eyes, trying to will these emotions away when I feel Zaries lay his whole weight on me. I feel his shuddering breath on my lips, feel his need growing between his legs just as my own builds for him.
Something is about to happen…something terrible, or wonderful, but either way—wrong. He isn’t mine. He was never meant to be mine.
So why can't I stop myself from wanting him this badly?
“What in the name of the goddess!” Maggie shouts shrilly, running into my room and grabbing Zaries by the armor, and yanking him off me with a strength I didn’t know the small woman could possess.
He flies up and crashes into my bedside table, crushing it.
“How dare you invade her room! How dare you impune her honor!” Maggie screams at him, wagging a finger in his face. “You filthy boy, nasty man!”
Shocked, I angle up on my elbows. I glance at Zaries, who looks just as bewildered as me, then down to my ruined table. My stomach drops out as I see the piles and piles of letters from Zaries to Elysandra littered all around him.
His gaze follows mine, and with trembling hands, he picks up a letter and stares at it. All softness, all care, disappears from his features as the realization sets in. “You have my letters to the princess?”
“Zaries, I can explain!”
He stands, body vibrating with emotion.
Face twisted with betrayal.
“Did…did you fucking do it on purpose, Anara? Did you let her die out of jealousy?” he hisses, gripping a letter with a white-knuckled grip.
“No, no! I would never! Please!” I crawl off the bed and reach for him, but he shoves me away.
“These were private, Anara. Meant only for my future wife. You having them…it’s like you’ve killed her all over again! They belonged to her! They belonged to my wife!” Fury rages through Zaries as he throws the letters in my face. “Maybe I should have let him fucking kill you!”
With a last, hate-filled glare, he shoves past Maggie and stalks out.
My knees give out and I sit heavily on the bed.
I had a taste of passion with Zaries. The briefest flash of what could’ve been.
And it was destroyed by our past, just like the friendship we once had.