Fevered: A Reverse Harem Fantasy Romance (The Carnal Court Book 1) Read online

  Verys takes Brae’s place so effortlessly, I don’t even miss a step. I can’t help but notice the ways in which he touches me differently. His fingers are careful, like I’m fragile. And yet, when he looks at me, it’s not like something broken or soft. It’s with a longing that steals my breath and almost makes me stumble. I want to kiss him and see what his eyes will do then and what he’ll do with that longing if I give him permission.

  Aeric steps into the dance with equal ease, and again the energy of the dance shifts. His hands are possessive, holding me tight against his body so I can feel absolutely all of him. So close that I can’t see his face. His lips are at my temple, and they don’t move, though I want them to. I want to tilt my face upwards and see the hunger that I know is there. God, what is happening to me? I don’t look, because I know that if I do something is going to break open inside me, and I don’t know if I’m ready. How can you ever be ready for this?

  Aeric hesitates before passing me to Kent, but he does it. And we’re not as smooth together, two humans dancing among the fae. The music has caught him too, and he smiles, just as overcome with joy as I am. Soon we’re spinning in circles, practically abandoning the dance, the melody carrying our steps together. I fit with Kent. I’ve always fit with him. Dancing with him feels comfortable and safe, while at once stirring to life those fantasies I’ve had of him—of us—in the back of my shop.

  The music swirls and hit a crescendo before ending, echoing up into the ceiling. I come out of the trance I’ve been in, catching my breath, and realize that we were the only ones still dancing. How long had it been like that? Was I the only one with all four of them? But the Court is clapping and smiling. Across the room I see Kaya grinning, and Merina, beside her, winks at me.

  It’s a habit long ingrained in me, I curtsy in the ballet style. I’m not embarrassed. This is what I love, and I’m glad they enjoyed it, even if I barely remember what the dance was or how it went. I’ll probably never know.

  Kent smiles at me. “Maybe we could count this as the party I was supposed to take you to.”

  “I’d like that,” I say.

  He walks me back to our table, and the pain overwhelms me for a moment. I hadn’t felt it the entire evening, like joy and conversation were somehow a barrier to it coming back, but it slithers out from its dormant hiding spot, clinging to my bones and rendering me still for a moment. Gripping the back of my chair is the only thing that keeps me upright.

  Verys is next to me a second. “Perhaps we should retire.”

  The energy that the music poured into me is gone, and exhaustion is creeping in. Too many sleepless nights on the run, too much magic taking its toll on my body. “Yes.”

  Our guide from earlier appears at the Rialoia’s summons, and we follow him to the rooms that have been prepared in the palace. We each have our own, all clustered together. We stop as one at my door, and I have to face them all looking with concern. “Do you need help?” Verys asks softly, and I’m not sure if he’s asking about getting dressed or if I need another dose of pleasurable magic, but I’m fine.

  “No,” I say, looking at each of them. If Kaya were here, she might be yelling at me to invite them inside. And yet I’m not ready for that yet. Not like this. “Thank you for dancing with me,” I say. “That’s the most fun I’ve had in a long time.”

  No one but Kent knows about my ballet history, and none of them know that I’m talking about well before the attack. But they don’t have to know that now. I turn towards the door and Kent calls after me. “Goodnight, Kari.”

  “Goodnight.”

  I close the door softly behind me, and I hear a few murmured words between the men before the shutting of more doors. It only takes me a few moments to take off the beautiful dress and change into one of the simple silk nightgowns that have been left for me. My energy is slipping away, and I barely make it under the covers before I’m pulled under into deep, bottomless sleep.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  ________

  KARI

  Hands tear me open. Pale, female hands with nails like talons. I scream, fighting against the pain, but I can’t. It rips through me, shattering whatever I have left to fight with. Crimson light is pulsing under my chest and I can’t breathe.

  She found me. I don’t know how she found me. I’m surrounded by darkness, the only light coming from my chest in a ghastly parody of a lantern. I manage to bring my hands to my chest, and it’s whole. There are no gashes, no other hands, no wounds, and yet I can’t stop screaming because I feel them. My skin is hot. I’m burning.

  All I can taste is ash and rotten and death. In and out reminding me that she’s here to kill me. That she won’t stop until I’m dead.

  A booming sound shocks through me, and a low voice cursing. There’s weight on top of me, a face lit by crimson and I scramble to get away. “Kari.”

  That’s not her. It’s not her voice.

  “Kari, look at me.”

  I can’t look. How can I look when I can’t see? Can’t breathe?

  Hands grip the sides of my face. “Kari, breathe. Look at me. Please.” The desperation snaps my eyes to his. Aeric. It’s Aeric. “I need you to say yes.”

  No, I shake my head. I won’t say yes to this pain. Never to this pain. Not while I have any life left. She won’t take me.

  Aeric’s lips are at my ear, the words sinking through me. I can hear. I can understand. “Focus as much as you can, Kari. Listen to me. You need magic. I need to touch you. I need your consent.”

  Oh. Oh. Yes.

  New pain erupts from that invisible wound, licking down my spine, binding every bone with ruby fire. The pain is fighting him, trying to take me first. He’s still speaking to me, telling me what I need. I can let him if I can find my voice. It’s somewhere here still. It has to be. “Yes.”

  I hear myself, voice hoarse from screaming and weak from pain, but I said the word.

  Magic flows into me, a wave of cool and refreshing power. It’s sharp with spices—cinnamon and cardamom and nutmeg. It crushes the taste of rotten and ash, soothing as it flows. Dampening her power. But it’s not gone. The magic feels like a cool breeze flowing through trees, and I realize that I’m thinking. I can think, the curse deep inside newly drawn to Aeric’s magic instead of my body. But not for long. It’s already restless.

  Aeric’s weight is still on me, pinning me to the bed as his magic pours from his soul into mine. “Say yes again,” his voice is deeper this time. A command.

  “Yes,” I breathe.

  His lips are on my skin then, pressing a kiss to my collarbone. His face is no longer lit with the light of infernal magic, but rather with his own, hands glowing as he drags them down my body. There’s nothing but the thinnest nightgown separating us, and then there’s nothing at all as he shoves it up below my breasts. Need rises to meet his touch on my skin, leaving me utterly breathless. His magic follows the path of his lips, settling low in my gut and adding to my arousal.

  Aeric pushes my thighs apart. My heart is pounding with anticipation. I want this. I want that fire and hunger that I’ve seen in his eyes. I want him to show me how it feels.

  There’s a brush of a kiss on my clit, and my body shudders with desire. It was so light I think I may have imagined it. But it doesn’t matter. I need more.

  “Say yes,” Aeric says. There’s no doubt about what he’s about to do. Save me. Pleasure me. Devour me.

  “Yes.” It’s more a moan than a word now.

  I don’t have time to breathe before his mouth is on me, and I want to scream again. This time for an entirely different reason. Aeric is licking me outside and his magic is doing the same from the inside, growing and sparking and cascading through me, already starting to banish that pain as if it never existed. His hands slide under my hips, drawing me closer to his mouth so he can ravage me with lips and teeth and tongue.

  My pussy is soaked, and he’s lapping me up like I’m the best drink there is, not giving my body a chance to
question this pleasure or back away from it. It’s perfect, sinful, gorgeous. Magic spins outward, flinging itself into every corner of me. I’m dragged through devastating pleasure, vision going white.

  The climax takes me fast. Dizzying ecstasy coiling up and out and twisting through me again and again. I arch off the bed, shaking and spent from power and bliss. I’m bathed in the energy of new magic created by the pleasure Aeric is gifting me with. I can feel it pushing back the curse until it’s nothing. Little more than a pinprick in my gut.

  Just like with Brae, it feels like becoming someone new when I’m released from the hold of the dark magic. I collapse back onto the bed, panting. Fuck, yes. I should have told them it was coming back. I should have never let it get to this point, where I could barely speak.

  I expect Aeric to pull back, but he doesn’t.

  “Aeric—” his name turns into a moan on my lips as he flicks his tongue across my clit once again. His touch isn’t forceful now. It’s teasing and light, but just as arousing. He’s moving over me, brushing his lips over my thighs. Little bites and licks, surprising me each time in a new place. Lips closed, he kisses that tiny bud of nerves, featherlight. I can feel his breath on my skin, and even that small sensation leaves me aching.

  Aeric licks me, tongue slipping inside, and I let out a moan. It feels so good—slick and deeply intimate. He presses further, harder, consuming me, stroking inside, fucking me with his mouth. It’s too much all at once and I’ll also never have enough.

  Reaching down, I weave my fingers into that perfect hair, and Aeric grabs my wrists. In a second he has them pinned at my sides while he licks up my pussy back to my clit. I’m anchored to him, pulled against him, held still while he pleasures me, and I shiver.

  There’s a new burst of wetness, of arousal, and he laps that up too before sealing his mouth over me, sucking fiercely. Aeric’s tongue works my clit in sure, long strokes. Over and over, the motion taking me a little higher with each delicious movement. Cool magic pours into me again, and my eyes fall closed.

  I’ve never felt anything like this. Pleasure that’s sharp like a knife, carrying me along the edge of orgasm but never pushing me over. I’m drowning in it, writhing under his mouth. Everything I do now is to try to get that little extra bit of pleasure. I beg him for it, force my hips closer to his tongue, try to pry my wrists out of his grasp so I can do it myself, and nothing works. He just continues that slow, steady teasing of my clit until I relax, surrendering to it and to him.

  My orgasm rolls in like a tide this time. Slow, sure, and steady. My breath comes in gasps, and my whole body going tense when Aeric’s teeth brush across my clit. Once, again, and a third time has me falling into the depths of pleasure. It washes over me in waves, threatening to pull me away. I might let it happen.

  I’m shaking, unable to do anything but let it have me. It goes on for what feels like forever, the ecstasy and magic splashing up and through, one feeding the other and back again.

  Aeric doesn’t stop, using that infernal mouth to guide me through it and keep the pleasure going until I’m limp and gasping. Only then does he release me, still pressing kisses to the insides of my thighs. I’m glad that it’s dark, so he can’t see the way I’m blushing. It’s been a long time since I’ve let anyone taste me, and I would have told him he didn’t have to—that his hand would have worked just fine—had I been able to truly speak.

  Light forms around us in a hazy cloud, pale and soft and dim. Just enough so that I can see him clearly, and he can see me. He’s looking down at me now, not hiding the fact that he’s taking me in. I imagine what I must look like for him—nightgown bunched up under my breasts, legs wantonly spread, pussy wet from his tongue.

  The fire in his dark eyes makes me wish he hadn’t stopped. That his mouth was still on me, tongue still inside me, making me come again and again. Instead, he kisses me on the mouth, hard body lowering to cover mine.

  I can taste myself on his lips, rich and sweet. Aeric sweeps his tongue across mine, plunging deeper to take the kiss that he wants. Yes. Everything in me surges to meet him. I’m wet again and my nipples ache with need.

  His hands find mine again, interlacing our fingers and raising them up so they’re above my head. The way he’s pressed up against me, I can feel how hard he is. He did want this. He might want more. But maybe not. I’ll take whatever he wants to give.

  “Thank you,” I say when he pulls back for a moment.

  “You’re welcome.” I feel the words in my gut.

  I swallow, looking up at him. I’m trying to decipher the look on his face. It’s unreadable. So I speak first. “You could have done less. Just the basics. Brae used his hand, and it worked just as well.”

  He raises an eyebrow, half of his mouth tipping into a lazy smile. “And why would I want to do that?” He kisses me long and slow, enough that my temperature rises, and I curl my legs around his hips. I’m practically begging for more. “You taste like sugar,” he murmurs. “And roses. I’ve been dying to taste you.”

  “You wanted to?” I need to be sure.

  He looks at me, and I realize that he doesn’t have a shirt on. I was too lost in my own pleasure to see that before. But in this pool of light he’s created I explore him with my eyes. Perfect chest and shoulders that I want to touch and trace—if he weren’t pinning me to the bed. I try to move my hands, but he doesn’t let me, intentionally gripping my wrists and keeping them there. “That and more,” he says.

  My heart skips a beat. “Are you just trying to save my life?”

  Aeric slowly shakes his head, leaning down to press his lips to the bare skin of my shoulder.

  “Do you want me because Brae had me first? Or do you want me?”

  Aeric moves his hips, pressing his cock harder against me so I can feel it. Nothing but the thin fabric of his trousers separates us, and the pressure sends tingling sparks through me. His mouth slips up my neck, leaving a trail of shivers behind it, all the way to my ear where he can whisper. “This is not the way I would have chosen,” he says, voice soft and fervent. “But I want you like I’ve wanted no other woman. And I have finished ignoring fate.”

  I’m not sure what that means, but my anxiety eases. He wants me. I can feel the truth of it in his body and in his gaze. “Okay,” I say. “Thank you for helping me. I feel…wonderful.”

  “I sincerely hope it is not the last time,” he says, kissing me. It’s a claiming kiss. Rough and deep. So thorough that it feels like a brand. I will never forget this kiss, and Aeric knows that. He presses further, until I forget where I am, and my own name. Words. I need the words.

  Stay with me. Give me more. Take me. Fuck me. Where’s my voice? “You can stay,” I whisper.

  “You need rest. Recovery,” Aeric says, voice low.

  The sound I make is needy. I don’t want him to go. “I feel much better now.”

  He laughs, the vibrations in his chest rolling through me. “You might not if I stay. I would not stop,” he whispers against my lips, “until you had no voice left with which to scream.” Molten heat sinks straight to my core. God, yes. Please. “It would be worth it,” I say.

  “Yes, it would. Goodnight, Kari.” With a final press of his lips on mine he’s gone, the door shutting quietly behind him.

  “Goodnight,” I say to the empty air, the glow around me fading and the feel of his lips on mine still vivid in my mind. How in the hell am I going to be able to sleep now?

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  ________

  KARI

  In the morning I discover what I hadn’t noticed last night—I’ve been given real clothes. Supple pants and shirts that seem sturdy and fit perfectly. They’re a shade of deep forest green. I have no doubt that these are the clothes that Kaya was talking about making. As much as I loved the dress she made, it feels amazing to be wearing something closer to normal.

  I’m not nearly as exposed, and if we’re attacked again, I feel like I might be able to help. I can sense
the magic in the fabric, even though I can’t grasp the details. There are wards here.

  Of course, after I told them what happened, she would weave protection into the clothing. I really hope I have the chance to thank her. Or see her again at all. Merina too. They were lovely, and in better circumstances I could see us being fast friends.

  There’s a bag as well, and I pack the spare clothes in it, as well as that little shimmering box that they gave me. It’s not the box that makes me flush; it’s the memory of last night and Aeric. It’s enough to warm me and even consider the possibility of seeking him out this morning.

  I put the flimsy nightgown in my bag too. If there’s a chance that I can use it again, I’m going to.

  There’s a soft knock at my door, and I answer it. The Rialoia of the Crystal Court stands there, wearing clothes that seem out of place for a ruler. She’s wearing something almost like my new clothes. Very casual and comfortable, though hers are a vivid blue that reminds me of pictures of the Caribbean. “I trust I did not wake you?”

  “No, Rialoia.”

  “You may call me Nissa,” she says, smiling. “I came to accompany you to the temple. Your companions have already been informed.”

  Right. She asked if she could see my attacker. And after last night, I’m inclined to agree. The more people know about her, the better. “Of course.”

  I leave the bag and follow her. We walk through twisting hallways of white stone, and there are so many that I don’t remember which way is up or down. I was right though, the palace is a completely new experience in the daylight. The jeweled windows cast patterns on walls, creating images with light. Some are stories, history, and some are just beautiful.