The Cursed King by Abigail Owen

Chapter Twelve

“I guess that answers the question about if they are the true phoenixes,” someone in the room—Tovar, maybe—muttered.

Angelika swallowed, unable to draw her gaze away from the tattoo-like symbol now magically emblazoned on Airk’s hand as though it had always been part of him. Her mother used to draw that exact symbol, doodle it absentmindedly wherever she went. In the dirt, even, before paper and ink or pencil were readily available. The sign of Serefina’s dead mate, which had never shown on the back of her own neck because their bond hadn’t solidified before Pytheios had killed Zilant.

The same soul-deep sadness struck Angelika now at the sight of it. “Mama,” she whispered.

Gods, she hoped her parents had found each other at last in the afterlife.

“But which Amon is the one to follow?” someone else asked.

“The one you just pledged your oath to.” Airk’s low snarl of words pulled her gaze up to his face to find his eyes trained on her.

Only that couldn’t be right.

“But I’m not—” She swallowed again. Had she bound these people to a dormant phoenix…to a human who could do no more than talk people round to her way of thinking? “I’m not—”

This was a disaster.

Airk searched her gaze. “Breathe,” he whispered, just for her.

“I’m not—” She hadn’t meant to bind them to her in this way. Only check their loyalty so trust could be established. Not as ruler to subject. This wasn’t how this was supposed to happen.

Airk reached for her hand and placed it over his heart, the steady thump, thump, thump palpable against her palm. “Breathe,” he said again and inhaled. The same way she’d done to help calm his dragon.

The kindness of that simple act, from this man in particular, knocked her back to normal. She sucked in deep, let it out, then turned to Delilah. “Why do they bear my father’s mark?”

Delilah pursed her lips, then glanced to her husband, Alasdair, who tipped his head in what might have been a shrug or maybe more a, “You be the one to tell her.”

“Best guess…” Delilah said, “is it’s your mark.”

“But wouldn’t her mark be a combination of our father and mother?” Kasia asked.

Unlike human mates, who took on their mate’s mark at the back of their neck, phoenixes were known to meld the two family crests into a new pattern. They’d never gotten to see what the Amon and Hanyu crests would look like combined, but Kasia was right. Kasia’s mark was a blend of Brand’s and their parents’. Skylar, the same way with Ladon’s. And Meira’s, too, with Samael’s.

Mine should be a blend as well.

Delilah shrugged. “Magic is…mysterious.” Her lips tipped up. “Since her phoenix side is dormant, perhaps her only magical connection is with her father.”

Ouch.

With a wince, Angelika dropped her head forward, wishing her hair wasn’t still up in that damn braid crown so that she could use the fall of it to hide what those words did to her insides. The stark pain of losing her mother ripped through her all over again, leaving her heart beaten and bloody. She may look like her father, but her mother’s blood was in her, too. She knew it. But the longer she went without her, without powers, the further away her mother felt.

A gentle hand landed on the nape of her neck. Airk again.

She turned her head slightly, leaning into the pressure of his hold, trying to absorb his silent strength. Because, damn it all, she needed it right then. She hated that she did, and at the same time appreciated that small gesture more than she could say. If anything, she wanted to turn into him and bury her face in his chest. But she feared suddenly that he wouldn’t let her. Reject her in front of all these people and add to the sense that she was alone—truly alone—in this world.

She lifted her head slowly, careful not to dislodge his hand. “We should go.”

They’d already explained to her newly oath-bound followers the plan of going to the headquarters of the White Clan. The seat of the king.

“Actually.” Tovar stepped forward, breaking the circle around her finally, which almost gave her a reason to breathe easier. “I think you should send some of us ahead of you. Let us prepare them, get a feel for things, and turn some strategic allies to our side.”

“But—”

Skylar cut her off. “It’s a solid idea.”

Except she’d worked herself up to going. However, even she could see, sometimes, when caution was the better part of valor. “Very well.” She’d just…wait. Like always.

Her sisters all huffed visible sighs of relief, which made her lips tighten in the same instance that Airk’s hand did. He didn’t like their reaction, either? Funny. He probably would dislike this next part as much as her own flesh and blood would. “While we wait for word, I suggest we seek out other allies.”

“The Green Clan will never break with Pytheios,” Ladon warned. “Red and green have the longest running alliance of our kind.”

She waved that off. “I’m not talking about dragons.”

For the first time since performing the oath, she wanted to laugh, because every dragon shifter in the room’s expression turned dour. That sucking-on-lemons metaphor had never been so apt, because that was exactly what they looked like.

“We handle dragon problems internally,” Belyy said in a voice that brooked no compromise.

Angelika snorted. “Maybe if you’d gotten help from outside, you could have fixed all this centuries ago.”

Every dragon back went steel-rod straight at that, but she didn’t have time to coddle the shifters’ sensitive pride any longer. What she was suggesting was true, and they could use all the help they could get. Even if they got every dragon from all four clans—Black, Blue, Gold, and White—on the same side, Pytheios still had his witch. Rhiamon had proven to be his not-so-secret weapon and a hell of a lot more dangerous than any had dreamed.

“What kind of help?” Tavor asked, the first to let go of his vanity, though the lemon-sucking expression remained.

She looked to her sisters, a question in her eyes, knowing exactly what she was asking them to do. Because she would be doing the same.

Skylar could go speak with the rogue dragons in the colonies who’d kept her safe. Those men definitely had an axe to grind with the current leadership. Meira could speak with the gargoyles. As deliberately solitary and hidden as they were, they were the least likely to join this fight, but the answer to any question never asked would always be no.

They had to try.

Kasia had had their hellhound, Maul, for safety—their father reincarnate. He was gone now, so Kasia didn’t have anyone to ask, but Brand, who’d been a mercenary with connections before he became king, did. Look at Delilah and Alasdair.

Meanwhile, Angelika would go to the headquarters for the Federation of Packs, where the small pack of wolf shifters who’d given her shelter—who’d become her friends—now hid. If Pytheios won this war, they would never be safe, either. She hated it…putting more people she cared about at risk, but she had to ask.

Slowly, both Skylar and Meira nodded. Kasia, meanwhile, swung her gaze to Brand. “Hershel?” she questioned.

The towering King of the Gold Clan’s jaw worked, but he also gave a single, jerking nod. “I’ll ask.”

“Thank you,” Angelika said. Then turned to Delilah and Alasdair. “You have a stake in this, too, I’m afraid.”

A tiny frown pulled at Alasdair’s brows. “You’re referring to the red king’s witch?”

Delilah, however, closed her catlike eyes, seeming to focus, her mouth then compressing. “It’s worse than we thought,” she murmured to him.

Beyond a tiny twitch at the edge of his jaw, Alasdair didn’t visibly react. “How bad?”

“I can’t see her,” Delilah said, opening her eyes to look at her husband, still calm but something else, too. Worried. “I mean not at all. Nothing. As though she doesn’t exist.”

“So pretty damn bad,” he muttered.

“Kasia can fill you in,” Angelika said. She turned to the people who’d pledged their loyalty to her. “I’m not sure how long this is going to take me. You know what to do, here and elsewhere.”

Belyy and Tovar both nodded, though Tovar’s eyes remained trained on Airk when he did.

Right. Plan in place. Time to go. “Meira?”

She didn’t need to specify to her sister what she was asking. Meira simply walked over to the mirror she and their sisters had come through, igniting into flame as she walked.

“I can’t get you inside,” Meira said, speaking of the Federation’s home base. And she should know, as she was the one who’d sent Jedd and the rest of Angelika’s wolves there recently. “Only nearby. But they have sentries posted all around it. You head into the mountains southeast from where I send you, and they’ll pick you up eventually.”

And hopefully not kill them before they asked questions.

“I should—”

She shot Airk a glare. “If you say you should go alone, I’m leaving you here to wait for me.”

He stared at her long enough that a tiny bit of regret for snapping like that had her wrinkling her nose. She wasn’t a snapper. Not usually.

When he caught the small gesture, he shook his head. Though he didn’t smile, a spark of humor turned his eyes bluer. “I was going to suggest I stay here. I think the wolves would be more inclined to listen to you without a dragon around putting their fur up.”

“Oh.” His show of confidence in her also made her want to wrap her arms around him and kiss the man.

“We need a dragon representative,” she said. “And I need a bodyguard.”

He didn’t accept that right away, though, searching her expression. “Maybe someone who can shift—”

“No,” she cut him off. “You.”

“Why?” he asked.

Good question. The answer had mostly to do with suddenly feeling fairly certain that separation from him might kick off an anxiety attack. That was new. She’d never been prone to those, but already her chest was tightening.

She latched on to the first solid reason her brain could come up with. “Your story as someone directly impacted by Pytheios, but who still insists on fighting him anyway, is compelling. You’re also not part of the leadership that let things slip to this point.”

She leaned around him to look at the others. “No offense.” She straightened, paused, then leaned over again. “Actually, not sorry. That’s the truth. Now you’re doing something, though, so…good for you.”

She meant it kindly, but it came out more Skylar than her.

A choked sound from Airk might have been a laugh, but when she straightened again to look at him, his expression told her he was still on the fence. “Please,” she implored.

His gaze settled and blanked at the same time, but even so, she sensed steadiness more than anything. “I will come.”

Relief whooshed through her—way more than was probably warranted.

“Good.” She turned to Meira, and the reflection in the mirror changed, showing a narrow alleyway between pristine white plaster-sided buildings.

“The closest I can get you is the town of Victoria at the foothills of the mountains,” Meira said.

No one needed to question where they were going. The Federation didn’t bother hiding from other supernaturals the way they did from humans. For a little over a century now, the wolves had been headquartered in the Făgăraș Mountains, the southern part of the Carpathian range where it ran through Romania. Obviously, there were no mirrors in the forest, and Angelika would rather not use the reflection of a pond, which Meira could do if the day was still enough, and arrive wet, but…

“Is there no reflection inside the castle to use?” Angelika asked.

Meira shook her head. “They’ve covered all their mirrors since…me.”

In other words, Angelika’s wolves had shared Meira’s powers, and the wisely wary wolves took pains to keep them out.

“That does not bode well for us,” Airk muttered, apparently reaching the same conclusion.

Stretching her lips into a smile meant to project confidence took more effort than usual, thanks to more nerves fluttering in her gut. “I guess I’ll have to be extra persuasive.”

Another choked sound from the man at her side. One that could have been a snort of derision or of sympathy for the wolves. She wasn’t sure which and didn’t get a chance to check, because Airk didn’t wait for her, stepping right through the portal Meira had created between reflections.

Blowing a kiss to her visibly worried sisters, she followed, and immediately the side window of a storefront in the middle of a quaint Romanian town was all she could see as Meira cut off her power.

They’d have to contact Meira the usual way, via modern technology, when they were ready to leave. Until then, they were on their own.

“Thank you,” she said to the broad back of the silent man with her.

He glanced over his shoulder, dark brows pulling together slightly. “For what?”

For getting me through that, and for being here with me now.

He stilled as she stepped into him, a hand on his chest as she went up on tiptoe and pressed her lips to his cheek. “You know what,” she whispered, the stubble of a day’s growth of surprisingly black whiskers prickling her lips.

She dropped to flat feet, the warmth of him under her palm penetrating, the cherry-and-smoke scent of him wrapping around her almost protectively. An emotion she couldn’t possibly hope to interpret flashed at her, there then gone. Still, he hesitated, and she waited, wondering for a brief second what he would do.

But he turned away. “Where are we?”

“Transylvania.”

His shoulders went rigid, and, without moving beyond that small tell, she got the impression he was ready to fight the next thing to round the corner. “Vampires—”

“No.” She shook her head. “The bloodsuckers abandoned this region after it became popular following the publication of Bram Stoker’s supposedly fictional book, Dracula, in 1897. Apparently, all the vampires around here were being hunted by frightened humans and decided to go elsewhere. The wolf shifters took advantage and moved right in.”

Including requisitioning an abandoned castle.

“Smart.”

She pointed at a peak in the distance, one Jedd had made her memorize pictures of long before their falling out, just in case something happened. “That’s where we’re going. We hike from here until the wolves find us and take us the rest of the way.”

Airk stared at the mountain, expression turning broody. “You had better be right about them.”

Angelika patted his arm even as she hid her own trepidation. Bleidd, Jedd, and the others from their pack would never harm her. But a random wolf sentry who didn’t know her was a different ball of trouble.

I hope I’m right, too.

…

Airk leaned against the trunk of the piney tree they’d taken shelter under for the night, the bark rough poking through the thin layer of his shirt a vague irritation.

Night.

This was a bad idea, coming here at this hour. Not just because of the chill in the air, but night was when all the worst of the supernatural creatures that walked this planet decided to come out. Hopefully, the wolf shifters’ presence in the region scared off any truly bad ones.

Still, the forest was a welcome change after so long sleeping against stone. Anything different was good. He tipped his gaze to the skies.

The room where he’d been held in the dungeons of Everest was built inside the peak of the hollowed-out mountain. The precipice. Generations before him had hewn those walls from the very mountain itself, turning it hard as diamonds, strong enough to continue to support the weight and designed to allow those inside an unimpeded view of what lay outside.

Any being standing outside saw only the rock, snow, and ice of the most massive mountain on the planet. The mountain was so huge, they didn’t really worry about discovery by the humans determined to scale it. But putting the dungeon at the top…that was the perfect prison to torture dragon shifters. A view of skies where they could look but not touch.

Where Airk had never soared and never would.

This view of the sky here was also different. No more ice and snow. A different angle of the stars and evergreen branches overhead. Even a different feel—the sharp scent of the trees and musky earth, the wind rustling the leaves and needles for the forest, a new bite of cold that didn’t affect him.

And the clacking of teeth.

Angelika leaned against the other side of the tree, arms wrapped around her middle, hands stuffed under her armpits, and her teeth chattering so hard she could pass for a woodpecker hammering away at hard bark.

He clenched his own teeth until the molars scraped against each other and his jaw locked. “Come here,” he demanded.

“I’m fine,” came her voice from around the other side. Not stubborn like Skylar would have sounded, or Kasia’s sarcasm, or even Meira’s softness. Angelika was honestly trying not to be a bother. What was she trying to prove? That she wasn’t frail? That she could do this?

Sure enough, a second later she said, “Aren’t the stars amazing?”

As if that could distract him from the clatter of bone on bone. What if she caught a sickness and died because she was determined not to use his natural warmth?

“I have seen better.” He had, too. He’d lived in the highest place on earth, with no light pollution, a thing he’d learned of recently. On clear nights, he felt as though he could touch the cold light of the stars. Swim through the Milky Way stretched out overhead.

“So have I,” he caught the faint murmur. Then a huff. “I didn’t expect it to be this cold. It’s summertime, for goodness’ sake.”

Given that his personal experience to measure such things against was one of the harshest places on earth, Airk didn’t comment on that. Instead, he pushed to his feet, moved around the tree, and bodily lifted her up, then sat back down where she’d been, back against the trunk and Angelika cradled in his lap. He wrapped his arms around her, cringing at the way her body was shaking like an aspen leaf in a windstorm, strung so tight he could probably use her muscles to shoot arrows.

“Doesn’t this break your rules?” she asked.

“Rules?”

“Don’t touch Angelika. I’m pretty sure after giving me the most incredible orgasms, the next morning, that’s what you decided.”

She wasn’t wrong. He said nothing.

“Don’t you hate it when I’m right?” she teased.

No. It made him want to touch her more, if anything.

She shifted against him, burrowing her head between his chin and shoulder, cold little nose digging against the skin of his neck. Something inside his chest squeezed hard. Probably his dragon.

“I guess my sisters would kill you if I died from exposure on this trip.”

He wouldn’t like it much, either. “They could try.”

“Although…” she continued as though he hadn’t just dropped a subtle challenge to her family between them. “You know a terrific way to warm up is to…move around. Encourage circulation and all that.”

He frowned. “You want to keep walking?” They had been traveling by foot, over rough terrain for much of it, all day. “We need rest.” Or she did.

“True. Hmm…”

He waited for whatever came next. He’d started to pick up on the fact that when Angelika was worried, or rattled, or trying to be brave, was when she tended to come up with…ideas.

“I’ve been told fucking is a great way to get the blood pumping.”

Holy shit.

Yes, his dragon growled in his head, more than enthusiastic about that idea. Mine.

Not ours, though. The word his animal side used was distinctly possessive and singular. Almost as though, given Airk’s reaction this morning, the dragon side of him had decided Airk wasn’t part of the deal anymore.

Dammit.

With Angelika’s sunshine scent wending round him, her body against his, the softness of her hair tickling her jaw, Airk was already locked in a battle of wills with the beast inside and his own desires. Blood pumped through his body, swelling his already semi-hard cock to pulsing, painful life.

Holy hells. What do I do now?

Let go of her and move back to the other side of the tree. That was what he should do. Or say no. The word should have burst from him, but his mouth refused to form around it. And he didn’t remove himself from her. “Better that we keep our clothes on for warmth,” he muttered.

Her raspy chuckle, the sexiest damn sound in the world, was close to his undoing. “I’m sure we could get creative.”

Fuck.He dropped his head back against the tree with a painful thump and squeezed his eyes shut.

Images—lusty, sensual, beastly images of what he’d do to her—bombarded his mind, and he couldn’t even say they were from his dragon. Because, all the hells and heavens be damned, he wanted her.

One time had not been nearly enough.

Now he was picturing what he’d do to her—with her—in graphic, sensory-filled, brutal detail. He’d lift her from his lap and place her on her hands and knees where he could lower her pants just enough. Then, releasing his cock from his own pants, he’d surge inside the tight, hot, wet heart of her. Pound into her until the forest was filled with her cries of desire.

He tried to put a stop to the thoughts, but his mind was already far down that road. He kept going.

Nathair had brought him more than just books about combat. There’d also been rare tomes, and among those had been the Kama Sutra, though Airk doubted Nathair had read that one. But memories of some of the pages suddenly took on a whole new meaning as he pictured himself and Angelika in all those positions. Sexual positions drawn in titillating detail that he’d beat off to in his cell—his only form of release—now sent ideas and even more ideas slamming into him.

Her skin glowing in the moonlight. To have him push his thick cock inside her while he used his hands to stimulate other erogenous zones? He wanted to lay claim to every part of her. Leave his seed everywhere until she was his in no uncertain terms.

Even then, he wouldn’t be done.

He’d sit, back against the tree like he was now, and have her straddle him, ride him. Have her take her own pleasure from his body while he watched her come and come and come. Fill her body so full of him until they wouldn’t know where he ended and she began. Hells, if he could do that, there were so many ways he could take her, trap her, trap them both, in a sexual, beautiful haze and have the unique pleasure of having her come all over him. Over, and over, and over.

It might be decades before he let them up for air. The kind of prison he’d never want to escape.

A low, feminine moan yanked him out of his own head, out of those fantasies so real he almost cried out at the loss, only to freeze solid to find his hands down her pants, fingers buried in her slick heat and thumb pressing against that bundle of nerves that seemed to be the key to her pleasure.

Fuck!

“Don’t stop,” Angelika begged on another moan, shifting her hips to get him moving again.

Gods, what had he done? How had he—

She shifted positions in his lap, back to his chest, legs on either side of his, spreading her legs wider, and Airk clamped his eyes shut even as he was bombarded by everything that was Angelika. The musky, luscious scent of her desire hit him like a thunderclap, and he couldn’t stop himself. Didn’t want to stop himself.

“Fuck,” he said. Then said it again.

“Airk?”

He hated the uncertainty in her voice and that he’d put it there, almost more than he adored the feel of her. Closing his eyes, he locked down the beast inside him, pushing him so deep he couldn’t be part of this, then moved his hands.

The catch in her breathing, the way she relaxed against him—he would have smiled if he wasn’t using every part of his control to give her this pleasure while holding the worst of himself in check.

Gods, he hoped he was touching her right. Exploring her slick folds by touch alone was fascinating, and he kept losing himself in that. But at the same time, he returned to anything that made her breathing hitch, and that seemed to be working.

“Inside me,” she begged. Urged.

Happy to obey, he slipped one, then two fingers into her tightness. Pumping his fingers slowly in and out of her, he flicked with his thumb at that spot slightly above, a bundled nub that made her squirm, and she shuddered, pressing into his hand.

Yes. Fuck my fingers.

She undulated her hips, and the action pressed her ass into his pulsing cock, which was jutting straight up, trapped between his stomach and her body. Airk grunted.

She must’ve caught what caused the sound, because she did it again. This time, he couldn’t hold back a low groan.

“I hit a spot, huh?” The smile in her voice was an invitation to play.

One he wanted to accept so much, his chest burned with it. But he couldn’t. Dammit, he couldn’t. He’d finish what he’d unwittingly started, they’d sleep, and then they’d find those damn wolves and get this journey over with.

He pressed harder, faster, building the pleasure inside her. Pleasure that spilled from her lips in uninhibited sounds that wrapped around his dick and squeezed. At the same time, she kept moving her ass, rolling her hips so that she rubbed his erection—hells, throttled it—as she rode his fingers until they were both panting, both mindless, both reaching for the pinnacle.

A tiny flutter of her inside walls was his only warning. Then Angelika slammed back into his body, head flinging to land on his shoulder, mouth open around a cry of completion and greedy pussy clamping around his hand as she writhed and pulsed with release.

In the same instant, her release tipped him over and he exploded, jets of come pumping from his body.

Seed that should be inside her. Dammit.

He hadn’t even realized that could happen without direct stimulation. Reality brought him down from the high as harshly as a punch to the throat, but he tried not to do that to her, too. Not to drag her down with him.

Seemingly unaware of his reaction, Angelika took her time drifting back to reality, replete and languorous against him. And he held her, selfishly, as long as she let him.

The best and most horrible torture.

When she sighed—a sound of contentment that made his own chest ache—he pulled his hand out of her pants, rearranging both their clothing. Nothing he could do about the sticky dampness in his. He’d have to live with it. Then he pulled her around sideways in his lap and into him, her head lolling against his shoulder.

“See?” she murmured in a pleased little voice. “I told you we could get creative.”

Airk squeezed his eyes shut, trying not to stiffen at the happiness she radiated. Because nothing had changed, except that now he knew even fantasies about her were dangerous to indulge.

“Angelika Amon.” A deep voice resonated from the woods about fifty yards to their right.

Airk tensed, a warning growl ripping from his throat as he searched the trees. The distinct earthy scent of a wolf floated to him on the night breeze. They’d approached downwind. Damn the gods. He’d been so wrapped up in the woman in his lap, in chasing the small amount of indulgence he’d ever had in life, and he had failed to protect her. Failed to know danger lurked closely.

Had the damn wolves gotten an eyeful? He knew they’d had to have heard what had just gone on. A private show. Did they beat off to it?

Strange satisfaction ripped through him at that. At least they’d know she was his.

In the next instant, he shoved that possessive instinct in the same hole he’d locked his dragon in. She would never be his.

The woman who was the source of all his problems, meanwhile, oblivious to his internal struggle, pushed out of his arms to her feet. “I’m Angelika Amon.”