One Thousand Kisses (35 page)

Then she climbed onto his body and sank onto his cock as slowly as he’d first entered her.

He swallowed and grasped her hips, holding her immobile. His jaw clenched as he sought control. “Kiss me.”

She bent down, hands curled over his shoulders, and licked his bottom lip. His fingers tangled in her hair as he kissed her desperately. Their tongues danced and dueled. When she raised her hips, allowing his cock to slip almost all the way out of her body, he moaned into her mouth.

She reseated herself with pleasure. The hot, wet clutch of her inner muscles constricted his length. His hormones flickered red and orange.

She liked having him beneath her, both of them suffused with lust—but she was on top. She leaned forward, rolling her hips so his cock became a luscious glide of sensation. Her nipples rubbed his chest. Her hair fell around their faces. When their gazes locked, her desires sharpened. He caught her face in his hands. After another long, deep kiss, she sat up and touched herself intimately.

“Faster,” he demanded. She plied her moist clit as she raised and lowered herself on him. Magic boiled as their passion escalated. Her movements grew quicker, more irregular, the muscles in her thighs burning.

“Gods, yes. Touch yourself.”

She thought of Embor’s tongue on her pussy, how he’d sucked and licked her like a peach. She was so close again, and he was rooted inside her. Reaching. Grasping. Coming. She was ready. She braced her free hand on his chest and panted.

He thrust up, slamming into her, taking over. His muscular arms lifted and yanked her back down, his cock driving to her center. It swelled as he neared his peak, and she joined him at the top.

Magic crashed across them like a tidal wave. He called her name. She tumbled into her orgasm, and his, holding his shoulders and crying. Radiance melted everything, brightening all the colors. Their shared consciousness was a flood of pleasure. His arms wrapped around her and held her close as if he were never going to let her go.

He kissed her stiff, salty hair, her sandy cheek. He kissed her lips, lifting her chin so he could lick the wild pulse in her neck. She felt like she was floating. His cock pulsed inside her as their orgasms faded, leaving behind the union so many Fey sought but so few ever found.

He was as familiar to her as her own sibling, as essential as air and water.

His lips tickled her neck. “So we’re not dead.”

No
, she answered mentally, just because she could. How she loved him!

“I love you too.” He brushed sand off her back. “You’re sunburned.”

“So are you.” She’d have to harness her tendency for naughty, sarcastic or otherwise-irreverent thoughts now that he could hear them.

He smiled. There was no line of worry between his brows. There were no shadows of responsibility or pain in his eyes. Unless she missed her guess, she’d found the one thing that would heal Embor Fiertag of his wounds.

“Don’t hold back on my account,” he told her.

This time she said it aloud. “I love you.”

He kissed her so absolutely their bodies began to rouse for more lovemaking.

Enough. You’re mated now
, interrupted the cat, his thought clear as a bell in both of their minds. When he spoke to Ani, Embor could hear him, circumventing the Torvals’ mutilation.
Your healing ability has increased.

“That’s why you wanted us to bond,” Ani said with a surprised laugh. The cat had been indirect, out of necessity, but she knew. “To fix what the Torvals did to you.”

The cat licked his white paw and cleaned his ear, his head ducking and his black fur glossy in the sunlight.

Your intercourse wasn’t very efficient
, he commented.
This isn’t a vacation.

Ani glanced at her bondmate just in time to see his handsome face tighten into lines of worry and concern. He lifted her off his body, and she crouched next to the cat.

“I’ve never healed a cat before,” she told Master Fey. “You trust me?”

He rolled onto his belly and purred.

Embor placed a hand on her shoulder and watched curiously as she extended her senses over the cat. His fur crackled with static when she pet him, inspecting first his physical body and then, cautiously, his essence.

What she encountered shocked her profoundly. His psyche was more vast and impossible than she ever could have imagined. The endless strata, the colors, the images and swirls, nearly overwhelmed her, but Embor’s touch anchored her to the earth.

Was Master Fey a spirit? How could she possibly help him?

Some warm force nudged her in a different direction, and she noticed the gritty ropes of aversion magic in the upper reaches of the cat’s consciousness. Drawing on Embor for ballast, she drifted toward that stain until she could reach it.

She flexed her magic beyond anywhere she could have gone before, amazed at how much stronger she was. Tali was right. The cat was right. The way she felt now, she could do anything. With a mental wrench she flung the unnatural constraints off the cat, and he was free.

Colors she couldn’t even identify fountained out and bathed her and Embor in their light. It was like floating, like flying, like nothing and everything. Something shimmered around them as brightly as the bonding magic, and she had the sense the cat was winking at her. That he was very, very pleased.

Then suddenly she and Embor returned to their bodies. The cat sat watching them with an unblinking stare. When they noticed him, he began to clean his back end.

“Wow.” Ani exchanged a stunned glance with Embor, who’d experienced the healing through their new bond. They rose together, shaky and uncertain.

Embor’s gaze grew distant and his mental touch disappeared. His magic surged. After a moment he said gravely, “Skythia requests that you please kick my ass.”

“Your sister knows we’re here?”

“I began shielding us when I realized we weren’t deceased, but I could hardly hide what just happened from her,” he said with a tiny smirk. “She says the situation at Court requires our immediate presence. The Torvals have convened an emergency session and they’re a few votes from sevendusting our cabinet.”

“Your cabinet didn’t participate in this.”

“The Torvals don’t care as long as it nets them the Primary seats.” The skin across his cheekbones tightened, and his lips firmed. “Skythia is standing behind my actions without knowing the truth. All she knows are the lies they’re telling everyone.”

Ani’s heart began to race. They’d taken their hour. They’d had their personal bliss, when they should have been mindful of others. “This is terrible.”

“The Torval agents have been called as witnesses for the prosecution.”

She dug her toes into the sand so she wouldn’t run down the beach screaming her head off. “You seem so calm. Everything has gone awry.”

“Not everything. I have you now, Ani.” He gestured at the water. “Also, it appears my flak vest with the control globes has washed to shore.”

She wrapped her arms around herself, conscious of scorched flesh in exposed areas. “Any idea what happened to the Drakhmores?”

“They were taken into custody the moment they arrived in the Realm.” Embor frowned, still communicating with Skythia.

“The Ellsmen ring must have been rigged with a secondary spell,” Ani said, thinking of the onesie Milshadred had said could transport anyone, anywhere, anytime. “But how were the Drakhmores caught by it and not us?”

You’re welcome
, the cat said smugly.

Though it was on the tip of her tongue to ask how he’d managed it, Ani suspected he’d be no more talkative than when he’d been constrained. “Will you continue to help us? Is there anything else you need?”

The black feline finished his bath and stretched, claws digging into the white sand. Ani sighed.

“We should hurry.” Embor gestured, and a bundle of supplies appeared beside them. “They’ve just realized Skythia is communicating with me. She’s being numblocked. It won’t last on her, but it will cut us off temporarily.”

That would take a minute or two, more if Skythia fought. “What about the lost ones?” Ani asked, fisting her hands so she wouldn’t chew her nails. The most crucial part of their plan was removing the onesies from the Realm before they became maddened by the magic. Did anyone at Court have an idea of the danger they were in?

He spoke with Skythia again, his grey eyes hazing slightly. “She says there are fairies present she doesn’t recognize. It might be them.”

With the Drakhmores in custody and the agents playing witness, they’d no longer be able to conceal Embor’s lawbreaking—or his accomplices—but they couldn’t ponder the ramifications right now. They had to act.

“I bet Ophelia forced the Drakhmores to reveal our plans,” Ani said. “They’ll know about Jake’s globes now.”

“They might expect the globes, but I don’t see how they can defend against them. Jake’s magic is too penetrating.” Embor glanced at the ground. “Cat, if you have any ideas, now would be the time to share them.”

The cat chased a sand flea near the water, ignoring them. As she and Embor dressed in the clothing from the supplies, Ani tried to imagine what they could do. Their magical strengths had increased, and their bond would give them some ability to work through one another. That would help vanquish the Torvals and the AOC board, but they had no idea what powers the lost ones possessed. Nor would anyone at Court. If the onesies cast spells Realmside, what would happen to the world fabric? Could they withstand the magical stress here for weeks like Jake, or would insanity overwhelm them in days? Hours? Minutes?

Milshadred had said the lost ones were watched. Surely the Torvals weren’t so stupid they’d allow the lost ones to endanger the Realm’s entire existence?

I’m betting they’re that stupid
, the cat interrupted, his mind-voice a snarl.
Later, two-legs.
He disappeared in a shimmer of colors not unlike the ones they’d seen when Ani had healed him.

“I guess Master Fey’s not going to help,” Ani said. “We’ll probably never see him again.”

“If you were that cat, would you want to have anything to do with fairies now?”

“I suppose not.”

Embor kissed her swiftly to alleviate her chink of disappointment, which he could probably sense through their bond. She was fond of Master Fey, but it was better if he were somewhere safe. The earth onesie and Ophelia had already proven too much for him.

“We’ve got to go,” Embor said. “Nearly ready?”

Ani licked her lips and trapped her hair in an elastic band. “What if we ask the Seers what to do first?”

“They can’t predict events with that kind of specificity,” Embor said. “They’ve forecast nothing about this crisis at all.”

“Don’t we have allies outside the Court? My family would help.”

“There’s not enough time with the onesies here. I’m going to take us to the session chamber. Stick close when we transport in. If the control globe fails, I’ll shield us long enough for the Elders to hear our side of the story.”

“Okay.” She blew out an uneasy breath, trying to ignore the fact she teetered near the same anxiety level that had led her to discover agony magic. She couldn’t fall into a murderous panic when a clear head was so desperately needed.

Unless she had a chance to apply it to a Torval.

Embor eyed her thoughtfully while double-checking his vest pockets. “Come to think of it, we have a secret weapon, don’t we? An ace in the hole, as our not-very-good friend Milshadred would say. You.”

She clutched her stomach, afraid it might leap out of her body. He must have sensed her thoughts. “I’m no weapon.”

He clasped her shoulders. “They won’t expect you to fight, love. They have no idea how foolish that is.”

“I’d rather try to cast a mass sleep spell.” She was stronger now. Maybe it would work.

Embor pulled her into his arms before beginning the transportation. “Don’t be afraid to inflict pain. Sometimes it’s necessary.”

Ani closed her eyes and prayed to the spirits. To the cat. To anyone listening. How could she be useful? How could she be a secret weapon? She was made to come after and repair wounds. The only aggressive things she could do were strangle Primaries and kill gnomes. It seemed unlikely to give them the advantage they needed.

Was there any way they could win this? Because if they didn’t, the world might truly come to an end.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Embor brought them out of between-space at the peak of the session chamber, far above the crowd. Anisette tightened her arms around him when she realized they were hovering. It wasn’t flight, but it ought to buy them time to assess the situation.

Smoke lingered in the dome, evidence of high-level Elders feeling strong emotions. He could feel Anisette exerting her magic, reading hormone levels.

“Everyone’s very angry,” she whispered.

With Anisette balanced on his feet, Embor readied a control globe. Most Fey at Court were high-level, less susceptible to the sixth arts. He needed to isolate his targets for the spell to be most effective. Through the dissipating smoke, he counted the Elders seated along tables that formed a huge circle, with the Primaries at the apex and visitors in the upper gallery.

Only today, Warran and Ophelia had usurped the Primary seats, and Skythia, Gangee and half of his cabinet crouched in magical restraints in the center.

The spell needed to affect the Torval Elders, the Torval agents, the AOC directors and the lost ones. The directors sat in the midst of a cluster of young fairies he assumed were the onesies, along with Milshadred, the double-crossing witch.

The rest of his Court would be persuaded by reason. While the consequences for his use of the sixth arts might be unpleasant, getting the onesies out of the Realm was more important than preserving his status.

“I don’t see any Drakhmores,” Anisette whispered.

Euridyce Torval leaned between the tall Primary chairs to whisper to Warran. Embor flexed his fingers as adrenaline surged. The rest of the Elders were politicking, attempting to sway their neighbor’s opinion before a final vote. An aura of restrained violence and tension was nearly as thick as the smoke.

Skythia had been numblocked twice, but resisting numblock was one of her lesser-known skills. She zeroed in on him and Anisette. He created a battle shield, one that allowed some magic out, and fondled the control globe.

Not long now. If he could just get a solid head count…

“Something is not right,” Anisette whispered, echoing what he assumed. Nothing had been right this entire operation. The Torvals had out-connived his team at every turn. “My readings are skewed. I’m being deflected.”

“I’m going to try the globe.” So many of his adversaries were within reach. The Torval agents, the onesies, the AOC board, Warran and Ophelia. One spell and it could be over.

“Do it,” she urged. “We have to know.”

How could anyone prepare for the control globes? Their influence worked on everyone he and Jake had tested. So he launched the spell and directed it to dominate his targets in the room below.

As soon as he did, an alarm blared. It triggered an automatic numblock at the source of the globe. The dampener would have silenced any lesser Fey, but Embor’s shield barely rippled.

Some fairies caught by the backwash fainted, while others ducked and covered. Screams and curses erupted through the room. The spell quieted a few minds—but rolled off the ones he most needed to govern.

How in the hells? Their minds had been altered, their essences changed just enough to avert the spell.

Spirit wasn’t Embor’s element. Jake could handle the complication, but he couldn’t. He lost his grip on the dark magic, which flooded the room with an unmistakable stench. The alarm ceased.

Embor enlarged his protection to a full shield. Ophelia jabbed a scrawny arm at their position.

“The traitor!” she screeched. “He has brought his vile magic here to mind control us all. Thank the spirits we were prepared. Everyone, to arms!”

In moments, offensive spells rocked the chamber, smashing into Embor’s shield like eggs thrown at a wall. Warran, Ophelia, Artur and the security team brought their powers to bear. Visitors in the gallery broke for the exit. Wind howled and ice shattered. Agony flashed in pops of brilliance. The pressure of another numblock squeezed his defenses.

“They were ready again,” Anisette said, her face buried in his chest. “What are we going to do?”

“Whatever we have to.” Embor swooped to the ground in front of his cabinet, where Anisette stumbled out of his arms. He immediately extended the shield to protect his people. He couldn’t sustain it for hours at these dimensions, but he couldn’t leave them defenseless. He only wished he could do more when he saw two Elders who’d always been staunch supporters caught in the cross fire.

“What in the bloody hag are you doing?” Skythia yelled. Whatever magical restraints had confined her, she’d broken them.

“Lost ones.” Embor pointed at the frightened onesies in the gallery. The AOC directors struggled to keep them from bolting. Milshadred had disappeared. “We have to return them to humanspace immediately.”

Several members of his cabinet frowned. They could do little else. They’d been immobilized. Anisette hastened to Gangee’s side and removed his magical fetters.

Skythia threw up her hands. “We know. You’re accused of torturing them with dark magic, which you just used in front of a hundred witnesses. Nice going. Gangee, did you help him with this?”

The healer rose unsteadily while Anisette moved to another cabinet member. “Not I. The globes the Torvals showed the Court were definitely not my work.”

“I’ve tortured no one,” Embor said. If the Torvals had presented the stolen globes as evidence, it meant they hadn’t learned to use them—although they’d apparently learned to defend against them.

“But you did drop a shadow bomb on us,” Skythia said.

“I don’t deny that.” In Embor’s peripheral vision, Warran and a security detail leaped over the tables and advanced. He thickened the shield to block outgoing sound. “If I’m the one who stands accused, why are you in restraints?”

“Because we said they were fucking liars, of course.” Skythia grabbed his arm and lent him power. Her irritation blasted through their sibling bond. “Apparently they were telling the truth.”

“Not all the truth.” He breathed slowly, accepting her strength as magical forces battered his fortification. He turned his back on Warran, who was literally beating on the shield with a chair. The dull thuds reverberated through Embor like drumbeats. “The AOC abused the lost ones, and the Torval Elders have been working with them to discredit us. They employed their cousins as bait and the lost ones as a bludgeon.”

“And you jumped right into their trap.” Skythia shook him. “Bonehead. I knew you were plotting something, but I had no idea you’d lost your mind. Using the sixth arts? Violating the Policy of Discretion? Conniving with the Drakhmores? Could you have broken more laws?”

“Yes.” Embor’s teeth clicked as he hissed. They needed a plan, not Skythia’s recriminations. “I could have actually tortured and killed people.”

“You’ve yet to prove you didn’t.”

“I shouldn’t have to prove such a thing to you.” In the face of more pressing concerns, her continued indignation surprised him. Had she been told other lies that undermined her faith in him?

Her fingers bit into his arm. From the near-silent explosions rumbling through the chamber, bringing down tapestries, wood and stone, other Elders must have joined the fight—on both sides. It wasn’t unheard of for spells to slip out like profanities during a debate, but an all-out war hadn’t occurred at Court in centuries.

“I can’t believe our luck.” Skythia fizzed with suppressed energy even though she was infusig him. “By Hella, we had to swing the Incident, the Drakhmores, that idiocy five years ago, and now this? People are dying out there. You should have warned us you were bringing this down on our heads.”

“You’re the one who told me to come.” He would have come regardless, once he’d discovered she was on trial. “Should I have let them sevendust you?”

“By Ka, maybe you should have,” she exclaimed. “I’m so worthless to you that you couldn’t ask me for help in the first place.”

“When does he ever ask? The trick is to help him anyway.” Anisette grabbed his other hand, inserting herself into the power flow. Her luminous energy washed through him into Skythia, whose spine snapped straight. “Right now we must send the onesies to humanspace and the Torvals to prison. I can confirm everything Embor’s told you.”

“Ani, I nearly forgot you were hiding behind my brother over there.” Embor sensed Skythia’s jealousy right before she released him. Was that why she was being so emotional? “Welcome to the family.”

“I’m not hiding. I’m helping.” Anisette released him as well and returned to Gangee, who tended the remaining advisors. “What are you doing?”

Skythia muttered under her breath about someone’s britches being too big before issuing orders. “Close up ranks. We need a plan.”

Ambulatory staffers dragged the others closer to Embor. He shrank the barrier, but they couldn’t remain on defense indefinitely. Fight or flight?

Fight. Flight wasn’t an option. They couldn’t leave the onesies here. Their presence could be catastrophic for everyone—humanity included.

He had a control globe, he had Anisette’s agony magic, he had his cabinet and his sister, and he had offensive skills of his own. His destructive potential was overkill, though, for an area as densely as populated Capital City.

The loyal Elders outside the shield were outnumbered and fleeing. The trick might be to defeat the Torvals and their allies first. If he could get rid of the lost ones’ handlers, it would be simpler to relocate the onesies.

As Embor plotted how to avoid going nova, power surged in a whoosh that nearly broke his concentration. Ice crusted the shield, encasing them in a frozen bubble. The temperature dropped.

“Great shitting gnome on a stick,” Skythia roared. “Lower the shield and let me at ’em.”

Not yet. This battle wouldn’t be won by force alone. Embor knelt and placed his hands on the floor, reaching for magic. The flagstones were painfully cold.

Skythia punched the shield in frustration, cracking the ice. Others began doing the same to clear their view. The Torvals, the security branch and several AOC directors ringed them, all trying to slice through at once.

Tell me when you need an infusion
, Anisette whispered in his mind before turning back to her patients. Embor closed his eyes and focused.

“I’m going to remember everyone who stood against us,” Skythia yelled, loud enough that the outsiders could hear. She gripped his shoulder and started reciting the names of Elders to him in a furious chant.

With so many spells flying, the supply of natural magic waned. Skythia was infusing him from herself instead of serving as a conduit.

Don’t give me everything
, he told her.

I’m no martyr
, she snarled in his head.
Hurry up and suggest a plan so I can shoot it down. I want to pound somebody.

Sonja’s voice at his other shoulder, a touch on his arm. “Primaries, we’re going to brownout the district. We’ll be reduced to fighting with fists.” He heard the crack of her knuckles.

“Good equalizer,” Skythia agreed. “Loosen the shield and let’s fight.”

Another barrage of energy pounded the barrier. Magic stuttered, reduced to dregs. Capital City, with its high concentration of Fey, was prone to brownouts anyway.

Embor opened his eyes. Outside the bubble, Euridyce appeared, a gun aimed at two lost ones. Their youthful faces were terrified, and their raised hands trembled. One was an overweight youth, the other a brunette girl. An older man with thinning hair trailed behind them and seemed more curious than apprehensive.

“Get me in there. I don’t care how.” Ophelia gestured at the shield, ordering the onesies forward. To her right, Warran iced an assailant while Artur reloaded his gun.

“She’s trying to make the loons do magic,” Skythia exclaimed. “That bitch is as nuts as a Yeti.”

Skythia wasn’t the only one questioning Ophelia. An AOC director, waving her hands, dashed toward the Elder. “This is not the way, Elder Torval. This goes against everything we agreed on.”

Ophelia backhanded the woman, black power accompanying her blow. The boy broke for the exit, and Euridyce shot him in the back.

Anisette let out a little scream. The crack of the gunshot pierced Embor’s shield in a way none of the offensive spells had managed. Either that or his concentration had flagged. Euridyce took aim at the girl.

The young woman burst into tears. Before Euridyce could fire, the balding man spoke in the agent’s ear. Artur and another AOC director began arguing with them too. Ignored, the brunette inched toward the shield, her wide eyes meeting Embor’s.

Help
, she mouthed. She reached the barrier and held up her hands, surrendering.
Help us.

Beside him, Anisette inhaled. Her protective instincts bled through their bond. The girl, practically a child, had brown eyes and a tear-streaked face. Was she a decoy?

“Ah, shit.” Skythia punched the barrier in frustration. “Even that poor kid knows better than to work magic here. We have to do something.”

Ulster and Mikhal Torval steered the remaining lost ones toward the shield. Any resisting Elders had been subdued, and the Torvals’ group seemed to be the only ones left in the damaged chamber.

Embor hadn’t noticed a single director pushing the onesies to dangerous acts. Not that it reduced their culpability, but it was a potential wedge to drive between his enemies. Did the AOC rule Warran and Ophelia, or had the Torvals wrested control?