In the Service of the King (3 page)

He removed the blade from its holster.

“Do you give your blood freely, Proffered?” The knife hovered over her wrist.

She didn’t answer, and he glanced from her wrist to her face.

He hadn’t given her permission to answer. Such discipline, despite the stressed scent of her adrenaline in the air. Just who was testing whom here? “Answer me.”

“Yes, Your Highness, I give you my blood freely. It is yours.” Her voice was clear, firm.

He had no idea what possessed her to add on that final declaration, but he had no business liking the sentiment as much as he did. An odd tingling skittered over his right hand and his cock stirred under his robe. He shook off the rising fog of arousal. He had to do this. Now. Kael drew the dagger across the soft unblemished skin of her wrist. A red ribbon bloomed immediately, along with the rich, spicy aroma of her lifeblood, and Kael placed the knife on the edge of the stand next to the golden goblet.

“Beautiful,” he whispered. He glanced at her face. Her cheeks had paled, but otherwise she was silent, still. Her heart sounded out the same staccato beat as before. “You are doing so well, Proffered. Be at ease.”

As crimson droplets pooled in the deep cup, Kael reached up and released the tourniquet, increasing the fragrant flow. He swallowed thickly, his body anticipating, responding. Desire set his muscles on edge.

The cup filled steadily, perfectly. Kael inhaled and the heady scent of her offering collided with every nerve in his body. He gasped and his mouth dropped open. Though he wouldn’t need them, his fangs elongated further and demanded he taste the thick warm liquid, quench his endless thirst. Ancient instincts whispered dark promises in his ear and urged him to claim her, skin to skin, mouth to throat. His erection roared to life at his imaginings and pushed easily against the thin silk of his robe. Nearly panting, he licked his bottom lip repeatedly. Had he ever felt such hunger?

When he glanced up at Shay…er, the Proffered’s face, her bottom lip was quivering.

Kael frowned as his mind raced and unease settled like a rock in his gut.

Though the cup was not quite filled, he bent immediately and licked his healing saliva across her wound. The exquisite flavor of her lifeblood exploded inside his mouth and his cock twitched and wept.

A single tear rolled out from under the right side of her eye mask.

Kael’s loins deflated as he sucked in a breath. Dread slid like ice down his spine. He reached out and eased the mask up and off her eyes. The strap on one side tangled in a braid and pulled it loose. A white flower fluttered down into her lap.

Her eyes, so beautiful, so expressive, told him how badly he’d messed up.

What have I done?

Shayla couldn’t meet his eyes. If she did, she knew the tear she’d been unable to restrain would turn into the first of many. The relief of his tongue’s caress had just been so beautifully complete, easing her after the slicing cut of the blade had ignited a conflagration up her whole arm. She hadn’t really believed the bloodletting would be fully painless—how could someone make a knife wound painless, after all? But she also hadn’t expected it to hurt quite so bad. She’d been worried she wouldn’t be able to hold out against the stinging pain, that her weakness would disappoint him. When it was finally over, she’d lost control, just for a moment. She was so pissed at herself for crying in front of the king.

“You must tell me—” the king’s voice was tense, words clipped “—did you feel the blade?” Dark energy rolled off him like a storm. The hair on her arms and neck raised, prickled.

Not meeting his gaze, she nodded once.

“Say it.”

Shayla inhaled a deep breath. “Yes, Your Highness, I felt the blade.”

He shot to his feet and held his hands out from his body, imploringly. “And you did not think to say so? You must have known from your training that wasn’t…right.”

She shook her head and shrugged her shoulders. His disappointment in her was like a punch to the gut.

“Answer me!” His voice reverberated around the stone room.

Her gaze turned to his. It was the first time she’d violated her submissive role, meeting his eyes without permission, but his anger stirred up hers. “I endured it for you. I did not wish to displease you, but it appears I have done so anyway. So, I’m sorry I have not lived up to your expectations, but I didn’t know what else to do.” She held his gaze, annoyed that she found him so damn sexy even though she was angry. None of this was her fault. Was it? No.

Preternatural light reflected out from behind the emerald of his eyes. She could only describe his expression as bewildered, and his loss of control, even if only in hiding his reaction, softened her anger. Finally, when she could take his intense observation no longer, she dropped her gaze back into her lap.

Could this night go any worse?
She thought about what remained to happen between them and sagged against the unyielding wood of her seat.
Oh, God. Yes, there was every chance this night could get worse. Please, God and any other deity listening, don’t let me disappoint the ancient sex god vampire warrior king in bed.

Kael threw his hands in the air and growled. The sound startled Shayla but it also stirred a tingling sensation low in her belly. In another situation, his feral outburst, so full of power and otherworldliness, would have been entirely arousing. He paced again, and though she knew by his clenched jaw and fists he was angry, she was almost amused at what she assumed was a nervous habit. Head still down, she watched him from beneath her eyelashes. The movement of his lithe body mesmerized her.

Kael’s chest clenched and his stomach soured with his guilt over harming her. His weakness had driven him to cover her eyes, led him to rush through his normal preparations, kept him from assuring the needs of the Proferred—caused him to hurt her. His voice should’ve been enough, had been enough with others, but somehow he wasn’t surprised to find something else distinctive about this woman. About Shayla.

Not in three hundred years had he failed someone this egregiously. The comparison to Meara was so unexpected, he faltered in his step. Not since her had a Proffered twisted him up inside so badly. What was going on with him tonight?

He chanced a sideways glance at the beautiful source of his turmoil.

Over his seven centuries of life, many blades had pierced his skin. He knew the awful burn of sharp metal against unprotected flesh. Yet, she’d sat there so silent, so stoic.
To have done that…God, her strength.

Not to mention the way she’d defended herself. When was the last time someone had addressed him so forthrightly, had dared to express anger at him? Well, Liam did occasionally, but few others. Her actions put her in rather elite company.

And she was right. None of this was her fault. It was his, all his. He should send her away, now, before he made things worse.

He stopped pacing and faced her. The chair forced her into an erect posture, causing her breasts to thrust forward against the robe. Her dark nipples visibly pressed into the thin fabric. Kael’s fangs ached to bite into the mounded flesh of her ample breasts. He saw himself in his mind’s eye: striding across the room, falling to his knees between her parted thighs, pulling the gauzy material apart and devouring her slowly but surely….

The exact opposite of what his own best judgment told him to do.

As his eyes raked over this imagined scene, they fell on the goblet still perched under her hanging left wrist. The smell of precious lifeblood hung thick in the air. He salivated. Primal need demanded he have it,
now.
The urge was almost magnetic, cosmic.

But the way it had been obtained…

As he debated, Shayla drew her shoulders back, exaggerating her posture, as if she was girding herself for something. Her fingers fluttered for a moment before gripping the arms of the chair. She shook her head. Finally, she drew a breath. “May I speak, Your Highness?”

The steadiness of Shayla’s voice intrigued him. Once again, she surprised him, and yet her approach in initiating a conversation fell entirely within her role. Strong, disciplined, magical, sensual, beautiful…her appealing attributes multiplied with each passing minute. Wary, Kael nodded. “Speak freely.”

Her body eased forward on the wooden seat, setting off alarm bells in Kael’s head. Almost in slow motion, Shayla sank to her knees in front of the chair and assumed the waiting position in every manner except one: rather than rest her hands palm up on her thighs, she reached with her left hand and grasped the goblet, then cupped it in between both hands and held it above her head, up to him. “If it pleases you, Your Highness.”

Kael’s heartbeat stuttered, then took off at a sprint. Her initiative was daring and so damn sexy his groin tightened in anticipation. He unthinkingly added courageousness to her growing résumé. And fuck if the dramatic gaping of her robe wasn’t the most decadent thing he’d ever seen. The top of the silk opened in a plunging V that revealed the rounded, heaving flesh of her breasts. But it was the bottom of the robe that exposed previously hidden territory. As she’d slid to the ground, her knees had pulled the hem back, and her open-kneed pose gave him a direct view of the dark triangle of hair between her strong, shapely thighs.

The spiciness of her body’s natural lubricant combined with the rich, thirst-quenching promise of her dark offering proved an overwhelming aphrodisiac, spoke to parts of his soul he thought long dormant. Blood pounded through his head. His fangs throbbed. His cock jerked.

“Aw, hell,” he muttered as his instincts took over and cast his thinking consciousness into a dark corner. He stalked up to her and pulled the goblet from her hand, then placed it back on the stand. His hands threaded under her arms and, with little effort, pulled her to her feet.

Holding her lovely face, he pressed his mouth to hers.

Shayla’s mind erupted into a cacophony of joyous confusion. She’d been specifically told there would be no kissing. The king did not kiss. But,
holy hell!
Did the king ever kiss.

His large frame bent down over her, surrounding her in his heat. His full lips sucked and pulled at hers and his tongue demanded entrance and exploration, which she freely granted. His hard muscles bunched and thrummed around her, setting her body on fire everywhere they touched. The scent of powerful masculinity filled her nose, and the exquisite flavor of his tongue in her mouth intoxicated her. And, oh God, every time she felt the passing hardness of his fangs as they kissed made her whimper and moan. Her body readied itself immediately for his, moistening, opening.

Having shielded herself from physical relationships, she was astounded to learn her body had the ability to produce this crazy, urgent euphoria. Her brain scrambled to process each new, maddening sensation. In that moment, she would’ve done anything to maintain the feeling. Was it always like this?

Kael growled low in his chest as his mouth came at her again and again, and Shayla felt the vibration of the feral sound against her breasts. She squeezed her thighs together, seeking friction to satisfy even a little of her now uncontrollable lust. Her mouth was so filled with his probing tongue it was difficult to get enough oxygen, but his kisses convinced her she could live without it as long as he continued to devour her so intensely.

Never had she imagined the expression of physical love could make her feel so wanted, so needed.

His obvious pleasure throbbed against her stomach and flooded her with unbelievable feelings of power, and just a little fear. Because they were off the grid now, outside the bounds of the rules and expectations she’d been taught during her training. And she was thrilled it might mean he was as affected by her as she was by him. Wherever the king was leading them, she was only too happy to follow. In truth, she felt powerless to do otherwise.

A sharp, piercing sensation nicked the edge of her tongue. She gasped into his mouth. He bit her! They said he wouldn’t—

All thinking abruptly halted as he sucked on her tongue and fed. The intense suction made her knees go weak and her cunt clench. She sagged against his chest and threw her arms under his and up around his broad back so she could grasp onto his shoulders for leverage. The suction pulled through her tongue again and again, lighting up her entire nervous system and promising to make her come if it continued. She dug her nails into his bunching muscles as he rocked his thick cock against her belly. She pushed up onto tiptoe to bring her aching, dripping center closer to where she knew instinctively they both needed it. He gripped her tighter as he bent his knees and rolled his hips against her lower pelvis, teasing her by inching ever so much nearer her quivering clit. She could hardly tolerate the pressure building inside her. He sucked and sucked at her until the overwhelming pleasure of it all sent her into a dizzying and explosive orgasm unlike any she had ever had by herself.

A long, high-pitched moan ripped up her throat. Her legs lost all feeling and she fell against him entirely as all the muscles in the center of her body pulsed and clenched. His hands flew down to catch her weight and he pulled back from the kiss for the first time in what seemed like hours, glorious, ecstatic hours.

Trembling shudders rippled through her body over and over. The waves of sensation trapped her, lifted her up and spun her around. Finally, her muscles quieted. Sheer amazement and a deep, warm satiation flooded through her blood. Struggling to focus, she smiled up at the king.

Kael’s expression visibly chilled in the moments after she met his gaze. He shook her lightly and pushed her away from his body. “Stand.”

Shayla stumbled one step then caught herself, but her mind was still flying just enough she couldn’t fully make sense of his actions. “Sire?”

“No.” He shook his head and wiped at his mouth. His fists clenched.

Shayla’s stomach plummeted into her pelvis. Her equilibrium faltered and she stumbled another step as the room seemed to bend and twist.

The king stalked to the door in the back corner through which she had entered and hammered two swift blows with his fist against the wooden surface. “Retrieve the Proffered.”

“What? No!” Shayla didn’t know whether to be pissed at the king’s mixed signals or mortified at his apparent displeasure in kissing her, in bringing her to orgasm. But what she didn’t want to know was his rejection. Not when he was her best hope for quenching the vengeful fire burning in her gut. But, more than that, the girlish dream that she could find a connection with someone as magnificent and mysterious and powerful as Kael the Fair didn’t seem so childish anymore. Not after what she’d experienced tonight. She might be inexperienced, but she knew what she felt, and she hadn’t imagined it. Some sort of primal, magnetic pull existed between them. She felt it in her bones, in her blood. Her heart squeezed and thrummed in recognition of the odd, compelling sensation.

She had to make him believe in it, too. She resumed her submissive standing pose and lowered her head. “I will do better, Your Highness, please.”

“Leave.” He paced from the back door toward the ornate one through which he had entered.

Her whole body trembled at the impossible direction of their conversation. “No. Please. We can still—“

“Go. Now!” His words roared and echoed through the stone chamber.

Shayla jumped. Her tears flowed unbidden and she turned to retreat. Her first shaky step knocked her into the stand on which the goblet of her own blood still sat. The cup bobbled threateningly, a splash of crimson spilling out and staining a line of dark red against the bright white of her robe, before she caught and righted it. The sight of the crimson stain brought a whimper from her tightening throat and set her into a flat out run to the door.

She hadn’t seen it open, but her trainer stood there, face etched with disappointment and confusion, waiting to escort her away from the chamber, away from the Warrior King of the Vampires.