Her muteness eked on, his clenching chest unbearable. He dispatched the next goblin to move into his path. “If you won’t speak to me, sweetling, how can you tell me how wrong I’ve been?”
She lifted her nose in the air, flowing with her vines.
He swung his attention to Eye. “Well? I’ll hear an explanation for our lack of warning.”
“Since your departure, my head has been filled with thousands of inane images, and I couldn’t sort through it all,” the oracle responded. “But the battle is all but won, majesty, the number of goblins finally dwindling.”
“What of Jareth? Has he escaped?” Before Chantel, Kaysar would have rushed to the prince’s side first. He couldn’t regret his defense of his queen, though.
“He’s alive and uninjured.” Grunting, Eye fended off a group of four. “His father made a deal with Micah, who made a deal with the goblins, who agreed to leave the prince and all servants unharmed during the raid.”
“Amber, as my oracle I insist you charge a hefty fee before answering anyone’s questions about anything,” Chantel said, wielding her vines with lethal accuracy. “Only me, your sovereign queen, your favorite Little Bo Chantel, gets freebies. Starting today. This moment. By the way, I’m speaking to Amber and only to Amber. Anyone else in this hallway is receiving the silent treatment for crimes too numerous to list.”
He stiffened as he made the next kill. Leaving without a proper goodbye might have been the most foolish thing he’d ever done. Females needed goodbyes.
Kaysar had to fix this. Whatever punishment Chantel chose for him, he would gladly accept.
“We will talk,” he told her. He could withstand anything but her silence. “After.”
The wait would be excruciating.
Eye swung and replied, “If I may offer a piece of advice, majesty—”
“You may not,” he informed her sharply, adding another death to his tally.
Goblins toppled, one after the other, but not swiftly enough for Kaysar’s liking.
No longer trapped in a battle frenzy, he could better control his emotions and tone. Why not sing? Letting his throat heat, he released the first note of his song. Chantel’s eyelids dipped, going heavy.
Eye scrunched her features, shoved her hands to her ears and collapsed.
A thousand vines filled the hallway at once, impaling the remaining goblins. Fiends who writhed, gradually slowing. Stopping. Kaysar went quiet as the vines retracted and bodies fell.
Chantel rubbed her hands together, then helped Eye to her feet. “And you couldn’t see my path to victory. Good thing I never doubted myself.”
His shaft swelled with hot, blistering lust. Little Bo Chantel was battered, just as he was, but her eyes glowed bright silver. She’d loved the battle—but she no longer liked Kaysar.
“Chantel. Briar Rose. I... You...” He wiped a drop of blood from his eyes, but smeared another with his wet hand. What could he say to make this better?
“Well,” she said, pivoting, then looking over one shoulder to catch his gaze. “Allow me to give you a courtesy you didn’t grant me. Goodbye, Kaysar. I’m sure you can see yourself out of my castle.” Walking on, she called, “Someone had better clean up this mess.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
HIGH ON VICTORY and low on patience, Cookie shut herself in the master suite. Her bedroom. Hers. Kaysar had better not get any ideas about bunking up.
Shaky from battle and emotionally wrung out, she stumbled into the bathroom to strip and shower.
Her first IRL battle in her first IRL castle, and she’d won. Not easily, as evidenced by the blood that splattered her, but the best victories came with the greatest battles.
She was thrilled. Overjoyed.
Raw.
Seeing Kaysar for the first time in days had been a wonderful, terrible shock. He’d blasted emotion left and right, ruining her concentration. When he’d shouted at the goblin leader, he’d looked so...broken. During battle, there’d been no one more ferocious. Or protective. Time and time again, he’d willingly taken a wound to shield her. There at the end, he’d gazed at her with such incredible longing that her defenses had cracked. Then, afterward, seeing his sexy face covered in the blood of their kills... The Uncrumbled...had crumbled.
In that moment, she’d known two things. She was still in the running for top dog, and she would eventually forgive him for abandoning her.
If she gave up after every faulty start, she’d never make it to a finish line. With Cookie and Kaysar, the battle for gold had only just begun. So, despite their current discord, she would march onward with him. After she’d yelled at him. After she’d calmed.
Would he attempt to explain all the reasons she was wrong?
She finished washing and drying, then slathered herself with the most amazing lotion. After donning a buttery soft robe embellished with hand-sewn roses, Cookie padded into the bedroom, ready to find her boyfriend and chat.
She stopped short, her heart pounding. Seek and you shall find.
He stood in the middle of her bedroom, shirtless, a fierce scowl projecting all kinds of fury. He’d showered, the blood washed away. His chin was jutted, his shoulders rolled back, and his arms anchored behind him. A battle stance. A pair of leathers hung low on his waist, a belt partially undone. Bare feet.
Argument commencing in three...two...
“I’m sorry,” he barked, as if he’d held on to the words too long. As if his lucidity clung by a thread. “I shouldn’t have left without kissing you goodbye. Without saying the word at least.”
Well, he’d definitely taken a different approach than her past boyfriends.
The outburst shocked her. But his misery shocked her more. “No, you shouldn’t have,” she said, deflating. So much for yelling at him. She sighed. His entire life revolved around war. Did she really want the same for their relationship? He deserved at least one safe space. Besides, Rome wasn’t conquered in a day. “You hurt me,” she admitted softly. She deserved a safe space, too.
He flinched, true anguish contorting his expression. “I never wished to hurt you. Only to bring you smiles and laughter.” His gaze beseeched her. “Tell me you forgive me.”
She didn’t tell him. “You endangered me, Kaysar.”
He flinched harder. “That is my greatest sin, and I will never forgive myself.” Thrusting both of his arms forward, he presented her with a magnificent tiara made of sharp crystals. “This is for you. Your first crown as Queen of the Dusklands. A mere token of my great affections.”
A bribe? “This changes nothing,” she griped, even as she tripped over to snatch her prize. She petted and admired the dazzling accessory before setting it on the nightstand. “Fine. It doesn’t hurt your cause, either. Consider yourself seventy percent, bordering on seventy-five percent forgiven. And for your information, I expect you to forgive yourself when I do, okay? That is nonnegotiable. No caveats.”