Kissing me back, Collith eased himself out and back in, his movements fluid and sensual. Music filled my ears, the intensity building and climbing, just like the sensation inside my body. Collith reached between us and touched me at the perfect moment, his fingertips bringing me into the light with him.
Collith and I moaned into each other’s hands, muffling our sounds instinctively, that this feeling was exactly what the figures on stage were currently singing about.
Then the glow faded, as it always did. We broke apart. Collith removed the condom and tossed it into a tiny waste basket nearby. The movement made me notice that some of his buttons had come undone during our activities.
“Why are you wearing that?” I asked quietly, gesturing at the chain around his neck.
As I waited for Collith to respond, I remembered what he’d told me the first time I saw this necklace. Fae males have never worn something to represent their mates, which seemed strange to me. Why wouldn’t we want to announce it to the world? Why shouldn’t our partners have the same expectations our customs expect of them?
“Mating bond or not, I meant the things I said during our wedding,” Collith said, redoing his buttons.
So had I, but that didn’t stop us from breaking every vow we’d made. Feeling more somber now, I ran a hand through my hair, then reached down with both to fluff my skirts. “Some wedding. There wasn’t even cake,” was all I said.
Collith’s head tipped. He secured his belt while he responded to me. “I’d hoped to rectify that, actually. Renew our vows in front of the people you love. A ceremony that included cake, and dancing, and gifts. Maybe even a honeymoon.”
“I would’ve really liked that.” As much as I hated crowds, I had always imagined throwing a wedding of my own. Experiencing that normal, beautiful, messy passage of humanity and time. I smiled and added, “A fall ceremony, I think.”
“With a lot of garden lights. Maybe strung over our heads, like a canopy.”
Danger, danger, my heart blared. I’d been down this path with Collith before. Talking about the future with him. Daydreaming with him. If I wasn’t careful, I would find myself right back in that dark place that awaited at the end. And next time, I might not be able to find a way out. “Laurie should be ready for us by now,” I said abruptly.
Collith’s gaze saddened, and when I saw that, I felt a prick of longing. Followed by a prick of confusion. Wanting Collith after everything seemed so impossible I wondered if this was another dream.
But it couldn’t be a dream, because the next question he directed to me was so real, so stark that it caused physical pain. “Don’t you love me, even a little?”
I looked up sharply, frowning. Was this another attempt to manipulate me? But the faerie’s jaw was clenched, his eyes averted. It was obvious he hadn’t meant to ask out loud.
I didn’t answer right away, and his words floated in the space between us, refusing to dissipate. Collith didn’t know, I realized. I had never said the words to him, despite how many times I’d thought them. Felt them. Now my love for him was just a whisper, a sound from some forgotten place where nothing could die.
“I wish I could,” I lied.
Without waiting for his response, I lifted my skirts and turned away. After a moment, I heard the soft sounds of Collith’s shoes against the carpet. He followed me past the curtains and into the hallway. I checked the time on my phone and instantly felt the pricks of anticipation and anxiety.
It was time for the next phase of our plan.
“Laurie should be ready for us,” I said again. “He said they’d be in one of the offices.”
Collith nodded to the left, his expression inscrutable again. “This way.”
We walked past door after door. Minutes later, we ventured into a part of the opera house where every single light was turned out, and Collith led me into a room that was more of a study than an office. Books lined the walls and my footsteps were muted by a thick rug. There was still a faint scent of cologne in the air—whoever worked in this space had been here recently.
My eyes met Laurie’s, who leaned against the shelves, arms crossed, and then I turned.
Sitting in the middle of the room, Vulen was secured to a desk chair with the holy rope I’d brought in my backpack. The rope Laurie had fetched as soon as he followed Vulen to their box and knew where to find him. After that, Laurie assured me it would be a simple matter luring the other male to a secluded spot. Some place we could conduct our investigation without being disturbed. Before we killed Belanor, and his followers scattered to the wind, I wanted to know the truth about his goddamn spell.
I went over to Vulen with a huge smile, spinning him around to face me. He tried to control his reaction to my arrival, but the faerie was already thinking of the day he’d helped Belanor torture me. His terror filled the room.
“Damn it,” Vulen said in a burst. He’d probably seen my nostrils flare.
“Oh, no, fear is a good thing,” I whispered, bending closer. I ran the edge of my finger along his jaw, noticing the ligature marks across his throat again. “That just means you’re paying attention.”
Vulen felt the trickle of my power. He couldn’t hold back a whimper, and this made him angry, too. “What do you want?” he spat, jerking forward. The ropes held.
“Just tell me what you know about Belanor’s spell, and I’ll let you live,” I crooned. “Simple at that.”
But he shook his head. The taste of his terror filled my mouth, and I almost gagged with revulsion. Eggs. Rotten eggs. That’s what it made me think of.
Vulen had been inside thousands of minds. As a result, his own had been overwhelmed, and he couldn’t even protect himself against me. He couldn’t protect himself against anyone, in fact. I felt no pity for him, though, because Vulen liked his helplessness. Even those ligature marks had been a choice, I discovered. The faerie had gotten them during a long, bloody night he’d been a married couple’s plaything, and things had gone a bit too far.
There were so many other memories that rummaging through it made me think of a landfill. There was so much clutter that it would take me days to look at everything. No wonder Vulen hadn’t been able to stand up to Belanor—he barely had enough thoughts of his own to make basic decisions, much less one that required bravery or risk.
He’d also seen inside Laurie, I realized a moment later, my fingers tightening on the faerie’s temples. He’d had access to my friend’s mysterious past. There was so much I hadn’t gotten to see during my brief time beyond that impenetrable wall.
I reminded myself that I wasn’t digging through Vulen’s mind to find out more about Laurie. I was doing it to find out more about Belanor.
Extracting myself from a memory of Laurie and Collith—with more reluctance than I wanted to admit—I kept going through Vulen’s chaotic mind. When I stumbled across an image of Belanor’s face, I halted again. Focused on it like someone looking through a microscope.
Sulfur. Darkness. Power.
This memory was one of the few that Vulen had been able to obtain from his liege; Belanor was just as good as Laurie at guarding his mind. It was the same memory I’d seen during my time within the Seelie Prince’s head. A sunlit hallway. Echoes of laughter.