[Black Jewels Trilogy]: Sweet
Her smile was sweet and girlish. “Sit down.” The ring on her hand warned him of the price for disobedience. He sat on the grass, watching her through golden eyes that fought to be neutral. She smoothed her skirts self-consciously, looking at him through her eyelashes. He thought hard about not snapping her neck.
“Did you bring the food?” She asked him in her too soft, too sweet voice.
“Yes,” he said shortly, and called in the basket she’d handed him, letting it drop.
“Now, Yasi, be neat,” she scolded, chidingly. He tensed, but didn’t let her have the satisfaction of seeing the brief pain of her punishment on his face. Bitch.
“Yes, Lady.” He kept his voice deliberately quiet. Even. And tried to leash his temper.
“Would you set out the lunch, then?” She asked, charming and sweet again. He hated them. Hated all of them. Lucivar obeyed. The rage did him no good. It never did any good.
He ate in silence - after testing the food, which brought him a sharper reprimand, but not before he saw there was no safframate in it. Perhaps she fancied herself too special to need it. Too enticing. He bit back a snarl.
“Does the food please you, Yasi?”
How he hated that name. He bared his teeth at her and hoped she mistook it for a smile. “Certainly.”
“I’m glad to hear it.” She fluttered her eyelashes at him. “Clean up for me, please?”
Lucivar set his jaw. Stared at her. Considered defying her, and decided against it. He vanished the picnic and waited. The silence stretched between them. She shifted closer to him and he felt his body tense. The femaleness of her filled his nostrils. He wanted to recoil with disgust. He did shift his weight away from her, but it didn’t take the scent out of his nostrils. He could feel the snarl building in his throat.
She called in two glasses and a decanter, filled them with a rich wine. “Drink this,” she said, offering him his first. He didn’t bother to test it, this time, just tossed it back like ale. She frowned a little and he felt another pang. “Don’t waste it, Yasi. This is good vintage. Expensive.”
Lucivar turned his head and examined her coldly as she sipped delicately at her wine, almost leaning against him. He kept his voice neutral. “I’ve had better,” he said flatly, and let the tone make it a comment on more than the wine.
Her slap took him by surprise. “Don’t speak that way to me,” she said, sweetly, so mild. His face stung. He kept it turned away so she didn’t see the rage in his eyes. “I will not stand for it. Do you understand?”
He gritted his teeth. “I understand.”
“Good. Now look at me.” He forced his expression back to neutral and looked at her. She smiled sweetly at him, her eyes bright and her face pretty and innocent and young. He could feel the rage and hatred seething under his skin. “Kiss me, Yasi.”
Lucivar drew back, recoiling from her, not bothering to hide his revulsion. “No.”
He was expecting the pain, so he was prepared when it struck, hard and hot like a knife between his legs. He gritted his teeth and held himself still, muscles going rigid for the long moment it took to end. Her voice was still sweet and pleasant. “Don’t make this hard for yourself, Yasi. Kiss me.” Her tone was sweet and girlish. Her eyes made it a threat.
He shifted his weight toward her and kissed her as lightly as he could, trying to hold himself away from her. In a moment, she had shifted and wrapped herself around him like a snake, lips pressed to his, leg hitched over his hip, tongue forcing its way into his mouth. He jerked away and pushed her to the ground, sick nausea rising. “Get off me.”
She sat up, disheveled, and for a moment her face was twisted with hate. Then it was smooth and sweet again, and she smiled at him. He felt a flicker of uneasiness before the pain slammed into him again. This time the knife was twisting. He was on his knees before he knew it, mind blanking for a few seconds, and panting. She stood over him, one hand tilting his chin back so he was forced to look up at her. “Now, Yasi,” she said, her voice dripping with sugar-sweetness. “You can’t fight me.” She shifted, straddling him, and shoved him down and back so that he ended up on his back, wings crumpled and her kneeling over him. She ran a hand over his chest and kissed him again, pressing the length of her body against his. He fought it.
“Bitch.” He spat, when she withdrew to breathe, her face flushed, her hips pressing on his. His groin ached and the warning stab of a knife just renewed the agony. Her voice was still sweet.
“You like it. Admit you like it, Yasi.” She shifted her hips on him, grinding a bit. He tensed more and tried to move away, sick disgust surging violently in his throat, his wings cramping uncomfortably beneath him. She moved a hand down to his thigh and he surged to his feet, throwing her off again, backing away.
“Don’t touch me!” He couldn’t quite keep the fear and fury out of his voice. He knew it would hurt. He knew it would hurt. But he could not…could not tolerate that scent, not so close, not filling his nostrils -
He should have been prepared. Somehow he was still down and screaming before he knew what had happened. She stared down at him coldly when he fell still, panting. “Stand,” she told him, and, shame burning in his belly and agony in his groin, he did. She stepped to him, paused, and then seized his hair and dragged his head down, forcing his mouth to his, still smiling that viciously sweet smile.
Lucivar didn’t fight this time. He tasted bile on his tongue, his stomach lurched, but he held still and let her kiss him, the taste of the wine in her mouth foul. He closed his eyes and tried to wait for it to be over.
Then her hands moved and seized the bases of his wings where they met his shoulders. He wasn’t aware of moving, but a moment later he had a hand around her neck and her back against a tree.
“Touch me like that again and I’ll take your head off with my bare hands,” he snarled, and he knew he meant it. He could have done it then. He should have done it then. She started sniffling and he let her go. Too soon.
His last memory was her smiling sweetly as the guards dragged him down.
--
The lashes on his back burned with the stuff they’d put on them. He tried to lie still, tried not to fight the chains that held him to the floor. He hurt. Mother Night, he hurt. And it was only a warning, Prythian had told him. Only a warning.
He nearly whimpered.
The door opened. “Would you like the safframate, Lady?”
“That won’t be necessary. Thank you.” He knew that voice. Her footsteps echoed on the stone and he forced his eyes open, fear warring with rage warring with pain. His eyes found the ring on her right hand and then the tool in her left. He tried not to let the fear paralyze him.
She smiled. “They tell me I can’t kill you,” she said, sweetly. So sweetly. “That suits me just fine.”
Lucivar shivered.