Page 47 of Caroline the Cruel
“You’re not dead because you’re useful,” she said.
He chuckled and swam over to her. He’d use that spark to get an edge on her again.
An involuntary shudder rippled across Caroline’s skin as Breicher approached. She didn’t push him away, curious to see what he was going to do. He framed her in with long arms positioned on the stones on either side of her and she edged up a little taller in the water. His face was so near they were breathing the same air and static charges seemed to jump back and forth between them. Caroline thought of the control she’d had when she lulled the Gods into complacency before she stole their power. She fixed her features into the same inanimate gaze.
“May I kiss you?” he breathed, and her pulse threatened to drown out all other sounds.
“What for?” she said, trying to make her voice as apathetic as possible.
His brow creased as if he didn’t understand the question. “Why do people normally kiss?”
”Usually because theylikeeach other.” The words tumbled out before she could craft them.
Breicher grinned. “I think we definitelylikeeach other. That isn’t the problem.”
He had a point, though she wouldn’t admit it. “The problem is that I’m not feeling anything, Breicher. No chemistry. I guess when someone tries to murder you, whatever spark that might have been there fizzles out. But I’ll let you kiss me…”
His grin changed to a full toothy smile, like he’d finally won something. He leaned down and rubbed their noses together in the smoothest gesture, and an impossible heat surged through her. He met her eyes, leaning in, but they narrowed as his lips met the fingertip she’d slipped between them. It pressed into his puckered mouth and pushed him away.
“Cocky as ever, I see. You didn’t let me finish. I’ll let you kiss me the day we marry, after we take our vows. If you want to make any sort of inroads with me, you have a month to do it. Then the kiss you deliver better set the sky alight. Now go back to your side of the tub, or I’m leaving.”
Breicher peeled himself away from the queen, trying to slow his heart throbbing in time with his cock, which was fully aware of the naked woman only a few inches from it. As if reading his thoughts, she said, “Paid women count as lovers, too, Breicher. I expect fidelity if you want to prove yourself to me.”
He gritted his teeth. She didn’t understand that the vitality of the Ivanslohe line wasn’t only about physical robustness—it also enhanced his appetite, his primal needs. It was like an animal instinct, the need to mate, at times clouding all other thoughts from his mind until he’d found a release. It’s how all the Ivanslohe’s were, women included. A blessing or curse, depending on how you looked at it. Thank the Gods they’d got his nieces married off when they did. He laughed internally at the thought. But how could he explain that to her? Especially when being around her sent it into overdrive. “It’s the Gift, Caroline. I have needs.”
“I’ll still permit you your hand, if you’re a good boy.” Caroline, ever in control, blinked across the tub at him, ready to savor his reaction.
It was bullshit. She was lying. Or her game was longer than his. He should take a lesson from her playbook, thinking back to what she’d done to Felix. But he’d been in a prison cell alone for almost three months. Now that he was out and around the most seductive woman he’d ever seen, his body was trying to show both him and her just how much vigor it had, like a prancing rooster. Still, he tamped it down.
“Very well,” he obliged. “Then let’s talk.”
“Tell me the story of the rosenwood tree. I know it was a gift from the Gods designed to be my weakness, but I want to hear the lore,” she said.
“If you want to hear a story about your weakness, shouldn’t you be asking to hear a story about me?” Breicher let a wolfish smile loose as he cocked his head to the side.
“Keep dreaming, Prince.” Caroline pushed herself up from the water, letting the steaming rivulets drip off her bare flesh as she wrung out her hair.
Breicher swallowed a heavy breath and looked away. Seeing her like this and being forbidden from a woman was nearly unbearable. When he looked back, she had wrapped herself in a towel, and sat on the ledge, her back leaned up against the wall and feet dangling in the water. She’d poured the rest of the bottle into her glass and was twirling it in her hand, waiting for him.
“I’m surprised you’ve never heard it.”
“I have. I want to hear your version.”
Breicher sighed. He knew what she wanted. Or at least he thought he did. He’d get to the heart of it. She was going to spare his family, and he guessed part of the reason was the same as why she’d spared him. This he could give her. Besides, he guessed the wood would have no effect on her now, anyway.
“In Veetula, they teach every male of the Ivanslohe lineage to cultivate rosenwood from an early age. The Gods chose rosenwood because it is notoriously hard to grow. I had ten trees total when I selected and fell the one I used to carve the dagger I stabbed you with.”
Caroline’s eyes widened, and she leaned forward, setting her wine aside.
“When we get there, I’ll show you my grove. I’m sure you’d enjoy seeing it.” She chuckled, shaking her head, but kept silent. “We should have struck sooner, but after our assassins killed your father, we didn’t know what had happened to you and your sister. We knew there were assassins, my cousins and others, who never returned. Then, when rumors circulated that you’d taken the throne, you didn’t seem like much of a threat. Hollis and I were busy celebrating our victory.”
“For five years?” she asked, incredulous.
“You were learning the rigors of ruling, and we knew we’d have to deal with you, eventually. So, one day Hollis called a group of the surviving men in our family into a council and put out the call. I answered and harvested the largest of my trees to begin working on my dagger. The wood is only malleable for a few days before it dries and becomes hard as stone. And the trunks, it takes them years and years to gain diameter, especially enough to carve a dagger from. So, my hate for you drove me to work day and night to perfect the blade I’d kill you with. When I’d completed it, I thought it was a work of art. I was younger then. I hadn’t gone through Angus’s training yet. I rushed to show Hollis what I’d made. He’s a good man, Caroline. He praised me like an older brother should. We had one last night of glory before I left.”
“And it took you over five years to get to me?” she asked, clearly trying to keep her features schooled in neutrality.
“You were the last of your lineage. Ten years would have been worth the wait. The Ivanslohe line has had rosenwood for almost eight hundred years and we’d yet to rid the world of your bloodline. And they’d only given it to us after we’d spent the first two hundred years of recorded history, mostly under your family’s rule. Your ancestors were too powerful. What they’d asked for had been too much and we didn’t even know the price you paid to use the Gift. My ancestors had begged the Gods for something to even the scales. Every male in my family got one sorry seed. They struck the rest of the trees in the wild with disease, so we had the only known rosenwood in existence. It took almost twenty years for a tree that was even viable to grow large enough to carve into a weapon. You’ve heard of Magda, right?”
