Page 50 of In the Embrace of Dragons

Even the king smirks at this.

When we return to the castle, I follow Vizarios back to his room, but he waves me off.

“Go, go,” he says with a resigned sigh. “I know she’s waiting for you.”

There’s a tickle in my gut at his words. The queen did seem pleased when I agreed to spar with her again tonight.

“You could always come and watch,” I suggest.

Vizarios freezes where he stands, taking off his outer robe. I realize only after I’ve said the words that it sounds rather like a proposition.

Immediately, I imaginemyselfon the pedestal, fucking the queen while he stands in the audience.

“Watch you two play at sword fighting?” Vizarios says haughtily. “I think I have other ways to entertain myself.”

I shrug, then depart, letting the door fall closed behind me as the night guards take their positions.

Tonight,it is hard to keep my mind on the task at hand. As we fight, Nissia bites her lip between bouts, drawing my attention to her mouth again and again. When she gets tired enough that she’s panting, I remember her touching herself while I was inside Vizarios, her hot breaths coming fast and shallow.

At one point, I manage to get one of her legs out from under her, and she goes sprawling. But I catch her just before she hits the ground and haul her back up into my arms.

And oh, is she soft in my hands, pliable around her hips where I’m holding her in the air. Nissia’s big brown eyes get even bigger, and she clutches me, hanging on to keep from falling. Everywhere she touches my bare scales, it’s like a fire has been lit underneath them.

I help the queen back to her feet and quickly release her. It’s inappropriate of me to touch her that way, I know, so I clear my throat as I stand up straight again.

“Thank you,” Nissia says in a whispered breath, gazing up at me with parted lips. “Even though you’re the one who knocked me over.”

I rub the back of my head. “Apologies. I got carried away.”

“No, you didn’t.” She picks up her training sword. “You were fighting. Dirty trick, but a good one.”

Then she winks, and the steady beating of my heart erupts in a thundering storm.

I am far less focused the rest of our bout, and Nissiamanages to skirt my defenses twice. When we’re finished and hanging up our swords on the rack, she gives me an odd look.

“You weren’t all there today, Captain. Something on your mind?”

I startle. She noticed?

“N-no, nothing.” It sounds uncertain even to my own ears. “It was a long ride today.”

The queen arches an eyebrow like she doesn’t believe me for a moment, but she doesn’t pry further. Once we return to her room, I bend my head in respect, and we say goodbye.

When I’m safely back in my room, I rest against the door, unsettled. I love Vizarios. I truly, truly do, more than I’ve ever loved anyone.

I should not, shouldnot, be lusting after his wife.

And yet, I unlace my workout pants and take my cock in hand. It thickens and rises as I remember the feeling of Nissia in my arms, her soft curves giving under my fingers.

It is a strange and unfamiliar sensation, to find myself attracted to a female. I’ve always preferred males, which everyone around me has accepted. Still, I remember the queen up on that pedestal, naked and gasping as Vizarios sunk inside her. Could I make her scream the same way?

I grunt weakly as I pump my hand harder and faster, the guilt and the shame and the need and the pleasure all whirling up into a monstrous storm. I shouldn’t think of her this way, shouldn’t think of anyone but my king this way, not evenhim?—

When I jettison everything out, it splashes across the floor. I groan because I should have been better prepared.

Now I’ll have to clean it all up.

Chapter Nineteen