Page 77 of A Lady’s Guide to Fae Kings

She scoffed.

“I mean it,” he insisted.

“I know,” she replied lightly.

He frowned, momentarily bewildered. He was altogether too accustomed to getting his way, and to being feared. His confusion over her nonchalance was unexpectedly adorable.

“I am not one of your students, professor.” She moved to touch his scratched cheek, and realized they were still tied together, fingers clasped.

He glanced down at the velvet ribbon around their wrists, his eyes flaring. “We are married now by Fae custom and witch law,” he said quietly, raising their bound hands to his mouth. He kissed her fluttering pulse and slipped his knees between her legs. The awareness between shifted, sparked.

“I know it’s just for now,” she said softly.

He did not look appeased or reassured in any way. He looked ravenous. “You might know it, but I know no such thing.”

“We are not really married.” Fae marriages under duress were not real. She was not a fool.

“The hell we aren’t.” A great deal less of his icy, stoic composure was evident.

“You know what I mean.”

His hold around her waist was gentle, but unbreakable. More than a little desperate. “If that’s what you want,” he growled. “But I can already tell you that it will never be enough for me.”

Heat bolted through her, and something softer. Something a great deal more dangerous. She slipped her bracelet back on even though it was an awkward, one-handed affair. It would be far more awkward if she set fire to his hair. She did not want to push her control any further today.

He bent to kiss the sensitive spot under her jaw, sucking lightly until she felt it in her nipples. The scrape of his teeth made her arch against him wordlessly. She ran her free palm over his strong back, up over his nape, digging her fingers into his hair. The light scratch of her nails made him groan into her mouth, made him kiss her deeper. She met each stroke of his tongue with her own, chasing a different kind of fire. Chasing the rightness of his touch.

Nothing else mattered in that moment but his mouth, his hands sliding between her legs, the way his kisses made heat bolt into every part of her. She was already wet, aching for his touch. Aching to touch him in return. He slid a finger inside of her, using her wetness to circle her bud, dipping back into her quim until the dance of it made her writhe and whimper. He urged her on in rough whispers, “Let go for me, wisp. That’s it, just let go.”

She came apart, clutching at his arm and gasping.

“So beautiful,” he murmured.

As she returned to her body, he used his teeth to pull the knot loose, gaze never leaving hers. They didn’t speak as the ribbon slipped free, but they stayed as they were for a long time, hands clasped tightly.

They were stepping through the side door of the house when the threshold simply disappeared.

Pippa landed on the hill fort where the Tithing ritual had taken place. The roses still bloomed, but the spinning wheel had gone from inside the ring of red mushrooms. The other Tithes appeared at the same time, wearing their circlets of flowers and leaves. They were surrounded by the Fae in all their finery.

The second trial was upon them.

The disorientation of going from Lachlan’s body over hers to the press of Fae eager for violent entertainments was stark. It made her lightheaded for a moment while she tried to parse the sounds of trilling Fae voices, the baying of the Wild Hunt’s hounds, and the winds. The glint of ferocious and ethereal eyes, knives and thorns and teeth. The whip of magic leashing them tightly to where they had landed. The ground trembled under the force of stomping feet and hooves and thorny boots.

When a Hag appeared in the center of the ring, the cacophony halted so abruptly that Pippa’s ears popped.

The Hag wore a cloak of leaves and ribbons and fluttering ferns. She was gray as lichen, her eyes like moss. Hag stones and bones hung from her long, tangled hair, clattering together. “Welcome to the second trial,” she whispered. Even the hounds went quiet, the better to hear her. “Tithes, you may choose your weapons.”

The Tithes looked at each other in surprise. Less surprising were the mere seconds it took before Roman had an axe in his hand, and an embossed shield. Hellebore was next with two curved swords. A potion appeared in Molly’s left hand. Two hunting dogs appeared at Beth’s side.

Pippa could not think of a single weapon that might be of use to her. She had never wielded a sword in her life; her skills with a dagger were middling at best. Pippa wished for a book out of long habit, and a small guide to the boglands of Britain appeared in her hand.

And then Lachlan stalked forward, ignoring the gasps and the mutters. Mists trailed after him like a silver cloak. He stopped at her side. “I am her sword and her shield.”

Pippa stared at him. Was that even allowed? Something softened behind her ribcage. She wanted to tell him to stay behind, even as she wanted to clasp his hand and refuse to let go.

“I cry foul!” the Swan Queen called. “There are rules.”

“She is allowed weapons. You did not specify which kind,” Lachlan pointed out with that deceptive stillness of his, the one that made people tremble before they quite realized they were even reacting. The grass around her feet glimmered with ice.

The Hag smiled. It was not reassuring. “Very well. But you’ll go in without your magic, Owl King,” she warned. “You go in as her husband.”

He inclined his head in agreement. “Where she goes, I go.”

After that, Vesta was suddenly joined by a Redcap goblin with pointed teeth. Ennis apparently had a brother who was three times his size, larger even than Roman. A basket appeared in front of each Tithe.

“If you can find your way through the bog, you will meet my brother at the bridge,” the Hag continued. “To cross it, you must bring him three items. A light that shines without burning”—she looked in Pippa’s direction—“an animal without bones, and a limb shed with no blood.”

The ring of mushrooms glowed brighter around her.

“Enter.”