The Goblin's Throne

Chapter Forty Five: Baring Fangs

I pretended to be asleep when Lysander finally stumbled drunkenly into his old room and fell down onto the bed beside me. I kept my back turned to him, gripping my pillow until the knuckles of my fingers turned white. 

"You awake?" He slurred, touching me beneath the blankets. I turned my face more towards the pillow to keep my noises of displeasure muffled and moved onto my belly out of his reach, murmuring sleepily. "Thank The Hollow." I heard him sigh with relief. He turned onto his back, relaxing into the cushions and he was soon snoring. 

I laid awake for a while after, disgust turning still in my stomach. How could I relax knowing I was laying next to the man that had so thoroughly ruined mine and my family's lives? How long had Lysander been toying with me? When did he first start setting his plan into motion? I couldn't stop thinking back to when we'd first met, when the look in his eyes, the power they held, had turned my insides cold with true fear. I should've listened to my gut.

He'd kept things strictly business at that first meeting, working with me in hopes of saving his sister, though even that I now doubted. I suspected he was there to kill Kieran and undermine his father more so than to help Aurora. He'd been serious and focused on his goal that night, yet he'd laid on the charm at Midsummer the next time we crossed paths...Had it been that long? Had he been laying the groundwork for this for six, seven years, waiting for his opportunity?

I finally had to make myself stop. I squeezed my eyes shut, begging for sleep to take me into wonderful oblivion. Tomorrow was a big day. Knut would be coming. Lysander would die. And I was going home. 

I made myself think of them, of me and my family all pressed together in the brooding chamber bed. A twin on both sides, Odd on my chest, Knut's gleaming black eye watching me through a veil of grey hair over our children's heads, Cat stretched out at our feet and... a baby cooing in its cradle nearby. How I longed for it, that contentment I'd never feel again. Never again would I feel so full. Tears soon soaked my pillow but at last, sleep took pity on me.

When Lysander woke up, it was to my smiling face. I laid on my side with my head propped up, my lips forming a wide slash across my face. "Good morning." I cooed, stroking his chest. 

"Good morning." He groaned, wincing against the light pouring in between the pillars of the room's open side. He stretched and turned his head into my shadow. "You're up early. Excited?"

"I could hardly sleep." My lips pulled away from my teeth. Teeth ready to tear through flesh and gnaw on bones. "We should hurry and get ready." I jumped out of bed and yanked the blanket off of him. He groaned again, sucking in a hissing breath as if it were cold. "Come on now," I grabbed his arm and tugged at him. "You can sleep off your hangover later." When you're good and dead. 

"What's the rush?" He seized me by my waist and pulled me back into the bed, crushing me against him. "There's still hours yet before they'll expect us in the throne room. Why not spend it enjoying ourselves?" He kissed me and it took every ounce of willpower I had not to bite his tongue off. Now that I knew it was all an elaborate act, that he was playing me as much as I'd been playing him, his neediness made a lot more sense. For him, it was easier to use sex to fake affection. Too bad he wasn't even that good at it.

"Stop it." I giggled, playfully pushing away from him. He snatched me back by the hips as I tried to flee. I turned in his arms and pushed my fingers through his dark hair. "Save it save it for later." My voice dropped to a low sensual caress. I leaned in close and breathed it into his ear. "We'll have a lot to celebrate once there's a new ruler on The Summer King's throne."