Viciously Yours (Fae Kings of Eden Book 1)

Amelia smiled nervously at the guards as she walked through the palace gates toward the training arena. It was a large structure that looked miles away, but it couldn’t be that far.

Hopefully.

Not two steps outside of the walls, something bumped against her leg. She jumped and looked down to find the cutest thing she’d ever seen. A fluffy light brown lynx with white paws and black sprigs of fur sprouting from its ears stared up at her expectantly.

It struck her then that lynx were a type of wild mountain cat, and she scooted away, but with every step she took, it followed.

“Uh, hello.” She leaned to the side and glanced between its legs. “Little guy.”

It sat down, and she looked around. “Are you someone’s pet?”

She swore to the gods the thing shook its head. “Can you understand me?” It stared at her like she was stupid. “Guess not.”

She stood in a stare off with the cat, not knowing what to do. “Are you going to bite me?” The lynx looked bored, and she reached down, knowing she might lose a finger, and pet the cat’s head. To her astonishment, it purred. “Well,” she said finally, “if you’re coming with me, let’s go.”

The lynx trotted happily beside her across the large field toward the training arena, earning a few looks from passersby, including the guards at the entrance. Fawn wasn’t kidding when she said everyone was instructed to treat her like royalty, because the guard at the gate tipped his head and granted her entry when she told him her name. He glanced wearily at the lynx, but said nothing.

Amelia stayed close to the edge of the arena and warriors paused their training as she passed them, staring openly until she found a hiding place between a group of weapons racks. The lynx planted its butt on the muddy slush beside her and, together, they watched the warriors and young trainees with rapt fascination.

She’d come out here to keep her mind off Eddy and her growing concern he’d ventured back to the Human Kingdom looking for her, but her new furry sidekick only reminded her of him more. Fawn had a lot to do today, so here Amelia stood, with a cat she was fairly certain ate other animals, watching sweaty fae try to kill each other.

There must have been hundreds of warriors in the arena, and she wondered if they were all from the Mountain Kingdom capital or if some traveled from smaller villages. It was a testament to the size of the structure because they had ample room to fight and move about.

Finn walked into the arena with a group of people behind him and whistled loudly. Everyone stopped and fell into rows of regimented lines, backs straight, facing forward. Their discipline was impressive.

“Every male presenting fae with blond hair, line up on the right side of the arena,” Finn yelled, pointing in Amelia’s direction. She shrank back further into the shadows. “All others, gather your weapons and move to the left side.”

Confused looks passed between the guards while an impressive number of blond soldiers moved to one side.

Finn joined them and called for their attention. “A decree has been issued by the king that all male presenting citizens of the Mountain Kingdom with blond hair must shave their heads until after he and his chosen mate are wed.”

Wed? Amelia’s mind worked overtime, trying to make sense of it all.

Everyone started talking at once, and Finn whistled again. “The king has treated his people well since taking over as interim king. He has fought tirelessly at our sides to defeat rebels, some of whom took your loved ones away. You will do this for him voluntarily, or it will be done to you by force.” He motioned for the people who’d accompanied him to step forward. “I will go first.”

The warriors quieted. Why would Rennick force the blonds to shave their heads? It didn’t make sense.

Amelia watched as warrior after warrior took their turns, their blond hair sprinkling the muddy snow, and briefly she wondered how they would clean it all up.

“Do you have any idea why your mate is doing this?” Finn asked from the other side of the weapons rack, startling her.

Covering her pounding heart, she stepped out of the shadows, squinting from the sun. “He’s insane?”

Finn walked around the racks to stand in front of her. “He isn’t, except for when it comes to you.” His brows raised when he spotted the lynx at her feet, and he glanced quickly at her chest. He looked confused, but she was too offended to care.

“I didn’t ask him to do this.”

“I know you didn’t, but I’d bet every piece of coin I have that something involving you prompted this.”

He sounded curious, not mad, and her mind raced as she sifted through her interactions with Rennick that day, slightly gagging at their time in the dressing room. Blond men never came up. After the dressing room, she’d given him the letters, and… Her wide eyes lifted to Finn’s bare head.

“Oh, no.” Her eyes raked over the soldiers; her hand rose to cover her mouth. “I wrote him letters too,” she began. “Over the years, I’d kept them all, and I gave them to him today and…” She pressed her fists into her eyes. “Gods, this is humiliating.”

Finn took a wide stance and folded his arms across his chest. “And?”

“And after you dyed your hair blond, I wrote that I liked men with blond hair,” she confessed, refusing to look at him.

Finn groaned and ran a hand over his freshly shaved head. “I’m lucky he didn’t kill me. Ren is dangerous when it comes to you.”

“I’m sorry,” she said with a gulp. “Will he always be like this?”

He hung his hands on his hips with a thoughtful look on his face. “I think once you marry, his jealousy will subside. Until then, the bond can still be broken.”

The new information made her uneasy. “How? I thought mate bonds were strong?”

He nodded. “They are, but if one of the mates marries another person before their mate bond is completed through marriage, the bond breaks.”

Oh. She chewed on her lip, feeling guilty for what he’d done to these fae because of her. Does Rennick think I would consider marrying someone else? The thought made more guilt slam into her. If he was that insecure in their relationship, she was a terrible mate.

“Do you know where he is?” she asked.

“The last I saw him, he was leaving his study. Check your rooms. The only other place he would be is here.”

Her skirts twisted around her legs as she skirted around Finn and ran toward one of the exits with her new shadow on her heels. She had to calm his insecurities before he burned the entire world to ash.

Amelia stopped a guard in a hallway of the palace for directions to her rooms. He was hesitant at first, but when she told him her name, he instructed her to follow him. Like everyone else she passed, he balked at the lynx trailing behind her but said nothing.

She thanked him at the door of their rooms and burst inside without a plan, a fact she realized when Rennick glanced up from the book in his hand. He lounged in an oversized chair in the corner of their sitting room, looking like a wet dream.

“You like to read?” she asked, trying to see the title.

Placing a bookmark between the pages, he snapped the book closed and set it on the side table. “I do.”

She peeked at the cover and made a sound somewhere between a laugh and a curse. “You gave me that book.”

He nodded. “I did. Normally I wouldn’t read a book on the birthing techniques of mountain lions, but if it interests you, I’d like to know a little.” His smile was brilliant, warming her from the inside out.

The odd book blasted her rational thoughts to bits.

“I love you,” she blurted, cringing at her botched delivery.

The grace with which he stood and prowled across the room was impressive for such a large man, but her heart hammered too loudly against her ribcage to comment. With his attention locked on her, he wrapped his hands around the sides of her neck and tilted her head back.

“You love me.”

She licked her suddenly dry lips. “Yes. I wanted to tell you in a grand way,” that I hadn’t thought of yet, “but my mouth decided it couldn’t wait.”

He lowered his face, hovering his lips above hers. “Mine can’t either.”

Closing the distance between them, he claimed her mouth with his own. His tongue glided across her lips, and she gladly opened for him, greedy for more. Hearing that he was afraid she would break their bond had cracked something inside of her, and all she wanted was to show him love in every way possible.

It had always been him; the boy whose letters kept her warm when the icy shards of loneliness crept in, who’d deemed her beautiful when no one else had. The man who showed her his stunningly charcoaled soul time and again, whether through sending sweaters for a tiny fox or death threats to anyone who threatened what he knew they would have.

Bit by bit over the years, Rennick laid a sturdy path for love to cross from her heart to his. Some of his methods were fucked up and wrong, but she no longer cared. Loneliness was a cold feeling, like being buried alive in the snow, crushed and paralyzed, but love was a raging inferno, incinerating its victims from the inside out. They’d answer for their sins at Death’s gate, and should he look upon them and damn them to hell, they would burn together as they always had.

Breaking their kiss, he pressed his forehead to hers and closed his eyes. “I love you too, little mate. I always have.”