The Nightshade's Touch: A Paranormal Space Fantasy (Messenger Chronicles Book 3) Read online

  I trawled my gaze up his length. Violet eyes burned back at me, daring me, pleading with me. So raw. So open. So Talen.

  I took his arousal in my hand from the solid base to the sensitive tip. He locked up, fingers digging into the bed. I worked my hand and mouth together, tasting the saltiness as he unwittingly rocked his hips. His face, peering down, told me all I needed to know. The more I pleasured him, the more the gentle shimmer of silver in his eyes brightened. I’d never known power like it. It wasn’t physical strength, and it wasn’t magic. It was me, as a woman, controlling him and his pleasure while he was at his most vulnerable.

  When he threw his head back, growling in all the right ways, I shifted upright and lowered myself over him, easing him inside.

  His hands clamped onto my thighs and dug in as I rocked my hips, bringing him to the edge of ecstasy where his skin glowed with magic and his dark markings absorbed the light.

  A blaze of power surged again, shattering me with a sudden orgasm. Talen bucked, back arching, and groaned as he came. I kissed him messily, swallowing the sound, trapping all of him beneath me as we rode the dregs of pleasure together.

  I could have lost myself in lovemaking forever if reality hadn’t wormed its way back into my thoughts.

  Later, I lay in his arms, my leg hooked around one of his, his hair wrapping us in silk while his fingers traced lazy circles down my back. How long had we lain together? I wasn’t sure. The shower had been the beginning. I knew every inch of him now like I knew my own body, maybe more so. I’d had my mouth on most parts of him. And just thinking about it made me want to start over. But the worlds outside waited to be saved.

  “You believe I’m a star?” I ran my fingers over the ripple of his abs. Back and forth, back and forth, circling his ink.

  “Part of one.” His voice rumbled with contentment.

  “Oberon gave me my markings.” He didn’t reply, but his fingers still swirled on my back. “I was going to return to him.” Talen’s fingers stopped. I looked up, but he was gazing at the ceiling. “I can get close to him. I can stop him, or at least try to sway his thoughts, make him see the damage he’s doing to Halow. Make him see he doesn’t need to kill any more.”

  Sadness fell softly over his face. “Others have tried over millennia.”

  “Before I knew who you really are, I thought… perhaps I could make a difference and nobody else needed to get hurt.”

  Talen shook his head, rippling his waterfall of hair. I couldn’t resist it and scooped its length into my hands to toss it over his shoulder, twisting in my left hand. I kissed him on his exposed shoulder. He turned his head, concern digging lines into this brow. I eased my hand around his waist, leaning into him, skin to skin, and saw the moment his thoughts wandered. The worry faded and his mouth quirked in that secret smile.

  He twisted at the waist and plunged his hand into my hair to cup the back of my head. The kiss instantly plunging to my core, making me want him all over again. It was over too soon, leaving my mouth and body tingling.

  “You can’t go back to Faerie alone, Mylana.” He bumped his forehead against mine. “The secrets you keep from Oberon are too big to keep alone. You are but one piece of a larger puzzle. Alone, he will destroy you. We must go together, all of us. Oberon responds only to force.”

  Oberon’s wrath had razed cities, silenced planets. He would not hesitate to hurt those around me, those I cared for. “He’ll hurt you. He’ll hurt Kellee.”

  “I’ve been hurt before and so has the marshal.” He let me go and withdrew, taking his warmth with him. I admired the sight of him as he stood and collected his scattered clothes. There was a symphony in the way the moved. I could watch him for hours and never grow bored.

  “You had a life?” I asked. He methodically dressed, picking up the pieces of the Talen everyone knew and slotting them back together. He would be the distant, reserved Talen again in minutes. To keep himself hidden, he had to be. I missed my wild, raw, and hungry Talen already.

  “I lived as a lord, seelie and unseelie, both and neither at a time when the courts were a mix of dark and light. But Prince Oberon sought to use a weapon against all the unseelie, denying they were as much a part of Faerie as Oberon is.”

  “What happened?” I asked, almost wishing I hadn’t when pain hardened his face.

  Talen tossed his jacket on. His fingers made quick work of the buckles, tying himself up tight. “I had a household, saru and fae alike,” he said, his voice already adopting the level, direct tone that kept his emotions buried, but I felt the distant pang of regret as if it were my own. “There was one saru who I was… She was a brightness in my life.” His fingers stalled on the buckles. “Oberon threatened to kill her if I didn’t help deal with the unseelie. I agreed in exchange for Shanna’s life, and I sent her away.” His shoulders stiffened. “Oberon didn’t kill her. He didn’t lie.”

  “But something else did?”

  “The Hunt took Shanna.”

  “He does not control the Hunt. Nobody controls them. They are Faerie’s will.”

  Talen worried his lip between his teeth. “I do not know how he did it, but Shanna did not deserve to die. She did not deserve the Hunt’s attention.”

  He had to be wrong. Oberon was powerful, but only as far as Faerie allowed him to be. The Hunt was Faerie. If Shanna, his saru, had been taken by the Hunt, it was for a reason, for Faerie.

  “I was left bound by my word to help the prince vanquish the unseelie, but I did everything in my power to sabotage his efforts. That’s when the Nightshade legend was born. In public, I was one of Oberon’s greatest allies, but out of sight, I undid his plans at every turn. The unseelie and seelie fought for centuries, and I fought for the unseelie until Mab plucked a star from the night and crafted a weapon that would finally bring us down. With the light of the polestar, the prince and queen discovered the Shadow in their court. They shattered my power and then went on to drive the unseelie out of Faerie.”

  Stardust and shadow.

  He waited for me to comment, looking every inch the aloof fae, like a different being to the one who had relished our lovemaking. A contradiction. Both dark and light, seelie and unseelie. Gentle and fierce.

  “I am not looking for revenge. My anger waned long ago. I want justice. I want the unseelie back where they belong and Faerie whole.”

  He painted a pretty picture of a Faerie at peace but Faerie’s peace was often reliant on the suffering of others. “What of the saru?”

  “They will be free.”

  It was my turn to smile, because freedom could never happen for the saru while the fae treated us like lesser creatures. Saying something didn’t make it so. Saru were a part of Faerie’s fabric. They kept the households running. The sidhe would not give them up merely because Talen wanted them to. He was not a king, not of royal blood. If anything, he was a rogue, an outcast, and unseelie. The sidhe and ruling elite would never listen to him.

  I gathered my clothing, aware of his heated gaze on me, and said, “The saru cannot be given freedom. They must take it, or nothing will change.”

  “Much is wrong on Faerie while Oberon rules. We can make change happen. The Nightshade is no more, but the Messenger is real.”

  I finished dressing, feeling each layer of the Messenger myth slot back into place until I too was the cold, detached thing that Halow and the saru needed to fight the fae. I scanned the floor for my whip. I didn’t recall taking it off, but clearly, I had. It was nowhere in sight.

  “You cannot go back alone,” Talen said. It almost sounded like a threat, or was it a plea? With us both standing behind our wrappings, it was difficult to know the truth. But inside, I felt his fear, his uncertainty, and something else.

  He approached and dropped to a knee, bowing his head. “You told me your name and you gave me your heart, Mylana. And now you have mine. I ask only that you don’t break it.”

  Perhaps he was right. If I returned alone, Oberon or Eledan would try to manipulate
me, and as strong as I was becoming, I was still vulnerable to both. But with Talen, Kellee and Arran at my side, as the Messenger, I was so much more than I could ever be alone.

  I rested my hand gently on his head. “I swear on my saru name, we will get through this together.” But as for breaking hearts, I could not promise to keep his safe when I could hardly guard my own.

  The ship shuddered and he looked up. “Hapters.”

  Chapter 25

  Hapters had once been a golden marble sitting in Halow’s velvety blackness. Now, as Kellee, Talen, Arran, and I looked through the observation window, it was an angry, bruised purple orb.

  “How will we put countless wild unseelie back in their hole?” Kellee asked, gold star winking. When I didn’t answer, Kellee’s questioning gaze slid from me, past Arran, to Talen, who stood still and silent, peering down at Hapters.

  “With light,” the fae replied.

  Kellee’s eyebrow ticked. “With light?” The marshal bought a few seconds to rearrange his thoughts into words and said, “No.”

  Talen looked at him. We all did. And Kellee glared back.

  “I warred for centuries on vague fae karushit. I followed orders and slaughtered thousands on the poetry of sweet fae words, so don’t vague me, fae. You owe me more than that.”

  He had a point.

  Talen lifted his chin and blinked at Kellee. “All unseelie are drawn to light. They cannot help themselves.” Kellee’s hard gaze flinched, some of its edges breaking off at the truth of Talen’s words. “And so it is light we’ll use. Shinj will corral the wandering unseelie using low-orbit ordinance. It’ll alter the weather on Hapters, but the planet will recover and be habitable again in a few days.”

  “Just fireworks, no damage?” I asked.

  Talen nodded. “You,” he said to Kellee, “Kesh, Arran, Sota, and Sirius must close ranks and funnel the horde toward me.”

  Like on Valand. Talen had done something to the vakaru wraiths there, but those were more like ghosts. On Hapters, we were dealing with solid, angry monsters that could snap Talen in two.

  “And how are you planning on trapping them?” Kellee asked, too astute to let Talen skip the details.

  Kellee didn’t know Talen had been the Nightshade, or did he? He’d always denied Talen was the Nightshade, but so had Talen. I studied the marshal and Talen looking back at him. Both powerful, both stubborn. Kellee had known Talen for centuries. He had watched the fae just as Talen must have watched him—and learned. There was no way Kellee didn’t suspect Talen’s identity. Perhaps he began to suspect the first time Talen had escaped his prison and turned the guards against themselves. Kellee was too observant, too careful, too curious not to figure it out.

  “I don’t plan on trapping them,” Talen replied like it was the most obvious thing in the world. “They will kneel to me.”

  I gritted my teeth. Here it came, the moment Kellee realized the line Talen had drawn didn’t align with his. The myth we had made together might fall apart right here. Kellee’s glare darkened. They had always been enemies at their roots, and yet somehow, they hadn’t killed each other. Yet. But Kellee knew what was at stake. This was the beginning of so much more if we were together.

  Kellee checked me, the flicker so quick I almost missed it, and then he nodded slowly. “Just so long as you give the people their home back, I don’t care how you do it.”

  Talen bowed his head obligingly, and I breathed again.

  A fae pilot, the Wraithmaker, a saru gladiator, watching all this with quiet regard, and a vakaru war chief—we would never agree. The best we could do was work with our strengths and weaknesses for a greater cause.

  The ship shuddered, and through the window, I watched a crackling stream of light arch toward Hapters’s surface. Talen didn’t stick around to see its impact and left, I assumed to get ready to disembark.

  Arran handed me my whip, and before I could ask where he’d found it, he leaned in and planted a small kiss on my cheek. “Whatever happens here, know I’ll always protect you.”

  I wanted to tell him I didn’t need protecting, that I never had, but that he did. The boy in the cell next to mine, defiant and foolish, now a man on the cusp of warring for the greater good. We had survived, in our own ways. I nodded and watched him leave, thinking his promise back at him, I’ll always protect you too, Aeon.

  The ship banked, and through the observation window, stars slid sideways. Another shoot bloomed after the first and barreled through the atmosphere. Fireworks. The unseelie knew we were coming.

  “We’re on the edge of something important.” Kellee approached the window. Another blast sailed toward the growing planet, splashing color across his dark features. “There are few moments in time like these. Do you feel it?”

  “I do.” It felt as though fate were watching us, as though our choices would send ripples into a future we had yet to make. If I stopped to think on it too long I might start to come undone.

  “You’ve come a long way, Messenger.” He smiled as he said it and then turned that smile on me, melting some of my concern.

  “So have you,” I told him. My warm smile fought its way onto my lips despite my best efforts to hide it.

  He closed the distance between us and stood almost as close as the moment he’d asked me to dance. That night seemed like a lifetime ago. I’d seen his past since then and knew Kellee more now than ever before. I’d seen his people reach for him and seen him weep for their deaths, deaths he had carried with him for centuries. By-cyn, I loved this vakaru war chief. His complexities, his stubbornness, his challenge.

  “There are many things I want to tell you,” he began, eyes sparkling, like he was laughing. I’d heard his laugh. I wanted to hear it again and wondered what it would take to hear it now.

  “I imagine all the right ways to say them, but when you’re with me, I—” He pursed his lips. Yeah, this was hard for him. I watched him squirm on the spot.

  Well, look at this, an awkward marshal. More of my armor crumbled away. “Put a weapon in your hand and you know how to dance with me?”

  The kiss was sudden. A step, a touch, his mouth on mine. I didn’t have time to think, just react. I kissed him back, harder than I would have had I been thinking, and Kellee responded like a live wire pushed home. His touch slid into my hair and gripped, claiming territory. A heated rush of need had me clamping my hand on the back of his head and pulling him in, pulling him down. If I took that kiss and gave mine back any harder, there would be blood.

  It was a dance, I realized, and a dangerous one. One wrong move and Kellee could lose control. But oh, how that thrill of knowing he walked the edge lit me on fire. I teased and tamed my unseelie monster, riding that kiss out until we had to break apart. The red-tinged gold in his eyes was a warning. He brushed a thumb across his parted lips, eyes heavy with lust, and dropped his other hand to my hip.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, “For everything.”

  “You are?” If I kissed him again, it wouldn’t stop there. We would be on Hapters soon. There wasn’t enough time to own Kellee in all the ways I’d dreamed of. I gripped his coat lapels in my fists and tugged. “How sorry exactly?”

  His smile revealed white, blunt teeth. He bent forward and nuzzled my neck, below my ear. His tongue flicked, followed by a soft, sensual kiss that prompted a direct pulse of heat between my legs.

  “You like that?” he purred.

  “No.” By Faerie, yes.

  “Liar.” His rumbling voice was undoing me. That refined accent had a link to all the feminine parts of my mind, allowing him to reach inside and stoke desire and lust.

  “How about this?” His hand on my hip pushed lower, riding my pants seam, pushing inward. I was suddenly overdressed.

  “No. Absolutely. Not.”

  “Hmm…”

  I caught his hand and held him firmly in my grip. He looked down at me, eyes flicking over my expression. He was breathing hard, like me, I realized. He had said he didn’t des
erve me. There had been times when he’d thought he’d lost me, times he’d revealed how much losing me would hurt him. He had never been a monster to me. I bit my lip, careful not to draw blood. I loved him. I loved him so much it hurt in ways I didn’t know I could hurt.

  “Keep looking at me like that, Kesh, and I’ll take you so damn hard the war will have to wait.”

  Another pulse. He teased his mouth over mine, not touching, just… torturing. I still had him in my fists. “You think I’m easy to take, Marshal?”

  He smiled. His stance altered, tipping his weight to one side so that when he lunged, he would drive me back against the wall, but this close, and with his blood up, he was easy to read. When he pushed in, I twisted under his arm, sank my elbow into his shoulder, driving him down, and hooked my arm around his neck, jerking him back. It should have been an easy move, and for anyone who wasn’t vakaru, it would have been. But Kellee would never be an easy catch. He bowed forward, using his strength to fling me over his head. My back hit the floor before I knew I’d been had. And then he was there, one thigh arched over my hip, one arm braced over my shoulder. So close, but not touching.

  “Do you want your apology hard and fast?” he asked and leaned in to whisper in my ear, “or hard and slow?”

  The ship shuddered, signaling we were entering low atmosphere, and Kellee pulled back, leaving me tingling and wet, all from barely more than a few touches and one kiss. A promise of what was to come. He was a wild thing barely caged, and I wanted him.

  “Is there room in your heart for the last vakaru?” he whispered. How long had he waited to ask? How many times had he rolled the question over and over in his mind?

  “You’ve always been in my heart, Kellee.”

  He looked away and clenched his jaw, letting those words sink in. It had been a long time since he had allowed anyone to love him.

  He offered me his hand, golden eyes aglow, and hauled me to my feet.