The Passionate Queen (Dark Queens Book 2) (17 page)

“My name is Emmanuel. You may call me Emmanuel,” he purred, lifting a dark, shaggy brow and giving me a horrible come-hither look. “I am the son of a tea baron and am great friends with the Mad Hatter and his wife Alice—”

Oh, I doubted that very much. I knew Hatter and his Alice (sort of) and those two didn’t strike me at all as the type to put up with this pompous, arrogant prick before pitching him out on his pretty little ass into a deep pile of dingle wolf scat.

I heard a faint snicker and glanced up just in time to see Ragoth pressing his lips together tight. I wanted to choke him.

Drumming my fingers on my armrest, I glared at Dru, willing the time to move quicker than it was. When the ten minutes finished, I barked, “Go away.”

Emmanuel gave me wide eyes. “But, my queen, at least let me kiss you farewell.”

Nostrils flaring, I ground down on my molars. If I’d had just a little more magic left to me now, I’d have tossed him from me. “No, you may not. Go away, I loathe you. Next!”

And so it continued, on and on and on. A constant tide of swimming fish, giving me empty praise and platitudes. Very few were as genuine as Ic’s had been. Most were just airheaded beefcakes (which, I supposed, was my doing), but good goddess.

A few had powers that were interesting. One could turn anything to gold with a mere touch of his finger. Midas, if I recall. He’d shown me his delightful gift by forever ruining the hem of my gown. He was on my short list of those I wished to maim if I ever found myself alone with him in a darkened alley.

Making gold was a useful power, to be sure, but I could easily see him making power grabs for my throne down the line. I was none too sure about that one.

There’d been another, Jonas, who’d told me of his ability to call forth unusual and rare creatures from the forests surrounding us. But, he’d said, he’d have to talk me out into the woods personally to demonstrate. He’d piqued my interest if for no other reason than that I wished to someday see a unicorn up close.

But apart from a few of what felt like a limitless smorgasbord of men, most of them were either heavy-handed peacocks or entirely dull and dim-witted.

The sun had set long ago when Ragoth (very last in line) finally made his appearance.

I hated that I could not seem to stop trembling or that his velvety scent of fire and brimstone cradled me in an intoxicating embrace.

His blue-green eyes sparkled with laughter when he bowed before me. “My queen.”

I shivered. The heat of his words whipped through my veins like molten lava. I wanted to slap him and kiss him senseless, but all I could do was notch my chin higher. If I spoke now, if I even said a word, I was afraid of what I might do, what I might say.

Dru cleared her throat as if to hurry me along. I was really going to flay her tonight.

“I am not your queen.”

I wasn’t really sure why those words had popped out of my mouth, though they were technically true. Ragoth belonged to an entirely different world than mine. To use my title in that way felt far too intimate.

“Not yet. But you will be.”

Thinning my lips, I gave him a frosty glare. I couldn’t deny the vexing cave-woman side of me didn’t seem to care that the man before me was a cad. A heartless, cruel beast of a man. I wanted him. Sexually. In every way possible. I wanted to pull the leather thong out of his long black hair, I wanted to claw my fingers across his skull, down his spine, until his back bowed and his flesh bled. I wanted raw, animalistic, violent sex.

I also wanted to throttle him. Wanted to hurt him for the things he’d said to me the day before, for leaving me behind as he had.

His irises flared as he leaned in close to my side, whispering hotly in my ear. “Lena, are you well?”

I heard the chatter amongst my servants, the intake of breath from Dru when Ragoth gently rubbed his knuckles down my cheek. A male was touching me, in public. For all the world to see. Intimacy of any kind was simply not done in this castle. Not with me anyhow.

Charles had always had his paramours—as I’d had mine—but he’d been much more demonstrative with his. I pulled my bottom lip between my teeth, clamping down so hard as to nearly draw blood. The sharp bite of pain helped center and focus my thoughts on something other than ripping the snow-white vest off his powerfully built body and nipping and licking my way down the corded contours of his abdominals.

Turning my head sharply, so as to force him to stop touching me, I masked my desire with fury. “Do not touch me, boy, lest you feel my wrath.”

His smile made my pulse thunder. “I am no boy. As you well know. Listen well, my Lena. I was wrong with you before. But I am here to make things right. I told you long ago that you were mine. What I failed to tell you though, was that just as you belonged to me, I belonged to you. You are the very best parts of me, and I aim to make myself whole again. Have your little games, your bit of fun, but when this is all said and done, this dragon has spoken. And what a dragon wants, a dragon always gets.”

Then with a quick but firm press of his lips to my cheek, he bowed once more, turned, and acknowledged Dru—the first of the bunch to do so—and turning on his heel, walked regally away from me.

I could not move for a full five minutes after he’d left. I sat in that throne room, alone save for my servants, and had to fight not to weep bitter tears.

Aphrodite

C
alypso and I munched on a bowl of popcorn seasoned with sea kelp, salt, and cowfish butter; it was fishy but yummy. I licked my buttery fingers.

“So, what do you think?”

I bobbed along the ocean current. Normally, visiting Calypso’s sprawling temple in the below was calm waters, but the elemental goddess was excited and giddy, and her waters reflected it.

Today she was purely in her elemental form, with parts of the ocean waters being her gown, little fish and colorful eels wrapped around her naughty bits, and her greenish hair flowed in long dangling sea kelp strands.

Being around Caly always forced me to step up my game; she was ethereally beautiful and made even this diva sometimes feel a little underwhelming. So today I’d come to her dressed in spools of wispy clouds; there was a foggy transparency to my gown that shimmered with pinpricks of starlight when I moved. I was lovely to gaze upon, but there was just one problem with my choice of clothing. It was light. Meaning, I had nothing to weigh me down; as a result, I was constantly fighting to stay still, which was a near impossibility in the riptides swirling all around us.

I found myself turning a bit green around the gills. We’d been sitting on her massive clam-tongue bed, watching the glowing see-orb (basically a giant bubble of water magically attuned to the above) that Caly used almost like a TV so that she could keep her eye on the goings on at Zelena’s castle.

Groaning, I clutched at my stomach, wondering if I was about to lose all the popcorn I’d just been munching on for the past several hours.

Frowning, Caly studied me with her strange clear-blue eyes. “You look like a green salamander, Dite.”

“Your waters are rough today.” I said it slowly and kindly, always wise to not get snappy with water; she was prone to wild bouts of temper when she felt threatened. Caly and I were good friends (and I doubted very much she’d drown me at this point in our lives), but I always kept things polite. I’d never forget how she’d nearly brought Olympus to ruins with but a mere snap of her dainty fingers.

“Oh.” Her eyes widened in shock, and the kelp braid of her “hair” bobbed as she commanded, “Waters be still.”

Immediately all movement ceased. Even the cute little guppies of her gown stopped swimming.

Giving her a grateful grin, I sighed with relief.

“Well, it’s going okay, I guess,” Caly said, answering my question from earlier with a flick of her wrist. “I can see where your speaking with fire butt—”

Caly’s cute way of referencing Ragoth.

“—definitely helped him to get his head screwed on right, but Zelena needs a stern talking to.”

I sighed. “My dear, you cannot rush love. I cannot force this match.”

Grumping, Caly shoveled a palmfull of popcorn in her mouth and munched on it like a masticating cow. “I don’t see why not.”

A crumb of corn slipped from her hand; one of the eels in her gown poked its golden-veined head out to snap it up. Even being a pig, the goddess was lovely. I snorted; she was always delightfully fun. Down-to-earth—well, in a manner of speaking; maybe down-to-seren would be the proper analogy to make here—either way, Calypso simply was who she was, and it was all part of her appeal. For a goddess who grew easily bored, in over five hundred years, I’d never once found myself that way with her.

“If you wish this to become a successful love match, then trust me on this. I know a thing or two about it.” I gave her side-eye, silently reminding her of my great success between her and the dark-souled Hades.

Those two were still sickeningly in love, which was awesome.

“Fine.” She huffed and clapped her hands, vanishing the see-orb along with the bowl of popcorn. “I guess I have no choice but to trust you. But this show and pony horse—”

Hm, best not to try and decipher Caly’s nonsensical riddles all the time; trying to only gave me massive headaches in the end. I merely nodded for her to continue.

“—needs to get a move on already. I want them married, making babies, and done.”

Calypso was somehow convinced that if she could make this work between Ragoth and Zelena, she’d finally figured out the perfect way to nab both Fable and Fiera their men.

Lately Fiera had been shooting fiery meteors into seren, a sign that Caly and I took to mean she wanted her love match, and she wanted it now. I supposed after waiting five hundred years for her promised mate, she’d been patient enough.

I, however, was not convinced that Ragoth and Zelena mating would make any bit of difference, but one did not argue with an elemental.

“Do not worry, love.” I patted her hand. “All is going according to plan. Just trust me.”

She snorted. “Humph. Famous last words.”

~*~

Ragoth

B
ecause the processional to meet Lena had lasted the whole of the day, the castle had temporarily been opened to us all. Two men per room had bunked together; we’d not been given a choice in partners.

I’d been last in line, so I’d been given the dreg. A sturdily built, handsome male with dark hair and impossibly thick, long lashes that clearly had to be fakery had smiled when I’d walked in.

He’d smelled of incense and talcum powder. His face had been painted with thick black swirls around his eyes, as a way to focus the eye of an onlooker upon them. Dressed as he was in colors of fine indigo and royal blues, I pegged him as a merchant or a merchant’s son of some wealth.

What kind of men was Lena interested in now? This was a dandy if ever I saw one.

“Hello, I’m Maurice,” he’d said in a high-pitched but cultured voice.

Shaking his hand in greeting, because I’d promised myself I’d behave, I’d come very quickly to regret my decision to play nice.

The fool had spoken incessantly. Asking me what I thought of “our queen.” I’d nearly punched my fist through his face for that one. I’d snapped and said, “Not ours, mine.” Then I’d grabbed a pillow, tossed it onto the top bunk, and hopped up, trying to give him the hint that I was through talking.

But, as was usually the case with humans like him, he’d continued right on blathering for what felt like hours. Carrying on a one-sided conversation.

At one point I’d finally growled, “If you don’t shut up, I’ll eat you.”

And it’d not been an idle threat. I’d not eaten well in days, my stomach was grinding against itself with hunger, and humans had always been part of a dragon’s staple. Of course, I’d not eaten another one since the day I’d ingested Hagar (the look on Lena’s face still haunted me), but this fool hadn’t needed to know that.

He’d sucked in a deep breath and then barely squeaked out, “You were teasing, right?”

I’d snapped my teeth in response.

And subsequently gotten one of the best night’s sleep I’d had in a long time. I was in Lena’s castle. I might be surrounded by men vying for her hand, but none of them would gain it.

I’d acted poorly with her, allowed my anger to dictate my actions and words, but I’d meant every word I’d whispered to her in the throne room. I would remind Lena who I really was, who I still was, deep down.

For her, and her only, I’d move mountains. This was my chance to make things right between us again. So I whistled a jaunty tune as I’d descended the spiraling staircase toward the dining hall, following the scent of roasted meats to get me there.

There was a cacophony of noise the closer I drew, men talking over one another so loudly that I couldn’t make out any one conversation, just a number of discordant tones and sounds.

Muttering under my breath, I wondered how much longer I’d have to share space with the monkeys. As I walked down the long, winding hall that led me to breakfast, I studied the art on the walls.

I’d been born and raised in a castle, surrounded by a bevy of gods and goddesses. Wealth, power, and fame meant little to me. But I found myself struck dumb by a massive gilded mirror easily a story high. It wasn’t the richness of the gold on the frame or the pristine condition of the glass but the moving artwork that cycled upon its surface.

Images of Lena. No, actually, not Lena. Images of Zelena, queen of hearts, in all her haughty and royal glory.

I stared transfixed by one image after another. Her in a massive garden of trees the color of fall leaves, with white roses dripping with red. Her being carried in her carriage from one township to another, looking frosty and detached as her people threw wreaths of garland before her. Her sitting on her royal throne, the same one she’d been on last night, surrounded by a prism of dancing light as she stared numbly ahead. Her watching as one head after another after another rolled down a bloody trail toward a dark, haunted forest before her.

On and on and on it went, one picture after another, and always one thing remained the same. Lena was always alone. Alone and lonely.