Alōs curled his hands into fists, unable to look away as Niya ran her fingers over her silhouette, twisting to the beat.
His heart pounded loudly in his ears as she moved off the stage. With growing dread and traitorous hunger, he watched her slink nearer.
Guests took careful steps back, all while still reaching for the fire dancer, scared and desperate at once.
Alōs understood such temptation.
Niya glided and twisted, creating a pocket of space as she moved.
And just when he believed he had himself in control, beneath her mask, blue flames met his through the crowd, their eyes colliding.
It took all of Alōs’s strength not to take a step back.
Niya was locked onto him, approaching like a lit fuse to a bomb.
She rolled her hips, around and around, parting the mass of fawning and frenzied onlookers with her ripple of powerful magic, until she was a mere grain’s distance away.
Waves of her heat licked over his clothes, sending cracks along his frozen shield to finally seep into his skin. Alōs bit back a groan; he felt as if he were being unwrapped, dipping naked into a steaming pool.
His power responded to her power with a purr.
Yes, his magic crooned in treachery. More, it pleaded, bending to her will.
Alōs clung desperately to the thin strands of his lucidness, clenching his jaw as his gaze ran along Niya’s curves, watching as her gifts continued to pulse, lush and giving, from her body, red ripples in a pond.
She was magnificent.
She was consuming.
She was also testing him. Teasing him. Pushing him as far as she dared.
Here was the creature he had bound and collared aboard his ship.
She’d been given a night of freedom and was now angling to soar.
Alōs could not blame her. After months of being chained to him on his ship, of course she would burn the brightest once home. He had wanted this. To give her a night of freedom. He now realized his earlier warning to himself had been too late. For he was not sure he would survive until tomorrow as Niya continued to cover him with her magic. Her searing spell battling his icy tundra of strength. A wall of steam. Of dares.
She did not dance for the crowd this night. She danced for him.
Alōs was the only one responsible now for bringing himself back.
So he did it the only way he knew how.
Alōs turned and forced himself to walk away.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
Niya struggled to stand still as her sightless maids loosened and unclasped her costume. Her skin continued to buzz from the performance, a red haze of her magic circling her like hungry bees in a flower field. She wanted to keep moving, keep dancing. Oh, how she felt so alive!
It had been too long since she had moved so freely, had captured a roomful of souls and sent their minds spinning. Niya had allowed her worries of what still lay ahead with the Prism Stone to fall away. She had wanted to dance unbound, and her sisters had met her energy. The Mousai had truly outdone themselves this night. The kingdom would be talking about it for months.
Niya smiled as she thanked and dismissed her maids before slipping into the warm bath they had prepared for her.
With a sigh she let the warm water massage through her tired muscles. Honeysuckle filled the air as she lathered her body and worked her fingers through her scalp. For the first time in a long while, she felt at ease, relaxed.
She never wanted to leave her chambers.
Her private dressing room was covered in plush pillows and hanging floral tapestries. Candelabras burned in the corners, creating glowing pockets of warmth. At the back, her large circular bed was calling to her. Once she was done bathing, Niya planned to curl up in it and revel in its softness.
She and her sisters were scheduled to have an audience with the king later, but she had enough time to enjoy a little more lazy pampering.
I deserve it, she told herself, especially after spending months aboard a pirate ship.
Niya did not want to think just yet about how she’d be sailing away soon. She didn’t want to think about the black mark on her wrist or the responsibilities that were still bound with it. She didn’t want to think about anything.
Slipping under the water, Niya relaxed her whole body. Her magic settled gently into her veins, the sinking of wet leaves.
She held her breath for as long as she could, enjoying the quiet that filled her head.
When she resurfaced with a gasp, goose bumps rose on her bare arms; a new chill filled the empty room.
Niya was no longer alone.
The bath sloshed as she dipped lower into it.
“I know you’re here,” said Niya to a shadowy pocket in the corner.
He stepped forward from the dark as though carrying it with him.
Alōs’s sapphire gaze was bright against his brown skin, his angular features cut hard.
He stopped at the foot of her tub, standing before her like an eclipse.
Niya’s entire body tingled as his gaze slipped to what she hid beneath the suds.
When their eyes met again, his expression was unyielding.
“The servants’ passage to your chambers is still not well guarded.” His tone was casual, almost friendly compared to his coiled energy.
Niya raised a brow. “As I can see.”
Silence.
“Is there something I can help you with?” she asked.
Alōs’s eyes brushed the tops of her breasts, skimming the surface of her bathwater.
Niya felt a wave of hot panic as he shrugged out of his coat, but he merely draped it over a nearby chair and sat.
“I came to congratulate you on your performance,” he said, crossing ankle over knee.
“How kind of you,” she replied slowly, continuing to eye the pirate, every part of her body aware of every part of him, ready to act before he did. Alōs merely leaned farther into his seat as if they were sitting together for tea rather than her being naked in a bath.
She loathed him for forcing such an upper hand.
But Niya also knew she had pushed him tonight. It had been the most satisfying thing to watch desire flood into Alōs’s eyes, desire she had placed there.
He had been on the verge of being controlled.
By her.
And then he had walked away.
Alōs could not handle her, and knowing this filled Niya with carnal delight.
She was not one to ever be handled.
“While compliments are always welcome,” she went on, “I do not see why they couldn’t wait until another . . . more appropriate time to give them.”
“You never complained when I paid you visits like this before.” He angled a brow. “Do I make you uncomfortable?”
He was pushing her as she had pushed him. As they always seemed inclined to push one another.
“Perhaps you should get naked and I dressed and see if such a reversal would make you as disagreeable as I.”
White teeth flashed with his grin. “I would only find fault in that situation because we were not both naked together.”
Niya pursed her lips, the familiar irritation he prodded awake in her rising to the surface. But she was beginning to understand this game. “Why are you really here, Alōs?”
He regarded her for a long while, the gentle sound of the candles flickering in the room the only backdrop to their moment.
“The next part of our journey might be the hardest part yet,” he eventually admitted. “And while you have certainly proved your dedication in helping me find the pieces of the Prism Stone, I find when those in my crew do not trust one another in moments of importance, things go awry. When we get to Hallowed Island, it will only be you and me searching out the stone. Kintra will not follow.”
“Your point being?”
“You do not trust me.”
Niya snorted. “Of course not.”
“I’d like to remedy that.”
“And how, by the lost gods, do you intend to do that? You are a horrible person.”