Bride of the Sea (The Prophecy of Sisters #2) - Hayley Faiman Page 0,32
myself?
Releasing her legs, she doesn’t move from me, instead, she spreads them wide, wrapping her ankles around my back and pulls me closer toward her.
“Kiss me,” she breathes.
Touching my lips to hers, I slide my tongue inside of her mouth and taste her. She’s sweet and warm, wet and inviting, just like her skjede always seems to be. Breaking the kiss, I rest my forehead against hers while I catch my breath for a moment.
Slowly sliding out of her body, I roll onto my back next to her. Liv follows me, pressing her side against mine and hooking her leg over my thigh.
“Talk to me, Aaric. Now that we can understand one another, tell me what’s happening.”
Her demand should be an easy enough explanation. I want to tell her everything, but I don’t understand what has happened myself.
The urges inside of me when it comes to her are completely unexplainable. Her being here is also unexplainable. Sure, I know that the gods brought her to me, but it doesn’t seem possible, doesn’t seem real.
If she is a mirage, a changeling of some kind, what kind of risk am I putting myself and my people to?
“You will be my wife. The ceremony will be tomorrow. You’re to be the queen of all of my lands,” I state.
She places her palm on my chest and pushes up. “You don’t love me. We hardly know one another,” she snaps.
My lips twitch up into a grin as I watch her. She is cute when she is feigning shock. I can tell by the way her body responds, the way her fingers grip my chest that this is not an unwanted outcome for her.
“Love?” I ask. “Your kings marry for love?”
She shakes her head. “I don’t know any kings,” she whispers.
“Your people do not have them?”
She shrugs a shoulder. “Some countries do, mine doesn’t. We have politicians and they can marry whoever they want. Though, I have no doubt that some are in loveless marriages. But regular people, they marry for love, Aaric.”
Her last words are on a whisper and I wonder if she has ever been in love before. It’s not an emotion that I understand. I understand war, need, desire and the thirst for blood. I understand wealth, taking care of my people, providing for them. Love is a useless feeling, most emotions are.
“Commoners marry for love and for stability. I am not that, and you, sváss, are made by the gods. You will marry none other than a king or a god. I am the closest to a god on this earth so you will marry me, you will take me inside of your body, you will bear my heirs.”
Her head jerks back as if I’ve physically struck her. “That sounds like a demand,” she mutters.
Lifting my head slightly, I nip her bottom lip with my teeth right before I lick the sting away. “If that is what you need, then yes, Liv, I command you to join with me tomorrow.”
“What kind of power will I have as your queen?” she asks.
Laughing softly, she is lucky that I am completely spent and that she is so good at spending me. Wrapping my arms around her, I hug her close to my body, her face just inches from mine.
“You have the power of sitting beside the most powerful ruler in this corner of the earth. You have the power of taking me, of providing heirs.”
She’s quiet for a moment and I can’t read her thoughts by the expression that she wears. She touches her mouth to mine, her tongue sliding across my lips. “I will win you over, Aaric, and I will rule beside you, not behind you.”
I almost laugh at her, but wonder if this is magic that she is going to attempt to wield to bend me to her will. It will not work. I decide immediately that I will have Runa cast a spell to keep Liv from poisoning my mind with any dark magic.
“We shall see, sváss.”
“Yes, we totally will.”
Chapter Eleven
AARIC
Staring at the ceiling of my room, I think about everything that Liv said. Ruling beside me and love. It is far too much for her to ask of me, both of those things. Power and love are not something that I can freely give, not the way that she is asking for them.
“Aaric,” she rasps, touching her lips to my chest.
Tipping my chin down, I look at her face, into her eyes as she watches me through her