“That’s it, slow and steady,” I heard him say while my lungs pushed the air he had lent me back outside and took the first breath on their own. “Very good, fahrenor, another one,” he encouraged in a trembling voice. I gulped a second breath.
He took my hand and placed it on his chest, his figure a pillar for my weight. “Like this,” he urged as he pressed my fingers just above his heart, allowing me to feel his lungs heaving up and down. I sensed his heart beating heavily, full of worry and his lungs inflating and deflating, encouraging me to do the same. So I mimicked his movements and forced my body copy his. Up and down, up and down.
I don’t know how long we stood, breathing in silence, until our inhales coordinated. All the while, Ansgar caressed every part of me that he could find. My hair, my neck, my back, every muscle within his reach, trying to calm me down.
“I’m okay,” I whispered, not daring to fully voice the sentence from fear that everything might start all over again.
“I am so sorry, Anwen,” he uttered almost silently. “We’ll talk about it another day.”
His words almost pushed another attack down my throat, he would do it another day. He would abandon me another day because I was just a silly human who could not handle her emotions and was too kind to break my heart after I had a full breakdown in front of him. Because I couldn’t handle the news of him wanting to leave.
Because I had fallen in love with the forbidden fae prince.
Chapter Thirty-Two
I held her in my arms, forcing her body to keep breathing. What the hell was I thinking? Of course she would react like this. What did I expect? For her to jump into my arms and accept the mating? Of course she wouldn’t, she was scared within an inch of her life and stopped breathing from the fright I caused her.
My mate would rather stop allowing air into her lungs than come with me. Scratches of pain penetrated whilst I re-envisioned her reaction. What in the goddess’ name had I been thinking? For such a beautiful woman, who has success and riches in her life to just want to abandon everything and come with me into an unknown world just because she liked me and I was her mate? I huffed at the idiocy of my expectations, making my way to the river.
My marking ceremony remained scheduled for the next full moon and I had everything in my mind but the decision I needed to make. When a keeper chose their mark, it bound them to nature through the respective sign and allowed them to channel energy throughout the realm, enhancing their abilities by using said mark.
Because I guarded this district successfully for the past three moon cycles and was...had been—a creeping twist in my stomach reminded me—a member of the royal family, my ceremony opened the lines of celebrations and all the other keepers in the kingdom would follow in choosing theirs. The marking ceremony was one of the most important events in a keeper's life. It would become a symbol of their house once they chose a mate. Throughout their life, them and their family’s energy would be represented and channeled through the mark they had chosen.
I had been thinking about what I wanted to select as a mark since childhood. At first I started with fantastic ideas like dragon’s teeth or a harpie’s wing until I learnt such symbols had to be real, living things, and the more widespread the better. It meant that the energy surge would be constant throughout one’s lifespan. So basically, I had to pick something regal enough which would hopefully still be alive in the next century.
Father had chosen an orchid and Damaris a gloriosa, while Vikram renounced the right alongside his desire for a family. I was the only remaining one, the youngest prince, banished from the family. Great.
I spent the rest of the day healing, sprouting and explaining my glum expression to the passing faeries. Faelar found me just as I dug an old sycamore root to carve new life into the stem and kicked my shoulder to draw my attention. She scolded me for over ten minutes about how I left Anwen crying and scared, barely giving me a breath to explain the real situation.
“Are you sure?” the sjorka female asked, more to convince herself that her elongated ears had received my message correctly.
“I can’t explain it, but I know it,” I replied in such a firm tone, that she backed away a step. I immediately withdrew my power and apologised, but Faelar didn’t seem too upset. She disappeared within seconds, assuring me she would form a plan to help. Before she made a turn out of my view, she asked me to make my home presentable.
It was late afternoon when I finished cleaning the cave and, with Faelar’s help, wrote up an invitation for Anwen to join me for dinner, then passed it to the twins who offered to deliver it along with sugared raspberries. I thanked the females and, after their departure, took the time to make myself look presentable. After showering and scrubbing away the dirt of the day, I selected a grey shirt with the purpose to make my eyes brighter. The arms were just tight enough for the fabric to mould to my biceps but not too much so I ripped through it. I wanted her to like me, to feel attraction towards me. I hoped that if she enjoyed my looks, she would not want to break our relationship just yet.
A knock on the door announced her arrival and I sprinted towards the entrance to let her in. As soon as I opened the door, my eyes gouged out with amazement. She wore a red dress, perfectly modelled onto her form, displaying every curve of her body and showcasing her round breasts. Her hair was tightly pulled up in a sophisticated updo, her neck and shoulders bare and lips sparkled, painted in such a deep shade of red that they practically begged kisses.
“Anwen,” I stupidly called her name in a husky voice. I remained breathless and my brain stopped functioning correctly from beauty overload.
“Ansgar,” she replied, her gaze scanning mine. I pulled her into my arms, my lips devouring hers with urgency and need. I relished in the feeling, her unaltered desire towards me and kicked the door closed, pressing her tighter onto me.
I felt our lips mingling, breaths conjoined and hearts beating together and understood that I needed this woman now.
If I had a limited time with her, I had to enjoy the blessing. Without saying a word, I lowered my hands, pressing one onto her lower back and the other on her upper thigh, pulling her towards my waist. Her legs moved instinctively and curled over my hips, as she continued to taste my mouth, not breaking the kiss. Her hands ran through my hair while I moved us towards the bedroom with hurried steps. I was now caressing her thighs, her ass, her lower back, everywhere I could touch.
I lowered her onto the bed and she pulled at my shirt, dragging it from me with desperation. The gesture forced me to break the kiss just enough to take it off, leaving my chest bare for her to scratch and bite. I made quick work of her dress, unzipping the back and dragging it towards her legs and making it fly to the floor. Which left Anwen wearing only a small lacy red pair of panties.
“Red is officially my favourite colour.” It raised a chuckle from her sinful lips. I started spreading kisses on her inner thighs, coming closer and closer to the red lace temptation, her only defence against my eager tongue. I bit her slit through the lace, announcing what was to come, but instead of the low moan I had gotten so used to, Anwen released a gasp, her entire posture hardening. She instantly covered her bare breasts with her palms. I did not have time to move when I heard a familiar voice.
“If they look this good, I wouldn’t mind mating a human either,” Vikram’s voice echoed from behind me.
I turned abruptly, releasing Anwen’s panties from my mouth and tried to cover my brother’s field of vision with my body.
“What are you doing here?” I rasped.
He ignored me and shifted to gaze at my mate again, whistling in delight. Like a disgusting lustful male in heat. Rage overtook me and I didn’t stop the instinct, nor did I want to. I attacked my brother and automatically started covering his face with my fists, over and over until blood came pouring out of his nose and mouth. The only thing that stopped me were Anwen’s terrorised screams, begging me to a halt.Stop scaring her,my brain commanded, ordering the muscles to stop pumping blows into Vikram’s already hurt face.
“Ansgar, stop!” my mate’s cries demanded, so I released him from my grasp. I instinctively went back to her, covering her with the shirt I had just worn and cupping her cheeks, making sure she was alright. Tears gathered in her eyes, her face a composite of emotion I was unable to read. She shifted them from me, they went to my injured brother, then back onto my face.
