Queen Takes Checkmate (Their Vampire Queen Book 5) Read online

  The owl squawked and Carys patted her head soothingly. “No cats. I promise. May this crazy spinster aunt accompany you, Your Majesty? I would rather be close, so that I’m at your beck and call at a moment’s notice.”

  Nuzzling back into Rik’s embrace, I sighed. “She can come with us, G. But will someone let Winston know, so he can call ahead and have Magnum prepare a room for her?”

  “Already done, Your Majesty,” Winston said as Rik carried me down the hallway. “The car is waiting downstairs, and Magnum assured me a suite will be ready for your new sibling as well.”

  I yawned and almost cracked my jaw. “Out of curiosity, how many bedrooms does my mother’s house have?”

  “Ten, though several of the rooms are configured to accommodate many more people. I’m sure you could find a bed for at least thirty people.”

  “So many? Did she ever use them for siblings, or were they for her Blood?”

  “You’re very like your mother in that regard, Your Majesty. They—”

  A crash had us all whirling around. Rik crushed me to his chest. Daire and Itztli both crouched, hackles rising.

  Only to see my dragon glaring with disgust as he tried to slide down the hallway without damaging anything else.

  Daire made a coughing rattle that was evidently the warcat’s laughter. :Yo, dickhead, I don’t think the engineers designed this building for dragons. Why the fuck don’t you shift before you bring the roof down on our heads?:

  :I can’t shift, asswipe, until I’ve digested some of the Skye sibs. My belly already hurts. It’ll probably explode if I try to shift to human form.:

  I tried to imagine proud, arrogant Mehen strutting down the hall with a massive food-baby stomach, and I burst into laughter. It was a macabre thing to laugh about—because those were people in his belly—but it was still funny as hell. My eyes started to water, which only made me laugh harder. If I’d been standing up, I probably would have sunk to the floor as tension flowed out of me.

  It’d been such a dangerous, nerve-wracking trip. I’d almost lost Rik. We all could have died. A little laughter was the perfect medicine. Even if Mehen destroyed the whole building.

  “He already tore a hole in the roof,” Guillaume reminded me, sending me into another peal of laughter.

  “I hate this fucking building anyway,” I gasped out. “Tear it all down. I don’t give a fuck one way or the other.”

  Chuckling, Llewellyn raised a hand, waiting for my amusement to quiet. “There’s no need to destroy the whole building. As you saw earlier, the gryphon is also a large winged beast with a bloodthirsty appetite, though not as immense as our dragon friend. There’s an easy path back to the roof that he demolished here, and I can show him where the roof access is at the Isador house. The entire top floor is open and spacious for exactly this reason.”

  :But I don’t want to be separated from you, even by so much as a single story of your house,: Mehen growled in my head.

  “Then you shouldn’t have eaten so much,” Rik said, making me giggle again.

  Mehen glared at him, which only made me laugh harder.

  Llewellyn stepped closer and leaned down to lightly press his forehead to mine. “By your leave, Your Majesty, I’ll accompany the dragon and stay with him at least until he can shift.”

  I cupped Llewellyn’s cheek. “No.” His eyes widened, but he didn’t object. None of them would refuse an order from me. Though I didn’t keep him in suspense long. “Go with him now and show him the roof access. But someone else can stay with him tonight. I want you to come to me as soon as you’re both safely back. I need to be sure you’re healed and well-fed, along with Ezra and Rik.”

  “Then you’re going to need to feed deeply yourself,” Rik said, his tone as close to an order as he dared get with his queen.

  My fangs ached with anticipation.

  “I’ll babysit the dragon on first watch.” Guillaume said, not even flinching when the dragon snapped his jaws a hair’s breadth away from his ear. “Then when someone’s recovered enough to walk, come relieve me.”

  Llewellyn’s eyes started to swirl with flecks again. “You feed so deeply that your Blood can’t walk afterward?”

  Daire started purring. Loudly. :Among other things. Our queen’s hungers are ravenous.:

  My cheeks heated, and I shrugged sheepishly. “I’ll try to take it easy on you.”

  Llewellyn threw his head back and roared with laughter. Now it was my turn to glare a bit, though I was more embarrassed than angry. This man could have been my father, if my mother had been able to conceive with her alpha. I still couldn’t quite get my mind wrapped around that aspect of our relationship and all that entailed. I might chicken out in the end and not take him to my bed.

  His laughter stilled immediately, and he met my gaze, his eyes burning almost completely red gold. “You misunderstand me, my queen. I beg you to take me, anyway you wish, and the last thing on my mind is worry that you might use me too hard or take me too far. That would be impossible. I laugh only because I am so happy and blessed to have such a queen. After so many years in House Skye, I thought I’d never be able to laugh again. Let alone love.”

  I softened the glare, and now the moisture in my eyes was for an entirely different reason than uncontrollable laughter. “Then let’s make sure you laugh and love as much as possible.”

  “Long live our queen,” my Blood said in unison.

  8

  Llewellyn

  My queen’s hunger burned, spurring my steps quicker to her side. I left the dragon curled in a miserable ball in the attic, thoroughly pissed that he’d be missing out on what came next. I couldn’t blame him.

  I’d be pissed at myself too if I had cause to miss a single moment of feeding my queen’s hungers, whatever they were.

  A sudden wash of guilt drowned my joy at being able to serve again. I paused outside her room in the hallway and pressed my head to the ornate door. I’d passed through these doors many times, drawn by my queen’s desire.

  My former queen. My new queen’s mother.

  I loved her. I would have sacrificed my life for hers in a heartbeat if that would have given her the child she yearned for so desperately. Any alpha would have fucked himself into a coma to please his queen and give her a child.

  But it would have been a useless death, because my queen had never bred in all the centuries I served her. Had she looked through the future and seen me here, aching to fuck her daughter? Even as I made love to her? Had she seen the years of torture I’d endured, gladly, just to stand outside an Isador queen’s door again?

  Even if it wasn’t hers?

  Forgive me, my love.

  :There’s nothing to forgive, Lew.: Her voice whispered through me like a faint ghost, so soft and distant that it would have been easy to dismiss her touch as my imagination.

  But only my former queen had ever called me Lew. I might not be able to say her name, but I knew her touch. Her memory burned like a brand inside me. She’d etched herself into every bone and sinew in my body with her blood and her love.

  And if I was extremely lucky, her daughter would claim me exactly the same way.

  I waited a moment, making sure Shara felt my presence at the door. She didn’t order me inside, but I felt her tug on my bond like a crackling fire on a cold winter night. I entered the room and quietly shut the door behind me.

  The heavy-set man who smelled like bear gave me a slight nod. I had a feeling that was as close to a friendly welcome as the man would ever get. The twins stood on the opposite side of the door. They barely even looked at me. Not that I cared. The one with a black sun tattooed on his cheek smelled like pain and death, and his brother smelled like jungle. I couldn’t see the wolf, but I smelled a hint of him wafting through the room. It was a special Blood who could hide in plain sight like that, even from former alphas. I had a feeling even Rik wouldn’t be able to see Xin, unless he used our queen’s bond. I had no doubt at all that she knew and saw everything.<
br />
  The queen always did.

  The Blood with long, black hair and kilt smelled… strange. Not quite right. I couldn’t put my finger on what was wrong, but there was a secret there, too.

  It was no surprise that her alpha and his purring companion were closest to her. The feline Blood was helping her undress, though Rik hovered close. Damn, he was one big fucker. I was taller, but I’d never seen a man built like our alpha. He put weightlifters on steroids to shame.

  Combined with the Templar knight and Leviathan, king of the depths, our queen had quite an unusual array of Blood. No surprise, given that her father was Typhon, the god of monsters. Even her mother had always had a taste for the unique and strange.

  A flash of something sharp in the bond drew my attention to Shara. A tear trickled down her cheek.

  A fucking tear. Goddess. I felt the track of that salty drop like a knife sinking into my belly and scrambling my intestines. Her emotion became mine times a hundredfold. Blood needed to know when their queen hurt, so they could protect all the better. But this hurt…

  Goddess, I didn’t know if I could bear it. That was one reason my former queen had released all our bonds before she went to Typhon. Before she conceived, delivered her daughter in blood and pain, and ultimately, died. Because suffering that kind of pain through a Blood bond…

  The twin who smelled of pain exhaled, and a fine tremor shook his body. The bear fell down on his knees beside the bed and buried his face against the bedding. His shoulders shook. Rik scooped her up in his arms, tendons and muscles standing out in stark relief, and the cat purred frantically, as if that sound alone could help ease her pain.

  “Shhh, my queen,” Rik whispered, his voice raw. He climbed into bed with her and held her on his chest, with Daire pressed against them both. “We’re all alive. You did it.”

  Her bond tore open and released a flood of agony that buckled my knees. She’d contained her fear while dealing with the Skye sibs, but now, in the privacy of her bedroom, she wept.

  She cried at the suffering Rik had gone through in the demon’s circle. The realization that he’d done it to spare her, to spare us all, shredded her heart to ribbons. The thought of losing him undid her. I understood that fear to an extent, but this seemed to go so much deeper than what had happened with Keisha Skye. Her fear mounted, her pain a suffocating weight that crushed my ribcage. I dropped forward on my hands and knees, trying to breathe through the agony. We all did. Her Blood were all down, brought to our knees because of her pain.

  “You’re alive and well,” Rik whispered, each word vibrating with strain as he fought not to hurt her more by revealing how much her pain wounded us. “That’s all that matters. If we die…”

  “No,” she retorted, jerking her head up to glare at him. “No one can die. I can’t bear it. I can’t. Please, goddess. Please, spare me.”

  He cupped her cheek and smoothed her tears away with his thumbs. “You can, and you will, because you’re Shara fucking Isador.”

  Bewildered, I didn’t try to search her bond for answers, not while she was so volatile. Her emotions sliced through the bonds, stabbing and tearing through me. I’d only had her blood once. I didn’t know how Rik and the others could even function with such blinding pain.

  :My house’s goddess made a bargain with her,: the twin whispered in my head. :She can kill Ra, but it will cost her a life. One of us will die.:

  I closed my eyes and hung my head, letting despair overwhelm me for a moment. Of course. Her mother had seen what needed to be done from the beginning and had birthed Shara for this purpose. The mighty sun god would not die easily. Better that one of us died and allowed our queen to pick up the pieces afterwards and live happily the rest of her days, free of Ra’s dominion.

  It would be me. That had to be why her mother spared me. So I could pay this price for her daughter.

  :I will, gladly,: I whispered in my head, hoping my former queen would hear my acceptance. :I will love her as I did you, as long as I can. But then I will join you in the afterlife.:

  :It’s not my choice to make.: My former queen whispered in my head, so faint as if thousands of years separated us. I strained toward her, trying to reach her one last time. :It’s not her choice. Only the goddess knows who will be called upon to die.:

  I panted with effort, but as soon as I reached for where I thought she waited, the faint sense of her dissipated like fog. She was gone. Only a hint of her spirit remained, attached to her daughter, the last queen of Isador. The child she’d died to have.

  The harsh flood of pain flowing through Shara’s bonds eased, allowing me to rock back on my heels. She still cried, but not as desperately, as if everything she loved in this world had crumbled away. “I need to bleed.”

  “And you need to feed.” Rik’s voice rumbled to a bass register that rattled the floorboards. “Deeply. As deeply as you can hold.”

  She sighed, relaxing into his arms. “I don’t want to deplete any of you too much.”

  “Impossible.”

  She held her wrist out toward the bear, who still had his face pressed to the mattress. “Ezra, let me check your health. I want to be sure we got all of Tanza’s taint out of you.”

  He fisted his hands in the bedding and refused to lift his face. “I fucking failed you, my queen. It was my fault that Rik was trapped. Don’t waste a single fucking drop of your blood on healing me. Drain me dry. Use me to heal everyone else.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” she snapped with enough force that the bear flinched and lifted his face to hers. “You would cause me that much pain, just to soothe your own pride?”

  Ezra lurched up enough to press his shaggy head against her stomach. “You would hurt if I died?”

  She shuddered, clutching his head as desperately as he clamped his arms around her waist. “Without question. If any of you are called by the goddess…” Her voice broke and she squeezed him harder. “I would rather we all die than lose a single one of you.”

  Rik leaned back and stretched out beneath her with a welcoming bump of his hips. “Let’s worry about taking care of you here and now, and leave tomorrow to the goddesses.”

  Exhaling slowly, she allowed all the tension and stress to flow out of her. She even managed a small, secretive smile. The kind of smile that made every dick in the room go rock hard.

  She slid backwards and lifted her hips to take Rik inside of her. Her head fell back, her hair teasing over the man’s thighs.

  Need throbbed through me so viciously that I couldn’t completely smother the groan. I wanted her hair kissing my thighs. Her skin burning against mine. Her fangs. Her nails. Her blood.

  “Yes, Llewellyn. Join us. I need to feed you most of all.”

  Shara

  I held Rik inside me, squeezing my inner muscles so tightly that he grunted softly. If only I could hold him so tightly in my arms and my magic and keep him safe. Keep them all safe.

  Pressing my left wrist to Ezra’s mouth, I invited him to feed. His beard was damp with tears and his bond still weighed heavily in my mind. He blamed himself for what Rik had endured for us, but I couldn’t see how the showdown would have ended any other way. At some point, Keisha would have presented the same offer to me. Save her daughter to save my Blood, and Rik would have made the exact same choice.

  :Without question.:

  He didn’t move inside me but stroked his big palms over my thighs and hips, his fingers tracing my skin as if I was the most priceless object in the world.

  Ezra sank his fangs into my skin ever so gently and I shuddered, unable to sit still with Rik’s cock so deeply inside me.

  Llewellyn came closer on my right and knelt on the bed beside us. He made no move to touch me, but his eyes blazed with a maelstrom of red and gold flames. I offered my wrist to him, but he hesitated. “You’re weakened too, my queen. I don’t know that feeding two of us at the same time is a good idea. My thirst…” He licked his lips and dropped his gaze to my body. I could almost fee
l those flames in his eyes licking my skin. “I don’t know that I’ll be able to control it. Not after so long.”

  “I’ll drink as I need to, but I feel fine right now. In fact—” I met Rik’s gaze and his eyebrows arched with interest. “I’d like to feed you all at the same time, or at least as many as possible. We’ve never done that before.”

  I didn’t have to turn my head to note that all of my Blood now stood around the bed. Granted, it was big enough they couldn’t actually touch me, but close enough to respond between one heartbeat and the next.

  “Before you get too distracted, I suggest you do whatever healing you think necessary first,” Rik said. “At the first sign of any weakness in you, I’ll offer my throat. When I fall, I expect the rest of you to feed her deeply and long until she’s done with you, or you pass out.”

  “Understood, alpha,” they replied in unison.

  Closing my eyes, I concentrated on Ezra first. My blood flowed down his throat slowly. He hadn’t bitten me deeply and he lapped at the small, tidy punctures. I sank deeper into him, tracing the pathways of blood vessels through his body. Shivering, he whispered gruffly, “Fucking tickles.”

  Daire snorted and practically crawled into my lap, which put him closer to Rik and Ezra too. “You can feed on me first, if you like, Shara. That way you can enjoy Rik longer.”

  Throughout Ezra’s body, I sensed only my power. I glowed inside him like an opalescent moon, casting swirls of soft pearly light throughout his body. Nothing dark lingered. I opened my eyes and smiled at him. “I don’t sense anything inside you that shouldn’t be there. If you suspect anything at all, please let me know and I’ll check again. But I think I burned all of Tanza out of you successfully.”

  Lifting his mouth, he grimaced. “I will, at once. I’ve never tasted anything as nasty as her blood before.”

  He still felt… stretched, somehow. Tender. Like he wasn’t completely whole yet. I pressed my wrist back to his mouth, ignoring his muttered protests. “You need more. Bite me deeper if you need to. You know I like your fangs in me almost as much as I love your dick.”