“How would you know?”
“Because I have danced with him. If that’s what you’d been facing every night for the past few months, you would not have survived this long.”
She shook her head. She knew what she felt. “He’s been different since the night I stayed with him in his bedroom.”
He folded his wings all the way and stepped closer. “How has he been different? And why didn’t you say something? I told you I would help you.”
“What was I supposed to say? That I can’t think of anything but screwing him whenever he gets near me? That some days I feel like I’m nothing but a sheath for his cock?”
“Why didn’t you say something if his sexual heat was making you uncomfortable?”
“I did! Over and over again. What could I have said that he would hear?”
“Something like, ‘Sugar, I need to rest tonight. Could you bank the heat?’”
She snorted. “Could Marian say that to you?”
“She does. Only she doesn’t call me sugar.”
Surreal blinked. Using different words could have stopped this? No. Not possible. “I have been dealing with the Sadist.” She had to believe that, needed to believe there hadn’t been a choice.
Lucivar shook his head. “I’m not saying there isn’t a whisper of the Sadist or an edge to the way he sometimes plays in bed. Daemon likes to play. But you’re his friend, his partner, his lover, and his wife. When he plays with you, he knows exactly where the line is between pain and pleasure, and he will never cross it. Not with you.” He thought for a moment. “Well, he used to know where that line was, but neither of you told the other that something had changed, so I’m thinking both of you have crossed a few lines you wouldn’t normally cross—and there are wounded feelings on both sides because of it.”
Annoyed by the scold, Surreal shrugged off those words and concentrated on something else Lucivar had said. “The Sadist crossed that line with you.” Daemon and Lucivar had a complicated history, but her stomach started flipping at the thought of them doing . . . what?
Lucivar’s smile was bitter. “Even when we were younger and both wore the Birthright Red, he would hit me with that sexual heat and wind his particular kind of seduction spells around me, and there was nothing I could do. He played with me in front of an audience of bitch Queens. Do you have any idea what it’s like to be so mad with need, to have so little control over your own body, that your own brother could make you come in front of all those bitches?”
Lucivar walked away and stood for a minute with his back to her, before returning.
“I hated him for what he did to me during those entertainments. It took years before I figured out that he did it out of love. He offered those bitches an entertainment they couldn’t resist as a substitute for whatever they’d intended to do to me. Because what they’d intended would have been permanently disfiguring. I could have lost my balls or my wings. Lost my eyes, my ears. They wouldn’t have killed me and brought Saetan’s rage down on their heads, but they could have maimed me to the point of being a helpless lump that they could continue to torture. I’d seen them do that to other men. But the Sadist offered them a game that was entertainment and lesson—a lesson because he made it clear that if they touched me after he was done, he would do the same to them . . . without any mercy.”
“Mother Night,” Surreal breathed.
“I don’t know what it cost him to play those games.” A pause. “Well, I broke his ribs a couple of times when I beat on him afterward. But playing those games did things to him in here.” Lucivar tapped his chest. “He’s a lot more powerful now than he was then, and so is the Sadist. If you truly believe that’s who is coming to your bed, I need to know. If he’s acting oddly toward you, I need to know. If you’re thinking of leaving him, I need to know. You help him stay connected to the living, Surreal. But if something happens and he goes cold and the Sadist starts sliding into the Twisted Kingdom, I need to know because I’ll have to choose to join him in the destruction or stand against him.”
“You couldn’t stand against him,” she said wearily. “He would kill you.”
“Yes, he would.”
She stared at him. He said the words so simply, with such acceptance.
“Despite the past, or maybe because of it, I love him and I enjoy spending time with him. But I also keep an eye on him for the same reason that Andulvar kept an eye on Saetan, especially after what happened with Zuulaman. Men that powerful have to be protected in some ways, have to know there is a hand that will reach for them if they flounder, have to know someone will say ‘stop’ before they’re out of reach and can’t be stopped. That was true for Andulvar and Saetan. It’s true for me and Daemon. More so for us, because Daemon is a lot more dangerous than Saetan ever thought to be.”
Surreal pushed her hair away from her face. “What do you want me to do?”
“What do you want to do?” he countered.
“I don’t want to leave him.” And she didn’t want to leave Jaenelle Saetien alone with Daemon without a buffer. Not permanently. No one needed to tell her that if she walked away, the High Lord’s daughter wouldn’t be coming with her. “I’ll talk to him, explain why I can’t handle being around the Black every night.”
Lucivar looked past her and frowned. “Come on. We have other things to deal with.” He dropped the shields and hurried out of the study.
She hurried after him, not sure what he’d heard that made their discussion end so abruptly.
“Marian?” She looked at Marian’s pale face and the way one hand clung to Lucivar’s arm as soon as he reached his wife.
Marian sighed, a shuddering sound. “Surreal. Jillian asked if you could meet her at her home. Apparently something happened and she needs to talk.”
“All right.” She looked from Marian to Lucivar. “Something else?”
Marian’s hand tightened on Lucivar’s arm. “Rothvar needs Lucivar down in the village. There was some trouble. Daemonar . . .”
“I’ll take care of it,” Lucivar said. “You look after yourself and the baby. Let Morghann keep watch on the girls.”
Marian nodded.
The tender way Lucivar pressed his lips to Marian’s forehead made Surreal’s heart ache.
She followed Lucivar out the front door of the eyrie.
He looked toward the far end of the valley. “You’d better go if you’re going. That’s a wicked bitch of a storm heading this way, and everyone with any sense is going to go to ground until it passes.”
“After I talk to Jillian, I’ll talk to Daemon,” she said.
He watched the sky. “Well, that might be difficult, witchling. I don’t feel the Black in Ebon Rih anymore, and Daemon isn’t answering my call. Right now I have no idea where he is.”
Lucivar flew down to Riada as fast as he could, aiming for the knot of people and the scattered debris in front of one of the shops. He glided toward Zaranar, Hallevar, and Rothvar, who was holding Tagg. Backwinging, he landed lightly on the street just beyond the debris and the crowd, which was divided into such distinct groups he wondered if this was the start of a fight between Eyriens and Rihlanders or an isolated problem. On one side stood the three Eyrien Warlords. On the other side stood a dozen guards who served the Queen of Riada, including her Master of the Guard, who looked furious.
Between the two groups of warriors were five young men and the man who owned the shop. Four of the young Warlords were bloody—black eyes, split lips, a couple with broken noses. And two of them were cupping their balls and groaning, their clothes spattered with vomit. The fifth young Warlord looked rumpled, but Lucivar saw no sign that he’d been in the fight. A couple of men carried a sixth youth out of the shop on a stretcher.