“After that speech you made, it didn’t take much.” Despite my fatigue, I am hyperaware of his presence, of the heat of his skin and the way his slow, conspiratorial smile makes my stomach twist with stupid longing.

“It cannot be anything other than the truth,” he says. “Or it never could have left my tongue.”

I find my gaze drawn to his soft lips, the black of his eyes, the cliffs of his cheekbones.

“You didn’t come to bed last night,” I whisper.

It occurs to me abruptly that while I was unconscious, he would have spent his nights elsewhere. Perhaps not alone. It has been a long time since I was last at Court. I have no idea who is in his favor.

But if there is someone else, his thoughts appear far from her. “I’m here now,” he says, as though he thinks it’s possible he misunderstands me.

It’s okay to want something that’s going to hurt, I remind myself. I move toward him, so we are close enough to touch.

He takes my hand in his, fingers lacing together, and bends toward me.

There is plenty of time for me to pull away from the kiss, but I don’t. I want him to kiss me. My weariness evaporates as his lips press against mine. Over and over, one kiss sliding into the next.

“You looked like a knight in a story tonight,” he says softly against my neck. “Possibly a filthy story.”

I kick him in the leg, and he kisses me again, harder.

We stagger against the wall, and I pull his body to mine. My fingers glide up under his shirt, tracing up his spine to the wings of his shoulder blades.

His tail lashes back and forth, the furred end stroking over the back of my calf.

He shudders and presses more tightly against me, deepening the kiss. His fingers push back my hair, damp with sweat. My whole body is tense with desire, straining toward him. I feel feverish. Every kiss seems to make my thoughts more drugged, my skin more flushed. His mouth is against my neck, his tongue on my skin. His hand moves to my hips, lifting me.

I feel overheated and out of control.

That thought cuts through everything else, and I freeze.

He releases me immediately, letting me down and then stepping back as though scalded. “We need not—” he begins, but that’s even worse. I don’t want him to guess how vulnerable I feel.

“No, just give me a second,” I say, then bite my lip. His eyes are very dark, pupils dilated. He’s so beautiful, so perfectly, horribly, inhumanly beautiful that I can barely breathe. “I’ll be right back.”

I flee to the wardrobe. I can still feel the drum of my thundering pulse all through my body.

When I was a kid, sex was a mystery, some bizarre thing people did to make babies when they got married. Once, a friend and I placed dolls in a hat and shook the hat around to indicate that they were doing it.

That changed in Faerie, of course. The Folk come naked to revels, may couple for entertainment, especially as evenings wear on. But though I understand what sex is now and how it’s accomplished, I didn’t anticipate how much it would feel like losing myself. When Cardan’s hands are on me, I am betrayed into pleasure. And he can tell. He’s practiced in the arts of love. He can draw whatever response he wants from me. I hate that, and yet I want it, all at once.

But maybe I don’t have to be the only one made to feel things.

I strip off my dress, kick off my shoes. I even take down my hair, letting it fall over my shoulders. In the mirror, I catch sight of my curves—the muscles of my arms and chest, honed by swordplay; the heaviness of my pale breasts; and the swell of my hips. Naked, there is no disguise for my mortality.

Naked, I return to the bedroom.

Cardan is standing by the bed. When he turns, he looks so astonished that I almost laugh. I have seldom seen him unsure of himself, even when drunk, even when wounded; it is rare to see him overset. A wild heat leaps into his eyes, an expression not unlike fear. I feel a rush of power, heady as wine.

Now this is a game I don’t mind playing.

“Come here,” he says, voice rough. I do, crossing the floor obediently.

I might be inexperienced in love, but I know a lot about provocation. I slide to my knees in front of him. “Is this what you imagined I’d be like, back in your rooms at Hollow Hall, when you thought of me and hated it? Is this how you pictured my eventual surrender?”

He looks absolutely mortified, but there’s no disguising the flush of his cheeks, the shine of his eyes. “Yes,” he says, sounding like the word was dragged out of him, his voice rough with desire.

“Then what did I do?” I ask, my voice low.

I reach out to press my hand against his thigh.

His gaze shimmers with a sharp spike of heat. There’s a wariness in his face, though, and I realize he believes I might be asking him all this because I’m angry. Because I want to see him humiliated. But he keeps speaking anyway. “I imagined you telling me to do with you whatever I liked.”

“Really?” I ask, and the surprised laugh in my voice makes him meet my gaze.

“Along with some begging on your part. A little light groveling.” He gives me an embarrassed smile. “My fantasies were rife with overweening ambition.”

On my knees, it is a small thing to lie back on the cold stone. I reach up my hands, like a supplicant. “You may do with me whatever you like,” I say. “Please oh please. All I want is you.”

He sucks in a breath and gets down so we’re both on the floor and he’s on his hands and knees, making a cage of his body. He presses his mouth to the pulse point of my wrist, racing in time with my heart. “Mock me all you like. Whatever I imagined then, now it is I who would beg and grovel for a kind word from your lips.” His eyes are black with desire. “By you, I am forever undone.”

It seems impossible that he’s saying those words and that they’re true. But when he leans down and kisses me again, that thought blurs into sensation. He arches against me, shuddering. I begin to undo the buttons of his doublet. He tosses his shirt after it.

“I’m not mocking,” I whisper against his skin.

When he looks down at me, his face is troubled.

“We have lived in our armor for so long, you and I. And now I am not sure if either of us knows how to remove it.”

“Is this another riddle?” I ask. “And if I answer it, will you go back to kissing me?”

“If that’s what you want.” His voice sounds rough, unsteady. He moves so that he is lying at my side.

“I told you what I wanted,” I say in challenge. “For you to do with me whatever—”

“No,” he interrupts. “What you want.”

I move so that I am straddling his body. Looking down at him, I study the planes of his chest, the voluptuous black curls damp against his brow, his slightly parted lips, the furred length of his tail.

“I want—” I say, but I am too shy to say the words.

I kiss him instead. Kiss him until he understands.

He shucks off his pants, watching me as though waiting for me to change my mind. I feel the soft brush of his tail against my ankle, winding around my calf. Then I fumble my way into what I think is the right position. Gasp as our bodies slide together. He holds me steady through the sharp, bright spark of pain. I bite his palm. Everything is fast and hot, and I am kind of in control and out of control at the same time.