The Mirror Guardian

Chapter Twenty-Four: Chains + Naga = Kinkiness?

She'd awoken back up around noon feeling...clearer. The grief and pain were still there, writhing inside her, but for the first time in a long while, she felt as though she could finally see. As though she could finally breathe after Raloric's death.

Focusing on keeping her hands steady, she made another little mark, then another on the chains around Soveliss' wrists.

"Tell me about yourself."

"Tell me about yourself and I'll tell you about me," he said through gritted teeth as she kept messing with the cuffs. She had explained the spell to him thoroughly and instructed him not to move as much before she'd took the enchanted chalk to the enchanted metal.

"Fine. Are your parents alive?" A stupid, dangerous question to ask, given what had happened with her parents, but there was no grief in his face as he shook his head.

"My parents were very old when they conceived me." Not old in the human sense, she knew. "I was their only child in the millennia they'd been mated. They faded into Faenemo (The Silver Planes) before I reached my second decade." Before she could think more on that interesting, different way of describing death, Soveliss asked,

"How many siblings do you have?" She focused on her work as she let out the thinnest tendril of memory.

"Two half siblings. A little brother named Soren and the other a little sister named Kira. But--" She hesitated even though she knew she should just Shut her mouth. "But I have two cousins from my step-mother's side of the family. Vanora and Van, twins. They where 500 years older than me, and we fought and loved each other like siblings." She hadn't spoken about them aloud in three years. But she'd heard them, and seen it in court. She had to set down the chalk and flex her fingers. "I don't know what happened, but the courts started saying their names-- as skilled warriors in the king's courts."

She had failed to mention her unfortunate arranged engagement to Van to Soveliss. She detest her cousins for what they become and couldn't bare to tell Soveliss. She knew he would find out later about the arrangement that her father rearranged between the two. She was able to avoid the two, especially Van, when they were in or near the courts since the arrangement was announced.

For these past three years it was by luck or fate or something else entirely that she had never been in the castle when they were there after the engagement announcement. Because not only would Van have the right to command her, but if he knew that Soveliss had marked her as his mate...his hatred would make Mailee's look pleasant, probably.

Soveliss' features were set in a mask of contemplation as she said, "I think facing Van after everything would be the worst of it-- worse than facing my father, probably...if not close to it."

"Roisin ( little rose), keep working so we can break your bindings next," Soveliss said, jerking his chin at the chalk sitting in her lap. She obeyed, and he tried to ignore as she sat up a little more on his waist to reach once more. The contact was distracting to him as he felt her against him. "Do you think," he said after a moment, "this Van would try to kill me or torture me if he found out about our special bond? The mating mark?" She didn't say anything. "Don't think that I can't feel your emotions you're feeling inside. You should be able to feel mine as well at this point too through the mating bond. What is it that you're hiding from me about this certain cousin, Van?" A chill went down her spine at the way Soveliss said Van's name.

"I have no doubt that he would try to do both those things and not just to you. After all his loyalties lie with my father. He also doesn't like things that he considered to be his taken away from him and I rather not know what they would do about this...mating between you and I." She hesitated on the next part and took a deep breath before she continued. "All though the royal bloodline is not too close with us, that still didn't stop my father from rearranging a marriage between Van and I. I had protest against it right on the spot, but my father would not have listen to me and made sure that I couldn't go against his decision on the matter. I ended up in the end not being able to refuse it. So I left the castle every time he was there for a visit. I still refused to let him mark me as his mate."

The chain on his right wrist fell to the ground as the runes glowed breaking the spell on them. She started on the next metal cuff on his left wrist and rotated slightly in his lap to get a better angle. She knew and felt that he was having trouble controlling himself and what she was doing at the same time. She knew she could position herself differently, but she also wanted to torture him a little as payback for the bite mark on her neck. "The arrangement is still laughable now as it had been three years ago."

Soveliss stayed silent as she heard him shifting his coils slightly. She did not need him to speak to feel the anger and jealousy that rolled off his body. He wrapped his right arm around her waist and held her close to his chest. Mailee gently placed one of her free hand on one of his rather muscular arms and smiled to herself, she did certainly find Soveliss to be an interesting, handsome, naga.

"He shall not have you," He bared his teeth, though she knew he meant it, and glanced meaningfully at her. While he spoke he brought the tip of his large, snake tail to her face and using it to stroke her cheek. He let his head tilt for a moment; still keeping his eyes locked on Mailee's, he then smirked slightly. "I would think you would be better off with me, wouldn't you say princess?" Soveliss asked while giving her a tender stare, letting his tail's tip fall on the ground. He noticed her staring in shock and kissed her neck "After all I would most likely satisfy you better than him."

She cheeks turned to a tomato red as she understood what he was applying. She used her free hand to make a particularly vulgar gesture, and he caught it with his free hand, his smirk still showing. "That is not very queenly."

"Then it's good that I'm not a queen, isn't it?" But he wouldn't let go of her hand.

"You have sworn to be a crown princess and take the throne one day-- but will not even consider your own happiness. What scares you about seizing your happiness? Your father? Facing what remains of your court?" He kept his face so close to hers that she could see the flecks of gold in his crimson eyes. "Give me one good reason why you won't take back your life. One good reason, and I'll keep my mouth shut about it." She weighed the earnestness in his gaze, his breathing, and then said,

"Because if I free myself and take back what was mine from my father as Crown Princess Mailee, I can go anywhere after that and that scares me. The outcome could be disastrous if I fail. And even if I do succeed...this mating mark is just another set of shackles." She had finished with the last chain cuff as it to tell to the ground. She waited for the scolding, saw it simmering in Soveliss' eyes. But then he quietly asked,

"What do you mean, another set of shackles?" He loosened his grip to reveal the two thin bands of scars that wrapped around her wrist and then grabbed the other one with his left hand to see the same thing on them. His mouth tightened, and she yanked her wrists back hard enough that he let go.

"Nothing," she whispered. "King Lucifer, my father, liked to use them for training every now and then." Her father had chained her to make her learn how to get free. But the shackles in the 'punish room' had been crafted with people like her in mind. It wasn't until a few days before this festival had her father removed her from that room and removed them from her wrists.

She didn't want Soveliss knowing that--any of it. Anger and hatred she could handle, but pity...She could not have. Mailee studied her wrist with the binding tunes on them, and Soveliss' face remained tight--as if he could smell her half truths. It was hard for Mailee to look at him in the eye.

She flicked her tongue, and his brows rose in question. "These runes won't work on my bindings..." She trailed off and cleared her throat. "I will have to go back to the library." Soveliss nodded, lips pressed tight, and glanced towards her wrists.

"Maybe," he said, quietly enough that she looked at him again. He didn't smile, but his eyes were inquisitive. "Maybe we could find the way to our happiness together. What do you say to that?"

"I think," she said, barely more than a whisper, "I would like that very much." He held out a hand.

"Together, then?" She studied the calluses palm, then his face, full of a grim sort of hope. Someone who might-- who did understand what it was like to be crippled at your very core, someone who was still climbing inch by inch out of that abyss. Perhaps they would never get out of it, perhaps they would never be whole again, but...

"Together," she replied, and took his outstretched hand. And somewhere far and deep inside her, that ember feeling pull began to grow.