Des turns his attention to me. “Wife.” His eyes are burning. “We have some unfinished business.”

Chapter 30

“This is not how I expected to spend the day after my wedding.” The two of us walk through the castle’s halls. I assume we’re heading back to Des’s chambers to, you know, finish business, but the Bargainer leads me past the halls that wind towards his suite.

“I think that’s the point,” Des says. “I doubt the Thief wants us to enjoy our time together.”

Was that the Thief’s entire reason behind that show at the gates? He’d told me in a dream before that he wanted me to enjoy my time with Des. So it doesn’t make sense.

“Where were you this morning?” I ask.

“About.”

Ugh, why can’t fairies ever be straightforward?

“Your guards couldn’t find you. Were you even in the palace?”

Des disappears, only to reappear a few feet away at the end of the hallway. He hooks his hands on the archway above him and leans forward, blocking my way.

“Cherub, it’s precious that you should be peeved at me when you were the one daring the Thief to break my wards and snatch you away.”

Even as he speaks, shadows begin to thicken and coil at his feet. He sounds casual enough, but obviously this is a sore spot.

“Nuh-uh. That’s not how this works. You don’t get to be mad at me for how I handled the situation when you left me to do it alone,” I say.

Not entirely true—he was there to witness me playing chicken with a psychopathic monster—but he wasn’t there when the news reached me and Malaki.

He drops his hands and vanishes again, reappearing directly in front of me. Stepping in close, he says, “You’re right.” The shadows around him clear. “You were a queen this morning. I saw it, my people saw it, and the Thief saw it.”

Of course he’d bring this back to me being a queen.

“I also heard you outfoxed Malaki.” Des’s eyes practically dance at the thought.

“He wanted to hide me away like some fainting maiden.”

“The audacity,” he says.

Des takes my hand and, backing up, begins to lead me forward again. “I forgive you for your reckless endangerment this morning—”

I raise my eyebrows. “You are unbelievable.”

“—just as I’m sure you forgive me for abandoning you during such a situation.”

I guffaw.

Abruptly, Des stops us in front of a bronze door, the top of it coming to a curved point.

I’ve been so invested in our conversation that I haven’t been paying attention to where the Bargainer has been leading us.

“Where are we?” I ask, eyeing the door in front of me.

Des is giving me a look, his eyes sparking. I’d say he’s either particularly dangerous right now or particularly lusty—he tends to wear the same expression for both emotions. “Open the door.”

I stare at him for several seconds, my brows furrowing, then I grab the handle and swing the door open.

Inside, warm lamps hang from the ceiling. A series of columns hold up the arching ceilings, their surfaces inlaid with blue tile. The far wall is nothing more than open archways. Resting half inside and half outside the columned archway is an infinity pool, filled to the brim with Lephys’s glowing water. It snakes through the low lit chambers before curving out of sight. I’m not entirely sure, but I think it might bisect every one of this suite’s rooms.

Beyond the pool, Somnia is laid out before me, the lights of the city glittering amber and blue and pale green in the night.

I don’t think I breathe as I take it all in. I’m used to the beauty of the Otherworld, but this truly feels magical.

“You’ve been holding out on me, Flynn,” I say, walking deeper into the room, my gaze moving back to the pool.

I had no idea there even was a place like this in his palace.

“Do you like your wedding gift?” he asks from behind me.

“Wedding gift?” I turn to face him.

Des’s silver eyes gleam.

I glance around again. “Wait, are these … ?”

“Our new rooms.”

He slides his hands into his pockets, stepping up next to me to survey the chambers. “It’s no ocean—I’m afraid there are limits on even what I can do—but I figured my wife needed a place for her siren to unwind.”

Our new rooms. I’m still stuck on that. He did this all for me—for us.

The gauzy curtains blow in from the windows, the wind carrying in the evening scents. I run my hand over a column.

“I love it,” I breathe.

“I’m glad.”

When I glance back at Des, he wears a small smile on his face, his eyes soft.

Genuine happiness looks good on him.

I wander through the suite, taking in the opulent bathroom, with its iridescent turquoise tile and bronze fastenings—each detail harkening to the sea in some way. Around me, the walls of the bathroom are covered in slate grey rock, and the sunken tub is made of the same dark stone.

“I couldn’t help myself,” Des admits, following my gaze. “After all this time, I miss the caves I grew up in.”

Now that I look for it, I see it—the bathroom is some fusion between the ocean that I love and the caverns Des misses.

“It’s perfect.”

I leave the bathroom and walk into our bedroom. The chamber sits under the light of dozens of lamps, their flames sparking like fireworks. The headboard of the bed is the same worked bronze as in Des’s other chambers, but someone’s gone to the trouble of hammering out an image of crashing waves under a star-strewn sky.

There are a thousand other details to this suite that will surely take me days to fully notice and appreciate.

I turn to face Des. “You planned all this?”

He doesn’t say anything, but he doesn’t need to, it’s all in his eyes. Des must’ve spent ages putting this chamber together. I rub my chest. My heart hurts so damn much.

I shake my head. “Thank you.”

Des disappears, manifesting at my side. He tucks a strand of hair behind my ear. “It’s nothing,” he says, his voice a little rough.

I lean into his touch, giving him a small smile. My gaze sweeps over the rooms again, and again, my eyes catch on that pool.

Really want to get in.

Before I can so much as voice those words, my clothes slip off, leaving behind a strappy bathing suit.

I touch the soft material. “How do you do that?” But it’s not really a question and I don’t expect an answer. Des has always had his ways.

“Magic, love,” he says, answering me anyway.

I back up from him. The Night King watches me with his gleaming eyes, and I feel that gaze everywhere.

“If I get in the pool, will you join me?” I ask.

“Do I have a choice?”

“Do you really want one?”

His eyes narrow, even as delight touches his features. “Answering questions with questions. You are shaping up to be an excellent fairy, Callie.”

I turn to the pool to hide my grin, and slowly lower myself in. The water is cool against my skin and my siren beckons for more.

I sink farther and farther into the glowing liquid until I’m fully submerged.

Des is right—it’s not the tumultuous ocean. There are no sailors to call down to their deaths, no promise of violence. But there’s peace here, beneath the surface. And what’s more, I think as I feel the water shift and Des joins me, there’s sex.