The Bone Palace - Amanda Downum [85]
It wasn’t till well past midnight, after an awkward one-armed bath that nearly lulled her into sleep and drowning, that she remembered the jewel she’d found in Carnavas. She picked up her ruined coat, meaning to drop the filthy thing in a rubbish bin, and something small and glittering fell out of the pocket and rattled across the floor.
Savedra crouched to retrieve it from the shadows under the bed. She’d drunk several glasses of medicinal brandy during the stitching, and the movement nearly toppled her.
A ring. A woman’s ring, a brilliant pigeon’s blood ruby in a delicate gold band. The setting was clogged with grime, the stone dull with it, but there was no mistaking its beauty or its worth. Such a ring would be costly anywhere, but in Selafai it would only grace the hand of a mage.
Was it hers? The mysterious missing Severos sorceress?
She staggered off her knees at a knock on the door, and the ring vanished into the pocket of her robe.
Ashlin entered before Savedra reached the door. The princess was freshly bathed as well, her hair and shirt both damp and clinging to her skin. She went straight for the brandy and poured herself a tall glass. From the smell of her skin, it wasn’t her first either. The talon scratches on her face had scabbed dark and angry red.
“Are you all right?” Savedra asked, after watching the princess pace several circuits across the rug.
“I lied,” Ashlin said, jerking to a halt. She set down her half-empty glass and brandy splashed against her fingers. Her cheeks were flushed, eyes shining. “I don’t envy you. I envy Nikos.”
Savedra opened her mouth and closed it again. “What do you mean?”
Ashlin closed the space between them. The heat of her skin was a furnace, and the smell of brandy clinging to her reminded Savedra how much she’d drunk herself. It also reminded her that she wasn’t wearing anything beneath her robe; her good hand clenched at the collar.
“I watched you come to harm, and I couldn’t bear it.” She cupped Savedra’s cheek with one calloused hand. “It’s you I want, Vedra.” She took the last step, pressing the length of their bodies together. The princess was hard and lean against her, lips soft and demanding.
“I don’t like girls,” Savedra whispered when she could breathe again. But there was no denying the attraction, not with the sharp beat of her pulse, the heat and hardness of her traitorous flesh. She tried to pull away, but a bedpost trapped her.
Ashlin’s laugh caught in her throat. “Neither do I. But I like you.” She shifted her hips and Savedra gasped. Lips and tongue traced the line of her throat.
“Nikos will never forgive me,” Savedra whispered, even as she arched into the touch. Pins and combs fell away beneath Ashlin’s insistent fingers and the damp cloud of her hair enveloped both their faces.
“He will. He loves you. It’s me he won’t forgive, and I hardly care.” Teeth scraped her earlobe. “I want you, Vedra.”
A turn and gentle push and the edge of the bed met the back of Savedra’s knees. She sat, and Ashlin’s knee pressed between hers. With a scramble and shrug Ashlin cast her shirt aside and crawled forward, forcing Savedra back against the featherbed.
Curiosity and envy made Savedra raise her face to her breasts, but the shudder and moan that answered her only made the pressure at the base of her spine build all the more. “This is madness,” she murmured against clean soap-scented skin. A nipple brushed her mouth, taut and creased. “Not to mention adultery and treason.”
Ashlin pulled away, and she nearly whimpered with pain and relief, but the princess only stripped away her trousers, and then Savedra’s robe. The sour-sweet musk of her was alien but not unpleasant. Savedra slid a hand along the silken skin of her inner thigh, driven by