Chapter 1: The Blood-Red Bargain
The water didn’t just steam; it hissed. It coiled around Nesta’s ankles, her calves, her thighs as she descended the moonstone steps, a veil of condensation clinging to her skin. The baths were a silent, gleaming cathedral, the domed ceiling a map of stars that dripped liquid silver onto the surface of the pools. She ignored them. Her gaze was fixed on the shadow lounging against the far wall, where the water deepened into impossible black.
Rhysand’s wings were a dark echo of the cavern itself, draped over the submerged ledge like living obsidian. Water beaded on the membranous skin, catching the faint light. He didn’t move as she approached, just watched her with those ancient, violet eyes. A half-smirk played on his mouth. His arms were spread along the pool’s rim, and there, between his hips, his cock lay thick and heavy against his thigh, already fully erect, a bead of moisture glistening at its tip.
“Enjoying the view?” His voice was a low ripple in the humid air.
Nesta didn’t blink. The water was at her waist now, warm as blood. “I’ve seen more impressive things in a butcher’s window.”
He laughed, a soft, dark sound. “Liar.” His eyes trailed over her, not with lust, but with an appraising, terrible curiosity. “You came down here. You sought me out. In a bath. What did you think would happen?”
“I thought I might finally get clean.” She stopped a foot from him. The heat of his body was a separate force, pushing against the water’s warmth. “You seem to be the one wallowing in filth.”
His smirk didn’t falter. One hand slid from the ledge to trail through the water, a negligent movement. “What do you want, Nesta?”
“You know what I want.”
“Say it.”
Her silver eyes blazed. “I want you to stop looking at me like I’m a puzzle you can solve. I want you to stop sending Cassian away on pointless errands. I want you to get out of my head.”
“And you think,” Rhys said, pushing off the wall to stand, the water sluicing down the cut muscles of his abdomen, “that confronting me while we’re both naked is the way to achieve that?” He took a single step, closing the distance. His cock brushed her stomach. She refused to flinch. “This doesn’t feel like a negotiation. It feels like an invitation.”
The air crackled. Not with magic, but with the sheer, violent tension between them. Nesta could smell him—night-chilled mist and something deeper, something raw and potent.
“You want to fuck me, High Lord?” she snarled, her voice dropping to a whisper that echoed off the constellations above. “Then earn it.”
She moved. It wasn’t with the graceful precision of the Illyrians, but with a ferocious, untaught power that exploded from her core. Her hand shot out, not to his body, but to the water itself. She didn’t just shove him; she commanded the very pool to rise and slam him back against the obsidian tiles.
The impact was a thunderclap in the cavernous space. Rhys grunted, his wings flaring wide, shock flashing across his face for a fraction of a second before it was replaced by blazing interest. Before he could recover, Nesta was on him. She didn’t kiss him. She claimed him. Her mouth found the hard ridge of his shoulder and she bit down, hard enough to taste salt and the faint, wild tang of his power.
A growl ripped from Rhys’s throat. One hand fisted in her wet hair, yanking her head back, but not off him. His other arm banded around her waist, claws pricking the skin of her lower back. “Earn it?” he rasped against her ear. “You just made it a gift.”
In one brutal motion, he hoisted her up. She wrapped her legs around his hips, feeling the hard length of him press against her entrance. There was no gentle testing, no slow slide. He guided himself to her and she sank down, taking him in one sharp, unforgiving thrust.
The breath left her in a punched-out gasp. He filled her, stretched her, a devastating invasion that was all fire and pressure. For a heartbeat, they were still, locked together, breathing each other’s air.
Then Nesta began to move.
She set a punishing rhythm, riding him with sharp, driving strokes, using the water for leverage. Her nails scored down his back, over the sensitive joints of his wings. Every snap of her hips was a challenge, a punishment. His grip on her tightened, claws sinking deeper into the flesh of her thighs. A sharp, bright pain. She felt the warm trickle of blood mix with the bathwater.
“Is this what you needed?” Rhys gritted out, his own hips meeting her rise and fall with jarring force. “To fight? To bleed?” He drove up into her, hitting a spot that made her vision whiten. “You’re a fucking wildfire, Nesta. All anyone can do is get burned.”
“Shut up,” she gasped, but the words had no heat. The friction was building, a coil of pure sensation tightening low in her belly. The crude, wet sound of their joining echoed off the stone. She dropped her forehead to his, their breath mingling.
He shifted his angle, and the coil snapped.
Pleasure wrecked her, a violent, roaring wave that tore through every nerve. She cried out, a raw, ragged sound, as her body clenched around him, milking his length. The sensation tipped him over the edge. With a final, deep thrust that pinned her fully against the wall, he came, his roar swallowed by the steam. She felt the hot, pulsing spill of him inside her.
For long moments, there was only the sound of their ragged breathing and the lap of disturbed water. The star-light above swirled, dizzyingly slow.
Rhys’s forehead still rested against hers. His claws retracted from her thighs. Slowly, he lowered her until her feet found the floor, though his arms remained around her, keeping her upright as her legs trembled.
She expected a smug comment. A victorious quip.
He just looked at her, his eyes depthless. The water around their waists was tinged pink from her thighs. He brought a hand up, cupping her cheek, his thumb swiping roughly over her bottom lip. “Next time,” he said, his voice hoarse, “you don’t have to draw blood to get my attention.”
Nesta shoved against his chest, breaking his hold. She turned without a word and waded back through the steaming pool, the water cleansing the evidence of him from her skin with every step. The sting in her muscles, the dull ache between her legs, the warm trickle on her thighs—they were all marks. Not of ownership, but of a battle that had no clear winner.
She didn’t look back as she climbed the steps, the cool air of the passage raising goosebumps on her wet skin. Behind her, in the silent, star-lit water, Rhysand watched her go, the ghost of her teeth still in his shoulder, the echo of her tight heat still on his cock, and the undeniable knowledge that nothing between them was settled. It had only just begun.