The Keeper's Retribution: A Chosen Novel (The Keepers Book 2) Read online

  It took a second for his words to sink in, but when they did, her face scrunched in confusion. “In the five minutes since I left them?”

  “The Triumvirate have an efficient way of communicating.”

  It was true they could speak directly into someone’s mind, but Effie had always thought it required the person to at least be somewhat close to them physically. Then she remembered how the Triumvirate had been able to announce to all of the Keepers that Elysia was under attack. So maybe she didn’t know much of anything at all about what the Triumvirate could or couldn’t do.

  “Mmm,” she hummed noncommittally.

  “Effie?”

  “Hmm?”

  “Why won’t you look at me?”

  Her eyes snapped to his. “I am looking at you.”

  One side of his mouth curled in a mocking smile, but his eyes were serious. “Are you okay?”

  “Why does everybody keep asking me that?”

  His thumb brushed lightly over her cheekbone, just beneath the purple smudges she’d noticed in the mirror before trudging out of her room that morning.

  “It might have something to do with the fact that you almost bled out yesterday. Or it could just be because despite your best efforts to the contrary, people care about you.”

  The words were meant to provoke her temper, and any other time it might have worked, but his voice was soft and his eyes more concerned than she’d ever seen. He’d been worried about her.

  Some of her tension ebbed, and Effie took a deep breath, deciding to take a risk and tell him the truth. “I feel like I’ve been trampled by a pack of Daejaran wolves, and that’s just emotionally. I probably look better than I feel, truth be told.”

  Creases bracketed his mouth as he frowned.

  “Lucian, about last night . . .”

  If his gaze was intense before it was molten now.

  Effie tried not to cringe as her stomach twisted itself in knots. The words needed to be said so that things could go back to some semblance of normal between them, but she’d rather clean the floor with her tongue than have this conversation.

  “I-I’m sorry, that I . . . put you in that situation. You were right, I was drunk and not thinking clearly. It was a mistake.” The words left her in a single breath, her cheeks burning by the time she was finished speaking.

  His expression hadn’t changed, his eyes still pinning her in place. “And what happened after? Was that a mistake too?”

  “After?” she asked, her voice high and chest tight.

  “After you left me.”

  He barely spoke above a whisper, but she flinched.

  “It’s not like Kieran made it seem. I mean, yes, I went to his room, but I changed my mind before . . . before I made a mistake I couldn’t fix,” she finished lamely.

  Perhaps she didn’t owe him an explanation. She was a grown woman, after all. Who she decided to take to bed was really none of his business, but it was important to her that he understood what had—and hadn’t—happened.

  Lucian’s eyes burned as he stared at her. “I see.”

  “I was hurt—”

  Lucian recoiled as if she’d struck him.

  “—and I just wanted to—”

  “Effie, stop, it’s okay.”

  “—feel what it was like—”

  “You don’t have to explain,” he tried again, this time lifting his hands and gently grabbing the sides of her arms.

  “—to be wanted.”

  Before she finished speaking, he’d wrapped his arms around her and pulled her roughly against him. One of his hands cupped her head and the other banded across her back.

  Effie froze, stunned by his reaction. Lucian is . . . hugging me.

  He rested his cheek against the top of her head and held her. She could hear the thundering beat of his heart; it was a twin to her own. It took a full breath before she relaxed against him, tentatively wrapping her arms around his waist.

  “Perhaps this time I am the one that owes you an apology,” he rumbled above her.

  “Lucian—”

  “Shhh,” he whispered. “Now it’s my turn.”

  Effie clamped her lips together.

  “I shouldn’t have let you leave with things unresolved between us. If nothing else, I should have saw you back safely to your room. I am your Guardian; your well-being is my priority.”

  She shrank into herself. Mother take me, he feels guilty because he believes he failed in his duty.

  “But Effie?”

  “Hmm?” she asked, praying her voice sounded steady.

  Lucian shifted, the hand cupping her head releasing her so that his fingers could run along her cheek and gently tilt up her chin. “Don’t ever think I didn’t want you.”

  Her heart stuttered, and she forgot how to breathe. All she could see was the naked desire shining in his eyes. He blinked and the moment was lost, his feelings tucked away behind his carefully crafted façade.

  Effie sucked in a ragged breath, feeling like she’d been running for hours.

  “I’m sorry for my part in causing you pain. It was never my intention.”

  “Mine either,” she whispered.

  Lucian held her a moment longer, before moving both hands back to her arms and taking a small step backward.

  She shivered, her body instantly missing his heat.

  “Does that help?” he asked.

  “Help with what?” she asked, feeling like she’d lost the thread of their conversation.

  “Ease some of the Daejaran wolf trampling?”

  Effie snickered. Lucian was trying to make a joke. A sweet one, at that. As she reflected on his question, she was pleasantly surprised to find that their talk had done much to ease some of the previous night’s sting. The pressure that had settled in the vicinity of her chest had fled, allowing her to take her first easy breath all morning.

  “Yes,” she admitted, smiling shyly.

  “Good,” he said, returning her smile with one of his own. “Let’s get you back to your room, then, so you may rest.”

  He gestured for her to precede him down the hall. Effie turned and had only gone a few steps before he spoke again.

  “Maybe this time you’ll follow one of my orders.”

  Effie stared at Lucian, her eyes wide before she tilted her head back and laughed. “No promises.”

  Chapter 2

  Effie rolled and stretched, feeling fully rested for the first time since coming to the citadel. Still mildly disorientated from sleep, it took a moment for her to realize the orbs of enchanted light flickering around her chamber were the bright gold of morning and not the soft amber of afternoon or early evening.

  Bolting upright, she shoved the blankets from her legs and scrambled out of bed.

  Mother’s tits, I slept through the whole damn day. Why didn’t anyone come for me?

  She rubbed her eyes and shuffled around her room, pulling on whichever clothes she stumbled upon first. She paused in front of her mirror only long enough to ensure that she looked mostly presentable and to run her fingers through her wild curls. At least I don’t have to waste time worrying about what to do with my hair.

  Biting her lip, she scanned her room trying to remember where she’d tossed her boots the day before. Generally, Effie made a point to put everything back in its place, but she’d been more exhausted than even she’d realized and didn’t have the energy to manage more than haphazardly flinging her clothes about the room.

  Spotting one curling lace peeking out from under her bed, Effie sighed and dropped to her hands and knees, crawling beneath it to retrieve them.

  The first boot was easy enough to find, requiring her to only slap it out from below the bed, but the second proved more difficult. She must have used a bit more force when she kicked it off. Effie was having trouble making out much of anything in the dark shadows, and so she had to rely on touch to try and locate her boot’s twin. She batted her arm around, fingertips straining as she searched.

&
nbsp; No luck.

  Cursing, Effie scooched a bit further under the bed, her head and most of her torso fully cloaked in the dim light.

  “Ah-ha! Found you, you little—”

  “My, what a delectable sight,” a muffled voice drawled from somewhere behind her.

  Effie let out a garbled scream, her head bashing into the wooden bed frame as she jumped. “Elder’s gnarled knob!”

  There was a snort and then a wheezing laugh.

  She pushed herself back and stood, the lost boot dangling from her fingers forgotten as she rubbed the back of her head and glared at Kieran. He was red-faced with laughter, tears of mirth streaming from his eyes.

  “Wh-what did you just say?” he choked out.

  “What are you doing in my room?” she demanded.

  Wiping away a few tears, Kieran shook his head. “Not so fast. First, tell me how you came about such a colorful phrase.”

  Crossing her arms, Effie debated about whether she could get away with kicking him in the shin. “It’s not like I had much time to think about it. It just slipped out.”

  “Indeed,” Kieran murmured, shoulders still shaking with the last of his laughter.

  “You can leave now,” she said, looking pointedly at him and then the door.

  After a final snicker, Kieran said, “I did knock, you just didn’t hear me. Now I know why,” he added with a lascivious waggle of his eyebrows.

  “How did you take my lack of answer as an invitation to come in? Doesn’t that defeat the purpose of knocking in the first place?”

  “I was checking to make sure you were still alive. You’ve been asleep for almost a full day.”

  “After the way you treated me yesterday, I have trouble believing you’re concerned about my well-being.”

  “After the way I treated you?” he sputtered.

  Anger was swiftly replacing embarrassment as Effie recalled the horrible things he’d said to her in front of Lucian and Kael. “You practically labeled me a whore in front of the Guardians, Kieran. How would you classify that treatment?”

  There wasn’t a trace of laughter left on Kieran’s face. “Perhaps it was not my finest moment, but I was upset. Can you blame me? I’d just learned I was Lucian’s sloppy seconds.”

  Sharp ringing filled her ears, and Effie’s jaw dropped. “He told you?”

  Kieran’s brows lowered over glittering green eyes. “He didn’t have to. It was all over your face when you looked at him. I inferred it easily enough, and you just confirmed it.”

  “It’s none of your business what I choose to do or with whom.”

  “It is when I am the runner-up. Effie, you know how I feel about you. How could you do that to me?”

  Effie tried to rein back her emotion, recognizing that there was the smallest vein of truth to his words. She hadn’t treated him fairly, but it did not give him the right to bully her because of it.

  “Kieran, I wasn’t in my right mind. I’m sorry if I hurt you—”

  “Because that makes it better.” Kieran snorted. “To think I was here to tell you I forgive you—”

  “Forgive me?” she sputtered.

  “You led me on.”

  “Everyone has the right to change their mind,” she spat out, any hint of understanding vanishing.

  “So you’ll spread your legs for the Guardian, but not me?”

  Crack.

  Effie’s palm stung with the force of the slap.

  Kieran’s hand lifted to his cheek and then his lip. He glanced down at the blood staining his fingers and then back up at Effie. He took a step forward, but she stood her ground, tilting her chin up.

  There was a blur of movement and Kieran flew away from her, his body crashing into the bookcase on the other side of her room.

  “You’d dare raise your hand against a woman?” Lucian growled, already across the room leaning over him.

  “I wasn’t going to hit her,” Kieran groaned, pushing himself up.

  Lucian fisted his hand in Kieran’s tunic, pulling him to his feet. “That’s not what it looked like.”

  Kieran twisted his head and spat out a mouthful of blood. “You always make a habit of spying on your charge when she’s in her room?”

  Effie was shocked he had the balls to goad him. Lucian was fury incarnate, his lips peeled back over his teeth in a deadly snarl and his eyes on fire with savage promise. He pulled the fabric of Kieran’s tunic taut and lifted him higher until the tips of his boots scraped over her floor.

  “You listen, and you listen well, princeling. You so much as look at her wrong and I will rip your spine out through your mouth.” Twisting, he shoved Kieran toward the door. “Get out.”

  Kieran paused only long enough to shoot Effie a dark look. “This isn’t over.”

  Raising a brow, Effie glanced between Kieran and her Guardian. “Seems over to me.”

  Jaw clenched, Kieran made for the door. Lucian tracked each step like a predator preparing for the hunt.

  Seeking to distract him, Effie stepped into his line of vision. “I had the situation under control.”

  He looked at her with wild eyes, his nostrils flaring. “He was going to hurt you.”

  Effie tilted her head, finally realizing just how little control Lucian had over himself. “If I recall correctly, I’m the one that landed the first and only blow.”

  Lucian’s lips curled in a cruel smile. “Good.”

  Something dark and bloodthirsty deep within her appreciated the violence that was still rolling off him in waves. Violence that, while not directed at her, had built because of a perceived threat to her. It made her feel protected in a way that wasn’t familiar.

  Not ready to look at the new feelings too closely, Effie decided to try to diffuse his remaining anger.

  “He didn’t touch me,” she added softly.

  A shudder racked Lucian’s body as he processed her words, and his gaze dropped as he took a deep breath. “It’s the only reason he’s still alive.”

  Silence stretched between them as Effie gave Lucian the space to regain control. When he looked at her again, his eyes had lost their predatory gleam.

  “Are you alright?”

  She lifted a shoulder. “They were just words. I’ve heard worse.”

  Lucian nodded and then frowned. “I wasn’t spying.”

  It took a second for Effie to follow the shift in conversation. “I didn’t think you were.”

  “The door was open. I was coming to fetch you. We’ve already received word of other attacks.”

  Effie took a long breath. Right. Time to focus on something more important than wounded male egos. There was a realm to save.

  “Well, what are we waiting for?”

  Lucian’s eyes dropped to her bare feet.

  She rolled her eyes, and bent to snatch her boots off the floor.

  Lucian was smirking as he watched her lace them.

  “What?”

  He shook his head.

  “What?” she demanded, standing with her hands on her hips.

  “I was just thinking that you must have something against shoes. You never seem to be wearing them.”

  Effie bit back a smile. “I’ll have you know this is only the second time you’ve seen me without my shoes on.”

  “Fourth.”

  “Fourth?”

  “You’re forgetting when I found you in the pub.”

  “Right, then and now. That’s two.”

  “And the next morning . . . and the other night in the hallway.”

  Effie groaned. “Fine, four times. That’s not exactly a habit.”

  “Sure seems like it.”

  “Lucian,” she groaned, picking up a pillow and waving it threateningly.

  He smiled, the first full smile of his she’d ever seen. It was transformational. His eyes crinkled, and the small metallic flecks shimmered with his mirth. If possible, his bottom lip looked even fuller as it curved up, and a hidden dimple flashed high in his cheek.

 
Robbed of her ability to speak, Effie blinked at him. He’s beautiful. She’d been attracted to him before, but the strength of her reaction to him now was . . . unexpected.

  “What?” he asked, eyeing her warily.

  Effie shook her head, nowhere near ready to repeat that little revelation to him. “Nothing, let’s go.”

  He stared at her a moment longer before nodding. “After you.”

  It wasn’t until she walked past him and out into the hall that she realized she wasn’t the only one with a habit.

  “Is there some reason you’re always making me walk in front of you?”

  For a second, she didn’t think he was going to answer, but then a slow grin spread across his face, warming her insides.

  “I like the view,” he said in his low growl.

  Her stomach clenched, and her heart flipped in her chest. Mother’s tits.

  Effie stumbled as she turned back around and picked up the pace. Lucian’s laughter followed her the entire way.

  Chapter 3

  Any fragment of levity fled as soon as Effie stepped across the threshold of the Triumvirate’s inner sanctum. The room could have doubled as a tomb, not one person speaking as they waited for the last of the summoned guests to arrive.

  As she took her place beside Ronan and Reyna, Effie ignored Kieran as he glowered at her from the far right of the room. She cast them a brief smile before glancing up at the lone figure standing atop the raised dais.

  A ripple of unease slid down her spine. It was the first time one of the Triumvirate had removed their hoods since she joined them. She’d almost forgotten how eerie it was to be stared down by a man that had black sockets in place of eyes.

  Needing something to focus on that was less disturbing—which instantly ruled out his cracked lips and the cord of black that stitched them shut—Effie shifted her eyes up to the top of his bald head. The deep navy runes that were inked there seemed to pulse and shift along the pale white skin. Effie blinked, and the markings settled back into place.

  It was hard to reconcile the memory of Smoke and his brief glimmers of humanity with the being standing before her. Although, the person on the dais could be any one of the Triumvirate’s three members. It’s not like there was a way to tell them apart unless they were using their personal voices while speaking telepathically.