Quicksilver (Fae & Alchemy, #1)

by Callie Hart

Almost a year ago to the day, I’d watched one of the queen’s men clad in beaten golden armor gut my neighbor for lying about his age. And before that, and far worse, I’d stood silently in the street while my mother’s throat had been split wide open, spilling jets of hot, peasant blood into the sunbaked sand.

Jesus what a start to the story

his beautifully engraved gauntlet reflecting the glare of the twin suns overhead like a golden mirror,

Twin suns?? This place has two them?!

During reckoning, when the suns, Balea and Min,

Yo naming the suns is cool af

This bastard would shit himself if he realized he had the Saeris Fane in his grasp.

oop there it is, there's that cliché intro we all know and love

The guardian staggered back. “Residents of Third Ward are quarantined. Punishment for leaving the ward is… is…”

Oh snap they have the Rona

His crooked, taunting smile made me want to forget all about my ward. It made me want to remember crawling into his lap, and when his strong hands had found my waist, and— No.

Girl stay on track people are DYING

He already knew the answer to his question. He wasn’t stupid. I said it out loud for him anyway, because he clearly needed to hear it. “Because it’s the right thing to do, Fisher.” He said nothing. Just looked me up and down in a way that made me feel small and silly. “After you, Little Osha.”

Mortars and pestles, and large glass vials containing powders, dried herbs, flowers, and all manner of different liquids.

Aesthetic

I stooped down and picked up one of the rings. It was very feminine, with roses engraved on either side of a beautiful aquamarine stone. “There must be a thousand of them,” I said breathlessly.

He needs to know that you’re more than our way out of a tight corner. And the only way to accomplish that is if he learns more about you.” Why didn’t I like the sound of this? “Okaaaay.” “I told him he needed to have dinner with you tonight.”

Not the 1st date being arranged lmao

The dining table was a league long. All right, all right, it was maybe only thirty feet long, but still far too big for two people to sit at and share a meal. Alone. Fisher sat at one end. I sat at the other. In between us, a mountain of food had been delivered by an army of fire sprites led by Archer.

Lmao this is so awkward to imagine

The proximity of his voice and the way he spoke felt… intimate. As though his lips were so close to my ear that his breath should have stirred my hair. “How are you doing that?” I whispered. “Magic runs through this place the same way your blood runs through your veins. It lives in the very air.

Cool party trick bro

“Do you like it?” He spoke to me normally. No magic this time. “Yes. It’s… it’s interesting.” He pouted, nodding to himself. Something told me he was desperately trying not to smile. “Please. Help yourself to more. I don’t have to speak to the men for a couple of hours. I’ve got time to share the bottle.” I looked at him properly. Really took him in. There was something different about him. Something I couldn’t put my finger on.

Bro is the wine gonna make her fairy drunk

I took another deep pull of my wine. The unique taste bloomed into floral notes in my mouth. It tasted smooth, rich, and complex all at the same time. The flavor had surprised me at first, but it was really starting to grow on me. Kingfisher watched me with steady eyes.

This bitch fairy drunk

An unfamiliar tension radiated from Fisher. He seemed to be working very hard at nonchalance. “Mm. I wouldn’t have thought he was your type, but it explains a lot.” My type? A weightless, falling sensation made me sit back in the chair. I felt so dizzy all of a sudden. “What are you talking about?” “He mentioned that you were infatuated with him. Back in your room.”

Oh this man is so pressed about sweet Carrion

“Don’t. Do not, Fisher. Please. Just…” “When you were grinding yourself all over my lap, you marked me up very efficiently,” he purred. A fire burned in my throat, causing my voice to crack. “I hate you.”

HE AINT THE ONLY ONE PURRING HELLO

“There’s every way,” Fisher rumbled, his eyes darkening. “I’d know the smell of you anywhere. On anyone. I’d know it blind and in the dark. Across a fucking sea. I’d be able to scent you—”

Hey now sir let’s calm tf down

“Stay in that bed, Little Osha.” The command was gentle, almost kind, but there was a resonant quality to it that left no room for argument. My grip on the silky black sheets tightened. “Then where are you going to sleep?” If he thought for one second that I’d share a fucking bed with him, he was sorely mistaken.

ONLY ONE BED TROPE LETS GOOO

“For the record, I’d never use an injury as an excuse to sneak my way into a bed,” Fisher said. His voice was even closer now. I could almost feel the brush of his lips against the shell of my ear. “I’ve never had a problem securing myself an invite.”

AND WE KNOW WHY DONT WE GIRLS

Fuck me. That smile. Slightly open-mouthed, flashing the smallest hint of pointed teeth. I had to be so, so careful around that smile. It would wreck me if I let it. “Mm. You’re right. I don’t think you will invite me. When the time comes, I think you’ll beg—”

ON OUR KNEES FOR FISHER

Carrion threw up his hands. “I surrender! I’m… fucking beat.” He fought to swallow. “Torture her now. I need to… catch my breath.”

“You never wore the dresses I put out for you,” he murmured into my hair. “I don’t want to talk about dresses,” I whispered. “Fair enough. Let’s talk about food, then.” “Food?” He nodded. “Don’t share food with that prick again, Little Osha.” “What?” “Swift. Earlier. Back in the war room. You were trading that cake back and forth with him for ages.”

Possessive baddie ughhh

Fisher drew his bottom lip into his mouth, eyes the softest I’d ever seen them. Gently, he gathered the flyaway hair that had escaped my braid and carefully swept it behind my ear. “Breathe, Little Osha.”

😮‍💨😮‍💨😮‍💨

“I know that you want me.” I didn’t step back, even though my body was screaming at me that I should. “I can want to fuck you and still hate you, Little Osha.”

PASSION LETS GOO

“I’m telling you to fuck me, Fisher. I’m asking you to—” His lips crashed down on mine. He stole my words, claiming my mouth with a ragged snarl. The kiss was incendiary. The moment I tasted him and felt his tongue sweep past my teeth, I whimpered, grabbing the bottom of his shirt. No more sniping at each other. No more thinly veiled innuendo. No more threats.

The burn is SCORCHING

Fisher’s eyes flared as he grabbed the front of my pants by the waistband and pulled me roughly to him. “You asked for this. When you’re sore from coming so hard and you can’t recall your own name, remember that, Little Osha.”

Yes lord need me a freak like that

“My, my. So worked up already? You’re slick as hell. What do you taste like, mm? Are you going to scream for me like a good girl when I have you ride my face?”

Giggling!!!!

“When you take all of me, remember to breathe.” He let go of my throat, and my head swam as I dragged down a lungful of air. There was no time to brace myself.

Hello?!

“I can’t wait to hear what kind of sounds you make when I thrust into you for the first time,” he purred. “I’m going to make you pant for me, Little Osha. And when we’re done, I’ll close my eyes and replay the sound of you moaning in my head every time I stroke myself to completion.”

You say that to all the girls

Graceless gods and holy martyrs. He wasn’t wearing underwear. That didn’t surprise me. But the sheer size of his erect cock as it sprang free from his pants made my eyes round out of my head.

✧˖° screaming*

“Let your knees fall open,” he demanded. “I—” “No arguments, Osha. I’ve driven myself half-crazy wondering what you look like. I need to fucking see. Put me out of my misery.”

HES BEEN MISERABLE?? IM UNWELL

I shivered, nearly leaving my body altogether when I looked down and met his eyes. He ran the tip of his nose up, up, up, inhaling deeply as he went.

RIP HERE LIES ERIKA

“You smell so, so fucking good,” he said thickly. “Back in the forge at the palace, I caught a hint of this. I knew then I had to taste you. This smell has been haunting my fucking dreams. I haven’t been able to think straight for remembering the scent of your need.”

I gotta go touch some grass

“Do not fucking dare finish that sentence,” he snarled. “I don’t want a mouthful of soap and perfume. I want to taste you.” With that, he placed his mouth right onto the very center of me, as if he were biting into a piece of ripe, delicious fruit, and my whole world ignited.

Bye

Wisps of iridescent smoke trailed up my arms, circling my wrists, stroking over my skin, so soft and seductive that I trembled under the contact. It was him. An extension of him, and it was everywhere. His mouth worked over me, his fingers coaxing me toward a steep drop that would claim me body and soul.

Shadow daddy!

My eyes started to roll back into my head. But then… “Oh, no, Little Osha. You’re gonna be looking right at me for this,” Fisher said. “Look.” He waited until I’d made eye contact with him again, then his hand moved up to my jaw. He held me almost tenderly as he said, “You still want it?”

GIVE THE PEOPLE WHAT THEY WANT FISHER

I hated him, I did. But you couldn’t hate something without caring about it just a little, too. “Witch,” he accused. “You do have magic.” He was so fucking big; his hard length twitched inside me, and my body answered in kind, tightening around him.

Need me a freak to call me a witch bc I’ve bewitched him body and sooooul

The ink flowed beneath his skin, crossing from him to… to… sinners, it flowed along my fingertips, spreading over my skin, flowing just like his smoke over the backs of my hands. A delicate little bird took shape on the inside of my right forearm. It stretched its wings and took flight, its tiny body flitting over my stomach as its wings beat a thousand times a minute.

Free tattoo during sex?!

“Oh?” Archer looked confused. “In that case, do you need to see a healer? Are you hurt? It sounded like—” “No, no, I’m fine. Honestly, I’m fine.

Girl sounded like you were dying in there

He didn’t stop. He didn’t even slow. I upgraded to a jog, my breath forming a cloud of steam when I fell into step beside him. “Would you care to explain what the fuck this is?” I snapped, yanking down my shirt collar. A flicker of annoyance flashed in Fisher’s eyes, but he did not look at me. “Don’t worry. It’ll fade. Probably,” he said in a flat tone.

Not the mating tattoo!

“I can’t have children, Fisher. I was cleansed when I was fourteen.” I expected to see relief on his face. But instead, his face drained of color. “What the fuck did you just say to me?” I stopped laughing. “I was cleansed. When I was fourteen. They do it to about seventy percent of the girls in my ward.” He came and stood very close to me, his head bowed over mine, nostrils flaring. “What do you mean… cleansed?” “I mean… they sterilize us,” I whispered.

Oh damn...

Fisher’s expression flattened out. His eyes went blank. “What? I figured you’d think that was good news.” Clenching his jaw, he spun around, his eyes searching the horizon for gods only knows what.

Oh he's pissed

‘Never forget. Monsters thrive best in the dark. Commit all you read here to memory. Prepare for war!!’

That sounds important - write that down

“You are extra fucking miserable today. You should really get laid. Might help improve your mood. Tell him, Sunshine.” I choked. Loudly.

Carrion I’m dying pls

“Because she is moonlight. The mist that shrouds the mountains. The bite of electricity in the air before a storm. The smoke that rolls across a battlefield before the killing starts. You have no idea what she is. What she could be. You should call her Majesty.

✧˖° sigh ✧˖°

“What did you even think he’d lied about?” It came back to me at once. My thinly veiled “how big is your cock?” question. And Fisher’s slow, arrogant smile. “Big enough to make you scream and then some

Hehe

“A part of his…?” I hadn’t heard him right. The alcohol was making my ears play tricks on me. If souls existed, and I wasn’t entirely convinced that they did, then you couldn’t just go around giving pieces of your own away. “It’s an ancient rite,” Lorreth said. “One very few know how to perform anymore.

Not the horcrux

She surrounds herself with infatuated males who are willing to die to keep her safe, and so she announces that she plans to live forever. She takes tonics and elixirs and is rumored to drink vampire blood to extend her life. Nearly three thousand years have passed since her mother died, and Saoirse doesn’t look a day over thirty. Meanwhile, her mother’s spirit has been chained to her, forced to witness the world of the living without being able to interact with it. Without being able to move on to her eternal rest…”

Interesting...

The scrape on his cheek was gone. The purple bruises beneath his eyes weren’t as vivid as they had been when he’d arrived, either. He looked refreshed. His mood seemed lighter as well, which did little to make me feel better. Any sane person would have been happy that the Lord of Cahlish wasn’t as grouchy as usual, but for some reason, it irked me endlessly.

This man drank some blood?

Her mouth slowly hinged open as she took me in. “Hmm.” She sniffed me. “More than just a companion, then?” Wendy scowled at Fisher out of the corner of her cloudy eye. “She’s a friend,” Fisher said, without a hint of feeling in his voice. “A temporary one. She’ll be heading back to Zilvaren soon, where she’ll go back to her life and forget all about the things that have happened here.”

MA’AM