Quicksilver (Fae & Alchemy, #1)

by Callie Hart

Fisher threw his head back, the muscles in his neck straining, his jaw clenched tight, roaring through his teeth. 'Fuuuuck!”

🫠🫦🤤 ⚜️👹🫦😮‍💨🫠❤️‍🔥🦋

“Witch,” he accused. “You do have magic.”

🫠🫦🤤 ⚜️👹🫦😈❤️‍🔥🦋

His fingers gouged into my skin, digging deeper into my hips.

Fisher just shook his head, grabbing one of my hands and putting it back on his flesh.

He just drove himself deeper, slamming himself into me faster, relinquishing more of his control with each thrust. “Magnificent,” Fisher rasped. He moaned as he palmed my breasts.

🫠🫦🤤 ⚜️👹🫦😈🫠😟❤️‍🔥🦋

his strong hands at my waist, and the rough edge of his strained voice. “Gods and fucking martyrs. Holy fucking shit. That's right. Come. Show me how pretty you are when you fall apart.”

🫠🫦🤤 ⚜️👹🫦😈😏😮‍💨🤤❤️‍🔥🦋

Fisher came hard, slamming into me. He roared out his release, and together the two of us shattered.

“Did you know, the Yvelian Fae are the youngest of the Fae houses? By a thousand years. There was a dispute between these two brothers, and they splintered off to make their own court.”

🐲>🦋>>📜🧚🏼‍♂️

“Do you mind? You're blocking the light,” he grumbled.

🐲>>🦋

'Fae creatures of the Gilarian Mountains,' it's called. There's a note written on the first page. It says, 'Never forget. Monsters thrive best in the dark. Commit all you read here to memory. Prepare for war!!’

🐲>🦋>>👵🏼📕🧚🏼‍♂️📜

Carrion held up his middle finger and his index finger. “Two exclamation points. The Swifts have always been very serious people. Gracia took the superfluous punctuation to mean that the situation, should these Gilarian Fae creatures ever show their faces, would be very dire indeed. I wasn't allowed to have dessert until I'd recited at least seven traits of the Gryphon sprite or explained in great detail how to kill a blooded Fae Warrior wearing full plate and armor.”

🐲📜👵🏼📕>>🦋

“Did Fisher send you up here to wait for me?” I asked. “That's one way of putting it,” Carrion said. “I was fast asleep in my tent. Then, there he was, a black cloud with a shitty attitude, growling at me to get up. The sun hadn't even come up yet, and he kept griping about me being lazy. He called me a waste of carbon. What does that even mean?”

⚜️🐲🦋

“What are you doing right now?” I asked him. “Aside from prodding this fire with a stick and reading this?” he asked, holding the book up again. “Nothing much. Why do you ask?” “Want to come and set fire to some far more exciting things?” He snapped his book closed with a flourish. “Absolutely, yes.”

🦋🐲

Fisher cast Carrion a dubious glance. “Do you know anything about refining silver?” “Not a fucking thing,” he answered. “I'm more of a logistics guy.” “What does that mean?” “I’m very good at moving things from one place to another.” “We have plenty of other asses for that. You should go and find something useful to do,” he snapped. “Uh, he's been helping me!” I got up, brushing one hand off on my pants as I handed the small bowl of nuts to Carrion, who took the bowl and tossed a nut into his mouth, shooting Fisher a needling smile. Fisher didn't react. Not personally, I supposed. A wave of black smoke swept over the campfire we'd started to keep warm while we ate, hitting Carrion square in the chest. It wasn't a powerful blow. It was only equivalent to a strong breeze, but it sent the bowl of nuts toppling from Carrion's hands, scattering its contents all over the ground. Such a child. “Find Ren. Ask him for a job, or I'll find one for you,” Fisher said. “I'm assuming cleaning the latrines doesn't sound appealing to you since you have no magic and would have to do it by hand?” Carrion's grin faltered. “You are extra fucking miserable today. You should really get laid. Might help improve your mood. Tell him, Sunshine.” I choked. Loudly. Carrion couldn't have made a more unfortunate suggestion if he'd tried.

⚜️🐲🦋

He just cocked his head a little, nostrils flaring, and spoke in a low rumble. “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.”

🥺🫠🫦🥹 ⚜️❤️‍🔥🦋>>🐲

“Lupo Proelia. Kingfisher's wolves,”

🐺

“When we turn twenty-one, we kneel before the Firinn Stone and make our decision. Every one of us. We have a choice. Bleed on the stone and make our vow. To always be truthful. To always be bound by our word, no matter what it costs us.” “Or?” “Or we choose the Lawless path. A Lawless Fae may lie. They may cheat. They may steal. Useful tools in many situations, I’ll admit. But they come with a price that Kingfisher—and the rest of us, I might add—was not willing to pay.” I arched an eyebrow at him. “And that was?” He shrugged nonchalantly, as if the answer were obvious. “Our honor.” I harumphed at that. “So you see, no matter how much we might want to sometimes, we're physically incapable of breaking our word or telling a lie.”

🐿️>🦋>>📜🧚🏼‍♂️

I was a traveling singer once, if you can believe that.”

🐿️>🦋>>📜🐿️🐺⚜️

“A good one?” I asked. “A mediocre one. Turned out I was better suited to killing than I ever was at performing. Anyway, I met Fisher one night out on the road. He was on his way to help some friends. I was lying in a ditch when he found me.” I buried a smirk. “Drunk?” “No. Dead, actually. Or very nearly, anyway.” He winked, though he suddenly looked a little washed out in the muted tavern lighting. “I'd been attacked by two vampires. Strays. They weren't part of the horde. But they were hungry. They took one look at me—a scrawny kid with a lute strapped to his back. Alone—and decided I'd make a decent meal. They nearly drained me dry.”

🐿️>🦋>>📜🐿️🐺⚜️

Anyway, we were miles away from anywhere. I wouldn't have lasted until they could get me to help. If I'd died and come back turned while I was with them, there was a chance I could have killed a number of the party, and some of them didn't want to risk that. They told Fisher it would be best to run me through and have done with it, but he refused. He made them set up camp for the night, and he transported me to Cahlish. He carried me in his arms, for fuck's sake. I was a lot smaller then,” Lorreth stressed. “He put me in a bed, and he had healers come and tend to me, and he waited to see what they'd say. They weren't optimistic about my odds. I had more venom than blood in my veins, and there are limits to what even the most skilled healer can accomplish under those circumstances. They told him to go back to the wolves, and when I passed, they would bury me beneath a yew tree out in one of the fields that bordered the estate. But Fisher didn't do that.” “What...did he do?” Lorreth tossed his head back and laughed. “Something I'm sure I've given him innumerable reasons to regret since. He made me his brother. By blood. He gave me a part of his soul.”

🐿️>🦋>>📜🐿️🐺⚜️

“It's an ancient rite,” Lorreth said. “One very few know how to perform anymore. But Fisher's father had almost died once, and his friend had used it to save him. So, he'd made sure Fisher knew it, too, in case, one day, he was able to use it to save the life of someone who was important to him.” “But you were a stranger...” Lorreth’s sharp blue eyes glittered hard as diamonds. He took a sip of his whiskey and set the glass down, regarding it. “Yes. A stranger. And Fisher did it anyway. He bonded a small part of himself to the scrap of life that was clinging on inside me, and that was that. I was still sick as a dog, but death loosened his grip on me. I knew I was going to live, and so did Kingfisher. He told me he was leaving to find the other wolves and that he'd be back in three months. He said I could go as soon as I was feeling better, if that's what I wanted to do, but that there was a place here for me as well, if I preferred the idea of that instead.”

🐿️>🦋>>📜🐿️🐺⚜️

If I die first, the piece of Fisher's soul returns to him. He becomes whole again. Everybody has a big party. The end. But if he dies first, he's condemned to wait here for me to die before he can move on. He’d be trapped here, in a non-corporeal state, unable to touch anything or anyone. Unable to be heard. That's the sacrifice he made when he decided to give me the gift of life.

🐿️>🦋>>📜🐿️⚜️

Saoirse, Queen of the Lìssian Fae,

🐡

Her mother, who was queen before her, saved her life when she was a child. A hundred and eighty years later, her mother is murdered by unknown entities, and Saoirse rises to power. She's young and beautiful. She likes being queen. 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...”

🐿️>🦋>>📜🐡

“Fisher says he's not worried about what happens to him if he dies first,” Lorreth said. “And I'm not worried, either. Truth is, I plan on dying first, anyway. But if the fates guide the stars in a different direction and our better angels claim him first, I won't permit a single breath into my body beyond the last one Kingfisher takes. By my own hand, I'll make sure the piece of soul he loaned to me finds its way back to him. And if the fates consider it just, and I've done enough to earn a place at his side, I'll go quietly and happily with my brother into whatever lies beyond.”

🐿️>🦋>>🐿️❤️‍🔥⚜️

Ballard.

🛖

Wendy,”

🥠

'Edina of the Seven Towers. Lady of Cahlish.’ Kingfisher's mother.

🦚

“My father died when I was two. I don’t even remember him. My mother was four months pregnant with Hayden when it happened. A sand dune came down on a trader’s outpost on the glass flats. He was either crushed or suffocated to death, one of the two. And when we lost his income, my mother became a prostitute,”

🦋>⚜️>>📜🦋

Iris Fane,

🍄

“She sold her body for food and water mostly, but she made money, too. Her client list was mostly comprised of guardians. Madra's men. Five days out of the week, she worked at this place near the market. The House of Kala. Kala's employed security, so the women who worked there were safe for the most part. One shout from a bedroom and five huge bastards would kick the door down and beat the living shit out of whoever was causing trouble. But she worked from our home sometimes, too. To make ends meet. I used to watch through a crack in her bedroom door when the guardians would come, resplendent and proud, dripping in their golden armor.

🦋>⚜️>>📜🍄

“The man I used to apprentice for. Elroy? He loved her. She was beautiful and full of this...this fire. He'd come to the house and fix things from time to time. He never tried anything on with her, though. He wasn't like that. The amount of times he took care of her when one of the palace guards beat her black and blue at our house...”

🦋>⚜️>>📜⚒️❤️‍🔥🍄

“She didn't want me to follow in her footsteps, so she made him promise to take me on in the forge as soon as I was old enough. I was ten when I first stepped into his workshop.

🦋>⚜️>>📜🍄⚒️🦋

She’d already started smuggling weapons into the ward by then. It started as pieces of scrap metal. Things that could be turned into weapons. Elroy was happy to make them at first. Just daggers. Small knives. My mother handed them out to her friends at Kala's first, to protect themselves with when they took their work home with them. But then she started bringing home swords and shields. The kinds of things that would get her killed if she was caught trading in them.”

🦋>⚜️>>📜🍄⚒️

They never touched me. They showed me where the entrances to various tunnels were. The ones that led to the underground reserves where Madra kept water reservoirs. Plenty to supply the whole city and then some. They showed me how to tap the tanks and siphon off a little here and a little there. They showed me how to pick locks and how to climb. I learned how to fight with daggers and how to throw them. A rebel would stay at the house, hidden in the attic, for a week, or a month. Sometimes maybe two. Then they'd switch out, and someone new would show up. Hayden knew nothing about it. He was too young to understand most of what was happening, and he didn't know how to keep his mouth shut. So I learned how to fight, and steal, and how to take care of him, too, since our mother was never home anymore. And that's just how it was for a long time. I spent my days in the forge. After, I cared for Hayden. Cooked for him. Kept the house clean. And then, as soon as he went to sleep, I'd be out stealing whatever we needed to live.”

🦋>⚜️>>📜🦋🏑

She refused to accept guardians as clients anymore. Some of her regulars, the ones who used to come to the house, didn't like that. One morning, six years ago, she left the house and headed to Kala's, but she forgot her water ration. She'd left it sitting there on the kitchen table, her bottle full. Hadn't even taken a sip out of it. I knew if she didn't have it with her, she wouldn't get any water all day, so I grabbed it and chased after her. I found her in the square, already on her knees. The guardian she'd turned away from the house the night before was standing there, smug as fuck, while his underlings searched her bags. They found two knives on her. Tiny, pointless things. The blades were barely even three inches long, but that didn't matter.” “Because the punishment for carrying a weapon in the Third is death,” Fisher whispered. “I watched them slit her throat,” I said. “No arrest. No trial. They love carrying out their sentencing on the spot. Saves time and energy, I suppose. She died face down in the sand, in the blistering heat, with five men pissing in her hair and on her back. And then they left her there. I ran to her as soon as they went. Flipped her over. Shook her.” I shrugged. “But she was already gone. I couldn't carry her by myself, so I had to run and fetch Elroy. When we got back to the square, our neighbors were out there, standing over her, spitting in her face. Elroy knocked out one man who was trying to tear the clothes off her body.”

🦋>⚜️>>📜🍄🪦

Ours was the first house they quarantined. More followed, though. A week later, Madra had the whole ward placed on lockdown. No in or out. They said the ward was stricken with a plague.”

🦋>⚜️>>📜🏚️

Fisher rested his forehead against the back of my head and groaned.

🫠🫦🤤 ⚜️🫦🫠👹😈😮‍💨

Rolling my nipple, he drove his hips upward so hard that I felt the swollen head of his erection in the small of my back.

🫠🫦🤤 ⚜️🫦👹😈

Kneading the flesh of my breast with one hand, he roughly yanked the button at my waistband open, sliding his other hand down into the front of my pants. When he coaxed me open and dipped his fingers between my slick folds, he discovered how wet I was and growled deep.

🫠🫦🤤 ⚜️🫦👹😈🤤

riding his hand as he rubbed me. Fuck me with your fingers. Choke me. Hold me down and ride me until I scream. Fisher made an animal, desperate noise into the crook of my neck as if he could read my mind

🫠🫦🤤 🦋🧠>>⚜️🫦👹😈🤤😮‍💨

He snarled as he ripped his arm out from underneath my shirt and closed his hand around my throat. I’ll make you beg, Little Osha. I’ll fill every one of those pretty little holes. I’ll fuck you so hard, you'll never want another male ever again.

🫠🫦🤤 ⚜️🧠🫦👹😈❤️‍🔥🦋

He pulled me even closer, grip tightening around my throat, his thumb digging into my jaw, and I allowed my head to rock back. He buried his face into the crook of my neck, groaning,

🫠🫦🤤 ⚜️🫦👹😈🤤😮‍💨

Bite me. Fisher drove his fingers up inside me, releasing a strained huff. Hand tightening around my throat, he gave me a little shake that seemed almost like a reprimand.

🫠🫦🤤 🦋🧠>>⚜️🫦👹😈🤨😮‍💨

he buried his face into my hair again, releasing another strained groan.

Every warrior in Innìr will smell me on you, Fisher's voice rumbled in my mind. I'm going to make you hoarse from screaming my fucking name. I'm going to mark you in every way imaginable, so that everyone knows you're fucking mine.

🫠🫦🤤 ⚜️🧠😠🫦👹😈

He set up a merciless pace, thrusting himself up inside me, pounding himself home. His hand was still between my legs, his fingers working over my clit as he fucked me.

Easy. Quiet. Don’t…fucking move. The words were ragged. Desperate.

🫠🫦🤤 ⚜️🧠🫦👹😈😮‍💨❤️‍🔥🦋

Ruin me. The command was all he needed. Fisher's arms tightened around my body like a vice, and he fucked me with the force of all those sledgehammers smashing down on the frozen surface of the Darn.

🫠🫦🤤 🦋🧠>>⚜️🫦👹😈⛓️‍💥

He was drowning in this, too. He fucked me even harder, drinking deeper, his arms tight as bands of steel around me.