The Queen's Mage

Chapter 100: You May

Serali reached for Allandra’s hand and placed it over the knot of her robe.

Allandra’s hands hesitated, reverence and restraint written in every line of her body. Serali could feel the queen’s breath, feel the answering thrum in her own blood, feel the old magic brightening behind the glass doors they had so carefully constructed. The wordless heat of the bond pressed in, neither command nor overture, only the possibility of touch.

The queen’s voice was unsteady, but clear: “May I take this off?”

Serali’s pulse hammered, nerves and wanting tangled so tightly that permission itself became a weapon. She nodded once, then forced herself to say it, quietly, stubbornly: “You may.”

The knot loosened under Allandra’s careful fingers, fabric sliding heavy and warm over Serali’s bare arms. Beneath, her nightshirt was thin, unadorned. It was almost enough to make her recoil. Almost.

Allandra never stopped touching her with her eyes; she seemed to memorize every change in Serali’s breath, every shift in tension, every time her shoulder blades drew taut in wary memory. She asked again, near a whisper, “Where may I touch you?”

Serali’s mouth opened, but for a moment, nothing emerged. The question was too precise, too much like standing naked before an unlit mirror, waiting to see what surface would reflect back.

“Where do you want to?” she managed, not quite steady.

Allandra was silent. The silence stretched, not because Allandra lacked words, but because she inspected each one for sharp edges before using them.

“Where you want me,” Allandra said finally, “but most of all, where the wanting is.”

Serali wanted to say it, but her jaw locked, the yes so immense and so conditional that it refused reduction to anything as simple as consent.

She looked away, at the darkness pooling beyond the bed. The word stuck in her mouth, until at last she said, “Yes,” but it came out wrong, not quite as a word, or as if the word had been built of scaffolding and regret.

Allandra smiled. Not a queen’s smile, not the tight diplomatic pull of lips meant for affairs of state, but a genuine, startled, delighted expression of a woman who had just been given something she’d stopped hoping for.

“Yes?” she echoed, her voice warm.

“There are conditions,” Serali said, fiercely, as if she might withdraw the offer or swallow it if she hesitated.

Allandra’s grin became a laugh. “Of course there are. What is the first condition?”

That made Serali’s embarrassment spike; her throat tightened against it, but she refused to yield. “I do not know yet. If there is one, I’ll report it, as required by palace procedure.”

Allandra straightened, the laughter draining into a steady intent. “That seems wise. I will listen for amendments.”

Serali’s face felt hot, but the heat was not the bond’s alone. It was hers: humiliated and exultant, terrified and bold, the peculiar spasm of pride that came from setting the terms for the first time in her life. It made her want to run. It made her want to stay and see what would happen next.

The movement was careful, Allandra’s signature, even at the edge of abandon. She let her hand linger just beneath the fabric, waiting. When Serali didn’t move, didn’t do anything but breathe a little faster, Allandra slipped her fingers up, tracing the old scars with the delicacy of someone reading a language she was determined not to mistranslate.

She did not move quickly, nor did she hesitate; her touch was measured, as if mapping the body for the first time was a privilege that could not be rushed. When her palm settled at the narrowest part of Serali’s waist, Serali nearly lost her balance. But Allandra gave her time. Gave her space to tense, to breathe, to choose.

Permission had been given, but Allandra acted as if it could be rescinded at any moment. This was not a performance. There was no choreography, no cunning seduction. Only the honest, awkward, desperate attempt to learn how to want each other with care.

Allandra’s hand moved higher, tracing the ribs, and then higher still, to the shallow valley between Serali’s breasts.

Allandra’s hand cupped the underslope of one breast. She did not squeeze; she only held it, learning its shape, the impossible softness of it, the way Serali’s breath shivered and then caught, as if she’d been struck.

The queen’s thumb drifted over the sharp ridge of a rib, then up, slow and deliberate, until it circled the peak of the nipple underneath the nightshirt.

Her body arched up without her consent, as if desperate to close the last inch of distance, to collapse the space between the wanting and the having. The heat of the bond flared open, gold and shadow lapping together, and the old magic which had always wanted to be seen, wanted to be known, and for the first time, the knowing did not come with a threat attached.

Serali whimpered, a small, gasp-shattered sound, and then set her jaw as if refusing to let anything else out. Her hands gripped the bedspread, then Allandra’s forearm, as if to either anchor herself or keep Allandra from leaving. She glared, violet eyes fierce with accusation, embarrassment, and, most dangerous of all, delight.

“This is unfair,” Serali said, voice rough. “You have done this before.”

Allandra stilled, the words cutting through the haze of want.

She pulled her hand back, not from shame or apology, but to rest it over Serali’s, stilling the tremor in those long, ink-stained fingers.

“Yes,” Allandra said, her own breath as uneven as Serali’s. “I have had lovers before. but never this.”

The admission should have been self-assured, something a queen might use to instruct or reassure a trembling partner. Instead, it sounded like a confession excavated from some private, ancient ache.

“Never like this,” she said, quieter. “Never you before.”

Serali blinked, stung and uncertain, suspicious that the line was a trick of courtly seduction. But Allandra’s eyes held no calculation, only a straightforward hunger and more than a little awe. The queen’s thumb passed once more, so gently, over her nipple, then withdrew, leaving the heat buzzing not only in the body but in the air between them.

Allandra’s hand gilded to Serali’s waist, thumb tracing the line where the nightshirt had ridden up. She looked at Serali as if asking for a map, as if every inch was new country and every reaction a landmark. “May I touch you lower?” she asked, voice as careful as if she could be burned by carelessness.

Serali pressed her lips together. The words arrived unbidden: “You are a tyrant.”

Allandra laughed, a sound that came from the belly and had nothing of the queen in it. “That is not an answer,” she said, laughter warming her eyes.

Serali glared with intent to kill, but her body betrayed her, hips lifting in invitation. Her voice, when it came, was low and sure: “You may.”

If you would like to read the rest of this chapter (all the spicy bits), you can find it here on Inkitt: Chapter You May | The Queen's Mage by Lemon_Tea_With_Honey at Inkitt

Chapter 101: Again?

If you would like to read the beginning of this chapter (all of the spicy bits), you can find it here on Inkitt: Chapter Again | The Queen's Mage by Lemon_Tea_With_Honey at Inkitt

Allandra grinned, a real grin, so wide and fierce it could have justified the existence of monarchy for one more generation. Serali blinked hard, unsure whether the tears running from her eyes were from the aftershocks, the humiliation, or the unfamiliar relief.

She managed to get one elbow under her. The movement made her muscles quiver, threatening collapse. Allandra moved to help, but Serali lifted one shaking finger in warning, and the queen, either wise or newly terrified, held back, hands up in a show of surrender.

It took Serali the better part of thirty seconds to sit up. Her hair was wet at the temples, her nightshirt clinging to her in awkward places, and her thighs and the sheets beneath them were soaked. She had never in her life felt so thoroughly conquered by her own body, or by anyone else’s. She looked at Allandra. The queen knelt on the bed, hair mussed and gold in the lamplight, breathing hard, lips shiny with what she refused to believe was evidence.

For a while, neither of them spoke. The lamp’s flame guttered and then steadied, as if the air itself were wary of such disturbance. Serali found that what followed was not embarrassment, not really, but a lightness so intense it made her dizzy. The world had not dissolved; her body was not gone. She could still taste her own breath, could still feel herself shaking in the aftermath, could still sense Allandra’s gaze anchoring her to the world in case she drifted out of it.

She wiped the back of her hand across her eyes, which was useless because more tears kept coming.

“You are crying,” Allandra said, voice so gentle it nearly shattered her again.

Serali sniffed, then glared at her through watery eyes. “Do not sound so pleased about it.”

“I am not pleased,” said Allandra, who was both pleased and not pleased, who was full of something that had no name.

“Liar.”

“Perhaps.”

She reached, blindly, for Allandra’s arm.

The queen’s hands, now steady, caught her fingers and drew them to her mouth. For a moment they only breathed together, the fire’s hush and the bedroom’s dimness closing around them.

She opened her mouth, then closed it, then opened it again, and what came out was, “Is it finished?”

Allandra’s smile softened, and she shook her head. “It’s not finished unless you want it to be.”

Serali looked at her own body, at the shaking in her thighs, the tremor in her hands, the mark of someone who had only just barely survived. She could not imagine surviving again. She could not imagine not wanting to.

“Again?” she ventured, all suspicion, as if the word itself were a trick.

Allandra’s answering grin was blinding, reckless, a weaponized beam of delight that reduced Serali’s skepticism to vapor. “Yes,” she said, and her voice was ruined with hunger. “If you allow me.”

Serali’s laugh was a wreck, all disbelief and delight, but she heard herself say it even before her mind caught up: “You may.”

Serali’s defenses tried to regroup, but Allandra was already kissing her, this time with none of the earlier hesitation. The queen’s mouth was slick and hot and tasted, absurdly, impossibly, of Serali. The salt of her tears, the sweetness of her sweat, the wild, unfamiliar tang of her own pleasure. It was so outrageous, so destabilizing, that Serali could only clutch at Allandra’s shoulders and let herself be kissed until her mind went white again.

It was not a straight path, nor a simple one. Each touch, each request, was a careful negotiation: “May I?” and “If you wish,” passed like fragile glass between them. Sometimes Serali said nothing, only nodded, and Allandra waited for the sound.

There were questions, answers, pauses. It became a pattern. Allandra would reach, her intention so deliberate it felt ceremonial, and then hesitate, gaze fixed on Serali’s face as though bracing for denial or disaster.

Sometimes Serali laughed, sometimes cursed, sometimes pulled Allandra down by the fabric of her sleeve and simply pressed their mouths together until the fear receded behind the heat. Once, Serali’s leg jerked in reflex and kicked a pillow off the bed. It landed with a muffled thump, and Allandra startled so visibly that Serali had to stifle her own hysterical laughter in Allandra’s neck. “Sorry,” she managed, half-choking, and Allandra’s answer was a sound somewhere between a groan and a laugh and a curse in a language Serali did not know yet.

There were moments when the bond rose so hot and wild that the lamp on the vanity flickered, and both of them stilled, heartbeats tripping in sync, until Serali could catch her breath and say, “Yes,” or “Wait,” or “Not yet,” or, rarely, “Now.” Allandra’s name became an anchor. A lifeline when the intensity threatened to crack the world open.

Somewhere in the palace, a bell sounded the hour, but neither of them cared. At one point, Serali pulled Allandra on top of her, just to see if she could. She could. She asked Allandra to say something filthy in High Solvari, and when Allandra obliged, Serali burst out laughing and covered her face with both hands, mortified and delighted. At one point Serali lost herself so completely in Allandra’s mouth that she forgot what time was, or that there was a world outside the bed.

There was a point at which Serali realized she had stopped bracing for the part where she disappeared.

It did not happen.

She remained herself.

Breathless, frightened, wanting, occasionally furious at the limitations of buttons, but herself.

More than herself, perhaps.

No.

That sounded like the books.

She remained.

That was enough.

Chapter 102: I Didn’t Disappear

The room was dark except for the firelight slipping through the open bedchamber door and the faint silver stars painted above them.

Serali lay on her side beneath the blankets, staring at Allandra’s hand resting on the sheet between them.

Not touching.

Near.

Allandra had asked before even that, which had made Serali laugh and then almost cry and then hide her face in the pillow until Allandra, alarmed, asked if she was all right.

She had said yes.

Then she had said, “Do not look tragic.”

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Allandra had said, “I am trying.”

“Try differently,” Serali had muttered.

Allandra had laughed.

Now the queen lay beside her in Serali’s bed with her hair loose across the pillow, looking nothing like a portrait and too much like a person.

A beautiful person.

Still irritating.

Serali watched her breathing and waited for panic.

Some came.

A little.

Not enough to drown her.

She touched the latch inside herself.

The bond was different.

Not quiet.

It had not gone quiet.

It had stopped shouting.

Warmth moved through it, steadier now, less like pressure and more like a hand near hers in the dark.

Allandra’s eyes opened.

“Are you all right?” she whispered.

Serali considered lying.

Then did not.

“I don’t know yet.”

Allandra went still.

Serali rolled her eyes. “That was not no.”

“I know.”

“You looked like a condemned woman.”

“I will try differently.”

“Good.”

A pause.

Then Allandra asked, “May I touch you?”

Serali looked at her hand on the sheet.

Then at Allandra.

“You may.”

The words were softer now.

Not less powerful.

Allandra’s hand moved slowly, giving her every chance to change her mind, and settled over Serali’s.

No heat surged this time.

No door blew open.

Only warmth.

Serali curled her fingers around hers.

For several breaths, they lay that way.

Then, without meaning to, Serali began to cry.

It was deeply inconvenient.

The tears slipped sideways across the bridge of her nose and into the pillow. Silent at first, which was at least something. Then her breath hitched,

betraying her.

Allandra’s hand tightened once, then loosened immediately, as if even comfort required permission.

“Serali?”

“I’m fine.”

“Liar.”

“Yes.”

Allandra did not move closer. “Tell me what you need.”

Serali covered her face with her free hand. “For you not to make this important.”

A silence.

Then Allandra said, solemnly, “I will make it moderately important.”

A laugh broke through the tears.

Serali hated her.

Loved—

No.

Not yet.

Perhaps.

Allandra’s thumb moved lightly over her knuckles. “Is this all right?”

Serali nodded, then realized Allandra might not see it in the dark. “Yes.”

The tears kept coming for a little while anyway.

She had expected shame, maybe. Or regret. Or triumph. Or the heat satisfied and smug as a cat.

Instead she felt too full of herself.

That was the only way to think it.

Too aware of her own body as hers. Too aware of the fact that Allandra had touched her and stopped and asked and wanted and waited, and not once had Serali left herself behind to survive it.

“I kept waiting,” she said.

Allandra’s hand stilled. “For what?”

Serali stared at the ceiling.

At the silver stars she had once hated.

“The part where I disappeared.”

The room went very quiet.

Allandra’s breath caught.

Serali turned her head. “Do not.”

“I did not say anything.”

“You were about to feel too much.”

Allandra made a sound that might have been a laugh if it had not hurt. “I am guilty of that often.”

“Yes.”

Serali looked back at the stars.

“I didn’t,” she said.

Allandra said nothing.

Good.

Serali found her hand again in the dark and held it harder.

“I didn’t disappear.”

Allandra’s voice was low and rough. “No.”

“I am still here.”

“Yes.”

“And you are here.”

“Yes.”

“And that is…” Serali searched for the word.

Safe was too simple.

Good was too small.

Terrifying was accurate but incomplete.

“Troubling,” she decided.

Allandra laughed softly.

The bond warmed.

Serali smiled despite herself.

“Do not laugh. It is very troubling.”

“I believe you.”

“No, you don’t.”

“I do.” Allandra’s thumb brushed her knuckles again. “It is deeply troubling.”

Serali turned toward her.

In the dark, Allandra looked softer, less composed, the lines of queen and mantle and grief blurred into something more human. Her eyes were bright. Not with tears, quite. With something close enough to be dangerous.

Serali touched her face.

Allandra leaned into her palm this time without catching herself.

That small surrender entered Serali more deeply than any kiss.

“You are allowed to need me,” Serali said.

Allandra’s eyes closed.

Serali added quickly, because the room had become too serious again, “Occasionally. Within reason. Subject to review.”

Allandra laughed.

Then opened her eyes.

“You are allowed to need me too,” she said.

Serali’s throat tightened.

“I know.”

“Do you?”

“No.”

Allandra’s smile was tender enough to be rude. “Then I will keep telling you until belief becomes less impossible.”

Serali groaned. “You are quoting yourself now.”

“I am very wise.”

“You are very sleepy.”

“That too.”

Allandra’s eyes did look tired. Not the brittle exhaustion Serali had seen in council, but something looser. A body finally permitted to understand that night existed for something other than work and restraint.

Everly’s nap law had merit.

“Sleep,” Serali said.

Allandra’s brows rose. “Is that an order?”

“No. I am not queen.”

“No.”

“It is advice.”

“From my Royal Mage?”

“From someone whose bed you are occupying.”

Allandra’s smile changed. “Your bed.”

Serali went still.

Not badly.

Just struck.

Her room. Her bed. Her door. Her yes.

“Yes,” she said.

Allandra’s gaze softened.

Serali pointed at her. “Do not make that face.”

“What face?”

“The one where you understand me.”

“I will try not to.”

“You won’t.”

“No.”

Serali tucked herself under the blanket more firmly and did not move away when Allandra settled beside her, still not touching except where their hands were joined.

The room was warm.

The palace was quiet.

For once, Serali did not count the exits before sleep.

She knew them.

Door. Balcony. Servants’ passage. Window. Hearth screen.

And, beside her, not an exit.

A choice.

She fell asleep before she could decide whether that was the most dangerous thing of all.

Allandra woke to three discoveries.

The first was that Serali slept badly even when safe.

Not violently. Not with the sharp, fighting startle Allandra had seen in the first weeks. There was no flinch, no hand reaching for a hidden blade, no breath caught behind clenched teeth. But even in sleep, Serali seemed to argue with rest. Her brows drew faintly together. One hand lay curled near her mouth, fingers half-closed around nothing. Her hair had come loose across the pillow in dark waves, one strand caught at the corner of her lips.

The second discovery was that the bond was quiet.

Not gone.

Never gone.

But for the first time since Lia had named it, the bond did not feel like a storm pressing against shutters or a flame needing glass to keep it from burning through the room. It lay between them like banked warmth beneath ash, steady and present and astonishingly gentle.

Allandra could feel Serali there.

Not thoughts. Not dreams. Not even clear emotion.

Only presence.

Alive. Near. Chosen.

The third discovery was that Serali had stolen all the blankets.

Allandra opened her eyes fully and stared at the ceiling.

Silver stars glimmered against deep blue plaster in the gray pre-dawn light. Serali’s ceiling. Serali’s bed. Serali’s warmth pressed into the sheets. Serali beside her, asleep and alive and somehow both sharp-edged and soft in the dimness.

Allandra was cold from the waist down.

She looked over.

Serali lay wrapped in an almost military consolidation of blankets, only one shoulder and her head visible. She had done this with the apparent ruthlessness of a woman reclaiming territory from an invading power.

Allandra stared at her.

Then, despite everything, smiled.

The movement felt strange on her face.

Not because she rarely smiled. She smiled often enough when required. Court smiles. Mother smiles. Sovereign smiles. The occasional real one for Everly, Daravan, sometimes Hagen when he was being unbearable in the way that reminded her they had once been children together.

This smile belonged to none of those offices.

It existed before thought.

Serali shifted, drawing the blankets tighter.

Allandra bit back a laugh.

The bond warmed in answer, faint and sleepy. Serali’s mouth moved against the pillow.

“Stop being pleased,” she muttered.

Allandra went still.

Serali’s eyes remained closed.

Allandra whispered, “Are you awake?”

“No.”

“You answered.”

“Reflex.”

Allandra’s smile deepened. “You stole the blankets.”

Serali’s brows drew together. “Spoils of war.”

“I was unaware we were at war.”

“I won.”

“So I gather.”

Serali opened one eye.

For a moment, neither of them moved.

The night returned, not as heat this time, but in fragments: Serali’s hand over hers at the knot of the robe. You may. The first sharp intake of breath. The

way Serali had laughed when the pillow fell. The way she had cried afterward, furious at herself for it, and said, I kept waiting for the part where I disappeared.

Allandra’s chest tightened.

The bond did not flare.

It deepened.

Serali felt it. Her expression shifted, the last fragments of sleep clearing from her eyes.

“Do not look tragic before breakfast,” she said.

Allandra exhaled softly. “I was not.”

“You were considering it.”

“I was thinking.”

“That is often where tragedy begins with you.”

“Fair.”

Serali blinked at her.

Then, slowly, almost suspiciously, she smiled.

Not large. Not easy.

Enough.

Allandra wanted to touch her face.

She did not.

Serali noticed the restraint and, with a small roll of her eyes, extracted one hand from the blanket fortress and held it out between them.

“You may,” she said.

Allandra’s heart hurt.

That was becoming a pattern.

She reached for Serali’s hand and laced their fingers together.

No storm. No surge of ungovernable heat. No immediate collapse of reason. The bond answered, yes, but with warmth rather than pressure. With a low hum of recognition that made Allandra want to close her eyes again and stay there until the realm learned to govern itself.

Serali’s fingers tightened around hers. “Is it different for you?”

Allandra looked at her. “Yes.”

“How?”

She thought before answering.

That mattered. Careful answers mattered here. Not polished ones. Not royal ones. True ones.

“Quieter,” Allandra said. “Not weaker. Just… less desperate.”

Serali’s gaze searched hers.

Allandra continued, “Before, it felt like every feeling had to become action or pain. Now it feels like it can simply exist for a moment.”

Serali looked down at their joined hands. “That is better.”

“Yes.”

“I still hate old magic.”

“I know.”

“But perhaps less this morning.”

“A diplomatic improvement.”

“Do not enter it into record.”

“I would not dare.”

Serali yawned.

It was utterly undignified.

Allandra watched, fascinated.

Serali caught her watching. “What?”

“Nothing.”

“You look too fond.”

Allandra did not deny it quickly enough.

Serali’s face warmed.

The bond warmed too, but gently, the way embers brightened when stirred.

Allandra said, “Is that all right?”

Serali looked annoyed by the question, and then, more annoyingly for her, moved by it.

“Yes,” she said. “Unfortunately.”

Allandra laughed softly.

Serali’s eyes narrowed. “Do not become smug.”

“I would never.”

“You are queen. Smugness is probably in the training.”

“It was covered briefly.”

“I knew it.”