“Love, you forget yourself.” I caught her wrists with my shadows and pulled her hands back to the desk. I let more tendrils whisper over her thighs, pulling her gown up, but it was my fingers I used to grip them and drag her to the edge of the desk.
She let out a yelp, falling back, cheeks now a blazing pink that made me want to take her this instant.
“These thighs… fuck, Katherine, these thighs.” Not wanting to let them go for long, I used my shadows to unfasten my trousers, and peeled off my shirt as quickly as possible, before returning my grip.
Her gaze drifted over my bare chest, trailing over my scar in a way that lifted the hairs at the nape of my neck.
If her look could have that effect on me, what would happen if I gave her free rein to touch?
It was too much. Sharing space with her, my work, my body, my secrets… it threatened to overwhelm me as it was, but to let her take my control too? I hovered on its edge enough when she was close by.
To hand it over, willingly…
Something bad would follow. It had to. That was how the world worked.
My heart pounded all the harder, making my dick throb as shadows slid my trousers down and freed it.
Without my instruction, shadows had already slid between her legs, working her pussy and back entrance at once, rippling over her clit, leaving her writhing and whimpering before me.
“Fuck. Aren’t you a picture?” I lifted and spread her thighs, getting a better look at her slickness as my shadows disappeared inside. “I’m going to need a whole gallery of all the different ways I get to fuck you.”
She arched under my gaze, teeth digging into her lip until it went pale. Part of her was trying to keep quiet because of the open doors. I’d thought her past that, but hadn’t the world thrown those men at her? A recent reminder of every lesson she was trying to escape.
I ran my cock along her, and the sounds she tried to hold in grew louder. “Please,” she gasped, before going right back to biting her lip.
“Are you asking for this, love?” I slid my dick over her again.
She nodded, every muscle in her growing taut as my shadows and I worked her.
“Ah, but my ember isn’t quiet, remember?” With my thumb, I gently pulled her lower lip from between her teeth. “She has nothing to be ashamed of. She is a fucking queen and she deserves to be heard, doesn’t she?”
“Yes.” Out loud, but not loud enough.
“Doesn’t she?” My shadows’ thrusts grew deeper with those two words, and the ones in her pussy curled forward.
“Yes,” she cried out, trembling. “Yes!” Her eyelids fluttered as she came apart in my hold, coating my length in her sweet wetness.
“That’s it. Perfect.” I pulled the shadows from her channel and set myself at her entrance. “Now my forest fire gets what she asked for.”
Movement on the edge of my vision distracted me from the heave of her chest as she sank down from her peak, though I didn’t let my shadows ease up, still inside and around her.
Out in the corridor, a guard passed.
“You might gather an audience, love.”
Half dazed from her orgasm, halfway to the next one, Kat’s gaze turned to the doorway.
I stood ready to have my shadows shut the door, if that was what she asked for.
For a long beat she watched as someone else passed, and I wasn’t sure if she realised her back arched, displaying her curves even better. “Then we’d better give them a show.”
The sight of her, the words, the feel of her trying to push onto me—they sent a jolt of heady, tight pleasure down my spine.
“Yes, we had,” I rasped out, gathering myself. Setting one hand on her belly, I adjusted my grip on her thigh and brought my shadows around the other. “We had.” It came out firmer this time, and I trusted myself to drive into her.
She cried out, all attempts at quiet forgotten as she clenched around me. The feel of her parting, hot and wet and tight was maddening, soul-tearing, sublime. I set to a fast, deep pace, chasing her pleasure and my own, which rose far too quickly, snapping my hips into hers.
“You’re so good, love,” I told her as she rocked to meet me, and a dazed smile lit her face.
Stars above, I fucking loved her. More than I thought possible. I might’ve said it out loud—I wasn’t sure.
A bone-breaking tension rose in me—a tingling that pulled every muscle more taut and made every thought more fleeting.
With every thrust she let out another cry, each one more breathless than the last, her tits bouncing. The sight of her stole the air from my lungs, the sanity from my mind, and my fingers dug into her as she screwed her eyes shut and lost herself in another writhing climax.
“Fuck. Fuck!” I followed her, balls tightening as electricity exploded inside me and the world disappeared, leaving just the image of her, the feel of her, the sound of her moans.
Just her.
There was only her.
I barely caught myself on the table instead of collapsing on her, my muscles melting into blissful ease. Shadows ebbed around us as if exhausted. Freed, she draped her arms over my shoulders and murmured my name. I kissed her throat, still inside her and yet needing more points of connection as I tried to gather myself.
As I caught my breath, I pressed my forehead to hers and met her sleepy gaze. Her green eyes were the colour of forests and grass and the leaves of the roses she adored so much. She was a thing of life—a goddess of it—and it felt like she’d finally started to live.
With a half smile, she touched my cheek, fingertips brushing my earlobe, sending a ripple of pleasure down my spine.
“Love,” I managed to say, foolishly—not a complete sentence.
But she destroyed me. In the best possible way, she destroyed and re-created me.
Shaking my head, I nuzzled her nose. “I love you, my beautiful genius—I fucking love you.”
80
Kat
Without the prospect of Kaliban to take my memories, I went to the Hall of Healing the next day with a sickly feeling in my stomach. My nerves hummed, the magic around me too, and if not for numerous chances to let go recently, my hands would’ve been covered in my purple stain. I might even have hazed.
“Are you sure you’ll be all right?” Rose stood beside me at the bottom of the stairs. “I can come in with you.”
“I…” I blinked up at the marble building. “I was about to say I’d started this journey alone, but… that isn’t true. Bastian was here when I woke. And you’ve been with me almost every day since.” I gave her a sidelong look. “Would you?”
“I offered, didn’t I? And it wasn’t out of politeness, but… if she really does have a cure for you, I want to be there to support you. I’m sure Ella would come, but…”
“But she isn’t the best with blood.” I scoffed, the tightness in my stomach easing to know I had Rose.
“Gods willing there is no blood, but…” She shrugged, then nodded towards the doors. “Shall we?”
I squared my shoulders and offered a silent prayer to the gods I’d told to fuck themselves more times than I cared to admit.
Please, please let this be the last time I have to do this.