By the Horns

by Jeanette Lynn

  “Not Adelric’s,” I shook my head, “mine.” When he looked like he wanted to argue, I gave a small smile. “I’ll be gone but a moment.”

  With a grumble he relented, and I calmly made my way past the dining area, ignoring the low, hushed conversation that kicked up between Adelric and Yhem as I made my swift exit.

  Down the hall I went, dipping my head in a short nod of greeting to those I passed. Almost there. Just a little bit more.

  Opening my door quietly, I slipped inside.

  It was dark, no candles lit, a little chill in the air. It took me a full minute to realize I had a new, un-horned door. Stumbling to my bed in the dark, I felt around for what I wanted. Grabbing it and pulling it towards me, turning and plopping down on the bed, I wrapped it around me protectively. Swaddled in the thin fur, I took a few deep, even breaths, squeezing my eyes shut tight as the tide washed over me.

  I’d bonded, mated, myself to a damned fae, if what Robin the Peacock Puck of fae was to be believed. Would the bond hurt my mates? Would they suffer for my foolishness?

  I couldn’t feel him now, hadn’t since my sword christening into Tauran demon-dom, praying, hoping, the sword’s fire had cleared that mistake up for me.

  Had it absolved me of that sin, I wondered, shuddering.

  Biting my lip, starting to rock a little in place, I tried to ignore the flame that lit in my core at some of the particular activities I’d engaged in with the villain of my story. Surely that wasn’t normal, to fuck your tormentor? No, I was fucking Kvigor, or rather, fucking the Puck out of Kvigor.

  “Gods, I’m a mess...” Lifting a shaking hand to my face, I scrubbed it down my drawn mug.

  The door creaked and I gasped, jumping, squinting as it opened quickly to close, but not before the lights from the hall shone on the big shadow slipping inside.

  “I was coming right back,” I muttered as he drew near.

  Big hands found the tops of my thighs, opening my legs to accommodate his hefty frame. The short furs of his coat tickled my skin, warm, bristly.

  “I know,” that deep voice, smooth, soothing, said quietly.

  “I’m fine,” I muttered, my voice cracking as I instinctively wiggled closer.

  Fingers found the tie of my k’h se, the other cupping my nape to draw me closer. “I want to feel you,” I murmured.

  “It’s okay,” he swore, pressing a soft peck to that spot right between my eyebrows, then lower, until his mouth hovered over mine.

  “Kvigor...” My hands went to his chest, kneading when I should’ve been holding him off.

  “Only me,” a hand cupped mine, sliding it over his heart where it thumped that steady drum. “It’s only me in here.”

  “But back when- When you were- Back at the- When, ah- Gods, why is this so hard to get out?”

  “I know.” His hand slid down my arm, the pads of his fingers tickling my skin, sending a fresh wave of awareness through me.

  “It didn’t count,” I burst out, swallowing thickly.

  Brushing my braid from my shoulder, his thumb traced the line of my collarbone, teasing a tantalizing path to my breast. “This.” His thumb stroked over my nipple, tweaking, teasing, until it was a hardened bud, throbbing from his attentions. “Feel me,” he muttered, nipping and kissing a fiery path across my shoulder, nipping the flesh, teasing it when I had yet to move.

  With an, “Eeep,” my hands flew to his groin, slapping the bottom of his stomach, just above his cock, making us both laugh at the awkwardness of it.

  “I’m glad you’re, ah, you,” I said in a rush, suddenly feeling flustered. There were so many things I wanted to say, discuss, but found myself disgustingly tongue tied.

  The urge to cry hit me, overwhelmed as I gave in to what if’s, lost to how it could have turned out. Sitting up, reaching out, my free hand found his face, brushing along its length. I found fur and scars, tracing each path, starting from the corner of his mouth to what was left of one horn.

  His breath caught and he shuddered, shivering, pressing into my touch. “What you did for me,” he started, but sounded as if he found he couldn’t finish.

  Hand going to his nape, where my fingertips danced across the short chain wrapped around it, I shook my head. “No, it was you. It was always you. I can’t say what I did, actually, I- I-” It hurt to admit it, the fact I might have inadvertently made things worse for him, though my heart had been in the right place. Truth be told, I couldn’t explain what had gone on between the Trickster and me. It was... It both warmed my belly and curdled my stomach. I was scared of the former, felt I deserved the latter.

  His hands disappeared to land on my waist, where the material of my k’h se was parted and he pulled away. “YOU brought me back. You, and no one else.” A hand slid over my belly, the feather light touch dusting across it making me quiver.

  Oh, Heavens above and Hell down below, I was getting teary-eyed, bad. “You understand what I- What he- What ended up happening?” I croaked out. Didn’t he understand?!

  “Was it not my body you took into yours?” he asked a tad too harshly. “Was this,” his hand fisted over mine on his cock, forcing my fingers to pump his rigid member, “not what you took, sweet wife?”

  “W-w-wife?” I could hardly believe my ears. I loved those words on his lips.

  Releasing me, leaning in close, until he loomed over me, his massive body filled up the small space. Red eyes glowed from the dark, the sound of steam hissing from his nostrils only serving to heat me up even more than before.

  “Mine,” he muttered, one arm bracing his weight, his other going to my mound to cup it. “Mine. All of it.” His hand slid up, resting over my belly. “Anything in here, that’s mine too. My blood, my lips speaking the words by the gate that night, our bond.”

  “But he said-”

  A finger went to my lips, pressing. “The rest doesn’t matter. It only matters if we allow it to. We won’t. He has no power over us.” That thick digit ran across my mouth, pulling away when he leaned in and gently, reverently pressed his mouth to mine. It was over before it started, a hint of tongue as my lips parted, enough to torment sweetly, and it was done. “But you won’t let it, will you, vacha?”

  When I didn’t answer he started to pull away. Or so I thought.

  Panicking, I started to jerk up, already feeling too gobsmacked to form sentences that would make any actual sense.

  A thick hand pressed to my chest, right between my breasts, forcing me to halt. Warm breath fell over my breast. I was squirming for an entirely different reason as he murmured huskily, “Tell me, Addie-mine, who is your mate-husband, your bonded for life?”

  As if an answer was not required at the moment, a hot, wet mouth closed over my nipple, where he began to suckle, his tongue teasing my bar piercing. Jackknifing up off the bed, crying out, my hands went to his head, where I practically mauled his face, wrapping myself around it.

  “Ah, you! YOU!” I fairly screeched, when he let my breast go with a resounding pop, ready to beg him not to stop. A deep, heady chuckle issued from the dark. I didn’t give one single shite.

  Leaning back on my elbows, ignoring the tightness in my joints, I spread my legs, my head rolling back on my neck, chest thrust out.

  Peeking at my mate, knowing he could see me in the dark, I told him breathlessly, “I want to try this again. A redo. I want to know I’m yours. Tell me, show me. Make me see.” Flushing at my boldness, I bit my lip.

  He paused, untangling my legs from his hips. There was a short pause before he said in all seriousness, not an ounce of humor to his voice, “Is this what you wish?”

  “Make it count, husband-mine,” was all I said, and he launched himself at me.

  The snarl that rent the air was all the warning I had and he jerked me half off the bed, wrenching me to him. My arms flailed, my hands scooped up to be shoved above my head, where he let out a warning growl that let me know I was to keep them there.

  Warm skin, flesh to heated flesh, p
ressed as he fell upon me. The tip of that fat bar of an erection pressed into my lower belly and he groaned at the contact.

  “You’re so beautiful, Addie-mine,” he ground out huskily, like he was grinding his teeth not to rush. Hands cupped my knees, flexing. “You’re mine, do you hear me? All mine, and if anyone thinks to take you from me, I’ll kill them.”

  “And Adelric, Kvigor?” I just had to ask.

  The hands gripping my thighs stilled, to start kneading the flesh. He paused so long my heart began to sink.

  “I love him, too,” I whispered softly.

  “I know.” He sounded like he loathed the fact.

  When my hand would have gone to his, starting to lower, he snarled warningly, until I put it back in place. Lips tipping up a little, I shook my head. “I won’t choose.”

  A long, disgusted sigh issued from my beastie bull that made me laugh a little at the sound.

  “I need both of you.”

  Wide hands cupped my face, a wet snout brushing my nose. “Then don’t.”

  I silently lost it then, wondering how many more times I’d shed tears this night.

  “None o’ that,” he muttered, ruining a beautiful moment with a slick, wet glide of that tongue across my face.

  Squealing and laughing, unsure whether to be grateful or appalled at the brute, he hopped back, his hands clutching my thighs, forcing them open, and that same tongue swiped across my waiting folds. “Best fix it now,” he got out between leisurely laps at my sex, like he was savoring his mate.

  “Ah, gods!” I cried out, hips jerking, going wide-eyed, mouth agape.

  He did it again, and again, making sure to hit that little bud every other go. And right as I was about to tip over he clamped his mouth over my clit and sucked.

  Gripping his busted horns, ignoring his growls, I held on, fucking his face, going with him when he lifted up, grabbing my ass to keep me in place, spinning to press me into the wall. Pulling his face away, ignoring my cry of distress, he let out a needy sound. “More,” he muttered, and I could have sworn I heard him lick his lips before he dove back in, continuing his assault. That thick appendage slid lower, breaching my sex.

  “Now! Now-now-now!” I howled, slapping at the spot just past his horns, making him laugh hard enough he lost his rhythm. “This isn’t funny,” I ground out, aching, wiggling, on the edge of completion. “Torturing me.”

  “Torture? No, dearling, this is nothing compared to what it was like for me, with him, without you. Nothing. With that body snatcher clinging on, invading my mind. He was in my head. In it. He saw, knew everything... He knew I loved you and tormented me with it. Watching you giving yourself over, for me, trying to get me back? Having to listen to him trying to tell you that you were to be his? Knowing you’re mine? Knowing the truth and unable to speak up, in my own body? That was torture.”

  “I’m sorry, I only mean to-”

  “No.” He shook his head. “I needed it. I hate to admit it. I needed to see, for myself, how it could be. I fought harder after that day than I ever had. It got to the point he realized I’d rather die than live a moment longer with that parasite inside me.”

  “Oh, Kvigo- Ah!”

  He let go of me then, allowing me to fall. My legs hit his shoulders, my feet dangling over either side of his head, a shriek on my lips at the sudden drop, and then his hands were on my ass, gripping a cheek each, lifting me. His cock found my pussy, the fat head teasing my entrance, pressing, but he paused.

  “Kvigor, please.”

  “Addie,” he choked out, his cock already twitching as he pulled back until the underside of his shaft brushed my slit and he gave a shallow thrust. “I want you so badly... I won’t last long.”

  “I won’t either,” I admitted, shifting my hips as he pulled back so his next forward motion brought us together.

  Kvigor made a choked noise, hips jerking, to slide in farther. He was thick and already starting to twitch. It wouldn’t be long at all. We gasped in unison as we became one. Body tightening, I clenched around him reflexively, attempting to move things along myself when he stalled.

  Sliding one hand to my shoulder, he gripped it tight. “I won’t be gentle.”

  Leaning forward, I nipped his chin with my new pearly whites. “Don’t want you to be.”

  With a growl he rammed home, again and again, until that pinch of pain that comes with a hard fucking mixed with pleasure.

  “Oh gods,” was all the warning I could give him, toes curling, insides bunching, right before everything exploded and I forgot how to breathe.

  “MINE!” he roared through my climax, pounding into me lustily, riding each wave. Though he began to pulse inside of me, coming with my name on his lips and a heavy groan, he kept going.

  Semen spilled, dripping down the wall to splatter the floor. Already hardening again, he wasn’t nearly done.

  His rhythm shifted, until he slipped free from my depths, his cock coated in us, to pop back, sliding to the crack of my ass. The top of his shaft rubbed the spot, his breathing growing labored. “Addie,” he mumbled, a question to that one word.

  “It’s okay,” I murmured, cupping the back of his head, carefully bringing our foreheads together, nodding against his skin.

  Slowly, adjusting his hold, he brought his cock to my back passage. His fingers slipped to my pussy, where he found an abundance of our combined juices and brought them to the tight, puckered hole behind. One finger slowly teased the spot, then the other, taking his time, until he could comfortably slide in two fingers deep.

  That broad head with the funny tip was next as his fingers slipped free. This wasn’t like with Titania and Puck taking hold, doing as they wished. We weren’t merely along for the ride, mixed emotions on the matter overwhelming. We were taking this back, taking everything back, making it ours. I didn’t want to think of doing this with anyone, in any other situation, but with my males. And only my males.

  “I don’t want to hurt you,” he muttered, working his way in past that tight outer ring.

  “You’re not,” I promised, wiggling down a little bit farther, trying not to tense up.

  Once he was all the way in he paused, exhaling deeply. “I’m going to move now.” His hands flexed, shoulders rolled, yet he didn’t move an inch.

  It didn’t take a scholar to figure out he was nervous.

  “I want this,” I wiggled around experimentally. “Want you to take, claim, all of me.”

  He grunted, his hips moving for a moment, but paused. I needed this, more than he probably understood. I couldn’t take all that had occurred back, but we could make new memories, just ours.

  Despite my reassurances, I felt my imposing beast of a male hesitating, starting and stopping, stalling. He needed a bit more... encouragement.

  Kneading the loose skin at the back of his neck, I gripped it, forcing his head back. “Do you want me, Tauran?”

  Kvigor jerked in my hold, sputtering, stunned.

  “I said, do you want me?” I was barking at the poor male, shouting in his face. Odd, considering his sausage was skewering my arse, but there you have it.

  “I- Yes.”

  My fingers tightened until it sounded like he winced, that huffy, puffing noise he makes when he’s getting good and riled starting to surface, and then I released him. “Then gods damned show me. Or, perhaps, let the next male try...”

  His snarl blew warm air across my face, that familiar steam I associated with his kind sending tingles of anticipation rushing through me. “Never,” he ground out gutturally, crushing me to him, “you’re mine.”

  His hand at my shoulder held me in place, big body pinning me. His hips started moving, powering into me at first, his grip on me bruisingly tight, before easing suddenly, as if he’d managed to remember himself.

  Squashed between him and the wall, his body grinding into mine allowed a delicious friction, rubbing the nub at my apex. It wasn’t the same as having a cock eagerly tunneling into me, but the taboone
ss of the act we were currently partaking, combined with the friction our position provided, was enough I’d orgasm from that alone.

  Our breaths were harsh, puffing and panting as he took me and I accepted the invasion. Nay, welcomed it.

  Kvigor was getting close, his body starting to tremor slightly, his breaths so choppy they drowned out the noise from mine. His tail slapped behind him noisily, swatting the backs of his thighs.

  When the big bull stopped suddenly, robbing me of that wonderful, teasing friction, my clit pulsing, body aching with need, he snarled at first but quickly clapped his trap shut. “Do not just stand out there, brother,” he called. “Come inside and make yourself useful.”

  Pulling away from the wall as the door opened, he slowly slid his cock free, setting me on my feet. I felt my mate’s eyes on me, glancing up to stare into maroon swirled red depths. “And bring the oil,” he grunted out, as an afterthought.

  The sound of stomping steps hurrying away had my eyes rounding. “He really was standing right out there?”

  “His mate is in here with another male. Of course he was.”

  My cheeks flamed with equal parts embarrassment and shame. I was mending things with one male at the risk of tarnishing things with another.

  “He went to get the oil,” he offered, as if sensing my conundrum, like that should somehow make me feel better. “Addie-mine,” he murmured, bending to plant a soft kiss to my lips. “You could no sooner be rid of that ugly bastard than you could this one.” And with his big hands clamping down over my shoulders, he spun me around.

  The door opened and closed as the world twirled, and my head started to swim.

  A velvety soft voice purred at my ear, a hand reaching over me to pull back, “You didn’t think we were done with this,” the sound of a cork popping reached my ears, movement, slick fingers going one to my sex, the other my back passage, making me jump. “I think this may just work to your advantage, little wife, if Adelric over there is willing to oblige.” Fingers slippery, they slid into place, two deep each. Kvigor’s thumb strummed my hidden pearl and he made a happy noise in his throat when I squirmed, swallowing hard. “What think you, brother? Our lady requires assistance.”