by Mima
“You’re not worried I’ll ruin everything?”
“I expect you will, but I already know I needed to leave. I’ll be going out with a … roar.” She nuzzled him, their noses a match. There was no need to be sensitive about her big blade of a nose when his used to be just like it before it was broken. “They already resent and fear me. The chatelaine needs to hold respect and mine is melting away like wet sand.”
“You don’t fear him at all.” He kissed along her cheek. The pulsing softness lingering inside stirred, heated.
She gave tiny licks to his eyelashes. “I didn’t before and I certainly don’t now, when we’re Bonded.”
He made a face, pulling from her touch at his eyes. “He’s not biddable. If you think you can manage him—”
She put her fingers over his mouth and pressed his lips to silence him. She held his gaze, letting him see her own steady foundation. “Donte, if you think you can manage me, you will have to shift your plans. I am full of relief to have you as my partner. I am full of joy to meet you, and claim you, and look forward to discovering more of you. But you now have a partner, too.”
His gaze was the brown of rich, wet earth, ripe for planting. When it slid away from hers, she twisted her wrist and pressed her thumb to his lips. He accepted it, taking it gently into his mouth and holding it there in the wet heat, with an erotic press of his tongue.
“You don’t believe me.” Sadness swept through her, but it was quickly pushed out with intent. She couldn’t be disappointed in him, because she knew just how focused on the darkmages he was, and how damaged, and how long he’d been alone. She understood, but she wouldn’t accept his thinking. He may have reasons but there would be no excuse for not grabbing onto her love after what they’d just been through together.
He lifted his face from her thumb and she let it slide free. “Moriko…”
She waited, painting his throat with the hot wetness. And because the trails were so enticing, she swooped down to lap at him and make wider paths.
He took her shoulders and drew her up, shivering again.
She smiled, slow and wide and devious. “Ohhhh,” she teased. “I’m gonna get you so good. When we have time, I’m gonna lick you all over and rub—”
His hips thrust up and she gasped. The joined sensation she’d grown used to exploded into scrambled need. Now it was his turn to smile slow and devious. “You’re used to being in charge, but your favorite lovers are the ones who act on their own desires. You’re not submissive but you hate being catered to. You want an active lover.”
“Yeah…” She ground her hips down, grinding her clit into his tummy and clamping hard around the shaft she held inside. “I wish I’d wake to have you in my bed. I’ll miss you. Is there anything I can do to help get you away from them?”
She refused to believe they’d actually kill him. He was too powerful. It would be completely impractical to throw away his expertise and ability to get close to the darkmages. And as soon as she got him into her territory, she’d make sure the sanctimonious clans didn’t touch him again.
“Tell your Queen we’ve Bonded. Ask for me, with whatever power you can apply.”
“I don’t have access to the Queen.”
“She’s your aunt. And you’re her chatelaine.”
Arching her back, Moriko offered her swollen breasts to him. He took the offering eagerly, his mouth roving across the rise of one, swirling his tongue around the tip of the other.
And that touch alone soothed her, settled her, calmed her agitation. What a gift his touch was, that it matched her. “She’s Queen and I’m not part of the government. I met her several times as a child but after she took the Crown, I’ve only seen her rarely. But yes, I have ways to communicate and I’ll do what I can, especially since she’s already interested in you for her own purposes.”
“We’ll get to you soon and I’ll come to you each night.” He sucked at her nipple, strong and twistingly hard, then soft and soothing. “Usually we’d have a whole week to discover each other’s bodies, to fuck all day and night until we slept only to wake and eat and continue.” His lips closed on the very tip of her nipple and a flashing sting made her jump.
The heat zapped deep into her chest, then trickled down to her gently churning hips. “There’s no usual for us. Darkmage survivor and chatelaine.”
“Rogue and princess.”
She ground down harder, crushing herself on his swollen shaft. “Oh, Donte. That’s not us.” Her eyes clenched closed, her hands struggling to find purchase on his massive biceps. “We’re protectors, you and I. Guardians. Even though they don’t want us to be. They can’t stop us.”
He froze and his sudden stillness had her eyes flying open. She was rotating her hips in strong twisting circles, loving the pressure of him, amazed at the peace of joining with him here in his private magescape. But when she focused on his face, she knew her words had touched a nerve and moaned at the raw emotion naked on his face.
Rolling forward, he bore her onto her back again. The fronds were cool and vaguely scratchy against her back, like crisp-scented burlap. Donte lay his weight down along her chest. Moriko cried out, holding tight to his ribs as her legs were smushed wide. He thrust into her with a groan, his hips pausing to seal against hers before drawing back in a thrill of internal sensation, then slamming forward, taking her breath. Watching Donte take her, focused, serious, lost in his own pleasure, was familiar. This was the fucking she’d grown to know over the past nights. Astonishing and forceful.
But now she knew him. She was literally cradled inside his mind at this very moment. He’d invaded her, captured her, seduced her. His lips opened with the force of his increasing agitation. His chest ground against hers, his belly flattened her spine, his hips churned with wet slaps, controlling her breathing.
“You’re mine,” she warned him.
He grunted and swung forward with a muscular flex. Tears popped into her eyes and her throat tightened, swelling with the precious sense of belonging he fucked into her, like he was stuffing the gift tighter, ramming it deep into her body. His thighs trembled alongside hers, and her nails bit into his skin. Blessed Skyfather, Bountiful Earthmother. They’d delivered a perfect match. Now it was up to her to hold it tight.
Her abs tightened, her muscles lengthening, straining taut. His gaze held hers, and they panted across each others’ throats with their growing need.
“So fucking special.” His voice was a gritty rasp. “Moriko.”
She was almost there. Her hands slid higher around the wide girth of his chest, reaching to hold him closer.
“Beautiful woman.”
The words were barely distinguishable between the strangled breaths of his churning hips and the darkening of her impending need. But she heard them. She felt them. She knew he meant them, and her head tossed back, throat offered. He claimed it, mouth burning across the fragile tendons in a wave of heat. Her spirit burst inside. He was with her. Swirls of light and dancing joy and the most perfect orgasm of her life.
“Donte!” His name was the drum of her heart, the swelling in her lungs, the thrum of her blood. He was the structure of her bones, the liquid power in her locked muscles.
The weight of him sank through her. The force of his spirit, even that darkly pulsing anchor dragging in one corner, it was everything she’d ever wanted. And his body flexing on hers was the moment she’d always dreamed of. Her man. The man who wanted her, wasn’t afraid of her, understood her.
Moriko. Her name whispered through her shaking skin, echoing with the same joy. Time held still. Moriko fell.
When she opened her eyes, she stared at the happy frolicking people on the beach. The ceiling was far above her, and the metallic gold flourishes of the crown molding framing the mural seemed to pulse with the light inside her. Her legs were spread, her arms outstretched, her body sizzling with fading satisfaction.
One magelight in a swirled green glass globe lit the corner of her desk enough to shi
ne on the white curtains framing the open door. The breeze rolled across her skin like a soft, soothing touch. She breathed deep of the ocean, took in the rhythm, and settled back to earth. A smile stretched across her face as one tear leaked from the corner of her eye to dampen her hairline. She managed to roll upright, then crawl off the end of her bed. Nude, she stumbled on shaky legs to her desk.
Humming a light, happy jig, she began to write the letter announcing her Bonding to the Queen. Her thighs pulsed and ached, soaked with pungent juices. Signing her name with a flourish, she walked out onto her terrace and reached her arms out to the sky. Her hips tipped into a sensual dance, and she twined her wrists, swaying her shoulders as she circled in the starlight, breasts hardening in the night air. Everything would change now. Donte was with her.
Chapter Nine
Donte lay on the stone floor, the narrow confines of the room lit by one magelight set in the wall. The guards controlled it. It was always on. The soft folds of the new blanket draped over him suddenly seemed abrasive after the plush flesh of Moriko. He flung it off.
His chest heaved, but Bear was totally silent, satiated. Lifting his whirling head, he looked down at his hard, aching cock. Its demand was belied by the puddles of white cream coating his belly and dripping off his hips.
He held his hands up in front of his face. He was shaking. Not a little tremble of overused muscle, not a shiver of passing strong emotion. His entire body visibly shook, sweaty muscles twitching. He clenched his fists, but the tremor was deep in his frame. He ground his clamped teeth as he struggled to slow his breathing.
Moriko. She was inside him. Their connection was a living entity, as permanent as the scars in his flesh.
He threw one forearm across his eyes and slammed his fist against the floor once, twice, and again. His knuckles bled but he brought them down with bone-jarring force.
What the fuck had he done?
Chapter Ten
The guard found Dom and Aidan in his private rooms poring over reports. There were so many fronts to this war now he’d had to bring in a few more assistants, but he trusted no one as much as his white wolf friend. There were the usual weekly reports from each of the clans on any news of import. Those he gave to Aidan. Soon his friend would leave to permanently destroy the darkmages’ secrecy potion. With the information the newly adopted firemage had given them, they had been shutting the supply lines down, and now it came to the endgame. Once the humans had no ability to cloak themselves, the tide would surely turn, as there would be no ability for the darkmages to hide from trux tracking. Yet this was just one beat of the wardrums.
There was the securing and watching of the darkmage sifting stones, and the quartering of all the land two days’ run around the Cities to look for more Donte might not have known about. There were the now daily reports on the territory of the so-called wildlings, the guildless, lawless humans outside the City Walls the truxet had ignored to their peril.
And of course there were various City reports on unrest, including the Mage Guild’s current shenanigans as they tried to twist out of their own guilt while admitting to a portion of it. There was a Royal report from the martens who now had sole responsibility for guarding the Queen, a clear target. And of course the most bitter reports, the deadly results of their latest failed experimental attacks on the fortress.
Yesterday had seen three more watercoasters and an owl dead. He repeated a short prayer four times, adding four coals to the bonfire of his fury. The Alpha of the river wolves wanted a personal meeting with the Council. However, their agenda was full of Donte.
At least, that was what Dom had been thinking before the mountaincat had come panting to the doorway and uttered the nonsensical words.
“What?” Aidan asked in place of Dom’s silence.
“He’s Bonded.” The red-haired warrior spit the words out as if they tasted bad.
“That’s impossible,” Aidan said, sending piles of scrolls cascading to the floor around him as he stood. “Perhaps some woman snuck into his cell.”
“There’s been no one in his cell. No female scent at all besides Sunshine’s from yesterday. But when we brought him his breakfast this morning, he reeked of a mating. We took him to the baths just to be sure, but it’s truly in his skin.”
Dom stood more slowly, shedding his own pile of papers. “We’ll come. Who else has been told?”
“I went to his Alpha first, thinking he must know of it. But Alaric didn’t. He sent me to you and went to see the rogue.”
His wolf howled at the thought of Alaric facing Donte. The Waters take him if anything happened to the Bear clan Alpha. Moving at a dead run with Aidan and the mountaincat at his heels, he raced to the holding cells, currently unoccupied but for Donte.
Alaric was sitting at the guard’s table in the central lounge, staring blankly at the table. A hard inhale confirmed confusion and no blood. Relief for a moment, that Donte hadn’t gutted the old man.
“Is it true?” Dom whispered.
Alaric nodded. “I did not do this, Dom. Bear is troubled.”
You fucking arrogant crazy asshole, Dom thought viciously at Donte.
“I know you wouldn’t do such a thing, Alaric. How this happened is a secondary mystery to why he’s done it, and the woman’s status.” Dom looked into Aidan’s cool, composed eyes. “Escort the Alpha to his Lair. I’m visiting the Queen and will be back immediately.”
Aidan nodded, helping the elderly man stand and walking sedately beside the once-powerful but increasingly fragile warrior.
Dom turned to the mountaincat. “Tell no one else.”
A brisk run to the sifting stone and then Dom slapped his hand down, willing himself to the Royal compound. The stone changed under his grip, his lizzeed lashed its tail in irritation, and the tan marble walls and frescoes of the inner palace formed around him. The marten on guard greeted him but Dom didn’t spare more than a nod.
He strode to the secondary guard and said, “Tell the Queen I have news.”
It ate at him he couldn’t just go directly to her, but that would cause an incident with her human team. The human team he couldn’t even be sure of because of the cursed Mage Guild potion.
So he paced in the hall for fifteen infuriating minutes before the marten returned and they both ran to meet her. She was on the beach, under a wide shelter, surrounded by people and guards. Lying on a divan, she read from a stack of papers. At least she too faced a pile of reports. He stood at the end of the wide steps, glaring at the horizon that hid the fortress the darkmages had somehow stolen from the clans.
He stayed at the bottom of the steps. She came to him in another robe, this one sheer lace but also heavily embroidered. The tight body wrap beneath it showed a woman who was still fit in her maturity.
“Yes, Dom?” Her face was empty, bland and cold.
“The rogue Donte has managed a Bond on his own. I need to check on your niece.”
“She sent me a note this morning sharing the glad tidings.” Her voice was just as bland, but the last was said without irony. “Of course, by our laws she is yet unmarried, but I sent the announcement of her engagement out at breakfast. We passed this news through to all the Cities, where it was announced with great fanfare and joy—” she broke off and glanced toward the City and the rising sun—“perhaps a half hour ago.”
She bent and stroked a soft pile of red flowers growing closest to the stairs. The whole line of the beach was bordered with terraced, orderly gardens. “It has caused only a mild stir at the moment, but I’ve ordered extra guards into the streets all day.” She picked one of the flowers and rose to place it in the end of her long, loose braid. In the bright morning sunlight, her many white hairs shone bright against rich brown.
He stood there breathing the ocean, which always made his watercoaster leap, and chewed on his lips to keep from bellowing in frustration. “You know my council is unlikely to let him live. Why you announced a betrothal of such magnitude when he’ll likely be
dead by midday—”
“That would be absolutely unacceptable.” Her dark gaze pinned him, challenging his sandcat. “I want this warrior. I want him with my niece, in this City, today.”
He met her stare for stare, struggling not to step into her space, not to curl his hands into fists.
Eventually, she looked away. Gracefully, as if bored. She’d faced him down longer than some of his own people could, which was more maddening than admirable.
“He will rip this City apart. He will create deadly chaos and mass hysteria. And we won’t even know if he’s doing it for them or for us.”
The Queen shrugged her braid behind her perfect spine. “Moriko tells me he can track them. And that is everything. Last night they dared to start a riot here. Here. In my own City. At my grandfather’s fountain.” Her calm control cracked and tension vibrated in every word. “You will get him to me, and we will start purging my Cities of evil, or I will banish every trux from our Walls.” She still stared out at the horizon.
Dom stepped directly into her line of sight. “Don’t threaten me.”
She met his gaze and the façade cracked. Her eyes welled with tears, and her rouged lips trembled. “It is not a threat,” she whispered. “All is lost. They are everywhere, invisible, untouchable. If he is not the weapon I think he is, then all he does is speed up their game.” She stepped into him, putting one finger on his cheek. “My Beast Lord, don’t you see? Our defenses are crumbling. We either attack or drown.”
He would not put it past this woman to use emotion as a weapon, and so he was not particularly troubled to watch the unprecedented silver tear spill down her elegant cheek. But with his groundbear butting continuously against his ribs in an effort to get him to move away from her coercing touch, he ground out. “All right. I will give him to you. He will become the target of both my people and them, but perhaps before he falls he will be the weapon we hope he is. Our weapon.”
Muck and Mist, Dom truly didn’t know what Donte was. But Rowan might.