The Sorcerer King and the Fire Queen

by Ana Lee Kennedy

  The need for sex intensified. I shifted on the hard seat and pushed Shunka away. I stifled a whimper, crossing my legs in hopes the tingling in my crotch would stop. Adrenaline whizzed through my system, heightening my desire. I gulped and looked away.

  The urge to shag Azazel lessened. It wasn’t a lot, but it was enough I noticed it.

  He seemed to sense or read my thoughts, so I couldn’t clue him in on the fact I’d realized eye contact only made the need for sex stronger. At least it gave me some tiny portion of leverage.

  “Why do you want me?” Instead of meeting his gaze, I focused on the tattoo covering his right shoulder. “Why am I so important to you?”

  “You’re the only one who can change everything.” His voice wrapped around me. It tickled me with its deep timbre, seduced me into a world where only the two of us existed. “You’re the key, Ruby, the one who can help us. You can return everything to the way it once was.”

  “And who says I want to help you?” I uncrossed and re-crossed my legs, the urge to screw so primal it even resonated in my bones.

  Azazel leaned forward. “You know you want me,” he whispered. “Just admit it.”

  “What I’m feeling isn’t natural.” A delicious shudder cascaded through my body. “You’re making me feel this way.”

  Panting, I knew if I didn’t leave soon one of two things would happen. I’d either let Azazel whisk me away somewhere to fuck me, or I’d do something horribly embarrassing. I’d be a small feature in tomorrow’s Key West newspaper: Horny Woman Humps Pub Furniture! Damage Estimate in the Hundreds!

  There was no way I could allow myself to do either. The unexpected appearances of my powers always caused me public embarrassment, but I sensed if Azazel seduced me, it would seal my fate and doom others as well.

  It took every ounce of concentration I could manage but I pushed the lust aside just enough that I was able to summon my power. A string of words passed through my mind: vanish, disappear, leave, run, depart, flee! Tingling ravaged my muscles, and dimly I detected a few startled gasps around me. Nausea hit my gut, my equilibrium flip-flopped, and the sound of ocean waves followed. Something hard poked and jabbed my backside as I stared up at the stars.

  With a start, I sat up. The world dipped and spun. I gasped at the nauseating sensations, but they soon passed. Seconds later, I realized something terrible.

  Although I’d escaped Azazel, I’d failed to bring Shunka with me.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  I rose to my feet on a rocky shore. My knees knocked together as I picked my way across the stones. How could I defend myself against Azazel if he could find me so easily? I’d escaped this time, but what if he found me again? Shaking so hard my bones almost rattled, I stepped up on a big rock, the ocean wind buffeting me, and looked around. Poor Shunka. He’d been trying to protect me and I’d accidentally left him behind. The dog was probably frantic to find me.

  The waves lapped at the mini boulders, and the moonlight danced upon the water like vaporous, iridescent flames. Except for an occasional cloud, the sky boasted a googolplex of stars. The moon illuminated a sign nearby that stated: The Southernmost Part of the U.S.

  My powers were growing. The ability to vanish in one place and appear in another was something foreign to me as well as disconcerting. The sensation of hurtling through space had left me weak, disoriented, and scared silly.

  What am I? Who am I?

  “You are the one who can set everything right.”

  About to step off the rock, I froze with my foot in midair. How had he found me so easily, so quickly?

  “Magic leaves a trail, Ruby,” Azazel said somewhere in the darkness to my left. “I can teach you how to wield your magic. You’re more powerful than you know. More powerful than you could ever imagine.”

  Sill trembling, I tried to steady myself on the rock. “Why can’t you just leave me alone?” I yelled, but the wind snatched my words and turned them into a pathetic complaint. “I don’t want any part of you, and I don’t want anything to do with the others who follow you either.”

  “You have no choice,” he replied, his voice strong and closer than the last time.

  “I always have a choice.”

  “No, you don’t,” he insisted.

  Where was he? Although moonshine bathed the shoreline, the dead-end street and the walls surrounding the military base, shadows still cloaked many areas.

  “Your soul wears a cloak of destiny, and fate rules your life.” His deep voice touched me in such a way my knees nearly buckled.

  Footsteps approached, but the wind distorted them. At first I thought he was off to my left, but as he drew closer, I wasn’t so certain.

  I’d been foolish to believe I could walk to the parking lot unscathed, even with Shunka by my side. The events over the past week should have proven I wasn’t safe alone. I’d been so worried about my presence causing harm to Solomon, Maureen and Anthony that I’d forgotten to protect myself.

  Now I’d pay the price.

  Perhaps I could disappear again, but where would I go? If I appeared in the apartment, Azazel would follow my path of magic, and as a result, the others would be in serious danger. However, without the ability to control this new power, I might also find myself bobbing around in the middle of the Atlantic and end up zapping ocean predators with my finger-fire. Shark steaks, anyone?

  What if I thought of home or...?

  Lust sliced through my thoughts, scattering my puny escape plans to the wind. Terror joined that lust. Acting on instinct, I leapt from the rock and managed two steps only to find myself scooped up into Azazel’s waiting arms. With his broad chest squeezed against mine, I was painfully aware of the hard length of him, my feet dangling in midair. The word “sex” screamed in my head. I wanted it, needed it, pined for it, but what would such a huge man do to me? If he managed to seduce me, would my body be able to accommodate him?

  “Now I shall have you.”

  “No!” I struggled, Heaven help me did I ever struggle, but his power rolled over me in waves as strong and as heavy as the ones coursing toward the shores of the tiny island. “Please...please, just let me go.”

  The brilliant moon revealed him in an ethereal daylight. He smiled down at me, his azure eyes bright as quicksilver and aglow with feral sexuality. Thunder rumbled from the south.

  Thunder? How was that possible on such a clear, starry night?

  “Before I consummate our union,” he whispered, “I need you to first remember who you are.” Azazel tightened his arms around me, fastening mine firmly to my sides. He nuzzled my hair and breathed deeply. “You smell like fear.” He sniffed again, drawing in a deep lungful and holding it a moment before adding, “And I smell your delicious body scent too. Your aroma is of warm, delectable woman, and you want me. Oh, yes! I detect your desire. It’s musky-sweet and all mine.”

  Thunder boomed somewhere far out over the water.

  I wanted to lie down, spread my legs, and give myself to him. Desire crashed through me, and I turned lax in his arms.

  “Yes...that’s it,” he said softly. “Give yourself to me.”

  A whimper slipped from my lips. This was wrong on so any levels, but I didn’t know how to stop it. Somehow I sensed that once Azazel possessed my body, I was trapped forever.

  Lightning lit up the cloudless sky, and more thunder echoed in the night.

  Still holding me with one arm, Azazel tugged the elastic band from the end of my braid and unwound my hair with his other hand. My wavy locks floated and whipped in the stiff breeze. He smoothed his hand up my left arm and over my shoulder, and then moved it to cup my cheek. He brushed his thumb back and forth across my lower lip.

  Please don’t kiss me, please don’t kiss me...

  The need for sex streaked downward from that simple touch to nestle in my loins where it combusted into flames of desire so hot, so demanding I couldn’t move, couldn’t protest, and struggled to even breathe.

  He continued
to hold me as if I was a rag doll. At his mercy, transfixed with terror and awe, I met his alluring gaze and waited for his lips to touch mine. The instant our mouths made contact, my power leapt to life within me and surged to the surface. A brilliant white spark snapped between us, singing my tongue. Azazel murmured in approval, his lips firm yet soft, demanding yet delicious, and I couldn’t move, couldn’t protest.

  He raised his head and stared deeply into my eyes. “You are very powerful, indeed.”

  The fear that sang through me ignited my power further. The illumination burst from my skin, surrounding us and brightening the dark shoreline.

  Azazel captured my lips again. As he deepened the kiss, his power, dark and startling, meshed with mine. Still holding me tightly, he sat upon one of the small boulders and cradled me on his lap. More magic flowed from him, and dimly, the sound of grating stone and tumbling rocks permeated my sex-induced haze. A moment later, I found myself lying on damp sand, his mouth still ravaging mine.

  He slid his hands over my shoulders, down my sides and slipped them under my hips to palm my ass. With his massive body pinning me to the earth, and the evidence of his arousal against my belly, the only thing I wanted was to have his cock inside me, our naked flesh pressed together, bodies joined tightly.

  He broke the kiss and studied me again. Stars framed his beautiful face and moon-silvered hair. I turned my head from side to side quickly surveying the area he’d cleared of rocks so he could make love to me upon the soft, cool sand.

  “Now I shall you,” he said.

  The ocean breeze grew stronger, and thunder sounded in the distance, each boom driving more fear into my heart—the nails to the coffin of my fate.

  He ground his hips against mine and kissed me again. My power replied with another brighter, stronger spark that leapt between us. The breeze lifted strands of my hair, each tendril a bright orange-red live wire.

  Azazel kissed me, his tongue separating my lips. “Come,” he said, his mind linking with mine. “Allow me to show you who we are, and in doing so, you will remember who you are.”

  Visions flashed through my mind as if I’d been plunked in front of a movie screen. From a lofty height, I viewed a mountainous terrain splashed with blues, greens, brown, and tan. Off to my right, hundreds of extremely tall, beautiful men and women looked down at the scene sprawling below them.

  He towered over me, and I saw him in his true form. Not quite human and not exactly the epitome of angelic paintings, he was awe inspiring. Beautiful proved an inadequate word to describe the angel next to me. He didn’t emanate a heavenly glow, but instead exuded power, an underlying malevolence and alarming intelligence. Forgotten knowledge stirred in my brain, memories of things I’d learned over the years, trivia I’d filed away to use should I ever need to call upon it. Azazel, one of the angels, a leader of the Fallen Angels after Satan had...

  My gaze drifted back to the others surveying the scene below us.

  The Sons of God.

  Realization slapped me hard. My gaze flew up to meet his. “If you are the Sons of God, how can there be women amongst you?”

  “Angels are neither male nor female. We can assume any form we want.”

  That familiar sensation of doom that often settled in my gut rose within me in the form of darkness. It wrapped around my senses, crushed my lungs and forced me to gasp for breath.

  “Let me love you, Ruby...let us be one...”

  His mouth moved from my lips and along my jaw to my ear, jarring me back to the present. Azazel sucked and nipped on my earlobe, eliciting a sudden, excited moan from me. He pushed his hips against mine, his cock rock-hard and huge through his jeans. Desire roiled in me. The battle had shifted in his favor. I had to fight him, had to find a way to extricate myself from the danger about to consume me. He claimed my lips again and returned me to the past over four thousand years ago.

  Back on the precipice again, Azazel hooked me under the arms and leapt into the ether with me. Terrified, I screamed and squeezed my eyes shut.

  “You are safe, Ruby. You’re merely seeing the past. Open your eyes and know the truth.”

  His words made sense. His kiss permitted me the means to remember. And as long as I remembered that my body lay on the beach I was fine.

  Slowly, I opened my eyes.

  The other angels took various forms—giant hawks, dragons, eagles, griffins—and descended into the valleys and plains. They posed as handsome, beautiful humans and wooed the peasants, the royalty, the peddlers, politicians, farmers, and servants. The females seduced the men, and the males went in unto the lovely women. I witnessed scenes of lovemaking that fueled the flames already consuming my fleshly body lying on the sand.

  Angels in disguise pushed their cocks into the lithe, comely bodies of beautiful human women. The angelic females lay upon beds covered in furs as two to three men took turns pleasuring them as well as themselves. Orgasmic cries filled tents, every shady oasis dotting the deserts, and within clay houses, stone palaces, forts, tents, and animal-skin huts. The Fallen Ones kissed and caressed their human lovers. They rode the females as if it was the first and last time they would ever mate. The human women locked their legs around the driving hips of their angelic lovers, and each ethereal woman offered herself to the next man with the energy to service them.

  Azazel withdrew from the scenes and lifted me to watch from an invisible perch. Time spun and flashed by, and then I saw the heavenly and human women giving birth to babies. Newborns arrived in every village, town and city. Hundreds of new lives voiced their lust for life in every tent, hut, and palace.

  And the children grew. They grew from infancy into adulthood within a short time instead of years like normal children...but they transformed into giants.

  “They are called the Nephilim,” Azazel spoke in my ear. “The offspring of the humans and angels. And giants roamed the earth...”

  But I watched in horror as their offspring ate everything in the lands. The Nephilim consumed the food, the crops. They laid waste to the livestock and the wildlife.

  And then, once they realized their food sources had been exhausted, they turned on the humans who had raised them, cared for them. I cried out at the blood, the carnage, and I wept as they slaughtered the people as though they were no more than cattle and ate them.

  Releasing my mouth, Azazel raised his head and stared into my eyes. Lightning laced the sky, and thunder crashed around us.

  “Do you understand your destiny?” he asked.

  “I won’t give you a child,” I croaked.

  Behind him, inkiness spread through the stars. Lightning bolts shredded the blackness. Something was coming, and if I didn’t act soon, it would be here at any moment. What or who was coming? It couldn’t be—

  “Ah, you are beginning to understand,” he said and chuckled.

  The sound and vibration of his laughter shot spirals of desire into my body. Against my will, I wiggled beneath him, delighting in the sensation.

  His eyes rolled back in his head. “That’s it, Ruby. Imagine how my cock shall feel inside your body. And you will bear me a child. Through you, the Nephilim will roam the earth once more.”

  I could barely speak for the lust coursing through my veins. “Stop...this is...wrong...”

  “Now why would I,” he drove his hips hard against mine, “want to do that when we’ve waited so long to reclaim this world?”

  “Why me?” The answer to that question had taunted me for the last few days, but asking it was more to distract him from taking me. If he tantalized me any further, I’d be defeated.

  As red, yellow, and silver lightning splintered the sky, Azazel kissed me again, his tongue tasting and jousting with mine. He ground his hips harder, his cock rubbing my belly until it became painful, but regardless, I found myself wanting more.

  Again, his kiss propelled me back to ancient times. I glimpsed a dirty nomad woman wrapped in skins next to a fire, chanting unintelligible words, and in the flames,
something gyrated as white sparks arced toward the heavens. The images blurred. The sensation of flying through space suffocated me. I gasped, and suddenly the scene of a dark-haired, dark-skinned woman rose in my mind. Her face remained obscured, but she stood upon a mountain overlooking the terrain I’d visited earlier. She called to something above, shouted to something below, and flames shot from her hands.

  A fissure opened in the sky. Planets, stars, and galaxies swirled and sparkled in the black void. Within that hole another fissure appeared. Beyond it, barren and dusty, a world boasted nothing but sand, rocks and the putrid smell of decay. The woman screamed words I didn’t understand. More cobalt and white fire erupted from her palms, and, with her face turned toward the sky, orbs of power spewed from her eyes and mouth. Thunder and lightning scarred the ground as the Fallen Ones rushed from the four corners of the Earth. They arrowed through the heavens, beating their wings of feathers or leather, the angels intent on stopping the woman. Teeth and talons bared, they screamed obscenities to the world, their serpentine eyes flashing with fury and fire.

  The woman threw her hands out in front of her, and a semi-transparent wall protected her from the angels’ vengeance. The fissures widened more, and a tornado appeared to snatch each being from the air. The twister passed through the first slice in the firmament and into the next, followed by both dimensional doors slamming shut behind it, imprisoning the angels. The resulting clap of displaced air triggered avalanches. Earth and rock crumbled to the valley floors, and gargantuan clouds of dust rose into the air to disperse on the wind currents.

  Silence followed.

  Then, in the darkness and quiet, a thunderous voice sounded.

  Rain began. It poured so hard I felt as though I was peering through a waterfall to no avail. The rain filled the valleys, washed across the plains and ascended the mountainsides. People climbed to higher ground, but the floodwaters rose to wash away their footprints. Within a couple of days, the Nephilim and all other life had drowned, and the woman waited for the water to claim her too.