Dark Embrace (Principatus)

by Couper, Lexxie

  Haral may be his twin brother, but that would not save him. Not from the American vampire. Not from a just punishment long overdue.

  He cast his gaze over the vampires still mingling around them, some still writhing in the pain of Inari’s earlier control, most standing silent, struck dumb with shock. “I am Ezryn Navarr.” His voice carried throughout the hall, each syllable resonating with the ancient power of his bloodline, each note reverberating with half a century of denied leadership. “First born of the First Family. Let it be known, by right of birth and confession, I am the overlord of the vampire race and reclaim the position denied me for fifty years.”

  Every vampire still standing dropped to their knees, their stares locked on Ezryn.

  “The tyranny of Haral Navarr’s rule is over,” he spoke, his blood roaring in his ears, Haral’s whimpering pleas echoing around the room. “The vampire race has a new leader. The true overlord has returned.”

  He swung his gaze to the far corner of the ballroom, his mouth filling with disgust at the five naked, chained females staring at him. Five petrified, degraded women. “The humans are to be released. Now. We do not feed on the unwilling, nor treat them as cattle.”

  With a nod, three of Haral’s guards hurried over to the women and the solid chink of metal falling to marble ricocheted through the charged silence. Sobs of relief and gratitude came from the corner, the completely human sound filling Ezryn with a heavy sensation.

  He turned to Inari, to the Principatus he’d once sought to kill, the succubus he’d once planned to punish, the woman he knew he loved beyond measure and who loved him in return. A wave of warmth rolled through him, an emotion he recognized as pride.

  She was proud of him. He gave her a small smile. It felt good. Very good.

  Swinging his attention back to the waiting vampires, he fixed them with a long, steady stare. “Change is coming, and you should prepare for it.” He thought of the overlord’s advisors back in Denmark, he thought of the oracle. He thought of their reaction to the situation, to his reclaimed leadership. He thought of their faces when he walked into the overlord’s compound in Copenhagan and told them they were no longer required, and couldn’t stop his smile stretching wider. “All our kind should prepare for it.”

  He turned back to his sniveling twin brother. “Primoris prognatus ut primoris prognatus,” he stated, his heart heavy, his earlier resolution as cold as it was before. He knew what he had to do to begin to heal the wounds his brother had rent on the vampire race. Knew it without doubt or hesitation. “Navarr vadum attero Navarr.”

  “No,” Haral wailed. “No, you fucking piece of piss-soaked shit. You can’t kill me. I am your brother. You can’t kill your only brother. You can’t!”

  “Navarr shall destroy Navarr,” Ezryn murmured.

  He moved his gaze to his best friend, noting the congealed blood down Jacob’s side. The puncture in Jacob’s armpit had healed, but it was the hurt and loss and grief swimming in his clear, blue eyes that made Ezryn clench his fists. Emotional wounds Haral had wrought upon Jacob’s heart that would quite possibly never heal. For the American vampire, the torture and rape of his human wife would never be forgotten. “He is yours to do with what you will, Jake.”

  “No!’ Haral screeched. “No!”

  With one final look at Jacob, Ezryn returned his attention to the waiting guards around him. “Leave now. And send word of what happened here tonight to all our kind.”

  They nodded, their expressions shocked as they ran from the room. It had begun.

  “Brother?” Haral whimpered from the floor, his voice cracking. “Please, brother, have mercy.”

  Ezryn closed his eyes, drawing an image of Haral into his mind—Haral as a young vampire child. Laughing, playing. The Haral he’d known before their fates took over their lives. He would remember his twin that way. The Haral he’d once loved.

  “Ezryn?”

  At Inari’s soft voice, he opened his eyes and found her standing beside him, her face composed. He felt her worry thread through their bond, a cool ribbon of concerned love he felt all the way to his very center. Without another glance at his brother on the floor, he placed his hand on the small of her back and began to walk. Away from his twin. Away from his best friend and most trusted general.

  And as he did, Haral began to shriek.

  And shriek.

  Her heart wouldn’t stop beating. Not that Inari wanted her heart to stop beating, but she sure as hell wanted it to stop beating as fast as it currently was. She moved through the compound, marveling in wary amazement at the vampires falling to their knees and pressing their foreheads to the floor, their eyes wide with fear and reverence.

  Their subservient actions had nothing to do with her, of course.

  She shot the silent vampire striding across the black granite floor beside her a surreptitious look, and her heart thumped out a rapid rhythm.

  He hadn’t said a word to her since his calm, “Enough, my love” when she’d released the full force of her succubus power on his brother. She frowned, a squirming tension making itself at home in her belly. There were many things she could sense in the overlord of the vampire race, yet none of them told her what was going on in his head.

  The only thing she could do was focus on the cool pressure of his hand at the small of her back, draw comfort—of a sort—from its physical contact until they were clear of his brother’s compound. Then, if he hadn’t said something to her, she’d kick his ass for being a prick. After she threw him against the wall and kissed him stupid.

  “Now that is the most sane thought you’ve had since we left Haral to Jacob’s devices.”

  Inari startled at Ezryn’s deep voice. She gave him another look, this one less clandestine and more infuriated. “What?” she snipped. “The thought of kicking your ass for being a prick? Glad you agree with me.”

  The corners of Ezryn’s mouth curled and he slipped his hand a touch farther down her back, his fingertips skimming the curve of her butt cheeks with a teasing caress. He didn’t say anything, nor did he have to. For the first time since she’d opened up and let her succubus powers flow, she could truly feel what was in his head.

  Her nipples pinched tight. Her pussy flooded with wet heat.

  Ezryn chuckled and kept walking, his pace even and arrogant.

  Inari clenched her fists and shook her head. Of all master vampires to be bound to, she had to go and get herself bitten by the supreme lord and commander of the bloodsuckers. She’d be dealing with his conceit for decades.

  Ezryn chuckled again and stroked little circles on the tops of her ass cheeks. “As I will be dealing with your righteous calling.”

  She opened her mouth to tell him to fuck off and closed it without uttering a sound. What could she say? He was right.

  The massive double doors of Haral Navarr’s compound loomed before her, and a tight tingle rippled through Inari’s body. She didn’t need the bond between them both to know what awaited her on the other side. They might spend the rest of eternity arguing like cats and dogs, or vamps and werewolves, but one thing was very, very clear—the make-up sex was going to be—

  “Going to fucking kill you!”

  A high-screeching female voice shattered the silence of the mansion and Inari gasped, spinning around to see a voluptuous blonde poured into blood-red leather running at them both, fangs bared, fingers hooked into claws, eyes venomous with insane hate.

  “Chantise!” Ezryn snapped. “Enough!”

  The female vampire hissed, running at them faster. “I’m going to fucking kill you both. Starting with the cunt.”

  Ezryn moved like a blur. But not before Inari.

  She transformed. In the space of a heartbeat.

  Her flesh razed with a million pinpricks of blistering heat. The bones in her body tore apart and reformed until she was taller, leaner and roped with steely muscles. Two wings of epic proportions tore through her flesh, unfurling from between her shoulder blades, their membr
ane-taut width launching her from the floor with infinite speed and grace. Her mouth filled with needle-sharp teeth, her nails hooked into talons.

  Principatus. Assassin of the Highest. In her most terrifying form.

  The female vampire screeched again, eyes bulging. She scrambled backward, shaking her head, stare glued on Inari. “I want you dead! Dead!”

  The acrid stench of urine and terror sliced into Inari’s heightened sense of smell. Lips curling, she landed on the shrieking woman and sank her talons into the female’s neck. Pinned her to the cold black floor. “And I want you to shut up.”

  “You killed my cousin!” The vampire bucked beneath her, spittle spraying from her mouth.

  Inari cocked an eyebrow. “If he was a soulless bloodsucker who preyed on the innocent, it’s quite likely.”

  The female hissed, thrashing against the floor. “Kill you! Fucking kill you! And the traitorous fuck who’s been fucking you.”

  “Now, now, Chantise.” Ezryn stepped up beside Inari to shake his head at the writhing blonde in Inari’s inescapable grip. “You really need to expand your vocabulary. Three fucks in one threat?”

  Chantise hissed again, glaring at Ezryn. “You let that…that…American filth kill my husband! I will kill you all. I will—”

  “Enough,” Ezryn growled. A dark expression fell over his face, and Inari felt the icy force of his demon roll from him. “I think you need to go back to Denmark, Chantise,” he said, voice low and even, stare locked on the female’s eyes. “Australia isn’t the right place for you.” He straightened and turned away, giving Inari an unreadable look as he did so.

  Her stomach knotted, all the more so because the only emotion she could feel emanating from him through their bond was cold distaste.

  “Release her, Principatus,” she heard him say, his voice as ambivalent as his earlier stare.

  Principatus. The title sent an uneasy shiver up her spine and her wings flexed. Once, Ezryn had seen her in her assassin form. He’d seen—and felt—what she could do with her succubus soul, and now she couldn’t tell a thing about what he was thinking or feeling. She ground her teeth. Her stomach knotted tighter.

  Chantise whimpered, a scared, child-like sound that vibrated against Inari’s palm.

  With a silent sigh, she removed her hand from the female vampire’s throat.

  Why? Is Ezryn your master now as well as your lover?

  She rose to her feet and looked at his retreating back, noting the coiled muscles, tense shoulders and clenched fists.

  Is he even that now?

  “I am the overlord’s wife!” Chantise sobbed from the floor, voice weak, defeated.

  “Not anymore,” Ezryn threw over his shoulder.

  He kept walking, the silent vampire guards surrounding them scurrying farther away as he strode past them, their eyes downturned, their expressions reverent. Inari narrowed her eyes. They knew who their new master was. Knew and accepted it.

  She closed her eyes and swallowed. Acceptance. What a bitch of a word.

  So where do you stand now, Inari?

  A shimmer of prickling heat razed her flesh and, with a slight shake of her shoulders, she stood in her human form again, her torn clothes hanging from her body.

  Opening her eyes, she glared at Ezryn’s back.

  Acceptance. She’d finally accepted who she was, what she was, and she’d never been more bloody confused.

  Releasing a low growl, Inari stalked after the overlord. Confused she may be, but one thing was certain, Ezryn Navarr was about to get the biggest ass kicking of his life. And there would be no kissing afterwards.

  The humid night air from outside slid over her as she approached the open mansion doors, the soft scree scree of cicadas doing nothing to calm her agitation. What lay ahead of Ezryn was not just intimidating, but monumental. He stood on the cusp of a revolution that could change the status quo between man and vampire forever. She wanted to be there for him through it all, help him, but even with their bond, she had no idea if he wanted her to. And how could the born leader of the vampire race take a Principatus as his partner? How could the Dark Ones and the Powers allow it?

  Where did that leave her?

  She crossed the compound’s threshold, the stares of the vampire guards drilling into her back, the hitching sobs of the once-overlord’s wife scraping at her nerves. Bloody vampires. She couldn’t wait to be—

  A hand snared her wrist—hard—and before she could do anything but gasp in shock, Ezryn yanked her from her feet and slammed her against the mansion wall.

  He grabbed her other wrist and pinned it beside her head, his gaze a black inferno roaming her face. “I can tell you where it leaves you, Inari Chayse,” he murmured, ramming his hips to hers, his long, thick erection grinding against the junction of her thighs. “Exactly where I want you to be. With me. Mine. Forever.” His fangs glinted at her in a smile Inari felt all the way to her core. “And I don’t care what the Dark Ones and Powers think.”

  His mouth crushed hers, his knee shoving her legs wider as he thrust his tongue past her lips. He pressed his trapped cock against her sex, the domed head stroking her clit through her shredded pants with such insistent need her head swam.

  “Forever.”

  The word echoed in her head, an entirely enthralling notion. She rolled her hips and lifted one leg to wrap it around the back of Ezryn’s thigh, holding him to her.

  The symbiotic existence of her succubus and Principatus forces purred with anticipation, and her nipples puckered into pinched tips. Oh, fuck, forever.

  “Yes,” he growled against her lips, sliding her hands up the stone wall of the mansion until her arms were stretched above her head. “Forever.” He pulled back, barely a fraction, his cool breath caressing her face even as he pressed his body closer to hers. “If you think one little pair of wings is going to scare me off, you have another thing coming.”

  He dragged his hands down her arms, over her breasts, to her hips and back up to her arms again, pinning her to the wall with his lower body. “I am the overlord of the vampire race. My wife needs to be just as tough as I am.”

  Inari’s heart thumped into her throat. “Wife?” The word left her on a breath.

  He nodded. Once. “My wife.” His gaze roamed her face, as if charting it, devouring it. Branding it in his mind. “My lover. My Principatus.”

  The absolute hunger in his thought flowed into Inari, through her, and she arched her spine, pressing her hips closer to his, letting him feel the heat of her own hunger. The potent desire in his eyes made her sex constrict, and she let out a small, hitching sigh. “My lover,” she murmured in reply, wrapping her arms around his neck. “My master vampire. My husband.” She let her lips into a small smile. “You just better buy me a really, really big diamond ring.”

  “A really big one,” he murmured back, and claimed her mouth as his.

  Epilogue

  Melbourne, Australia. Six months later

  The constant thump-thump-thump of the loud, monotonous music pounded against Ezryn’s head. He suppressed a scowl, scanning the club’s writhing patrons mashed against each other on the tiny dance floor with feigned disinterest. The Sang Frais might be Melbourne’s premium nightclub catering to the city’s paranormal world, but it was a far cry from the Pleasure Pussy. For starters, there were no fae strippers copulating on the stage. For another, they didn’t serve Carpathian mountain water.

  Ignoring a particularly determined human female’s efforts to gain his attention, he took a sip from the sweating glass in his hand.

  The single-malt scotch whiskey slid down the back of his throat with ease but did little to calm his thirst. Only one thing did that now, and Inari was currently nowhere to be seen.

  He didn’t like that. Not one little bit.

  His mouth filled with saliva at the mere thought of his bound mate, the sweet taste of her blood, the heady scent of her sex, and he growled, the sound rumbling deep in his chest like thunder. Where was she
?

  “Here, lover.”

  Her soft voice tickled his left ear. He turned, snaked his arm around her slim waist and yanked her against his body with preternatural speed and strength, letting his agitation and instant desire throb through their bond. “Dark Ones, you’ve had me worried, Principatus,” he murmured, gazing down into her face. “And angry. Where have you been?”

  She slid her fingers up his chest, pressing herself closer to his body. “You were worried?”

  He smoothed his hand down her back and cupped her ass in a firm hold. “Yes.” The exquisite muscles of her butt flexed under his touch, and for a split second, he wanted nothing more than to rip the skin-tight leather pants she wore from her body and sink his fangs into one of her ass cheeks. Slake his thirst. Feed his hunger. But neither he nor Inari was here for fun, at least not that kind of fun. Inari had work to do. A task long overdue and weighing heavily on her soul.

  He held her close, wanting her to feel every second of careful warning he would not express in words. He knew her well, and telling her to be careful would only irritate her. Instead, he let his thoughts open to her. She released a soft sigh, the coiled tension in her body relaxing for a brief moment before she stiffened and pulled slightly away.

  “He’s leaving,” she murmured, skimming her fingers down his chest in an act he knew was designed to appear casual and fitting to their current location. Her stare, unwavering and icy cold, tracked someone moving behind him. With a silent snarl, Ezryn narrowed his senses onto Inari’s prey, and a vile stench filtered into his nose like poisoned fog.

  He straightened, shooting a quick look over his shoulder at the creature responsible for such a foul odor.

  Without a word, Inari turned and walked away from him, weaving her way through the packed club, disengaging herself from more than one overenthusiastic grope as she did so.

  Ezryn clenched his jaw and followed her, keeping his control firmly in check. He’d seen her do this many times. He knew she was more than capable of handling it, but this target, this job, was different. Personal. And in Ezryn’s mind, that made it dangerous.