by Karin Tabke
Falon sat stunned, her stomach a nervous flutter of disbelief. “What kind of conduit?”
“A vessel with the gift of the sight, of seeing and hearing the lost souls who walk the earth around us.”
“I can’t help them!”
“Alone you can’t. For there to be any hope of their resurrection, you must control Fenrir’s magic. It’s powerful. While that deformed wolf has used his power to kill his own kind, he also possesses the power to restore those lives.”
“How?”
“That is a mystery. But I do know from the whispers of the northern elders that there must be blood for blood.”
“Like how Corbet needed your blood to resurrect the ring?”
“Yes. I am a direct descendant of Singarti, the Great Spirit Mother who cast Fenrir into the ring. Only the combination of my blood and the blood of the eldest son of the Corbet bloodline could call it out. Thomas knew what to do, too, and it worked.”
“Would Sharia know what to do?”
Layla chuckled. “That old witch knows everything. I swear she has a crystal ball.”
“She said for the Lycan nation to prevail, the power of the three must unite.”
Layla’s eyes darkened but she nodded. “It has always been foretold.”
Falon swallowed hard. “She seems to think the three in question are me, Lucien, and Rafe.”
Layla nodded. “I always assumed the power of the three would be a Vulkasin, a Corbet, and Fenrir. But I understand now. The power of the three is the only power to defeat Fenrir.”
Falon’s temples began to throb again. None of this made sense. It was like chasing your tail. “But what of Rafael’s chosen one?”
Layla cocked an arched brow. “He has not marked her yet.”
“But he has vowed to do so. He would never go back on his word.”
Her mother shrugged. “Perhaps he doesn’t have to.”
Falon’s brows wrinkled. “What do you mean?”
“Rafael made his vow based on information he had at the time. If that information should change, then he would have an out.”
“I don’t know what you mean by that.”
“I just mean with the entire nation at stake, nothing is carved in stone, buniq. Not even the Blood Law.”
Falon rubbed her head as the migraine erupted full force between her temples. “I don’t understand any of this. I don’t want to understand any of this! It’s too hard and makes no sense to me.”
“What do you want, Falon?”
“I want Lucien and Rafael.”
“But if you can have only one, which would it be?”
“That is like asking me whether I would choose my heart or my soul.”
“To live a full life, you must possess both.”
Falon lay back on the thin mattress and clamped her hand across her eyes. She would sell her soul to Thomas Corbet for both men. “Try telling them that.”
“Perhaps you should.”
Falon lifted her hand and peered at her mother. “What are you saying?”
“Have them both. Tell them that is what you want. Accept nothing less.”
Falon jackknifed up; her cheeks flamed red-hot. “Are you kidding me? They would tear each other apart!”
“If they love you, they will share you. If they want to see the morning after the rising they will have no choice but to come to terms with it.”
“I—ah, I don’t think Sharia meant it like that, Mother. She meant united in spirit and power.” Warmth fizzled through Falon’s veins. Oh, dear Lord, in her perfect world she would have them both. But she lived in reality. “Rafael is honor bound to Anja, and I am soul bound to Lucien.”
Layla smiled and lay back onto the mattress, pulling Falon into the security of her arms. “To be united in spirit, one must be united in heart, body, and soul. From there comes the power.”
“Mother!” Falon cried, embarrassed that she was talking about, well, alluding to living with two men in a sexual relationship. Her skin shivered with warmth. Lord, it would be a wild ride. “Lucien and Rafe would never co-alpha, and they would never share me that way. And honestly? I would go crazy trying to make them both not be jealous of the other. It would be impossible.”
“If you say so, Daughter.”
“I say so because it is so.”
But when she closed her eyes, Falon could not help but think of the two men she loved and what it would mean to belong to them both.
SHAMELESSLY, FALON RAN naked through the timber. Her path up the steep mountain ran parallel to the road to Vulkasin. When Rafe’s scent became too strong to ignore, she banked away, backtracking, looking for a calm place where she could lay beneath the moon’s soft glow and call upon her imagination to make her dreams come true. She shifted, increasing her speed. Her long, lean body stretched; her taut muscles loosened. The wind brushed across her face through her silky fur. She was free. Free to love whom she wanted, when she wanted. Free of Slayers, free of the impending doom. In her dream she could do anything, be with anyone.
Feeling a presensce nearby, she looked to her left and gasped. Lucien’s black wolf ran beside her. His golden eyes glowed brightly, his wolf grin holding happy promise.
A nose nudged her right flank. Startled, Falon looked back. Her heart stumbled in her chest. Rafa’s deep aqua-colored eyes glittered beneath the moonlight. He moved up and in perfect step, the three of them raced across the mountain.
Her heart sang with joy. There was no hostility, no snarling or posturing, just peaceful synchronicity.
As they came back around and down the mountain, Falon came to an abrupt stop at the edge of the small pond nestled peacefully behind the Amorak encampment. Both alphas stopped beside her. For long minutes, they stood blowing, catching their breath. Lucien stepped past her into the quiet pond and drank. Falon threw her head back and growled happily, running into the water and splashing him playfully. He grinned and dove in after her. She shifted and came up for air. Naked in his human body, Lucien laughed and swooped her into his arms. She looped her arms around his neck, feeling loved and carefree. His hard muscles felt good on her soft skin.
“I love you,” she happily cried. His hands cupped her tender breasts. She arched against him, as his lips possessively claimed hers in a deep breath-stealing kiss.
Firm fingers traced along her spine. Tearing her lips from Lucien’s, she quarter turned and gasped. Rafael smiled down at her. Wide-eyed, she turned to him, lacing an arm around his neck while she kept the other possessively wrapped around Lucien. “Rafa,” she breathed. His lips dropped to hers, still warm and damp from Lucien’s lips, in a long, passionate kiss. She turned fully into him, missing the protective warmth of him. His erection stabbed her in the belly. Of their own volition, her legs lifted and locked around his hips.
“I have missed you,” she crooned to Rafael.
“No more than I have missed you, my love.”
Falon’s heart overflowed with emotion. He still loved her, despite everything, he still loved her.
Lucien growled softly behind her, reminding her he was there. She laughed and turned to him. Stroking his cheek, she looked up into his darkened eyes. “My proud Luca, I miss you even in my sleep.”
Lucien’s erection swelled between her buttocks. Rafael’s between her thighs. Her entire body shimmered with arousal and awe. There was no growling or snarling. No fighting over her as if she were a bone. They were there, united, for her.
If only it were not a dream.
Falon leaned back against Lucien’s strong chest and wrapped an arm around his neck. Snaking her fingers into his hair, she rose to his lips as she turned more fully toward him. As his lips captured hers in a deep spiraling kiss, Rafael’s lips imprisoned a sensitive nipple, suckling her tenderly. Falon moaned, reveling in the wondrous touch of both men.
Lucien’s hand snaked around her waist to her other breast. When his fingers plucked her sensitive nipple, she cried out in pleasure. Her damp skin steamed beneath the
ir touch. Her heart pounded against her rib cage. Her womb clenched, hungering for each of them in turn. Rafa’s big hand slid down her belly, to her mons. She gasped in Luca’s mouth and his tongue swirled against hers, silencing her cries of pleasure, when Rafael slid his fingertips across her hard clit, then between her swollen lips. She jerked against him, moaning louder, arching into Rafa’s sweet assault, as Lucien’s lips held hers captive.
She dug her fingers into Rafael’s leg, spreading her thighs in unabashed offering.
Sliding a thick finger into her, he took her offer. She cried out, pressing her head back against Luca’s strong shoulder. The need to mate was strong. Her body was on fire, her essence heady. Both men’s nostrils flared, recognizing she was ripe to conceive.
Falon closed her eyes, absorbing the fact that, dream or not, she was in the middle of a perfect storm. Never in her wildest fantasies had she imagined how blissfully insane it would feel to be loved by both brothers at the same time.
Rafa moved his finger slowly in and out of her. Lucien’s finger gently slid along her anus, gently probing, carefully stretching her. Falon bit her lip, drawing blood. The sensation of what Lucien did to her was odd but exhilarating. She wanted to experience more. And as she was wont to do with Lucien, Falon faithfully followed where he led her, trusting and excited, knowing he would take her to a place she had never been.
The scent of her blood stirred both men’s bodies. Rafa growled low, grazing his teeth along a turgid nipple. He nipped her, then licked away the sting. Luca slid a finger into her anus. One slow inch at a time. Her vaginal walls clamped around Rafa’s finger as she tried to loosen for Luca’s.
Rafa slipped his finger from her. Falon cried out, digging her nails deeper into his thigh. His blazing eyes caught and held hers as he lifted her hips and steered his warm cock into her waiting wetness.
“Rafe,” she sobbed against Lucien’s lips as his brother slowly filled her. Her eyes rolled back into her head, the feeling so mouthwatering she could not form a word to describe it.
“Easy, angel face,” Lucien said as he, too, slipped his finger from her. Impaled on Rafa’s swollen cock, she shuddered when Lucien spread her cheeks and slowly probed her with his.
Anticipation sizzled along every nerve ending in her body.
Falon moaned when he entered her inch by incremental inch from behind. “Luca,” she breathed as the new scintillating sensation took hold.
“Relax,” he said softly. “I would never hurt you.” When he slowly pressed deeper into her, Falon loosened, not realizing she had been tense. There was no pain, only a pleasure that she could not define heightened by the extra stimulant of his cock ring.
He was gentle and slow, easing his way into her. Rafael held her steady, not moving in her as Lucien filled her. “You okay, love?” Rafa asked, stroking her cheek. She was so overcome with emotion and sensation, she was unable to speak at the moment, Falon nodded. Rafa smiled and brushed his lips across hers. “I love you.”
“I love you, too,” she managed before an avalanche of tears flooded her eyes. They were so gentle, so patient, so caring.
“Thank you, Luca,” she breathlessly moaned. “Thank you, Rafa.”
She closed her eyes, blinking away the tears, wanting to revel in this new and astonishing emotional and physical sensory overload. Of being filled by them both. Of them giving themselves to her unselfishly.
She hung suspended for an eternity as her body adapted to them. Energy sparked and snapped inside of her. Her womb clenched like a fist around Rafael, and her bottom hugged Lucien. Three hearts beat to the same chaotic cadence. Three bodies as one. Three souls as one. Lucien’s heart thudded against her back, Rafe’s against her chest. Their bodies thrummed with her energy. It was magical, omnipotent, and sublime. The power of three.
When Rafael moved deeper into her, Falon gasped, the sensation of his potent energy sparking like a match to gasoline. As he pulled away, Lucien rocked into her from behind. Falon’s body shimmered with sensation, then melted around him like warm honey on a hot biscuit. A deep moan began in her belly and worked its way up her throat, sloughing from her lips in a long, satisfied sound. It was too much, but not enough. In a slow, succulent cadence, they moved in and out of her. Taking her to a place she never imagined existed. A place dreams were made of.
Heat, lips, hands, and cock worked her body into such a fevered pitch, Falon feared she would come apart at the seams. Her body was on fire with wild electrical sensation. Every part of her, every cell, every molecule sizzled with unleashed desire. Her heart sang with emotion overload. Her pussy clenched Rafe as her anus fisted Lucien. Her body arched, drawing so tight she was sure she would snap in half. The energy inside of her built to a towering crescendo. And just as she came apart, bursting into a million tiny pieces, Rafael bit her neck on one side from in front, and Lucien bit her neck on the other side from behind. They exploded within her, their seed hot and thick.
Hers.
She screamed as a devastating orgasm slammed into her.
FALON WOKE WITH a start. Sitting up, she gasped for air, her body trembling violently as energy snapped in microbursts around her. Wildly, she looked around. Her mother’s calming scent reminded her she had fallen asleep at the Amorak camp.
Angor’s low growl from outside the door soothed her. “It’s okay,” she whispered. Though her body still shimmered with the remnants of her orgasm. “It was just a dream.” One hell of a dream!
Falon shook her head, running her fingers through her damp, tangled hair. She sucked in a huge breath of air and exhaled loudly. My God, that had been so real. Her heart still pounded like a sledgehammer against her breastbone. Licking her dry lips, she stood. She needed air. As she stumbled from the cabin, she pressed her hand to her chest and caught her breath. She was naked! Her vaginal muscles clenched. Her bottom was sore. Her hands went to her neck. She flinched as her fingertips brushed tender flesh.
Her heartbeat spiked. Not possible. It had been a dream!
Her nipples strained against the sultry night air. She moaned, sliding her hand down between her thighs. She was soaking wet and on fire.
She ran toward the small pond at the back of the camp. Her dress and moccasins lay scattered as if she had taken them off in a hurry among the soft moss bank. Her heart thundered, the percussion choking off her breath.
“It was a dream!” she shouted at the night.
She did not wade into the cool water; instead, she dove in headfirst, gasping as the cold mountain water sluiced against her sultry skin. When she broke the water, her fevered body shivered.
Standing, she smoothed her hair back from her face, then gasped. Her hard nipples tightened. Not from the cool air wafting across them, but from the penetrating gaze of the very naked and very aroused man standing at the water’s edge.
Emotion infused her. Her body trembled so violently she could barely stand as he walked toward her and into the water, stopping only a few feet from her.
“Rafa,” she breathed. It took every ounce of control she possessed not to reach out to him. To touch his handsome face and smooth away the deep stress lines that etched him.
“Falon,” he said huskily. “It’s not safe out here. Vipers and Slayers wander the forest looking for souls to claim.”
“I had a dream about you.”
His eyes blazed. “I know.”
“You know?” Her cheeks flared with heat.
He took a step closer to her. “I heard you call my name. I could not help myself, Falon.” His voice cracked under the pressure. His big hand slid behind her neck to cup her head. He drew her to him. A violent storm raged across his features. “I came to you even though I swore on your life I would shun you. Even though I swore I would mark another by the next full moon.” His voice was rough, cruel almost, as if he despised himself. “But I never swore I would stop loving you.”
“My dream was so real.” She brushed her fingertips across his lips. “Are you real? Or am I drea
ming again?” Closing her eyes, she inhaled his deep earthy scent. Her eyes flew open. Intermingled with his scent was her essence and—her heart pounded—Lucien’s…
She trembled violently. It wasn’t possible. It was a dream. Because only in her dreams could she have the two men she loved.
They stood so close their warm breaths mingled.
“I am real, Falon. I have always been real.”
“Oh, Rafa,” she cried. “How I wish things could be different.” She leaned her head back into his hand, letting him do the work. She was weary of this struggle between the two men she loved. “I dreamed of you inside me. It was so real, I had to come out here to cool off, but then I found my clothes here, and you are here, and you smell like me.” She lifted her head and faced him almost eye to eye. “What happened?” she demanded, suddenly feeling ashamed. She would never betray Lucien, not even with the other man she loved.
He growled low. “Do not tempt me to show you—again.”
Falon slapped her hands over her mouth to keep from crying out. Dear God! Had she allowed Rafael into her dream only for it to become a reality? “How could you do that to me? To Lucien?”
“How could I do what? Make love to my chosen one? My chosen one that was stolen from me? The one that for the first time since she was marked by another called out to me?” He shook her. “Do you have any idea what it does to me knowing you are fucking my brother and liking it?”
“Rafa, please, don’t do this.”
“I’m not sorry for coming to you, Falon. Call me again and I will come to you before you finish your thought.”
“Rafe, stop it! This is not who you are!”
“It is who I have become. I’m done making it easy for you, Falon. I want you, and damn it, I’ll have you when you call me.”
Rafael’s passionate words stunned her. It was because of her, dreaming of what could never be that he had broken his vow and come to her. Furious with herself for her weakness, Falon realized, though there had been progress with the brothers since she had accepted Lucien, she didn’t fool herself into thinking that, given the chance, Lucien and Rafael would kill each other over her.