by Olivia Waite
Lambourne went wild. His broad hands seized her hips and with a fierce cry he sank his cock within her to the base. She was more than wet and still it felt shocking to be so full so quickly. There was no grace, no seductive finesse to him now, merely a reckless passion that set him driving into her cunt over and over. The demoness keened her approval and writhed against him, answering every demanding thrust with a powerful swirl of her hips. Water surged and leapt around them as they fought each other for climax—her fingernails biting as she grasped his shoulders for leverage, his grip on her ass implacable.
The damned lord shifted one hand slightly and slid a thumb between the demoness’s legs and across the flesh that ached the most. It was a rough, hard caress and it sent her hurtling to the peak, volcanic and earth-shattering. She sank her teeth into his neck to keep from screaming as he thrust twice more into her rippling channel and came, cursing fluently into her ear as she shivered and shook in his arms.
Once the crisis had passed, Lambourne slid his cock free but kept her curled in his lap with both her legs stretched to one side, caressed by soothing warmth. The waves from their activity subsided in the pool and Idared’s concentration ebbed with them. She felt Lambourne’s breathing steady and then return to its normal pace. Her face seemed to fit perfectly in the curve of his neck and she turned to kiss the reddened marks her teeth had made, still vivid against the pale color of his flesh. His head tilted to rest atop hers.
Idared horrified herself by yawning.
She sat up, appalled, only to see that Lambourne was laughing.
The demoness took swift vengeance by arching her back and stretching languorously. When she looked again, she was pleased to note that the damned lord’s eyes had gone sharp and the teasing grin had been replaced by an expression of barely leashed hunger. Despite the evening’s events, she could feel him starting to grow hard yet again. “I think it is time we slept,” she said and climbed out of his lap and onto the bank of the pool. Lambourne surged out after her, water cascading down his newly healed body.
Idared was not yet so tired that she failed to appreciate the view. She’d enjoyed how their bodies had felt together and she was not inclined to give it up just yet. “Would you like to join me?” she asked.
He blinked. “Is that allowed?”
Idared shrugged. “My superiors enjoy being fickle. They’ll care when they see fit to care and not before. As long as we are careful to balance greater sins with greater punishment, they should leave us alone.”
She led him back to her small bed, which felt even smaller once all his bulk was in it but was only the cozier for the addition. He lay on his back and Idared stretched out beside him, half on her side and half of her draped across his body.
The last thing she thought before sleep claimed her was how deliciously warm his arm felt, tight around her waist.
* * * * *
The next week passed in a similar fashion—Idared tormented Lambourne during the day and in turn, he pleasured her thoroughly at night. It was by far the most intense affair the demoness had ever embarked upon and she was hard-pressed to keep the tenderer parts of her heart hidden and secret. It was plain to her that he gloried in her strength, even when that strength was used against him physically. She refused to show him any weakness that might damage his view of her.
For this particular day’s torture, she had compelled him to recite any snippets of love poetry he remembered. Her sinuous whip strokes matched the rhythm of the verses and his body bore many a curling red welt by the end of the night. Later, she sat beside him on the stone floor of her house and smoothed those scratches away with ointment, one by one.
She stroked her slick hands over one particularly pleasing swirl and watched it fade back into unmarked skin. “Sometimes I wish we didn’t have to heal them so quickly,” she said. “Sometimes I want them to last.”
“I knew you had a vicious streak,” Lambourne said with a smile.
Idared shook her head. “It’s only that it grows tedious, after so many centuries, when every day’s work is erased the night afterward. As though your efforts don’t accomplish anything.” She traced the now-vanished mark before it faded from her memory. “As though they don’t matter.”
He took her hands in his while the final wound disappeared. “They matter to me,” said Lambourne, his expression terrifyingly serious. “I remember every single slash, no matter how light or how deep. Maybe in hundreds of years, the whip strokes will start to blend together.” He smiled. “Shall we wait and find out?”
With horror, Idared realized her moment of thoughtfulness had opened a door to the frailty she’d tried to keep from him. And there was a mad moment of temptation when she thought she could just let it all go and tell him everything that worried her, things she lay awake sometimes fretting over, all the questions she hadn’t found answers to or even the words to ask properly.
And he would listen, she knew. But he would also despise her, since if she was weak, then he was weak by association.
Demonkind took lovers for pleasure, but long-term connections were made for reasons of strategy and politics. You found a partner who was as invulnerable as possible and you raised sturdy demonlets to shun weakness and seek power and promotion.
It had never before occurred to Idared that things could be done differently.
Embarrassed, she turned away and focused on cleaning the last of the ointment from her hands while she tried to regain her control.
Lambourne, however, refused to retreat. “Idared?” he asked.
She merely shook her head. If she tried to speak, it would all come crashing down— and it was only newly clear to her how much she’d come to care for him, how much she’d come to value his body and his mind and his presence in her life.
His lips touched her shoulder and made her shiver, as always. She turned her head to look up at him and saw nothing in his expression but honest worry and confusion. She forced her features into a scowl. “A demoness is never weak,” she said.
He cupped her face gently with one very human hand. “I understand,” he said. “This is new for me too.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” the demoness insisted stubbornly.
“You’re much stronger than I am, in a physical sense,” he went on in that same maddeningly calm tone. “Does that make me weak in your eyes?”
Idared blinked. “You are human,” she said. “There are different rules for you and for me.”
“What about the rules for us?” he asked. “Together?”
“There aren’t any. This,” and a wave of her hand indicated the whole confusing
mess, “is very rare. Unique.”
“Then we can make up rules to suit ourselves, can we not?” Idared had no immediate answer to that.
Lambourne took advantage, leaned in and kissed her softly.
That softness was her undoing—it was deep, and inexorable as the current of a broad and ancient river. She let it flow over her, sweeping away fear and hesitation as she sank into the depths. His tongue slipped between her lips, leisurely and deliberate. Each stroke of that tongue seemed to take an age. Centuries later, Lambourne broke the kiss and rested his forehead against hers. “Now you try,” he said.
At first Idared couldn’t think what to do. The frantic need she’d grown accustomed to had transformed into something equally powerful—but slower, more patient and very unfamiliar. She began by echoing the kiss he’d given her, the same tenderness and serenity. The distance between them became a problem, so she slid into his lap with the ease of familiarity.
Of course his arms came around her then—but Idared was paying closer attention to this than usual and it gave her an idea.
She pulled away from the kiss and smiled at him while her wings flickered open.
They spread briefly, a dark silhouette against the red sky, and then curled closed around both Lambourne and Idared. The membrane was thin enough to allow some light to pass through, but it was
a light softer than was normally seen in Hell. It turned Lambourne’s skin nearly as green as hers, inside this cocoon of herself.
Suddenly she couldn’t pretend they were all that different anymore. She could trust him with herself because he trusted her, too—to know her own strength, to know the limits of what he could stand. He had told her of what haunted him in the silence of the night. Why shouldn’t she trust him with all the darker parts of herself as well?
This time when she slid onto his cock she knew she was offering more of herself than she ever had before. But it was safe here in the shelter of her wings and she was able to let her guard fully down for the first time in her very long life.
And to Idared’s great surprise, it made things different.
Everything felt more vivid—the taste of his mouth intoxicated her, the muscles moving beneath her palms were more tensely corded, love bites were made with sharper teeth. Even the hard length of him seemed to reach deeper into her welcoming body. She rode him in a measured rhythm, her strokes keeping time with the beat of her heart and the pulse of heated blood in her veins.
She’d never known it could be like this. She never wanted it to stop.
She couldn’t stop.
The demoness moved faster, falling deeper, as the man beneath her gasped and urged her on in desperate tones. His tongue swirled around one nipple and she didn’t know whether she would laugh or cry. There was only one certainty left amid the rush of her nearing climax. She bent her head forward, never breaking rhythm, and whispered, “You’re mine.”
The sound of his groan was a bell that sent shivers through every inch of her. She very nearly came just hearing it.
And then he brushed his lips roughly against hers and said one word, very clear. “Y ours.”
Idared plunged into climax and awareness splintered into a thousand pieces, rocketing outward from her center. She bore down, her movements frantic now, and through the dizzying wash of pleasure she heard him cry her name as he followed her, pumping and filling her body and trying to match her stuttered pace.
For one pointed moment, Idared wished they could stay this way, limbs entangled, bodies caught, her wings protecting them from all the world outside. But she was tired and her bed was tempting—and so, with one final sigh, she furled her dark wings and put them away. Lambourne’s skin regained its golden, human color—but the sense of him as part of herself remained even after she pulled away.
Lambourne was asleep nearly as soon as his head hit the pillow, but still he managed to throw one long leg over her hip, pinning her against him.
She wasn’t going anywhere—and neither was he, she realized. Not for all eternity. The demoness smiled, extended one broad wing and curled it over both herself and the damned lord, shielding them both from whatever eyes roamed the infernal night.
Together, they slept.
Chapter Three
Three weeks later
Hell slumbered in darkness, broken only by the occasional pulse of volcanic light or distant whimpering of the damned. Chained to a sentry rock, Cerberus laid one sleepy head on his massive paws and used the mouth of a second head to bite at an itch on his back, while the third kept watch on the road leading upwards out of the infernal realms. His itch conquered, the second head curled itself against his enormous flank and began to doze.
There was a slight squeak, tumbling out of the wind from the upper air. Cerberus’ third head pricked up its pointed ears and his eyes flashed red with the beginnings of alarm.
Another squeak and a squeal, louder this time, and the beginnings of a light could be seen at the road’s vanishing point in the distance. It was not the red, fiery light of Hell, but rather a steady white glow, pure and clean and hurtful on Cerberus’ dark-accustomed eyes. His other two heads snorted themselves awake, shaking with a great flap of ears, as the light grew brighter and brighter and the squeaks and squeals louder. It was a piercing, uneven sound now, as though someone had taught several rusty hinges how to feel pain and then sadistically run them through a meat grinder.
Cerberus’ three heads all began to whimper and his body began twisting with agony and panic. He had six ears, but only four paws. As the source of the sound crested the nearest hill, the hellhound raised all his heads to the darkness above and howled in three-part cacophony.
* * * * *
The morning had no sooner crept over the peak of Mount Seek-no-further than something flashed into existence before Idared’s still-sleep-lined eyes.
She reached out and plucked from the air a glowing scroll. Unfurled, it summoned her to the infernal palace for an audience with Lucifer himself.
“Is that common?” yawned Lambourne from behind her.
“No, it is not,” said Idared. She could feel his thick erection warm on the small of her back and all at once she realized how cold her bed would feel without him in it. Suddenly she would have given everything—every badge of rank, every Hellish promotion—to keep this man with her for the rest of her immortal life.
He pressed his lips to the tense line of her shoulders and wrapped those strong arms around her. “Either it’s nothing, or they’ve found us out,” he said. “If it’s nothing, then there is no point in worrying. If they’ve found us out, well—it was worth it.”
“I hope so,” said the demoness, “because they’ve bade you to come with me.”
“Ah. That does seem discouraging, doesn’t it?”
“You cannot imagine the tortures they’ll put you through,” Idared whispered.
She felt his wry smile against her skin. “It’s nothing compared to what you do to me.” Idared didn’t know if he was referring to her means of punishment or pleasuring—nor did she care. She kissed him as deeply as she dared, but in their mingled breath was a sigh of despair.
They obeyed the summons.
The once-fallen angel and present Lord of Hell was dressed in his usual black eveningwear, but his posture on his sinister throne was far from regal. In all honesty: he slumped, head in hand, his terrible eyes blazing with vast irritation and something that looked very like fear.
Beside him, standing with impeccable posture in a rather scorched gown of sky- blue muslin, was a proud young woman with brown-red hair, pale skin and a face ablaze with determination. She held an old violin and bow in a manner best described as threatening. Several infernal minions stood around her, poised to strike. The lady sent them an occasional warning glare but kept most of her glowering attention on Lucifer himself.
When Idared dropped Lambourne gently to the ground, the young woman gave a shocked cry and averted her eyes. “My lord!” she cried. “You are naked!”
Lambourne seemed equally shocked, though not at all for the same reason. “Virginia!” he exclaimed. “How on earth did you—that is, what in the bloody hell are you doing in Hell?”
“Miss Greening is here to reclaim the soul of her fiancé,” Lucifer explained. His majestic voice held a distinctly long-suffering tone.
“Fiancé?” Idared whispered. Her lover belonged to someone else. The demoness’s heart cracked within her and the slow, red burn of rage pushed at the weakened spot.
Under Idared’s questioning glower, Lambourne found his voice. “But we’re not engaged! Our parents wanted the match—but I joined the army instead.”
“And your parents told everyone you were planning to offer for me when you returned,” Miss Greening insisted. Lambourne visibly winced and the young woman continued. “I’ve been considered affianced for nearly ten years now—and if you won’t marry me, there is nobody else. There was a book in Father’s library that talked about demons and passing through Hell and... I decided to try and bring you back. I thought you might be grateful.” Idared could see tears in the fabric of the lady’s dress and a few scratches and scrapes on her ankles. She could almost admire the kind of courage it took to make such a journey when one was mortal and so easily wounded.
“So you just assumed I’d be in Hell?” Lambourne demanded.
> “I turned out to be right, didn’t I?” Miss Greening shot back.
“More importantly,” said Lucifer, rubbing at his horned temples, “it turns out that she has an airtight legal case.”
“Excuse me?” said Idared. Her sympathy for Miss Greening wicked out like a snuffed candle.
The fallen angel continued. “It is an old clause, grandfathered in from pagan times. A loophole that ought to have been closed long ago. You have heard the story of Orpheus and Eurydice?”
“This is ridiculous,” said the demoness.
Lucifer went on as though she hadn’t spoken. “The young woman died from a snakebite and her lover came here to bring her soul back from the underworld. His music was so lovely that even the dead were moved, and Hades—my lamented predecessor—promised the girl would accompany her beloved back to the mortal world. All he had to do was not turn around until they reached the upper air.”
“And the idiot failed completely and lost his love a second time,” Lambourne said.
Everybody looked at him.
He returned their stares and shrugged, muscles moving beneath his skin. “I had as classical an education as anyone—and I paid particular attention, since so many of those ancients wrote some very naughty things.”
“I am not as foolish as Orpheus,” said Miss Greening, “and I came prepared.” She scraped the bow across the strings of the violin with a sound like a cat.
“No more of that!” said Lucifer, but his usual thunderous tone was merely a distant storm. “You’ll take your prize,” he snarled at the girl, “and you will get out of my kingdom as fast as your mortal feet can carry you.”
Idared could not help but protest. “But this is impossible!” she said. “He is dead and damned for his sins.”
“There is nothing I can do,” said the fallen angel. “She has infernal law on her side.”
“Idared,” said Lambourne, turning away from the girl and taking the demoness’s hands, “I swear that I’ll return to you, if I have to throw myself off the nearest bridge to do it.” He pressed a kiss to her knuckles, which went pale green with the force of her grip as her hands clutched at his.